of forms; and from these forms botanists have given
them their names, which are almost as various. What proportion do we
discover between the stalks and the leaves of flowers, or between the
leaves and the pistils? How does the slender stalk of the rose agree
with the bulky head under which it bends? but the rose is a beautiful
flower; and can we undertake to say that it does not owe a great deal of
its beauty even to that disproportion; the rose is a large flower, yet
it grows upon a small shrub; the flower of the apple is very small, and
grows upon a large tree; yet the rose and the apple blossom are both
beautiful, and the plants that bear them are most engagingly attired,
notwithstanding this disproportion. What by general consent is allowed
to be a more beautiful object than an orange-tree, nourishing at once
with its leaves, its blossoms, and its fruit? but it is in vain that we
search here for any proportion between the height, the breadth, or
anything else concerning the dimensions of the whole, or concerning the
relation of the particular parts to each other. I grant that we may
observe in many flowers something of a regular figure, and of a
methodical disposition of the leaves. The rose has such a figure and
such a disposition of its petals; but in an oblique view, when this
figure is in a good measure lost, and the order of the leaves
confounded, it yet retains its beauty; the rose is even more beautiful
before it is full blown; in the bud; before this exact figure is formed;
and this is not the only instance wherein method and exactness, the soul
of proportion, are found rather prejudicial than serviceable to the
cause of beauty.

SECTION III.

PROPORTION NOT THE CAUSE OF BEAUTY IN ANIMALS.

That proportion has but a small share in the formation of beauty is full
as evident among animals. Here the greatest variety of shapes and
dispositions of parts are well fitted to excite this idea. The swan,
confessedly a beautiful bird, has a neck longer than the rest of his
body, and but a very short tail: is this a beautiful proportion? We must
allow that it is. But then what shall we say to the peacock, who has
comparatively but a short neck, with a tail longer than the neck and the
rest of the body taken together? How many birds are there that vary
infinitely from each of these standards, and from every other which you
can fix; with proportions different, and often directly opposite to each
other! and yet many