The second characteristic of works of art is Beauty. The highest object of meditation for man is man, and for the artist there is none above his own frame. ’Tis by moving your senses that he reaches your soul: and hence the analysis of the bodily system has no less difficulties for him, than that of the human mind for the philosopher. I do not mean the anatomy of the muscles, vessels, bones, and their different forms and situations; nor the relative measure of the whole to its parts, and _vice versa_: for the knife, exercise, and patience, may teach you all these. I mean the analysis of an attribute, essential to man, but fluctuating with his frame, allowed by all, misconstrued by many, known by few:—the analysis of beauty, which no definition can explain, to him whom heaven hath denied a soul for it. Beauty consists in the harmony of the various parts of an individual. This is the philosopher’s stone, which all artists must search for, though a few only find it: ’tis nonsense to him, who could not have formed the idea out of himself. The line which beauty describes is elliptical, both uniform and various: ’tis not to be described by a circle, and from every point changes its direction. All this is easily said; but to apply it—_there is the rub_. ’Tis not in the power of Algebra to determine which line, more or less elliptic, forms the divers parts of the system into beauty—but the ancients knew it; I attest their works, from the gods down to their vases. The human form allows of no circle, nor has any antique vase its profile semicircular. After this, should any one desire me to assist him more sensibly in his inquiries concerning beauty, by setting down some rules (a hard task), I would take them from the antique models, and in want of these, from the most beautiful people I could meet with at the place where I lived. But to instruct, I would do it in the negative way; of which I shall give some instances, confining myself however to the face.