firit and moft natural feelings of mankind, whether, on beholding a beautiful eye, or a wellfashioned mouth, or a well-turned leg, any ideas of their being well fitted for seeing, eating, or running, ever present themselves. What idea of use is it that flowers excite, the most beautiful part of the vegetable world? It is true, that the infinitely wife and good Creator has, of his bounty, fre quently joined beauty to those things which he has made ufeful to us: but this does not prove that an idea of use and beauty are the fame thing, or that they are any way dependent on each other.

SECT. VII.

THE REAL EFFECTS OF FITNESS.

WHEN I excluded proportion and fitnefs from any share in beauty, I did not by any means intend to say that they were of no value, or that they ought to be difregarded in works of art. Works of art are the proper fphere of their power; and here it is that they have their full effect. Whenever the wifdom of our Creator intended that we should be affected with any thing, he did not confine the execution of his design to the languid and precarious operation of our reafon; but he endued it with powers and properties that prevent the understanding, and even the will, which feizing upon the fenfes and imagination, captivate Q 2

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the foul before the understanding is ready either to join with them, or to oppose them. It is by a long deduction, and much study, that we discover the adorable wifdom of God in his works: when we discover it, the effect is very different, not only in the manner of acquiring it, but in its own nature, from that which ftrikes us without any preparation from the fublime or the beautiful. How different is the fatisfaction of an anatomist, who discovers the ufe of the muscles and of the skin, the excellent contrivance of the one for the various movements of the body, and the wonderful texture of the other, at once a general covering, and at once a general outlet as well as inlet; how dif ferent is this from the affection which poffeffes an ordinary man at the fight of a delicate smooth skin, and all the other parts of beauty, which require no investigation to be perceived! In the former cafe, whilst we look up to the Maker with admiration and praife, the object which caufes it may be odious and diftafteful; the latter very often fo touches us by its power on the imagination, that we examine but little into the artifice of its contrivance; and we have need of a ftrong effort of our reafon to difentangle our minds from the allurements of the object, to a confideration of that wisdom which invented fo powerful a machine. The effect of proportion and fitness, at leaft fo far as they proceed from a mere confidera

tion of the work itself, produce approbation, the acquiefcence of the understanding, but not love, nor any paffion of that fpecies. When we exa mine the structure of a watch, when we come to know thoroughly the ufe of every part of it, fatisfied as we are with the fitness of the whole, we are far enough from perceiving any thing like beauty in the watch-work itfelf; but let us look on the cafe, the labour of fome curious artist in engraving, with little or no idea of ufe, we fhall have a much livelier idea of beauty than we ever could have had from the watch itself, though the mafter-piece of Graham. In beauty, as I faid, the effect is previous to any knowledge of the ufe; but to judge of proportion, we must know the end for which any work is defigned. According to the end, the proportion varies. Thus there is one proportion of a tower, another of an house; one proportion of a gallery, another of an hall, another of a chamber. To judge of the proportions of these, you must be first acquainted with the purposes for which they were defigned. Good sense and experience acting together, find out what is fit to be done in every work of art. We are rational creatures, and in all our works we ought to regard their end and purpofe; the gratification of any paffion, how innocent foever, ought only to be of secondary confideration. Herein is placed the real power of fitnefs and proportion; they operate

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operate on the understanding confidering them, which approves the work and acquiefces in it. The paffions, and the imagination which principally raises them, have here very little to do. When a room appears in its original nakedness, bare walls and a plain ceiling; let its proportion be ever fo excellent, it pleafes very little; a cold approbation is the utmost we can reach; a much worse-proportioned room with elegant mouldings and fine feftoons, glaffes, and other merely ornamental furniture, will make the imagination revolt against the reafon; it will please much more than the naked proportion of the first room, which the understanding has fo much approved, as admirably fitted for its purposes. What I have here faid and before concerning proportion, is by no means to perfuade people abfurdly to neglect the idea of ufe in the works of art. It is only to fhew that these excellent things, beauty and proportion, are not the fame; not that they should either of them be difregarded.

SECT. VIII.

THE RECAPITULATION.

ON the whole; if such parts in human bodies as are found proportioned, were likewife conftantly found beautiful, as they certainly are not; or if they were fo fituated, as that a pleasure might

flow from the comparison, which they feldom are; or if any affignable proportions were found, either in plants or animals, which were always attended with beauty, which never was the cafe; or if, where parts were well adapted to their purposes, they were conftantly beautiful, and when no use appeared, there was no beauty, which is contrary to all experience; we might conclude, that beauty confifted in proportion or utility. But fince, in all refpects, the cafe is quite otherwife; we may be fatisfied that beauty does not depend on these, let it owe its origin to what else it will.

SECT. IX,

PERFECTION NOT THE CAUSE OF BEAUTY.

THERE is another notion current, pretty closely allied to the former; that Perfection is the conftituent cause of beauty. This opinion has been made to extend much farther than to fenfible objects. But in thefe, fo far is perfection, confidered as fuch from being the cause of beauty; that this quality, where it is higheft, in the female fex, almost always carries with it an idea of weakness and imperfection. Women are very fenfible of this; for which reason, they learn to lifp, to totter in their walk, to counterfeit weakness, and even ficknefs. In all this they are guided by nature. Beauty in distress is much the most affecting beauty. BlushQ 4

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