OF THE BEAUTIFUL. 95 



philosophy of life has become, in many instances, the 

 philosophical creed of a later generation. This also 

 explains the prominent part which music, elevated and 

 deepened in the compositions of Beethoven and his 

 followers, plays in the spiritual life of large numbers 

 among the German people. 



To trace this more in detail would mean to penetrate 

 deeper into the poetic and religious thought of the cen- 

 tury, into that region where scientific and philosophical 

 forms and methods avail little or nothing, but which 

 is nevertheless the spontaneous and creative source out 

 of which all other mental efiforts flow, notably in which 

 all new movements of philosophical no less than of 

 scientific thought have their origin and beginnings. 

 But as this would belong to a different portion of 

 this history, I must at present drop the subject with 

 the single remark that the philosophical study of the 

 Beautiful has led thinkers to the limits of speculation, 

 to the recognition that beyond these limits lies a deeper 

 and more productive region of thought. 



Similar reasons prevent me from entering at present 53. 



'^ . Unsystenia- 



upon an appreciation of that range of ideas which have tic^sthe- 

 been more unconsciously active than philosophically de- |°f|fj^*^" 

 lined, in the writings and deliverances of English art- 

 critics during the second half of the nineteenth century. 

 The great stimulus to this original and spontaneous — 

 though unsysteinatic — expression of thought was un- 

 doubtedly given by the publication of the first volume 

 of John Euskin's 'Modern Painters' in 1843. It was 

 not a philosophical interest which produced this highly 

 original work, but it has been significantly pointed out 



