ovides us with no more than a single view, enclosed within strict
limits, which separate the picture from the adjacent reality. Here,
then, there is no room for illusion, and consequently none for that
interest or sympathy which resembles the interest we have in reality;
the will is at once excluded, and the object alone is presented to us
in a manner that frees it from any personal concern.

It is a highly remarkable fact that a spurious kind of fine art
oversteps these limits, produces an illusion of reality, and arouses
our interest; but at the same time it destroys the effect which fine
art produces, and serves as nothing but a mere means of exhibiting the
beautiful, that is, of communicating a knowledge of the ideas which it
embodies. I refer to _waxwork_. Here, we might say, is the dividing
line which separates it from the province of fine art. When waxwork is
properly executed, it produces a perfect illusion; but for that very
reason we approach a wax figure as we approach a real man, who, as
such, is for the moment an object presented to our will. That is
to say, he is an object of interest; he arouses the will, and
consequently stills the intellect. We come up to a wax figure with the
same reserve and caution as a real man would inspire in us: our will
is excited; it waits to see whether he is going to be friendly to us,
or the reverse, fly from us, or attack us; in a word, it expects some
action of him. But as the figure, nevertheless, shows no sign of life,
it produces the impression which is so very disagreeable, namely, of
a corpse. This is a case where the interest is of the most complete
kind, and yet where there is no work of art at all. In other words,
interest is not in itself a real end of art.

The same truth is illustrated by the fact that even in poetry it is
only the dramatic and descriptive kind to which interest attaches; for
if interest were, with beauty, the aim of art, poetry of the lyrical
kind would, for that very reason, not take half so great a position as
the other two.

In the second place, if interest were a means in the production of
beauty, every interesting work would also be beautiful. That, however,
is by no means the case. A drama or a novel may often attract us by
its interest, and yet be so utterly deficient in any kind of beauty
that we are afterwards ashamed of having wasted our time on it. This
applies to many a drama which gives no true picture of the real life
of man; w