My imagination darts forward with benevolent fervour to greet theſe amiable and reſpectable groups, in ſpite of the ſneering of cold hearts, who are at liberty to utter, with frigid ſelf-importance, the damning epithet—romantic; the force of which I ſhall endeavour to blunt by repeating the words of an eloquent moraliſt.—'I know not whether the alluſions of a truly humane heart, whoſe zeal renders every thing eaſy, is not preferable to that rough and repulſing reaſon, which always finds in indifference for the public good, the firſt obſtacle to whatever would promote it.'
I know that libertines will alſo exclaim, that woman would be unſexed by acquiring ſtrength of body and mind, and that beauty, ſoft bewitching beauty! would no longer adorn the daughters of men! I am of a very different opinion, for I think that, on the contrary, we ſhould then ſee dignified beauty, and true grace; to produce which, many powerful phyſical and moral cauſes would concur.—Not relaxed beauty, it is true, nor the graces of helpleſſneſs; but ſuch as appears to make us reſpect the human body as a majeſtic pile fit to receive a noble inhabitant, in the relics of antiquity.
I do not forget the popular opinion that the Grecian ſtatues were not modelled after nature. I mean, not according to the proportions of a particular man; but that beautiful limbs and features were ſelected from various bodies to form an harmonious whole. This might, in ſome degree, be true. The fine ideal picture of an exalted imagination might be ſuperiour to the mate-
