movement.


148

The desire to find something certain and fixed in æsthetic led to the
worship of Aristotle: I think, however, that we may gradually come to
see from his works that he understood nothing about art, and that it is
merely the intellectual conversations of the Athenians, echoing in his
pages, which we admire.


149

In Socrates we have as it were lying open before us a specimen of the
consciousness out of which, later on, the instincts of the theoretic man
originated: that one would rather die than grow old and weak in mind.


150

At the twilight of antiquity there were still wholly unchristian
figures, which were more beautiful, harmonious, and pure than those of
any Christians: _e.g._, Proclus. His mysticism and syncretism were
things that precisely Christianity cannot reproach him with. In any
case, it would be my desire to live together with such people. In
comparison with them Christianity looks like some crude brutalisation,
organised for the benefit of the mob and the criminal classes.

Proclus, who solemnly invokes the rising moon.