converse, whatever can be brought into the sphere of the understanding, as
a dialectic subject, is not an Idea. It will be observed, however, that we
do not say an idea may not be denied; but to deny is not to disprove. Many
things are denied in direct contradiction to fact; for the mind can
command, and in no measured degree, the power of self-blinding, so that it
cannot see what is actually before it. This is a psychological fact, which
may be attested by thousands, who can well remember the time when they had
once clearly discerned what has now vanished from their minds. Nor does
the actual cessation of these primeval forms, or the after presence of
their fragmentary, nay, disfigured relics, disprove their reality, or
their original integrity, as we could not else call them up in their
proper forms at any future time, to the reacknowledging their truth: a
_resuscitation_ and result, so to speak, which many have experienced.

In conclusion: though it be but one and the same Power that prescribes
the form and determines the truth of all Ideas, there is yet an
essential difference between the two classes of ideas to which we have
referred; for it may well be doubted whether any Primary Idea can ever
be fully realized by a finite mind,--at least in the present state.
Take, for instance, the idea of beauty. In its highest form, as
presented to the consciousness, we still find it referring to
something beyond and above itself, as if it were but an approximation
to a still higher form. The truth of this, we think, will be
particularly felt by the artist, whether poet or painter, whose mind
may be supposed, from his natural bias, to be more peculiarly capable
of its highest developement; and what true artist was ever satisfied
with any idea of beauty of which he is conscious? From this
approximated form, however, he doubtless derives a high degree of
pleasure, nay, one of the purest of which his nature is capable;
yet still is the pleasure modified, if we may so express it, by an