[1] Those who remarked in the countenance of this young hero a
dissolute audacity mixed with extreme haughtiness and indifference to
the feelings of others, could not yet deny to his countenance that sort
of comeliness, which belongs to an open set of features well formed
by nature, modelled by art to the usual rules of courtesy, yet so far
frank and honest that they seemed as if they disclaimed to conceal the
natural working of the soul. Such an expression is often mistaken for
manly frankness, when in truth it arises from the reckless indifference
of a libertine disposition, conscious of superiority of birth and
wealth, or of some other adventitious advantage totally unconnected
with personal merit.
_Ivanhoe_, Chap. VIII
[Pg 43]
CHAPTER XI
Crystallisation having once begun, we enjoy with delight each new
beauty discovered in that which we love.
But what is beauty? It is the appearance of an aptitude for giving you
pleasure.
The pleasures of all individuals are different and often opposed to one
another; which explains very well how that, which is beauty for one
individual, is ugliness for another. (Conclusive example of Del Rosso
and Lisio, 1st January, 1820.)
The right way to discover the nature of beauty is to look for the
nature of the pleasures of each individual. Del Rosso, for example,
needs a woman who allows a certain boldness of movement, and who by her
smiles authorises considerable licence; a woman who at each instant
holds physical pleasures before his imagination, and who excites in him
the power of pleasing, while giving him at the same time the means of
displaying it.
Apparently, by love Del Rosso understands physical love, and Lisio
passion-love. Obviously they are not likely to agree about the word
beauty.[1]
The beauty then, discovered by you, being the appearance of an aptitude
for giving you pleasure, and pleasure being different from pleasure as
man from man, the crystallisation formed in the head of each individual
must bear the colour of that individual's pleasures.
[Pg 44]
A man's crystallisation of his mistress, or her _beauty_, is no other
thing than the collection of all the satisfactions of all the desires,
which he can have felt successively at her instance.
[1] _My Beauty_, promise of a character useful to _my_ soul, is above
the attraction of the senses; that attraction is only one particular
kind of attraction(7). 1815.
[Pg 45]
CHAPTER XII
FURTHER CONSIDERATION OF CRYSTALLISATION
Why do we enjoy with delight each new beauty, discovered in that which
we love?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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