RHYTHM IN NATURE — FLATTELY. 397 



once to those who attended to these things, and were versed in them, that a 

 different sort of man was come into the world, with other manners and cus- 

 toms, and more or less the care of the gods than those who had preceded 

 them. * * * Such was the mythology of the most learned and respectable 

 of the Tuscan soothsayers. 



From the foregoing examples it becomes evident that life, in its 

 main aspects, is essentially a rhythmic phenomenon. The essence of 

 rhythm being order, it seems, indeed, inevitable that, with the prog- 

 ress of time, all biological phenomena of importance, whether con- 

 cerned with the inner functioning of the organism or with its be- 

 havior in relation to the outside world, should tend to become in- 

 creasingly rhythmic in character. 



Finally, it should be evident that the sense of rhythm, which forms 

 so large a part of the pleasure conveyed by all the higher forms of 

 art, results from the successful expression by man of his appreciation 

 of the order and measured flow so characteristic of his own nature 

 and of the world about him. 



