But here an important distinction is to be made.  For the Soul must not be called upon to moderate those passions which are only an outbreak of the lower spirits of Nature, nor can it be displayed in antithesis with these; for where calm considerateness is still in contention with them, the Soul has not yet appeared; they must be moderated by unassisted Nature in Man, by the might of the Spirit.  But there are cases of a higher sort, in which not a single force alone, but the intelligent Spirit itself breaks down all barriers—­cases, indeed, where even the Soul is subjected by the bond that connects it with sensuous existence, to pain, which should be foreign to its divine nature; where Man feels himself hard fought and attacked in the root of his existence, not by mere powers of Nature, but by moral forces; where innocent error hurries him into crime, and thus into misery; where deep-felt injustice excites to rebellion the holiest feelings of humanity.

This is the case in all situations, truly, and, in a high sense, tragic, such as the Tragedy of the ancients brings before our eyes.  Where blindly passionate forces are aroused, the collected Spirit is present as the guardian of Beauty; but if the Spirit itself be carried away, as by an irresistible might, what power shall watch over and protect sacred beauty?  Or, if even the soul participate in the struggle, how shall it save itself from pain and from desecration?

Arbitrarily to restrain the power of pain, of feeling in revolt, would be to sin against the very meaning and aim of Art, and would betray a want of feeling and soul in the artist himself.

Already therein, that Beauty, based on grand and firmly established forms, has become Character, Art has provided the means of displaying without injury to symmetry the whole intensity of Feeling.  For where Beauty rests on mighty forms, as upon immovable pillars, even a slight change in its relations, scarcely touching the form, causes us to infer the great force that was necessary in order to provide it.  Still more does Grace sanctify pain.  It is the essential nature of Grace that it does not know itself; but not being wilfully acquired, it also cannot be wilfully lost.  When intolerable anguish, when even madness, sent by avenging gods, takes away consciousness and reason, Grace stands as a protecting demon by the suffering person, and prevents it from manifesting anything unseemly, anything discordant to Humanity, but sees to it that, if the person falls, it falls at least a pure and unspotted victim.

Although not yet the Soul itself, but its forebodings only, Grace accomplishes by natural means what the Soul does by a divine power, in transforming pain, torpor, even death itself, into Beauty.

Yet Grace, which thus maintained itself in the extremest adversity, would be dead, without its transfiguration by the Soul.  But what expression can belong to the Soul in this situation?  It delivers itself from pain, and comes forth conquering, not conquered, by relinquishing its connection with sensuous existence.