d'argent, l'Age de fer_. Above is a pediment from which Christ presides
over this human panorama. But this is where this great genius has the
same intuition as you had: each of the three parts bears the name of a
hero--Adam, Orpheus, and Cain, and each one represents three periods.
Now, the periods of the golden age are called Ecstasy, Prayer, and
Sleep, while the periods of the silver age are called Inspiration, Song,
and Tears.

Ecstasy is the same as Grace, because the picture shows Adam and Eve in
the purity of their souls, in a scene of flowers, and in the enjoyment
of divine contemplation. The harmony of Nature itself urges them on in
their impulse towards God.

In the silver age, Inspiration is still Grace, but just beginning to be
complicated by human artifice. The poet Orpheus perpetually contemplates
God, but the Muse is always at his elbow, the symbol of human art is
already born; and that great human manifestation of God, Song, brings
with it grief and tears.

Following out the cycle and coming to human evil, Gustave Moreau shows
the iron age--Cain condemned to labour and sorrow.

This work shows that the divine moment may be seized, but is fugitive
and can never remain with man. It explains our failures. People say that
the picture is too literary, but it touches the heart of those who wish
to break through the ice with which all human expression is chilled.

Undoubtedly Rembrandt was the Poet of genius _par excellence_, at the
same time as he was pure Painter. But let us grant that ours is a less
rich time, our temperaments less universal; and let us recognise the