He cannot, like the painter, give us any background, he cannot make his hero move as on the theater stage.

The marble statue makes the one position of the hero everlasting, but this is so selected that all the chance aspects and fleeting gestures of the real man appear insignificant compared with the one most expressive and most characteristic position which is chosen.
However far this selection of the essential traits removes the artistic creation from the mere imitative reproduction of the world, a much greater distance from reality results from a second need if the work is to fulfill the purposes of art.

We saw that we have art only when the work is isolated, that is, when it fulfills every demand in itself and does not point beyond itself.

This can be done only if it is sharply set off from the sphere of our practical interests.

Whatever enters into our practical sphere links itself with our impulses to real action and the action would involve a change, an intrusion, an influence from without.
As long as we have the desire to change anything, the work is not complete in itself.