being the utterance and embodiment of that, so do we stand towards
Deity, being the utterance and embodiment of the divine thought and
will. As all our doings are but exhibitions of our minds, so ourselves
are manifestations of God. Through all things shines the eternal soul.
The more perfect the embodiment, the more translucent is the soul; and
when this is most transparent, making the body luminous with the
fullness of its presence, there is beauty, which may be said to be the
most intense and refined incarnation and exhibition of the divine
spirit.

Behind and within every form of being is immanent the creative power;
and thence, in proportion as this power discloses itself, is object,
act, or emotion beautiful. Thus is beauty always spiritual, a
revelation more or less clear of the creative spirit. Hence our
emotion in presence of the truly beautiful, which calms and exalts us.
Hence evil never is, cannot be, beautiful: the bad is, must be, ugly.
Evil consists in the deficiency of the divine creative spirit, whose
fullness gives, is, beauty. Evil is imperfection, unripeness,
shapelessness, weakness in, or opposition to, the creative spirit.
Evil is life that is unhealthy, short-coming. Wherever there is full,
unperverted life, there is, there must be, beauty. The beautiful
blossoms on every stem of unpoisoned power. The sap of sound life ever
molds itself into forms of beauty.

But however rich the exhibition of the divine soul, however glowing
with perfection the form, however noble the act and pure the feeling,
the richness, the perfection, the nobleness, the purity will be lost
on us, unless within us there be sympathy with the spirit whence they
flow. Only by spirit can spirit be greeted.