fects, the defects are those of art
itself, due to the limitation of its sphere. This limitation has its
root in the general attempt of art to represent in sensuous concrete
form the infinite and universal Spirit, and in the attempt of the
classical type of art to blend so completely spiritual and sensuous
existence that the two appear in mutual conformity. But in such a fusion
of the spiritual and sensuous aspects Spirit cannot be portrayed
according to its true essence, for the true essence of Spirit is its
infinite subjectivity; and its absolute internal meaning does not lend
itself to a full and free expression in the confinement of the bodily
form as its only appropriate existence.

Now, romantic art dissolves the inseparable unity which is the ideal of
the classical type, because it has won a content which goes beyond the
classical form of art and its mode of expression. This content--if
familiar ideas may be recalled--coincides with what Christianity
declares to be true of God as Spirit, in distinction to the Greek
belief in gods which constitutes the essential and appropriate subject
for classical art. The concrete content of Hellenic art implies the
unity of the human and divine nature, a unity which, just because it is
merely _implied_ and _immediate_, permits of a representation in an
immediately visible and sensuous mold. The Greek god is the object of
naive contemplation and sensuous imagination; his shape is, therefore,
the bodily shape of man; the circle of his power and his essence is
individual and confined. To man the Greek god appears as a being and a
power with whom he may _feel_ a kinship and unity, but this kinship and
unity, are not reflected upon or raised into definite knowledge. The
higher stage is the _knowledge_ of this unconscious unity, which
underlies the classical form of art and which it has rendered capable of
complete plastic embodiment. The elevation of what is unconscious and
implied into self-conscious knowledge brings about an enormous
difference; it is the infinite difference which, for example, separates
man from the animal. Man is an animal, but, even in his animal
functions, does not rest satisfied with the potential and the
unconscious as the animal does, but becomes conscious of them, reflects
upon them, and raises them--as, for instance, the process of
digestion--into self-conscious science. And it is thus that man breaks
through the boundary of his merely immediate and unco