always happen that the intuition of some unscholarly person was nearer
the truth; still no man could ever decide between the two, nor would any
sane man think it worth his while to take sides with either of them;
such questions are most useful when they are left open. This is the case
because the imagination is thus left freer to use such knowledge as it
has for the edification of the character; and that model for our example
or warning which the imagination constructs may always possibly be the
truth. According to the balance in it of apparent probability, with
edifying power it will beget conviction. Such a conviction may be doomed
to be superseded sooner or later; its value lies in its potency while it
lasts. The temper in which we look at our historical heritage is of more
importance to us now than the exactitude of our vision; for this latter
can never be proved, while the former approves itself by the fruit it
bears within us. It is better, more fruitful, to feel with Duerer about
the art of Ancient Greece than to know all that can be known of it
to-day and feel a great deal less. "Character calls forth character,"
said Goethe; we may add, "even from the grave." Now that the physical
miracle of the Resurrection has come to seem so unimportant and
uninteresting to educated men, it might be a wise economy to connect its
poetry with this experience, that great and creative characters can
raise men better worth knowing than Lazarus from the dead. Nietsche
thought that Shakespeare had brought Brutus back to life, (though he
knew very little of Roman history), and that Brutus was the Roman best
worth knowing. "Of all peoples, the Greeks dreamt the dream of life the
best," Goethe said; and again, "For all other arts we have to make some
allowance; to Greek art alone we are for ever debtors." To feel the
truth of these sayings with a passion similar to that shown in the
passages quoted above from Duerer, must surely be a great help to an
artist. Such a passion is an end in itself, or rather is the only means
by which we can win spiritual freedom from some of the heavier fetters