212 Colonel Sir Ronald Ross [June 4. 



come the much-labouring philosophic mind, and its two wonderful 

 final lyrics. The lines — 



Yea, I take myself to witness 

 That I have loved no darkness, 

 Sophisticated no truth, 

 Nursed no delusion, 

 Allow'd no fear, 



express the very spirit of true science. 



The criticism of the day affects to deride all philosophic and 

 didactic intention, and, in its small way, considers only the artistry of 

 the surface. It is true that all these great works are immortal not 

 only because of their philosophic and didactic intention, but because 

 of their art of presentment. But tlie latter is only the servant of 

 the former and not its master. You may exclaim against this ; you 

 may ask where is the science in the great lyrics, in those most poig- 

 nant moments of passion or beauty which suddenly appear in dramatic, 

 rhetorical or descriptive literature ? Where is the science, for 

 example, in Gray's " Elegy " ? I say that those moments are the 

 final summations, the supreme integrations of the spirit. The " Eleuy " 

 is the integration of all the sights and sounds of an English summer 

 evening, and of the reflections connected with them, crystallised in a 

 few lines of perfect form and music which remain in the memory for 

 ever. It is art. Yes : but it is not only art. Behind the art there 

 is an almost divine summary of things. So also, for example, in 

 Shelley's " Ode to the West Wind," when he exclaims : 



Be thou me, impetuous one ! 

 Drive my dead thoughts over the universe 

 Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth ! 



he is conscious of a mighty impulse behind that reolian harp which 

 the spiritual fingers of his genius sounded, and which was his art. 

 We see the same thing in all the other arts. Music, although she 

 has no words, teaches by the direct inspiration of beauty into us ; 

 and in the prime, and also the ultimate, sculpture of Greece we find 

 not only the beauty of nature, of the human form, but behind it the 

 summary of the sculptor's mind, his ideal of the godhood of man. 

 In short, the world's masterpieces consist, not of one thing, but of 

 two things commingled together for our perpetual instruction, the 

 spirit of discovery and the spirit of expression, or rather of instilla- 

 tion. Or, I may put it in this way. These forces are to the mind 

 what the great Calculus is to Mathematics ; Science, the Differential 

 Calculus which separates, subdivides, and analyses ; and Poetry, the 

 Integral Calculus which sums up. Nor is one ever complete without 

 the other : and in mv view — which is, I fear, contrary to much of the 



