In the apprehension of beauty, there are two apparently conflicting impulses : The first is recognition, as of a face suddenly rekindled in the memory, that makes the mind welcome her strangest comings as foreseen returns; the second is wonder, which sets men to question their own delight and to scrutinize that fabled face as a thing holy and remote. These tendencies follow no order of precedence. Now one, now the other, according to the temper of the times, prevails upon thought. The Italian artists before Giotto,...
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