lies before them, and whose development, as actual manifestation of that contradiction between this very loftiness and that particularity, spirituality, and sensuous existence classical art itself sets face to face with its final overthrow. (_c_) If we ask ourselves, then, _thirdly_, what is the nature of the external representation, which is adequate to this notion of the classic Ideal we have just indicated, we shall find in this connection, too, that the essential points of view have already in our general consideration of the Ideal been furnished us with considerable detail. We have consequently here only further to remark, that in the genuine classic Ideal the spiritual individuality of the gods is not conceived in their relation to something else, or brought about by virtue of their particularity in conflict, and battle, but rather is made visible in their eternal self-tranquillity, in this painfulness of the godlike peace itself. The determinate character is not, therefore, made active in the way that it stimulated the gods to the sense of particular emotions and passions, or compelled them to adopt specific aims of conduct. On the contrary, it is precisely out of that collision and development, nay, out of that very relation to the finite and all that is essentially discordant that they are brought back to that condition of pure self-absorption. This repose in its most austere severity, not inflexible, cold, or dead, but sensitive and immutable, is the highest and most adequate form of representation for the classic gods. When they make their appearance consequently in specific situations, it is not necessary that there should be conditions or actions which give rise to conflicts, but rather such which, as themselves harmless, so, too, leave the gods in a like condition. It is, therefore, sculpture which among the arts is above all adapted to portray the classic Ideal in its simple self-possession, in which what is rather the universal divinity receives more obvious emphasis than the particular character. Chiefly it is the more ancient and more austere type of sculpture which maintains its firm hold of this aspect of the Ideal, and only in the later forms we find a movement towards increased dramatic vividness of situations and characterization. Poetry, on the contrary, ranges the gods in vigorous action, that is, in an attitude of negation to a definite mode of life, and brings them thereby into conflict and strife. The repose of plastic art, where it remains in the sphere which is uniquely its own, can only express the aforesaid negative phase of spirit face to face with particular facts in that serious strain of melancholy, which we have already attempted to define more nearly. 2. THE SPHERE OF THE PARTICULAR GODS