The

fine though it be, "elevates and improves nature? Or that, to use Mr Swinburne's phrasing, it "takes no care of fact"? Surely not. essential merit of the picture, if I mistake not, is that, through the medium of line and colour, it represents to some extent what might actually have taken place on that supposed occasion : Mary bending over her young Son with a countenance expressive of deep maternal tenderness, whilst He, in youthful beauty, looks up with ineffable sweetness and serenity in his eyes, graphically significant of his perfect innocence. Over such a scene let not any artist or poet try to swell up into "elevation and improvement," or he will make a prodigious mistake. In waxing magniloquent he is almost sure to become stultiloquent. Rather let him render the historic, or the supposed, fact as clearly as he can imagine it; and after he has done his best, I apprehend that his picture, however noble it may be, will fall far short of the reality. With respect to the essential facts of the case, I think it will be found that to speak of elevating and improving them is absurd. So with the Gethsemane agonies, so with the tragedy of the Universe on Calvary. In all such cases I contend that the facts will be found to be far more impressive than any fiction that may be spun around them. "Jesus said unto the chief priests and captains of the Temple, and the elders, which were come to him, Be ye come out, as against a thief, with swords and staves?" Mark you,

the very Church did this bloody and preposterous thing! Fiction is really nowhere beside fact unless when it has the cunning to clothe itself, as it were, in the garments of Fact.

21. The Trial and Death of Socrates.-And I believe that the same principle will be found to hold good with respect to historic actuality in

general. Any one well read in History will be able to recall many instances illustrative of this truth. Take, for example, the trial, condemnation, and judicial murder of Socrates-the greatest man, probably, of classical antiquity. Note that this crime was not the work of some single, paltry, orgulous tyrant, but that of the sovereign people of Athens-the devil-bewitched democracy of that much-extolled city of light! Why this deed of shame ? The ostensible charges were that he disbelieved in the national Gods, and by his teaching corrupted the youth of Athens. It seems quite clear that the Athenians themselves did not believe in these, their own, accusations. The life of Socrates was, in the best sense, transparently Godly; his teaching highly moral. The real reason of his accusation and condemnation seems to have been that the man was too noble for them to tolerate. This is Schwegler's view of the case. Socrates, as he says, was no aristocrat, "but he was too firm of character ever to lend himself to an accommodation with the humours of the sovereign masses, and too truly convinced of the necessity of a lawful and intelligent control of political affairs to be able to make friends with the Athenian democracy as it was. Only once, as chief president of the Prytanes, had he filled a public office, and then only to fall into opposition with the will of the people and of those who held power. There was added to this that he allowed only men of knowledge and discrimination to be entitled to administer state affairs; that on every occasion he spoke against democratic institutions, especially election by ballot." (How gloriously different, say, from the late Mr W. E. Gladstone, or the late Sir William Harcourt, or the present Sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman!1) Further, "he

1 Written during the Campbell-Bannerman supremacy.

"1

would not condescend in any way to flatter the people, and in the proud confidence of his innocence he bade defiance to his judges." 1 Penalty -the Hemlock Cup! What a triumph of popular devilry! A triumph, of course, all to the confusion and damnation of the people themselves. Let modern democracies reflect upon it. But just think of the actuality of the scene-the greatest man of classical antiquity presented by the sovereign people of Athens with a cup of Hemlock for his virtuous labours! So discerning and humane were that sovereign people! Fiction can devise no grimmer scene.

22. The best material of Poetry and Art is to be found in real Life.-On this point, then, observe how we stand. It is a common error to regard matter of fact as prosy. There are lettered but ignorant people who rail at those who insist on fact and truth to Nature in Literature and Art. Nay, there are some who even try to rail at those who insist on fact and truth in Theology and Philosophy! They could not make a worse blunder. They fail to notice that Fact embraces the whole Universe, and all the Divinity of thought and power as well as the Devilry which it manifests. To rail at fact is to rail at the Divine, and to ignore the resources of the devilish. The bravest material of Poetry and Art is to be found in real life, as also the most astonishing instances of human baseness. Matter-of-fact deeds greater, probably, than have been invented or imagined, and fouler, perhaps, than could be anticipated, have been enacted. It is matter of fact that is most beautiful and sublime on the one side, and most horrific and revolting on the other, from Calvary downwards. "I wonder," says Montaigne, that they who are addicted to the com1 'History of Philosophy,' pp. 44-5. D

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position of fictitious tales, do not rather cull out ten thousand very fine stories which are to be found in very good authors, that would save them the trouble of invention, and be more useful and entertaining." 1

23. Nature furnishes us with models in every field of Life.-In a word, it may be taken that Nature furnishes us with models in every field of Lifein the true and the false, the kind and the cruel, the beautiful and the ugly, the serious and the trivial, the magnanimous and the base, the sublime and the ridiculous. Literature and Art can only attain to a noble development as growing out of a deep life-interest.

1 'Essays,' ‚' Vol. ii. p. 561. Mr Gosse writes: "When Malherbe arrived at Paris, he found the world tired of literary nonsense, ' and that what was wanted after such a glut of ornament and exuberance was an arbiter and tyrant of taste who should bring poetry rigidly into line with decency, plainness, and commonsense, qualities which had long been thought unnecessary to, and even ridiculously incompatible with, literature of a high order.'" 'Aspects and Impressions,' p. 134.

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CHAPTER III.

THE SOURCES OF POETRY.

1. The Science of Esthetics, like all other sciences, must be founded in Consciousness." It is the perfection of a rational being," says that great philosopher Thomas Reid, "to have no belief but what is founded on intuitive evidence or just reasoning" a perfection which is, of course, only to be slowly acquired. "Never give an entire assent to any proposition," advises Malebranche, except those which are so evidently true that we cannot refuse to admit them without an internal uneasiness and reproach of our reason." 2 Now, however little such precepts may be observed in practice, they ought to be observed not only in one or two, but in all departments of intellectual activity. The Science of Mathematics, as everybody knows, derives its impregnable strength from the intuition of First Principles; the Science of the Laws of Thought derives its unassailable validity from our mental constitution; the Moral Law derives its majesty from the same source. In the language of Metaphor, it is said to be written on the tablets of the Heart. In this sense it is

1 'Works,' p. 332 (Hamilton's Edition). No philosopher, no theologian, has truly begun to know his business until he has accepted this aphorism as the criterion of the true.

2 Quoted by Hallam, 'Introduction to the Literature,' &c., Vol. iv. p. 217.