9 
The root, the stalk and the flower of the lily show the progress 
of purity to its symbolic bloom. 
♦ 
♦ ♦ 
All bodies are equal before the light and their modifications 
come from this luminous power which moulds them according 
to its will. 
We do not know all the colours, and each man invents new 
ones. 
But the painter must, above all, become himself the spectator 
of his own divinity, and the pictures which he offers to the 
admiration of men will confer upon them also the glory of 
exercising for the moment their own divinity. 
For this it is necessary to embrace at a glance the past, pres 
ent and future. 
The canvas should present that essential unity which alone can 
produce ecstacy. 
Then, nothing transient will be dashed off at random. We 
will not suddenly be turning backwards. Free spectators, we 
will not give up our life because of our curiosity. The salt 
smugglers of appearances will not be able to pass our statues 
of salt before the custom house of reason. 
We will not go astray in the unknown future, which, separated 
from eternity, is only a word designed to tempt man. 
We will not exhaust ourselves seizing the too fugitive present, 
for fashion after all can only be for the artist the mask of death. 
♦ 
♦ ♦ 
The picture will exist inevitably. The vision will be entire, 
complete, and its infinity, instead of marking an imperfection, 
will only bring out the relation between a new creature and a 
new creator, only this and nothing more. Otherwise there will 
be no unity, and the connection which the different points of the 
canvas have with different geniuses, with different objects, with 
different lights, will show only a multiplicity of inharmonious 
dissimilarities. 
For, if there can be an infinite number of creatures, each one 
attesting its creator, with no creation to block the extent of those