in their complex state, as they are usually found, co-existing with conceptions and other emotions, in which they have obtained names familiar to us. He arranges them according to their relation to time, as present, or involving no notion of time whatever; as past; and as future. For example, we admire what is before us, we feel remorse for some past crime, we hope some future good. The immediate emotions, or those belonging to the present, are subdivided into such as do, and such as do not, involve any moral feeling.

Those lectures which treat of our emotions, contain some of the most interesting views of human nature to be found in the whole series; a philosophical spirit of discriminating delineation, together with that disposition to view every thing as the production of infinite wisdom and benevolence, which is no less philosophical than it is amiable, is here fully displayed. We must pass over this whole division of the subject, with the exception of a brief abstract of the lectures on beauty, and sublimity, and one or two extracts; earnestly recommending, however, (even to those who may have no relish for the more metaphysical parts of the work,) a perusal of these and the succeeding lectures.

There is perhaps no class of feelings, (says Brown,) in treating which so little precision has been employed, and so little certainty obtained, as those of beauty. In the first place, beauty is a pleasing emotion. It is one of the forms of joyous delight, to be ranked among those elementary feelings, to which all our emotions may be reduced. In the second place, we transfer this feeling to the object which excites it, in the same manner as we do colour, (which can only be a sensation of the eye,) to the objects around us. Beauty is therefore a pleasing emotion, which we diffuse and combine with the objects which produce it. This diffusion of the emotions of beauty is only one instance of a general law, by which the mind is led to that condensation of feeling, which gives the principal value to the objects familiar to us: the home of our infancy, the walks of our youth, the most trifling gift of friendship, which are all invested to our imaginations with the emotions they have excited. Of moral beauty, all acknowledge the charm, and it is the analogy of this beauty which lends the greatest attraction to the inanimate universe. Brown is of opinion that the emotion of beauty is an original feeling, and that certain objects are better fitted to excite it than others; but he allows that this original feeling is so much modified by association, that objects wholly unfit originally to produce it, may, by association, become beautiful to us. This modification is no argument against the originality of the principle; the same may be said of our conception of truth, which is sometimes so modified by prejudice, that it seems to be wholly lost; yet no one infers from this that truth is not something dif

ferent from error. The remark is also applicable to our moral feelings; yet even in the worst of times the distinctions of right and wrong have never been wholly obliterated.

"In the very triumph of usurpation, when a single hour at Pharsalia had decided the destiny of ages, and Utica had heard the last voice of freedom, like the fading echo of some divine step, retiring from the earth;-still slavery itself could not overcome the silent reverence of the heart for him, who had scorned to be a slave." Lect. 55.

"Her last good man dejected Rome adored,

"And honoured Cæsar's less than Cato's sword."

The emotion of beauty is not owing to a succession of harmonious images, as Allison supposes, but consists of one instantane ous absorbing feeling; and although some objects are originally fitted to excite it rather than others, yet by association almost any object may become the occasion of this emotion. The more the mind is enriched with pleasing images, and the more of these are associated with our conceptions of beautiful objects, the more vivid and rich will be the emotions these objects will excite. From the diversity of individual association, we might expect that each one would differ in his notions of beauty; yet we are governed by general laws in this, as in other judgments. We correct our own notions by those of others, and come to regard that only as beautiful, which not merely pleases ourselves, but which we know will generally please. Thus beauty is not any essence, which exists in every object that excites the emotion, but a general term, which we apply, as we do other general terms, to those objects which resemble each other in the power of exciting the emotion of beauty in our minds, though perhaps they agree in nothing else.

The same remarks apply to sublimity. This is a general term, expressive of the resemblance which certain objects have to each other in the power of exciting the emotion of sublimity.

We think that this account of beauty and sublimity will satisfy every one and for ever put the subject at rest. It is very elaborately stated, and beautifully illustrated in the 53d, 54th, 55th, 56th, 57th, and 58th lectures, and we recommend a perusal of them to those who are curious in this matter. Stewart, in his philosophical essays, was the first who showed that the terms beauty and sublimity are general terms, including a number of objects which agree in certain respects, or rather, according to him, they are terms which though originally applied to objects fitted to excite the emotion, had become generalized, that is, transferred to other objects, which had, by the aid of association, acquired the power to excite these emotions. The notion that beauty and sublimity express an essence, is merely another uni

versal, a parte rei, like the idea of an universal man, and although it has held its place among philosophers somewhat longer than the universals, it is doomed at last to retire with them like phantoms of the night, before the advancing splendour of true science.

Of all our emotions, the prospective are the most important, from their direct influence on action. This order includes all our desires and all our fears. Desire is a vivid feeling, of a peculiar kind, and cannot be classed with mere approbation or love. It is a prospective emotion, and one of the most delightful of which the mind is susceptible. To enumerate all our desires, would be to enumerate almost every thing that exists; they are, in this work, all arranged under a few heads.

Hope, which is so important to our happiness, is not to be considered as a distinct emotion, but merely as one of the forms in which all our desires are capable of existing. It is not the less valuable on that account. "What hour of our existence is there, to which it has not given happiness and consolation? We need not speak of the credulous alacrity of our wishes in our early years. The influence of hope is felt through all the years of our existence. As soon as we have learnt what is agreeable, it delights us with the prospect of attaining it. It is our flatterer and comforter in boyhood, it is our flatterer and comforter in years that need still more to be comforted. This power which attends us, with more than consolation, through the anxieties and labours of life, does not desert us at the close of that life, which it has blessed and consoled." Lect. 65.

Speaking of our desire of knowledge, (Brown says,) when we compare the vast acquisitions and admirable faculties of a highly cultivated intellect, with the human being on his first entrance into life, it is difficult for us to regard this knowledge and absolute ignorance as states of the same mind, "The mind which is enriched with as many sciences as there are classes of existing things in the universe, which our organs are able to discern, and which, not content with the immensity of existence, forms to itself sciences, even of abstraction, that do not exist as objects in nature; the mind which is skilled in all the languages of all the civilized nations of the globe, and which has fixed and treasured in its own remembrance, the beauties of every work of transcendent genius which age after age has added to the stores of antiquity, this mind, we know well, was once as ignorant as the dullest and feeblest of those minds which hardly know enough to wonder at his superiority. And how vast are the acquirements of a mind even of the humblest rank! acquirements which a few years, that may be said to be almost years of infancy, must have formed. If we knew nothing more of the mind of man, than his capacity of becoming acquainted

with the powers of so vast and so complicated an instrument as that of speech, and of acquiring this knowledge in circumstances the most unfavourable, we might indeed find cause to wonder at a capacity so admirable. But even at this early period, what reasonings, what observations have been formed! And nature effects all this by the simplest means, the more sure for their simplicity. The simple desire of knowledge explains a mystery which nothing else could explain." Lect. 67.

Brown concludes his view of the physiology of mind, with these remarks: "The last lecture concluded our view of the physiology of mind in all the aspects it presents to our observation; and we trust that good reasons have appeared for the new arrangement we have adopted, since every former arrangement would have been inconsistent with the results of the minuter analysis into which we have been led. In treating of the extensive order of our emotions, which comprehend all our moral feelings, we did not confine ourselves to the mere physiology of those feelings, but intermixed many discussions as to moral duty, and the relation of the benevolent author of nature to the contrivances of our moral frame. It would have been wonderful, if this connexion had escaped us, in considering the human mind. But these remarks were intentionally made, in order to connect in the mind a consideration of the wisdom and goodness of God, with the contemplation of this subject. This connexion will not render us less quick in observation, or less nice in analysis, while it will produce feelings and views far more valuable than the discovery of the greatest truths." Lect. 73.

The last part of the course is more strictly ethical. The science of ethics, (says Brown,) has relations to our affections of mind, not simply as phenomena, but as virtuous or vicious, right or wrong. In the consideration of such questions, we feel that philosophy is something more than knowledge; that it not only teaches us what virtue is, but assists us in obtaining it.

It is the opinion of Professor Brown, that the feelings of approval and blame, which we feel on the contemplation of virtuous or vicious actions, are ultimate facts in our nature, which cannot be resolved into any thing more elementary. Many mistakes have arisen, from the confused phraseology of writers on ethical subjects. Merit and obligation are not different things. If a man perform a virtuous action, he must have merit; that is, he will excite the feeling of approbation, in those who contemplate him. In thinking of virtue, we must not look for any thing self-existing, like the universals of the schools, but a felt relation, of certain actions to certain emotions, and nothing more. That there is this relation, no one will deny; but there are some who deny the originality of the principle, and who ascribe our approbation of one class of actions as virtuous, and

our disapprobation of another class as vicious, to other principles in our nature, or to adventitious circumstances. There is no principle which is more universally displayed, than moral feeling; without it, society could not exist. There are, it must be allowed, some instances in which it is modified and even perverted by circumstances, as other principles may be. Passion may warp our moral feelings, as it would our rational judgments. Association may prevent our forming a true estimate of an action, which, if truly estimated, would excite emotions different from those, which, under the influence of such association, it does now excite. The mixed nature of human actions, may cause our feelings to vary, according as they have leaned to one or the other element, in the complex action; but still, we never approve vice, merely as vice, without any mixture of good; or refuse our approbation to virtue, when it is distinctly perceived. If any are interested to prove that virtue is nothing, and therefore vice is nothing, it is the guilty; and yet the truth of virtue cannot be shaken off, even by him to whom conviction brings only misery.

Brown examines the systems of different philosophers, who have attempted to resolve our moral feelings into others considered more general; such as the love of praise, the influence of reason, of utility, the selfish systems, (in which he includes Paley's,) and the system of Adam Smith, which refers them to sympathy. He shows that all these either deny the difference of moral feeling from all other emotions, which the consciousness of each one would disprove; or else, take for granted that very principle of moral approbation and disapprobation, for which their systems are designed to account.

Having settled the foundation of virtue, Brown proceeds to the consideration of those practical duties which virtue commands. Some philosophers have made the whole of virtue to consist in benevolence-others in justice; and the inaccuracy in these arrangements, has led to a denial of all moral distinctions.

Here, (we would remark,) may be perceived the importance of mere arrangement; which often, when inaccurate, occasions the confounding of things essentially different. We are all influenced by names; when two things are called by the same name, it is in consequence of some real or supposed resemblance. This resemblance takes our attention, and we lose sight of the distinctions which may exist, and be far more important and characteristic than the resemblance. We are then led to reason as if no such distinctions actually existed; and, our reasonings being deduced from such false premises, though apparently correct in their processes, lead to absurdities. Thus we imbibe a sceptical feeling with regard to all reasoning. Therefore, although no arrangement, however unphilosophical, can alter the actual quali