100 PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 



was a region in which we found them weak. They 

 thought more of the individual formation, the crystal, 

 the plant, the animal, while the co-operating laws and 

 larger combinations of phenomena were scarcely within 

 the range of the characteristic as they understood it. 

 But fully in the spirit of science, Mr Ruskin has pointed 

 out with loving appreciation the value and import of 

 variable curves, graduated colours, and the nature and 

 stratification of earth and rock, so that to the nature- 

 lover versed in this expressiveness, the hills and plains, 

 the cliffs and river-courses, are able to tell their story 

 like a human face." 



All this, however, is mentioned here only in passing, 

 and to show again how the problem of the Beautiful was 

 studied independently of the great philosophical move- 

 ment and outside of the systems of the school, as a special 

 branch of art-criticism. At a somewhat later period 

 than that which produced the earlier writings of Carlyle 

 and Euskin, the desire began to make itself felt, also in 

 this country, to elaborate a philosophical creed. As I 

 have repeatedly pointed out, this demand had existed 

 abroad ever since the middle of the seventeenth century. 

 Under its influence the great philosophical problems were 

 formulated, latest among them probably that of the 

 Beautiful. In this country these problems, so far as 

 they were recognised at all, arose in a loose and dis- 

 connected manner through other influences and interests, 

 among which social questions were probably the most 

 important and pressing. We find this specific English 

 characteristic strongly marked also in many of the prom- 



