ABSTRACT
A great medley of heterogeneous ideas is noticeable among other writers on aesthetic during the same period. In 1746 appeared a little volume by Abbe Batteux bearing the attractive title of The Fine Arts reduced to a Single Principle, in which the author attempted a unification of all the different rules laid down by the writers of treatises. All such rules (says Batteux) are branches emerging from one trunk; he who possesses the simple principle will be able to deduce the rules one by one without entangling himself in their mass, which can but involve him in endless coils. It is difficult to string together a more insubstantial mass of contradictions. But Batteux is rivalled and outdone by the English philosophers or rather scribblers on aesthetic or rather on things in general which sometimes accidentally include aesthetic facts.
