nnocent serenity with which these babe-like
Jupiters sit in their clouds, and from age to age prattle to each other
and to no contemporary. Well assured that their speech is intelligible
and the most natural thing in the world, they add thesis to thesis,
without a moment's heed of the universal astonishment of the human race
below, who do not comprehend their plainest argument; nor do they
ever relent so much as to insert a popular or explaining sentence,
nor testify the least displeasure or petulance at the dulness of their
amazed auditory. The angels are so enamored of the language that is
spoken in heaven that they will not distort their lips with the hissing
and unmusical dialects of men, but speak their own, whether there be any
who understand it or not.

*****

ART.

GIVE to barrows trays and pans
Grace and glimmer of romance,
Bring the moonlight into noon
Hid in gleaming piles of stone;
On the city's paved street
Plant gardens lined with lilac sweet,
Let spouting fountains cool the air,
Singing in the sun-baked square.
Let statue, picture, park and hall,
Ballad, flag and festival,
The past restore, the day adorn
And make each morrow a new morn
So shall the drudge in dusty frock
Spy behind the city clock
Retinues of airy kings,
Skirts of angels, starry wings,
His fathers shining in bright fables,
His children fed at heavenly tables.
'Tis the privilege of Art
Thus to play its cheerful part,
Man in Earth to acclimate
And bend the exile to his fate,
And, moulded of one element
With the days and firmament,
Teach him on these as stairs to climb
And live on even terms with Time;
Whilst upper life the slender rill
Of human sense doth overfill.

XII. ART.

Because the soul is progressive, it never quite repeats itself, but
in every act attempts the production of a new and fairer whole. This
appears in works both of the useful and the fine arts, if we employ the
popular distinction of works according to their aim either at use or
beauty. Thus in our fine arts, not imitation but creation is the aim. In
landscapes the painter should give the suggestion of a fairer creation
than we know. The details, the prose of nature he should omit and give
us only the spirit and splendor. He should know that the landscape has
beauty for his eye because it expresses a