nsient touch of these purer feelings has not raised
the individual to, at least, a momentary exemption from the common
thraldom of self. And we greatly err if their universality is not
solely limited by those "shades of the prison-house," which, in the
words of the poet, too often "close upon the growing boy." Nay, so
far as we have observed, we cannot admit it as a question whether any
person through a whole life has always been wholly insensible,--we
will not say (though well we might) to the good and true,--but to
beauty; at least, to some one kind, or degree, of the beautiful. The
most abject wretch, however animalized by vice, may still be able to
recall the time when a morning or evening sky, a bird, a flower, or
the sight of some other object in nature, has given him a pleasure,
which he felt to be distinct from that of his animal appetites, and
to which he could attach not a thought of self-interest. And, though
crime and misery may close the heart for years, and seal it up for
ever to every redeeming thought, they cannot so shut out from the
memory these gleams of innocence; even the brutified spirit, the
castaway of his kind, has been made to blush at this enduring light;
for it tells him of a truth, which might else have never been
remembered,--that he has once been a man.

And here may occur a question,--which might well be left to the ultra
advocates of the _cui bono_,--whether a simple flower may not
sometimes be of higher use than a labor-saving machine.

As to the objects whose effect on the mind is here discussed, it is
needless to specify them; they are, in general, all such as are known
to affect us in the manner described. The catalogue will vary both in
number and kind with different persons, according to the degree of
force or developement in the overruling Principle.

We proceed, then, to reply to such objections as will doubtless be
urged against the characteristic assumed. And first, as regards the
Beautiful, we shall probably be met by the received notion, that we
experience in Beauty one of the most powerful incentives to passion;
while examples without number will be brought in array to prove it
also the wonder-working cause of almost fabulous transformations,--as
giving energy to the indolent, patience to the quick, perseverance
to the fickle, even courage to the timid; and, _vice versa_, as
unmanning the hero,--nay, urging the honorable to falsehood, treason,
and murder; in a word, throu