LOVE is a term fometimes of very extenfive, fometimes of very limited fignification. I mean, by the word, that attachment between the fexes which has the whole perfon for its objects. This attachment is compounded of various emotions and defires. It includes ADMIRATION of perfonal charms and accomplishments; of mental talents and acquirements; ESTEEM of good difpofitions of heart; DESIRE of poffeffion; of promoting happiness; and of becoming the object of the fame emotions and defires in the party beloved. The defire of poffeffion takes its rife from the fenfual appetite. VOL. II.

This appetite does, by no means, conftitute love' though the term has been fometimes limited to that fignification; but it is an effential ingredient in the compofition of love. A kind of friendship fuppofed to fubfift between man and woman, more tender than that between man and man, but entirely divefted of senfual appetite, is, I believe, what is diftinguished by the name of Platonic love. It is doubted, whether an attachment of this description exifts in nature. Friendfhip between man and woman can differ from that which may take place between man and man, only in fo far as it is impregnated with fenfual paffion. That paffion may be mixed in fuch a fmall proportion as not to be perceived; or if it be, it is not acknowledged, but disguised under the names of soft defire, tender affection, and the like. But when the attachment grows to a certain height, the feveral ingredients of which it is compofed are more diftinctly perceived, and then the sensual appetite manifeftly discovers itfelf.

As love prompts us ftrongly to promote the happinefs of its object, we must experience a high delight in the gratification of this defire. In the intercourse between the fexes, according as either party is conscious of a pleasurable fenfation, the other is conceived to be fimilarly affected; and in proportion to the defire which each has to give pleasure to the other, each muft feel a high enjoyment in the consciousness of contributing to the pleasure of the other. This reflex feeling affords a much higher degree of enjoyment, than what refults immediately from the corporeal fenfation: And as it is of a more generous kind, the reflection on it, after it is paft, yields a fatisfaction which never accompanies the reflection on enjoyments merely felfish. Where there is no difinterefted attachment between the parties, this reflex feeling fubfifts only in a very low degree. This is one reafon of the little enjoyment that is found in the embraces of a harlot, one

for whom you have no affection, and whofe pleasure you have no difinterested defire to promote.

Love covets a return of affection, and is ever diffatisfied without it. Hence the impatience of rivalship, and the high delight which attends the perfuafion of poffeffing the whole undivided affection of a beloved object. Every circumftance in the behaviour of the party beloved, which furnishes a proof of such return of affection, ftrengthens this perfuafion, and heightens the pleasure it yields. Many of the strongest proofs that can be given of a fincere preference, and ardent return of affection, occur in the perfonal gratifications of connubial love; and in this view they contribute greatly to enhance the pleasure it affords. Hence appears another caufe of the infipidity of the harlot's mercenary embrace: You are fenfible that the gives you no preference to another; for her favours are bestowed for hire, and are prostituted alike to all.

The contemplation of perfonal charms has a powerful influence in ftrengthening the paffion for perfonal enjoyment, and heightening the pleasure of gratification. This is eafily accounted for from the fympathy between the bodily fenfes. When one fenfe is highly gratified, the others are the more disposed to find their gratification in the same object. Fruit that is fair to the eye, and fragrant to the smell, is expected to be alfo fweet to the taste. If the fenfes find that gratification which was expected, the enjoyment felt by each is greater than it would have been, had any of them been gratified fingly. The enamoured fwain conceives the object of his paffion to be fitted to gratify every external fenfe. Her fhape and complexion, the touch of her fkin, the taste of her lip, the perfume of her breath, and the found of her voice, charm the several senses to which they are respectively addreffed. All these gratifications, whether real or imaginary, being combined, heighten the pleafure refulting from the gratification of connubial intercourfe.

It is also true, that the contemplation of mental endowments and agreeable difpofitions, which are the objects of admiration and efteem, contributes not a little to increase the pleasure of perfonal enjoyment. The fact is eafily afcertained. No man furely can find the fame pleasure in the embrace of an idiot or of a termagant, as in that of a woman of fenfe and good nature. It is only claffing the moral fenfe along with the external fenfes, in the account that has been just given of the latter, and this phenomenon is accounted for alfo. Perfonal charms may be found in a harlot in perfection. She may poffefs alfo many mental accomplishments : But the enjoyment, which might be expected from thefe, is impaired in a very confiderable degree, by the confideration of their being prostituted and abuf ed.

These observations apply, not equally indeed, but partly, to both fexes. In purfuing the analyfis of the feelings in queftion, we muft not overlook a painful fenfation, peculiar perhaps to the female, which may be fuppofed, at first thought, to detract from the pleafures of connubial love, but will be found, on inquiry, to add to thofe pleasures confiderably.

As the appetite for fex is the most importunate in the human frame, and the most apt to run into pernicious exceffes, the indulgence of it is guarded by the restraints of chastity and modefty. These terms have been often confounded together, or, at least, have been underfood to imply each other. A few illuftrations will fuffice to difcriminate them. It is evidently the intention of nature, that, in the human race, as in ma

ny

other fpecies of animals, the fexes fhould pair. For this end, there is implanted in the foul a moral principle which prohibits the promifcuous indulgence of the fenfual appetite. This moral principle is CHASTITY. MODESTY, in a general fenfe, is that feeling which makes a perfon avoid public notice: In a more reftricted fenfe, it is that feeling which makes a perfon

shrink from the public indulgence of the fenfual appe tite, and from the acknowledgement of fenfual defires or thoughts. It leads its poffeffor to feek retirement in all acts of fenfual indulgence; and to ftudy fecrecy and concealment in every thing that refpects the carnal appetite. Illicit amours are tranfgreffions of the laws of chastity; but if they are private, they are not violations of modefty. Married persons are chaste, if they confine their defires of fenfual indulgence to the enjoyment of each others perfon; but they trespass against modefty, if they gratify thefe defires before others. An obfcene object, which excites irregular defires, does violence to chastity: the fame object, feen without any fuch emotion, does not. An obfcene object feen in public, offends modefty; not because it excites fenfual ideas, but because it difcovers to the fpectators that your thoughts are then employed about fuch ideas: the fame object, feen in private, cannot be faid, strictly fpeaking, to hurt modefly. In the earliest ages of fociety, when the manners are moft fimple, modefty is little known, but chastity is often ftrictly obferved. In thofe periods when refinement and luxury have made greater advances, the dictates of modefty are more studioufly attended to; thofe of chaltity, lefs. When a total corruption of manners prevails, chastity aud modefty both difappear. So much for the difcrimination. and illuftration of thofe two guardians of female conduct.

Both chastity and modefty may be ftrengthened or weakened, in one individual more than another, or in one fex more than in another, by education and habit. In the female fex, where they are moft cherished, and their influence is combined, they gradually generate an abhorrence of every thing that tends toward fenfual indulgence, without any exception or limitation whatever. The idea itself is confidered as impure: it is detefted as a corrupter of the heart; and is never admitted into the thoughts but with reluctance, nor har