and Bedouit, gathers an ample harveft, by at once making his advantage of the devotion of fome, and the love of pleasure of a great many others.

"Each city of Egypt has, like. wife, its faint, its proceffions, and its diverfions, which are frequented by thofe of the environs, and authorized by the government. It will be perceived, that the faint of the capital enjoys his privileges as a metropolitan, and that his tomb is never without cuftom. But the devotion of the women, more fervent in every country than that of the men, is not confined, in Egypt, to the invocation of the dead; and as knaves are always encouraged by dupes, there are to be found, at Cairo, many faints in perfect health, to whom they prefer paying their addreffes.

"These predeftinated perfons take their station at the door, or in the court of the mofques; where, extended on a ragged mat, they feem loft in extafy, and in poflef fion of the joys of paradife, while this appearance of beatitude infpires veneration. Others, to give themselves more importance, walk, gravely, through the street, only covered with a long white woollen tunic. They preach up a contempt for riches, of which they infolently demand a share, and prophefy continually the end of the world..

"One of thefe Egyptian faints afforded a proof, that the habit of deceiving others may, at last, lead us to deceive ourfelves. This impoftor had worked himself up to fuch a pitch of enthufiafm, as to declare to the people, that, on fuch a certain day, and hour, he would crofs the Nile, ftanding upright on his mat, only by pronouncing the name of God. Great numbers af fembled on the banks of the river.

The faint presently funk to the bottom, and his toolifh followers, for fear of interrupting him in working his miracle, fuffered him to be drowned without any affiftance.

"Humanity, though degraded, in Egypt, by thefe pious abfurdi. ties, is, at the fame time, honoured by an unlimited foundation in fa vour of the blind; and it is on fo enlarged a plan, that all the blind in Egypt are affembled at Cairo. This has given birth to the opinion, that this climate occafions blindness.

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They reckon about four thoufand, maintained by the mofque of fultan Haffan; and perhaps this number does not exceed that of other countries, in proportion to the number of the inhabitants. It must, however, be allowed, that in Egypt, the clafs of individuals who are accustomed to lie in the fireets, or on the terraces of houses, are particularly fubject to this misfor tune. A cold dew, which falls during the night, makes the eyelids tender, and difpofes them to ulcerate with the heat of the day. But the fight of those who lie under cover, does not fuffer fo much as it would by intemperance in other climates.

"After having confidered the monuments of Egypt, the ferenity of its fky, its population, the induftry of its inhabitants, and the riches of its productions, nothing remains but to caft an eye of contempt on its government.

"Georgian children, brought and fold in Egypt, replace those who die out of ten or twelve thou fand Mamalukes. This fmall num ber furnishes the beys, their ty rants, the fubaltern officers, more cruel than their masters, and the troops, who execute and aggravate their barbarous orders.

"From

"The external sense of taste, by which we diftinguifh and relish the various kinds of food, has given occafion to a metaphorical application of its name to this internal power of the mind, by which we perceive what is beautiful, and what is deformed or defective in the various objects that we contemplate.

"Like the taste of the palate, it relishes fome things, is difgufied with others; with regard to many, is indifferent or dubious, and is confiderably influenced by habit, by affociations, and by opinion. Thefe obvious analogies between external and internal taste, have led men, in all ages, and in all or moft polifhed languages, to give the name of the external fenfe to this power of difcerning what is beautiful with pleafure, and what is ugly and faulty in its kind with difguit.

"In treating of this as an intellectual power of the mind, I intend only to make fome obfervations, first on its nature, and then on its objects.

1. In the external fenfe of tafte, we are led by reafon and reflection to diftinguish between the agreeable fenfation we feel, and the quality in the object which occafions it. Both have the fame name, and on that account are apt to be confounded by the vulgar, and even by philofophers. The fenfation I feel when I taste any fapid body is in my mind; but there is a real quality in the body which is the cause of this fenfation. These two things have the fame name in language, not from any fimilitude in their nature, but because the one is the fign of the other, and becaufe there is little occafion in common life to diffinguish them.

This was fully explained in treating of the fecondary qualities of bodies. The reafon of taking

notice of it now is, that the internal power of tafe bears à great analogy in this refpect to the external.

"When a beautiful object is before us, we may diftinguifh the agreeable emotion it produces in us, from the quality of the object which caufes that emotion. When I hear an air in mufic that pleases me, I fay, it is fine, it is excellent. This excellence is not in me; it is in the mufic. But the pleasure it gives is not in the mulic; it is in me. Perhaps I cannot fay what it is in the tune that pleafes my ear, as I cannot fay what it is in a fapid body that pleafes my palate; but there is a quality in the fapid body which pleafes my palate, and I call it a delicious tafte; and there is a quality in the tune that pleases my tate, and I call it a fine or an excellent air.

This ought the rather to be obferved, because it is become a fafhion among modern philofophers, to refolve all our perceptions into mere feelings or fenfations in the perfon that perceives, without any thing correfponding to thofe feelings in the external object. According to thefe philofophers, there is no heat in the fire, no taste in a fapid body; the taste and the heat being only in the perfon that feels them. In like manner, there is no beauty in any object whatsoever; it is only a fenfation or feeling ia the person that perceives it.

"The language and the common fenfe of mankind contradict this theory. Even thofe who hold it, find themselves obliged to use a language that contradicts it. I had occafion to fhow, that there is no folid foundation for it when applied to the fecondary qualities of body; and the fame arguments fhow c qually, that it has no folid founda

them but the names of the different objects to which they belong.

"As there is fuch diverfity in the kinds of beauty as well as in the degrees, we need not think it ftrange that philofophers have gone into different fyftems in analyfing it, and enumerating its fimple ingredients. They have made many just obfervations on the fubject; but, from the love of fimplicity, have reduced it to fewer principles than the nature of the thing will permit, having had in their eye fome parti cular kinds of beauty, while they overlooked others.

tion when applied to the beauty of objects, or to any of thofe qualities that are perceived by a good taste. "But though fome of the qualities that please a good tafte refemble the fecondary qualities of body, and therefore may be called occult qualities, as we only feel their effect, and have no more knowledge of the cause, but that it is fomething which is adapted by nature to produce that effect; this is not always the cafe.

"There are moral beauties as well as natural; beauties in the objects of fenfe, and in intellectual objects; in the works of men, and in the works of God; in things inanimate, in brute animals, and in rational beings; in the conftitution of the body of man, and in the conThere is no fitution of his mind. real excellence which has not its beauty to a difcerning eye, when placed in a proper point of view; and it is as difficult to enumerate the ingredients of beauty as the ingredients of real excellence.

"3. The taste of the palate may be accounted most just and perfect, when we relifh the things that are fit for the nourishment of the body, and are difgufted with things of a contrary nature. The manifeft intention of nature in giving us this fenfe, is, that we may difcern what it is fit for us to eat and to drink, and what it is not. Brute animals are directed in the choice of their food merely by their tafte. Led by this guide, they chufe the food that pature intended for them, and feldom make mistakes, unless they be pinched by hunger, or deceived by artificial compofitions. In infants likewife the taite is commonly found

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and

nious and fyftematic procefs at Otaheite? Yet fuch has been in a great meafure undefignedly the cafe. In the language of Otaheite ai fignifies to eat, or to fatisfy the first appetite of human nature; ea fignifies to copulate, or to fatisfy another appetite: eiya fignifies to catch fif, aiya, to feal or rob-all of them alluding to the fatisfaction of wants and appetites. In the fame language e vai fignifies water; avai, the foot: whence we may venture to conclude, that the radical vai or vai fignifies fomething beneath or under us. This kind of regularity in compofition, notwithstanding the variety introduced from the differ ent dialects, is very obfervable in the Greek, and undoubtedly induced lord Monboddo to fuppofe it a language of art.

"In pursuance of what has been premised, and confiftently with what is to follow, I will venture to propofe it as the bafis of my theory, that language is altogether a human invention; and that the progrefs of the mind, in the invention and improvement of language, is, by certain natural gradations, plainly difcernible in the compofition of words. The first men would probably make known their wants and defires, in a great measure, by inarticulate founds, actions, and geftures; in procefs of time, particular founds would be ufually annexed to particular ideas; and thefe founds would become articulate, by uniting two or more of them to gether, for instance, the thing or action with the manner or the time in which it existed or was performed-Thus Do (I give) Do-di or Dedi (I have given).

The fources of language are, firft, thofe natural cries, which ferve to exprefs pain or pleature, aud which generally accompany any

firong paffion or emotion; and le condly, imitative sounds.

"The primitive parts of speech appear to be, 1. Noun. 2. Verb. 3. Interjection. The derivative, 4. the adjective, 5. the pronoun, 6. the adverb, 7. the conjunction, 8. the prepofition, 9. the arti cle.

“I. The names of fenfible ob jefts are derived, firit, from thofe emotions, which the perception of them excites, whether painful or pleafant, and the natural cries cor refpondent to them. Secondly, from thofe founds, which accom pany certain actions of nature, and which men, endeavouring to defcribe, would be induced to imitate; fuch are buzz, murmur; of which there are numberless in iances in all languages, and particularly in the Greek. Thirdly, from a certain analogy between objects of fight and of hearing. A craggy rock, or a rapid torrent (confidered as an object of fight) affociate naturally with a broken and harfh found. Quick and violent motion affects the fenfes in a correfpondent manner; and, in defcribing it, men involuntarily adopt a hasty and vio lent enunciation, often accompanied with much action. Fourthly, (in procefs of time, and when language is confiderably improved) from compofition, as daily (the flower) from day's eye; nightingale from night, and galan (to fing); with many more obvious. Fifthly, from contractions of participles, &c. as dawn from daying.

"It is highly probable, that, in many cafes, common names have been adopted from proper names; or, in other words, the names di flinguishing the relations of civil life, were probably at first the names of individuals. Thus, in the first language, the word answerable to

our