DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.48956#0160
154.
CHAP. XVIII.
Beauty of L a n g u a g e.
O F all the fine arts . painting only and sculp-
ture are in their nature imitative. An orna-
mented field is not a copy or imitation os na-
ture, but nature itself embelliihed. Architecture
is productive of originals, and copies not from
nature. Sound and motion may in some mea-
sure be imitated by music ; but for the most
part music, like architecture , is productive of
originals. Language copies not from nature ,
more than music or architecture; unless where,
like music, it is imitative of sound or motion.
Thus, in the description of particular sounds,
language sometimes furnilheth words, which,
beside their cufiomary power of exciting ideas,
resemble by their softness or harssiness the
sounds described ; and there are words which,
by the celerity or ssowness of pronunciation,
have some resemblance to the motion they
signify. The imitative power of words goes one
CHAP. XVIII.
Beauty of L a n g u a g e.
O F all the fine arts . painting only and sculp-
ture are in their nature imitative. An orna-
mented field is not a copy or imitation os na-
ture, but nature itself embelliihed. Architecture
is productive of originals, and copies not from
nature. Sound and motion may in some mea-
sure be imitated by music ; but for the most
part music, like architecture , is productive of
originals. Language copies not from nature ,
more than music or architecture; unless where,
like music, it is imitative of sound or motion.
Thus, in the description of particular sounds,
language sometimes furnilheth words, which,
beside their cufiomary power of exciting ideas,
resemble by their softness or harssiness the
sounds described ; and there are words which,
by the celerity or ssowness of pronunciation,
have some resemblance to the motion they
signify. The imitative power of words goes one