208 THE MAGAZINE OF HORTICULTURE. 



mouldered into beauty many a tower," is one of the few 

 happy expressions to be found in Mr. Mason's " English Gar- 

 den." According to Mr. Price, however, beauty, even in ar- 

 chitecture, implies the freshness of youth, or at least a state 

 of high and perfect preservation; and buildings are mouldered 

 out of beauty into piduresqiieness. Who (exclaims our author) 

 shall ever understand the English language, if new and un- 

 couth words are thus to deprive those sanctioned by long 

 usage of their authorized and established meaning ? All 

 these forms, appearances and combinations which Mr. Price 

 considers picturesque, our author considers beautiful, while 

 the former confines this latter term to objects which are 

 smooth, fresh and young, unwisely limiting its application to 

 a (e\Y species of things, as if we were to say that the only 

 beautiful women were those who are light haired, and who 

 have round and smooth faces. Mr. Knight very justly con- 

 siders the term picturesque as applicable to a certain class of 

 beautiful objects, and not as implying qualities opposite to 

 those of beauty. Even grotesque^ objects he admits may be 

 beautiful likewise. The beauty of those whimsical and ex- 

 travagant paintings, called, from the subterraneous apartments 

 in Rome, where the first specimens of them were found, 

 grot-tesque, has, he thinks, never been questioned. The 

 brilliancy and variety of the tints have afforded pleasure to 

 every eye ; and the airy lightness and playful elegance of the 

 forms have pleased every imagination. Yet these things are 

 beautiful only in painting ; in reality we should be disgusted 

 with them. By this and many other examples he proves 

 that a scene may be beautiful in painting, though it represent 

 an object which is disgusting or offensive in real nature. 



This is no place to follow the controversy on this point to 

 its end ; the author's opinion seems to be like that of Sir 

 Joshua Reynolds, who maintains that beauty does not consist 

 in any particular forms, lines, or colors, but is merely the re- 

 sult of habitual association, and of our ideas of their fitness 

 to contribute to our pleasures. Hence the productions of the 

 fine arts, continues the author, are never thoroughly enjoyed 

 but by persons whose minds are enriched by a variety of 



