Chap. XV. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 195 



perfe£l intelled often errs; and then we are deceived with falfe notions 

 of the beautiful in fcntiments and adions. In private life, when 

 this happens, it is called Vanity; which, though it may not make 

 a man miferable in any great degree, makes him contemptible : 

 In public life it gets the name of Ambition, which produces great 

 dilorders in the government of ftates when it prevails among the 

 fubjedts ; but, when it becomes the paflion of kings and gover- 

 nors, their ambition produces wars and conquefts, and wonderful 

 events in the affairs of men. It was ambition which, in antient 

 times, produced thofe great empires, the Affyrian, that of the Medes, 

 the Perfian, and, the greatefl: of all, the Roman; all which, and parti- 

 cularly the la>, may be faid to have almoft defolated the earth. Beau- 

 ty naturally produces adm.iration ; and, therefore, a man, who thinks 

 himfeif poflcffed of that quality, admires himfelf, and defires that 

 others ihouid admire him, and that they fnould exprefs their admira- 

 tion by praife, and by allowing him a pre-eminence in all the bufinefs 

 of life, and particularly in government. From this motive thofe 

 conquerors, who eftabliflied the empires I have mentioned, aflerted 

 that pre-eminence, to which they thought they were entitled, by 

 force of arms. 1 his miflaken fcnfe of the beautiful, thei'cfore, I 

 hold to be the foundation of all the great empires I have mentioned; 

 and, even in private life, when joined with the pleafures of fenfe, it 

 is the fource of all the mifery of man in this llate of his exiftence. 



But it will be afked, What is the thing 1 call Beauty^ which, I 

 fayv has produced fuch wonderful effcdls in human life ? This 

 qucftion 1 have anfwcred in the Vth. volume of this work ; * 

 where I have faid, " That it is a perception, which the intelledl, and 

 *' the intellc'^ only? has of a certain union and congruity of fcveral 

 " things, which makes them in fome fenfe one^ or in other words, a . 

 '''■ fyjlem, which we perceive not only in different objeds, but in 



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