work of art, it has no more to do with dogmas or doctrines, facts or
theories, than with the interests and emotions of daily life.




II

ART AND HISTORY


And yet there is a connection between art and religion, even in the
common and limited sense of that word. There is an historical
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between the history of art and the history of religion. Religions are
vital and sincere only so long as they are animated by that which
animates all great art--spiritual ferment. It is a mistake, by the way,
to suppose that dogmatic religion cannot be vital and sincere. Religious
emotions tend always to anchor themselves to earth by a chain of dogma.
That tendency is the enemy within the gate of every movement. Dogmatic
religion can be vital and sincere, and what is more, theology and ritual
have before now been the trumpet and drum of spiritual revolutions. But
dogmatic or intellectually free, religious ages, ages of spiritual
turmoil, ages in which men set the spirit above the flesh and the
emotions above the intellect, are the ages in which is felt the
emotional significance of the universe. Then it is men live on the
frontiers of reality and listen eagerly to travellers' tales. Thus it
comes about that the great ages of religion are commonly the great ages
of art. As the sense of reality grows dim, as men become more handy at
manipulating labels and symbols, more mechanical, more disciplined, more