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INTRODUCTION. 
N OW       offer to the public a Ihort effay, accom- 
panied with two explanatory prints, in which I 
fhall endeavour to fhew what the principles are in 
nature, by which we are dire&ed to call the forms of 
fome bodies beautiful, others ugly; fome graceful, and 
others the reverfe; by celdriag more minutely than 
has hitherto been done, the nature of thofe lines, and 
their different combinations, which ferve to raife in 
the mind the Jdeas of all the variety of forms imagina- 
ble. At firif, perhaps, the whole defign, as well as the 
prints, may feem rather intended to trifle and con- 
found, than to entertain and inform: but I am per- 
fuaded that when the examples in nature, referr'd to in 
this eflay, are duly confider'd and examined upon the 
principles laid down in it, it will be thought worthy of a 
careful and attentive perufal : and the prints themfelves 
too will, I make no doubt, be examined as attentively, 
when it is found, that almoft every figure in them (how 
odly foever they may feem  to be group'd together) is 
referr'd to fingly in the effay, in order to affift the 
B                 reader's