pleasure to any thing but its form and plumage? Concerning natural
objects, and those inferior animals which are not under the influence
of domestic associations, there is little or no difference among men:
if they differ, it is only in degree, according to their sensibility.
Men do not dispute about a rose. And why? Because there is nothing
beside the physical to interfere with the impression it was
predetermined to make; and the idea of beauty is realized instantly.
So, also, with respect to other objects of an opposite character; they
can speak without deliberating, and call them plain, homely, ugly, and
so on, thus instinctively expressing even their degree of remoteness
from the condition of beauty. Who ever called a pelican beautiful, or
even many animals endeared to us by their valuable qualities,--such as
the intelligent and docile elephant, or the affectionate orang-outang,
or the faithful mastiff? Nay, we may run through a long list of most
useful and amiable creatures, that could not, under any circumstances,
give birth to an emotion corresponding to that which we ascribe to the
beautiful.

But there is scarcely a subject on which mankind are wider at
variance, than on the beauty of their own species,--some preferring
this, and others that, particular conformation; which can only be
accounted for on the supposition of some predominant expression,
either moral, intellectual, or sensual, with which they are in
sympathy, or else the reverse. While some will task their memory,
and resort to the schools, for their supposed infallible
_rules_;--forgetting, meanwhile, that ultimate tribunal to which
their canon must itself appeal, the ever-living principle which first
evolved its truth, and which now, as then, is not to be reasoned
about, but _felt_. It need not be added how fruitful of blunders
is this mechanical ground.