he relations between himself and the person, and all the
circumstances of the fact, were previously known to him; but the motive
of revenge, or fear, or interest, prevailed in his savage heart over the
sentiments of duty and humanity. And when we express that detestation
against him to which he himself, in a little time, became insensible,
it is not that we see any relations, of which he was ignorant; but that,
for the rectitude of our disposition, we feel sentiments against which
he was hardened from flattery and a long perseverance in the most
enormous crimes.

In these sentiments then, not in a discovery of relations of any kind,
do all moral determinations consist. Before we can pretend to form any
decision of this kind, everything must be known and ascertained on the
side of the object or action. Nothing remains but to feel, on our part,
some sentiment of blame or approbation; whence we pronounce the action
criminal or virtuous.

III. This doctrine will become still more evident, if we compare moral
beauty with natural, to which in many particulars it bears so near a
resemblance. It is on the proportion, relation, and position of parts,
that all natural beauty depends; but it would be absurd thence to
infer, that the perception of beauty, like that of truth in geometrical
problems, consists wholly in the perception of relations, and was
performed entirely by the understanding or intellectual faculties. In
all the sciences, our mind from the known relations investigates the
unknown. But in all decisions of taste or external beauty, all the
relations are beforehand obvious to the eye; and we thence proceed to
feel a sentiment of complacency or disgust, according to the nature of
the object, and disposition of our organs.

Euclid has fully explained all the qualities of the circle; but has not
in any proposition said a word of its beauty. The reason is evident. The
beauty is not a quality of the circle. It lies not in any part of the
line, whose parts are equally distant from a common centre. It is only
the effect which that figure produces upon the mind, whose peculiar
fabric of structure renders it susceptible of such sentiments. In vain
would you look for it in the circle, or seek it, either by your senses
or by mathematical reasoning, in all the properties of that figure.

Attend to Palladio and Perrault, while they explain all the parts and
proportions of a pillar. They talk of the cornice, and frieze, and bas