STUDY X. 279 



But when two contraries come to be blended, of 

 whatever kind, the combination produces pleafure, 

 beauty, and harmony. I call the inftant, and the 

 point, of their union : harmonic exprej/ton. This is 

 the only principle which I have been able to per- 

 ceive in Nature ; for the elements themfelves, as 

 we have feen, are not fimple : they always prefent 

 accords formed of two contraries to analyfes mul- 

 tiplied without end. Thus, to refume fome of the 

 inftances already adduced, the gentleft; tempera- 

 tures, and the moft favourable, in general, to 

 every fpecies of vegetation, are thofe of the feafons 

 in which cold is blended with heat, as in the 

 Spring and Autumn. They are then produdive 

 of two faps in trees, which the ftrongeft heats of 

 Summer do not effeft. The moft agreeable pro- 

 dudlion of light and darknefs are perceptible at 

 thofe feafons when they melt into each other, and 

 form what Painters call the clear -objciire and half- 

 lights. For this reafon it is, that the moft inte- 

 refting hours of the day are thofe of morning and 

 evening : thofe hours, when, in the beautiful ima- 

 gery of La Fontaine, in his charming fable of 

 Pyramus and Thi/be, the fliade and the light ftrive 

 for the maftery in the azure fields. The moft 

 lovely profpedls are thofe in which land and water 

 are loft in each other ; this fuggefted that obferva- 

 tionofhoneft Plutarch; natr.ely, that the plea- 

 fanteft land-journies are thofe which we make 



T 4 along 



