For we have not one only, but numerous general ideas annexed to every
object in nature. Thus one of the series may be that that object is
matter, one that it is individual matter, one that it is animal
matter, one that it is a bird, one that it is a pheasant, one that it
is a dead pheasant, and one that it is food. Now, our general ideas
or notions are not evoked in this order as each new object addresses
the mind; but that general idea is _first_ elicited which accords
with the first or principle destination of the object: thus the first
general idea of a cowry, to the Indian, is that of money, not of a
shell; and our first general idea of a dead pheasant is that of food,
whereas to a zoologist it might have a different effect: but this is
the exception. But it was said, that a dead pheasant in a picture
would always be as food, while the same at the poulterer's would be
but a dead pheasant: what then becomes of the first general idea? It
seems to be disposed of thus: at the first sight of the shop, the
idea is that of food, and next (if you are not hungry, and poets
never are), the mind will be attracted to the species of animal,
and (unless hunger presses) you may be led on to moralize like
Sterne: but, amongst pictures, where there is nothing else to
excite the general ideas of food, this, whenever adverted to,
must over re-excite that idea; and hence it appears that these
_esculent_ subjects might be poetical enough if exhibited all
together, _i.
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