t since the beginning of things.

The painter has but the same pencil--the sculptor the chisel of
centuries.

Colours are not more since the heavy hangings of night were first
drawn aside, and the loveliness of light revealed.

Neither chemist nor engineer can offer new elements of the
masterpiece.

* * * * *

False again, the fabled link between the grandeur of Art and the
glories and virtues of the State, for Art feeds not upon nations, and
peoples may be wiped from the face of the earth, but Art _is_.

It is indeed high time that we cast aside the weary weight of
responsibility and co-partnership, and know that, in no way, do our
virtues minister to its worth, in no way do our vices impede its
triumph!

How irksome! how hopeless! how superhuman the self-imposed task of the
nation! How sublimely vain the belief that it shall live nobly or art
perish.

Let us reassure ourselves, at our own option is our virtue. Art we in
no way affect.

A whimsical goddess, and a capricious, her strong sense of joy
tolerates no dulness, and, live we never so spotlessly, still may she
turn her back upon us.

As, from time immemorial, she has done upon the Swiss in their
mountains.

What more worthy people! Whose every Alpine gap yawns with tradition,
and is stocked with noble story; yet, the perverse and scornful one
will none of it, and the sons of patriots are left with the clock that
turns the mill, and the sudden cuckoo, with difficulty restrained in
its box!

For this was Tell a hero! For this did Gessler die!

Art, the cruel jade, cares not, and hardens her heart, and hies her
off to the East, to find, among the opium-eaters of Nankin, a favourite
with whom she lingers fondly--caressing his blue porcelain, and
painting his coy maidens, and marking his plates with her six
marks of choice--indifferent in her companionship with him, to all
save the virtue of his refinement!

He it is who calls her--he who holds her!

And again to the West, that her next lover may bring together the
Gallery at Madrid, and show to the world how the Master towers above
all; and in their intimacy they revel, he and she, in this knowledge;
and he knows the happiness untasted by other mortal.

She is proud of her comrade, and promises that in after-years, others
shall pass that way, and understand.

So in all time does this superb one cast about for the man worthy her
love--and Art seeks the Artist al