language, which import blame, and others praife; and all men, who use the fame tongue, muft agree in their application of them. Every voice is united in applauding elegance, propriety, fimplicity, fpirit in writing; and in blaming fuftian, affectation, coldness, and a falfe brilliancy: But when critics come to particulars, this feeming unanimity vanishes; and it is found, that they had affixed a very different meaning to their expreffions. In all matters of opinion and fcience, the cafe is oppofite: The difference among men is there oftner found to lie in generals than in particulars; and to be lefs in reality than in appearance. An explication of the terms commonly ends the controverfy; and the difputants are furprized to find, that they had been quarrelling, while at bottom they agreed in their judgment.

Thofe who found morality on fentiment, more than on reafon, are inclined to comprehend ethics under the former, obfervation, and to fuppofe, that in all queftions, which regard conduct and manners, the difference among men is really greater than at first fight it appears. It is indeed obvious, that writers of all nations and all ages concur in applauding juftice, humanity, magnanimity, prudence, veracity; and in blaming the oppofite qualities. Even poets and other authors, whofe compofitions are chiefly calculated to please the imagination, are yet found, from HOMER down to FENELON, to inculcate the fame moral precepts, and to beftow their applause and blame on the fame virtues and vices. This great unanimie is ufually afcribed to the influence of plain reafon; which, in all these cafes, maintains fimilar fentiments in all men, and prevents thofe controverfies, to which the abftract fciences are fo much

expofed.

expofed. So far as the unanimity is real, the account may be admitted as fatisfactory: But it must also be allowed that fome part of the feeming harmony in morals may be accounted for from the very nature of language. The word, virtue, with its equivalent in every tongue, implies praife; as that of vice does blame: And no one, without the most obvious and groffest impropriety, could affix reproach to a term, which in general ufe is understood in a good fenfe; or beflow applaufe, where the idiom requires difapprobation. HOMER'S general precepts, where he delivers any fuch, will never be controverted; but it is very obvious, that when he draws particular pictures of manners, and represents heroism in ACHILLES and prudence in ULYSSES, he intermixes a much greater degree of ferocity in the former, and of cunning and fraud in the latter, than FENELON would admit of. The fage ULYSSES in the GREEK poet feems to delight in lies and fictions, and often employs them without any neceffity or even advantage: But his more fcrupulous fon in the FRENCH epic writer exposes himself to the most imminent perils, rather than depart from the exactest line of truth and veracity.

The admirers and followers of the ALCORAN infift very much on the excellent moral precepts, which are interfperfed throughout that wild performance. But it is to be fuppofed, that the ARABIC words, which correfpond to the ENGLISH, equity, justice, temperance, meeknefs, charity, were fuch as, from the conftant ufe of that tongue, muft always be taken in a good fenfe; and it would have argued the greateft ignorance, not of morals, but of language, to have mentioned them with any epithets, befides thofe of applause and approbation. But would we know, whether the pretended prophet had really attained a VOL. I. just

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just fentiment of morals? Let us attend to his narration; and we shall foon find, that he bestows praife on fuch instances of treachery, inhumanity, cruelty, revenge, bigotry, as are utterly incompatible with civilized fociety. No steady rule of right feems there to be attended to; and every action is blamed or praised, so far only as it is beneficial or hurtful to the true believers.

The merit of delivering true general precepts in ethics is indéed very fmall. Whoever recommends any moral virtues, really does no more than is implied in the terms themselves. The people, who invented the word charity, and used it in a good fenfe, inculcated more clearly and much more efficaciously, the precept, be charitable, than any pretended legislator or prophet, who should insert such a maxim in his writings. Of all expreffions, those, which, together with their other meaning, imply a degree either of blame or approbation, are the least liable to be perverted or mistaken,

It is natural for us to feek a Standard of Tafte; a rule, by which the various fentiments of men may be reconciled; or at least, a decision afforded, confirming one fentiment, and con-demning another.

There is a species of philosophy, which cuts off all hopes of success in such an attempt, and represents the impoffibility of ever attaining any standard of taste. The difference, it is faid, is very wide between judgment and fentiment. All fentiment is right; because sentiment has a reference to nothing beyond itself, and is always real, wherever a man is confcious of it. But all determinations of the understanding are not right; because they have a reference to fomething beyond themselves, to

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wit, real matter of fact; and are not always conformable to that ftandard. Among a thousand different opinions which different men may entertain of the fame fubject, there is one, and but one, that is just and true; and the only difficulty is to fix and afcertain it. On the contrary, a thousand different sentiments, excited by the fame object, are all right: Because no fentiment represents what is really in the object. It only marks a certain conformity or relation between the object and the organs or fa'culties of the mind; and if that conformity did not really exist, the fentiment could never poffibly have a being. Beauty is no quality in things themselves: It exifts merely in the mind which contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty. One person may even perceive deformity, where another is fenfible of beauty; and every individual ought to acquiefce in his own sentiment, without pretending to regulate those of others. To feek the real beauty, or real deformity is as fruitlefs an enquiry, as to pretend to ascertain the real sweet or real bitter. According to the difpofition of the organs, the fame object may be both sweet and bitter; and the proverb has juftly determined it to be fruitless to difpute concerning taftes. It is very natural, and even quite neceffary, to extend this axiom to mental, as well as bodily tafte; and thus common fenfe, which is so often at variance with philosophy, especially with the sceptical kind, is found, in one inftance at least, to agree in pronouncing the fame decifion.

But though this axiom, by paffing into a proverb, feems to have attained the fanction of common fenfe; there is certainly a fpecies of common sense which opposes it, or at least serves to modify and restrain it. Whoever would affert an equality of genius and elegance between OGILBY and MILTON, or BUN

YAN and ADDISON, would be thought to defend no less an extravagance, than if he had maintained a molehill to be as high as TENERIFFE, or a pond as extenfive as the ocean. Though there may be found perfons, who give the preference to the former authors; no one pays attention to such a taste; and we pronounce without fcruple the fentiment of these pretended critics to be abfurd and ridiculous. The principle of the natural equality of taftes is then totally forgot: and while we admit of it on fome occafions, where the objects feem near an equality, it appears an extravagant paradox, or rather a palpable abfurdity, where objects fo difproportioned are compared together.

It is evident, that none of the rules of compofition are fixed by reafonings a priori, or can be deemed abftract conclufions of the understanding, from comparing those habitudes and relations of ideas, which are eternal and immutable. Their foundation is the fame with that of all the practical sciences, experience; nor are they any thing but general obfervations, concerning what has been univerfally found to please in all countries and in all ages. Many of the beauties of poetry and even of eloquence are founded on falfehood and fiction, on hyperboles, metaphors, and an abuse or perverfion of expreffions from their natural meaning. To check the fallies of the imagination, and to reduce every expreffion to geometrical truth and exactnefs, would be the moft contrary to the laws of criticifm; because it would produce a work, which, by univerfal experience, has been found the most infipid and disagreeable. But though poetry can never submit to exact truth, it must be confined by rules of art, discovered to the author either by genius or observation. If fome negligent or irregular writers have pleafed, they have

not