And the monuments of municipal greatness are not among the least of the trophies and achievements of architecture. Ambition has imbodied its of one infinite brightness: may we not go further, and observe that art is one in its real nature and object? In the infinity of beauty and of truth, pervading this mighty universe of matter and of mind, lie the inspirations of art; and it is from his fresher, deeper insight into this inexhaustible life, that genius derives his power, and his productions their value. No matter what his tools, whether colours, or marble, or stone, or sounding pipes and strings, or cadenced words, his work is the same; his eye has looked through and beyond the horizon of his time; his ear has listened, through the discords of the present, to the harmonies of the future; his thought has pierced through the crust of the surface, to the deep beneath; and now the time is come; he has seen. - he must show; he has heard. - he must tell; he has received. - he must give; in picture, or statue, or structure, or symphony, or poem, he imbodies his results; and in all these various forms of production, whatever be the character of their design, the aim of the earnest-souled receiver, is one; - that the thing produced shall be beautiful and true.

As the artist's work is similar, so is its purpose. Like the mountain stream, which, descending from the clouds of heaven, seeks, with a widening current, the boundless ocean whence its waters first exhaled, the true artist ever strives after that whole infinity of beauty and of truth, from a detached ray, as it were, of which his course of inspired action began. In the beginning of his career there was an extension of the infinite to him. - a revelation to his spirit of a beauty and a truth, newer in kind or higher in degree, than was before known or felt: from this his labors sprang; and the true tendency and end of them is to make what he thus knows and feels, known and felt; to open to his own and all others' eyes a wider and more perfect view of that glory which has glanced upon him; and in proportion as he has fulfilled this, shall his work endure. But this is not all: The ruling principles also of the several arts are identical: in the expression of the same quality or feeling, the same law of means obtains in all the arts, i. e., the elements must be used after the same principles, and therefore the laws of the fine arts are deducible from the principles of art, and may be considered as a polyglot version of art-law. If, therefore, we obtain a comprehensive knowledge of the principles and laws of art, we possess the key to the intelligence and application of the laws of the arts, which are its different branches.

The aim of art, in all its branches, throughout its works, is, from variety of element, by harmony of combination and arrangement, to produce unity of effect; in fewer words, variety in unity.

It would free an artist from the pedantry - from the trammels of the technical, to acquire some knowledge of the arts which thus claim kindred with his own; and where there is original power, the mind, instead of being oppressed by its increase of attainments, will discover, or discern, more clearly, the common bearings and hidden analogies of the different branches of art, which will thus shed light upon each other. An architect for instance, would be a better architect from knowing someting of painting and sculpture. - while the painter and sculptor would find their advantage in an acquaintance with architecture - the principles of the three arts being the same, only differently applied. The architect need not be able to paint a picture or model a bust. - nor the sculptor or painter to design a mansion: but each should understand the great principles of the sister arts, and know how, or in what way, they are identical with those of his own, and be able to trace the analogy and relations of the various productions of genius, He does not thoroughly understand the principles of his own art, unless he sees their universal application.

A study of the laws of art, generally, would not enable the same man to write an epic,com-pose an overture, and design a palace, but it would be attended with advantages sufficienta glance to which of the arts any given subject was best fitted, and prevent a painter taking one that was more suited, or perhaps only suited to a poem; or a sculptor attempting to illustrate, by his chisel, one that required the superior resources of painting to express. Many failures have Lad their source in ignorance or inattention on this head. There are necessary limitations to each of the arts: their scope is various. Painting is more confined than poetry, and sculpture than either. Of the five several arts, poetry is the most excellent - the most comprehensive: the poet has the longest line, the widest range. Ideas can be expressed in poetry, that cannot be adequately expressed otherwise. - by any other of the arts. S. H.