ers from
the artist in this: he aims not only at the contemplation of truth, but
at the ordering of truths, he seeks to make of the whole universe an
intelligible structure. Further, he is not driven by the gadfly of
creation, he is not forced to cast his images into visible or audible
shape. He is remoter from the push of life. Still, the philosopher,
like the artist, lives in a world of his own, with a spell of its own
near akin to beauty, and the secret of that spell is the same detachment
from the tyranny of practical life. The essence of art, says Santayana,
is "the steady contemplation of things in their order and worth." He
might have been defining philosophy.

* * * * *

If art and philosophy are thus near akin, art and science are in their
beginning, though not in their final development, contrasted. Science,
it seems, begins with the desire for practical utility. Science, as
Professor Bergson has told us, has for its initial aim the making of
tools for life. Man tries to find out the laws of Nature, that is, how
natural things behave, in order primarily that he may get the better of
them, rule over them, shape them to his ends. That is why science is at
first so near akin to magic--the cry of both is:

"I'll do, I'll do, and I'll do."

But, though the feet of science are thus firmly planted on the solid
ground of practical action, her head, too, sometimes touches the
highest heavens. The real man of science, like the philosopher, soon
comes to seek truth and knowledge for their own sake. In art, in
science, in philosophy, there come eventually the same detachment from
personal desire and practical reaction; and to artist, man of science,
and philosopher alike, through this detachment there comes at times the
same peace that passeth all understanding.

Attempts have been often made to claim for art the utility, the
tool-making property, that characterizes the beginnings of science.
Nothing is beautiful, it is sometimes said, that is not useful; the
beauty of a jug or a table depends, we are often told, on its perfect
adaptation to its use. There is here some confusion of thought and some
obvious, but possibly unconscious, special pleading. Much of art,
specially decorative art, arises out of utilities, but its aim and its
criterion is not utility. Art may be structural, commemorative, magical,
what-not, may grow up out of all manner of practical needs, but it is
not till