III. As in literature, so in what have been denominated by scholars the _Fine Arts_. The past fifty years has not produced a painter, sculptor, or composer, who ranks above mediocrity in their respective vocations. Canova and Thorwaldsen were the last of their race; Sir Joshua Reynolds left no successor, and the immortal Beethoven has been superseded by negro minstrelsy and senseless pantomime. The greatest architect of the age is a railroad contractor, and the first dramatist a cobbler of French farces. IV. But whilst the highest faculty of the mind--the imagination--has been left uncultivated, and has produced no worthy fruit, the next highest, the casual, or the one that deals with causes and effects, has been stimulated into the most astonishing fertility. Our age ignores fancy, and deals exclusively with fact. Within its chosen range it stands far, very far pre-eminent over all that have preceded it. It reaps the fruit of Bacon's labors. It utilizes all that it touches. It stands thoughtfully on the field of Waterloo, and estimates scientifically the manuring properties of bones and blood. It disentombs the mummy of Thotmes II, sells the linen bandages for the manufacture of paper, burns the asphaltum-soaked body for firewood, and plants the pint of red wheat found in his sarcophagus, to try an agricultural experiment. It deals in no sentimentalities; it has no appreciation of the sublime. It stands upon the ocean shore, but with its eyes fixed on the yellow sand searching for gold. It confronts Niagara, and, gazing with rapture at its misty shroud, exclaims, in an ecstasy of admiration, "Lord, what a place to sponge a coat!" Having no soul to save, it has no religion to save it. It has discovered that Mohammed was a great benefactor of his race, and that Jesus Christ was, after all, a mere man; distinguished, it is true, for his benevolence, his fortitude and his morality, but for nothing else. It does not believe in the Pope, nor in the Church, nor in the Bible. It ridicules the infallibility of the first, the despotism of the second, and the chronology of the third. It is possessed of the very spirit of Thomas; it must "touch and handle" before it will believe. It questions the existence of spirit, because it cannot be analyzed by chemical solvents; it questions the existence of hell, because it has never been scorched; it questions the existence of God, because it has never beheld Him.