Page:The Obligations of the Universities Towards Art.djvu/24

 'Art is nature raised above Accident by human love, Marring mist of accident By chance and vile occasion sent, Touched by love's divining-rod .'

To those who delight not in either the moral or the physical beauty of any sight or sound they see or hear, the chivalry that made the sentinel at Pompeii die at his post, the heroism that makes a sailor in the night dive into the black and tumbling waters to save a fallen comrade, are sheer folly; to them the nightingale's song is without charm; the illumination of the setting sun on the expanse of a goodly earth does not make them turn their eyes, or if they do declare themselves moved, it is from conventional example; and the raptures of another over hitherto unrecorded beauty in regions unexplored—still wanting the finger-post of stale authority—are eccentricity and affectation.

Such uninspired beings must publish a philosophy of their own; they teach that natural beauty is imaginary, from habitual association, that moral beauty exists not, that all creatures should follow selfish impulse, that there is no right, no wrong, and that egotism will work out the best end; these men have no instinct of selection; they may be versed in the catch phrases of Art, but they are not artists. They can speak only the slang that is current, and with it they destroy inspiration.

With the true artist we have seen it is a question with what means he shall interpret God's harmony of the