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CHAP. IV.

Grandeur and Sublimity.

NATURE hath not more remarkably

diftinguished us from other animals by an erect pofture, than by a capacious and afpiring mind, attaching us to things great and elevated. The ocean, the fky, feize the attention, and make a deep impreffion:* robes of state are made large and full, to draw refpect; we admire an elephant for its magnitude, notwithstanding its unwieldinefs.

The elevation of an object affects us no lefs than its magnitude: a high place is chofen for the ftatue of a deity or hero: a tree growing on the brink of a precipice looks charming when viewed from the plain below a throne is erected for the chief magiftrate; and a chair with a high feat for the prefident of a court. Among all nations, heaven is placed far above us, hell far below us.

In fome objects, greatnefs and elevation concur to make a complicated impreffion: the Alps and the Peak of Teneriff are proper examples; with the following difference, that in the former greatnefs feems to prevail, elevation in the latter.

The emotions raised by great and by elevated objects, are clearly diftinguifhable, not only in internal feeling, but even in their external expreffions. A great object

Longinus obferves, that nature inclines us to admire, not a small rive ulet, howeyer clear and transparent, but the Nile, the Ifter, the Rhine, or fill more the ocean. The fight of a small fire produceth no emotion; but we are ftruck with the boiling furnaces of Eina, pouring out whole rivers of liquid flame, Treatife of the Sublime, chap. 29.

object makes the fpectator endeavour to enlarge his bulk; which is remarkable in plain people who give way to nature without referve; in defcribing a great object, they naturally expand themselves by drawing in air with all their force. An elevated object produces a different expreffion: it makes the fpectator ftretch upward, and stand a-tiptoe.

Great and elevated objects confidered with relation to the emotions produced by them, are termed grand and fublime. Grandeur and fublimity have a double fignification: they commonly fignify the quality or circumftance in objects by which the emotions of grandeur and fublimity are produced; fometimes the emotions themselves.

In handling the present subject, it is neceffary that the impreffion made on the mind by the magnitude of an object, abstracting from its other qualities, fhould be afcertained. And because abftraction is a mental operation of fome difficulty, the fafeft method for judging is, to choose a plain object that is neither beautiful nor deformed, if fuch a one can be found. The plaineft that occurs, is a huge mafs of rubbish, the ruins, perhaps, of fome extenfive building, or a large heap of ftones, fuch as are collected together for keeping in memory a battle or other remarkable event. Such an object, which in miniature would be perfectly indifferent, makes an impreffion by its magnitude, and appears agreeable. And fuppofing it fo large, as to fill the eye, and to prevent the attention from wandering upon other objects, the impreflion it makes will be fo much the deeper. *

But though a plain object of that kind be agreeable, it is not termed grand: it is not entitled to that character, unless, together with its fize, it be poffeffed of.

* See Appendix, Terms defined, fe&t. 33.

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of other qualities that contribute to beauty, fuch as regularity, proportion, order, or colour: and according to the number of fuch qualities combined with magnitude, it is more or lefs grand. Thus, St Peter's church at Rome, the great pyramid of Egypt, the Alps towering above the clouds, a great arm of the fea, and above all, a clear and ferene sky, are grand, because, beside their size, they are beautiful in an eminent degree. On the other hand, an overgrown whale, having a difagreeable appearance, is not grand. A large building, agreeable by its regularity and proportions, is grand, and yet a much larger building deftitute of regularity, has not the least tincture of grandeur. A fingle regiment in battle-array, makes a grand appearance; which the furrounding croud does not, though perhaps ten for one in number. And a regiment where the men are all in one livery, and the horfes of one colour, makes a grander appearance, and confequently ftrikes more terror, than where there is confufion of colours and of drefs. Thus greatness or magnitude is the circumstance that distinguishes grandeur from beauty: agreeableness is the genus, of which beauty and grandeur are species.

The emotion of grandeur, duly examined, will be found an additional proof of the foregoing doctrine. That this emotion is pleafant in a high degree, requires no other evidence but once to have feen a grand object; and if an emotion of grandeur be pleasant, its cause or object, as obferved above, muft infallibly be agreeable in proportion.:

The qualities of grandeur and beauty are not more distinct, than the emotions are which these qualities produce in a fpectator. It is obferved in the chapter immediately foregoing, that all the various emo

tions

tions of beauty have one common character, that of fweetnefs and gaiety. The emotion of grandeur has a different character: a large object that is agreeable, occupies the whole attention, and fwells the heart into a vivid emotion, which, though extremely pleas ant, is rather ferious than gay. And this affords a good reafon for diftinguifhing in language thefe different emotions. The emotions raised by colour, by regularity, by proportion, and by order, have fuch a refemblance to each other, as readily to come under one general term, viz. the emotion of beauty: but the emotion of grandeur is fo different from thefe mentioned, as to merit a peculiar name.

Though regularity, proportion, order, and colour, contribute to grandeur, as well as to beauty, yet these qualities are not by far fo effential to the former as to the latter. To make out that propofition, fome preliminaries are requifite. In the first place, the mind, not being totally occupied with a small object, can give its attention at the fame time, to every minute part; but in a great or extenfive object, the mind being totally occupied with the capital and striking parts, has no attention left for thofe that are little or indifferent. In the next place, two fimilar objects appear not fimilar when viewed at different distances; the fimilar parts of a very large object cannot be seen but at different diftances; and for that reafon, its regularity, and the proportion of its parts, are in fome measure loft to the eye; neither are the irregularities of a very large object fo confpicuous as of one that is fmall. Hence it is, that a large object is not fo agreeable by its regularity, as a small object; nor fo difagreeable by its irregularities.

Thefe confiderations make it evident, that gran, deur is fatisfied with a lefs degree of regularity and of the other qualities mentioned, than is requifite for

beauty;

beauty; which may be illuftrated by the following experiment. Approaching to a finall conical hill, we take an accurate furvey of every part, and are fenfible of the flighteft deviation from regularity and proportion. Suppofing the hill to be confiderably enlarged, fo as to make us lefs fenfible of its regularity, it will, upon that account, appear lefs beautiful. It will not, however, appear lefs agrecable, because some flight emotion of grandeur, come in place of what is loft in beauty. And at last, when the hill is enlarged to a great mountain, the fmall degree of beauty that is left, is funk in its grandeur. Hence it is, that a towering hill is delightful, if it have but the flightest resemblance of a cone; and a chain of mountains no lefs fo, though deficient in the accuracy of order and proportion. We require a fmall furface to be fmooth; but in an extenfive plain, confiderable inequalities are overlooked. In a word, regularity, proportion, order, and colour, contribute to grandeur as well as to beauty; but with a remarkable difference, that in pafling from fmall to great, they are not required in the fame degree of perfec tion. This remark ferves to explain the extreme delight we have in viewing the face of nature, when fufficiently enriched and diverfified with objects. The bulk of the objects in a natural landscape are beautiful, and fome of them grand: a flowing river, a fpreading oak, a round hill, an extended plain, are delightful; and even a rugged rock or barren heath, though in themselves difagreeable, contribute by contraft to the beauty of the whole joining to these, the verdure of the fields, the mixture of light and fhade, and the fublime canopy spread over all; it will not appear wonderful, that fo extenfive a group of fplend id objects fhould fwell the heart to its utmost bounds, and