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fore be pleasant, and angular, abrupt, and irregular movements will be unpleasant; and slow and gentle motion will be more grateful than fast. The first class of movements are called graceful, the second ungraceful. Compare, for example, the sweeping curve of a rocket with the irregular shooting of forked lightning, and say which is pleasantest to the eye; compare the ups and downs of the blades in a sawmill with the rotating of the wheels in the machinery or with the water-jets of a fountain; compare the angular charging and counter-charging of football players with the sliding and winding of a party of dancers or with the curving and sweeping of a crowd of skaters; compare the motion of a carriage, an omnibus, or a train with that of a steamer, a yacht, or a canoe; compare the pointed motions of a billiard ball or a weaver's shuttle with the rounded gliding of a pigeon or a goldfish; compare the thrust and parry of the bayonet in military exercise with the floating folds of a royal standard or the waving of a tree's branches, and then say whether in each of these cases the graceful and grateful do not accompany the circular, serpentine, or undulating motion and the unpleasant the angular.

It appears, then, that in a recognition of the beautiful neither colour, shape, nor motion are anything more than sensations in the retina. We must not, however, suppose from this that the retina is the only field of such sensations. True, colour can only come in by that entrance, but both shape and motion are set up in us in every part of the body; in other words, the whole body itself is an object endowed with the qualities which cause shape and motion. in the mind; and though the shape and motion with which the eye furnishes us are very much more extensive than what we get through any other part of the body, they are also of a much less accurate and reliable description. Now, with the pleasant sensations of colour, shape, and motion, as with all other pleasant sensations, there is coexistent with the organic feeling an appetital or animal

propensity for the sensation; this appetite, of course, has but a faint and delicate influence, and being, in fact, but the active side of the sensation itself, is not easily recognised; but if the sensation be pleasant at all, its pleasure implies the existence of an appetital impulse, however much that impulse may be repressed by reason or otherwise; and I call attention to it now in order to get the emotion of admiration clear from every trace of sensuality.

The results to be registered from the foregoing considerations are, first, that colour is a feeling in ourselves, and in so far as it seems to be a quality in objects it is we that make it, and are by our nature necessitated to make it, seem so; and, secondly, that shape and motion are likewise sensations in ourselves, and so far as they appear to be a quality or condition of objects, it is we that make them, and are necessitated to make them, appear so. Everything, in short, which we suppose to be a quality in objects, is no more than a feeling in our own mind, the consequence of a modification of our sensitive organism caused by something external to us; but as to what this. causatory something is, we have not the smallest information, and neither it nor its sensible effects in the mind has any right to the epithet "beautiful.”

Pass we now from the sensational to the second and only other class of feelings of which the mind is capable, viz., the emotional; let us turn from organic to inorganic, from corporeal to spiritual affections. Every sensation influences us in some degree, either greater or less, and by so doing calls up an emotion of a greater or less intensity. It is a psychological impossibility that we should be perfectly indifferent to any of our sensations, for if they are neither a source of direct harm nor of direct benefit to us, they may be a source of negative harm or of indirect benefit, i.e., of knowledge. We regard each one of our sensations with something of hope or fear, of love or repugnance, of admiration or disgust, of awe or contempt; and while in some cases the emotion is almost imper

ceptible, in others it seems to occupy the mind to the exclusion of sensation, reason, and will. A clear and distinct appreciation of the emotion of admiration is quite as necessary as a clear and distinct appreciation of the sensations which precede it in the mind; for on this clearness and distinctness much of our subsequent investigations will depend. Except in infancy we never look upon an object with perfect impartiality; we always think of its utility or its inutility, and are affected according to the estimate we form; if we know not what the object which we see is, we are puzzled and inquisitive, and therefore unhappy, till we do know. The sensations which objects cause on the retina are very delicate, and under ordinary circumstances removed from intensity; the emotions, on the other hand, which these same objects call up often reach a high degree of intensity, and in fact generally obscure by their presence the sensations that forerun them. When a peasant and a poet look at a single bright star shining in the sky, they both have the same sensations; but while the former can think of nothing but the colour, size, and brilliancy of the object, and is consequently but little affected by emotion, the latter is carried off at once into the regions of imagination, and revels in the countless suggestions which the orb awakens in his fancy; and he is thereby led to admire the object to such a degree that he presently becomes quite oblivious to his sensations. To the peasant the star is very bright; to the poet it is very beautiful. Beauty is a relative term, implying admiration and something that is admirable. subjective side of beauty is this emotion of admiration consequent upon the suggestion of pleasant sensations. To speak, then, of the emotion of beauty or of the emotion of sublimity is irregular and erroneous phraseology; there is an emotion of admiration for beauty and an emotion of awe for sublimity, an emotion of disgust for ugliness and of contempt for meanness; but there is no emotion of beauty or of sublimity, and it is quite as improper to speak

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of such as it would be to speak of the emotion of ugliness or of meanness.

Let us further distinguish the emotion from the sensation in a recognition of the beautiful. Suppose you were to see something of a silvery green and blue colour glittering in the distance, and were unable to guess what it was, you would doubtless think the colours rare and lovely; you could come to no other conclusion, because the sensations were organically pleasant while you confined your attention to them; but when you remember the important fact that you are ignorant of the nature of the object, this consciousness of ignorance causes curiosity, and curiosity, if it be not appeased, breeds unhappiness. In this state of things, therefore, you have little inclination to take pleasure in the colours you see; you are ill at ease, and must be so till you learn what the object is. On approaching nearer to it, you discover that the object is a serpent coiled up on a mossy stone and flashing back the sunlight from its skin. Note now what ensues. You still have a variety of pleasant sensations, a combination of choice colours, a tapering cylindrical shape, and altogether an object whose sensible qualities are decidedly grateful; you experience, however, little or no admiration for the thing; your abhorrence of the reptile is the predominating feeling in your mind; a thrill of horror and hatred runs. through you, and you are ready to destroy the animal forthwith. This emotion bids fair to swallow up all other feelings, and, in fact, completely minimises your pleasant sensations. Suppose now that you were mistaken in the object, and that on coming up closer you find it to be a kingfisher, what a change comes over your mind! You now admire the object from every point of view; let loose your fancy and give your imagination wings; you wander off into the region of poetic similitudes, conjuring up suggestions and piecing out analogies, till you are again almost unconscious of your sensations.

Thus, it will be seen, we never look impartially at an

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object-i.e., we never take the optic sensations as they come for what they are worth in themselves; we always look behind and beyond them-calculating, considering, comparing so that the dullest and quietest sensations of sight may produce the strongest emotions, and the keenest sensations of sight the faintest emotions. hungry boy does not admire a piece of bread-and-butter, because the estimate he forms of it leads him to desire it; a nervous person does not despise a wasp or contemplate its organism, because the estimate he forms of it leads. him to fear it. So we may pronounce a flower very beautiful until we learn that it is a deadly poison, after which our estimate will lead us to consider it detestable, though the sensations are the same for one verdict as for the other. The emotions with which we contemplate an object, being thus dependent on the estimate we form of the object, are capable of undergoing a complete reversal upon an alteration of our knowledge of it, upon a change of the associations with which we invest it. The grateful sensations of pleasant colours are supplanted and submerged by the emotions awakened by the associations. connected with the subject of those colours as a whole.

These remarks may be further illustrated by certain coincidences noticeable in the appreciation of colours by different nations. It is observed by Alison that black, in England the colour appropriated to mourning, is there a disagreeable colour; but that in Spain, and ancient Venice, where it was the dress of the great, it was looked upon as attractive; that white in England is extremely beautiful, because it is emblematical of innocence and cheerfulness, while in China it is disliked because it is there appropriated to mourning; and that yellow, which in the latter country is the imperial hue, is there a favourite colour, while in England, where it is associated with nothing in particular, it is beautiful or not according to circumstances.1 Black is intrinsically the least attractive of all colours, 1 On Taste, essay ii. c. 3.

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