himself; but I am prevented by its length from quoting it here. I cannot, however, deny myself the pleasure of transcribing a few unconnected sentences:

"Jamais personne n'a parlé de Dieu avec tant de dignité. La Divinité est dans ses discours comme dans l'univers, remuant tout, agitant tout.-Dans son éloquence sublime, il se place entre Dieu et l'homme, il s'adresse à eux tour-à-tour. Qui mieux que lui, a parlé de la vie, de la mort, de l'éternité, du tems? Ces idées par elles-mêmes inspirent à l'imagination une espèce de terreur, qui n'est pas loin du sublime. . . . A travers une foule de sentimens qui l'entrainent, Bossuet ne fait que prononcer de temps en temps des mots; et ces mots alors font frissonner, comme les cris interrompus que le voyageur entend quelquefois pendant la nuit, dans le silence des forêts, et qui l'avertissent d'un danger qu'il ne connoit pas. . . . Mais ce qui le distingue le plus, c'est l'impétuosité de ses mouvements, c'est son âme qui se mêle à tout. Il semble que du sommet d'un lieu élevé, il découvre des grands évènemens qui se passent sous ses yeux, et qu'il les raconte à des hommes qui sont en bas."

NOTE OO, (p. 336.)--Essay III. chap. 1.—Coup d'Œil Militaire.

In his argument concerning the Coup d'Eil Militaire, Folard rests his opinion, not on any general philosophical considerations, but on the results which his good sense suggested to him from the records of military history, and from his own personal observation and experience. The following short quotation will confirm what I have stated in the text, concerning the universality of the prejudice there mentioned, at the period when he wrote; a circumstance which, when contrasted with the glaring absurdity which it now presents to the most superficial inquirers, may be regarded as good evidence of the progress which the theory of the human mind has made during the course of the last century.

"C'est le sentiment général que le coup d'œil ne dépend pas de nous, que c'est un présent de la nature, que les campagnes ne le donnent point, et qu'en un mot il faut l'apporter en naissant, sans quoi les yeux du monde les plus perçans ne voyent goutte et marchent dans les tenèbres les plus épaisses. On se trompe; nous avons tous le coup d'œil selon la portion d'esprit et de bon sens qu'il a plu à la providence de nous départir. Il naît de l'un et de l'autre, mais l'acquis l'affine et le perfectionne, et l'expérience nous l'assure.”

...." Philopomen avoit un coup d'œil admirable. On ne doit pas le considérer en lui comme un présent de la nature, mais comme le fruit de l'étude, de l'application, et de son extrême passion pour la guerre. Plutarque nous apprend la méthode dont il se servit pour voir de tout autres yeux que de ceux des autres pour la conduite des armées," &c. &c. &c.

NOTE PP, (p. 347.)-Essay III. chap. 2.-Tact.

"Ceux qui passent leur vie dans la société la plus étendue sont bien bornés, s'ils ne prennent pas facilement un tact fin et délicat, et s'ils n'acquièrent pas la connoissance du cœur humain."-Les deux Réputations. Conte moral, par Madame de Sillery.

Quintilian seems to employ the phrase sensus communis in the same acceptation

nearly with the French word tact. "Sensum ipsum, qui communis dicitur, ubi discet, cum se a congressu, qui non hominibus solum, sed multis quoque animalibus naturalis est, segregarit ?"

On which passage Turnebus remarks: "Per sensum communem, intelligit peritiam quandam et experientiam, quæ ex hominum congressu sensim colligitur, appellaturque a Cicerone Communis Prudentia."

D'Alembert occasionally uses tact to denote one of the qualities of Taste;-that peculiar delicacy of perception, which (like the nice touch of a blind man) arises from habits of close attention to those slighter feelings which escape general notice; a quality which is very commonly confounded (sometimes by D'Alembert himself) with that sensibility to beauty, which is measured by the degree of pleasure communicated to the observer. It appears to me, at the same time, to be probable, that when he thus employed the word, he had an eye chiefly to those questions concerning taste, which (as I before said) fall under the province of the connoisseur. No person, I apprehend, would use tact to express a quick perception of the beauty of a fine prospect-nor does it seem to be often or very correctly applied to a quick and lively perception of the beauties of writing. "On peut, ce me semble, d'après ces réflexions, répondre en deux mots à la question souvent agitée, si le sentiment est préférable à la discussion, pour juger un ouvrage de goût. L'impression est le juge naturel du premier moment, la discussion l'est du second. Dans les personnes qui joignent à la finesse et à la promptitude du tact la netteté et la justesse de l'esprit, le second juge ne fera pour l'ordinaire que confirmer les arrêts rendus par le premier,"* &c. &c.

NOTE QQ, (p. 358,) Essay III. chap. 3.-The Beautiful and St. Augustine.

In the article Beau of the French Encyclopédie, mention is made of a treatise on the beautiful, by St. Augustine, which is now lost. Some idea, however, we are told, may be formed of its contents from different passages scattered through his other writings. The idea here ascribed to St. Augustine amounts to this, that the distinctive character of beauty is, that exact relation of the parts of a whole to each other, which constitutes its unity. "C'est l'unité qui constitue, pour ainsi dire, la forme et l'essence du beau en tout genre. Omnis porro pulchritudinis forma, unitas est."-The theory certainly is not of very great value; but the attempt is curious, when connected with the history of the author and with that of his age.

With respect to this attempt, (which may be considered as a generalization of the theory of Utility,) it may be remarked farther, that although evidently far too confined to include all the elements of the Beautiful, yet that it includes a larger proportion than many others, of those higher beauties, which form the chief objects of study to a man of refined taste. [In the words of Horace :]

Denique sit quod vis, simplex duntaxat et unum.”—[Ars. 23.]

"Still follow sense of every art the soul:

Parts answering parts, will slide into a whole."

[Réflexions sur l'usage et sur l'abus de la Philosophie dans les Matières de Goût.—Mélanges,

vol. iv. p. 317]

Even in the works of nature, one of the chief sources of their Beauty to a philosophical eye, is the Urity of Design which they everywhere exhibit. On the mind of St. Augustine, who had been originally educated in the school of the Manicheans, this view of the subject might reasonably be expected to produce a peculiarly strong impression.*

NOTE RR, (p. 375,) Essay III. chap. 4.-Faculty of Taste.

The same remark will be found to hold in all the fine arts. A true connoisseur," says a late writer, who has had the best opportunities to form a just opinion on this point, "who sees the work of a great master, seizes, at the first glance, its merits and its beauties. He may afterwards discover defects; but he always returns to that which pleased him, and would rather admire than find fault. To begin with finding fault where there are beauties to admire, is a sure proof of want of taste. This remark is the result of several years of my observation in Italy. All the young men looked for defects in the finest works of Corregio, Guido, and Raphael, in the Venus de Medicis, the Apollo Belvidere, and the Church of St. Peter; whereas, those who profited by the lessons which were given them saw only beautics.”—Dutensiana, p. 110.

Taste is defined by the same writer to be "the discernment of the beautiful.” The definition is obviously much too confined and partial; as the discernment of faults as well as of beauties is a necessary ingredient in the composition of this power. But it has the merit of touching on that ingredient or element which is the most essential of the whole; inasmuch as it is the basis or substratum of all the rest, and the only one where education can do but little to supply the deficiencies of nature. According to the vulgar idea, Taste may be defined to be "the discernment of blemishes." ["Have you read,” says Gray in one of his letters, “Lord Clarendon's Continuation of his History? Do you remember Mr. -'s account of it before it came out? How well he recollected all the faults, and how utterly he forgot all the beauties: Surely the grossest taste is better than such a sort of delicacy."--Memoirs of Gray by Mason. Letter 35.]

NOTE SS, (p. 395,) Essay IV. chap. 1.-Reynolds.

The account given by Reynolds himself of what he felt upon this occasion, does not accord literally with the fiction of the poet; as it appears that his first raptures were inconsiderable, in comparison of those which he experienced afterwards, upon a careful and critical examination of Raffaelle's Works. The fact, therefore, is incomparably more favourable than the fiction, to the argument stated in the

text.

* [Augustin, in his Confessions, records the purport of his treatise, now lost, De Apto et Pulero; André, in his acute and eloquent Essai sur le Beau, follows out the theory of St. Austin,

which was, indeed, it may be asserted, that of all antiquity; and Diderot, author of the article Beau in the French Encyclopédie, founds almost exclusively upon Le Père André.-Ed.]

APPENDIX.

[FIRST PUBLISHED IN SECOND EDITION, 1816.]

ARTICLE I.-(See p. 279.)

Essay II. chap. 1.—Parr's derivation of the word SUBLIMIS.

THE following is a very imperfect abstract of Dr. Parr's observations on the etymology of the word sublimis. I regret that circumstances rendered it impossible for me, before sending it to the press, to submit it to the revisal and corrections of my learned friend; but as I have, in every sentence, scrupulously copied his words, I trust that I have done no injustice to his argument, but what is the necessary consequence of the mutilated and disjointed form in which it is exhibited. As I have not mentioned in the Note which gave occasion to Dr. Parr's strictures, the grounds on which I presumed to call in question the common etymology of sublimis, I think it proper to acknowledge here, that he has pointed his arguments, with the most sagacious precision, against the two considerations which tacitly weighed with me in rejecting that etymology as unsatisfactory. The one is the base and abject origin which it assigns to a word, identified, both in ancient and modern languages, with all our loftiest and most unearthly conceptions. The other, the

Of

1 In yielding so readily to this consideration, I am now fully aware how completely I lost sight of what, in the beginning of the preceding Essay, I had written on the gradual and successive transitions in the meaning of words, so often exemplified in the history of all languages. this general fact, not less interesting to the philosopher, than to the philologer, a copious variety of curious and highly instructive instances are produced by Dr. Parr, in the course of the different communications with which he has lately favoured me. While perusing these, I have frequently recollected a passage which struck me forcibly some years ago, in an anonymous pamphlet published at Oxford; and which expresses so happily my own idea of the nature and value of Dr. Parr's philological disquisitions, that I shall take the liberty to adopt it as part of this Note. Whether the learned author, [Copleston,-Ed.] in writing it, had in view the illustrious scholar to whom I at present apply it, or some philosophical grammarian yet unknown to fame, I am not entitled to conjecture. [He had.-Ed.]

"There is, I doubt not, a clue to every mazy dance of human thought, which we trace in the

texture of language. When once unravelled, it appears simple enough: And the more simple it is, the greater is the merit of the discovery. And yet in such matters the world are apt to show ingratitude and contempt, when they ought most to admire and to be thankful.

Such injustice will not, I trust, deter

a philosophical critic from attempting to solve the intricate phenomena of language which stil remain unexplained. To perform the task well requires not only extensive erudition, a strong memory, an acute and penetrating mind, but an acquaintance also, either self-taught or methodically acquired, with that true logic which enables us to sort, to discriminate, and to abstract ideas, to know them again under all the changes of dress and posture, and to keep a steady eye upon them, as they mingle with the confused and shifting crowd. This combination of qualities is indeed rare; but there have been men so variously gifted, though few; and some perhaps there still are; ONE I know there is, who could not render a more acceptable service to the lovers of ancient learning, than by guiding their footsteps through this perplexing labyrinth."

anomalous, and (as I conceived) inexplicable extension which it gives to the preposition sub to convey a meaning directly contrary to that in which it is generally understood. I shall take the liberty, accordingly, to arrange Dr. Parr's observations under two separate heads, corresponding to the two distinct objections which they are intended to obviate.

I. Mr. Stewart rejects the commonly received derivation of sublimis from supra limum. But, when a language furnishes all the constituent parts of a compound word, and when no other part of that language offers, even to our conjecture, any other terms, there surely is abundant reason for our acquiescence in that etymology, which contains nothing irrational and absurd.

That phrase, which to us, who live at a distant time, appears degrading, may not have borne the same appearance to those who spoke and wrote in that language. By the force of mere custom, figurative expressions acquire grandeur and energy from the subjects to which they are applied; and even the insignificant or offensive notions which adhere to the parts separately considered, may be unseen and unfelt, when they are compounded, and, in that compounded state, are applied metaphorically.

Elevation above the earth might be expressed by a term to which custom would give the sense of indefinite elevation, and elevation itself is a property so agreeable to the mind, that we at once approve of the term, which expresses it luminously. Even single terms acquire beauty or dignity by their union with other terms without the aid of composition; and Hence the precept of Horace,—

"Dixeris egregie, notum si callida verbum

Reddiderit junctura novum."-Epist. ad Pisones, v. 47, 48.

Mire is, as a physical object, offensive. But who, upon that account, will object to the following passage in Juvenal?

"Quibus arte benigna,

Et meliore luto finxit præcordia Titan.”—Sat. xiv. 34.

When Cicero says, "Tria esse in verbo simplici quæ orator afferat ad illustrandam atque ornandam orationem," he adds, " conjungendis verbis, ut hæc—

"Tum pavor sapientiam mihi omnem ex animo expectorat.

An non vis hujus me versutiloquas malitias?"

"Videtis versutiloquas et expectorat, ex conjunctione facta esse verba, non nata."-Cicero, De Oratore, lib. iii. To an Englishman, when he reads expectorat in Latin, the word loses nothing of its force, because we have a word with a similar sound and an undignified literal sense in our own tongue, and the "junctura" with "pavor" and "sapientiam" heightened doubtless the effect to a Roman reader. When a Roman met with "versutiloquas," he felt, from the composition of the word, more than he would feel when he read "versutus" and "loquor" separately. By the common experience of all readers, and the common consent of all critics, words compounded of parts, which have no grandeur, become grand from composition.

In the formation of sublimis, I suspect that not "dirtiness," the property of