CANTO in. PROGRESS OF THE MIND. 109 



He justly copies with enamour'd sigh 

 From Beauty's image pictured on his eye. 



4< 



Thus when great ANGELO in wondering Rome 

 Fix'd the vast pillars of Saint Peter's dome, 

 Rear'd rocks on rocks sublime, and hung on high 

 A new Pantheon in the affrighted sky. 

 Each massy pier, now join'd and now aloof, 

 The figured architraves, and vaulted roof, 



Thus when great Angela. 1. 303. The origin of this propensity to 

 imitation has not been deduced from any known principle; when any 

 action presents itself to the view of a child, as of whetting a knife, 

 or threading a needle; the parts of this action in respect of time, 

 motion, figure, are imitated by parts of the retina of his eye; to per- 

 form this action therefore with his hands is easier to him than to in- 

 vent any new action; because it consists in repeating with another set 

 of fibres, viz. with the moving muscles, what he had just performed 

 by some parts of thfe retina; just as in dancing we transfer the times 

 of the motions from the actions of the auditory nerves to the muscles 

 of the limbs. Imitation therefore consists of repetition, which is the 

 easiest kind of animal action ; as the ideas or motions become presently 

 associated together; which adds to the facility of their production; 

 as shown in Zoonomia, Vol. I. Sect. XXII. 2. 



It should be added, that as our ideas, when we perceive external 

 objects, are believed to consist in the actions of the immediate organs 

 of sense in consequence of the stimulus of those objects ; so when we 

 think of external objects, our ideas are believed to consist in the re- 

 petitions of the actions of the immediate 'organs of sense, excited by 

 the other sensorial powers of volition, sensation, or association. 



