On a superficial view we may seem to differ very widely from each
other in our reasonings, and no less in our pleasures; but
notwithstanding this difference, which I think to be rather apparent
than real, it is probable that the standard both of reason and taste
is the same in all human creatures. For if there were not some
principles of judgment as well as of sentiment common to all mankind,
no hold could possibly be taken either on their reason or their
passions sufficient to maintain the ordinary correspondence of life.
It appears indeed to be generally acknowledged that with regard to
truth and falsehood there is something fixt. We find people in their
disputes continually appealing to certain tests and standards, which
are allowed on all sides, and are supposed to be established in our
common nature.
But there is not the same obvious concurrence in any uniform or
settled principles which relate to taste. It is even commonly supposed
that this delicate and aerial faculty, which seems too volatile to
endure even the chains of a definition, can not be properly tried by
any test, nor regulated by any standard. There is so continual a call
for the exercise of the reasoning faculty, and it is so much
strengthened by perpetual contention, that certain maxims of right
reason seem to be tacitly settled amongst the most ignorant. The
learned have improved on this rude science and reduced those maxims
into a system. If taste has not been so happily cultivated, it was not
that the subject was barren, but that the laborers were few or
negligent; for to say the truth, there are not the same interesting
motives to impel us to fix the one which urge us to ascertain the
other.
And after all, if men differ in their opinion concerning such matters,
their difference is not attended with the same important consequences;
else I make no doubt but that the logic of taste, if I may be allowed
the expression, might very possibly be as well digested, and we might
come to discuss matters of this nature with as much certainty as those
which seem more immediately within the province of mere reason. And
indeed, it is very necessary, at the entrance into such an inquiry as
our present, to make this point as clear as possible; for if taste has
no fixt principles, if the imagination is not affected according to
some invariable and certain laws, our labor is like to be employed to
very little purpose; as it must be judged a useless, if not an absurd
undertaking, to lay down rules for caprice, and to set up for a
legislator of whims and fancies.
The term taste, like all other figurative terms, is not extremely
accurate; the thing which we understand by it is far from a simple and
determinate idea in the minds of most men, and it is therefore liable
to uncertainty and confusion. I have no great opinion of a definition,
the celebrated remedy for the cure of this disorder. For when we
define, we seem in danger of circumscribing nature within the bounds
of our own notions, which we often take up by hazard, or embrace on
trust, or form out of a limited and partial consideration of the
object before us, instead of extending our ideas to take in all that
nature comprehends, according to her manner of combining. We are
limited in our inquiry by the strict laws to which we have submitted
at our setting out.
_... Circa vilem patulumque morabimur orbem,
Unde pudor proferre pedem vetet aut operis lex._
A definition may be very exact, and yet go but a very little way
toward informing us of the nature of the thing defined; but let the
virtue of a definition be what it will, in the order of things, it
seems rather to follow than to precede our inquiry, of which it ought
to be considered as the result. It must be acknowledged that the
methods of disquisition and teaching may be sometimes different, and
on very good reason undoubtedly; but for my part, I am convinced that
the method of teaching which approaches most nearly to the method of
investigation is incomparably the best; since, not content with
serving up a few barren and lifeless truths, it leads to the stock on
which they grew; it tends to set the reader himself in the track of
invention, and to direct him into those paths in which the author has
made his own discoveries, if he should be so happy as to have made any
that are valuable.
But to cut off all pretense for caviling, I mean by the word Taste no
more than that faculty or those faculties of the mind which are
affected with, or which form a judgment of, the works of imagination
and the elegant arts. This is, I think the most general idea of that
word, and what is the least connected with any particular theory. And
my point in this inquiry is, to find whether there are any principles
on which the imagination is affected, so common to all, so grounded
and certain, as to supply the means of reasoning satisfactorily about
them. And such principles of taste I fancy there are, however
paradoxical it may seem to those who on a superficial view imagine
that there is so great a diversity of tastes, both in kind and degree,
that nothing can be more determinate.
All the natural powers in man, which I know, that are conversant about
external objects are the senses, the imagination, and the judgment.
And first with regard to the senses. We do and we must suppose, that
as the conformation of their organs are nearly or altogether the same
in all men, so the manner of perceiving external objects is in all men
the same, or with little difference. We are satisfied that what
appears to be light to one eye appears light to another; that what
seems sweet to one palate is sweet to another; that what is dark and
bitter to this man is likewise dark and bitter to that; and we
conclude in the same manner of great and little, hard and soft, hot
and cold, rough and smooth; and indeed of all the natural qualities
and affections of bodies. If we suffer ourselves to imagine that their
senses present to different men different images of things this
skeptical proceeding will make every sort of reasoning on every
subject vain and frivolous, even that skeptical reasoning itself which
had persuaded us to entertain a doubt concerning the agreement of our
perceptions.
But as there will be little doubt that bodies present similar images
to the whole species, it must necessarily be allowed that the
pleasures and the pains which every object excites in one man, it must
raise in all mankind, whilst it operates, naturally, simply, and by
its proper powers only; for if we deny this, we must imagine that the
same cause operating in the same manner, and on subjects of the same
kind, will produce different effects, which would be highly absurd.
Let us first consider this point in the sense of taste, and the rather
as the faculty in question has taken its name from that sense. All men
are agreed to call vinegar sour, honey sweet, and aloes bitter; and as
they are all agreed in finding these qualities in those objects, they
do not in the least differ concerning their effects with regard to
pleasure and pain. They all concur in calling sweetness pleasant, and
sourness and bitterness unpleasant.
Here there is no diversity in their sentiments; and that there is not
appears fully from the consent of all men in the metaphors which are
taken from the sense of taste. A sour temper, bitter expressions,
bitter curses, a bitter fate, are terms well and strongly understood
by all. And we are altogether as well understood when we say a sweet
disposition, a sweet person, a sweet condition, and the like. It is
confest that custom and some other causes have made many deviations
from the natural pleasures or pains which belong to these several
tastes; but then the power of distinguishing between the natural and
the acquired relish remains to the very last. A man frequently comes
to prefer the taste of tobacco to that of sugar, and the flavor of
vinegar to that of milk; but this makes no confusion in tastes, whilst
he is sensible that the tobacco and vinegar are not sweet, and whilst
he knows that habit alone has reconciled his palate to these alien
pleasures. Even with such a person we may speak, and with sufficient
precision, concerning tastes. But should any man be found who declares
that to him tobacco has a taste like sugar, and that he can not
distinguish between milk and vinegar; or that tobacco and vinegar are
sweet, milk bitter, and sugar sour; we immediately conclude that the
organs of this man are out of order and that his palate is utterly
vitiated. We are as far from conferring with such a person upon tastes
as from reasoning concerning the relations of quantity with one who
should deny that all the parts together were equal to the whole. We do
not call a man of this kind wrong in his notions, but absolutely mad.
Exceptions of this sort, in either way, do not at all impeach our
general rule, nor make us conclude that men have various principles
concerning the relations of quantity or the taste of things. So that
when it is said taste can not be disputed, it can only mean that no
one can strictly answer what pleasure or pain some particular man may
find from the taste of some particular thing. This indeed can not be
disputed; but we may dispute, and with sufficient clearness too,
concerning the things which are naturally pleasing or disagreeable to
the sense. But when we talk of any peculiar or acquired relish, then
we must know the habits, the prejudices, or the distempers of this
particular man, and we must draw our conclusion from those.
This agreement of mankind is not confined to the taste solely. The
principle of pleasure derived from sight is the same in all. Light is
more pleasing than darkness. Summer, when the earth is clad in green,
when the heavens are serene and bright, is more agreeable than winter,
when everything makes a different appearance. I never remember that
anything beautiful, whether a man, a beast, a bird, or a plant, was
ever shown, tho it were to a hundred people, that they did not all
immediately agree that it was beautiful, tho some might have thought
that it fell short of their expectation, or that other things were
still finer. I believe no man thinks a goose to be more beautiful than
a swan, or imagines that what they call a Friesland hen excels a
peacock. It must be observed, too, that the pleasures of the sight are
not nearly so complicated and confused and altered by unnatural habits
and associations as the pleasures of the taste are; because the
pleasures of the sight more commonly acquiesce in themselves, and are
not so often altered by conditions which are independent of the sight
itself.
But things do not spontaneously present themselves to the palate as
they do to the sight; they are generally applied to it, either as food
or as medicine; and from the qualities which they possess for
nutritive or medicinal purposes, they often form the palate by
degrees, and by force of these associations. Thus opium is pleasing to
Turks on account of the agreeable delirium it produces. Tobacco is the
delight of Dutchmen, as it diffuses a torpor and pleasing
stupefaction. Fermented spirits please our common people, because they
banish care and all consideration of future or present evils. All of
these would lie absolutely neglected if their properties had
originally gone no further than the taste; but all these, together
with tea and coffee, and some other things, have passed from the
apothecary's shop to our tables, and were taken for health long before
they were thought of for pleasure. The effect of the drug has made us
use it frequently; and frequent use, combined with the agreeable
effect, has made the taste itself at last agreeable. But this does not
in the least perplex our reasoning, because we distinguish to the last
the acquired from the natural relish. In describing the taste of an
unknown fruit, you would scarcely say that it had a sweet and pleasant
flavor like tobacco, opium, or garlic, altho you spoke to those who
were in the constant use of these drugs, and had great pleasure in
them.
There is in all men a sufficient remembrance of the original natural
causes of pleasure to enable them to bring all things offered to their
senses to that standard, and to regulate their feelings and opinions
by it. Suppose one who had so vitiated his palate as to take more
pleasure in the taste of opium than in that of butter or honey to be
presented with a bolus of squills; there is hardly any doubt but that
he would prefer the butter or honey to this nauseous morsel, or to any
other bitter drug to which he had not been accustomed; which proves
that his palate was naturally like that of other men in all things,
that it is still like the palate of other men in many things, and only
vitiated in some particular points. For in judging of any new thing,
even of a taste similar to that which he has been formed by habit to
like, he finds his palate affected in the natural manner and on the
common principles. Thus the pleasure of all senses, of the sight, and
even of the taste, that most ambiguous of the senses, is the same in
all, high and low, learned and unlearned.
Besides the ideas, with their annexed pains and pleasures, which are
presented by the sense the mind of man possesses a sort of creative
power of its own; either in representing at pleasure the images of
things in the order and manner in which they were received by the
senses, or in combining those images in a new manner, and according to
a different order. This power is called imagination; and to this
belongs whatever is called wit, fancy, invention, and the like. But it
must be observed that the power of the imagination is incapable of
producing anything absolutely new; it can only vary the disposition of
those ideas which it has received from the senses. Now the imagination
is the most extensive province of pleasure and pain, as it is the
region of our fears and our hopes, and of all our passions that are
connected with them; and whatever is calculated to affect the
imagination with these commanding ideas, by force of any original
natural impression, must have the same power pretty equally over all
men. For since the imagination is only the representation of the
senses, it can only be pleased or displeased with the images, from the
same principle on which the sense is pleased or displeased with the
realities; and consequently there must be just as close an agreement
in the imaginations as in the senses of men. A little attention will
convince us that this must of necessity be the case.
But in the imaginations, besides the pain or pleasure arising from the
properties of the natural object, a pleasure is perceived from the
resemblance which the imitation has to the original; the imagination,
I conceive, can have no pleasure but what results from one or other of
these causes. And these causes operate pretty uniformly upon all men,
because they operate by principles in nature, and which are not
derived from any particular habits or advantages. Mr. Locke very
justly and finely observes of wit that it is chiefly conversant in
tracing resemblances; he remarks at the same time that the business of
judgment is rather in finding differences. It may perhaps appear, on
this supposition, that there is no material distinction between the
wit and the judgment, as they both seem to result from different
operations of the same faculty of comparing.
But in reality, whether they are or are not dependent on the same
power of the mind, they differ so very materially in many respects
that a perfect union of wit and judgment is one of the rarest things
in the world. When two distinct objects are unlike to each other, it
is only what we expect; things are in their common way, and therefore
they make no impression on the imagination; but when two distinct
objects have a resemblance, we are struck, we attend to them, and we
are pleased. The mind of man has naturally a far greater alacrity and
satisfaction in tracing resemblances than in searching for
differences; because by making resemblances we produce new images; we
unite, we create, we enlarge our stock: but in making distinctions we
offer no food at all to the imagination; the task itself is more
severe and irksome, and what pleasure we derive from it is something
of a negative and indirect nature. A piece of news is told me in the
morning; this, merely as a piece of news, as a fact added to my stock,
gives me some pleasure. In the evening I find there was nothing in it.
What do I gain by this but the dissatisfaction to find that I had been
imposed upon?
Hence it is that men are much more naturally inclined to belief than
to incredulity. And it is upon this principle that the most ignorant
and barbarous nations have frequently excelled in similitudes,
comparisons, metaphors, and allegories, who have been weak and
backward in distinguishing and sorting their ideas. And it is for a
reason of this kind that Homer and the Oriental writers, tho very fond
of similitudes, and tho they often strike out such as are truly
admirable, seldom take care to have them exact; that is, they are
taken with the general resemblance, they paint it strongly, and they
take no notice of the difference which may be found between the
things compared.
Now, as the pleasure of resemblance is that which principally flatters
the imagination, all men are nearly equal in this point, as far as
their knowledge of the things represented or compared extends. The
principle of this knowledge is very much accidental, as it depends
upon experience and observation, and not on the strength or weakness
of any natural faculty; and it is from this difference in knowledge
that what we commonly, tho with no great exactness, call a difference
in taste proceeds. A man to whom sculpture is new sees a barber's
block, or some ordinary piece of statuary; he is immediately struck
and pleased, because he sees something like a human figure; and,
entirely taken up with this likeness, he does not at all attend to its
defects. No person, I believe, at the first time of seeing a piece of
imitation ever did. Some time after, we suppose that this novice
lights upon a more artificial work of the same nature; he now begins
to look with contempt on what he admired at first; not that he admired
it even then for its unlikeness to a man, but for that general tho
inaccurate resemblance which it bore to the human figure. What he
admired at different times in these so different figures is strictly
the same; and tho his knowledge is improved, his taste is not altered.
Hitherto his mistake was from a want of knowledge in art, and this
arose from his inexperience; but he may be still deficient from a want
of knowledge in nature. For it is possible that the man in question
may stop here, and that the masterpiece of a great hand may please
him no more than the middling performance of a vulgar artist; and this
not for want of better or higher relish, but because all men do not
observe with sufficient accuracy on the human figure to enable them to
judge properly of an imitation of it.
And that the critical taste does not depend upon a superior principle
in men, but upon superior knowledge, may appear from several
instances. The story of the ancient painter and the shoemaker is very
well known. The shoemaker set the painter right with regard to some
mistakes he had made in the shoe of one of his figures, and which the
painter, who had not made such accurate observations on shoes, and was
content with a general resemblance, had never observed. But this was
no impeachment to the taste of the painter; it only showed some want
of knowledge in the art of making shoes. Let us imagine that an
anatomist had come into the painter's working-room. His piece is in
general well done, the figure in question in a good attitude, and the
parts well adjusted to their various movements; yet the anatomist,
critical in his art, may observe the swell of some muscle not quite
just in the peculiar action of the figure. Here the anatomist observes
what the painter had not observed; and he passes by what the shoemaker
had remarked.