IV
In Britain, taste as “inclination” is used by Caxton
in 1477 (Caxton, 1893); it appears later (1502) with
the meaning of “intuitive judgment” (Atkynson, 1893),
and in the seventeenth century this is connected with
beauty, e.g., by Milton and Congreve (Milton, 1671;
Congreve, 1694). Norris, in 1691, mentions a “moral
tast” [sic]. But a theory is not developed until the
eighteenth century, when it centers on aesthetics much
more in Britain than in France. The irrationalist view
appears with Shaftesbury. Taste as a sense for beauty
is closely connected with common sense and with
moral sense, which reveal themselves through internal
sensations. Taste is the internal sense of a harmonic
order perceived in certain objects and belonging to
them and to the perceiving mind as well; it is inborn,
but it needs refining; it depends on the character of
a nation, but, stripped of accidental influences, it is
universal (Formigari, 1962; Morpurgo, 1962b). For
Addison, “... the Taste is not to conform to the [rules
of] Art, but the Art to the Taste”; taste is universal
if it is duly educated (admiration for the classics), but
in some degree it is innate if present at all (Addison,
The Spectator, No. 29, 1711; No. 409, 1712). Hutcheson
(1725) proceeds on the same line as Shaftesbury, stres-
sing the universality of taste, and the fact that the taste
for beauty is independent of considerations of utility
(von Stein, 1886; Tonelli, 1955a); and Webb insists on
the universality of taste (Tonelli, 1955a). The connec-
tions between beauty and utility, and even that be-
tween beauty and morality, taken for granted in French
aesthetics, are no longer taken for granted in Britain
after Hutcheson questions the first, and Gerard (see
below) the second.
Hume declares in his essay “On the Standard of
Taste” (1757) that beauty does not belong to things
in themselves: taste expresses the reaction of the mind
to things. Nevertheless taste, judging about beauty and
about virtue as well, is universal, due to the uniformity
of human nature, in spite of accidental differences
(Wellek, 1955; Tonelli, 1955a). Hume's aesthetic sub-
jectivism marks a turning point in British aesthetics.
For Burke (1759), taste is a composite of different
powers; it is universal, and independent of utility
(Tonelli, 1955a; Formigari, 1962; Morpurgo, 1962c).
Gerard (1759) carefully distinguishes taste from moral
sense, but if beauty is independent of virtue, it is not
independent of utility. Taste seems to be universal
(Tonelli, 1955a). For him, as well as for other authors,
taste is not a simple power: judgment is one of its
components (Green, 1934). Hume (1762) considers taste
universal, although this universality is restricted to a
few connoisseurs; taste is not independent of consid-
erations of utility (Tonelli, 1955a; Wellek, 1955). Al-
though Dr. Johnson makes concessions to relativism in
taste, he asserts after all the presence of universal
common sense (Wellek, 1955). The only significant
supporter of absolute relativism in taste is Joseph
Priestley (1777), who applies to this subject the aes-
thetic principles elaborated by Mandeville and Hartley
(Tonelli, 1955b). During the late eighteenth century,
interest in the problem of taste is less intense in Britain:
much attention is given to the theory of sublimity, and
usually theories of the sublime are not referred to
taste.
