for a virtuous Conduct, than ||20our|| Moralists seem to imagine, by almost as quick and powerful Instructions, as we have for the preservation of our Bodys. ||21He has made Virtue a lovely Form, to excite our pursuit of it; and has given us strong Affections to be the Springs of each virtuous Action.||
This moral Sense of Beauty in Actions and Affections, may appear strange at first View. Some of our Moralists themselves are offended at it in my Lord Shaftesbury,iii so much ||22are they|| accustom’d to deduce every Approbation, or Aversion, from rational Views of ||23Interest||, (except it be merely in the simple Ideas of the external Senses) and have such a Horror at innate Ideas, [xvi] which they imagine this borders upon. But this moral Sense has no relation to innate Ideas, as will appear in the second Treatise. 24Our Gentlemen of good Taste can tell us of a great many Senses, Tastes, and Relishes for Beauty, Harmony, Imitation in Painting and Poetry; and may not we find too in Mankind a Relish for a Beauty in Characters, in Manners? ||25aI doubt we have made Philosophy, as well as Religion, by our foolish management of it, so austere and ungainly a Form, that a Gentleman cannot easily bring himself to like it; and those who are Strangers to it, can scarcely bear to hear our Description of it. So much ||26bit isb|| changed from what was once the delight of the finest Gentlemen among the Antients, and their Recreation after the Hurry of publick Affairs!a||
In the first Treatise, the Author perhaps in some Instances has gone too far, in supposing a greater Agree-[xvii]ment of Mankind in their Sense of Beauty, than Experience ||27will|| confirm; but all he is solicitous about is to shew, “That there is some Sense of Beauty natural to Men; ||28that we find|| as great an Agreement of Men in their Relishes of Forms, as in their external Senses which all agree to be natural; and that Pleasure or Pain, Delight or Aversion, are naturally join’d to their Perceptions.” If the Reader be convinc’d of ||29such Determinations of the Mind to be pleas’d with Forms, Proportions, Resemblances, Theorems,|| it will be no difficult matter to apprehend another superior Sense, natural ||30also|| to Men, determining them to be pleas’d with Actions, Characters, Affections. This is the moral Sense, which makes the Subject of the second Treatise.
The proper Occasions of Perception by the external Senses, occur to us as soon as we come into the [xviii] World; ||31whence|| perhaps we easily look upon these Senses to be natural: but the Objects of the superior Senses of Beauty and Virtue generally do not. It is probably some little time before Children ||32reflect||, or at least let us know that they reflect upon Proportion and Similitude; upon Affections, Characters, Tempers; or come to know the external Actions which are Evidences of them. ||33Hence|| we imagine that their Sense of Beauty, and their moral Sentiments of Actions, must be entirely owing to Instruction, and Education; whereas it ||34is as|| easy to conceive, how a Character, a Temper, as soon as they are observ’d, may be constituted by Nature the necessary occasion of Pleasure, or an Object of Approbation, as a Taste or a Sound; ||35tho it be sometime before these Objects present themselves to our Observation.|| [xix]
||36The first Impression of these Papers was so well receiv’d, that the Author hopes it will be no offence to any who are concern’d in the Memory of the late Lord Viscount Molesworth,iv if he lets his Readers know that he was the Noble Person mention’d in the Preface to the first Edition, and that their being published was owing to his Approbation of them. It was from him he had that shreud Objection, which the Reader may find in the first Treatise;* besides many other Remarks in the frequent Conversations with which he honour’d the Author; by which that Treatise was very much improved beyond what it was in the Draught presented to him. The Author retains the most grateful Sense of his singular Civilitys, and of the Pleasure and Improvement he received in his Conver-[xx]sation; and is still fond of expressing his grateful Remembrance of him: but,
Id cinerem, & Manes credas curare sepultos.v
To be concern’d in this Book can be no honour to a Person so justly celebrated for the most generous Sentiments of Virtue and Religion, deliver’d with the most manly Eloquence: yet it would not be just toward the World, should the Author conceal his Obligations to the Reverend Mr. Edward Syng;vi not only for revising these Papers, when they stood in great need of an accurate Review, but for suggesting several just Amendments in the general Scheme of Morality. The Author was much confirm’d in his Opinion of the Justness of these Thoughts, upon finding, that this Gentleman had fallen into the same way of thinking before him; and will ever look upon his Friendship [xxi] as one of the greatest Advantages and Pleasures of his Life.
To recommend the Lord Shaftesbury’s Writings to the World, is a very needless Attempt. They will be esteemed while any Reflection remains among Men. It is indeed to be wished, that he had abstained from mixing with such Noble Performances, some Prejudices he had receiv’d against Christianity; a Religion which gives us the truest Idea of Virtue, and recommends the Love of God, and of Mankind, as the Sum of all true Religion. How would it have moved the Indignation of that ingenious Nobleman, to have found a dissolute set of Men, who relish nothing in Life but the lowest and most sordid Pleasures, searching into his Writings for those Insinuations against Christianity, that they might be the less restrained from their Debaucherys; when at the same time their low Minds are [xxii] incapable of relishing those noble Sentiments of Virtue and Honour, which he has placed in so lovely a Light!||
Whatever Faults the Ingenious may find with ||37this Performance, the Author|| hopes no body will find any thing in it contrary to Religion or good Manners: and he shall be well pleased if he gives the learned World an occasion of examining more thorowly these Subjects, which are, he presumes, of very considerable Importance. The chief Ground of his Assurance that his Opinions in the main are just, is this, That as he took the first Hints of them from some of the greatest Writers of Antiquity,vii so the more he has convers’d with them, he finds his Illustrations the more conformable to their Sentiments.
||38In the former Edition of this Book there were some Mistakes in one or two of the Instances borrowed [xxiii] from other Sciences, to a perfect Knowledge of which the Author does not pretend; nor would he now undertake that this Edition is every way faultless. He hopes that those who are studious of the true measures of Life, may find his Ideas of Virtue and Happiness tolerably just; and that the profound Connoisseurs will pardon a few Faults, in the Illustrations borrow’d from their Arts, upon which his Arguments do not depend.|| [xxiv]
THE CONTENTSi
SECTION II. Of original or absolute Beauty.
SECTION III. Of the Beauty of Theorems.
SECTION IV. Of || 39 comparative or relative|| Beauty.
SECTION VI. Concerning the Universality of our Sense of Beauty.
SECTION VII. Concerning the Power of Custom, Education and Example, as to our internal Senses.
SECTION VIII. Of the Importance of the internal