It is in his pictures, replete with exquisiteness, that one finds the true analogy to lyric poetry. This lyricism makes them seem mostly Greek--often I have thought them Persian, sometimes again, Indian; certainly he learned something from the Chinese in their porcelains and in their embroidery. I am sure he has been fond of these outer influences, these Oriental suggestions which were for him the spiritual equivalent from the past for his spontaneous ideas, for he, too, had much of all this magic, as he had much of the hypnotic quality of jewelry and precious stones in all his so delicate pictures, firelike in their subtle brilliancy. They have always seemed to contain this suggestion for me: flowers that seemed to be much more the embodiment of jades, rubies, emeralds, and ambers, than just flowers from the common garden. His flamelike touches have always held this preciousness: notations rather for the courtly robe or diadem than just drawings. All this gift of goldsmithery comes as one would expect, quite naturally, from his powers as an engraver, in which art he held a first place in his time and was the master of the younger school, especially in Belgium and Germany. Of all the painters of this time it is certain he was first among them essaying to picture the jewelled loveliness of nature; it is most evident in La Touche who was in no way averse to Renoir either, but Redon has created this touch for himself and it is the touch of the virtuoso. Perhaps it would have been well if Moreau, who had a sicker love of this type of expression, had followed Redon more closely, as he might then have added a little more lustre to these very dead literary failures of his. I cannot now say who else beside Ferdinand Khnopff has been influenced greatly by him, but I do know that he was beloved by the more modern men, that he was revered by all regardless of theories or tenets, for there is in existence somewhere in Paris a volume of letters and testimonials celebrating some anniversary of Redon in proof of it. And I think that--regardless of ideas--the artist must always find him sympathetic, if for no other reason than that he was the essence of refinement, of delicacy, and of taste. When I think of Redon I think of Shelley a little, "he is dusty with tumbling about among the stars," and I think somewhat, too, of some phrases in Debussy and his unearthly school of musicians, for if we are among those who admire sturdier things in art we can still love the fine gift of purity. And of all gifts Redon has that, certainly.