says Guibert in his Essay on Tactics, "which may be improved, but which is not to be acquired by practice. It is an intuitive faculty, and the gift of Nature; a gift which she bestows only on a few favorites in the course of an age. The same author, however, elsewhere qualifies these very strong assertions, by remarking, that the principal means by which a military man acquires it, is daily practice in his youth; constantly keeping in view its culture and improvement, not only when actually employed in the field, but while amusing himself with a journey or with a hunting expedition, in times of peace. In confirmation of this, he refers to the studies and exercises by which Philopomen (who has been always peculiarly celebrated for this talent) prepared himself for the duties of his profession; and certainly no example could have been referred to, fitter to illustrate the comment, or more directly in opposition to the general maxim. The account given of these studies, by Livy, is so circumstantial and interesting, that I shall make no apology for transcribing it at length; more especially, as it affords a moral lesson, equally applicable to all the various pursuits of mankind.

"Erat autem Philopomen præcipuæ in ducendo agmine locisque capiendis solertiæ atque usûs; nec belli tantum temporibus, sed etiam in pace, ad id maxime animum exercuerat. Ubi iter quopiam faceret, et ad difficilem transitu saltum venisset, contemplatus ab omni parte loci naturam, quum solus erat, secum ipse agitabat animo; quum comites haberet, ab iis quærebat, 'Si hostis eo loco apparuisset, quid, si a fronte, quid, si ab latere hoc aut illo, quid si a tergo adoriretur, capiendum consilii foret? Posse instructos rectâ acie, posse inconditum agmen, et tantummodo aptum viæ, occurrere. Quem locum ipse capturus esset,' cogitando aut quærendo, exsequebatur; aut quot armatis, aut quo genere armorum usurus: quo impedimenta, quo sarcinas, quo turbam inermem rejiceret: quanto ea, aut quali, præsidio custodiret; et utrum pergere, quâ cœpisset ire viâ, an eam, quâ venisset, repetere melius esset: castris quoque quem locum caperet, quantum munimento amplecteretur loci, quâ opportunà aquatio, quâ pabuli lignorumque co

pia esset; quâ postero die castra movendi tutum maximè iter, quæ forma agminis foret.' His curis cogitationibusque," the historian adds, "ita ab ineunte ætate animum agitaverat, ut nulla ei nova in tali re cogitatio esset."

The assertion of Guibert, which led me to introduce the foregoing quotation, may perhaps appear to some too extravagant to merit any notice in the present state of science; but it is not more than a century ago, since the common ideas even of speculative men, concerning the talent to which it relates, were as vague and erroneous as they are at present, with respect to the general theory of our intellectual habits. Accordingly, we find that Folard, in his essay on the coup d'œil militaire, labors to correct the prejudices of those who considered a military eye as a gift of nature, as strenuously as Mr. Burke, Sir J. Reynolds, Dr. Gerard, and Mr. Alison have combated in our own times, the prevailing doctrines which class Taste among the simple and original faculties which belong to our species.*

An accurate examination and analysis of our various acquired powers of judgment and intellectual exertion, as they are exemplified in the different walks of life, would, if I am not mistaken, open some prospects of the mind, equally new and interesting. At present, however, I propose to confine myself to the power of Taste; partly on account of its close connexion with the train of thinking which I have pursued in the two preceding Essays; and partly of its extensive influence in a cultivated society, both on the happiness of individuals and on the general state of manners. My speculations concerning some other powers of the understanding, which I consider as entirely analogous in their origin, will find a place in the sequel of my work on the Human Mind; if I should live to execute that part of my plan, which relates to the varieties of genius, and of intellectual character.

It was with a reference to the Power which I am now to examine, and to the doctrine with respect to it, which

* See note (Nn.)

I wish at present to establish, that I was led, many years ago, (in treating of those rapid processes of thought, which it is sometimes of importance to bring to light by patient investigation) to take notice of the peculiar difficulty of arresting and detecting our fleeting ideas, in cases where they lead to any interesting conclusion, or excite any pleasant emotion.

The fact seems to be (as I have observed on the same occasion) that "the mind, when once it has felt the pleasure, has little inclination to retrace the steps by which it arrived at it." It is owing to this, that Taste has been so generally ranked among our original faculties; and that so little attention has hitherto been given to the process by which it is formed. Dr. Gerard and Mr. Alison, indeed, have analyzed, with great ingenuity and success, the most important elements which enter into its composition, as it exists in a well-informed and cultivated mind; and some very valuable observations on the same subject may be collected from Montesquieu, Voltaire, and D'Alembert: but it did not fall under the design of any of these writers to trace the growth of Taste from its first seeds in the constitution of our nature; or to illustrate the analogy which it exhibits, in some of the intellectual processes connected with it, to what takes place in various other acquired endowments of the understanding. It is in this point of view, that I propose to consider it in this essay;-a point of view, in which I am sensible the subject by no means presents the same pleasing and inviting aspect, as when examined in its connexion with the rules of philosophical criticism; but in which it is reasonable to expect, that it may afford some new illustrations of the theory of the human mind. The two inquiries, it is obvious, are widely different from each other; resembling somewhat, in their mutual relation, that which exists between Berkeley's analysis of the process by which children learn to judge of distances and magnitudes, and the researches of the Optician concerning the defects to which vision is liable, and the means by which art is enabled to enlarge the sphere of its perceptions.

Different, however, as these inquiries are in their aim,

they may perhaps be found to reflect light on each other, in the course of our progress; and, indeed, I should distrust the justness of my own opinions, were they to lead me to any conclusions materially different from those which have been sanctioned by so many and so high authorities.

1

CHAPTER SECOND.

GRADUAL PROGRESS BY WHICH TASTE IS FORMED.

I HAVE already said, that, notwithstanding the attempts which a few philosophers have made to ascertain the nature of Taste, the prevailing notions concerning it are far from being correct or definite. Of this, no doubt can be entertained by those who have observed the manner in which it is classed by some of the latest writers on the human mind, in their analysis of our intellectual faculties; or who recollect the definitions given of it, in our most popular books of criticism. It is sufficient for me to mention that of Dr. Blair, according to which its characteristical quality is said to consist in "a power of receiving pleasure from the beauties of nature and of art." From the following lines, too, it would appear that the idea of it entertained by Akenside was nearly the same:

"What then is Taste, but these internal powers,

Active and strong, and feelingly alive

To each fine impulse?"

It is in consequence of this gift that we are supposed to be susceptible of the pleasures resulting from a poem, a picture, a landscape, a well-proportioned building, a regular set of features; and it is to those individuals who possess it, that Nature is understood to have confined exclusively the right of pronouncing judgment in the fine arts, and even on the beauties of her own productions.

If these ideas be just, it evidently follows, that the degree of our taste is proportioned to the degree of pleasure we are fitted to receive from its appropriate objects. The fact, however, is certainly different. Many, whose taste is indisputably good, contemplate with little interest what they acknowledge to be beautiful; while others, in whom the slightest pretension to taste would be justly treated with ridicule, are affected, on the same occasion, with rapture and enthusiam. Nor are the