when the scene is supposed to be in a palace; if the dresses are not suitable to the rank of the persons, then such disagreements become displeasing. It is the same, when the concord of time, place, and action, is not observed. Let us suppose the chief action of a theatrical piece to be multiplied; let some ages pass away in the course of a few hours; let the performers be transported in an instant from one part of the world to another: do not all these things appear as the greatest absurdities, yet at the same time they bring to our mind the fiction of the representation, and are as it were a voice telling us it is folly to waste real tears on feigned sorrow?

Of the satisfaction, which is annexed to virtuous pleasures; that is to say, such as are proofs of our perfection.

Through Nature's ever varying scene,

By different ways pursu❜d;

The one eternal end of Heav'n,
Is universal good.

I HAVE SO far endeavoured to discover the source of pleasure in the soul, and the organs of sensation. According to their various modifications, there are always others in the brain, familiar and proportional to them, the traces of which

are retained by the memory. Is there any possibility of unravelling this mystery? For here, Nature appears to have enveloped herself in a mystic veil, which I fear mortals will never be able to remove. But if we cannot expect to arrive at the true knowledge of this point, let us not despair of guessing, for when experience fails us, conjecture is always willing to assist us with her light.

We cannot observe Nature, without perceiving that a valuable simplicity prevails through all her laws. We may then form an idea of the impression which is made upon the brain, by that made upon the organs of the senses, which are as it were the branches of it. An object which is agreeable, exercises the fibres

of the brain without weakening or exhausting them; on the contrary, whatever is displeasing wounds them, and whatever wearies, leaves them in a state of inaction.

On superior powers

Were we to press, inferior might on our's;

Or in the full creation leave a void,

Where, one step broken, the great scale's destroy'd: From Nature's chain, whatever link you strike, Tenth, or ten thousandth, breaks the chain alike.

It is not only from the motion in the fibres of the brain that this pleasure springs, but it principally arises from the relation which the motions imprinted there bear to each other. The theory of music teaches us, that the most delightful harmony is that, where the vibrations

which compose it most frequently unite. This has induced the greatest natural philosophers to believe, that those colours, smells, and tastes, which being mixed, are agreeable, excite the organs of sight, smell, and taste, which accord and correspond with each other. Are we not therefore authorized to conjecture that imitation, proportion, symmetry, rhyme, and that true relation of certain means to a decided end and chief object, and, in short, the pleasures which delight us most, either in the works of nature or art, make at the same time pleasing impressions on the brain, because they bring forth ideas which are nearly annexed, and assist each other.

But whence comes it, that we feel so