had reached years
of discretion, and then only with a certificate, and for purely
literary purposes.

It is a terrible instance how strong a thing Art is; the grim old
author, master of every form of ugly vituperation, had drifted
miserably away from his beautiful youth, when he wrote the sweet poems
and sonnets that make the pedestal for his fame; and on that delicate
pedestal stands this hideous iron figure, with its angry gestures, its
sickening strength.

I could pile up indignant instances of the further harm the book has
done. Who but Milton is responsible for the hard and shameful view of
the position of women? He represents her as a clinging, soft,
compliant creature, whose only ideal is to be to make things
comfortable for her husband, and to submit to his embraces. Milton
spoilt the lives of all the women he had to do with, by making them
into slaves, with the same consciousness of rectitude with which he
whipped his nephews, the sound of whose cries made his poor girl-wife
so miserable. But I do not want to go further into the question of
Milton himself. I want to follow out a wider thought which came to me
among the downs to-day.

There seems to me to be in art, to take the metaphor of the temple at
Jerusalem, three gradations or regions, which may be typified by the
Court, the Holy Place, and the Holy of Holies. Into the Court many
have admittance, both writers and readers; it is just shut off from the
world, but admittance is easy and common. All who are moved and
stirred by ideas and images can enter here. Then there is the Holy
Place, dark and glorious, where the candlestick glimmers and the altar
gleams. And to this place the priests of art have access. Here are to
be found all delicate and strenuous craftsmen, all who understand that
there are secrets and mysteries in art. They can please and thrill the
mind and ear; they can offer up a fragrant incense; but the full
mystery is not revealed to them. Here are to be found many graceful
and soulless poets, many writers of moving tales, and discriminating
critics, who are satisfied, but cannot satisfy. Those who frequent
this place are generally of opinion that they know all that is to be
known; they talk much of form and colour, of values and order. They
can make the most of their materials; and indeed their skill outruns
their emotion.

But there is the inmost shrine of all within, where the darkness
broods, lit at intervals by the s