characteristic may limit the beautiful, and finally extend even to hideousness, in the drunken Silenus, in the Faun, &c. If the characteristic goes so far as actually to annul the character of the species, if it extends to the unnatural, it becomes caricature. But we can far less afford to allow grace to be interfered with by what is characteristic than even beauty, for graceful position and movement are demanded for the expression of the character also; but yet it must be achieved in the way which is most fitting, appropriate, and easy for the person. This will be observed, not only by the sculptor and the painter, but also by every good actor; otherwise caricature will appear here also as grimace or distortion. In sculpture, beauty and grace are the principal concern. The special character of the mind, appearing in emotion, passion, alternations of knowing and willing, which can only be represented by the expression of the countenance and the gestures, is the peculiar sphere of _painting_. For although eyes and colour, which lie outside the province of sculpture, contribute much to beauty, they are yet far more essential to character. Further, beauty unfolds itself more completely when it is contemplated from various points of view; but the expression, the character, can only be completely comprehended from _one_ point of view. Because beauty is obviously the chief aim of sculpture, Lessing tried to explain the fact that the _Laocoon does not cry out_, by saying that crying out is incompatible with beauty. The Laocoon formed for Lessing the theme, or at least the text of a work of his own, and both before and after him a great deal has been written on the subject. I may therefore be allowed to express my views about it in passing, although so special a discussion does not properly belong to the scheme of this work, which is throughout concerned with what is general.