BUILDING USE ONLY

EDINBURGH:

PRINTED FOR JOHN BELL AND WILLIAM CREECH;
AND FOR T. CADELL, G. G. J.ANDJ.ROBINSON,

LONDON.

M,DCC,LXXXVIII.

ELEMENT S

O F

CRITICISM

CHA P. XVIII.

BEAUTY OF LANGUAGE,

O

F all the fine arts, painting only and sculpture are in their nature imitative. An ornamented field is not a copy or imitation of nature, but nature itself embellished. Architecture is productive of originals, and copies not from nature. Sound and motion may in fome measure be imitated by mufic but for the most part mufic, like architecture, is productive of originals. Language copies not from nature, more than mufic or architecture; unless, where, like mufic, it is imitative of found or motion. Thus, in the defcription of particular founds, language fometimes furnisheth words, which, befide their cuftomary power of A 2 exciting

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