Two dissertations, I. Concerning the end for which God created the world. II. The…

4. THIS secondary kind of beauty, consisting in uniformity and proportion, not only takes place in material and external things, but also in things immaterial; and is, in very many things, plain and sensible in the latter, as well as the former: and when it is so, there is no reason why it should not be grateful to them that behold it, in these, as well as the other, by virtue of the same sense or the same determination of mind to be gratified with uniformity and proportion. If uniformity and proportion be the things that affect, and appear agreeable to, this sense of beauty, then why should not uniformity and proportion affect the same sense in immaterial things, as well as material, if there be equal capacity of discerning it in both? and indeed more in spiritual things (caeteris paribus) as these are more important than things merely external and material?

4. THIS secondary kind of beauty, consisting in uniformity and proportion, not only takes place in material and external things, but also in things immaterial; and is, in very many things, plain and sensible in the latter, as well as the former: and when it is so, there is no reason why it should not be grateful to them that behold it, in these, as well as the other, by virtue of the same sense or the same determination of mind to be gratify'd with uniformity and proportion. If uniformity and proportion be the things that affect, and appear agreable to, this sense of beauty, then why should not uniformity and proportion affect the same sense in immaterial things, as well as material, if there be equal capacity of discerning it in both? and indeed more in spiritual things (caeteris paribus) as these are more important than things meerly external and material?

THIS is not only reasonable to be supposed, but is evident in fact, in numberless instances. There is a beauty of order in society, besides what consists in benevolence, or can be referred to it, which is of the secondary kind. As, when the different members of society have all their appointed office, place and station, according to their several capacities and talents, and every one keeps his place, and continues in his proper business. In this there is a beauty, not of a different kind from the regularity of a beautiful building, or piece of skilful architecture, where the strong pillars are set in their proper place, the pilasters in a place fit for them, the square pieces of marble in the pavement in a place suitable for them, the panels in the walls and partitions in their proper places, the cornices in places proper for them, &c. As the agreement of a variety in one common design, of the parts of a building, or complicated machine, is one instance of that regularity, which belongs to the secondary kind of beauty, so there is the