SECT. II.

the consciousness of integrity and justice, or the most painful PART II. and distressing reflections in the consciousness of wickednefs, de- CHAP. I. bafement, and folly. Complacency and peace of confcience are expreffions of the one; fhame, remorse, and despair, are expreffions of the other.

The fool may enjoy his folly, and the madman may enjoy his frenzy; but no one will congratulate the perfons who are so affected with pleasure. The enjoyments of human nature require the warrants of reason and truth; and no perfon, in his fenfes, can be reconciled to a ftate, in which he knows his own character to be marked with deformity, meannefs, or vice, nor think that he can be truly happy, in the absence of every good quality which can be required to adorn or perfect his nature.

The foundations of a pleasure, fo effential to happiness, merit a feparate confideration in the following fections.

SECTION

SECTION III.

Of Beauty and Deformity, Excellence and Defect.

PART II.

СНАР. І.

IN the rational nature of man, there are principles which do not SECT. III. terminate merely in fenfibility to pleasure and pain, or in mere active exertions; but confift in a kind of cenforial inspection, over the general tenor of enjoyments and actions; ferving to distinguish, among pleasures, the elegant and beautiful from the inelegant and deformed; and, among specimens of existence, the perfect or excellent, from the defective or imperfect. Such is the discriminating power of intelligence, by which the qualities of things are estimated; by which unequal measures of worth are conceived, and the gradations of excellence affigned in the scale of being.

In the exercise of these reflex and cenforial powers, there is great enjoyment and fuffering, according as the objects of them are happily or miserably distributed to ourselves or others. Difguft, indignation, remorse, and shame, are among the pains of

which they render us fufceptible; delight, efteem, approbation, PART II. confidence, love, and peace of mind and of confcience, are among their CHAP. I. gratifications, or happy effects.

In the difcernment of external objects, there arifes a fentiment, which may be expreffed in terms of praise or blame, of estimation or contempt; and which frequently conftitutes, or fenfibly modifies, the general affection of the mind, in refpect to the diftinction of good and evil; for, as good is pleasant, so, also in many instances, is it estimable: As evil is painful, fo alfo is it, in many instances, vile and contemptible.

Of these sentiments, the specific occafions or objects are termed beauty and deformity, excellence and defect.

To perceive beauty or excellence, is to admire or esteem: And, least these expreffions, which are applicable to fubjects of the highest nature, fhould appear too strong, when applied to matters of inferior confideration, in which fome degree of beauty nevertheless may be admitted; let it be remembered, that it is the species of fentiment, not any measure of the emotion, or degree of merit in its object, which we are now about to confider.

Admiration and efteem, like benevolence and love, are agreeable fentiments; fo much, that, to admire or esteem and to be pleased with an object, are expreffions often mutually substituted one for the other.

We are pleased with beauty and excellence; we are displeased with deformity and defect: But all that pleases is not beautiful or excellent; nor all that displeases, deformed or defective. We

know

SECT. III.

CHAP. I.
SECT. III.

PART I know not, however, frequently, how otherwife to express the pleasure we take in any subject, than by pronouncing it excellent or beautiful; nor how to exprefs the displeasure we feel, otherwise than by pronouncing the cause of it, ugly or defective. The wonderful organ of human language does not always ferve the purpose of discrimination, even where it is of the most real importance to state the fubjects of confideration apart.

We may, nevertheless, endeavour, in this place, to confider beauty and excellence, as distinguishable from other causes of pleasure, by the specific accompanyment of esteem or preference, to which, even if no one should admire, we conceive the object entitled; and to confider deformity and defect as distinguishable from other causes of pain by a peculiar fentiment of disapprobation or contempt; of which we conceive them to be proper objects, even if the world should not perceive the defect or the deformity.

These specific sentiments, differing either in respect to the occafion on which they arise, or the degrees of intensity with which they are felt, have, in every language, a variety of appellations or names. In our language, approbation and disapprobation, esteem or admiration, opposed to indifference, difguft, or contempt, make a part of the terms by which we exprefs them.

The ingenious author of some Essays on the Nature and Principles of Tafte, has observed, that material subjects give sensation and perception of reality; but no emotion or fentiment of beauty or deformity, except fo far as they are affociated with fome object of affection, whether character or disposition of mind; chearfulness or melancholy, wisdom, goodness, or power,

Mr Alifon,

CHAP. I.

SECT. III.

If a subject please, in confequence of its being affociated with PART II. fome object of esteem, the delight it affords is properly enough claffed with the species of fentiment which we are now considering; but if it be associated only with utility, fafety, or joy, it may please in confequence of this affociation: But the compound fo made up is not any more a subject of admiration or esteem, than is the pleasurable circumstance by which it is recommended.

Attempts have been made to refolve this principle of esteem or admiration into fome of the other principles or forms of proceeding, equally familiar in the operations of the human mind; and confequently, to account for the use of these terms, without the neceffity of fuppofing that there is in nature any distinction of excellence, or in us any distinctive faculty by which it is known. And it should follow, from any theory of this fort, that, in reality, we mistake for esteem fome other operation or affection of mind: but, in fuch substitutions of one species of affection for another, it does not appear that any advantage is gained. We neither can refolve the sentiment of admiration or esteem into any thing better known than itself, nor the good qualities of mind, into any thing that, being more in our power, may fhew us a readier way to the improvement of our nature.

We fhall, therefore, be contented with giving to the fentiments which beauty or excellence occafions, fome one of their ordinary names of preference, whether delight, approbation, or esteem. The fubjects of beauty and excellence themselves, in the mean time,

VOL. II.

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