The Connexion Between Taste and Morals: Two lecturesHopkins, Mark
Religion
The Connexion Between Taste and Morals: Two lectures
Hopkins, Mark
Aesthetics; Ethics
The illustration of this point will lead to a further confirmation of
what was said in reference to moral beauty. No sight, for example, can
be more beautiful than that of a family in which there is mutual
attachment, and in which the performance of every duty is sweetened by
affection. How beautiful is the assiduity of a child, who bears with
every infirmity, and soothes every care, and anticipates every want, of
a parent in sickness or in age! It is beautiful, but not sublime. The
conduct of that young man, who labors hard and denies himself the
ordinary pleasures of the young that he may support an aged mother, or
add to her comfort, is highly beautiful; but natural affection
coöperates with a sense of duty, and therefore it is not sublime. No one
has ever considered as sublime the conduct of Æneas, when he bore his
aged father upon his shoulders from the flames of Troy. But when the
ancient Brutus, with a power that was supreme, sat in judgment on his
own son who was accused of being a traitor, and when he gave the sign to
the lictor to take him to execution, then there was a struggle, then
inflexible justice triumphed over natural affection, and it was--not
beautiful, it was too awful for that--but it was sublime. That act of
our Saviour, (if I may be permitted to refer to such a scene in this
connexion,) by which he remembered his mother upon the cross and
provided for her wants, was beautiful--how beautiful! His prayer for his
murderers was sublime. It is, in general, acts of tenderness,
gentleness, condescension, pity, gratitude, humanity, that are
beautiful; while it is, on the other hand, acts of magnanimity, of
fortitude, of inflexible justice, of high patriotism, and, on proper
occasions, of contempt of danger and of death, that are sublime. In all
these latter cases it will be seen that the principle is the same, and
that the sublime emotion is awakened by virtuous self-control, in union
with high resolve.
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