That the second kind of beauty also enters into the acts or products of intellectual beauty, is sufficiently illustrated by the observation of Hogarth,who on this subject observes, that all the common and necessary motions for the business of life are performed by men in straight or plain lines, while all the graceful and ornamental movements are made in waving lines.
As Alison has given the best view of the history and character of beauty in the intellectual arts, as that indeed constitutes the most valuable portion of his work, I shall conclude this section by a greatly abridged view of these as nearly as possible in his own words.
There is no production of taste, which has not many qualities of a very indifferent kind; and our sense of the beauty or sublimity of every object accordingly depends upon the quality or qualities of it which we consider.
This, Mr. Alison might have observed, is in great measure dependant upon our will. We can generally, when we please, confine our consideration of it to the qualities that least excite pleasurable or painful emotion, and that can least interest the imagination.
It is in consequence of this, that the exercise of criticism always destroys, for the time, our sensibility to the beauty of every composition, and that habits of this kind generally destroy the sensibility of taste.
When, on the other hand, the emotions of sublimity or beauty are produced, it will be found that some affection is uniformly first excited by the presence of the object; and whether the general impression we receive is that of gayety, or tenderness,or melancholy, or solemnity, or terror, &c., we have never any difficulty of determining.
But whatever may be the nature of that simple emotion which any object is fitted to excite, if it produce not a train of kindred thought in our minds, we are conscious only of that simple emotion.
In many cases, on the contrary, we are conscious of a train of thought being immediately awakened in the imagination, analogous to the character of expression of the original object.
“Thus, when we feel either the beauty or sublimity of natural scenery—the gay lustre of a morning in spring, or the mild radiance of a summer-evening—the savage majesty of a wintry storm, or the wild magnificence of the tempestuous ocean—we are conscious of a variety of images in our minds, very different from those which the objects themselves present to the eye. Trains of pleasing or of solemn thought arise spontaneously within our minds; our hearts swell with emotions, of which the objects before us seem to afford no adequate cause; and we are never so much satiated with delight, as when, in recalling our attention, we are unable (little able, perhaps, and less disposed) to trace either the progress or the connexion of those thoughts, which have passed with so much rapidity through our imagination.
“The effect of the different arts of taste is similar. The landscapes of Claude Lorraine, the poetry of Milton, the music of the greatest masters, excite feeble emotions in our minds when ourattention is confined to the qualities they present to our senses, or when it is to such qualities of their composition that we turn our regard. It is then only we feel the sublimity or beauty of their productions, when our imaginations are kindled by their power, when we lose ourselves amid the number of images that pass before our minds, and when we waken at last from this play of fancy, as from the charm of a romantic dream.
“The degree in which the emotions of sublimity or beauty are felt, is in general proportioned to the prevalence of those relations of thought in the mind, upon which this exercise of imagination depends. The principal relation which seems to take place in those trains of thought that are produced by objects of taste, is that of resemblance; the relation, of all others the most loose and general, and which affords the greatest range of thought for our imagination to pursue. Wherever, accordingly, these emotions are felt, it will be found, not only that this is the relation which principally prevails among our ideas, but that the emotion itself is proportioned to the degree in which it prevails.
“What, for instance, is the impression we feel from the scenery of spring? The soft and gentle green with which the earth is spread, the feeble texture of the plants and flowers, the young of animals just entering into life, and the remains of winter yet lingering among the woods and hills—all conspire to infuse into our minds somewhat of that fearful tenderness with which infancy is usually beheld. With such a sentiment, how innumerableare the ideas which present themselves to our imagination! ideas, it is apparent, by no means confined to the scene before our eyes, or to the possible desolation which may yet await its infant beauty, but which almost involuntarily extend themselves to analogies with the life of man, and bring before us all those images of hope or fear, which, according to our peculiar situations, have the dominion of our heart!—The beauty of autumn is accompanied with a similar exercise of thought.
“Whatever increases this exercise or employment of imagination, increases also the emotion of beauty or sublimity.
“This is very obviously the effect of all associations. There is no man who has not some interesting associations with particular scenes, or airs, or books, and who does not feel their beauty or sublimity enhanced to him by such connexions. The view of the house where one was born, of the school where one was educated, and where the gay years of infancy were passed, is indifferent to no man.
“In the case of those trains of thought, which are suggested by objects either of sublimity or beauty, it will be found, that they are in all cases composed of ideas capable of exciting some affection or emotion; and that not only the whole succession is accompanied with that peculiar emotion which we call the emotion of beauty or sublimity, but that every individual idea of such a succession is in itself productive of some simple emotion or other.
“Thus the ideas suggested by the scenery of spring, are ideas productive of emotions of cheerfulness, of gladness, and of tenderness. The images suggested by the prospect of ruins, are images belonging to pity, to melancholy, and to admiration. The ideas, in the same manner, awakened by the view of the ocean in a storm, are ideas of power, of majesty, and of terror.”
To prevent circumlocution, such ideas may be termed ideas of emotion; and the effect which is produced upon the mind, by objects of taste, may be considered as consisting in the production of a regular or consistent train of ideas of emotion.
“In those trains which are suggested by objects of sublimity or beauty, however slight the connexion between individual thoughts may be, it will be found, that there is always some general principle of connexion which pervades the whole, and gives them some certain definite character. They are either gay, or pathetic, or melancholy, or solemn, or awful, or elevating, &c., according to the nature of the emotion which is first excited. Thus the prospect of a serene evening in summer, produces first an emotion of peacefulness and tranquillity, and then suggests a variety of images corresponding to this primary impression. The sight of a torrent, or of a storm, in the same manner, impresses us first with sentiments of awe or solemnity, or terror, and then awakens in our minds a series of conceptions allied to this peculiar emotion.”
The intellectual, or fine arts are those whose objects are thus addressed to the imagination; and the pleasures they afford are described, by way of distinction, as the pleasures of the imagination.
SUMMARY OF THIS CHAPTER.
Thus, by analysis, generalization, and systematization, of the materials which the best writers present, I have, in this chapter, endeavored to take new and larger views; and, by an examination of the elements of beauty, I have endeavored to fix its doctrines upon an immoveable basis.
I have shown that there exist elements of beauty equally invariable in themselves, and in the kind of effect they produce upon the mind; that these elements are modified, varied, and complicated, as we advance from the most simple to the most complex class of natural beings, or of the arts which relate to these respectively; that the elements of beauty in inanimate beings, consist in the simplicity, regularity, uniformity, proportion, order, &c., of those geometrical forms which are so intimately connected with mere existence; that the elements of beauty in living beings, consist in adding to the preceding the delicacy, bending, variety, contrast, &c., which are connected with growth, and reproduction; that the elements of beauty in thinking beings, consist in adding to the preceding the symmetry, proportion,[15]&c., which are connected with fitness for sense, thought, and motion; that the elements of beauty in the objects of useful art, consist in the same simplicity,regularity, uniformity, proportion, order, of geometrical forms which belong to inanimate beings; that the elements of beauty in the objects of ornamental art consist in the same delicacy, bending, variety, contrast, which belong to living beings; and that the elements of beauty in the objects of intellectual art consist in thinking forms, in gesture, sculpture, and painting, or in functions of mind actually exercised, in oratory, poetry, and music.
The elements of beauty have hitherto been confounded by many writers, as more or less applicable to objects of all kinds; and as this general and confused application was easily disproved as to many objects, uncertainty and doubt have been thrown over the whole. The remaining writers have consequently been led to adopt, as characters of beauty, only one or two of these elements, which were consequently capable of application only to one or two classes of its objects. Hence, no subject of human inquiry has hitherto been left in a more disgraceful condition than this, the very foundation of taste.
I do not hesitate to state that, owing to the near approximations to truth, and the insensible transitions into error, which I have found in every writer, and the immense mass of confused materials which they present, this subject has cost me more trouble than any one I have ever investigated, except that of my work on the mind;[16]nor withoutsome physiological knowledge, do I think tasks of this kind at all practicable. Generally speaking, each branch of knowledge is most surely advanced by acquaintance with its related branches; and philosophers cannot too much bear in mind the words of Cicero: “Etenim omnes artes quæ ad humanitatem pertinent, habent quoddam commune vinculum, et quasi cognatione quadam inter se continentur.”
In landscape, the nature of the beautiful and the sublime seems to be better understood than that of the picturesque. There are few disputes as to the former; many as to the latter. These disputes, moreover, are not as towhat is picturesque, but as towhat picturesque is.
Payne Knight asserts, that the picturesque has no distinctive character, and merely designates what a painter would imitate. Price, on the contrary, has given so many admirable illustrations of it, that its characteristics are before every reader. Strange to tell, its nature or essence has not been penetrated, because these characteristics have not been rigidly analyzed.
Price has, indeed, generalized considerably on this subject, by showing that irregularity, roughness, &c., enter into all scenes of a picturesquedescription; and the examination of any one of them will certainly verify the truth of his observation.
Thus, on a remote country-road, we often observe the deep ruts on its surface which in winter would render it impassable—the huge and loose moss-grown stone, ready to encumber it by falling from the bank—the stunted pollard by its side, whose roots are exposed by the earth falling away from it, and which must itself be swept away by the first wind that may blow against it in an unfavorable direction—the almost ruined cottage, above and beyond these, whose gable is propped up by an old and broken wheel, and whose thatched roof, stained with every hue of moss or lichen, has, at one part, long fallen in—the shaggy and ragged horse that browses among the rank weeds around it—and the old man, bent with age, who leans over the broken gate in front of it.
Here, in every circumstance, is verified the irregularity and roughness which Price ascribes to the picturesque. But he has failed to observe, thatthe irregularity and roughness are but the signs of that which interests the mind far more deeply, namely, the universalDECAYwhich causes them. This is the essence of the picturesque—the charm in it which begets our sympathy.
Confining his remark merely to ruins, the author of “Observations on Gardening,” says: “At the sight of a ruin, reflections on the change, the decay, and the desolation, before us naturally occur; and they introduce a long succession of others, alltinctured with that melancholy which these have inspired; or if the monument revive the memory of former times, we do not stop at the simple fact which it records, but recollect many more coeval circumstances which we see, nor perhaps as they were, but as they are come down to us, venerable with age, and magnified by fame.”—What is here said of ruins, and is indeed as to them sufficiently striking, is true of the picturesque universally, and it is only surprising that, amid such disputes, this simple and obvious truth should not have been observed.
In landscape, therefore, the picturesque stands in the same relation to the beautiful and sublime, that the pathetic does to them in poetry. Hence, speaking also of ruins only, Alison says: “The images suggested by the prospect of ruins, are images belonging to pity, to melancholy, and to admiration.”
A thousand illustrations might be given in support of this truth and the principle which it affords; but I think it better to leave these to the suggestion or the choice of every reader.
This has been partly explained by Beattie, partly by Hobbes; and it is chiefly to vindicate the latter, who knew much more of the human mind than thepeople who have attacked him, that I write the pages immediately following.
Speaking of the quality in things, which makes them provoke the pleasing emotion or sentiment of which laughter is the external sign, Beattie says: “It is an uncommon mixture of relation and contrariety, exhibited, or supposed to be united, in the same assemblage.” And elsewhere he says: “Laughter arises from the view of two or more inconsistent, unsuitable, or incongruous parts or circumstances, considered as united in one complex object or assemblage, or as acquiring a sort of mutual relation from the peculiar manner in which the mind takes notice of them.”
“The latter may arise from contiguity, from the relation of cause and effect, from unexpected likeness, from dignity and meanness, from absurdity, &c.
“Thus, at first view, the dawn of the morning and a boiled lobster seem utterly incongruous, but when a change of color from black to red is suggested, we recognise a likeness, and consequently a relation, or ground of comparison.
“And here let it be observed, that the greater the number of incongruities that are blended in the same assemblage, the more ludicrous it will probably be. If, as in the last example, there be an opposition of dignity and meanness, as well as of likeness and dissimilitude, the effect of the contrast will be more powerful, than if only one of these oppositions had appeared in the ludicrous idea.”
The first part of the subject seems, indeed, so clear as to admit of no objection.
Hobbes, viewing more particularly the act of the mind, defines laughter to be a “sudden glory, arising from a sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves, by comparison with the infirmity of others, or with our own formerly.” And elsewhere he says: “Men laugh at jests, the wit whereof always consisteth in the elegant discovering and conveying to our minds, some absurdity of another.”[18]
Dr. Campbell objects that “contempt may be raised in a very high degree, both suddenly and unexpectedly, without producing the least tendency to laugh.” But if there exist that incongruity in the same assemblage described as the fundamental cause of this sudden conception of our own superiority, laughter, as Beattie has shown, “will always, or for the most part, excite the risible emotion, unless when the perception of it is attended with some other emotion of greater authority,” dependant on custom, politeness, &c.
Dr. Campbell also observes, that “laughter may be, and is daily, produced by the perception of incongruous associations, when there is no contempt.
“We often smile at a witty performance or passage, such as Butler’s allusion to a boiled lobster, in his picture of the morning, when we are so far from conceiving any inferiority or turpitude in theauthor, that we greatly admire his genius, and wish ourselves possessed of that very turn of fancy which produced the drollery in question.
“Many have laughed at the queerness of the comparison in these lines,
‘For rhyme the rudder is of verses,With which like ships they steer their courses,’
who never dreamed that there was any person or party, practice or opinion, derided in them.
“If any admirer of the Hobbesian philosophy should pretend to discover some class of men whom the poet here meant to ridicule, he ought to consider, that if any one hath been tickled with the passage to whom the same thought never occurred, that single instance would be sufficient to subvert the doctrine, as it would show that there may be laughter where there is no triumph or glorying over anybody, and, consequently, no conceit of one’s own superiority.
Now, the class of men laughed at in both cases is the same, namely, poets, whose lofty allusions are ridiculed by the former, and silly rhymes by the latter; nor can any one duly appreciate or be pleased with either, to whom this intention of the writer is not obvious. Who ever dreamed of “turpitude in the author,” as Dr. Campbell supposes!
“As to the wag,” says Beattie, “who amuses himself on the first of April with telling lies, he must be shallow, indeed, if he hope, by so doing, to acquire any superiority over another man whom heknows to be wiser and better than himself; for, on these occasions, the greatness of the joke, and the loudness of the laugh, are, if I rightly remember, in exact proportion to the sagacity of the person imposed on.”—No doubt; but it is because he is thrown into an apparent and whimsical, though momentary inferiority; and the greater his sagacity, the more amusing does this appear.
“Do we not,” says he, “sometimes laugh at fortuitous combinations, in which, as no mental energy is concerned in producing them, there cannot be either fault or turpitude? Could not one imagine a set of people jumbled together by accident, so as to present a laughable group to those who know their characters?”—Undoubtedly; but then the slouch of one, and the rigidity of the other, &c., make both contemptible, as to physical characteristics at least, and there is no need of turpitude in either.
The strongest apparent objection, however, is that of Dr. Campbell, who says: “Indeed, men’s telling their own blunders, even blunders recently committed, and laughing at them, a thing not uncommon in very risible dispositions, is utterly inexplicable upon Hobbes’s system. For, to consider the thing only with regard to the laugher himself, there is to him no subject of glorying, that is not counterbalanced by an equal subject of humiliation (he being both the person laughing, and the person laughed at), and these two subjects must destroy one another.”
But he overlooks the precise terms employed by Hobbes, who says: “The passion of laughter isnothing else but sudden glory, arising from a sudden conception of some eminency in ourselves, by comparison with the infirmity of others, or withour own formerly. For men laugh atthe follies of themselves past, when they come suddenly to remembrance,except they bring with them any present dishonor.”
It is not therefore true, as Dr. Campbell says, that “with regard to others, he appears solely under the notion of inferiority, as the person triumphed over.” He, on the contrary, appears as achieving a very glorious triumph, that, namely, over his own errors.
This shows also the error of Addison’s remarks, that “according to this account, when we hear a man laugh excessively, instead of saying that he is very merry, we ought to tell him that he is very proud.”—A man may contemn the errors both of himself and others, without pride: and, indeed, in contemning the former, he proves himself to be far above that sentiment, and verifies Dr. Campbell’s remark that no two characters more rarely meet in the same person, than that of a very risible man, and a very self-conceited supercilious man.
It is curious to see a great man, like Hobbes, thus attacked by less ones, who do not even understand him.
Many hypotheses have been proposed to explain this cause.
According to the Abbé Du Bos,[19]in order to get rid of listlessness, the mind seeks for emotions; and the stronger these are the better. Hence, the passions which in themselves are the most distressing, are, for this purpose, preferable to the pleasant, because they most effectually relieve the mind from the less endurable languor which preys upon it during inaction.
The sophistry of this explanation is evident. Pleasant passions, as Dr. Campbell has shown, ought in every respect to have the advantage, because, while they preserve the mind from this state of inaction, they convey a feeling which is agreeable. Nor is it true that the stronger the emotion is, so much the fitter for this purpose; for if we exceed a certain measure, instead of a sympathetic and delightful sorrow, we excite only horror and aversion. The most, therefore, that can be concluded from the Abbé’s premises, is, that it is useful to excite passion of some kind or other, but not that the distressing ones are the fittest.
According to Fontenelle,[20]theatrical representationhas almost the effect of reality: but yet not altogether. We have still a certain idea of falsehood in the whole of what we see. We weep for the misfortunes of a hero to whom we are attached. In the same instant, we comfort ourselves by reflecting, that it is nothing but a fiction.
The short answer to this is, that we are conscious of no such alternation as that here described.
According to David Hume, whose hypothesis is a kind of supplement to the former two, that which “when the sorrow is not softened by fiction, raises a pleasure from the bosom of uneasiness, a pleasure which still retains all the features and outward symptoms of distress and sorrow, is that very eloquence with which the melancholy scene is represented.”
In reply, Dr. Campbell has shown that the aggravating of all the circumstances of misery in the representation, cannot make it be contemplated with pleasure, but must be the most effectual method for making it give greater pain; that the detection of the speaker’s talents and address, which Hume’s hypothesis implies, is in direct opposition to the fundamental maxim, that “it is essential to the art to conceal the art;” and that the supposition that there are two distinct effects produced by the eloquence on the hearers, one the sentiment of beauty, or of the harmony of oratorical numbers, the other the passion which the speaker purposes to raise in their minds, and that when the first predominates, the mixture of the two effects becomes exceedingly pleasant, and thereverse when the second is superior, is altogether imaginary.
According to Hawkesworth,[21]the compassion in question may be “resolved into that power of imagination, by which we apply the misfortunes of others to ourselves;” and we are said “to pity no longer than we fancy ourselves to suffer, and to be pleased only by reflecting that our sufferings are not real; thus indulging a dream of distress, from which we can awake whenever we please, to exult in our security, and enjoy the comparison of the fiction with the truth.”
This hypothesis is evidently too gross to need reply.
Dr. Campbell has answered the preceding hypotheses at great length, and quite satisfactorily. I regret to say that his own is as worthless, as well as remarkably confused and unintelligible.
To Burke, who wrote at a later period, it falls to my lot to reply at greater length.
“To examine this point concerning the effect of tragedy in a proper manner,” says that writer, “we must previously consider how we are affected by the feelings of our fellow-creatures in circumstances of real distress. I am convinced we have a degree of delight, and that no small one, in the real misfortunes and pains of others; for, let the affection be what it will in appearance, if it does not make us shun such objects, if on the contrary it induces us to approach them, if it makes us dwell uponthem, in this case I conceive we must have a delight or pleasure of some species or other in contemplating objects of this kind.... Our delight in cases of this kind is very greatly heightened, if the sufferer be some excellent person who sinks under an unworthy fortune.... The delight we have in such things hinders us from shunning scenes of misery; and the pains we feel, prompt us to relieve ourselves, in relieving those who suffer.... In imitated distress, the only difference is the pleasure resulting from the effects of imitation.”
A more monstrous doctrine than this was never perhaps enunciated. A very little analysis will expose its fallacy.
In relation to events of this kind, there are three very distinct cases—real occurrence, subsequent inspection or historical narration, and dramatic representation; in each, the affection of the mind is very different; and nearly all the errors on this subject seem to have occurred from confounding them. Burke has done this in the greatest degree.
The real occurrence of unmerited suffering is beheld with no delight, but with unmixed pain, by every well-constituted mind. Hume,[22]therefore, justly observes, that “the same object of distress, which pleases in a tragedy, were it really set before us, would give the most unfeigned uneasiness.” It is only by confounding this with the next case, of subsequent inspection or historical narration, that Burke gets into error here.
“We do not,” says Burke, “sufficiently distinguish what we would by no means choose to do [orto see done—he should have added] from what we should be eager enough to see if it was once done. We delight in seeing things [after they are done—he should have added], which, so far from doing, our heartiest wishes would be to see redressed.”
That the additions I have made, more truly state the case, seems as evident, as it is, that they afford a very different conclusion from Burke’s, of our beholding unmerited suffering with delight. But he himself proves this by the very instance which he gives in illustration of his doctrine.
“This noble capital,” he says, “the pride of England and of Europe, I believeno man is so strangely wicked as to desire to see destroyedby a conflagration or an earthquake, though he should be removed himself to the greatest distance from the danger. Butsuppose such a fatal accident to have happened, what numbers from all parts would crowd to behold the ruins, and among them many who would have been content never to have seen London in its glory!”
Here the words which I have put in italics clearly show that I was right in the additions I suggested in his previous statement, and that he there confounded delight in seeing the infliction of unmerited suffering, with delight in seeing it after infliction, or of seeing it historically narrated; for, in this his illustration, it is the latter, and not the former, that he supposes—nay he now says “no man is so strangely wicked as to desire to see destroyed!”&c. Indeed, it is quite plain that, supposing an attempt made to destroy London, so far would every one be from being delighted to see it done, that he would eagerly prevent it. There is here, therefore, on the part of this writer, only his common and characteristic confusion of ideas.
“Choose a day,” he says, “on which to represent the most sublime and affecting tragedy we have; appoint the most favorite actors; spare no cost upon the scenes and decorations; unite the greatest efforts of poetry, painting, and music; and when you have collected your audience, just at the moment when their minds are erect with expectation, let it be reported that a state-criminal, of high rank, is on the point of being executed in the adjoining square; in a moment the emptiness of the theatre would demonstrate the comparative weakness of the imitative arts, and proclaim the triumph of the real sympathy.”
This presents only another instance of want of discrimination. If the “state-criminal, of high rank,” were not a real criminal—if he were an unmerited sufferer, the place of execution, supposing his rescue impossible, would assuredly be fled from by every person of feeling and honor; as we read of in the public papers, lately, when a murder of that kind was perpetrating by some one of the base little jailor-princes of Germany. And we know that, in the case of legal perpetrations of that kind in England, even upon real criminals, none but the most degraded wretches go to witness such scenes.
In tragic representation, then, we know that the suffering is not real, else should we fly. There have, indeed, in such cases, been instances of a sort of momentary deception, but it is only children, and very simple people, utter strangers to theatrical amusements, who are apt to be so deceived; and as their case always excites the surprise and laughter of every one, it clearly proves that others are under no sort of deception.
Even Burke, notwithstanding his want of discrimination, and his monstrous hypothesis, says: “Imitated distress is never so perfect, but we can perceive it is imitation, and on that principle are somewhat pleased with it.” And his case of desertion of the theatre, if it occur under any circumstances, illustrates this.
Burke adds, indeed: “But then I imagine we shall be muchmistakenif we attribute any considerable part of our satisfaction in tragedy to the consideration that tragedy isa deceit, and its representationsno realities. [We seek no satisfaction of the kind: we know it to be a deceit throughout!] The nearer it approaches the reality, and the farther it removes us from all idea of fiction, the more perfect is its power.”
The nearest possibleapproachto reality, is only necessary to the success of fiction, to the pleasure of imagination. He himself has said: “Imitated distress is never so perfect, but we can perceive it is imitation!” Again, therefore, here is only Burke’s characteristic confusion of ideas.
My own doctrine on this subject is already obvious from the remarks made on others.We never cease to know that tragic representation is a mere deception; our reason is never imposed upon; our imagination is alone engaged; we are perfectly conscious that it is so; and we have all the sensibility, fine feeling, and generosity of pity, as well as the satisfaction of being thereby raised wonderfully in our own esteem, at the small cost of three shillings!
It is not a little curious, that this should not have been evident to those who have written so much about it. Dr. Campbell, alone, has approached it. “So great,” he says, “is the anomaly which sometimes displays itself in human characters, that it is not impossible to find persons who are quickly made to cry at seeing a tragedy, or reading a romance, which they know to be fictions, and yet are both inattentive and unfeeling in respect of the actual objects of compassion who live in their neighborhood, and are daily under their eye.... Men may be of a selfish, contracted, and even avaricious disposition, who are not what we should denominate hard-hearted, or unsusceptible of sympathetic feeling. Such will gladly enjoy the luxury of pity (as Hawkesworth terms it) when it nowise interferes with their more powerful passions; that is, when it comes unaccompanied with a demand upon their pockets.”—This should have led him to the simple truth, and should have prevented his framing the most confused, unintelligible, and worthless hypothesis upon this subject.
To any inquiry respecting the beauty of woman, the replies are, in general, various, inconsistent, or contradictory. The assertion might, therefore, appear to be true, that, even under the same climate, beauty is not always the same.
Our vague perceptions, however, and our vague expressions respecting beauty, will be found to be, in a great measure, owing to the inaccuracy of our mode of examining it, and, in some measure, to the imperfect nomenclature which we possess for describing it.
Beauty, and even true taste, respecting it, are always the same; but, in the first place, we observe beauty partially and imperfectly; and in the second place, our actual preferences are dependant on our particular wants, and will be found to differ only because these wants differ in every individual, and even in the same individual at different periods of life.
The laws regulating beauty in woman, and taste respecting it in man, have not been attempted to be explained, except in the worthless work alludedto in the advertisement. Yet nothing perhaps is more universally interesting.
As, in this view, the kinds of beauty demand the first and chief attention, the following illustrations are necessary:—
We observe a woman possessing one species of beauty:—Her face is generally oblong; her neck is rather long and tapering: her shoulders, without being angular, are sufficiently broad and definite; her bosom is of moderate dimensions; her waist, remarkable for fine proportion, resembles in some respects an inverted cone; her haunches are moderately expanded; her thighs, proportional; her arms, as well as her limbs, are rather long and tapering; her hands and feet are moderately small; her complexion is often rather dark; and her hair is frequently abundant, dark, and strong.—The whole figure is precise, striking, and brilliant. Yet, has she few or none of the qualities of the succeeding species.
We observe, next, another species of beauty:—Her face is generally round; her eyes are generally of the softest azure; her neck is often rather short; her shoulders are softly rounded, and owe any breadth they may possess rather to the expanded chest, than to the size of the shoulders themselves; her bosom, in its luxuriance, seems laterally to protrude on the space occupied by the arms; her waist, though sufficiently marked, is, as it were, encroached on by the enbonpoint of all the contiguous parts; her haunches are greatly expanded; her thighs are large in proportion; but her limbsand arms, tapering and becoming delicate, terminate in feet and hands which, compared with the ample trunk, are peculiarly small; her complexion has the rose and lily so exquisitely blended, that we are surprised it should defy the usual operation of the elements; and she boasts a luxuriant profusion of soft and fine flaxen or auburn hair.—The whole figure is soft and voluptuous in the extreme. Yet has she not the almost measured proportions and the brilliant air of the preceding species; nor has she the qualities of the succeeding one.
We observe, then, a beauty of a third species:—Her face is generally oval; her high and pale forehead announces the intellectuality of her character; her intensely expressive eye is full of sensibility; in her lower features, modesty and dignity are often united; she has not the expanded bosom, the general embonpoint, or the beautiful complexion, of the second species; and she boasts easy and graceful motion, rather than the elegant proportion of the first.—The whole figure is characterized by intellectuality and grace.
Such are the three species of beauty of which all the rest are varieties.
Now, as it is in general one only of these species which characterizes any one woman, and as each of these species is suited to the wants of, and is consequently agreeable to, a different individual, it is obvious why the common vague reports of the beauty of any woman are always so various, inconsistent, or contradictory.
In the more accurate study of this subject, it isindispensable that the reader should understand the scientific principles on which the preceding brief analysis of female beauty, as reducible to three species, is founded.
To attain this knowledge, and to acquire facility in the art of distinguishing and judging of beauty in woman, a little general knowledge of anatomy is absolutely essential. The writer begs, therefore, attention to the following sketch. It may not at first seem interesting to the general reader; but it is the sole basis of a scientific knowledge of female beauty; the study of it during one hour is sufficient to apprehend it in all its bearings; and it will obviate every future difficulty.
In viewing the human organs in a general manner, a class of these organs at once obtrudes itself upon our notice, from its consisting of an apparatus of levers, from its performing motion from place to place or locomotion, and from these motions being of the most obvious kind.—A little more observation presents to us another class, which is distinguished from the preceding by its consisting of cylindrical tubes, by its transmitting and transmuting liquids, performing vascular action or nutrition, and by its motions being barely apparent.—Farther investigation discovers a third, which differs essentially from both these, in its consisting of nervous particles, in its transmitting impressions from external objects, performing nervous action or thought, and in that action being altogether invisible.
Thus, each of these classes of organs is distinguished from another by the structure of its parts,by the purposes which it serves, and by the greater or less obviousness of its motions.
The first consists of levers; the second, of cylindrical tubes; and the third, of nervous particles. The first performs motion from place to place or locomotion; the second transmits and transmutes liquids, performing vascular action or nutrition; and the third transmits impressions from external objects, performing nervous action or thought. The motion of the first is extremely obvious; that of the second is barely apparent; and that of the third is altogether invisible.
Not one of them can be confounded with another: for, considering their purposes only, it is evident that that which performs locomotion, neither transmits liquids nor sensations; that which transmits liquids, neither performs locomotion nor is the means of sensibility; and that which is the means of sensibility, neither performs locomotion nor transmits liquids.
Now, the organs employed in locomotion are the bones, ligaments, and muscles; those employed in transmitting liquids or in nutrition, are the absorbent, circulating, and secreting vessels; and those employed about sensations or in thought, are the organs of sense, cerebrum, and cerebel, with the nerves which connect them.
The first class of organs may, therefore, be termed locomotive, or (from their very obvious action) mechanical; the second, vascular or nutritive, or (as even vegetables, from their possessing vessels, have life) they may be termed vital; andthe third may be named nervous or thinking, or (as mind results from them) mental.
The human body, then, consists of organs of three kinds. By the first kind, locomotive or mechanical action is effected; by the second, nutritive or vital action is maintained; and by the third, thinking or mental action is permitted.
Anatomy is, therefore, divided into three parts, namely, that which considers the mechanical or locomotive organs; that which considers the nutritive or vital organs; and that which considers the thinking or mental organs.
Under the mechanical or locomotive organs are classed, first, the bones or organs of support; second, the ligaments or organs of articulation; and third, the muscles or organs of motion.
Under the nutritive or vital organs are classed, first, the absorbent vessels or organs of absorption; second, the bloodvessels, which derive their contents from the absorbed lymph, or organs of circulation; and third, the secreting vessels, which separate various matters from the blood, or organs of secretion.[23]
Under the thinking or mental organs are classed, first, the organs of sense, where impressions take place; second, the cerebrum or organ of thought, properly so called, where these excite ideas, emotions, and passions; and third, the cerebel or organof volition, where acts of the will result from the last.[24]
We may now more particularly notice the functions of these organs, which are the subject of physiology.
In the locomotive functions, the bones at once give support, and form levers for motion; the ligaments form articulations, and afford the points of support; and the muscles are the moving powers. To the first, are owing all the symmetry and elegance of human form; to the second, its beautiful flexibility; and to the third, all the brilliance and grace of motion which fancy can inspire, or skill can execute.
In the nutritive functions, the food, having passed into the mouth, is, after mastication, aided by mixture with the saliva, thrown back, by the tongue and contiguous parts, into the cavity behind, called fauces and pharynx; this contracting, presses it into the œsophagus or gullet; this also contracting, propels it into the stomach, which, after its due digestion aided by the gastric juice, similarly contracting, transmits whatever portion of it, now called chyme, is sufficiently comminuted to pass through its lower opening, the pylorus, into the intestines; these, at the commencement of which it receives the bile and pancreatic juice, similarly pressing it on all sides, urge forward its most solid part to the anus; while its liquid portion partly escapes from the pressure into the mouths of theabsorbents. The absorbents arising by minute openings from all the internal surfaces, and continuing a similar contractile motion, transmit it, now called chyle, by all their gradually-enlarging branches, and through their general trunk, the thoracic duct, where it is blended with the lymph brought from other parts, into the great veins contiguous to the heart, where it is mixed with the venous or returning and dark-colored blood, and whence it flows into the anterior side of that organ. The anterior side of the heart, forcibly repeating this contraction, propels it, commixed with the venous blood, into the lungs, which perform the office of respiration, and in some measure of sanguification; there, giving off carbonaceous matter, and assuming a vermilion hue and new vivifying properties, it flows back as arterial blood, into the posterior side of the heart. The posterior side of the heart, still similarly contracting, discharges it into the arteries; these, maintaining a like contraction, carry it over all the system; and a great portion of it, impregnated with carbon, and of a dark color, returns through the veins in order to undergo the same course. Much, however, of its gelatinous and fibrous parts is retained in the cells of the parenchyma, or cellular, vascular, and nervous substance forming the basis of the whole fabric, and constitutes nutrition, properly so called; while other portions of it become entangled in the peculiarly-formed labyrinths of the glands, and form secretion and excretion—the products of the former contributing to the exercise of other functions, andthose of the latter being rejected. As digestion precedes the first, so generation follows the last of these functions, and not only continues the same species of action, but propagates it widely to new existences in the manner just described.
In the thinking functions, the organs of sense receive external impressions, which excite in them sensations; the cerebrum, having these transmitted to it, performs the more complicated functions of mental operation, whence result ideas, emotions, and passions; and the cerebel, being similarly influenced, performs the function of volition, or causes the acts of the will.
It is not unusual to consider the body as being divided into the head, the trunk, and the extremities; but, in consequence of the hitherto universal neglect of the natural arrangement of the organs and functions into locomotive, nutritive, and thinking, the beauty and interest which may be attached to this division, have equally escaped the notice of anatomists.
It is a curious fact, and strongly confirmative of the preceding arrangements, that one of these parts, the extremities, consists almost entirely of locomotive organs, namely, of bones, ligaments, and muscles; that another, the trunk, consists of all the greater nutritive organs, namely, absorbents, bloodvessels, and glands; and that the third, the head, contains all the thinking organs, namely, the organs of sense, cerebrum, and cerebel.[25]
It is a fact not less curious, nor less confirmative of the preceding arrangements, that, of these parts, those which consist chiefly of locomotive or mechanical organs—organs which, as to mere structure, and considered apart from the influence of the nervous system over them, are common to us with the lowest class of beings, namely, minerals[26]—are placed in the lowest situation, namely, the extremities; that which consists chiefly of nutritive or vital organs—organs common to us with a higher class of beings, namely, vegetables[27]—is placed in a higher situation, namely, the trunk; and that which consists chiefly of thinking or mental organs—organs peculiar to the highest class of beings, namely, animals[28]—is placed in the highest situation, namely, the head.
It is not less remarkable, that this analogy is supported even in its minutest details; for, to choose the nutritive organs contained in the trunk as an illustration, it is a fact, that those of absorption and secretion, which are most common to uswith plants, a lower class of beings, have a lower situation—in the cavity of the abdomen; while those of circulation, which are very imperfect in plants,[29]and more peculiar to animals, a higher class of beings, hold a higher situation—in the cavity of the thorax.
It is, moreover, worthy of remark, and still illustrative of the preceding arrangements, that, in each of these three situations, the bones differ both in, position and in form. In the extremities, they are situated internally to the soft parts, and are generally of cylindrical form; in the trunk, they begin to assume a more external situation and a flatter form, because they protect nutritive and more important parts, which they do not, however, altogether cover; and, in the head, they obtain the most external situation and the flattest form, especially in its highest part, because they protect thinking and most important organs, which, in some parts, they completely invest.
The loss of such general views is the consequence of arbitrary methods.[30]
We may now apply these anatomical and physiological views to the art of distinguishing and judging of beauty in woman.
It is evidently the locomotive or mechanical system which is highly developed in the beauty whose figure is precise, striking, and brilliant.
It is evidently the nutritive or vital system which is highly developed in the beauty whose figure is soft and voluptuous.
It is not less evidently the thinking or mental system which is highly developed in the beauty whose figure is characterized by intellectuality and grace.
Thus can anatomical principles alone at once illustrate and establish the accuracy of the three species of beauty which I have analytically described.
The variations of the organization of woman do not distinctly mark the seasons of life. Many connected phenomena glide on imperceptibly; and we can distinguish the strong characters of different and distinct ages, only at periods remote from each other. Although, therefore, woman is perpetually changing, it requires some care to discriminate the principal epochs of her life.
The first age of woman extends from birth to the period of puberty.
In beginning the career of life, woman is not yet truly woman; the characters of her sex are not yet decided; she is an equivocal being, who does not differ from the male of the same age even by the delicacy of the organs; and we observe between them a perfect identity of wants, functions, and movements. Their existence is, then, purely individual; we perceive none of the relations which afterward establish between them a mutual dependance; each lives only for self.
This conformity and independence of the sexes are the more remarkable, the earlier the age and the less advanced the development.
Confining our view to woman alone, it is not only in dimensions that, at this age, her person differs from that in which the growth is terminated: it presents another model. The various parts have not, in relation to each other, the same proportions.
The head is much more voluminous; and this is not a result of the extent of the face, for that is small and contracted, because the apparatus of smell and of mastication are not yet developed. Nor is the head only more voluminous; it is also more active, and forms a centre toward which is directed all the effort of life.
The spine of the back has not either the minuter prominences or the general inflexions which favor the action of the extensor muscles, a circumstance which is opposed to standing perpendicularly during the first months. The infant consequently can only crawl like a quadruped.
Little distinction can then be drawn, and that with difficulty, from the comparative width of the haunches, and magnitude of the pelvis. That part is scarcely more developed in the female than in the male; its general form is the same; and its different diameters have similar relations to each other.
The length of the trunk is great in proportion to the limbs, which are slightly and imperfectly developed.
Owing to the great length of the chest, and the imperfection of the inferior members, the middle of the body then corresponds to the region of theumbilicus. An infant having other proportions, would appear to be deprived of the characters of its age.
In the locomotive system, the muscles have not yet acted with sufficient power and frequency to modify the direction of the bones, and to bestow a peculiar character upon their combination in the skeleton. The fleshy and other soft parts do not yet appear to differ from those of the male, either as to form or as to relative volume.
The vital functions of digestion, of circulation and respiration, of nutrition, secretion, and excretion, are performed in the same manner. The want of nourishment is unceasingly renewed, and the movements of the pulse, and of inspiration and expiration, are rapidly performed, owing to the extreme irritability of all the organs.
The mental functions present the same resemblance; the ideas, the appetites, the passions, have the greatest analogy; and similar moral dispositions prevail. Little girls, it has been observed, have in some measure the petulance of little boys, and these have in some measure the mobility and the inconstancy of little girls.
Owing to the pelvis not being yet developed, little girls walk nearly like children of the other sex.
These points of resemblance do not continue during a long period: the female begins to acquire a distinct physiognomy, and traits which are peculiar to her, long before we can discern any of the symptoms of puberty; and although the especialmarks which distinguish her sex do not yet show themselves, the general forms which characterize it may be perceived. These differences, however, are only slight modifications, more easily felt than determined.
The cartilaginous extremities of the bones appear to enlarge; and the mucous substance, which ultimately gives the soft reliefs which distinguish woman, is not yet secreted. She is now perhaps more easily distinguished by the nature of her inclinations and the general character of her mind: while man now seeks to make use of his strength, woman endeavors to acquire agreeable arts. The movements, the gait, of the little girl begin to change.
These shades are so much the more sensible as the development is more advanced. Still, woman, in advancing toward puberty, appears to remove less than man from her primitive constitution; she always preserves something of the character proper to children; and the texture of her organs never loses all its original softness.
At the near approach to puberty, woman becomes daily more perfect.
We observe a predominance of the action of the lungs and the arteries; the pelvis enlarges; the haunches are rounded; and the figure acquires elegance.
There is in particular a remarkable increase of the capacity of the pelvis, of which the circumference at last presents the circular form; it being no longer, as in the little girl and in man, theanteroposterior diameter which is the greatest, but the transverse one. It has been observed that the same occurs in the females of the greater quadrupeds. The pelvis, however, does not acquire, till the moment of perfect puberty, its proper form and dimensions.
The changes which the same cause produces at the surface, are a general development of the cellular tissue, the delicacy of all the outlines, the fineness and the animation of the skin, and the new state of the bosom.
The fire of the eyes, and the altogether new expression of the physiognomy, show that there now also exists the sensation of a new want, which various circumstances may for a time enfeeble or silence, but can never entirely stifle; and with it come those tastes, that direction of the mind, and those habits, which are the effect of an internal power now called into activity.
The gait and bearing of woman are now no longer the same; and the voice changes as well as the physiognomy.
In all that has yet occurred, it will be observed that nutrition and growth take place with great rapidity in woman. Her internal structure, her external form, her faculties, are all developed promptly. It would appear that the parts which compose her body, being less, less compact, and less strong, than those of man, require less time to attain their complete development.
Woman consequently arrives earlier at the age of puberty, and her body is commonly, at twentyyears of age, as completely formed as that of a man at thirty. Thus beauty and grace, as has been observed, seem to demand of nature less labor and time than the attributes of force and grandeur.
In many women, however, nutrition languishes even until the sexual organs enter into action, and determine a revolution under the influence of which growth is accomplished.
Still it is certain that, for several years, the locomotive system predominates in young women, even in figures promising the ultimate development of the vital system in the highest degree.
The second age of woman extends from puberty to the cessation of the menses, or, we may say, from the period of full growth, the general time of bearing children, to the time of ceasing to bear—generally perhaps from twenty to forty.
It is at the beginning of this period that woman has acquired all her attributes, her most seducing graces. She is not now distinguished merely by the organs which are the direct instruments of reproduction: many other differences of structure, having a relation to her part in life, present themselves to our view.
At this maturer age, the whole figure is, in the female, smaller and slenderer than in the male. The ancients accordingly gave seven heads and a half to the Venus, and eight heads and some modules to the Apollo.
The relations between the dimensions of the different parts differ also in the two sexes.
In woman, the head, shoulders, and chest, aresmall and compact, while the haunches, the hips, the thighs, and the parts connected with the abdomen, are ample and large. Hence, her body tapers upward, as her limbs taper downward. And this is the most remarkable circumstance in her general form.
Owing to smaller stature, and to greater size of the abdominal region, the middle point, which is at the pubis in the male, is situated higher in the female. This is the next remarkable circumstance in a general view.
The inferior members still continue shorter.
In general, woman is not only less in stature, and different in her general proportions, but her haunches are more apart, her hips more elevated, her abdomen larger, her members more rounded, her soft parts less compact, her forms more softened, her traits finer.
During youth, especially, and among civilized nations, woman is farther distinguished by the softness, the smoothness, the delicacy, and the polish, of all the forms, by the gradual and easy transitions between all the parts, by the number and the harmony of the undulating lines which these present in every view, by the beautiful outline of the reliefs, and by the fineness and the animation of the skin.
The soft parts which enter into the composition of woman, and the cellular tissue which serves to unite them, are also more delicate and more supple than those of man.
All these circumstances indicate very clearlythe passive state to which nature has destined woman, and which will be fully illustrated in a future volume.
If, in a living body, any part liable to be distended had too much firmness, or even elasticity, it might press against some essential organ; and the liquids being impeded in their course, would in that case be speedily altered, if the neighboring parts offered not flexible vessels for their reception.
Now, in the body of woman, certain parts are exposed to suffer great distentions and compressions. It is therefore necessary that her organs should be of such structure as to yield readily to these impressions, and to supply each other when their respective functions are impeded.
From this it follows, that woman never enjoys existence better, than when a moderate plumpness bestows on her organs, without too much weakening them, all the suppleness of which they are capable.
This leads to the consideration of the natural mobility of the organs of woman.
Their mobility is a necessary consequence, in the first place, of their littleness. The movements of all animals, appear to be executed with more rapidity, the less their bulk. It has been observed, that the arteries of the ox beat only thirty-five times, while those of the sheep beat sixty, and that the pulse of women is smaller and more rapid than that of men.
A second physical quality, which concurs torender more mobile the various parts of woman, is their softness.
A certain feebleness is the necessary consequence of these two circumstances. But it is thence that spring woman’s suppleness and lightness of movement, and her capacity for grace of attitude.
It has been conjectured, that even the elements of the parts which constitute woman, have a particular organization, on which depends the elegance of the forms, the vivacity of the sensations, and the lightness of the movements, which characterize her.
The result of these circumstances is that, while man possesses force and majesty, woman is distinguished by beauty and grace. The characteristics of woman are less imposing and more amiable; they inspire less admiration than love. As has been observed, a single trait of rudeness, a severe air, or even the character of majesty, would injure the effect of womanly beauty. Lucian admirably represents to us the god of love frightened at the masculine air of Minerva.
While man, by force and activity, surmounts the obstacles which embarrass him, woman, by yielding, withdraws from their action, and adds to beauty, a gentle and winning grace which places all the vaunted power of man at her disposal.
It is evidently the influence of the organs distinguishing the two sexes, which is the primary cause of their peculiar beauty.
As the liquid which, in man, is secreted incertain vessels for the purpose of reproduction, communicates a general excitement and activity to the character, so when, in woman, the periodical excretion appears, the breasts expand, the eyes sparkle, the countenance becomes more expressive, but at the same time more timid and reserved, and a character of flexibility and grace distinguishes every motion.
Conformably with this view, the appearance and the manners of eunuchs approach to those of women, by the softness and feebleness of their organization, as well as by their timidity, and by their acute voice.
The very opposite is naturally the result of the extirpation of the ovaries in women. Pott, giving an account of the case of a female, in whom both the ovaries were extirpated, says, the person “has become thinner, and more apparently muscular; her breasts, which were large, are gone; nor has she ever menstruated since the operation, which is now some years.” Haighton found that, by dividing the Fallopian tubes, which connect the ovaries with the womb, sexual feelings were destroyed, and the ovaries gradually wasted.
The women, also, in whom the uterus and the ovaries remain inert during life, approximate in forms and habits to men. It is stated, in the Philosophical Transactions for 1805, that an adult female, in whom the ovaries were defective, presented a corresponding defect in the state of the constitution.
To the same general principle, it has beenobserved, we must refer the partial growth of a beard on females in the decline of life, and the circumstance that female-birds, when they have ceased to lay eggs, occasionally assume the plumage, and, to a certain extent, the other characters of the male.
Under the influence of this cause, the first exercise of her new faculty determines remarkable modifications in woman. Her neck swells and augments in size—
“Non illam nutrix orienti luce revisensHesterno collum poterit circumdare filo;[31]
her voice assumes another expression; her moral habits totally change: and many women owe to love and marriage more splendid beauty.
The women thus happily constituted are not those of hot climates, but those of cooler regions and calmer temperament, whose placid features and more elastic forms announce a gentler and more passive love.
Impassioned women, on the contrary, do not so long preserve their freshness: the expansive force,from which the organs derived their form and coloring, abates; and a less agreeable flaccidity succeeds to the elasticity with which they were endowed, if the plumpness which adult age commonly brings does not sustain them.
During pregnancy and suckling, the firstmentioned class of women retain a remarkable freshness and plumpness.
The lastmentioned class of women most frequently become meager, and lose their freshness during the continuance of these states.
If, however, during these states, suitable precautions and preservative cares be not employed, it is the first class who most suffer from traces of maternity.
Conception, pregnancy, delivery, and suckling, being renewed more or less frequently during the second age, hasten debility in feeble and ill-constituted women; especially if misery or an improper mode of life increase the influence of these causes.
In the third age of woman, extending generally from forty to sixty, the physical form does not suddenly deteriorate; and, as has often been observed, “when premature infirmities or misfortunes, the exercise of an unfavorable profession, or a wrong employment of life, have not hastened old age, women during the third age preserve many of the charms of the preceding one.”