nces on every side; for on the upper part the eyebrows
turn aside the perspiration which falls from the head and forehead; the
cheeks beneath rise a little, so as to protect them on the lower side;
and the nose is placed between them as a wall of separation.

The hearing is always open, for that is a sense of which we are in need
even while we are sleeping; and the moment that any sound is admitted
by it we are awakened even from sleep. It has a winding passage, lest
anything should slip into it, as it might if it were straight and
simple. Nature also hath taken the same precaution in making there a
viscous humor, that if any little creatures should endeavor to creep
in, they might stick in it as in bird-lime. The ears (by which we mean
the outward part) are made prominent, to cover and preserve the
hearing, lest the sound should be dissipated and escape before the
sense is affected. Their entrances are hard and horny, and their form
winding, because bodies of this kind better return and increase the
sound. This appears in the harp, lute, or horn;[237] and from all
tortuous and enclosed places sounds are returned stronger.

The nostrils, in like manner, are ever open, because we have a
continual use for them; and their entrances also are rather narrow,
lest anything noxious should enter them; and they have always a
humidity necessary for the repelling dust and many other extraneous
bodies. The taste, having the mouth for an enclosure, is admirably
situated, both in regard to the use we make of it and to its security.

LVIII. Besides, every human sense is much more exquisite than those of
brutes; for our eyes, in those arts which come under their judgment,
distinguish with great nicety; as in painting, sculpture, engraving,
and in the gesture and motion of bodies. They understand the beauty,
proportion, and, as I may so term it, the becomingness of colors and
figures; they distinguish things of greater importance, even virtues
and vices; they know whether a man is angry or calm, cheerful or sad,
courageous or cowardly, bold or timorous.

The judgment of the ears is not less admirably and scientifically
contrived with regard to vocal and instrumental music. They distinguish
the variety of sounds, the measure, the stops, the different sorts of
voices, the treble and the base, the soft and the harsh, the sharp and
the flat, of which human ears only are capable to judge. There is
likewise great judgment in the smell, the