The Sublime and Beautiful

In order to shed light on the communal nature of passions-for which we may read emotions-and to make the case that the power of the arts is to shape and affect those emotions, Burke opens with a section on the senses in relation to human individuality and society. Burke notes the emotions brought on by the sublime in the second section, including panic. He also keeps track of how specific sensory impressions, such as sound, light, colour, and scent, might bring about the sublime. Part three continues along the same lines, but instead of comparing the two, part three discusses the beautiful, and part four looks for natural explanations for them.