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which there are oaks, thorns, and hollies ' 

 such trees and bushes, also, break and in- 

 terrupt the continued flow of those sweeps, 

 which most nearly approach to what has- 

 been called the line of beauty; and cer- 

 tainly any abruptnesses in the ground, how- 

 ever slight, are contrary to the idea of 

 beauty in its confined sense : yet a river, 

 even with broken ground and with rocks, 

 when they are softened, not concealed by 

 wood, so that the whole is blended together, 

 will not only be more varied, more suited to 

 the painter, and to the genuine lover of na- 

 ture, but will be more strictly beautiful than 

 the finest turf and the most artfully formed 

 curves, without similar accompaniments of 

 trees and bushes , for such curves, from their 

 distinctness and their nakedness, present no- 

 thing but hard, formal lines. All this to me 

 is a proof, that insensible transitions, and 

 not any particular lines or curves, are the 

 means by which beauty in landscape is 

 chiefly effected ; for I will venture to assert, 

 that whenever in natural scenery a line of 

 beauty is made by rule, it will most as- 

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