“Now translate this technical system into spiritual terms; you will then recognize that antique art signifies contentment, calm, grace, balance, reason.” Rodin cast a glance at his figure. “I could carry it further,” he said, “but it would be only to amuse us, because, as it stands, it has sufficed me for my demonstration. The details, moreover, would add very little to it. And now, by the way, an important truth. When the planes of a figure are well placed, with decision and intelligence, all is done, so to speak; the whole effect is obtained; the refinements which come after might please the spectator, but they are almost superfluous. This science of planes is common to all great epochs; it is almost ignored to-day.” Pushing aside the clay figure, he went on: “Now I will do you another after Michael Angelo.” He did not proceed at all in the same way as for the first. He turned the two legs of the figure to the same side and the torso to the opposite side. He bent the body forward; he folded one arm close against the body and placed the other behind the head. The attitude thus evoked offered a strange appearance of effort and of torture. Rodin had fashioned this sketch as quickly as the preceding one, only crushing his balls of clay with more vigor and putting almost frenzy into the strokes of his thumb. “There!” he cried. “What do you think of it?” “I should take it for a copy of a Michael Angelo—or rather for a replica of one of his works. What vigor, what tension of the muscles!” “Now! Follow my explanation. Here, instead of four planes, you have only two; one for the upper half of the statuette and the other, opposed, for the lower half. This gives at once a sense of violence and of constraint—and the result is a striking contrast to the calm of the antiques. “Both legs are bent, and consequently the weight of the body is divided between the two instead of being borne exclusively by one. So there is no repose here, but work for both the lower limbs. “Besides, the hip corresponding to the leg which bears the lesser weight is the one which is the more raised, which indicates that the body is pushing this way. “Nor is the torso less animated. Instead of resting quietly, as in the antique, on the most prominent hip, it, on the contrary, raises the shoulder on the same side so as to continue the movement of the hip. [Illustration: A CAPTIVE By Michael Angelo ]