c
or prosaic treatment is fixity, limitation. The latter must formulate
and define; but the principle of the former is to flow, to suffuse, to
mount, to escape. We can conceive of life only as something constantly
_becoming._ It plays forever on the verge. It is never _in loco,_ but
always _in transitu._ Arrest the wind, and it is no longer the wind;
close your hands upon the light, and behold, it is gone.

The antithesis of art in method is science, as Coleridge has intimated.
As the latter aims at the particular, so the former aims at the
universal. One would have truth of detail, the other truth of
_ensemble._ The method of science may be symbolized by the straight
line, that of art by the curve. The results of science, relatively to
its aim, must be parts and pieces; while art must give the whole
in every act; not quantitively of course, but qualitively,--by the
integrity of the spirit in which it works.

The Greek mind will always be the type of the artist mind, mainly
because of its practical bent, its healthful objectivity. The Greek
never looked inward, but outward. Criticism and speculation were foreign
to him. His head shows a very marked predominance of the motive and
perceptive powers over the reflective. The expression of the face is
never what we call intellectual or thoughtful, but commanding. His gods
are not philosophers, but delight in deeds, justice, rulership.

Among the differences between the modern and the classical aesthetic
mind is the greater precision and definiteness of the latter. The
modern genius is Gothic, and demands in art a certain vagueness and
spirituality like that of music, refusing to be grasped and formulated.
Hence for us (and this is undoubtedly an improvement) there must always
be something about a poem, or any work of art, besides the evident
intellect or plot of it, or what is on its surface, or what it tells.
This something is the Invisible, the Undefined, almost Unexpressed,
and is perhaps the best part of any work of art, as it is of a noble
personality. To amuse, to exhibit culture, to formulate the aesthetic,
or even to excite the emotions, is by no means all,--is not even the
deepest part. Beside these, and inclosing all, is the general impalpable
effect, like good air, or the subtle presence of good spirits, wordless
but more potent far than words. As, in the superbest person, it is not
merely what he says or knows or shows, or even how he behaves, but the
silent q