object which art touches into
beauty, becomes in the very act a whole. The thing that is beautiful is
always complete, the embodiment of something absolutely valuable, the
product and the source of love; and the beloved object is all the world
for the lover--beyond all praise, because it is above all comparison.

"Then why not witness, calmly gazing,
If earth holds aught--speak truth--above her?
Above this tress, and this, I touch
But cannot praise, I love so much!"[A]

[Footnote A: _Song_ (Dramatic Lyrics).]

This characteristic of the work of art brings with it an important
practical consequence, because being complete, it appeals to the whole
man.

"Poetry," it has been well said, is "the idealized and monumental
utterance of the deepest feelings." And poetic feelings, it must not be
forgotten, _are_ deepest; that is, they are the afterglow of the
fullest activity of a complete soul, and not shallow titillations, or
surface pleasures, such as the palate knows. Led by poetry, the
intellect so sees truth that it glows with it, and the will is stirred
to deeds of heroism. For there is hardly any fact so mean, but that when
intensified by emotion, it grows poetic; as there is hardly any man so
unimaginative, but that when struck with a great sorrow, or moved by a
great passion, he is endowed for a moment with the poet's speech. A
poetic fact, one may almost say, is just any fact at its best. Art, it
is true, looks at its object through a medium, but it always seems its
inmost meaning. In Lear, Othello, Hamlet, in Falstaff and Touchstone,
there is a revelation of the inner truth of human life beyond the power
of moral science to bestow. We do well to seek philosophy in the poets,
for though they teach only by hints and parables, they nevertheless
reflect the concrete truth of life, as it is half revealed and half
concealed in facts. On the other hand, the reflective process of
philosophy may help poetry; for, as we shall show, there is a near
kinship between them. Even the critical analyst, while severing element
from element, may help art and serve the poet's ends, provided he does
not in his analysis of parts forget the whole. His function, though
humble and merely preliminary to full poetic enjoyment, is not
unimportant. To appreciate the grandeur of the unity of the work of art,
there must be knowledge of the parts combined. It is quite true that the
guide in the gallery is prone to be too talkative, and