ull_, _perfect_, and _intire_; its idea is also a compound of
the common and the uncommon, being at once like and unlike the general
form; but inherently it has no contrast, and therefore affords no
recreation, no pleasing exercise, to the mental faculties; there is
nothing to re-create, nothing to wish; and hence the instability
of the passion which it inspires. Perfect beauty is, like perfect
happiness, lost as soon as it is attained.

It is, I imagine, to the principles of the masculine and the feminine
character, that we owe the perception of beauty or taste, in any
object whatever, throughout all nature and all art that imitates
nature; and, in objects which differ from the human form, the
principles must be in the extreme, because the object is then merely
symbolical. Thus, the meekness of the lamb, and the high-spirited
prancing steed; the gentle dove, and the impetuous eagle; the placid
lake, and the swelling ocean; the lowly valley, and the aspiring
mountain. It is the feminine character that is the sweetest, the most
interesting, image of beauty; the masculine partakes of the sublime.
Thus it will be found, that, in every object that is universally
pleasing, there exist principles which are analogous to those that
constitute beauty in the human species; and that its appearance does
always, in some degree, move the affections, though the mind may be
unconscious of its similitude to any idea in which the affections are
concerned. But the test of the object's possessing the principles
of beauty is when we are able to assimilate its appearance with
some amiable interesting affection; and, according as that affection
prevails in the breast of the spectator, it will appear with an
additional power of pleasing.

From association of ideas, any object may be pleasing, though
absolutely devoid of beauty, and displeasing with it. The form is
_then_ out of the question; it is some _real_ good or evil, with which
the object, but not its form, is associated.

It is observable, that those animals I have mentioned (and I imagine
all animals that are symbolical of our affections have the same) have
a double character of beauty, or reference to the affection that is
moved: i.e. their form and their disposition, exactly corresponding
with each other. Probably on that union depends their power of
pleasing; their _form alone_, so different from human beauty, could
not sufficiently engage the attention, or afford the interesting