particularly, in that Sort of Dances which are meant to exprefs Characters and Paffions; and in which you may eafily recollect how much Comargo excelled, for the nobler Sort of Grace; and Fossanine, for the more tender and pathetic. There is no Poet I have ever read, who seems to me to understand this Part of Beauty fo well as our own Milton. He fpeaks of thefe Two Sorts of Grace very diftinctly; and gives the Majestic [b] to his Adam, and both the Familiar and Majeftic to Eve; but the latter in a lefs Degree than the former: In [6] Two of far nobler Shape, erect and tall, worthy feem'd. For in their Looks divine Milton's Parad. Loft, B. iv. 298. Grace was in all her Steps: Heav'n in her Eye; B. viii. 489. Speaking, or mute, all Comeliness and Grace Attends thee; and each Word, each Motion, forms, 4 Ib, 223. doing doing which he might either be led by his own excellent Judgment, or poffibly might have an Eye to what is faid by [c] Cicero, in fpeaking on this Subject. Though Grace is fo difficult to be accounted for in general; yet I have obferv'd Two particular Things, which (I think) hold universally in relation to it. The Firft is: "That there is no Grace, without "Motion ;" by which I mean, without fome genteel or pleafing Motion, either of the whole Body, or of fome Limb, or, at leaft, of fome Feature. And it may be hence, that Lord Bacon (and, perhaps Horace,) [d] call Grace, by the Name of decer Motion; juft as if they were equivalent Terms. Virgil in one Place points out the Majesty of Juno, and in another the graceful Air of Apollo [e], by only It is obfervable, that in each of the Three laft Paffages, Milton feems to have had thofe Lines of Tibullus in his Thoughts: Illam, quicquid agit, quoquò veftigia vertit, Componit furtim fubfequiturque decor. [c] Venuftatem, muliebrem ducere debemus; dignitatem, virilem. Cicero de Offic. lib. i. 130. [d] In Beauty, that of Favour is more than that of Colour; and that of gracious and decent Motion, more than that of Favour. Lord Bacon's Works, vol. iii. p. 362. Quo fugit Venus, heu! quove color? Decens Quo motus? (For fo, I think, this Paffage fhould be read; because the Epithet of graceful, cannot belong to Colour) Horace, lib. iv. Od. 13. 18, [e] Aft ego, quæ divûm incedo regina Ipfe jugis Cynthi graditur. En. i. 4.6. saying, that they move; and poffibly he means no more, when he makes the Motion of Venus [f] the principal thing, by which Æneas discovers her under all her Difguife; though the Commentators, as ufual, would fain find out a more dark and myfterious Meaning for it. All the best Statues are represented as in fome Action, or Motion; and the most graceful Statue in the World (the Apollo Belvedere) is fo much fo, that when one faces it at a little Distance, one is almost apt to imagine, that he is actually going to move on toward you. All graceful Heads, even in the Portraits of the beft Painters, are in Motion; and very ftrongly in those of Guido in particular; which, as you may remember, are all either cafting their Looks up toward Heaven, or down toward the Ground, or fide-way, as regarding fome Object. A Head that is quite unactive, and flung flat upon the Canvas (like the Faces on Medals after the Fall of the Roman Empire, or the Gothic Heads before the Revival of the Arts) will be fo far from having any Grace, that it will not even have any Life in it. The Second Observation is: "That there can be "no Grace, with Impropriety;" or, in other Words, [f] Dixit; & avertens rofeâ cervice refulfit ; that that nothing can be graceful, that is not adapted to the Characters of the Perfon. The Graces of a little lively Beauty would become ungraceful in a Character of Majefty; as the majeftic Airs of an Empress would quite destroy the Prettiness of the former. The Vivacity that adds a Grace to Beauty in Youth, would give an additional Deformity to old Age; and the very fame Airs, which would be charming on fome Occasions, may be quite fhocking when extremely mif-timed, or extremely mis-placed. This infeparable Union of Propriety and Grace feems to have been the general Senfe of Mankind; as we may guefs from the [g] Languages of several Nations; in which fome Words that answer to our Proper or Becoming, are used indifferently for Beautiful or Graceful. And yet I cannot think (as some seem inclined to do) that Grace confifts entirely in Propriety; because Propriety is a Thing easy enough to be underftood, and Grace (after all we can say about it) very difficult. Propriety therefore and Grace are no more one and the fame Thing, than Grace and Motion are: 'Tis true, it cannot fubfift without either; but then there seems to be fomething else, what I cannot explain, and what I do not know that ever any body has explained, that goes to the Composition; and [g] Thus, among the Greeks, the Words Пgerov and Kaλov, and among the Romans, Pulchrum and Decens, or Decorum, are used indifferently for one another. D 3 which which poffibly may give its greatest Force and Pleafingness. Whatever are the Causes of it, this is certain, that Grace is the chief of all the conftituent Parts of Beauty; and fo much fo, that it feems to be the only one which is absolutely and univerfally admired: All the reft are only relative. One likes a brunette Beauty better than a fair one; I may love a little Woman, and you a large one, beft; a Person of a mild Temper will be fond of the gentler Paffions in the Face, and one of a bolder Caft may choose to have more Vivacity and more vigorous Paffions expreffed there; But Grace is found in few, and is pleafing to all. Grace, like Poetry, must be born with a Person 3 and is never wholly, to be acquired by Art. The most celebrated of all the ancient Painters, was Apelles; and the most celebrated of all the Modern, Raphael: And it is remarkable, that the distinguishing Character of each of them was Grace. Indeed, that alone could have given them fo high a Preeminence over all their other Competitors, Grace has nothing to do with the loweft Part of Beauty, or Color; very little with Shape, and very much with the Paffions; for it is the who gives their highest Zeft, and the moft delicious Part of their Pleafingness to the Expreffions of each of them. All |