192 TREES IN NATURE, MYTH & ART 



as possible, but when they are using natural 

 forms to artistic ends. Do these distinctions 

 seem tedious? I will not urge them further. 

 But upon the understanding of them depends 

 the possibility of our getting the greatest variety 

 of enjoyment, one kind from architecture and 

 its attendant sculpture and painting, another 

 kind from sculpture and painting standing 

 alone. None the less, the study of nature 

 makes for perfection in the practice and enjoy- 

 ment of art, and art sends us back to nature 

 with a keener eye for natural beauty. We 

 shall love the trees the better if we have found 

 how beautiful is the work of the Gothic archi- 

 tects and sculptors. 



There is another field of interest in the 

 mediaeval sculpture, a very wide and great one, 

 of which, if I may carry through the simple 

 metaphor, I can only open the gate, and ask the 

 reader to glance at it. The old nature-worship 

 lingered and still lingers, as we have seen, in 

 Christendom ; and its forms were taken up in 

 Christian art. We will look at just one or two 

 examples that will be a link with the particular 

 form of nature- worship we have had to 

 consider. 



