But, as in the course of his lecture he had more than once touched the giddy regions of supernaturalism, this formula seemed a contradiction to certain minds, yet enthusiastic applause greeted the orator from all parts of the hall.

One paper, L’Union, said in this connection: 

“M.  Delsarte is a spontaneous soul, his mind is at once Christian and free, his only passion is the proselytism of the Beautiful, and this is the charm of his speech....I do not assert that everything in it should be of an absolute rigor of philosophy,” etc.

The same paper says elsewhere: 

“All these theories are new, original, ingenious, in a word, felicitous.  Are they undeniably true?  What I can affirm is that none doubt it who hear the master make various applications of them by examples.  Delsarte is an irresistible enchanter.”

The opposition of principles with which he is reproached, these doubts of the strength of his logic, will be greatly diminished if this point of view be taken:  that Delsarte traced back an assured science, that he deduced from the faculties of man the hypothesis that these faculties are contained in essence and in the full power of their development, in an archetype which, to his mind, is no other than the Divine Trinity.  Plato’s ideal in aesthetics and in philosophy was similar although less precise.

There is a saying that Italians “have two souls.”  In Delsarte there were two distinct types, the theistic philosopher and the scientist.

Now, the philosopher could give himself up to the study of causes and their finality, that faculty being allotted to the mental activity; he could even, without giving the scientist cause for complaint, make, or admit, speculative theories regarding the end and aim of art, provided that the scientific part of the system was neither denied nor diminished thereby.

And is there not a certain kinship between science and hypothesis which admits of their walking abreast without conflicting?

Delsarte, as we have seen, rarely left his audience without winning the sympathy of every member of it.  At the meeting of which I speak, he vastly amused his hearers by an anecdote.  He doubtless wished to clear away the clouds caused by that part of his discourse which, by his own confession, had a good deal of the sermon about it.

I will repeat the tale, a little exaggerated perhaps, but still very piquant, which doubtless won his pardon for those parts of his speech which might have been for various reasons blamed, misunderstood or but half understood!

The story was of four professors who, having examined him, had each, in turn, he said, administered upon his [Delsarte’s] cheeks smart slaps to the colleagues by whose advice he had profited in previous lessons.

The following lines were the subject of the lesson: 

    “Nor gold nor greatness make us blest;
    Those two divinities to our prayers can grant
    But goods uncertain and a pleasure insecure.”