hopes, and of all our passions that are
connected with them; and whatever is calculated to affect the
imagination with these commanding ideas, by force of any original
natural impression, must have the same power pretty equally over all
men. For since the imagination is only the representation of the
senses, it can only be pleased or displeased with the images, from the
same principle on which the sense is pleased or displeased with the
realities; and consequently there must be just as close an agreement
in the imaginations as in the senses of men. A little attention will
convince us that this must of necessity be the case.

But in the imaginations, besides the pain or pleasure arising from the
properties of the natural object, a pleasure is perceived from the
resemblance which the imitation has to the original; the imagination,
I conceive, can have no pleasure but what results from one or other of
these causes. And these causes operate pretty uniformly upon all men,
because they operate by principles in nature, and which are not
derived from any particular habits or advantages. Mr. Locke very
justly and finely observes of wit that it is chiefly conversant in
tracing resemblances; he remarks at the same time that the business of
judgment is rather in finding differences. It may perhaps appear, on
this supposition, that there is no material distinction between the
wit and the judgment, as they both seem to result from different
operations of the same faculty of comparing.

But in reality, whether they are or are not dependent on the same
power of the mind, they differ so very materially in many respects
that a perfect union of wit and judgment is one of the rarest things
in the world. When two distinct objects are unlike to each other, it
is only what we expect; things are in their common way, and therefore
they make no impression on the imagination; but when two distinct
objects have a resemblance, we are struck, we attend to them, and we
are pleased. The mind of man has naturally a far greater alacrity and
satisfaction in tracing resemblances than in searching for
differences; because by making resemblances we produce new images; we
unite, we create, we enlarge our stock: but in making distinctions we
offer no food at all to the imagination; the task itself is more
severe and irksome, and what pleasure we derive from it is something
of a negative and indirect nature. A piece of news is told me in the
morning; this, m