grandeur and magnificence, it recedes from loveliness.

66

Soft,

As the eye borrows many of its sensations from the touch, so that again seems to borrow others from the sight. fresh, and beautiful colours, though not sensible to feeling as to sight," give us an inclination to try their effect on the touch; whereas, if the colour be not beautiful, that inclination, I believe, is always diminished; and, in objects merely picturesque, and void of all beauty, is rarely excited *.

It has been observed in a former part, that symmetry, which perfectly accords with the beautiful, is in the same degree adverse to the picturesque; and this circumstance forms a strongly marked distinction between the

* I have read, indeed, in some fairy tale, of a country, where age and wrinkles were loved and caressed, and youth and freshness neglected; but in real life, I fancy, the most picturesque old woman, however her admirer may ogle her on that account, is perfectly safe from his

caresses.

F4

two characters. The general symmetry which prevails in the forms of animals is obvious; but as no precise standard of it in each species has been made or acknowledged, any slight deviation from what is most usual is scarcely attended to; in the human form, however, from our being more nearly interested in all that belongs to it, symmetry has been more accurately defined; and as far as human observation and selection can fix a standard for beauty, it has been fixed by the Grecian sculptors, That standard is acknowledged in all the most civilized parts of Europe: a near approach to it, makes the person to be called regularly beautiful; a departure from it, whatever striking and attractive peculiarity it may bestow, is still a departure from that perfection of ideal beauty, so diligently sought after, and so nearly attained by those great artists, from the few precious remains of whose works, we have gained some idea of the refined art which raised them to such high eminence; for by

their means we have learned to distinguish what is most exquisite and perfect, from the more ordinary degrees of excellence.

There are several expressions in the language of a neighbouring people of lively imagination, and distinguished for their gallantry and attention to the other sex, which seem to imply an uncertain idea of some character, which was not precisely beauty, but which, from whatever causes, produced striking and pleasing effects such are une physionomie de fantaisie, and the well known expression of un certain je ne sais quoi; it is also common to say of a woman-que sans être belle elle est piquante-a word, by the bye, that in many points answers very exactly to picturesque. The amusing history of Roxalana and the Sultan, is also the history of the piquant, which is fully exemplified in her person and her manners: Marmontel certainly did not intend to give the petit nez retroussé as a beautiful feature;

but to shew how much such a striking irregularity might accord and co-operate, with the same sort of irregularity in the character of the mind. The playful, unequal, coquetish Roxalana, full of sudden turns and caprices, is opposed to the beautiful, tender, and constant Elvira ; and the effects of irritation, to those of softness and languor: the tendency of the qualities of beauty alone towards monotony, are no less happily insinuated.

Although there are no generally received standards with respect to animals, yet those who have been in the habit of breeding them and of attending to their forms, have fixed to themselves certain standards of perfection. Mr. Bakewell, like Phidias or Apelles, had probably formed in his mind an idea of perfection beyond what he had seen in nature; and which, like them, though by a different process, he was constantly endeavouring to imbody. It may be said, that this perfection relates only to their disposition to produce fat upon the most profitable parts;

a very grazier-like, and material idea of beauty it must fairly be owned: but still, if a standard of shape (from whatever cause) be acknowledged, and called beautiful, any departure from that settled correspondence and symmetry of parts, will certainly, within that jurisdiction, be considered as an irregularity in the form, and a consequent departure from beauty, however striking the object may be in its general appearance. More marked and sudden deviations from the general symmetry of animals, whether arising from particular conformation, from accident, or from the effects of age or disease, often very strongly attract the painter's notice, and are recorded by him; but they never can be thought to make the object more beautiful: many of these would, on the contrary, by most men be called deformities, and not without reason. I shall hereafter have occasion to shew the connection, as well as the distinction that subsists between deformity and picturesqueness.

5