CALLING OSCAR WILDE'S philosophy of art his "most elusive legacy," Brown attempts to define Wilde's conception of what art is and what it is not, of what the experience of art means in the modern world, and of the contradictory relations between the work of art and the sphere of everyday ethics. She traces the experimental character of Wilde's thought from its resonance in his own life through …
Returning from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, St. Francis finds the order of humble friars, which he had founded, has grown so tremendously that now over 6,000 monks consider themselves "Franciscans." But St. Francis is appalled to find that with this apparent success came a total rejection of his original vision which this thriving community of friars regarded as outmoded and unsuited for the…