The Sacred Beetle and Others 



clad in horn, yet not insensible, after all, to 

 delicate contours. 



It occurred to me to put children's in- 

 telligence to the test with this problem in 

 aesthetics suggested by the Sacred Beetle's 

 work. I wanted very immature minds, 

 hardly opened, still slumbering in the 

 misty clouds of early childhood, in short, 

 approximating as nearly as possible to the 

 vague intellect of the insect, if any such 

 approximation is permissible. At the same 

 time I wanted them to be clear-headed 

 enough to understand me. I selected some 

 untutored youngsters of whom the oldest 

 was six. 



I submitted to this tribunal the work of 

 the Sacred Beetle and a geometrical produc- 

 tion of my own fingers, representing in the 

 same dimensions the sphere surmounted by 

 a short cylinder. Taking each of them 

 aside, as though for confession, lest the 

 opinion of one should influence the opinion 

 of another, I sprang my two toys upon them 

 and asked them which they thought the 

 prettier. There were five of them; and they 

 all voted for the Sacred Beetle's pear. 



I was stuck by this unanimity. The rough 

 little peasant-lad, who has scarcely yet learnt 

 how to blow his nose, has already a certain 



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