The writer does not mean to suggest that these systems are set up for the purpose of being knocked down: he desires only to indicate surprise that in new works dealing with the perception of beauty, it is considered necessary to restate the old æsthetic theories and to point out their drawbacks, albeit the fatal objections to them are so numerous that there is always fresh ground available for destructive criticism. The best of the recent works on the subject that have come under the notice of the writer, is E. F. Carritt's review of the present position in respect of æsthetic systems. Though profound, he is so comprehensive that he leaves little or nothing of importance for succeeding critics to say till the next system is put forward. Yet here is his conclusion[a]: If any point can be thought to have emerged from the foregoing considerations, it is this: that in the history of æsthetics we may discover a growing pressure of emphasis upon the doctrine that all beauty is the expression of what may be generally called emotion, and that all such expression is beautiful. This is all that an acute investigator can draw from the sum of the æsthetic systems advanced. Now what does this mean? Let us turn to the last page of Carritt's book and find the object of the search after a satisfactory æsthetic system. It is, he says, "the desire to understand goodness and beauty and their relations with each other or with knowledge, as well as to practise or enjoy them." If we accept beauty as the expression of emotion, how far have we progressed towards the indicated goal? Not a step, for we have only agreed upon a new way of stating an obvious condition which applies to the animal world as well as to human beings. Beyond this there is nothing--not a glimpse of sunshine from all the æsthetic systems laid down since the time of Baumgarten. More than twenty years ago Leo Tolstoy pointed out the unintelligible character of these systems, but no further light has been thrown upon them. Nevertheless Tolstoy's own interpretation of the significance of beauty cannot possibly meet with general approval. He disputes that art is directly associated with beauty or pleasure, and finds in fact that what we call the beautiful representation of nature is not necessarily art, but that[b] Art is a human activity, consisting in this, that one man consciously, by means of certain external signs, hands on to others feelings he has lived through, and that other people are affected by these feelings, and also experience them.