soul is a concept, human spirit is also a concept, but at the same time, very real. Humans are one of the most helpless species on the planet. In fact mammals in general are generally helpless. A baby human is totally helpless and will die without someone to take care of it. Most species are not like this, it generally seems to be a mammal thing. Over the many many years of humans developing in such an intellectual way, we have lost some of our primal instinct because we are cared for by others instead. We still have some primal instinct though, which makes up all of our bad/evil emotions, like greed, and gluttony, etc..

It is hard to say if compassion is instinctual or not. I think to some degree it is, however I feel that some if it is also manufactured by our surroundings and morality, and what we are taught from a young age.