[78] Darwin's Botanic Garden, Canto IV. v. 371—380.
[LECTURE XXI.]
ON HEARING—CONTINUED.
Gentlemen, after considering, in a former Lecture, some states of mind, which arise immediately from affections of our nerves, and which, therefore, I can see no reason for classing apart from our other sensations, I proceeded, in my last Lecture, to consider the feelings, which are more commonly termed sensations, beginning with the most simple of these, in the order of smell, taste, and hearing.
In the elucidation of these, my great object was to show, that there is nothing, in the mere states of mind, that constitutes the sensations of fragrance, sweetness, sound, which could have led us to ascribe them to corporeal objects as their causes,—more than in any of our internal joys or sorrows,—if we had had no other means of acquiring knowledge of those causes, than are afforded by the sensations themselves,—that, in short, we consider them as sensations, or external affections of the mind, because we have previously believed in an external world,—not that we believe in an external world, merely because we have had those particular sensations.
The various advantages, which these three senses afford, I endeavoured to point out to you; and, in particular occupied a great part of my Lecture, in illustrating the advantages for which we are indebted to our organ of hearing, as the medium of language, and by it, more or less directly, not of the high acquisitions of science and civilization only, but of the rudest forms of social communication, and almost of social existence.
After the remarks on this advantage received from language, which is unquestionably, and beyond all comparison, the most inestimable benefit which the sense of hearing affords,—it would be improper to omit wholly the mention of the pleasure, which we receive from it, as a source of musical delight,—of that expression of feeling, which itself, almost like verbal discourse, may be said to be a language, since it is the utterance of thought and emotion from heart to heart,—but which has a voice, as independent of the mere arbitrary forms of speech, as the tears of gratitude, or the smiles of love, that may indeed, give eloquence to words, but require no words to render them eloquent. Though, when very strictly considered, even the pure, and almost spiritual delight of music, may perhaps be counted only a pleasure of sense, it yet approaches, by so many striking analogies, to the nature of our intellectual enjoyments, that it may almost be said to belong to that class; and though,—relatively to minds that are capable of enjoyments more truly intellectual,—it is to be considered as a mere pastime or relaxation, it assumes a far higher character, in its relation to the general pleasures of common minds, and may be said, at least, to be the intellectual luxury of those, who are incapable of any other luxury, that deserves so honourable a name. And it is well, that there should be some intermediate pleasure of this sort, to withdraw for a while the dull and the sensual, from the grosser existence in which they may be sunk, and to give them some glimpses, at least, of a state of purer enjoyment, than that which is to be derived from the sordid gains, and sordid luxuries, of common life.
Of the influence,—whether salutary or injurious,—which music has upon the general character,—when cultivated, to great refinement, and so universally as almost to become a part of the habit of daily social life,—it is not, at present, the place to speak. But of its temporary influence, as a source of tranquillizing delight, there can be no doubt,—nor, perhaps too, of its occasional efficacy, in exciting emotions of a stronger kind, when peculiar circumstances may have predisposed to them in a very high degree. But there can be as little doubt, that by far the greater number of anecdotes of this kind, which have been handed down in ancient history, are as fabulous, as the existence of that god of music, to whose miraculous influence alone, they could, with any decent appearance of epic or dramatic truth, have been ascribed.
“Hear, how Timotheus' varied lays surprise,