4G 
though it may be contended that a dish uniting various 
flavours, or a perfume composed of well-assorted scents 
might be called beautiful. We look at the spectrum thrown 
on a screen, arid say it is beautiful, but it is the effect of the 
various colours seen in juxtaposition, and the exquisite sha- 
ding and melting of one into the other that we admire. 
When we speak of- the beautiful colours of sunset, we forget 
that a fine sunset is in fact a grand chromatic display. We 
see the fiery red of the fleecy clouds and the deep blue of the 
sky contrasted with the green of the foliage, and the brown 
of the tree stems, followed by a flood of yellow light on a 
cool grey ground in the heavens, while the gloom of night 
is settling over the earth beneath, and the eye is pleased and 
satisfied. Were we to see the sun like a ball of red-hot iron 
set through a coppery sky over a sea of blood washing a 
coast line of red rocks overgrown with red seaweed, it is 
certain we should not speak of the beautiful colours of sun- 
set. Let any one, to test what I maintain, look at any colour 3 
however brilliant and pure, through a tube blackened inside, 
and say whether it appears beautiful. It is the great activity 
of the eye, which during our waking hours is constantly 
roaming from object to object, seldom seeing the same thing 
nor the same colour for more than a few consecutive mo- 
ments that deceives us. 
3. Much of the confusion as regards the names of colours 
arises, as it has doubtless at all times arisen, from the habit, 
difficult to explain, of using inexact designations, and even 
applying names to colours which we know to be incorrect. 
Poets, for instance, call gold red, though it is always yellow. 
We speak of white wines and red wines, though in reality, 
as we are well aware, they are yellow and purple, so that in 
a thousand years hence it may be possible for a iiterary man 
to say that we were colour-blind, our eyes having not yet 
acquired the capacity to see yellow and blue, yellow appear- 
ing to us colourless and purple red, and he may in support 
