ot make the ideas of beds and tables, but he
made beds and tables according to the ideas. And is there not a maker
of the works of all workmen, who makes not only vessels but plants and
animals, himself, the earth and heaven, and things in heaven and under
the earth? He makes the Gods also. 'He must be a wizard indeed!' But do
you not see that there is a sense in which you could do the same? You
have only to take a mirror, and catch the reflection of the sun, and the
earth, or anything else--there now you have made them. 'Yes, but only
in appearance.' Exactly so; and the painter is such a creator as you are
with the mirror, and he is even more unreal than the carpenter; although
neither the carpenter nor any other artist can be supposed to make the
absolute bed. 'Not if philosophers may be believed.' Nor need we wonder
that his bed has but an imperfect relation to the truth. Reflect:--Here
are three beds; one in nature, which is made by God; another, which is
made by the carpenter; and the third, by the painter. God only made one,
nor could he have made more than one; for if there had been two, there
would always have been a third--more absolute and abstract than either,
under which they would have been included. We may therefore conceive God
to be the natural maker of the bed, and in a lower sense the carpenter
is also the maker; but the painter is rather the imitator of what the
other two make; he has to do with a creation which is thrice removed
from reality. And the tragic poet is an imitator, and, like every
other imitator, is thrice removed from the king and from the truth.
The painter imitates not the original bed, but the bed made by the
carpenter. And this, without being really different, appears to be
different, and has many points of view, of which only one is caught by
the painter, who represents everything because he represents a piece of
everything, and that piece an image. And he can paint any other artist,
although he knows nothing of their arts; and this with sufficient skill
to deceive children or simple people. Suppose now that somebody came to
us and told us, how he had met a man who knew all that everybody knows,
and better than anybody:--should we not infer him to be a simpleton who,
having no discernment of truth and falsehood, had met with a wizard
or enchanter, whom he fancied to be all-wise? And when we hear persons
saying that Homer and the tragedians know all the arts and all the
virtues, must