for the most subtle analyses; he must have the
_creative_ genius to combine the scattered facts of natural beauty, with
their varied effects upon the human consciousness, into one great whole;
while, at the same time, the tenderness and susceptibility of the
_receptive_ genius must be equally developed in him. He should blend the
loving and devout soul of a Fra Angelico with the logical acumen of a
Bacon. How seldom is the creative genius sufficiently tender and humble
to be, in the full sense of the term, at the same time, _receptive_!

After its treatment of the philosophical theory of Art, such a work
should also throw its light upon the special theories, and more general
rules of specific arts; for such rules, when true, are never arbitrary,
but spring from the fundamental laws, of universal Beauty. They are but
the external manifestation, through material mediums, of eternal laws.

The compiler of the present article can offer no such great work to the
reader. An earnest effort will however be made to bring together the
related thoughts upon Art and Beauty. They are found scattered almost at
random over so many pages; to link them together by arranging them in
their logical sequences, placing them so that they will illustrate and
mutually corroborate one another: and, working up with them the thoughts
suggested by them, the author has labored to form of them a compact and
easily perused _whole._ For the ideas selected are _essentially
related_, and, scattered as they may have hitherto been, naturally
gravitate round a common centre. No longer drifting apart through the
chaos of multitudinous pages, they are now formed into a system of
order, a galaxy of which the central sun is--the Divine attributes as
manifested through the Beautiful.

If the writer shall succeed in suggesting to some lucid and
comprehensive mind the fact that a noble field for the culture of the
human heart and soul remains almost unexplored, and induce one worthy of
the task to undertake its cultivation; or if her humble work shall
induce one lover of pure art to direct his attention to the glorious
promises which it reveals to him of a closer communion with the Great
Artist, the beneficent Creator of the Beautiful--she will feel herself
more than compensated for her 'pleasant labor of love.'

All true art is symbolic; a thought, an idea, must always constitute the
significance, the soul of its outward form. The mere delusive
imitations, the