How do we perceive beauty in natural beings? Beauty, with living and animate beings, is neither accidental and capricious movements, nor simple conformity of those movements to an end—the uniform and mutual connection of parts. This point of view is that of the naturalist, of the man of science; it is not that of the Beautiful. Beauty is total form in so far as it reveals the force which animates it; it is this force itself, manifested by a totality of forms, of independent and free movements; it is the internal harmony which reveals itself in this secret accord of members, and which betrays itself outwardly, without the eye’s pausing to consider the relation of the parts to the whole, and their functions or reciprocal connection, as science does. The unity exhibits itself merely externally as the principle which binds the members together. It manifests itself especially through the sensibility. The point of view of beauty is then that of pure contemplation, not that of reflection, which analyzes, compares and seizes the connection of parts and their destination. This internal and visible unity, this accord, and this harmony, are not distinct from the material element; they are its very form. This is the principle which serves to determine beauty in its inferior grades, the beauty of the crystal with its regular forms, forms produced by an internal and free force. A similar activity is developed in a more perfect manner in the living organism, its outlines, the disposition of its members, the movements, and the expression of sensibility. Such is beauty in individual beings. It is otherwise with it when we consider nature in its totality, the beauty of a landscape, for example. There is no longer question here about an organic disposition of parts and of the life which animates them; we have under our eyes a rich multiplicity of objects which form a whole, mountains, trees, rivers, etc. In this diversity there appears an external unity which interests us by its agreeable or imposing character. To this aspect there is added that property of the objects of nature through which they awaken in us, sympathetically, certain sentiments, by the secret analogy which exists between them and the situations of the human soul. Such is the effect produced by the silence of the night, the calm of a still valley, the sublime aspect of a vast sea in tumult, and the imposing grandeur of the starry heavens. The significance of these objects is not in themselves; they are only symbols of the sentiments of the soul which they excite. It is thus we attribute to animals the qualities which belong only to man, courage, fortitude, cunning. Physical beauty is a reflex of moral beauty.