is from the perfection of form, _beauty_.

[Illustration:
SUBLIMITY.
|
GRACE
|
BEAUTY | TRUTH
|
COMMON SENSE | COMMON FORM
|
NATURE]

On meditating on this subject, and marking the progressive stages
or degrees of human excellence, the great leading general truths,
or mental rests, as I may call them, _the common, the beautiful, the
graceful, and the sublime_, I have been naturally led to form a kind
of diagrammatic representation of their respective distances, &c. &c.
which I present to my reader on the opposite page, requesting him to
refer to it now and then as he goes on, in order to facilitate his
comprehension of my meaning.

And here it may be necessary to premise, that, however whimsical and
absurd this delineation may appear to my reader, something analogous
to the thought may be found in the works of many eminent philosophers,
particularly in those of Bacon[A] and of Locke:[B] the latter
suggesting that the whole system of morality might be reduced to
mathematical demonstration; and the former, in his treatise on the
Advancement of Learning, gives a description of the stages of science
very much resembling my delineation of the stages of intellectual
perfection, or taste.

[Footnote A: Advancement of Learning, Book 2d.]

[Footnote B: Essay on human Understanding, Chap. 3d, Book the 4th, and
Chap. 12th, same Book, Sect. 8th.]

It could have been no dishonour to me to have been led by such
conductors! Yet, as the truth cannot dishonour me neither, I must
aver, that my little system was projected, and brought to the exact
state it now is in, without my having the least apprehension that any
thing similar had been suggested before by any person whatever; nor
have I, in consequence of the discovery I have lately made of the
opinions of these respectable authors, added or omitted a single
thought in my treatise. But to return from my digression.

In the exact center of my circle of humanity, I have placed nature,
or the springs of the intellectual powers, which tend, in a
straight line, to its boundary; and, on its boundary, I have placed
demonstrable beauty and truth, and the utmost power of rules; and,
midway; I have placed common sense and common form, half deriving
their existence from pure nature, and half from its highest
cultivation, as far as art or rules can teach. A conjunction whic