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Part IVSections I - XIV.
Sections I - XIV.
Section I.
Of the Efficient Cause of the Sublime and Beautiful
When I say I intend to inquire into the efficient cause of Sublimity
and Beauty, I would not be understood to say, that I can come to the ultimate
cause. I do not pretend that I shall ever be able to explain, why certain
affections of the body produce such a distinct emotion of mind, and no other;
or why the body is at all affected by the mind, or the mind by the body. A
little thought will show this to be impossible. But I conceive, if we can
discover what affections of the mind produce certain emotions of the body, and
what distinct feelings and qualities of body shall produce certain
determinate passions in the mind, and no others, I fancy a great deal will be
done; something not unuseful towards a distinct knowledge of our passions, so
far at least as we have them at present under our consideration. This is all,
I believe, we can do. If we could advance a step farther, difficulties would
still remain, as we should be still equally distant from the first cause.
When Newton first discovered the property of attraction, and settled its laws,
he found it served very well to explain several of the most remarkable
phaenomena in nature; but yet, with reference to the general system of things,
he could consider attraction but as an effect, whose cause at that time he did
not attempt to trace. But when he afterwards began to account for it by a
subtle elastic aether, this great man (if in so great a man it be not impious
to discover anything like a blemish) seemed to have quitted his usual cautious
manner of philosophizing; since, perhaps, allowing all that has been advanced
on this subject to be sufficiently proved, I think it leaves us with as many
difficulties as it found us. The great chain of causes, which links one to
another, even to the throne of God himself, can never be unravelled by any
industry of ours. When we go but one step beyond the immediate sensible
qualities of things, we go out of our depth. All we do after is but a faint
struggle, that shows we are in an element which does not belong to us. So that
when I speak of cause, and efficient cause, I only mean certain affections of
the mind, that cause certain changes in the body; or certain powers and
properties in bodies, that work a change in the mind. As if I were to explain
the motion of a body falling to the ground, I would say it was caused by
gravity; and I would endeavour to show after what manner this power operated,
without attempting to show why it operated in this manner: or if I were to
explain the effects of bodies striking one another by the common laws of
percussion, I should not endeavour to explain how motion itself is
communicated.
Sect. II.
Association
It is no small bar in the way of our inquiry into the cause of our
passions, that the occasions of many of them are given, and that their
governing motions are communicated at a time when we have not capacity to
reflect on them; at a time of which all sort of memory is worn out of our
minds. For besides such things as affect us in various manners, according to
their natural powers, there are associations made at that early season,
which we find it very hard afterwards to distinguish from natural effects.
Not to mention the unaccountable antipathies which we find in many persons,
we all find it impossible to remember when a steep became more terrible than
a plain; or fire or water more terrible than a clod of earth; though all
these are very probably either conclusions from experience, or arising from
the premonitions of others; and some of them impressed, in all likelihood,
pretty late. But as it must be allowed that many things affect us after a
certain manner, not by any natural powers they have for that purpose, but by
association; so it would be absurd, on the other hand, to say that all things
affect us by association only; since some things must have been originally
and naturally agreeable or disagreeable, from which the others derive their
associated powers; and it would be, I fancy, to little purpose to look for the
cause of our passions in association, until we fail of it in the natural
properties of things.
Sect. III.
Cause Of Pain And Fear
I have before observed,^1 that whatever is qualified to cause terror is a
foundation capable of the sublime; to which I add, that not only these, but
many things from which we cannot probably apprehend any danger, have a similar
effect, because they operate in a similar manner. I observed too,^2 that
whatever produces pleasure, positive and original pleasure, is fit to have
beauty ingrafted on it. Therefore, to clear up the nature of these qualities,
it may be necessary to explain the nature of pain and pleasure on which they
depend. A man who suffers under violent bodily pain, (I suppose the most
violent, because the effect may be the more obvious), I say a man in great
pain has his teeth set, his eyebrows are violently contracted, his forehead is
wrinkled, his eyes are dragged inwards, and rolled with great vehemence, his
hair stands on end, the voice is forced out in short shrieks and groans, and
the whole fabric totters. Fear, or terror, which is an apprehension of pain or
death, exhibits exactly the same effects, approaching in violence to those
just mentioned, in proportion to the nearness of the cause, and the weakness
of the subject. This is not only so in the human species; but I have more than
once observed in dogs, under an apprehension of punishment, that they have
writhed their bodies, and yelped, and howled, as if they had actually felt the
blows. From hence I conclude, that pain and fear act upon the same parts of
the body, and in the same manner, though somewhat differing in degree; that
pain and fear consist in an unnatural tension of the nerves; that this is
sometimes accompanied with an unnatural strength, which sometimes suddenly
changes into an extraordinary weakness; that these effects often come on
alternately, and are sometimes mixed with each other. This is the nature of
all convulsive agitations, especially in weaker subjects, which are the most
liable to the severest impressions of pain and fear. The only difference
between pain and terror is, that things which cause pain operate on the mind
by the intervention of the body; whereas things that cause terror generally
affect the bodily organs by the operation of the mind suggesting the danger;
but both agreeing, either primarily or secondarily, in producing a tension,
contraction, or violent emotion of the nerves,^1 they agree likewise in
everything else. For it appears very clearly to me, from this, as well as from
many other examples, that when the body is disposed, by any means whatsoever,
to such emotions as it would acquire by the means of a certain passion; it
will of itself excite something very like that passion in the mind.
[Footnote 1: Part I. sect. 8.]
[Footnote 2: Part I. sect. 10.]
[Footnote 1: I do not here enter into the question debated among
physiologists, whether pain be the effect of a contraction, or a tension of
the nerves. Either will serve my purpose; for by tension, I mean no more than
a violent pulling of the fibres, which compose any muscle or membrane, in
whatever way this is done.]
Sect. IV.
Continued
To this purpose Mr. Spon, in his Recherches d` Antiquite, gives us a
curious story of the celebrated physiognomist Campanella. This man, it seems,
had not only made very accurate observations on human faces, but was very
expert in mimicking such as were any way remarkable. When he had a mind to
penetrate into the inclinations of those he had to deal with, he composed his
face, his gesture, and his whole body, as nearly as he could into the exact
similitude of the person he intended to examine; and then carefully observed
what turn of mind he seemed to acquire by this change. So that, says my
author, he was able to enter into the dispositions and thoughts of people as
effectually as if he had been changed into the very men. I have often
observed, that on mimicking the looks and gestures of angry, or placid, or
frighted, or daring men, I have involuntarily found my mind turned to that
passion, whose appearance I endeavoured to imitate; nay, I am convinced it is
hard to avoid it, though one strove to separate the passion from its
correspondent gestures. Our minds and bodies are so closely and intimately
connected, that one is incapable of pain or pleasure without the other.
Campanella, of whom we have been speaking, could so abstract his attention
from any sufferings of his body, that he was able to endure the rack itself
without much pain; and in lesser pains everybody must have observed, that,
when we can employ our attention on anything else, the pain has been for a
time suspended: on the other hand, if by any means the body is indisposed to
perform such gestures, or to be stimulated into such emotions, as any passion
usually produces in it, that passion itself never can arise, though its cause
should be never so strongly in action; though it should be merely mental, and
immediately affecting none of the senses. As an opiate or spirituous liquors,
shall suspend the operation of grief, or fear, or anger, in spite of all our
efforts to the contrary; and this by inducing in the body a disposition
contrary to that which it receives from these passions.
Sect. V.
How The Sublime Is Produced
Having considered terror as producing an unnatural tension and certain
violent emotions of the nerves; it easily follows, from what we have just
said, that whatever is fitted to produce such a tension must be productive of
a passion similar to terror,^1 and consequently must be a source of the
sublime, though it should have no idea of danger connected with it. So that
little remains towards showing the cause of the sublime, but to show that the
instances we have given of it in the second part relate to such things as are
fitted by nature to produce this sort of tension, either by the primary
operation of the mind or the body. With regard to such things as effect by the
associated idea of danger, there can be no doubt but that they produce terror,
and act by some modification of that passion; and that terror, when
sufficiently violent, raises the emotions of the body just mentioned, can as
little be doubted. But if the sublime is built on terror, or some passion like
it, which has pain for its object, it is previously proper to inquire how any
species of delight can be derived from a cause so apparently contrary to it. I
say delight, because, as I have often remarked, it is very evidently different
in its cause, and in its own nature, from actual and positive pleasure.
[Footnote 1: Part II. sect. 2.]
Sect. VI.
How Pain Can Be A Cause Of Delight
Providence has so ordered it, that a state of rest and inaction, however
it may flatter our indolence, should be productive of many inconveniences;
that it should generate such disorders, as may force us to have recourse to
some labour, as a thing absolutely requisite to make us pass our lives with
tolerable satisfaction; for the nature of rest is to suffer all the parts of
our bodies to fall into a relaxation, that not only disables the members from
performing their functions, but takes away the vigorous tone of fibre which is
requisite for carrying on the natural and necessary secretions. At the same
time, that in this languid inactive state, the nerves are more liable to the
most horrid convulsions, that when they are sufficiently braced and
strengthened. Melancholy, dejection, despair, and often self-murder, is the
consequence of the gloomy view we take of things in this relaxed state of
body. The best remedy for all these evils is exercise or labour; and labour is
a surmounting of difficulties, an exertion of the contracting power of the
muscles; and as such resembles pain, which consists in tension or contraction,
in everything but degree. Labour is not only requisite to preserve the coarser
organs in a state fit for their functions; but it is equally necessary to
those finer and more delicate organs, on which, and by which, the imagination,
and perhaps the other mental powers, act. Since it is probable, that not only
the inferior parts of the soul, as the passions are called, but the
understanding itself, makes use of some fine corporeal instruments in its
operation; though what they are, and where they are, may be somewhat hard to
settle; but that it does make use of such, appears from hence; that a long
exercise of the mental powers induces a remarkable lassitude of the whole
body; and, on the other hand, that great bodily labour, or pain, weakens, and
sometimes actually destroys, the mental faculties. Now, as a due exercise is
essential to the coarse muscular parts of the constitution, and that without
this rousing they would become languid and diseased, the very same rule holds
with regard to those finer parts we have mentioned; to have them in proper
order, they must be shaken and worked to a proper degree.
Sect. VII.
Exercise Necessary For The Finer Organs
As common labour, which is a mode of pain, is the exercise of the
grosser, a mode of terror is the exercise of the finer parts of the system;
and if a certain mode of pain be of such a nature as to act upon the eye or
the ear, as they are the most delicate organs, the affection approaches more
nearly to that which has a mental cause. In all these cases, if the pain and
terror are so modified as not to be actually noxious; if the pain is not
carried to violence, and the terror is not conversant about the present
destruction of the person, as these emotions clear the parts, whether fine or
gross, of a dangerous and troublesome encumbrance, they are capable of
producing delight; not pleasure, but a sort of delightful horror, a sort of
tranquillity tinged with terror; which, as it belongs to self-preservation,
is one of the strongest of all the passions. Its object is the sublime.^1 Its
highest degree I call astonishment; the subordinate degrees are awe,
reverence, and respect, which, by the very etymology of the words show from
what source they are derived, and how they stand distinguished from positive
pleasure.
Sect. VIII.
Why Things Not Dangerous Produce A Passion Like Terror
^2 A Mode of terror or pain is always the cause of the sublime. For
terror, or associated danger, the foregoing explication is, I believe,
sufficient. It will require something more trouble to show, that such examples
as I have given of the sublime in the second part are capable of producing a
mode of pain, and of being thus allied to terror, and to be accounted for on
the same principles. And first of such objects as are great in their
dimensions. I speak of visual objects.
[Footnote 1: Part II. sect 2.]
[Footnote 2: Part I. sect. 7. Part II. sect 2.]
[Footnote 3: Part II. sect. 7.]
Sect. IX.
Why Visual Objects Of Great Dimensions Are Sublime
Vision is performed by having a picture, formed by the rays of light
which are reflected from the object, painted in one piece, instantaneously,
on the retina, or last nervous part of the eye. Or, according to others, there
is but one point of any object painted on the eye in such a manner as to be
perceived at once; but by moving the eye, we gather up, with great celerity,
the several parts of the object, so as to form one uniform piece. If the
former opinion be allowed, it will be considered,^3 that though all the light
reflected from a large body should strike the eye in one instant; yet we must
suppose that the body itself is formed of a vast number of distinct points,
every one of which, or the ray from every one, makes an impression on the
retina. So that, though the image of one point should cause but a small
tension of this membrane, another and another, and another stroke, must in
their progress cause a very great one, until it arrives at last to the highest
degree; and the whole capacity of the eye, vibrating in all its parts, must
approach near to the nature of what causes pain, and consequently must produce
an idea of the sublime. Again, if we take it, that one point only of an object
is distinguishable at once, the matter will amount nearly to the same thing,
or rather it will make the origin of the sublime from greatness of dimension
yet clearer. For if but one point is observed at once, the eye must traverse
the vast space of such bodies with great quickness, and consequently the fine
nerves and muscles destined to the motion of that part must be very much
strained; and their great sensibility must make them highly affected by this
straining. Besides, it signifies just nothing to the effect produced, whether
a body has its parts connected and makes its impression at once; or, making
but one impression of a point at a time, causes a succession of the same or
others so quickly as to make them seem united; as is evident from the common
effect of whirling about a lighted torch or piece of wood: which, if done with
celerity, seems a circle of fire.
Sect. X.
Unity Why Requisite To Vastness
It may be objected to this theory, that the eye generally receives an
equal number of rays at all times, and that therefore a great object cannot
affect it by the number of rays, more than that variety of objects which the
eye must always discern whilst it remains open. But to this I answer, that
admitting an equal number of rays, or an equal quantity of luminous particles,
to strike the eye at all times, yet if these rays frequently vary their
nature, now to blue, now to red, and so on, or their manner of termination, as
to a number of petty squares, triangles, or the like, at every change, whether
of colour or shape, the organ has a sort of relaxation or rest; but this
relaxation and labour so often interrupted, is by no means productive of ease;
neither has it the effect of vigorous and uniform labour. Whoever has
remarked the different effects of some strong exercise, and some little
piddling action, will understand why a teasing, fretful employment, which at
once wearies and weakens the body, should have nothing great; these sorts of
impulses, which are rather teasing than painful, by continually and suddenly
altering their tenor and direction, prevent that full tension, that species of
uniform labour, which is allied to strong pain, and causes the sublime. The
sum total of things of various kinds, though it should equal the number of the
uniform parts composing some one entire object, is not equal in its effect
upon the organs of our bodies. Besides the one already assigned, there is
another very strong reason for the difference. The mind in reality hardly ever
can attend diligently to more than one thing at a time; if this thing be
little, the effect is little, and a number of other little objects cannot
engage the attention; the mind is bounded by the bounds of the object; and
what is not attended to, and what does not exist, are much the same in effect;
but the eye, or the mind, (for in this case there is no difference,) in great,
uniform objects, does not readily arrive at their bounds; it has no rest
whilst it contemplates them; the image is much the same everywhere. So that
everything great by its quantity must necessarily be one, simple and entire.
Sect. XI.
The Artificial Infinite
We have observed, that a species of greatness arises from the artificial
infinite; and that this infinite consists in an uniform succession of great
parts: we observed, too, that the same uniform succession had a like power in
sounds. But because the effects of many things are clearer in one of the
senses than in another, and that all the senses bear analogy to and illustrate
one another, I shall begin with this power in sounds, as the cause of the
sublimity from succession is rather more obvious in the sense of hearing. And
I shall here, once for all, observe, that an investigation of the natural and
mechanical causes of our passions, besides the curiosity of the subject,
gives, if they are discovered, a double strength and lustre to any rules we
deliver on such matters. When the ear receives any simple sound, it is struck
by a single pulse of the air, which makes the eardrum and the other membranous
parts vibrate according to the nature and species of the stroke. If the stroke
be strong, the organ of hearing suffers a considerable degree of tension. If
the stroke be repeated pretty soon after, the repetition causes an expectation
of another stroke. And it must be observed, that expectation itself causes a
tension. This is apparent in many animals, who, when they prepare for hearing
any sound, rouse themselves, and prick up their ears: so that here the effect
of the sounds is considerably augmented by a new auxiliary, the expectation.
But though, after a number of strokes, we expect still more, not being able to
ascertain the exact time of their arrival, when the arrive, they produce a
sort of surprise, which increases this tension yet further. For I have
observed, that when at any time I have waited very earnestly for some sound,
that returned at intervals, (as the successive firing of cannon,) though I
fully expected the return of the sound, when it came it always made me start a
little; the ear-drum suffered a convulsion, and the whole body consented with
it. The tension of the part thus increasing at every blow, by the united
forces of the stroke itself, the expectation, and the surprise, it is worked
up to such a pitch as to be capable of the sublime; it is brought just to the
verge of pain. Even when the cause has ceased, the organs of hearing being
often successively struck in a similar manner, continue to vibrate in that
manner for some time longer; this is an additional help to the greatness of
the effect.
Sect. XII.
The Vibrations Must Be Similar
But if the vibration be not similar at every impression, it can never be
carried beyond the number of actual impressions; for move any body, as a
pendulum, in one way, and it will continue to oscillate in an arch of the same
circle, until the known causes make it rest; but if after first putting it in
motion in one direction, you push it into another, it can never reassume the
first direction; because it can never more itself, and consequently it can
have but the effect of that last motion; whereas, if in the same direction you
act upon it several times, it will describe a greater arch, and move a longer
time.
Sect. XIII.
The Effects Of Succession In Visual Objects Explained
If we can comprehend clearly how things operate upon one of our senses,
there can be very little difficulty in conceiving in what manner they affect
the rest. To say a great deal therefore upon the corresponding affections of
every sense, would tend rather to fatigue us by an useless repetition, than to
throw any new light upon the subject by that ample and diffuse manner of
treating it; but as in this discourse we chiefly attach ourselves to the
sublime, as it affects the eye, we shall consider particularly why a
successive disposition of uniform parts in the same right line should be
sublime,^1 and upon what principle this disposition is enabled to make a
comparatively small quantity of matter produce a grander effect, than a much
larger quantity disposed in another manner. To avoid the perplexity of general
notions; let us set before our eyes a colonnade of uniform pillars planted in
a right line; let us take our stand in such a manner, that the eye may shoot
along this colonnade, for it has its best effect in this view. In our present
situation it is plain, that the rays from the first round pillar will cause in
the eye a vibration of that species; an image of the pillar itself. The pillar
immediately succeeding increases it; that which follows renews and enforces
the impression; each in its order as it succeeds, repeats impulse after
impulse, and stroke after stroke, until the eye, long exercised in one
particular way, cannot lose that object immediately; and, being violently
roused by this continued agitation, it presents the mind with a grand or
sublime conception. But instead of viewing a rank of uniform pillars, let us
suppose that they succeed each other, a round and a square one alternately. In
this case the vibration caused by the first round pillar perishes as soon as
it is formed: and one of quite another sort (the square) directly occupies its
place; which, however, it resigns as quickly to the round one; and thus the
eye proceeds, alternately; taking up one image, and laying down another, as
long as the building continues. From whence it is obvious, that, at the last
pillar, the impression is as far from continuing as it was at the very first;
because, in fact, the sensory can receive no distinct impression but from the
last; and it can never of itself resume a dissimilar impression: besides,
every variation of the object is a rest and relaxation to the organs of sight;
and these reliefs prevent that powerful emotion so necessary to produce the
sublime. To produce therefore a perfect grandeur in such things as we have
been mentioning, there should be a perfect simplicity, an absolute uniformity
in disposition, shape, and colouring. Upon this principle of succession and
uniformity it may be asked, why a long bare wall should not be a more sublime
object than a colonnade; since the succession is no way interrupted; since the
eye meets no check; since nothing more uniform can be conceived? A long bare
wall is certainly not so grand an object as a colonnade of the same length and
height. It is not altogether difficult to account for this difference. When we
look at a naked wall, from the evenness of the object, the eye runs along its
whole space, and arrives quickly at its termination; the eye meets nothing
which may interrupt its progress; but then it meets nothing which may detain
it a proper time to produce a very great and lasting effect. The view of the
bare wall, if it be of a great height and length, is undoubtedly grand; but
this is only one idea, and not a repetition of similar ideas: it is therefore
great, not so much upon the principle of infinity, as upon that of vastness.
But we are not so powerfully affected with any one impulse, unless it be one
of a prodigious force indeed, as we are with a succession of similar impulses;
because the nerves of the sensory do not (if I may use the expression) acquire
a habit of repeating the same feeling in such a manner as to continue it
longer than its cause is in action; besides, all the effects which I have
attributed to expectation and surprise in sect. II, can have no place in a
bare wall.
[Footnote 1: Part II. sect. 10.]
Sect. XIV.
Locke`s Opinion Concerning Darkness Considered
[Footnote 1: Part II. sect. 3.]
It is Mr. Locke`s opinion, that darkness is not naturally an idea of
terror; and that, though an excessive light is painful to the sense, the
greatest excess of darkness is no ways troublesome. He observes indeed in
another place, that a nurse or an old woman having once associated the idea of
ghosts and goblins with that of darkness, night, ever after, becomes painful
and horrible to the imagination. The authority of this great man is doubtless
as great as that of any man can be, and it seems to stand in the way of our
general principle.^1 We have considered darkness as a cause of the sublime;
and we have all along considered the sublime as depending on some modification
of pain or terror: so that if darkness be no way painful or terrible to any,
who have not had their minds early tainted with superstitions, it can be no
source of the sublime to them. But, with all deference to such an authority,
it seems to me, that an association of a more general nature, an association
which takes in all mankind, and make darkness terrible; for in utter darkness
it is impossible to know in what degree of safety we stand; we are ignorant of
the objects that surround us; we may every moment strike against some
dangerous obstruction; we may fall down a precipice the first step we take;
and if an enemy approach, we know not in what quarter to defend ourselves;
in such a case strength is no sure protection; wisdom can only act by guess;
the boldest are staggered, and he, who would pray for nothing else towards
his defence, is forced to pray for light.
As to the association of ghosts and goblins; surely it is more natural to
think, that darkness, being originally an idea of terror, was chosen as a fit
scene for such terrible representations, than that such representations have
made darkness terrible. The mind of man very easily slides into an error of
the former sort; but it is very hard to imagine, that the effect of an idea so
universally terrible in all times, and in all countries, as darkness, could
possibly have been owing to a set of idle stories, or to any cause of a nature
so trivial, and of an operation so precarious.
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