IMPORTANCE OF THE ZSTHETIC AIM IN DRAWING. ' 463 
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realizing what beauty is; and I put beauty first among the qualities which 
should distinguish the objects that are to serve as models, mainly, or at 
least largely, on this ground :—Its message is so direct and of such uni- 
versal interest, that I suppose its only competitor is fitness ; and without 
soing into the old question as to whether fitness and beauty are identical 
or not, it may be urged that this appearance of being perfectly adapted 
to a given use or purpose is of more importance than anything else in the 
sbjects which are held up as models before the childish mind, and that 
recognition and appreciation of this fitness is the main thing. But appre- 
siation of this kind is too much to expect of the child. It involves too 
much knowledge and too many considerations with which the young mind 
a1as not yet learned to deal. 
To know whether a member is too heavy or too light, too straight or 
too much curved, for the service it is expected to perform or the material 
'n which it is made, is something which requires investigation and 
experience to determine ; but to say whether it looks well or not, quite 
apart from these other considerations, is a comparatively simple matter, a 
matter mainly of feeling, something with which we are all fairly equipped 
at the start. And besides being simpler, this question of beauty is in- 
finitely more interesting. Everybody cares for, and will make an effort 
to master the secret of, beauty. The child will try his hardest to draw, 
as to master in any other form of study, the thing that interests him, and 
in the long run nothing interests us so much as that which is beautiful. 
But my plea touches other matters than these. 
To cultivate creative power is what we are after, whether the process 
is interesting to the pupil or not; and I want to say in this place, as in 
all places, that the one word which stands for this original force, in what- 
ever form it expresses itself in the work of human hands, is arf. We can- 
not keep too close to the study of what this means and of all that it im- 
lies. To leave this out of our plan is to try to produce bodies without 
souls. What does it mean, this little word that is on everybody’s lips when- 
ever anything is done well ? For the story or the poem that is well written ; 
for the music that is well composed, or played, or sung; for the play 
shat moves or the address that thrills us, we have but the one expres- 
sion, the same that we apply to the picture or the statue or the: building 
shat realizes in some sort our ideal of what such things should be—* It is 
a work of art.” It is not without deep significance that this is so, and 
we cannot do better than come back again and again and try to find out 
‘n what the essential purpose and spirit of art consists. It is an old ques- 
sion, I know, but the last answer has not been given, and as the point 
of view changes, the question itself becomes new for the time. 
What, then, is the secret of the charm that art imparts to so wide and 
varied a range of production ? Is it not simply and solely this—refinement ? 
Whatever refines our sensibilities and leads us to appreciate, and so to