1895.] on Acting : an Art. 421 



completely different word to express the originator of ideas — the 

 word creator, or maker — the poet, as we call him to this day. The 

 functions of these two, the poet and the artist, are entirely different, 

 and their work can be dissociated. Homer, the poet, conceived 

 his thoughts and gave them utterance, but the fashion in which he 

 moulded them in giving them birth was the work of art. When 

 others disclaimed his verses so as to give forth their mighty roll and 

 rhythm, the fashion of their speech was the work of art. When, 

 later on, the sculptors modelled the forms of the gods and heroes, 

 as Homer described them, translating the thoughts of the poet into 

 graceful form, whose inner significance men could understand, this 

 was the work of the artist too. It was no detraction from the merit 

 of the work as work of art, that the sculptor set forth Homer's ideas 

 and not his own. Nay, more, when a sculptor, when Homer's name 

 was a great tradition, gave forth what appeared to be his image, was 

 this less a work of art because it professed to represent a real man, 

 and not a creation of the sculptor's mind ? 



What, then, is it which is in common with poetry, music, sculp- 

 ture, painting? — It is the knowledge of the powers of nature, and 

 the systematisation of them in such a way that effects may be 

 recurrent as required. Hear Alexander Pope on the subject : — 



" These Rules of old discover'd not devis'd, 

 Are Nature still, but Nature methodiz'd ; 

 Nature, like Liberty, is but restrain'd 

 By the same laws which first herself ordain'd." 



And again : — 



" All Nature is but Art unknown to thee." 



If we, then, broadly define art as the systematisation of natural 

 powers, wherein may we find the limitation of " fine " as applied to 

 the arts ? M. Taine, in his exhaustive treatise on The Philosophy 

 of Art, says that if " we succeed in defining Nature, and in marking 

 the conditions of existence of each art, we then possess a complete 

 explanation of the Fine Arts, and of art in general, that is to say, 

 a philosophy of the Fine Arts — what is called an sesthetic system." 

 And he goes on to say that this aesthetic system — the science of the 

 beautiful — "imposes no precepts, but ascertains and verifies laws." 

 . . . That she " has sympathies for every form of art." . . . That 

 " she accepts them as so many manifestations of human intelligence." 

 He then proceeds : — " It is plain that a statue is meant to imitate 

 accurately an animated human form, that a picture is intended to 

 portray real persons in real attitudes, house interiors and landscape, 

 such as nature provides. It is no less evident that a drama or 

 romance attempts to represent faithfully characters, actions, and 

 conversations, and to furnish as vivid and as accurate impressions of 

 them as is possible." 



He thus sums up his examination of the nature of a work of 

 art : — " We have discovered a loftier aim for art, which thus becomes 

 the work of intelligence, and no longer merely that of hand." 



Vol. -XIV. (No. 89.) 2 a 



