gs supplied by their memory,
and then made abridgments or additions.

Pecuchet was for sentiment and ideality, Bouvard for imagery and
colouring; and they began to understand each other no longer, each
wondering that the other should be so shallow.

The science which is known as aesthetics would perhaps settle their
differences. A friend of Dumouchel, a professor of philosophy, sent them
a list of works on the subject. They worked separately and communicated
their ideas to one another.

In the first place, what is the Beautiful?

For Schelling, it is the infinite expressing itself through the finite;
for Reid, an occult quality; for Jouffroy, an indecomposable fact; for
De Maistre, that which is pleasing to virtue; for P. Andre, that which
agrees with reason.

And there are many kinds of beauty: a beauty in the sciences--geometry
is beautiful; a beauty in morals--it cannot be denied that the death of
Socrates was beautiful; a beauty in the animal kingdom--the beauty of
the dog consists in his sense of smell. A pig could not be beautiful,
having regard to his dirty habits; no more could a serpent, for it
awakens in us ideas of vileness. The flowers, the butterflies, the birds
may be beautiful. Finally, the first condition of beauty is unity in
variety: there is the principle.

"Yet," said Bouvard, "two squint eyes are more varied than two straight
eyes, and produce an effect which is not so good--as a rule."

They entered upon the question of the Sublime.

Certain objects are sublime in themselves: the noise of a torrent,
profound darkness, a tree flung down by the storm. A character is
beautiful when it triumphs, and sublime when it struggles.

"I understand," said Bouvard; "the Beautiful is the beautiful, and the
Sublime the very beautiful."

But how were they to be distinguished?

"By means of tact," answered Pecuchet.

"And tact--where does that come from?"

"From taste."

"What is taste?"

It is defined as a special discernment, a rapid judgment, the power of
distinguishing certain relationships.

"In short, taste is taste; but all that does not tell the way to have
it."

It is necessary to observe the proprieties. But the proprieties vary;
and, let a work be ever so beautiful, it will not be always
irreproachable. There is, however, a beauty which is indestructible, and
of whose laws we are ignorant, for its genesis is mysterious.

Since an idea cannot be interpreted in every form, we ought