e, hearing the voices or feeling the atmosphere that appealed to
his artist mind. The charm of common things, the ever-present beauty
and harmony in all forms of life, supplied him with endless
inspiration.

In portraying nature, he is in no sense a copyist. He does not
describe a scene, an occasion or an object, but suggests it, being an
adept in the use of musical metaphor. Robert Louis Stevenson says that
the one art in literature is to omit. "If I knew how to omit," says
he, "I should ask no other knowledge." Painters tell us that the
highest evidence of skill in transferring nature to canvas is to avoid
too much detail, and they squint up their eyes in order not to see too
much. These standards prove MacDowell the artist. He does not make the
mistake that so many preachers and public teachers do of presuming
upon the ignorance or stupidity of his hearers, but leaves something
to their imagination and inner artistic senses.

There is a reverence of nature, a depth of love that amounts almost to
sadness, in this man's work that stamps him the pantheist in the
highest sense. This is, I think, a common characteristic of the
mystic. Their consciousness of the oneness of all life is so perfect
that God is seen even in its lowest forms. Sermons are read in stones
and books in the running brooks. This suggests MacDowell's kinship to
Shakespeare, Ruskin, Emerson and Thoreau; but it is a limitless
analogy. All genius, in the end, is of one blood, and MacDowell is
unquestionably a genius.

When one is entering upon a literary career, the first injunction is
to "acquire a style." "But how?" asks the aspirant. Some say by
becoming familiar with the forms of expression of the best authors,
and such advise that you read without stint. Others bid you write,
write incessantly about everything under the sun, until by long
practice you evolve a style of your own, unhampered in its originality
by the memory of the achievements of others resulting from much
reading. There are still others who advise an equal division of time
between study of the classics and self-expression. The latter is the
most natural and common method and leads in time to the goal. Perhaps
the same is true of musical style. Technical skill, accuracy,
interpretation and appreciation come from studying and performing the
works of others; then if one aspires to original work, let him
compose, essaying any and everything until his own peculiar bent is
discovered,