rational Idealism sees all these things,
but it sees also not only appearances
but potentialities; or, to recall another
of Goethe's phrases, it sees the object
whole.

To see life clearly and to see it
whole is not only to see distinctly the
obvious facts of life, but to see these
facts in sequence and order; in other
words, to explain and interpret them.
The power to do this is one of the
signs of a great imagination; and, other
things being equal, the rank of a
work of art may, in the last analysis,
be determined by the clearness and
veracity with which explanation and
interpretation are suggested. Homer
is, for this reason, the foremost writer
of the Greek race. He is wholly free
from any purpose to give ethical in-
struction; he is absolutely delivered
from the temptation to didacticism;

[[255]]

p254 _ -chap- _ toc-1 _ p255w _ toc-2 _ +chap+ _ p256

v?