226 Rev. Mr. Hall's Inquiry concert ling 
ufurpation to feme new conqueror, which will 
probably be equally flnort-lived. 
But to return from this digreflion. The ad¬ 
vocates for the influence of Tafte on the Moral 
Character, have generally confounded that fa¬ 
culty with the moral sense. They feem to be 
perfuaded, that the fame power, which difeovers, 
and reliflies the beauties of nature and of art, 
mull equally difeover, and relifh the beauty, the 
order, the harmony of virtue. Lord Shaftes- 
eury * has fully adopted this notion. His difei- 
ciple Hutcheson, f with fome trifling diftinc- 
tions, has embraced the fame opinion. The 
very ingenious author of the Elements of Crilicifm 
tells us, that there is a ftrong and dole affinity 
between tafte, and the moral fenfe. “ Tafte, 
fays he, in the fine arts, goes hand in hand 
with the moral fenle, to which indeed it is nearly 
allied.” X 
This natural connexion, and clofe alliance, 
of tafte with the moral fenfe, may, perhaps, be 
very juftly difputed i as tafte, I apprehend, muft 
be the joint refult of delicate, corporeal, and 
intellectual powers; whilft what is ufually un- 
derftood by a moral fenfe, muft be of a nature 
altogether intellectual. 
* Lord Shaftelbury’s Charadteriftics paffim: 
f Hatchefon’s Inquiry into the Orig. of our Ideas of 
Beauty, &c. 
f Elem. Crit. Introduc. p. 7. 
But 
