.
Love is a desire of enjoying that which is good and fair. Austin dilates
this common definition, and will have love to be a delectation of the
heart, [4468]"for something which we seek to win, or joy to have, coveting
by desire, resting in joy." [4469]Scaliger _exerc. 301._ taxeth these
former definitions, and will not have love to be defined by desire or
appetite; "for when we enjoy the things we desire, there remains no more
appetite:" as he defines it, "Love is an affection by which we are either
united to the thing we love, or perpetuate our union;" which agrees in part
with Leon Hebreus.

Now this love varies as its object varies, which is always good, amiable,
fair, gracious, and pleasant. [4470]"All things desire that which is good,"
as we are taught in the Ethics, or at least that which to them seems to be
good; _quid enim vis mali_ (as Austin well infers) _dic mihi? puto nihil in
omnibus actionibus_; thou wilt wish no harm, I suppose, no ill in all thine
actions, thoughts or desires, _nihil mali vis_; [4471]thou wilt not have
bad corn, bad soil, a naughty tree, but all good; a good servant, a good
horse, a good son, a good friend, a good neighbour, a good wife. From this
goodness comes beauty; from beauty, grace, and comeliness, which result as
so many rays from their good parts, make us to love, and so to covet it:
for were it not pleasing and gracious in our eyes, we should not seek.
[4472]"No man loves" (saith Aristotle _9. mor. cap. 5._) "but he that was
first delighted with comeliness and beauty." As this fair object varies, so
doth our love; for as Proclus holds, _Omne pulchrum amabile_, every fair
thing is amiable, and what we love is fair and gracious in our eyes, or at
least we do so apprehend and still esteem of it. [4473] "Amiableness is the
object of love, the scope and end is to obtain it, for whose sake we love,
and which our mind covets to enjoy." And it seems to us especially fair and
good; for good, fair, and unity, cannot be separated. Beauty shines, Plato
saith, and by reason of its splendour and shining causeth admiration; and
the fairer the object is, the more eagerly it is sought. For as the same
Plato defines it, [4474]"Beauty is a lively, shining or glittering
brightness, resulting from effused good, by ideas, seeds, reasons, shadows,
stirring up our minds, that by this good they may be united and made one."
Others will have beauty to be the perfection of the whole composition,
[4475]"c