omne tulit punctum qui miscuit utile dulci._"[15] Thus looked at, the office of the poet was confounded with that of the orator, for he too was a practical man aiming at practical effects; hence there arose discussions as to whether Virgil was to be considered as a poet or as an orator ("_Virgilius poeta an orator?_"). To both was assigned the triple end of _delectare, movere, docere_; in any case this tripartition was very empirical, for we clearly perceive that the _delectare_ is here a means-and the _docere_ a simple part of the _movere_: to move in the direction of the good, and therefore, among other goods, towards that of instruction. In like manner, it was said of the orator and poet (recording the meretricious basis of their task, and with a metaphor significant in its _naïveté_) that they were bound to avail themselves of the _allurements_ (_lenocinium_) of form. [Sidenote: _Mystical æsthetic in antiquity._] The mystical view, which considers art as a special mode of self-beatification, of entering into relation with the Absolute, with the Summum Bonum, with the ultimate root of things, appeared only in late antiquity, almost at the entrance to the Middle Ages. Its representative is the founder of the neo-Platonic school, Plotinus. It is strange that Plato should be usually selected as the founder and head of this æsthetic tendency, and that for this very reason to him should be attributed the honour of being the father of Æsthetic. But how could he, who had expounded with such great limpidity and clearness the reasons for which he was not able to accord to art a high place among the activities of the spirit, be credited with having accorded to it one of the highest places, equal, if not superior, to philosophy itself? This misunderstanding has evidently arisen out of the enthusiastic effusions about the Beautiful that we read in the _Gorgias,_ the _Philebus,_ the _Phædrus,_ the _Symposium,_ and other Platonic dialogues. It is well to dissipate it by declaring that the _Beauty_ of which Plato discourses has nothing to do with art or with _artistic beauty._ [Sidenote: _Investigations as to the Beautiful._]