influenced
greatly by him, but I do know that he was beloved by the more modern
men, that he was revered by all regardless of theories or tenets, for
there is in existence somewhere in Paris a volume of letters and
testimonials celebrating some anniversary of Redon in proof of it. And
I think that--regardless of ideas--the artist must always find him
sympathetic, if for no other reason than that he was the essence of
refinement, of delicacy, and of taste. When I think of Redon I think
of Shelley a little, "he is dusty with tumbling about among the
stars," and I think somewhat, too, of some phrases in Debussy and his
unearthly school of musicians, for if we are among those who admire
sturdier things in art we can still love the fine gift of purity. And
of all gifts Redon has that, certainly.

His art holds, too, something of that breathlessness among the trees
one finds in Watteau and in Lancret, maybe more akin to Lancret, for
he, also, was more a depicter of the ephemeral. We think of Redon as
among those who transvaluate all earthly sensations in terms of a
purer element. We think of him as living with his head among the
mists, alert for all those sudden bursts of light which fleck here and
there forgotten or unseen places, making them live with a new
resplendency, full of new revealment, perfect with wonder. Happily we
find in him a hatred of description and of illustration, we find these
pictures to be illuminations from rich pages not observed by the
common eye, decorations out of a world the like of which has been but
too seldom seen by those who aspire to vision. _Chansons sans paroles_
are they, ringing clearly and flawlessly to the eye as do those songs
of Verlaine (with whom he has also some relationship) to the
well-attuned ear.

He was the master of the nuance, and the nuance was his lyricism, his
special gift, his genius. He knew perfectly the true vibration of note
to note, and how few are they whose esthetic emotions are built upon
the strictly poetic basis, who escape the world-old pull towards
description and illustration. How few, indeed, among those of the
materialistic vision escape this. But for Redon there was but one
world, and that a world of imperceptible light on all things visible,
with always a kind of song of adoration upon his lips, as it were,
obsessed with reverence and child wonder toward every least and
greatest thing, and it was in these portrayals of least things that he
exposed t