leisure hours. Thorough acquaintance with the principles of an art doubles the pleasure we receive from it; and one whose taste has been cultivated by assiduous study of the philosophy of criticism will find, on almost every page, beauties which the common reader overlooks, is incapable of appreciating, and consequently entirely loses. A love for the standard master-pieces of literature is thus awakened; and he who has once acquired such a relish is in no danger of being a burden to himself, or of yielding to the seductions of false and destructive pleasures.

These studies, however, do more than entertain and please; they improve the understanding. To apply the principles of sound oriticism to composition, to examine what is beautiful and why it is so, to distinguish between affected and real ornaments, can hardly fail to improve us in the most valuable department of philosophy, the philosophy of human nature. Such examinations teach us self-knowledge. They necessarily lead us to reflect on the operations of the judgment, the imagination, and the heart; and familiarize us with the most refined feelings that ennoble our race. Beauty, harmony, grandeur, and elegance; all that can soothe the mind, gratify the fancy, or move the affections,—belong to the province of these studies. They bring to light various springs of action, which, without their aid, might have passed unobserved; and which, though delicate, often exercise an im portant influence in life.

Lastly, the cultivation of taste by the study of belles-lettres has in all ages been regarded as an important aid in the enforcement of morality. Let the records of the world be canvassed, and we shall find that trespasses, robberies, and murders, are not the work of refined men; that though, in some instances, the latter have proved unequal to temptation, and are betrayed into gross crimes, yet they constitute the exception and not the rule. Nor does the study of rhetoric operate as

and geometry; one author even goes so far as to introduce in a treatise on the subject a discourse on the seven sacraments of the Roman Catholic Church. At the Lyceum of Arts in Paris, the department of belleslettres comprehends general grammar, languages, rhetoric, geography, history, antiquities, and numismatics. In this country, the term is generally used in a more limited sense, to denote polite literature, including criticism, taste, the pleasures of the imagination, &c.

are by some embraced under this head? At the Lyceum of Arts in Paris, what does the department of belles-lettres comprehend? As used in this country, what does the term signify?

Besides entertainment, what may we gain from the study of belles-lettres? What do critical examinations teach us?

What else results from the cultivation of taste by the study of belles-lettres? What

a preventive to the more heinous offences only; it elevates the tone of the mind, increases its sensibility, enlarges the sphere of its sympathies, and thus enables it to repress its selfishness and restrain its more violent emotions. To a man of acute and cultivated taste, every wrong action, whether committed by himself or another, is a source of pain; and, if he is the transgressor, his lively sensibility brings him back to duty, with renewed resolutions for the future. Even the highest degree of cultivation may, to be sure, prove insufficient to eradicate the evil passions; yet its tendency will certainly be to mitigate their violence. The poet has truly said:

"These polished arts have humanized mankind;

Softened the rude, and calined the boisterous mind."

Noble sentiments and high examples, constantly brought before the mind, cannot fail to beget in it a love of glory, and an admiration of what is truly great. Though these impressions may not always be durable, they are at least to be ranked among the means of disposing the heart to virtue.

§ 235. As an aid in enabling us to communicate our thoughts in the best manner, it would seem as if the value of rhetoric would be obvious to all; yet there are some who venture to call it in question. Rules, they say, hamper the mind, fetter genius, and make stiff and artificial composers. They prefer leaving the writer, untrammelled, to chance or the in spiration of the moment; ridiculing the idea of his inquiring, while in the act of giving utterance to a thought, what is required, or what prohibited, by 'rule. This principle, if true of Rhetoric, obviously applies to logic, grammar, and even the elementary branches of education; and it follows that, through fear of cramping the natural powers, we should do away with training of all kinds. The absurdity of this con

clusion is manifest.

Such reasoning can come only from a shallow mind, which would thus excuse its own ignorance. A writer can not hope to attain perfection in his art, without paying due attention to its rules and principles. Men are not born great composers, any more than they are born skilful

feeling does a wrong action generally awaken in a man of cultivated taste? What do noble sentiments and high examples produce in the mind?

§ 235. What objection is made by some to the study of rhetoric? prefer leaving the writer? Expose the fallacy of this objection.

To what do they

What is the ad

carpenters or expert shoemakers. Proficiency in either vocation is the result of study and practice. It is not necessary that, while composing. the writer should keep rules constantly before him, and thus make his style mechanical and lifeless. But the principles of his art should be so familiar to his mind, as, without consciousness on his part, to control its action. He thus intuitively avoids what is wrong, while there is nothing to prevent his sentences from being as easy, natural, and unconstrained, as those of the loosest and most ignorant scribbler.

LESSON XXXIV.

TASTE. ITS UNIVERSALITY AND CULTIVATION.

§ 236. The rules of Rhetoric and Criticism are not arbitrary, but have been deduced from examinations and comparisons of those great productions which in all ages have elicited the admiration of men. Striking passages have been analyzed; the peculiarities which render them pathetic, sublime, or beautiful, have been investigated; and thus rules have been formed, by which the critic is enabled to judge of other literary performances, and the writer is shown how to express his thoughts in such a way as to reproduce similar impressions.

Thus, Aristotle, who was the first to lay down rules for unity of action in dramatic and epic poetry, did not arrive at them by a train of inductive reasoning, but by close observation of Sophocles and Homer. Perceiving that these writers, by confining themselves in each of their respective works to one action complete in itself, awakened deeper interest in their readers than those who combined unconnected facts, he generalized the important principle that in the drama and the epic poem

vantage of studying principles and rules? Is a constrained style likely to be the result?

§ 236. What is said of the rules of rhetoric and criticism? Whence have they been deduced? Describe the process. How did Aristotle arrive at his rules for unity

of action!

unity of design is essential to success.

All the rules of the rhetorician have been deduced in a similar manner, and are thus based at once on experience and nature.

$237. The works from which the principles of Rhetoric are deduced, have, as already remarked, elicited the universal admiration of men. This implies the existence in the human mind of a faculty capable of forming opinions respecting them. Such a faculty does, indeed, exist; nor is its action limited to the works of literature. It extends alike to all the creations of nature and art; and is known by the name of TASTE.

§ 238. TASTE may be defined as that faculty of the mind which enables it to perceive, with the aid of reason to judge of, and with the help of imagination to enjoy, whatever is beautiful or sublime in the works of nature and art.

The word taste is thus used metaphorically. It literally signifies the sense residing in the tongue by which we distinguish different flavors, and is hence appropriately applied to the analogous faculty of the mind which recognizes alike the most delicate beauties and the most minute imperfections.

So contradictory are the definitions of Taste given by different authors, so obscure is their language, and so inconsistent are many of them with themselves, that it is difficult to ascertain their real views on the subject. Hume calls Taste "a natural sensibility". Hutcheson makes it a distinct faculty, perfect in itself: he maintains that it is entirely independent of both judgment and imagination, not only receiving impressions, but also passing judgment on them, and producing the pleasures arising therefrom; or, in other words, that it perceives and at the same time judges and enjoys. With this view Blair for the most part agrees; nor are Addison's views, as set forth in No. 409 of the Spectator, materially different. An opposite theory is advocated by Burke and Akenside. The former unhesitatingly attributes the perception and the enjoyment arising therefrom to entirely different faculties, confining Taste to the perception. Akenside distinctly teaches that all the pleasures connected with the sublime and beautiful have their source in the

§ 237. What does the general admiration of the master-pieces of literature imply in the human mind? To what does this faculty extend? What is it called?

§ 288. What is Taste? What does this term literally signify? What is said of the definitions of Taste given by different authors? What does Hume call Taste? State Hutcheson's view. What writers agree with him in the main? What is Burke's theory? Akenside's? Alison's? Cousin's?

imagination. Alison, also, in parts of his Essay ably advocates this theory; yet, with strange inconsistency, in his very definition makes Taste "to be that faculty of the human mind by which we perceive and enjoy whatever is beautiful or sublime in the works of nature or art." The French philosopher Cousin says, "Three faculties enter into that complex faculty that is called taste,-imagination, sentiment, reason." Sentiment, according to this author, receives the impression; reason passes judgment on it; while imagination produces the sensation of pleasure experienced by the mind.

Amid these conflicting theories, the author has adopted that which seems to him least liable to objection.

§ 239. Taste is common, in some degree, to all men. Even in children it manifests itself at an early age, in a fondness for regular bodies, an admiration of statues and pictures, and a love of whatever is new or marvellous. In like manner, the most ignorant are delighted with ballads and tales; the simplest intellects are struck with the beauties of earth and sky; and savages, by their ornaments, their songs, and the rude eloquence of their harangues, show that along with reason and speech they have received the faculty of appreciating beauty. We may therefore conclude that the principles of Taste are deeply and universally implanted in the minds of

men.

240. Though Taste is common to all men, yet they by no means possess it in the same degree. There are some endowed with feelings so blunt, and tempers so cold and phlegmatic, that they hardly receive any sensible impressions even from the most striking objects; others are capable of appreci ating only the coarsest kind of beauties, and for these have no strong or decided relish; while in a third class pleasurable emotions are excited by the most delicate graces. There seems, indeed, to be a greater difference between men as respects Taste than in point of common sense, reason, or judgment. In this Nature discovers her beneficence. In facul

§ 239. What is said of the universality of Taste? How does it manifest itself in children? How, in the ignorant? How, in savages? What is the natural inference? $240. Is Taste possessed by all men in the same degree? What is said of the difference between individuals in is respect. How does nature show her beneficence