_Sophon._ Christian thinks and says, that if the spiritual be not
_in_ a thing, it cannot be put upon it; and hence, if a work of art
be not a god, it must be a man, or a mere image of one; and that the
faith of the Pagan is the foolishness of the Christian. Nor does he
utter unreason; for, notwithstanding their perfect forms, their gods
are not gods to us, but only perfect forms: Apollo, Theseus, the
Ilissus, Aphrodite, Artemis, Psyche, and Eros, are only shapeful
manhood, womanhood, virginhood, and youth, and move us only by the
exact amount of humanity they possess in common with ourselves.
_Homer and aeschylus, and Sophocles, and Phidias, live not by the
sacred in them, but by the human:_ and, but for this common bond,
Hellenic art would have been submerged in the same Lethe that has
drowned the Indian, Egyptian, and Assyrian Theogonies and arts. And,
if we except form, what other thing does Hellenic art offer to the
modern artist, that is not thoroughly opposed to his faith, wants,
and practice? And thought--thought in accordance with all the lines
of his knowledge, temperament, and habits--thought through which he
makes and shapes for men, and is understood by them--it is as
destitute of, as inorganic matter of soul and reason. But Christian
art, because of the faith upon which it is built, suffers under no
such drawbacks, for that faith is as personal and vigorous now as
ever it was at its origin--every motion and principle of our being
moves to it like a singing harmony;--it is the breath which brings
out of us, aeolian-harp-like, our most penetrating and heavenly
music--the river of the water of life, which searches all our dry
parts and nourishes them, causing them to spring up and bear
abundantly the happy seed which shall enrich and make fat the earth
to the uttermost parts thereof.
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