esire may be attended
with subordinate ones, which are connected with it, and to which if
other desires are parallel, they are by that means related to the
principal one. Thus hunger may oft be considered as the primary
inclination of the soul, and the desire of approaching the meat as the
secondary one; since it is absolutely necessary to the satisfying that
appetite. If an object, therefore, by any separate qualities, inclines
us to approach the meat, it naturally encreases our appetite; as on the
contrary, whatever inclines us to set our victuals at a distance, is
contradictory to hunger, and diminishes our inclination to them. Now
it is plain that beauty has the first effect, and deformity the second:
Which is the reason why the former gives us a keener appetite for our
victuals, and the latter is sufficient to disgust us at the most savoury
dish that cookery has invented. All this is easily applicable to the
appetite for generation.

From these two relations, viz, resemblance and a parallel desire,
there arises such a connexion betwixt the sense of beauty, the bodily
appetite, and benevolence, that they become in a manner inseparable: And
we find from experience that it is indifferent which of them advances
first; since any of them is almost sure to be attended with the related
affections. One, who is inflamed with lust, feels at least a momentary
kindness towards the object of it, and at the same time fancies her more
beautiful than ordinary; as there are many, who begin with kindness and
esteem for the wit and merit of the person, and advance from that to the
other passions. But the most common species of love is that which first
arises from beauty, and afterwards diffuses itself into kindness and
into the bodily appetite. Kindness or esteem, and the appetite to
generation, are too remote to unite easily together. The one is,
perhaps, the most refined passion of the soul; the other the most gross
and vulgar. The love of beauty is placed in a just medium betwixt them,
and partakes of both their natures: From whence it proceeds, that it is
so singularly fitted to produce both.

This account of love is not peculiar to my system, but is unavoidable
on any hypothesis. The three affections, which compose this passion,
are evidently distinct, and has each of them its distinct object. It is
certain, therefore, that it is only by their relation they produce
each other. But the relation of passions is not alone sufficient