artist it is the working test of absolute
"rightness." It is the gauge that measures the pressure of steam; the
artist stokes his fires to set the little handle spinning; he knows that
his machine will not move until he has got his pointer to the mark; he
works up to it and through it; but it does not drive the engine.

What, then, is the conclusion of the whole matter? No more than this, I
think. The contemplation of pure form leads to a state of extraordinary
exaltation and complete detachment from the concerns of life: of so
much, speaking for myself, I am sure. It is tempting to suppose that the
emotion which exalts has been transmitted through the forms we
contemplate by the artist who created them. If this be so, the
transmitted emotion, whatever it may be, must be of such a kind that it
can be expressed in any sort of form--in pictures, sculptures,
buildings, pots, textiles, &c., &c. Now the emotion that artists express
comes to some of them, so they tell us, from the apprehension of the
formal significance of material things; and the formal significance of
any material thing is the significance of that thing considered as an
end in itself. But if an object considered as an end in itself moves us
more profoundly (_i.e._ has greater significance) than the same object
considered as a means to practical ends or as a thing related to human
interests--and this undoubtedly is the case--we can only suppose that
when we consider anything as an end in itself we become aware of that in
it which is of greater moment than any qualities it may have acquired
from keeping company with human beings. Instead of recognising its
accidental and conditioned importance, we become aware of its essential
reality, of the God in everything, of the universal in the particular,
of the all-pervading rhythm. Call it by what name you will, the thing
that I am talking about is that which lies behind the appearance of all
things--that which gives to all things their individual significance,
the thing in itself, the ultimate reality. And if a more or less
unconscious apprehension of this latent reality of material things be,
indeed, the cause of that strange emotion, a passion to express which is
the inspiration of many artists, it seems reasonable to suppose that
those who, unaided by material objects, experience the same emotion have
come by another road to the same country.

That is the metaphysical hypothesis. Are we to swallow it whole, acce