GRACE.

IN persons and works, grace signifies, not only that which is pleasing, but that which is attractive; so that the ancients imagined that the goddess of beauty ought never to appear without the graces. Beauty never dis pleases, but it may be deprived of this secret charm, which invites us to regard it, and sentimentally attracts and fills the soul. Grace in figure, carriage, action, and discourse, depends on its attractive merit. A beautiful woman will have no grace, if her mouth be shut without a smile, and if her eyes display no sweetness. The serious is not always graceful, because unattractive, and approaching too near to the severe, which repels.

A well-made man, whose carriage is timid or constrained, gait precipitate or heavy, and gestures awkward, has no gracefulness, because he has nothing gentle or attractive in his exterior. The voice of an orator which wants flexibility or softness, is without grace.

It is the same in all the arts. Proportion and beauty may not be graceful. It cannot be said that the pyramids of Egypt are graceful; it cannot be said that the colossus of Rhodes is as much so as the Venus of Gnidus. All that is merely strong and vigorous exhibits not the charm of grace.

It would show but small acquaintance with Michael Angelo and Caravaggio to attribute to them the grace of Albano. The sixth book of the Eneid is sublime; the fourth has more grace. Some of the gallant odes of Horace breathe gracefulness, as some of his epistles cultivate reason.

It seems, in general, that the little and pretty of all kinds are more susceptible of grace than the large. A funeral oration, a tragedy, or a sermon, are badly praised, if they are only honoured with the epithet of graceful.

It is not good for any kind of work to be opposed to grace, for its opposite is rudeness, barbarity, and dry

1

ness. The Hercules of Farnese should not have the gracefulness of the Apollo of Belvidere and of Antinous, but it is neither rude nor clumsy. The burning of Troy, in Virgil, is not described with the graces of an elegy of Tibullus, it pleases by stronger beauties. A work, then, may be deprived of grace, without being in the least disagreeable. The terrible, or horrible, in description, is not to be graceful, neither should it solely affect its opposite; for if an artist, whatever branch he may cultivate, only expresses frightful things, and softens them not by agreeable contrasts, he will repel.

Grace, in painting and sculpture, consists in softness of outline and harmonious expression; and painting, next to sculpture, has grace in the unison of parts, and of figures which animate one another, and which become agreeable by their attributes and their expression.

Graces of diction, whether in eloquence or poetry, depend on choice of words and harmony of phrases, and still more upon delicacy of ideas and smiling descriptions. The abuse of grace is affectation, as the abuse of the sublime is absurdity: all perfection is nearly a fault.

To have grace applies equally to persons and things. This dress, this work, or that woman, is graceful. What is called a good grace, applies to manner alone. She presents herself with good grace. He has done that which was expected of him with a good grace. To possess the graces :-This woman has grace in her carriage, in all that she says and does.*

To obtain grace is, by metaphor, to obtain pardon, as to grant grace is to pardon. We make grace of one thing by taking away all the rest. The commissioners took all his effects and made him a gift (a grace) of his money. To grant graces, to diffuse graces, is the finest privilege of the sovereignty; it is to do good by some thing more than justice. To have any one's good

* Lord Chesterfield has completely anglicised this phrase.-T. + It is scarcely necessary to observe that this paragraph applies only partially to the English language. Graces, speaking of continental sovereignty, principally signify remissions ofthatwhich might have been claimed or exacted, either penally or otherwise.-T.

graces, is usually said in relation to a superior: to have a lady's good graces, is to be her favourite lover. To be in grace, is said of a courtier who has been in disgrace; -we should not allow our happiness to depend on the one, or our misery on the other. Graces, in Greek, are "charites: a term which signifies amiable.

The graces, divinities of antiquity, are one of the most beautiful allegories of the Greek mythology. As this mythology always varied according either to the imagination of the poets, who were its theologians, or to the customs of the people, the number, names, and attributes of the graces often change: but it was at last agreed to fix them to the number of three, Aglaia, Thalia, and Euphrosyne, that is to say, sparkling blooming, mirthful. They were always near Venus. No veil should cover their charms. They preside over favours, concord, rejoicings, love, and even eloquence; they were the sensible emblem of all that can render life agreeable. They were painted dancing and holding hands; and every one who entered their temples was crowned with flowers. Those who have condemned the fabulous mythology, should at least acknowledge the merit of these lively fictions, which announce truths intimately connected with the felicity of mankind.

GRACE (OF).

SECTION I.

THIS term, which signifies favour or privilege, is employed in this sense by theologians. They call grace a particular operation of God on mankind, to render them just and happy. Some have admitted universal grace, that which God gives to all men, though mankind, according to them, with the exception of a very small number, will be delivered to eternal flames: others admit grace towards christians of their communion only; and lastly, others only for the elect of that communion.

It is evident that a general grace, which leaves the universe in vice, error, and eternal misery, is not a

grace, a favour, or privilege, but a contradiction in

terms.

Particular grace, according to theologians, is either in the first place "sufficing", which if resisted, suffices not, resembling a pardon given by a king to a criminal, who is nevertheless delivered over to the punishment; or "efficacious," when it is not resisted, although it may be resisted; in this case, they just resemble famished guests to whom are presented delicious viands, of which they will surely eat, though, in general, they may be supposed at liberty not to eat; or "necessary," that is, unavoidable, being nothing more than the chain of eternal decrees and events. We shall take care not to enter into the long and appalling details, subtleties, and sophisms, with which these questions are embarrassed. The object of this dictionary is not to be the vain echo of vain disputes.

St. Thomas calls grace a substantial form, and the jesuit Bouhours names it a je ne sais quoi; this is perhaps the best definition which has ever been given of it.

If the theologians had wanted a subject on which to ridicule Providence, they need not have taken any other than that which they have chosen. On one side, the Thomists assure us that man, in receiving efficacious grace, is not free in the compound sense, but that he is free in the divided sense; on the other, the Molinists invent the medium doctrine of God and congruity, &c. and imagine exciting, preventing, concomitant, and co-operating grace.

Let us quit these bad, but seriously-constructed jokes of the theologians; let us leave their books, and each consult his common sense; when he will see that all these reasoners have sagaciously deceived themselves, because they have reasoned upon a principle evidently false. They have supposed that God acts upon particular views; now an eternal God, without general, immutable, and eternal laws, is an imaginary being, a phantom, a god of fable.

Why, in all religions, on which men pique them

selves on reasoning, have theologians been forced to admit this grace which they do not comprehend? It is, that they would have salvation confined to their own sect, and further, they would have this salvation divided among those who are the most submissive to themselves. These particular theologians, or chiefs of parties, divide among themselves. The mussulman doctors entertain similar opinions and similar disputes, because they have the same interest to actuate them; but the universal theologian, that is to say, the true philosopher, sees that it is contradictory for nature to act on particular or single views; that it is ridiculous to imagine God occupying himself in forcing one man in Europe to obey him, while he leaves all the Asiatics untractable; to suppose him wrestling with another man who sometimes submits, and sometimes disarms him, and presenting to another a help, which is nevertheless useless. Such grace, considered in a true point of view, is an absurdity. The prodigious mass of books composed on this subject, is often an exercise of intellect, but always the shame of reason.

SECTION II.

All nature, all that exists, is the grace of God; he bestows on all animals the grace of form and nourishment. The grace of growing seventy feet high is granted to the fir, and refused to the reed. He gives to man the grace of thinking, speaking, and knowing him; he grants me the grace of not understanding a word of all that Tournelli, Molina, and Soto, &c. have written on the subject of grace.

The first who has spoken of efficacious and gratuitous grace is, without contradiction, Homer. This may be astonishing to a bachelor of theology, who knows no author but St. Augustin; but, if he reads the third book of the Iliad, he will see that Paris says to his brother Hector: "If the gods have given you valour, and me beauty, do not reproach me with the presents of the beautiful Venus; no gift of the gods is despicable, it does not depend upon man to obtain them."