ning daily upon us, till the outward shape
seemed lost in its brightness, leaving no trace in the memory.

Whether the position we have endeavoured to establish be disputed or
not, the absolute correspondence between the Moral and the Physical
is, at any rate, the essential ground of the Plastic arts; which could
not else exist, since through _Form alone_ they have to convey,
not only thought and emotion, but distinct and permanent character.
For our own part, we cannot but consider their success in this as
having settled the question.

From the view here presented, what is the inference in relation to
Art? That Man, as a compound being, cannot be represented without an
indication as well of Mind as of body; that, by a natural law which we
cannot resist, we do continually require that they be to us as mutual
exponents, the one of the other; and, finally, that, as a responsible
being, and therefore a free agent, he cannot be truly represented,
either to the memory or to the imagination, but as an Individual.

It would seem, also, from the indefinite varieties in men, though
occasioned only by the mere difference of degrees in their common
faculties and powers, that the coincidence of an equal developement of
all was never intended in nature; but that some one or more of them,
becoming dominant, should distinguish the individual. It follows,
therefore, if this be the case, that only through the phase of such
predominance can the human being ever be contemplated. To the Artist,
then, it becomes the only safe ground; the starting-point from
whence to ascend to a true Ideal,--which is no other than a partial
individual truth made whole in the mind: and thus, instead of one
Ideal, and that baseless, he may have a thousand,--nay, as many as
there are marked or apprehensible _individuals_.

But we must not be understood as confining Art to actual portraits.
Within such limits there could not be Art,--certainly not Art in its
highest sense; we should have in its place what would be little better
than a doubtful empiricism; since the most elevated subject, in the
ablest hands, would depend, of necessity, on the chance success of a
search after models. And, supposing that we bring together only the
rarest forms, still those forms, simply as circumscribed portraits,
and therefore insulated parts, would instantly close every avenue
to the imagination; for such is the law of the imagination, that it
cannot admit, or, in other wor