Three or four years have elapsed since the state of nature, to which I
have referred, was brought to an end, so far as a small patch of the
soil is concerned, by the intervention of man. The patch was cut off
from the rest by a wall; within the area thus protected, the native
vegetation was, as far as possible, extirpated; while a colony of
strange plants was imported and set down in its place. In short, it
was made into a garden. At the present time, this artificially treated
area presents an aspect extraordinarily different from that of so much
of the land as remains in the state of nature, outside the wall.
Trees, shrubs, and herbs, many of them appertaining to the state of
nature of remote parts of the globe, abound and flourish. Moreover,
considerable quantities of vegetables, fruits, and flowers are
produced, of kinds which neither now exist, nor have ever existed,
except under conditions such as obtain in the garden; and which,
therefore, are as much works of the art of man as the frames and
glasshouses in which some of them are raised. That the "state of Art,"
thus created in the state of nature by man, is sustained by and
dependent on him, would at once become [10] apparent, if the watchful
supervision of the gardener were withdrawn, and the antagonistic
influences of the general cosmic process were no longer sedulously
warded off, or counteracted. The walls and gates would decay;
quadrupedal and bipedal intruders would devour and tread down the
useful and beautiful plants; birds, insects, blight, and mildew would
work their will; the seeds of the native plants, carried by winds or
other agencies, would immigrate, and in virtue of their long-earned
special adaptation to the local conditions, these despised native
weeds would soon choke their choice exotic rivals. A century or two
hence, little beyond the foundations of the wall and of the houses and
frames would be left, in evidence of the victory of the cosmic powers
at work in the state of nature, over the temporary obstacles to their
supremacy, set up by the art of the horticulturist.
It will be admitted that the garden is as much a work of art,* or
artifice, as anything that can be mentioned. The energy localised in
certain human bodies, directed by similarly localised intellects, has
produced a collocation of other material bodies which could not be
brought about in the state of nature. The same proposition is true of
all the
* The sense of the term "Art" is becoming narrowed; "work of
Art" to most people means a picture, a statue, or a piece of
bijouterie; by way of compensation "artist" has included in its
wide embrace cooks and ballet girls, no less than painters and
sculptors.
[11] works of man's hands, from a flint implement to a cathedral or a
chronometer; and it is because it is true, that we call these things
artificial, term them works of art, or artifice, by way of
distinguishing them from the products of the cosmic process, working
outside man, which we call natural, or works of nature. The
distinction thus drawn between the works of nature and those of man,
is universally recognized; and it is, as I conceive, both useful and
justifiable.