pectator or the listener, as the harmony of the perfect
features which compose the divine beauty of this face which is before
me; for the features united all together simultaneously afford me a
pleasure which I consider to be unsurpassed by any other thing on the
earth which is made by man."

{82}

[Sidenote: Value of the Visible Universe]

21.

There is no one so foolish who if offered the choice between
everlasting blindness and deafness would not immediately elect to lose
both his hearing and sense of smell rather than to be blind. Since he
who loves his sight is deprived of the beauty of the world and all
created things, and the deaf man loves only the sound made by the
percussion of the air, which is an insignificant thing in the world.

Thou sayest that science increases in nobility in proportion as the
subjects with which it deals are more elevated, and, for this reason, a
false rendering of the being of God is better than the portrayal of a
less worthy object; and on this account we will say that painting,
which deals alone with the works of God, is worth more than poetry,
which deals solely with the lying imaginings of human devices.

[Sidenote: Poet and Painter]

22.

Thou sayest, O painter, that worship is paid to thy work, but impute
not this power to thyself, but to the subject which such a picture
represents. Here the painter makes answer: O thou poet, who sayest
that thou also art an imitator, why dost thou not represent with thy
words objects of such a nature that thy writings which contain these
words may be worshipped also? But nature has favoured the painter more
than the poet, {83} and it is fair that the works of the more greatly
favoured one should be more honoured than those of the less favoured
one. Therefore let us praise him who with words satisfies the hearing,
and him who by painting affords perfect content to the eyes; but let
the praise given to the worker in words be less, inasmuch as they are
accidental and created by a less worthy author than the works of nature
of which the painter is the imitator. And the existence of these works
is confined within the forms of their surfaces.

23.

Since we have concluded that the utmost extent of the comprehension of
poetry is for the blind, and that of painting for the deaf, we will say
that the value of painting exceeds that of poetry in proportion as
painting gratifies a nobler sense than poetry does, and this nobility
has b