THE ANCIENT ABBEY OF AJANTA 93
The best answer to the suggestion lies in the extraordinary difference between the two forms of art.
The art of the Greek world was concerned almost
entirely with the human form. The horse, indeed,
with the deer, the eagle, and the palm-tree, are not
altogether unknown to it. But it is remarkable for
the absence of any strong feeling for vegetative
beauty, or for the animal world as a whole. Now
it is precisely in these two elements that the populations of the Gandharan country were and are to
this day strongest. Severe chastity and restraint of
the decorative instinct is the mark of Greece. Exuberance is the characteristic, on the other hand,
of Oriental art. It revels in invention. Its fertility
of flower and foliage is unbounded. Being of the
nature of high art, it knows indeed how to submit
itself to curbing forces. The highest achievement
of the Eastern arts of decoration, whether Chinese
or Persian, Tibetan or Kajhmirian, or Indian proper,
often seems to lie in the supreme temperance and
distinction with which they are used. But the
power of hydra-headed productivity is there. In
Greece and Rome it is altogether lacking Thus
to say that the art of Gandhara was due to elements
in the population which were of Hellenic descent is
absurd. There was never in it the slightest sign of
any wedding of East and West in a single blended
product, such as this theory presupposes. We
can always pick out the elements in its compositions that are unassimilated of the West, as
well as those that are unassimilated of the East,
