Page:Through the torii (IA throughtorii00noguiala).pdf/36

 colours that have reached the final essence, and power of Nature. Although it might be a modem fashion to speak of symbolism, I flatly refuse to look through its looking-glass of confused quality, on the phoenixes, paradise-birds, lotuses, peonies, lions, and ocean waves which decorate the inside of the temple, where the years of incense and prayer have darkened and mystified the general atmosphere. Our old artists had a strength in their jealous guarding of beauty for beauty’s sake; they felt but not theorised; therefore, in such a beauty of confusion as I see in these holy temples, there is the most clear simplicity, the beauty of the last judgment. Indeed, I wish to know if there is any house better fitting for sleep and rest than the temples of spirit in my beloved Shiba Park.

The beauty of Death is in its utter rejection of profusion; it is the desire of intensity itself which only belongs to the steadfastness and silence of a star; oh, what a determination it declares! It is perfect; its epical perfection arises from the point that it will never return towards Life; its grandeur is in the pride that it Rh