t is in times of new philosophies that Art, itself in
essence always a discovery, must flourish. Those whose sacred suns and
moons are ever in the past, tell us that our Art is going to the dogs;
and it is, indeed, true that we are in confusion! The waters are broken,
and every nerve and sinew of the artist is strained to discover his own
safety. It is an age of stir and change, a season of new wine and old
bottles. Yet, assuredly, in spite of breakages and waste, a wine worth
the drinking is all the time being made.

I ceased again to think, for the sun had dipped low, and the midges were
biting me; and the sounds of evening had begun, those innumerable
far-travelling sounds of man and bird and beast--so clear and
intimate--of remote countrysides at sunset. And for long I listened, too
vague to move my pen.

New philosophy--a vigorous Art! Are there not all the signs of it? In
music, sculpture, painting; in fiction--and drama; in dancing; in
criticism itself, if criticism be an Art. Yes, we are reaching out to a
new faith not yet crystallised, to a new Art not yet perfected; the forms
still to find-the flowers still to fashion!

And how has it come, this slowly growing faith in Perfection for
Perfection's sake? Surely like this: The Western world awoke one day to
find that it no longer believed corporately and for certain in future
life for the individual consciousness. It began to feel: I cannot say
more than that there may be--Death may be the end of man, or Death may be
nothing. And it began to ask itself in this uncertainty: Do I then
desire to go on living? Now, since it found that it desired to go on
living at least as earnestly as ever it did before, it began to inquire
why. And slowly it perceived that there was, inborn within it, a
passionate instinct of which it had hardly till then been conscious--a
sacred instinct to perfect itself, now, as well as in a possible
hereafter; to perfect itself because Perfection was desirable, a vision
to be adored, and striven for; a dream motive fastened within the
Universe; the very essential Cause of everything. And it began to see
that this Perfection, cosmically, was nothing but perfect Equanimity and
Harmony; and in human relations, nothing but perfect Love and Justice.
And Perfection began to glow before the eyes of the Western world like a
new star, whose light touched with glamour all things as they came forth
from Mystery, till to Mystery they were r