The Cruise of the Branwen

ATHENS two alternatives, or have no time to consider fully the differing results of various actions. Those who break these written or unwritten laws only find themselves far more straitly tied and bound within the fetters of some vice that brings the inevitable executioner : his feet may linger on their way, but they will never cease from their relentless progress to a doom without escape. The true artist, on the other hand, is the man whose eyes can freely see, whose ears can freely understand, as the dull senses of his fellows never will, and who tr;msmits the emotions which his senses have conveyed to him through instruments akin to ours, but tuned to a finer melody, and harmonised to deeper chords. For him the little hills rejoice on every side, the valleys also standing thick with corn do laugh and sing. Fire and hail, snow and vapours, the heavens that are a tabernacle for the sun, " which goeth forth as a bridegroom out of his chamber and rejoiceth as a giant to run his course "-these things appeal to him with a keener sympathy than ours, with a quicker perception of that intimate, far-off progression of the race throughout the ages, with a deeper knowledge of what Nature means to Man. And so, discovering the laws by which this Nature works, he frames some kindred principle on which to fashion new creations of his own. He does not merely reproduce the Beauty he has seen ; he adds to the stock of Beauty in the universe by his own skill and handiwork. 143