 The French revolution had shown the romantics both the value of a republic based on liberty, equality and fraternity, but also the dangers of anarchism and strife that revolutions carry with them. The proper path to a republic, they thought, is not through a revolutionary act, but through proper education. Art does not only offer a model for a harmonious, cultivated soul, but is also the best medium through which to achieve the moral education that leads to this harmony and, on its basis, to the best republic. Attending to art (as well as producing it) is a form of self-cultivation because the spirit of art allows human beings to transcend baseness (a particular danger given modern instrumentalism and materialism), and to develop their humanity. 