2 Hartley Burr Alexander 



prehended Greek and Italian cultures, it is the aesthetic aspect 

 that most vividly impresses us, still the impression is not so vital 

 nor so close. There is richness and sensuous variety in Oriental 

 culture not unlike that of the Italian, but it does not appeal to 

 us with the same pertinence. We do not comprehend a cast of 

 mind so thoroughly alien in vision; we cannot touch the human 

 motive that actuates its expression ; the psychical reality, the 

 ideal, which is the reason and worth of the creation, is hidden 

 from us, and we have no art to read the mind's complexion in 

 features not transfigured by the sympathy that springs from 

 community of culture. 



Now just as we understand other peoples best through their 

 artistic expression, so may we best understand ourselves in our 

 own aesthetic tastes and achievements. To be sure, we, as all 

 modern peoples, have borrowed freely from the cultures that have 

 historically anteceded ours, and consequently there are many ele- 

 ments and influences in our work which represent an assimilated 

 and not a native taste. Nevertheless these are mainly superficial, 

 having to do with form rather than spirit, — which not the most 

 imitative art can wholly conceal. No matter what one race learns 

 from another, its work is bound to be imbued with a turn and 

 temper native to the flesh ; and where this is perceived, therein 

 is discovered the portraiture of the art. 



Ethnologists tell us that the English people is the product of a 

 highly complex fusion of races. An understratum of Iberian 

 blood; an infusion of Celt; and out of the two the Briton of the 

 era of the Roman occupation. Later the Teutons, — Angles, 

 Saxons, Norwegians, Danes, Normans. From all these arises 

 the modern Britisher and British-American, quite inappropriately 

 called Anglo-Saxon. But however great the variety of races, the 

 time of first fusion is now so long passed that a thoroughly char- 

 acteristic type has been developed. It is Teuto-Celtic rathei 

 than Anglo-Saxon ; for in the modern Briton are united two dis- 

 tinctive trends of character and temperament probably not 

 wrongly accredited to a Teutonic and a Celtic element (if 

 Caesar's Briton was indeed a Celt). The two strains may be 

 clearly distinguished, and they are important factors in any 



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