444 



OPllRATlONS SUBSIBlAkV TO iNDtTCTION. 



Among the words which have un- 

 dergone so many successive transi- 

 tions of meaning that every trace of 

 a property common to all the things 

 they are ^applied to, or at least com- 

 mon and also peculiar to those things, 

 has been lost, Stewart considers the 

 vvord Beautiful to be one. And (with- 

 out attempting to decide a question 

 which in no respect belongs to Logic) 

 I cannot but feel, with him, con- 

 siderable doubt whether the word 

 Beautiful connotes the same property 

 when we speak of a beautiful colour, 

 a beautiful face, a beautiful scene, a 

 beautiful character, and a beautiful 

 poem. The word was doubtless ex- 

 tended from one of these objects to 

 another on account of a resemblance 

 between them, or more probably be- 

 tween the motions they excited ; and, 

 by this pi'ogressive extension it has 

 at last reached things very remote 

 from those objects of sight to which 

 there is no doubt that it was first 

 appropriated ; and it is at least 

 questionable whether there is now 

 any property common to all the things 

 which, consistently with Tisage, may 

 be called beautiful, except the pro- 

 perty of agreeableness, which the term 

 certainly does connote, but which can- 

 not be all that people usually intend 

 to express by it, since there are many 

 agreeable things which are never 

 called beautiful. If such be the case, 

 it is impossible to give to the word 

 Beautiful any fixed connotation, such 

 that it shall denote all the objects 

 which in common use it now denotes, 

 but no others. A fixed connotation, 

 however, it ought to have ; for, so long 

 as it has not, it is unfit to be used as 

 a scientific term, and is a perpetual 

 source of false analogies and erroneous 

 generalisations. 



This, then, constitutes a case in ex- 

 emplification of our remark, that even 

 when there is a property common to 

 all the things denoted by a name, to 

 erect that property into the definition 

 and exclusive connotation of the name 

 is not always desirable. The various 

 things called beautiful unquestionably 



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resemble one another in being agree* 

 able ; but to make this the definition 

 of beauty, and so extend the word 

 Beautiful to all agreeable things, would 

 be to drop altogether a portion of 

 meaning which the word really, though 

 indistinctly, conveys, and to do what 

 depends on us towards causing those 

 qualities of the objects which the word 

 previously, though vaguely, pointed 

 at, to be overlooked and forgotten. 

 It is better, in such a case, to give a 

 fixed connotation to the terra by re- 

 stricting, than by extending its use ; 

 rather excluding from the epithet 

 Beautiful some things to which it is 

 commonly considered applicable, than 

 leaving out of its connotation any of 

 the qualities by which, though oc- 

 casionally lost sight of, the general 

 mind may have been habitually guided 

 in the commonest and most interest- 

 ing applications of the term. For 

 there is no question that when people 

 call anything beautiful, they think 

 they are asserting more than that it is 

 merely agreeable. They think they 

 are ascribing a peculiar sort of agree- 

 ableness, analogous to that which they 

 find in some other of the things to 

 which they are accustomed to apply 

 the same name. If, therefore, there 

 be any particular sort of agreeable- 

 ness which is common, though not to 

 all, yet to the principal things which 

 are called beautiful, it is better to 

 limit the denotation of the term ti» 

 those things, than to leave that kind 

 of quality without a term to connote 

 it, and thereby divert attention from 

 its peculiai'ities. 



§ 6. The last remark exemplifies 

 a X'ule of terminology, which is of 

 great importance, and which has 

 hardly yet been recognised as a rule, 

 but by a few thinkers of the present 

 century. In attempting to rectify 

 the use of a vague term by giving it 

 a fixed connotation, we must taks 

 care not to discard (unless advisedly, 

 and on the ground of a deeper know- 

 ledge of the subject) any portion of 

 the connotation which the word, in 



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