168 FRAGMENTS ON THF, BEAUTIFUL. 



is a primitive pattern or archetype of beauty originally existing in the 

 hinnan soul, "-by a reference to which all the principles of taste are de- 

 termined." This theory is beautii\il — and in the spirit of philosophy 

 strives to attain a unity of cause. Had it rejected the absurdity of in- 

 tuitive ideas, and assumed the soul itself in the exercise of its finer per- 

 ceptions, as the model, and shown it grasping all that was in commun- 

 ion with it in the outer world, and in the ideal world — then would it 

 have approached the truth. 



The spirit of man witliin him is capable of richest music. As two 

 instruments in perfect unison will both vibrate, though but one be struck, 

 thus the soul of man thrills with the undulations of whatever it en- 

 counters in entire harmony with its own chords. Without it, and with- 

 in it, there must be that which tunes it, but this destroys not the integri- 

 ty of its own action. Like the iEolian harp, it may not sound without 

 the winds that sweep above it, yet its heavenly music springs from its 

 own wires. Though the hand that touches it be unseen, the notes are 

 too varied, too rich, and too frequent to betoken less than the power of 

 some high spirit. Many of its emotions may be traced to the great laws 

 of relation and association, but the most and the highest to a spirit of 

 intellectual beauty pervading the Universe which the eye sees not, and 

 the ear never hears. But its melody is caught by the soul within ; and 

 that other sense, whose organ is all of man's higher nature, brings it to 

 his perceptions To the poet more of it is given than to mere men. In 

 him, though the light of this outer world should be cut off, and men of 

 clay should call him blind, his soul glows with heavenly rays of poetry 

 and prophecy, and the urgings of the divinity within him give to the 

 world ''high thoughts, which voluntary move harmonious numbers." 

 With our whole soul we join the eloquent apostrophe of Akenside : 



"Mind, mind alone, bear witness earth and heaven. 

 The living- fountains in itself contains, 

 Of beauteous and sublime." 

 ******* 



Tliat the picture of a beautiful object does not charm us as deeply and 

 as long as the reality, is a proof, that it is not the eye alone from whence 

 the conception of beauty arises. 



How often are emotions of the beautiful excited, where, by the ad- 

 mission of all the vividness even of the mental image, it bears no ratio to 

 the excitement of I'celing. It is not true, that the mind always forms to 

 itself or pictures the object which excites the beautiful. The most 

 charming and delicate ccmceptions of the great poets are precisely such 

 as no painter can represent, and no imagination embody. We cannot 



