e already remarked, but yet
perceptible to all, is what the language of the Greeks designated by
the name _Charis_, ours as Grace.

Wherever, in a fully developed form, Grace appears, the work is
complete on the side of Nature; nothing more is wanting; all demands
are satisfied. Here, already, soul and body are in complete harmony;
Body is Form, Grace is Soul, although not Soul in itself, but the Soul
of Form, or the Soul of Nature.

Art may linger, and remain stationary at this point; for already,
on one side at least, its whole task is finished. The pure image of
Beauty arrested at this point is the Goddess of Love.

But the beauty of the Soul in itself, joined to sensuous Grace, is the
highest apotheosis of Nature.

The spirit of Nature is only in appearance opposed to the Soul;
essentially, it is the instrument of its revelation; it brings about
indeed the antagonism that exists in all things, but only that the
one essence may come forth, as the utmost benignity, and the
reconciliation of all the forces.

All other creatures are driven by the mere force of Nature, and
through it maintain their individuality; in Man alone, as the central
point, arises the soul, without which the world would be like the
natural universe without the sun. The Soul in Man, therefore, is not
the principle of individuality, but that whereby he raises himself
above all egoism, whereby he becomes capable of self-sacrifice, of
disinterested love, and (which is the highest) of the contemplation
and knowledge of the Essence of things, and thus of Art.

In him it is no longer concerned about Matter nor has it immediate
concern with it, but with the spirit only as the life of things.
Even while appearing in the body, it is yet free from the body, the
consciousness of which hovers in the soul in the most beauteous shapes
only as a light, undisturbing dream. It is no quality, no faculty, nor
anything special of the sort; it knows not, but is Science; it is
not good, but Goodness; it is not beautiful, as body even may be, but
Beauty itself.

In the first instance, it is true, in a work of art, the soul of the
artist is seen as invention in the detail, and in the total result as
the unity that hovers over the work in serene stillness. But the Soul
must be visible in objective representation, as the primeval energy
of thought, in portraitures of human beings, altogether filled by an
idea, by a noble contemplation; or as indwelling, essential