be looked for in
the good graphic arts; one, the commonest, which, by any partial or
imperfect sign conveys to you an idea which you must complete for
yourself; and the other, the finest, a representation so perfect as to
leave you nothing to be farther accomplished by this independent
exertion; but to give you the same feeling of possession and presence
which you would experience from the natural object itself. For instance
of the first, in this representation of a rainbow,[124] the artist has
no hope that, by the black lines of engraving, he can deceive you into
any belief of the rainbow's being there, but he gives indication enough
of what he intends, to enable you to supply the rest of the idea
yourself, providing always you know beforehand what a rainbow is like.
But in this drawing of the falls of Terni,[125] the painter has
strained his skill to the utmost to give an actually deceptive
resemblance of the iris, dawning and fading among the foam. So far as he
has not actually deceived you, it is not because he would not have done
so if he could; but only because his colours and science have fallen
short of his desire. They have fallen so little short that, in a good
light, you may all but believe the foam and the sunshine are drifting
and changing among the rocks.

127. And after looking a little while, you will begin to regret that
they are not so: you will feel that, lovely as the drawing is, you would
like far better to see the real place, and the goats skipping among the
rocks, and the spray floating above the fall. And this is the true sign
of the greatest art--to part voluntarily with its greatness;--to make
_itself_ poor and unnoticed; but so to exalt and set forth its theme
that you may be fain to see the theme instead of it. So that you have
never enough admired a great workman's doing till you have begun to
despise it. The best homage that could be paid to the Athena of Phidias
would be to desire rather to see the living goddess; and the loveliest
Madonnas of Christian art fall short of their due power, if they do not
make their beholders sick at heart to see the living Virgin.

128. We have then, for our requirement of the finest art (sculpture, or
anything else), that it shall be so like the thing it represents as to
please those who best know or can conceive the original; and, if
possible, please them deceptively--its final triumph being to deceive
even the wise; and (the Greeks thought) to please ev