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 PSYCH. 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
ANALYSIS AND THEORY 
 OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
ANALYSIS AND THEORY 
 OF THE EMOTIONS 
 
 WITH DISSERTATIONS 
 
 ON BEAUTY SUBLIMITY AND THE 
 
 LUDICROUS 
 
 BY GEORGE RAMSAY B.M. 
 
 Author of " An Essay on the Distribution of Wealth. 
 
 " Principles of Human Happiness and Duty." 
 
 " A Classification of the Scibncbs," &c. 
 
 V OF THf 
 
 UNIVERSITY }. 
 
 EDINBURGH: ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK. 
 
 LONDON : 
 LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. 
 
 MDCCCXLVIII. 
 
,7,. '^ 
 
 ii 
 
 BTJGBY : 
 
 r&UtTZD BV C808SLEV k.tl O BllLINGTO.V. 
 
ADVERTISEMENT 
 
 In a work published by the Author a few years 
 ago, entitled "An Enquiry into the Principles of 
 Human Happiness and Human Duty," a detailed 
 account was given of some of the principal desires, 
 chiefly with a view to their influence upon human 
 happiness ; but no attempt was made at a general 
 classification and theory of the Emotions, such as 
 is contained in the present volume. Those desires 
 which were treated of at large in the previous work 
 are here but briefly noticed, the reader being 
 referred to the " Enquiry" for a fuller investigation. 
 The present work may be considered as one 
 of a series which the Author began to publish 
 nearly twelve years ago, commencing with Political 
 Economy, continued through Political and Moral 
 Philosophy, and ending with pure Mental Philoso- 
 phy, to which this volume belongs. 
 
 1591 AR 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Analysis and Theory of the Emotions. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Part I. Analysis and Classification 1 
 
 Part II. Theory 35 
 
 Dissertation on Beauty and Sublimity. 
 
 part i. — ON beauty. 
 
 Chap. 1. Introduction 63 
 
 Chap. 2. On the Nature of Beauty 65 
 
 Chap. 3. On the Sources op Beauty. 
 
 Sec. 1 . Does Beauty depend entirely on Association ? 75 
 
 Sec. 2. On the real Sources of Beauty 100 
 
 part II.— on sublimity. 
 Chap 1. Wherein Sublimity differs from Beauty 129 
 Chap. 2. On the Sources of Sublimity 137 
 
 Dissertation on the Ludicrous Emotion. 
 
 Chap. 1. On the Nature of the Ludicrous Emotion 149 
 Chap. 2. On the Sources of the Ludicrous Emotion 154 
 
ANALYSIS AND THEORY 
 OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 Part I. 
 
 Analysis and Classification. 
 
 The object of the present work is to analyse and 
 classify the Emotions, and by means of this analy- 
 sis to trace their origin. And in order not to 
 interrupt the general view of the Emotions, such of 
 them as claim a lengthened inquiry will be treated 
 of afterwards in separate Dissertations. 
 
 The emotions may be classified in various ways : 
 first as simple and compound, the former class 
 comprising but few, the latter very many emotions. 
 The simple emotions are these, Joy, Grief, Wonder, 
 Desire, Fear, and possibly one or two more, such as 
 Weariness of mind from repetition, and Ennui from 
 vacancy, which however may be classed under the 
 general head of grief. All the other emotions are 
 either modifications or compounds of these elements. 
 
 B 
 
Z ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 Another classification may be derived from the 
 circumstance whether the emotions do or do not 
 necessarily involve the notion of Time. Emotions 
 not necessarily involving the notion of time, are the 
 elementary emotions of Joy, Grief, and Wonder, as 
 well as Cheerfulness, Melancholy, Beauty, Sub- 
 limity, the Ludicrous emotion, etc. 
 
 Emotions necessarily involving the notion of 
 time are of two sorts, as they look to the past, or as 
 they look to the future, and therefore they may be 
 subdivided into the Retrospective and the Pro- 
 spective. Of the former kind are Regret and 
 Remorse ; of the latter. Desire and Fear, and every 
 compound emotion embracing desire as one of its 
 elements. 
 
 Though each of these classifications has its 
 advantages, yet is there another which I would 
 propose as preferable to either, for it is equally 
 true to nature, and probably of more practical use. 
 < Some emotions are not immediately connected with 
 ^outward action, while others are. Of the first sort 
 are simple Joy and Grief, Cheerfulness, Melan- 
 choly, Beauty, Sublimity, etc. These like every 
 feeling, nay like every thought, may lead to out- 
 ward action, but they may not, and they never 
 immediately precede it ; whereas. Desire and Fear, 
 in some form or other, directly urge to action, and 
 when this takes place, they are always the 
 
PRIMARY DIVISION. 3 
 
 immediate antecedents. This distinction seems 
 sufficiently well defined, and sufficiently important, 
 for the purposes of classification. 
 
 Agreeably to this view, our primary division 
 will be into the PASSIVE and the ACTIVE 
 emotions. 
 
 CLASS FIRST.— Passive Emotions. 
 
 These the mind suffers^ but they are not the agents 
 in motion. 
 
 This class may be divided into two orders, into 
 emotions which have not, and those which have a 
 necessary reference to other individuals, or to our 
 own past conduct. Under the first order we may 
 enumerate the following. 
 
 y^' I. II. — Joy and Grief, emotions of an opposite 
 ^ character but of a simple nature, and as such, 
 c unsusceptible of analysis and definition. 
 
 Under these may be classed, either as species or 
 varieties, the following emotions. Under Joy, 
 
 1. Cheerfulness^ which is permanent but gentle 
 Joy. 
 
 2. Mirth : a lively joy, the result of ludicrous 
 emotions. 
 
 Under Grief, 
 
 1. Melancholy^ w^hich is Grief permanent, but 
 not intense. 
 
 2. Weariness of Mind, arising from sameness 
 
 B 2 
 
4 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 or repetition ; a simple emotion, and allied to Grief. 
 3. Ennui, from vacancy of mind, also a simple 
 feeling, and of the nature of Grief. 
 
 III. Wonder, an emotion produced by what is 
 new, likewise a simple emotion and not to be 
 analysed. 
 
 IV. Beauty.^^ 
 
 V. Sublimity.* 
 
 VI. The Ludicrous Emotion.* 
 
 Ennui is the malady of those who have no 
 sufficient occupation; and a tendency thereto de- 
 pends upon that peculiar frame of mind in which 
 desires are weak in proportion to the intellectual 
 faculties. Increase desire, or diminish intellect, 
 and in either case you drive away Ennui. And 
 though melancholy be not unfrequently the result 
 of long continued misfortune, yet it is the grief of 
 those especially who have no positive evils, and is 
 often greatest in youth, when everything smiles 
 upon us, and abates with advancing years. The 
 cares and active occupations of mature life effectu- 
 ally expel this dreamy sentimental emotion. Youth, 
 so to say, can better afford to be melancholy, for 
 upon youth consolations shower. 
 
 We have little sympathy with Ennui, but more 
 with melancholy, probably because we are aware 
 
 * For a particular account of these emotions, see the disserta- 
 tions contained in this volume. 
 
PASSIVE EMOTIONS. O 
 
 that the frame of mind indicated, is very different. 
 The man who suffers habitually from Ennui, is 
 likely never to do much good, for in him the active 
 principles are deficient, but the Melancholy wight 
 gives a better promise. The frame of mind which 
 tends to melancholy seems to consist of sensibility ' 
 more than ordinary, and of eager wishes and 
 aspirations after great things, united with little 
 hopefulness, but with much tenacity. Desio senza 
 speme would be a suitable motto. This constitution 
 of mind is however far from unpromising; for 
 delicate sensibility, which implies delicacy of con- 
 science, is highly moral ; and eager desire, with 
 constancy, will force its way almost without hope. 
 
 Tenacity of thought and feeling supposes frequent 
 recurrence of the same ideas ; and sameness has a 
 tendency to lower the tone of spirits. It is thus 
 that tenacity favours melancholy. 
 
 Though Ennui and Melancholy differ so widely 
 in themselves, as well as in their causes, yet the 
 remedy for both, as indeed for every ill, but for 
 them especially, is occupation. 
 
 CLASS FIRST.— Passive Emotions. 
 
 Order Second: Emotions having a necessary 
 reference to others, or to our own past conduct, either 
 towards ourselves or others, and therefore bearing 
 
b ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 upon morality and remotely influencing practice. 
 
 Though the emotions already considered may 
 have an influence upon practice, yet the influence is 
 neither so near nor so general as in the case of the 
 second order, which in the usual course of things 
 leads on to the active emotions. It may be divided 
 into the Immediate and the Retrospective Emo- 
 tions, according as they look to the present or 
 to the past. 
 
 The Immediate Emotions are, 
 
 I. Sympathy and Antipathy. 
 
 Sympathy is an emotion of pleasure arising from 
 the contemplation of some pleasure in another, or of 
 pain on the contemplation of pain. 
 
 Antipathy is exactly the reverse of sympathy, and 
 is quite an exception to the general law, for sympathy 
 is the rule of human nature. 
 II. Pride and Humility. 
 
 Pride, a pleasing emotion, arising from the 
 consciousness of some real or supposed excellence in 
 ourselves, or connected with ourselves, as compared 
 with others. 
 
 Humility is a painful emotion, arising from the 
 consciousness of some real or supposed defect in 
 ourselves, or connected with ourselves, as compared 
 with others. 
 
 Retrospective Emotions. 
 
 I. Remorse is a compound state of mind, com- 
 
BEMORSE, SHAME. 7 
 
 prising : (1) a judgment of condemnation on our 
 own past conduct; (2) an emotion immediately 
 consequent thereon. The precise nature of this 
 emotion may be a matter of some doubt ; it is evident 
 that it cannot be quite the same as that which belongs 
 to Moral Disapprobation when felt towards others, 
 for though in common language we are said almost 
 to hate ourselves, sometimes to be angry with our- 
 selves, by reason of a base action, yet we cannot 
 seriously desire our own injury. The emotion of 
 Remorse, then, is not Hatred, but Grief; grief 
 modified by the reflection that we have done wrong, 
 and accompanied with the resolution of acting better 
 in future. I repent, or think again, I am sorry for 
 my sin, is the language of Remorse, and well 
 describes it. First comes the thought or reflection 
 that we have done wrong, then the sorrow, lastly 
 the resolution consequent on that sorrow. 
 
 The grief of Remorse partakes of the nature of 
 Humility, but not to the same extent as the next 
 and kindred emotion. Shame. 
 
 II. Shame and Remorse are the two grand 
 bulwarks of morality, and though allied and often 
 mixed one with another, yet they are by no means 
 identical. The nature of the actions which gives 
 rise to each differs considerably. Remorse never 
 arises but from some action which in the retrospect 
 appears to ourselves morally wrong ; whereas shame 
 
8 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 is often roused by acts really indifferent as concerns 
 morality, and sometimes, as in the case of false shame, 
 by deeds positively praiseworthy. Even when the 
 conduct which rouses Shame is of an immoral 
 nature or tendency, the shame is often out of all 
 proportion to the degree of guilt. A woman is more 
 ashamed of a slight act of immodesty than of a 
 crime. Chastity is a virtue particularly guarded by 
 Shame ; for in women especially, a breach of 
 Chastity gives far more shame than remorse. 
 These and similar considerations prove to us 
 that shame peculiarly depends upon opinion ; 
 and as the opinion changes, so will the shame. 
 Adam Smith informs us, in his Theory of 
 Moral Sentiments, that the native Americans would 
 be greatly ashamed of living together openly like us, 
 as man and wife; and we know that a Turkish woman 
 is ashamed of showing her face. What would she 
 think of our ladies who uncover themselves down 
 to the breast ^ In England many men are ashamed 
 of being poor, others are ashamed of their poor 
 relations, or of being seen in unfashionable company, 
 or in unfashionable places ; but will any one say that 
 mere poverty or vulgarity is vice *? or is it despised 
 where equality prevails*? In the English great 
 public schools, where the sons of gentry alone 
 resort, a boy is ashamed of being ill-drest; in the 
 great day-schools in Scotland, frequented by all 
 
KEMORSE, SHAME. 9 
 
 classes, a boy is rather ashamed of being well drest. 
 I have known schools where a boy would have been 
 ashamed to be found reading his Bible. Shame, 
 then, is an emotion much more subject to the caprice 
 of opinion than Remorse. Shame originates in the 
 consciousness, not that we have done wrong, but that 
 we have done something that lays us open to Ridicule 
 or Contempt. Now, as Ridicule and Contempt, the 
 former especially, are often awarded where there is 
 no moral delinquency, so Shame is frequently felt 
 where there is little to blame. Shame, then, is 
 variable, because it depends chiefly on the sentiments 
 of others, and upon sentiments of Ridicule and Con- 
 tempt, which themselves are liable to change. 
 
 Since Shame arises from Ridicule or Contempt, 
 it contains, as might be supposed, a strong mixture 
 of Humility ; but Humility is not the whole, as is 
 proved by that outward sign which distinguishes 
 Shame from all other emotions, the Blush. 
 
 Anger generally reddens, but sometimes, like fear, 
 renders pale the face ; Love and Jealousy are said 
 to give a tinge of green or yellow ; Pride and 
 Humility are known by the expression of the 
 countenance, and almost by every act; Grief by 
 tears, Wonder by silence ; but Shame communicates 
 that beautiful crimson which comes and goes like 
 sunshine in a chequered sky, overspreading in a 
 moment face, neck, arms, and bosom. This sign of 
 c 
 
10 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 an inward emotion is one of the most charming things 
 in nature, and a peculiar effect must have a peculiar 
 cause, in the emotion of Shame, which, therefore, 
 besides Humility, comprises a feeling which is , 
 properly its own, and of the painful sort. 
 
 CLASS SECOND.— Active Emotions. 
 
 This very important class of emotions may be 
 divided into two orders ; for some of them look only 
 to the good of self; some to the good of others, either 
 in whole or in part. The former may be called the 
 solitary or self-regarding, the latter the social active 
 emotions. 
 
 Every one of the active emotions contains Desire 
 or Fear in some form or other, as one of its elements ; 
 and Desire and Fear simply as such, admit not of 
 analysis or definition. To these alone, and only 
 when intense or permanent, the term Passion is 
 properly applied.* 
 
 Before entering upon the different kinds of Desire, 
 we must observe that this emotion, in all its species 
 and varieties, is often combined with Belief, and 
 according to the degree of probability, that is of 
 apparent probability, the compound becomes modified 
 in character, and assumes different names, such 
 as Wish, Hope, Expectation, Confidence. In all 
 
 * For a more detailed account of the principal desires, see the 
 Author's "Enquiry into the Principles of Human Happiness and 
 Human Duty." Book First, Part 1 1. 
 
ACTIVE EMOTIONS. 11 
 
 these the essential elements are the same, and vary 
 only in degree, for in all, desire is combined with 
 Belief, an emotion with a relation, and in all, the 
 degree of probability modifies the intensity of Desire. 
 Certainty of not succeeding, and certainty of suc- 
 ceeding, in other words Despair and Security, both 
 destroy desire, which depends upon Uncertainty, and 
 therefore, as we approach the opposite limits, the desire 
 will begin to decline ; so that the degree of proba- 
 bility most favourable to ardour will be between the 
 two extremes, and at some distance from either. 
 
 Order First : Solitary or Self -regarding Active 
 Emotions, 
 
 1. Ambition in its proper signification is desire 
 of power, though it be often used in a more vague 
 sense for desire of superiority of any kind ; in other 
 words of eminence, — 
 
 Jtiev apiareveiv koI v7reLpo')(pv e/nfievai, aXkcov. 
 
 Power is valued on three accounts ; first for itself, 
 for there is a peculiar gratification attached to the 
 exercise of power in any line, quite independent of 
 consequences, and this gratification is original and 
 elementary. 
 
 Secondly, power is valued, as many other things 
 are valued, because they argue Superiority, and feed 
 Pride. 
 
 Thirdly, power is valued from its consequences, 
 which are apparent to all. 
 c 2 
 
12 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 2, Desire of Wealth : 
 
 Covet ousness, Avarice. 
 
 Covetousness is an eager desire for getting riches, 
 and, as commonly used, the word expresses Blame 
 for some supposed moral turpitude in the desire. 
 
 Avarice is an eager desire for saving riches, and it 
 also expresses that the desire is blameable. 
 
 Stinginess, narrowness, parsimony, are lower 
 degrees of avarice, and these words consequently 
 express a lower degree of blame. 
 
 Frugality, Economy, are also a desire for saving, 
 but these words convey praise. 
 
 Riches are valued first for their uses in spending 
 and consuming, but sometimes also, as it would 
 seem, for their own sake. When riches seem to be 
 valued for themselves, as by the confirmed miser, 
 what are the essential circumstances connected with 
 them for which really they are prized"? These 
 circumstances will be found to be two which are 
 very nearly allied, namely, the feeling of power, and 
 that of security, inseparably attached to riches, and 
 the latter is the principal cause. Great desire of 
 power, or ambition, overcomes Avarice, for money 
 must be spent in order really to create power, as 
 Caesar began by ruining himself in order to acquire 
 popularity ; but in the eyes of the timid, security is 
 impaired by every expense which promises no imme- 
 diate return. Fear, therefore, is the grand promoter 
 
DESIRE OF REPUTATION. 13 
 
 of Avarice, and on that account Avarice is apt to 
 increase with age. 
 
 3. Desire of Reputation^ of Fame, or Glory. 
 
 These are all modifications of one and the same 
 emotion, which in its humble form is merely a Desire, 
 but in its higher a powerful passion. 
 
 Reputation is valued on many accounts. First, it 
 is valued for its own sake ; Admiration and Esteem, 
 like Affection, being certainly delightful in themselves 
 without any reference to consequences. So far desire 
 of Reputation is primary or original, like desire of 
 affection or power, and unlike desire of wealth, which 
 has been shown to be derivative. 
 
 Secondly, Reputation is valued because it seems 
 to fortify our good opinion of ourselves, and so 
 cherishes Self-Complacency, Self- Admiration, or 
 Pride. 
 
 Thirdly, Reputation is valued on account of its 
 consequences ; for whether it be for moral worth or 
 for ability, Reputation is useful in every pursuit. 
 
 From the above it appears that desire of Reputa- 
 tion comprises a desire for two distinct things, 
 Esteem and Admiration ; the one founded on moral 
 worth, the other on talents or some other personal 
 excellence, not necessarily connected with morality, 
 for instance, Grace or Beauty ; and as we long for 
 the one more than the other, so the desire will change 
 materially both in its nature and in its consequences. 
 
14 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 Reputation, as we have seen, is valued partly 
 because it fortifies our good opinion of ourselves. 
 But this opinion may refer either to moral worth, or 
 to talents and other accomplishments, and, in the 
 latter case especially, Reputation ministers to our 
 Pride, and feeds the universal passion for Superiority. 
 Here then the humble desire begins to swell into the 
 passion, the passion for Fame or Glory, which fills 
 the whole man. 
 
 The passion for Fame is chiefly a desire of 
 Admiration, for it may exist with little or no care 
 for Esteem ; and herein lies the danger. So long as 
 men shall admire superior talents, or accomplish- 
 ments, even when abused, for that they do so is 
 certain, so long will a thirst for glory be the charm 
 and terror of mankind. 
 
 But other principles unite to heighten this in- 
 toxicating passion. We all wish to extend as well 
 as to perpetuate our being, and fame through the 
 aid of Fancy, conduces to these wished-for ends. 
 An extension of Fame seems to us an extension of 
 self, as common language proves, for we are said to 
 live in the breath of our admirers, and these may be 
 innumerable : and a perpetuity of Fame seems an 
 immortality, for we call illustrious authors, as Bacon 
 and Newton, immortal. The passion for Glory is, 
 then, the child of Imagination, and it partakes of that 
 unspeakable charm which surrounds its magical pa 
 
CURIOSITY. 15 
 
 rent.* One very common form of this desire is Vanity^ 
 a term which always conveys disapprobation.-]- 
 
 4. Curiosity^ or Desire of Knowledge for its own 
 sake, without reference to the use or application 
 thereof. The great spur of Curiosity is Novelty, 
 and on that account it is apt to decline with years, 
 unlike Ambition, Desire of Wealth or of Fame, 
 which rather increase with age. Curiosity is the 
 proper passion of Philosophers, for this alone 
 looks to the end which they propose to themselves, 
 whereas other passions, such as Desire of Fame, 
 though they may rouse the intellect, frequently 
 lead us aside from the path of truth. Though 
 Curiosity is not without its dangers, yet on the 
 whole it is the safest of all the Self-regarding 
 Active Emotions, because it is the most solitary, 
 and the most independent of other men. Hence 
 it is free, in a great degree, from those anxieties 
 which wait upon the rest of the passions. It is 
 generally an agreeable stimulus, seldom a rankling 
 goad. 
 
 5. Desire of Life^ or of Continued Existence, 
 here and hereafter. Though without some pleasure 
 
 * For a more particular account of this passion see '* An 
 Enquiry into the Principles of Human Happiness and Human 
 Duty." — Book First, Part II. Chap. ii. Sec. v. 
 
 f For a more particular account of Vanity, which is the wish 
 for display^ see Note at the end of this Analysis. 
 
16 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 we could hardly desire life, yet this feeling seems 
 distinct from desire of pleasure. 
 
 As it is with Riches so with Life. Had Riches 
 been of no use to us they would certainly never 
 have been valued ; but, after a time, from long 
 association, they come to be prized by some for 
 their own sake. So, though Life without enjoy- 
 ment could hardly have been an object of desire, 
 yet since there can be no enjoyment without life, 
 therefore, from constant association, life came to be 
 prized for itself. Certainly the desire does not vary 
 directly as enjoyment; since the young, who enjoy 
 most, are frequently most prodigal of their days, 
 while the old, who enjoy least, are often the most 
 eager for life. 
 
 This desire, though in general exceedingly 
 permanent, is inferior in intensity to many; for 
 not only may it be overcome for a time by various 
 other passions, as by Love, Ambition, Covetousness, 
 Desire of Glory, Curiosity, but it may be even 
 extinguished and give place to a contrary wish.=^ 
 Sudden and violent grief, or long-continued pain, 
 
 * Bacon even says " It is worthy the observing that there is no 
 passion in the mind of man so weak but it meets and masters the 
 fear of death. Revenge triumphs over death ; Love slights it ; 
 Honour aspireth to it; Grief flieth to it; Fear pre-occupates it ; 
 nay, we read, after Otho the Emperor had slain himself. Pity, which 
 is the tenderest of affections, provoked many to die, out of mere 
 compassion to the sovereign, and as the truest sort of followers. — 
 Bacon's Essays : of Death. 
 
LOVE. 17 
 
 mental or bodily, may give rise to desire of death ; 
 but mental distress alone terminates in self-destruc- 
 tion. As an element of religious feeling, Desire of 
 Existence becomes of first-rate importance ; but the 
 religious emotions will come under another head. 
 
 Class Second. — Order Second : Social Active 
 Emotions. 
 
 This order of Emotions may be subdivided into 
 the Benevolent, and the Malevolent. 
 
 Benevolent Emotions. 
 
 Most of the emotions comprehended under this 
 head are either different species, or merely varieties 
 of 
 
 I. Love. Love, in v^hatsoever form, comprises 
 at least two elements : first, a certain pleasure de- 
 rived from beholding or reflecting on the beloved 
 object; secondly^ a desire of good to that object. 
 These elements are essential, for they are sufficient 
 to constitute Love, and without them there can be 
 no such emotion. 
 
 Under this genus may be enumerated as species : 
 
 L General Benevolence, or Love to Mankind in 
 general, which is the simplest species of Love, and 
 
 I may remark that the custom of self-sacrifice on the death of a 
 Chief, prevailed of old among the followers of princes both in Spain 
 and in Gaul. — See Plutarch in Sartorioy and Cesar de Bello 
 Gall. Lib. in. 
 
18 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 distinguished from other species by the circumstance 
 of its being indiscriminate. 
 
 2. Friendship^ and every private attachment, 
 whether transient or permanent, slight or deep- 
 seated, contains a third element in addition to the 
 two above mentioned, namely, the desire of being 
 loved in return. 
 
 3. Love^ properly so called, Love between the 
 sexes, comprises a fourth element besides these 
 three, namely, the sensual desire, which is so 
 powerful, that the word desire^ when used by itself, 
 often signifies this alone. 
 
 These three species are quite distinct ; but the 
 following are only modifications or varieties of the 
 same. 
 
 Thus, Patriotism is general Benevolence limited 
 to our own countrymen. 
 
 Party Spirit, Esprit de Corps, the Clannish Spirit, 
 are also General Benevolence still further limited to 
 our own party, sect, clan, or profession. 
 
 Family Affection, again, from the nearest and 
 dearest that exists between parent and child, down to 
 a slight regard for distant relations, is a modification 
 of Friendship, taken in its widest sense, for whatever 
 partiality we may entertain towards relatives, we 
 certainly wish that it should be reciprocal. No doubt 
 there are differences between Friendship in its strict 
 sense, and family affection, depending in part upon 
 
GRATITUDE. 1^ 
 
 this, that Friends, properly so called, are of our own 
 choosing, while Relations come by nature; but these 
 differences are not sufficient to constitute a difference 
 of species ; they form therefore only varieties. 
 
 Gratitude is Love towards an individual on 
 account of some benefit conferred intentionally. 
 This last consideration somewhat modifies the 
 emotion, for we feel that love is due, and though 
 love in every form desires the good of its object, 
 Gratitude is not satisfied unless that good be our 
 own act. Such however is our natural dislike to 
 anything like constraint in affection, that the very 
 circumstance which ought to command our love, 
 sometimes prevents any real warmth of feeling. 
 This is especially the case where the love ought to 
 be the strongest, namely, where the benefit con- 
 ferred has been very great ; for then, not only is 
 the constraint most felt, but along with it is a sense 
 of inferiority, and the greater the favour, the 
 greater the humiliation. Hence the more Pride 
 prevails in the character, the less is it open to 
 gratitude. 
 
 When a return seems to be expected, then the 
 irksomeness of constraint is felt in the highest 
 degree ; while the idea thus suggested that the 
 benefit was not gratuitous, serves as an excuse for 
 Ingratitude. 
 
 Religious Emotions are of a compound nature, 
 D 2 
 
20 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS, 
 
 embracing, firsts a feeling of Gratitude towards 
 God for all his benefits conferred upon us ; and 
 Gratitude is a variety of Love, comprising a delight 
 in contemplating God, and a wish to do all things 
 pleasing in His sight, as well as a desire of favour 
 in His eyes. 
 
 Secondly^ the Religious Emotion comprehends 
 the desire of continued existence, that longing after 
 immortality which all men feel, but chiefly the 
 intelligent and good. The dolt and the wicked 
 man may be content with this life, but the enlight- 
 ened and the virtuous never cease to pant for an 
 hereafter. 
 
 Love, in some form or other, is the grand solace 
 of human kind ; Love, properly so called, is the 
 most violent, the most complex, the most way- 
 ward, the most imaginative, the most captivating of 
 the passions, and for a time the most happy ; but 
 the Religious Emotions, though occasionally violent, 
 are in general calming, and give a permanent and 
 unspeakable satisfaction.^ 
 
 Besides the above, there are other emotions and 
 mixed states of mind, of which Love forms a 
 component part ; for instance : 
 
 Admiration. This is a state of mind which 
 seems to occupy the interval between pure Love and 
 
 * This is the delectation interieure of the good, the spiritual 
 Malebranche. 
 
PITY. 21 
 
 Esteem, comprising as it does some AflFection, 
 as well as a favourable Judgment concerning 
 its object. But it is essentially distinguished 
 from either by the presence of Wonder, which is a 
 necessary element of Admiration ; and it is owing to 
 this element in particular, that the compound state 
 of mind is on the whole more allied to emotion, than 
 to cool intellectual decision. 
 
 Esteem. Here the emotion of Love is reduced to 
 the lowest degree compatible with any partiality, 
 while on the other hand the judgment as to the 
 merits of the object is serious and decided. Esteem 
 is synonymous with Moral Approbation, or, if there 
 be a shade of difference, it is that the latter refers 
 more particularly to the outward expression, the 
 former to the inward sentiment. 
 
 Respect, Respect is a mixture of Love with 
 Humility ; and Humility tempers Love with some- 
 thing approaching to Fear. Moreover, Respect 
 seems to comprise a certain exercise of the judg- 
 ment. 
 
 In Veneration., the Humility is deeper, and con- 
 sequently the love is more tempered with Fear; 
 while in Awe., fear predominates. 
 
 IL Pity. Pity and Love are emotions so nearly 
 allied that it is not possible to conceive any person 
 susceptible of the one, and at the same time unsus- 
 ceptible of the other ; meaning by Love no more than 
 
22 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 general Benevolence ; though Pity frequently gives 
 rise to a warmer affection. 
 
 Pity, or Compassion, embraces two elements : 
 first, a feeling of pain at the sufferings of another, 
 secondly, a desire to relieve those sufferings ; and 
 though other feelings may follow, those two alone 
 seem to constitute the emotion. The desire, however, 
 which forms a part of Pity, probably admits of a 
 further analysis, for it seems to be compounded of 
 (1) a desire of relief to the sympathetic pain which 
 we ourselves experience, instantly followed by (2), 
 a desire of removing the occasion of that pain, viz. 
 the sufferings of a fellow creature. 
 
 Thus it appears that the primary element in Pity 
 is Painful Sympathy, which seems necessary to 
 produce the other, Desire of Relieving, and without 
 the first it does not appear that we should ever have 
 felt the second. Love, on the other hand, seems to 
 begin with pleasing Sympathy, a feeling for the joy 
 of others, followed by the wish to promote that joy ; 
 and when our fellow creatures have become 
 associated in our minds with pleasure, the first 
 element of love exists. Sympathy, then, is the 
 foundation of both Pity and Love ; and we can 
 hardly conceive the one without the other, (on the 
 proper occasion), for how can we feel for Grief 
 without feeling for J oy ^ how can we desire to 
 relieve pain without desiring to confer pleasured 
 
HATE. 23 
 
 Conversely, if we love any one we must pity his 
 misfortunes, and the greater the love the deeper the 
 pity. Indeed, it is well known from experience that 
 a feeling which began in Pity frequently terminates 
 in ardent Love ; that the helplessness of women, 
 their delicacy of constitution, nay, their very ail- 
 ments and sufferings, often rouse the tender passion. 
 From the above it follows that Sympathy, a 
 feeling for the weal and w^oe of others, is an ultimate 
 fact in Human nature, and the origin of Love and 
 Pity. 
 
 CLASS SECOND.— Order Second. 
 
 Family Second: The Malevolent Emotions. 
 As almost all the Benevolent Emotions are species 
 or varieties of Love, so nearly all the Malevolent 
 are species or varieties of Hate. 
 
 L Hatred, in whatsoever form, contains at least 
 two elements ; first, a certain pain derived from 
 beholding or reflecting on the object hated ; 
 secondly, a desire of evil to that object. These 
 elements are essential, for they are sufficient to 
 constitute Hatred, and without them there can be 
 no such emotion. Under the Genus Hate may be 
 enumerated as species, 
 
 1. Anger. All the species or varieties of Hate 
 agree in this, that they are limited to certain indi- 
 
24 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 viduals, or classes of individuals, and that there is 
 always some particular cause for the Hate. There 
 is no such thing as general Hate, as there is general 
 Love or Benevolence ; for at the utmost, Hate extends 
 to certain nations, not to the whole family of man- 
 kind ; and then there is always some particular cause 
 of Hatred. If Misanthropy exist, it is a disease, 
 not a regular phenomenon of human nature. Thus, 
 Anger is a sudden and violent emotion of Hatred 
 towards an individual on account of some injury or 
 affront. Nor is it essential to Anger that the injury 
 or affront be intentional ; for though this may make 
 a great difference in the intensity, and still more in 
 the duration of the emotion, yet the storm is raised 
 before there is time for reflection, and cannot be 
 immediately quelled. When pain is acutely felt, we 
 instantly hate the author, even though it should 
 afterwards appear that he was perfectly innocent. 
 But the absence of intention alone is not enough to 
 render any one blameless, for Carelessness and 
 Indifference to others may be highly culpable. But 
 whether he be to blame or not in the eyes of an 
 impartial spectator, the author or occasion of evil to 
 us, becomes the object of Anger, which when con- 
 firmed by reflection, terminates in Resentment or 
 Revenge. There is then this difference between 
 Anger and the converse emotion Gratitude, that the 
 former is roused by Injury or Affront simply as 
 
RESENTIVIENT, REVENGE. 25 
 
 caused by a fellow-creature ; while the latter cannot 
 exist unless the Benefit be supposed intentional. 
 Gratitude and Anger however agree in this, that 
 the desire which belongs to each respectively is not 
 satisfied with the good or evil of another howsoever 
 produced, but it requires that the good or evil proceed 
 from the party benefitted or injured, and on account 
 of such benefit or injury ; whereas Love or Hate, 
 simply as such, is gratified by good or evil that may 
 befall its object, from whatever source. 
 
 2. Resentment. Resentment is Anger permanent 
 and confirmed by reflection on the conduct of the 
 offending party. 
 
 The observation just made upon Anger as a 
 passion which desires the evil of another, through 
 the agency of the injured individual, applies also to 
 Resentment, and with peculiar force, for Anger does 
 not terminate in Resentment until we become con- 
 vinced that the injury was intentional, or the result 
 of Negligence as concerns us ; and whereas upon 
 better information Anger may altogether cease, 
 Resentment, on the contrary, is confirmed and 
 strengthened by reflection, and is apt to pass into 
 Revenge. 
 
 3. Revenge, Here the desire of retaliating on 
 the offending party becomes intense, and whatever 
 calamities may befall him, retaliation alone fully 
 gratifies, that is, the fact that we who received, 
 
26 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 also return, the injury. Where the opportunity of 
 Revenge is delayed, this may become a very perma- 
 nent as well as a very violent passion, and the 
 attainment of its object would seem to be attended 
 with an intense pleasure, scarcely, if at all, inferior to 
 any of which our nature is susceptible. 
 
 If I can catch him once upon the hip, 
 
 I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him. 
 
 He hates our sacred nation ; and he rails, 
 
 E'en there where merchants most do congregate, 
 
 On me, my bargains, and my well-won thrift. 
 
 Which he calls interest. Cursed be my tribe 
 
 If I forgive him ! * 
 
 The scene in which Tubal announces to Shylock 
 Antonio's losses is highly characteristic of Revenge. 
 
 Tubal. Yes, other men have ill luck too : Antonio, as I heard 
 
 in Genoa, 
 
 Shy. What, what, what ? ill luck, ill luck ? 
 
 Tubal. hath an argosy cast away coming from Tripolis. 
 
 Shy. I thank God, I thank God ; is it true ? is it true ? 
 
 Tubal. I spoke with some of the sailors that escaped the 
 wreck. 
 
 Shy. I thank thee, good Tubal ; — good news, good news, ha ! 
 ha ! — where ? in Genoa ? 
 
 Tubal. There came divers of Antonio's creditors in my com- 
 pany to Venice, that swear he cannot choose but break. 
 
 Shy. I am very glad of it ; I'll plague him ; I'll torture him ; 
 I am glad of it. 
 
 Here, as in every variety of Hate, the disasters of 
 
 * Merchant of Venice, Act. I . Scene 3. 
 
INDIGNATION. 27 
 
 an enemy are a source of gratification ; but the 
 grand cause of Shylock's delight in these disasters 
 is the prospect of Retaliation which they hold out. 
 
 I'll plague him ; I'll torture him ; 
 
 1 will have the heart of him if he forfeit.* 
 
 Revenge is in a peculiar degree the passion 
 of savage nations,^r5^, because Violence and Injury 
 are there of frequent occurrence, and secondly, 
 because there is no Law to take the place of private 
 Resentment. In proportion as the empire of law 
 becomes more established, that of Resentment and 
 Revenge declines. 
 
 4. Indignation. Resentment and Indignation 
 are both species of Anger, and differ from one 
 another in this respect, that the former depends 
 entirely upon private injury or affront, and may arise 
 even when the offender is not morally to blame; 
 whereas the latter may be roused by an injury to 
 others as well as to ourselves, and always supposes 
 some moral guilt in the provoking party. As the 
 injuries which are the object of Resentment are felt 
 by us directly, so those which are the object of 
 Indignation are in many cases felt by Sympathy, 
 indirectly, and in these cases Indignation rarely 
 becomes excessive. It is then a moral emotion, and 
 when united with a decision or judgment, constitutes 
 
 * Merchant of Venice, Act III, Scene 1. 
 E 2 
 
28 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 the moral sentiment of Disapprobation. Resent- 
 ment, on the contrary, being roused by personal injury, 
 is sometimes unjust, more frequently excessive, 
 and at least it never fails to give additional energy to 
 Moral Indignation. 
 
 5. Jealousy. Jealousy, whatever be its object, 
 comprises two proximate elements, (1) a fear of 
 being deprived by another of something which we 
 consider our right; (2) a feeling of Hate towards 
 the author of the injury. The emotion of Hate has 
 been already analysed. Thus, Fear and Hate are the 
 essential elements of Jealousy, and the former 
 precedes and gives birth to the latter. We hate 
 because we fear to be deprived by another of some- 
 thing which we prize, and which we have been 
 accustomed to consider as of right our own ; so that 
 it is the self-regarding Passion which rouses the 
 Malevolent ; and the two when united constitute 
 Jealousy. 
 
 6. Envy, The Passion of Envy comprehends 
 also two elements; (1) Grief at the superiority of 
 another; (2) a feeling of Hate towards the possessor 
 of such superiority. 
 
 Thus, a Passive emotion of Pain and an Active 
 emotion of Hate, are the constituent elements of 
 Envy, and the former rouses the latter. The 
 envious man hates because he painfully feels the 
 superiority of another, which is equivalent to his 
 
JEALOUSY, ENVY. 29 
 
 own inferiority ; and he hates without the shadow 
 of pretence that any mortification was intended. It 
 is enough that another, however innocently, has 
 caused him to feel humiliated. Envy, then, is an 
 unjust passion, and the mark of a bad mind; whereas 
 Jealousy may be well-founded and blameless ; for no 
 one is blamed for fearing to lose his due, and some 
 ill-will towards those who rob us of our rights seems 
 altogether unavoidable. 
 
 Envy, moreover, is a confession of inferiority, for 
 were we not really inferior we should not feel so. 
 But Jealousy denies superiority and asserts equality 
 at least. Envy, then, cannot be a passion of great 
 minds, though Jealousy may. Othello, as lago 
 allows, was of a " noble nature ;" nor does his 
 Jealousy seem at variance with that character ; but 
 had he been represented as envious, he would have 
 forfeited all title to our respect. ^^^ 
 
 Since Love of Superiority is the universal passion, 
 and since every superiority in another lessens our own, 
 we may be sure that Envy is very general ; though 
 it be the ugliest feature of human nature, the blane 
 of the mind, a sore which ever runs, for it is ever 
 irritated, and which, if stopped for a time, only breaks 
 out again with greater malignity. 
 
 Where the little-minded feel Envy^ more gene- 
 
 * *'La plus veritable marque d'etre n^ avec de gi'andes qualit^s, 
 c'est d'etre n^ sans envie." — Rochefoucauld^ Max. 455. 
 
30 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 rous natures experience Emulation. Envy and 
 Emulation agree so far that in each there is some 
 uneasiness at another's superiority ; but whereas in 
 Envy this uneasiness gives rise to Hate, a wish to 
 depreciate, and if possible to pull down our com- 
 petitor to our own level ; in Emulation, on the 
 contrary, it awakens the desire of raising ourselves. 
 In the one case, then, the primary Grief rouses a 
 Malevolent, in the other a Self-regarding passion, 
 and this difference of result will depend upon the 
 talents and moral disposition. Where any one is 
 conscious that he cannot rise. Envy will be apt to 
 grow up; where advancement seems attainable, 
 Emulation will probably ensue. 
 
 We may remark this difference between the 
 Malevolent desire which belongs to Anger and 
 Resentment, and the one included under Envy, that 
 the former is a Primary or Original desire, the latter 
 Secondary or derived from another. When we 
 receive an injury, Anger immediately follows, and 
 the Anger vents itself without any notion that the 
 injury can thereby be repaired. If a man be struck, 
 his anger rises, and he instantly returns the blow, 
 though the fracture of an adversary's rib will not 
 mend his own. The Malevolent feeling, in this case, 
 therefore, is original, not dependent on calculation, 
 nor subservient to any other design. But in Envy, 
 the Grief experienced cannot be looked upon as an 
 
JEALOUSY, ENVY. 31 
 
 injury for which any one is to blame, otherwise 
 Resentment, not Envy, would be felt, and conse- 
 quently Hatred here is not roused immediately. A 
 painful sense of Inferiority is felt, instantly followed 
 by the desire of relieving this uneasiness ; the mind 
 then turns to the innocent cause of the same, wishes 
 to pull it down as the means of raising self, and finally 
 comes to hate it as the obstacle to Self-Complacency. 
 In this case, then, the Malevolent feeling is the con- 
 sequence of a self-regarding desire. The same holds 
 true of that passion which most nearly resembles 
 Envy, namely, Jealousy, as has been already observed 
 under that head.* 
 
 Since Envy and Jealousy both originate in desire 
 of Superiority, or of Equality at least, it follows 
 that this desire, in a greater or less degree^ must 
 tend to promote Malevolent passions. Envy, indeed, 
 can never want for food, so long as high and low, 
 rich and poor, exist in the world ; and only modesty 
 or kindness on the part of the great seem capable 
 of alleviating it; but peculiar circumstances may 
 greatly favour or repress Jealousy. Even Envy has 
 less for its object those who are very much above 
 us, because we are not accustomed to compare our- 
 
 * The Angry Passions, including Simple Anger, Resentment, 
 Revenge, Indignation, might be classed together as a sub-genus of 
 Hate ; and the Jealous Passions, namely. Jealousy and Envy, as 
 another sub-genus. 
 
32 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 selves with them, from which comparison alone a 
 painful sense of Inferiority is felt. But Jealousy 
 exists only between competitors, between those who 
 stand nearly on equal terms, and who, consequently, 
 have similar pretensions. Jealousy fears to be sup- 
 planted and outdone, rather than confesses inferiority, 
 and is nourished by doubt, destroyed by certainty. 
 Whatever, then, keeps up doubt, will tend to promote 
 Jealousy. It may be said to spring from Pretension 
 mixed with Diffidence. Therefore, an uncertain 
 position, combined with an eager desire of rising, 
 cannot fail to fan the passion. Now these are the 
 essential elements of a democratical state of Society, 
 which by breaking down every barrier between one 
 class and another, by presenting honours and emolu- 
 ments as the prize, not indeed of all, but of any, 
 opens up a boundless field to the desires and energies 
 of man. These desires and these energies cannot 
 fail to do great things, as they have in America ; but 
 as they meet with a thousand competitors, they will 
 rouse a thousand Jealousies ; and though national 
 prosperity will be advanced, and the national 
 grandeur promoted, Tranquillity of Mind will be 
 unknown. 
 
 7. Contempt is a mixture of Pride with Hatred 
 or Dislike; and is directly opposed to Respect^ 
 which unites Humility with Love. 
 
 II. Malice. Malice seems to bear the same 
 
MALTCE. 33 
 
 relation to Hatred which Pity does to Love. As Pity 
 is composed of two elements, a painful sympathy 
 with the sufferings of another, who may be no 
 friend, and a desire to relieve those sufferings, so 
 Malice is compounded of a pleasurable feeling, 
 arising from the pains of another, who is no enemy, 
 and of a desire to inflict such pains. The one unites 
 a painful Sympathy with desire of relief, the other 
 pleasurable Antipathy with desire of its continuance. 
 This desire also, like that which belongs to Pity, 
 probably admits of a further Analysis, for it seems 
 to be compounded of (I) A desire of the continuance 
 of that pleasure of Antipathy which we experience, 
 and (2) A desire of the continuance of the occasion 
 of that pleasure, viz. the pain of another. And as 
 in Pity the primary element is a pain of Sympathy, 
 so in Malice the original element is a pleasure of 
 Antipathy, which seems necessary to produce the 
 desire which follows. 
 
 Be it observed that Malice is quite an exception 
 to the general law of human nature ; for where 
 there is no particular reason to the contrary. 
 Sympathy not Antipathy, Good-will, not Ill-will, is 
 the rule. But simple Malice supposes no cause of 
 Hatred, and therefore it may be looked upon as a 
 vile excrescence rather than an ordinary part of 
 the mental system. Malice also has in it 
 nothing personal, that is peculiar to any one 
 
34 ANALYSIS OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 more than another, but applies indifferently to all. 
 Malice, however, is not Misanthropy; for the 
 primary element in the one is Pleasure, in the other 
 Pain. Besides, the latter, if it exist, is a permanent 
 feeling ; the former but an occasional emotion ; and 
 whereas Malice supposes no previous injustice. 
 Misanthropy arises from some injury or series of 
 injuries inflicted on an individual, who, by associa- 
 tion, comes to hate not only those who injured him, 
 but even the whole human race. 
 
ANALYSIS AND THEORY 
 OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 Part II. 
 
 Theory. 
 
 Having now completed our Analysis and Classi- 
 fication of the Emotions, we may proceed to enquire 
 whether it be possible to draw any general con- 
 clusions from this long detail of facts. The reader 
 will observe that we strictly follow the Inductive 
 method, by which alone we can hope to arrive at the 
 knowledge of General Principles. 
 
 When we pass in review all the Social Emotions, 
 divided into the Benevolent and the Malevolent, the 
 conclusion at once presents itself, that the Primary 
 or Original Element of all these emotions is some 
 feeling of Pleasure or of Pain. In every case this 
 pleasure or pain precedes the movement of desire, 
 and therefore we are justified in concluding that it 
 is the cause of that desire. As all our knowledge 
 F 2 
 
36 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 of Cause and Effect amounts to little more than 
 this, that the one invariably precedes and the other 
 invariably follows ; wherever we find such a sequence 
 of phenomena, we may conclude that a relation of 
 causation exists between them. 
 
 Passive feelings then, pleasurable or painful, must 
 be considered as the cause of all our Benevolent and 
 Malevolent desires ; and in general Pleasure is the 
 Source of the Benevolent ; Pain of the Malevolent. 
 We call those feelings Passive because they are not 
 immediately connected with outward Action, but 
 inert they by no means are. 
 
 Here, however, a remarkable exception presents 
 itself. Though, in general, Pleasure is the source of 
 the Benevolent, Pain of the Malevolent Emotions, 
 as in all the varieties of Love and Hate, yet in the 
 two emotions of Pity and Malice, which we have 
 separated from Love and Hate, the contrary holds 
 good ; for in Pity and Malice, Pain and Pleasure 
 create good and ill will respectively. We feel the 
 sufferings of our brother, and desire to relieve them ; 
 we are gratified at another's vexation, and wish to 
 plague him. How shall we account for this 
 anomaly^ Is the anomaly real or only apparent*? 
 How comes it to pass that the pain which we 
 experience in Pity, instead of venting itself against 
 the unhappy author of that pain, urges us to acts of 
 kindness *? 
 
PITY. 37 
 
 Let us observe in the first place, that we do not 
 compassionate all the sufferings of our fellows ; nay, 
 that those sufferings often rouse a contrary feeling. 
 A beggar with sores who forces himself on our notice, 
 or a miserable object clad in rags and eaten up with 
 vermin, rouses our anger or disgust, rather than our 
 pity, though, to outward appearances, he be in the 
 extremity of woe. Again, whenever we have reason 
 to think that the sufferer has brought his calamities 
 on himself. Pity is replaced by Indignation ; and be 
 it remarked, that people have a great tendency to 
 suppose that calamities are the result of ill-conduct, 
 and seem to wish to persuade themselves to this 
 effect. They thus obtain an excuse for not pitying, 
 and not relieving. 
 
 Men in general, the proud especially, pity the 
 misfortunes of their relations less than those of 
 strangers, because they feel humiliated by them, 
 and this painful feeling of humility creates dislike 
 rather than compassion. 
 
 Some are so sensitive, so shocked by the ap- 
 pearance of misery, that they fly from every sight 
 of woe ; so that with these, dislike or horror, 
 certainly not pity, is the consequence. 
 
 Many men have but little tendency to compassion 
 at any time, and instead of pitying, are apt to despise 
 the poor and unfortunate. This is the case par- 
 ticularly with Proud and Self-Confident characters. 
 
38 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 who think themselves too secure to be in danger of 
 falling into the like calamities. 
 
 Lastly, Pity is but little felt towards beings unlike 
 ourselves ; unlike either in species or in the order of 
 society. Persons otherwise of compassionate natures, 
 even sensitive women, are often known to kill and 
 torture the lower kinds of animals ; and in those 
 states of society where permanent Inequality reigns, 
 the sufferings ofslaves and others are regarded by their 
 masters and superiors with wonderful indifference. 
 
 In all the above cases there is no exception to 
 the rule that pain somehow proceeding from ano- 
 ther is the cause of Malevolent feelings ; for in the 
 first five cases, some modification of Hate, some 
 dislike is roused ; in the last no pain is felt. 
 
 However, with these exceptions, the sufferings 
 of our fellow creatures do certainly rouse Compas- 
 sion. But observe, that the feelings thus called up 
 are by no means exclusively painful. The first 
 impression undoubtedly is so, but consequent there- 
 on is a feeling of Self-Complacency, proceeding 
 from the consciousness of our being susceptible of 
 so amiable an emotion as Sympathy. Then comes 
 an emotion of Pride, which arises from comparing 
 the miserable state of another with our own more 
 fortunate condition. These two feelings, being both 
 of an agreeable nature, serve to neutralize, in part, 
 if not entirely, the primary painful emotion, and 
 
PITY. 39 
 
 prevent any ill-will towards the unhappy occasion 
 of that pain. And ill-will being repressed, another 
 desire naturally springs up, desire of relief to that 
 uneasiness which may remain, instantly followed by 
 the wish to remove the cause, the sufferings of 
 another. But if the Pride which waits upon Pity 
 become excessive, it will stifle Good-will instead of 
 promoting it ; and then the painful feeling of Sym- 
 pathy will create dislike, which when combined with 
 Pride, constitutes Contempt. Pity, then, and 
 Contempt, are often roused under similar circum- 
 stances, according to the disposition of mind that 
 may be exposed to the sight of woe. 
 
 If the above explanation be correct, it will follow 
 that the instance of Pity is no real anomaly, that it 
 forms no real exception to the rule, that Pain 
 somehow proceeding from another is the cause of 
 Malevolent feelings ; for every cause may be over- 
 come by an opposite cause sufficiently powerful ; and 
 in this case the opponent Pleasure counteracts the 
 tendency of Pain ; but not completely ; for on many 
 occasions, and with some dispositions in particular, 
 the tendency of Pain to produce ill-will becomes 
 even here apparent. 
 
 Upon the whole, when the sufferings of others 
 give us unmixed • pain, especially the pain of 
 Humility, they create simply dislike; when they 
 may be traced with some probability to the fault of 
 
40 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 the sufferer, they rouse Indignation ; when they 
 present themselves to a very proud character, 
 Contempt ; which results are all in agreement with 
 the general principle : but when those sufferings give 
 us a mingled feeling of Pain and Pleasure, par- 
 ticularly a gentle emotion of Self-Complacency, 
 then the Malevolent desire is replaced by the 
 Benevolent ; and this, as we have seen, is no real 
 exception to the general law. 
 
 The only question which now remains to be 
 answered is, why a large dose of Pride produces 
 Indifference or Contempt, while a smaller quantity 
 of the same is favourable to Compassion. As the 
 feeling is the same in kind, why is the effect so 
 different^ When Pride becomes prevalent and 
 habitual, it renders a man indifferent to the calamities 
 of those beneath him, partly on the principle of 
 occupation ; for when the mind is habitually filled 
 with Pride, there is no room for the softer emotions ; 
 partly on the principle that we fully sympathize 
 with those only whom we consider similar to our- 
 selves, and whose fate may become our own. The 
 proud man looks upon those below him as an 
 inferior race of beings, and has little or no sympathy 
 with joys or woes which he thinks can never be 
 his. But should he at all sympathize with such 
 woes, he could feel no perceptible increase of Pride 
 by comparing his own prosperity with the misfor- 
 
MALICE. 41 
 
 tunes of those whom he considers so far beneath 
 him. Nay, such a comparison would wound rather 
 than gratify his Pride, for comparison appears an 
 approach to equality. Therefore the sufferings of 
 humanity cannot increase the self-satisfaction of the 
 proud man ; but on the contrary, so far as felt, they 
 must rather diminish it, for they create a secret 
 consciousness that he is of the same clay. Hence 
 Contempt, rather than Pity, is the consequence. 
 
 But the man of humble mind, being not en- 
 grossed by Pride, is more open to the tender 
 feelings ; and though the woes of others give him 
 pain, yet, on the other hand, they rouse some Self- 
 complacency, because he has never been accustomed 
 to consider himself above humanity. " Homo sum, 
 nihil humani a me alienum puto" has been his 
 maxim ; and therefore he is content to occupy a 
 good place in the scale. On this account, he 
 neither dislikes nor despises, but on the con- 
 trary, pities the wretched. 
 
 With respect to Malice, which still remains to 
 be explained, we may repeat the observation, that 
 the feeling which lies at the bottom of it, namely, 
 a pleasure of Antipathy, is quite an exception to 
 the general law of human nature ; for where there 
 is no particular reason to the contrary. Sympathy 
 is the rule. But supposing such a pleasure to 
 exist, how comes it to pass that it does not, as in 
 
 G 
 
42 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 Other cases, rouse a Benevolent rather than a 
 Malevolent feeling ? To this the simple answer is, 
 because a Benevolent feeling is inconsistent with 
 the continuance of the pleasure. The pleasure of 
 the malicious man is derived from the pain of 
 another; and since he desires to continue that 
 pleasure, he naturally wishes to perpetuate the pain 
 from which it springs. The only thing unaccount- 
 able is the original feeling of Antipathy, for this 
 being supposed to exist, the rest follows of course. 
 Sympathy, as well as Antipathy, must be looked 
 upon as ultimate facts in human nature ; the one 
 the rule, the other the exception. And this original 
 feeling of Antipathy is not only an exception, but 
 it is so anomalous that it may almost be considered 
 as a disease. When Antipathy is connected with 
 Hatred the case is different ■ for it is then no longer 
 an original feeling, but the consequence of the 
 previous state of mind in reference to an individual. 
 When one man hates another, he naturally receives 
 pleasure from the pain and pain from the pleasure 
 of the detested object. 
 
 But in Malice there is no previous hatred, and 
 therefore here the feeling of Antipathy is original and 
 unaccountable. When we say that it is owing to a 
 peculiar constitution of mind, we give no informa- 
 tion ; we only state what has been already said, that 
 it is a peculiar fact, of which the cause is unknown* 
 
SYMPATHY. 43 
 
 Hobbes denies that Sympathy is an ultimate 
 fact, in other words, that the pains of others, simply 
 and immediately, are a cause of pain to us ; for he 
 says that the effect is produced by the consideration 
 that we ourselves are exposed to similar evils. We 
 are witnesses of a calamity, we consider that the 
 like may befall us, and therefore we sympathize 
 with it. Now it must be allowed that the circum- 
 stances of similarity and dissimilarity have a great 
 influence in increasing or diminishing the feeling 
 of Sympathy ; that the nearer the sufferers come to 
 us in species, station, age, character, even in space 
 and time, the more are we prone to feel for them. 
 We are certainly more afilicted by a small calamity 
 in our own parish than by a great disaster in 
 China or Japan. The fall of a house in our own 
 street affects us more than that of the amphitheatre 
 of Fidena, in the days of Tiberius, which buried in 
 its ruins fifty thousand spectators. Above all, if 
 we have actually experienced any calamity, we feel 
 for it the more readily in others. " Le coeur, cher 
 Chactas, est comme ces sortes d'arbres, qui ne 
 donnent leur baume pour les blessures des autres, 
 que quand le fer les a blesses eux-memes.* 
 
 True and beautiful words! This similarity, 
 
 * The heart, dear Chactas, is like those trees which yield no 
 balm for the wounds of others until the iron has wounded themselves. 
 — Chateaubriand. 
 
 G 2 
 
44 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 this nearness to ourselves, seems necessary, firsts 
 to arrest our attention, and secondly^ to enlighten 
 our imagination ; for we cannot even comprehend 
 the ills of creatures very different from ourselves ; 
 and why should we attend much to events over 
 which we can have no control ^ and without atten- 
 tion, without adequate conception, we of course 
 cannot sympathize. Similarity, then, is a circum- 
 stance which greatly promotes Sympathy, supposing 
 a tendency thereto already to exist ; but, that a 
 return on Self is essential to Sympathy, is a pure 
 hypothesis; for innumerable cases occur in which 
 we are unconscious of any such consideration. It 
 is more agreeable to experience to admit that the 
 pains as well as the pleasures of others affect us 
 immediately, and that the circumstances of the 
 case greatly modify the degree of Sympathy. 
 
 One or two very important questions with 
 respect to our Desires still remain to be discussed. 
 Firsts It has often been asked whether all our 
 Desires, without exception, be at the bottom Self- 
 regarding, in other words, whether they all arise 
 from the prospect of some Good or Evil to Self? 
 
 Before answering this question directly, let us 
 repeat that Sympathy with the weal or woe of 
 others is an undoubted fact in human nature ; and 
 this Sympathy, even with strangers, with persons in 
 no way connected with us, seems to arise im- 
 
SYMPATHY. 45 
 
 mediately on the view of their happiness or misery. 
 Hobbes indeed, as we have just seen, says " Grief 
 for the calamity of another is Pity, and ariseth 
 from the imagination that the like calamity may 
 befall himself." But were this theory true, (for 
 the first part only of the sentence expresses a fact, 
 the second a theory^, still the fact is certain that 
 we do sympathize with others, or, in other words, 
 have a fellow-feeling for them, in numberless cases 
 where our own interests are not immediately con- 
 cerned. The Theory of Hobbes does not deny 
 Sympathy, but only attempts to explain its 
 origin by a distant reference to Self. Besides, we 
 have seen that the theory is not sufficiently sup- 
 ported. 
 
 Again, it cannot be denied that we often desire 
 the good of others, and sometimes their evil, and 
 that too in cases where the good or evil of others 
 seems productive of no benefit to ourselves. No 
 doubt, it has been maintained, that in desiring the 
 welfare of others we really look to our own gra- 
 tification, and that the pleasure anticipated from 
 Sympathy creates the motive to deeds of Charity 
 and Love. Were this theory true, for this also is a 
 theory, it would not disprove the reality of our 
 Benevolent desires ; it would only account for 
 their origin, supposing them to exist. In every 
 view of the case, then, the pleasures and pains of 
 
46 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 Sympathy, which reach us by reflection, in other 
 words, because pleasure or pain has first been felt 
 by others, must be distinguished from the pleasures 
 and pains which affect us directly ; and the desires 
 which look immediately to the welfare of our fellow 
 creatures, which becomes our own only by Sym- 
 pathy, must be separated from the desires which 
 urge us to our own gratification without regard to 
 that of others. 
 
 But we may proceed further, and maintain that 
 all our Desires do not originate in the prospect of 
 some good or evil to Self. To prove this, we need 
 only consider the phenomena of Anger, Love, and 
 Gratitude. Take the case of Anger. When a 
 man, particularly one of a choleric temper, receives 
 a blow, does he take time to consider what benefit 
 or injury may result to himself from returning it *? 
 If he do, we may be sure that Anger is not 
 uppermost in his mind, but Prudence, Fear, or 
 some other principle. He may certainly restrain 
 his anger from prudential considerations, from Fear, 
 from Respect, but that is nothing to the present 
 purpose, for it is by no means contended that Anger 
 cannot be mastered. But supposing it to be in- 
 dulged in, what does it imply '^ When a blow or 
 other injury is received, the first impulse is to return 
 it ; and if the impulse be not checked, the injury is 
 returned forthwith. To the feeling of injury, to the 
 
ANGER. 47 
 
 perception of an individual as the cause of that 
 injury, there succeeds immediately a violent emo- 
 tion of Hatred towards that individual, comprising 
 pain at his presence, and desire of evil towards 
 him. Between the perception of the being who 
 has injured us, and the subsequent emotion of 
 Hatred, it does not seem possible to detect any 
 intervening feeling, much less any calculation of 
 consequences, or balancing of opposing advantages. 
 The emotion and its consequences are too sudden 
 to admit of such an hypothesis. This is confirmed 
 by the circumstance, that Anger and its results are 
 often in direct opposition to our interests; as we 
 ourselves acknowledge when we become cool. It 
 is a powerful object with the crafty and ambitious 
 man to keep down his temper, to subdue every 
 appearance of Resentment; for this, he knows, might 
 mar the success of his schemes. To feign Love, or 
 at least Insensibility, where Hate is the natural 
 emotion, belongs to the deceitful man, because Hate 
 is impolitic. 
 
 It seems then vain to deny that the Malevolent 
 feeling contained in Anger, looks really to the evil 
 of another, not to the good of self. That desire is 
 roused, as experience proves, not by the prospect of 
 some personal pleasure to come, but by some pain 
 actually felt. There is surely no reason prior to 
 experience, why hurt to one who has injured us, 
 
48 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 may not be an ultimate object of desire. Pleasure 
 to self may be a more general object, but must it be 
 the only one *? And where there is no convincing a 
 priori argument, experience should decide. 
 
 Now wh^thas been said of Anger, applies equally 
 to Love and Gratitude. In many instances where 
 favours have been received, Love towards our bene- 
 factor rises instantly, far too suddenly to admit of 
 any calculation as to the advantages likely to result 
 to ourselves from returning his kindness, and even 
 too quickly to allow of the pleasure of Sympathy 
 being presented to the mind in prospect as an object 
 of desirCc As far as our experience tells us, and 
 we can go no further, the Love, the Goodwill, 
 immediately follows the feeling of a benefit, and 
 the perception of a benefactor ; nor are we sensible 
 of any intervening sequence of phenomena. That 
 sequence must then be pronounced hypothetical, 
 and the utmost that can be said is, that there is a 
 bare possibility that the mind, quick as lightning, 
 sees the pleasure of sympathy before it, and desires 
 in consequence. But besides the high probability 
 against this, derived from direct experience, we may 
 draw an argument from Analogy; for if it be proved 
 in one case, as in the case of Anger, that we can 
 desire something besides the good of self, namely 
 the evil of others, it will not appear improbable that 
 we are capable of desiring their good as an ultimate 
 
SELF-REGARDING DESIRES. 49 
 
 object. As, in the case of Anger, ill-will follows 
 instantly after the injury received, so, in the case of 
 Gratitude, the good will immediately succeeds to the 
 benefit. Thus it is the pain or the pleasure already 
 experienced, not a vague pleasure in prospect, which 
 in these instances rouses the emotion of desire. 
 
 The question with which we set out, whether all 
 our desires originate in the prospect of some good 
 or evil to self, is thus determined in the negative. 
 
 The origin of the social desires being thus 
 discussed, a second question remains, whether all 
 the other desires, which we have called self-regarding, 
 may be reduced to desire of pleasure of some 
 kind, in other words, desire of self-gratification ; 
 whether, in short, they be all varieties of one princi- 
 ple, Self-Love: or whether there be desires, such 
 as Ambition, Covetousness, Curiosity, which, though 
 they look to self in some measure, may still be 
 distinguished from Self-Love *? * 
 
 The truth probably is, that Pleasure, positive or 
 negative, is the original object of all our self- 
 regarding desires, but it does not therefore follow 
 that we can never desire anything but Pleasure ; 
 
 * This last opinion was broached by Bishop Butler in his 
 Sermons at the Rolls, and has since been adopted by Dr. Brown 
 in his Lectures on the Philosophy of the Human Mind, Vol. III. 
 Lect. Ixv, Ixvi. What Butler calls Self Love, is a calm calcu- 
 lating view of our interests ; a principle, according to him, es- 
 sentially different from the Passions. 
 
 H 
 
50 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 for when an object has long been associated 
 ■with pleasure, that object comes at last to be 
 desired for itself, without any actual thought of the 
 pleasure that may attend it. Thus, Riches are at 
 first sought as the means of enjoyment, afterwards 
 for their own sake ; and the same may be said of 
 Life; but in both cases they are sought for our- 
 selves, not for others, and therefore in both cases 
 the desire is Self-regarding. Whether it be Pleasure, 
 or Power, or Riches, or Knowledge, or continued 
 Existence, it is still our Pleasure, our Power, our 
 Riches, our Life, which we seek to increase or 
 prolong. What though the immediate object be 
 not always Pleasure *? If the object be the good of 
 Self in any form, surely the Principle is the same, 
 and therefore the term should be the same, viz. 
 S elf-Love. Though the desire contained in Self- 
 Love may be under the guidance of Reason and 
 Calculation, that does not change the nature of the 
 desire, but only regulates its intensity, or rather 
 the outward signs of intensity, restraining these 
 when necessary to the end in view. Here, Self- 
 Love is a compound state of mind, but the desire 
 which forms part of that compound is of no pe- 
 culiar sort; it differs not from other desires and 
 passions. When we say that one man is governed 
 by Reason, another by Impulse, we must not suppose 
 that the moving principle is necessarily different, or 
 
SELF-REGARDING DESIRES. 51 
 
 that Reason is at all a principle of Action ; we can 
 mean only that the desire, whatever it be, is more 
 or less guided by Reflection. 
 
 But the assertion with which we set out, that 
 Pleasure of some kind or other, Pleasure positive 
 or negative, is the original object of all our Self- 
 regarding desires, deserves more particular proof. 
 
 It is allowed by the advocates of an opposite 
 opinion, that Pleasure always accompanies, or at 
 least follows, the desire, when the object is attained ; 
 and it is also allowed that such Pleasure may after- 
 wards increase the desire, or rouse a similar one on 
 a future occasion ; but it is denied that in the first 
 instance Pleasure was necessarily the object in view, 
 and the source of the desire. They do not dispute 
 that Pleasure is one source of Self-regarding desire, 
 but they deny that it is the only primary one, and 
 affirm that Power, Knowledge, etc. are originally 
 coveted for themselves. 
 
 Since Pleasure is admitted to be one immense 
 source of Desire, since the attainment of every 
 Desire is attended with Pleasure, and since this 
 Pleasure certainly re-acts upon the Desire, enough 
 is allowed whereon to build a probability that 
 Pleasure may be the source of all. But in order to 
 decide this point, we must further consult Experience. 
 
 It is notorious that men do not desire things 
 eagerly until they feel a want of them. But what 
 H 2 
 
52 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 is meant by a want, is a passive feeling of Pain, 
 accompanied by the desire of relief to that pain. 
 Thus, when we are hungry or thirsty, we are said to 
 be in want of food ; that is, we experience a certain 
 sensation of a painful nature, attended by desire . 
 of relief. Hunger, Thirst, etc. are properly called 
 Appetites^ because the pain is a sensation, or 
 immediately depends upon a change in the state of 
 the body. In all cases, then, of bodily want, there 
 is first a pain, and then a desire to get rid of it, 
 which is a desire of Negative Pleasure ; and the 
 greater the pain, the stronger the desire. But, wants 
 are mental as well as bodily ; and in the feeling of 
 wants there is an immense difference between men, 
 and desires vary in proportion. Persons of little 
 sensibility, little alive to annoyance or pain of any 
 kind, are apt to be indolent, while sensitive natures 
 are always full of wishes and activity. Those who 
 feel no uneasiness in the absence of comforts and 
 luxuries, as savages, slaves, particularly negro slaves, 
 never desire them eagerly ; and persons who 
 feel no shame, no distress at ignorance, never 
 seek knowledge with ardour. The pain of Ennui 
 is a great incentive to exertion, but when 
 the habit is acquired (and acquired it may 
 be) of being idle without uneasiness, there is 
 no hope of amendment, for desire is dead. What- 
 ever renders Home agreeable and comfortable 
 
SELF-REGARDING DESIRES. 53 
 
 deadens the longing for gay amusements, such 
 as Plays, Operas, Concerts, Balls, etc. which 
 are frequented by the single, or those less 
 happy at home, who alone feel a want of them. 
 The domestic may relish such amusements, perhaps, 
 quite as much as others, but they must force 
 themselves to go; while the others, urged by 
 Ennui or Discomfort, cannot keep away. Hence 
 the connexion between these three things. Comfort, 
 Domesticity, Morality. 
 
 These facts being granted, it seems to follow that 
 Pain actually experienced, not a vague Pleasure in 
 prospect, is the original source of Desire. An 
 uneasiness is felt ; the immediate consequence is a 
 desire to get rid of the same, and hence all other 
 desires. But desire of relief from pain is only one 
 form of Desire of Pleasure; and therefore, the 
 result upon the whole is, that Pain, actually felt, is 
 the source, the origin, the first exciting cause of 
 Desire, while Pleasure is its object. The first 
 desire that arises in the mind of an infant is desire 
 of relief to that uneasiness which he feels in the 
 absence of food ; but after he has tasted the food, 
 he can desire the same, because it is positively 
 agreeable. What is it that first induces us to use 
 our limbs and move them from place to place ^ 
 Not the pleasure of Activity which is as yet un- 
 known to us, but the uneasiness resulting from 
 
54 THEOBY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 inaction. Afterwards, indeed, that pleasure is an 
 inducement, but not at first. The same holds good 
 of mental activity, the first spur to which is Ennui. 
 So, what compels us to seek Change or Variety ^ 
 Not the charms peculiar to variety, which as yet we 
 know not, but the uneasy feelings resulting from 
 Sameness or Repetition. Thus it probably is with 
 all our Desires ; and had we not known the pains 
 of Privation, of Insecurity, of Inferiority, and of 
 Ignorance, w^e should not have eagerly coveted 
 Riches, Power, and Knowledge. 
 
 Search and you will find that every Desire has a 
 pain belonging to it ; and as no one pretends that 
 Pain is the effect of Desire, what can it be but the 
 cause*? And that Pain does really precede, not 
 follow Desire, we conceive to be proved by 
 Experience. 
 
 Talking of Curiosity, Brown has said, and his 
 observation applies to many other desires, " Plea- 
 sure, indeed, attends the discovery ; but it is surely 
 very evident that there must have been Curiosity 
 before the Pleasure, or no pleasure could have been 
 felt. Pain or Disquietude attends the un gratified 
 Curiosity. But in like manner, there must have 
 been a previous desire of Knowledge ; or if there 
 was no previous desire of knowing anything, there 
 could be no pain in the continued ignorance."* 
 * Lectures : Vol. III. Lect. Ixvi. 
 
SELF-REGARDING DESIRES. 55 
 
 Now, what is this but begging the question? 
 and on what ground can it be said that there " must 
 have been curiosity before the pleasure, or no plea- 
 sure could have been felt ? or, '* that there must 
 have been a previous desire of Knowledge, or if 
 there was no previous desire of knowing anything, 
 there could be no pain in the continued ignorance?" 
 Do we see a priori^ any necessity in the case ? 
 Might we not as well reverse the proposition, and 
 say : It is surely very evident that there must have 
 been pleasure in prospect before the curiosity, or no 
 curiosity could be felt ; or that there must have been 
 a previous pain in ignorance, or had there been no 
 previous pain in ignorance there could be no desire 
 of knowledge. 
 
 Surely one of these propositions is as necessary in 
 our eyes, is as self-evident as the other. But we 
 do not tread on the high priori road ; but on the 
 humble but safer way of Experience. To Ex- 
 perience, then, we appeal, direct as well as indirect, 
 the latter being called Analogy ; and we maintain that 
 not only the innumerable cases in which pleasure is 
 certainly the object of desire, and the allowed in- 
 separable connection between the two, render it 
 probable that pleasure in some form or other, positive 
 or negative, is the original object of all Self-regard- 
 ing Desire; but also, the direct experience of all 
 our wants, bodily and mental, seems to prove that 
 
 S ^NfVERSITY ) 
 
56 THEORY OF THE EMOTIONS. 
 
 pain is originally the indispensable antecedent^ in 
 other words, the actual cause of Desire ; while the 
 absence thereof, or negative Pleasure, is its first 
 object. 
 
 Pain, therefore, as I have elsewhere said "is the 
 Primum mobile of the human race/'* first in the 
 order of Time, as well as in importance. 
 
 The existence of evil has ever been, and will 
 ever be, the great stumbling-block of Natural 
 Theology ; for our faculties are too limited, as com- 
 pared with the vastness and variety of the universe, 
 to allow of the hope that we shall ever be able by 
 unassisted reason, fully to " vindicate the ways of 
 God to man." 
 
 But, to the religious, every glimpse behind the 
 veil which hides from their eyes the mysteries of 
 the Holy of Holies is invaluable. When, then, we 
 see, that Pain, itself the grand cause of offence, has 
 yet a beneficial tendency, by rousing our faculties, 
 we cannot but embrace with ardour a truth so 
 consoling, so favourable to the idea of Providence ; 
 and how small soever may be the portion of the 
 heavenly veil which thus is drawn aside, we shall 
 there for ever gaze, in hopes that hereafter more may 
 be disclosed. 
 
 When treating of the Social Desires, we found 
 
 * Enquiry into the Principles of Human Happiness and Human 
 Duty, Book I. Part iii, chap. 2. 
 
CONCLUSION 57 
 
 that those desires are real, and different from the 
 self-regarding ; and that they take their origin in 
 Passive Emotions of Pleasure and Pain, roused by 
 another ; and now we find that the self-regarding 
 desires originate in feelings of Pain. Therefore, 
 the grand conclusion is, that desire universally 
 springs from the actual feeling of Pleasure or of 
 Pain ; that the Self-regarding as well as the Male- 
 volent affections, Malice excepted, take their origin 
 from Pain; the Benevolent from Pleasure alone, 
 except Pity, which springs from a mixture of Pain 
 and Pleasure. 
 
 If, then, you wish for the love of others, try to 
 confer Pleasure ; and beware of giving Pain, if you 
 would not be an object of Hate. 
 
 From the above principles we may also draw this 
 inference : that Pain of every kind, bodily as well 
 as mental, tends to render men Selfish or Malevo- 
 lent ; while Pleasure opens the heart, and disposes 
 it to Love and Charity * 
 
 * Pity, indeed, as depending in part upon Pain, may be more 
 lively in those who have suffered themselves; but much private 
 suffering is unfavourable to this amiable emotion. The remark of 
 Tacitus, in reference to a Military Tribune, et eo immilior quia 
 toleraveratj is one of general application. 
 
 I 
 
59 
 
 Note to Page 16. 
 
 Vanity is the desire of the admiration of others; so called 
 chiefly when fixed upon small things, or when very prominent and 
 exacting. 
 
 Pride is Self-admiration on account of some excellence, real or 
 supposed ; so called chiefly when in excess. 
 
 Self-Conceit is the Amour propre of the French; a compound 
 of Pride and Vanity ; not so self-dependent as simple Pride ; not 
 so dependent upon others, as simple Vanity. This compound may 
 be considered the ordinary state of man, for few are so distrustful of 
 themselves as to live entirely upon the praises of others ; few are 
 so self-satisfied as utterly to neglect them. 
 
 Vanity tends to make a man ridiculous : Jlrst, because it is 
 usually fixed on small things, is demonstrative and exacting. 
 
 Secondly f because Vanity is often ill-founded. 
 
 Thirdly f because in seeking applause, it argues some self-dis- 
 trust. This incongruity between the palpable efforts at display and 
 the real want of capability, between the outward bearing and the 
 inward man, is of the very essence of the ludicrous. 
 
 Pride, on the other hand, seldom causes Ridicule, often 
 Aversion, and, not unfrequently. Respect. 
 
 It causes Aversion, because, by assuming Self-Superiority, it 
 creates in others the pain of Inferiority. 
 
 It generates Respect, when it is supposed to arise from the con- 
 sciousness of solid qualities, such as Independence of Character, 
 Disdain of Servility, Firmness, Constancy, and Hatred of all base 
 actions. For a strong belief in the possession of such qualities is 
 
 I 2 
 
60 NOTE. 
 
 generally more or less well-founded. The pleasure which accom- 
 panies this Pride, and the pain which attends its loss, are strong 
 preservatives of Virtue. 
 
 Pride, which cares little for the suffrages of others, tends to 
 render a man unsocial, and regardless of pleasing; while Vanity- 
 leads a man into society, and urges him to make himself agreeable, 
 for it is only by giving pleasure to others that he can hope to obtain 
 their applause. 
 
 Affectation is the offspring of Vanity and Diffidence. The 
 bantling partakes of the character of its parents ; for as the issue of 
 Vanity, it seeks applause ; as sprung from Diffidence, it is radically 
 awkward. Affectation is laughed at ; for what is more ludicrous 
 than awkward attempts at display ? Vanity tends to make a man 
 ridiculous, but Affectation always does so. If there be more Vanity 
 in France than in England, yet is there less Affectation; because 
 there is less Diffidence. 
 
 The alliance of Pride with Diffidence seems less natural than 
 that of Vanity and Diffidence ; but it is by no means uncommon ; 
 for a person may be proud of his solid qualities or other advantages, 
 and yet diffident of pleasing. And as the effects of Pride and of 
 Diffidence upon the outward deportment are not unlike. Shyness 
 or Reserve is attributed to the one or the other, according to the 
 good or ill-will of the by-standers, though it may really be owing 
 to an union of the two. 
 
 Affectation is a sign of mediocrity. There is hope of a man 
 who is affected under twenty ; but after that age not much. 
 
 Since Admiration and Love are kindred emotions, it would seem 
 that Vanity, or Desire of being Admired, and the Desire of being 
 Beloved, should also be alUed. But as those who differ the least 
 are sometimes the bitterest enemies, and as neighbouring, not dis- 
 tant states, are most apt to be foes, so Vanity and Desire of Affection 
 most frequently come into collision. Between these the victory is 
 often in suspense ; and of all the triumphs of Love, the greatest is 
 that over Vanity. 
 
DISSERTATION FIRST. 
 
 ON BEAUTY AND SUBLIMITY. 
 
A DISSERTATION 
 ON BEAUTY AND SUBLIMITY. 
 
 PART I.—ON BEAUTY. 
 Chapter I. 
 
 » Introduction. 
 
 In the Analysis and Classification of the Emotions, 
 we assigned to Beauty and Sublimity their proper 
 place; but as these emotions have long been con- 
 sidered as one of the most interesting, as well as 
 one of the most difficult subjects of metaphysical 
 inquiry, they demand a separate Dissertation. 
 
 How often has the question been started. What 
 is Beauty'? How various have been the accounts 
 of its nature, how difi*erent the theories of its origin ! 
 
 Vain and unprofitable would be the attempt to 
 state and examine these numerous and conflicting 
 systems, for though I should succeed in engaging 
 the reader for a while, yet he must needs be tired in 
 the end, and but ill-disposed to yield an undivided 
 attention to any thing new that might here be set 
 
64 DISSERTATION 
 
 before him. The writer, too, as well as the reader, 
 becomes fatigued with an endless conflict ; and when 
 at last he brings forward his own views, he appears 
 with a bad grace, like an Eastern Monarch who 
 rises to power by the slaughter of all his rivals. 
 But in metaphysical inquiries, and indeed in all 
 inquiries which admit not of demonstration, it ought 
 to be the writer's object to conciliate his readers, 
 rather than arm them against himself by previous 
 habits of controversy. Moreover, nothing tends so 
 much to create general distaste for any subject, and 
 even a contempt for it, as perpetual wrangling ; for 
 where there is so much variance, the indolent es- 
 pecially are apt to persuade themselves that nothing 
 is really ascertained. Thus, the never-ending dis- 
 putes which at one time prevailed among Political 
 Economists, threw discredit on the science of 
 National Wealth, as if it dealt merely in barren 
 subtleties ; whereas some of its most important 
 principles were established beyond dispute. For 
 these reasons, I shall proceed at once to the con- 
 sideration of Beauty, without thinking it necessary 
 to discuss all the systems of my predecessors ; but 
 without pretending to undervalue their efforts, or to 
 deny how much I am indebted to some of them. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 65 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 On the Nature of Beauty. 
 
 In discussing Beauty, or any other emotion, the 
 proper method appears to be to treat first of the 
 Nature of the emotion, next of its Causes, and lastly, 
 if this be thought necessary, of its Effects. We 
 shall begin, then, with the Nature of Beauty. 
 
 In ordinary language, the word Beauty is taken 
 in two different, senses ; for sometimes it means the 
 inward feeling of the mind, sometimes the outward 
 cause of that feeling, whether this be a material 
 object, or something moral or intellectual. This 
 double sense has been one plentiful source of con- 
 fusion and error in treatises of Beauty ; and a similar 
 ambiguity served for a long while to perplex the 
 writings of metaphysicians concerning the Qualities 
 of Objects and the Nature of Sensation. But we 
 must remember that Beauty is not a Sensation, but 
 an Emotion. In a former work, I pointed out the 
 distinction between our sensations and all other 
 mental phenomena, and showed that it consists in 
 this, that the Cause, or, in the language of Brown, 
 The Immediate Invariable Antecedent, of a Sensa- 
 tion, is some change in the state of the body; 
 
 K 
 
66 
 
 DISSERTATION 
 
 whereas the cause of the other mental phenomena, 
 whether Perceptions, Conceptions, or Emotions, is 
 itself some state of mind, and not any bodily 
 affection. When the emotion of Beauty arises from 
 material objects, the immediate antecedent is either 
 a Sensation or a Perception ; when it arises from 
 something moral or intellectual, then the immediate 
 antecedent is a Conception ; but in all cases, that 
 which immediately precedes is a change in the state 
 of the mind. With Sensation it is otherwise : there 
 the immediate antecedent is some change in the 
 state of the nerves, whether of smell, sight, hearing, 
 taste, or touch. But the Emotion of Beauty has 
 often been confounded with Sensation, and for this 
 reason, that, as in the case of Sensation, so in the 
 case of Beauty, we mix up the Outward Cause with 
 the Inward Effect, and, by a singular mental process, 
 incorporate the beauty, which we feel, with the sense- 
 less object before us, just as we incorporate the 
 colours, as seen by us, with inanimate matter. So 
 long as the objects are before us this delusive 
 process goes on, whether we will or not; but it 
 requires, one would think, but a slight exercise of 
 reflection, to be aware that nothing but mind can 
 feel, and that the outward material cause must be 
 something totally different from the inward effect, 
 whether Colour or Beauty, of which we are conscious. 
 But obvious as this may appear to us now, it does 
 
ON BEAUTY. 67 
 
 not seem always to have been so ; for when Locke 
 brought forward the notion that the Secondary 
 qualities of matter, such as colour, sound, taste, 
 etc. are not in the objects themselves, but in our 
 minds, he was thought, as Addison informs us, to 
 have made a great discovery ; but the discovery 
 consisted only in separating the material cause from 
 the inward and mental effect; for Locke never 
 thought of denying that there are certain real 
 qualities in objects which give rise to our sensations, 
 still less that there are any material objects at all. 
 It appears then that some reflection is necessary to 
 distinguish between our feelings and the outward 
 objects with which we mentally incorporate them ; 
 and as the mass of mankind are not much given to 
 reflection, and as philosophers themselves are liable 
 to popular error, we cannot greatly wonder that two 
 such different things should have sometimes been 
 confounded. And as we so readily incorporate the 
 sensation of Colour as well as the emotion of Beauty 
 with outward material objects. Beauty itself came 
 to be thought a sensation. Besides, the one fol- 
 lows the other so closely that it was the more easy 
 to confound the two. 
 
 How necessary it is to remember that Beauty is 
 
 truly an Emotion, not a Sensation, we may learn 
 
 from one of the best treatises in our language on 
 
 this subject, viz. that of Burke. This well known 
 
 K 2 
 
68 DISSERTATION 
 
 work is divided into five parts. The first three are 
 pleasing, interesting, and philosophical; but the 
 last two evince a woeful misapprehension of the 
 subject. Having previously endeavoured, and, as I 
 conceive, with very considerable success, to deter- 
 mine some of the sources of Beauty and Sublimity 
 in outward objects, the author, in the fourth part, 
 aims at finding out what he calls the efficient cause, 
 by which he means the immediate efiicient cause, 
 or some link in the chain interposed between the 
 qualities of outward objects, and the feeling of 
 Beauty in the Mind, which link, according to him, 
 is a change in the state of the Body. Thus he 
 is led to attribute the emotions of Sublimity and 
 Beauty, the one to a contraction, the other to a 
 relaxation of the muscular fibre ! This is nothing 
 less than absurd. The cause, or immediate indispen- 
 sable antecedent, of these emotions, is not a change 
 in the state of the body, for then they would be 
 Sensations, not Emotions, but a change in the state 
 of the mind, a previous sensation or perception. 
 Therefore, the attempt to discover the cause of 
 Beauty in a change in the state of the body, must 
 be altogether vain and futile.* 
 
 Let us then always bear in mind these two 
 
 * No less absurd is the attempt, in the Fifth Part, " Of Words," 
 to prove that the effect of Poetry depends not at all upon the ideas it 
 suggests ! But I repeat that the first three parts of Burke's In- 
 quiry are not only pleasing but truly philosophical. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 69 
 
 things : firsts that the Beauty which we feel must 
 be distinguished from the outward cause which 
 excites it ; secondly^ that Beauty is an Emotion, not 
 a Sensation. 
 
 Beauty, then, is an emotion ; a pleasurable emo- 
 tion ; but what else do we know of its nature *? Is 
 it simple or compound *? Wonder, and other pas- 
 sions, such as Love, may combine with Beauty, and 
 enhance the feeling, but they do not seem essential 
 to its existence. Though 
 
 The lover all as frantic 
 Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt ; 
 
 Yet the Love is one thing, and the Beauty which 
 mingles with it, and is increased by it, is another. 
 We often feel Beauty from objects which we cannot 
 be said to love ; and which, being far from new, 
 rouse no emotion of Wonder. 
 
 And if Beauty do not arise from the union of two 
 or more pleasing emotions, assuredly it cannot result 
 from a mixture of painful emotions, or of pleasing 
 with painful, because the feeling of Beauty is free 
 from all pain. Therefore it is a simple emotion, 
 and consequently, cannot be analysed or defined ; 
 though it may be described, as an emotion altogether 
 pleasing, which we incorporate with outward objects. 
 
 Beauty is altogether pleasing ; and herein it is 
 distinguished from Sublimity, which, as we shall 
 find, does not exclude some pain. Sublimity is 
 
70 DISSERTATION 
 
 connected with Fear, Beauty with Joy or Love. 
 This is one reason why, upon the whole, we prefer 
 the Beautiful to the Sublime ; though another reason 
 is, that Beauty is a less violent emotion, and 
 therefore fatigues less. It charms the soul, and 
 leaves behind an impression which may linger 
 long, without creating any violent perturbation, 
 apt to be followed by a corresponding sinking of 
 the spirits. Sublimity is related to Beauty as 
 Pleasure is to Happiness ; the one being an intense, 
 but rare and temporary gratification, the other a 
 more permanent delight. The former is the odour 
 of the most precious essences distilled from the 
 choicest herbs ; the latter the perfume which salutes 
 the sense from fields and gardens, on a warm and 
 sunny day. 
 
 Beauty and Sublimity are distinguished from all 
 other emotions by the incorporating process above 
 alluded to, whereby the mind, unintentionally and 
 unconsciously, nay, in defiance of reflection, com- 
 municates its own feelings to outward objects, 
 clothing dead matter with the nature and qualities 
 of spirit. While we gaze intently on anything 
 that rouses the feeling of beauty, we cannot help 
 thinking for the time, as many do all their lives, 
 that what we inwardly experience is a part of the 
 object before us, and therefore we call it beautiful ; 
 as if the beauty, which we alone feel, resided in 
 
ON BEAUTY. 7l 
 
 something outward. The experience drawn from 
 every people and every language, proves the uni- 
 versality of this delusion, which is common to the 
 careless and the thoughtful, with this only 
 difference, that the latter, in the absence of the object, 
 and in the hours of reflection, separates the feeling of 
 his mind from insensible matter. It is this incor- 
 porating process which distinguishes Beauty and 
 Sublimity from all other emotions, and therefore is 
 really characteristic ; for we never incorporate our 
 Love, Hate, Desire, Fear, or Wonder, with their 
 exciting causes, well knowing those to be in our 
 minds alone, not in outward objects. 
 
 Another proof, if proof were wanting, of the 
 delusive process, by which we are led to suppose 
 that the Beauty or the Sublimity, which we alone 
 feel, resides in things outward, might be drawn 
 from one circumstance, in particular, belonging to 
 ordinary language, viz : that while all the other 
 emotions have verbs either of action or expressing 
 states of being, connected with them, Beauty and 
 Sublimity alone have none. Thus we have the 
 verbs to Love, to Hate, to Desire, to Fear, to 
 Wonder, to be Proud, to be Humble, to be Grateful, 
 to be Revengeful, to be Cheerful, Melancholy, 
 Languid, etc. but we cannot say to Beautiful, or to 
 be Beautiful, for the last has quite a different 
 meaning, and expresses not that we feel the emo- 
 
72 DISSERTATION 
 
 tion. This seems as strong a proof as can be 
 given, that the incorporating process here alluded 
 to really takes place, and is peculiar to Beauty and 
 Sublimity. Further, when we use the words to 
 beautify, or to be beautiful, we express our con- 
 viction that we add beauty to outward objects, or 
 that it already resides in them. 
 
 Beauty is a Passive Emotion ; the mind suffers 
 it, but it does not directly nor necessarily lead 
 to action. Also, it is an Immediate Emotion ; having 
 no reference to time, past or future. Beauty is 
 wholly occupied with the present, and therefore the 
 idea of time enters not into it at all; for without 
 reference to the past or the future, without the 
 thought of succession, there can be no notion of 
 time. So long as the impression remains, the mind 
 is agreeably filled, and seeks not to dwell on the 
 past, nor on the vague and boundless future. There- 
 fore, the feeling of Beauty is a prodigious solace to 
 the mind, relieving melancholy recollections, as well 
 as eating cares, breaking the routine of thought, and 
 varying the train of ideas by lively and softening 
 images. Beauty is not like our principal desires, 
 Love, Ambition, Covetousness, etc. or like Cheer- 
 fullness and Melancholy, a permanent emotion, but 
 it is roused occasionally as the proper objects present 
 themselves, and subsides as soon as they are absent ; 
 though it may leave behind a vague agreeable 
 
ON BEAUTY. 73 
 
 impression, to continue for some length of time. 
 When one has lately witnessed some scene of un- 
 usual beauty, the mind does not at once return to 
 its ordinary state, but retains a gentle but pleasing 
 emotion, like the swell of the sea after the wind is 
 hushed. 
 
 Beauty is distinguished from Utility, and in a 
 certain sense is superior to it ; for while Utility only 
 tends to enjoyment. Beauty is enjoyment itself. 
 Whatever some writers may say, no two things 
 appear more different than Beauty and Utility ; nay, 
 they are often utterly opposed, so that the more we 
 cultivate the one, the less can we have of the other. 
 True it is that a certain beauty does seem to arise 
 from Contrivance, the skilful adaptation of means 
 to an end ; and as no one takes the trouble of con- 
 triving what appears to be entirely useless, therefore 
 it has been supposed that Utility is a source of 
 Beauty. But this seems disproved by the fact, that 
 the Contrivance alone is of any avail in this respect, 
 the excellence of the end being altogether unim- 
 portant ; for as much Beauty may arise from an 
 ingenious musical snuff-box, or other toy, as from 
 a well-built ship which wafts us from England to the 
 Indies, and conveys the superabundance of one 
 country to feed the penury of another. But this 
 branch of the subject belongs properly to the fol- 
 lowing chapter. 
 
74 DISSERTATION 
 
 We must remember that the emotion of Beauty 
 is not absolutely one and the same. The term 
 comprehends emotions which differ in some degree, 
 though they be sufficiently alike to be classed to- 
 gether under a common name ; for our ideas and our 
 emotions are more varied than our language. The 
 most striking varieties are, Material, Intellectual, 
 and Moral Beauty ; and even in each of these there 
 may be smaller differences, which have no name. 
 In the following chapter, we shall consider chiefly 
 the sources of material Beauty, which may enable 
 us to judge of the rest. 
 
 Beauty is felt by all mankind, though not always 
 from the same objects, still less in the same degree 
 from the same objects. Much, then, must depend 
 upon the individual mind ; but are there no General 
 Principles, or Causes, upon which the emotion de- 
 pends ^ 1 shall endeavour to answer this question 
 in the following chapter. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 75 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 On the Sources of Beauty. 
 
 SECTION FIRST. 
 
 Does Beauty depend entirely on Association? 
 
 It must be allowed that an inquiry into the Sources 
 of Beauty, is one of the most difficult within the 
 range of Metaphysics ; but it is also one of the 
 most interesting ; and if, in what has preceded, I 
 have been successful in throwing light upon the 
 Nature of the Emotion, I trust that the still greater 
 difficulties which beset this part of the Dissertation 
 will not be found insuperable. 
 
 In the very threshold of our inquiry into the 
 sources or causes of Beauty, we are met by an 
 opinion supported by great names, and maintained 
 with much ingenuity of argument, and power of 
 eloquence, the opinion that there are no Original 
 Causes of Beauty at all, none deeply fixed in the 
 nature of things ; but that the Emotion is derived 
 entirely from Association. If this be true, then it 
 is evident that we may save ourselves the trouble 
 of inquiring into the Original Sources of Beauty, for 
 on this supposition there are none, no Standard of 
 L 2 
 
76 DISSERTATION 
 
 Beauty or of Taste, and no true philosophy ap- 
 plicable to the subject. Before proceeding any 
 further, therefore, it is necessary to examine this 
 point, and at some length. 
 
 At first sight assuredly, the probability is against 
 those who maintain the above opinion. In the 
 previous chapter, we found that the Emotion of 
 Beauty is a simple or elementary feeling of the 
 mind; and if so, it would appear to be original, 
 like all other elementary feelings. All elementary 
 feelings are original, and all original feelings are 
 elementary ; how then can Beauty be an exception ? 
 And if the feeling be original, it must have its 
 proper original cause. This argument alone ap- 
 pears to be conclusive. That association may rouse 
 a feeling already experienced, we can readily con- 
 ceive, but that it can create a feeling entirely new, 
 it seems impossible to admit. Assuredly, asso- 
 ciation has no such power ; for association supposes 
 the previous existence of feeling, which from some 
 circumstance is suggested on a future occasion, and 
 which never could be so suggested, had it not been 
 first experienced from the proper cause. It would 
 be quite as absurd to say that Moral Sentiment is 
 derived entirely from association, as to afiirm that 
 Beauty is ; for association may change, modify, or 
 pervert, provided there be something to be changed, 
 modified, or perverted ; but, in all cases, some foun- 
 
ON BEAUTY. 77 
 
 dation is supposed on which association rests. To 
 build in association alone, is to build without a base. 
 
 The next argument is of a more popular nature 
 than the former, and is not without its weight. All 
 men think and talk of Beauty as if there were 
 something fixed on which it depends; and they 
 would be nearly as much astonished to be told that 
 they were in error in this respect, as to be assured 
 that the material world is nothing but an empty 
 pageant, a phantom of the brain. Nay, we have 
 seen that they carry this notion so far as to believe 
 that Beauty resides entirely in things outward ; and 
 though this be a delusion, yet it must be allowed 
 to be more probable, that, in part at least, they are 
 right, than not at all. But according to the theory 
 which we are now considering. Beauty is entirely the 
 creature of the brain, without any definite standard 
 in nature whatever ; a feeling of a new and peculiar 
 nature, elaborated by some mysterious process, by 
 some metaphysical alchemy, out of other and dif- 
 ferent feelings, and yet not compounded of any of 
 them. At the least, then, the burthen of proof lies 
 with those who oppose the universal sense of 
 mankind. 
 
 The grand argument which is relied on by those 
 who deny all original Beauty, is the endless diversity 
 of sentiment that prevails on this subject. They 
 refer triumphantly to the various and seemingly 
 
78 DISSERTATION 
 
 opposite feelings and opinions which have been 
 known to exist, not only in distant ages and in 
 different countries, but in the same country at short 
 intervals of time; especially to the changes of fashion ; 
 what was the mode and what was generally admired 
 but a few years ago, appearing ludicrous now, as the 
 present fashion will soon appear to others, and even 
 to ourselves. But, though fashion be the most 
 palpable case in point, on account of the sudden 
 change in our own feelings, yet there are other as 
 great and more permanent differences. What dif- 
 ferent ideas are formed in different nations concern- 
 ing the beauty of the human shape and countenance ^ 
 " A fair complexion is a shocking deformity on the 
 coast of Guinea. Thick lips and a flat nose are a 
 beauty. In some nations, long ears that hang down 
 upon the shoulders are the objects of universal 
 admiration. In China, if a lady's foot is so large as 
 to be fit to walk upon, she is regarded as a monster 
 of ugliness."* So writes Adam Smith, with some 
 exaggeration, in giving an account of the system of 
 Father Buffier; though Smith himself disbelieves 
 that Beauty entirely depends upon association. 
 
 To this grand argument, it has been answered, 
 and certainly not without reason,*!* that the very 
 same objections may be urged against the existence 
 
 * Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments: Part v. Chap. 1. 
 t See Brown's Lectm'es: Vol. III. Lect. Iv. Ivi. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 79 
 
 of Truth, as against fixed principles of Beauty ; 
 that the " incurable diversity of human opinions on 
 all subjects short of demonstration" is well known, 
 and is proved, not only by the varying opinion of 
 unreflecting men on all subjects, by the endless 
 difference of religious sects and political parties, 
 but also by the rival systems of those who devote 
 themselves especially to the investigation of Truth. 
 Look at the various Schools of Philosophy, see how 
 one has risen upon the ruins of another, like Empire 
 upon Empire, each to be speedily overthrown ; and 
 if you still talk of truth as something distinct from 
 opinion, you have no reason to deny that, notwith- 
 standing all diversities, there is also a Standard of 
 Beauty. 
 
 A similar argument may be derived from the 
 sense of Taste. What more striking than the dif- 
 ferences which are found among men with respect 
 to the relish of certain dishes ! When an English- 
 man goes abroad for the first time, he generally 
 rails against Continental cookery, and says he can 
 get nothing to eat ; while a Frenchman, newly ar- 
 rived in England, finds our English fare meagre 
 and detestable. Shall we then say that Taste 
 entirely depends on custom, and that originally, all 
 things are alike'? Assuredly not; for, judging 
 from the infant palate, it appears that Sweetness 
 is originally agreeable. Bitterness disagreeable; 
 
80 DISSERTATION 
 
 though a different taste may be afterwards acquired. 
 So, amidst all the vicissitudes of feeling with 
 respect to Beauty, there may be some original 
 difference between Beautiful and Ugly objects, and 
 the analogy of the sense renders this even probable. 
 These arguments from Analogy certainly have 
 their weight ; but the true answer to those who, 
 on account of the diversity of feeling, deny all 
 Original Beauty, seems to me to consist in denying 
 that the differences are so great and general as they 
 suppose. Nothing is more easy than to make out 
 a case, by bringing forward some affirmative 
 instances, which from their nature make an impres- 
 sion on the mind, while the innumerable negative 
 instances are overlooked. 1 have no doubt that this 
 grand source of fallacy has been the principal cause 
 of misconception in the present case. It is one of 
 the leading Idols of the human mind, being common 
 to men of every class, in every age, and in every 
 state of civilisation. Besides, in philosophy, as well 
 as in daily life and conversation, it is the differences 
 alone of opinion, or of feeling, that strike us and 
 rouse opposition ; while points of agreement, how- 
 ever numerous, almost escape notice. But if men 
 had no common opinion they could not converse 
 together, for the very arguments they use suppose 
 some common principle, and if they had no common 
 feelings, derived from similar causes, they could 
 
ON BEAUTY. 81 
 
 have no pleasure in society, and could not even 
 understand one another; each man would be an 
 enigma to his neighbour. If one man found a 
 dunghill more beautiful than a bed of roses, and so 
 in other cases, what fellowship could there be upon 
 the earth '? In fact, without common feelings from 
 similar causes, whether Beauty, Sublimity, or others, 
 there could be no common language , but each one 
 would give vent to his emotions by spontaneous and 
 inarticulate sounds. As it is, how readily is an 
 emotion of Beauty responded to by another, perhaps 
 by a large company, whose attention is drawn to the 
 object ! The eyes of all are riveted, and glisten 
 at the same time, a proof that they feel alike. 
 Their admiration may not be equally lively, and 
 one man may like this part better than another, but 
 these differences do not exclude similarity. In- 
 numerable are the instances of Beauty wherein men 
 fundamentally agree. All men admire the starry 
 heavens ; the sun rising and setting in majesty, and 
 tinging the clouds with many and brilliant hues ; 
 the sweet summer morning and pensive evening ; 
 the sea, or other expanse of water, reposing in 
 sunshine ; the smooth grassy mead ; the forest of 
 noble trees ; the mountain top, bathed in floods of 
 red or purple ; and the clear and rapid river, hurry- 
 ing along between precipitous banks, here rocky 
 and bare, there clothed with natural wood, bending 
 
 M 
 
82 DISSERTATION 
 
 gracefully to the stream. These are but a few, a 
 very few, of the objects which all men deem 
 beautiful, at least all who have ever had sufficient 
 leisure of mind to attend to them. For one grand 
 cause of the diversity which prevails in the feeling 
 of Beauty, is the occupation or the pre-occupation 
 of men. What avails it that the earth, the water, 
 the sky, teem with sources of Beauty, if we be 
 too much engaged to attend to what we see around 
 us *? Consider the condition of the great mass of 
 mankind, born to daily toil, and for ever in danger 
 of falling into indigence and want. Consider also 
 the lives of the middle class, intensely occupied in 
 the pursuit of gain ; and even the upper ranks, 
 deeply immersed in the cares which accompany 
 fortune, and in political strife. Can we wonder 
 that, among all these pre-occupations, the spectacle 
 which nature presents should often be overlooked, 
 or viewed with an absent eye ^ But Beauty is not 
 a sensation which we can hardly help feeling in some 
 degree when the proper object presents itself, but 
 it is an emotion which may or may not follow the 
 sensation, according as the mind is sufficiently free 
 from thought. Freedom from anxious care or urgent 
 thought on any subject, is a condition indispensable 
 to the feeling of Beauty, according to the principle, 
 that the mind cannot be occupied with two things at 
 once ; and, from want of such freedom, many pass 
 
ON BEAUTY. 83 
 
 their lives surrounded by charming objects, without 
 ever feeling their beauty. Moreover, as the capacity 
 of the mind is limited, and as the opportunities of 
 men are various, it cannot but happen that some men 
 will attend more to some objects than to others ; and, 
 in proportion as they do attend to them, they are able 
 to discover beauties which are hidden from the 
 common eye. By dwelling on the object long and 
 frequently, whatever source of Beauty it may 
 possess, cannot fail to produce an effect. Thus, 
 while pre-occupation prevents us from seeing Beauty 
 in anything, occupation, special occupation about one 
 thing, enables us to see more in it than other people. 
 In this way, the general dullness of some men on the 
 score of Beauty, as compared with others, may, in 
 part, be accounted for, as well as much of the 
 diversity of feeling which prevails among mankind. 
 So far as we can judge from our experience of 
 that period of life which has few or no associations, 
 it certainly appears that there is Original Beauty ; 
 for even the very young child does not view all 
 things with the same eye, but he shows keen pleasure 
 at the sight of some objects, and indifference at 
 others. Gay and varied colours, as well as musical 
 sounds, generally arrest and please him. Would 
 the nurse sing her lullaby if it did not soothe 
 the babe'? And this brings us to the grand 
 and decisive instance in favour of Original Beauty. 
 M 2 
 
84 DISSERTATION 
 
 Almost every nation has a music of its own, which 
 it prefers to all other kinds. What a prodigious 
 variety prevails upon the face of the earth ! What 
 a difference between a simple Scottish air, Swiss 
 ranz-devache, or French romance, and the varied 
 and complicated music of Germany and Italy ! 
 Compare a symphony of Beethoven with an air of 
 Neil Gow ; the intricate compositions of Thalberg 
 with the last new English ballad. Yet, in spite of 
 the wide difference between these styles of music, 
 they, and every other style, however rude or refined, 
 that exists on the face of the earth, fundamen- 
 tally agree ; and though some may prefer one kind, 
 some another, yet no one, who has an ear, positively 
 dislikes any. The fundamental points of agreement 
 can be stated with mathematical precision, for music 
 is an exact science ; and however varied the strains 
 may be, yet certain successions of sound, and those 
 only, are musical, viz. " such as admit of certain 
 mathematical proportions in the times of vibration."* 
 Within these limits there is scope for almost endless 
 variety, but without them there is nothing but dis- 
 cord. This instance is really an Experimentum 
 Crucis, for it proves that all Beauty at least does not 
 depend upon association ; and if there be Original 
 Beauty of one kind, it is probable, from analogy, that 
 there may be also of another. 
 
 * See Brown's Lectures, Vol. Ill, Lect. Iv. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 85 
 
 I know but of one objection that can be made to 
 this instance. It may be said that the pleasure 
 derived from music is of a two-fold nature, partly a 
 sensation, partly an emotion ; that the sensitive 
 pleasure, or at the least the absence of any sensitive 
 pain, of hearing, is an indispensable preliminary to 
 the rise of the emotion of Beauty ; that the laws of 
 harmony suffice only to produce the pleasure of 
 sensation, and that of themselves they cannot rouse 
 emotion; for though these laws be essential to 
 beautiful composition, yet not every composition 
 that adheres to them is beautiful. In like manner, 
 certain rules of metre are necessary to verse ; but 
 the mere observance of these rules will not insure fine 
 poetry. Such, in substance, is the view of the case 
 taken by Alison, in his very ingenious and elaborate 
 work on the nature and principles of Taste.* That 
 the pleasure derived from music is in part a sen- 
 sation, I am willing to admit ; and the reason why 
 some never feel any pleasure from music, probably 
 is, that they are unsusceptible of this pleasing sen- 
 sation. The fact of the total want of musical ear 
 in some persons throughout the whole of their lives, 
 is most readily explained by the want of suscepti- 
 bility to the agreeable sensation ; and this, probably, 
 depends upon a physical defect in the organ of hear- 
 ing, though too minute to be detected by anatomy. 
 * See Alison on Taste : Essay II, Chap, ii. Sec. 2. 
 
86 DISSERTATION 
 
 Further, let it be admitted for the sake of argu- 
 ment, that attention to the laws of harmony can 
 insure only the sensitive pleasure, (though this is 
 only supposed, not proved), yet even this supposition 
 is enough for our present purpose. According to 
 this viev^, certain invariable rules are necessary to 
 the gratification of the sense, and this again is 
 necessary to the emotion ; so that, ultimately, the 
 emotion of Beauty rests upon some principles which 
 are fixed, and independent of association. That 
 the observance of the above rules does not always 
 produce beautiful composition, does not prove that 
 they are no part of the cause of Beauty, but only 
 that something else is also necessary. If, as is 
 allowed, they be essential, they must constitute part 
 of the cause. 
 
 Closely allied to the notion which we have 
 been considering, and even in some respects 
 identical with it, is the supposition that Beauty 
 depends entirely on Custom. But if Beauty de- 
 pend at all upon custom, it cannot be directly; 
 for, as I have shown in a former work,* the primary 
 effect of custom is to deaden, not quicken, all our 
 sensibilities; and therefore Beauty, no more than 
 any other feeling, can be roused by this cause, 
 which, on the contrary, tends to render all things 
 
 * Principles of Huraan Happiness and Human Duty : Book I, 
 Part iii. Chap. 4. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 87 
 
 indifferent. If, then, Beauty depend at all upon 
 custom, it must be indirectly ; that is, it must result 
 from remembrance or association, which springs from 
 frequent use, and this case is the same as the one 
 we have already considered. 
 
 But the effects of Custom demand a more full 
 explanation. Let us take that case which more 
 than all others seems to prove the power of custom, 
 the case of Fashion, and let us see whether we can 
 account for the facts on the above theory. That the 
 fashions of our ancestors often strike us as ludicrous, 
 as well as any quite new fashion in our own day, 
 but that this feeling is temporary, and frequently 
 gives place even to an opposite, are facts well 
 known to all. How shall we account for these 
 phenomena, if custom be not directly a source of 
 Beauty "^ If the fashions of our ancestors, or our 
 own, strike us at first as ugly, the probability is 
 that they really are so ; for in this case, as in many 
 others, first impressions are right. But, by constant 
 use, the feeling of ugliness is deadened; and as 
 rank and wealth set the fashion, the associations 
 connected therewith are of course pleasing ; and 
 therefore we feel inclined to find out any beauty 
 that it really may possess ; for though ugliness may 
 predominate in an object, it by no means follows 
 that it has no points of beauty. These, being pre- 
 disposed to find them, we readily seize upon, and 
 
88 DISSERTATION 
 
 overlook the opposite qualities. Thus it is that 
 association acts, not by converting Ugliness into 
 Beauty, but by pre-disposing the mind to receive 
 the latter. But the power of custom in destroying 
 Ugliness seems stronger than the power of association 
 over Beauty, for many fashions cease to be thought 
 ugly without being esteemed beautiful. =^ Very simi- 
 lar is the effect of custom in friendly intercourse. 
 Constant use tends to deaden us much more to the 
 defects than to the excellencies of our friends, 
 because we wish to forget the former and remember 
 the latter ; while, in the case of these, the primary 
 influence of custom is counteracted by the pleasures 
 of remembrance, which grow out of long intercourse. 
 In the case of present fashion, association pre- 
 disposes us to see Beauty, if it can possibly be found 
 in the object; but in other instances it pre-disposes 
 us differently, and produces an effect diametrically 
 opposite. Thus it is difficult to admire what is out 
 of fashion, however beautiful the object may be in 
 itself; and there may be fashions not only in dress 
 and furniture, but even in the fine arts, such as 
 
 * Though long use has deadened us much to the ugliness of 
 man's dress in civilized Europe, yet in statues we allow it to be 
 frightful, and admire the Roman toga, which is new to us; and we 
 never see an Asiatic without being struck with the superior beauty 
 of his flowing costume. Different as is the eastern style of archi- 
 tecture from our own, the Mahometan mosque commands the 
 admiration of travellers, and probably not the less by reason of the 
 novelty. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 89 
 
 architecture. It would certainly be rash to say 
 that no new order of architecture could be invented 
 worthy of being placed beside the Doric, the Ionic, or 
 the Corinthian ; but, were such an one really found 
 out, it would meet with almost un surmountable 
 opposition, for the associations of centuries have 
 hallowed the others, and a new order would seem a 
 standing insult to our old friends. But, had the 
 Greek orders not been originally beautiful, they 
 never would have been generally adopted, though 
 this general adoption by the most polished people of 
 antiquity gives them an additional charm in our 
 eyes, and even induces us to think there can be no 
 others. Thus we are pre-disposed to find ugliness 
 in any new invention which rivals the old ; but 
 when there is no rivality, then we allow beauty, as 
 in the shafts and capitals of Gothic pillars, which 
 are infinitely diversified. 
 
 Novelty and Custom are, originally, two opposing 
 powers ; but each, by itself, may produce different 
 effects. The primary effect of Novelty is to quicken, 
 of Custom, to deaden our sensibilities, whether to 
 pleasure or pain; but, in either case, these 
 effects may be counteracted by other circumstances, 
 which grow out of each respectively. Thus 
 the deadening effects of Custom are more or less 
 counteracted by Remembrance, and the loss of 
 Novelty is somewhat compensated by Facility, the 
 
 N 
 
90 DISSERTATION 
 
 result of Repetition ; while the pleasing influence 
 of Novelty is impaired by the feeling of Strangeness, 
 of Bewilderment, of Inexperience. Thus, in youth, 
 though all be new, all is not delightful, from want 
 of ease, from shyness, from embarrassment; and 
 though, as we advance in years, the world loses its 
 novelty, yet we acquire facility in all our modes of 
 intercourse. In like manner, though a beautiful 
 object, when first seen, ought to strike us most from 
 Novelty, yet it does not always, for we may not 
 sufficiently comprehend it, as in the case of a 
 complex piece of music, which requires to be heard 
 often before it be appreciated; or the new object 
 may interfere with old associations. Thus, in 
 Beauty, as well as in other things. Strangeness, 
 and rival Association, may weaken or destroy the 
 pleasing influence of Novelty. 
 
 There is one Association which demands our 
 particular attention, because it has often been con- 
 sidered as a principal source of Beauty : this is the 
 Association of Utility. In the previous chapter, 
 however, we took occasion to remark that in this 
 respect it is Contrivance, rather than Utility, which 
 is of consequence ; that here the end is as nothing ; 
 the degree of ingenuity displayed, everything ; for 
 in those cases where Beauty seems really to result 
 from a happy adaptation of means, an object the 
 most frivolous may please as much as the most 
 
ON BEAUTY. 91 
 
 important. Indeed, the more we examine the 
 subject, the less will appear the connection between 
 Beauty and Utility. In innumerable cases they are 
 even quite opposed. Who are more at variance than 
 the political economist and the poet, the agriculturist 
 and the lover of nature, the engineer and the man 
 of virtu^ the patron of the useful and of the fine 
 arts ^ It is not denied that the two characters may, 
 in a degree, be united in the same individual ; but 
 still they are always at war with one another. 
 Indeed, this is a struggle of which most men are 
 conscious occasionally ; for few are so exclusively 
 devoted to Beauty, or to Utility, as to pursue the one 
 at all costs. But the great apostle of Utility in our 
 times seems to have been proof against the allure- 
 ments of Beauty, and even to have considered her 
 as his chief foe ; for, not content with discarding all 
 graces of style in his own writings, and depreciating 
 such in others, he would, if possible, have annihilated 
 poetry and the fine arts, as utterly opposed to his 
 favourite principle. He considered the Iliad as one 
 of the most noxious books that ever were written. 
 Time would fail to accumulate instances of the 
 opposition between Beauty and Utility ; but a few 
 may be mentioned, and will suffice. Look at that 
 rivulet, meandering gracefully between grassy banks; 
 here slow, there more rapid, with willows weeping 
 over the stream ; does not this form an agreeable 
 N 2 
 
92 DISSEKTATION 
 
 picture ? But the farmer finds that a winding course 
 is not the best for draining ; he therefore makes a 
 straight cut; and the natural brook becomes an 
 ugly ditch. There is a fine lake, surrounded by 
 steep banks, and fringed with natural wood ; can 
 anything be more lovely ^ But what cares the 
 farmer for that *? the water is said to cover a precious 
 bed of marl ; he therefore drains the lake, and the 
 delight of our eyes is changed into a bed of mire. 
 Waterfalls are charming objects ; but how often is 
 their beauty impaired by foot-paths made for the 
 weak and timid ! How many old and picturesque 
 buildings have been destroyed to widen streets and 
 roads ! How many properties have been cut up by 
 railways, one of the most useful, but at the same 
 time one of the most ugly of modern inventions ! 
 No beauty is comparable to that of nature, left in 
 all her original wildness ; but how is this compatible 
 with corn fields and pasture fields, hedges, ditches, 
 and roads ^ A forest is one of the noblest of nature's 
 works, and old trees, untouched by man, are par- 
 ticularly beautiful ; but forests often occupy uselessly 
 the ground, and well-grown trees must be felled for 
 timber. What more majestic than distant and lofty 
 mountains! but on nearer approach we find that 
 even these may be injured, by rooting out their 
 natural plants, and enclosing and cultivating their 
 sides. Surely rocky torrents are more captivating 
 
ON BEAUTY. 93 
 
 than slow navigable rivers ; and if you can make 
 them navigable, you destroy their beauty. 
 
 These facts, and innumerable others that might 
 be mentioned, go to prove the inherent opposition 
 between Beauty and Utility. There are, in fact, 
 two different classes of men, distinguished by their 
 attachment to one of these rather than the other, 
 who may be called respectively men of Utility and 
 men of Sentiment, and who never meet and part 
 without mutual contempt : the man of Utility think- 
 ing the other an imaginative fool, while the man of 
 Sentiment considers the Utilitarian as an unfeeling 
 calculator, raised by intellect alone above barbarism. 
 This distinction between men is as old as our race, 
 and will probably always exist, and the strife 
 will be maintained between them without the anni- 
 hilation of either side ; for each is partly in the 
 right. If without Utility the world could not go on 
 at all, it would be a dull world without Beauty. 
 This, at least, must be allowed, that those who for 
 the sake of temporary Utility destroy some striking 
 and permanent object of Beauty, really do their best 
 to limit our sources of enjoyment, and deserve to be 
 called barbarians. Thus, we do not hesitate to call 
 those Turks barbarians, who could pull down the, 
 temples of Athens, and fill their lime-kilns with the 
 sculptured marbles of Phidias. Surely the Pasha 
 of Egypt, who could destroy the temple of Denderah 
 
94 DISSERTATION 
 
 to build a cotton manufactory, deserves no better 
 appellation ; for the one had already seen some 
 thousand years, and might have lasted as many 
 more, to give pleasure to countless generations, 
 while the other may not survive its founder. But it 
 is not necessary to travel to Turkey and Egypt in 
 order to find such instances of barbarism. Our 
 own country, unhappily, can supply us with cases 
 enough. All who visit the capital of Scotland 
 must be struck with that beautiful hill w^hich 
 borders on the town ; not, indeed, remarkable for 
 height, but for grace of form, and especially for 
 the long unbroken ridge of rocks called Salisbury 
 Craigs, which in part surrounds it. Would it then 
 be believed that this unrivalled ridge was for many 
 years converted into a common stone quarry, and 
 not for building, but to mend the roads % and that 
 too in a country where stones abound ^ Thus, an 
 object that might have lasted unimpaired till the 
 end of time, and given satisfaction to countless 
 millions, has been seriously injured, for the sake of 
 the most temporary of all temporary purposes. And 
 this, I am sorry to say, is not a solitary case of 
 barbarism. About ten miles above the town of 
 Perth there is, or rather was, a celebrated spot on 
 the Tay, where a ridge of rock crossed the stream, 
 there a noble river, and formed a cataract called the 
 Linn of Campsie. This fall is now destroyed ; and 
 
ON BEAUTY. 95 
 
 what was the mighty object for which it was 
 doomed to ruin^ His Grace of Athol had some 
 fine larches, of which he was very proud, for he 
 had first introduced them into this country, and, 
 wishing to build a ship with them, the rock was 
 blown to facilitate their passage to the sea. To 
 his Grace, no doubt, it was an object of interest 
 to have a frigate called the Athol, built of his 
 own wood, but to the nation at large it was utterly 
 insignificant. The Athol might last, at most, thirty 
 or forty years, the Linn of Campsie might have 
 lasted for ever ; and therefore, those who destroyed 
 it, for the sake of a straw, robbed of their enjoyment 
 all succeeding ages. What, then, shall we think 
 of the Duke who proposed, and of the proprietor 
 who consented to, such an act of barbarism *? 
 
 From the above we perceive that though Beauty 
 be commonly said to be a frail and fleeting thing, 
 yet this is true only of certain sorts ; while nothing 
 can be more permanent than other kinds. 
 
 Art, Glory, Freedom fail ; but Nature still is fair. 
 
 Things useful necessarily perish in the using ; but 
 things beautiful are lavish of their charms, impart 
 to all, and yet lose nothing. 
 
 Finally, we by no means contend that Association 
 has no influence upon Beauty, but we conceive that 
 we are justified in concluding, from the whole of 
 
96 DISSERTATION 
 
 this discussion, that Association is not a Primary 
 or Original Cause of the same, still less the only 
 Cause, but a Secondary or Subsequent one. Agree- 
 able Association seems to act chiefly by pre-disposing 
 the mind to dwell upon an object, and to see Beauty 
 in it if possible ; and most things have some pleasing 
 points which may be detected if we wish to detect 
 them, neglecting whatever may be ugly. Beyond 
 this, Association may give an additional charm of 
 another sort, in many cases easily distinguishable 
 from proper Beauty, and in fact often so distinguished, 
 even by those who have no pretensions to analytical 
 acuteness. When from the top of the Alban hills, 
 one looks down upon the storied, but naked and 
 desolate Campagna^ bounded by the Mediterranean 
 and the Apennines, and covered with ruins of tombs, 
 temples, and aqueducts, with Rome itself in the 
 centre ; one is lost in a delicious reverie, which one 
 well knows to be not a mere feeling of Beauty. 
 But when one*s eye first takes in the Bay of Naples, 
 with its mountainous shores and rocky islands lit 
 by a southern sun, the mind is too full of Beauty 
 to admit of Associated ideas. When the proper 
 feeling of Beauty is most powerful, it overwhelms 
 and prevents all association, and this acquires power 
 when the former is on the decline. New countries 
 strike us much more than our own, or than places 
 which we have known all our lives, though the 
 
ON BEAUTY. 97 
 
 former can have no personal associations, and the 
 latter must have many. Nothing deadens us so 
 much to Beauty of any kind, as to have become 
 familiar v^ith the object before we were capable of 
 appreciating it ; though, the earlier the knowledge, 
 the more numerous, and probably the more pleasing, 
 will be the recollections. These facts seem to prove 
 that Beauty is one thing, Associated pleasure 
 another; that the former owes much to Novelty, 
 while the latter grows out of Custom. 
 
 Of all the systems of Beauty founded on Associa- 
 tion, probably none is so comprehensive and philo- 
 sophical as that of Alison. According to him, the 
 Beauty of the Material world is entirely to be 
 attributed to the Mental qualities, of which, in his 
 own words. Material qualities are the Signs or 
 Expressions.* But then, these Material Qualities, 
 whether sounds, forms, or colours, which express 
 pleasing mental qualities, and hence rouse Beauty, 
 are allowed to be, for the most part, fixed and 
 permanent; and they suggest qualities of mind, 
 either by natural analogy, or by the inseparable 
 connection of cause and effect, much more than by 
 casual Association. A great deal of ingenuity has 
 been displayed by the above writer, often, 1 cannot 
 
 * These words seem to me very inaccurate, for a Sign or 
 Expression is an Effect from which we infer the Cause, whereas 
 in this case Material qualities are supposed to be Causes which 
 suggest Mental qualities. 
 
98 DISSERTATION 
 
 but think, far-fetched, in order to show that, wherever 
 Beauty is felt from the material world, there is 
 always some pleasing emotion suggested distinct 
 from Beauty, and necessary to rouse the latter ; but 
 at all events, it is allowed that certain sounds, forms, 
 and colours, rather than others, are calculated to 
 express emotion, and, hence, to appear beautiful. 
 This system, then, does not suppose Beauty to be a 
 vain and fleeting thing without any fixed principles, 
 but it introduces, as indispensable, a link in the 
 chain of cause and effect, between the perception of 
 an outward object, and the feeling of Beauty. That 
 such a link is indispensable seems to me not proved ; 
 but be that as it may, we must still enquire what 
 qualities of matter are beautiful, and what not; 
 whether their Beauty be felt as soon as the object 
 is perceived, or whether another emotion must 
 intervene. On either supposition, there are, in the 
 material world, some permanent sources of Beauty, 
 either immediate or remote. 
 
 The perception of an object must precede any 
 pleasing emotion roused by means of it ; and, ac- 
 cording to Alison's theory, this pleasing emotion 
 must precede Beauty. Therefore, instead of a 
 sequence of two phenomena, we have one of three ; 
 we have the Perception, the pleasing Emotion, and 
 then Beauty, instead of the Perception and after- 
 wards Beauty directly. In this view, the qualities 
 
ON BEAUTY. 99 
 
 of the object are more remote causes of the effect, 
 Beauty, but still they are causes. 
 
 Or, it may be said, although the pleasing emotion 
 must, in the first instance, succeed to the perception, 
 yet, afterwards, the two must coalesce and co-exist 
 in the mind in order to rouse the emotion of Beauty. 
 According to this view, the cause of Beauty is 
 a compound of two elements, a perception, and a 
 pleasing emotion suggested thereby. Now, were 
 this true, still the inquiry would be interesting and 
 useful, what qualities are there which tend to rouse 
 pleasing emotions, and Beauty through them ^ Such 
 qualities would still be real, though remote, causes 
 of Beauty, nay, the only causes that could be 
 defined with any accuracy, and therefore alone 
 of practical importance in the fine arts. Therefore, 
 Alison's theory, were it true, would not supersede 
 the inquiry pursued in the following section. But 
 it is hoped that by this time the reader is convinced 
 that no theory can be true that looks upon Associ- 
 ation as indispensable to Beauty. 
 
 o 2 
 
100 DISSERTATION 
 
 Chapter III. 
 
 SECTION SECOND. 
 
 On the real Sources of Beauty, 
 
 If we have now succeeded in proving that 
 Beauty does not depend entirely on Association ; 
 that Association is but a secondary cause ; and that 
 there must be some Primary or Original sources ; 
 the important question remains, what these sources 
 are? 
 
 In order to understand the nature of this inquiry, 
 and what is the exact object in view, it is necessary 
 to remark that I do not here propose to discover the 
 ultimate or essential Cause of Beauty, in the language 
 of Bacon, The Form. Whether there be any one 
 circumstance common to all beautiful objects, and on 
 which alone the beauty depends ; and, if so, whether 
 that circumstance shall ever be discovered, I do not 
 attempt to decide ; but this would be the Form or 
 essential Cause of the emotion, the utmost limit of 
 our philosophy. If there be such a principle, and 
 should it ever be discovered, we cannot hope 
 to reach it at once, however, and an attempt 
 
ON BEAUTY. 101 
 
 BO to reach it would probably end in some wide 
 generalization, without any real addition to our 
 knowledge. The only sure mode of proceeding is 
 to endeavour first to find out some of the proximate 
 principles, and if we succeed so far, we shall have 
 accomplished something real, we shall have laid 
 a step whereby others may climb to the top of 
 the pyramid. This being understood, we shall now 
 proceed to trace, if possible, some of the Proximate 
 Causes of Beauty. 
 
 There seem to be at least four different sources 
 of Beauty in material visible objects. 
 
 1. Colour. 2. Form. 3. Outward Texture. 
 4. Intimate Composition. 
 
 Let us begin with Colour. 
 
 We must first remark that, besides the Beauty 
 derived from certain Colours, Forms, etc. by them- 
 selves, there is also a charm arising from a continuation 
 of the same, or from a mixture of another quite dif- 
 ferent. Accordingly, we shall find that Uniformity 
 or Regularity, Variety or Contrast, are important prin- 
 ciples of Beauty. Moreover, Beauty is heightened 
 by Novelty, deadened by Repetition or Custom, as 
 other emotions are. 
 
 I. At the first dawn of perception, and probably 
 long before the infant can distinguish forms and 
 distances, he shows pleasure at the sight of Colours; 
 and those colours please him most which are the most 
 
102 DISSERTATION 
 
 lively and varied. This, as far as we can judge, is 
 an emotion of Beauty, for at no period of our lives 
 does the mere sensation of Sight appear to be 
 positively agreeable, though a great glare of light 
 may be very much the reverse ; and therefore the 
 cessation of that pain may communicate pleasure. 
 It is otherwise with the rest of the senses, for 
 certain Smells, Tastes, Sounds, and even Feelings 
 of Touch, are decidedly agreeable or disagreeable. 
 And if this be an emotion of Beauty, it certainly is 
 the first, for Colours, as we know, are the proper 
 objects of vision, and at first the only objects ; the 
 knowledge of forms, magnitude, and distance, being 
 acquired by means of touch, and by it communi- 
 cated to sight. Lively and varied colours are then 
 originally beautiful ; though of course it must be 
 difficult, if not impossible to tell, at so early a 
 period of life, before the use of speech, what 
 peculiar variety is the most agreeable. And lively 
 colours please at all ages, though not in all places 
 and on all occasions, and this for various reasons. 
 First, very bright colours, when long exposed to 
 view, become disagreeable to the sense of sight, or 
 glaring, as the expression is, and this sensitive 
 pain overcomes all feeling of Beauty. Secondly, 
 when objects are represented by art, in colours 
 more lively than those of nature, we are of course 
 shocked by the badness of the imitation, and this 
 
ON BEAUTY. 103 
 
 feeling is so strong as to subdue any pleasing 
 emotion. But children, and uneducated persons, 
 who do not attend to accurate imitation, and who 
 are satisfied with a rude resemblance, find the most 
 gaudy pictures the most beautiful. Who does not 
 admire the bright and variegated rainbow, or the 
 most brilliant colours of the rising and setting sun *? 
 but were they to last, as the sight would become 
 fatigued, we should cease to admire them, and long 
 for a milder hue. Neither would such please on 
 canvass, partly for the same reason, for as painting 
 cannot, like nature, change, we have time to tire ; 
 partly because their is an incongruity in represent- 
 ing as permanent what we know to be very 
 transitory. The painter often sees colours in 
 nature which he dares not put upon canvass, for, 
 from the brilliancy, they would be thought unnatural ; 
 as the colouring of Italian landscape painters 
 sometimes appears unnatural to us who live in a 
 northern climate. But those who have been in the 
 South can admire the picture, because they have 
 witnessed the reality, can doat upon the deep, deep 
 blue, because they have seen water, sky, and 
 mountain, tinged with that matchless colour. It is 
 difficult for such as dwell in the North, to con- 
 ceive the intensity of delight, the rapture of beauty 
 which fills the soul, when, of a summer evening, one 
 sees the distant mountain bathed in a flood of 
 
104 DISSERTATION 
 
 purple.* It is colour that makes the wide difference 
 between a northern and a southern landscape, for 
 though our forms may be as fine, they appear com- 
 paratively cold, from the want of that magical power 
 which can convert even a barren waste into a scene 
 of enchantment. Look through the kingdoms of 
 nature, the animal, the vegetable, the mineral, and 
 you will find that the brightest colours are the most 
 admired, whenever they are not presented to us in 
 such quantity, or for so long a time,' as to fatigue the 
 sight, as in nature they seldom are. Wisely has it 
 been ordained that the world in general should be 
 clad in sober colours ; for, had it been otherwise, 
 our sight must have been injured ; as we may learn 
 from the effect of snow, which, when long on the 
 ground, weakens the eyes, and may produce even 
 total blindness. But observe the beauty of brilliant 
 colours in the smaller objects around us ; in birds, 
 for instance, tropical birds in particular, which are 
 universally admired on account of their brilliant 
 hues ; in gold and silver fish ; in insects, such as 
 beetles and butterflies of various sorts; in fruits, 
 such as the holly berry, mountain ash berry, arbutus, 
 common strawberry, cherry, peach, nectarine, pome- 
 granate, wild rose berry, nightshade, and countless 
 
 * Such a sunset did I once witness from the Poggio Imperiale, 
 near Florence. Were I to live a thousand years I never could 
 forget the impression produced by that wonderful colour. Such 
 sunsets are rare even in Italy- 
 
ON BEAUTY. 105 
 
 others, which are beautiful chiefly as highly 
 coloured ; for those without colour, of similar form, 
 and even of the same kind, are less thought 
 of. Does any one admire the white strawberry or 
 the white grape as much as the red or the purple ^ 
 And surely it cannot be maintained that here 
 the charm depends entirely on Association, for 
 fruits of no use to us, as the holly and mountain ash, 
 or even noxious, as the nightshade, are still beautiful. 
 Look again at the flowers ; are not these the darling 
 children of Colour ? and without her what would 
 they be *? Flowers there are many in nature, colour- 
 less, or nearly so, as those of the forest trees, which 
 few but botanists remark; but in porportion as 
 colour appears, we stop and admire, and the brighter 
 the hue, the more the admiration. The blossoms of 
 the common horse-chesnut and of the hawthorn are 
 certainly agreeable to the eye, but can they be com- 
 pared with the red varieties of the same species *? or 
 with the blossom of the peach, or of the pome- 
 granate, one of the most exquisite objects in nature *? 
 Lastly, cast your eyes on the mineral kingdom, and 
 say whether those stones be not the most admired 
 which are most highly coloured, such as the precious 
 stones, precious, no doubt, by reason of their rarity, 
 but, had they not been originally beautiful, none 
 but mineralogists would have cared for them. 
 Rarity alone cannot give Beauty, though it may 
 
106 DISSERTATION 
 
 enhance the feeling when already produced by its 
 proper causes. Did we possess a bit of the true 
 cross, no object in nature could be so rare and 
 precious, but beautiful it could not be. Brightness of 
 colour, however, is not the only circumstance of im- 
 portance ; for much depends upon the disposition of 
 colours. Now the due disposition of different colours 
 depends, in great measure, on a proper mixture 
 of Uniformity and Contrast. Herein, in great part, 
 lies the art of dress ; and " in France, where this is 
 almost reduced to a science, it is well known what 
 colours go well or ill together; and the general 
 principle seems to be, that those which suit are 
 either very different, or else mere shades of the 
 same. Thus black, or purple, or deep blue, and 
 scarlet make a very pleasing mixture ; as well as 
 black and white, blue and yellow, brown and pink, 
 lastly, lilac and green ; whereas yellow and green, 
 or blue and green, are decidedly disagreeable. In 
 the former case, the colours are strongly opposed, in 
 the latter, they are too much alike without being the 
 same. But a dark and a light shade of the same 
 colour are never amiss, for here there is uniformity 
 as well as contrast ; though the shades should not 
 approach too nearly unless they become identical."^ 
 No more striking instance can be given of the 
 
 * Principles of Human Happiness and Human Duty : Book 
 I, Part iii. Chap. 3. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 107 
 
 effect of uniform colour than that of an army drawn 
 up in military array ; though the effect be increased 
 by some contrast of uniforms, as of the line with the 
 cavalry or artillery. In the dress of each soldier in 
 the French army, though the pantaloon be rather of 
 a dusky red, yet it contrasts pretty well with the 
 dark blue of the coat. Nothing could be more 
 beautiful in its kind than the gold lace of our hussars 
 on their deep blue jackets ; but when these were 
 changed to scarlet the effect was much impaired. 
 
 Amidst all the Variety of nature there is still a 
 majestic Uniformity, as is seen in the blue sky and 
 the green earth, which are certainly beautiful ; 
 though we should tire of perpetual blue or green, 
 and might long for the contrast of a cloud or of a 
 desert. In the works of art, as well as in those of 
 nature, uniformity, as well as contrast, of colour, are 
 of great avail, not only in dress, but also in furniture, 
 and especially in painting. Even in architecture 
 the influence of the same principles may be felt. 
 Though, in general, uniformity of colour is sought 
 for in a building, yet occasionally we may see the 
 happiest effects produced by the opposite principle ; 
 as in several buildings in Italy, especially in 
 Florence, where the beauty of the Duomo and 
 Campanile is certainly enhanced by the mixture of 
 black with white marble; and even in our own 
 country, where several old churches and mansions 
 p 2 
 
108 DISSERTATION 
 
 derive a peculiar charm from the contrast between 
 the dark red brick, approaching to black, and the 
 white stone facing.* If any part of the building 
 happen to be modern, and be composed of new 
 bricks, we instantly see how inferior is the effect. 
 Many village churches in England are built with 
 dark flint, faced with white stone, and the effect 
 is always good. It would be easy to accumulate 
 instances in support of these principles, but as the 
 above may be sufficient, I shall now proceed to 
 the second source of Beauty. 
 
 II. Form. Though Colour be so great a source 
 of pleasure, yet Colour is imperfect without the 
 beauty of Form. Now forms are of two kinds: 
 those which are bounded by straight lines, and those 
 which are bounded by curves ; and we shall find, as 
 a general rule, that the latter are more beautiful than 
 the former ; though the greatest beauty of all arises 
 from an union of the two. 
 
 When we cast our eyes upward and look upon 
 the sky, we cannot but admire the majestic vault 
 above our heads ; but we admire it more as con- 
 trasted with the straight line of the earth. Strange, 
 that what has really no form (for how can we 
 limit the infinite *?) should appear spherical, while 
 what is truly spherical, should, to the eye, be 
 
 * Take as a specimen the fine old mansion of Charlton, near 
 Woolwich. 
 
ON BEAUTY. .109 
 
 straight ! This is the most noble and the most con- 
 stant spectacle in nature ; and if we are not always so 
 much struck with it as it deserves, we owe this partly 
 to custom, and partly to pre-occupation. We have 
 here two magnificent instances of uniformity directly 
 opposed to each other; and, though the vault be 
 decidedly more beautiful than the plane, yet the two 
 together are certainly more striking than the former 
 could be alone. From this general view we may 
 descend to more limited instances, and everywhere 
 we shall find that the curve line is more beautiful 
 than the straight. Let us first observe natural 
 objects, and then attend to works of art. 
 
 In the animal kingdom we see that roundness 
 is a great principle of Beauty. All animals, 
 when in full health and condition, have their 
 bodies and limbs rounded off, instead of being 
 bounded by straight lines and angles; and it is 
 only when they fall into sickness, and in old age, 
 that they become square, long, and angular, and 
 lose all pretensions to beauty. Compare that well- 
 fed horse, so round and sleek, with the gaunt and 
 angular shape of the old and half-starved hackney; 
 or the fair full face of youth with the square visage, 
 the projecting chin and cheek bones of tottering age, 
 What is more becoming in woman than roundness? 
 what more ugly than squareness and angularity ? 
 The plump cheek, the round chin, neck, breast, 
 
110 DISSERTATION 
 
 arms, and waist, are universally admired ; and so 
 much is beauty thought to depend on roundness, 
 that ladies, French ladies especially, torture their 
 shapes by padding here and pressing there, till 
 forms are produced rounder even than any in nature. 
 Would painters be so fond of representing infants 
 if they did not find beauty in them *? and on what 
 does this depend but on their roundness ^ What we 
 call grace seems to depend very much on movement 
 in curves rather than in straight lines ; and at 
 all events, such is the connexion felt between 
 roundness and beauty, that in common language, 
 whether literally or metaphorically, roundness and 
 grace, stiffness and awkwardness, are synonymous. 
 
 Again, when we look to the charming productions 
 of the vegetable world, trees and plants of all sorts, 
 we perceive that their trunks or stems, their leaves, 
 seeds, flowers, and fruits are all bounded by curve 
 lines. The beauty of fruits in particular, seems to 
 depend upon this cause as much as upon their 
 colour. What more graceful than pears, quinces, 
 bunches of white grapes, or white currants, white 
 cherries, white strawberries, or even the common 
 acorn, with its round cap *? though these have little 
 colour or none. 
 
 Lastly, if we turn our attention to unorganized 
 matter, we shall find that the forms of nature are in 
 general waving, and at the same time graceful, 
 
ON BEAUTY. Ill 
 
 while those of mens' creation, when they depart from 
 this rule, are ugly. The river, when left to itself, 
 seldom takes a direct course, and as it turns or 
 meanders, always charms the eye ; while the canal 
 is straight, ugly, and monotonous. Graceful also 
 are the winding shores of a lake, but the formal 
 reservoir is a dismal pool. Nature has no roads, 
 but in proportion as ours are straight or winding, 
 so are they tiresome or pleasant, ugly or attractive. 
 Nothing can be conceived more unsightly than the 
 undeviating causeway of France, lined, if at all, by 
 elm trees lopped into poles; except the railway, 
 that in ugliness surpasses all things. Two or more 
 rails of metal carried in the same direction, as far 
 as the eye can reach, passing here between formal 
 banks, there beneath the surface, with the usual 
 accompaniments of noise and smoke, certainly con- 
 stitute one of the most dismal objects in the universe. 
 But if at any place there be a curve on the line, the 
 ugliness is somewhat diminished. To be thoroughly 
 aware of the deformity, one must have travelled 
 outside Viewed from such a position paradise itself 
 could have few charms. 
 
 And here I must remark an apparent exception 
 to the rule here given. Though we greatly admire a 
 rolling country, the graceful forms of downs and 
 swelling hills, yet in lofty mountains we are more 
 delighted with precipitous sides, needle-like peaks, 
 
112 DISSERTATION 
 
 and serrated ridges. The needles of Chamouny, 
 the Monte Viso, the shining horns of the Dolden, 
 the serrated cone of the Finster-Aar, and the 
 tremendous pyramid of the Schreckhorn, are some 
 of the most admired of the Alps; as the moun- 
 tains of Arran are of the Grampians. How can 
 this fact be reconciled with our present theory ^ 
 Various causes tend to produce this effect. Much 
 must be attributed to Rarity and Contrast, for 
 forms of this sort are rare, and therefore they 
 cause Wonder ; and they present a striking Contrast 
 with the ordinary face of nature. Also, from 
 Association they cause fear, for precipices are known 
 to be dangerous. But Fear and Wonder, as we shall 
 find, are allied to Sublimity rather than to Beauty ; 
 and thus we are brought to the real answer to 
 the difiiculty, which is, that the emotion produced 
 by such objects is not properly Beauty but Sublimity. 
 Even in lofty mountains there are certain curved 
 forms which on the long run, perhaps, please us more 
 than the very percipitous ; as the dome of the 
 Jungfrau, and the majestic crown of Monte Rosa. 
 
 The most delightful part of every country is that 
 which intervenes between the mountains and the 
 plain, where the sight is not bounded by the narrow 
 horizon, nor the steps confined by the difiiculties of 
 the one, nor yet are they condemned to the wearisome 
 monotony of the other; but where the eye can 
 
ON BEAUTY. 113 
 
 alternately rest on both ; while at hand is an infinite 
 diversity of hill and dale, flat and ravine, through 
 which the river flows, forming rapids, and cataracts. 
 On the north of the Alps this region is extensive, 
 comprehending the whole of the low country of 
 Switzerland ; but on the south it is very confined, 
 though exquisitely beautiful. There is a narrow 
 border between the Alps and the plain of Lombardy, 
 which is probably unrivalled in Europe, cut by the 
 Dora, the Ticino, the Adda, the Adige, and 
 innumerable smaller streams, some emerging from 
 extensive lakes, having cast off the pollutions 
 of their origin, and again starting into life, clear, 
 vigorous, and full. There, in a delightful and 
 healthy climate, would the traveller like to dwell, 
 could nature alone make amends for the loss of 
 country and home. 
 
 From the works of nature we may turn to those 
 of art. Two of the fine arts are peculiarly con- 
 versant with forms. Sculpture and Architecture ; the 
 former especially, which depends upon form alone; 
 for although attempts have been made to introduce 
 colour into sculpture, yet these attempts have been 
 unsuccessful. Two reasons may be assigned for 
 this : firsts that sculpture is an imitative art ; and 
 as no colour in stone can imitate the natural, the 
 absence of colour, or white, is better than a false 
 tint ; secondly^ that colour in stone prevents the form 
 Q 
 
114 DISSERTATION 
 
 from being so well seen. The ancients did occa- 
 sionally employ coloured marbles in sculpture, 
 specimens whereof may be seen in the galleries at 
 Rome, but the effect is not good. 
 
 As sculpture is an imitative art, it can only 
 reproduce the forms existing in nature ; and those 
 which it generally chooses belong to the animal or 
 vegetable kingdom, in the beautiful specimens of 
 which, as we have already seen, the curve prevails 
 over the straight line, the round over the square. 
 And as sculptors naturally select the most graceful 
 specimens, so we find that no long, thin, angular, 
 square figure, is ever represented, but the plump and 
 round. Such are the Venus de Medici, the Apollo, 
 and the dying Gladiator, the graceful bend of whose 
 drooping figure is universally admired; and such 
 are all statues that have any pretensions to beauty. 
 
 Since architecture is not an imitative art, for it 
 has no exact original in nature, it will be found the 
 more valuable, as affording new and independent 
 proofs of our present theory. Though the incon- 
 venience of the circle and oval has prevented 
 them from becoming general in building, yet, 
 wherever they exist, we are struck with their 
 graceful form. Of the round temples of antiquity 
 but few remain ; but whoever has seen the small 
 fane of Vesta, on the banks of the Tiber, the interior 
 of San Stephano Rotondo, above all the Pantheon, 
 
ON BEAUTY. 115 
 
 must have been impressed with the peculiar beauty 
 of the circle. The amphitheatres of antiquity were 
 oval, some of which still remain, at Nismes, Aries, 
 Verona, and Rome, and owe much of their beauty 
 to this very graceful form. Even in our modern 
 towns how fond are we of the circus and crescent ! 
 But the grand instances in point are the column, 
 the cupola, and the arch; especially the two 
 former, for some might say that the beauty 
 of the arch was derived from an association with 
 Utility, nay, with Necessity ; whereas a square 
 column would appear as substantial as a circular, 
 and would be much more easily constructed; and 
 the cupola is entirely ornamental. The column is 
 the principal beauty of Greek, and even of Gothic 
 architecture ; the cupola of Italian, Take away the 
 columns from a Greek temple, and what remains ? 
 Little, certainly, to admire, except the elegance of 
 the sculpture. But, as it is, the Greek temple is a 
 perfect object of art; and the sources of its beauty 
 seem to be these : firsts there is the beauty of the 
 circular columns by themselves ; secondly^ the charm 
 derived from their long succession, and the perfect 
 equality of the space between them, for nothing is 
 more agreeable than variety recurring at regular 
 intervals; lastly^ there is the striking contrast 
 between the round pillars, and the long, unbroken, 
 straight entablature. There is thus, at once, great 
 Q 2 
 
116 DISSERTATION 
 
 Simplicity or Uniformity, and yet Variety. The 
 effect is less fine where arches are used instead of 
 an Entablature ; for though the arch be in itself 
 more graceful than the straight line, yet it forms 
 no contrast with the circular columns beneath ; as 
 any one may be convinced who shall attend to 
 Italian buildings, where this combination frequently 
 occurs, as in Santa Agnese, San Pietro in Vincoli, 
 Santa Sabina on the Aventine, San Paulo without 
 the walls, and other fine churches in and about 
 Rome. 
 
 To take a similar case, it may be doubted by some 
 whether a flat or a curved bridge be the more 
 pleasing ; but most people, I think, prefer the flat, 
 for the straight line above sets off the arch below. 
 Besides, when a bridge rises towards the centre, the 
 arches cannot be of equal size, and therefore the 
 uniformity is impaired. The superiority of con- 
 trivance may tend also to increase our admiration 
 for the flat bridge. Waterloo bridge in London, and 
 the Pont dTena at Paris, are perfect specimens. 
 But New London bridge is slightly curved, and a 
 finer example of the kind, probably, exists not in the 
 world. 
 
 In Gothic Architecture, the arch rises with 
 good effect from the column, partly, perhaps, 
 because the column is in general not circular, but 
 clustered, but principally because the arch is 
 
OFTHf *^ 
 
 tJN/V£RsiTy 
 
 ON BEAUTY. ' '^9mh^ H7 
 
 pointed ; for thus greater height is gained, and the 
 point gives sufficient contrast. 
 
 The round column supporting the round arch 
 is a mixture of the Greek and Italian styles ; for 
 in Italian architecture, properly so called, there 
 are no round columns, or none that are essential; 
 but instead thereof, there is the massy square 
 pillar beneath the semicircular arch ; as in St. 
 Peter's, where the columns are mere ornaments, as 
 well as in the great majority of churches through- 
 out Italy. 
 
 In the Greek temple, the principal and often 
 the only columns being without the walls, and in the 
 Gothic within, the result is, that the outside of the 
 one, and the inside of the other, are the most 
 remarkable parts of the building. In this respect, 
 modem Italian architecture, whether pure or mixed, 
 agrees with the Gothic ; for there also the columns 
 or the pillars are inside, so that some of the first 
 churches in Rome, presenting magnificent colon- 
 nades within, are unsightly fabrics without. The 
 old Roman temple was a modification of the 
 Grecian, but very inferior; for whereas in the 
 latter, the columns were continued all round the 
 building, as in the Parthenon, and the temples of 
 Paestum ; in the former, there was only a portico 
 in front, with square pilasters along the side 
 walls. The best specimen now existing of this 
 
118 DISSERTATION 
 
 sort of building, is the Maison carre, at Nismes. 
 
 The characteristics of Greek architecture are 
 the round column, and its straight entablature ; of 
 modern Italian, the square pillar, the round arch, 
 and the cupola; of Gothic, the clustered column, 
 the pointed arch, the vaulted and groined roof, and 
 the spire and minaret. The grand modern inven- 
 tion and the glory of Italian architecture, is the 
 cupola, of which the finest specimens are, St. 
 Peter s, at Rome, the Duomo of Florence, and our 
 own St. Paul's.* This seems to have been un- 
 known to the ancients, for the Pantheon cannot be 
 called a cupola. To raise the Pantheon in air was 
 the gigantic idea of Michael Angelo, and this has 
 been effected in St. Peter's, probably the most 
 wonderful achievement of architectural art, in any 
 age or country. Rome may be called the city of 
 cupolas, and when viewed from the Pincian or some 
 other hill in the neighbourhood, presents such a 
 magnificent appearance, that one might almost 
 forget that she is no longer empress of the world. 
 
 Though beauty of form result from curved lines 
 as well as from a due mixture of curved with 
 straight, yet much also depends upon the relative 
 magnitude of the lines, whether curved or straight, 
 
 * In point of solidity and architectural art, however, St. Paul's 
 cannot be compared with the two others, for it is not a stone 
 cupola. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 119 
 
 which define a figure, in a word, on proportion. 
 The charm of proportion, again, seems to depend 
 upon one or other of the two principles, Unifor- 
 mity and Contrast. Thus, a perfect square, whether 
 an entire building, or a room, pleases from 
 uniformity, an oblong from contrast ; while a shape 
 between the two has an ill effect. Most of the fine 
 temples of antiquity were oblong, and the length 
 was generally much greater than the breadth, as 
 in the Parthenon, where there are eight columns in 
 front and rear, and seventeen on each side, and in 
 the temple of Neptune, at Psestum, where the 
 numbers are six and fourteen respectively. The 
 last are still standing without a single interruption. 
 The Exchange at Paris errs by being neither square 
 nor oblong; not so the Madeleine, the finest 
 imitation of a Greek Temple to be found in the 
 world. 
 
 The Greek cross, where the arms are equal, is 
 an instance of Beauty from Uniformity, the Latin 
 from Contrast. The most striking effects in archi- 
 tecture seem to result from the latter principle. 
 The Latin cross has been adopted in St. Peter's at 
 Rome, with manifest advantage, so far as the 
 interior is concerned, for thus great length has, 
 been given to the nave, which contrasts well with 
 the shortness of the transept ; but the exterior has 
 suffered in consequence. For the very length of 
 
120 DISSERTATION 
 
 the nave, which is all gain within, is a loss without, 
 by obstructing the view of the cupola, by far 
 the noblest part of the building, which cannot 
 be properly seen except at a distance. Viewed 
 from the great square in front, it is half hid. 
 
 With respect even to the interior, it has often 
 been questioned whether the effect correspond to 
 the magnitude of the building. All allow that at 
 first there is some disappointment, that the temple, 
 though really immense, does not appear so, and that 
 time is required to be aware of its gigantic size. 
 But, some say, this is a proof of excellence, a 
 proof of fine proportion, for all well-proportioned 
 buildings, or rooms, contain more than they seem ; 
 as a well-proportioned man never appears very tall. 
 To such it may be answered, what do you mean by 
 well in this case*? do you refer to Utility or Con- 
 venience, to Beauty or Effect. In the former sense, 
 we can easily understand that a room of the most 
 convenient shape may, on that account, be called 
 well-proportioned, but what we cannot comprehend 
 is, how, with reference to Beauty, a room can be 
 called well-proportioned, which produces less effect 
 than one of equal size, but of different shape. True, 
 it may be said that what strikes at first may not 
 please so much for a continuance ; and this will apply 
 to St. Peter^s, if it gain upon us day by day. And 
 <;ertainly it does gain upon us ; but in spite of this. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 121 
 
 when we consider the enormous size of the building, 
 and that, surely, one object of vast dimensions, is to 
 rouse Sublimity rather than Beauty, for a much 
 smaller edifice would suffice for this, we must 
 conclude, as the effect produced does not correspond 
 with the magnitude, that so far the architect has 
 laboured in vain. Had the nave been much narrower, 
 the length remaining the same, or much loftier with 
 the same breadth, the contrast would have been 
 greater, and the first impression more profound. It 
 is in the bold use of contrast that architectural 
 genius is chiefly shown, as in the Gothic cathedral, 
 where the length of the nave contrasted with its 
 narrowness, and the narrowness with the great 
 height, rouse an emotion of Sublimity. 
 
 III. Outward Texture of Bodies, or Nature 
 of the Surface. 
 
 This division of our inquiry need not detain us 
 so long as the foregoing ; for the subject is more 
 simple, and it will be easy to show that smoothness 
 and glossiness of surface are real sources of Beauty. 
 To be convinced of this we have only to turn our 
 attention to the various objects around us whether 
 natural or artificial ; though, as high gloss 
 or polish is but rarely found in nature, most of 
 our instances under this head must be derived 
 from the works of art, or from those of nature 
 modified by man. But wherever remarkable 
 
 R 
 
122 DISSERTATION 
 
 smoothness or glossiness is found in natural 
 objects, it is sure to be admired. How beautiful 
 are the downy peach, the glossy nectarine, the 
 shining leaves and fruit of the holly ! The fruit 
 of the mountain ash has nearly as rich a colour 
 as the holly-berry, but it wants the gloss, and 
 is not so pretty. Surely the lustre of the silver fir 
 is finer than the dead green of the Norway spruce. 
 The fruit of the horse-chesnut has nothing very 
 much to recommend it, either for form or colour, 
 though this be not amiss ; it is not eatable, and there- 
 fore cannot be prized on that account ; but it is highly 
 polished, and certainly pretty. With what eagerness 
 do children collect horse-chesnuts, knowing them not 
 to be eatable, and how much do they admire them ! 
 In form and colour the sweet chesnut is not inferior, 
 and association is all in its favour ; but it is dull in 
 comparison, and does not much charm the eye ; and 
 when horse-chesnuts lose their lustre, they lose their 
 beauty. 
 
 One great end of art certainly is to give smooth- 
 ness and gloss to objects ; and as we afiirm, Beauty, 
 by means of these. Some objects are, in all their 
 principal points, the work of nature alone, and all 
 we can do is to modify them a little, principally on 
 the surface. Thus we cannot change a horse's 
 form and colour; but we can keep the hair short, 
 close, and fine ; and render the coat smooth, glossy, 
 
ON BEAUTY. 123 
 
 and beautiful. So, ladies cannot very much 
 alter their shape, but by means of cosmetics and 
 alteratives they may hope to smooth and improve 
 their skin. Grass in its wild state shoots up rough, 
 rank, and course, but in the trim pleasure ground it 
 becomes the velvet lawn. What are our best free- 
 stones, or even our finest marbles, until they be 
 smoothed by the mason's hand '? The most precious 
 stones often present no beauty at first, but, when cut 
 and polished by the lapidary, they are admired uni- 
 versally. Wood, as it comes from the tree, has 
 certainly no great Beauty, though in the rough state 
 it may serve every useful purpose ; but in the hands 
 of the cabinet maker it is polished and varnished, 
 and rendered highly ornamental. Of late years the 
 introduction of French varnish has increased the 
 beauty of our tables, chairs, and piano-fortes. In 
 France, even the floors and stairs are rubbed 
 with wax, and made as shining and slippery as 
 possible, to the no small danger of one's limbs, but 
 they look pretty. 
 
 Other objects, though derived originally, as all 
 things must be, from nature, yet become so changed 
 by art that they may be said to be entirely artificial, 
 as woollen cloths, calico, and other cotton goods, 
 silks, leather, and even articles of hardware. And 
 in all these branches of manufacture, whatever is 
 most smooth and glossy, that we most admire. Thus 
 R 2 
 
124 DISSERTATION 
 
 we principally admire superfine smooth cloth, shining 
 kid gloves, oy g ants glace s, as the French call them, 
 shoes highly polished, and of late years even 
 varnished, silks of all kinds, but especially satins and 
 velvets, those most beautiful of tissues. Even to 
 our cotton furniture we can give gloss and beauty 
 by putting it under presses and mangles. So, 
 plate and hardware are rendered more agreeable 
 to the eye, by the labour of the butler and the 
 housemaid, who spends about half her life in giving 
 lustre to grate, fender, and fire-irons. 
 
 The following instance may, to some, appear 
 trifling, but in reality it is curious and instructive, 
 as showing the influence of two opposing principles. 
 Which is prettier, a beaver or a silk hat ^ Associa- 
 tion apart, I have no doubt that the silk hat would 
 be preferred, for it is more smooth and glossy ; 
 but it is cheap, and the idea of cheapness is fatal. 
 
 I might go on accumulating instances in support 
 of our present proposition ; but these will sufiice 
 to prove that smoothness and glossiness of surface 
 are real sources of Beauty. 
 
 IV. Intimate Composition of Bodies. 
 
 It will, I think, be generally, allowed that trans- 
 joar^w^ bodies are beautiful, and transparency depends 
 upon the Intimate Composition. The number of 
 clear and visible bodies is comparatively limited, 
 and perhaps on that account we admire them 
 
ON BEAUTY. 125 
 
 more. Instances in point are, first the diamond, 
 then glass, particularly plate-glass and crystal, the 
 most transparent of their kind, rock crystal and 
 quartz in all its varieties, provided they be not 
 opaque, and clear water, whether sparkling in a 
 tumbler, or glistening on the face of the earth, in 
 the tiny well, the feeble streamlet, the rocky torrent, 
 or the ever-changing sea. Even muddy water is 
 often better than none, on account of the variety 
 which it gives to the general landscape, the motion, 
 and the shining appearance which, on a fine day, 
 all water presents at a distance ; but without clear- 
 ness the charm is incomplete. Feeble are our 
 Highland waters, compared with the torrents 
 which descend from the glaciers of Switzerland ; 
 but the former are clear, the latter turbid; these 
 make but one rush, those are varied by pool and 
 current ; and though the Swiss streams may be more 
 sublime, the Scottish are more beautiful. Few sub- 
 stances are more ornamental than alabaster, which 
 is smooth, shining, and semi-transparent. When 
 colour and transparency go together, the efi*ect is 
 particularly fine, as in the precious stones, coloured 
 quartz, such as is found on the beach at Brighton, 
 Scotch cairngorm, and even coloured glass, 
 which is often used to imitate more costly orna- 
 ments. Though the glass in our Gothic cathedrals 
 be but semi-transparent, yet this degree of clearness 
 
126 DISSERTATION 
 
 adds immensely to the beauty of the painting. The 
 gases are transparent, and also invisible, except 
 when coloured, but those which are coloured, 
 as Chlorine and Iodine, the latter especially, 
 are certainly pretty. The air we breathe 
 cannot be seen, yet a clear atmosphere imparts an 
 inexpressible charm to every landscape. In this 
 country, the clearest waters are generally colour- 
 less, but the wonderful blue of the transparent Rhone, 
 and the scarcely inferior tint of the Rhine, the 
 Ticino, and the Adda, after leaving their lakes, 
 produce an emotion never to be forgotten. 
 
 Though in the course of the preceding inquiry, 
 numerous instances have been brought forward in 
 support of each principle separately, it may be well, 
 before concluding, to state one or two examples 
 to illustrate them all. We shall select 
 
 then a remarkable instance from inanimate, 
 and another from animated nature. Of the objects 
 which meet the eye in the unconscious world around 
 us, there is perhaps none more beautiful than a 
 deep sequestered valley, traversed by a clear 
 mountain river, rushing over a rocky bed, and 
 bordered by lofty banks, here densely wooded, there 
 bare and precipitous. This being allowed, let us 
 endeavour to trace the sources of the beauty. Firsts 
 there is the water, clear ^ possibly of a lovely 
 colour^ animating us by sympathy with its motion. 
 
ON BEAUTY. 127 
 
 but varied by pool and stream, here presenting one 
 even surface, there broken by points of rock into 
 dazzling foam, seldom pursuing a straight course, 
 but turning and winding along : then there are the 
 banks, where bare rock contrasts with exuberant 
 richness, and which appear more lofty by contrast 
 with the narrow ravine ; banks diversified in form 
 by the constant working of the river, and covered 
 in part with natural wood, in part with yellow 
 furze and flowers of lively hue : and lastly there is 
 the sky above which, as partially seen from the gorge, 
 appears at a greater distance, and of a deeper blue. 
 In animated nature there is one object to which 
 all will yield the palm, a beautiful woman. Look 
 upon that matchless face and figure, that master- 
 piece of nature's hand, and observe first the perfect 
 Regularity of form, the exact correspondence of 
 one side with the other, of eye with eye, and cheek 
 with cheek, and think what would be the effect of 
 the slightest difference between them ; consider then 
 the rise of the nose and the variety which it gives ; 
 the oval form of the head and countenance, the 
 smooth unwrinkled marble forehead, the plump 
 downy cheek, Xh^ finely rounded chin, the full clear 
 oval eye, the arched eyebrows, and the striking 
 contrast between the dark hair and the white skin, 
 between the white skin and the lively red of the 
 lips. Mark also the regular and finely polished 
 
128 DISSERTATION, ETC. 
 
 teeth, the circular neck, the graceful curve of the 
 falling shoulders, the alabaster back and breast, 
 the sioelling bosom, the round arms and waist ; 
 and you must exclaim, here, indeed, is Beauty. 
 
A DISSERTATION 
 ON BEAUTY AND SUBLIMITY 
 
 PART II.— ON SUBLIMITY. 
 Chapter I. 
 
 Wherein Sublimity differs from Beauty. 
 
 Having dwelt so long on the nature and sources 
 of Beauty, it will be less necessary to enlarge 
 upon Sublimity. So much indeed of what has 
 been said on the nature of the one is applicable 
 to the other, that a brief recapitulation of the points 
 of agreement will suffice, before we come to the 
 differences. 
 
 In the First place, as in the case of Beauty, so in 
 that of Sublimity, we must carefully distinguish the 
 Sublimity which we feel inwardly, from the outward 
 Cause of the same ; for the two are often confounded 
 in ordinary ideas as well as in ordinary language, 
 and this^ whether the cause be a material object, or 
 something moral or intellectual. 
 
 Secondly^ Sublimity, like Beauty, is not a Sensa- 
 tion, but an Emotion, and consequently it is always 
 s 
 
130 DISSERTATION 
 
 preceded immediately, not by any bodily change, 
 but by a change in the state of the mind, by a 
 Sensation, Perception, Conception, or some other 
 Emotion. 
 
 Thirdly, like Beauty, Sublimity is distinguished 
 from all other emotions by the incorporating process 
 above described, whereby we embody the feelings 
 of our own mind with inanimate matter, with stocks 
 and stones, which, for the moment, seem to contain 
 the emotion which they only rouse. 
 
 Fourthly, Sublimity, as well as Beauty, is a 
 Passive Emotion ; one which the mind suffers ; but 
 it does not immediately nor necessarily lead to action. 
 
 Fifthly, Sublimity also is an Immediate emotion, 
 having no reference to time, past or to come, and 
 therefore not including the notion of time at all, for 
 without reference to the past or the future there 
 can be no idea of succession. 
 
 Lastly^ Sublimity is a Temporary emotion, as 
 compared with Cheerfulness, or Melancholy, or with 
 our leading desires. Love, Ambition, Covetousness, 
 Curiosity, being roused occasionally, as the proper 
 objects present themselves, and then ceasing alto- 
 gether. It is even less permanent than Beauty, as 
 we have already observed. 
 
 In all these particulars Beauty and Sublimity 
 agree ; but wherein do they differ ^ We before re- 
 marked that the emotions which we include under 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 131 
 
 the general name of Beauty are not absolutely one and 
 the same; and the like may be said of Sublimity. 
 These are generic terms, which comprehend certain 
 species, or at least varieties, sufficiently alike to be 
 classed together under a common term, but differing 
 in some respects. And although in extreme cases 
 Beauty and Sublimity differ widely from one another, 
 yet in others they approach, as happens with many 
 classes of objects, as with the animal and the vege- 
 table world, which, in general, are widely separated, 
 though certain bodies exist which might be included 
 under either. So, though Beauty and Sublimity 
 may pass the one into the other by insensible 
 degrees, from the Sublime to the Grand, from the 
 Grand to the Fine, and so on through gradations 
 more numerous than the terms which we possess to 
 express them ; yet in many cases they are quite 
 distinct, and constitute two emotions which we feel 
 to be different, in spite of those points of similarity 
 above enumerated. That the emotions are different 
 is proved by our own consciousness, as well as by 
 the different words which we use ; for, vague as 
 ordinary language may be. Beauty and Sublimity 
 are not employed indiscriminately the one for the 
 other. No doubt, both feelings may be roused at 
 the same time by the same objects, as by the deep 
 unclouded blue or starry firmament, or by a wide 
 expanse of unruffled water on a sunny day ; but in 
 s 2 
 
132 DTSSERTATTON 
 
 spite of the sameness of these objects, the real 
 sources of the two emotions are as different as the 
 emotions themselves, as we shall presently see. These 
 observations are necessary in order to show that the 
 subject of this second part is real, and not the same 
 as the former. 
 
 Beauty, as we have seen, is a simple or uncom- 
 pounded Emotion : how as to Sublimity ^ 
 
 When we consider the nature of those objects 
 which excite the feeling of Sublimity, we may 
 perceive that they are the same as rouse the Emotion 
 of Wonder. The lofty mountain, the steep precipice, 
 a wide expanse of land or water, the vast firmament 
 over our heads, the Ocean's roar, the sounding 
 cataract, the pealing thunder, are all Wonderful, 
 and all Sublime. But many objects rouse Wonder 
 without exciting Sublimity, as all those curious 
 and rare phenomena which are disclosed by 
 the Microscope, the effects real or pretended of 
 Animal Magnetism, the properties of Electricity, 
 Galvanism, and the Magnet, many Chemical 
 experiments, and even the tricks of jugglers and 
 conjurors. These, and a thousand other Phenomena, 
 give rise to W^onder but not to Sublimity ; and 
 therefore, though Sublimity be connected with 
 Wonder, it is not the same. The essential cause of 
 the latter seems to be Rarity, of whatever kind, but 
 this alone suffices not for the former. . 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 133 
 
 Again, when we reflect on the nature of those 
 objects which appear sublime, we shall find that 
 they are such as excite Fear. All those objects or 
 phenomena above enumerated as sublime are accom- 
 panied by a degree of Fear ; as a deep precipice, a 
 storm at sea, thunder, a great flood, or a great fire, 
 and the avalanche echoing from mountain to moun- 
 tain. These are among the most sublime and 
 terrible of natural phenomena; and though a wide 
 expanse of sky, of flat desert or sea, be less fear- 
 ful, it is not exempt from awe, and gives a 
 milder impression of Sublimity. But innumerable 
 causes produce Fear which certainly rouse no 
 Sublimity, as venomous reptiles, such as the tiny 
 but deadly cobra capella, or manilla, or even 
 noxious insects, and ten thousand other objects or 
 phenomena; and consequently, though Fear and 
 Sublimity be connected, they are not identical. 
 
 It appears then that Sublimity is somehow con- 
 nected with Wonder and Fear, and yet differs from 
 both ; that whatever rouses Sublimity also rouses 
 Wonder and Fear, but that innumerable causes may 
 produce one or other of these without producing the 
 first. What, then, is the conclusion ^ Evidently 
 this, that the emotion of Sublimity is a compound 
 of Wonder and Fear, or in other words, the result 
 of the two united. 
 
 From this we are not to infer that every mixture 
 
134 DISSERTATION 
 
 of Fear and Wonder constitutes Sublimity, any more 
 than that every mixture of an acid with an alkali 
 produces a salt ; but only mixture in certain pro- 
 portions. If either Fear or Wonder be in excess, 
 the result will be a loose compound of the two, or 
 rather the mind will pass rapidly from the one to 
 the other, dwelling principally, however, on the 
 stronger emotion, till at last this may exclude the 
 other altogether. Thus, a lofty perpendicular rock, 
 when viewed from a safe position, may appear 
 sublime, for Fear and Wonder can blend har- 
 moniously, but when the precipice is beneath us, 
 Sublimity is destroyed by the predominance of Fear. 
 So, a storm at sea is sublime to the spectator on 
 shore, but not to those on the waters, unless to the 
 very courageous, who can admire the tempest even 
 in the midst of danger. To the fearless, thunder is 
 grand ; not so to the timid, who fly to caves and dark- 
 ness to avoid the threatening bolt. What more 
 sublime than the tumult, the danger, the desolation 
 of w^ar, to one placed at some distance, apart from 
 the extreme terrors or the tumultuous passion of 
 the conflict ! 
 
 When we consider the phenomena of Sublimity 
 as distinct from Beauty, we shall find that they admit 
 of a ready explanation on the supposition that the 
 emotion is the result of Wonder combined with 
 Fear. Firsts Sublimity, as has been observed, differs 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 135 
 
 from Beauty in this, that it contains an alloy of pain ; 
 and if Fear be an element of the former, the 
 pain which it contains is at once accounted for. 
 Secondly^ Sublimity is more violent but less 
 durable than the feeling of Beauty, and it bears 
 not repetition so well. Now, both Wonder and 
 Fear are apt to be violent, and both readily subside 
 on a better acquaintance, the former especially, which 
 mainly depends on Ignorance and Novelty. Fear 
 indeed may sometimes increase by increase of 
 Knowledge, but if Wonder subside. Sublimity is 
 doubly destroyed ; for it cannot subsist if the two 
 be not in a certain proportion. The predominant 
 element appears to be Wonder, and an excess of 
 Fear soon destroys the result. 
 
 Lastly, that, for a continuance. Beauty should 
 please us more than Sublimity, cannot now at all 
 surprise, for, either Fear becomes irksome when 
 Wonder has subsided, or both are soon subdued 
 by custom, and give place to Satiety or Indifference. 
 
 Since then the phenomena of Sublimity are 
 readily accounted for on the supposition that 
 Sublimity results from an union of Fear and Wonder, 
 the conclusion above arrived at in favour of that 
 union, drawn from an induction of facts relative to 
 the nature of the objects which rouse the three 
 emotions, is hereby fully confirmed. 
 
 It being allowed that both Fear and Wonder are 
 
136 DISSERTATION 
 
 necessary to Sublimity, it may still be doubted 
 by some, whether a degree of Beauty be not also 
 essential to that emotion. Before we can give 
 a satisfactory answer to this supposition, we must 
 trace the sources of Sublimity, and compare them 
 with those of Beauty, as already ascertained. 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 137 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 On the Sources of Sublimity, 
 
 Having ascertained in the First Part of this 
 Dissertation, that Beauty has real and original 
 Sources in the material world, and that it does not 
 depend entirely on Association, we shall not renew 
 the discussion on the present occasion ; but without 
 further preface w^e proceed to enquire what are the 
 sources of Sublimity. That it depends more on 
 other Emotions than Beauty does, will readily 
 appear. 
 
 I. It is evident that the great, the vast, tends to 
 rouse Sublimity. But greatness is a relative quality, 
 for a size which would be immense for a dog, 
 would be very diminutive for a pony ; and therefore, 
 it is greatness of the kind, or relative bulk, that 
 alone appears vast and rouses emotion. Instances of 
 Sublimity derived from greatness occur in a prospect 
 over vast expanse of any kind, whether of sea, 
 sky, or land, of land cultivated or wild, wooded or 
 bare, fertile or barren. These circumstances may 
 greatly influence the beauty of the prospect, but 
 they do not seem materially to affect the Sublimity. 
 
138 DISSERTATION 
 
 Uniformity of appearance is of most importance 
 in this respect ; and a boundless forest, an open 
 savannah, even a vast sandy or stony desert, is more 
 sublime than an enclosed, w^ell-cultivated country, 
 varied by corn, pasture, and wood. The more 
 uniform the surface, the more readily does the eye 
 take it all in at once, and therefore the greatness 
 strikes the more. But Beauty, as we have seen, 
 depends much upon a due mixture of Uniformity 
 with Variety, not on the former alone ; and here, 
 therefore, we perceive one difference between the 
 sources of the two. We also see one reason why 
 we sooner get tired of Sublimity than of Beauty, for 
 Variety pleases longer than Uniformity. If there 
 be any truth in what Burke has stated, that Beauty 
 partly depends on Smallness, we shall have another 
 remarkable difference, nay, an opposition between 
 the sources of the two emotions. Certain it is that 
 in our own language as well as in other tongues, the 
 words jpr^^(^ and little are frequently found together. 
 A pretty little hand, foot, or even head ; a pretty 
 little woman, a pretty little dog, or pony, or cottage, 
 flower, etc. etc. are words in every one's mouth. 
 The word little also expresses affection. The Italian 
 language, in particular, is full of diminutives which 
 imply tenderness ; and this tenderness may be sup- 
 posed often to arise from Beauty. At the least, then, 
 there is no contrariety between Smallness and 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 139 
 
 Beauty, but, if anything, a connection ; whereas the 
 former is directly opposed to Sublimity. 
 
 II. Though a vast extent of land, of what- 
 ever kind, whether forest, moorland, or desert, be 
 imposing and grand, yet the effect is much increased 
 when greatness is united with elevation; and the 
 more abrupt the rise, the greater the Sublimity. 
 The height of the Grampians is surely more 
 striking than the flats of England ; and the lofty 
 and precipitous Alps, than the plains of France and 
 Germany. To what shall we attribute this '? to 
 what but to the circumstance that great elevation is 
 more rare than an extensive flat. This, at least, 
 seems to be one cause of the difference of impression. 
 A certain variety of surface seems to be essential to 
 Beauty, but this does not demand any extraordinary 
 height. But extraordinary height seems necessary 
 to the fulness of Sublimity ; and if so. Magnitude and 
 Rarity are sources of this emotion. A height which 
 in Scotland would appear magnificent, might pass 
 unnoticed in the Alps, because in the latter situation 
 it would not be rare, and could not appear great. 
 And the more sudden the rise, the more profound 
 the impression. How noble are those precipitous 
 Needles which tower above the valley of Chamouni ! 
 But, did the monarch of mountains himself present 
 but one precipice reaching from top to bottom, what 
 mortal eye could stand the sight! Here, again, 
 T 2 
 
140 DISSERTATION 
 
 Rarity contributes to the impression ; for what is 
 more rare than magnitude of such a sort *? Though 
 Rarity enhance Beauty, as it does all our emotions, 
 yet it does not seem properly a source of this, as it 
 is of Sublimity. Rarity cannot render beautiful 
 those barren rocks which surround the Mer de 
 Glace, but nothing can be more grand than this and 
 other scenes where all is barrenness and desolation. 
 Here, then, we see another difference between the 
 sources of Beauty and Sublimity. 
 
 III. Lastly^ Sublimity is raised to the utmost by 
 the presence of some danger^ not so great as to 
 engross the mind and destroy the influence of the 
 other causes. Thus thunder is highly sublime ; 
 and a land storm, as well as one at sea, to those on 
 shore, who by sympathy, and only by sympathy, 
 enter into the fears of those on board of ship. A 
 traveller in America, talking of the grand emotions 
 which he experienced when descending the St. 
 Lawrence in a small boat, mentions the degree of 
 danger as one of the causes thereof; danger sufficient 
 to excite, not to overwhelm the mind.* The same 
 cause conduces to the sublimity of the battle field, 
 of the avalanche, of deep precipices, gloomy caverns, 
 lowering skies, and of wide, open, houseless moors, 
 conveying the idea of desolation and danger. On 
 this account northern climes seem favourable to 
 * Hamilton's Men and Manners in America. 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 141 
 
 the Sublime, southern to the Beautiful. The cha- 
 racter of Ossian's poetry is gloomy and grand; 
 full of images such as Scotland presents ; the black 
 mountain, half hid in mist ; the dark lake ; the 
 sunless den; the starless night ; the bleak, boundless, 
 pathless moor, enlivened only by the cry of the 
 grouse and the scream of the curlew. With all these 
 the idea of danger is associated. Far different is 
 the scenery, and far different the poetry of southern 
 climes, where desolation is nowhere to be seen 
 except near the tops of the highest mountains, where, 
 if all be not rich, at least nearly all is cultivated, 
 where the cheerful sun is seldom hid by day, and 
 where even the nights are bright with moon and 
 stars. The impressions produced by such scenes 
 are, no doubt, far more delightful in general, but 
 they seldom amount to that deep feeling of Sublimity 
 which is roused by the aspect of nature in the more 
 gloomy region of the north. Nothing is more im- 
 pressive than total solitude and desolation, for they 
 are fearful. 
 
 All is hushed and still as death, — 'Tis dreadful ! 
 
 Nay, quickly speak to me, aud let me hear 
 
 Thy voice — my own affrights me with its echoes.* 
 
 Moreover, a misty atmosphere adds to the 
 apparent height of mountains ; and partial con- 
 
 * Mourning Bride : Act II, Scene 3. 
 
142 DISSERTATION 
 
 cealment gives scope to the imagination, which 
 fancies objects half seen to be greater than they 
 really are ; whereas a clear atmosphere has just a 
 contrary effect. These causes contribute to the 
 sublimity of Northern scenery. 
 
 It may be asked why Silence, Solitude, and 
 Desolation, are fearful ^ The reason is obvious. 
 Man, when left to himself, is but a weak animal, 
 compared with many beasts of the field or even 
 fowls of the air ; his strength depends on association 
 and union. When therefore he finds himself in a 
 situation where, far from descrying any of his fellows, 
 he cannot see even the traces of them, his natural 
 weakness occurs to him, and he trembles. 
 
 The result of the above investigation is that the 
 sources of Sublimity are Greatness, Relative Great- 
 ness, Rarity, and Danger. 
 
 Thus it appears that although the two emotions 
 may frequently be blended in one compound 
 state of mind, yet, that, in reality, the feeling of 
 Sublimity, as known by Consciousness, and traced 
 to its elements by Analysis, differs as widely 
 from Beauty as the sources of the one differ from 
 those of the other. The view from a balloon in 
 air must be one of the most sublime in the world, 
 for it must comprehend Vast Extent united with 
 Rarity in a high degree, and with Danger. 
 
 Greatness, then. Rarity, and Danger, are the 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 143 
 
 sources of Sublimity. But the same are the sources 
 of Wonder and Fear. Therefore our Analysis is con- 
 firmed, whereby Sublimity was resolved into these 
 two elements. 
 
 It being allowed that Greatness, Earity, and 
 Danger, are the sources of Sublimity, it may still 
 be asked whether they act directly on the mind, or 
 through the medium of some proximate principle, as 
 by suggesting power, extraordinary power. Were it 
 true that power is the proximate Cause of Sublimity, 
 this would not interfere with the conclusion already 
 arrived at, for, extraordinary power being a complex 
 idea, we should have to enquire on what its efficacy 
 depends, and we should probably find that extraor- 
 dinary power is sublime, because it is great, rare, 
 and dangerous to those around. There is assuredly 
 something grand in any remarkable display of the 
 powers of nature, and even in the power of a single 
 man, such as Napoleon, who commanded and it was 
 done ; and this is a reason why almost all historians, 
 even his political enemies, have been more lenient to 
 him than he deserves. When the mind is captivated 
 by the sublime emotion arising from the conception 
 of wonderful power, it is little disposed to attend 
 to the cold dictates of Reason, or the rigid lessons 
 of Morality. But, though extraordinary power does 
 rouse sublimity, for it contains the three elements 
 above mentioned, yet the conception of power 
 
144 DISSERTATION 
 
 does not seem necessary to produce that emotion. 
 
 It appears to me inconsistent with our experience 
 to say that we cannot look upon any object in nature, 
 such as a lofty mountain, and feel its Sublimity, 
 without calling to mind the Power which brought it 
 into being. This conception may arise and perhaps 
 may increase the feeling, but it does not seem 
 necessary to its existence. Greatness, Rarity, and 
 Danger, are, therefore, the real, ultimate, or elemen- 
 tary sources of Sublimity; and power is sublime 
 only by containing these, not as an elementary 
 cause ; and even as a proximate principle it does not 
 seem to be indispensable. 
 
 Having discussed the nature and causes of 
 both Beauty and Sublimity, our task may be con- 
 sidered as finished ; for it seems scarcely necessary 
 to say a word concerning their effects. But I 
 cannot conclude this Dissertation without dwelling 
 a moment on the proof which these Emotions afford 
 of the goodness of the Author of Nature. The 
 pleasure which these emotions impart, may be 
 considered as an extraordinary gift of God, a gift 
 for its own sake, and which, for aught we can 
 see, might have been withheld without interfering 
 with the other dispensations of his Providence, or 
 arresting the business of the world. Men might 
 have been born to eat, sleep, toil, and die ; populous 
 and flourishing nations might have arisen; the 
 
ON SUBLIMITY. 145 
 
 whole earth might have been peopled, though not 
 a soul had ever felt the emotions of Beauty and 
 Sublimity. These, then, have been given to em- 
 bellish, not to spread, the existence of man ; to deck 
 the table of creation ; to sweeten the cup of life ; 
 and, I may add, to turn our minds to our Creator 
 with feelings of lively gratitude, for this and all his 
 blessings. When the mind is softened by Beauty or 
 elevated by Sublimity, it is drawn for a time from 
 the engrossing cares of life, and is prepared for the 
 kindred but more important feelings of devotion. 
 Wisely, then, have men in most ages of the world 
 exhausted all their resources in beautifying their 
 places of worship, whether Pagan temple, Ma- 
 hometan mosque, or Christian church ; and wisely 
 have they placed them in situations where the 
 charms of Nature were added to those of Art. The 
 temples of ancient Greece were generally placed on 
 spots commanding delightful prospects; like the 
 churches of modern Italy, where Architecture, 
 Sculpture, and Painting unite to adorn the hallowed 
 fane. Even in a barbarous age, our Gothic ancestors 
 raised those stately fabrics, the wonder of their more 
 civilized descendants, who are often content to 
 worship their Creator in a building little better than 
 a barn. Nay, such was the fury of some of our 
 early Eeformers, such their hatred to Rome, that 
 they refused to worship in the noble structures of 
 
 V 
 
146 DISSERTATION, ETC. 
 
 antiquity, pulled them to the ground, and thought 
 that the purity of their faith was in proportion to 
 the meanness of their church. But in spite of such 
 instances, arising sometimes from a spirit of oppo- 
 sition, sometimes from a spirit of economy, from 
 lukewarmness, poverty, or necessity, whoever 
 considers the nature of man will see that the 
 emotions of Beauty and Sublimity are the genuine 
 allies of Piety ; that the attempt to separate them 
 does violence to that nature, and tends to the 
 decay of all religion, or to the growth of a savage 
 fanaticism, or at best to a purely intellectual system 
 of belief, which may occupy the head, but plays not 
 around the heart. 
 
 The connection of Beauty and Sublimity with 
 the holiest feelings of the soul must greatly enhance 
 our estimate of their importance. Delightful 
 though they be in themselves, they are not the mere 
 creatures of an hour, for they exert an influence 
 opposed to the malevolent passions, and favourable 
 to Tenderness, to Morality, to Beligion ; they im- 
 prove the mind here, and prepare it for happiness 
 hereafter. 
 
DISSERTATION SECOND. 
 
 ON THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 
 
 v2 
 
A DISSERTATION 
 ON THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 
 
 Chapter I. 
 
 On the Nature of the Ludicrous Emotion. 
 
 There is another Emotion, which on many accounts 
 ought to be considered in connection with Beauty 
 and Sublimity, namely, the Ludicrous Emotion; 
 which, along with the two former, constitutes the 
 object of Taste. All the fine arts, and all fine 
 writing and speaking, aim at rousing one or more of 
 these emotions, and though they may rouse others 
 also, yet these are the peculiar objects of the arts of 
 Painting and Sculpture, of Poetry, Oratory, and fine 
 Prose. Without these emotions there may be Truth, 
 there may be Acuteness, there may be Original 
 Thinking, but a charm is wanting which nothing 
 else can supply. We may correct the mis-statements^ 
 or combat the arguments and detect the fallacies of 
 any work of history or of reasoning, as we may 
 point out the weak point of any building, or a 
 defect in any piece of machinery; but the proper 
 
150 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 object of Criticism is to mark what is beautiful, 
 sublime, or ludicrous, and what is not ; and to tell 
 why this is beautiful, sublime, or ludicrous, and that 
 is not. Such is the business of criticism, which 
 requires a combination of Sensibility with Judgment; 
 for, without the one. Emotions cannot be felt, and 
 without the other, the means adapted to rouse them 
 cannot be discovered. If there be any fixed principle 
 of Beauty, etc. then Criticism is a science, otherwise 
 it is a vain thing, a Will-o'-the-wisp, which lures one 
 in search of nothing. Whatever, therefore, may 
 here be said in favour of the doctrine that Beauty, 
 etc. are not merely conventional, or liable to infinite 
 change, tends to establish the point that there is a 
 standard of Taste as well of Morality, and that 
 Criticism is a science as well as Ethics. 
 
 Tliough the Ludicrous Emotion differ so widely 
 from Beauty and Sublimity, yet in certain particulars 
 it agrees with both. 
 
 First, it is, like them, an Emotion not a Sensa- 
 tion, and consequently it is always preceded 
 immediately by a mental not a bodily change, 
 whether that change be a Sensation, Perception, 
 Conception, or some other Emotion. 
 
 Secondly, it is a Passive Emotion, an expression 
 which has been already explained. 
 
 Thirdly, it is an Immediate Emotion, having no 
 reference to Time. 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 151 
 
 Fourthly^ it is a Temporary Emotion, as all will 
 allow : and 
 
 Fifthly^ it is a Pleasing Emotion, as will be 
 readily admitted. 
 
 In all these particulars, Beauty, Sublimity, and 
 the Ludicrous Emotion, agree. 
 
 But, in spite of these resemblances, the Ludicrous 
 Emotion differs widely from both Beauty and 
 Sublimity, as is evident to every man's conscious- 
 ness, as well as by the outward convulsive movement 
 of laughter, whereby this feeling is distinguished 
 from all others. An effect so peculiar must have a 
 peculiar cause. 
 
 The Sublime often passes into the Ludicrous, 
 according to the proverb " from the Sublime to the 
 Ridiculous there is but one step," and hence we may 
 infer that there is some secret analogy between them. 
 This analogy it seems not very difficult to trace ; for 
 Sublimity depends in part upon Wonder or Surprise ; 
 and so it would appear does the Ludicrous. If we 
 attend to the matter we shall find that all ludicrous 
 incidents, mistakes, or practical jokes, all sallies of 
 wit, in order to produce their full effect, must be 
 unexpected. Sometimes, indeed, we may laugh at 
 an old joke, but if we do, it is by sympathy with the . 
 emotion of others to whom it is new. Therefore we 
 may conclude that Wonder or Surprise is essential 
 to the Ludicrous Emotion, as it is to Sublimity ; and 
 
152 DISSERTATTON ON 
 
 this is one reason, at least, why the latter sometimes 
 passes into the former. But Surprise alone has 
 nothing ludicrous, and, when combined with Fear, 
 the result is Sublimity, when united to Love, 
 Admiration ; emotions very different in their nature 
 from the present. What then is the emotion which 
 must be combined with Surprise in order to produce 
 the Ludicrous ^ This seems to be no other than the 
 feeling well known under the name of Mirth or 
 Gaiety, which is a modification of the common 
 emotion of Delight. 
 
 Simple Mirth or Gaiety is not necessarily accom- 
 panied with a ludicrous emotion, or with laughter ; 
 it prepares the mind for perceiving and feeling the 
 ridiculous, but it may exist alone. The Gay are 
 certainly more prone to ridicule and laughter than 
 the Grave. 
 
 Sport that wrinkled care derides. 
 And Laughter holding both her sides, 
 
 are the proper attendants of Mirth. 
 
 Grave characters are rather fond of the Gay, 
 provided there be no peculiar turn to Ridicule in the 
 latter, for that the grave dread and abhor. With 
 this exception, the contrast of humours does good ; 
 the one tempers the other : whereas grave people find 
 each other but dull company ; and the gay, when they 
 meet together, are apt to depress more sober spirits. 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 153 
 
 Mirth is allied to Cheerfulness, but it is a more 
 boisterous and less permanent emotion, depends 
 more upon particular exciting causes, and declines 
 with these ; whereas Cheerfulness often continues 
 without any outward cause sufficient to account for 
 it, sometimes amid circumstances which, in the eyes 
 of a spectator, have a very discouraging appearance. 
 To us, nothing can seem more wretched, more 
 depressing, than the life of a native Greenlander, 
 but the Esquimaux are said to bear a cheerful 
 countenance. Mirth, as thus distinguished from 
 Cheerfulness, is the feeling which in union with 
 Surprise seems to constitute the Ludicrous Emotion, 
 and produces Laughter. 
 
 w 
 
154 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 Chapter II. 
 
 On the Sources of the Ludicrous Emotion . 
 
 Having ascertained, in the preceding chapter, that 
 nothing is ludicrous but what is unexpected, and 
 that Wonder or Surprise is one of the elements of 
 the emotion ; we have already discovered, in part, 
 the cause or source of the same. But though every 
 thing strange, new, or unexpected, be a cause of 
 Wonder, yet every thing new is not ludicrous. To 
 determine then what strange things are also ludicrous 
 is the question. 
 
 Since the Ludicrous Emotion is a mirthful one, 
 it follows that the novelty which rouses it must be 
 of a pleasing nature. Nothing positively disagree- 
 able can be a source of the ludicrous. We may 
 affirm then that the source we seek must be found 
 in a pleasing novelty; but, still, this goes but a 
 little way towards fixing the real cause ; for many 
 kinds of novelty are pleasing without being ludicrous. 
 This problem can be solved only by induction; 
 by examining the various objects, incidents, or 
 expressions, which are ludicrous, and endeavouring 
 to find wherein they all agree. 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 155 
 
 The apparent sources of the Ludicrous Emotion 
 may be divided into two great classes. Firsts objects 
 or incidents that have really existed in nature ; or, 
 what amounts nearly to the same thing, accurately 
 described in words, as they either did or might have 
 occurred. Secondly^ images brought together which 
 may never have been united in nature, and expressed 
 in words. Each of these classes admits of a sub- 
 division, according as the natural incidents or the 
 images are presented to us with or without the 
 intention of raising laughter. Thus, the first class 
 consists of accidental ludicrous incidents, and practical 
 jokes; the second of ludicrous blunders expressed 
 in words, and wit. 
 
 I. — 1. Among natural incidents where no 
 ludicrous effect is intended, but which nevertheless 
 are ludicrous, we may mention all awkward attempts 
 at bodily dexterity or mental display, where the 
 object of the performer is ambitious, but the result 
 altogether a failure. We laugh at the awkward 
 speaker or writer, as well as at the awkward 
 marksman, who has a great opinion of himself. 
 We laugh at the tragic actor who means to be 
 forcible and pathetic, but who is only noisy, as we do 
 at the vain boaster, whose ball or arrow, instead of 
 hitting the bull's eye, flies far wide of the target ; or 
 at the vain puppy who pretends to superior ease and 
 elegance, while art and constraint are visible in every 
 w2 
 
156 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 motion. So, when we see a man very particular 
 about his dress, suddenly bespattered with mud, we 
 can seldom refrain from laughter. 
 
 When we meet a poor man. in tattered clothes, 
 we may or may not pity him, but certainly we feel 
 no disposition to laughter ; but were we to see a 
 man, otherwise remarkably well-dressed, with a 
 sleeve all torn, or the tail of his coat half off, we 
 should certainly be amused. Were I to enter a 
 cottage in Scotland and find the inmates dining on 
 a haggis, I should think nothing of it; but were 
 such a dish presented at a nobleman's table, the 
 company would be convulsed. 
 
 Now in all these and similar cases, what is 
 it that is ludicrous'? It is evident in the first 
 place that there is something quite unexpected, 
 whether an unexpected failure, or something else. 
 Secondly^ there is a contrast, a very striking contrast, 
 between the pretensions and the result, or between 
 what we witness, and what is usual in such circum- 
 stances. It would appear then, that in these 
 cases at least, the essence of the Ludicrous is an 
 unexpected and violent Contrast. 
 
 2. As an instance of practical jokes we may 
 mention that boyish trick, introduction to king and 
 queen, where the person introduced is requested to 
 take his seat between the royal couple, on a cloth 
 stretching from one throne to the other ; when their 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 157 
 
 majesties rising up together, and, the cloth being 
 without support, down falls the luckless courtier 
 into a tub of water below. Or we may notice the 
 trick of sewing up a person's sheets before he go to 
 bed, or strewing them with something prickly ; 
 putting salt into one's tea instead of sugar ; sending 
 one on a fool's errand ; sticking a pig tail behind 
 one's back, etc. etc. 
 
 Now, in these and innumerable other instances 
 of practical jokes what do we find *? Firsts the 
 scheme, whatever it may be, is totally unknown to 
 the sufferer, and his surprise is great when he detects 
 it; and into this surprise we enter by sympathy. 
 Secondly, there is a violent contrast between his 
 expectations, or his previous state of mind, and that 
 which follows upon the discovery of the trick ; 
 between his previous security and the subsequent 
 catastrophe ; between his real situation and his total 
 unconsciousness thereof. In these cases, then, as 
 well as in those enumerated under the foregoing 
 head, it appears that Contrast, violent and unex- 
 pected, is the real source of the Ludicrous Emotion. 
 
 Under this head must be classed Buffoonery of 
 all sorts : such as we see in pantomimes, or during 
 the carnival in Roman Catholic countries, where 
 there is a violent contrast between the real and the 
 assumed character and dress ; or where that dress is 
 made of the most strange and incongruous parts. 
 
158 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 where the human face is caricatured in masks, or 
 the human form degraded into the brute. In these 
 instances, also, the sport seems to depend upon 
 novelty, combined with excessive contrast. When 
 masks become familiar they cease to raise any 
 laughter, unless there be one of extraordinary 
 ugliness ; and the nearer they approach to a good 
 imitation of the face, the less they amuse. 
 
 II. — 1. The second of the two classes into which 
 we have divided the apparent sources of the Ludicrous 
 Emotion, comprehends, like the first, two orders: 
 blunders expressed in words, and wit. In both, 
 words are the means by which images or ideas are 
 brought together, which may never have been united 
 in nature ; but in blunders they are brought together 
 unintentionally, in wit intentionally. The former 
 rather augur some mental deficiency ; while wit, in 
 its best form, requires a lively fancy, and is a very 
 rare and highly valued exercise of the faculties. 
 
 As a specimen of blunders in speech, we may 
 take the well-known scene in " Much ado about 
 Nothing," where Dogberry gives his charge to the 
 watch. 
 
 Dogb. Are you good men and true ? 
 
 Verges. Yea, or else it were pity but they should suffer 
 salvation, body and soul. 
 
 Dogb. Nay, that were a punishment too good for them, if 
 they should have any allegiance in them, being chosen for the 
 prince's watch. 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 159 
 
 Verg. Well, give them their chai-ge, neigbour Dogberry. 
 
 Dogb. First, who think you the most desarlless man to be 
 constable ? 
 
 \st Watch. Hugh Oatcake, Sir, or George Seacoal ; for ihey 
 can write and read. 
 
 Dogb. Come hither neighbour Seacoal; God hath blessed you 
 with a good name ; to be a well-favoured man is the gift o{ fortune ; 
 but to write and read comes by nature. 
 
 2nd Watch. Both which, master constable, — 
 
 Dogb. You have ; I knew it would be your answer. Well, 
 for your favour. Sir, why, give God thanks, and make no boast of 
 it ; and for your writing and reading, let that appear where there is 
 no need of such vanity. You are thought here to be the most 
 senseless and fit man for the constable of the watch ; therefore, 
 bear you the lantern ; this is your charge ; you shall comprehend 
 all vagrom men; you are to bid any man stand, in the prince's 
 name. 
 
 2nd Watch. How if he will not stand ? 
 
 Dogb. Why, then take no note of him, but let him go ; and 
 presently call the rest of the watch together, and thank God you 
 are rid of the knave. 
 
 Verg. If he will not stand when he is bidden he is none of the 
 prince's subjects. 
 
 Dogb. True, and they are to meddle with none but the prince's 
 
 subjects; you shall also make no noise in the streets; for, for 
 
 the watch to babble and talk, is most tolerable, and not to be 
 endured. 
 
 2nd Watch. We will rather sleep than talk ,• we know what 
 belongs to a watch. 
 
 In this very ludicrous dialogue we may remark 
 two sorts of blunders, the one sort blunders in 
 words only, the other in idea or sense. The words 
 salvation, allegiance^ desartless, senseless, tolerable, 
 comprehend, are very different in meaning from what 
 was intended ; the first five altogether opposite to 
 the meaning ; and these five have a more ludicrous 
 
160 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 effect than the word comprehend^ which is not so 
 striking a contrast to the sense. But, to most 
 readers, I believe that the word allegiance loses 
 much of its ludicrous effect from their not per- 
 ceiving at once what word it is put for ; so that 
 to them it is nonsense, and nothing more. It is 
 clear, also, that the speakers are quite uncon- 
 scious of the blunders they are making, whether in 
 words or in sense. Here, then, we perceive what 
 are the three particulars essential to a ludicrous 
 verbal blunder. The words, taken, in their usual 
 sense, mean something not only different from what 
 is really intended to be expressed, but altogether 
 opposite ; while the speaker is quite unconscious of 
 any such incongruity. He, good easy man, really 
 believes that he has spoken sense, or, if he do not 
 believe it, there is no blunder in him, no laughter in 
 others. Again, in spite of inaccuracy of language, 
 the meaning must still be apparent ; for, if not, we 
 may stare and demand an explanation, but we feel 
 no disposition to laugh. We cannot laugh at mere 
 nonsense, or what we do not understand, which to 
 us is mere nonsense ; but we laugh when we see the 
 meaning, although the words imply the very reverse. 
 The ludicrous effect, then, seems to depend upon the 
 violent, and of course unexpected, contrast between 
 the speaker s words as usually understood, and what 
 he really means to say ; so that the real source of 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 161 
 
 the emotion is the same in these cases as in those 
 comprehended under the first class. The blunders 
 contained in the words salvation^ allegiance^ etc. are 
 purely verbal, and the test of this is, that, like verbal 
 wit or puns, they are untranslatable ; whereas the 
 other blunders contained in the above dialogue are 
 real absurdities, which might be turned into any 
 language without injuring the effect. To say that 
 " to be a well-favoured man is the gift of fortune, but 
 to write and read comes by nature," is no blunder 
 upon the words fortune and nature^ which have no 
 resemblance, and could never have been mistaken 
 for each other ; but it is a real confusion of ideas. 
 All the ideas are there, as well as all the right 
 words, but they are exactly put in the wrong places. 
 It would be easy to turn this sentence into French, 
 or any language : La bonne mine est le don de la 
 fortune, mais ecrire et lire vient de la nature ; where 
 the ludicrous effect is the same as in English. This 
 test may be applied to the other blunders contained 
 in the above dialogue, to determine whether they be 
 merely verbal or not ; as, for instance, to the last ; 
 " We will rather sleep than talk ; we know what 
 belongs to a watch." The words sleep and talk have 
 no resemblance, no more than fortune and nature, 
 and never could be confounded; and, accordingly, 
 the sentence is translatable, the ludicrous effect re- 
 maining unimpaired : Nous aimerions mieux dormir 
 
 X 
 
162 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 que parler ; nous savons Men ce qui convient a un 
 garde. 
 
 In blunders purely verbal the contrast exists 
 betweeen the speaker's words as usually understood, 
 and what he means to say ; but, in mental blunders 
 expressed in words, the contrast lies between what 
 he means and says and what he ought to mean and 
 say; and this contrast is violent, and of course 
 unexpected; otherwise the ludicrous effect is not 
 produced. 
 
 2. From what has gone before, it would appear 
 that Novelty and Excessive Contrast are essen- 
 tial to the ludicrous. Let us inquire whether this 
 conclusion be corroborated by the phenomena of 
 Wit. 
 
 It is universally allowed that there is a wide 
 difference between Judgment and Fancy. The 
 peculiar office of the one is to find out differences, 
 the business of the other is to discover resemblances. 
 The object of the former is Truths naked and 
 unadorned; the object of the latter is Delight, 
 Most, if not all the error existing in the world, arises 
 from confounding things really different, and reason- 
 ing as if they were the same; and it belongs to 
 judgment to draw a line between them, and to assign 
 to each its proper place ; and when once things 
 are shown to be different, it is immediately seen that 
 any inference drawn from the one does not necessarily 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 163 
 
 apply to the other. We believe that like causes are 
 always followed by like effects, it is a necessity of our 
 nature to believe it ; but then the causes must be 
 really the same, the principal cause as well as all the 
 circumstances, which are in truth auxiliary causes. 
 Here, then, is the grand source of fallacy : we take 
 for like altogether what is like only in certain par- 
 ticulars ; for the same, what is only similar ; and 
 draw our conclusions accordingly. To detect dif- 
 ferences where they really exist, is, then, the peculiar 
 office of judgment. 
 
 The business of Fancy on the contrary lies in 
 detecting Resemblances, and its object is not Truth 
 but Delight. In general, resemblances are much 
 more obvious than differences. To a child all trees 
 are alike, and it is long before he can distinguish 
 one sort from another, and in this respect some are 
 always children. So, the child confounds one man 
 with another, one large animal with another large 
 animal, a horse with an ox, a sheep with a goat, 
 and having got a name for the first, he applies it to 
 the second. To a casual observer all the sheep in 
 a flock are so similar that he cannot tell one from 
 another, but the shepherd can distinguish each. 
 When we first visit a foreign land all the faces seem 
 alike, and it requires some time to discover that they 
 differ as much among themselves as those of our 
 own country. Nothing then is more obvious than 
 X 2 
 
164 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 Resemblance of many kinds, but others are more 
 hidden, and to discover these is the office of Fancy. 
 Moreover the perception of Resemblance is always 
 pleasing, and on that account w^e sooner detect, and 
 dwell longer upon it than on Difference, which of 
 itself has nothing agreeable but rather the contrary, 
 and is interesting only from the results. The detec- 
 tion of differences is often a laborious and painful 
 operation, but resemblance strikes at once and 
 suggests itself rather than is sought. 
 
 Though Resemblance be in general agi-eeable, 
 yet Custom deadens the charm : and in order to feel 
 keenly, the similitude must be new and unexpected. 
 But pleasing Similes are of different kinds, they may 
 be Beautiful, Sublime or Ludicrous ; and Fancy 
 varies accordingly, and is poetical, eloquent, or 
 witty. 
 
 As there are two kinds of ludicrous Blunders, 
 the verbal and the real, so are there two kinds of 
 Wit, the one depending partly on words, the other 
 on ideas alone ; the former consequently untrans- 
 latable, the latter capable of being turned into any 
 language without destroying the effect. 
 
 To some, nothing appears more contemptible 
 than verbal wit or puns, probably on account of the 
 facility ; but they have not been despised even by 
 our best authors, particularly by Shakspeare and 
 Swift. Shakspeare abounds in verbal and sometimes 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 165 
 
 indulges even in literal wit. As a specimen of the 
 latter take the following : 
 
 Holof ernes. Sir Nathaniel, will you hear an extemporal epitaph 
 on the death of the deer ; and to humour the ignorant I have called 
 the deer the princess kill'd, a pricket. 
 
 Nathaniel. Perge, good master Holofernes, perge, so it shall 
 please you to abrogate scurrility. 
 
 Hoi. I will something affect the letter : for it argues facility. 
 The praiseful princess pierced and pricked 
 
 A pretty pleasing pricket ;* 
 Some say a sore ; but not a sore till 
 
 Now made sore with shooting. 
 The dogs did yell ; put L to sore, then sorel 
 
 Jumps from thicket ; 
 Or pricket, sore, or else sorel ; the people 
 
 Fall a hooting. 
 If sore be sore, then L to sore makes fifty sores; 
 
 O sore L ; 
 Of one sore I an hundred make, by adding 
 
 But one more L. 
 
 Nath. A rare talent ! 
 
 Dull. If a talent be a claw, look how he claws him. with a 
 talent, f 
 
 We may take another specimen of punning, (in 
 this case upon words), from the same play. 
 
 Rosaline. Madam, came nothing more along with that ? 
 
 Princess. Nothing but this ? Yes, as much love in rhyme 
 As could be cramm'd up in a sheet of paper. 
 Writ on both side the leaf, margent and all ; 
 That he was fain to seal on Cupid's name. 
 
 Ros. That was the way to make his Godhead wax, | 
 For he hath been five thousand years a boy. 
 
 Katherine. Ay, and a shrewd unhappy gallows too. 
 
 * Pricket, sore, sorel, are all names for a deer at particular ages, 
 f Love's Labour Lost: Act iv, Scene 2. % Grow. 
 
166 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 Mos. You'll ne'er be friends with him, he kill'd your sister. 
 
 Kath. He made her melancholy, sad, and heavy ; 
 
 And so she died ; had she been light, like you. 
 Of such a merry, nimble, stirring spirit, 
 She might have been a gradam ere she died ; 
 And so may you ; for a light heart lives long. 
 
 Ros. What's your dark meaning, mouse, of this light word ? 
 
 Kath. A hght condition in a beauty dark. 
 
 Ros. We need more light to find your meaning out. 
 
 Kath. You'll mar the light by taking it in snuff,* 
 Therefore, I'll darkly end the argument. 
 
 Ros. Look, what you do, you do it still i' the dark. 
 
 Kath. So do not you ; for you are a light wench. 
 
 Ros. Indeed, I weigh not you ; and therefore light. 
 
 Kath. You weigh me not ; O, that's you care not for me. 
 
 Ros. Great reason ; for past cure is still past care.f 
 
 Now in these and other instances of punning, 
 wherein consists the wit, such as it is, and what is 
 the cause of the Ludicrous Emotion *? By means of 
 the words Sore^ Sorely or sore L etc. two very 
 different, nay totally incongruous ideas are suggested 
 in immediate succession, by reason of Similarity or 
 Identity of Sound in the words expressing these 
 ideas, combined with such a turn of phrase as calls 
 up the two meanings alternately. Thus, at first 
 sore is a deer^ then not a sore in that sense, but a 
 hurt. Again sorel is a deer^ then not a deer, but 
 sore /, or sorel, and so a deer once more and the 
 same as sore, and L added to sore makes sore L, or 
 fifty sores or hurts^ or sorel a deer again, the same 
 
 * Snuff Anger. f Act v. Scene 2. 
 
THE LUDICBOUS EMOTION. 167 
 
 as sore, to which sore or sore L adding but one more 
 L we have sore L L, or a hundred sores or hurts. 
 How sore then must L be which can turn one sore 
 into an hundred. Truly, Shakspeare is supreme in 
 everything, even in quibbling. 
 
 We perceive by this example that the object of 
 the punster is to call up two utterly incongruous 
 ideas, by Similarity or Identity of sound in the 
 words or letters that express them, and by such a 
 turn of phrase as shall suggest each in turn. There 
 must then be Firsts Similarity of Sound; and 
 Secondly^ an extreme contrast in meaning. And 
 the nearer the sound, the more remote the meaning, 
 the better the pun. 
 
 Thus, in the above instance, the sounds of the 
 two words, sore, a deer, and sore, a hurt, of sorel 
 and sore L, are identical, and the opposition of 
 meaning is as great as possible ; therefore the wit is 
 good of its sort. But, in what follows, as the words 
 talent and talon are not quite the same in sound, the 
 pun is not so happy. 
 
 From this it follows that a pun may be defined 
 to be a double meaning, suggested by similarity of 
 sound in words, the two meanings being in striking 
 contrast. 
 
 We may now bring forward some instances of 
 wit not purely verbal, and therefore of a higher 
 order, and, in the opinion of some, alone worthy of 
 
168 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 the name. Wit of this kind displays a very fine 
 and rare exercise of the faculties, and is one of the 
 highest intellectual treats, whether in private society, 
 in books, or on the stage. Of comedy, in particular, 
 it is the very life and soul. 
 
 In all Sheridan's plays there are fine strokes of 
 wit ; but I shall here mention only one, taken from 
 his comic opera of the Duenna, where Isaac, the 
 Jew, on account of the undecided neutral state of 
 his faith, is compared to the blank leaf between the 
 Old and the New Testament. The same witty 
 author was famous for his sallies in private life. 
 One night, returning from a jovial party, reeling 
 along the streets, he was hailed by the watch : 
 Who goes there ^ Sheridan replied in a very grave 
 tone of Yoice—Wilberforce. Here the contrast 
 between the real and assumed character and con- 
 dition of the speaker is inimitably ludicrous. 
 
 Let us now take a passage from Shakspeare's 
 
 play of " Much ado about Nothing." 
 
 Beatrice. I wonder that you will still be talking, Signior 
 Benedick ; nobody marks you. 
 
 Benedick, What, my dear lady Disdain ! are you yet living ? 
 
 Beat. Is it possible disdain should die, while she hath such 
 meet food to feed it, as Signior Benedick ? Courtesy itself must 
 convert to disdain, if you come in her presence. 
 
 Bene. Then is courtesy a turn-coat : — But it is certain I am 
 lov'd of all ladies, only you excepted ; and I would I could find 
 in my heart that I had not a hard heart ; for truly I love none. 
 
 Beat. A dear happiness to women ; they would else have been 
 troubled with a pernicious suitor. I thank God and my cold blood 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 169 
 
 I am of your humour for that ; I had rather hear my dog bark at 
 a crow, than a man swear he loves me. 
 
 Bene. God keep your ladyship still in that mind ! so some 
 gentleman or other shall 'scape a predestinate scratched face. 
 
 Beat. Scratching would not make it worse an 'twere such a 
 face as yours were. 
 
 Bene. Well, you are a rare parrot teacher. 
 
 Beat A bird of my tongue is better than a beast of yours. 
 
 Bene. I would my horse had the speed of your tongue ; and 
 so good a continuer. But keep your way, o' God's name ; I have 
 done. 
 
 Beat. You always end with a jade's trick, I know you of old.* 
 
 In this dialogue all seems to be genuine wit, 
 except the last repartee, where there is a pun on the 
 word jade. 
 
 Congreve shall furnish us with the next specimen. 
 In the following dialogue, Trapland is a scrivener 
 and dun, who has been induced to take a glass with 
 his creditor. 
 
 Scandal. Here's a dog now, a traitor in his wine; siiTah, 
 refund the sack. Jeremy, fetch him some warm water, or I'll rip 
 lip his stomach, and go the shortest way to his conscience. 
 
 Trapland. Mr. Scandal, you are uncivil; I did not value 
 your sack; but you cannot expect it again, when I have 
 drank it. 
 
 Scandal. And how do you expect to have your money again 
 when a gentleman has spent it ? f 
 
 The following contains a very ludicrous blunder, 
 as well as wit. 
 
 * Act I, Scene 1. f Love for Love, Act I, Scene 7. 
 Y 
 
170 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 Tattle. I'll make thy fortune; say no more. Thou art a 
 pretty fellow, and canst cany a message to a lady in a pretty soft 
 kmd of phrase, and with a good persuading accent. 
 
 Jeremy. Sir, I have the seeds of Rhetoric and Oratory in my 
 head. I have been at Cambridge. 
 
 Tattle. Ay, 'tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an 
 university ; but the education is a little too pedantic for a gentle- 
 man. I hope you are secret in your nature, private, close, ha ? 
 
 Jeremy. O, Sir, for that. Sir, 'tis my chief talent ; I'm as 
 secret as the head of J^filus. 
 
 Tattle. Ay ? Who's he, tho' ? A Privy Councillor ? 
 
 Jeremy. O, Ignorance; {aside). A cunning Egyptian, Sir, 
 that with his arms would over-run the country, yet nobody could 
 ever find out his head quarters. 
 
 Tattle. Close dog ! * 
 
 There are many dialogues very lively and spark- 
 ling, which no doubt are witty, though the wit be 
 less decided than in the above instances. Such is 
 the following : 
 
 Leonato. Well niece, I hope to see you one day fitted with a 
 husband. 
 
 Beatrice. Not till God make men of some other metal than 
 earth. Would it not grieve a woman to be over-mastered with a 
 piece of valient dust ? To make an account of her hfe to a clod 
 of wayward marl ? No, uncle, I'll none. Adam's sons are my 
 brethren ; and, truly, I hold it a sin to match in my kindred. 
 
 Leon. Daughter, remember what I told you, if the prince do 
 solicit you in that kind, you know your answer. 
 
 Beat. The fault will be in the music, cousin, if you be not 
 woo'd in good time ; if the prince be too important,f tell him, there 
 is measure in everything, and so dance out the answer. For, hear 
 me. Hero ; wooing, wedding and repenting, is as a Scotch jig, a mea- 
 sure, and a cinque-pace : the first suit is hot and hasty, like a Scotch 
 jig, and full as fantastical; the wedding mannerly-modest, as a 
 
 * Love for Love : Act v. Scene 3. f Importunate. 
 
THE LUDICROUS E^pTION. 171 
 
 measure, full of state and ancientry ; and then comes repentance, 
 and with his bad legs, falls into the cinque-pace faster and faster, 
 till he sinks into his grave. 
 
 Leon. Cousin, you apprehend passing shrewdly. 
 
 Beat. I have a good eye, uncle ; I can see a church by day- 
 light* 
 
 As another specimen of this sort of dialogue, 
 take the following scene from Congreve. 
 
 Bellmour. How now George, where hast thou been snarling 
 odious truths, and entertaining company like a physician with dis- 
 course of their diseases and infirmities ? What fine lady hast thou 
 been putting out of conceit with herself, and persuading that the 
 face she had been making all the morning was none of her own ? 
 for I know thou art as unmannerly and as unwelcome to a woman 
 as a looking-glass after the small-pox. 
 
 Heartivell. I confess I have not been sneering fulsome lies and 
 
 nauseous flattery, fawning upon a little tawdry , that will fawn 
 
 upon me again, and entertain any puppy that comes, like a tumbler, 
 with the same tricks over and over ; for such, I guess, may have 
 been your late employment. 
 
 Bellmour. Would thou hadst come a little sooner ; Vainlove 
 would have wrought thy conversion, and been a champion for the 
 cause. 
 
 Heartwell. What, has he been here ? That's one of Love's 
 April fools ; is always upon some errand that's to no purpose ; ever 
 embarking in adventures, yet never comes to harbour. 
 
 Sharper. That's because he always sets out in foul weather, 
 loves to buffet with the winds, meet the tide, and sail in the teeth 
 of opposition. 
 
 Heartwell. What, has he not dropt anchor at Araminta? 
 
 Bellmour. Truth on't is she fits his temper best ; is a kind of 
 floating island ; sometimes seems in reach, then vanishes, and keeps 
 him busied in the search. 
 
 Sharper. She had need of a good share of sense to manage so 
 capricious a lover. 
 
 * Much ado about Nothing: Act II, Scene 1. 
 Y 2 
 
172 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 Bellmour. Faith I don't know ; he's of a temper the most 
 easy to himself in the world ; he takes as much always of an amour 
 as he cares for, and quits it when it grows stale and unpleasant. 
 
 Sharper. An argument of very little passion, very good un- 
 derstanding, and very ill-nature. 
 
 Heartwell. And proves that Vainlove plays the fool with 
 discretion.* 
 
 Let us now examine some of these instances of 
 wit, in order to discover wherein consists their 
 ludicrous effect. 
 
 Taking the first in order, we perceive that a 
 certain resemblance, not a mere resemblance in 
 sound, is struck out between two things, otherwise 
 as different as can be imagined, between a man, 
 Isaac, and a leaf of paper. 
 
 There is an analogy, a far-fetched one, no doubt ; 
 but still there is an analogy between the neutral 
 religious state of the one, and the blank leaf which 
 divides the Old and the New Testament ; while in 
 other respects the contrast is extreme. And the test 
 that the analogy is real, not verbal, lies in this, that 
 the sentence may be translated into any language 
 without destroying the wit : II est comme lefeuillet 
 hlanc qui separe VAncien du Nouveau Testament ; 
 which is as witty as the English. In the next 
 instance, the grave tone of voice with which the 
 word Wilherforce was pronounced harmonized well 
 with the serious temper of that benevolent man; 
 
 * The Old Bachelor; Act I, Scene 4. 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 173 
 
 while the contrast between the general character 
 and actual state of him and Sheridan was as great 
 as possible. This is an instance of what is properly 
 called humour, where the effect is produced, not so 
 much by the words themselves, as by the tone and 
 manner in which they are pronounced, The co- 
 median Liston was one of the most humourous men 
 that ever lived, and he could throw his audience into 
 fits of laughter by his gestures and the expression 
 of his countenance, without speaking a word. 
 
 Much of the wit in the first dialogue, from 
 " Much ado about Nothing," quoted above, consists 
 in that particular variety which is properly called 
 Repartee ; where the words of the last speaker are 
 taken up by him who follows, and applied in a way 
 totally different from what the former intended. 
 A deduction is drawn from them which he never 
 thought of, and retorted upon him as the natural 
 inference from his own words. There is required for 
 repartee a great quickness of intellect, to discover in 
 a moment some point in the previous speech from 
 which a conclusion may be drawn, utterly at variance 
 with what was expected, and which may tell against 
 the first speaker. The contrast, then, is great, be- 
 tween the obvious meaning of the words of the first 
 speaker, and what is deduced from them by the 
 second ; the retort is unexpected, and causes sur- 
 prise ; but there is no formal comparison, as in 
 
174 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 other cases of wit. When, however, Beatrice says, 
 " Courtesy itself must convert to disdain, if you come 
 in her presence," and Benedick answers, " Then is 
 courtesy a turn-coat," there is struck out a fanciful 
 analogy between two things very different. 
 
 In the very witty answer of Scandal to Trapland, 
 "and how do you expect to have your money again, 
 when a gentleman has spent if?" there is a far- 
 fetched analogy struck out between the case of a 
 man who has taken in liquor, and that of another 
 who has received money, and an inference is drawn 
 from this analogy and retorted upon the first speaker; 
 though in reality the contrast between the cases is 
 as great as possible. 
 
 In the second dialogue from Congreve there is 
 wit in the sally of Tattle, ''Ay, 'tis well enough 
 for a servant to be bred at an University : but the 
 education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman" ; 
 and the wit consists in discovering some point from 
 which a conclusion may be drawn diametrically 
 opposite to what it ought to be; though in the 
 person of Tattle it is rather a ludicrous blunder than 
 wit. The Blunder about Nilus is irresistibly 
 ludicrous; "Who's he'? a Privy Councillor*? and 
 the answer of Jeremy " A cunning -Egyptian, Sir, 
 that with his arms would over-run the country, yet 
 nobody could ever find out his head-quarters," is 
 pointed and smart, but not of the highest degree of 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 175 
 
 wit ; because the simile is too true, the contrast not 
 sufficient. But the rejoinder of Tattle, who takes 
 the words literally, is inimitable; "close dog!" 
 This observation applies generally to the instances 
 which follow, which we have brought forward as 
 lively and sparkling, rather than highly witty. 
 Thus in the dialogue between Beatrice, Leonato, and 
 Hero, where Beatrice compares wooing, wedding, 
 and repenting, to a Scotch jig, a measure, and a 
 cinque-pace, the comparison is lively, amusing, and 
 no doubt ludicrous, but not vert/ ludicrous, because 
 it is too near the truth. The sally, " No, uncle, I'll 
 none : Adam's sons are my brethren ; and truly, 
 I hold it a sin to match in my kindred," has more 
 contrast and more wit. 
 
 In the dialogue from Congreve's Old Bachelor, 
 where Bellmour says to Heartwell " thou art as 
 unmannerly and as unwelcome to a woman as a 
 looking-glass after the small pox," the simile is 
 sparkling and good, only too good to be eminently 
 witty. The like may be said of the rest of this 
 dialogue, which is clever and lively rather than very 
 ludicrous. The best hits are where Vainlove is 
 called one of Love's April fools; and where 
 Araminta is compared to a floating island, which 
 sometimes seems in reach, then vanishes and keeps 
 the pursuer busy. 
 
 From the above instances of wit, and the ex- 
 
176 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 amination of them, it appears that the art of the 
 humourist consists in finding some similarity, or 
 point of contact, between ideas widely different, so 
 that the one shall seem naturally to suggest the 
 other. In verbal wit or puns, the similarity is one 
 of sound only between the words ; but in real wit, 
 the ideas themselves, how different soever they may 
 be, are brought into contact in some one point. In 
 puns, the nearer the similarity of sound the better, 
 for thus the one word the more readily suggests the 
 other, having a totally different meaning ; but in 
 real wit, the analogy being of idea, must not be 
 close, otherwise the ludicrous effect is impaired and 
 destroyed, and instead of a witty, we have an 
 instructive, perhaps a beautiful simile. In wit, then, 
 the only use of the fanciful analogy or simile, is to 
 enable us to perceive the real contrast, w^hich, as in 
 other cases, is the true source of the ludicrous 
 emotion. Though in the beautiful and sublime 
 similes which we meet with in serious prose or 
 poetry, the objects compared may in reality be very 
 different, yet the resemblance must be sufficient to 
 induce us to dwell upon it, and not upon the 
 difference. When this is not the effect of the simile, 
 when we pass over the resemblance and fix our 
 minds upon the contrast, then the ludicrous emotion 
 arises, whether it were intended or not. Sublime 
 similes fail more frequently than those which are 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 177 
 
 less ambitious, because contrast, to a certain extent, 
 is sublime, but carried a little further, ludicrous. In 
 that famous instance of the bathos^ 
 
 And thou Dalhousie, thou great God of war ! 
 Lieutenant Colonel to the Earl of Mar : 
 
 the author sets out in the sublime strain, but im- 
 mediately falls into the ludicrous, from the excessive 
 absurdity of making a God out of a Lieutenant 
 Colonel. 
 
 Some similes there are of an ambiguous nature ; 
 we hardly know whether to find them beautiful or 
 ludicrous, because the mind vacillates between the 
 resemblance and the difference. Of this nature, I 
 conceive, is that simile of Wordsworth, where he 
 says of some one. 
 
 As lonely he stood as a crow on the sands ; 
 
 In that kind of Wit, called Repartee, of which an 
 example has been given above, no simile at all is 
 expressed, but the words of the first speaker are 
 taken up by the second, and a new and unexpected 
 inference deduced from them, not altogether without 
 a shadow of reason. Thus, when Benedick says, 
 " But it is certain I am loved of all ladies, only you 
 excepted : and I would I could find in my heart 
 that I had not a hard heart ; for truly I love none :" 
 and Beatrice answers " A dear happiness to woman; 
 they would else have been troubled with a pernicious 
 
178 DISSERTATION ON 
 
 suitor ;" the answer, it is clear, is quite unlocked for, 
 though it follows naturally enough from the speech 
 of Benedick. Here it cannot be said that there is 
 any simile, only a point of contact, some common 
 ground, whereby the repartee is connected with the 
 first speech. This point of contact is found in the 
 words of Benedick " I love none," on which cir- 
 cumstance he was inclined rather to pride himself ; 
 but Beatrice deduced from it " A dear happiness to 
 woman, etc." 
 
 As then there may be true wit without any 
 proper simile at all, and as, when a resemblance is 
 struck out, it must be far-fetched, otherwise wit is 
 destroyed ; it follows that the simile is useful only 
 by bringing into comparison things highly contrasted. 
 Whenever things so contrasted are brought together, 
 no matter in what way, so as to allow the contrast 
 to be felt^ then a ludicrous effect is produced. The 
 pleasure derived from Resemblance alone is never 
 of a ludicrous nature, but is allied to Beauty, to 
 Sublimity, or to the gratification derived from the 
 Intellect, when, by an analogy, some light is thrown 
 upon a difficult subject. If the comparison be new, 
 its beauty or truth strikes us much more, and gives 
 us more delight; for novelty has a great power; 
 but so long as we dwell on the Resemblance alone, 
 however new and unexpected, surprise never ends 
 in laughter. But where the Resemblance is passed 
 
THE LUDICROUS EMOTION. 179 
 
 over as insignificant, and our mind rests upon the 
 Contrast, the ludicrous emotion is felt. In truth 
 there is no contrast without some similarity ; for, 
 when things are very different, we never compare 
 them, and never think of the difference. We never 
 compare a house with a tree, a quadruped with a 
 reptile, or even one quadruped with another of a 
 different species. A small poodle does not seem 
 smaller beside a tall horse, but beside a Newfound- 
 land dog it appears very diminutive ; though, after 
 all, the Newfoundland be less than a little pony. 
 Thus, wit, by striking out a similarity between 
 objects, forces us to compare them, and then we are 
 struck with the contrast. 
 
 The object then of Wit and Humour, as well as 
 of Practical Jokes, is to bring together the most 
 incongruous ideas or events, so as to allow the 
 incongruity to be felt ; and the same combination is 
 often produced unintentionally by casual incidents 
 and blunders in speech. The effect of all is to rouse 
 the ludicrous emotion and produce laughter. 
 
 We have thus examined the various apparent 
 sources from which the emotion is derived, and 
 amidst all this variety we have found one constant 
 phenomenon, violent and unexpected contrast. , 
 Relying on so copious an Induction, We may there- 
 fore safely conclude, that Novelty and Excessive 
 Contrast are the real sources of the Ludicrous 
 En>otion. 
 
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