[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
digested these observations; but I have since experienced it. And
I have often experienced, and so have a thousand others, that on
the first inclining towards sleep, we have been suddenly
awakened with a most violent start; and that this start was
generally preceded by a sort of dream of our falling down a
precipice: whence does this strange motion arise, but from the
too sudden relaxation of the body, which by some mechanism in
nature restores itself by as quick and vigorous an exertion of the
contracting power of the muscles? The dream itself is caused by
this relaxation; and it is of too uniform a nature to be attributed
to any other cause. The parts relax too suddenly, which is in the
nature of falling; and this accident of the body induces this image
in the mind. When we are in a confirmed state of health and
vigour, as all changes are then less sudden, and less on the
extreme, we can seldom complain of this disagreeable sensation.
Sect. XVIII.
The Effects Of Blackness Moderated
Though the effects of black be painful originally, we must not
135
think they always continue so. Custom reconciles us to
everything. After we have been used to the sight of black objects,
the terror abates, and the smoothness and glossiness, or some
agreeable accident, of bodies so coloured, softens in some
measure the horror and sternness of their original nature; yet the
nature of their original impression still continues. Black will
always have something melancholy in it, because the sensory will
always find the change to it from other colours too violent; or if it
occupy the whole compass of the sight, it will then be darkness;
and what was said of darkness will be applicable here. I do not
purpose to go into all that might be said to illustrate this theory of
the effects of light and darkness, neither will I examine all the
different effects produced by the various modifications and
mixtures of these two causes. If the foregoing observations have
any foundation in nature, I conceive them very sufficient to
account for all the phenomena that can arise from all the
combinations of black with other colours. To enter into every
particular, or to answer every objection, would be an endless
labour. We have only followed the most leading roads; and we
shall observe the same conduct in our inquiry into the cause of
beauty.
Sect. XIX.
The Physical Cause Of Love
When we have before us such objects as excite love and
complacency, the body is affected, so far as I could observe,
much in the following manner: the head reclines something on
one side; the eyelids are more closed than usual, and the eyes roll
136
gently with an inclination to the object; the mouth is a little
opened, and the breath drawn slowly, with now and then a low
sigh; the whole body is composed, and the hands fall idly to the
sides. All this is accompanied with an inward sense of melting
and languor. These appearances are always proportioned to the
degree of beauty in the object, and of sensibility in the observer.
And this gradation from the highest pitch of beauty and
sensibility, even to the lowest of mediocrity and indifference, and
their correspondent effects, ought to be kept in view, else this
description will seem exaggerated, which it certainly is not. But
from this description it is almost impossible not to conclude, that
beauty acts by relaxing the solids of the whole system. There are
all the appearances of such a relaxation; and a relaxation
somewhat below the natural tone seems to me to be the cause of
all positive pleasure. Who is a stranger to that manner of
expression so common in all times and in all countries, of being
softened, relaxed, enervated, dissolved, melted away by pleasure?
The universal voice of mankind, faithful to their feelings, concurs
in affirming this uniform and general effect: and although some
odd and particular instance may perhaps be found, wherein there
appears a considerable degree of positive pleasure, without all the
characters of relaxation, we must not therefore reject the
conclusion we had drawn from a concurrence of many
experiments; but we must still retain it, subjoining the exceptions
which may occur, according to the judicious rule laid down by
Sir Isaac Newton in the third book of his Optics. Our position
will, I conceive, appear confirmed beyond any reasonable doubt,
if we can show that such things as we have already observed to
be the genuine constituents of beauty, have each of them,
separately taken, a natural tendency to relax the fibres. And if it
137
must be allowed us, that the appearance of the human body,
when all these constituents are united together before the
sensory, further favours this opinion, we may venture, I believe,
to conclude, that the passion called love is produced by this
relaxation. By the same method of reasoning which we have used
in the inquiry into the causes of the sublime, we may likewise
conclude, that as a beautiful object presented to the sense, by
causing a relaxation of the body, produces the passion of love in
the mind; so if by any means the passion should first have its
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]