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Show ORIGIN OF SOCtETY. CANTO li I . lOti First the charm'd Mind mechanic powers collects, Means for some end, and causes of effects; 290 Then learns from other Minds their joys and fears, Contagious smiles and sympathetic tears. " What one fine stimulated Sense discerns,. Another Sense by IMITATION learns.- So in the graceful dance the step sublime Learns from the ear the concordance of Time. So, when· the pen of some young artist prints . Recumbent Nymphs in TITIAN's living tints; The glo·wing.limb, fair cheek, and flowing hair; Respiring bosom, and seductive air,_ 300 ympathy; and I. 331 on languag~; and the subseqyent lines on the arts of painting and architecture. Another sense, 1. 29 1~. As the p,a.rt o£the org;:tns of touch or of sight, which is stimulated into action by a tangible or visible object, must Tesemble in figure at. least the· figure of that obj~ct, as . it thus constitutes an idea; it may be said to imitate the figure of that object ; and thus imitation may be esteemed .coeval .with the existence both of man and other animals: but this would confound perception with imitation; which latter is, better defined from the ac.tions of one sense <;:opying those of another. C'tANTO HI. PROGRESS OF THE MIND. He justly copies with enamour'd sigh. From Beauty's image pictured on his eye. H>9 " Thus when great ANGELO· in wondering Rome Fix' d the vast pillars of Saint Peter's dome, Rear' d rocks on rocks sublime,. and hung on. high A new Pantheon in. the affrighted sky •. Each massy pier, now join'd and now aloof, The figured architraves,. and vaulted roof,, Thus when great' Angelo. 1. 303. The origin of this propensity to imitation has not been deduced from any known principle; when any action presents itself to the view of a. chihl, as of whetting a knife, or threading a. needle; the parts of this action in respect of time, motion, figure, are imitated by parts of the retina of hi eye; to perform this action therefore with. his hands is easier to him than to invent any new action; because it consists in repeating with another set of fibres, viz. with the moving muscles, what· he had just perlormed by some parts of the retina; just as in dancing· we transfer the times of the· motions from th.e actions· of the auditory nerve to the muscles of the limbs. Imitation therefore consists of repetition, which is the easiest kind of animal action; as the ideas or motions become presently associated together; which adds to the facility of their Rroduction; as shown· in Zoonomia, Vol. I. Sect. XXH~ ~. It should be added, that as our ideas,. when we perceive external objects, are believed to .consist in the actions of. the immediate organs of sense in conseqpencc of the. stimulus of. those objects; so when we t~1ink of external objects, our ideas are believed to consist in the repetitions of the actions of the immediate organs of sense, excited by the other sensorial powers of volition, sensation, or association. |