Steer. XXII. 3. i. AND IMITATION. 201 



facility and diftindlnefs, with which we perceive and underftand 

 repeated fenfations, enters into all the agreeable arts $ and when 

 it is carried to excefs is termed formality. The art of dancing like 

 that of mufic depends for a great part of the pleafure it affords, 

 on repetition ; architecture, efpecially the Grecian, confiits of 

 one part being a repetition of another ; and hence the beauty of 

 the pyramidal outline in iandfcape-painting ; where one fide of 

 the picture may be faid in fome meafure to balance the other. 

 So univerfally does repetition contribute to our pleafure in the 

 fine arts, that beauty itfelf has been defined by fome writers to 

 eonfift in a due combination of uniformity and variety. See 

 Sea. XVI. 6. 



111. i. Man is termed by Ariftotle an imitative animal ; this 

 propenfity to imitation not only appears in the actions of children, 

 but in all the cuftoms and fafhions of the world : many thou- 

 fands tread in the beaten paths of others, for one who traverfes 

 regions of his own difcovery. The origin of this propenfity of 

 imitation has not, that I recollect, been deduced from any known 

 principle ; when any action prefents itfelf to the view of a child, 

 as of whetting a knife, or threading a needle, the parts of this ac- 

 tion in refpect of time, motion, figure, are imitated by a part of 

 the retina of his eye ; to perform this action therefore with his 

 hands is eafier to him than to invent any new action, becaufe 

 it confifts in repeating with another fet of fibres, viz. wi:h the 

 moving mufcles, what he has juit performed by fome parrs of 

 the retina ; juft as in dancing we transfer the times of motion 

 from the actions of the auditory nerves to the mufcles of che limbs. 

 Imitation therefore confifts of repetition, which we have {hewn 

 above to be the eafieft kind of animal action, and which we per- 

 petually fall into, when we poffefs an accumulation of fenfuriai. 

 power, which is not otherwife called into exertion. 



It has been (hewn that our ideas are configurations of the or- 

 gans of fenfe, produced originally in coniequence of the ftimu- 

 lus of external bodies. And rhat thefe ideas, or configurations 

 of the organs of fenie, refemble in fome property a correfpond- 

 ent property of external matter ; as the parts of the fenfes of 

 fight and of touch, which are excited into action, refemble in 

 figure the figure of the (limulating body ; and probably alib the 

 colour, and the quantity of denfity, which they perceive. As 

 explained in Sect. XIV. 2. 2. Hence it appears, that our per- ^ 

 ceptions themfeives are copies, that is, imitations of fome prop- ' 

 erties of external matter ; and the propenfity to imitation is thus 

 interwoven with our exiftence, as it is produced by the flimuli 

 of external bodies, and is afterwards repeated by our volitions 



VOL, I. C c and 



