On the Sublime and Beautiful

On the Sublime and Beautiful by Edmund Burke

NEW YORK: P.F. COLLIER & SON COMPANY, 1909–14 Edited by Charles W. Eliot, who wrote the introduction.

• Introductory Note

• Part I
  • Chapter 1: Novelty
  • Chapter 2: Pain and Pleasure
  • Chapter 3: The Difference Between the Removal of Pain, and Positive Pleasure
  • Chapter 4: Of Delight and Pleasure as Opposed to Each Other
  • Chapter 5: Joy and Grief
  • Chapter 6: Of the Passions Which Belong to Self-Preservation
  • Chapter 7: Of the Sublime
  • Chapter 8: Of the Passions Which Belong to Society
  • Chapter 9: The Final Cause of the Difference Between the Passions Belonging to Self-Preservation and Those Which Regard the Society of the Sexes
  • Chapter 10: Of Beauty
  • Chapter 11: Society and Solitude
  • Chapter 12: Sympathy, Imitation, and Ambition
  • Chapter 13: Sympathy
  • Chapter 14: The Effects of Sympathy in the Distresses of Others
  • Chapter 15: Of the Effects of Tragedy
  • Chapter 16: Imitation
  • Chapter 17: Ambition
  • Chapter 18: The Recapitulation
  • Chapter 19: The Conclusion

• Part II
  • Chapter 1: Of the Passion Caused by the Sublime
  • Chapter 2: Terror
  • Chapter 3: Obscurity
  • Chapter 4: Of the Difference Between Clearness and Obscurity with Regard to the Passions
  • Chapter 5: The Same Subject Continued
  • Chapter 6: Power
  • Chapter 7: Privation
  • Chapter 8: Vastness
  • Chapter 9: Infinity
  • Chapter 10: Succession and Uniformity
  • Chapter 11: Magnitude in Building
  • Chapter 12: Infinity in Pleasing Objects
  • Chapter 13: Difficulty
  • Chapter 14: Magnificence
  • Chapter 15: Light
  • Chapter 16: Light in Building
  • Chapter 17: Colour Considered as Productive of the Sublime
  • Chapter 18: Sound and Loudness
  • Chapter 19: Suddenness
  • Chapter 20: Intermitting
  • Chapter 21: The Cries of Animals
  • Chapter 22: Smell and Taste. Bitters and Stenches
  • Chapter 23: Feeling. Pain

• Part III
  • Chapter 1: Of Beauty
  • Chapter 2: Proportion not the Cause of Beauty in Vegetables
  • Chapter 3: Proportion not the Cause of Beauty in Animals
  • Chapter 4: Proportion not the Cause of Beauty in the Human Species
  • Chapter 5: Proportion Further Considered
  • Chapter 6: Fitness not the Cause of Beauty
  • Chapter 7: The Real Effects of Fitness
  • Chapter 8: The Recapitulation
  • Chapter 9: Perfection not the Cause of Beauty
  • Chapter 10: How Far the Idea of Beauty May be Applied to the Qualities of the Mind
  • Chapter 11: How Far the Idea of Beauty May be Applied to Virtue
  • Chapter 12: The Real Cause of Beauty
  • Chapter 13: Beautiful Objects Small
  • Chapter 14: Smoothness
  • Chapter 15: Gradual Variation
  • Chapter 16: Delicacy
  • Chapter 17: Beauty in Colour
  • Chapter 18: Recapitulation
  • Chapter 19: The Physiognomy
  • Chapter 20: The Eye
  • Chapter 21: Ugliness
  • Chapter 22: Grace
  • Chapter 23: Elegance and Speciousness
  • Chapter 24: The Beautiful in Feeling
  • Chapter 25: The Beautiful in Sounds
  • Chapter 26: Taste and Smell
  • Chapter 27: The Sublime and Beautiful Compared

• Part IV
  • Chapter 1: Of the Efficient Cause of the Sublime and Beautiful
  • Chapter 2: Association
  • Chapter 3: Cause of Pain and Fear
  • Chapter 4: Continued
  • Chapter 5: How the Sublime is Produced
  • Chapter 6: How Pain Can be a Cause of Delight
  • Chapter 7: Exercise Necessary for the Finer Organs
  • Chapter 8: Why Things not Dangerous Produce a Passion Like Terror
  • Chapter 9: Why Visual Objects of Great Dimensions are Sublime
  • Chapter 10: Unity, Why Requisite to Vastness
  • Chapter 11: The Artificial Infinite
  • Chapter 12: The Vibrations Must be Similar
  • Chapter 13: The Effects of Succession in Visual Objects Explained
  • Chapter 14: Locke’s Opinion Concerning Darkness Considered
  • Chapter 15: Darkness Terrible in its Own Nature
  • Chapter 16: Why Darkness is Terrible
  • Chapter 17: The Effects of Blackness
  • Chapter 18: The Effects of Blackness Moderated
  • Chapter 19: The Physical Cause of Love
  • Chapter 20: Why Smoothness is Beautiful
  • Chapter 21: Sweetness, Its Nature
  • Chapter 22: Sweetness, Relaxing
  • Chapter 23: Variation, Why Beautiful
  • Chapter 24: Concerning Smallness
  • Chapter 25: Of Colour

• Part V
  • Chapter 1: Of Words
  • Chapter 2: The Common Effects of Poetry, Not by Raising Ideas of Things
  • Chapter 3: General Words Before Ideas
  • Chapter 4: The Effect of Words
  • Chapter 5: Examples that Words May Affect Without Raising Images
  • Chapter 6: Poetry not Strictly an Imitative Art
  • Chapter 7: How Words Influence the Passions

This work published before January 1, 1923 is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago.