Skip to main content

Full text of "The works of John Ruskin"

See other formats 


Google 


This  is  a  digital  copy  of  a  book  that  was  preserved  for  generations  on  library  shelves  before  it  was  carefully  scanned  by  Google  as  part  of  a  project 

to  make  the  world's  books  discoverable  online. 

It  has  survived  long  enough  for  the  copyright  to  expire  and  the  book  to  enter  the  public  domain.  A  public  domain  book  is  one  that  was  never  subject 

to  copyright  or  whose  legal  copyright  term  has  expired.  Whether  a  book  is  in  the  public  domain  may  vary  country  to  country.  Public  domain  books 

are  our  gateways  to  the  past,  representing  a  wealth  of  history,  culture  and  knowledge  that's  often  difficult  to  discover. 

Marks,  notations  and  other  maiginalia  present  in  the  original  volume  will  appear  in  this  file  -  a  reminder  of  this  book's  long  journey  from  the 

publisher  to  a  library  and  finally  to  you. 

Usage  guidelines 

Google  is  proud  to  partner  with  libraries  to  digitize  public  domain  materials  and  make  them  widely  accessible.  Public  domain  books  belong  to  the 
public  and  we  are  merely  their  custodians.  Nevertheless,  this  work  is  expensive,  so  in  order  to  keep  providing  tliis  resource,  we  liave  taken  steps  to 
prevent  abuse  by  commercial  parties,  including  placing  technical  restrictions  on  automated  querying. 
We  also  ask  that  you: 

+  Make  non-commercial  use  of  the  files  We  designed  Google  Book  Search  for  use  by  individuals,  and  we  request  that  you  use  these  files  for 
personal,  non-commercial  purposes. 

+  Refrain  fivm  automated  querying  Do  not  send  automated  queries  of  any  sort  to  Google's  system:  If  you  are  conducting  research  on  machine 
translation,  optical  character  recognition  or  other  areas  where  access  to  a  large  amount  of  text  is  helpful,  please  contact  us.  We  encourage  the 
use  of  public  domain  materials  for  these  purposes  and  may  be  able  to  help. 

+  Maintain  attributionTht  GoogXt  "watermark"  you  see  on  each  file  is  essential  for  in  forming  people  about  this  project  and  helping  them  find 
additional  materials  through  Google  Book  Search.  Please  do  not  remove  it. 

+  Keep  it  legal  Whatever  your  use,  remember  that  you  are  responsible  for  ensuring  that  what  you  are  doing  is  legal.  Do  not  assume  that  just 
because  we  believe  a  book  is  in  the  public  domain  for  users  in  the  United  States,  that  the  work  is  also  in  the  public  domain  for  users  in  other 
countries.  Whether  a  book  is  still  in  copyright  varies  from  country  to  country,  and  we  can't  offer  guidance  on  whether  any  specific  use  of 
any  specific  book  is  allowed.  Please  do  not  assume  that  a  book's  appearance  in  Google  Book  Search  means  it  can  be  used  in  any  manner 
anywhere  in  the  world.  Copyright  infringement  liabili^  can  be  quite  severe. 

About  Google  Book  Search 

Google's  mission  is  to  organize  the  world's  information  and  to  make  it  universally  accessible  and  useful.   Google  Book  Search  helps  readers 
discover  the  world's  books  while  helping  authors  and  publishers  reach  new  audiences.  You  can  search  through  the  full  text  of  this  book  on  the  web 

at|http: //books  .google  .com/I 


r 


HARVARD  UNIVERSITY 


FOGG  ART  MUSEUM 


¥ 


■        •    k — ^" 


THE    COMPLETE 
WORKS    OF 

JOHN    RUSKIN 


Ikpo  tho/iua/nd  anid  sia^ty-two  copies  of  thix 
edUiofi — of  which  two  thousand  are  for  sale  in 
England  and  America — have  beeti  printed  at  the 
BaUantyne  Prees^  Edinburgh^  and  the  type  has 
been  disfrihiUed, 


LIBRARr    EDITION 

THE  WORKS  OF 

JOHN    RUSKIN 

BDITBD    By 

E.   T.    COOK 

AND 

ALEXANDER  WEDDERBURN 


LONDON 

GEORGE  ALLEN,  156,  CHARING  CROSS  ROAD 

NEW  YORK :  LONGMANS,  GREEN,  AND  CO. 

■905 


V 


-////    rights    ruervid 


LIBRARY    EDITION 


VOLUME  XX 


LECTURES  ON  ART 

AND 

ARATRA    PENTELICI 

WITH  LECTURES  AND  NOTES 
ON  GREEK  ART  AND  MYTHOLOGY 

1870 


LECTURES  ON  ART 


AND 


ARATRA    PENTELICI 


WITH  LECTURES  AND  NOTES 
ON  GREEK  ART  AND  MYTHOLOGY 


1870 


BY 

JOHN    RUSKIN 


LONDON 
GEORGE  ALLEN,  156,  CHARING  CROSS  ROAD 

NEW  YORK :  LONGMANS,  GREEN,  AND  CO. 

1905 


CONTENTS  OF   VOLUME    XX 

PAOX 

List  of  Illustrations xiii 

Introduction  to  this  Volume xvii 

Part  I.  ''Lectures  on  Art"  (Inaugural  Course  Delivered  at 
Oxford  in  Hilary  Term>  1870): — 

bibliographical  note .5 

contents 11 

PREFACE  TO  THE   EDITION    OF    1887 13 

TEXT   (of  ALL  THE   EDITIONS) 17 

Part  II.  "  Aratra  Pentelici  "  (Six  Lectures  on  the  Elements 
OF  Sculpture,  Delivered  at  Oxford  in  Michaelmas 
Term,  1870):— 

bibuographical  note 185 

contents 191 

PREFACB 193 

199 


(Added  in  this  Edition) 

''the  school  of  Florence":  being  the  concluding  lecture 

OF  the  course  on  sculpture S55 

APPENDIX 

LECTURES  AND  NOTES  FOR  LECTURES  ON  GREEK 

ART  AND  MYTHOLOGY 

(1870) 

I.  ''The    Story    of    Arachne":     a    Lecture    Delivered    at 

Woolwich,  December  13,  1870 37 

II.  ''  The  Tortoise  of  Aegina  " :   an  Undelivered   Lecture  in 

Continuation  of  "Aratra  Pentelici"    .  .        .381 

IZ 


X  CONTENTS 

PAOB 

III.  "The  Riders  of  Tahentum" 890 

IV.  "The  Eagle  or  Elis" 398 

(Notes  for  intended  Lectures  in  the  same  Connexion) 


V.  Greek   and   Christian    Art:   as   affected   by   the    Idea   of 

Immortauty  403 

VI.  Some    Characteristics    of     Greek     Art    in     relation     to 

Christian 407 


The  Volume  also  contains  the  following  Minor  Ruskiniana: — 

Extract  from  a  Lettbr  to  his  Father  (May  22^  1846)  on  the  Duomo 

OF  Pisa 236 


Lbttbrs  on  his  Apfointmbmt  as  Phofbbsor  at  Oxford  : — 
to  acland  (oigssbach,  august  19^  1869)    • 

to   LIDDEIiL   (dRNUARK   HILL,   SEPTEMBER   2,    1869) 

Letter  to  Mrs.  Cowper-Tbmple  (Pisa^  July  1,  1870)     . 
LnTER  to  W.  H.  Harbison  (Airolo^  July  8^  1870) 
Lettbr  to  Acland  on  '^Aratra  Pentblici"  (1870) 


xuc 

XX 

m 

.      liv 
.     Mi 


Letter  to  Acijlnd  on  the  Hincksby  Diooings  (Herne  Hill,  March  28, 

1874) xli 

Letters  and  Extracts  from  Letters  to  his  Mother  (1870): — 

HIB   first  oxford  LECTURE  (FEBRUARY   8) XXi 

HIS  SECOND  LECTURB  (FEBRUARY   16)    .                                                           .           .  xlvii 

ANOTHER  LECTURE  (FEBRUARY) XXViH 

A  DINNER    WITH   JOWBTT   (mARCH) XXX 

REACTION   (mARTIGNY,   MAY   13) 1 

THB  REDEMPTION   OF  THB  MOUNTAINS   (mARTIGNY,   MAY   13)  ...  1 

SUNRISE  ON   THE  JURA  (OBNBVA,   APRIL   30) 1 

SWITZERLAND   REVISITED  (OBNEVA>    MAY   1) 1 

THE  FLOWBRS   OF   VBVAY   (mAY   7,    S) 1 

A  profebsor's  rbbponbibilitibb  (milan,  may  21)  1 

AT  THB  ARMENIAN   CONVBNT  (vENICE,   JUNB   19) U 

DRAWING   AT   VENICE  (mAY  30)        ........  11 

PROPOSED     LBOTURBB     ON     TINTORBT    (VBNICE,    JUNB     13  ;      FLORENCE, 

JUNE  21) li 

FRA   FILIPPO   LIPPI   (SIBNA,   JUNE   25) Hi! 

THE  FIRB-FUBB  OF  SIENA  (jUNB  26) liv 


CONTENTS  xi 

Minor  Ruskiniana:   Continued: — 

PAOB 

Lbttbr  to  Prinob  Leopold  (Oxford^  Mat  8^  1871)  ....  xxxv 

Extracts  from  Ruskin's  Diarirb  (1872,  1874) : — 

tired  and  ill  (januart  29,  1872) xvu 

HIS  MANY   IRONS  (fBRRUARY    12,    1872) XVil 

AT   THE  DIOOINOe   (OGTORER   27   AND  NOVBMRBR   2,    1874)  xlli  tl. 

Conversations  with  Ruskin  : — 

ON   his  oxford  LBOTfTRBB  (wiTH   M.    H.    SPIELMANN,   1884)    .  .     Xxli 

ON   PRINCE  LEOPOLD  (wiTH   M.    H.    8PIBLMANN,    1884)     .  XXXVl 

Reminucbncbb  of  Ruskin  : — 

HIS  OXFORD  lectures:    BT   dean   KITCHIN XXUi 

„  „  BY   THB   REV.   H.    O.    WOOD»         ....    XXlu 

y,  „  BY    W.    H.    MALLOCK Xxiv 

,>  „  BT   AN   AMERICAN   STUDENT         ....    XXiv 

AN   ETON  lecture:    BY  OSCAR   BROWNING XXV 

RUSKIN  AT  CORPUS :  BY  J.  w.  ODDiE    .  .  XXX,  xxxi,  xxxvii,  xxxviii 

,,  y,  BY   C.    PLUMMER XXXVIU 

„  ,,  BY   MAX   MftliLER XXXVU,  XXXVili 

„  ,y         BY  ^'  PETER "...    xxxiv,  xxxvii,  xxxviii|  xl 

AN   APPRECIATION  I   BY   PRINCE   LEOPOLD XXXVi 

THB   HINCKSEY   DIGGINGS  :    BY   DEAN   KITCHIN xH 

„                                 y,               BY   A.    WHDDERBURN      ....     xlil^  xlili 
RUSKIN  AT  SIENA  !   BY   PROFESSOR   NORTON liu 

ruskin  and  jowett  :  by  e.  abbott  and  l.  campbell  .    xxx 

Lbttbrs  to  Mrs.  Arthur  Severn  : —  . 

THE  amenities  OF  OXFORD  (dbcember  6,  1873) xxxH 

THB  embarrassments   OF  OXFORD  (1871) xl 

Letter  to  Alexander  Wedderburn  on  the  Hincksey  Diggings  (Asbisi, 
June  24,  1874)       .  xUii 


LIST    OF    ILLUSTRATIONS 


Portrait  of  thb  Author  {Photogravure  from  the  fvood- 

cut  by  H.  S,   Uklrich) Frontispiece 

PLATES 

PlAfM 

A.  The  Rubkin  Road  at  Hincksby  {Photogravure  from 
a  woodcut  m  the  *'  Graphic,"  and  from  a  photo- 
graph)       7  0  f  (fee  page  xliii 


IN   "LECTURES  ON   ART 


ft 


B.  Swiss   Bridge,   Mont  St.   Gothard  {Photogravure 

from  the  unpublished  plate  for  Turner's  *'  Uber 
Studiorum")       .  .         .  •        m       >>      15^ 

C.  The  Etching   for  the  Same  {Line  Block  reduced 

from  a  copy  6y  George  Allen)  .         .  •       ^j       >>      1^6 


IN   "ARATRA   PENTELICI 


»» 


I.  Porch  of  San  Zenone,  Verona  {Photogravure  from 

a  photograph) yy       *»      ^14 

II.  The    Arbthusa    of    Syracuse   {Photogravure   from 

Greek  coini) *         >       99       $,      21^ 

III.  The  Warning  to  the  Kings:  San  Zrnone,  Verona 

( Wood  Engraving  bjf  H.  S,  Uhlrich,  from  a  draw- 
ing by  A.  Burgees) a       >t      216 

IV.  The  Greek  Type  of  Athena  {Wood  Engraving  by 

A.  Burgess,  from  a  Greek  vase)  '       a       a      242 

V.  Triptolemus    in    his    Car    {Wood    Engraving    by 

A.  Burgess,  from  a  Greek  vase)  •       >*       n      243 

VI.  The    Nativity   op    Athena    {Wood   Engraving   by 
H.  S.   Uhlrich,  printed  in  colours,  from  a  Greek 

vase) >9       f>      248 

zui 


xiv  LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 

VII.  Tomb  or  the  Dooes  Jacopo  and  Lorenzo  Tie- 
polo  {Photogravure  from  a  photograph)       .         To  face  page  252 

VIII.  Archaic,  Central,  and  Declining  Art  of  Greece 

(Photogravure  from  Greek  coins)  -an      280 

IX.  The  Apollo   of  Syracuse,  and  the  Self-made 
Man  {Photogrwmre  from  a   Greek  coin,  and 
from  a  droning  6y  Charles  Keene)  •       »       m      294 

X.  Apollo    Chrysocomes     of    CLAzoMBNiB    {Photo- 

graoure  from  a  Greek  coin)    .  *       »       99      295 

XI.  Marble  Masonry  in  the  Duomo  of  Verona 
{Wood  Engraving  hy  H,  S.  Uhlrich,  from  a 
drawing  htf  A,  Burgess)  .         .         .        „       „      514 

XII.  The  First  Elements  of  Sculpture:  Incised 
Outunb  and  Opened  Space  {Wood  Engrav- 
ing by  H,  S.  Uhlrich,  after  a  drawing  hy  the 
author) w       «      315 

XIII.  Branch   or    Phillyrea    {Steel  Engraving  by   G, 

Allen,  from  a  dranAng  by  the  author)  -       a       93      325 

XIV.  Aphrodite  Thalassia  {Photogravure  of  an  early 

Florentine  engraving)       ....   Between  pp.  SS6,  337 

XV.  Aphrodite  Urania  {Photogravure  from  a  Greek 

vase) „      836, 337 

XVI.  Greek  Flat  Reuef,  and  Sculpture  by  Edged 
Incision  {Photogravure  from  a  drawing  by  A. 
Burgess,  from  the  Frieze  of  the  Parthenon)      To  face  page  326 

XVII.  Apollo  and  the  Python,  and  Heracles  and 
the  Nbmean  Lion  {Photogravure  from  Greek 
coins) n       „      339 

XVIII.  Hera  of  Aroos,  Zeus  of  Syracuse,  Dbmetbr 
op  Messene,  and  Hera  of  Cnossus  {Photo- 
gravure from  Greek  coins)       .  .         •        >i       ,>      340 

^\/  XIX.  "  The  Siren  Ligeia  "  {Photogravure  from  a  study 

by  the  author  of  a  Greek  coin)       .         .         »        ,9       n      342 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS  xv 

FIiATI 

XX.  Artbmu  of  Syracuse,  Athena  of  Thurium, 
AND  Hera  of  the  Lacinian  Cape  (Photo- 
grmmre  Jrom  Greek  coins)      .        ,         .         To  face  page  344 

XXI.  Zeus  of   Messene,  and   Ajax  of  Opus  {Photo- 
gravure ffwn  Greek  coins)  >       ),       n      '^^^ 

XXII.  Greek  and  Barbarian  Sculpture  (Photogravure 

from  a  Greek  coin  aud  a  carved  Indian  bull)       „       „      S49 

XXIII.  The  Beginnings  of  Chivalry  (Photogravure  from 

Greek  coins) „       „      351 

IN  THE  SCHOOL  OF  FLORENCE" 

^      D.  The   Griffin  of  Verona  (Photogravure  from  a 

drawing  by  Ruskin) y,       „      362 

'\y    E.  The    Lioness    of    Siena    (Photogramre  from    a 

drawing  by  Ruskin)  •       »       >?      S6S 

IN   THE  APPENDIX 

F.  The    Riders    of    Tarentum    and    other   Coins 

(Photogravure  from  Greek  coins)     .         .         >       n       n      396 

G.  Italian    Type    of    Eagle    (Steel    Engraving    by 

Hugh  Allen,  from  a  drawing  by  Ruskin)  .,       .,      402 

H.  An  Egyptian  Queen  (Wood  Engramng  by  H,  S. 

Uhlrich  from  an  Egyptian  Sarcophagus)  „       „      411 

WOODCUTS    IN    THE    TEXT^ 
Ruskin's  Rooms  at  Corpus xxxi 


IN  "LECTURES  ON   ART 


ff 


(Designs  from  Greek  Vases) 

no.  PAOB 

1.  Athena  with  Nymphs  and  Faun  .        .  .146 

2.  Artemis  as  the  Moon  of  Morning 147 

3.  Apollo,  God  of  the  Morning 148 

1  Figs.  1-6, 10, 11, 16,  ftnd  17  are  by  H.  S.  Uhlricli,  the  rest  by  A.  Burgess. 


XVI 


LIST  OF  ILLUSTRATIONS 


no. 


4.  Hermes  Stealing  Io  from  Argus 

5.  The  Course  of  an  Entire  Day 

6.  Hermes  as  the  Cumulus  Cloud 


PA6B 

150 
151 
152 


IN   ''ARATRA   PENTELICI/'   ETC. 


7. 


A  Breakfast  Plate.         ...... 

8.  The  Birth  of  Athena  (Jrwn  a  Greek  vase) 

9.  An  Angel  (Jrom  the  Sarcophagus,  Plate  VIL)  . 

10.  Archaic  Head  of  Athena  (from  a  Greek  coin) 

11.  The  Same  (Jrom  a  coin  of  Corinth,  with  the  reverse) 

12.  Athena's  Owl  (from  the  reverse  of  the  coin,  Fig,  10) 

13.  A  John  Dory  (from  a  bas-relief)    .         »         .         . 

14.  Common  Branched  Iron  Bar 

15.  Outline  of  Phillyrea  (compare  PkUe  XIII.)  . 


206 
248 
251 
252 
253 
253 

289 
312 
325 


IN   THE  "NOTES   FOR   LECTURES  ON   GREEK   ART 

AND   MYTHOLOGY 


»t 


16.  The  Lion  of  Leontini  (from  a  Greek  coin) 

17.  The  Tortoise  of  Aeoina  (from  a  Greek  coin) 

18.  The  Bacchus  of  Thasos  (Jrom  a  Greek  com)   . 


383 
388 
410 


FACSIMILES 

The  First  Page  of  the   MS.  of  *' Lectures  on  Art" 

(§1) Betweenpp,  l6,  17 

A  Page  of  the  MS.  of  "  Lectures  on  Art  "  (§  29)     •        „        42,  43 
A  Page  of  the  MS.  of  "Aratra  Penteuci  "  (§g  123, 

124) „     283,  284 


Note, — The  drawiogs  by  Ruskiu  given  in  Plates  D,  £,  and  G  have  not  been 
exhibited,  nor  hitherto  reproduced.  The  drawing,  reproduced  on  Plate  XIX., 
is  at  Brantwood  (water-colour,  lOx  11) ;  it  was  exhibited  at  Couiston  (No.  180), 
at  the  Royal  Society  of  Painters  in  Water-Colours  (No.  256)  and  at  Man- 
chester (No.  415). 


INTRODUCTION   TO   VOL.  XX 


This  volume— containing  Lectures  on  Art  and  Aratra  Penielicij  together 
with  some  additional  matter  related  to  the  latter  book — introduces  us 
to  Ruskin's  first  Professorship  at  Oiford  (1870-1878).^  It  was  an  event- 
ful period  in  his  life.  These  years  saw  the  death  of  his  mother  and  his 
removal  to  a  new  home ;  they  were  the  time  of  his  **  most  acute  mental 
pain""  and  *^mo6t  nearly  mortal  illness.*"'  Also  this  was  perhaps  the 
busiest  period  even  in  his  busy  life.  In  it  he  delivered  eleven  courses 
of  lectures  at  Oxford.  He  wrote  guide-books.  He  published  at  various 
intervals  portions  of  works  on  Botany,  on  Greology,  and  on  Drawing. 
He  started  a  library  of  standard  literature.  He  arranged  an  Art  Col- 
lection at  Oxford,  contributing  to  it  some  hundreds  of  his  own  drawings 
— a  large  number  of  them  made  for  the  purpose — and  writing  several 
explanatory  catalogues.  He  founded  a  Museum  at  She£Beld.  He  en- 
gaged in  several  social  experiments;  the  better  sweeping  of  the  streets 
in  St.  Gileses  and  the  sale  of  tea  at  a  fair  price  were  not  too  trivial 
for  his  efforts,  nor  the  reformation  of  England,  through  a  Companion- 
ship of  St.  Greorge,  too  large.  He  wrote  incessantly  to  the  newspapers 
on  topics  of  the  day ;  and  all  the  while  he  poured  forth,  at  monthly 
intervals,  that  strange  and  passionate  medley  of  information,  controversy, 
homily,  reminiscence,  and  prophecy  which  he  entitled  Fors  Clavigera, 
These  tasks  were  undertaken,  not  one  thing  at  a  time,  but  often  all  at 
the  same  time.  '*Head  too  full,^  he  wrote  in  his  diary  (February  IS, 
1872),  ^^aud  don^t  know  which  to  write  first.^  He  solved  the  problem 
by  writing  something  of  everything  every  month,  or  even  every  day. 
He  describes  in  Fors  how  at  a  particular  moment  he  had  seven  large 
books  going  through  the  press  at  the  same  time;'  and  his  MS.  books 
of  this  period  reflect  this  process,  passing  on  successive  pages  from  notes 
for  one  subject  to  another.  ^  There  is  no  use,^  he  wrote,  again,  in  his 
diary  (January  99^  187S),  *^  saying  tired  and  ill ;  always  now.**^    No  use ; 

1  Raskin  was  elected  in  ISeO,  and  re-elected  in  1873  and  1876.  At  the  end 
of  1878  he  resigned.  In  1883  he  was  acain  elected.  It  is  convenient  to  speak  of 
the  earlier  period  (1870-1878)  as  that  of  his  ''  first  Professorship." 

>  For$  (Aivigeraj  Letter  13. 

'  Letter  69  (October  1876). 

XTli  A 


xviii  INTRODUCTION 

and  no  wonder.  The  intense  strain  upon  his  emotions,  the  unsparing 
drafts  upon  his  physical  and  mental  resources,  were  doomed  to  pay 
the  penalty;  and  the  period  of  his  life  now  under  review  comes  to 
an  end  with  a  serious  illness,  followed  by  the  resignation  of  his 
Professorship. 

It  will  be  apparent  from  what  has  thus  been  said  that  an  exclusively 
chronological  order  now  becomes  impossible — alike  in  the  arrangement 
of  the  contents  of  the  volumes  and  in  the  biographical  introduc- 
tions to  them.  A  volume,  for  instance,  which  should  contain  all  that 
Ruskin  published  in  1875,  and  nothing  else,  would  have  to  be  made  up 
of  twelve  numbers  of  Fora  davigera,  two  chapters  of  Ariadne  Floreniina, 
four  parts  of  Mornings  in  Florence,  two  of  Proserpina,  two  of  Deu- 
calion, and  a  pamphlet  of  Academy  Notes.  It  thus  becomes  necessary 
in  arranging  the  later  volumes,  as  was  indicated  in  the  Preface  to  this 
edition,  to  temper  the  chronological  order  with  considerations  of  topical 
appropriateness,  and  to  distribute  the  biographical  and  bibliographical 
matter  accordingly.  The  present  volume  contains  the  lectures  given 
in  the  first  year  of  Ruskin^s  Professorship;  and  this  Introduction, 
besides  discussing  the  particular  books  here  included,  recounts  the 
foundation  of  the  Chair,  and  gives  a  general  description  of  his  work 
and  life  at  Oxford,  as  well  as  some  account  of  a  foreign  tour  in  1870, 
in  which  he  collected  material  for  future  lectures.  The  next  volume 
(XXI.)  deals  with  the  Art  Collection  which  he  arranged  at  Oxford  in 
connexion  with  the  Professorship.  Then,  in  Volumes  XXII.  and 
XXIII.,  the  rest  of  his  Oxford  Lectures  during  the  first  Professorship 
— with  some  exceptions  explained  in  the  Introduction  to  the  former 
volume — are  given.  The  arrangement  of  later  volumes,  and  the  dis- 
tribution of  topics  in  the  several  Introductions,  are  explained  in  the 
proper  place. 

RUSKIN^  WORK  AT  OXFORD 

Ruskin'^s  call  to  Oxford  as  Professor  was  due  to  the  munificence  of 
the  late  Mr.  Felix  Slade.  The  desirability  of  establishing  a  Chair  of 
Fine  Art  in  the  old  Universities  had  long  been  mooted.  It  had  been 
one  of  Acland^s  fondest  hopes.  ^^I  will  whip  in,^  he  wrote  in  1845, 
^^and  try  to  get  myself  made  Teacher  of  Artistic  Anatomy  in  some 
manner  to  the  Randolph  Institution  [now  the  University  Galleries}, 
get  Ruskin  down,  and  get  him  made  Professor  of  Art.^^  A  year 
before,  Mr.    Greswell,  as  we   have  seen,'  had   published   a   pamphlet 

1  Sir  Henry  Wentworih  Aeland:  a  Memoir,  by  J.  B.  Atlay,  1908,  p.  131. 
'  SAe  Vol.  III.  p.  674  n. 


INTRODUCTION  xix 

advocating  that  '^  three  ProfeBsorships  of  the  Theory  of  Art  (and 
especially  of  Christian  Art)  should  be  founded  by  Royal  Authority, 
one  in  London,  and  the  other  two  at  Oxford  and  Cambridge.^  Ruskin 
himself  had  written  on  the  importance  of  ^^The  Arts  as  a  Branch  of 
Education*";^  and  Adand  had  in  1867  hoped  indirectly  to  attain  his 
end  if  Ruskin  could  be  made  a  Curator  of  the  University  Galleries.' 
The  realisation  of  all  these  hopes  was  left  to  Mr.  Slade,  a  wealthy 
Proctor  in  Doctors^  Commons,  and  a  great  virtuoso  and  collector. 
Dying  in  1868,  he  bequeathed  valuable  collections  of  glass,  Japanese 
carvings,  pottery  and  engravings  to  the  British  Museum,  and  a  sum  of 
£SSfiOO  for  the  endowment  of  (Slade)  Professorships  in  Fine  Art  in 
the  Universities  of  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  and  in  University  College, 
London.'  The  "  Graduate  of  Oxford,""  "  Author  of  Modem  Pakden;^ 
was  obviously  marked  out  for  the  Professorship  in  that  University ;  and, 
though  other  names  were  tentatively  mentioned,^  Ruskin  was  un€mi- 
mously  appointed.  His  friends,  liddell  and  Acland,  were  among  the 
electors,  and  to  them  he  sent  his  thanks,  his  hopes,  and  promises : — 

''Hotel  Gjebbaaoh,  Lao  de  Bribnte, 

''  \9th  Auffiut,  1869. 

"  My  dear  Acland^ — ^Your  letter  has  given  me  very  deep  pleasure. 
I  cannot  answer  to-day,  but  it  is  very  touching  to  me  to  see  what 
strength  of  feeling  you  have  for  me.  I  am  thankful  also  to  hear  of 
the  Dean's  having  wished  this,  and  wrought  for  it. 

''I  hope  both  he  and  you  wiU  find  that  you  have  been  more 
right  than  it  is  possible  you  should  yet  think  in  giving  me  this 
position.  The  last  ten  years  have  ripened  what  there  was  in  me  of 
serviceableness,  and  chastised  much  of  my  hasty  stubborn  and  other 
foolish,  or  worse^  faults — more  than  all  that  had  happened  to  me 
in  former  life — and  though  much  has  been  killed  and  much  spoiled 
of  me,  what  is  left  is,  I  believe,  just  what  (if  any  of  me)  will  be 
useful  at  Oxford.  I  believe  you  will  both  be  greatly  surprised  for 
one  thing  at  the  caution  with  which  I  shall  avoid  saying  anything 
with  the  University  authority  which  may  be  either  questionable  by, 
or  offensive  to,  even  persons  who  know  little  of  my  subject,  and 
at  the  generally  quiet  tone  to  which  I  shall  reduce  myself  in  all 
public  duty. 

1  Vol.  XVI.  pp.  449-464. 

*  VoL  XIX.  p.  XXXV. 

>  A  ''  Preliminary  Notiee"  of  Mr.  Slade,  by  his  friend,  Bir  A.  W.  Franks,  may 
be|  found  in  the  privately  printed  (1871)  Oatalogue  <if  the  OoUecHm  qf  Qkmf^rmedhy 
FeU»  SUtde,  Esq.,  F,8,A.  The  collections  which  he  bequeathed  to  the  Mnieom  had 
cost  him  £28,000. 

*  See  Mr.  J.  B.  Atlay's  Memoir  qf  SHr  Henry  Adand,  p.  370. 


XX  INTRODUCTION 

''You  may,  on  the  other  hand,  both  be  disappointed — partly 
by  actual  want  of  energy  in  me,  partly  by  my  carelessness  about 
immediate  results.  But  on  the  whole,  I  believe  I  shall  put  as 
much  fire  into  the  work  as  any  one  else,  and  what  there  is,  will  be 
without  smoke,  or  nearly  so. 

''I  have  been  very  hard  at  work  for  exactly  three  months  at 
Verona  and  Venice,  and  it  gives  me  good  help  and  confidence  to 
find  that,  while  I  have  largely  to  extend  and  correct  partial  views 
in  many  directions,  the  main  gist  of  what  I  have  written  seventeen 
years  ago  is  entirely  right,  and  the  things  I  then  declared  to  be 
admirable,  more  admirable,  in  the  sense  I  meani,  than  even  I  then 
thought  them. 

''For  instance,  I  now  recognise  in  Tintoret  faults  before  entirely 
hidden  from  me,  because  I  can  measure  him  by  standards  I  then 
knew  not,  and  because  my  own  character  is  more  formed.  But  the 
speciality  of  art  power,  the  invention,  and  the  magnificent  painter's 
handling  which  expresses  it,  are  now  more  amazing  to  me  than  ever, 
and  I  left  the  Scuola  more  crushed  by  the  sense  of  power  immeasur* 
ably  above  me  than  in  my  early  youth. 

"I  have  written  a  line  to  Angle ^  also;  if  she  tells  me  you  are 
staying  at  Wildbad,  I  will  write  again  before  I  leave  the  Giessbach. 

"Ever  your  afiectionate  friend, 

"J.    RUSKIN." 


"  Denmark  Hill,  S.E., 

"2nd  September,  1869. 

'*  Dear  Mr.  Dean, — Your  kind  letter  was  sent  abroad  to  a  wrong 
address  and  has  only  reached  me  to-day.  I  thought  it  better  to 
wait  for  it  before  thanking  you  for  the  exertion  of  your  influence — 
I  know  how  earnestly — to  obtain  my  appointment  to  this  Professor- 
ship. 

"I  hope  that  in  some  respects  you  will  find  that  I  shall  be  able 
to  justify  your  trust  in  me  more  than  I  have  yet  given  you  ground 
to  expect,  for  I  shall  scrupulously  avoid  the  expression  of  any  of  my 
own  peculiar  opinions  when  I  speak  by  permission  of  the  University, 
and  I  shall  endeavour  to  bring  whatever  I  venture  to  teach,  into 
closer  harmony  with  the  system  of  University  as  it  used  to  be,  than 
its  Conservative  members  would  I  think  at  present  hope  from  me. 
For  while  I  have  been  always  earnestly  pleading  for  the  extension 
of  education,  I  have  never  used  that  word  in  the  sense  to  which  it 
has  been  warped  in  the  popular  English  manner,  and  there  is  no 

^  Mi8s  Acland. 


INTRODUCTION  xxi 

modem  error  in  that  respect  which  I  more  regret  than  the  increas- 
ingly prevalent  corruption  of  a  University  as  a  place  for  teaching 
youth  various  trades  or  accomplishments  by  which  they  may  get 
their  living,  instead  of  what  it  has  been  —  and  roust  against  aU 
vulgar  pressure  maintain  itself  in  being — a  place  where  the  character 
is  to  be  formed  which  shall  make  Life  graceful  and  honourable — 
after  it  has  been  won. 

''I  suppose  it  would  be  well  that  I  should  come  to  Oxford  soon 
after  the  autumn  term  begins,  to  talk  over  the  possibilities  and 
needs  of  things  with  you  and  Acland  and  others  who  may  care  to 
advise  me.  In  the  meantime  let  me  not  trespass  on  your  happy 
vacation  hours  by  any  anxiety  as  to  what  I  may  wish  or  endeavour 
to  do.  I  will  answer  for  its  being  nothing  intemperate  or  mis- 
chievous, though  I  cannot  answer  for  its  being  useful — at  least  for 
a  time.  My  own  impression  is  that  I  must  work  for  very  slow 
results,  trying  to  lose  no  ground  once  gained. 
"With  sincere  regards  to  Mrs.  Uddell, 

'^  Believe  me,  dear  Mr.  Dean, 

"Gratefully  and  fidthfully  yours, 

"J,   RUSKIN. 

"Let  me  thank  you  and  Mrs.  Liddell  for  your  kind  invitation 
to  the  Deanery,  but  I  never  now  stay  at  any  friends'  houses,  for 
my  best  hours  for  the  little  I  can  do  are  before  breakfBist,  and  I 
am  always  so  tired  in  the  evening  that  I  cannot  rightly  take  part 
in  the  talk  or  cheerfulness  of  the  after-dinner  circle." 

Ruskin^s  expressions  of  thanks  were  no  empty  formula.  He  felt  his 
appointment  to  be  a  great  compliment  and  a  great  trust.  ^^  What- 
ever happens  now,^  he  said  to  his  mother  (February  8,  1870)  after  his 
Inaugural  Lecture,  *^I  have  been  permitted  by  the  ordaining  Power  to 
begin  in  Oxford  the  study  of  my  own  art,  for  others.^  Henceforth^ 
Ruskin  became  to  all  his  friends  '^The  Professor,^  as  presently  to 
disciples  of  his  economic  teaching,  ''The  Master.'*^ 

A  Chair  of  Fine  Art  was,  then,  established  at  Oxford,  and 
Ruskin  had  been  called  by  acclamation  to  fill  it.  How  did  he 
discharge  the  responsibility.^  Four  different  views  may  be  held  of 
the  Professorial  o£Bce.  A  Professor  at  Oxford  or  Cambridge  may  be 
appointed  by  way  of  ornament,  or  for  the  purpose  of  research,  or 
in  order  to  give  general  instruction,  or,  lastly,  with  a  view  to  pro- 
fessional teaching.  Ruskin'^s  tenure  of  the  Slade  Professorship  illus- 
trated each  and  all  of  these  different,  but  not  necessarily  conflicting, 


xjrii  INTRODUCTION 

functions.  In  the  first  instance  he  was  no  doubt  elected  as  the  man 
best  able  to  combine  them  all.  When  he  was  reappointed  after  an 
interval  of  some  years,  in  188S,  his  election  was  perhaps  mainly  due 
to  the  eminent-man  theory  of  the  office;  but  his  first  Professor- 
ship was  very  far  indeed  from  being  only  titular  or  honorary.  The 
fire  which  he  promised  in  his  letter  to  Acland  was,  so  long  as  his 
health  permitted,  unflagging.  He  lectured;  he  taught;  he  founded 
and  endowed  a  Drawing  Mastership;  he  formed,  presented,  and 
catalogued  collections  to  illustrate  his  subject.  He  spent  infinite 
pains  over  the  preparation  of  his  more  formal  lectures,  and  during 
these  eight  years  he  published  six  volumes  of  them*^  Interpreting  his 
duties  in  a  liberal  sense,  he  considered  further  that  '^the  real  duty 
involved  in  my  Oxford  Professorship  cannot  be  completely  done  by 
giving  lectures  in  Oxford  only,  but  that  I  ought  idso  to  give  what 
guidance  I  may  to  travellers  in  Italy.*"  ^  In  the  execution  of  this 
self-imposed  duty,  he  published  three  Italian  Guides — Mornings  in 
Florence^  St.  MarVs  Rest,  and  a  Guide  to  the  Principal  Pictures 
in  the  Academy  qf  Fine  Arts  at  Venice.  It  is  sometimes  alleged 
against  Oxford  Professors  that  they  publish  very  little ;  Ruskin,  it  must 
be  admitted,  poured  out  with  no  niggard  hand  a  whole  library  of 
books.  Though  strangely  neglected  by  many  of  his  critics,  who  are 
apt  to  judge  Ruskin  by  isolated  sentences  from  his  earliest  writings, 
the  Oxford  Lectures  contain  much  of  his  matured  thought  on  many 
artistic  subjects,  of  his  most  careful  research,  and  of  his  most  ingenious 
and  penetrating  analysis.  Upon  the  composition  of  his  more  formal 
lectures  he  spent  infinite  trouble.  "I  believe,''  he  wrote,  in  a  note 
to  Ariadne  Floreniina  (§  44),  ^^that  I  am  taking  too  much  trouble  in 
writing  these  lectures.  This  sentence  has  cost  me,  I  suppose,  first 
and  last,  about  as  many  hours  as  there  are  lines  in  it.*"  And  in 
conversation  with  a  friend  he  said  at  a  later  date :  *^  ^  I  have  taken  more 
pains  with  the  Oxford  Lectures  than  with  anything  else  I  have  ever 
done,  and  I  must  say  that  I  am  immensely  disappointed  at  their  not 
being  more  constantly  quoted  and  read.  What  have  I  ever  done 
better  than  this?'  And  as  he  spoke  he  took  down,''  continues  his 
friend,  ^*a  copy  of  Aratra  Pen^lici  and  read  in  his  own  impressive 
manner  the  concluding  passages  of  one  of  those  lectures."' 

^  Namely^  Lectures  on  Art,  Aratra  Pentelicij  The  Eagle's  Nest,  Ariadne  Florentinoy 
Lovi^s  Meinie,  and  Vai  €pAmo.  A  single  lecture^  on  The  Relation  between  Michael 
Angela  and  Tinioretj  was  also  publishea  as  a  pamphlet. 

*  Prefiiee  to  Mornings  in  Florence. 

'  ''  A  Conversation  with  Mr.  Ruskiu  " :  PaU  Mall  Gazette^  April  21^  1884.  The 
•onversation  was  with  Mr.  M.  H.  Spielmann. 


INTRODUCTION  xxui 

The  part  that  Ruskin  played  in  the  general  education  of  the  Univer- 
sity by  meant  of  lectures  and  personal  influence  was  also  considerable. 
There  are  some  Professors  who,  admirable  though  their  research  work 
may  be,  might  yet  as  well  be  living  in  the  moon  for  any  vital  influ* 
ence  which  they  exercise  upon  the  studies  or  students  of  the  University. 
The  educational  theory  of  professorships  is  by  some  persons  dismissed 
as  an  obsolete  survival  from  mediseval  times;  and  Carlyle  said  that 
*'the  true  University  in  these  days  is  a  Collection  of  Books.^  There 
is  an  element  of  truth  in  this  point  of  view;  but  however  wide 
may  be  the  dispersion  of  books,  there  will  always  remain  a  place  in 
the  educational  system  for  the  Living  Voice  and  the  Living  Teacher. 
Delightful  as  the  Oxford  Lectures  are  to  read,  yet  as  the  Dean  of 
Durham  truly  says,  **  no  one  can  appreciate  their  effect,  unless  he  was  so 
fortunate  as  to  hear  them.  One  saw  the  same  strange  afflatus  coming 
and  going  in  his  eye,  his  gestures,  his  voice.*"  ^  ^^Many  members  of 
the  University,^  says  the  Master  of  the  Temple,  ^^  date  from  that  period 
their  first  awakening  to  a  sense  of  the  beauty  of  Italian  Art,  and  it 
may  be  doubted  whether  the  interest  of  the  University  in  painting 
and  sculpture  has  ever  again  been  so  keen  or  so  widely  spread  as  it 
was  then.^'  In  arresting  and  stimulating  attention,  some  of  the  less 
formal  lectures  were  even  more  effective  than  those  which  Ruskin 
printed  as  books.  The  figure  of  the  lecturer  was  striking,  with  ample 
gown — discarded  often  when  its  folds  became  too  hopelessly  involved — 
and  the  velvet  collie  cap,  one  of  the  few  remaining  memorials  of  the 
**  gentleman  commoner.^  The  quaintness  of  his  costume — the  light 
home-spun  tweed,  the  double-breasted  waistcoat,  the  ill-fitting  and  old- 
fashioned  frock-coat,  the  amplitude  of  inevitable  blue  tie' — accurately 
reflected  something  of  the  originality  of  his  mind  and  talk.  If  it  were 
not .  for  the  peculiarly  delicate  hands  and  tapering  fingers,  denoting 
the  artistic  temperament,  the  Oxford  Professor  might  have  been  taken 
for  an  old-fashioned  country  gentleman.  In  repose  his  face  was  at 
this  time  fiinowed  into  sadness;  but  the  blue  eyes,  piercing  from 
beneath  thick,  bushy  eyebrows,  never  ceased  to  shine  with  the  fire  of 

1  Bmkin  in  Oj^ard  and  Other  Studies,  hy  6.  W.  Kitchin,  D.D.,  1904^.  40. 

*  A  contribution  by  the  Rev.  H.  G.  Woods,  D.D.,  to  the  Rev.  H.  L.  Thompson's 
Memoir  qf  Dean  LiddeU,  p.  211. 

*  The  following  is  an  item  from  '^  Affurs  of  the  Master/'  as  given  in  Fore,  1876  : 
''July  16.  GeogbMm  (blue  neckties)  ...  £4  0  0."  The  blue  ties  offended 
Matthew  Arnold.  '^Ruskin  was  there/'  he  wrote  in  a  letter  describing  a  London 
dinner  partWDeoember  1877),  ^'looking  very  slight  and  spiritaal.  I  am  getting  to 
like  hhn.  He  gains  mach  by  evening  dress,  plain  blacK  and  white,  and  by  his 
hnej  being  forudden  to  range  through  the  world  of  coloured  cravats"  (Letters  ^ 
Matthew  AmM,  voL  ii.  p.  141).  In  fiMt  Ruskin's  fiincy  never  strayed  from  true 
blue. 


xxiv  INTRODUCTION 

genius;  whilst  the  smile  that  was  never  long  absent  when  he  lectured, 
lit  up  his  face  with  the  radiance  of  a  singularly  gracious  and  gentle 
spirit.  His  voice,  though  not  very  strong,  had  a  peculiar  timbre^ 
which  was  at  once  penetrating  and  attractive.  His  old-fashioned 
pronunciation,  with  the  peculiar  roll  of  the  r's,  seemed  in  perfect 
harmony  with  the  mediaeval  strain  in  his  thought  ^^I  have  heard 
him  lecture  several  times,^  says  Mr.  Mallock  in  his  description  of 
Ruskin  as  "Mr.  Herbert  in  The  New  ReptMic,  "and  that  singular 
voice  of  his,  which  would  often  hold  all  the  theatre  breathless,  haunts 
me  still,  sometimes.  There  was  something  strange  and  aerial  in  its 
exquisite  modulations  that  seemed  as  if  it  came  from  a  disconsolate 
spirit,  hovering  over  the  waters  of  Babylon  and  remembering  Zion."*^^ 
He  was  not  a  practised  orator;  and,  as  I  have  heard,  he  once  told  an 
audience,  with  a  touch  of  his  peculiar  humour,  that  he  had  intended 
to  deliver  an  extempore  lecture,  but  that  the  trouble  of  writing  an 
extempore  lecture  and  then  learning  it  by  heart  was  too  much  for 
him,  and  so  he  would  simply  read  what  he  had  to  say.  He  read 
magnificently.  The  quotations  from  Homer  or  from  Chaucer  or  from 
some  other  favourite  author  were  declaimed  as  no  other  public  man 
of  the  time,  exo^t  Gladstone,  could  have  declaimed  them.  Passages, 
too,  from  his  own  earlier  books  came  with  new  force  and  meaning 
when  recited  with  the  appropriate  emphasis  and  intonation.  But 
though  Ruskin  seldom,  if  ever,  trusted  a  discourse  entirely  to  improvi- 
sation, he  also  seldom  adhered  exclusively  to  the  written  text.  From 
time  to  time  some  key  was  struck  which  took  his  attention,  and  then 
came  an  outburst  of  spontaneous  rhetoric.  An  American  writer,  who 
spent  a  winter  at  Oxford  as  an  unattached  student,  was  bidden  by  the 
Censor  "not  to  neglect  your  opportunity  to  hear  the  most  eloquent 
man^in  England.*"  He  went  to  one  of  Ruskin's  lectures,  and  thus 
reported  what  he  heard: — 

"  To  illustrate  the  honesty  of  mediaeval  art  in  contrast  with  modem  sham, 
he  pointed  out  an  arabesque  from  a  MS.  of  the  Psalms^  copied  with  coarse 
inaccuracy  for  a  tailpiece  in  a  current  magazine.  He  made  us  see  how  the 
graceful  lines  were  distorted^  and  the  whole  perfect  design  cheapened  and 
falsified.  '  And  that's  what  you  like,  you  English ! '  he  railed,  as  he  flung 
the  offending  magazine  on  the  floor.     Then  taking  up  his  manuscript  Psalter 

1  The  New  RepubRcy  ed.  1879,  pp.  16, 17.  The  portrait  of  Mr.  Herbert  is  perhaps 
the  only  one  in  the  collection  which  is  not  a  decided  caricature ;  and  "  he  is  almost 
the  only  man  in  these  days,"  we  are  told,  ''for  whom  I  feel  a  real  reverenoe — 
almost  the  onlv  one  of  our  teachers  who  seems  to  me  to  speak  with  the  least  breath 
of  inspiration. 


INTRODUCTION  xxv 

he  opened  to  the  first  psahn^  and  began  to  read  it,  giving  both  the  majestie 
Vulgate  Latin  that  was  before  him,  and  the  English  he  knew  so  well.  In 
a  moment  his  spirit  was  rapt  into  an  ecstasy.  Striding  back  and  forth 
behind  his  platform  rail^  he  poured  out  a  rhapsody  of  exalted  thought  in 
rhythmic  phrase  which  no  one  could  have  attempted  to  transcribe,  but 
which  must  have  overwhelmed  all  who  heard  it  vdth  the  thrilling  conscious- 
ness of  being  in  the  immediate  presence,  and  listening  to  the  spontaneous 
exercise  of  creative  genius."  ^ 

Some  of  Ruskin'^s  courses — the  Readings  in  Reynolds  and  in  Modem 
Painters^  for  instance — were  very  largely  trusted  to  this  kind  of  impro- 
visation, though  his  MS.  notes  show  that  particular  phrases  were  often 
jotted  down  beforehand.  He  would  begin  on  a  quiet  note,  standing 
at  the  desk  and  reading  with  the  sonorous  dignity  that  befitted 
his  author  some  pages  from  Sir  Joshua^s  Discourses.  Very  often  this 
was  all  of  Reynolds  that  the  lecture  would  contain.  Some  phrase 
suggested  the  line  of  thought.  The  desk  would  be  abandoned,  the 
gown  thrown  off;  and  striding  up  and  down,  Ruskin  would  pour  forth 
his  prophecies.  A  description  by  Mr.  Oscar  Browning  of  a  lecture  at 
Eton  gives,  with  some  exaggeration,'  the  general  effect  on  perhaps  some 
of  his  hearers : — 

"  Shortly  after  the  commencement  manuscript  and  notes  were  put  aside, 
the  lecturer  gathered  his  singing  robes  around  him  and  chanted  a  long- 
drawn  dithyramb  which  held  his  audience  spell-bound.  No  one  could  tell 
what  it  was  about,  whither  it  started,  or  whence  it  came.  It  had  no 
beginning  or  end,  no  form  or  substance,  no  argument  or  conclusion,  nor 
could  you  remember  it  when  it  was  over.  But  the  row  of  boys  sat  as  if 
entranced,  hanging  on  every  word,  unconscious  of  the  flight  of  time,  and 
when  it  ended  they  woke  as  from  a  dream.  They  had  been  lifted  into  a 
higher  sphere  of  thought  and  emotion,  but,  like  St  Paul  of  old,  whether  in 
the  body  or  out  of  the  body  they  could  not  telL"  * 

Another  feature  of  the  lectures  which  gave  specisd  interest  to  the 
Spoken  Lecture,  as  distinct  from  the  Printed  Word,  was  their  illus- 
tration by  means  of  drawings,  diagrams,  and  pictures.  The  eye  was  at 
every  turn  called  in  to  confirm  the  lecturer^s  appeal  to  the  imagination 

^  '^  Raskin  as  an  Oxford  Lecturer,"  by  James  Manning  Bruce,  in  the  Centuty 
Magazine,  Februarv  1808,  p.  694. 

'  One  of  several  lectures  which  Ruskin  gave  at  Eton  is  printed  in  a  later  volume ; 
it  was  discursive,  but  hardly  so  indefinite  as  in  Mr.  Browning's  recollection  of  this 
occasion. 

^  '*  Personal  RecoUections  of  John  Ruskin,"  in  St.  Oeoiye,  1903,  voL  vL  pp.  141- 
142. 


xxvi  INTRODUCTION 

or  the  reason;  and  on  the  preparation  of  these  examples  Ruskin  (as 
we  shall  see  more  fully  in  the  next  volume)  spent  the  greatest  pains. 
In  the  present  edition  of  his  Works,  a  large  number  of  the  illustra- 
tions which  were  shown  at  the  lectures  and  placed  in  the  permanent 
Art  Collection  are  reproduced — some  in  the  passages  of  the  text  where 
they  were  referred  to,  while  more  than  fifty  are  brought  together  in 
Volume  XXI.  to  illustrate  the  Catalogues  of  the  Collection. 

The  specimens  which  Ruskin  was  in  the  habit  of  exhibiting  in  his 
lectures  may  be  divided  into  three  classes — standard  and  permanent 
works  of  art;  drawings  of  his  own  of  particular  places  or  objects;  and 
diagrams,  copies,  and  enlargements  prepared  specially  to  illustrate  or 
enforce  some  passing  point.  Many  specimens  of  the  first  and  second 
kind,  and  a  few  of  the  third,  may  still  be  seen  in  the  cabinets  of  the 
Ruskin  Drawing  School  (see  next  volume).  For  purposes  of  illustra- 
tion Ruskin  had  the  University  galleries  as  well  as  his  own  collec- 
tions to  draw  upon,  and  any  student  who  attended  all  the  Slade 
Professor^s  lectures  had  the  advantage  of  examining  at  one  time  or 
another  a  large  and  unique  gallery  of  art  under  the  immediate  guidance 
of  the  great  critic.  The  large  table  in  the  theatre  and  the  wall 
behind  were  generally  covered  with  drawings  and  pictures;  most  of 
these  would  be  referred  to  in  the  course  of  the  lecture,  whilst  at  the 
end  there  would  be  a  rush  to  the  front,  and  the  Professor  would  hold 
an  informal  ^^  class  ^  (as  the  University  Extensionists  call  it)  for  further 
explanation  and  criticism  of  the  pictures  to  such  students  as  cared  to 
stay.  The  ingenuity  expended  in  the  preparation  of  temporary  iilus* 
trations  gave  additional  piquancy  to  the  lectures.  The  plate  in  Araira 
Penielici  (p.  S94)  of  a  Greek  Apollo  and  the  British  self-made  man, 
illustrates  the  kind  of  whimsical  effect  at  which  Ruskin  often  aimed. 
But  only  a  few  of  the  diagrams  and  pictures  exhibited  at  the  lecture- 
room  have  been  reproduced.  Mr.  Macdonald,  the  talented  and  zealous 
master  of  the  Ruskin  Drawing  School,  might  have  preserved  a  large 
collection  of  them,  for  it  was  upon  his  willing  hands  that  the  work 
of  preparing  the  Professor^s  topical  illustrations  mostly  fell.  Often 
amongst  the  pictures  placed  behind  the  lecturer  there  would  be  one 
with  its  face  turned  to  the  wall,  or  two  or  three  would  be  brought 
in  at  the  last  moment,  carefully  covered  up,  by  Ruskin'^s  servant.  The 
audience  would  always  smile  in  anticipation  on  such  occasions,  for 
they  knew  that  some  pretty  jest  or  curious  fancy  was  in  store.  Great 
was  the  amusement  on  one  occasion  when  a  hidden  treasure  was  dis- 
closed in  the  shape  of  a  sketch  from  Tintoret*s  **  Paradise,^^  which  the 
Professor — by  chance  or   design — held  out  with   the   wrong    side  up. 


INTRODUCTION  xxvu 


U 


Ah,  well,^  he  said,  joining  in  the  general  laughter,  ^^what  does  it 
matter?  for  in  Tintoret^s  'Paradise^  you  have  heaven  all  round  you.^ 
In  one  of  the  lectures  on  The  Jri  of  England  there  was  a  characteristic 
incident.  Ruskin  was  contrasting  the  way  in  which  modem  French 
art  looks  at  the  sky  with  that  in  which  Turner  saw  and  drew  ^^the 
pure  traceries  of  the  vault  of  morning.^  ^^See,^  he  said,  ^what  the 
French  artistic  imagination  makes  of  it,^  and  a  drawing  done  by 
Mr.  Macdonald  firom  a  Fr«ich  hand-book  was  disclosed,  showing  the 
clouds  grouped  into  the  fiice  of  a  mocking  and  angry  fiend.  When 
the  audience  had  had  their  look  and  their  laugh,  Mr.  Macdonald 
modestly  proceeded  to  turn  his  sketch  with  its  back  to  the  wall  again. 
^No,  no!^  interposed  the  lecturer,  *^keep  it  there,  and  it  shall  per* 
manently  remain  in  your  school,  as  a  type  of  the  loathsome  and  lying 
spirit  of  defamation  which  studies  man  only  in  the  skeleton  and  nature 
only  in  ashes.^^  I  recall  another  effective  piece  of  what  may  be  called 
the  lecturer^s  stage-play.  Ruskin  was  expatiating,  as  was  his  wont,  on 
the  vandalism  of  the  modem  world.'  On  an  easel  beside  him  was  a 
water-colour  drawing  of  Leicester  by  Turner.  ^^The  old  stone  bridge 
is  picturesque,^  he  said,  *^  isn^t  it  ?  But  of  course  you  want  something 
more  *  imposing^  nowadays.  So  you  shall  have  it.""  And  taking  his 
paint-box  and  brush  he  rapidly  sketched  in  on  the  glass  what  is  known 
in  modem  specifications  as  "a  handsome  iron  structure.'*  "Then,"  he 
continued,  "you  will  want,  of  course,  some  tall  factory  chimneys,  and 
I  will  give  tiiem  to  you  galore.*^  Which  he  proceeded  to  do  in  like 
fashion.  **The  blue  sky  of  heaven  was  pretty,  but  you  cannot  have 
everything,  you  know.*"  And  he  painted  clouds  of  black  smoke  over 
Turner's  sky.  "Your  *  improvements,' '^  he  went  on,  "are  marvellous 
*  triumphs  of  modern  industry,'  I  know ;  but  somehow  they  do  not  seem 
to  produce  nobler  men  and  women,  and  no  modem  town  is  complete, 
you  will  admit,  without  a  gaol  and  a  lunatic  asylum  to  crown  it.  So 
here  they  are  for  you."  By  which  time  not  an  inch  of  the  Tumer 
drawing  was  left  visible  under  the  "improvements"  painted  upon 
the  glass.  "But  for  my  part,"  said  Ruskin,  taking  his  sponge,  and 
with  one  pass  of  the  hand  wiping  away  those  modem  improvements 
i^ainst  which  he  has  inveighed  in  so  many  printed  volumes — "for  my 
part,  I  prefer  the  old." 

Such  reminiscences  will,  perhaps,  serve  to  explain  the  vivid  impression 
which   Ruskin's  lectures  made  on  those  who  heard  them.     It  was  the 

1  This  example  remains  in  the  School :  a%6  AH  qf  England,  §  184.    The  above 
acooiiot  18  my  note  of  the  lecture  as  delivered  at  the  time. 

*  In  one  of  the  lectures  called  '^Readings  in  Modem  Painten"  :  see  Vol.  XXII. 


xxviii  INTRODUCTION 

unflagging  vivacity  of  the  lecturer — his  complete  absorption  in  the 
subject,  the  zest  with  which  he  admired  or  denounced,  his  transparoit 
sincerity  and  his  intensity  of  conviction — ^that  made  the  Living  Voice 
so  potent.  Nor  was  it  only  on  younger  and  more  impressionable  minds 
that  Ruskin^s  eloquence  cast  its  spell.  ^^Acland  has  come  in  to  say,^ 
he  writes  to  his  mother  after  one  of  the  earlier  Lectures  on  Ari,  **  that 
a  very  hard  and  stem  man  had  been  so  much  moved  by  my  talk  to-day 
that  he  could  not  speak  for  near  an  hour  afterwards.'"^  But  the 
popularity  and  the  topics  of  Ruskin'^s  lectures  by  no  means  pleased 
everybody.  ^^  My  University  friends  came  to  me,*"  he  says  of  his  appeal 
to  young  Englishmen  at  the  end  of  the  Inaugural  Lecture,  ^^with 
grave  faces,  to  remonstrate  against  irrelevant  and  Utopian  topics  of  that 
nature  being  introduced  in  lectures  on  art.^^  The  discontent  among 
some  of  the  other  lecturers  in  the  University  is  reflected  at  second 
hand  in  some  vivacious  letters  of  J.  R.  Green,  the  historian: — 

(To  W.  Boyd  Dawkins,  March  6,  1870.) 

"  I  hear  odd  news  from  Oxford  about  Ruskin  and  his  lectures.  The  last 
was  attended  by  more  than  1000  people,  and  he  electrified  the  Dons  by 
telling  them  that  a  chalk-stream  did  more  for  the  education  of  the  people 
than  their  prim  'national  school  with  its  well-taught  doctrine  of  Baptism 
and  gabbled  Catechism.'  Also  '  that  God  was  in  the  poorest  man's  cottage, 
and  that  it  was  advisable  He  should  be  well  housed.'  I  think  we  were  ten 
years  too  soon  for  the  fun!" 

(To  £.  A.  Frebuax,  undated.) 

''Everybody  is  going  in  'for  strong  forms.'  Ruskin  lectures  on  Art  at 
Oxford,  and  tells  1000  people  (Stubbs  gets  20)  that  a  chalk-stream  does 
more  for  education  than  100  National  Schools  'with  all  their  doctrines  of 
Baptismal  Regeneration  into  the  bargain.'  Also  that  cottages  ought  to  be 
repaired,  because  'God  lives  in  the  poor  man's  hovel,  and  it's  as  well  He 
should  be  well  housed.'  To  all  which,  Vice-Chancellor  and  Heads  of  Houses 
listen  plaintively."' 

1  "  February  1870 "  is  the  date ;  the  day  is  not  given. 

^  Fori  Ciavigera^  Letter  42,  and  compare  Letter  68.  See  also  The  Pletuurei  qf 
England,  §  3.  Mr.  Mallock  pleasantly  satirises  such  remonstrances  in  The  New 
Bepublic.  "What  a  dreadful  blowing-up  Mr.  Herbert  gave  us,"  he  makes  one  of 
the  characters  (Lady  Ambrose)  say.  "  Now  that,  you  know,  I  think  is  all  very  well 
in  a  sermon,  but  in  a  lecture,  when  the  things  are  supposed  to  be  taken  more  or 
less  literally,  I  think  it  is  a  Uttle  out  of  place "  (p.  365). 

>  Letters  qf  J.  R.  Oreen,  p.  246.  The  passage  m  Ruskin's  lectures  to  which  he 
refers  seems  to  be  §§  60,  61.  The  letter  to  Freeman  must  have  saddened  or 
angered  the  recipient,  for  "  amonff  the  authors  whom  he  most  disliked  were  Plato, 
Carlyle,  and  Ruskin,  in  no  one  of  whom  could  he  see  any  merit "  (Bryce's  Siudiee 
in  Contemporary  Biography,  1903,  p.  269). 


INTRODUCTION  xxix 

To  the  lecturer  himself  ^Hhe  irrelevant  topics^  were  the  very 
essence  of  what  he  had  to  say.  He  had  promised  Acland  and  Liddell, 
we  have  seen,  to  be  on  his  good  behaviour;  but,  as  he  wrote  to  Lady 
Mount-Temple  at  the  same  date  (September  4, 1869),  he  was  not  going 
to  Oxford  to  be  only  a  drawing  master.  He  did,  indeed,  devote  him- 
self industriously  to  the  narrower  duties;  but  with  him,  as  we  have 
seen  increasingly  in  our  chronological  study  of  his  work  and  thought, 
the  teaching  of  art  was  the  teaching  of  everything.  The  Inaugural 
Oxford  Lectures  fill  their  organic  place  in  the  body  of  his  work,  growing, 
through  the  Stones  of  Venice^  out  of  Unto  this  Last^  and  leading  on, 
in  their  turn,  to  Fors  Clavigera.  He  had  taught  in  the  fii*st  book 
**the  dependence  of  all  human  work,  or  edifice,  for  its  beauty,  on  the 
happy  life  of  the  workman.^  He  laid  down  in  the  second  book  ^Hhe 
laws  of  that  life  itself,  and  its  dependence  on  the  Sun  of  Justice.*"  He 
went  to  Oxford  to  preach  the  necessity  that  such  life  ^^  should  be  led, 
and  the  gracious  laws  of  beauty  and  labour  recognized,  by  the  upper, 
no  less  than  the  lower,  classes  of  England  ^ ;  and,  finally,  ^^  it  is  simply 
one  part  of  the  practical  work  I  have  to  do  in  Art-teaching,^^  he  said 
in  FoTS  Clavigeraf  ^Ho  bring  somewhere  [the  conditions  of  fine  art] 
into  existence.*"^  Ruskin,  in  the  exercise  of  his  professorial  duties, 
did  not  neglect  research;  but  he  was  also  a  missionary.  It  was  his 
business  to  claim  for  Art  its  full  place  among  the  Humanities;  and 
where,  more  properly  than  from  an  Oxford  Chair,  could  his  protest 
have  been  made,  on  one  side,  against  the  commercial  Philistinism  of 
the  outer  world,  and,  on  the  other,  against  the  over-specialism  of 
merely  intellectual  studies  which  sometimes  dominates  the  lecture-rooms 
of  a  University  ?  ^ 

Lectures  and  classes  were  not  the  only  channels  through  which 
Ruskin  exerted  some  humanising  and  stimulating  influence  in  the 
University.  He  mixed  at  times  in  the  social  life  of  the  place,  and 
he  came  in  personal  touch  with  many  of  the  younger  men.  During 
the  first  year  of  his  Professorship  he  made  his  home  with  Acland, 
living  witii  him  as  one  of  the  family.  ^^He  used  to  say  that  he 
could  write  unusually  well  there  in  his  room,  a  quiet  one  at  the 
back,  as  Mrs.  Acland — ^Mama^  he  called  her — ^made  him  so  extremely 

^  Letters  0  and  78. 

*  Mr.  J.  A.  Hobson  in  his  John  Ruskin,  Social  Btformer,  has  some  suggestive 
remarks  in  this  connexion  :  ''The  rough  shaking  of  academic  proprieties  was  not  one 
of  the  least  services  Mr.  Ruskin  has  rendered  in  his  life.  The  shock  was  particu- 
larly needed^  for  one  of  the  chief  intellectual  dangers  of  the  age  is  a  too  precise 
specialism^  which^  by  sharply  marking  out  into  carefully  defined  provinces  the 
domain  of  learnings  runs  a  constant  risk  of  losing  the  wide  standard  of  humanity^ 
and  cultivating  triviality  under  the  fedse  name  of  thoroughness "  (p.  263). 


INTRODUCTION 

comfortable,  and  he  had  nothing  to  disturb  him,  for  he  could  not  waste 
his  time  looking  out  of  the  windows,  since  the  outlook  over  the  blank 
brick  wall  and  the  chimney-pots  was  the  ugliest  that  he  had  ever 
seen.*"^  He  objected  to  being  lionised,  and  shrunk,  as  we  have  heard, 
from  frequent  dining  out;  though  he  was  often  to  be  met  at  the 
Deanery  —  a  reminiscence  of  an  encounter  there  with  Disraeli  is  given 
in  Praeterita^ — and  sometimes,  too,  at  Jowett's  table.  ^I  dined  at 
Balliol  yesterday,^  he  writes  to  his  mother  (March  1870),  **with  the 
Dean  of  Westminster  and  Lady  Augusta  Stanley,  and  they  seemed  to 
like  me.*"  Jowett,  in  later  years,  came  to  know  and  like  Ruskin  well.' 
But  at  this  period,  we  are  told,  '^his  attitude  towards  Ruskin  was 
hesitating.'"  He  was  ^^not  insensible  to  the  genius  of  his  writings, 
or  the  noble  devotion  of  his  character,^^  but  ^^he  was  suspicious  of 
sestheticism  *'  and  had  no  sympathy  with  Ruskin^s  economic  ideas  or 
schemes.  Ruskin^s  enthusiastic  manner,  too,  did  not  appeal  to  the 
Master.  ^^Once  after  dinner,  when  Ruskin  was  seated  in  Jowett^s 
drawing-room  talking  to  a  lady,  Jowett,  who  stood  with  other  friends 
in  front,  suddenly  broke  into  a  hearty  ringing  laugh.  Ruskin  sprang 
up  and  caught  him  by  both  hands:  ^Master,  how  delighted  I  am  to 
hear  you ;  I  wish  /  could  laugh  like  that !  ^  Upon  which  all  the  room 
laughed — except  Jowett.'** 

In  daytime  ^^the  Professor"  was  often  to  be  seen  at  the  Bodleian 
— copying  from  illuminated  MSS.  shown  him  by  his  fnend,  H.  O.  Coxe, 
the  librarian,  or  ^^ studying  Renaissance^  with  his  ^^antagonistioest^ 
pupil,  Mrs.  Mark  Pattison.^  But  Ruskin  felt  that  he  ought  to  come 
into  closer  relation  with  the  corporate  life  of  the  University,  and  after 
a  year's  residence  in  Acland's  house,  or  at  Abingdon,  he  went  into 
College.  How  this  came  about  has  been  told  in  a  charming  paper  by 
Mr.  J.  W.  Oddie,  Fellow  of  Corpus :  «— 

''Early  in  1870  Professor  Ruskin  visited  Corpus.  He  came  to  see  the 
illuminated  manuscripts  at  the  invitation  of  a  pupil  who  happened  to  be  a 
tutor  of  the  CoUege  at  that  time.  .  .  .  While  walking  round  the  Fellows' 

^  Mr.  J.  B.  Atlay's  Menunr  qf  Sir  Henry  Adand,  p.  383. 

>  In  iiL,  §§  33  «w. 

«  See  Vol.  XVIII.  pp.  lx.-lxi. 

4  Life  and  Letters  of  Benjamin  Jowett,  hy  Evelyn  AbboU  and  Lewis  Campbell,  1897, 
vol.  u.  p.  76.  At  the  end  of  ''Mr.  Herbert's"  leeture  in  The  New  B^nAUe,  ''after 
the  firOj  from  one  of  the  side  boxes  came  a  still  small  voice :  '  Very  poor  taste — 
very  poor  taste.' "    The  voice  was  "  Dr.  Jenkinson's "  (p.  360). 

^  Memoir  prefixed  to  Lady  Dilke's  Boidt  i^  the  Spiritual  Ltfe.  1906^  p.  5. 

•  *'  Ruskin  at  Corpus/'  in  the  POiean  Record^  vol  ii..  No.  i,  June  1894,  pp.  101- 
107.  In  the  following  number,  pp.  134-137>  there  was  a  continuation  of  tne  story 
by  another  Fellow  of  the  College,  Mr.  C.  Plnmmer. 


INTRODUCTION  xnri 

garden,  'in  that  peaeefiil  comer,'  «■  be  sud,  'between  the  two  towen 
of  Chriit  Church  aad  Merton,'  be  suddenly  aaked  hia  friend  if  he  thought 
it  would  be  poatible  for  him  to  obtain  roomi  in  Corpm.  He  felt  tbst 
there  only,  nestled  to  close  to,  yet  not  in,  the  old  '  House '  of  over- 
powering memories,  could  he  live  quite  happily  in  Oxford.  .  .  .  Without 
hesitation  the  President  and  Fellows  eipressed  tbeir  willingness  to  allot 
to  Professor  Ruskin  rooms  in  the  Fellows'  Buildings,  and  to  elect  him  to 
an  Honorary  Fellowship," 

He  was  admitted  oa  April  99,  1871,  and  at  once  took  up  his  residence 
in  the  College;   the  rooms  allotted  being  on  the  first  floor,  right,  of 


No.  2  staircase.^  The  window  looking  out  on  to  the  meadows  is 
marked  by  a  small  cross  in  the  accompanying  woodcut.  The  ceremony 
of  his  admission  as  an  Honorary  Fellow  was  not  unimpressive,  cod- 
tinues  Mr.  Oddie,  "and  it  certainly  was  amusing'": — 

"The  good  old  President* — one  of  the  kindliest  of  being* — wu  a  fine 
example  of  '  pre^scientific  man,'  to  borrow  a  phrase  applied  to  himself  by 
the  Vicegerent  of  another  College  about  that  time.  To  him  Raskin,  in 
the  plenitude  of  his  genius  and  culture,  made  a   dutiful   little  address, 

>  The  roomi  hod  been  vacated  by  the  Rev.  Hrary  Fonuaux,  on  marrying  Mr. 
Arthur  Severn's  twin-sister. 

>  Dr.  James  NorriB,  President  1U8-1872. 


xxxii  INTRODUCTION 

taking  upon  himself  vows  of  almost  monastic  character,  especially  in  the 
reverence  and  obedience  which  he  promised  to  the  head  of  his  second 
College.  .  •  .  One  little  speech  of  the  Professor  completely  puzsled  the 
President.  It  was,  'Mr.  President,  I  would  not  have  left  .£des  Christi 
for  anything  less  than  Corpus  Christi.' 


• » »» 


The  President,  failing  to  catch  the  point  about  the  House  and  the 
Body  of  Christ,  is  said  to  have  hoped  Professor  Ruskin  found  his  rooms 
comfortable.^  After  the  formal  admission,  there  was  a  luncheon  in 
the  President's  lodgings: — 

"It  was  there  that  to  the  President's  favourite  remark,  deprecatory  of 
the  Americanising  of  our  institutions^  Ruskin  prettily  replied,  '  Yes,  but  even 
where  the  mighty  waters  of  Niagara  are  tumbling  and  rushing  past,  little 
birds  have  their  peaceful  nests  in  holes  of  the  rocks.  So  we  may  make 
us  quiet  retreats  and  nests  such  as  this,  while  the  great  torrent  of  humanity 
rushes  by  us  to  its  doom.'  It  was  on  the  same  occasion  that  he  compared 
trees  to  cities,  with  their  countless  multitudes,  not  merely  of  sentient 
buildings,  but  also  of  restless,  wind-stirred  leaves — 'so  busy,  so  busy!' 
The  whole  impression  left  of  the  day's  proceedings  was  mediaeval,  romantic, 
idyUic." 

Ruskin  came  to  enjoy  his  College  nest  not  a  little  at  times,  as 
this  letter  to  his  cousin  Joan  will  show: — 

'' Corpus  Chribti  Collbob,  Oxford. 
''[EnvL  Dec.  6,  73.] 

"With  all  my  grumbling  over  what  might  have  been,  or  what 
I  crave  for^  or  what  I  have  lost,  I  am  not  unconscious  of  the  much 
good  I  have,  especially  in  power  of  giving  pleasure  and  help;  and 
I  admit  it  to  be  really  a  very  comfortable  thing  for  an  old  gentle- 
man to  be  able  to  sit  in  a  cathedral  stall  to  hear  Bach  music  and 
to  have  Ediths  to  flirt  with.  Princes  to  walk  with,  and  Pussies  to 
love.2 

^'  I  am  also  to-night  in  a  very  comfortable  room — all  my  own ;  have 
four  wax-candles  and  a  nice  fire ;  a  college  dinner  about  to  be  brought 
up  in  state^  admirably  cooked.  A  Titian  portrait  in  the  comer, 
Turner's  Bolton  Abbey  over  the  chimney-piece,  fifteen  sketches 
by  Mantegna  under  my  table,  any  book  in  London  that  I  like  to 

1  Ojpf&rd  and  its  CMImm,  by  J.  Wells,  p.  200. 

^  See  Praterita,  iii.  §  30.    For  his  friendship  with  Prince  Leopold,  see  below, 
p.  zxxvi. ;  the  other  allusion  is  to  a  pet  name  for  his  cousin^  Mrs.  Severn. 


INTRODUCTION  xxxiii 

send  for,  and  a  balance  of  about  a  thousand  pounds  ready  money 
at  my  banker's. 

''And  I  think  in  claiming,  or  even  expecting,  any  extraordinary 
share  of  pity  or  condolence  from  my  fellow-mortals,  I  am  perhaps 
a  little  exacting/' 

To  the  rooms  in  Corpus  Ruskin  gradually  brought  a  large  portion  of 
his  choicest  manuscripts,  engravings,  books,  drawings,  and  pictures.^ 
To  Oxford  also  he  brought  a  portion  of  his  beautiful  collection  of 
minerals,  contained  in  two  of  the  five  cabinets  which  his  father  had 
given  him,  when  a  youth  beginning  the  study.  Ruskin,  when  at  Oxford, 
would  show  his  treasures  to  pupils,  friends,  or  distinguished  visitors, 
with  comments,  explanations,  rhapsodies,  as  formerly  at  Denmark  Hill.' 
During  absences  in  Italy  he  entrusted  the  keys  of  his  rooms  and 
cabinets  to  one  of  the  Fellows,  with  full  permission  to  show  them  at 
his  pleasure.  Here,  too,  Ruskin  was  in  the  habit  of  giving  little 
dinners  to  the  Dons,  and  breakfasts  or  *^tea  and  counsel'"^  to  the 
undergraduates.  His  influence  over  the  grown-up  University,  says  Dean 
Kitchin,  was  not  great;*  though  there  were  some  of  the  older  men, 
among  his  more  intimate  associates,  who  valued  intercourse  with  him, 
highly.  "No  one  felt  more  strongly  than  did  the  Dean  [Liddell],^ 
writes  Mr.  Woods,  "  how  great  was  the  advantage  to  Oxford  of  having 
Mr.  Ruskin  among  its  teachers ;  and  later  on,  when  his  connexion  with 
the  University  was  severed,  to  no  one  did  his  loss  mean  more  than  to 
the  Dean.  I  have  heard  him  more  than  once  refer  with  deep  feeling 
to  his  sense  of  the  personal  loss  to  himself.^  ^ 

But  Ruskin  himself  was  conscious  that  the  elder  dons  in  the  Uni- 
versity were  unsympathetic.  "He  told  me  one  day,^  says  an  Oxford 
friend,  "  that  it  troubled  him  to  think  how  little  the  senior  men  under- 
stood him,  and  how  little  they  seemed  to  care  to  do  so;  he  was  not 
even  sure  that  they  cared  to  meet  him.  I  did  my  best  to  assure  him 
that  sympathy  and  understanding  were  not  lacking — only  the  oppor- 
tunity for  meeting,  which  he  had  never  given  them.**  A  College  dinner- 
party, to  meet  the  Professor,  was  the  outcome  of  this  talk;  and 
"everything  fell  out  so  pleasantly  that  he  asked  me  to  help  him  to 

'  A  list  in  one  of  his  note-books  shows  that  the  contents  of  his  rooms  at  Corpus 
were  insured  in  1872  for  £30,000. 

*  See  VoL  V,  pp.  xlvii.  »eq. 

s  Mr.  Plummer's  phrase.  '^ Crumpets  and  Corinthians"  was  the  description 
given  by  the  undergraduates  to  the  entertainments  of  another  distinguished  man 
at  this  time. 

*  Buskin  in  Oa^ord  and  Other  Studies,  p.  43. 
«  Memoir  of  Dean  LiddeU,  p.  212. 


xxxiT  INTRODUCTION 

arrange  a  leries  of  little  dinneivparties  in  fais  own  rooms,  to  be  followed 
by  talks  round  the  fire,  which  should  teach  him  more  of  what  was 
going  on  in  that  newer  Oxford  which  he  had  never  known.^^  The 
Dean  of  Durham  hints  that  Ruskin^s  entertainments  were  intended 
also  to  inaugurate  a  return  to  'Hhe  simpler  life^:  '^He  tried  strange 
things.  I  remember  that  he  tried  to  make  University  society  pause 
in  its  race  for  show  and  display  of  luxury;  he  bade  us  cease  from 
competing  dinner-parties,  and  to  take  to  simple  symposia.  A  few 
tried  it,  but  their  motUon  aux  navets  did  not  attract  the  Oxford  Don 
more  than  once;  it  might  begin  with  simple  eating  and  good  talk; 
champagne  and  truffles  were  always  lurking  behind  the  door  ready  to 
rush  in  on  a  hint.  Wordsworth'^s  ^ Plain  Living  and  High  Thinking'' 
was  never  very  popular  even  in  Balliol ;  and  Ruskin^s  dinner  of  herbs 
with  love  had  no  greater  success.^  ^  In  absence  from  Oxford,  the  Dean^s 
recollection  has  perhaps  exaggerated  the  Lucullan  magnificence  of  the 
University.  Ruskin  himself  kept  a  not  ungenerous  table,  and  not  even 
a  Common  Room  epicure  could  find  fault  with  the  quality  of  the 
paternal  sherry.  If  Ruskin'^s  symposia  were  discontinued  after  a  few 
terms,  it  was  due  rather  to  his  failing  health  than  to  any  meagreness 
of  fare.  When  the  Professor  fell  ill  well-nigh  unto  death  in  the  early 
part  of  1878,  the  esteem  in  which  he  was  held  found  expression  in  the 
Latin  speech  delivered  by  the  Senior  IVoctor  on  going  out  of  office: — 

''Nee  multum  abfuit  qain  nuper  desideraret  Aeademia  morbo  letall 
abreptum  Professorem,  in  saa  materie  unicum,  Joaanem  Ruskin.  'Sed 
multe  urbes  et  publiea  vota  vicemnt.'  Neque  id  indignum  memoiatu  puto 
quod  nuperimme  mihi  in  Italia  commoranti  contigit  videre  qoantse  soJUici- 
tudines  ob  ejus  salutem,  quantss  preces  moverentur  in  ea  terra  eujus  ille 
artes  et  monumenta  disertissime  illustraverit."  * 

Upon  many  of  the  younger  dons  and  undergraduates  Ruskin^s  influence 
was  in  the  highest  degree  stimulating  and  suggestive.    Among  those 

»  ''Ruskin  at  Oxford,"^  by  "Peter"  (Mr.  E.  P.  Barrow),  in  J^.  George,  vol.  vi. 

p.  loe. 

3  BuMn  in  Oafard  and  Other  Studiee,  p.  43. 

'  Speech  in  Convocation^  April  24.  A  copy  of  the  speech  was  sent  to  Ruskin^ 
and  Mr.  Collingwood  printed  the  passage  in  his  Life  (1900^  p.  335).  It  may  also 
be  read  in  St.  George  (vol.  vi.  p.  109),  where  the  following  translation  is  appended  : 
'^Verv  nearly  did  this  University  have  to  mourn^  not  long  ago^  the  loss  through 
mortal  sickness  of  one  of  her  Professors— one  who  in  his  own  subject  stands  alone 
— John  Ruskin.  'But  the  public  pravers  of  many  cities  prevailed.'  And  this^  1 
think^  is  not  undeserving  of  mention^  tnat  quite  btely^  when  I  was  stapng  in  Italy, 
I  myself  had  the  good  fortune  to  see  how  great  was  the  anxiety^  how  many  the 
supplications^  called  forth  on  his  behalf  in  tiiat  very  land  whose  arts  and  public 
buildings  his  learning  and  eloquence  have  done  so  much  to  adorn." 


INTHODUCtlON  axxr 

who  cMie  nfidef  it  tiiost  stiNAiglj  and  appreciated  it  most  warmly  Wai 
Prinee  Led{>oId.  He  w^  a  regular  atte&datit  kt  Ruskin's  lecturer,  and 
Rttftkid'wito  li  frequent  guest  at  his  dinner-parties,  when,  whatever  thfe 
company  might  be,  the  Prince  almost  invariably  seated  the  Professdt 
at  Ids  side.  The  letter  in' which  Ruskin  asked  him  to  be  one  of  the 
Trustees  of  the  Ruskin  Drawing  School  is  a  charaeteristic  example  of 
the  Professor^s  courtly  style; — 

''Corpus  Chbisti  Coixegb,  Oxford^ 
"8M  Maff,  1871. 

''  Sir, — I  feel  as  if  there  would  be  a  like  fault  in  laying  the  re- 
quest I  have  in  my  mind  before  your  Royal  Highness  without  some 
excuse  of  its  boldness,  and  in  attempting  excuse  which  could  consist 
only  in  tde  statement  of  facts  which  I  am  sure  are  by  your  Royal 
Highness  already  well  known  and  well  considered. 

"  But,  Sir,  you  have  always  been  so  kind  to  me,  and  have  so 
often  condescended  to  express  interest  in  my  work  in  the  Uni- 
versity, that  I  will  rather  be  presumptuous  than  tedious;  and  will 
say  at  onee  that  my  hope  is  io  prevail  with  your  Royal  Highness 
to  accept  (with  the  coadjutorship  of  the  Dean  of  Christ  Church, 
Dr.  Adand,  and  the  Bodley  Librarian),  such  Trusteeship  as  may  be 
necessafy  to  secure  the  permanent  utility  of  the  series  of  drawings 
and  engraving  on  which  my  method  of  Art  Education  has  been 
founded  in  Oxford. 

''  And  I  permit  myself  only  to  add  that  I  make  this  request  not 
in  the  audacity  of  ambition,  but  of  respectful  affection;  and  that, 
it  seems  to  me,  the  graciousness  with  which  your  Royal  Father 
fostered  every  faithful  effort  made  in  the  advancement  of  Art  in 
England,  would  make  it  a  kind  of  treason  to  his  memory  if  any  who 
were  labouring  earnestly  in  the  promotion  of  an  object  he  had  so 
much  at  heart,  feared  to  ask  the  protection  of  any  of  the  Princes, 

his  sotis. 

"1  am,  Sir, 

"With  devoted  respect, 

*<Your  Royal  Highnesd's 

"Loyal  and  grateful  Servant, 

'*J.  Ruskin. 

''To  RlB  RoYAli  HlOHKEBS 

''Thb  Phinoe  Lbopold." 

The  formal  note  in  this  letter  ripened  later  on  into  personal  intimacy. 
The  Prince  used  to  correspond  with  Ruskin  about  books  and  pictures, 
and  their  common  love  of  music  and  of  chess  w^re  further  bonds  of 
friendship.     Some  letters  from  Ruskin  to  the  Prince,  kindly  placed  at  the 


v 


xxxvi  INTRODUCTION 

editors^  disposal  by  his  widow,  the  Duchess  of  Albany,  wUl  be  foimd 
in  a  later  volume  of  this  edition.  In  alluding,  in  a  printed  conyersa- 
tion,  to  the  Princess  untimely  death,  Ruskin  recorded  his  impressions 
of  their  friendship : — 

^'  I  had  the  deepest  regard  and  respect  for  what  I  would  call  his 
genius^  rather  than  his  intellect.  He  was  entirely  graceful  and  kind 
in  every  thought  and  deed.  There  was  no  mystery  about  him — ^he 
was  perfectly  frank  and  easy  with  every  one.  At  Oxford  I  thought 
he  desired  to  take  all  the  advantage  that  was  possible  from  the 
University  course^  but  I  also  thought  that  the  conditions  of  his  life 
there  were  rather  a  courteous  compliance  vdth  the  duties  of  his 
position  than  an  earnest  and  intense  application,  whether  the  subject 
was  art  or  Greek.  I  do  certainly  think  that  within  these  limits  he 
learned  every  day  of  his  life  as  much  as  was  possible  for  him  to  learn, 
whether  from  the  University  or  from  the  surrounding  elements  or 
elsewhere.  He  had  no  extraordinary  taste  for  art,  although  all  his 
sisters  are  artistic ;  his  special  gift  was  musical"  ^ 

The  Princess  admiration  for  Ruskin  was  eloquently  expressed  in  the 
first  public  address  which  he  delivered: — 

"  It  is  not  only  at  Cambridge  that  it  has  been  felt  that  men  of  learning 
and  culture  could  hardly  have  a  worthier  aim  than  that  of  carrying  high 
thoughts  and  elevating  knowledge  into  homes  which  perhaps  know  few  other 
joys.  Of  such  aims  we  in  Oxford  have  had  a  great,  an  inspiring  example. 
We  have  seen  a  man  in  whom  all  the  gifts  of  refinement  and  of  genius  meet, 
and  who  yet  has  not  grud^d  to  give  his  best  to  all;  who  has  made  it 
his  main  effort — by  gifts,  by  teaching,  by  sympathy — to  spread  among  the 
artisans  of  Sheffield  and  the  labourers  of  our  English  fields  the  power  of 
drawing  the  full  measure  of  instruction  and  happiness  from  this  wonderful 
world,  on  which  rich  and  poor  can  gaze  alike.  Such  a  man  we  have  seen 
in  Professor  Ruskin ;  and  amongst  all  the  lessons  which  those  who  have  had 
the  privilege  of  his  teaching  and  of  his  friendship  must  have  gained  to 
carry  with  them  through  life,  none,  I  think,  can  have  sunk  deeper  than 
the  lesson  that  the  highest  wisdom  and  the  highest  pleasure  need  not  be 
costly  or  exclusive,  but  may  be  almost  as  cheap  and  as  firee  as  air, — and 
that  the  greatness  of  a  nation  must  be  measured,  not  by  her  wealth  or 
her  apparent  power^  but  by  the  degree  in  which  all  her  people  have  learnt 
to  gather  from  the  world  of  books,  of  Art,  and  of  Nature,  a  pure  and  an 
ennobling  joy."  * 

1  ''A  Conversation  with  Mr.  Ruskin"  :  PaU  MaU  Gazette,  April  21,  1884. 

>  Speech  at  the  Mansion  House,  in  support  of  the  London  Society  for  the 
Extension  of  University  Teaching,  February  10,  1879.  The  passage  is  here  printed, 
by  grace  of  the  Duchess  of  Albany,  from  the  original  MS. 


INTRODUCTION  xxxvii 

Of  the  originality  and  quaintness  of  Rnskin^8  familiar  talk  at  Oxford, 
some  good  descriptions  have  been  penned;^  though  who  has  ever 
sacoeeded  in  fixing  upon  paper  any  complete  picture  of  a  swallow^s 
flight,  or  the  mingled  passing  of  sunshine  into  shade?  He  delighted, 
we  are  told  by  one  of  his  colleagues  at  Corpus,  in  starting  some 
extreme  or  paradoxical  opinion  in  Common  Room.  ^^He  would  then 
playfully  defend  himself,  with  all  kinds  of  unexpected  sallies  and  turns, 
against  the  united  attack  of  those  present.  It  was  a  kind  of  intel- 
lectual bear-baiting,  especially  enjoyed  by  the  bear,  as  the  fox  is  said 
to  enjoy  being  hunted.  When  entirely  surrounded  or  cornered,  and 
shown  how  grossly  self-contradictory,  at  the  very  least,  was  the  position 
he  had  assumed,  he  would  acknowledge  his  defeat,  and  let  us  into  the 
secret  of  the  game  by  a  great  burst  of  merriment.'"  His  dislike  of 
abstruse  speculation  was  sometimes  amusingly  shown.  '^In  reply  to  a 
question,  'What  are  you  lecturing  upon  this  term?'  an  unwary  tutor 
replied,  'Inductive  Psychology/  'Oh,  the  Devil ! '  shouted  the  Professor, 
immediately  rushing  up  the  stairs  and  violently  sporting  his  oak.***  His 
acute  sensitiveness  often  revealed  itself  very  suddenly  and  unexpectedly. 
One  of  the  Fellows  happened  to  praise  some  of  Dora's  work.  "  He  laid 
down  his  knife  and  fork,  saying,  'You  have  spoiled  my  dinner.' *"  On 
another  occasion,  when  he  was  showing  Turner's  drawing  of  Richmond 
in  Yorkshire,  some  one  explained  that  at  a  certain  point  a  railway 
bridge  was  now  thrown  across  the  river.  Ruskin  was  heard  to  mutter 
under  his  breath  the  single  word  ' Damruxtion  / ' " ^  "I  remember,*" 
writes  Professor  Max  Miiller,  "once  taking  Emerson  to  lunch  with 
Ruskin,  in  his  rooms  in  Corpus.  Emerson  was  an  old  friend  of  his, 
and  in  many  ways  a  cognate  soul.  But  some  quite  indifferent  subject 
turned  up,  a  heated  discussion  ensued,  and  Ruskin  was  so  upset  that 
he  had  to  quit  the  room  and  leave  us  alone.*" '  At  other  times  he 
showed  an  unexpected  toleration.  One  of  the  Fellows  commiserated 
with  him  when,  during  a  subsidence  of  the  floods  in  the  Meadows, 
there  was  an  overpowering  smell  of  decaying  vegetation.  "I  rather 
like  it,^  replied  Ruskin;  "it  reminds  me  of  Venice.*"  He  was  a  con- 
stant attendant  at  early  chapel,  "and  if  you  looked  in  to  his  rooms 
earlier  you  would  see  on  his  vrriting-table  a  pair  of  silver  candlesticks, 
an  open  Bible,  a  blotting  pad,  and  a  cork-handled  pen.  When  I  read 
of  his  attitude  as  to  religion  constantly  shifting,  I  think  of  these  eight 
oVlock  services,  and  of  talks  which  sometimes  followed,  and  how  easy 

^  Especially  by  Mr.  Oddie  and  Mr.  Plummer  in  the  papers^  already  referred  to, 
in  tbe  Pelican  Record, 

^  Mr.  Oddie  in  the  PeRcan  Record,  voL  ii.  p.  104. 

'  Auid  Lang  Syne,  by  the  Rt  Hon.  Professor  Max  MuUer,  1878^  p.  129. 


xxj^ym  INTRODUCTION 

it  is  for  me&tal  attitudes  tp  dtange*  apd  to  lei^y«  unchanged  the  spirit 
of  reverence  withii^.'"^  ^^His  occasional  remarks  on  the  Prayer-book 
Service  were  i^tere8ting.  He  thought  the  phrase  ^requisite  and  necev* 
sary**  in  the  exhortation  a  thorough  piece  of  Cockney  English,  and 
that  the  petition  in  the  prayer  of  St.  Chrysostom,  that  we  may 
have  in  this  world  knowledge  of  Thy  truth,  and,  in  the  world  to  come, 
life  everlasting,  was,  if  I  may  use  a  slang  expression,  rather  a  large 
order,"* 

Not  a  trace  of  the  arrogance  which  sometimes  figures  on  the  printed 
page  was  present  in  his  familiar  conversation;  and  he  was  one  of  the 
most  attentive  and  encouraging  of  listeners.  '^He  was  really,"  says 
Max  Miiller,  a  fellow  Professor  and  an  occasional  attendant  at  Ruskin^s 
lectures,  ^'the  most  tolerant  and  agreeable  man  in  society.  He  could 
discover  beauty  where  no  one  else  could  see  it,  and  make  allowance 
where  others  saw  no  excuse.  I  remember  him  as  diffident  as  a  young 
girl,  fiill  of  questions  and  grateful  for  any  information.  Even  on  art 
topics  I  have  watched  him  listening  almost  deferentially  to  others  who 
laid  down  the  law  in  his  presence.  His  voice  was  always  most  winning, 
and  his  language  simply  perfect.  He  was  one  of  the  few  Englishmen 
I  knew  who,  instead  of  tumbling  out  their  sentences  like  so  many 
portmanteaux,  bags,  rugs,  and  hat*boxes  from  an  open  railway  van, 
seemed  to  take  a  real  delight  in  building  up  their  sentences,  even  in 
familiar  conversation,  so  as  to  make  each  deliverance  a  work  of  art.^"** 
^When  pleased  by  any  remark,  he  would  not  only  express  approval 
in  the  usual  way,  but  also  clap  his  hands  for  joy.  And  this  he  would 
do  even  when  severe,  but,  as  he  thought,  just  criticism  was  passed  upon 
himself  by  younger  men;  as,  for  instance,  when  one  of  us  said,  ^ There 
is  one  privil^e  of  genius  of  which  you  avail  yourself  to  the  utmost 
extent— self-contradiction.^  Again,  when  he  was  once  laying  down  the 
law  that  a  picture  should  be  finished  calmly  from  comer  to  corner,  and 
it  was  replied,  ^That  is  what  you  never  do  yourself;  you  know  that 
difiiculties,  like  toads,  lurk  in  comers^ — ^his  laughter  and  hand-clapping 
were  greater  even  than  usual.'"  ^  ^^He  would  fling  oat  wildly  at  you,^ 
says  another  memorial  of  these  Oxford  days — ^^^at  the  music-stool  you 
were  sitting  on,  with  its  blunt,  machine-turned  edges;  at  the  pictures 
on  your  walls;  and  then  come  and  stand  by  you,  and  with  folded 
hiO^ds  and  half-closed  eyes  ask  you,  repentantly,  to  lecture  himJ"^    He 

»  '^Ruskin  at  Oxford,"  by  "Peter,"  in  St.  Oeorge,  vol.  vl  p.  111. 

*  Mr.  Plammer  in  the  Peiiean  Record,  vol.  ii.  p.  136. 

*  Auld  Lang  Syne,  by  the  Rt.  Hon.  Professor  Max  Muller,  1878,  pp.  127-128. 

*  Mr.  Oddie  in  the  Peiiean  Beeord,  vol  ii.  p.  104. 

*  St.  Charge,  vol.  vi.  p.  106. 


INTKODUCTION  xxxix 

W9S  intolerant  only  of  affectation  or  presumptioii.  *^Ah,  Mr.  Ruskin,^ 
said  a  too  eager  disciple,  *'  the  first  moment  that  I  entered  the  gallery 
at  Florence  I  saw  at  once  what  jou  meant  when  asserting  the  supremacj 
of  Botticelli/'  ^^  Did  you  ?  ^  said  the  Professor,  ^^  and  in  a  moment !  It 
took  me  twenty  years  to  find  out  that.^^ 

Of  the  so-called  ^^sesthetic^  movement,  which  had  borrowed  firom. 
Ruskin  some  of  its  catchwords,  such  as  *^  entirely  precious,^  he  had 
an  utter  loathing.'  It  was  perhaps  partly  in  order  to  dissociate  him- 
self from  Postlethwaites  or  Maudles  that  Ruskin  embarked  upon  the 
road*digging  experiment,  which  in  the  great  world  attracieid  more 
attention  than  any  of  his  other  work  at  Oxford.  Ruskin,  for  all  his 
idealism,  was  constantly  bent  upon  practice.  He  taught  in  his  lectures 
that  the  fine  arts,  and  especially  the  art  of  landscape  painting,  require, 
aa  a  condition  of  their  perfection,  a  happy  country  life.  He  tliught, 
too,  incidentally,  that  manual  labour  is  a  condition  of  a  completely 
healthy  and  rounded  human  existence,  and  he  deplored  the  over- 
importance  attached  in  England  to  merely  athletic  exercise.'  He  often 
practised  what  he  preached;  for  digging,  as  he  tells  us,  was  ever  one 
of  his  fsivourite  pursuits.^  He  wanted  the  exercise  necessary  to  the 
health  of  young  Oxford  to  produce  some  tangible  result.  Also,  what 
he  said  in  his  lectures,  he  always  went  on  to  show.  Just  as  he  illus- 
trated a  discussion  of  Greek  art  by  getting  his  pupils  to  examine  and 
handle  actual  coins,  so  he  desired  to  make  them  discover  what  the 
work  of  a  day-labourer  really  was,  and  by  some  practical  piece  of 
serviceable  toil,  to  come  into  personal  contact  with  the  lives  of  the 
poor  and  the  conditions  of  rural  life. 

This  was  the  genesis,  in  Ruskin's  mind,  of  the  road-digging  experi-> 
ment;  the  choice  of  a  spot  for  it  introduces  us  to  another  side  of 
Ruflkin's  life  at  Oxford.  He  was  used,  when  he  tired  of  the  view  of 
back-walls  in  Broad  Street,^  or  when  he  felt  the  need  of  greater  quiet 
than  could  always  be  secured  in  College,  to  migrate  into  country 
quarters  at  Abingdon — ^thus  anticipating  a  movement  which  has  covered 
the  he%hts  of  Headington  and  Boards  Hill  with  so  many  pleasant  villas 
of  University  residents.  He  liked  the  walk  or  drive  from  Abingdon 
to  Oxford,  thus  enjoying  Tumer^s  view  of  the  city,  and  rejoicing  in 
qpiring-time  in  ^^the  wild  hyacinths  opening  in  flakes  of  blue  fire  in 

^  From  a  sermon  by  Canon  Scott  Holland  to  Univsrsity  Extension  students, 
noticed  in  the  Pali  Mail  Gazette,  September  7,  1891.  There  is  a  reference  to  this 
remark  in  Ariadne  Fiorentina,  §  158. 

*  See  Vol.  IV.  pp.  7-8,  36  (note  of  1883). 
s  See  Vol.  VII.  p.  341  n. 

«  See  JPtestenta,  ii.  §  79. 

*  See  above,  p^  zxx. 


INTRODUCTION 

Bagley  wood.^^  He  shrunk  sometimes  from  the  social  ties  of  the  Uni- 
Teisity.  ^'I  have  been  dining  at  C.  C.  C.  and  liked  it,^  he  wrote  to 
Mrs.  Seyem  in  1871,  "but  Oxford  is  very  terrible  after  Coniston — 
being  liable  to  meet  somebody  whom  you  don^t  know,  and  ought  to, 
at  the  comer  of  every  street,  and  asked  questions  whidi  you  canH: 
answer,  and  ought  to,  at  the  comer  of  every  table,^  Moreover,  the 
country  more  immediately  around  Oxford  was  painful  to  him.  ^He 
told  me  onoe,^  says  an  Oxford  friend,  ^^that  he  could  not  walk  with 
me  to  the  Upper  River  through  Port  Meadow,  because,  to  do  so,  he 
would  have  to  pass  through  ^  Jericho  *"  ^ ;  and  in  one  of  his  Oxford  lectures 
he  spoke  despairingly  of  the  new  suburbs  of  the  city.'  Let  no  one 
suppose  that  such  expressions  had  anything  of  affectation  in  them. 
The  poverty,  of  which  he  felt  the  pang,  he  strove,  as  occasion  offered, 
to  alleviate,  and  in  so  doing  endured  pains  which  he  might  have 
avoided.  ^*At  the  very  time  when  he  was  working  in  the  Buskin 
School  he  had  settled  in  lodgings  across  the  road  an  apprentice-lad 
from  Sheffield,  far  gone  in  consumption,  and  then  almost  dying.  The 
poor  fellow  would  pour  out  his  tale  of  the  woes  of  Sheffield  grinders, 
and  was  too  weak  to  know  when  to  stop.^' 

His  quarters  in  Abingdon  were  at  the  ^^  Crown  and  Thistle,^^ 
where  he  stayed,  on  and  off,  for  several  months  in  1871,  and  where 
occasionally  he  would  entertain  his  friends.  The  march  of  *^  improve- 
ments^ gave  him  much  to  deplore,^  but  there  was  enough  of  the  old* 
world  left  in  the  picturesque  churches,  gateways,  streets  and  alms-houses 
of  the  town  to  afford  compensation.  He  was  fond  of  the  country  walks 
between  Abingdon  and  Oxford,  and  in  talking  with  the  peasants  found 
opportunities  for  such  charities  as  are  mentioned  in  Fors  ClavigeraJ^ 
He  found  a  little  girl  playing  by  the  roadside,  because  she  had  no 
garden.  He  rented  a  tiny  piece  of  ground  for  her,  and  sent  the  child 
herself  to  learn  shepherding. 

He  was  especially  fond  of  the  walk  to  Ferry  Hincksey — ^^the 
sweetest  of  all  our  old  village  churches,^  which  he  caused  his  friend 
Mr.  Albert  Goodwin  to  paint:  the  drawing  is  in  the  Oxford  Ck>l- 
leddon^ — the  haunted  ground,  too,  of  Matthew  Amold^s  *^  Scholar 
Gipsy."  Unless  one  takes  the  ferry,  the  way  to  Ferry  (or  North) 
Hincksey  lies  by  the  ^^ Seven  Bridge  Road^  out  of  Oxford;  after  the 

^  Fort  Clamgera.  Letter  6. 

«  EagU^9  NeH,  |  95  (Vol.  XXII.  p.  192). 

'  St.  Qeorge,  vol.  vi.  p.  112. 

^  See  For$  CKav^era^  Letter  6. 

^  Letter  67  (^^  Notes  and  Correspondenoe "). 

'  No.  141  in  the  Rudimentary  Series:  see  VoL  XXL  p.  211. 


INTRODUCTION  xU 

last  of  the  bridges  is  crossed,  a  lane  runs  off  to  the  left,  which  drops 
presently  into  a  track  leading  through  damp  fields  to  the  village. 
Some  cottages  bordered  on  a  piece  of  green,  and  the  carts,  coming 
across  the  green  for  want  of  a  road,  cut  it  up  into  ruts.  It  was  here 
that  Ruskin  obtained  permission  to  make  a  new  road  for  the  carts 
to  use,  and  so  leave  the  green  in  fair  order;  and  ^Hhither  a  gang  of 
undergraduates  in  flannels,  with  spades,  picks,  and  barrows,  went  day 
by  day,  while  the  Professor  came  forth  sometimes  and  applauded  them 
at  their  task.""^  The  following  letter,  which  Ruskin  wrote  to  Acland 
for  transmission  to  the  owner  of  the  land — ^Mr.  Harcourt,  of  Nuneham 
and  Stanton  Harcourt — gives  his  own  account  of  the  scheme : — 

''HxaiKB  Hill,  2Sth  March,  74. 

''My  dbar  Acland, — ^I  have  not  courage  to  write  directly  to  Mr. 
Harcourt,  at  length  enough  to  explain  what  I  have  to  ask  of  him — 
the  bearing  of  it,  I  mean,  for  the  thing  itself  is  explicable  enough 
in  few  words — ^but  if  you  will  kindly  see  him,  or,  if  you  cannot  at 
present,  introduce  the  matter  to  him  with  a  word  or  two,  and  enclose 
this  letter,  I  do  not  doubt  his  kind  consent. 

"  In  the  first  place,  I  want  to  show  my  Oxford  drawing  class  my 
notion  of  what  a  country  road  should  be.  I  am  always  growling  and 
howling  about  rails,  and  I  want  them  to  see  what  I  would  have 
instead,  beginning  with  a  quite  by-road  through  villages.  Now  I 
don't  know  in  all  England  a  lovelier  site  of  road  than  the  lane  along 
the  foot  of  the  hills  past  Ferry  Hincksey,  and  I  want  Mr.  Harcourt's 
leave  to  take  up  the  bit  of  it  immediately  to  the  south  of  the  village, 
and  bring  it  this  spring  into  the  prettiest  shape  I  can.  I  want  to 
level  one  or  two  bits  where  the  water  lodges,  to  get  the  ruts  out  of 
the  rest,  and  sow  the  banks  with  the  wild  flowers  that  ought  to 
grow  on  them;  and  this  I  want  to  do  with  delicatest  touching, 
putting  no  rough  workmen  on  the  ground,  but  keeping  all  loveliness 
it  has.     This  is  my  first,  not  my  chief  object. 

'^  My  chief  object  is  to  let  my  pupils  feel  the  pleasures  of  usefid 
muscular  work,  and  especially  of  the  various  and  amusing  work  in- 
volved in  getting  a  Human  Pathway  rightly  made  through  a  lovely 
country,  and  rightly  adorned.  You  haven't  attended  my  pretty  lectures 
as  you  ought,  you  know!  and  so  you  don't  know  how  strongly  I 
have  urged  as  the  root  of  all  good  in  any  of  the  arts,  from  highest  to 
lowest,  the  founding  of  all  beauty  and  useful  purpose,  and  the  sancti- 
fication  of  useful  purpose  by  affectionate  grace-giving  or  decoration. 

''Now  that  country  road  under  the  slope  of  the  hill  with  its 
irregular  line  of  trees,  sheltering  yet  not  darkening  it,  is  capable 

^  RuMn  in  Oxford  and  Other  8tudie$,  by  G.  W.   Kitchin,  1904,  p.  45.     Hie 
Dean's  aocount  of  the  details  of  the  road,  etc.,  is  not  very  acoarate. 


idii  INTRODUCTION 

of  being  made  one  of  the  loveliest  tbinga  in  this  English  vorld  1^ 
only  a  little  tenderness  and  patience  in  easj  labour.  We  can  get 
all  stagnant  water  carried  away,  of  coursei  with  the  simplest  arrange** 
ments  of  faU^  and  we  can  make  the  cottages  more  healthy,  and  the 
walk^  within  reach  of  little  time  and  slight  strength  from  Oxford, 
far  more  beautiful  than  any  college  gardens  can  be.  So,  as  you  do 
know,  I  have  got  one  or  two  of  my  men  to  promise  me  that  they 
will  do  what  work  is  necessary  with  their  own  shoulders.  I  will 
send  down  my  own  gardener  to  be  at  their  command,  with  what 
under  work  may  here  and  there  be  necessary  which  they  cannot 
do  with  pleasure  to  themselves,  and  I  will  meet  whatever  expenses 
is  needful  for  cartage  and  the  like;  and  all  that  I  ask  of  Mr. 
Harcourt  is  permission  to  make  the  road  sound,  to  carry  the  drainage 
under  it  and  away,  and  trim  the  banks  to  my  mind.  But  all  depends 
upon  the  place  remaining,  at  least  for  this  summer,  in  other  respects 
what  it  is  now;  the  quietude  to  it  and  entirely  rustic  character  of 
its  exquisite  little  church  and  beautifully  placed  cottages  being  the 
necessary  condition  of  showing  what  a  pure  country  scene  may  be 
made  by  the  active  care  of  gentle  minds  and  delicate  hands.  I  had 
more  to  say,  but  my  paper  says,  I  suppose  rightly,  better  not, 
except  that,  I  am, 

''Ever  your  loving  friend, 

''JOHH    RlTSKIN." 

Ruskin  had  started  the  scheme  in  the  spring  term  by  getting  some 
Balliol  men  who  were  ready  to  take  it  up  to  breakfast  at  Corpus.  The 
first  of  the  diggers'  breakfasts  was  on  March  S4, 1874.  ^*  I  remember,^ 
says  Mr.  Wedderbum,  **that  Ruskin  on  this  occasion  described  to  us 
his  ideal  state  of  society.  The  breakfast  took  place  in  the  Common 
Room,  and  we  went  to  Raskin's  rooms  after  it.  He  was  to  go  abroad 
at  once  while  we  started  the  work,  and  I  remember  saying  to  him, 
^Well,  we  will  do  the  rough  work,  and  you  can  make  it  beautiful 
when  you  come  back ; '  on  which  he  held  out  both  his  hands  and  shook 
both  of  mine  with  gratitude.  His  desire  for  sympathy  and  delight  at 
getting  it  were  pathetic.  When  we  came  away  I  recall  some  one 
8ayingj  *Well,  if  he\  mad,  it's  a  pity  there  are  not  more  lunatics  in 
the  world,'  and  this  expressed  the  feeling  of  us  aU.  The  work  was 
started  under  Ruskin's  old  gardener,  David  Downs^  Ruskin  was  abroad 
until  the  October  term;  he  then  used  to  come  «nd  superintend  the 
work  himself.^    Hie  spade-work  was  over  by  this  time,  I  think,  but 

^  His  diary  shows  that  his  first  attendance  was  on  October  27,  1874  (''To 
diggings  and  work  for  the  first  time  with  my  merry  men").  And  ag^  on 
November  2 :  ''At  the  diggings,  finding  the  difficulty  of  nakiag  rosdii" 


■   ttuskln    Rond    nl    HInksc-y 


INTRODUCTION  xliii 

the  stouts  had  to  be  broken  fior  the  road,  and  we  found  stone-breaking 
none  so  easy.  Downs  taught  us,  and  we  broke  a  good  many  hammers 
in  learning;  Ruskin  took  his  turn  at  this  part  of  the  work."*^  The 
Professor  had  qualified  himself  by  practice  in  this  part  of  the  job. 
^When  I  had  to  direct  road-making  at  Oxford,^  he  says,  *^I  sate, 
myself,  with  an  iron-masked  stone-breaker,  on  his  heap,  to  break  stones 
beside  the  London  road,  just  under  Iffley  Hill,  till  I  knew  how  to 
advise  my  too  impetuous  pupils  to  effect  their  purposes  in  that  matter, 
instead  of  bi*eaking  the  heads  of  their  hammers  off  (a  serious  item  in 
our  dcdly  expenses).*"^  "While  abroad  he  wrote  to  me,**  continues 
Mr,  Wedderbum,  "from  Assisi  on  the  subject  (* Longest  Day,  1874'):-^ 

"'Even  digging;,  righily  done,  is  at  least  as  much  an  furt  as  the 
mere  muscular  act  of  rowing;  it  is  only  inferior  in  Harmony  and 
time.  On  the  other  hand,  the  various  stroke  and  lifl  (in  soft  and 
hard  ground)  is  as  different  in  a  good  labourer  from  a  tyro  as 
any  stroke  of  oar.  But  all  that  is  of  no  moment;  the  real,  final, 
unanswerable  superiority  is  in  the  serviceableness  and  duty,  and  the 
avoidance  (this  is  quite  an  immense  gain  in  my  mind)  of  strain  or 
rivalry.' " 


Such,  then,  was  Ruskin'^s  experiment.  "  The  world,"^  says  Deanr  Eitchin, 
^'naturally  laughed,^  There  were  facetious  letter^  in  the  I^ondou 
papers;  "Platonic  Dialogues^  in  the  University  squibi;  fancy  pictures 
of  ^^  Amateur  Navvies  at  Oxford  ^  in  the  illustrated  pi^pers ;  aod  in  the 
window  at  Shrimpton^s  in  the  Broad,  consecrated  to  cartoons,  a  sketch 
of  the  Professor  of  Fine  Art  with  pick  and  shovel  aa  "President  of 
the  Amateur  Li^idscape  Gardening  Society.^  To  walk  over  to  Hincksey 
and  laugh  at  th^  diggers  was  a  fashionable  afternoon  amusement* 
"  There  was  a  good  deal  of  levelling  to  be  done,^  says  Mr*  Wedderbum, 
"and  1^  hank  to  be  cut  away.  The  sooiFers  (Dons  included)  used  to 
come  and  stand  on  the  top  of  the  bank  while  we  dug«^'  The  opposite 
plate  shows  (below)  the  actual  work  in  progress  (from  a  photograph 
by  Mr.  H.  W,  Taunt,  at  Oxford) ;  and  (above)  the  version  of  it  given 
in  the  Graphic  (June  91,  1874). 

At  the  time  of  the  most  contemptuous  allusions  in  the  papers 
Ruskin  was  himself  in  Italy,  and  Acland  with  characteristic  ardour 
wrote  eloquently  in  defence  of  his  friend  :->- 

"Mr.  Raskin,"  he  wrote  in  the  course  of  a  letter  to  the  Timet  (dated 
May  19,  1874),  "a  man  of  no  narrow  sympathies,  has  known  Oxford  for 

«  Praterita,  ii.  §  197. 


xliv  INTRODUCTION 

forty  yean.  He  is  as  interested  in  the  greatness  of  the  educated  youth 
of  England  as  he  is  in  the  well-being  of  the  poor.  He  is  loved  by  both. 
To  the  high-spirited  youth  of  Oxford  he  has  said,  'Will,  then,  none  of  you 
out  of  the  abundance  of  your  strength  and  of  your  leisure,  do  anything 
for  the  poor  ?  The  poor  ye  have  always  with  you.  Drain  a  single  cottage ; 
repair  a  single  village  by-way;  make  good  a  single  garden  wall;  make 
pleasant  with  flowers  one  widow's  plot,  and  your  muscles  will  be  more  strong 
and  your  hearts  more  light  than  had  all  your  leisure  hours  been  spent  in 
costly  games,  or  yet  more  hurtful  amusements.'  ...  To  say  nothing  of 
the  good  of  humane  and  hearty  occupation  to  the  men  themselves,  are  we 
sure  that  some  men  such  as  these  when  wisely  directed  will  not  be  among 
the  best  safeguards  in  the  heaving,  restless,  social  fabric  of  modem  life  ? "  ^ 

Ruskin  himself  took  the  ridicule  good-naturedly;  his  sense  of  humour 
was  at  least  as  alert  as  that  of  his  revilers.  The  road  which  his 
pupils  made  is,  he  was  heard  to  admit,  about  the  worst  in  the  three 
kingdoms  (though  in  fact  it  is  passable  enough),  and  for  any  level 
places  in  it  he  used  to  give  the  credit  to  his  old  gardener,  whom 
he  summoned  to  Oxford  to  act  as  Professor  of  I^igging.  But  he 
had  a  serious  purpose;  and  the  experiment,  even  from  the  point  of 
view  of  road-making,  was  by  no  means  barren.  An  inch  of  practice 
is  sometimes  worth  a  yard  of  preaching;  and  Ruskin^s  road-digging 
experiment  gave  a  real  stimulus  to  ^the  gospel  of  labour,^  of  the 
same  kind  as  the  later  and  independent  teaching  of  Count  Tolstoi. 
Ruskin,  by  this  experiment  which  attracted  so  much  attention,  causing 
some  to  consider,  if  many  to  smile,  was  a  pioneer  in  an  educational 
movement  which  is  now  spreading.  In  the  greater  Public  Schools, 
and  at  the  old  Universities,  the  rage  for  mere  athletics  continues, 
indeed,  unabated;  but  the  importance  of  manual  dexterity  is  coming 
to  be  recognised  even  in  the  old  schools,  while  there  are  many 
newer  foundations  in  which  athletics  are  tempered  by  daily  practice 
in    the   elementary    arts   of  digging  and  gardening,  upon  which  life 

V-l  ^  Mr.  Punch  sided  with  Acland,  and  published  some  verses  (June  6, 1874)  which 
thus  ended : — 

"  Pity  we  have  for  the  man  who  thinks  he 

rroves  Raskin  fool  for  work  like  this. 
Why  shouldnH  young  Oxford  lend  hands  to  Hincksey, 

Though  Doctrinaires  may  take  it  amiss? 
Careless  wholly  of  critic's  menace. 

Scholars  of  Ruskin,  to  him  be  true ; 
The  truth  he  has  writ  in  The  Stonei  df  Venice 

May  be  taught  by  the  Stones  of  Hincksey  too." 

The  Spectator,  also,  approved ;  see  the  passage  quoted  in  Fore  Olavigera,  Letter  46 
'''Notes  and  Correspondence"). 


INTRODUCTION  xlv 

upon  this  earth  is  based.^  Educationalists  of  ^^the  new  school^ 
recognise,  too,  that  a  sound  principle  lies  underneath  the  methods 
which  Dickens  caricatured — *^C-l-e-a-n,  clean,  verb  active,  to  make 
bright,  to  scour.  W-i«n,  win,  d*e-r,  der,  winder,  a  casement.  When 
a  boy  knows  this  out  of  the  book,  he  goes  and  does  it.**^  Mr*  Squeers 
only  lost  the  credit  of  an  educational  pioneer  by  misapplying  his 
principles. 

But  Ruskin,  in  preaching  ^  d-i-g,  dig,  go  and  do  it,^  had  a  second 
object  in  view.  His  ^^  class  ^  at  Hincksey  weeded  out  the  weaker 
brethren,  and  drew  the  more  devoted  closer  to  him.  Some  of  the 
Oxford  roflui-diggers  were  attracted  to  the  work,  less  for  its  own 
sake,  perhaps,  than  for  the  reward  of  it — ^the  reward  of  the  breakfast- 
parties  and  talks  in  the  Professor^s  rooms  at  Corpus;  but  they  had  to 
do  the  digging  first.  Acland^s  prediction  was  in  considerable  measure 
fulfilled ;  for  it  was  in  Ruskin^s  lectures,  talks,  and  digging-parties  that 
the  seeds  were  sown,  or  watered,  of  that  practical  interest  in  social 
questions  which  was  to  be  the  next  Oxford  Movement.  Among  the 
undergraduate  road-diggers  were  Alfred  Milner  (now  Viscount  Milner), 
whose  tall  figure  may  be  seen  in  the  photograph,  and  Arnold  Toynbee 
— ^that  rare  and  beautiful  spirit,  most  persuasive  of  talkers,  most 
devoted  of  workers,  whose  name  cannot  be  mentioned  by  any  of  his 
friends  without  some  word  of  affectionate  admiration.  Toynbee  rose 
by  his  zeal  in  the  Hincksey  work  to  the  rank  of  foreman.  ^^He  was 
thus  entitled,^  adds  his  biographer,  ^^to  appear  fr^uently  at  those 
breakfasts  which  Mr.  Ruskin  gave  to  his  young  friends,  and  enlivened 
with  quaint,  eloquent  conversation.  Upon  men  like  Toynbee,  intercourse 
with  Mr.  Ruskin  had  a  stimulating  effect  more  durable  than  the  actual 
improvement  of  the  road  near  Hincksey.  Toynbee  came  to  think  very 
diffierently  from  Mr.  Ruskin  upon  many  subjects,  and  especially  upon 

1  See^  for  instance,  an  article  in  the  Pali  Mail  QazeUe  of  August  26,  1889,  on 
'' The  New  School/'  founded  at  Abbotsholme  by  Dr.  Cecil  Reddie ;  and  ''An  Essay 
in  Education/'  entitled  Bedales  School,  by  J.  H.  Badley  (Cambridge  University 
Press,  1900).  ''After  the  indoor  classes,  Mr.  Badley  explains,  "come,  on  two 
days  of  the  week,  the  usual  school  games ;  on  two  other  afternoons,  instead  of 
games,  there  is  outdoor  worlc,  in  garden,  ham,  or  dairy.  The  majority  take  part, 
under  the  direction  of  the  head-gardener,  in  whatever  work  is  going  on  in  the 
garden.  Older  boTS  have  the  option  of  doing  &nn-work  instead,  under  the  £um- 
manager.  Here  they  practise  ploughing,  hoeing,  etc.  It  shoiUd  be  made  clear 
that  all  this  is  not  done  with  the  intention  of  turning  out  fiirmers.  ...  It  is  a 
wholeseme  variant  from  the  games  which  may  easily  be  overdone  at  school,  and 
from  the  head-work  of  the  morning;  it  is  healthy  work,  and  work  that  has  a 
practical  interest  and  satisfttction  of  its  own;  and  further,  work  that  serves  to 
beat  down  conventional  barriers  and  notions  of  what  is  befitting  a  gentleman" 
(p.  14). 


xlri  INTRODUCTION 

dtauK»acy,  but  Always  regarded  him  with  reverence  and  al^tim.^^ 
It  18  impoflsible  to  say  in  how  many  leaders  and  followers  of  the 
^^ young  Oxford^  morement  Ruskin^s  influenoe  worked  directly  0t  in- 
directly As  a  ittmolus  and  an  inspiration.  YIThat  is  certain  is,  that 
the  actual  course  taken  by  that  movement  has  followed  the  princijiles 
preached  by  him.  ^^I  tell  you,^  said  the  Professor  of  Fine  Art,  ht 
the  close  of  one  of  his  lectures,  *^that  neither  sound  art,  policy,  not 
religion  can  exist  in  England  until,  neglecting,  if  it  filust  be,  your 
own  pleasure-gardens  and  pleasurenchambers,  you  resolve  that  the 
streets  which  are  the  habitation  of  the  poor,  and  the  fields  which  are 
the  playgrounds  of  their  dbildren,  shall  be  again  restored  to  the  riile 
of  the  spirits,  whosoever  they  are,  in  earth  and  heaven,  that  ordain 
aad  rewwrd,  with  constant  and  conscious  felicity,  all  that  is  detent  Ahd 
orderly,  beautiful  and  pure.*" '  It  was  the  conviction  of  this  truth  that 
had  no  small  share  in  leading  to  the  Universities^  Settlements  in  East 
Lcmdon. 

Of  Ruskin^s  professional  teaching,  and  of  the  collections  which  he 
formed  to  illustrate  it,  account  is  given  in  the  next  volume.  His 
hopes  and  schemes  are  set  forth  in  the  Inaugural  Lecture  here.' 
With  regard  to  these,  and  to  his  work  at  Oxford  generally,  he  con- 
fesses in  the  Preface  of  1887^  to  mudi  sense  of  disappointment  and 
failure.  To  ardent  and  enthusiastic  spirits,  ever  conscious  of  ^such 
things  to  be,  such  things  to  do,^  the  accomplishment,  in  this  imperfect 
world,  is  also  ever  doomed  to  fall  far  short  of  the  aspiration.  Ruskin 
lays  all  the  blame  on  his  own  shortcomings,  and  hazards  the  opinion 
that,  if  he  had  spent  his  whole  time  and  energy  upon  his  Oxford 
work,  he  might  have  succeeded  in  establishing  a  real  school  of  art-^ 
with  subsidiary  schools  of  sculpture,  architecture,  metal  Work,  and 
manuscript  illumination,  and  in  gathering  around  the  Slade  Professor- 
ship a  large  band  of  serious  students — within  the  University.  But 
all  this  may  be  doubted.  The  inaugural  lectures  of  most  F^fessors 
meet  with  the  same  fate.  They  set  forth  schemes  of  work  which  are 
based  on  the  assumption  that  Oxford  is  a  home  of  disinterested 
study;  the  assumption  is  hardly  in  accordance  with  the  facts,  and  so 
the  Professor'^s  hopes  come  to  nought.  The  undergraduates  are  partly 
our  ^  young  barbarians  all  at  play,^  and  partly  students  working  for 

1  Arnold  Toynbee,  bv  F.  C.  Montagae^  1889,  p.  14. 

'  Art  4tf  England,  §  123;  and  compare,  in  this  volame,  Lectures  en  Att,  §§  4, 
116  (pp.  21,  107). 

*  See  below,  pp.  21-^22,  ISa 

*  See  below,  p.  13. 


INTRODUCTION 

tipecA&td  cfxaminatioiis.  Thei%  is  no  ExamiimtioB  School  of  Fine  Arts» 
and  therefixe  there  is  no  ^stemAtic  study  of  them.  Even  the  attrac- 
tion of  Ruskin^s  fame  and  personality  failed  to  draw  more  than  a 
handfal  to  his  professional  dasses.  His  work  at  Oxford  must  stand, 
therefore,  not  on  the  realisation  of  the  schemes  propounded  in  these 
Ledures  on  Arty  but  rather  on  the  art  collections  which  he  gave  to 
the  University,  and  which,  though  at  present  little  used,  are  capable 
of  serving  a  useful  purpose,^  and  on  the  stimulus — ^intellectual,  moral, 
and  flBsliietio — whidi  his  lectures  and  his  conversation  applied  to  sue- 
oessive  generations  of  young  men.  The  written  word  in  part  remains, 
the  inspiration  of  the  Living  Voice  passes  away;  yet  where  the  teacher 
has  in  him  the  divine  sparky  ^^its  echoes  roll  from  soul  to  soul,^  and 
thus  may  ^live  for  ever  and  for  ever.'" 

**  LECTURES  ON  ART^ 

The  interest  which  was  taken  in  the  appointment  to  the  Chair  of 
a  Professor  so  distinguished  as  Raskin  was  shown  at  his  Inaugural 
Lecture.  It  had  been  announced  for  the  Theatre  in  the  Museum,  but 
long  before  the  appointed  hour  the  room  was  so  densely  crowded,  and 
there  were  so  many  disappointed  of  admission,  that  Acland  b^ged  the 
audience  to  adjourn,  with  the  lecturer  at  their  head,  to  the  Sheldonian 
Theatre.  There  had  been  no  such  scene  in  Oxfon^  since  1841,  when 
Dr.  Arnold  gave  his  inaugural  lecture  as  Professor  of  Modem  History.* 
Ruskin  was  able  to  send  a  line  to  his  mother,  immediately  after  Uie 
lecture  was  over,  telling  that  it  had  been  a  great  success;  adding  in 
a  later  note  that  he  had  been  obliged  to  give  it  6om  the  same  place 
where,  thirty-one  years  before,  he  had  recited  his  prize  poem.  The 
second  lecture  was  equally  successful,  and  Rnskin  reported  to  his  mother 
as  follows:-^ 

'^Thb  UNivBRsiTy  Galleribb,  Oxford, 
"  leth  February,  1870. 

'^  My  dearest  Mother, — The  afternoon  is  bright  and  a  little  soft 
at  last,  and  everybody,  as  far  as  I  can  hear,  has  been  much  pleased 
with  my  lecture.  My  voice  lasted  excellently,  and  it  was  just  an  hour 
of  talk,  to  certainly  as  important  an  audience  as  it  could  have  been 
addressed  to,  young  and  old. 

"  I  have  a  notion  you  will  hear  a  good  deal  of  it,  for  they  seemed 

^  See  on  this  subjeet  the  Introduetion  to  the  next  volume. 
>  See  Stonle/B  W  ^  Armid,  ed.  1901,  p.  619. 


xlviii  INTRODUCTION 

very  much  interested;  and   Henry  Acland  was  crying,  he  was  so 

pleased,  and  reUeved  from  the  fear  of  my  saying  anything  that  would 

shock  people. 

^*  I  really  think  the  time  has  come  for  me  to  be  of  some  use.     I 

am  quite  well. 

"Ever,  my  dearest  Mother, 

"Your  most  affectionate  Son, 

"J.    RUSKIN." 

The  attendance  remained  very  large,  though  Ruskin  declined  to 
repeat  the  ei[periment  of  lecturing  in  so  large  a  room  as  the  Sheldonian 
Theatre.  At  various  times  he  made  efforts  to  exclude  the  ladies,  who 
threatened,  by  their  greater  pertinacity,  to  oust  the  University  men, 
and  many  of  his  subsequent  courses  were  delivered  twice — first  to  the 
University,  and  then  to  a  general  audience.  After  the  first  four 
lectures  of  the  present  course,  which  were  of  a  general  character, 
Ruskin  limited  his  audience  by  requiring  a  previous  application  for 
tickets.  The  remaining  lectures  were,  as  the  reader  will  see,  more 
technical  in  character,  .and  more  copiously  illustrated  by  examples  which 
could  not  be  properly  shown  or  explained  to  a  public  meeting. 

The  lectures  were  published  shortly  after  their  delivery  by  the 
Clarendon  Press,  Ruskin  leaving  to  his  faithful  friend  W.  H.  Harrison 
the  task  of  correcting  the  proofs.  The  book  was  widely  noticed  in 
the  newspapers,  an<}  passed  rapidly  through  successive  editions.  In  1887 
it  was  reissued  in  a  cheaper  form,  and  started  upon  a  new  career 
of  wider  publicity.  The  text  of  this  edition  stands  as  last  revised  by 
Ruskin;  but  all  passages  omitted  from  the  earlier  edition  are  supplied 
either  in  the  list  of  various  readings  (p.  8),  or  in  footnotes  (see,  ^^., 
pp.  S2,  60,  118).  The  iUustrixtions  introduced  in  the  present  edition 
will,  it  is  hoped,  add  considerably  to  the  interest  of  the  book.  Some 
of  the  examples  shown  at  the  lectures  are  now  reproduced  here 
(pp.  156,  166)  or  in  the  next  volume  (see  the  reference  in  §  25). 
The  passages  descriptive  of  Greek  vases  (§§  158-156)  are  much  more 
intelligible  with  illustrations,  and  woodcuts  are,  therefore,  introduced 
in  the  text. 

Ruskin  not  unjustly  regarded  these  Lectures  on  Art  as  being  one 
of  his  principal  works.  On  the  general  topics  treated  in  Lectures  i.-iv. 
they  give  his  most  matured  views,  as  also  they  contain  some  of  his 
finest  pieces  of  rhetoric.  Of  the  remaining  lectures,  which  limiting 
themselves  to  painting,  treat  specifically  of  line,  light,  and  colour,  it  has 
been  well  said  that  ^^  none  but  a  master  practised  in  the  art,  and  with 
extraordinary  gifts  of  perception  and  expression,  could   have   written 


INTRODUCTION  xlix 

them.  The  attention  of  the  student  is  not  confined  to  technical  detail, 
but  is  directed  to  the  broader  aspects  of  the  subject  by  general  state- 
ments in  regard  to  the  different  schools  of  painting.  Some  of  these 
statements  may  seem  to  require  modification,  but  they  all  serve  to 
illustrate  leading  fE^ts  and  principles,  and  to  quick^i  observation  and 
reflection.^  ^ 

The  mamucfipi  dirqfls  which  have  been  in  the  editors^  hands  fully 
bear  out  what  Ruskin  says  (above,  p.  xzii.)  oi  the  pains  taken  in  the 
composition  of  the  lectures.  There  are  at  Brantwood  two  huge  ledgers 
which  contain  the  author^s  first  versions  of  his  earlier  Oxford  Lectures. 
He  wrote  them  over  and  over  again,  revising  the  language  and  re- 
arranging the  order  of  his  topics  incessantly.  The  final  £ur  copy, 
which  in  its  turn  was  doubtless  much  revised  on  proof,  is  not  known 
to  the  editors.  The  facsimUea  here  given— of  the  opening'  sentences 
(p.  16)  and  of  a  famous  piece  of  rhetoric,  delivered  later  in  the  course 
(p.  4S) — are  from  pages  of  the  ledgers  above  described.  Many  pas* 
sages,  omitted  for  considerations  of  time  and  space,  are  now  added  in 
footnotes,  from  the  same  source  (see,  e.g*y  pp.  18,  2S,  40,  57,  68). 
The  MS.  of  the  Preface  of  1887  is  in  Mr.  Allen^s  possession. 


1870 

Ruskin^s  lectures  were  brought  to  an  end  in  March,  but  he  spent 
some  further  time  in  Oxford  arranging  the  examples  for  his  Drawing 
School,  and  preparing  the  first  Catalogue  of  them.  This  is  the  Cata- 
logue of  Examples  refeired  to  in  the  lectures  (p.  IS);  in  this  edition 
references  have  been  supplied  in  accordance  with  the  existing  arrange- 
ment of  the  collections.  After  this  spell  of  work,  Ruskin  felt  the  need 
of  change,  both  to  recover  strength  and  to  carry  forward  various  studies 
for  future  Oxford  courses.  He  was  abroad  for  three  months,  from  the 
end  of  April  to  the  end  of  July,  with  his  friend  Mrs.  Hilliard  and  her 
daughter,  and  his  cousin  Joan.  He  wrote  no  detailed  diary,  but  letters 
to  his  mother  and  friends  give  us  glimpses  of  the  travellers.^    After  the 

^  Introdaction  by  Professor  Norton  to  the  American  ^'Brantwood"  edition  of 
Lecture*  <m  Art,  p.  vi.  Ruskin's  fondness  for  classification  led  him  into  some 
apparent  confusion  at  one  point:  see  the  note  on  p.  127,  below. 

•  The  diary  of  the  tour  was  as  follows :  Boulogne  (April  27),  Paris  (April  28), 
Geneva  (April  90),  Vevay  (May  6),  Martigny  (May  11),  Brieg  (May  17),  Baveno 
(May  18),  Milan  (May  21),  Verona  (May  26),  Venice  (May  26),  Florence  (June  21), 
Siena  (June  25),  Florence  (June  28),  Pisa  (July  1),  Pistoja  (July  3),  Padua  (July  4), 

d 


1  INTRODUCTION 

severe  work  at  Oxford,  Ruskin  found  **the  reaction  very  considerable,^ 
he  told  his  mother,  ^^  and  was  for  a  time  very  languid  and  unwilling  for 
the  least  manual  exertion^  (May  13).  But  as  soon  as  he  came  among 
the  mountains  his  schemes  and  energies  were  renewed.  '^  I  am  examining 
the  mountains,''  he  writes  on  the  same  day  from  Martigny  (May  18), 
^^with  a  view  to  my  plan  for  the  redemption  of  their  barren  slopes. 
There  is  just  difficulty  enough  to  make  it  a  sublime  piece  of  manual 
work.*"  The  mountains  brought  him  pleasure  also,  though  tinged  with 
s€uiness.  Even  when  his  senses  were  most  keenly  touched  by  beautiful 
scenes,  the  still,  sad  music  of  humanity  was  ever  sounding  in  his  ears. 
^'  We  had  a  lovely  sunrise  on  the  Jura,**  he  writes  (Greneva,  April  80), 
*^  and  an  exquisite  morning  among  them,  and  I  very  much  enjoy  giving 
so  much  pleasure  as  this  whole  journey  is  giving.''  **All  these  beau- 
tiful places,"  he  writes  next  day,  '^are  now  more  to  me  in  some  ways 
than  ever;  had  they  remained  as  they  once  were,  I  could  have  been 
deeply  happy,  though  sad;  now,  the  uppermost  feeling  is  a  hard  in- 
dignation and  amazement,  and  the  next  one  of  wistful  longing  for 
the  old  time."  But  the  meadows  at  least  remained,  and  their  glory 
had  not  passed  away  from  the  earth.  ^^Here  is  a  fine  day  at  last," 
he  writes  from  Vevay  (May  7),  ^^and  I  am  going  to  take  Downs  up 
the  hills  to  see  narcissus.  They  are  out  in  all  their  glory,  white,  as 
in  the  old  time,  and  the  blossoming  trees  are  lovely."  And  again, 
"It  was  an  entirely  splendid  day  yesterday,  and  I  got  up  to  some 
of  my  old  favourite  (Vevay,  May  8)  fields,  aud  showed  Downs 
narcissus  and  oxalis  and  forget-me-nots  and  violet  and  primrose  and 
cowslip  and  oxlip,  all  growing  within  a  few  feet  of  each  other,  and  all 
luxuriantly.  I  had  grand  views  of  the  hills  above,  and  came  at  last 
to  gentians." 

Ruskin  had  meant  this  tour  to  be  a  real  holiday;  but  in  Italy  he 
could  not  be  idle.  "Now  that  I  am  the  ^professor,'"  he  writes  from 
Milan  (May  21),  ^^I  have  so  much  to  notice  and  set  down  every 
moment  of  my  day  in  Italy."  At  Venice  he  had  the  pleasure  of  much 
converse  with  his  dearly-loved  friend,  Rawdon  Brown,  and  he  made 
great  friends  too  with  the  Fathers  at  the  Armenian  Convent:^     "The 

Como  (July  5)^  Bellinzona  (July  7),  Airolo  (July  8),  Fluelen  (July  9),  Giessbach 
(July  10),  Lauterbrunnen  (July  20),  Thun  (July  23),  Genevft  (tluly  25),  Paris 
(July  26),  Boulogne  (July  27).  Ruskin  was  accompanied  on  this  occasion  not  only 
by  his  valet  and  a  maid  for  the  ladies,  but  also  by  his  gardener,  Downs,  to  whom 
he  desired  to  refer  on  some  of  his  Alpine  schemes,  and  to  give  the  pleasure  of  a  tour 
abroad. 

^  A  letter  from  Ruskin  of  later  date  is  framed  in  the  little  Museum  of  the 
Convent,  and  will  be  found  in  a  later  volume  of  this  edition. 


INTRODUCTION  U 

oleanders  are  superb,"  he  says  (June  19),  "and  it  is  the  only  quiet 
place  in  Venice.**^  He  was  satisfied  also  with  his  drawings  at  this 
time : — 

^'Yknioe,  Monday,  dOth  May. 

''My  dkarbst  Mother^ — I  enjoy  my  mornings  ,here,  they  make 
me  feel  young  again.  I  go  out  and  have  my  cup  of  coffee  in  the 
sunshine,  and  then  sit  in  my  boat,  as  I  used  to  do  with  Harding,  and 
draw,  not  as  I  used  to  do  with  delight,  for  I  know  too  well  now 
what  drawing  should  be,  but  with  a  pleasant  sense  that  other  people 
will  have  real  pleasure  in  what  I  am  doing.  But  I  don't  think  I  ever 
heard  of  any  one  who  so  mourned  over  his  departed  youth. 

"  Your  letters  give  me  great  pleasure.  I  cannot  resist  sending  you 
another  envelope.^     Joan's  love. 

''Ever  your  affectionate  Son, 

"J.    RUSKIN." 

Some  of  the  drawings  here  mentioned  were  placed  in  his  Art  Collec- 
tion at  Oxford,  and  one  of  them  is  reproduced  in  this  edition.' 

In  addition  to  drawings  of  Venetian  palaces,  Ruskin  devoted  himself 
to  a  close  study  of  Carpaccio  (as  in  the  preceding  year')  and  of 
Tintoret.  He  planned  at  once  a  new  course  of  lectures.  *^I  have 
resolved,**  he  wrote  to  his  mother  (June  18,  1870),  "to  give  my  five 
autumn  lectures  at  Oxford  on  one  picture,  Tintoret^s  Paradise.  It  will 
be  rather  too  large,  than  too  narrow,  a  subject.  What  a  strange 
thing  it  is  that  the  largest,  actually  in  canvas,  should  also  be  the  best, 
picture  in  the  world.'^     And  again,  from  Florence  (June  21): — 

"Flobenob,  Tuuday,  21it  June,  1870. 

"My  oearest  Mother, — The  morning  of  this  longest  day  broke 
bright  for  us  over  the  towers  of  Bologna,  and  at  half-past  six  we 
were  coming  down  the  Apennines  on  Pistoja,  into  the  most  splendid 
views  of  the  Val  d'Amo ;  at  nine,  our  usual  breakfast  hour,  we  were 
quietly  here  at  breakfast.  You  ask  me,  in  one  of  your  last  letters,  why 
I  say  that  Tintoret  is  too  awful.  I  mean  that  he  stands  so  alone  and 
is  so  grand  that  not  one  person  in  a  thousand  can  reach  up  to  him, 
and  he  is  useless  to  the  world  from  his  greatness.  I  was  afraid  I 
should  say  too  much  in  the  lectures  I  mean  to  give  this  autumn  on 
the  Paradise,  so  I  have  come  on  here  to  look  at  the  Florentine  school ; 

'  That  18,  addressed  to  himself  for  her  to  use.    Her  failing  sight  rendered  her 
writing  difficult  to  read. 

»  See  Plate  XXVH.  in  VoL  XXL 

s  See  the  letter  to  Bume-Jones  in  Vol.  IV.  p.  356  n. 


lii  INTRODUCTION 

but  I  have  seen  enough^  even  io-dt^j,  to  make  me  quite  sure  of 
what  I  have  to  say,  and  it  is  very  lucky  I  fcame  on.  I  send 
you  an  envelope  from  Milan,  for  I   shall   not  stay  long  here,  and 

am  ever, 

''My  dearest  Mother, 

''Your  most  affectionate  Son, 

"J.   RUSKIN." 

Ultimately  the  whole  course  on  Tintoret  resolved  itself  into  the  one 
lecture  (^^The  Relation  between  Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret,^  in 
Vol.  XXII.),  which  ended  with  an  enthusiastic  description  of  the 
'^  Paradise.''^  In  Tuscany  a  new  star  came  into  his  ken,  as  he  thus  ex- 
plains in  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Cowper  Temple: — 

"  Pisa,  lit  July,  1870. 

"My  dearest  Isola, — I  wonder  what  you  have  been  thinking  of 
me.  It  is  not  because  I  had  people  with  me  that  I  have  not 
written,  but  because  the  various  work  and  pain  of  this  year  have 
put  me  in  a  temper  in  which  no  pleasant  thoughts  ever  come  to 
me,  such  as  I  should  choose  to  write  to  you;  but  on  the  other  hand 
I  have  not  been  suffering  much — except  from  my  old  grievances 
about  pictures  and  buildings^  for  I  am  compelled  to  think  of  them 
now  nearly  all  day  long,  and  my  life  is  mere  inquiry  and  delibera- 
tion. I  have  only  had  some  good  to  tell  you  yesterday,  and  this 
morning  having  found  great  part  of  the  Pisan  buildings  safe,  and 
the  little  chapel  of  the  Virgine  della  Rosa  at  Lucca  ^ — ^so  I  write  to 
you.  I  have  learned  much  on  this  journey,  and  hope  to  tell  things 
in  the  autumn  at  Oxford  that  will  be  of  great  use,  having  found  a 
Master  of  the  religious  schools  at  Florence,  Filippo  Lippi,  new  to 
me,  though  often  seen  by  me,  without  seeing,  in  old  times,  though 
I  had  eyes  even  then  for  some  sights.  But  this  Filippo  Lippi  has 
brought  me  into  a  new  world,  being  a  complete  monk,  yet  an 
entirely  noble  painter.  Luini  is  lovely,  but  not  monkish.  Lippi  is 
an  Angelico  with  Luini's  strength,  or  perhaps  more,  only  of  earlier 
date,  and  with  less  knowledge.  I  came  on  to  Florence  from  Venice 
feeling  anxious  about  many  of  these  things,  and  am  glad  that  I 
have.  I  have  been  drawing  little  but  thinking  much,  and  to  some 
good  purpose.  Will  you  send  me  a  line  to  the  Giessbach?  I  am 
very  weary  in  the  innermost  of  me,  into  which,  you  will  see,  there 
is  more  surrender  perhaps  than  there  used  to  be,  and  even  a  com- 
parative peace ;  but  my  plans  have  been  broken  much  by  this  work, 

1  Two  years  later  both  were  "  destroyed "  :  see  Vol.  XXL  p.  33. 


INTRODUCTION  liH 

and  I  am  languid  with  unfollowed  purposes.  We  are  on  our  way 
home> .  This  is  not  a  letter,  hut  only  that  you  may  know  why  I  do 
not  write.     Love  to  William  always. 

''Ever  your  aiTectionate  St.  C."^ 

To  his  mother  Buskin  had  already  announced  his  new  discovery: — 

''  SiBNA,  Saturday,  2tUh  June,  1870. 

"My  dearest  Mother, — Yesterday  on  St.  John's  day  I  saw  a 
picture  of  the  religious  schools  by  a  man  whom  I  never  before  had 
much  looked  at^  which  is  as  much  beyond  all  other  religious  paint- 
ing as  Tintoret  is  above  all  secular  painting.  Curiously  enough, 
St.  John  Baptist  is  also  the  principal  figure  in  it,  and  I  am  really 
beginning,  for  the  first  time  in  my  life,  to  be  glad  that  my  name 
is  John.     Many  thanks  for  giving  it  me. 

"Last  night  the  air  was  quite  calm,  the  stars  burning  like 
torches  all  over  the  sky,  the  fire-flies  flying  all  about,  literally 
brighter  than  the  stars.  One  came  into  the  railroad  carriage  and 
shone  clear  in  fuU  lamplight,  settling  above  my  head;  but  the  look 
of  them  on  the  mid-sky  above  the  stars  was  marvellous,  all  the 
while  bright  sheet-lightning  pla3ang  on  the  Florentine  mountains. 
We  got  here  soon  after  ten,  and  found  it  cool  and  delicious.  Every- 
body is  in  raptures  to  see  us. 

'^Ever,  my  dearest  mother, 

"Your  most  affectionate  Son, 

"J.    RUSKIN." 

Raskin  and  his  party  had  gone  to  Siena  to  visit  Professor  Norton, 
who  had  made  his  temporary  home  in  one  of  the  spacious  old  villas 
which  lie  around  that  delightful  city: — 

''He  was  in  a  delightful  mood/'  writes  Ruskin's  host;  ''the  clouds 
which  darkened  his  spirit  had  lifted  for  the  moment,  and  all  its  sunshine 
and  sweetness  had  free  play.  He  spent  much  time  in  drawing  the  lioness 
and  her  cubs  at  the  base  of  one  of  the  pillars  of  the  wonderful  pulpit  in 
the  wonderful  cathedral.  We  wandered  through  the  mediaeval  town,  we 
drove  and  walked  through  many  of  the  roads  and  paths  of  the  picturesque 
region,  and  Ruskin  enjoyed  to  the  full  all  the  loveliness  of  the  Tuscan 
landscape,  the  interest  of  its  historic  associations,  and  the  charm  of  the 
Italian  atmosphere.  No  guest  could  have  added  more  to  the  pleasure  of 
the  household."^ 

^  For  this  signature,  see  Praterita,  iii.  §  56. 

*  Letters  qf  John  Ruekin  to  Charles  EUot  Norton,  vol.  ii.  p.  3. 


liv  INTRODUCTION 

The  drawing  of  the  lioness  and  the  cubs  also  took  its  place  in  the 
Oxford  Collection,  and  was  referred  to  in  the  last  lecture  of  AroAra 
Pentelicif  where  it  is  now  reproduced  (see  p.  863).  The  fire-flics  of 
Siena  made,  as  we  have  seen,  a  great  impression  on  Ruskin.  In 
another  letter  to  his  mother  (June  S6)  he  returns  to  them :  ^*  The  fire- 
flies,^ he  says,  ^^are  almost  awful  in  the  twilight,  as  bright  as  candles, 
flying  in  and  out  of  the  dark  cypresses;^  and  in  a  later  letter  to 
W.  H.  Harrison  they  are  again  described  : — 

'^AiROiiO,  St.  Gothard,  8^A  July,  1870. 

"My  dear  HarrisoNj — I  promised  to  write  when  I  left  Venice, 
but  had  not  finished  there  when  I  was  called  to  Siena  and  Florence, 
and  have  been  only  busy  worse  and  worse  ever  since.  I  had  half 
the  pre&ce  written  before  I  left  home,  but  have  not  added  a  page 
since  coming  abroad,  and  shall  be  forced,  I  see,  at  last,  to  write 
a  short  and  merely  explanatory  one.^  This,  however,  I  hope  really 
to  get  done  in  a  day  or  two,  and  the  unfinished  fragment  for  'miscel- 
lanies.' 

"I  am  very  glad  of  your  little  note  with  account  of  the  light 
day's  work  at  the  Literary  Fund  (long  may  such  work  remain  light),' 
and  to  hear  that  you  liked  the  Dublin  lecture. 

"  The  want  of  rain  which  is  causing  so  much  suffering  was  of  great 
service  to  mf  haymaking  in  Italy,  for  the  perpetual  and  clear  sun- 
shine enabled  me  to  see  pictures  even  in  the  darkest  churches,  and 
as  far  south  as  Florence  we  had  no  uncomfortable  heat ;  while  Siena, 
in  a  hill  district,  has  at  this  season  a  climate  like  the  loveliest  and 
purest  English  summer,  with  only  the  somewhat,  to  me,  awful  addi- 
tion of  fire-flies  innumerable,  which,  as  soon  as  the  sunset  is  fairly 
passed  into  twilight,  light  up  the  dark  ilex  groves  with  flitting 
torches,  or  at  least,  lights  as  large  as  candles,  and  in  the  sky,  larger 
than  the  stars.  We  got  to  Siena  in  a  heavy  thunderstorm  of  sheet- 
lightning  in  a  quiet  evening,  and  the  incessant  flashes  and  showers 
of  fire-flies  between,  made  the  whole  scene  look  anything  rather  than 
celestial.     But  it  was  very  lovely  by  morning  light.  .  .  . 

''I  will  write  soon  again  now,  and  with  sincere  regards  to  Mrs. 
Harrison  and  the  young  ladies,  am  ever  your  affectionate 

*'J.  Ruskin." 

^  Ultimately  Lectures  on  Art  appeared  without  any  preface  (until  1887,  when  a 
short  one,  written  in  that  year,  was  added).  The  editors  have  not  found  ^'tfae 
unfinished  fragment"  among  Ruskin's  MSS. 

'  Harrison  was  Registrar  of  the  Fund :  see  Ruskin's  paper  on  him,  ''  Mv  First 
Editor,"  §  10,  in  On  the  Old  Road,  The  ''Dublin  lecture''  is  ''The  Mystery  of  Life 
and  ita  Arts"  (VoL  XVIII. ). 


INTRODUCTION  Iv 

It  is  a  striking  illustration  of  the  keenness  of  Ruskin^s  impressions, 
and  the  retentiveness  of  his  memory,  that  nineteen  years  later,  when 
the  twilight  was  gathering  around  him,  the  shining  of  these  fire-flies 
at  Siena  remained  bright  before  him.  *^  How  they  shone !  moving  like 
fine-broken  starlight  through  the  purple  leaves.^  These  are  words  from 
the  closing  paragraph  of  PrceierUa — ^the  last  that  Ruskin  was  to  print.^ 

On  his  way  home  Ruskin  stayed  some  days  in  Switzerland,  to  see 
Marie  of  the  Giessbach,'  and  there,  as  appears  from  a  letter  to  his 
mother,  he  was  busy  already  with  Oxford  lectures  for  the  autumn, 
which,  as  then  intended,  were  to  be  on  Italian  painting.  The  war 
between  France  and  Germany  suddenly  broke  out,  and  Ruskin  brought 
his  party  home  lest  the  ways  should  be  closed.  His  distress  at  the 
conflagration  threatening  so  much  ill  to  a  country  which  he  dearly 
loved  appears  incidentally  in  this  volume.' 


"ARATRA  PENTELICI 


^ 


On  returning  home  Ruskin  changed  his  plan  for  the  next  Oxford 
course.  The  projected  lectures  on  Italian  Painting  were  abandoned, 
and  a  course  upon  *^The  Elements  of  Sculpture^  was  substituted. 
He  conceived  the  felicitous  thought  of  illustrating  his  discourse  upon 
Greek  art  from  coins.  The  analysis  of  coins  can,  as  he  says,  ^^be 
certified  by  easily  accessible^ — and,  it  might  have  been  added,  securely 
dated  and  wholly  unrestored — ^'^  examples,^  and  they  lend  themselves 
peculiarly  well  to  reproduction  by  photographic  processes.^  Ruskin,  in 
the  large  use  he  made  of  coins  for  the  illustration  of  Greek  art  and 
history,  was  in  this  country  a  pioneer  of  methods  which  are  now 
more  generally  admitted.^  Ruskin  himself  possessed  a  choice  collection 
of  Greek  coins,  and  during  the  early  autumn  of  1870  his  main  pre* 
occupation  was  the  study  of  them  and  of  the  Coin  Room  at  the 
British  Museum. 

^  There  is  also  a  reference  to  the  fire-flies  in  a  note  of  1877  in  Ethics  qf  the  DuH 
(VoL  XVIII.  p.  368). 

'  A  reminiscence  of  a  walk  at  Giesshach  on  this  occasion  is  given  in  The  Eagk*9 
Nest,  §  101. 

'  See  pp.  Id9^  275,  308  n.,  354,  401. 

^  See  the  anther's  note  in  the  Preface  to  Aratra  (helow,  p.  104). 

^  A  passage  from  Professor  Percy  Gardner's  recently  published  Grammar  of  Greek 
Art  (1905)  may  be  cited :  *'  Of  all  classes  of  Greek  remains  coins  are  the  most 
trustworthy,  give  us  the  most  precise  information^  introduce  us  to  the  greatest 
variety  of  facts.  .  .  .  Work  upon  them  is  perhaps  the  best  possible  introduction  to 
archsBology.  The  student  who  takes  this  road  avoids  areas  of  controversy;  he 
trains  his  eves  by  the  contemplation  of  works  of  unauestioned  genuineness  and 
beauty;  he  learns  to  think  by  periods  and  by  districts     (p.  254). 


Ivi  INTRODUCTION 

The  lectures  were  delivered  in  November  and  December  1870,  and 
were  revised  for  publication  a  year  later.  The  title  given  to  tbe  book 
containing  the  lectures — Araira  PenieUci  (Ploughs  of  Pentelicus) — 
was  an  aftei'thought,  perhaps  suggested  to  the  author  by  passages 
which  he  wrote,  unless  some  of  these  were  themselves  introduced  to 
play  around  the  title.  ^^Its  meaning  is,"^  he  wrote  in  sending  the 
sheets  of  the  book  to  Professor  Norton,  ^'that  I  have  traced  all  the 
elementary  laws  of  sculpture,  as  you  will  see  in  following  sheets,  to 
a  right  understanding  of  the  power  of  incision  or  furrow  in  marble.^  ^ 
A  ploughshare,  the  thus  fundamental  instrument  of  sculpture,  was  duly 
laid  on  the  table  at  the  first  lecture  (§  4  n.);  and  the  moral  lessons, 
which  with  Ruskin  €dways  underlaid,  and  sometimes  perhaps  overlaid, 
the  artistic,  were  enforced  by  reference  to  ^^  other  furrows  to  be  driven 
theui  these  in  the  marble  of  Pentelicus"  (§  180).'  The  technical  dis- 
cussions in  this  book  are  full  of  acuteness ;  and  not  less  interesting  is 
the  theory  of  the  origin  of  art  which  Ruskin  works  into  it — **not 
Schiller^s  nor  Herbert  Spencer's,"  says  Mr.  CoUingwood,  "and  yet  akin 
to  theirs  of  the  Spieltrieby — involving  the  notion  of  doll-play; — man  as 
a  child,  re-creating  himself,  in  a  double  sense;  imitating  the  creation 
of  the  world,  and  really  creating  a  sort  of  secondary  life  in  his 
art,  to  play  with,  or  to  worship."^  But  imagination  must  ever  be 
founded  on  life ;  the  true  sculptor  is  to  "  see  Pallas  "  (pp.  269,  272) — 
the  spirit,  that  is,  of  life  and  of  wisdom  in  the  choice  of  life.  The  dis- 
cussion of  the  spirit  of  Greek  art,  with  the  close  examination  of  parti- 
cular coins  and  the  comparison  between  the  Greek  and  the  Florentine 
schools  with  which  the  book  concludes,  is  one  of  the  author's  closest 
pieces  of  critical  analysis.  "The  lectures,^  says  Mr.  Frederic  Harrison, 
with  just  appreciation,  "graceful  in  expression,  fertile  in  suggestion, 
and  original  in  thought,  are  a  joy  to  read,  and  were  a  genuine 
example  of  sound  professional  guidance,  both  in  the  way  of  judgment 
and  of  research."^  There  are  many  who  will  be  disposed  to  question 
his  denial  to  Greek  art  of  any  ideal  beauty,  but  there  can  be  few 
who,  through  whatever  differences  of  opinion,  will  forget  "how  much 
of  truth  and  charm  is  embodied  in  these  fiery  darts  into  the  soul 
of  Greek  and  Florentine  sculpture.'*'*    The  author  himself  enjoyed  his 

^  Letters  to  Charles  Eliot  Norton,  vol.  ii.  p.  33. 

'  In  this  passage  (pp.  829-330)  there  is  perhaps  a  playful  reference  (character- 
istic of  Ruskin's  Oxford  lectures)  to  '^  ploughing     in  University  examinations. 
«  Life  and  Work  of  John  Ruskin,  1900,  p.  277. 
*  John  Ruskin  ("English  Men  of  Letters"  Series),  p.  124. 
6  Ibid.,  p.  126. 


INTRODUCTION  Ivii 

subject,  and  felt  that  he  had  some  special  qaalifications  for  treating 
it.  In  writing  to  Adand  when  the  course  was  first  announced  in  the 
UniversUff  Gazette  he  says:—' 


tt 


Denmark  Himj,  S.E. 


**  I  hope  the  lectares  will  be  interesting  in  their  balanced  estimate 
of  the  Greek  and  Florentine  schools,  which  I  suppose  few  men  could 
now  strike  so  iropartially  as,  according  to  what  knowledge  I  possess, 
I  am  now  disposed  to  do.  There  are  few  artists  who  are  not  in  some 
^position  of  antagonism  either  to  medisevalism  or  heathenism,  and,  I 
should  think,  none  who  cared  so  much  as  I  do  for  both.  This 
course,  however,  will  mainly  be  on  the  Greeks,  as  well  as  the  one  I 
hope  to  get  ready  for  the  spring.  Then  in  autumn  I  shall  get  fairly 
on  to  Pisa,  if  my  health  holds."  ^ 

The  study  of  Greek  coins  and  their  types  and  legends  led  Ruskin 
into  many  by-ways  of  history  and  mythology.  His  keen  interest  in 
such  inquiries  has  already  been  noticed.^  The  paragi*aphs  on  Greek 
vases  in  the  Lectures  on  Art,  with  their  ingenious  reading  of  nature- 
myths  into  the  designs,  and  the  incidental  allusions  to  mythology  in 
Araira  Pentelici,  should  be  considered  in  relation  with  what  has  been 
said,  in  the  preceding  volume,'  about  Ruskin^s  general  standpoint  in 
this  study. 

The  lectures  on  sculpture  as  printed  by  Ruskin  differ  considerably 
in  arrangement  from  the  lectures  as  written  and  delivered,  and  the 
lectures  as  delivered  or  printed  give  only  the  half  of  what  he  had 
planned.  With  regard  to  the  first  point,  particulars  are  given  in 
the  Bibliographical  Note  (p.  185);  and  it  need  only  here  be  stated 
that  the  last  of  the  delivered  lectures,  on  "The  School  of  Florence,^' 
is  now  for  the  first  time  added  to  the  book.  Ruskin  intended  to 
use  it  elsewhere,  and  had  spent  much  time  upon  its  composition. 
There  are  no  less  than  three  MS.  copies  of  it  among  his  papers. 
There  is  a  rough  draft  (in  Ruskin^s  hand)  in  one  of  the  Oxford 
ledgers;  a  copy  in  Crawley^s  hand,  corrected  by  Ruskin;  and  also  a 
fair  copy  of  the  complete   lecture  in  his  own  hand.     The  two  latter 

^  The  letter  is  undated,  but  must  have  been  written  in  November  1870,  as 
the  announcement  appeared  in  the  Qaatette  on  November  8.  The  course  "for  the 
spriag,"  as  then  intended,  is  exobaned  below.  He  "got  hirlj  to  Pisa"  in  the 
lectures  delivered  in  October  and  November  1873,  and  afterwards  published  under 
the  title  Vol  (fAmo. 

«  See  VoL  VII.  p.  brii. 

'  VoL  XIX.  pp.  Ixvi.-lxx. 


Mii  INTRODUCTION 

copies  are  bound  up  in  volumes  at  Brantwood,  marked  (respectively) 
"  School  of  Florence "  and  "  Readings  in  Modem  Paifdera.'"  The  same 
care  with  which  Kuskin  wrote  this  terminal  lecture  is  shown  in  the 
rest  of  Aratra  Pentelid.  The  ultimate  MS.  from  which  the  book  was 
printed  is  not  known  to  the  editors ;  the  ledgers  contain  various  drafts 
for  most  of  the  lectures.  A  facsimile  of  a  page  from  one  of  the 
ledgers  is  here  given  (p.  S83),  and  several  additional  passages  are 
printed  in  footnotes  (see,  e^.y  pp.  £73,  SOI,  308,  309). 

Next,  the  lectures  on  sculpture  as  delivered  and  as  afterwards 
published  give  only  half  of  what  Ruskin  had  planned.  He  disclosed 
the  full  scheme  in  a  postscript  to  the  letter  just  cited  : — 

^'The  spring  lectures  are  to  join  on   to  Zoology — they  are  to 
be  six : — 

1.  The  Tortoise  of  Aegina. 

2.  The  Eagle  of  Elis. 

8.  The  Lion  of  Leontini. 

4.  The  Riders  of  Tarenturo. 

5.  The  Demeter  of  Metapontum. 

6.  The  Zeus  of  Syracuse. 

I  hope  these  will  come  out  amusing." 

The  same  scheme  appears  in  two  or  three  places  of  the  ledgers 
which  contain  the  draft  of  the  lectures  of  1870  (see  above,  p.  xlix.); 
the  six  additional  lectures  were  in  large  measure  planned  out  and,  to 
some  extent,  put  into  form,  but  they  were  not  delivereid  or  printed 
by  him.  When,  however,  Ruskin  came  to  revise  Araira  PenteUci  for 
publication,  the  material  collected  under  the  heads  ^^The  Demeter  of 
Metapontum,""  "  The  Zeus  of  Syracuse,""  and  ♦*  The  Eagle  of  Elis '"  were 
incorporated  in  that  book  (see  §  195  n.).  For  the  proposed  lecture 
on  ^'The  Lion  of  Leontini""  there  is  no  material,  though  allusions  to 
this  coin-type  occur  in  "The  Tortoise  of  Aegina""  (p.  883). 

From  the  remaining  MSS.  six  chapters  are  now  printed  in  the 
Appendix.  This  comprises  (1)  "The  Story  of  Arachne,""  a  lecture  on 
an  allied  subject  delivered  at  Woolwich  in  December  1870,  and  (9) 
"The  Tortoise  of  Aegina,""  the  first  lecture  in  the  intended  sequel 
to  Arcdra  PenkUci.  These  two  chapters  have  previously  been  printed 
in  the  volume  of  miscellanies  entitled  Verona  and  Other  Lectures  (see  the 
notes  on  pp.  371,  881).  The  Appendix  next  includes  (8)  "The  Riders 
of  Tarentum,""  and  (4)  "  The  Eagle  of  Elis  ""—the  subjects  which  were 
to  have  formed  the  fourth  emd  second  lectures  of  the  intended  sequel. 


INTRODUCTION  Ux 

These  chapters  are  printed  from  the  *^  ledgers,^  where  they  are  carefully 
written  and  revised;  they  are,  however,  incomplete,  and  an  attempt 
has  been  made  to  trace  from  the  author^s  memoranda  the  line  of 
thought  he  intended  to  pursue.  These  two  chapters  are  very  char- 
acteristic of  the  way  in  which  Buskin  dovetailed  one  subject  into 
another.  The  sequel  to  Aratra  was,  we  have  seen,  ^Ho  join  on  to 
Zoology^:  they  touched,  that  is,  on  various  animal*types  in  Greek 
art.  Ldi  this  respect  the  chapters  have  affinity  with  The  Eo^L^b  Ne9t 
and  Lovers  Mmme.  But  they  also  join  on  to  Araira  itself,  and  to  the 
studies  of  Greek  myths  contained  in  The  Qfieen  of  the  Air  and  the 
Oxford  Catalogues.  The  Appendix  contains,  next,  (5)  some  carefully 
written  passages  (now  printed  from  the  same  ^Medgers^)  on  ^^  Greek 
and  Christian  Art,  as  affected  by  the  Idea  of  Immortality.'"  This  is  a 
discussion  which  Buskin  promises  in  other  places  (see  p.  408  n.),  but 
which  he  failed  to  print.  The  first  scheme  for  the  course  on  sculpture, 
given  below,^  shows  that  the  passages  were  written  for  Araira.  The 
Appendix  contains,  lastly,  (6)  notes  on  **  Some  Characteristics  of  Greek 
Art,  in  relation  to  Christian.^  These  are  particularly  interesting,  and 
must  also  have  been  intended  for,  and  were  perhaps  delivered  in,  the 
lectures  on  Greek  sculpture.  They  are  here  printed  fix>m  some  MS. 
sheets  which  are  bound  up  at  Brantwood  in  the  volume  entitled  ^  School 
of  Florence.^ 

Some  of  the  illustrations  in  this  volume  have  already  been  referred 
to,  but  the  usual  details  may  here  be  added.  The  froniiapiece  is  re- 
produced from  a  portrait  of  the  author  by  Mr.  H.  S.  Uhlrich.  It 
appeared  in  a  different  form  as  a  large  woodcut  in  the  Graphic  (July  6, 
1879X  ^^  Buskin  wrote  to  the  artist  that  it  was  *^  out  and  out  the  best 
portrait  of  me  yet  done^  (July  4,  1879).  Mr.  Uhlrich  is  the  engraver 
who  has  skilfrdly  cut  the  designs  from  Greek  vases,  now  introduced 
to  illustrate  Lechiirea  on  Art  (Figs.  1-6). 

The  plate  (A)  in  this  Introduction  has  been  already  mentioned 
(p.  xliii.). 

Two  plates  (B  and  C)  are  introduced  to  illustrate  a  passage  in 
Lechiores  on  AH;  they  are  reproductions  of  the  mezzotint  and  the 
etching,  respectively,  of  Tumer^s  unpublished  plate  (intended  for  Liber 

1  In  one  of  the  ledgers  is  the  following  '' General  Plan,  October  1870^:  'H\\ 
Relation  of  the  three  great  arts  to  each  oSier.  (2)  Imitation.  (3)  Stniotare.  (4) 
The  Division  of  Schools  and  the  Influences  of  the  Hope  of  Immortality.  (5)  llie 
Principles  of  Bas-relief.  (6)The  Tortoise  of  A^na.  (7)  The  Eagle  of  Elis.  (8) 
The  Uon  of  Leontini.    (9)  The  Riders  of  Tarentum.    (10)  The  Zeus  of  Syracuse. ' 


Ix  INTRODUCTION 

Studiorum)  of  the  "Swiss  Bridge,  Mount  St.  Gothard.'**  The  plate, 
which  was  both  etched  and  engraved  by  Tomer,  is  not  very  well 
known,  and  it  is  frequently  referred  to  by  Ruskin,  who  had  in  his 
collection  one  of  the  very  scarce  engraver^s  proofs,  and  also  a  copy 
of  the  somewhat  rare  etching.  The  plate  is  here  reduced  by  photo- 
gravure, by  kind  permission  of  Mr.  W.  6.  Rawlinson,  from  the  copy 
in  his  collection;  the  etching  is  reduced  from  a  large  outline  which 
Mr.  George  Allen  made  under  Ruskin^s  directions  for  exhibition  at 
his  lectures. 

The  illustrations  to  Aratra  PerUeUei  comprise  (1),  in  one  form  or 
another  and  with  some  rearrangement  (explained  in  the  Bibliographical 
Note,  p.  187),  all  those  contained  in  previous  editions ;  and  also  (S)  two 
additional  subjects.  With  regard  to  the  original  illustrations,  photo- 
gravure or  wood-engraving  has  been  employed  in  place  of  the  auto- 
type process.  A  comparison  of  the  present  volume  with  the  original 
edition  of  1872  will,  I  think,  convince  the  reader  of  the  advan- 
tage thus  gained ;  it  has  also  been  possible,  owing  to  the  size  of  the 
present  page,  to  increase  the  scale  in  some  cases  (as  in  Plates  I.,  II., 
VII.,  X.,  XVII.,  XX.,  XXIII.).  Owing  to  the  fine  work  of  the 
Greek  die-cutters,  and  to  the  facility  of  taking  photographs  from  white 
plaster  moulds,  it  is  possible,  without  losing  the  sharpness  of  the 
original  work,  to  enlarge  the  coins  so  as  the  better  to  bring  out  the 
details.  For  Plate  VL  (IV.  in  the  original  edition)  it  has  been  neces- 
sary to  cut  new  blocks  (by  Mr.  Uhlrich),  as  those  made  for  Ruskin  by 
A.  Burgess  were  found  to  have  shrunk,  so  that  accuracy  of  register, 
in  the  successive  colour  printings,  would  have  been  impossible.  The 
coins  shown,  not  very  successfully,  by  autotype  process  on  Plate  VL  of 
the  original  edition  are  now  given  as  woodcuts,  again  by  Mr.  Uhlrich 
(Figs.  10,  11).  Plates  XI.  and  XII.  in  this  edition  are  woodcuts 
(Uhlrich)  in  place  of  autotypes.  No.  XIII.  is  printed  from  the  original 
steel  plate  by  Mr.  G.  Allen.  No.  XVI.  is  reproduced  by  photo- 
gravure from  the  drawing  by  Burgess,  from  which  the  autotype  in  the 
original  edition  was  made. 

The  additional  plates  here  introduced  (XIV.  and  XV.)  will,  it 
is  thought,  render  more  interesting  and  intelligible  one  of  the  most 
suggestive  passages  in  the  book.  Particulars  of  them  are  ^ven  in 
the  note  on  p.  385. 

The  remaining  woodcuts  in  Aratra  Pentelici  (Figs.  7-9,  13-15)  are 
the  same  as  appeared  in  the  original  edition. 

^  No.  7B  in  Mr.  Rawlinaon's  Catalogue.    The  plate  is  called  also  (incorrectly) 
''Via  Mala."     For  Raskin's  references  to  it,  see  below,  p.  166  n. 


INTRODUCTION  bd 

The  additional  chapter  on  **  The  School  of  Florence  ^  is  illustrated 
by  two  of  the  examples  (Plates  D  and  £)  which  Ruskin  showed  at 
the  lecture.  They  are  both  photogravures  from  drawings  by  him  now 
in  the  Oxford  Collection  (for  particulars,  see  pp.  862,  863  tm.). 

A  further  plate  of  coins  (F)  is  given  to  illustrate  the  new  chapters 
on  *'  The  Riders  of  Tarentum  ^  and  ''  The  Eagle  of  Ells ""  (see  pp.  896, 
897,  400  nn.) ;  and  an  engraving  by  Mr.  Hugh  Allen,  from  a  drawing 
by  Ruskin,  showing  the  type  of  eagle  in  Italian  sculpture,  is  added 
(6)  to  illustrate  the  latter  lecture.  The  two  woodcuts  (Figs.  16  and 
17)  in  the  lecture  on  ^^The  Tortoise  of  Aegina^  replace  photogravures 
on  a  smaller  scale  in  Vcfxma  and  Other  Lectures, 

The  woodcut  in  Appendix  vi.  (Fig.  18)  is  made  from  a  photographic 
plate  which  Ruskin  had  printed  but  did  not  publish  (see  p.  410  n.). 

Finally,  a  plate  (H,  also  a  woodcut)  is  introduced  in  the  same 
lecture  to  illustrate  Ruskin^s  remarks.  It  is  founded,  by  kind  permis- 
sion of  Dr.  E.  A.  Wallis  Budge,  on  a  drawing  in  his  Sarcophagus  qf 
Jnchnesran^erabf  Queen  qf  Jmasis  II.  (1886). 

E.  T.  C. 


LIST   OF   RUSKIN'S   OXFORD   LECTURES 

DURING  HIS  FIRST  TENURE  OF  THE  SLADE 

PROFESSORSHIP  (i  870-1 878) 

1870.  February  and  March.     Inaugural :  Lectures  on  Art  (in  this  volume). 


f9 


November  and  December.     The  Elements  of  Sculpture:   Araira 
Penielici  (hi  this  volume). 


1871.  January  and  February.     Ledwrei  on  Landicape  (Vol.  XXII.). 


99 


June.      The  Relation   between  Michael  Angela   and   Tmtoret  (Vol. 
XXII.). 


1872.  February  and  March.     The  Relation  of  Natural  Science  to  Art: 

The  EagUM  Nest  (Vol.  XXII.). 

,,      November  and  December.     Botticelli  and  the  Florentine  Schools 
of  Engraving :  Ariadne  Florentina  (Vol  XXII.). 

1873.  March  and  May.     English  and  Greek  Birds  as  the  subjects  of 

Fine  Art:  Love's  Meinie.    (See  a  later  volume.) 


99 


October  and  November.     Tuscan  Art :  Vol  iAmo  (Vol.  XXIII.). 


1874.  October  and  November.     Mountain  Form  in  the   Higher  Alps: 

partly  printed  in  Deucalion*     (See  a  later  volume.) 

„      November  and  December.     The  ^thetic  and  Matheroatic  Schools 
of  Art  in  Florence  (Vol.  XXIII.). 

1875.  November.     Studies  in   the   Discourses  of  Sir  Joshua   Reynolds 

(Vol.  XXI I.^  Appendix). 

1876*.  No  lectures. 

1 87 7.  November  and  December.    Readings  in  Modem  Painters  (Vol.  XXII., 

Appendix). 

1878.  No  lectures. 

Iziii 


I 


LECTURES   ON   ART 


(1870) 


XX. 


% 


LECTURES    ON   ART 


DELIVERED  BEFORE  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  OXFORD 

IN  HILAR  Y  TERM,  1870 


BY 

JOHN   RUSKIN,   M.A. 

HONOKAILY   STUDENT    OF    CHRIST    CHURCH 
SLADB   PROFESSOR   OF   FINB  ART 


AT  THE  CLARENDON  PRESS 
MDCCCLXX 

[AU  righU  ruervtd^ 


[BibHoffrapkical  Noie, — The  Leeturta  on  Art  were  announced^  under  their 
present  titles,  in  the  Oj^ard  University  Oazette  of  January  2S,  1870^  the 
general  subject  of  the  course  being  given  as  ''The  LimitB  and  Elementary 
Practice  of  Art/'  with  ''lionardo's  Trattato  deUa  PUtura*'  as  the  ''Text 
Book."  The  lectures  were  delivered  at  Oxford  on  the  following  dates,  and 
were  reported  at  the  time  thus: — 

I.  February  8,  1870.     Pall  Mall  Gazette,  February  9^  and  Atheruman; 

February  12. 
II.  February  16.     Atherueum,  February  19. 
UI.  February  23.     Athenmimf  February  26. 
IV.  March  3.    Athenmum,  March  12. 

V   March  9    (  "^^se  were  delivered  to  more  restricted  audiences 

Vl'  March  16  )      ^^^  ^^^  ^^^  reported^  a  notice  in  the  UninereUy 

VII*  March  23  /      ^^'^^  of  March  8   announcing  that   admission 

'  (      would  be  by  ticket  only. 
Later  in  the  year  the  Lectures  were  published  by  the  author  in  a  volume, 
of  which  there  have  been  the  following  editions : — 

First  Edition  (1870). — ^The  title-page  is  as  shown  on  the  preceding  leaf. 
Octavo,  pp.  viii.  + 189.  On  the  reverse  of  the  half-title  is  the  imprint : 
"  London :  Macmillan  &  Co.  [device  of  the  Clarendon  Press],  Publishers  to 
the  University  of  Oxford."  Contents  (here  p.  11),  p.  v. ;  Prefittory  Note 
(here  p.  12),  p.  vil. ;  Text,  pp.  1-189.  The  paragraphs  were  numbered 
throughout  The  headlines,  which  read  from  left  page  to  right,  are  the  titles 
of  the  lectures ;  in  the  comer  of  the  left-hand  pages  is  "  [Lect"  ;  in  that  of 
the  right-hand  pages, ''  I,]/'  etc.  There  is  a  fly-title  preceding  each  of  the 
seven  lectures.  At  the  end  is  a  fly-sheet  containing  an  advertisement  of 
Mr.  St.  John  Tyrwhitt's  Handbook  of  Pictorial  Art  (see  Vol.  XV.  p.  xxx., 
the  reference  there  being  to  the  Second  Edition  of  the  Handbook) ;  and  this 
is  followed  by  twelve  numbered  pages  of  advertisements  of  books  published 
by  Messrs.  Macmillan  and  Co.  for  the  Clarendon  Press. 

Issued,  in  July  1870,  in  cloth  boards  of  a  bright  magenta  colour,  lettered 
across  the  back,  "Lectures  |  on  Art  |  delivered  at  |  Oxford  |  Prof.  Rusldn," 
with  the  device  of  the  Clarendon  Press  at  foot.    Price  68.    (1000  copies.) 

Second  Edition  (1875).— This  is  an  exact  reprint  of  the  first,  with  the 
following  small  diffsrences :  (1)  the  Note  on  p.  viL  was  altered  (see  here 
p.  12);  (2)  the  date  was  altered  on  the  title-page,  and  the  words  "Second 
Edition"  were  added ;  and  (3)  a  reference  was  corrected  in  §  146  (see  here 
p.  138  fi.).     Uniform  in  appearance  with  the  First  Edition.     (1000  copies.) 

Tkird  Edition  (1880).— This  was  an  exact  reprint  of  the  Second ;  except 
that  (1)  the  title-page  was  similarly  altered ;  (2)  the  Note  was  omitted 
(thus  reducing  the  preliminary  pagination) ;  (3)  the  imprint  was  altered  to 
"  London :  Henry  Frowde  [device  of  the  Clarendon  Press],  Oxford  Univer- 
sity Press  Warehouse,  Paternoster  Row."  Uniform  in  appearance  with  the 
earlier  editions,  but  with  the  word  "  Oxford  "  added  at  the  foot  of  the  back. 

(1000  copies.) 

5 


6  LECTURES  ON  ART 

New  and  Bevised  Edition  (1887). — ^Thia  edition  was  reviaed  by  the  aathor, 
and  many  alterations  were  made  in  the  text  (see  "  VarisB  Lectiones^"  below). 
The  aathor  also  introduced  many  italics,  and  had  a  few  sentences  set  in 
capitals.  The  italics  are  followed  in  this  volume ;  the  sentences  which  were 
put  in  capitals  are  indicated  in  footnotes.  The  title-page  of  the  New  and 
Revised  Edition  was: — 

Lectures  on  Art  |  Delivered  before  the  University  of  Oxford  |  in  Hilary 
Term,  1870.  |  By  John  Ruskin^  LL.D.^  |  Honorary  Student  of  Christ 
Church,  and  Honorary  Fellow  of  |  Corpus  Christi  College^  Oxford.  | 
New  Edition,  |  Revised  by  the  Author.  |  George  Allen,  Sonnyside, 
Orpington,  Kent  |  1887.  |  Ail  rights  reserved. 

Crown  8vo,  pp.  X.+250.  Imprint  (at  foot  of  the  reverse  of  the  title-page 
and  at  foot  of  the  last  page) :  '^  Printed  by  Hazell,  Watson,  &  Viney,  Ld., 
London  and  Aylesbury."  New  Preface  (here  pp.  13-15),  pp.  v.-viii. ; 
Contents,  p.  ix. ;  Text  (no  fly-titles),  pp.  1-250.  At  the  end  there  are 
ten  blank  peges,  unnumbered,  as  explained  by  the  author  in  his  Pre£we 
(see  here  p.  15).    Headlines  as  in  this  volume. 

Issued  in  February  1888,  both  in  chocolate  and  in  dark  green  coloured 
cloth ;  lettered  across  the  back :  **  Ruskin.  |  Lectures  |  on  |  Art."  Price  58. 
(2000  copies.) 

B&4ssues  of  the  book  in  the  form  last  described  were  made  in  May 
1890,  called  ''Fifth  Edition"  (2000  copies);  and  December  1891,  ''Sixth 
Edition"  (2000  copies). 

Seventh  Edition  (1894). — ^The  book  was  now  re-set,  the  title-page  being 
also  different : — 

Lectures  on  Art.  |  Delivered  |  before  the  |  University  of  Oxford  |  in 
Hilary  jTerm,  1870.  |  By  |  John  Ruskin,  LL.D.,  |  Honorary  Student  of 
Christ  Church,  and  Honorary  Fellow  {  of  Corpus  Christi  College, 
Oxford.  I  Seventh  Edition.  |  Loudon :  |  George  Allen,  156,  Charing 
Cross  Road.  |  1894.  |  [Att  rights  reserved,] 

Crown  8vo,  pp.  x. +276.  An  index  (by  Mr.  Wedderburn)  was  now  added 
(pp.  287-276).  The  imprint  (at  the  foot  of  the  reverse  of  the  title-page 
and  at  the  foot  of  the  last  pege)  is  "  Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  A  Co. 
I  At  the  Ballantyne  Press.''  Issued  in  December  1894.  Price,  eta,  as 
before.    (2000  copies.) 

Re-issues  in  this  form  were  made  in  November  1896  ("  Eighth  Edition," 
1000  copies);  April  1900  ("Thirteenth  Thousand");  July  1901  ("Fou^ 
teenth  Hiousand  ") ;  and  June  1903  ("  Fifteenth  Thousand  ").  In  this  form 
the  book  is  stall  current  The  price  was  reduced  on  January  1,  1904, 
to  ds.  6d. 

Pocket  Edition  (1904).— The  title-page  of  this  edition,  uniform  with  other 
volumes  in  the  same  series  (see  Vol.  XV.  p.  6),  is : — 

Lectures  on  Art  |  By  |  John  Ruskin  |  Loudon :  George  Allen. 

The  edition  is  printed  (except  for  the  title-page,  etc.)  from  the  electrotype 
plates  of  those  last  described.     Issued  in  April  1904  (4000  copies);  price 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE 

Si.  6d.  B&^Umted  in  June  1904  (dOOO  copies^  making  the  Twenty-second 
ThonMBd). 

An  authorised  American  issue  of  the  First  Edition  was  issaed  in  1870. 
The  same  type  was  kept  standing,  hut  the  leads  were  altered^  so  that  the 
hook  made  fewer  pages  (155);  and  the  hook  was  printed  on  crown  Svo, 
instead  of  demy  8to  paper.  The  imprint  (on  reverse  of  the  title-page) 
is:  ''Oxford  |  By  T.  Comhe,  M.A.^  £.  B.  Gardner,  £.  P.  Hall^  and 
H.  Latham,  M.A.  |  Printers  to  the  University."  Issaed  in  cloth  boards 
of  a  brownish  red  colour. 

Unauthorieed  American  EdiHcne  have  been  numerous,  in  various  forms 
and  at  various  prices  (from  50  cents  upwards). 

An  authorised  American  (''Brantwood  ")  Edition  of  the  ''New  and  Revised 
Edition"  of  1887  was  issued  in  1891  by  Messrs.  Charles  £.  Merrill  &  Co., 
New  York,  with  an  introduction  by  Charles  Eliot  Norton  (pp.  v.-xii). 

A  German  TranHation  was  issaed  in  1901  as  volume  iv.  in  "  John  Ruskin 
Ausgewfthlte  Werke  in  Vollstandiger  tTbersetzung."    The  title-page  is  :— 

John  Raskin  |  VortrSge  Qber  Kunst  |  Aus  dem  Englischen  von  | 
Wilhelm  Scholermaun  |  Verlegt  bei  Eugen  Diederichs,  Leipzig  1901. 

Crown  8vo,  pp.  iv.+240.  The  translation  is  of  the  Revised  Edition  of 
1887,  hut  several  passages  are  shortened  or  omitted  (a  list  of  these  is  given 
by  the  translator  on  pp.  229,  230).  The  translator  added  an  index  of  his 
own  (pp.  231-240). 

The  greater  part  of  Lectnres  iv.,  v.,  vL,  and  vii,  is  also  translated  in 
the  following  work : — 

ffiege  lux  Jhtnfl.  |  III.  |  JBor(efungen  u6er  Stanfi.  \  [Flower]  \  (Sine 
®cban!ettlefe  |  ova  ben  ®etfen  |  M  \  So^n  (Ru^fin.  |  ^  |  SlitS  bem 
ttnglifil^cti  iiberfe^  nub  infoimnengeftent  |  9on  |  3a!ob  flrei^.  |  ^va  fcinew 
^a^ia$  f^xaia^^thtn  \  oon  |  ®.  dinger.  |  Ctrajbtttg.  |  3.  f.  (Bb.  ^ei^ 
(^tH  nnb  IKitnbeO. 

Crown  8vo,  pp.  87.  A  few  passages  £rom  the  earlier  lectures  are  included 
in  voL  it  of  the  same  series. 

Seviews  appeared  in  the  Atheruman,  July  23,  1870 ;  Saturday  Beview, 
July  30^  1870;  Spectator,  August  6  and  13,  1870  (this  review  is  noticed 
by  Ruskin  in  Aratra  Penteiicij  §  139 — below,  p.  296;  and  in  Fore 
Ctavigera,  Letter  27);  the  Academy y  September  10,  1870,  vol.  i.  pp.  305- 
906  (signed  by  E.  F.  S.  Pattison,  afterwards  Lady  Dilke  ^) ;   MacmiUan'e 

1  "Fourteen  yean  before  the  date  in  1870  on  which  the  article  appeared,  Ruskin 
had^  been  the  flrat  ^tron  of  her  studies  and  desi^pis.  Until  seven  years  before  the 
oritioism,  he  had  still  been  the  director  of  a  portion  of  her  work.  .  .  .  Her  article 
was  of  eonrse  appreciatiTe  in  a  high  deme;  out  it  contained  sharp  criticism  upon 
many  leading  heads.  .  «  .  The  last  woras  of  the  article  formed  a  protest  agamst 
being  led  by  the  charm  of  eloquence,  or  the  infection  of  zeal,  on  to  unsafe  ground. 
It  was  a  good  many  years  before  Ruskin  forgave  the  emancipated  disciple ;  but  he 
ended  by  completely  forgiving  her"  (Memoir  by  Sir  Charles  Dilke  prehxed  to  The 
Book  of  the  Spiritual  Liu  by  the  laU  Lady  DUke,  1905.  pp.  32-88).  Some  extracts 
from  letters  between  Buskin  and  Lady  Dilke,  whom  he  described  as  one  of  his  "anta- 
gonisticeet  powers/'  are  reprinted  from  the  same  Memoir  in  a  later  volume  of  this 
edition. 


8  LECTURES  ON  ART 

Moffomnef  October  1870,  toL  22,  pp.  429-434,  by  Mr.  Stopford  Brooke  (this 
article  elicited  a  reply  from  Ruskin,  which  wu  pabliehed  in  the  November 
namber :  see  a  later  volume  of  this  edition) ;  Quardian,  November  2,  1870 
(the  Guardian  also  had  a  leading  article  on  the  first  lecture,  February  16) ; 
AH  Journal,  October  1890,  N.S.,  voL  9,  p.  801;  NoHh  BriiUh  Review, 
October  1870,  vol.  53,  pp.  300-^2;  the  New  Enafander  (New  Haven), 
October  1870,  vol.  29,  pp.  669-677  (by  H.  N.  Day).  The  reviews  in  the 
Academy  and  MacmiUan'i  Magazine  noticed  also  the  Catalogue  qf  Examplee 
(see  p.  373). 


VaruB  LeUionee. — ^The  following  is  a  list  of  all  the  variations  (a  few 
minor  matters  of  punctuation  and  paragraphing  alone  excepted).  Where 
the  variations  are  given  in  footnotes,  a  reference  to  them  only  is  here 
included : — 

Note. -See  p.  12. 

Lecture  t.--§  2,  Une  5,  eds.  1^,  <'and  which"  for  ''which."  §  4, 
line  3,  ''rest"  italicised  in  1887,  when  also  the  footnote  was  added.  §  5, 
Une  19,  for  an  additional  passage  in  eds.  1-3,  see  p.  22  n.  §  0,  line  1, 
eds.  1-3,  ''And  first,  we  have"  for  "We  have  first" ;  line  2,  see  p.  22  n. ; 
line  3,  eds.  1-3,  "and  of  the  means  of  intercourse"  for  "and  enlarged 
means  of  intercourse'^;  lines  16,  19,  "assuredly"  and  "with  a  view" 
italicised  in  1887.  §  9,  line  6,  see  p.  26  ».  §  11,  lines  6-8,  eds.  1-3, 
"...  critical,  so  that  they  may  both  be  directed  to  such  works  of  existing 
art  as  will  best  reward  their  study,  and  enabled  to  make  the  exercise  of 
their  patronage  .  .  ." ;  and  in  line  11,  "only"  before  "to  the  men" ;  and 
in  line  12,  "and,  to  those,"  before  "in  the  early."  §  13,  line  12,  "We" 
italicised  in  1887 ;  line  19,  eds.  1^,  " changes"  instead  of  " change."  §  14, 
Hne  7,  eds.  1-3,  "in"  for  "o£"  §  21,  lines  22,  23,  eds.  1-5,  "...  I 
shall  choose  will  at  first  not  be  costly ;  many  of  them,  only  engravings  or 
photographs."  §  27,  Hne  6,  "is  .  .  .  virtues"  italicised  in  1887,  as  also 
"parUy  .  .  .  usury"  in  Unes  29-32.  §  29,  line  28,  "churches"  italicised 
in  1887. 

Lecture  it.— §  31,  line  44,  "fiu^"  and  "element"  italicised  in  1887; 
last  lines,  see  p.  46  n.  §  34,  line  6,  "I"  italicised  in  1887;  so  also  in 
lines  17,  18,  "fine,"  "good,"  and  "base."  §  36,  line  6,  "falsifying" 
italicised  in  1887 ;  closing  passage  italicised  in  1887 ;  lines  28,  29,  see  p.  48  n. 
§  36,  line  7,  "that"  italicised  in  1887.  §  37,  line  6,  all  editions  hitherto 
have  read,  not  very  grammatically,  "  and  to  the  understanding  the  lives " ; 
Ruskin's  early  draft,  however,  which  is  a  good  deal  corrected,  clearly  shows 
the  word  "rightly"  in  place  of  "the"  before  "understanding."  §  37,  last 
lines,  see  p.  49  fi.  §  39,  last  lines,  "  namely  .  .  .  understand "  italicised  in 
1887.  §  44,  lines  22,  23,  "equaUy  human"  and  "equally  Divine"  italicised 
in  1887.  §  46,  lines  10,  11,  "sign  .  .  .  derangement"  italicised  in  1887. 
§  47,  author's  second  footnote,  the  reference  to  the  note  in  the  Catalogue 
was  omitted  in  1887  and  later  editions.  §  48,  line  13,  eds.  1-3  omit 
''Reynolds."  §  61,  end,  for  an  additional  passage  in  eds.  1-3,  see  p.  60  n. 
§  62,  line  17,  "Le  Normand's"  (in  all  previous  editions)  here  corrected 
to  "Lenormant's."  §  69,  line  7,  1887  and  later  editions  (apparently  in 
error)  placed  "idolatry"  in  brackets. 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE  9 

Ltdure  nL — §  87>  linee  16-18^  ''the  fineneM  .  .  .  expreent"  italidaed  in 
1887.  §  95,  lines  84,  36,  the  word  *'the"  before  ''whirlwind"  and  before 
"leproBf"  is  here  omitted  in  aocordanoe  with  Ruskxn's  marking  in  his  eopy 
for  revision. 

Leetumw. — §  116,  lines  10-13,  "Yon  cannot  .  •  .  pourtrayed"  italicised 
in  1887 ;  so  also  in  lines  16,  18,  "is  in  .  .  .  beaatifuL''  §  117,  the  footnote 
was  added  in  1887.     §  122,  the  footnote  was  added  in  1887. 

Xeohifv  V. — §  126|  line  2,  for  an  additional  passage  in  eds.  1-3|  see 
p.  118  n.  §  136,  line  10,  in  eds.  1-3,  "1.  Textures  are  principally  .  .  ." ; 
line  31,  eds.  1-3,  " .  .  .  or  threads ;  and  even  in  advanced  ..."  §  136,  for 
an  additional  passage  at  the  end,  see  p.  126  n.  §  137,  line  24,  see  p.  126  ft. ; 
the  footnote  was  added  in  1887.  §  138,  for  an  additional  passage,  and 
other  variations  in  eds.  1-3,  see  p.  128  n.  §  141,  lines  1,  2,  in  eds.  1-3 
the  words  "There  is  .  .  .  advisable"  were  printed  at  the  end  of  §  140. 
§  142,  line  24,  for  an  additional  passage  in  eds.  1-3,  see  p.  133  n. ;  line  28, 
"measurement"  italicised  in  1887. 

Lecture  vL — §  146,  line  13,  see  p.  138  ik ;  line  18,  for  an  additional  passage, 
see  p.  138  n. ;  line  21,  the  reforence  to  the  page  was  added  in  1887.  §  160, 
line  1,  eds.  1-^  omit  "the  photograph  of."  §  161,  line  18,  "spiritual" 
italicised  in  1887.  §  162,  line 3,  "Helen"  in  all  previous  editions  is  here 
corrected  to  "Hellen."  §  163,  line  23,  all  previous  editions  read  "Le 
Normant"  for  "Lenormant"  §  166,  line  41,  "clambering"  italicised  in 
1887.  §  169,  Hne  13,  "everything"  italicised  in  1887,  as  also  "This"  in 
line  19.    §  166,  for  an  additional  passage  in  eds.  1-3,  see  p.  160  n. 

Lecture  mi — §  173,  for  an  additional  passage  in  eds.  1-3,  see  p.  168  n. 
§  183,  lines  14-17,  see  p.  173  n.  §  184,  line  7,  "Liberty"  was  put  into 
capitals  in  1887.  §  186,  line  6,  eds.  1-3  read  "Now"  for  "But"  §  186, 
the  footnote  was  added  in  1887.  §  187,  line  1,  see  p.  176  n.  §  189,  the 
footnote  was  added  in  1887.  §  189,  for  an  additional  passage  at  the  end, 
see  p.  178  n.     §  190,  line  9,  see  p.  178  tt. ;  line  11,  see  p.  178  n.] 


CONTENTS 


PAOI 

Preface  to  the  Edition  of  1887 13 


LECTURE   I 
Inaugural 17 

LECTURE   II 
The  Relation  of  Art  to  Reugion 45 

LECTURE   III 

The  Relation  of  Art  to  Morals 78 

LECTURE  IV 
The  Relation  of  Art  to  Use 9^ 

LECTURE  V 
Line 118 

LECTURE   VI 
Light 188 

LECTURE   VII 
Colour 166 


11 


\ 


[The  first  edition  contained  the  following  note : — 

''The  Catalogue  referred  to  in  the  Lectures  is  at  present 
incomplete.  It  will^  however^  in  its  present  form  be  published 
shortly,  and  may  be  had  either  from  Messrs.  Macmillan,  16 
Bedford  Street,  Coveiit  Grarden,  London,  or  at  the  University 
Galleries,  Oxford." 

In  the  second  edition  this  was  altered  to,  *'The  Catalogae  referred  to  in 
the  Lectures  may  be  had  either  from  Messrs.  Macmillan,  29  Bedford 
Street,**  etc.    For  the  Catalogue,  see  now  Vol.  XXI.  pp.  5  teq,'} 


PREFACE  TO  THE  EDITION  OF  1887 

The  following  lectures  were  the  most  important  piece  of 
my  literary  work  done  with  miabated  power,  best  motive, 
and  happiest  I  concurrence  of  circumstance.  They  were 
written  and  delivered  while  my  mother  yet  lived,  and  had 
vividest  sympathy  in  all  I  was  attempting;^ — ^while  also 
my  friends  put  unbroken  trust  in  me,  and  the  course  of 
study  I  had  followed  seemed  to  fit  me  for  the  acceptance 
of  noble  tasks  and  graver  responsibilities  than  those  only 
of  a  curious  traveller,  or  casual  teacher. 

Men  of  the  present  world  may  smile  at  the  sanguine 
utterances  of  the  first  four  lectures :  but  it  has  not  been 
wholly  my  own  fault  that  they  have  remained  unfulfilled; 
nor  do  I  retract  one  word  of  hope  for  the  success  of 
other  masters,  nor  a  single  promise  made  to  the  sincerity 
of  the  student's  labour,  on  the  lines  here  indicated.  It 
would  have  been  necessary  to  my  success,  that  I  should 
have  accepted  permanent  residence  in  Oxford,  and  scattered 
none  of  my  energy  in  other  tasks.  But  I  chose  to  spend 
half  my  time  at  Coniston  Waterhead ;  and  to  use  half  my 
force  in  attempts  to  form  a  new  social  organisation, — ^the 
St.  George's  Guild, — ^which  made  all  my  Oxford  colleagues 
distrustful  of  me,  and  many  of  my  Oxford  hearers  con- 
temptuous. My  mother's  death  in  1871,  and  that  of  a 
dear  friend  in  1875,^  took  away  the  personal  joy  I  had 
m  an3rthing  I  wrote  or  designed:  and  in  1876,  feeling 
unable  for  Oxford  duty,  I  obtained  a  year's  leave  of  rest, 

^  [There  Is  atfBrantwood  a  copy  of  the  first  edition  of  these  lectures,  inscrihed 
"Mamret  Ruskin.  With  her  Son's  dear  love.  1870."  ''FaU  of  my  mother's 
marks/  Ruskin  added  at  a  later  date.] 

*  [The  dear  friend  referred  to  in  Praterita,  iii.  ch.  iii.] 

13 


14  LECTURES  ON  ART 

and,  by  the  kind  and  wise  counsel  of  Prince  Leopold, 
went  to  Venice,^  to  reconsider  the  form  into  which  I  had 
cast  her  history  in  the  abstract  of  it  given  in  the  Stones 
of  Venice. 

The  more  true  and  close  view  of  that  history,  begun 
in  St.  Mark^s  Best,  and  the  fresh  architectural  drawings 
made  under  the  stimulus  of  it,  led  me  forward  into  new 
fields  of  thought,  inconsistent  with  the  daily  attendance 
needed  by  my  Oxford  classes;  and  in  my  discontent  with 
the  state  I  saw  them  in,  and  my  inabUity  to  return  to 
their  guidance  without  abandonment  of  all  my  designs  of 
Venetian  and  Italian  history,  began  the  series  of  vexations 
which  ended  in  the  very  nearly  mortal  illness  of  1878,* 

Since,  therefore,  the  period  of  my  effective  action  in 
Oxford  was  only  from  1870  to  1875,  it  can  scarcely  be 
matter  of  surprise  or  reproof  that  I  could  not  in  that 
time  obtain  general  trust  in  a  system  of  teaching  which, 
though  foimded  on  that  of  Da  Vinci  and  Reynolds,  was 
at  variance  with  the  practice  of  all  recent  European  aca- 
demy schools;^  nor  establish — on  the  unassisted  resources 
of  the  Slade  Professorship — the  schools  of  Sculpture,  Archi- 
tecture, Metal-work,  and  manuscript  Illumination,  of  which 
the  design  is  confidently  traced  in  the  four  inaugural 
lectures. 

In  revising  the  book,  I  have  indicated  as  in  the  last 
edition  of  the  Seven  hamps^  passages  which  the  student 
will  find  generally  applicable,  and  in  all  their  bearings 
usefid,  as  distinguished  from  those  regarding  only  their  im- 
mediate subject.  The  relative  importance  of  these  broader 
statements,  I  again  indicate  by  the  use  of  capitals  or 
italics;^  and  if  the  reader  will  index  the  sentences  he  finds 

^  [Raskin  was  in  Venice  from  early  in  September  1876  till  late  in  May  1877. 
For  his  intimacy  with  Prince  Leopold,  see  above^  Introduction,  p.  zzzv.] 

>  [See  Vol.  XIII.  pp.  liv.-lv.l 

3    See  Vol.  XVI.  p.  xx.] 

«  't.6.,  the  edition  of  1880 :  see  Vol.  VIII.  p.  lii.] 

^  [For  the  sake  of  uniformity  the  passages  thos  printed  in  the  edition  of  1887 
are,  howoTer,  given  in  italics,  and  noted  as  having  been  printed  in  capitals.] 


PREFACE  TO  THE  EDITION  OF   1887        15 

useful  for  his  own  work,  in  the  blank  pages  left  for  that 
purpose  at  the  close  of  the  volume,  he  will  certainly  get 
more  good  of  them  than  if  they  had  been  grouped  for 
him  according  to  the  author's  notion  of  their  contents.^ 

Sandoate,  10th  Jamuay,  1888.^ 

^  [In  later  editions,  when  an  index  (by  Mr.  Wedderbnm)  wat  supplied,  the  blank 
pagea  were  omitted^  thon^h  this  passage  was  left  as  Raskin  wrote  it  J 

*  [Raskin  was  at  Folkestone  and  at  Sandgate  in  the  latter  part  of  1887,  and  in 
tlie  early  part  of  1888 — at  a  time  of  fiuling  health.] 


9 


^ 


f 


n 


« / 


^ 


LECTURES   ON   ART 

LECTURE   V 

m 

INAUGURAL 

1.  Th£  duty  which  is  to-day  laid  on  me,  of  introducing, 
among  the  elements  of  education  appointed  in  this  great 
University,  one  not  only  new,  but  such  as  to  involve  in  its 
possible  results  some  modification  of  the  rest,  is,  as  you 
weQ  feel,  so  grave,  that  no  man  could  undertake  it  without 
laying  himself  open  to  the  imputation  of  a  kind  of  inso- 
laice ;  and  no  man  could  undertake  it  rightly,  without  being 
in  danger  of  having  his  hands  shortened  by  dread  of  his 
task,  and  mistrust  of  himself. 

And    it  has   chanced  to   me,   of  late,  to   be  so  little 

acquainted  either  with  pride  or  hope,  that  I   can  scarcely 

recover  so  much  as  I  now  need,  of  the  one  for  strength^ 

and  of  the  other  for  foresight,  except  by  remembering  that 

^  noble  persons,  and  friends  of  the  high  temper  that  judges 

\  most  clearly  where  it  loves  best,  have  desired  that  this  trust 

Whould  be  given  me;  and  by  resting  also  in  the  conviction 

V  that  the  goodly  tree  whose  roots,  by  God's  help,  we  set  in 

\\sMx  to-day,  will  not  fail  of  its  height  because  the  plant- 

ng  of  it  is  under  poor  auspices,  or  the  first  shoots  of  it 

enfeebled  by  HI  gardening. 

2.  The  munificence  of  the  English  gentleman  to  whom 
«^e  owe  the  founding  of  this  Professorship*  at  once  in  our 
three  great  Universities,'  has   accomplished  the  first  great 


1 

s 


[Dttlirered  on  February  8,  1870.1 


•  See  above,  Introduction,  p.  xiz.] 
*  rrbe  Slade  Chairs  of  Fine  Arte  were  founded  in  the  Univeinties  of  Oxford 
nd  Cttnbridge,  and  in  University  College,  London.] 


.^ 


\  18  LECTURES  ON  ART 

group  of  a  series  of  changes  now  taking  gradual  effect  in 
our  system  of  public  education ;  which,  as  you  well  know, 
are  the  sign  of  a  vital  change  in  the  national  mind,  respect- 
ing both  the  principles  on  which  that  education  should  be 
conducted,  and  the  ranks  of  society  to  which  it  should  ex- 
tend. For,  whereas  it  was  formerly  thought  that  the  dis- 
cipline necessary  to  form  the  character  of  youth  was  best 
given  in  the  study  of  abstract  branches  of  literature  and 
philosophy,  it  is  now  thought  that  the  same,  or  a  better, 
disciplme  may  be  given  by  informing  men  in  early  years 
of  the  things  it  will  be  of  chief  practical  advantage  to  them 
afterwards  to  know;  and  by  permitting  to  them  the  choice 
of  any  field  of  study  which  they  may  feel  to  be  best 
adapted  to  their  personal  dispositions.  I  have  always  used 
what  poor  influence  I  possessed  in  advancing  this  change;^ 
nor  can  any  one  rejoice  more  than  I  in  its  practical  results. 
But  the  completion — I  will  not  venture  to  say,  correction — 
of  a  system  established  by  the  highest  wisdom  of  noble 
ancestors,  cannot  be  too  reverently  undertaken:  and  it  is 
necessary  for  the  English  people,  who  are  sometimes  violent 
in  change  in  proportion  to  tiie  reluctance  with  which  they 
admit  its  necessity,  to  be  now,  oftener  than  at  other  times, 
reminded  that  the  object  of  instruction  here  is  not  primarily 
attainment,  but  discipline;'  and  that  a  youth  is  sent  to  our 
Universities,  not  (hitherto  at  least)  to  be  apprenticed  to  a 
trade,  nor  even  always  to  be  advanced  in  a  profession ;  but, 
always^  to  be  made  a  gentleman  and  a  scholar.' 

^  ([See  especially  Appendix  7  in  Stonei  of  Venice,  toL  iii.  (Vol.  XI.  pp.  258  m^.}.] 

'On  education  ag  an  ethical  process,  compare  VoL  XIX.  p.  171 J 

[In  one  of  the  MS.  drafts  of  the  lecture  there  is  here  tne  following  passage 

on  '^Gentlemen  and  Scholars"  (compare  Aratra  PerUelid,  §  236;  below^  p.  066): — 

''Now  it  is  prohable  that  by  the  Laws  of  Heaven  it  may  be  determined 

that  every  man  shall  live  by  doing  his  proper  duty^  or  devoir,  and  no 

otherwise.     Let  ns,  therefore^  first  define  the  characters  of  the  gentleman 

and  scholar^  and  ascertain  the  proper  work  of  each. 

''  A  Gentleman  is  a  person  trained  so  as  to  be  full  of  mercy  and  desirous 
of  honour ;  that  is  to  say^  the  praise  of  good  men,  especially  of  his  children 
and  their  descendants^  and  tiie  praise  of  God.  This  fulness  of  mercy  and 
desire  of  praise  are  so  inseparably  connected  with  purity  of  race  that  in 
the  transition  from  the  language  which  will  without  doubt  remain  as  the 
means  of  intercourse  between  educated  persons  of  all  nations  to  that  which 


I.   INAUGURAL  19 

8.  To  be  made  these, — ^if  there  is  in  him  the  making 
of  either.  The  populaces  of  civilized  countries  have  lately 
been  under  a  feverish  impression  that  it  is  possible  for  all 
men  to  be  both;  and  that  having  once  become,  by  passing 
through  certain  mechanical  processes  of  instruction,  gentle 

wiU  certainlv  become  the  expression  of  the  activity  of  their  dominant 
power,  ffnUiki  and  jfeneramg  oeoome  expressive  of  moral  dispositions  as 
they  change  into  gentle  and  generous;  and  notabihs  gradually  contrasts 
and  intensifies  itself  into  nMHt  and  wMe,  Now.  gentlemen,  for  the  sake 
of  continuity  of  statement,  I  must  permit  myself  to  repeat  to  yon  what 
you  well  know,  that  one  of  the  chief  usee,  if  not  the  chief  use,  of  the 
study  of  letters  is  to  discern  in  the  language  of  great  nations  the  central 
idess  by  which  they  lived ;  for  it  is  certain  that  the  thoughts  which  led 
them  to  their  greatness  must  be  founded  on  an  unfailing  truth.  And, 
therefore,  not  as  the  curious  tradition  of  a  barbaric  time,  but  as  indicating 
the  root  of  a  power  which  is  to  last  through  all  time,  you  must  remember 
always  the  first  meaning  of  the  words  Lord  and  Lady,  as  Givers  or  dividers 
of  bread.  For  in  that  word  is  summed  the  devoir  of  the  governing  race. 
Their  Mercy  and  their  Honour  are  both  in  this,  that  they  are  givers  of 
bread,  not  takers  of  it,  and  replenishers  of  eaiih,  not  devastators  of  it 
FuU  of  mercy,  observe ;  that  is  to  say,  occupied  in  aiding  and  protecting 
the  life  of  men  upon  the  earth ;  and  as  throughout  nature  the  corrup- 
tion of  any  good  is  for  the  most  part  into  a  contrary  form  of  evil,  we 
may  read  in  uie  very  madness  of  the  war  which  has  been  the  delight  and 
sustenance  of  kings,  the  corruption  of  their  true  function  to  its  contrary, 
and  perceive  also  that  their  true  strength  and  all  possibility  of  their  con- 
tinuance lay  not  in  that,  but  in  the  reverse  of  that  in  whatever  true  care 
and  help  to  the  people  was  given  by  those  who  were  in  any  wise  true 
kings.  And  it  is  in  maintaining  contention  with  all  forms  of  evil  and 
death,  and  rightly  ordering  the  natural  elements  fiivourable  to  man's 
existence — above  all,  in  justly  governing  the  energies  of  life  itself,  and 
extending  the  civUization  wuch  is  the  making  of  civil  persons,  that  the 
purest  happiness  of  humanity  is  to  be  reached,  and  the  phases  of  its  in- 
telligence which  are  certainly  highest,  whether  terminating  in  them- 
selves, or  fitting  us,  if  that  be  conceivable,  for  companionship  with  spiritual 
natures  greater  and  kinder  than  our  own. 

^'  Practically,  therefore,  the  first  school  which  youths  have  to  enter  at 
the  University  is  that  of  Gentleness;  in  which  they  may  botii  learn  how 
to  take,  and  recognize  it  for  their  duty  to  take,  such  captaincy  over  the 
Poor  as  shall  enable  them  to  feed  and  clothe  them  by  leading  them  in 
disciplined  troops  to  fruitful  labour  by  land  and  sea,  by  being  first  in 
adventure,  last  in  endurance,  stron^peat  in  war  with  adverse  element  and 
circumstance,  and  above  all  things  just  in  magistracy  by  watchful  reward 
of  virtue,  and  fearless  quenching  of  crime.  This  is  the  work  of  the 
Knights  and  Lords  of  England,  to  become  Knights  Templars  of  the  Temple 
of  God,  which  is  the  Body  and  Spirit  of  His  poor. 

''Thus,  then,  of  the  character  and  work  of  Gentlemen.  Next,  we  have 
to  ask  what  is  the  &rther  character  and  work  of  the  Scholar,  who  must 
be  this  and  more.  We  may  be  sure  that  in  this  case  also  the  true  nature 
of  both  has  been  corrupted  and  superseded  largely  by  a  false  one  which 
takes  its  name,  and  is  its  exact  contrary ;  so  that,  as  you  have  a  malignant 
and  destroying,  instead  of  a  healing.  Authority,  so  you  have  a  turbulent 
and  deceiving,  instead  of  a  peaceful  and  instructing  Scholarship,  and  that 
as  the  power  of  the  king  has  passed  from  him  because  he  used  it  to  slay. 


20  LECTURES  ON  ART 

and  learned,  they  are  sure  to  attain  in  the  sequel  the  eon- 
summate  beatitude  of  being  rich.^ 

Rich,  in  the  way  and  measure  in  which  it  is  well  for 
them  to  be  so,  they  may,  without  doubt,  all  become^ 
There  is  indeed  a  land  of  Havilah  open  to  them,  of  which 
the  wonderful  sentence  is  literally  true — "The  gold  of  that 
land  is  good." '  But  they  must  first  understand,  that  educa- 
tion, in  its  deepest  sense,  is  not  the  equalizer,  but  the  dis- 
cemer,  of  men;^  and  that,  so  far  from  being  instruments 
for  the  collection  of  riches,  the  first  lesson  of  wisdom  is  to 
disdain  them,  and  of  gentleness,  to  difiuse. 

It  is  not  therefore,  as  far  as  we  can  judge,  yet  possible 

*  The  full  meaning  of  this  sentence,  and  of  that  which  closes  the 
paragraph,  can  only  be  understood  by  reference  to  my  more  developed 
statements  on  the  subject  of  Education  in  Modem  Painters  and  in  Time 
and  Tide,^  The  following  fourth  paragraph  is  the  most  pregnant  summary 
of  my  political  and  social  principles  I  have  ever  been  able  to  give.    [1887.} 

80  the  power  of  the  teacher  has  passed  from  him  because  he  has  used  it 

to  deceive  and  has  taken  away  ute  Key  of  Knowledge,  and  entering  not 

in  himself,  them  that  would  enter  in  he,  under  religious  pretext,  has  also 

hindered.     And  we  may  be  sure  that  the  true  scholar,  oein^  the  exact 

contrary  of  this,  will  be  one  who  by  resolute  withdrawal  of  himself  from 

all  pursuit  of  the  objects  of  vulgar  anxiety  and  avarice,  obtains  such  rest 

of  body  and  peace  of  heart  as  may  enable  him  at  last  to  enter  into  the 

shade  of  the  Avenues  that  encompass  the  Acropolis  of  Heaven,  and  into 

the  Leschai  that  lead  to  the  temple  of  its  Light,  therein  to  be  taught 

by  Nature  and  by  the  Lord  of  Nature,  and  by  all  the  dead  who  rest 

with  him." 

For  ''the  first  meaning  of  the  words  Lord  and  Lady,"  see  Sesame  and  LUiei,  §  88 

^oL  XVIIL  p.  138  and  n.).    For  the  Bible  reference,  see  Matthew  xxiii.  13.    In 

''the  Leschai  that  lead  to  the  temple  of  its  Light,"  Rusldn  refers  to  the  arcades  or 

corridors  (X^o-xot),  usually  dedicated  to  Apollo,  which  were  used  as  centres  of  reunion 

and  dlflcussiou.] 

^  [In  one  of  the  early  drafts  this  passage  stood  as  follows : — 

" .  .  .  of  being  rich.  But  the  dream  of  this  discoverable  Eden,  filled  with 
forests  of  trees  of  knowledge  whose  fruit  is  good  for  food,  and  traversed 
by  rivers  of  life  whose  sands  are  good  for  coinage,  will  soon  be  pain- 
folly  dispelled ;  and  it  will  be  comfortlessly,  but  surely,  apprehended  by 
them  that  education  is  not  the  equalizer^  but  the  discemer  and  separator 
of  men;  and  that,  so  far  from  being  instruments  for  the  attainment  of 
riches,  the  first  lesson  of  wisdom  is  to  despise  them,  and  of  gentleness,  to 
diffuse." 
For  the  Bible  reference  here,  see  Genesis  ii.  9, 10 ;  and  for  education  as  the  discemer 
of  men.  Time  and  Tide,  §  171  (Vol.  XVII.  pp  466-467).] 

•  [Genesis  ii.  11    12.1 

»  rVol.  VI.  pp.  482^ ;  Vol.  VII.  pp  427-429 ;  and  VoL  XVIIL  pp.  466-467. 
See  also  General  Index,  «.  Education.] 


I.  INAUGURAL  21 

for  all  men  to  be  gentlemen  and  scholars*  Even  under  the 
best  training  some  will  remain  too  selfish  to  refuse  wealth, 
and  some  too  dull  to  desire  leisure.  But  many  more  might 
be  so  than  are  now;  nay,  perhaps  all  men  in  Englimd 
might  one  day  be  so,  if  England  truly  desired  her  supre- 
macy among  the  nations  to  be  in  kindness  and  in  learn- 
ing. To  which  good  end,  it  will  indeed  contribute  that  we 
add  some  practice  of  the  lower  arts  to  our  scheme  of 
University  education;  but  the  thing  which  is  vitally  neces- 
sary is,  that  we  should  extend  the  spirit  of  University 
education  to  the  practice  of  the  lower  arts. 

4.  And,  above  all,  it  is  needfiil  that  we  do  this  by 
redeeming  them  from  their  present  pain  of  self-contempt, 
and  by  giving  them  rest.  It  has  been  too  long  boasted  as 
the  pride  of  England,  that  out  of  a  vast  multitude  of  men, 
c(»ifessed  to  be  in  evil  case,  it  was  possible  for  individuals, 
by  strenuous  effort,  and  rare  good  fortune,  occasionally  to 
emerge  into  the  light,  and  look  back  with  self-gratulatory 
scom  upon  the  occupations  of  their  parents,  and  the  cir* 
eumstances  of  their  infancy.  Ought  we  not  rather  to  aim 
at  an  ideal  of  national  life,  when,  of  the  employments  of 
Englishmen,  though  each  shall  be  distinct,  none  shall  be 
mihappy  or  ignoble;  when  mechanical  operations,  acknow- 
ledged to  be  debasing  in  their  tendency,^  shall  be  deputed 
to  less  fortunate  and  more  covetous  races ;  when  advance 
from  rank  to  rank,  though  possible  to  all  men,  may  be  rather 
shunned  than  desired  by  the  best;  and  the  chief  object  in 
the  mind  of  every  citizen  may  not  be  extrication  from  a 
eondition  admitted  to  be  disgraceful,  but  fulfilment  of  a 
duty  which  shall  be  also  a  birthright? 

5.  And  then,  the  training  of  all  these  distinct  classes 
will  not  be  by  Universities  of  general  knowledge,  but  by 
distinet  schools  of  such  knowledge  as  shall  be  most  useful 
for  every  class:  in  which,  first  the  principles  of  their 
special  business  may  be  perfectly  taught,  and  whatever 
higher  learning,  and  cultivation  of  the  faculties  for  receiving 

*  '^Tcxvac  iTippftiroi,*'  compare  page  113. 


22  LECTURES  ON  ART 

and  giving  pleasure,  may  be  properly  joined  with  that 
labour,  taught  in  connection  with  it  Thus,  I  do  not 
despair  of  seeing  a  School  of  Agriculture/  with  its  fully- 
endowed  institutes  of  zoology,  botany,  and  chemistry;  and 
a  School  of  Mercantile  Seamanship,  with  its  institutes  of 
astronomy,  meteorology,  and  natural  history  of  the  sea: 
and,  to  name  only  one  of  the  finer,  I  do  not  say  higher, 
arts,  we  shall,  I  hope,  in  a  little  time,  have  a  perfect 
school  of  Metal-work,  at  the  head  of  which  will  be,  not 
the  ironmasters,  but  the  goldsmiths;  and  therein,  I  believe, 
that  artists,  being  taught  how  to  deal  wisely  with  the 
most  precious  of  metals,  will  take  into  due  government 
the  uses  of  all  others.* 

But  I  must  not  permit  myself  to  fail  in  the  estimate 
of  my  immediate  duty,  while  I  debate  what  that  duty 
may  hereafter  become  in  the  hands  of  others;  and  I  will 
therefore  now,  so  far  as  I  am  able,  lay  before  you  a  brief 
general  view  of  the  existing  state  of  the  arts  in  England, 
and  of  the  influence  which  her  Universities,  through  these 
newly-founded  lectureships,  may,  I  hope,  bring  to  bear  upon 
it  for  good. 

6.  We  have  first  to  consider  the  impulse  which  has  been 
given  to  the  practice  of  all  the  arts'  by  the  extension 
of  our  commerce,  and  enlarged  means  of  intercourse  with 
foreign  nations,  by  which  we  now  become  more  familiarly 
acquainted  with  their  works  in  past  and  in  present  times. 
The  immediate  result  of  these  new  opportunities,  I  regret 
to  say,  has  been  to  make  us  more  jedous  of  the  genius  of 
others,  than  conscious  of  the  limitations  of  our  own ;   and 

^  [A  School  of  Agriculture  wu  established  in  Cambridge  in  1809,  and  a  School 
of  Forestry  (transferred  from  Cooper's  Hill)  at  Oxford  in  1906.] 

>  [Eds.  1^  added  here  :— 

''.  .  .  all  others;  having  in  connection  with  their  practical  work  splendid 
institutes  of  chemistry  and  mineralogy,  and  of  ethical  and  imaginative 
literature. 

"And  thus  I  oonfoss  myself  more  interested  in  the  final  issue  of  the 
chance  in  our  system  of  central  education,  which  is  to-day  consummated 
by  the  admission  of  the  manual  arts  into  its  scheme,  than  in  any  direct 
effect  likely  to  result  upon  ourselves  from  the  innovation.  But  I  must 
not  ...  'H 

s  [Eds.  1-3  add :  "  of  which  the  object  is  the  production  of  beautiful  things."] 


\ 


I.  INAUGURAL  2» 

to  make  us  rather  desire  to  enlarge  our  wealth  by  the  sale 
of  art,  than  to  elevate  our  enjoyments  by  its  acquisition. 

Now,  whatever  efforts  we  make,  with  a  true  desire  to 
produce,  and  possess,  things  that  are  intrinsically  beauti- 
ful, have  in  them  at  least  one  of  the  essential  elements 
of  success.  But  efforts  having  origin  only  in  the  hope  of 
enriching  ourselves  by  the  sale  of  our  productions,  are 
asmredly  condenmed  to  dishonourable  failure;  not  because, 
ultimat^y,  a  well-trained  nation  is  forbidden  to  profit  by 
the  exercise  of  its  peculiar  art-skiU;  but  because  that  pecu- 
liar art-skiU  can  never  be  developed  mth  a  view  to  profit.^ 
The  right  fulfilment  of  national  power  in  art  depends 
always  on  the  direction  of  its  aim  by  the  experience  of 
ages.'  Self-knowledge  is  not  less  difficult,  nor  less  neces- 
saiy  for  the  direction  of  its  genius,  to  a  people  than  to 
an  individual;    and   it   is   neither  to   be   acquired   by  the 

*  [One  of  the  early  dnfti  has  an  additional  passage  in  this  connexion : — 

'^  All  good  work  is  done  by  a  company  of  poor  men.    This  law  is  'a 

▼ery  stem  and  singular  one,  but  inevitable.    Agricultnre^  by  which  the 

world  lives^  has  been  done  either  bv  the  hands  of  slaves,  or  of  labourers 

who  only  obtained  such  share  of  the  produce  as  was  sufficient  for  their 

lile>  and  happy  those  who  can  get  of  it  so  much.    The  g^ood  building  of 

the  world  has  oeen  done  byjpoor  and  nameless  builders,  mason  and  master 

mason  working  together.    Ine  good  painting,  for  low  fixed  salaries ;  Man- 

tegna's,  for  thirty  pounds  a  year ;  Titian's,  John  Bellini's,  and  Carpaccio's 

for  five  ducats  a  month.    The  best  poetry  has  been  done  for  no  salary  at 

all;  but  for  casual  alms,  as  the  Iliad;  or  bitter  bread,  as  the  Divina 

Oommedia.     Chaucer,  indeed, — ''well  of  English  undefiled" — had  salary, 

thirteen  pounds  a  year  and  a  pitcher  of  wine  daily;  but  when  he  was 

seventy  years  old,  was  borrowing  a  few  shillings  from  week  to  week  in 

advance  of  his  pension.    The  sweet  songs  of  Scotland  were  written  for 

smaU  pay  beside  the  plough  furrow;  and  if  ever  sUver  and  gold  were 

prised  by  the  country  lover  of  Ann  Hatiiaway,  it  was  but  in  the  lilies  of 

Avon.    In  science,  calculate  the  pay  of  Galileo,  Kepler,  Linntsus,  and 

Newton ;  and  set  tiie  sum  beside  wnat  estimate  you  can  make  of  the  wages 

that  the  world  gives  ignorance.    In  war,  count  the  pay  that  Marathon  was 

fought  for,  Sempech  and  Marston  Moor ;  and  then  set  beside  that,  some 

example  of  the  wages  the  world  pays  to  its  robbers.    You  may  sometimes 

have  imagined  that  all  this  was  wrong,  and  to  be  amended  in  these  wiser 

days.    But  not  so.    This  is  eternally  right,  and  may  never  be  changed." 

Compare  YoL  XYI.  pp.  83  and  nn,,  183-185.     For  the  references  to  Italian  painters 

sad  their  salaries,  see  Omde  to  the  Venetian  Academy;  for  the  bitter  bread  of  J[)ante's 

eiile,  see  Paradieo,  zvii.  69 ;  particulars  about  the  pension  of  Chaucer  (the  description 

of  whom  Ruskin  quotes  from  Spenser's  Faerie  Queene,  iv.  2,  32)  may  be  found  in  any 

lift  of  the  poet  (lee,  e,g,,  vol.  i.  p.  31  of  Chaucer's  Works  in  ^'Bohn's  Standard 

library");  for  the  rewards  of  Kepler  and  other  pioneers  of  science,  see  Vol.  VII. 

*  [The  words  ^<the  direeHon  .  .  .  ages"  were  put  into  capitals  in  1887-] 


24  LECTURES  ON  ART 

eagerness  of  unpractised  pride,  nor  during  the  anxieties  of 
improvident  distress.  No  nation  ever  had,  or  will  have,  the 
power  of  suddenly  developmg,  under  the  pressure  of  neces- 
sity, faculties  it  had  n^lected  when  it  was  at  ease;  not 
of  teaching  itself,  in  poverty,  the  skill  to  produce  what  it 
has  never,  in  opulence,  had  the  sense  to  admire. 

7.  Connected  also  with  some  of  the  worst  parts  of  our 
social  system,  but  capable  of  being  directed  to  better  result 
than  this  commercial  endeavour,  we  see  lately  a  most 
powerful  impulse  given  to  the  production  of  costly  works 
of  art,  by  the  various  causes  which  promote  the  sudden 
accumulation  of  wealth  in  the  hands  of  private  persons. 
We  have  thus  a  vast  and  new  patronage,  which,  in  its 
present  agency,  is  injurious  to  our  schools;  but  which  is 
nevertheless  in  a  great  degree  earnest  and  conscientioust 
and  far  from  being  influenced  chiefly  by  motives  of  osten- 
tation«  Most  of  our  rich  men  would  be  glad  to  promote 
the  true  interests  of  art  in  this  country:  and  even  those 
who  buy  for  vanity,  found  their  vanity  on  the  possession 
of  what  they  suppose  to  be  best. 

It  is  therefore  in  a  great  measure  the  fault  of  artists 
themselves  if  they  suffer  from  this  partly  unintelligent,  but 
thoroughly  well-intended,  patronage.  If  they  seek  to  attract 
it  by  eccentricity,  to  deceive  it  by  superficial  qualities,  or 
take  advantage  of  it  by  thoughtless  and  facile  production, 
they  necessarily  degrade  themselves  and  it  together,  and 
have  no  right  to  complain  afterwards  that  it  will  not  ac- 
knowledge better-grounded  claims.  But  if  every  painter  of 
real  power  would  do  only  what  he  knew  to  be  worthy  of 
himself,  and  refuse  to  be  involved  in  the  contention  for 
undeserved  or  accidental  success,  there  is  indeed,  whatever 
may  have  been  thought  or  said  to  the  contnuy,  true  instinct 
enough  in  the  public  mind  to  follow  such  firm  guidance.  It 
is  one  of  the  facts  which  the  experience  of  thirty  years 
enables  me  to  assert  without  qualification,  that  a  really 
good  picture  is  ultimately  always  approved  and  bought, 
unless  it  is  wilfully  rendered  offensive  to  the  public  by  faults 


L   INAUGURAL  25 

which  the  artist  has  been  either  too  proud  to  abandon  <nr 
too  weak  to  correct 

8.  The  development  qf  whatever  is  healthful  and  service- 
aUe  in  the  two  modes  of  impulse  which  we  have  been  con- 
sidering, depends  however,  ultimately,  on  the  direction  taken 
by  the  true  interest  in  art  which  has  lately'  been  aroused 
by  the  great  and  active  genius  of  many  of  our  living,  or  but 
lately  lost,  painters,  sculptors,  and  architects.  It  may  per- 
haps surprise,  but  I  think  it  will  please  you  to  hear  me,  or 
(if  you  will  forgive  me,  in  my  own  Oxford,  the  presumption 
of  fimcjring  that  some  may  recognize  me  by  an  old  name) 
to  hear  the  author  of  Modem  Painters^  say,  that  his  chief 
error  in  earlier  days  was  not  in  over  estimating,  but  in  too 
slightly  acknowledging  the  merit  of  living  men.  The  great 
painter  whose  power,  while  he  was  yet  among  us,  I  was 
able  to  perceive,  was  the  first  to  reprove  me  for  my  dis-- 
i^ard  of  the  skill  of  his  fellow-artists ; '  and,  with  this 
inauguration  of  the  study  of  the  art  of  all  time, — a  study 
which  can  only  by  true  modesty  end  in  wise  admiration, 
—it  is  surely  well  that  I  connect  the  record  of  these  words 
of  his,  spoken  then  too  truly  to  myself,  and  true  always 
more  or  less  for  all  who  are  untrained  in  that  toil, — 
'*You  don't  know  how  difficult  it  is." 

You  will  not  expect  me,  within  the  compass  of  this 
lecture,  to  give  you  any  analysis  of  the  many  kinds  of 
excellent  art  (in  all  the  three  great  divisions)  which  the 
complex  demands  of  modem  life,  and  yet  more  varied  in- 
stincts of  modem  genius,  have  developed  for  pleasure  or 
service.  It  must  be  my  endeavour,  in  conjunction  with  my 
colleagues  in  the  other  Universities,'  hereafter  to  enable 
you  to  appreciate  these  worthily;  in  the  hope  that  also  the 

^  [ifodem  Painters^  it  will  be  remembered^  was  publisbed  as  ''by  a  Graduate  of 
Oxford^"  the  author's  name  being  first  given  on  the  title-page  of  Swen  LampB  (1849)9 
vhioh  was  described  as  being  by  ''John  Ruskin,  author  of  'Modem  Painters'" 
(lee  Vol.  VIII.  p.  li.l 

'  [Compare  Vol.  All.  p.  129  and  fi.1 

'  [The  first  Slade  Professor  at  Cambridge  was  Sir  Matthew  Digby  Wyatt  (suc- 
ceeded in  1873  by  Mr.  Sidney  Colvin)  ;  and  at  University  Oolk^^  London^  Sir 
Edward  Poynter.] 


26  LECTURES  ON  AKT 

members  of  the  Royal  Academy,  and  those  of  the  Institute 
of  British  Architects,  may  be  induced  to  assist,  and  guide, 
the  efforts  of  the  Universities,  by  organizing  such  a  system 
of  art-education  for  their  own  students,  as  shall  in  future 
prevent  the  waste  of  genius  in  any  mistaken  endeavours; 
especially  removing  doubt  as  to  the  proper  substance  and 
use  of  materials;^  and  requiring  compliance  with  certain 
elementary  principles  of  right,  m  every  picture  and  design 
exhibited  with  their  sanction.  It  is  not  indeed  possible  for 
talent  so  varied  as  that  of  English  artists  to  be  compelled 
into  the  formalities  of  a  determined  school;  but  it  must 
certainly  be  the  function  of  every  academical  body  to  see 
that  their  younger  students  are  guarded  £rom  what  must 
in  every  school  be  error;  and  that  they  are  practised  in 
the  best  methods  of  work  hitherto  known,  before  their  in- 
genuily  is  directed  to  the  invention  of  others. 

9.  I  need  scarcely  refer,  except  for  the  sake  of  complete* 
ness  in  my  statement,  to  one  form  of  demand  for  art  which 
is  wholly  unenlightened,  and  powerful  only  for  evil; — 
namely,  the  demand  of  the  classes  occupied  solely  in  the 
pursuit  of  pleasure,  for  objects  and  modes  of  art  that  can 
amuse  indolence  or  excite  passion.*  There  is  no  need  for 
any  discussion  of  these  requirements,  or  of  their  forms  of 
influence,  though  they  are  very  deadly  at  present  in  their 
operation  on  sculpture,  and  on  jewellers'  work.  They  can- 
not be  checked  by  blame,  nor  guided  by  instruction;  they 
are  merely  the  necessary  result  of  whatever  defects  exist 
in  the  traiper  and  principles  of  a  luxurious  society;  and 
it  is  only  by  moral  changes,  not  by  art-criticism,  that  their 
action  can  be  modified. 

10.  Lastly,  there  is  a  continually  increasing  demand  for 
popular  art,  multipliable  by  the  printing-press,  illustrative 
of  daily  events,  of  general  literature,  and  of  natiural  science. 
Admirable  skill,  and  some  of  the  best  talent  of  modem 
times,  are  occupied  in  supplyuig  this  want;  and  there  is 

1  [ComiMure  Vol.  XVL  p.  44.1 

>  [£df.  1-3  r«Ad  ''ntitfy  MiisibUitj''  for  *<  excite  piMuon."] 


I.   INAUGURAL  27 

no  limit  to  the  good  which  may  be  effected  by  rightly 
taking  advantage  of  the  powers  we  now  possess  of  placing 
good  and  lovely  art  within  the  reach  of  the  poorest  classes. 
Much  has  been  already  accomplished;  but  great  harm  has 
been  done  also, — ^first,  by  forms  of  art  definitely  addressed 
to  depraved  tastes;  and,  secondly,  m  a  more  subtle  way, 
by  really  beautiAil  and  useful  engravings  which  are  yet  not 
good  enough  to  retain  their  influence  on  the  public  mind; 
—which  weary  it  by  redundant  quantity  of  monotonous 
average  excellence,  and  diminish  or  destroy  its  power  of 
accurate  attention  to  work  of  a  higher  order. 

Especially  this  is  to  be  regretted  in  the  effect  produced 
on  the  schools  of  line  engraving,  which  had  reached  in 
England  an  executive  skill  of  a  kind  before  unexampled, 
and  which  of  late  have  lost  much  of  their  more  sterling 
and  legitimate  methods.  Still,  I  have  seen  plates  produced 
quite  recently,  more  beautiful,  I  think,  in  some  qualities 
than  anything  ever  before  attained  by  the  burin  :^  and  I 
have  not  the  slightest  fear  that  photography,'  or  any  other 
adverse  or  competitive  operation,  will  in  the  least  ulti- 
mately diminish, — I  believe  they  will,  on  the  contrary, 
stimulate  and  exalt — ^the  grand  old  powers  of  the  wood  and 
the  steel. 

11.  Such  are,  I  think,  briefly  the  present  conditions  of 
art  with  which  we  have  to  deal;  and  I  conceive  it  to  be 
the  function  of  this  Professorship,  with  respect  to  them, 
to  establish  both  a  practical  and  critical  school  of  fine  art 
for  English  gentlemen:  practical,  so  that,  if  they  draw  at 
all,  they  may  draw  rightly;  and  critical,  so  that,  being  first 
directed  to  such  works  of  existing  art  as  will  best  reward 
their  study,  they  may  afterwards  make  their  patronage  of 
living  artists  delightftd  to  themselves  in  their  conscious- 
ness of  its  justice,  and,  to  the  utmost,  beneficial  to  their 

^  [Rmldn  placed  mhim  modem  engnvings  in  hit  Reference  Series :  see  Noe.  103, 
151-164,  100,  and  176  (etching) ;  V<3.  XXL  pp.  36,  41,  42.] 

'  [On  the  relation  of  photorraphy  to  art,  see  Oeiua  qf  Aglaia,  §§  37,  105 
(Vol  XIX.  pp.  88-89,  160.] 


38  LECTURES  ON  AUT 

country,  by  being  given  to  the  men  who  desa*ve  it;  in  the 
early  period  of  their  lives,  when  they  both  need  it  most 
and  can  be  influenced  by  it  to  the  best  advantage/ 

12.  And  especially  with  reference  to  this  function  of 
patronage,  I  believe  myself  justified  in  taking  into  account 
future  probabilities  as  to  the  character  and  range  of  ait  in 
England:  and  I  shall  endeavour  at  once  to  organize  with 
you  a  S3rstem  of  study  calculated  to  develop  chiefly  the 
knowledge  of  those  branches  in  which  the  English  schools 
have  shown,  and  are  likely  to  show,  peculiar  excellence* 

Now,  in  asking  your  sanction  both  for  the  nature  of 
the  general  plans  I  wish  to  adopt,  and  for  what  I  conceive 
to  be  necessary  limitations  of  them,  I  wish  you  to  be  fully 
aware  of  my  reasons  for  both :  and  I  will  therefore  risk  the 
burdening  of  your  patience  while  I  state  the  directions  of 
efibrt  in  which  I  think  English  artists  are  liable  to  failure, 
and  those  also  in  which  past  experience  has  shown  they  are 
secure  of  success. 

18.  I  referred,  but  now,^  to  the  effort  we  are  making  to 
improve  the  designs  of  our  manufactures.  Within  certain 
limits  I  believe  this  improvement  may  indeed  take  effect: 
so  that  we  may  no  more  humour  momentary  fashions  by 
ugly  results  of  chance  instead  of  design ;  and  may  produce 
both  good  tissues,  of  harmonious  colours,  and  good  forms 
and  substance  of  pottery  and  glass.  But  we  shall  never 
excel  in  decorative  design.  Such  design  is  usually  produced 
by  people  of  great  natural  powers  of  mind,  who  have  no 
variety  of  subjects  to  employ  themselves  on,  no  oj^ressive 
anxieties,  and  are  in  circumstances  either  of  natural  scenery 
or  of  daily  life,  which  cause  pleasurable  excitement.  We 
cannot  design,  because  we  have  too  much  to  think  of,  and 
we  think  of  it  too  anxiously.  It  has  long  been  observed 
how  little  real  anxiety  exists  in  the  minds  of  the  partly 
savage  races  which  excel  in  decorative  art;  and  we  must 
not  suppose  that  the  temper  of  the  Middle  Ages  was  a 


See  A  Joy  M  ^Bwr,  §  27  (Vol  XVI.  p.  34).] 
See  above,  §  6,  p.  22.] 


!•   INAUGUBAL  29 

troubled  one,  because  every  day  brought  its  danger  or  its 
change.  The  very  eventftikiess  of  the  life  rendered  it  care- 
less, as  generally  is  still  the  case  with  soldiers  and  sailors. 
Now,  when  there  are  great  powers  of  thought,  and  little  to 
tiiink  of,  all  the  waste  energy  and  fiincy  are  thrown  into 
the  manual  work,  and  you  have  so  much  intellect  as  would 
direct  the  affairs  of  a  large  mercantile  concern  for  a  day, 
spent  all  at  once,  quite  unconsciously,  in  drawing  an  in- 
genious spiral. 

Also,  powers  of  doing  fine  ornamental  work  are  only  to 
be  readied  by  a  perpetual  discipline  of  the  hand  as  well 
as  of  the  fancy;  discipline  as  attentive  and  painftil  as  that 
which  a  juggler  has  to  put  himself  through,  to  overcome 
the  more  palpable  difficulties  of  his  profession.  The  execu- 
tion of  the  best  artists  is  always  a  splendid  tour-de-force; 
and  much  that  in  painting  is  supposed  to  be  dependent  on 
material  is  indeed  only  a  lovely  and  quite  inimitable  leger- 
demain. Now,  when  powers  of  fancy,  stimulated  by  this 
triumphant  precision  of  manual  dexterity,  descend  uninter- 
ruptedly from  generation  to  generation,  you  have  at  last, 
what  is  not  so  much  a  trained  artist,  as  a  new  species  of 
animal,  with  whose  instinctive  gifts  you  have  no  chance  of 
oontaading.  And  thus  all  our  imitations  of  other  people's 
work  are  futile.  We  must  leam  first  to  make  honest 
English  wares,  and  afterwards  to  decorate  them  as  may 
please  the  then  approving  Graces. 

14.  Secondly — ^and  this  is  an  incapacity  of  a  graver  kind, 
yet  having  its  own  good  in  it  also — ^we  shall  never  be  suc- 
cessful in  the  highest  fields  of  ideal  or  theological  art. 

For  there  is  one  strange,  but  quite  essential,  character 
in  us— ever  since  the  Conquest,  if  not  earlier — a  delight  in 
the  forms  of  burlesque  which  are  connected  in  some  degree 
with  the  foulness  of  evil.  I  think  the  most  perfect  type 
of  a  true  English  mind  in  its  best  possible  temper,  is 
that  of  Chaucer;^  and  you  will  find  that,  while  it  is  for 
the  most  part  fuU  of  thoughts  of  beauty,  pure  and  wild 

»  [See  below,  §  70,  p.  77 ;  Vol.  V.  p.  127 ;  and  General  Index.] 


«0  LECTURES  ON  ART 

like  that  of  an  April  morning,^  there  are,  even  in  the 
of  this,  sometimes  momentarily  jesting  passages  which  stoop 
to  play  with  evil — while  the  power  of  listening  to  and  en- 
joying the  jesting  of  entirely  gross  persons,  whatever  the 
feeling  may  be  which  permits  it,  afterwards  degenerates 
into  forms  of  humour  which  render  some  of  quite  the 
greatest,  wisest,  and  most  moral  of  Elnglish  writers  now 
almost  useless  for  our  youth.  And  yet  you  will  find  that 
whenever  Englishmen  are  wholly  without  this  instinct,  their 
genius  is  comparatively  weak  and  restricted. 

15.  Now,  the  first  necessity  for  the  doing  of  any  great 
work  in  ideal  art,  is  the  looking  upon  all  fouhiess  with 
horror,  as  a  contemptible  though  dreadful  enemy.  You 
may  easily  understand  what  I  mean,  by  comparing  the 
feelings  with  which  Dante  regards  any  form  of  obscenity  or 
of  base  jest,'  with  the  temper  in  which  the  same  things  are 
regarded  by  Shakespeare.  And  this  strange  earthly  instinct 
of  ours,  coupled  as  it  is,  in  our  good  men,  with  great  sim- 
plicity and  common  sense,  renders  them  shrewd  and  perfect 
observers  and  delineators  of  actual  nature,  low  or  high; 
but  precludes  them  from  that  speciality  of  art  which  is 
properly  called  sublime.  If  ever  we  try  anything  in  the 
manner  of  Michael  Angelo  or  of  Dante,  we  catch  a  £fdl, 
even  in  literature,  as  Milton  in  the  battle  of  the  angels, 
spoiled  from  Hesiod;'  while  in  art,  every  attempt  in  this 
style  has  hitherto  been  the  sign  either  of  the  presump- 
tuous egotism  of  persons  who  had  never  really  learned  to 
be  workmen,  or  it  has  been  connected  with  very  tragic 
forms  of  the  contemplation  of  death, — it  has  always  been 
partly  insane,  and  never  once  wholly  successfuL^ 

But  we  need  not  feel  any  discomfort  in  these  limitations 

^  TA  reference  to  the  first  line  of  the  CanteHmry  Tales:  ''Whan  that  Aprile 
with  nis  schowres  swoote."] 
>  [Compare  Vol.  VII.  p.  337.] 

*  [Compare  Sesame  and  LUiee,  S  111  (VoL  XVIII.  p.  157),  where  Ruskin  again 
refers  to  Milton's  fall  of  the  angels  ''spoiled  and  degraded  from  Hesiod.'*] 

*  [See,   for   instance^    Ruskin's  criticisms  on   Barry  and    Haydon   (Vol.    VII. 
p.  231)^  and  on  Haydon  and  Blake  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  133).] 


1.  INAUGURAL  81 

of  our  capacity.  We  can  do  much  that  others  cannot,  and 
more  than  we  have  ever  yet  ourselves  completely  done. 
Our  first  great  gift  is  in  the  portraiture  of  living  people — 
a  power  already  so  accomplished  in  both  Reynolds  and 
Gainsborough  that  nothing  is  left  for  future  masters  but  to 
add  the  cahn  of  perfect  workmanship  to  their  vigour  and 
felicity  of  perception.  And  of  what  value  a  true  school 
of  portraiture  may  become  in  the  futmre,  when  worthy  men 
will  desire  only  to  be  known,  and  others  will  not  fear  to 
know  them,  for  what  they  truly  were,  we  cannot  fix>m  any 
past  records  of  art  influence  yet  conceive.  But  in  my  next 
address  it  will  be  partly  my  endeavour  to  show  you  how 
much  more  useful,  beoiuse  more  humble,  the  labour  of 
great  masters  might  have  been,  had  they  been  content  to 
bear  record  of  the  souls  that  were  dwelling  with  them  on 
earth,  instead  of  striving  to  give  a  deceptive  glory  to  those 
they  dreamed  of  in  heaven. 

16.  Secondly,  we  have  an  intense  power  of  invention 
and  expression  in  domestic  drama;  (King  Lear  and  Hamlet 
being  essentially  domestic  in  their  strongest  motives  of 
interest).  There  is  a  tendency  at  this  moment  towards 
a  noble  development  of  our  art  in  this  direction,  checked 
by  many  adverse  conditions,  which  may  be  summed  in 
one, — ^the  insufficiency  of  generous  civic  or  patriotic  pas- 
sion in  the  heart  of  the  English  people;  a  fault  which 
makes  its  domestic  affection  selfish,  contracted,  and,  there- 
fore, frivolous. 

17.  Thirdly,  in  connection  with  our  simplicity  and  good- 
humour,  and  partiy  with  that  very  love  of  the  grotesque 
which  debases  our  ideal,  we  have  a  sympathy  with  the  lower 
animals  which  is  peculiarly  our  own;  and  which,  though  it 
has  already  foimd  some  exquisite  expression  in  the  works 
of  Bewick  and  Landseer,  is  yet  quite  undeveloped.  This 
sympathy,  with  the  aid  of  our  now  authoritative  science 
of  physiology,  and  in  association  with  our  British  love 
of  adventure,  will,  I  hope,  enable  us  to  give  to  the  Aiture 
inhabitants  of  the   globe  an  almost  perfect  record  of  the 


82  LECTURES  ON 

present  forms  of  animal  life  upon  it,  of  which  many  are  on 
the  point  of  being  extinguished. 

Lastly,  but  not  as  the  least  important  of  our  spedal 
powers,  1  have  to  note  our  skill  in  landscape,  of  which  I 
will  presently  speak  more  particularly. 

18.  Such  I  conceive  to  be  the  directions  in  which, 
principally,  we  have  the  power  to  excel;  and  you  must  at 
once  see  how  the  consideration  of  them  must  modify  the 
advisable  methods  of  our  art  study.  For  if  our  professional 
painters  were  likely  to  produce  pieces  of  art  loftily  ideal  in 
their  character,  it  would  be  desirable  to  form  the  taste  of 
the  students  here  by  setting  before  them  only  the  purest 
examples  of  Greek,  and  the  mightiest  of  Italian,  art.  But 
I  do  not  think  you  will  yet  find  a  single  instance  of  a 
school  directed  exclusively  to  these  higher  branches  of  study 
in  England,  which  has  strongly,  or  even  definitely,  made 
impression  on  its  younger  scholars.  While,  therefore,  I 
shidl  endeavour  to  poipt  out  clearly  the  charactos  to  be 
looked  for  and  admired  in  the  great  masters  of  imagina^ 
tive  design,  I  shall  make  no  special  effort  to  stimulate  the 
imitation  of  them;  and  above  all  things,  I  shall  try  ta 
probe  in  you,  and  to  prevent,  the  affectation  into  which  it 
is  easy  to  fall,  even  through  modesty,— of  either  endeavour- 
ing to  admire  a  grandeur  with  which  we  have  no  natural 
sympathy,  or  losinir  the  pleasure  we  miirht  take  in  the 
studV  i  famiUar  things,  by  oonsidering  it  a  sign  of  le. 
finement  to  look  for  what  is  of  higher  class,  or  rarer 
occurrence. 

19.  Again,  if  our  artisans  were  likely  to  attain  any 
distinguished  skill  in  ornamental  design,  it  would  be  in- 
cumbent  upon  me  to  make  my  class  here  accurately  ac- 
quainted with  the  principles  of  earth  and  metal  work,  and 
to  accustom  them  to  take  pleasure  in  conventional  arrange- 
ments of  coloiur  and  form.  I  hope,  indeed,  to  do  this, 
so  far  as  to  enable  them  to  discern  the  real  merit  of 
many  styles  of  art  which  are  at  present  neglected;  and, 
above  all,  to  read  the  minds   of  semi-barbaric  nations  in 


I.   INAUGURAL  88 

tiie  only  language  by  which  their  feelings  were  capable  of 
expression;  and  those  members  of  my  class  whose  temper 
inclines  them  to  take  pleasure  in  the  interpretation  of 
mythic  symlxds,  will  not  probably  be  induced  to  quit  the 
profound  fields  of  investigation  which  early  art»  examined 
carefully,  will  open  to  them,  and  which  belong  to  it  alone; 
for  this  is  a  general  law,  that  supposing  the  intellect  of  the 
workman  the  same,  the  more  imitatively  complete  his  art^ 
the  less  he  will  mean  by  it;  and  the  ruder  the  symbol, 
the  deeper  is  its  intention/  Nevertheless,  when  I  have  once 
sufficiently  pointed  out  the 'nature  and  value  of  this  con- 
ventional work,  and  vindicated  it  from  the  contempt  with 
which  it  is  too  generally  regarded,  I  shall  leave  the  student 
to  his  own  pleasure  in  its  pursuit;  and  even,  so  far  as  I 
may,  discourage  all  admiration  founded  on  quaintness  ot  ^ 
peculiarity  of  style;  and  repress  any  other  modes  of  feel* 
ing  which  are  likely  to  lead  rather  to  fastidious  collection 
of  curiosities,  than  to  the  intelligent  appreciation  of  work 
which,  being  executed  in  compliance  with  constant  laws  of 
right,  cannot  be  singular,  and  must  be  distinguished  only 
by  excellence  in  what  is  always  desirable. 

20.  While,  therefore,  in  these  and  such  other  directions^ 
I  shall  endeavour  to  put  every  adequate  means  of  advance 
within  reach  of  the  members  of  my  class,  I  shall  use  my 
own  best  energy  to  show  them  what  is  consummately  beau- 
tiful and  well  done,  by  men  who  have  passed  through  the 
symbolic  or  suggestive  stage  of  design,  and  have  enabled 
themselves  to  com|dy,  by  truth  of  representation,  with  the 
strictest  or  most  eager  demands  of  accurate  science,  and  of 
disciplined  passion.  I  shall  therefore  direct  your  observation, 
during  the  greater  part  of  the  time  you  may  spare  to  me, 
to  what  is  •  indisputably  best,  both  in  painting  and  sculpture ; 
trusting  that  you  will  afterwards  recognize  the  nascent  and 
partial  skill  of  former  days  both  with  greater  interest  and 
greater  respect,  when  you  know  the  full  difficulty  of  what 
it  attempted,  and  the  complete  range  of  what  it  foretold. 

1  [See  below^  §  152,  and  ArtUra  FenUHci,  §  71  (pp.  144,  246).] 
XX.  c 


34  LECTURES  ON  ART 

21.  And  with  this  view,  I  shall  at  once  endeavour  to 
do  what  has  for  many  years  been  in  my  thoughts,  and 
now,  with  the  advice  and  assistance  of  the  curators  of  the 
University  Galleries,  I  do  not  doubt  may  be  accomplished 
here  in  Oxford,  just  where  it  will  be  pre-eminently  useful 
— ^namely,  to  arrange  an  educational  series  of  examples  of 
excellent  art,^  standards  to  which  you  may  at  once  refer 
on  any  questionable  point,  and  by  the  study  of  which  you 
may  gradually  attain  an  instinctive  sense  of  right,  which 
will  afterwards  be  liable  to  no  serious  error.  Such  a  collec- 
tion may  be  formed,  both  more  perfectly,  and  more  easily, 
than  would  commonly  be  supposed.  For  the  real  utility  of 
the  series  will  depend  on  its  restricted  extent,— on  the  severe 
exclusion  of  all  second-rate,  superfluous,  or  even  attractively 
varied  examples, — ^and  on  the  confining  the  students'  atten* 
tion  to  a  few  types  of  what  is  insuperably  good.  More 
progress  in  power  of  judgment  may  be  made  in  a  limited 
time  by  the  examination  of  one  work,  than  by  the  review 
of  many;  and  a  certain  degree  of  vitality  is  given  to  the 
impressiveness  of  every  characteristic,  by  its  being  exhibited 
in  clear  contrast,  and  without  repetition. 

The  greater  number  of  the  examples  I  shall  choose  will 
be  only  engravings  or  photographs:  they  shall  be  arranged 
so' as  to  be  easily  accessible,  and  I  will  prepare  a  catalogue, 
pointing  out  my  purpose  in  the  selection  of  each.  But  in 
process  of  time,  I  have  good  hope  that  assistance  will  be 
given  me  by  the  English  public  in  making  the  series  here 
no  less  splendid  than  serviceable;  and  in  placing  minor 
collections,  arranged  on  a  similar  principle,  at  the  com* 
mand  also  of  the  students  in  our  public  schools. 

22.  In  the  second  place,  I  shall  endeavour  to  prevail 
upon  all  the  younger  members  of  the  University  who  wish 
to  attend  the  art  lectures,  to  give  at  least  so  much  time 
to  manual  practice  as  may  enable  them  to  understand  the 
nature  and  difficulty  of  executive  skill.  The  time  so  spent 
will  not    be  lost,   even   as   regards    their    other   studies  at 

»  [See  Vol.  XXI.] 


!•   INAUGURAL  35 

the  Univosity,  for  I  will  prepare  the  practical  exercises  in 
a  double  series,  one  illustrative  of  history,  the  other  of 
natural  science.^  And  whether  you  are  drawing  a  piece  of 
Grade  armour,  or  a  hawk's  beak,  or  a  lion's  paw,  you  will 
find  that  the  mere  necessity  of  using  the  hand  compels 
attention  to  circumstances  which  would  otherwise  have 
escaped  notice,  and  fastens  them  in  the  memory  without 
farther  effort  But  were  it  even  otherwise,  and  this  prac- 
tical training  did  really  involve  some  sacrifice  of  your  time, 
I  do  not  fear  but  that  it  will  be  justified  to  you  by  its 
felt  results:  and  I  think  that  general  public  feeling  is  also 
tending  to  the  admission  that  accomplished  education  must 
include,  not  only  fiiU  command  of  expression  by  language, 
but  command  of  true  musical  sound  by  the  voice,  and  of 
tme  form  by  the  hand.' 

28.  While  I  myself  hold  this  professorship,  I  shall  du*ect 
you  in  these  exercises  very  definitely  to  natural  history, 
and  to  landscape;'  not  only  because  in  these  two  branches 
I  am  probably  able  to  show  you  truths  which  might  be 
despised  by  my  successors;  but  because  I  think  the  vital 
^d  joyful  study  of  natural  history  quite  the  principal  ele- 
ment requiring  introduction,  not  only  into  University,  but 
into  national,  education,  from  highest  to  lowest;^  and  I 
even  will  risk  incurring  your  ridicule  by  confessing  one  of 
my  fondest  dreams,  that  I  may  succeed  in  making  some 
of  you  English  youths  like  better  to  look  at  a  bird  than 
to  shoot  it;^  and  even  desire  to  make  wild  creatures  tame, 
instead  of  tame  creatures  wild.  And  for  the  study  of  land- 
scape, it  is,  I  think,  now  calculated  to  be  of  use  in  deeper, 

^  [On  this  point  compare  Vol.  XV.  p.  xziz.  For  the  extent  to  which  Ruskin 
earrieil  out  the  intention  here  expressed,  see  again^  Vol.  XXI.] 

'  [For  the  place  of  music  in  education,  see  Vol.  XV.  p.  341 ;  and  for  that  of 
iiKwing,  VoL  Vll.  p.  428  «.,  and  Vol.  XVI.  pp.  xxx.,  Ixvii.] 

^  [See,  in  Vol.  XXII.,  the  Lecturet  on  LandKape  (§  1),  delivered  in  the  following 
year  (1871).] 

*  [Compare  Vol  VII.  pp.  427-428  n, ;  Vol.  XL  pp.  258-259;  and  Vol.  XVI. 
pp.  144-145.  Ruskin's  views  of  the  place  of  natural  history  in  popular  education 
Aave  not  heen  without  their  effect:  see  W.  Jolly's  Ruskin  on  Education,  pp.  43-44.] 

*  [Compare  Eagle's  Nest,  §  175.] 


86  LECTURES   ON  ART 

if  not  more  important  modes,  than  that  of  natural  science, 
for  reasons  which  I  will  ask  you  to  let  me  state  at  some 
length. 

24.  Observe  first; — ^no  race  of  men  which  is  entirely 
bred  in  wild  country,  far  from  cities,  ever  enjoys  landscape. 
They  may  enjoy  the  beauty  of  animals,  but  scarcely  even 
that:  a  true  peasant  cannot  see  the  beauty  of  cattle;  but 
only  qualities  expressive  of  their  serviceableness.  I  waive 
discussion  of  this  to-day ;  permit  my  assertion  of  it,  under 
my  confident  guarantee  of  futiu*e  proof.  Landscape  can 
only  be  enjoyed  by  cultivated  persons;  and  it  is  only  by 
music,  literatiu*e,  and  painting,  that  cultivation  can  be  given. 
Also,  the  faculties  which  are  thus  received  are  hereditary; 
so  that  the  child  of  an  educated  race  has  an  innate  in- 
stinct for  beauty,  derived  from  arts  practised  hundreds  of 
years  before  its  birth.  Now  farther  note  this,  one  of  the 
loveliest  things  in  human  nature.  In  the  children  of  noble 
races,  trained  by  surrounding  art,  and  at  the  same  time  in 
the  practice  of  great  deeds,  there  is  an  intense  delight  in 
the  landscape  of  their  country  as  memorial;^  a  sense  not 
taught  to  them,  nor  teachable  to  any  others;  but,  in  them, 
innate;  and  the  seal  and  reward  of  persistence  in  great 
national  life; — the  obedience  and  the  peace  of  ages  having 
extended  gradually  the  glory  of  the  revered  ancestors  also 
to  the  ancestral  land;  until  the  Motheiiiood  of  the  dust, 
the  mystery  of  the  Demeter'  from  whose  bosom  we  came, 
and  to  whose  bosom  we  return,  surrounds  and  inspires, 
everywhere,  the  local  awe  of  field  and  fountain ;  the  sacred- 
ness  of  landmark  that  none  may  remove,  and  of  wave  that 
none  may  pollute;  while  records  of  proud  days,  and  of 
dear  persons,  make  every  rock  monumental  with  ghostly 
inscription,  and  every  path  lovely  with  noble  desolateness. 

25.  Now,  however  checked  by  lightness  of  temperament, 

^  [On  this  aspect  of  landscape,  compare  Ruskin's  lecture  of  1884,  reprinted  in 
a  later  volume  from  E.  T.  Cook's  StudtM  in  RusJHn  (p.  289).] 

■  [For  the  Greek  conception  of  Demeter  (=£artii  Mother),  see  Queen  of  the  Air, 
§  U  (VoL  XIX.  p.  304).] 


L  INAUGURAL  87 

the  instinctive  love  of  landscape  in  us  has  this  deep  root, 
which,  in  your  minds,  I  will  pray  you  to  disencumber  from 
whatever  may  oppress  or  mortify  it,  and  to  strive  to  feel 
with  all  the  strength  of  your  youth  that  a  nation  is  only 
worthy  of  the  soil  and  the  scenes  that  it  has  inherited, 
when^  by  all  its  acts  and  arts,  it  is  making  them  more 
lovely  for  its  children. 

And  now,  I  trust,  you  will  feel  that  it  is  not  in  mere 
yielding  to  my  own  fancies  that  I  have  chosen,  for  the  first 
three  subjects  in  your  Educational  Series,  landscape  scenes; 
— ^two  in  England,  and  one  in  France, — ^the  association  of 
these  being  not  without  purpose : — ^and  for  the  fourth  Albert 
Durer^s  dream  of  the  Spirit  of  Labour.^  And  of  the  land- 
scape subjects,  I  must  tell  you  this  much.  The  fibrst  is  an 
engraving  only;  the  original  drawing  by  Turner  was  de- 
stroyed by  fire  twenty  years  ago.*  For  which  loss  I  wish 
you  to  be  sorry,  and  to  remember,  in  connection  with  this 
first  example,  that  ^whatever  remains  to  us  of  possession  in 
the  arts  is,  compared  to  what  we  might  have  had  if  we 
had  cared  for  them,  just  what  that  engraving  is  to  the  lost 
drawing.  You  will  find  also  that  its  subject  has  meaning 
in  it  which  will  not  be  harmful  to  you.  The  second  ex- 
ample is  a  real  drawing  by  Turner,'  in  the  same  series,  and 
very  nearly  of  the  same  place;  the  two  scenes  are  within 
a  quarter  of  a  mile  of  each  other.  It  will  show  you  the 
character  of  the  work  that  was  destroyed.  It  will  show 
you,  in  process  of  time,  much  more;  but  chiefly,  and  this 
is  my  main  reason  for  choosing  both,  it  will  be  a  permanent 
expression  to  you  of  what  English  landscape  was  once; — 
and  must,  if  we  are  to  remain  a  nation,  be  again. 

I  think  it  farther  right  to  tell  you,  for  otherwise  you 
might  hardly  pay  regard   enough  to  work   apparently  so 


1  [Nos.  1-4  in  tb6  Standard  Seriei  (not  in  that  called  the  Educational  Series) : 
VoL  XXL  pp.  10-12.] 

*  [For  other  references  to  this  drawing— '^  Briguall  Banks  " — and  its  destruction 
hy  fire,  see  VoL  XII.  p.  d7l  and  n.,  and  VoL  VI.  p.  381.] 

*  [For  other  references  to  this  drawing — '^The  Junction  of  the  Greta  and  the 
Teee'^^Haee  below^  §  170,  p.  168,  and  ugtSn  VoL  XXI.  p.  11.] 


88  LECTURES  ON  ART 

simple,  that  by  a  chance  which  is  not  altogether  displeasing 
to  me,  this  drawing,  which  it  has  become,  for  these  reasons, 
necessary  for  me  to  give  you,  is — ^not  indeed  the  best  I 
have,  (I  have  several  as  good,  though  none  better) — ^but,  of 
all  I  have,  the  one  I  had  least  mind  to  part  with. 

The  third  example  is  also  a  Turner  drawing — a  scene  on 
the  Loire — never  engraved.  It  is  an  introduction  to  the 
series  of  the  Loire,  which  you  have  already;*  it  has  in  its 
present  place  a  due  concurrence  with  the  expressional  pur- 
pose of  its  companions;  and  though  small,  it  is  very  pre- 
cious, being  a  faultless,  and,  I  believe,  unsurpassable  example 
of  water-colour  painting. 

Chiefly,  however,  remember  the  object  of  these  three 
first  examples  is  to  give  you  an  index  to  your  truest  feel- 
ings about  European,  and  especially  about  your  native  land- 
scape, as  it  is  pensive  and  historical;  and  so  far  as  you 
yourselves  make  any  effort  at  its  representation,  to  give 
you  a  motive  for  fidelity  in  handwork  more  animating  than 
any  connected  with  mere  success  in  the  art  itself. 

26.  With  respect  to  actual  methods  of  practice,  I  will 
not  incur  the  responsibility  of  detennining  them  for  you. 
We  will  take  Leonardo's  treatise  on  painting  for  our  first 
text-book;^  and  I  think  you  need  not  fear  being  misled 
by  me  if  I  ask  you  to  do  only  what  Leonardo  bids,  or 
what  will  be  necessary  to  enable  you  to  do  his  bidding. 
But  you  need  not  possess  the  book,  nor  read  it  through. 
I  will  translate  the  pieces  to  the  authority  of  which  I  shall 
appeal;*  and,  in  process  of  time,  by  analysis  of  this  frag- 
mentary treatise,  show  you  some  characters  not  usually 
understood  of  the  simplicity  as  well  as  subtlety  conunon 
to  most  great  workmen  of  that  age.  Afterwards  we  will 
collect  the  instructions  of  other  undisputed  masters,  till  we 

^  [i.e. J  in  the  series  of  Tarner  drawings  presented  by  Ruskin  to  the  University 
Galleries  in  1861 :  see  Vol.  XIII.  pp.  669,  560.  For  other  references  to  the  present 
drawing,  see  Vol.  XXI.  p.  12.] 

'  [For  other  references  by  Ruskin  to  Leonardo's  Trattato  della  PUtura,  see  Vol.  XV. 

p.    XXV.] 

s  [See  below,  §§  129,  130,  142,  164 ;  pp.  121,  122,  132,  158.] 


I.  INAUGURAL  8» 

liave  obtained  a  code  of  laws  clearly  resting  on  the  consent 
of  antiquity. 

While,  however,  I  thus  in  some  measure  limit  for  the 
present  the  methods  of  your  practice,  I  shall  endeavour 
to  make  the  courses  of  my  University  lectures  as  wide  in 
their  range  as  my  knowledge  will  permit.  The  range  so 
conceded  will  be  narrow  enough;  but  I  believe  that  my 
proper  function  is  not  to  acquaint  you  with  the  general 
history,  but  with  the  essential  principles  of  art;  and  with 
its  history  only  when  it  has  been  both  great  and  good,  or 
where  some  special  excellence  of  it  requires  examination  of 
the  causes  to  which  it  must  be  ascribed. 

27.  But  if  either  our  work,  or  our  enquiries,  are  to  be 
indeed  successful  in  their  own  field,  they  must  be  connected 
with  others  of  a  sterner  character.  Now  listen  to  me,  if  I 
have  in  these  past  details  lost  or  burdened  your  attention; 
for  this  is  what  I  have  chiefly  to  say  to  you.  The  art  of 
any  coimtry  is  the  eoopmierd  of  its  social  and  political  mr^ 
tues.  I  will  show  you  that  it  is  so  in  some  detail,  in  the 
second  of  my  subsequent  course  of  lectures ;  meantime  accept 
this  as  one  of  the  things,  and  the  most  important  of  aU 
things,  I  can  positively  declare  to  you.^  The  art,  or  general 
productive  and  formative  energy,  of  any  country,  is  an 
exact  exponent  of  its  ethical  life.  You  can  have  noble  art 
only  from  noble  persons,  associated  under  laws  fitted  to 
their  time  and  circumstances.  And  the  best  skill  that  any 
teacher  of  art  could  spend  here  in  your  help,  would  not 
end  in  enabling  you  even  so  much  as  rightly  to  draw  the 
water-lilies  in  the  Cherwell  (and  though  it  did,  the  work 
when  done  would  not  be  worth  the  lilies  themselves)  unless 
both  he  and  you  were  seeking,  as  I  trust  we  shall  together 
seek,  in  the  laws  which  regulate  the  finest  industries,  the 
due  to  the  laws  which  regulate  all  industries,  and  in  better 
obedience  to  which  we  shall  actuaUy  have  henceforward  to 

^  [This  proposition  was^  it  will  be  remembeFed,  the  harden  also  of  Raskin's 
lecture  in  the  University  of  Cambridge  (see  Vol.  XIX.  pp.  163-194) ;  and  for  many 
other  passages  to  the  same  effect,  see  the  General  Index  (under  '^  Morality ").] 


40  LECTURES  ON  ART 

live:  not  merely  in  compliance  with  our  own  sense  of 
what  is  right,  but  under  the  weight  of  quite  literal  neces- 
sity. For  the  trades  by  which  tiie  British  people  has  be- 
lieved it  to  be  the  highest  of  destinies  to  maintain  itself, 
cannot  now  long  remain  undisputed  in  its  hands;  its  un- 
employed  poor  are  daily  becoming  more  violently  criminal; 
and  a  certain  distress  in  the  middle  classes,  arising,  partly 
from  their  vanity  in  Uving  always  up  to  their  incomes j  and 
partly  from  their  folly  in  imagining  that  they  can  subsist 
in  idleness  upon  usury^  will  at  last  compel  the  sons  and 
daughters  of  English  families  to  acquaint  themselves  with 
the  principles  of  providential  economy;  and  to  learn  that 
food  can  only  be  got  out  of  the  ground,  and  competence 
only  secxu^  by  frugality;  and  that  although  it  is  not  pos* 
sible  for  all  to  be  occupied  in  the  highest  arts,  nor  for 
any,  guiltlessly,  to  pass  theu:  days  in  a  succession  of  plea- 
sures, the  most  perfect  mental  culture  possible  to  men  is 
founded  on  their  useful  energies,  and  their  best  arts  and 
brightest  happiness  are  consistent,  and  consistent  only,  with 
their  virtue,* 

28.  This,   I  repeat,  gentlemen,  will  soon  become  mani- 
fest to  those  among  us,  and  there  are  yet  many,  who  are 

1  rOn  this  subject  compare  Vol.  XVI.  p.  109 ;  Vol.  XVIL  pp.  220,  271.] 
*  [In  one  of  the  earlv  drafts  of  this  lecture  there  is  a  passage   here  whkh 
Raskin  afterwards  marked  '' Important:  unused": — 

^*  I  repeat,  that  only  because  it  is  evident  to  me  that  the  time  has  come 
for  these  things  to  be  recognized  by  some  part  at  least  of  the  English 
people,  I  have  been  able  hopefully  to  obey  your  summons  to  tell  you  the 
laws  of  the  higher  arts.  For,  just  ten  years  ago,  in  the  year  1800^  per- 
ceiving all  declarations  of  such  laws  to  be  at  that  time  impossible, — becaose, 
firsts  the  active  English  mind  had  become  persuaded  that  money  was  to 
be  gotten  by  money,  instead  of  won  by  work,  and  secondly,  that  the 
foundation  of  prosperous  work  was  in  enmity  Instead  of  charity, — I  drew 
aside  from  my  own,  then  useless,  specialities  of  pursuit,  went  away  to 
the  Valley  of  Chamonni,  and  there  set  myself  to  declare,  with  the  needful 
obstinacy,  first,  that  two  and  two  did  not  make  five;  secondly,  that 
progress  in  either  commerce  or  the  arts  depended  finally  on  people  doing 
the  best  they  could  for  each  other,  and  not  the  wont.  The  first  of  these 
statements  was  then  universally  attributed  to  my  ignorance  of  arithmetic, 
and  the  second  to  my  ignorance  of  human  nature.  But  there  has  occurred 
to  the  public  mind  within  the  past  ten  years,  occasion  for  reconsidering 

In  these  words  Ruskin  was  thinking  no  doubt  of  the  commercial  panic  of  1866 : 
compare  a  reference  in  Fqt%  Ctamgera^  Letter  30,  to  the  failure  of  Overend  and 
Gumey.] 


I.   INAUGURAL  41 

honest-heartecL  And  the  future  fate  of  England  depends 
upon  the  position  they  then  take,  and  on  their  courage  in 
maintaining  it.^ 

There  is  a  destiny  now  possible  to  us'  —  the  highest 
ever  set  before  a  nation  to  be  accepted  or  refused.  We 
are  still  undegenerate  in  race;  a  race  mingled  of  the  best 
northern  blood.  We  are  not  yet  dissolute  in  temper,  but 
still  have  the  firmness  to  govern,  and  the  grace  to  obey. 
We  have  been  taught  a  religion  of  pure  mercy,  which  we 
must  either  now  betray,  or  learn  to  defend  by  fulfilling. 
And  we  are  rich  in  an  inheritance  of  honour,  bequeathed 
to  us  through  a  thousand  years  of  noble  history,  which  it 
should  be  our  daily  thirst  to  increase  with  splendid  avarice, 
so  that  Englishmen,  if  it  be  a  sin  to  covet  honour,  should 
be  the  most  offending  souls  alive.'  Within  the  last  few 
years  we  have  had  the  laws  of  natural  science  opened  to 
us  with  a  rapidity  which  has  been  blinding  by  its  bright- 
ness ;  and  means  of  transit  and  communication  given  to  us, 
which  have  made  but  one  kingdom  of  the  habitable  globe.^ 
One  kingdom; — ^but  who  is  to  be  its  king?  Is  there  to 
be  no  king  in  it,  think  you,  and  every  man  to  do  that 
which  is  right  in  his  own  eyes?*  Or  only  kings  of  terror, 
and  the  obscene  empires  of  Mammon  and  Belial  ?  Or  will 
you,  youths  of  England,  make  your  country  again  a  royal 
throne  of  kings;  a  sceptred  isle,^  for  all  the  world  a  source 
of  light,  a  centre  of  peace ;  mistress  of  Lieaming  and  of  the 
Ajrts ; — ^faithful  guardian  of  great  memories  in  the  midst  of 
irreverent  and  ephemeral  visions; — faithful  servant  of  time- 
tried  principles,  under  temptation  from  fond  experiments 
and  licentious  desires;  and  amidst  the  cruel  and  clamorous 

1  rCompare  Ofwn  qf  Wild  OHve,  §  142  (VoL  XVIII.  p.  501).] 

'  [Ruakiii  read  §  28  (from  this  point)  in  the  first  of  his  lectures  on  The  Pkaturei 
^  Engkaid,  §  3  (see  a  later  yoluroe  of  this  edition),  where  he  describes  the  present 
paessge  as  '*  the  most  pregnant  and  essential "  of  all  his  teaching.] 

»  reee  Henry  F.,  iv.  3,  28.] 

^  rrhe  reader  who  desires  a  summary  of  such  discoveries  and  developments  may 
be  rmrred  to  Ths  Wfmderfid  Century,  by  A.  R.  Wallace,  18d8,  ch.  zv.j 

*  [Deuteronomy  xii.  8;  Proverbs  xii.  15.] 

•  [iNehard  11. ,  Act  ii.  sc.  1.] 


42  LECTURES   ON  ART 

jealousies  of  the  nations,  worshipped  in  her  strange  valour 
of  goodwill  towards  men  ?  ^ 

29.  "  Vexilla  regis  prodeunt," '  Yes,  but  of  which  king  ? 
There  are  the  two  oriflammes;  which  shall  we  plant  on 
the  farthest  islands, — ^the  one  that  floats  in  heavenly  fire, 
or  that  hangs  heavy  with  foul  tissue  of  terrestrial  gold? 
There  is  indeed  a  course  of  beneficent  glory  open  to  us, 
such  as  never  was  yet  ofiered  to  any  poor  group  of  mortal 
souls.  But  it  must  be — it  is  with  us,  now,  "Reign  or 
Die."  And  if  it  shall  be  said  of  this  country,  "Fece  per 
\iltate,  il  gran  rifiuto,"'  that  refusal  of  the  crown  will  be, 
of  all  yet  recorded  in  history,  the  shamefiillest  and  most 
untimely. 

And  this  is  what  she  must  either  do,  or  perish:  she 
must  found  colonies  as  fast  and  as  far  as  she  is  able, 
formed  of  her  most  energetic  and  worthiest  men; — seizing 
every  piece  of  firuitful  waste  ground  she  can  set  her  foot 
on,  and  there  teaching  these  her  colonists  that  their  chief 
virtue  is  to  be  fidelity  to  their  country,  and  that  their  first 
aim  is  to  be  to  advance  the  power  of  England  by  land 
and  sea:  and  that,  though  they  live  on  a  distant  plot  of 
ground,  they  are  no  more  to  consider  themselves  therefore 
disfranchised  from  their  native  land,  than  the  sailors  of  her 
fleets  do,  because  they  float  on  distant  waves.  So  that 
literally,  these  colonies  must  be  fastened  fleets;  and  every 
man  of  them  must  be  under  authority  of  captains  and 
ofificers,  whose  better  command  is  to  be  over  fields  and 
streets  instead  of  ships  of  the  line ;  and  England,  in  these 
her  motionless  navies  (or,  in  the  true  and  mightiest  sense, 
motionless  churches,  ruled  by  pilots  on  the  Galilean  lake^ 
of  all  the  world),  is  to  "expect  every  man  to  do  his 
duty";''  recognizing  that  duty  is  indeed  possible  no  less  in 

1  [Luke  ii.  14.] 

*  [The  first  line  of  the  hymn  of  Venantius  Fortunatus  (530-609),  Bishop  of 
Poitiers,  transkted  in  Hymns  Ancient  and  Modem,  ''The  royal  banners  forward  go/'],; 

'  [Inferno,  iii.  60;  for  another  reference  to  the  passage,  see  Sesame  and  Lilies. 
§  43  (Vol  XVIII.  p.  101).] 


*  [Lycidas.    See  Sesame  and  Lilies,  %  20  (Vol.  XVIII.  p.  69).] 
^  [For  another  reference  to  Nelson's  signal  at  Trafalgar,  see  Vol. 


XII.  p.  138.] 


c 


ni"     'W       Ua^juiP 


i^^KTS      U>^ 


Icrr*--^    ^ 


lu 


^=* 


I.   INAUGURAL  48 

peace  than  war;  and  that  if  we  can  get  men,  for  little 
pay,  to  cast  themselves  against  cannon-mouths  for  love  of 
England)  we  may  find  men  also  who  will  plough  and  sow 
for  her,  who  will  behave  kindly  and  righteously  for  her, 
who  vnll  bring  up  their  children  to  love  her,  and  who  will 
gladden  themselves  in  the  brightness  of  her  glory,  more 
than  in  all  the  light  of  tropic  skies. 

But  that  they  may  be  able  to  do  this,  she  must  make 
her  own  majesty  stainless;  she  must  give  them  thoughts 
of  their  home  criF  which  they  can  be  proud.  The  England 
who  is  to  be  mistress  of  half  the  earth,  cannot  remain 
herself  a  heap  of  cinders,  trampled  by  contending  and  mis- 
erable  crowds;  she  must  yet  again  become  the  England 
she  was  once,  and  in  all  beautiful  ways, — ^more:  so  happy, 
so  secluded,  and  so  pure,  that  in  her  sky — ^polluted  by  no 
unholy  clouds — she  may  be  able  to  spell  rightly  of  every 
star  that  heaven  doth  show;  and  in  her  fields,  ordered  and 
wide  and  fair,  of  every  herb  that  sips  the  dew ;  ^  and  under 
the  green  avenues  of  her  enchanted  garden,  a  sacred  Circe, 
true  Daughter  of  the  Sim,  she  must  guide  the  human  arts,^ 
and  gather  the  divine  knowledge,  of  distant  nations,  trans- 
formed from  savageness  to  manhood,  and  redeemed  from 
despairing  into  peace. 

80.  You  think  that  an  impossible  ideal.  Be  it  so; 
refuse  to  accept  it  if  you  will ;  but  see  that  you  form  your 
own  in  its  stead.  All  that  I  ask  of  you  is  to  have  a  fixed 
purpose  of  some  kind  for  your  coimtry  and  yourselves ;  no 
matter  how  restricted,  so  that  it  be  fixed  and  imselfish. 
I  know  what  stout  hearts  are  in  you,  to  answer  acknow- 
ledged  need:  but  it  is  the  fttdlest  form  »f  error  in  EngUd. 
youths  to  hide  their  hardihood  till  it  fades  for  lack  of 
sunshine,  and  to  act  in  disdain  of  purpose,  till  all  purpose 
is  vain.  It  is  not  by  deliberate,  but  by  careless  selfishness ; 
not   by   compromise   with   evil,   but   by   dull   following   of 

»  [Milton :  //  Penteraw,  170-172.] 

'  [Circe^  daughter  of  Helios,  celebrated  for  her  knowledffe  of  the  virtues  of 
herbs.  Ruskin  counts  as  hers  the  power  which  has  ''knowle&e  of  all  herbs,  and 
fruits,  and  balms,  and  spices" :  see  Ethta  itf  the  DuH^  Vol.  XVIII.  p.  298.] 


44  LECTURES   ON  ART 

good,  that  the  weight  of  national  evil  increases  upon  us 
daily.  Break  through  at  least  this  pretence  of  existence; 
determine  what  you  will  be,  and  what  you  would  win. 
You  will  not  decide  wrongly  if  you  will  resolve  to  decide  at 
all.  Were  even  the  choice  between  lawless  pleasure  and 
loyal  suffering,  you  would  not,  I  believe,  choose  basely. 
But  your  trial  is  not  so  sharp.  It  is  between  drifting  in 
confused  wreck  among  the  castaways  of  Fortune,  who  con- 
demns to  assured  ruin  those  who  know  not  either  how  to 
resist  her,  or  obey;  between  this,  I  say,  and  the  taking  of 
your  appointed . part  in  the  heroism  of  Rest;  the  resolving 
to  share  in  the  victory  which  is  to  the  weak  rather  than 
the  strong ;  ^  and  the  binding  yourselves  by  that  law,  which, 
thought  on  through  lingering  night  and  labouring  day,  makes 
a  man's  life  to  be  as  a  tree  planted  by  the  water-side,  that 
bringeth  forth  his  fruit  in  his  season; — 


(( 


ET  FOLIUM  EJUS  NON   DEFLUET, 

ET  OMNIA,   QUiBCUN'QUE   FACIET,   PROSPERABUNTUK."  * 

^  [Compare  EcclesiasticiM  ix.  9.] 

*  [Psalms  i.  3.    For  a  reference  to  this  passage  in  a  later  lecture,  see  LeeHtret 
en  Landacape^  §  13  n.] 


LECTURE  11^ 

THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION 

81,  It   was  stated,  and    I  trust  partly  with  your   accept- 
ance, in  my  opening  lecture,  that  the  study  on  which  we 
are  about  to  enter  cannot  be  rightly  undertaken  except  in 
furtherance  of  the  grave  purposes  of  life  with  respect  to 
which    the  rest  of  the  scheme  of  your  education  here  is 
designed.     But  you  can  scarcely  have  at  once  felt  all  that 
I  intended  in  saying   so; — ^you   cannot   but  be   still  partly 
under  the  impression  that  the  so-called  fine  arts  are  merely 
modes  of  graceful  recreation,  and  a  new  resource  for  your 
times   of  rest.     Let  me  ask  you,  forthwith,  so  far  as  you 
can  trust  me,  to  change  your  thoughts  in  this  matter.     All 
the  great  arts  have  for  their  object  either  the  support  or 
exaltation  of  human  life, — usually  both ;  and  their  dignity, 
and  ultimately  their  very  existence,  depend  on  their  being 
"a*€to    Xoyou  o\j;d<H/j,"*   that  is   to   Say,  apprehending,  with 
right  reason,  the  nature  of  the  materials  they  work  with, 
of  the  things  they  relate  or  represent,  and  of  the  faculties 
to  which  they  are  addressed.     And  farther,  they  form  one 
united  system  from  which  it  is  impossible  to  remove  any 
part  without   harm  to   the  rest.      They  are   founded    first 
in  mastery,  by  strength  of  arm^  of  the  earth  and  sea,  in 
agriculture    and    seamanship;    then    their    inventive    power 
begins,  with  the  clay  in  the  hand  of  the  potter,  whose  art 
is  the  humblest  but  truest  t3rpe    of   the   forming   of   the 
human  body  and  spirit ;  and  in  the  carpenter's  work,  which 
probably  was  the  early  employment  of  the  Founder  of  our 
reli^on.      And  until  men  have  perfectly  learned  the  laws 

^  [Delivered  on  February  16,  1870.] 

'  [Rusldn  quotes  from  Aristotle's  definition  of  art  in  Ethio9f  vi.  4 :  art  is  the 
faculty  of  producing  an  effect  ''in  accordance  with  true  reason."] 

46 


46  LECTURES  ON  ART 

of  art  in  clay  and  wood,  they  can  consummately  know  no 
others.  Nor  is  it  without  the  strange  significance  which 
you  will  find  in  what  at  first  seems  chance,  in  all  noble 
histories,  as  soon  as  you  can  read  them  rightly, — that 
the  statue  of  Athena  Folias  was  of  olive-wood,  and 
that  the  Greek  temple  and  Gothic  spire  are  both  merely 
the  permanent  representations  of  useful  wooden  structures. 
On  these  two  first  arts  follow  building  in  stone, — sculpture, 
— metal  work, — ^and  paintmg;  every  art  being  properly 
called  '*  fine "  which  demands  the  exercise  of  the  fiill  facul- 
ties of  heart  and  intellect.^  For  though  the  fine  arts  are 
not  necessarily  imitative  or  representative,  for  their  essence 
is  in  being  irepi  yivetnv^ — occupied  in  the  actual  prodtcction 
of  beautiful  form  or  colour, — still,  the  highest  of  them  are 
appointed  also  to  relate  to  us  the  utmost  ascertainable 
truth  respecting  visible  things  and  moral  feelings:  and 
this  pursuit  of  fact  is  the  vital  element  of  the  art  power ; 
— ^that  in  which  alone  it  can  develop  itself  to  its  utmost. 
And  I  will  anticipate  by  an  assertion  which  you  will  at 
present  think  too  bold,  but  which  I  am  willing  that  you 
should  think  so,  in  order  that  you  may  well  remember 
it, — the  highest  thing  that  art  can  do  is  to  set  before  you 
the  true  image  oj  the  presence  of  a  noble  human  being.  It 
has  never  done  more  titan  this,  and  it  ought  not  to  do  less.^ 
82.  The  great  arts — ^forming  thus  one  perfect  scheme 
of  human  skill,  of  which  it  is  not  right  to  call  one  divi- 
sion more  honoiu*able,  though  it  may  be  more  subtle,  than 
another — have  had,  and  can  have,  but  three  principal  direc- 
tions of  purpose: — ^first,  that  of  enforcing  the  religion  of 
men ;  secondly,  that  of  perfecting  their  ethical  state ;  thirdly, 
that  of  doing  them  material  service.* 

1  [Compare  the  definition  of  Fine  Art  in  Two  Paths,  §  54  (Vol.  XVI.  p.  294).l 

*  [Here,  ^gaia,  Ruskin  quotes  from  EtMa,  vi.  4^  4 :  every  art  is  concerned  with 
production.] 

<  [The  words  ''the  highest  .  ..  do  less"  were  put  into  capitals  in  1887.  See 
the  references  to  the  words  in  §  103  (helow,  p.  d8),  and  The  BekUion  between  Michael 
Angelo  and  Tintaret,  §  29.] 

«  [These  aspects  of  art  are  discussed  (1)  in  §§  43  seq.,  (2)  in  §§  66  eeq^^  and 
(3)  in  §§  97  seq.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    47 

88.  I  do  not  doubt  but  that  you  are  surprised  at  my 
saying  the  arts  can  in  their  second  function  only  be 
directed  to  the  perfecting  of  ethical  state,  it  being  our  usual 
impression  that  they  are  often  destructive  of  morality.  But 
it  is  impossible  to  direct  fine  art  to  an  immoral  end,  except 
by  giving  it  characters  unconnected  with  its  fineness,  or  by 
addressing  it  to  persons  who  cannot  perceive  it  to  be  fine. 
Whosoever  recognizes  it  is  exalted  by  it.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  has  been  commonly  thought  that  art  was  a  most 
fitting  means  for  the  enforcement  of  religious  doctrines 
and  emotions;  whereas  there  is,  as  I  must  presently^  try 
to  show  you,  room  for  grave  doubt  whether  it  has  not  in 
this  function  hitherto  done  evil  rather  than  good. 

84.  In  this  and  the  two  next  following  lectures,  I  shall 
endeavour  therefore  to  show  you  the  grave  relations  of 
human  art,  in  these  three  functions,  to  human  life.  I  can 
do  this  but  roughly,  as  you  may  well  suppose — since  each 
of  these  subjects  would  require  for  its  right  treatment 
years  instead  of  hours.  Only,  remember,  /  have  alreiEidy 
given  years,  not  a  few,  to  each  of  them ;  and  what  I  try 
to  tell  you  now  will  be  only  so  much  as  is  absolutely 
necessary  to  set  our  work  on  a  clear  foundation.  You 
may  not,  at  present,  see  the  necessity  for  any  ^foundation, 
and  may  think  that  I  ought  to  put  pencil  and  paper  in 
your  hands  at  once.  On  that  point  I  must  simply  answer, 
"Trust  me  a  little  while,*'  asking  you  however  also  to 
remember,  that — irrespectively  of  any  consideration  of  last 
or  first — my  true  function  here  is  not  that  of  your  master 
in  painting,  or  sculpture,  or  pottery;  but  to  show  you 
what  it  is  that  makes  any  of  these  arts  fine^  or  the  con- 
trary of  fine :  essentially  good^  or  essentially  base.  You  need 
not  fear  my  not  being  practical  enough  for  you;  all  the 
industry  you  choose  to  give  me,  I  will  take ;  but  far  the 
better  part  of  what  you  may  gain  by  such  industry  would 
be   lost,  if   I    did   not  first   lead   you   to   see   what   every 

^  [Below,  §§  49  9eq,,  pp.  57  m?.] 


48  LECTURES  ON  ART 

form  of  art-industry  intends,  and  why  some  of  it  is  justly 
called  right,  and  some  wrong. 

85.  It  would  be  well  if  you  were  to  look  over»  with 
respect  to  this  matt»»  the  end  of  the  second,  and  what 
interests  you  of  the  third,  book  of  Plato's  Republic;  noting 
therein  these  two  principal  things,  of  which  I  have  to  speak 
in  this  and  my  next  lecture:  first,  the  power  which  Plato 
so  frankly,  and  quite  justly,  attributes  to  art,  of  faJnfying 
our  conceptions  of  Deity:  which  power  he  by  fatal  error 
partly  implies  may  be  used  wisely  for  good,  and  that  the 
feigning  is  only  wrong  when  it  is  of  evil,  **iav  r<9  f*h  koKSh 
>/r€i/ jirrai " ;  ^  and  you  may  trace  through  all  that  follows  the 
beginning  of  the  change  of  Greek  ideal  art  into  a  beautiful 
expediency,  instead  of  what  it  was  in  the  days  of  Pindar, 
the  statement  of  what  ''could  not  be  otherwise  than  so.'*' 
But,  in  the  second  place,  you  will  find  in  those  books  of 
the  Polity,  stated  with  far  greater  accuracy  of  expression 
than  our  English  language  admits,  the  essential  relations 
of  art  to  morality ;  the  sum  of  these  being  given  in  one 
lovely  sentence,  which,  considering  that  we  have  to-day 
grace  done  us  by  fair  companionship,^  you  will  pardon  me 
for  translating.  **  Mtist  it  be  then  only  with  our  poets  that 
we  insist'  they  shall  either  create  for  us  the  image  of  a  noble 
moraUty,  or  among  v>s  create  none?  or  shall  we  not  also 
keq^  guard  over  all  other  workers  for  the  people^  and  for- 
bid  them  to  make  what  is  ill-custoTnedj  and  unrestrained,  and 
ungentle,  and  without  oj^der  or  shape,  eit/ier  in  likeness  of 
Uxnng  things,  or  in  buildings,  or  in  any  other  thing  what- 
soever that  is  made  for  the  people  ?  and  shall  we  not  rather 
seek  for  workers  who  can  track  the  inner  nature  of  all  that 
may  be  sweetly  schemed;^  so  that  the  young  men,  as  living 

*  There  were,  in  fact,  a  great  many   more   girU   than   Universitj  men 
at  the  lectures.    [1887.] 

*" — ■ ■ — • ■ r-^  111        !■  ■■irw  iirirr  ii  .  ■  ■        —   — 

^  [377  D.    The  passage  translated  (and  condensed)  by  Ruskin  is  in  Book  iii.  401.] 
'  [For  the  GreeK  feeling,  summed  by  Raskin  in  this  phrase,  see  below,  pp.  403, 
404.] 

'  [The  words  ''can  .  .  .  schemed"  were  put  into  capitals  in  1887.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    49 

m  a  wholesome  place,  may  be  profited  by  everything  that,  in 
work  fairly  wrought,  may  touch  them  through  hearing  or 
sight— as  if  it  were  a  breeze  bringing  health  to  them  from 
places  strofig  for  life?"" 

86.  And  now — ^but  one  word,  before  we  enter  on  our 
task,  as  to  the  way  you  must  understand  what  I  may 
endeavour  to  teU  you. 

Let  me  beg  you — now  and  always — not  to  think  that  I 
mean  more  than  I  say.  In  all  probability,  I  mean  just 
what  I  say,  and  only  that.  At  all  events  I  do  fully  mean 
that;  and  if  there  is  anything  reserved  in  my  mind,  it  will 
be  probably  different  fh>m  what  you  would  guess.  You 
are  perfectly  welcome  to  know  all  that  I  think,  as  soon  as 
I  have  put  before  you  all  my  grounds  for  thinking  it;  but 
by  the  time  I  have  done  so,  you  will  be  able  to  form  an 
opinion  of  your  own;  and  mine  will  then  be  of  no  conse- 
quence to  you. 

87.  I  use  then  to-day,  as  I  shall  in  future  use,  the  word 
<'  Religion »  as  signifying  the  feelings  of  love,  reverence,  or 
dread  with  which  the  human  mind  is  affected  by  its  concep- 
tions of  spiritual  being;  and  you  know  well  how  necessary 
it  is,  both  to  the  rightness  of  our  own  life,  and  to  rightly^ 
understanding  the  lives  of  others,  that  we  should  always 
keep  clearly  distinguished  our  ideas  of  Religion,  as  thus 
defined,  and  of  Morahty,  as  the  law  of  rightness  in  human 
conduct.  For  there  are  many  religions,  but  there  is  only 
one  morality.  There  are  moral  and  immoral  religions, 
which  differ  as  much  in  precept  as  in  emotion;  but  there 
is  only  one  morality,  which  has  been,  is,  and  mtLst  be  for 
ever,  an  instinct  in  the  hearts  of  all  cixilized  men,  as  certain 
and  unalterable  a^  their  outward  bodily  form,  and  which 
receives  from  religion  neither  law,  nor  place ;  but  only  hope, 
and  felicity.^ 

88.  The  pure  forms  or  states  of  religion  hitherto  known 
are  those  in  which   a  healthy  humanity,  finding   in  itself 

^  [For  tha  text  here,  see  p.  9,  above.! 

*  [iThe  words  ^' which  has  Deen  .  •  .  felicity"  were  put  into  capitals  in  1887.2 
zx.  D 


50  LECTURES  ON  ART 

many  foibles  and  sins,  has  imagined,  or  been  made  con- 
scious of,  the  existence  of  higher  spiritual  p^sonality,  liable 
to  no  such  fault  or  stain;  and  has  been  assisted  in  effort, 
and  consoled  in  pain,  by  reference  to  the  wiU  or  sym- 
pathy of  such  purer  spirits,  whether  imagined  or  real.^  I 
am  compelled  to  use  these  painful  latitudes  of  expression, 
because  no  analysis  has  hitherto  sufficed  to  distinguish  accu- 
rately, in  historical  narrative,  the  difference  between  impres- 
sions resulting  from  the  imagination  of  the  worshipper,  and 
those  made,  if  any,  by  the  actually  local  and  temporary 
presence  of  another  spirit  For  instance,  take  the  vision, 
which  of  all  others  has  been  since  made  most  frequently 
the  subject  of  physical  representation — ^the  appearance  to 
Ezekiel  and  St.  John*  of  the  four  living  creatures,  which 
throughout  Christendom  have  been  used  to  sjrmbolize  the 
Evangelists.*  Supposing  such  interpretation  just,  one  of 
those  figiures  was  either  the  mere  sjrmbol  to  St  John  of 
himself,  or  it  was  the  power  which  inspired  him,  mani- 
festing itself  in  an  independent  form.     Which  of  these  it 

*  Only  the  Gospels^  ''IV  Evangclia,"  according  to  St.  Jerome.' 


^  [One  of  the  drafts  of  this  lecture  contains  the  following  additional  passage  : — 
''The  relative  character  and  dignity  of  Religions  must  depend  always 
on  the  character  and  dignity  of  the  Persons  whom  the  devotee  has  con- 
ceived for  the  objects  of  his  trusty  and  therefore  ultimately  in  his  own 
power  of  conceiving  or  understanding  that  character.  It  is  not  possible 
for  a  dishonest  spirit  to  imagine  a  true  one;  nor  for  an  unkind  spirit  to 
imagine  a  benevolent  one;  so  that^  whether  the  Devotee  himself  invents 
his  God,  or  the  existing  God  seeks  and  finds  the  Devotee,  the  purity  of 
the  religion  is  alike  limited  by  the  purity  of  the  worshipper. 

"No  lower  intelligence  can  comprehend,  though  it  may  acknowledge, 
a  higher;  and  the  mutual  relations  between  men  and  angels  are  limited 
by  the  qualities  of  men  as  strictly  as  those  between  men  and  dogs  or 
serpents  are  limited  by  those  of  the  hound  and  snake.  The  highest  attri- 
butes we  acknowledge  in  the  Deity  are  only  exaltations  of  our  own  feel- 
ings of  charity  and  justice;  what  we  recognize  as  His  strength  is  the 
likeness  of  our  own  arts ;  what  we  hope  from  His  indulgence,  presupposes 
His  liabUity  to  our  weakness ;  our  sense  of  gratitude  to  Him  is  founded 
on  an  attribution  to  Him  of  effort  or  of  pain;  and  our  trust  in  His 
specially  attentive  Providence  involves  an  accusation  of  His  equity."] 
*  [See  Ezekiel  i.  and  x. ;  Revelation  iv.-vii.,  xiv.,  and  xix.] 
'  [One  of  the  MS.  books  containing  a  draft  of  these  lectures  has  a  passage  in  ex- 

?lanation  of  this  note :  "  Symbols  of  Evangelists.  St  Jerome  first  authority  for  it : 
Comment,  on  Ezekiel  (Jerom.,  vol.  v..  Opera  Vallarsii,  Verona  edition):  'quidam 
dicunt  IV  Evangelia  quos  nos  quoque  secuti  sumus.'"  For  a  discussion  of  the 
symbols,  see  below,  "The  Eagle  of  Elis,"  §  1/p.  398.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    51 

was,  or  whether  neither  of  these,  but  a  vision  of  other 
powers,  or  a  dream,  of  which  neither  the  prophet  himself 
knew,  nor  can  any  other  person  yet  know,  the  interpreta- 
tion,— I  suppose  no  modestly-minded  and  accurate  thinker 
would  now  take  upon  himself  to  decide.  Nor  is  it  there- 
fore anywise  necessary  for  you  to  decide  on  that,  or  any 
other  such  question;  but  it  is  necessary  that  you  should 
be  bold  enough  to  look  every  opposing  question  steadily 
in  its  face;  and  modest  enough,  having  done  so,  to  know 
when  it  is  too  hard  for  you.  But  above  all  things,  see  that 
you  be  modest  in  your  thoughts,  for  of  this  one  thing 
we  may  be  absolutely  sure,  that  all  our  thoughts  are  but 
degrees  of  darkness.  And  in  these  days  you  have  to  guard 
against  the  fatallest  darkness  of  the  two  opposite  Prides; — 
the  Pride  of  Faith,  which  imagines  that  the  nature  of  the 
Deity  can  be  defined  by  its  convictions;  and  the  Pride  of 
Science,  whidi  imagines  that  the  energy  of  Deity  can  be 
explained  by  its  analysis. 

89.  Of  these,  the  first,  the  Pride  of  Faith,  is  now,  as  it 
has  been  always,  the  most  deadly,  because  the  most  com- 
placent and  subtle; — ^because  it  invests  every  evil  passion 
of  our  nature  with  the  aspect  of  an  angel  of  light,  and  en- 
ables the  self-love,  which  might  otherwise  have  been  put  to 
wholesome  shame,  and  the  cruel  carelessness  of  the  ruin  of 
our  fellow-men,  which  might  otherwise  have  been  warmed 
into  human  love,  or  at  least  checked  by  human  intelli- 
gence, to  congeal  themselves  into  the  mortal  intellectual 
disease  of  imagining  that  myriads  of  the  inhabitants  of  the 
world  for  four  thousand  years  have  been  left  to  wander 
and  perish,  many  of  them  everlastingly,  in  order  that,  in 
fulness  of  time,  divine  truth  might  be  preached  sufficiently 
to  ourselves:  with  this  farther  ineffable  mischief  for  direct 
result,  that  multitudes  of  kindly-disposed,  gentle,  and  sub- 
missive persons,  who  might  else  by  their  true  patience  have 
alloyed  the  hardness  of  the  common  crowd,  and  by  their 
activity  for  good  balanced  its  misdoing,  are  withdrawn  from 
all  such  true  services  of  man,  that  they  may  pass  the  best 


52  LECTURES  ON  ART 

part  of  their  lives  in  what  they  are  told  is  the  service  of 
God;  namely i  desiring  what  they  cannot  obtain^  lamenting 
what  they  cannot  avoid,  and  reflecting  on  what  they  cawiot 
understand.^ 

40.  This,  I  repeat,  is  the  deadliest,  but  for  you,  under 
existing  circumstwces,  it  is  becoming  daily,  almost  hourly, 
the  least  probable  form  of  Pride.  That  which  you  have 
chiefly  to  guard  against  consists  in  the  overvaluing  of 
minute  though  correct  discovery;  the  groundless  denial  of 
all  that  seems  to  you  to  have  been  groundlessly  affirmed; 
and  the  interesting  yourselves  too  curiously  in  the  progress 
of  some  scientific  minds,  which  in  their  judgment  of  the 
universe  can  be  compared  to  nothing  so  accurately  as  to 
the  woodworms  in  the  panel  of  a  pictiu*e  by  some  great 
painter,  if  we  may  conceive  them  as  tasting  with  discrimi- 
nation of  the  wood,  and  with  repugnance  of  the  colour, 
and  declaring  that  even  this  imlooked-for  and  undesirable 
combination  is  a  normal  result  of  the  action  of  molecular 
Forces. 

41.  Now,  I  must  very  earnestly  warn  you,  in  the  be- 
ginning of  my  work  with  you  here,  against  allowing  either 
of  these  forms  of  egotism  to  interfere  with  your  judgment 
or  practice  of  art.  On  the  one  hand,  you  must  not  allow 
the  expression  of  your  own  favourite  religious  feelings  by 
any  particular  form  of  art  to  modify  your  judgment  of 
its  absolute  merit;  nor  allow  the  art  itself  to  become  an 
illegitimate  means  of  deepening  and  confirming  your  con- 
victions, by  realizing  to  your  eyes  what  you  dimly  con- 
ceive with  the  brain;  as  if  the  greater  clearness  of  the 
image  were  a  stronger  proof  of  its  truth.  On  the  other 
hand,  you  must  not  allow  yoiu*  scientific  habit  of  trust- 
ing nothing  but  what  you  have  ascertained,  to  prevent  you 
from  appreciating,  or  at  least  endeavouring  to  qualify  your- 
selves to  appreciate,  the  work  of  the  highest  faculty  of  the 
human  mind, — ^its   imagination, — when  it  is  toiling  in  the 

*  This  concentrated  definition  of  monastic  life  is  of  coarse  to  be  under- 
stood onlj  of  its  more  enthusiastic  forms.     [1887.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    58 

presence  of  things  that  cannot  be  dealt  with  by  any  other 
power. 

42.  These  are  both  vital  conditions  of  your  healthy 
progress.  On  the  one  hand,  observe  that  you  do  not  wil- 
fully use  the  realistic  power  of  art  to  convince  yourselves 
of  historical  or  theological  statements  which  you  cannot 
otherwise  prove;  and  which  you  wish  to  prove: — on  the 
other  hand,  that  you  do  not  check  your  imagination  and 
conscience  while  seizing  the  truths  of  which  they  alone 
are  cognizant,  because  you  value  too  highly  the  scientific 
interest  which  attaches  to  the  investigation  of  second 
causes. 

For  instance,  it  may  be  quite  possible  to  show  the  con- 
ditions in  water  and  electricity  which  necessarily  produce 
the  craggy  outline,  the  apparently  self-contained  silvery 
light,  and  the  sulphurous  blue  shadow  of  a  thunda*-cloud, 
and  which  separate  these  from  the  depth  of  the  golden 
peace  in  the  dawn  of  a  summer  morning.  Similarly,  it 
may  be  possible  to  show  the  necessities  of  structure  which 
groove  the  fangs  and  depress  the  brow  of  the  asp,  and 
which  distinguish  the  character  of  its  head  from  that  of 
the  face  of  a  young  girl.  But  it  is  the  function  of  the 
rightly-trained  imagination  to  recognize,  in  these  and  such 
other  relative  aspects,  the  unity  of  teaching  which  im- 
presses, alike  on  our  senses  and  our  conscience,  the  eternal 
difference  between  good  and  evil:  and  the  rule,  over  the 
clouds  of  heaven  and  over  the  creatures  in  the  earth,  of 
the  same  Spirit  which  teaches  to  our  own  hearts  the 
bitterness  of  death,  and  strength  of  love. 

4f8.  Now,  therefore,  approaching  our  subject  in  this 
balanced  temper,  which  will  neither  resolve  to  see  only 
what  it  would  desire,  nor  expect  to  see  only  what  it  can 
explain,  we  shall  find  our  inquiry  into  the  relation  of  Art 
to  Religion  is  distinctly  threefold:  first,  we  have  to  ask 
how  far  art  may  have  been  literally  directed  by  spiritual 
powers;  secondly,  how  far,  if  not  inspired,  it  may  have 
been    exalted    by   them;    lastly,    how   far,    in   any    of   its 


54  LECTURES  ON 

agencies,  it  has  advanced  the  cause  of  the  creeds  it  has 
been  used  to  recommend. 

44.  First:  What  ground  have  we  for  thinking  that  art 
has  ever  been  inspired  as  a  message  or  revelation?  What 
internal  evidence  is  there  in  the  work  of  great  artists  of 
their  having  been  under  the  authoritative  guidance  of  super- 
natural powers? 

It  is  true  that  the  answer  to  so  mysterious  a  question 
cannot  rest  alone  upon  internal  evidence;  but  it  is  well 
that  you  should  know  what  might,  from  that  evidence 
alone,  be  concluded.  And  the  more  impartially  you  exa^ 
mine  the  phenomena  of  imagination,  the  more  firmly  you 
will  be  Ic^  to  conclude  that  they  are  the  result  of  the 
influence  of  the  common  and  vital,  but  not,  therefore,  less 
Divine,  spirit,  of  which  some  portion  is  given  to  all  living 
creatures  in  such  manner  as  may  be  adapted  to  their  rank 
in  creation;  and  that  everything  which  men  rightly  accom- 
plish is  indeed  done  by  Divine  help,  but  under  a  consistent 
law  which  is  neva*  departed  from. 

The  strength  of  this  spiritual  life  within  us  may  be  in- 
creased or  lessened  by  our  own  conduct ;  it  varies  from  time 
to  time,  as  physical  strength  varies;  it  is  summoned  on  dif- 
ferent occasions  by  our  will,  and  dejected  by  our  distress,  or 
our  sin ;  but  it  is  always  equally  humane  and  equally  Dtoine. 
We  are  men,  and  not  mere  animals,  because  a  special  form 
of  it  is  with  us  always;  we  are  nobler  and  baser  men,  as 
it  is  with  us  more  or  less;  but  it  is  never  given  to  us  in 
any  degree  which  can  make  us  more  than  men. 

45.  Observe: — I  give  you  this  general  statement  doubt- 
frdly,  and  only  as  that  towards  which  an  impartial  reasoner 
will,  I  think,  be  inclined  by  existing  data.  But  I  shall 
be  able  to  show  you,  without  any  doubt,  in  the  course 
of  our  studies,  that  the  achievements  of  art  which  have 
been  usually  looked  upon  as  the  results  of  peculiar  inspira- 
tion have  been  arrived  at  only  through  long  courses  of 
wisely  directed  labour,  and  imder  the  influence  of  feelings 
which  are  common  to  all  humanity. 


II.  THE  RELATION  OP  ART  TO  RELIGION     55 

But  of  these  feelings  and  powers  which  in  different 
degrees  are  common  to  humanity,  you  are  to  note  that 
thare  are  three  principal  divisions:  first,  the  instincts  of 
construction  or  melody,  which  we  share  with  lower  animals, 
and  which  are  in  us  as  native  as  the  instinct  of  the  bee  or 
nightingale ;  secondly,  the  faculty  of  vision,  or  of  dreaming, 
whether  in  sleep  or  in  conscious  trance,  or  by  voluntarily 
exerted  fancy;  and  lastly,  the  power  of  rational  inference 
and  collection,  of  both  the  laws  and  forms  of  beauty. 

46.  Now  the  faculty  of  vision,  being  closely  associated 
with  the  innermost  spiritual  nature,  is  the  one  which  has 
by  most  reasoners  been  held  for  the  peculiar  channel  of 
Divine  teaching:  and  it  is  a  feet  that  great  part  of  purely 
didactic  art  has  been  the  record,  whether  in  language,  or 
by  linear  representation,  of  actual  vision  involuntarily  re- 
ceived at  the  moment,  though  cast  on  a  mental  retina 
blanched  by  the  past  course  of  faithful  life.^  But  it  is 
also  true  that  these  visions,  where  most  distinctly  received, 
are  always — I  speak  deliberately — always^  the  sign  of  some 
mental  Umitation  or  derangement;  and  that  the  persons 
who  most  clearly  recognize  their  value,  exaggeratedly  esti- 
mate  it,  choosing  what  they  find  to  be  useful,  and  calling 
that  *<  inspired,"  and  disregarding  what  they  perceive  to 
be  useless,  though  presented  to  the  visionary  by  an  equal 
authority, 

47*  Thus  it  is  probable  that  no  work  of  art  has  been 
more  widely  didactic  than  Albert  DUrer's  engraving,  known 
as  the  "Knight  and  Death."*  But  that  is  only  one  of 
a  series  of  works  representing  similarly  vivid  dreams,  of 
which  some  are  uninteresting,  except  for  the  manner  of 
their  representation,  as  the  "St  Hubert,"*  and  others  are 

*  Standard  Series^  No.  9. 

^  [Oa  the  involuntarinen  of  tme  vision^  tee  Vol.  V.  p.  116  n.,  and  Vol.  XIX. 
%  309.  For  the  expreation  ''mental  retina/'  compare,  in  a  later  volume, 
^  Bladings  m  *  Modem  Pamiers:"] 

'  [For  other  references  to  the  "  St  Huhert,"  see  Vol.  VII.  pp.  127,  306 ; 
Vol  XI.  p.  68 ;  and  Eagle'i  Neit,  Preface.] 


56  LECTURES  ON  ART 

unintelligible;  some,  frightful,  and  wholly  unprofitable;  so 
that  we  find  the  visionary  faculty  in  that  great  painter,  when 
accurately  examined,  to  be  a  morbid  influence,  abasing  his 
skill  more  frequently  than  encouraging  it,  and  sacrificing 
the  greater  part  of  his  energies  upon  vain  subjects,  two 
only  being  produced,  in  the  course  of  a  long  life,  which  are 
of  high  didactic  value,  and  both  of  these  capable  only  of 
giving  sad  courage,*  Whatever  the  value  of  these  two,  it 
bears  more  the  aspect  of  a  treasure  obtained  at  great  cost 
of  sufiering,  than  of  a  directly  granted  gift  from  heaven. 

48.  On  the  contrary,  not  only  the  highest,  but  the 
most  consistent  results  have  been  attained  in  art  by  men 
in  whom  the  faculty  of  vision,  however  strong,  was  subordi- 
nate to  that  of  deliberative  design,  and  tranquillized  by  a 
measured,  continual,  not  feverish,  but  afiectionate,  observance 
of  the  quite  imvisionary  facts  of  the  surrounding  world. 

And  so  far  as  we  can  trace  the  connection  of  their 
powers  with  the  moral  character  of  their  lives,  we  shaU 
find  that  the  best  art  is  the  work  of  good,  but  of  not  dis- 
tinctively religious  men,  who,  at  least,  are  conscious  of  no 
inspiration,  and  often  so  unconscious  of  their  superiority  to 
others,  that  one  of  the  greatest  of  them,  Reynolds,  deceived 
by  his  modesty,  has  asserted  that  '^all  things  are  possible 
to  well-directed  labour."^ 

*  The  meaning  of  the  ''Knight  and  Death/'  even  in  this  respect,  has 
lately  been  questioned  on  good  grounds.  See  note  on  the  plate  in  Cata- 
logue.* 


^  [See  the  Second  Discourse :  "  nothing  is  denied  to  well-directed  labour "  (voL  i. 
p.  31,  in  the  edition  of  1820).  One  dnSt  of  Ruskin's  lecture  continues  with  the 
following  passage,  which,  though  cut  out  of  the  lecture,  he  marks  ''use  after- 
wards":— 

"The  words  are  memorable  as  much  for  the  weight  of  what  in  them 
is  true  as  for  the  innocence  of  what  in  them  is  erring ;  for  the  testimony 
borne  by  them  at  once  to  the  unconsciousness  which  is  the  crown  of  the 
highest  genius,  and  to  the  industry  which  is  the  price  of  its  highest  power. 
But  I  wish  you  to  dwell  on  the  '  well-directed  as  the  emphatic  part  of 
the  sentence ;  for  indeed,  whether  in  the  opening  of  life,  or  in  that  of  any 
special  study  of  it,  your  first  motto,  and  best  encoursgement,  must  be 
'claudus  in  via.'"] 
*  [Vol.  XXI.  p.  16.] 


IL  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    57 

49.  The  second  question,  namely,  how  far  art,  if  not 
inspired,  has  yet  been  ennobled  by  religion^  I  shall  not 
touch  upon  to-day;^  for  it  both  requires  technical  criticism, 
and  would  divert  you  too  long  from  the  main  question  of 
all, — How  far  religion  has  been  helped  by  art? 

You  will  find  that  the  operation  of  formative  art — (I 
will  not  speak  to-day  of  music) — ^the  operation  of  forma- 
tive art  on  religious  creed  is  essentially  twofold;  the  reali- 
sation, to  the  eyes,  of  imagined  spiritual  persons;  and  the 
limitation  of  their  imagined  presence  to  certain  places. 
We  will  examine  these  two  functions  of  it  successively. 

50.  And  first,  consider   accurately  what  the  agency  of 


^  [One  of  the  early  drafts^  however,  discoflaes  the  question  fully : — 

''How  far  has  art  been  strengthened  by  her  employment  in  religious 
service?  Many  careful  thinkers  on  this  subject,  and  I  myself  very  strenu- 
ously in  past  years,  have  contended  that  the  occupation  of  artists  in  the 
representation  of  divine  histories  or  persons  has  stimulated  and  purified 
the  powers  of  the  art  so  employed.  It  is  not  of  course  possible  for  me 
to-day  to  enter  with  you  even  on  the  first  steps  of  so  vast  an  inquiry ; 
but  it  will  be  part  of  my  subsequent  duty  to  lay  before  you  the  grounds 
of  my  now  fixed  conviction  that  few  of  the  greatest  men  ever  painted 
religious  subjects  by  choice,  but  only  because  uiey  were  either  compelled 
by  eodesiasticsl  autnorilir,  supported  by  its  patronage^  or  invited  by  popular 
applause;  that  bv  all  three  influences  their  powers  were  at  once  wasted 
and  restrained ;  that  their  invention  was  dulled  by  the  monotony  of  motive 
and  perverted  by  its  incredibility ;  that  the  exertion  of  noble  human  skill 
in  making  bodily  pain  an  object  of  morbid  worship  compelled  a  correlative 
reaction  in  making  bodUy  pleasure  an  object  of  morbid  pursuit ;  and  that 
the  successes,  of  whatever  positive  value  they  may  be,  reached  under  the 
orders  of  Christianity  have  been  dearly  bought  by  the  destruction  of  the 
best  treasures  of  heathen  art,  by  the  loss  of  the  records  of  what  was  most 
interesting  in  passing  history,  by  the  aversion  of  all  eyes  from  what  was 
lovely  in  present  nature,  and  by  the  birth,  in  the  chasm  left  by  the  con- 
tracted energies  of  healtiifiil  art^  of  a  sensual  art  fed  by  infernal  fire. 

''Thus  the  best  achievements  of  so-called  religious  art  have  been  dearly 
bought,  even  supposing  their  exceUence  had  been  otherwise  unattainable. 
But  you  will  see  fitrther  reason  to  regret  the  sacrifice,  when  you  per- 
ceive, as  I  shall  be  able  to  show  you  by  strict  analysis,  that  the  merits  of 
sacred  art  itself  were  never  owing  to  religion.  Observe :  I  say,  '  of  sacred 
art  itself.'  I  do  not  speak  of  the  consummate  art  power,  but  of  its  re- 
served and  regulated  beginnings.  As  to  its  highest  attainments,  there  has 
never  been  any  question  out  tluit  they  were  founded  entirely  on  the  beauty 
and  the  love  of  this  present  world.  I  told  you  many  vears  ago  that  there 
was  no  religion  in  any  of  the  works  of  Titian,  and  that  the  mind  of 
Tintoret  only  sometimes  forgot  itself  into  devotion.^  But  I  then  thought 
that  all  the  nascent  and  dawning  strength  of  art  had  been  founded  on 
pious  fiuth;  whereas  I  now  with  humilmtion,  but  I  dare  not  say  with 

1  [Slonei  of  Vemiee^  vol,  i.  ch.  i.  (Vol.  IX.  pp.  81,  S2).] 


58  LECTURES  ON  ART 

art  is,  in  realising,  to  the  sight,  our  conceptions  of  spiritual 
persons. 

For  instance.  Assume  that  we  believe  that  the  Madonna 
is  always  present  to  hear  and  answer  our  prayers.  Assume 
also  that  this  is  true.  I  think  that  persons  in  a  perfectly 
honest,  faithful,  and  humble  temper,  would  in  that  case 
desire  only  to  feel  so  much  of  the  Divine  presence  as  the 
spiritual  Power  herself  chose  to  make  felt;  and,  above  all 
things,  not  to  think  they  saw,  or  knew,  an3rthing  except 
what  might  be  truly  perceived  or  known. 

But  a  mind  imperfectly  faithful,  and  impatient  in  its 
distress,  or  craving  in  its  dulness  for  a  more  distinct  and 
convincing  sense  of  the  Divinity,  would  endeavour  to  com- 
plete, or  perhaps  we  should  ra^er  say  to  contract,  its  con- 
ception,  into  the   definite   figure   of  a  woman   wearing   a 

sorrow,  recognize  that  they  were  founded,  indeed,  upon  the  acorn  of  death, 
but  not  on  the  hope  of  immortality — founded,  indeed,  upon  the  purity  of 
loTO,  but  the  love  of  wife  and  child,  and  not  of  angel  or  deity ;  and  that 
the  sweet  skill  which  gave  to  such  foelings  their  highest  expression  came 
not  by  precept  of  religion,  but  by  the  secular  and  scientific  training  which 
Christianity  was  compelled  unwillingly  to  permit,  and  by  the  noble  instruc- 
tion received  from  the  remnants  of  that  very  heathen  art  which  Christianity 
had  done  her  utmost  to  destroy. 

^^The  reserve  and  the  rapture  of  monastic  piety  were  only  powerful 
in  creation  when  they  involuntarily  opened  themselves  to  the  sight,  and 
stooped  to  the  sympathies,  of  common  human  life;  and  the  skiU  which 
enforced  with  vividest  imagery  the  doctrines  of  the  Catholic  fsith  was 
taught  by  spirits  that  had  incurred  its  condemnation.  If  ever  you  are 
able  in  some  degree  to  measure  the  skill  that  has  been  spent  by  Luini, 
La  Robbia,  or  Ghiberti  on  the  vision  of  the  Virgin,  you  will  also  know 
it  to  have  been  received  at  the  feet  of  Athena  and  Artemis;  and  from 
them,  not  as  Queens  of  Heaven,  but  as  Queens  of  Earth,  permitting  no 
idleness  to  virtue,  and  promising  no  pardon  to  sin.  The  grace  or  the 
redeemed  souls  who  enter,  celutamente  ballando,  the  gate  of  AngeUco's 
Paradise  had  been  first  seen  in  the  terrestrial,  but  pure  mirth,  of  Florentine 
maids.^  The  dignity  of  the  Disputa  del  Sacramento  was  learned  from  the 
laurelled  patience  of  the  Roman  and  gentle  bearing  of  the  Greek. 

''If  thus  the  inflaence  of  Religion  upon  Painting  and  Sculpture  is  deter- 
mined, virtually  its  e£fect  on  Architecture  is  decided  also.  But  as  doubt- 
less the  subject  is  here  more  questionable  than  in  any  other  of  its  branches, 
I  wiU  endeavour  to  set  it  before  you  in  the  form  in  which  it  may  be  dealt 
with  clearly.  Here,  under  the  snadow  of  St.  Mary's  spire,  or  in  the  front 
of  any  English  or  French  cathedral,  it  ought  to  be  difficult  for  you  so 
much  as  to  put  the  question  to  yourselves.  You  would  say  that  archi- 
tecture was  consummated  in  these.  It  was  so.  But  we  are  not  inquiring 
about  its  consummation,  but  its  development    And  to  examine  into  that 

1  [This  sentence  was  used  with  some  reviAon  in  |  lOS.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    59 

Uue  or  crimson  dress,  and  having  fair  features,  dark  eyes, 
and  gracefully  arranged  hair. 

Suppose,  after  forming  such  a  conception,  that  we  have 
the  power  to  realise  and  preserve  it,  this  image  of  a 
beautiftd  figure  with  a  pleasant  expression  cannot  but  have 
the  tendency  of  afterwards  leading  us  to  think  of  the 
Viigin  as  present,  when  she  is  not  actually  present;  or  as 
pleased  with  us,  when  she  is  not  actually  pleased;  or  if 
we  resolutely  prevent  ourselves  from  such  imagination, 
nevertheless  the  existence  of  the  image  beside  us  will  often 
turn  our  thoughts  towards  subjects  of  religion,  when  other- 
wise they  would  have  been  differently  occupied ;  and,  in  the 
midst  of  other  occupations,  will  familiarize  more  or  less,  and 
even  mechanically  associate  with  common  or  faultfiil  states 
of  mind,  the  appearance  of  the  supposed  Divine  person. 

rightly,  vou  must  first  separate  whatever  modes  of  architecture  were  learned 
in  us^i  works,  as  aquedacts  and  sea  walls;  then,  whatever  was  learned 
in  war,  and  the  forma  of  tower,  of  battlement,  and  window,  and  gateway 
required  for  defence;  next,  the  forms  dependent  on  humble  domestic  re- 
quirements, as  the  gables  of  roofs  baUt  steep,  or  dormer  windows  enrich- 
ing their  slope,  or  turrets  for  winding  stairs,  or  projecting  niches  of  windows 
for  looking  up  and  down  streets,  or  lifting  oz  merchandise  and  the  like ; 
after  that,  whateyer  forms  resulted  from  social  and  civic  requirements; 
the  spans  required  for  halls  like  those  of  my  own  Christ  Church  or  of 
Westminster,  or  of  the  room  of  the  Greater  Council  at  Venice ;  the  dignity 
of  town  halls  and  brolettos  with  their  towers  of  pride  or  warning  and 
arcades  of  state.  Lastly,  you  must  separate  whatever  exquisiteness  was 
reached  by  completed  art  in  palatial  decoration,  in  loggias,  ceilings,  sculp- 
tured and  painted  saloons  and  gaUeries,  from  Vicenza  to  Versailles;  and 
then  examine  carefully  what  speciality  is  thus  left  as  the  result  of  ecclesi- 
astical influences. 

''The  best,  you  will  say,  still :  the  ecstasy  and  perfectness  of  all  this, 
poured  out  in  devotion.  You  will  find,  when  you  look  into  it,  as  I  will 
endeavour  partly  to  show  you,  that  this  power  was  used  not  so  much  to 
express  devotion  as  to  recommend  and  to  direct  it.  But  the  point  before 
us  is,  with  what  effects  on  the  architecture?  Mainly  with  these  three — 
the  introduction  of  spectral  effects  of  light  and  shade,  rendering  architec- 
ture sensational  instead  of  intellectual;  the  excitement  of  quite  frantic 
efforts  to  obtain  height  and  richness  of  ornament,  ending  in  the  corrup- 
tion of  style ;  and,  Sistly,  ^e  taking  away  the  funds  and  streng^  which 
would  have  made  wholesome  the  houses  of  the  poor,  cleansed  the  streets, 
and  cultivated  the  field. 

''  Whatever  excitement  of  religious  emotion  the  inhabitants  of  London 
now  receive  from  St.  Paul's  and  Westminster  Abbey,  I  conceive  to  become 
ineffectual  even  in  the  small  space  which  separates  the  two  buildings ;  and 
for  all  moral  or  religious  purposes,  I  would  willingly  part  with  both  choir 
and  cupola,  if  I  could  bring  in  their  stead  a  distinctly  sanctifying  influence 
over  the  pictures  and  literature  of  the  shops  in  the  Strand."] 


60  LECTURES  ON  ART 

51.  There  are  thus  two  distinct  operations  upon  our 
mind:  firsts  the  art  makes  us  believe  what  we  would  not 
otherwise  have  believed;  and  secondly,  it  makes  us  think 
of  subjects  we  should  not  otherwise  have  thought  of,  in- 
truding them  amidst  our  ordinary  thoughts  in  a  confiusing 
and  familiar  manner.  We  cannot  with  any  certainty  affirm 
the  advantage  or  the  harm  of  such  accidental  pieties,  for 
their  effect  will  be  very  different  on  different  characters: 
but,  without  any  question,  the  art,  which  makes  us  believe 
what  we  would  not  have  otherwise  believed,  is  misapplied, 
and  in  most  instances  very  dangerously  so.  Our  duty  is  to 
believe  in  the  existence  of  Divine,  or  any  other,  persons, 
only  upon  rational  proofs  of  their  existence;  and  not  be- 
cause we  have  seen  pictures  of  them.* 

52.  But  now  observe,  it  is  here  necessary  to  draw  a  dis- 
tinction, so  subtle  that  in  dealing  with  facts  it  is  continu- 
ally impossible  to  mark  it  with  precision,  yet  so  vital,  that 
not  only  your  understanding  of  the  power  of  art,  but  the 
working  of  your  minds  in  matters  of  primal  moment  to 
you,  depends  on  the  effort  you  make  to  affirm  this  dis- 
tinction strongly.^  The  art  which  realises  a  creature  of 
the  imagination  is  only  mischievous  when  that  realisation  is 
coqiceived  to  imply,  or  does  practically  induce  a  belief  in, 
the  real  existence  of  the  imagined  personage,  contrary  to, 
or  unjustified  by  the  other  evidence  of  its  existence.     But 

*  I  have  expunged  a  sentence  insisting  farther  on  this  point,  having 
come  to  reverence  more,  as  I  grew  older,  every  simple  means  of  stimulat- 
ing all  religious  belief  and  affection.  It  is  the  lower  and  realistic  world 
which  is  fullest  of  false  beliefs  and  vain  loves.     [1887.*] 


^  [Compare  Aratra  Pentelici,  §  45  (below,  p.  230),  where  the  same  distinction 
it  nuuie.] 

*  [The  sentence  in  eds.  1-3  is  as  foUows : — 

''  And  since  the  real  relations  between  us  and  higher  spirits  are,  of  all 
facts  concerning  our  being,  those  which  it  is  most  important  to  know 
accurately,  if  we  know  at  all,  it  is  a  folly  so  great  as  to  amount  to  real, 
though  most  unintentional,  sin,  to  allow  our  conceptions  of  those  relations 
to  be  modified  by  our  own  undisciplined  &ncy."] 


IL  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    61 

if  the  art  only  represents  the  personage  on  the  understand*' 
ing  that  its  form  is  imaginary,  then  the  effort  at  realisa- 
tion is  healthful  and  beneficial 

For  instance,  the  Greek  design  of  Apollo  crossing  the 
sea  to  Delphi,  which  is  one  of  the  most  interesting  of 
Lenormant's^  series,  so  far  as  it  is  only  an  expression,  under 
the  symbol  of  a  human  form,  of  what  may  be  rightly 
imagined  respecting  the  solar  power,  is  right  and  enn<; 
Uing;  but  so  far  as  it  conveyed  to  the  Greek  the  idea  of 
there  being  a  real  Apollo,  it  was  mischievous,  whether 
there  be,  or  be  not,  a  real  Apollo,  If  there  is  no  real 
Apollo,  then  the  art  was  mischievous  because  it  deceived; 
but  if  there  is  a  real  Apollo,  then  it  was  still  more  mis* 
chievous,^  for  it  not  only  began  the  degradation  of  the 
image  of  that  true  god  into  a  decoration  for  niches,  and 
a  device  for  seals;  but  prevented  any  true  witness  being 
borne  to  his  existence.  For  if  the  Greeks,  instead  of  mul- 
tiplying representations  of  what  they  imagined  to  be  the 
figure  of  the  god,  had  given  us  accurate  drawings  of 
the  heroes  and  battles  of  Marathon'  and  Salamis,  and  had 
simply  told  us  in  plain  Greek  what  evidence  they  had  of 
the  power  of  Apollo,  either  through  his  oracles,  his  help 
or  chastisement,  or  by  immediate  vision,  they  would  have 
served  their  religion  more  truly  than  by  all  the  vase-paint- 
ings and  fine  statues  that  ever  were  buried  or  adored. 

58.  Now  in  this  particular  instance,  and  in .  many  other 
examples  of  fine  Greek  art,  the  two  conditions  of  thought, 
symbolic  and  realistic,  are  mingled;  and  the  art  is  helpful, 
as  I  will  hereafter  show  you,  in  one  function,  and  in  the 

''^  I  am  Again  doubtful,  here.  The  most  important  part  of  the  chapter 
is  fimn  §  60  to  end.     [1887.] 

^  [AUe  des  Monuments  CSramographiquM  .  .  .  appHqu^s  ei  commeniSs  par  Ch. 
Lenormant  et  J,  d»  WUte^  4  vols.,  1837^  etc  Raskin  placed  the  plate  in  tiiie 
Reference  Series,  No.  11^  (VoL  XXI.  p.  49).  The  design  is  also  mentioned  in 
Queen  of  the  Air,  §  89  (VoL  XIX.  p  dd8)|  where  an  engraving  of  it  is  given 
(Plate  XV.>] 

'  [As  they  sometimes  did:  see  Vol.  XII.  p.  161.] 


62  LECTURES  ON  ART 

other  so  deadly,  that  I  think  no  degradation  of  conception 
of  Deity  has  ever  been  quite  so  base  as  that  implied  by 
the  designs  of  Greek  vases  in  the  period  of  decline,  say 
about  250  B.c. 

But  though  among  the  Greeks  it  is  thus  nearly  always 
difficult  to  say  what  is  S3rmbolic  and  what  realistic,  in  the 
range  of  Christian  art  the  distinction  is  clear.  In  that,  a 
vast  division  of  imaginative  work  is  occupied  in  the  sym- 
bolism of  virtues,  vices,  or  natural  powers  or  passions;  and 
in  the  representation  of  personages  who,  though  nominally 
real,  become  in  conception  symbolic.  In  the  greater  part 
of  this  work  there  is  no  intention  of  impl}dng  the  exist- 
ence of  the  represented  creature ;  Diirer's  "  Melencolia "  and 
Giotto's  "Justice"^  are  accurately  characteristic  examples. 
Now  all  such  art  is  wholly  good  and  useful  when  it  is  the 
work  of  good  men. 

54.  Again,  there  is  another  division  of  Christian  work  in 
which  the  persons  represented,  though  nominally  real,  are 
treated  as  dramatis-personae  of  a  poem,  and  so  presented 
confessedly  as  subjects  of  imagination.  All  this  poetic  art 
is  also  good  when  it  is  the  work  of  good  men. 

55.  There  remains  only  therefore  to  be  considered,  as 
truly  religious,  the  work  which  definitely  implies  and  modi* 
fies  the  conception  of  the  existence  of  a  real  person.  There 
is  hardly  any  great  art  which  entirely  belongs  to  this  class; 
but  Raphael's  Madonna  della  Seggiola  is  as  accurate  a  type 
of  it  as  I  can  give  you;'  Holbein's  Madonna  at  Dresden, 
the  Madonna  di  San  Sisto,  and  the  Madonna  of  Titian's 
Assimtiption,  all  belong  mainly  to  this  class,  but  are  re- 
moved somewhat  from  it  (as,  I  repeat,  nearly  all  great  art 
is)  into  the  poetical  one.     It  is  only  the  bloody  crucifixes 

»  [For  the  "Melencolia"  see  Vol.  VII.  Plate  E,  p.  312;  for  Giotto's  "Justice," 
the  frontispiece  to  FW9  Okmi^era,  Letter  11.] 

*  [A  photograph  of  this  ''Madonna"  is  No.  37  in  the  Standard  Series  (VoL  XXL 
p.  26) :  for  otiier  references  to  the  picture,  see  VoL  IV.  p.  85,  and  VoL  V.  p.  78. 
For  Holhein's  "Madonna  at  Dresden/'  see  VoL  XIX.,  Plate  III.,  p.  la  For  his 
numerous  references  to  the  ''San  Sisto,"  and  Titian's  "Assumption,"  see  the 
General  Index.] 


^« 


IL  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION     68 

and  gilded  virgins  and  other  such  lower  forms  of  imagery 
(by  which,  to  the  honour  of  the  English  Church,  it  has 
been  truly  claimed  for  her,  that  '^she  has  never  appealed 
to  the  madness  or  dulness  of  her  people/')  which  belong 
to  the  realistic  class  in  strict  limitation,  and  which  properly 
constitute  the  type  of  it. 

There  is  indeed  an  important  school  of  sculpture  in 
Spain,  directed  to  the  same  objects,  but  not  demanding  at 
present  any  special  attention.  And  finally,  there  is  the 
vigorous  and  most  interesting  realistic  school  of  our  own,^ 
in  modem  times,  mainly  known  to  the  public  by  Holman 
Hunt's  picture  of  the  Light  of  the  World,^  though,  I  be- 
lieve, deriving  its  first  origin  from  the  genius  of  the  painter 
to  whom  you  owe  also  the  revival  of  interest,  first  here  in 
Oxford,'  and  then  universally,  in  the  cycle  of  early  EngUsh 
legend,— Dante  RossettL 

56.  The  efiect  of  this  realistic  art  on  the  religious  mind 
of  Europe  varies  in  scope  more  than  any  other  art  power; 
for  in  its  higher  branches  it  touches  the  most  sincere  reli- 
gious minds,  affecting  an  earnest  class  of  persons  who  cannot 
be  reached  by  merely  poetical  design;  while,  in  its  lowest, 
it  addresses  itself  not  only  to  the  most  vulgar  desires 
for  religious  excitement,  but  to  the  mere  thirst  for  sensa- 
tion of  horror  which  characterises  the  uneducated  orders 
of  partially  civilized  countries ;  nor  merely  to  the  thirst  for 
horror,  but  to  the  strange  love  of  death,  as  such,  which 
has  sometimes  in  Catholic  countries  showed  itself  pecuharly 
by  the  endeavour  to  paint  the  images  in  the  chapels  of  the 
Sepulchre  so  as  to  look  deceptively  like  corpses.  The  same 
morbid  instinct  has  also  affected  the  minds  of  many  among 
the  more  imaginative  and  powerful  artists  with  a  feverish 

^  [Compare  Leetare  i.  of  The  Art  qf  England  on  RoMOtti  and  Hunt  at  repre- 
sentative of  ''Realistic  Schools  of  Painting.n 

'  [An  enmving  of  it  is  No.  2  in  the  l^ucalional  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  106) ; 
and  lor  a  fall  description  of  the  picture,  see  Vol.  XII.  pp.  d28--331/| 

*  [The  reference  is  to  the  paintings  of  Arthurian  legend  which  Rossetti  and  his 
band  of  disciples  executed  on  tiie  walls  of  the  Oxford  Union  (see  Vol.  XVI.  p.  xlviiL^, 
and  to  the  influence  upon  Bume-Jones  and  William  Morris  of  his  interest  in  sucn 
legends.] 


t 
I 


64  LECTURES   ON  ART 

gloom  which  distorts  their  finest  work ;  and  lastly — and  this 
is  the  worst  of  all  its  effects — it  has  occupied  the  sensi- 
bility of  Christian  women,  universaUy,  in  lamenting  the 
sufferings  of  Christ,  instead  of  preventing  those  of  His 
people. 

57.  When  any  of  you  next  go  abroad,  observe,  and 
consider  the  meaning  of,  the  sculptures  and  paintings,  which 
of  every  rank  in  art,  and  in  every  chapel  and  cathedral, 
and  by  every  mountain  path,  recall  the  hours,  and  repre- 
sent the  agonies,  of  the  Passion  of  Christ:  and  try  to  form 
some  estimate  of  the  efforts  that  have  been  made  by  the 
four  arts  of  eloquence,  music,  painting,  and  sculpture,  since 
the  twelfth  century,  to  wring  out  of  the  hearts  of  women 
the  last  drops  of  pity  that  could  be  excited  for  this  merely 
physical  agony:  for  the  art  nearly  always  dwells  on  the 
physical  wounds  or  exhaustion  chiefly,  and  degrades,  far 
more  than  it  animates,  the  conception  of  pain. 

Then  try  to  conceive  the  quantity  of  time,  and  of  ex- 
cited and  thrilling  emotion,  which  have  been  wasted  by  the 
tender  and  delicate  women  of  Christendom  during  these  last 
six  hundred  years,^  in  thus  picturing  to  themselves,  under 
the  influence  of  such  imagery,  the  bodily  pain,  long  since 
passed,  of  One  Person: — ^which,  so  fSar  as  they  indeed  con- 
ceived it  to  be  sustained  by  a  Divine  Nature,  could  not  for 
that  reason  have  been  less  endurable  than  the  agonies  of 
any  simple  human  death  by  torture:  and  then  try  to  esti- 
mate what  might  have  been  the  better  result,  for  the  right- 
eousness and  felicity  of  mankind,  if  these  same  women  had 
been  taught  the  deep  meaning  of  the  last  words  that  were 
ever  spoken  by  their  Master  to  those  who  had  ministered 
to  Him  of  their  substance :  **  Daughters  of  Jerusalem,  weep 
not  for  me,  but  weep  for  yourselves,  and  for  your  children."  * 
If  they  had  but  been  taught  to  measure  with  their  pitiful 
thoughts  the  tortures  of  battle-fields — ^the  slowly  consuming 
plagues  of  death  in  the  starving  children,  and  wasted  age, 

1  [Compare  Setame  and  LUiet,  §  140  (VoL  XVIII.  pp.  185-186).] 
*  [Luke  xziiL  28.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION     65 

of  the  innumerable  desolate  those  battles  left; — ^nay,  m  our 
own  life  of  peace,  the  agony  of  unniirtured,  untaught,  un- 
helped  creatures,  awaking  at  the  grave's  edge  to  know  how 
they  should  have  Uved ;  and  the  worse  pain  of  those  whose 
existence*  not  the  ceasing  of  it,  is  death;  those  to  whom 
the  cradle  was  a  curse,  and  for  whom  the  words  they  can- 
not hear,  *^  ashes  to  ashes,"  are  all  that  they  have  ever  re- 
ceived of  benediction.  These, — ^you  who  would  fain  have 
wept  at  His  feet,  or  stood  by  His  cross, — ^these  you  have 
always  with  you!  Him,  you  have  not  always.^ 

58.  The  wretched  in  death  you  have  always  with  you. 
Yes,  and  the  brave  and  good  in  life  you  have  always ; — 
these  also  needing  help,  though  you  supposed  they  had 
only  to  help  others;  these  also  claiming  to  be  thought  for, 
and  remembered.  And  you  will  find,  if  you  look  into 
history  with  this  clue,  that  one  of  quite  the  chief  reasons 
for  the  continual  misery  of  mankind  is  that  they  are  always 
divM^a  in  thd,  wo«h5  brtw.«.  «H5d»  »  «inl.  who  Je 
out  of  their  sight,  and  heed  no  help,  and  proud  and  evil- 
minded  men,  who  are  too  definitdy  in  their  sight,  and 
ought  not  to  have  their  help.  And  consider  how  the 
arts  have  thus  followed  the  worship  of  the  crowd.  You 
have  paintings  of  saints  and  angels,  innumerable ; — of  petty 
courtiers,  and  contemptible  or  cruel  kings,  innumerable. 
Few,  how  few  you  have  (but  these,  observe,  almost  always 
by  great  painters),  of  the  best  men,  or  of  their  actions. 
But  think  for  yourselves, — I  have  no  time  now  to  enter 
upon  the  mighty  field,  nor  imagination  enough  to  guide 
me  beyond  the  threshold  of  it, — ^think,  what  history  might 
have  been  to  us  now; — ^nay,  whitt  a  different  history  that 
of  all  Europe  might  have  become,  if  it  had  but  been  the 
objeet  both  of  the  people  to  discern,  and  of  their  arts 
to  honour  and  bear  record  of,  the  great  deeds  of  their 
worthiest  men.  And  if,  instead  of  living,  as  they  have 
always  hitherto  done,  in  a  hellish  cloud  of  contention  and 

>  [See  Matthew  xxvi.  67.] 
XX.  E 


66  LECTURES  ON  ART 

revenge,  lighted  by  fantastic  dreams  of  cloudy  sanctities, 
they  had  sought  to  reward  and  punish  justly,  wherever 
reward  and  punishment  were  due,  but  cluefly  to  reward; 
and  at  least  rather  to  bear  testimony  to  the  human  acts 
which  deserved  Grod's  anger  or  His  blessing,  than  only,  in 
presumptuous  imagination,  to  display  the  secrets  of  Judg- 
ment, or  the  beatitudes  of  Eternity. 

59.  Such  I  conceive  generally,  though  indeed  with  good 
arising  out  of  it,  for  every  great  evil  brings  some  good 
in  its  backward  eddies — ^such  I  conceive  to  have  been  the 
deadly  function  of  art  in  its  ministry  to  what,  whether  in 
heathen  or  Christian  lands,  and  whether  in  the  pageantry 
of  words,  or  colours,  or  fair  forms,  is  truly,  and  in  the 
deep  sense,  to  be  called  idolatry — ^the  serving  with  the  best 
of  our  hearts  and  minds,  some  dear  or  sad  fantasy  which 
we  have  made  for  ourselves,  while  we  disobey  the  present 
call  of  the  Master,  who  is  not  dead,  and  who  is  not  now 
fainting  under  His  cross,  but  requiring  us  to  take  up 
ours.^ 

60.  I  pass  to  the  second  great  functicxa  of  religious  art, 
the  limitation  of  the  idea  of  Divine  presience  to  particular 
localities.  It  is  of  course  impossible  within  my  present 
limits  to  touch  upon  this  power  of  art,  as  employed  on 
the  temples  of  the  gods  of  various  religions;  we  will  ex* 
amine  that  on  future  occasions.'  To-day,  I  want  only  to 
map  out  main  ideas,  and  I  can  do  this  best  by  speaking 
exclusively  of  this  localizing  influence  as  it  affects  our  own 
faith.' 

Observe  first,  that  the  localization  is  almost  entirely 
dependent  upon  human  art  You  must  at  least  take  a 
stone  and  set  it  up  for  a  pillar,  if  you  are  to  mark  the 
place,  so  as  to  know  it  again,  where  a  vision  appeared.    A 

^  [See  Luke  zxiT.  6,  6,  and  Matthew  zvi  24.] 

*  'An  intention  not  fulfilled  in  any  subsequent  lectures.] 

*  [ComiNM  anm  Lmnpt,  Vol.  Vm.  ^  39,  irhere  (in  a  nota  of  18B0)  RmUa 
refers  to  the  present  discussion  as  placing  the  subject  ''without  any  remains 
of  Presbyterian  prejudice  in  the  aspect  which  it  must  take  on  purely  rational 
grounds.''] 


11.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION     67 

persecuted  people,  needing  to  conceal  their  places  of  wot* 
diip,  may  perform  every  religious  ceremony  first  under  one 
crag  of  the  hillside,  and  then  under  another,  without  invali- 
di&]g  the  sacredness  of  the  rites  or  sacraments  thus  admin- 
istered.     It  is,  therefore,  we  all  acknowledge,   inessential, 
that  a  particular  spot  should  be  surrounded  with  a  ring  of 
stones,  or  enclosed  within  walls  of  a  certain  style  of  archi- 
tecture, and  so  set  apart  as  the  only  place  where  such  cere- 
moiiies  may  be  properly  performed;  and  it  is  thus  less  by 
any  cUrect  appeal  to  experience  or  to  reason,  but  in  con- 
sequence of  the  effect  upon  our  senses   produced  by  the 
architecture,  that  we  recdlve  the  first  strong  impressions  of 
what  we  afterwards  contend  for  as  absolute  truth.     I  par- 
ticulaiiy  msh  you  to  notice  how  it  is  always  by  help  of 
human  art  that  such  a  result  is  attained,  because,  remember 
always,   I  am  neither  disputing  nor  asserting  the  truth  ci 
any  Ideological  doctrine ; — ^that  is  not  my  province ;— I  am 
only  questioning  the  expediency  of  enforcing  that  doctrine 
by  the  help  of  architecture.      Put  a  rough  stone  for  an 
altar  under  the  hawthorn  on  a  village  green; — separate  a 
portion  of  the  green  itself  with  an  ordinary  paling  from 
the  rest ; — then  consecrate,  with  whatever  form  you  choose, 
the  space  of  grass  you  have  enclosed,  and  meet  within  the 
wooden  fence  as  often  as  you  desire  to  pray  or  preach; 
yet  you  will  not  easily  fasten  an  impression  in  the  minds 
of  the  villagers,  that  God  inhabits  the  space  of  grass  inside 
the  fence,  and  does  not  extend  His  presence  to  the  common 
beyond  it:  and  that  the  daisies  and  violets  on  one  side  of 
the  ndling  are  holy,— on  the  other,  pro&ne.     But,  instead 
of  a  wooden  fence,  build  a  wall,  pave  the  interior  space; 
loof  it  over,  so  as   to  make  it  comparatively  dark; — and 
you  may  persuade  the  villagers  with  ease  that  you  have 
built   n    house   which   Deity    inhabits,    or    that    you    have 
become,   in  the  old    French    phrase,    a    *4ogeur   du    Bon 

61.  And  farther,  though  I  have  no  desire  to  introduce 

^  [See  Mmera  PulverU,  §  107  (Vol.  XVII.  p.  280).] 


68  LECTURES  ON  ART 

any  question  as  to  the  truth  of  what  we  thus  architectu- 
rally teach,  I  would  desire  you  most  strictly  to  determine 
what  is  intended  to  be  taught. 

Do  not  think  I  underrate — I  am  among  the  last  men 
living  who  would  underrate, — ^the  importance  of  the  septi- 
ments^  connected  with  their  church  to  the  population  of  a 
pastoral  village.  I  admit,  in  its  fullest  extent,  the  moral 
value  of  the  scene,  which  is  almost  always  one  of  perfect 
purity  and  peace;  and  of  the  sense  of  supernatural  love 
and  protection,  which  fills  and  surrounds  the  low  aisles  and 
homely  porch.  But  the  question  I  desire  earnestly  to  leave 
with  you  is,  whether  all  the  earth  ought  not  to  be  peace- 
ful and  pure,  and  the  acknowledgment  of  the  Divine  pro- 
tection, as  universal  as  its  reality?  That  in  a  mysterious 
way  the  presence  of  Deity  is  vouchsafed  where  it  is  sought, 
and  withdrawn  where  it  is  forgotten,  must  of  course  be 
granted  as  the  first  postulate  in  the  enquiry:  but  the 
point  for  our  decision  is  just  this,  whether  it  ought  always 
to  be  sought  in  one  place  only,  and  forgotten  in  levery 
other. 

It  may  be  replied,  that  since  it  is  impossible  to  conse- 
crate the  entire  space  of  the  earth,  it  is  better  thus  to 
secure  a  portion  of  it  than  none:  but  surely,  if  so,  we 
ought  to  make  some  effort  to  enlarge  the  favoured  ground, 
and  even  look  forward  to  a  time  when  in  English  villages 
there  may  be  a  God's  acre  tenanted  by  the  living,  not  the 
dead;  and  when  we  shall  rather  look  with  aversion  and 
fear  to  the  remnant  of  ground  that  is  set  apart  as  profane, 
than  with  reverence  to  a  narrow  portion  of  it  enclosed  as 
holy.^ 

'  [In  one  of  the  MS.  drafts  of  this  lecture^  there  is  a  further  passage  on  this 
theme: — 

'^  The  worst  of  all  the  effects  of  art  in  this  localization  of  <fffort,  is  the 
collecting  of  sentimental  interests  and  devotions  where  they  are  without 
practical  eileet,  and  withdrawing  them  from  wholesome  work  in  hamaa 
service. 

"I  have  placed  in  your  permanent  series  two  sketches  of  the  Church 
of  St  Vulfrau  at  AhbeviUe,  in  the  second  of  which  you  will  see  the  stream 
which  pssses  hetween'it  and  the  Estaminet  du  Pont  d' Amour.  When  I 
made  tnis  drawing  in  1868,  that  stream,  which  is  a  little  branch  of  the 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    69 

62.  But  now,  futher.  Suppose  it  be  admitted  that  by 
«cl<«tog  pound  ^th  wdl/ikd  p«formi.^t  certain  ceri 
monies  there  habitually,  some  kind  of  sanctity  is  indeed 
secured  within  that  space, — still  the  question  remains  open 
whether  it  be  advisable  for  religious  purposes  to  decorate 
the  enclosure.  For  separation  the  mere  walls  would  be 
aioug^»    What  is  the  purpose  of  your  decoration  ? 

Liet  us  take  an  instance — ^the  most  noble  with  which 
I  am  acquainted^  the  Cathedral  of  Chartres.^  You  have 
there  the  most  splendid  coloured  glass,  and  the  richest 
sculpture,  and  the  grandest  proportions  of  building,  united 
to  produce  a  sensation  of  pleasure  and  awe.  We  profess 
that  this  is  to  honour  the  Deity ;  or,  in  other  words,  that  it 
is  pleasing  to  Him  that  we  should  delight  our  eyes  with 
blue  and  gold^i  colours,  and  solemnize  our  spirits  by  the 
sight  of  large  stones  laid  one  on  another,  and  ingeniously 
carved. 

Somme,  and  is  of  purest  and  sweetest  water,  was  left  at  the  place  in 
which  it  is  drawn — that  is  to  say,  in  the  centre  of  the  tovm — encumbered 
with  heaps  of  market  garbage,  and  slowly  trickling  over  slime  many  times 
its  own  depth,  composed  of  every  kind  of  aniimd  refuse.  But  in  the 
cha^l  of  the  south  aisle  of  St.  Vulfran,  at  great  cost  of  fresh  painting  and 
ffildmg,  a  dramatic  representation  of  the  Assumption  had  been  prepared 
tor  the  pleasure  of  the  religious  ladies  of  AbboTiUe,  with  wooden  clouds 
emerging  quite  out  over  the  altar  into  the  church ;  and  skilfully  lighted 
from  above  through  a  hole  in  the  roof. 

^^The  little  I^orman  church,  of  which  I  have  also  placed  a  photograph 
in  the  permanent  series  arranged  for  you,  was  one  of  the  fairest  villas;e 
sanctities  that  ever  charmed  a  passing  traveller— on  the  slope  of  a  hill- 
nde  which  autumn  made  sparkling  with  apples  brighter  than  rubies,  and 
which  spring  embroidered  with  violets  as  soft  as  the  sky.  For  a  moment 
of  pleasing  and  foolish  sentiment,  the  country  seemed  happy  that  could 
embosom  such  a  scene,  and  happy  indeed  it  is — if  compared  with  either 
the  wastes  of  savage  lands,  or  wealth  of  corrupted  cities.  Yet  it  cannot 
be  without  horror  and  wonder  that  we  perceive — and  the  watchful  pause 
only  ci  a  few  minutes  would  enable  us  to  perceive — ^that  In  all  this  village, 
which  the  Christian  faith  had  governed  for  a  thousand  years,  there  is 
not  now  a  single  house  in  which  there  is  light  enough  to  read  by,  fire 
enough  to  lie  warmed  with,  floor  enough  to  keep  the  adults  from  ague, 
or  food  enough  to  keep  the  children  from  scrofula." 
j  Oaly  one  sketch  of  St  Vulfran  is,  however,  at  Oxford — ^No.  95  in  the  Reference 
1  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  35) — of  the  southern  porch.  The  sketch  referred  to  in  this 
mge  18  reproduced  as  Plate  17  in  Vol.  II.  (p.  396).  The  photograph  of  the 
e  Norman  church  was  No.  52  in  the  Educational  Series  (afterwards  removed): 
Vol.  XXI.  p.  121.] 

'  [For  references  to  other  passages  in  which  Ruskin  expresses  his  admiration  of 
this  Cktbedral,  see  VoL  I.  p.  377  n. ;  and  see  the  General  Index.] 


70  LECTURES  ON  ART 

68.  I  do  not  think  it  can  be  doubted  that  it  is  pleas- 
ing to  Him  when  we  do  this;  for  He  has  Himself  pre- 
pi^ed  for  us,  nearly  evety  morning  and  evening,  windows 
painted  with  Divine  art,  in  blue  and  gold  and  vermilion: 
windows  lighted  from  within  by  the  lustre  of  that  heaven 
which  we  may  assume,  at  least  with  more  certainty  than 
any  consecrated  ground,  to  be  one  of  His  dwelling-places. 
Again,  in  every  mountain  side,  and  clifF  of  rude  sea  shore. 
He  has  heaped  stones  one  upon  another  of  greater  magni- 
tude than  those  of  Chartres  Cathedral,  and  sculptured 
them  with  floral  ornament, — ^surely  not  less  sacred  because 
living  ? 

64.  Must  it  not  then  be  only  because  we  love  our  own 
work  better  than  His,  that  we  respect  the  lucent  glass,  but 
not  the  lucent  clouds;  that  we  weave  embroidered  robes 
with  ingenious  fingers,  and  make  bright  the  gilded  vaults 
we  have  beautifully  ordained — while  yet  we  have  not  con- 
sidered the  heavens,  the  work  of  His  fingers,  nor  the  stars 
of  the  strange  vault  which  He  has  ordained?^  And  do 
we  dream  that  by  carving  fonts  and  lifting  pillars  in 
His  honour,  who  cuts  the  way  of  the  rivers  among 
the  rocks,  and  at  whose  reproof  the  pillars  of  the  earth 
are  astonished,^  we  shall  obtain  pardon  for  the  dishonour 
done  to  the  hills  and  streams  by  which  He  has  appointed 
our  dwelling-place; — ^for  the  infection  of  their  sweet  air 
with  poison; — ^for  the  burning  up  of  their  tender  grass 
and  flowers  with  fire,  and  for  spreading  such  a  shame 
of  mixed  luxury  and  misery  over  our  native  land,  as 
if  we  laboured  only  that,  at  least  here  in  England,  we 
might  be  able  to  give  the  lie  to  the  song,  whether  of  the 
Cherubim  above,  or  Church  beneath — "Holy,  holy,  Liord 
God  of  all  creatures ;  Heaven — and  Earth — are  full  of  Thy 
glory'*?' 

65.  And  how  much  more  there  is  that  I  long  to  say 

^  rPsalms  viii.  3.] 

'  [Job  zxviii.  10 ;  and  see  zxri.  11.1 

»  [See  Vol  VII.  p.  206.] 


II.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  RELIGION    71 

to  you;  and  how  much,  I  hope,  that  you  would  like  to 
answer  to  me,  or  to  question  me  of!  But  I  can  say  no 
more  to-day.  We  are  not,  I  trust,  at  the  end  of  our  talks 
or  thoughts  together;  but,  if  it  were  so,  and  I  never  spoke 
to  you  more,  this  that  I  have  said  to  you  I  should  have 
been  glad  to  have  been  permitted  to  say;  and  this,  farther, 
which  is  the  sum  of  it, — ^That  we  may  have  splendour  of 
art  again,  and  with  that,  we  may  truly  praise  and  honour 
our  Maker,  and  with  that  set  forth  the  beauty  and  holiness 
of  all  that  He  has  made:  but  only  after  we  have  striven 
with  our  whole  hearts  first  to  sanctify  the  temple  of  the 
body  and  spirit  of  every  child  that  has  no  roof  to  cover 
its  head  from  the  cold,  and  no  walls  to  guard  its  soul  from 
comiption,  in  this  our  English  land. 

One  word  more. 

What  I  have  suggested  hitherto,  respecting  the  relations 
of  Art  to  Religion,  you  must  receive  throughout  as  merely 
motive  of  thought;  though  you  must  have  well  seen  that 
my  own  convictions  were  established  finally  on  some  of 
the  points  in  question.  But  I  must,  in  conclusion,  tell 
you  something  that  I  know; — ^which,  if  you  truly  labour, 
you  will  one  day  know  also;  and  which  I  trust  some  of 
you  will  believe,  now. 

During  the  minutes  in  which  you  have  been  listening 
to  me,  I  suppose  that  almost  at  every  other  sentence  those 
virhose  habit  of  mind  has  been  one  of  veneration  for  estab- 
lished forms  and  faiths,  must  have  been  in  dread  that  I 
vfBS  about  to  say,  or  in  pang  of  regret  at  my  having  said, 
what  seemed  to  them  an  irreverent  or  reckless  word  touch- 
ing vitally  important  things. 

So  far  from  this  being  the  fact,  it  is  just  because  the 
feelings  that  I  most  desire  to  cultivate  in  your  minds  are 
those  of  reverence  and  admiration,^  that  I  am  so  earnest 
to  prevent  you  from  being  moved  to  either  by  trivial  or 


J^rComfMtre  Rnskin's  frequent  quotation  {e,g.,  Vol.  IV.  p.  29^  Vol.  XVII.  p.  106) 
of  Wordsworth's  line — ''We  live  by  admiration,  hope^  and  love" ;  and  see  General 
Indez^  #.  ''Reverence."] 


72  LECTURES   ON  ART 

false  semblances.  This  is  the  thing  which  I  know — and 
which,  if  you  labour  faithfully,  you  shall  know  also, — that 
in  Reverence  is  the  chief  joy  and  power  of  life ; — Rever- 
ence, for  what  is  pure  and  bright  in  your  own  youth;  for 
what  is  true  and  tried  in  the  age  of  others;  for  all  that 
is  gracious  among  the  living, — great  among  the  dead, — and 
marvellous,  in  the  Powers  that  cannot  die. 


LECTURE  III^ 

THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS 

66.  You  probably  recollect  that,  in  the  beginning  of  my 
last  lecture,  it  was  stated  that  fine  art  had,  and  could 
have,  but  three  functions:  the  enforcing  of  the  religious 
sentiments  of  men,  the  perfecting  their  ethical  state,  and 
the  doing  them  materisJ  service.*  We  have  to-day  to 
examine,  the  mode  of  its  action  in  the  second  power — 
that  of  perfecting  the  morality,  or  ethical  state,  of  men. 

Perfecting,  observe — ^not  producing. 

You  must  have  the  right  moral  state  first,  or  you  can- 
not have  the  art.  But  when  the  art  is  once  obtained,  its 
reflected  action  enhances  and  completes  the  moral  state 
out  of  which  it  arose,  and,  above  all,  communicates  the 
exultation  to  other  minds  which  are  already  morally  cap- 
able of  the  like. 

67.  For  instance,  take  the  art  of  singing,  and  the  sim- 
plest perfect  master  of  it  (up  to  the  limits  of  his  nature) 
whom  you  can  find ; — a  skylark.  From  him  you  may 
learn  what  it  is  to  *^sing  for  joy."'  You  must  get  the 
moral  state  first,  the  pure  gladness,  then  give  it  finished 
expression;  and  it  is  perfected  in  itself,  and  made  com- 
municable to  other  creatures  capable  of  such  joy.  But  it 
is  incommunicable  to  those  who  are  not  prepared  to  re- 
ceive it. 

Now,  all  right  human  song  is,  similarly,  the  finished 
expression,  by  art,  of  the  joy  or  grief  of  noble  persons,  for 


1 
t 


Delivered  on  February  23,  1870.] 
Above,  §  32,  p.  46.] 

Pnlms  Izvii.  4.    Compare  Eaglet  Ne9t,  §  67^  where  this  paesage  ia  cited.] 

78 


74  LECTURES   ON  ART 

right  causes.  And  accurately  in  proportion  to  the  right- 
ness  of  the  cause,  and  purity  of  the  emotion,  is  the  possi- 
bility of  the  fine  art.^  A  maiden  may  sing  of  her  lost 
love,  but  a  miser  cannot  sing  of  his  lost  money.  And 
with  absolute  precision,  from  highest  to  lowest,  the  fineness 
of  the  possible  art  is  an  index  of  the  moral  purity  and 
majesty  of  the  emotion  it  expresses.  You  may  test  it 
practically  at  any  instant.  Question  with  yourselves  re^ 
specting  any  feeling  that  has  taken  strong  possession  of 
your  mind,  ^^  Could  this  be  sung  by  a  master,  and  sung 
nobly,  with  a  true  melody  and  art?'*  Then  it  is  a  right 
feeling.  Could  it  not  be  sung  at  all,  or  only  sung  ludic- 
rously? It  is  a  base  one.  And  that  is  so  in  all  the  arts; 
so  that  with  mathematical  precision,  subject  to  no  error 
or  exception,  the  art  of  a  nation,  so  far  as  it  exists,  is  an 
exponent  of  its  ethical  state. 

68.  An  exponent,  observe,  and  exalting  influence;  but 
not  the  root  or  cause.  You  cannot  paint  or  sing  your- 
selves into  being  good  men;  you  must  be  good  men  before 
you  can  either  paint  or  sing,  and  then  the  colour  and 
sound  will  complete  in  you  all  that  is  best. 

And  this  it  was  that  I  called  upon  you  to  hear,  saying, 
"listen  to  me  at  least  now,"  in  the  first  lecture,*  namely, 
that  no  art-teaching  could  be  of  use  to  you,  but  would 
rather  be  harmAil,  unless  it  was  grafted  on  something 
deeper  than  all  art.  For  indeed  not  only  with  this,  of 
which  it  is  my  function  to  show  you  the  laws,  but  much 
more  with  the  art  of  all  men,  which  you  came  here  chiefly 
to  learn,  that  of  language,  the  chief  vices  of  education 
have  arisen  from  the  one  great  fallacy  of  supposing  that 
noble  language  is  a  communicable  trick  of  grammar  and 
accent,  instead  of  simply  the  careful  expression  of  right 
thought.  All .  the  virtues  of  language  are,  in  their  roots, 
moral;    it   becomes  accurate  if  the  speaker  desires  to  be 

^  [Compare  Eagle'i  NeH,  §  18,  where  this  lecture  \%  referred  to.] 
«  [Above,  §  27,  p.  39.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    75 

true;  dear,  if  he  speaks  with  sympathy  and  a  desire  to 
be  intelligible;  powerful,  if  he  has  earnestness;  pleasant, 
if  he  has  sense  of  rhjrthm  and  order.  There  are  no  other 
virtues  of  language  producible  by  art  than  these:  but  let 
me  mark  more  deeply  for  an  instant  the  significance  of 
one  of  them.  Language,  I  said,  is  only  clear  when  it  is 
sympathetic.  You  can,  in  truth,  understand  a  man's  word 
only  by  understanding  his  temper.  Your  own  word  is  also 
as  of  an  unknown  tongue  to  him  unless  he  understands 
yours.  And  it  is  this  which  makes  the  art  of  language, 
if  any  one  is  to  be  chosen  separately  from  the  rest,  that 
which  is  fittest  for  the  instrument  of  a  gentleman's  educa- 
tion. To  teach  the  meaning  of  a  word  thoroughly,  is  to 
teach  the  nature  of  the  spirit  that  coined  it;  the  secret  of 
language  is  the  secret  of  sympathy,  and  its  full  charm  is 
possible  only  to  the  gentle.  And  thus  the  principles  of 
beautiful  speech  have  all  been  fixed  by  sincere  and  kindly 
speech.  On  the  laws  which  have  been  determined  by 
sincerity,  false  speech,  apparently  beautiful,  may  afterwards 
be  constructed;  but  all  such  utterance,  whether  in  oration 
or  poetry,  is  not  only  without  permanent  power,  but  it  is 
destructive  of  the  principles  it  has  usurped.  So  long  as 
no  words  are  uttered  but  in  fEuthfulness,  so  long  the  art 
of  language  goes  on  exalting  itself;  but  the  moment  it  is 
shaped  and  chiselled  on  external  principles,  it  falls  into 
frivolity,  and  perishes.  And  this  truth  would  have  been 
long  ago  manifest,  had  it  not  been  that  in  periods  of 
advanced  academical  science  there  is  always  a  tendency  to 
deny  the  sincerity  of  the  first  masters  of  language.  Once 
leam  to  write  gracefully  in  the  manner  of  an  ruicient 
aiitiior,  and  we  are  apt  to  think  that  he  also  wrote  in  the 
manner  of  some  one  else.  But  no  noble  nor  right  style 
was  ever  yet  founded  but  out  of  a  sincere  heart. 

No  man  is  worth  reading  to  form  your  style,  who  does 
not  mean  what  he  says;  nor  was  any  great  style  ever 
invented  but  by  some  man  who  meant  what  he  said. 
Find  out  the  beginner  of  a  great  manner  of  writing,  and 


y 


I 


76  LECTURES   ON  ART 

you'  have  also  found  the  declarer  of  some  true  facts  or 
smcere  passions:  and  your  whole  method  of  reading  will 
thus  be  quickened,  for,  being  sure  that  your  author  really 
meant  what  he  said,  you  will  be  much  more  careful  to 
ascertain  what  it  is  that  he  means. 

69.  And  of  yet  greater  importance  is  it  deeply  to  know 
that  every  beauty  possessed  by  the  language  of  a  nation 
is  significant  of  the  innermost  laws  of  its  being.  Keep 
the  temper  of  the  people  stem  and  manly;  make  their 
associations  grave,  courteous,  and  for  worthy  objects; 
occupy  them  in  just  deeds;  and  their  tongue  must  needs 
be  a  grand  one.  Nor  is  it  possible,  therefore — observe  the 
necessary  reflected  action — ^that  any  tongue  should  be  a 
noble  one,  of  which  the  words  are  not  so  many  trumpet- 
calls  to  action.  All  great  languages  invariably  utter  great 
things,  and  command  them;  they  cannot  be  mimicked  but 
by  obedience;  the  breath  of  them  is  inspiration  because  it 
is  not  only  vocal,  but  vital;  and  you  can  only  learn  to 
speak  as  these  men  spoke,  by  becoming  what  these  men 
were.^ 

70.  Now  for  direct  confirmation  of  this,  I  want  you  to 
think  over  the  relation  of  expression  to  character  in  two 
great  masters  of  the  absolute  art  of  language,  Virgil  and 
Pope.  You  are  perhaps  surprised  at  the  last  name;  and 
indeed  you  have  in  English  much  higher  grasp  and  melody 
of  language  from  more  passionate  minds,  but  you  have 
nothing  else,  in  its  range,  so  perfect.'  I  name,  therefore, 
these  two  men,  because  they  are  the  two  most  accomplished 
Artists^  merely  as  such,  whom  I  know  in  literature;  and 
becauc^  I  think  you  will  be  afterwards  interested  in  in- 
vestigating how  the  infinite  grace  in  the  words  of  the  one, 
and  the  severity  in  those  of  the  other,  and  the  precision  in 
those  of  both,  arise  wholly  out  of  the  moral  elements  of 
their  minds : — out  of  the  deep  tenderness  in  Virgil  which 


^  piuskiii  again  read  this  passage  (M  69-70)  in  his 
in  ^Modern  Painters*"  (see  a  later  volume).] 


course  of  1877,  "  Beadingi 
^  [For  a  sammary  of  Ruskin's  references' to  Pope,  see  VoL  XVL  p.  446  it.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    77 

enabled  him  to  write  the  stories  of  Nisus  and  Lausus ;  ^  and 
the  serene  and  just  benevolence  which  placed  Pope,  in  his 
theology,  two  centuries  in  advance  of  his  time,  and  enabled 
him  to  sum  the  law  of  noble  life  in  two  lines  which,  so  far 
as  I  know,  are  the  most  complete,  the  most  concise,  and 
the  most  lofty  expression  of  moral  temper  existing  in  Eng- 
lish words : — 

^^ Never  elated^  xchiie  one  man's  oppressed; 
Never  defected^  whik  another's  oless'dT*^ 

I  wish  you  also  to  remember  these  lines  of  Pope,  and  to 
make  yourselves  entirely  masters  of  his  system  of  ethics; 
because,  putting  Shakespeare  aside  as  rather  the  world's 
than  ours,  I  hold  Pope  to  be  the  most  perfect  representa- 
tive we  have,  since  Chaucer,  of  the  true  English  mind;' 
and  I  think  the  Dunciad  is  the  most  absolutely  chiselled 
and  monumental  work  '* exacted"*  in  our  country.  You 
will  find,  as  you  study  Pope,  that  he  has  expressed  for 
you,  in  the  strictest  language  and  within  the  briefest  Kmits, 
every  law  of  art,  of  criticism,  of  economy,  of  policy,  and, 
finally,  of  a  benevolence,  humble,  rational,  and  resigned, 
contented  with  its  allotted  share  of  life,  and  trusting  the 
problem  of  its  salvation  to  Him  in  whose  hand  lies  that  of 
the  imiverse. 

71.  And  now  I  pass  to  the  arts  with  which  I  have 
special  concern,  in  which,  though  the  facts  are  exactly  the 
same,  I  shall  have  more  difficulty  in  proving  my  assertion, 
because  very  few  of  us  are  as  cognizant  of  the  merit  of 
painting  as  we  are  of  that  of  language;  and  I  can  only 
show  you  whence  that  merit  springs,  after  having  thoroughly 
shown  you  in  what  it  consists.  But,  in  the  meantime,  I 
have  simply  to  tell  you,  that  the  manual  arts  are  as  accurate 
exponents  of  ethical  state,  as  other  modes  of  expression; 


1 

s 
s 

4 


Qeorgieg,  i.  404  seq, ;  JBneid,  x.  793  teg.] 

'Eksay  on  Man,  iv.  323-324.] 

ComiMure  §  14;  above,  p.  29.] 

•See  Horace,  Oiu,  iiL  30^  1:  **  Emgi  monumentam  «re  pereoniiia.*'] 


78  LECTURES  ON  ART 

first,  with  absolute  precision,  of  that  of  the  workman;  and 
then  with  precision,  disguised  by  many  distorting  influences, 
of  that  of  the  nation  to  which  it  belongs* 

And,  first,  they  are  a  perfect  exponent  of  the  mind 
of  the  workman:  but,  being  so,  remember,  if  the  mind  be 
great  or  complex,  the  art  is  not  an  easy  book  to  read ;  for 
we  must  ourselves  possess  all  the  mentid  characters  of  which 
we  are  to  read  the  signs.  No  man  can  read  the  evidence 
of  labour  who  is  not  himself  laborious,  for  he  does  not 
know  what  the  work  cost :  nor  can  he  read  the  evidence  of 
true  passion  if  he  is  not  passionate;  nor  of  gentleness  if 
he  is  not  gentle:  and  the  most  subtle  signs  of  fault  and 
weakness  of  character  he  can  only  judge  by  having  had  the 
same  faults  to  fight  with.  I  myself,  for  instance,  know 
impatient  work,  and  tired  wcMrk,  better  than  most  critics, 
because  I  am  myself  always  impatient,  and  often  tired: — 
so  also,  the  patient  and  indefatigable  touch  of  a  mighty 
master  becomes  more  wonderful  to  me  than  to  others. 
Yet,  wonderful  in  no  mean  measure  it  will  be  to  you  aUL 
when  I  make  it  manifest, — and  as  soon  as  we  begin  our 
real  work,  and  you  have  learned  what  it  is  to  draw  a  true 
line,  I  shall  be  able  to  make  manifest  to  you, — and  indis- 
putably so, — ^that  the  day's  work  of  a  man  like  Mantegna 
or  Paul  Veronese  consists  of  an  unfaltering,  uninterruptedt 
succession  of  movements  of  the  hand  more  precise  than 
those  of  the  finest  fencer :  the  pencil  leaving  one  point  and 
arriving  at  another,  not  only  with  unerring  precision  at  the 
extremity  of  the  line,  but  with  an  unerring  and  yet  varied 
course — sometimes  over  spaces  a  foot  or  mote  in  extent — 
yet  a  course  so  determine  everjrwhare,  that  either  of  these 
men  could,  and  Veronese  often  does,  draw  a  finished  profile, 
or  any  other  portion  of  the  contour  of  the  face,  with  oae 
line,  not  afterwards  changed.  Try,  first,  to  realise  to  your- 
selves the  muscular  precision  of  that  action,  and  the  intel- 
lectual strain  of  it;    for   the    movement  ci  a  fencer^   is 

1  [On  th«  «rt  of  ftacinf,  eoinpw«  Two  Pathi,  §  62  it.  (VoL  XVI.  p.  294  n.).] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    79 

pofect  in  jMractised  monotony;  but  the  movement  of  the 
hand  of  a  great  painter  is  at  every  instant  governed  by  a 
direct  and  new  intention.  Then  imagine  that  muscidar 
firmness  and  subtlety,  and  the  instantaneously  selective  and 
Mdinant  energy  of  the  htsia^  sustained  all  day  long,  not 
only  without  &tigue,  but  with  a  visible  joy  in  the  exertion, 
like  that  which  an  eagle  seems  to  take  in  the  wave  of  his 
wings ;  aad  this  all  life  long,  and  through  long  life,  not 
only  without  failure  of  power,  but  with  visible  increase  of 
it,  imtil  the  actually  organic  changes  of  old  age.  And 
then  consider,  so  far  as  you  know  anything  of  physiology, 
what  sort  of  an  ethical  state  of  body  and  mind  that  means  I 
— ethic  through  ages  past  1  what  fineness  of  race  there  must 
be  to  get  it,  what  exquisite  balance  and  symmetry  of  the 
vital  powers  I  And  then,  finally,  determine  for  yourselves 
whether  a  manhood  Uke  that  is  consistent  with  any  vicious- 
ness  of  soul,  with  any  mean  anxiety,  any  gnawing  lust,  any 
wretchedness  of  spite  or  remorse,  any  consciousness  of 
rebellion  against  law  of  Grod  or  man,  or  any  actual,  though 
UQConscious  violation  of  even  the  least  law  to  which  obedi* 
eaoice  is  essential  for  the  glory  of  life  and  the  pleasing  of 
its  Giver. 

72.  It  is,  of  course,  true  that  many  of  the  strong  masters 
had  deep  faults  of  character,  but  thdr  faults  always  show 
in  their  work.  It  is  true  that  some  could  not  govern  their 
passicms;  if  so,  they  died  young,  or  they  painted  ill  when 
old.  But  the  greater  part  of  our  misapprehension  in  the 
whole  matter  is  fix»n  our  not  having  wdl  known  who  the 
gi^eat  painters  were,  and  taking  delight  in  the  petty  skill 
that  was  bred  in  the  fumes  of  the  taverns  of  tiie  North, 
instead  of  theirs  who  breathed  emj^real  air,  sons  of  the 
morning,  under  the  woods  of  Assisi  and  the  crags  of  Cadore. 

78.  It  is  true  however  also,  as  I  have  pointed  out  long 
ago,^  that  the  strong  masters  fall  into  two  great  divisions, 
one  leading  simple  and  natural  lives,  the  other  restrained  in 

>  [Stanei  qf  Venice,  voL  ii.  (1853),  ch.  vi.  (Vol.  X.  pp.  221-^24).] 


80  LECTURES  ON  ART 

a  Puritanism  of  the  worship  of  beauty ;  and  these  two  man- 
ners of  life  you  may  recognize  in  a  moment  by  their  work. 
Generally  the  naturalists  are  the  strongest;  but  there  are 
two  of  the  Puritans,  whose  work  if  I  can  succeed  in  mak- 
ing clearly  understandable  to  you  during  my  three  years 
here,^  it  is  all  I  need  care  to  do.  But  of  these  two  Puritans 
one  I  cannot  name  to  you,  and  the  other  I  at  present  will 
not.  One  I  cannot,  for  no  one  knows  his  name,  except 
the  baptismal  one,  Bernard,  or  "dear  little  Bernard" — Ber- 
nardino, called  from  his  birthplace,  (Luino,  on  the  Lago 
Maggiore,)  Bernard  of  Luino.*  The  other  is  a  Venetian,* 
of  whom  many  of  you  probably  have  never  heard,  and  of 
whom,  through  me,  you  shall  not  hear,  imtil  I  have  tried 
to  get  some  picture  by  him  over  to  England. 

74.  Observe  then,  this  Puritanism  in  the  worship  of 
beauty,  though  sometimes  weak,  is  always  honourable  and 
amiable,  and  the  exact  reverse  of  the  false  Puritanism,  which 
consists  in  the  dread  or  disdain  of  beauty.  And  in  order 
to  treat  my  subject  rightly,  I  ought  to  proceed  from  the 
skill  of  art  to  the  choice  of  its  subject,  and  show  you  how 
the  moral  temper  of  the  workman  is  shown  by  his  seeking 
lovely  forms  and  thoughts  to  express,  as  well  as  by  the 
force  of  his  hand  in  expression.  But  I  need  not  now  urge 
this  part  of  the  proof  on  you,  because  you  are  already,  I 
believe,  sufficiently  conscious  of  the  truth  in  this  matter, 
and  also  I  have  already  said  enough  of  it  in  my  writings ;  ^ 
whereas  I  have  not  at  all  said  enough  of  the  infallibleness 
of  fine  technical  work  as  a  proof  of  every  other  good  power. 
And  indeed  it  was  long  before  I  myself  understood  the 
true  meaning  of  the  pride  of  the  greatest  men  in  their 
mere  execution,  shown  for  a  permanent  lesson  to    us,  in 

^  [The  Professor  is  appointed  for  ikree  years.  Ruskin  was  re-appointed  in  1873, 
and  win  in  1876 ;  and  once  more,  after  an  interval,  in  1882.1 

>  [For  a  characterisation  of  Lnino,  see  CeHus  qfAglaia,  §  83  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  129.] 

*  [Carpaccio.  See  Vol.  IV.  p.  S66  n.  for  Rosldn's  ''discovery"  of  him  in  1869; 
there  was,  however,  already  a  picture  by  Carpaccio  in  the  National  Gallery,  No.  760, 
purchased  in  1865  for  £3400.] 

*  [See,  $,g.,  Vol.  III.  p.  92  (end) ;  VoL  V.  pp.  42,  48.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    81 

the  stories  which,  whether  true  or  not,  indicate  with  abso- 
lute accuracy  the  general  conviction  of  great  artists; — ^the 
stories  of  the  contest  of  Apelles  and  Protogenes  in  a  line 
only,^  (of  which  I  can  promise  you,  you  shall  know  the 
meaning  to  some  purpose  in  a  little  while) — the  story  of 
the  circle  of  Giotto,*  and  especially,  which  you  may  perhaps 
not  have  observed,  the  expression  of  Durer  in  his  inscrip- 
tion on  the  drawings  sent  him  by  Raphael  These  figures, 
he  says,  '^Raphael  drew  and  sent  to  Albert  Diirer  in  Niim- 
berg,  to  show  him'* — What?  Not  his  invention,  nor  his 
beauty  of  expression,  but  "sein  Hand  zu  weisen,**  "To 
show  him  his  Aanrf."'  And  you  will  find,  as  you  exa- 
mine farther,  that  all  inferior  artists  are  continually  trying 
to  escape  from  the  necessity  of  sound  work,  and  either  in- 
dulging themselves  in  their  delights  in  subject,  or  pluming 
themselves  on  their  noble  motives  for  attempting  what  they 
cannot  perform ;  (and  observe,  by  the  way,  that  a  great  deal 
of  what  is  mistaken  for  conscientious  motive  is  nothing  but 
a  very  pestilent,  because  very  subtle,  condition  of  vanity;) 
whereas  the  great  men  always  understand  at  once  that  the 
first  morality  of  a  painter,  as  of  everybody  else,  is  to  know 
his  business;  and  so  earnest  are  they  in  this,  that  many^ 
whose  Hves  you  would  think,  by  the  results  of  their  work^ 
had  been  passed  in  strong  emotion,  have  in  reality  subdued 
themselves,  though  capable  of  the  very  strongest  passions, 
into  a  calm  as  absolute  as  that  of  a  deeply  sheltered  moun- 
tain lake,  which  reflects  every  agitation  of  the  clouds  in 
the  sky,  and  every  change  of  the  shadows  on  the  hills,  but 
is  itself  motionless. 

75.  Finally,  you   must   remember   that   great   obscurity 
has    been  brought  upon  the  truth  in  this  matter  by  the 

^  [See  Vol.  XII.  p.  183  for  the  reference  to  Pliny;  and  compare  Lecture*  on 
Landscape,  §  24] 

*  [See  Qiotto  and  hie  Worke  in  Padua,  §§  5-7>  for  the  reference  to  Vasari ;  and 
compare  Oeeiue  of  Agiaia,  §  70  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  120).] 

3  [^^1615. — Raffahell  di  Urbiu,  who  is  held  in  such  esteem  by  the  Pope^  made 
these  naked  figures  and  sent  them  to  Albrecht  Diirer  at  Nurnbei^  to  show  him  his 
hand."    Compare  Vol.  XIII.  p.  477,  and  Vol.  XIX.  p.  72.] 


82  LECTURES   ON  ART 

want  of  integrity  and  simplicity  in  our  modern  life.  I 
mean  integrity  in  the  Latin  sense,  wholeness.  Everything 
is  broken  up,  and  mingled  in  confusion,  both  in  our  habits 
and  thoughts;  besides  being  in  great  part  imitative:  so  that 
you  not  only  cannot  tell  what  a  man  is,  but  sometimes 
you  cannot  tell  whether  he  w,  at  all! — ^whether  you  have 
indeed  to  do  with  a  spirit,  or  only  with  an  echo.  And 
thus  the  same  inconsistencies  appear  now,  between  the  work 
of  artists  of  merit  and  their  personal  characters,  as  those 
which  you  find  continually  disappointing  expectation  in  the 
lives  of  men  of  modern  literary  power;  the  same  conditions 
of  society  having  obscured  or  misdirected  the  best  qualities 
of  the  imagination,  both  in  our  literature  and  art.  Thus 
there  is  no  serious  question  with  any  of  us  as  to  the  per- 
sonal character  of  Dante  and  Giotto,  of  Shakespeare  and 
Holbein;  but  we  pause  timidly  in  the  attempt  to  analyse 
the  moral  laws  of  the  art  skill  in  recent  poets,  novelists, 
and  painters. 

76.  Let  me  assure  you  once  for  all,  that  as  you  grow 
older,  if  you  enable  yourselves  to  distinguish,  by  the  truth 
of  your  own  lives,  what  is  true  in  those  of  other  men,  you 
will  gradually  perceive  that  all  good  has  its  origin  in  good, 
never  in  evil;  that  the  fact  of  either  literature  or  painting 
being  truly  fine  of  their  kind,  whatever  their  mistaken  aim, 
or  partial  error,  is  proof  of  their  noble  origin:  and  that,  if 
there  is  indeed  sterling  value  in  the  thing  done,  it  has 
come  of  a  sterling  worth  in  the  soul  that  did  it,  however 
alloyed  or  defiled  by  conditions  of  sin  which  are  some- 
times more  appalling  or  more  strange  than  those  which  all 
may  detect  in  their  own  hearts,  because  they  are  part  of 
a  personality  altogether  larger  than  ours,  and  as  far  beyond 
our  judgment  in  its  darkness  as  beyond  our  following  in 
its  light.  And  it  is  sufficient  warning  against  what  some 
might  dread  as  the  probable  efiect  of  such  a  conviction  on 
your  own  minds,  namely,  that  you  might  permit  yourselves 
in  the  weaknesses  which  you  imagined  to  be  allied  to  genius, 
when  they  took  the  form  of  personal  temptations; — it  is 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    88 

surely,  I  say,  sufficient  warning  against  so  mean  a  folly, 
to  discern,  as  you  may  with  little  pains,  that,  of  all  human 
existences,  the  lives  of  men  of  that  distorted  and  tainted 
nobility  of  intellect  are  probably  the  most  miserable. 

77.  I  pass  to  the  second,  and  for  us  the  more  practi- 
cally important  question,  What  is  the  effect  of  noble  art 
upon  other  men;  what  has  it  done  for  national  morality  in 
time  past:  and  what  effect  is  the  extended  knowledge  or 
possession  of  it  likely  to  have  upon  us  now?  And  here 
we  are  at  once  met  by  the  facts,  which  are  as  gloomy  as 
indisputable,  that,  while  many  peasant  populations,  among 
whom  scarcely  the  rudest  practice  of  art  has  ever  been 
attempted,  have  Lived  in  comparative  innocence,  honour 
and  happiness,  the  worst  foulness  and  cruelty  of  savage 
tribes  have  been  frequently  associated  with  fine  ingenuities 
of  decorative  design ;  also,  that  no  people  has  ever  attained 
the  higher  stages  of  art  skill,  except  at  a  period  of  its 
civilization  which  was  sullied  by  frequent,  violent  and  even 
monstrous  crime;  and,  lastly,  that  the  attaining  of  perfec- 
tion in  art  power  has  been  hitherto,  in  every  nation,  the 
accurate  signal  of  the  beginning  of  its  ruin.^ 

78.  Respecting  which  phenomena,  observe  first,  that  al- 
though good  never  springs  out  of  evil,  it  is  developed  to  its 
highest  by  contention  with  eviL  There  are  some  groups 
of  peasantry,  in  far-away  nooks  of  Christian  countries,  who 
are  nearly  as  innocent  as  lambs;  but  the  morality  which 
gives  power  to  art  is  the  morality  of  men,  not  of  cattle. 

Secondly,  the  virtues  of  the  inhabitants  of  many  country 
districts  are  apparent,  not  real;  their  lives  are  indeed  art- 
less, but  not  innocent ;  and  it  is  only  the  monotony  of  cir- 
cumstances, and  the  absence  of  temptation,  which  prevent 
the  exhibition  of  evil  passions  not  less  real  because  often 
dormant,  nor  less  foul  because  shown  only  in  petty  faults, 
or  inactive  malignities. 

1  [Compare  ''Cambridge  Inaugural  Address,"   §§   U  9eq.  (Vol.   XVI.   pp.   188 


84  LECTURES   ON  ART 

79.  But  you  will  observe  also  that  absolute  artlessness, 
to  men  in  any  kind  of  moral  health,  is  impossible;  they 
have  always,  at  least,  the  art  by  which  they  live — ^agri- 
culture or  seamanship;  and  in  these  industries,  skilfully 
practised,  you  will  find  the  law  of  their  moral  training; 
while,  whatever  the  adversity  of  circumstances,  every  rightly- 
minded  peasantry,  such  as  that  of  Sweden,  Denmark, 
Bavaria,  or  Switzerland,  has  associated  with  its  needful 
industry  a  quite  studied  school  of  pleasurable  art  in  dress ;  ^ 
and  generally  also  in  song,  and  simple  domestic  archi- 
tecture. 

80.  Again,  I  need  not  repeat  to  you  here  what  I  en- 
deavoured to  explain  in  the  first  lecture  in  the  book  I  called 
The  Two  Paths,  respecting  the  arts  of  savage  races:*  but 
I  may  now  note  briefly  that  such  arts  are  the  result  of  an 
intellectual  activity  which  has  found  no  room  to  expand, 
and  which  the  tyranny  of  nature  or  of  man  h&s  condemned 
to  disease  through  arrested  growth.  And  where  neither 
Christianity,  nor  any  other  religion  conveying  some  moral 
help,  has  reached,  the  animal  energy  of  such  races  neces- 
sarily flames  into  ghasitly  conditions  of  evil,  and  the  gro- 
tesque or  fiightful  forms  assumed  by  their  art  are  precisely 
indicative  of  their  distorted  moral  nature. 

81.  But  the  truly  great  nations  nearly  always  begin 
from  a  race  possessing  this  imaginative  power;  and  for 
some  time  their  progress  is  very  slow,  and  their  state  not 
one  of  innocence,  but  of  feverish  and  faultful  animal  energy. 
This  is  gradually  subdued  and  exalted  into  bright  human 
life;  the  art  instinct  purifying  itself  with  the  rest  of  the 
nature,  until  social  periectness  is  nearly  reached;  and  then 
comes  the  period  when  conscience  and  intellect  are  so 
highly  developed,  that  new  forms  of  error  begin  in  the 
inability  to  fulfil  the  demands  of  the  one,  or  to  answer 
the  doubts  of  the  other.  Then  the  wholeness  of  the 
people  is  lost;   all  kinds  of  hjrpocrisies  and  oppositions  of 

»  [Compare  Modem  Painters,  vol.  v,  (Vol.  VJI.  p.  428),  and  Vol.  XVI.  p.  48.] 
«  (See  Vol.  XVI.  pp.  259  eeq.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS     85 

science^  develop  themselves;  their  faith  is  questioned  on 
one  side,  and  compromised  with  on  the  other;  wealth 
commonly  increases  at  the  same  period  to  a  destructive 
extent;  luxury  follows;  and  the  ruin  of  the  nation  is 
then  certain:  while  the  arts,  all  this  time,  are  simply,  as 
I  said  at  first,  the  exponents  of  each  phase  of  its  moral 
state,  and  no  more  control  it  in  its  political  career  than  the 
gleam  of  the  firefly  guides  its  oscillation.  It  is  true  that 
their  most  splendid  results  are  usually  obtained  in  the 
swiftness  of  the  power  which  is  hunying  to  the  precipice ; 
but  to  lay  the  charge  of  the  catastrophe  to  the  art  by 
which  it  is  illumined,  is  to  find  a  cause  for  the  cataract  in 
the  hues  of  its  iris.  It  is  true  that  the  colossal  vices  be- 
longing to  periods  of  great  national  wealth  (for  wealth, 
you  will  find,  is  the  real  root  of  all  evil  *)  can  turn  every 
good  gift  and  skill  of  nature  or  of  man  to  evil  purpose. 
If,  in  such  times,  fair  pictures  have  been  misused,  how 
much  more  fair  realities?  And  if  Miranda  is  inmioral  to 
Caliban,  is  that  Miranda's  fault? 

82.  And  I  could  easily  go  on  to  trace  for  you  what 
at  the  moment  I  speak,  is  signified,  in  our  own  national 
character,  by  the  forms  of  art,  and  unhappily  also  by  the 
forms  of  what  is  not  art,  but  arexyia^  that  exist  among  us. 
But  the  more  important  question  is.  What  will  be  signified 
by  them;  what  is  there  in  us  now  of  worth  and  strength, 
which  under  our  new  and  partly  accidental  impulse  towards 
formative  labour,  may  be  by  that  expressed,  and  by  that 
fortified? 

Would  it  not  be  well  to  know  this?  Nay,  irrespective 
of  all  future  work,  is  it  not  the  first  thing  we  should  want 
to  know,  what  stuff  we  are  made  of — how  far  we  are 
iiyadoi  or  Kcucdi — ^good,  or  good  for  nothing?  We  may  all 
know  that,  each  of  ourselves,  easily  enough,  if  we  like  to 
put  one  grave  question  well  home. 

88.  Supposing  it  were  told  any  of  you  by  a  physician 


1  [1  Timotliy  vi.  20.] 
«  [1  Timothy  vi.  10.] 


86  LECTURES   ON  ART 

whose  word  you  could  not  but  trust,  that  you  had  not 
more  than  seven  days  to  live.  And  suppose  also  that,  by 
the  manner  of  your  education  it  had  happened  to  you, 
as  it  has  happened  to  many,  never  to  have  heard  of  any 
future  state,  or  not  to  have  credited  what  you  heard ;  and 
therefore  that  you  had  to  face  this  fact  of  the  approach  of 
death  in  its  simplicity:  fearing  no  pimishment  for  any  sin 
that  you  might  have  before  committed,  or  in  the  coming 
days  might  determine  to  commit ;  and  having  similarly  no 
hope  of  reward  for  past,  or  yet  possible,  virtue ;  nor  even 
of  any  consciousness  whatever  to  be  left  to  you,  after 
the  seventh  day  had  ended,  either  of  the  results  of  your 
acts  to  those  whom  you  loved,  or  of  the  feelings  of  any 
survivors  towards  you.  Then  the  manner  in  which  you 
would  spend  the  seven  days  is  an  exact  measure  of  the 
morality  of  your  nature.^ 

84.  I  know  that  some  of  you,  and  I  believe  the  greater 
number  of  you,  would,  in  such  a  case,  spend  the  granted 
days  entirely  as  you  ought.  Neither  in  numbering  the 
errors,  or  deploring  the  pleasures  of  the  past, ;  nor  in  grasp- 
ing at  vile  good  in  the  present,  nor  vainly  lamenting  the 
darkness  of  the  future;  but  in  an  instant  and  earnest 
execution  of  whatever  it  might  be  possible  for  you  to 
accomplish  in  the  time,  in  setting  your  affairs  in  order, 
and  in  providing  for  the  future  comfort,  and — so  far  as 
you  might  by  any  message  or  record  of  yourself, — ^for  the 
consolation,  of  those  whom  you  loved,  and  by  whom  you 
desired  to  be  remembered,  not  for  your  good,  but  for  theirs. 
How  far  you  might  fail  through  human  weakness,  in  shame 
for  the  past,  despair  at  the  little  that  could  in  the  rem- 
nant of  life  be  accomplished,  or  the  intolerable  pain  of 
broken  affection,  would  depend  wholly  on  the  degree  in 
which  your  nature  had  been  depressed  or  fortified  by  the 
manner  of  your  past  life.     But  I  think  there  are  few  of 

^  [Compare  Ethies  of  the  Bust,  Vol.   XVIII.  p.  204,  where  (in  the  Prefitce  of 
1877)  Roekin  refers  to  this  passage  in  connexion  with  the  Etkia,  pp.  301,  902.] 


P^MMMV^^^^MMM  _    . 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    87 

you  who  would  not  spend  those  last  days  better  than  all 
that  had  preceded  them. 

85.  If  you  look  accurately  through  the  records  of  the 
lives  that  have  been  most  useful  to  humanity,  you  will  find 
that  all  that  has  been  done  best,  has  been  done  so ; — ^that 
to  the  clearest  intellects  and  highest  souls, — ^to  the  true 
children  of  the  Father,  with  whom  a  thousand  years  are  as 
one  day,^  their  poor  seventy  years  are  but  as  seven  days. 
The  removal  of  the  shadow  of  death  from  them  to  an 
uncertain,  but  always  narrow,  distance,  never  takes  away 
from  them  their  intuition  of  its  approach;  the  extending 
to  them  of  a  few  hours  more  or  less  of  light  abates  not 
their  acknowledgment  of  the  infinitude  that  must  remain 
to  be  known  beyond  their  knowledge, — done  beyond  their 
deeds:  the  unprofitableness  of  their  momentary  service  is 
wrought  in  a  magnificent  despair,  and  their  very  honour 
is  bequeathed  by  them  for  the  joy  of  others,  as  they  lie 
down  to  their  rest,  regarding  for  themselves  the  voice  of 
men  no  more. 

86.  The  best  things,  I  repeat  to  you,  have  been  done 
thus,  and  therefore,  sorrowfully.  But  the  greatest  part  of 
the  good  work  of  the  world  is  done  either  in  pure  and  un- 
vexed  instinct  of  duty,  "  I  have  stubbed  Thomaby  waste ;  '*  * 
or  else,  and  better,  it  is  cheerful  and  helpful  doing  of 
what  the  hand  finds  to  do,  in  surety  that  at  evening 
time,  whatsoever  is  right  the  Master  wUl  give.'  And  that 
it  be  worthily  done,  depends  wholly  on  that  ultimate 
quantity  of  worth  which  you  can  measure,  each  in  him- 
self, by  the  test  I  have  just  given  you.  For  that  test, 
observe,  will  mark  to  you  the  precise  force,  first  of  your 
absolute  courage,  and  then  of  the  energy  in  you  for  the 
light  ordering  of  things,  and  the  kindly  dealing  with 
persons.     You    have    cut  away  from  these   two    instincts 

1  [2  Peter  iii.  8.1 

>  [Tflnnyaon:  ''Northern  Fanner,  Old  Style,"  yii.— ''an'  I  'a  ttubb'd  Thumabjr 

s  [See  Eeclesiasticns  ix.  10,  and  Matthew  xz.  7,  8.] 


88  LECTUKES  ON  ART 

every  selfish  or  common  motive,  and  left  nothing  but  the 
energies  of  Order  and  of  Love. 

87.  Now,  where  those  two  roots  are  set,  all  the  other 
powers  and  desires  find  right  nourishment,  and  become,  to 
their  own  utmost,  helpful  to  others  and  pleasurable  to 
ourselves.  And  so  far  as  those  two  springs  of  action  are 
not  in  us,  all  other  powers  become  corrupt  or  dead;  even 
the  love  of  truth,  apart  from  these,  hardens  into  an  in- 
solent and  cold  avarice  of  knowledge,  which  unused,  is  more 
vain  than  unused  gold. 

88.  These,  then,  are  the  two  essential  instincts  of 
humanity:  the  love  of  Order  and  the  love  of  Kindness. 
By  the  love  of  order  the  moral  energy  is  to  deal  with  the 
eiui;h,  and  to  dress  it,  and  keep  it;^  and  with  all  rebellious 
and  dissolute  forces  in  lower  creatures,  or  in  ourselves.  By 
the  love  of  doing  kindness  it  is  to  deal  rightly  with  all 
surrounding  life.  And  then,  grafted  on  these,  we  are  to 
make  every  other  passion  perfect;  so  that  they  may  every 
one  have  full  strength  and  yet  be  absolutely  under  control. 

89.  Every  one  must  be  strong,  every  one  perfect,  every 
one  obedient  as  a  war  horse.  And  it  is  among  the  most 
beautiful  pieces  of  mysticism  to  which  eternal  truth  is 
attached,  that  the  chariot  race,  which  Plato  uses  as  an 
image  of  moral  government,'  and  which  is  indeed  the  most 
perfect  type  of  it  in  any  visible  skill  of  men,  should  have 
been  made  by  the  Greeks  the  continual  subject  of  their 
best  poetry  and  best  art.  Nevertheless  Plato's  use  of  it  is 
not  altogether  true.  There  is  no  black  horse  in  the  chariot 
of  the  soul.  One  of  the  driver's  worst  faults  is  in  starving 
his  horses;  another,  in  not  breaking  them  early  enough; 
but  they  are  all  good.  Take,  for  example,  one  usually 
thought  of  as  wholly  evil  —  that  of  Anger,  leading  to 
vengeance.^    I  believe  it  to  be  quite  one  of  the  crowning 

1  rGenesis  ii.  16;  compare  Vol.  VII.  p.  13.] 

'  [Phadnu,  246.  For  an  example  of  a  vase-drawing  of  a  cbariot-raoe,  see 
No.  49  in  the  Educational  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  120).] 

s  [See  Queen  qf  the  Air,  §  118  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  400).  Compare  also  Fore  Oatfigera, 
Letter  23,  where  this  passage  is  referred  to.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    89 

wickednesses  of  this  age  that  we  have  starved  and  chilled 
our  faculty  of  indignation,  and  neither  desire  nor  dare 
to  punish  crimes  justly.  We  have  taken  up  the  benevo- 
lent idea,  forsooth,  that  justice  is  to  be  preventive  instead 
of  vindictive;^  and  we  imagine  that  we  are  to  punish, 
not  in  anger,  but  in  expediency;  not  that  we  may  give 
deserved  pain  to  the  person  in  fault,  but  that  we  may 
frighten  other  people  from  committing  the  same  fault. 
The  beautiful  theory  of  this  non-vindictive  justice  is,  that 
having  convicted  a  man  of  a  crime  worthy  of  death,  we 
entirely  pardon  the  criminal,  restore  him  to  his  place  in 
our  affection  and  esteem,  and  then  hang  him,  not  as  a 
malefactor,  but  as  a  scarecrow.  That  is  the  theory.  And 
the  practice  is,  that  we  send  a  child  to  prison  for  a  month 
for  stealing  a  handful  of  walnuts,^  for  fear  that  other  chil- 
dren should  come  to  steal  more  of  our  walnuts.  And  we 
do  not  punish  a  swindler  for  ruining  a  thousand  families, 
because  we  think  swindling  is  a  wholesome  excitement  to 
trade. 

90.  But  all  true  justice  is  vindictive  to  vice,  as  it  is 
rewarding  to  virtue.  Only — ^and  herein  it  is  distinguished 
firom  personal  revenge — it  is  vindictive  of  the  wrong  done; 
— ^not  of  the  Mrrong  done  to  us.  It  is  the  naticHial  expres- 
sion of  deliberate  anger,  as  of  deliberate  gratitude;  it  is 
not  exemplary,  or  even  corrective,  but  essentially  retri- 
butive; it  is  the  absolute  art  of  measured  recompense, 
giving  honour  where  honour  is  due,'  and  shame  where 
shame  is  due,  and  joy  where  joy  is  due,  and  pain  where 
pain  is  due.  It  is  neither  educational,  for  men  are  to  be 
educated  by  wholesome  habit,  not  by  rewards  and  punish- 
ments; nor  is  it  preventive,  for  it  is  to  be  executed  with- 
out regard  to  any  consequences ;  but  only  for  righteousness' 
sake,  a  righteous  nation  does  judgment  and  justice.^    But 

*  [On  the  ethics  of  punishment^  see  A  Joy  fwr  Every  §  123  (Vol.  XVI.  p.  106) ; 
liimera  PulverUf  §  120  n.,  lime  and  Tide,  §  86,  and  ^'Notes  on  Employment" 
(Vol.  XVII.  pp.  243,  392,  642).] 

*  [Compare  Sesame  and  lAUee,  §  30  (Vol  XVIII.  p.  82).] 


'   Romans  xiii.  7*] 
«  [1  Kings  z.  9.] 


90  LECTURES  ON  ART 

in  this,  as  in  all  other  instances,  the  tightness  of  the 
secondary  passion  depends  on  its  being  grafted  on  those 
two  primary  instincts,  the  love  of  order  and  of  kindness, 
so  that  indignation  itself  is  against  the  wounding  of  love. 
Do  you  think  the  /ivivig  'Ax<X$o9  came  of  a  hard  heart  in 
Achilles,^  or  the  "Pallas,  te  hoc  vulnere,  Pallas,***  of  a 
hard  heart  in  Anchises'  son? 

91.  And  now,  if  with  this  clue  through  the  labyrinth 
of  them,  you  remember  the  course  of  the  arts  of  great 
nations,  you  will  perceive  that  whatever  has  prospered,  and 
become  lovely,  had  its  banning — ^for  no  other  was  possible 
— ^in  the  love  of  order  in  material  things  associated  with 
true  Sucauxrvvti:  and  the  desire  of  beauty  in  material  things, 
which  is  associated  with  true  affection,  charitas^  and  with 
the  innumerable  conditions  of  gentleness  expressed  by  the 
different  uses  of  the  words  xapi^  and  grciia^  You  will 
find  that  this  love  of  beauty  is  an  essential  part  of  all 
healthy  human  nature,  and  though  it  can  long  co-exist 
with  states  of  life  in  many  other  respects  unvirtuous,  it  is 
itself  wholly  good; — the  direct  adversary  of  envy,  avarice, 
mean  worldly  care,  and  especially  of  cruelty.  It  entirely 
perishes  when  these  are  wilfully  indulged;  and  the  men  in 
whom  it  has  been  most  strong  have  always  been  compas- 
sionate, and  lovers  of  justice,  and  the  earli^  discemers  and 
declarers  of  things  conducive  to  the  happiness  of  mankind. 

92.  Nearly  every  important  truth  respecting  the  love  of 
beauty  in  its  familiar  relations  to  human  life  was  mjrthic*- 
ally  expressed  by  the  Greeks  in  their  various  accounts  of 
the  parentage  and  offices  of  the  Graces.  But  one  fact,  the 
most  vital  of  all,  they  could  not  in  its  Ailness  perceive, 
namely,  that  the  intensity  of  other  perceptions  of  beauty 
is  exactly  commensurate  with  the  inoaginative  purity  of  the 
passion   of  love,  and  with  the   singleness  of  its  devotion. 

^  [Cmnpftre  8e9ame  and  LUie$,  §  114  (Vol  XVIII.  p.  161)^  and  Querni  qf  the  Air, 
§  16  and  n.  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  307).] 
s  USneid,  zii.  948.] 
*  [On  theM  words,  aee  VoL  XVII.  p.  225  n.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    91 

They  were  not  fully  conscious  of,  and  could  not  therefore 
either  mythically  or  philosophically  express,  the  deep  rela- 
tion within  themselves  between  their  power  of  perceiving 
beauty,  and  the  honour  of  domestic  affection  which  found 
their  sternest  themes  of  tragedy  in  the  infringement  of  its 
laws; — ^which  made  the  rape  of  Helen  the  chief  subject  of 
their  epic  poetry,  and  whi^  fastened  their  clearest  ^mbol- 
ism  of  resurrection  on  the  story  of  Alcestis.^  Unhappily, 
the  subordinate  position  of  their  most  revered  women, 
and  the  partial  corruption  of  feeling  towards  them  by  the 
presence  of  certain  other  singular  states  of  inferior  passion 
which  it  is  as  difficult  as  grievous  to  analyse,  arrested 
the  ethical  as  well  as  the  formative  progress  of  the  Greek 
mind ; '  and  it  was  not  until  after  an  interval  of  nearly  two 
thousand  years  of  various  error  and  pain,  that,  partly  as 
the  true  reward  of  Christian  warfare  nobly  sustained  through 
centuries  of  trial,  and  partly  as  the  visionary  culmination 
of  the  faith  which  saw  in  a  maiden's  purity  the  link  be- 
tween God  and  her  race,  the  highest  and  holiest  strength 
of  mortal  love  was  reached;  and,  together  with  it,  in 
the  song  of  Dante,  and  the  painting  of  Bernard  of  Luino 
and  his  feUows,  the  perception,  and  embodiment  for  ever 
of  whatsoever  things  are  pure,  whatsoever  things  are  lovely, 
whatsoever  things  are  of  good  report; — that,  if  there  be 
any  virtue,  and  if  there  be  any  praise,  men  might  think  on 
those  things.' 

98.  You  probably  observed  the  expression  I  used  a 
moment  ago,  the  imaginative  purity  of  the  passion  of  love. 
I  have  not  yet  spoken,  nor  is  it  possible  for  me  to-day, 
to  speak  adequately,  of  the  moral  power  of  the  imagina- 
tion :  but  you  may  for  yourselves  enough  discern  its  nature 
merely  by  comparing  the  dignity  of  the  relations  between 
the  sexes,  from  their  lowest  level  in  moths  or  mollusca, 

^  [For  anoihor  reference  to  the  story,  tee  Suame  and  IAUm^  %  61  (VoL  XVIII. 

p.  117)0 

s  [CpDipere  Eagk^t  NeH,  §  107.] 
*  [PhilippiaiiB  iv.  8.] 


-JMil^ 


92  LECTURES   ON  ART 

through  the  higher  creatures  in  whom  they  become  a 
domestic  influence  and  law,  up  to  the  love  of  pure  men 
and  women;  and,  finally,  to  the  ideal  love  which  animated 
chivahy.^  Throughout  this  vast  ascent  it  is  the  gradual 
increase  of  the  imaginative  faculty  which  exalts  and  enlarges 
the  authority  of  the  passion,  imtil,  at  its  height,  it  is  the 
bulwark  of  patience,  the  tutor  of  honour,  and  the  perfect- 
ness  of  praise. 

94.  You  will  find  farther,  that  as  of  love,  so  of  all 
the  other  passions,  the  right  government  and  exaltation 
begins  in  that  of  the  Imagination,  which  is  lord  over 
them.  For  to  subdue  the  passions,  which  is  thought  so 
often  to  be  the  sum  of  duty  respecting  them,  is  possible 
enough  to  a  proud  dulness;  but  to  ea:cite  them  rightly, 
and  make  them  strong  for  good,  is  the  work  of  the 
unselfish  imagination.  It  is  constantly  said  that  human 
nature  is  heartless.  Do  not  believe  it.^  Human  nature 
is  kind  and  generous;  but  it  is  narrow  and  blind;  and 
can  only  with  difficulty  conceive  anjrthing  but  what  it 
immediately  sees  and  feels.  People  would  instantly  care 
for  others  as  well  as  themselves  if  only  they  could  imoLgine 
others  as  well  as  themselves.  Let  a  child  fall  into  the 
river  before  the  roughest  man's  eyes ; — ^he  will  usually  do 
what  he  can  to  get  it  out,  even  at  some  risk  to  himself; 
and  all  the  town  will  triumph  in  the  saving  of  one  little 
life.  Let  the  same  man  be  shown  that  hundreds  of 
children  are  dying  of  fever  for  want  of  some  sanitary 
measure  which  it  will  cost  him  trouble  to  urge,  and  he 
will  make  no  effort;  and  probably  aU  the  town  would 
resist  him  if  he  did.  So,  also,  the  lives  of  many  deserving 
women  are  passed  in  a  succession  of  petty  anxieties  about 
themselves,  and  gleaning  of  minute  interests  and  mean 
pleasures  in  their  immediate  circle,  because  they  are  never 
taught  to  make  any  effort  to  look  beyond  it;  or  to  know 

^  [On  this  subject  compare  tiie  lecture  added  in  this  edition  to  Ariadne 
FhrenHnaJy 

^  [On  Ruskin's  faith  in  the  dignity  and  nobility  of  human  nature,  compare 
Vol.  XVIII.  p.  474,  and  Vol  XIX.  pp.  1.,  365.] 


III.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  MORALS    98 

anything  about  the  mighty  world  in  which  their  lives  are 
fading,  like  bhides  of  bitter  grass  in  fruitless  fields.^ 

95.  I  had  intended  to  enlarge  on  this — and  yet  more 
on  the  kmgdom  which  every  man  holds  in  his  conceptive 
faculty,  to  be  peopled  with  active  thoughts  and  lovely  pre- 
sences, or  left  waste  for  the  springing  up  of  those  dark 
desires  and  dreams  of  which  it  is  written  that  ''every 
imagination  of  the  thoughts  of  man's  heart  is  evil  con- 
tinually."'  True,  and  a  thousand  times  true  it  is,  that, 
here  at  least,  ''greater  is  he  that  ruleth  his  spirit,  than  he 
that  taketh  a  city.''^  But  this  you  can  partly  follow  out 
for  yourselves  without  help,  partly  we  must  leave  it  for 
future  enquiry.  I  press  to  the  conclusion  which  I  wish 
to  leave  with  you,  that  all  you  can  rightly  do,  or  honour- 
ably become,  depends  on  the  government  of  these  two 
instincts  of  order  and  kindness,  by  this  great  Imagiiuttive 
faculty,  which  gives  you  inheritance  of  the  past,  grasp  of  the 
present,  authority  over  the  future.  Map  out  the  spaces  of 
your  possible  lives  by  its  help ;  measure  the  range  of  their 
possible  agency  I  On  the  walls  and  towers  of  this  your 
fair  city,  there  is  not  an  ornament  of  which  the  first  origin 
may  not  be  traced  back  to  the  thoughts  of  men  who  died 
two  thousand  years  ago.  Whom  will  you  be  governing  by 
your  thoughts,  two  thousand  years  hence?  Think  of  it, 
and  you  will  find  that  so  far  from  art  being  immoral, 
little  else  except  art  is  moral  ;^  that  life  without  industry 
is  guilt,  and  industry  without  art  is  brutality:  and  for 
the  words  "good*'  and  "wicked,"  used  of  men,  you  may 
almost  substitute  the  words  "Makers"  and  "Destroyers." 
Far  the  greater  part  of  the  seeming  prosperity  of  the 
world  is,  so  far  as  our  present  knowledge  extends,  vain : 
wholly  useless  for  any  kind  of  good,  but  having  assigned 

1  [Compare  Sesams  and  LUies,  §§  72  teq.  (Vol  XYIII.  pp.  125^  126^  140  seq,),] 

^   Genesis  vL  5.] 

»  iProverba  xvi.  32.] 

*  [Compare  Araira  PerUeHci,  §  97  (below^  p.  264),  where  this  passage  is  referred 
to.  Ruskin  reprinted  it  (beginning  at  *' Think  of  it"  and  continuing  to  the  end  of 
the  lecture)  at  the  end  of  his  paper  on  "  The  Three  Colours  of  Pre-RaphaeUtism " 
(see  a  later  volume  of  this  edition).] 


94  LECTURES  ON  ART 

to  it  a  certain  inevitable  sequence  of  destruction  and  of 
sorrow.  Its  stress  is  only  the  stress  of  wandering  storm; 
its  beauty  the  hectic  of  plague:  and  what  is  called  the 
history  of  mankind  is  too  often  the  record  of  whirlwind, 
and  the  map  of  the  spreading  of  leprosy.  But  underneath 
all  that,  or  in  narrow  spaces  of  dominion  in  the  midst  of 
it,  the  work  of  every  man,  *'qui  non  accepit  in  vanitatem 
animam  suam,"^  endures  and  prospers;  a  small  remnant  or 
green  bud  of  it  prevailing  at  last  over  eviL  And  though 
faint  with  sickness,  and  encumbered  in  ruin,  the  true 
workers  redeem  inch  by  inch  the  wilderness  into  garden 
ground;  by  the  help  of  their  joined  hands  the  oider  of 
all  things  is  surely  sustained  and  vitally  expanded,  and  al- 
though with  strange  vacillation,  in  the  eyes  of  the  watcher, 
the  morning  cometh,  and  also  the  night,  there  is  no  hour 
of  human  existence  that  does  not  draw  on  towards  the 
perfect  day.* 

96.  And  perfect  the  day  shall  be,  when  it  is  of  all  men 
understood  that  the  beauty  of  Holiness'  must  be  in  labour 
as  well  as  in  rest.  Nay  1  Tiwre^  if  it  may  be,  m  labour ;  in 
our  strength,  rather  than  in  our  wealoiess;  and  in  the 
choice  of  what  we  shall  work  for  through  the  six  days, 
and  may  know  to  be  good  at  their  evening  time,  than  in 
the  choice  of  what  we  pray  for  on  the  seventh,  of  reward 
or  repose.  With  the  multitude  that  keep  holiday,  we  may 
perhaps  sometimes  vainly  have  gone  up  to  the  house  of  the 
Lord,  and  vainly  there  asked  for  what  we  fancied  would 
be  mercy;  but  for  the  few  who  labour  as  their  Lord 
would  have  them,  the  mercy  needs  no  seeking,  and  their 
wide  home  no  hallowing.  Surely  goodness  and  mercy  shall 
foUmo  them,  all  the  days  of  their  life ;  and  they  shall  dwell 
in  the  house  of  the  Lord — for  ever. 


s 
a 


Psalmg  xxiv.  4 :  compare  Vol.  XIX.  p.  100.] 

Isaiah  xzi.  11,  12 ;  Proyerbs  iv.  18.] 

Psalms  xcyI  9 ;  and  for  the  other  Biblical  references  in  §  96,  see  Psalms  zlii.  4 


and  zxiiL  6.] 


LECTURE  IV  ^ 

THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE 

97.  OuE  subject  of  enquiry  to-day,  you  will  remember,  is 
the  mode  in  which  fine  art  is  founded  upon,  or  may  con- 
tribute to,  the  practical  requirements  of  human  life. 

Its  offices  in  this  respect  are  mainly  twofold:  it  gives 
Form  to  knowledge,  and  Grace  to  utility;  that  is  to  say, 
it  makes  permanently  visible  to  us  things  which  otherwise 
could  neither  be  described  by  our  science,  nor  retained  by 
our  memory ;  and  it  gives  delightfulness  and  worth  to  the 
implements  of  daily  use,  and  materials  of  dress,  furniture 
and  lodging.  In  the  first  of  these  offices  it  gives  precision 
and  charm  to  truth;  in  the  second  it  gives  precision  and 
charm  to  service.  For,  the  moment  we  make  anything 
useful  thoroughly,  it  is  a  law  of  nature  that  we  shall  be 
pleased  with  ourselves,  and  with  the  thing  we  have  made ; 
and  become  desirous  therefore  to  adorn  or  complete  it,  in 
some  dainty  way,  with  finer  art  expressive  of  our  pleasure. 

And  the  point  I  wish  chiefly  to  bring  before  you  to*day 
is  this  close  and  healthy  connection  of  the  fine  arts  with 
material  use;    but  I  must  first  try  briefly  to  put  in  clear    , 
light  the  function  of  art  in  giving  Form  to  truth. 

98.  Much  that  I  have  hitherto  tried  to  teach  has  been 
disputed  on  the  ground  that  I  have  attached  too  much 
importance  to  art  as  representing  natural  facts,  and  too 
little  to  it  as  a  source  of  pleasure.  And  I  wish,  in  the 
close  of  these  four  prefatory  lectures,  strongly  to  assert  to 
you,  and,  so  far  as  I  can  in  the  time,  convince  you,  that 
the  entire  vitality  of  art  depends  upon  its  being  either 
• 

>  [Delivered  on  March  3,  1870.1 

96 


96  LECTURES  ON  ART 

full  of  truth)  or  full  of  use ;  and  that,  however  pleasant, 
wonderful  or  impressive  it  may  be  in  itself,  it  must  yet 
be  of  inferior  kind,  and  tend  to  deeper  inferiority,  unless  it 
has  clearly  one  of  these  main  objects, — either  to  state  a 
true  thingy  or  to  adorn  a  serviceahle  one}  It  must  never 
exist  alone — never  for  itself;  it  exists  rightly  only  when  it 
is  the  means  of  knowledge,  or  the  grace  of  agency  for  life. 

99,  Now,  I  pray  you  to  observe — ^for  though  I  have 
said  this  often  before,^  I  have  never  yet  said  it  clearly 
enough — every  good  piece  of  art,  to  whichever  of  these 
ends  it  may  be  directed,  involves  first  essentially  the  evi- 
dence of  human  skill,  and  the  formation  of  an  actually 
beautiful  thing  by  it. 

Skill,  and  beauty,  always  then;  and,  beyond  these,  the 
formative  arts  have  always  one  or  other  of  the  two  objects 
which  I  have  just  defined  to  you — ^truth,  or  serviceableness ; 
and  without  these  aims  neither  the  skill  nor  their  beauty 
will  avail ;  only  by  these  can  either  legitimately  reign.  All 
the  graphic  arts  begin  in  keeping  the  outline  of  shadow  that 
we  have  loved,  and  they  end  in  giving  to  it  the  aspect 
of  life ;  and  aU  the  architectural  arts  begin  in  the  shaping 
of  the  cup  and  the  platter,  and  they  end  in  a  glorified 
roof.' 

Therefore,  you  see,  in  the  graphic  arts  you  have  Skill, 
Beauty,  and  Likeness;  and  in  the  architectural  arts.  Skill, 
Beauty,  and  Use;  and  you  must  have  the  three  in  each 
group,  balanced  and  co-ordinate ;  and  all  the  chief  errors  of 
art  consist  in  losing  or  exaggerating  one  of  these  elements. 

100.  For  instance,  almost  the  whole  system  and  hope 
of  modem  life  are  founded  on  the  notion  that  you  may 
substitute  mechanism  for  skill,  photograph  for  picture, 
cast-iron  for  sculpture.  That  is  your  main  nineteenth-cen- 
tury faith,  or  infidelity.    You  think  you  can  get  everything 

^  [Compare  Vol  d'AtTiOy  §  64,  where  this  statement  is  quoted  and  reinforced.] 
*  [See,  for  instance,  the  chapter  in  Modem  Painters,  vol.  iii.,  where  (Vol.   v . 
p.  6S)  technical  excellence  and  oeauty  (p.  66)  in  art  are  discussed ;  and  for  his 
admission  that  he  had  never  yet  said  it  clearly  enough,  compare  Vol.  Ill   p.  88  n.] 
>  [Compare  helow,  §  122,  p.  111.] 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE       97 

hy  grinding — ^music,  literature,  and  painting/  'You  will 
ftid  it  grievously  not  so;  you  can  get  nothing  but  dust 
by  mere  grinding.  Even  to  have  the  barley-meal  out  of 
it,  you  must  have  the  barley  first ;  and  that  comes  by 
growth,  not  grinding.  But  essentially,  we  have  lost  our 
delight  ia  Skill;  in  that  majesty  of  it  which  I  was 
trying  to  make  clear  to  you  in  my  last  address,'  and  which 
long  ago  I  tried  to  expr&ss,  under  the  head  of  ideas  of 
power.'  The  entire  sense  of  that,  we  have  lost,  because 
we  ourselves  do  not  take  pains  enough  to  do  right,  and 
have  no  conception  of  what  the  right  costs;  so  that  all 
the  joy  and  reverence  we  ought  to  feel  in  looking  at  a 
strong  man's  work  have  ceased  in  us.  We  keep  them  yet 
a  littiie  in  looking  at  a  honeycomb  or  a  bird's-nest;  we 
understand  that  these  differ,  by  divinity  of  skill,  from  a 
lump  of  wax  or  a  cluster  of  sticks.  But  a  picture,  which 
is  a  much  more  wonderful  thmg  than  a  honeycomb  or  a 
bird's-nest, — have  we  not  known  people,  and  sensible  people 
too,  who  expected  to  be  taught  to  produce  that,  in  six 
lessons  ? 

101.  Well,  you  must  have  the  skill,  you  must  have 
the  beauty,  which  is  the  highest  moral  element;  and  thai, 
lastly,  you  must  have  the  verity  or  utility,  which  is  not 
the  moral,  but  the  vital  element;  and  this  desire  for 
verity  and  use  is  the  one  aim  of  the  three  that  always 
leads  in  great  schools,  and  in  the  minds  of  great  masters^ 
without  any  exception.  They  will  permit  themselves  in 
awkwardness,  they  will  permit  themselves  in  ugliness;  but 
they  wiU  never  permit  themselves  in  uselessness  or  in  un- 
veracity. 

102.  And  farther,  as  their  skill  increases,  and  as  their 
grace,  so  much  more,  their  desire  for  truth.  It  is  im- 
possible to    find   the  three  motives   in  fairer   balance  and 

^  [Compare,  in  a  later  volume,  the  first  lecture  in  '' Readings  in  'Modem 
Paintert."^ 

«  [§  71 ;  above,  pp.  78,  79.] 

*  [Ch.  iii.  of  part  i.  sec.  i.  in  the  first  volume  of  Modem  Painters  (Vol.  IIL 
pp.  9S  eeq.),'] 


98  LECTURES  ON  ART 

harmony  than  in  our  own  Reynolds.  He  rejoices  in  show- 
ing you  his  skill ;  and  those  of  you  who  succeed  in  learn- 
ing what  painter's  work  really  is,  will  one  day  rejoice  also, 
even  to  laughter — ^that  highest  laughter  which  springs  of 
pure  deUght,  in  watching  the  fortitude  and  the  fire  of  a 
hand  which  strikes  forth  its  will  upon  the  canvas  as  easily 
as  the  wind  strikes  it  on  the  sea.  He  rejoices  in  all  ab- 
stract beauty  and  rhythm  and  melody  of  design;  he  will 
never  give  you  a  colour  that  is  not  lovely,  nor  a  shade 
that  is  unnecessary,  nor  a  line  that  is  ungraxjeful.'  But 
all  his  power  and  all  his  invention  are  held  by  him  subor- 
dinate,— and  the  more  obediently  because  of  their  nobleness, 
— ^to  his  true  leading  purpose  of  setting  before  you  such 
likeness  of  the  living  presence  of  an  English  gentleman 
or  an  English  lady,  as  shall  be  worthy  of  being  looked 
upon  for  ever. 

108.  But  farther,  you  remember,  I  hope — ^for  I  said  it  in 
a  way  that  I  thought  would  shock  you  a  little,  that  you 
might  remember  it — ^my  statement,'  that  art  had  never 
done  more  than  this,  never  more  than  given  the  likeness 
of  a  noble  human  being.  Not  only  so,  but  it  very  seldom 
does  so  much  as  this;  and  the  best  pictures  that  exist  of 
the  great  schools  are  all  portraits,  or  groups  of  portraits, 
often  of  very  simple  and  no  wise  noble  persons.  You 
may  have  much  more  brilliant  and  impressive  qualities  in 
imaginative  pictures;  you  may  have  figures  scattered  like 
clouds,  or  garlanded  like  flowers;  you  may  have  light  and 
shade,  as  of  a  tempest,  and  colour,  as  of  the  rainbow; 
but  all  that  is  child's  play  to  the  great  men,  though  it 
is  astonishment  to  us.  Their  real  strength  is  tried  to  the 
utmost,  and  as  far  as  I  know,  it  is  never  elsewhere  brought 
out  so  thoroughly,  as  in  painting  one  man  or  woman, 
and  the  soul  that  was  in  them;  nor  that  always  the 
highest    soul,    but    often    only   a  thwarted    one    that   was 

1  [Ruskin  included  some  studies  by  Reynolds,  remarkable  for  their  boldness 
and  mce,  in  the  Standard  Series :  see  VoL  XXL  p.  24.] 
s  [§  31 ;  above,  p.  45.] 


J 


IV.  THE  RELATION   OF  ART  TO  USE       99 

capable  of  height;  or  perhaps  not  even  that,  but  faultfiil 
4ind  poor,  yet  seen  through,  to  the  poor  best  of  it,  by 
the  mastered  sight.  So  that  in  order  to  put  before  you 
In  your  Standard  Series,  the  best  art  possible,  I  am  obliged, 
^ven  from  the  very  strongest  men,  to  take  portraits,  before 
I  take  the  idealism.^  Nay,  whatever  is  best  in  the  great 
compositions  themselves  has  depended  on  portraiture;  and 
the  study  necessary  to  enable  you  to  understand  invention 
will  also  convince  you  that  the  mind  of  man  never  in- 
vented a  greater  thing  than  the  form  of  man,  animated  by 
liftithful  life.  Every  attempt  to  refine  or  exalt  such  healthy 
humanity  has  weakened  or  caricatured  it;  or  else  consists 
only  in  giving  it,  to  please  our  fancy,  the  wings  of  birds, 
or  the  eyes  of  antelopes.  Whatever  is  truly  great  in 
cither  Greek  or  Christian  art,  is  also  restrictedly  human; 
imd  even  the  raptures  of  the  redeemed  souls  who  enter, 
'*  celestemente  ballando,'"  the  gate  of  Angelico's  Paradise, 
were  seen  first  in  the  terrestrial,  yet  most  pure,  mirth  of 
Florentine  maidens.' 

104.  I  am  aware  that  this  cannot  but  at  present  appear 
gravely  questionable  to  those  of  my  audience  who  are 
strictly  cognisant  of  the  phases  of  Greek  art;  for  they 
Jmow  that  the  moment  of  its  decline  is  accurately  marked, 
by  its  turning  from  abstract  form  to  portraiture.  But 
the  reason  of  this  is  simple.  The  progressive  coiurse  of 
•Greek  art  was  in  subduing  monstrous  conceptions  to  natu- 
ral ones;  it  did  this  by  general  laws;  it  r^udied  absolute 
ixuth  of  generic  human  form,  and  if  this  ethical  force  had 
jremained,  would  have  advanced  into  healthy  portraiture. 
But  at  the  moment  of  change  the  national  life  ended  in 
^^reece ;  and  portraiture,  there,  meant  insult  to  her  religion, 

^  [Compare  the  note  on  No«.  39,  40  in  the  Standard  Series  (Vol.  XXL  p.  26).] 

*  [See  ahove,  §  49  n.  (p.  67);  and  compare  ''The  wSSethetic  and  Mathematie 

^fichools  of  Florence."    The  quotation  is  from  Vasari's  account  of  Angelico's  ''  Last 

Judgment"  (now  in  the  Accademia  at  Florence):   "i  Beati  si  vcffgiono  entrare 

twlestemente  halLindo  per  la  porte  del  paradise"  (vol.  ii.  p.  30  in  fiohu's  transla- 

.tlon  of  Vasari).] 

'  [Compare  ^kici  of  the  DuH,  §  86  (Vol  XVIII.  p.  309).] 


100  LECTURES  ON  ART 

and  flattery  to  her  tyrants.  And  her  skill  perished,  not 
because  she  became  true  in  sight,  but  because  she  became 
vile  at  heart.^ 

105.  And  now  let  us  think  of  our  own  work,  and  ask 
how  that  may  become,  in  its  own  poor  measure,  active  in. 
some  verity  of  representation.  We  certainly  cannot  begin 
by  drawing  kings  or  queens;  but  we  must  try,  even  in 
our  earliest  work,  if  it  is  to  prosper,  to  draw  something 
that  will  convey  true  knowledge  both  to  ourselves  and 
others.  And  I  think  you  will  find  greatest  advantage  in 
the  endeavour  to  give  more  life  and  educational  power 
to  the  simpler  branches  of  natural  science:  for  the  great 
scientific  men  are  all  so  eager  in  advance  that  they  have 
no  time  to  popularise  their  discoveries,  and  if  we  can  glean 
after  them  a  Uttle,  and  make  pictures  of  the  things  which 
science  describes,  we  shall  find  the  service  a  worthy  one* 
Not  only  so,  but  we  may  even  be  helpful  to  science  her- 
self; for  she  has  suffered  by  her  proud  severance  from  the 
arts;  and  having  made  too  little  effort  to  realise  her  dis- 
coveries to  vulgar  eyes,  has  herself  lost  true  measure  of 
what  was  chiefly  precious  in  them. 

106.  Take  Botany,  for  instance.  Our  scientific  botanists 
are,  I  think,  chiefly  at  present  occupied  in  distinguishing^ 
species,  which  perfect  methods  of  distinction  will  probably 
in  the  future  show  to  be  indistinct; — ^in  inventing  descrip- 
tive names  of  which  a  more  advanced  science  and  more 
fastidious  scholarship  will  show  some  to  be  unnecessary, 
and  others  inadmissible;^ — ^and  in  microscopic  investigations 
of  structure,  which  through  many  alternate  links  of  trium- 
phant discovery  that  tissue  is  composed  of  vessels,  and  that 
vessels  are  composed  of  tissue,  have  not  hitherto  completely 
explained  to  us  either  the  origin,  the  energy,  or  the  course 
of  the  sap ;  and  which,  however  subtle  or  successful,  bear 
to  the  real  natural  history  of  plants  only  the  relation  that 
anatomy  and  organic  chemistry  bear  to  the  history  of  men* 

1  [Compsre  Aratra  JPenteiici,  §§  120^  121  (below^  pp.  281,  282).] 
•  [Compare  Modem  Painters,  vol.  v.  (Vol.  VII.  p.  71).] 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OP  ART  TO  USE     101 

In  the  meantime,  our  artists  are  so  generally  convinced  of 
the  truth  of  the  Darwinian  theory  that  they  do  not  always 
think  it  necessary  to  show  any  difference  between  the 
foliage  of  an  elm  and  an  oak ;  and  the  gift-books  of  Christ- 
mas have  every  page  surrounded  with  laboriously  engraved 
garlands  of  rose,  shamrock,  thistle,  and  forget-me-not,  with- 
out its  being  thought  proper  by  the  draughtsman,  or  desir- 
able by  the  public,  even  in  the  case  of  those  uncommon 
flowers,  to  observe  the  real  shape  of  the  petals  of  any  one 
of  them. 

107.  Now  what  we  especially  need  at  present  for  edu- 
cational purposes  is  to  know,  not  the  anatomy  of  plants, 
but  their  biography^ — how  and  where  they  live  and  die, 
their  tempers,  benevolences,  malignities,  distresses,  and  vir- 
tues. We  want  them  drawn  from  their  youth  to  their  age, 
from  bud  to  fruit.  We  ought  to  see  the  various  forms  of 
their  diminished  but  hardy  growth  in  cold  climates,  or  poor 
soils;  and  their  rank  or  wild  luxuriance,  when  full-fed, 
and  warmly  nursed.  And  all  this  we  ought  to  have  drawn 
so  accurately,  that  we  might  at  once  compare  any  given 
part  of  a  plant  with  the  same  part  of  any  other,  drawn  on 
the  like  conditions.  Now,  is  not  this  a  work  which  r/e 
may  set  about  here  in  Oxford,  with  good  hope  and  much 
pleasure  ?  I  think  it  is  so  important,  that  the  first  exercise 
in  drawing  I  shall  put  before  you  will  be  an  outline  of 
a  laurel  leaf.  You  will  find  in  the  opening  sentence  of 
Leonardo's  treatise,  our  present  text-book,  that  you  must 
not  at  first  draw  frt>m  nature,  but  from  a  good  master's 
work,  ^^per  assuefarsi  a  buone  membra,"  to  accustom  your- 
selves, that  is,  to  entirely  good  representative  organic  forms. 
So  yoiu*  first  exercise  shall  be  the  top  of  the  laurel  sceptre 
of  Apollo,  drawn  by  an  Italian  engraver  of  Leonardo's  own 
time;'  then  we  will  draw  a  laurel  leaf  itself;  and  little  by 
litde,  I  think  we  may  both  learn  ourselves,  and  teach  to 

^  [Compare  Pro$erpina,  i.  cb.  iv.  §  7)  when  Rntkin  refers  to  this  pesssfe.] 
*  [No.  8  in  the  Eduoatioiul  Series  (Vol.  XXL  p.  109) ;  alter  Bacdo  Baldini* 
The  ^'laurel  leaf  itself"  is  Na  9  (engraved— Plate  XL— in  Prompina).] 


102  LECTURES  ON  ART 

many  besides,  somewhat  more  than  we  know  yet,  of  the 
wild  olives  of  Greece,  and  the  wild  roses  of  England. 

108.  Next,  in  Greology,  which  I  will  take  leave  to  con* 
sider  as  an  entirely  separate  science  from  the  zoology  of 
the  past,  which  has  lately  usurped  its  name  and  interest. 
In  geology  itself  we  find  the  strength  of  many  able  men 
occupied  in  debating  questions  of  which  there  are  yet  no 
data  even  for  the  clear  statement;  and  in  seizing  advanced 
theoretical  positions  on  the  mere  contingency  of  their  being 
afterwards  tenable;  while,  in  the  meantime,  no  simple 
person,  taking  a  hoUday  in  Cumberland,  can  get  an  intelli- 
gible section  of  Skiddaw,  or  a  clear  account  of  the  origin  of 
the  Skiddaw  slates;  and  while,  though  half  the  educated 
society  of  London  travel  every  summer  over  the  great 
plain  of  Switzerland,  none  know,  or  care  to  know,  why 
that  is  a  plain,  and  the  Alps  to  the  south  of  it  are  Alps ;  ^ 
and  whether  or  not  the  gravel  of  the  one  has  anything  to 
do  with  the  rocks  of  the  other.  And  though  every  palace 
in  Europe  owes  part  of  its  decoration  to  variegated  marbles^ 
and  nearly  every  woman  in  Europe  part  of  her  decoration 
to  pieces  of  jasper  or  chalcedony,  I  do  not  think  any  geolo- 
gist could  at  this  moment  with  authority  tell  us  either  how 
a  piece  of  marble  is  stained,  or  what  causes  the  streaks  in 
a  Scotch  pebble.' 

109.  Now,  as  soon  as  you  have  obtained  the  power  of 
drawing,  I  do  not  say  a  mountain,  but  even  a  stone,  ac- 
curately, every  question  of  this  kind  will  become  to  you 
at  once  attractive  and  definite;  you  will  find  that  in  the 
grain,  the  lustre,  and  the  cleavage-lines  of  the  smallest 
fragment  of  rock,  there  are  recorded  forces  of  every  order 
and  magnitude,  from  those  which  raise  a  continent  by  oae 
volcanic  effort,  to  those  which  at  every  instant  are  polish- 
ing the  apparently  complete  crystal  in  its  nest,  and  con- 
ducting the  apparently  motionless  metal  in  its  vein;   and 

^  [Sm  DeueaRon,  L  ch.  i.  §  Q,  where  Raskin  refers  to  this  passage.] 
>  [Raskin  cites  these  cases  again — ^tiiat  of  the  cloudings  of  marble  in  Eagl^9 
Nut,  §  132,  and  that  of  the  reinings  of  Scotch  pebbles  in  DeMoM/on,  i.  ch.  y.  §  12.} 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE     108 

that  only  by  the  art  of  your  own  hand,  and  fidelity  of 
sight  wUch  it  develops,  you  can  obtain  true  perception 
of  these  invincible  and  inimitable  arts  of  the  earth  herself; 
while  the  comparatively  slight  effort  necessary  to  obtain 
so  much  skill  as  may  serviceably  draw  mountains  in  distant 
effect  will  be  instantly  rewarded  by  what  is  almost  equiva- 
lent to  a  new  sense  of  the  conditions  of  their  structure. 

110.  And,  because  it  is  well  at  once  to  know  some 
direction  in  which  our  work  may  be  definite,  let  me  sug- 
gest to  those  of  you  who  may  intend  passing  their  vacation 
in  Switzerland,  and  who  care  about  mountains,  that  if  they 
will  first  quaUfy  themselves  to  take  angles  of  position  and 
elevation  with  correctness,  and  to  draw  outlines  with  ap- 
proximate fidelity,  there  are  a  series  of  problems  of  the 
highest  interest  to  be  worked  out  on  the  southern  edge  of 
the  Swiss  plain,  in  the  study  of  the  relations  of  its  molasse 
beds  to  the  rocks  which  are  characteristically  developed  in 
the  chain  of  the  Stockhom,  Beatenberg,  Pilate,  Mythen 
above  Schwytz,  and  High  Sentis  of  Appenzell;  the  pursuit 
of  which  may  lead  them  into  many  pleasant,  as  well  as 
creditably  dangerous,  walks,  and  curious  discoveries;  and 
will  be  good  for  the  discipline  of  their  fingers  in  the 
pencilling  of  crag  form.^ 

111.  I  wish  I  could  ask  you  to  draw,  instead  of  the 
Alps,  the  crests  of  Parnassus  and  Olympus,  and  the  ravines 
of  Delphi  and  of  Tempe.  I  have  not  loved  the  arts  of 
Greece  as  others  have ;  yet  I  love  them,'  and  her,  so  much, 
that  it  is  to  me  simply  a  standing  marvel  how  scholars  can 
endure  for  all  these  centuries,  during  which  their  chief 
education  has  been  in  the  language  and  poUcy  of  Greece^ 
to  have  only  the  names  of  her  hills  and  rivers  upon  their 
lips,  and   never  one  line  of  conception  of  them  in   their 

^  [Rntkin  here  refon  to  the  difficult  problems  oonneeted  with  the  line  of  con- 
t»et  of  the  outer  Alpe  with  the  molane  beds  laid  down  in  Miocene  times  over 
the  Swiss  plain;  their  relations  can  only  be  explained  by  somewhat  complex 
hypotheses,  an  outline  of  which  is  given  in  Sir  John  Lubboclrs  Soenery  qf  Switaier^ 
land,  1896,  p.  286.] 

>  [Compare  Two  PathB,  §  80  and  ».  (Vol.  XVI.  p.  326).] 


104  LECTURES  ON   ART 

mind's  sight.^  Which  of  us  knows  what  the  valley  of  Sparta 
is  like,  or  the  great  moimtain  vase  of  Arcadia?'  which  of 
us,  except  in  mere  airy  syllabling  of  names,  knows  aught 
of  ''sandy  Ladon's  lilied  banks,  or  old  Lycaeus,  or  Cyllene 
hoar"?'  "You  cannot  travel  in  Greece ?"^ — I  know  it; 
nor  in  Magna  Grsecia/  But,  gentlemen  of  England,  you 
had  better  find  out  why  you  cannot,  and  put  an  end  to 
that  horror  of  European  shame,  before  you  hope  to  learn 
Greek  art. 

112.  I  scarcely  know  whether  to  place  among  the  things 
useful  to  art,  or  to  science,  the  systematic  record,  by  draw- 
ing,  of  phenomena  of  the  sky/  But  I  am  quite  sure  that 
your  work  cannot  in  any  direction  be  more  useful  to  your* 
selves,  than  in  enabling  you  to  perceive  the  quite  un- 
paralleled subtilties  of  colour  and  inorganic  form,  which 
occur  on  any  ordinarily  fine  morning  or  evening  horizon; 
and  I  will  even  confess  to  you  another  of  my  perhaps  too 
sanguine  expectations,  that  in  some  far  distant  time  it  may 
come  to  pass,  that  young  Englishmen  and  Englishwomen 
may  think  the  breath  of  the  morning  sky  pleasanter  than 
that  of  midnight,  and  its  light  prettier  than  that  of  candles. 

118.  Lastly,  in  Zoology.  What  the  Greeks  did  for  the 
horse,  and  what,  as  far  as  regards  domestic  and  expressional . 
character,  Landseer  has  done  for  the  dog  and  the  deer, 
remains  to  be  done  by  art  for  nearly  all  other  animals  of 
high  organization.  There  are  few  birds  or  beasts  that  have 
not  a  range  of  character  which,  if  not  equal  to  that  of  the 
horse  or  dog,  is  yet  as  interesting  within  narrower  limits, 
and  often  in  grotesqueness,  intensity,  or  wild  and  timid 
pathos,  more  singular  and  mysterious.  Whatever  love  of 
humour  you  have, — ^whatever  sympathy  with  imperfect,  but 


1 

s 

s 

4 


Compare  Eagle*9  NeH,  §  199.1 

Compare  Q^em  of  the  Air,  §  26  (VoL  XIX.  p.  321).] 

[Milton :  Arcadei,  97,  9a] 

For  the  '' European  shame"  in  the  want  of  poblia  aecurity  in  Greece,  lee 

VoL  XVIL  p.  449;  in  Calahria,  tMd,  VoL  VI.  p.  432,  and  Vol  dTAmo,  §§  49,  60.] 

^  FFor  Ruflldn's  own  constant  study  in  this  form  of  record  by  drawing,  see 

VoL  V.  p.  xxi.,  and.  in  a  later  volume,  The  Storm-Cloud  of  the  Nineteenth  Cenhuf* 

He  intended  to  pttbiish  a  series  of  his  cloud-drawings:  see  VoL  VIL  p.  169  n.] 


IV.  THE  RELATION   OF  ART  TO  USE     10» 

most  subtle,  feeling, — ^whatever  perception  of  sublimity  in 
conditions  of  fatal  power,  may  here  find  fullest  occupation: 
all  these  being  joined,  in  the  strong  animal  races,  to  a  vari- 
able and  fantastic  beauty  far  beyond  anything  that  merely 
formative  art  has  yet  conceived.  I  have  placed  in  your 
Educational  Series  a  wing  by  Albert  Diirer,^  which  goes  as 
fSar  as  art  yet  has  reached  in  delineation  of  plumage ;  while 
for  the  simple  action  of  the  pinion  it  is  impossible  to  go 
beyond  what  has  been  done  already  by  Titian  and  Tintoret ; 
but  you  cannot  so  much  as  once  look  at  the  rufflings  of 
the  plumes  of  a  peUcan  pluming  itself  after  it  has  been 
in  the  water,  or  carefully  draw  the  contours  of  the  wing 
either  of  a  vulture  or  a  common  swift,^  or  paint  the  rose 
and  vermilion  on  that  of  a  flamingo,  without  receiving 
almost  a  new  conception  of  the  meaning  of  form  and 
colour  in  creation* 

114.  Lastly.  Your  work,  in  all  directions  I  have  hitherto 
indicated,  may  be  as  deliberate  as  you  choose;  there  is  no 
immediate  fear  of  the  extinction  of  many  species  of  flowers 
or  animals;  and  the  Alps,  and  valley  of  Sparta,  vnll  wait 
your  leisure,  I  fear  tod  long.  But  the  feudal  and  mon* 
astic  buildings  of  Europe,  and  still  more  the  streets  of  ha 
ancient  cities,  are  vanishimr  like  dreams:  and  it  is  diflSicult 
to  imagine  the  mingled  ^vy  and  contempt  with  which 
future  generations  will  look  back  to  us,  who  still  possessed 
such  things,  yet  made  no  effort  to  preserve,  and  scarcely 
any  to  delineate  them :  for  when  used  as  material  of  land- 
scape by  the  modem  artist,  they  are  nearly  always  super- 
ficially or  flatteringly  represented,  without  zeal  enough  to 
penetrate  their  character,  or  patience  enough  to  render  it 
in  modest  harmony.  As  for  places  of  traditional  interest, 
I  do  not  know  an  entirely  faithful  drawing  of  any  historical 
site,  except  one  or  two  studies  made  by  enthusiastic  young 

1  [From  the  '^Graater  Fortnne/'  No.  237  (Vol.  XXL  p.  141);  for  another  wing 
hy  Durer  (from  the  ''All  of  Lnoifor"),  see  Fig.  49  in  voL  iv.  of  Modem  FaitUen 
<VoL  VL  p.  247>1 

*  [For  other  reforenees  to  the  iwift  on  the  wing,  lee  ''The  Story  of  Anchne," 
5  II  (helew,  p.  d7d) ;  Xet^«  Jfefoie,  Lecture  ii. ;  and  i^brr  Okivigtra,  Letter  12.] 


10«  LECTURES  ON  ART 

painters  in  Palestine  and  Egypt :  ^  for  which,  thanks  to  them 
always:  but  we  want  work  nearer  home. 

115.  Now  it  is  quite  probable  that  some  of  you,  who 
will  not  care  to  go  through  the  labour  necessary  to  draw 
flowers  or  animals,  may  yet  have  pleasure  in  attaining 
some  moderately  accurate  skill  of  sketching  architecture, 
and  greater  pleasure  still  in  directing  it  usefully.  Suppose, 
for  instance,  we  were  to  take  up  the  historical  scenery  in 
Carlyle's  Frederick.  Too  justly  the  historian  accuses  the 
genius  of  past  art,  in  that,  types  of  too  many  such  else- 
where, the  galleries  of  Berlin — "are  made  up,  like  other 
galleries,  of  goat-footed  Pan,  Europa's  Bull,  Romulus's  She- 
Wolf,  and  the  Correggiosity  of  Correggio,  and  contain,  for 
instance,  no  portrait  of  Friedrich  the  Great, — ^no  likeness 
at  all,  or  next  to  none  at  all,  of  the  noble  series  of 
Human  Realities,  or  any  part  of  them,  who  have  sprung, 
not  from  the  idle  brains  of  dreaming  dilettanti  but  from 
the  head  of  Grod  Almighty,  to  make  this  poor  authentic 
earth  a  Uttle  memorable  for  us,  and  to  do  a  little  work 
that  may  be  eternal  there."*  So  Carlyle  tells  us — ^toa 
truly  1  We  caimot  now  draw  Friedrich  for  him,  but  we 
can  draw  some  of  the  old  castles  and  cities  that  were  the 
cradles  of  German  life — HohenzoUem,  Hapsburg,  Marburg, 
and  such  others;' — ^we  may  keep  some  authentic  likeness 
of  these  for  the  future.  Suppose  we  were  to  take  up  that 
first  volume  of  FViedrich^  and  put  outlines  to  it:  shall 
we  begin  by  looking  for  Henry  the  Fowler's  tomb — ^Carlyle 
himself  asks  if  he  has  any — at  QuedUnburgh,^  and  so  down- 
wards, rescuing  what  we  can?  That  would  certainly  be 
making  our  work  of  some  true  use. 

1  [Ab,  for  iuituice,  Seddon's  ''Jerusalem"  (see  VoL  XIY.  pp.  464»  469),  and 
Holman  Hunt's  early  work,  ''The  Scapegoat"  {Und.,  p.  61).] 

*  [Fiiedrieh,  book  ir.  ch.  vi.  Ruskin  quoted  this  passage  again  in  "The  Three 
Colours  of  Pre-Raphaelitirtn,"  §  11 ;  and  see  also  The  Art  of  England,  §  195.] 

s  [For  Ruskin's  drawing  of  the  Castle  of  Hapsbui^,  see  Vol.  XVI.,  Plate  IV.^ 
and  pp.  bDni.~lxxiii.  For  descriptions  of  the  Castle  HohenaoUern  (near  the  station 
of  Zollem  on  the  railway  from  TQbingen  to  Sigmaringen)  and  of  the  Castle  of 
Marburg  (in  Hessen-Cassel),  see  Friedrich,  book  li.  ch.  v.  and  ch.  vii.] 

<  ["lies  buried  in  Quedlinburgh  Abbey :— any  Tomb ? "-^Frisdrieh,  booku.  ch. L] 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE     107 

116.  But  I  have  told  you  enough,  it  seems  to  me,  at 
least  to-day,  of  this  function  of  art  in  recording  fact;  let 
me  now  finally,  and  with  all  distinctness  possible  to  me, 
state  to  you  its  main  business  of  all; — ^its  service  in  the 
actual  uses  of  daily  life. 

You  are  surprised,  perhaps,  to  hear  me  call  this  its 
main  business.  That  is  indeed  so,  however.  The  giving 
brightness  to  picture  is  much,  but  the  giving  brightness  to 
life  more.  And  remember,  were  it  as  patterns  only,  you 
cannot,  without  the  realities,  have  the  pictures.  Tou  can- 
not have  a  landscape  by  Turnery  wtthotU  a  country  for  him 
to  paint;  you  cannot  have  a  portrait  by  Titian^  without 
a  man  to  be  pourtrayed.  I  need  not  prove  that  to  you,  I 
suppose,  in  these  short  terms;  but  in  the  outcome  I  can 
get  no  soul  to  believe  that  the  beginning  of  art  is  in  get- 
ting our  country  clean,  and  our  people  beautiful.  I  have 
been  ten  years  ^  trying  to  get  this  very  plain  certainty — I 
do  not  say  believed^— but  even  thought  of,  as  anything  but 
a  monstrous  proposition.  To  get  your  country  clean,  and 
your  people  lovely; — I  assure  you  that  is  a  necessary  work 
of  art  to  begin  with!'  There  has  indeed  been  art  in 
countries  where  people  lived  in  dirt  to  serve  God,  but 
never  in  countries  where  they  lived  in  dirt  to  serve  the 
deviL  There  has  indeed  been  art  where  the  people  were 
not  all  lovely — ^where  even  their  lips  were  thick — and  their 
skins  black,  because  the  sun  had  looked  upon  them;'  but 
never  in  a  country  where  the  people  were  pale  with  miser- 
able  toil  and  deadly  shade,  and  where  the  lips  of  youth, 
instead  of  being  full  with  blood,  were  pinched  by  famine, 
or  warped  with  poison.  And  now,  therefore,  note  this 
well,  the  gist  of  all  these  long  prefatory  talks.  I  said  ^  that 
the   two   great   moral   instincts   were  those   of  Order  and 

>  [Le.,  since  1860,  when  Unto  this  Ltut  was  written.] 

>  [Compsre,  below^  §  187  (p.  176) ;  Aratra  PaMici,  %  138  (below,  p.  294),  where 
this  sUtement  la  quoted  and  reinforced;  ''Modem  Art,"  §  23  (VoL  XIX.  pp.  214- 
216) ;  and  Art  qf  England,  §  12a] 


'  [Sonff  of  Solomon  L  6.] 


'i  W  *eq.;  aboT«,  pp.  87>  8&] 


108  LECTURES  ON 

Kindness.  Now,  all  the  arts  are  founded  on  agriculture 
by  the  hand,  and  on  the  inraces  and  kindness  of  feeding, 
id  dressii^.  «.d  lodipBg  ^  p«.ple.  Gr«k  .rt  begi^ 
in  the  gardens  of  Alcinous — ^perfect  order,  leeks  in  beds, 
and  fountains  in  pipes.  ^  And  Christian  art,  as  it  arose  out 
of  chivalry,  was  oidy  possible  so  far  as  chivalry  compelled 
both  kings  and  knights  to  care  for  the  right  personal  train- 
ing  of  their  people;  it  perished  utterly  when  those  kings 
and  knights  became  SnM^^fioi^  devourers  of  the  people.' 
And  it  will  become  possible  again  only,  when,  literally,  the 
sword  is  beaten  into  the  ploughshare,*  when  your  St.  George 
of  England  shall  justify  his  name,^  and  Christian  art  shall 
be  known  as  its  Master  was,  in  breaking  of  bread.^ 

117.  Now  look  at  the  working  out  of  this  broad  prin- 
dple  in  minor  detail;  observe  how,  from  highest  to  lowest, 
health  of  art  has  first  depended  on  reference  to  industrial 
use.  There  is  first  the  need  of  cup  and  platter,  especially 
of  cup;  for  you  can  put  your  meat  on  the  Harpies',^  or 
on  any  other,  tables ;  but  you  must  have  your  cup  to  drink 
froixL  And  to  hold  it  conveniently,  you  must  put  a  handle 
to  it;  and  to  fill  it  when  it  is  empty  you  must  have  a 
large  pitcher  of  some  sort;  and  to  carry  the  pitcher  you 
may  most  advisably  have  two  handles.  Modify  the  forms 
of  these  needful  possessions  according  to  the  various  re- 
quirements of  drinking  largely  and  drinking  delicately;  of 
pouring  easily  out,  or  of  keeping  for  years  the  perfume  in; 
of  stcmng  in  cellars,  or  bearing  from  foimtains ;  of  sacrificial 
libation,  of  Panathenaic  treasure  of  oil,  and  sepulchral  trea- 
sure of  ashes, — ^and  you  have  a  resultant  series  of  beautiful 
fonn  and  decoration,  firom  the  rude  amphora  of  red  earth 
up  to  Cellini's  vases  of  gems  and  crystal,  in  which  series, 

*  Virg.,  iEfi.,  iiL  209  *eqq. 


>  rSee  Vol.  VI.  p.  419.] 
p.  10 


*  [For  this   epithet  (lUad,  i.  231),  eee  Seiome  and  Ulie9,  §  43  (VoL  XVIU. 
101,  and  Eagles  Nut,  §  207).] 
3  riiaiah  ii.  4 ;  Micah  iv.  3 ;  Joel  iii.  10.    Compere  VoL  XVIU.  p.  491.] 

*  np*or  St  George  at  the  hashandinan,  see  Fon  Ckmgera,  Letter  26.] 
«  [Luke  xxir.  35.] 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE      109 

but  especially  in  the  more  simple  conditions  of  it,  are  de- 
veloped the  most  beautiful  lines  and  most  perfect  types  of 
«v.!roo,np<»ia<»  which  h.«  yet  b«n  .ttS«d  by  .rt. 

118.  But  again,  that  you  may  fill  your  cup  with  pure 
water,  you  must  go  to  the  well  or  spring;  you  need  a 
fence  round  the  well;  you  need  some  tube  or  trough,  or 
other  means  of  confining  the  stream  at  the  spring.  For 
the  conveyance  of  the  current  to  any  distance  you  must 
build  either  enclosed  or  open  aqueduct;  and  in  the  hot 
square  of  the  city  where  you  set  it  firee,  you  find  it  good 
for  health  and  pleasantness  to  let  it  leap  into  a  fountain. 
On  these  several  needs  you  have  a  school  of  sculpture 
founded;  in  the  decoration  of  the  walls  of  wells  in  level 
countries,  and  of  the  sources  of  springs  in  mountainous 
ones,  and  chiefly  of  all,  where  the  women  of  household  or 
market  meet  at  the  city  fountain. 

Thoe  is,  however,  a  farther  reason  for  fhe  use  of  art 
here  than  in  any  other  material  service,  so  far  as  we  may, 
by  art,  express  our  reverence  or  thankfulness.  Whenever 
a  nation  is  in  its  right  mind,  it  always  has  a  deep  sense 
of  divinity  in  the  gift  of  rain  from  heaven,  filling  its  heart 
with  food  and  gladness ;  ^  and  all  the  more  when  that  gift 
becomes  gentle  and  perennial  in  the  flowing  of  springs.  It 
literally  is  not  possible  that  any  fruitful  power  of  the  Muses 
should  be  put  forth  upon  a  people  which  disdains  their 
Helicon;  still  less  is  it  possible  that  any  Christian  nation 
should  grow  up  ^'tanquam  lignum  quod  plantatum  est  secus 
decursus  aquarum,"'  which  cannot  recognize  the  lesson  meant 
in  their  being  told  of  the  places  where  Rebekah  was  met ; 
— ^where  Rachel, — ^where  Zipporah, — ^and  she  who  was  asked 
for  water  under  Mount  Gerizim  by  a  Stranger,  weary,  who 
had  nothing  to  draw  with.' 

119.  And  truly,  when  our  mountain  springs  are  set 
apart   in   vale   or   craggy   glen,    or   glade   of  wood   green 


1 

s 

8 


Acts  xiv.  17.] 

^Ptalins  i.  3.] 

[See  Genesis  xxiv.  15^  16,  xxiz.  10 ;  Exodui  ii.  16 ;  John  iv.  11.] 


110  LECTURES  ON  ART 

through  the  drought  of  summer,  far  from  cities,  then  it 
is  best  to  let  them  stay  in  their  own  happy  peace;  but  if 
near  towns,  and  liable  therefore  to  be  defiled  by  common 
usage,  we  could  not  use  the  loveliest  art  more  worthily 
than  by  sheltering  the  spring  and  its  first  pools  with  pre- 
cious marbles:  nor  ought  anything  to  be  esteemed  more 
important,  as  a  means  of  healthy  education,  than  the  care 
to  keep  the  streams  of  it  afterwards,  to  as  great  a  dis- 
tance as  possible,  pure,  fuU  of  fibsh,  and  easily  accessible 
to  children.  There  used  to  be,  thirty  years  ago,  a  little 
rivulet  of  the  Wandel,  about  an  inch  deep,  which  ran  over 
the  carriage-road  and  under  a  foot-bridge  just  under  the 
last  chalk  hill  near  Croydon.^  Alas  I  men  came  and  went; 
and  it — did  not  go  on  for  ever.'  It  has  long  since  been 
bricked  over  by  the  parish  authorities;  but  there  was  more 
education  in  that  stream  with  its  minnows  than  you  could 
get  out  of  a  thousand  pounds  spent  yearly  in  the  parish 
schools,  even  though  you  were  to  spend  every  farthing  of 
it  in  teaching  the  nature  of  oxygen  and  hydrogen,  and  the 
names,  and  rate  per  minute,  of  all  the  rivers  in  Asia  and 
America. 

120.  Well,  the  gist  of  this  matter  lies  here  then.  Sup- 
pose we  want  a  school  of  pottery  again  in  England,  all 
we  poor  artists  are  ready  to  do  the  best  we  can,  to  show 
you  how  pretty  a  line  may  be  that  is  twisted  first  to 
one  side,  and  then  to  the  other;  and  how  a  plain  house- 
hold-blue will  make  a  pattern  on  white;  and  how  ideal 
art  may  be  got  out  of  the  spaniel's  colours  of  black  and 
tan.'  But  I  tell  you  beforehand,  all  that  we  can  do  will 
be  utterly  useless,  unless  you  teach  your  peasant  to  say 
grace,  not  only  before  meat,  but  before  drink ;  and  having 
provided  him  with  Greek  cups  and  platters,  provide  him 
also  with  something  that  is  not  poisoned  to  put  into  them. 

»  rOompare  Cfrown  qf  Wild  OUve,  §  1  (VoL  XVIII.  p.  385).] 

>  [TennyBon's  Brook  is  quoted  also  in  VoL  XVIII.  p.  465.  and  see  Vol.  IV. 

p.  355J 

*  [For  an  example  of  a   ''black  and  tan"  Greek  vue,   see   Plate    XV.   in 

Vol.  XIX] 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE     111 

121*  There  cannot  be  any  need  that  I  should  trace  for 
you  the  conditions  of  art  that  are  directly  founded  on 
serviceableness  of  dress,  and  of  armour ;  but  it  is  my  duty 
to  affirm  to  you,  in  the  most  positive  manner,  that  after 
recoverini?,  for  the  poor,  wholesomeness  of  food,^  your  next 
step  ZIU  f<nm^  schools  of  .rt  in  England  must  be 
in  recovering,  for  the  poor,  decency  and  wholesomeness  of 
dress;  thoroughly  good  in  substance,  fitted  for  their  daily 
work,  becoming  to  their  rank  in  life,  and  worn  with  order 
and  dignity.  And  this  order  and  dignity  must  be  taught 
them  by  the  women  of  the  upper  and  middle  classes,  whose 
minds  can  be  in  nothing  right,  as  long  as  they  are  so 
wrong  in  this  matter  as  to  endure  the  squalor  of  the 
poor,  while  they  themselves  dress  gaily.  And  on  the  proper 
pride  and  comfort  of  both  poor  and  rich  in  dress,  must  be 
founded  the  true  arts  of  dress;  carried  on  by  masters  of 
manufacture  no  less  careful  of  the  perfectness  and  beauty 
of  their  tissues,  and  of  all  that  in  substance  and  in  design 
can  be  bestowed  upon  them,  than  ever  the  armourers  of 
Milan  and  Damascus'  were  careful  of  their  steel. 

122.  Then,  in  the  third  place,  having  recovered  some 
wholesome  habits  of  life  as  to  food  and  dress,  we  must  re- 
cover them  as  to  lodging.  I  said  just  now^  that  the  best 
architecture  was  but  a  glorified  roof.  Think  of  it.  The 
dome  of  the  Vatican,  the  porches  of  Rheims  or  Chartres, 
the  vaults  and  arches  of  their  aisles,  the  canopy  of  the 
tomb,  and  the  spire  of  the  belfry,  are  all  forms  result- 
ing from  the  mere  requirement  that  a  certain  space  shall 
be  strongly  covered  from  heat  and  rain.  More  than  that 
— as  I  have  tried  all  through  The  Stones  of  Venice  to 
show, — the  lovely  forms  of  these  were  every  one  of  them 

^  [In  one  of  his  conies  Ruskin  has  here  written  in  the  margin :  ^*  That  a  friend 
should  have  risen  in  tne  House  of  Commons  to  defend  tiie  Adulteration  of  Food  " 
— t.e.^  a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends,  John  Bright  (a  Quaker).  Ruskin  quotes 
and  discusses  the  speech  in  question  (March  b,  1869)  in  For*  CUtxiigera,  Letter  37.] 

>  [For  the  steel  of  Milan,  compare  Vol  (tAmo,  §  69 ;  and  for  Damascus  steel, 
VoL  VI.  p.  3ia] 

'  [Above,  §  99 ;  p«  96.] 


112  LECTURES  ON  ART 

developed  in  civil  and  domestic  building,  and  only  after 
their  invention,  employed  ecclesiastically  on  the  grandest 
scale.^  I  think  you  cannot  but  have  noticed  here  in  Oxford^ 
as  elsewhere,  that  our  modem  architects  never  seem  to 
know  what  to  do  with  their  roofs.  Be  assured,  until  the 
roofs  are  right,  nothing  else  will  be;  and  there  are  just 
two  ways  of  keeping  them  right.  Never  build  them  of 
iron,  but  only  of  wood  or  stone;  and  secondly,  take  care 
that  in  every  town  the  little  roofs  are  built  before  the 
large  ones,  and  that  everybody  who  wants  one  has  got 
one.  And  we  must  try  also  to  make  everybody  want 
one.  That  is  to  say,  at  some  not  very  advanced  period  of 
Ufe,  men  should  desire  to  have  a  home,  which  they  do  not 
wish  to  quit  any  more,  suited  to  their  habits  of  life,  and 
likely  to  be  more  and  more  suitable  to  them  until  their 
death.'  And  men  must  desire  to  have  these  their  dwelling* 
places  built  as  strongly  as  possible,  and  furnished  and  de- 
corated daintily,  and  set  in  pleasant  places,  in  bright  light, 
and  good  air,  being  able  to  choose  for  themselves  that 
at  least  as  well  as  swallows.  And  when  the  houses  are 
grouped  together  in  cities,  men  must  have  so  much  civic 
fellowship  as  to  subject  their  architecture  to  a  common 
law,  and  so  much  civic  pride  as  to  desire  that  the  whole 
gathered  group  of  human  dwellings  should  be  a  lovely 
thing,  not  a  frightful  one,  on  the  face  of  the  earth.  Not 
many  weeks  ago  an  English  clergyman,*  a  master  of  this 
University,  a  man  not  given  to  sentiment,  but  of  middle 
age,  and  great  practical  sense,*  told  me,  by  accident,  and 
wholly  without  reference  to  the  subject  now  before  us, 
that  he  never  could  enter  London  from  his  country  parson- 
age but  with  closed  eyes,  lest  the  sight  of  the  blocks  of 

*  Osborne  Gordon. 

^  [See,  for  instance,  vol.  ii.  cfa.  iv.  §  52  (Vol.  X.  jppw  118  «e9.) ;  and  compare 
Lectures  on  Architecture  and  Painting,  Vol.  Xll.  p.  43.j 

'  [Here,  again,  compare  Lectures  on  Architecture  and  Painting,  Vol.  XII.  p.  72; 
and  see  also  Vol.  VIII.  p.  226,  and  Eagie'e  Neat,  §  206.1 

'  [For  this  description  of  Osborne  Gordon,  compare  Vol.  XVII.  p.  Ixxv.] 


IV.   THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE     118 

houses  which  the  laifaroad  intersected  in  the  suburbs  should 
unfit  him,  by  the  horror  of  it,  for  his  day's  work. 

128.  Now,  it  is  not  possible — and  I  repeat  to  you,  only 
in  more  deliberate  assertion,  what  I  wrote  just  twenty- 
two  years  ago  in  the  last  chapter  of  the  Seven  Lamps  of 
Architecture^ — ^it  is  not  possible  to  have  any  right  mor- 
ality, happiness,  or  art,  in  any  country  where  the  cities  are 
thus  built,  or  thus,  let  me  rather  say,  clotted  and  coagu- 
lated; spots  of  a  dreadful  mildew,  spreading  by  patches 
and  blotches  over  the  country  they  consume.  You  must 
have  lovely  cities,  crjrstallized,  not  coagulated,  into  form; 
limited  in  size,  and  not  casting  out  the  scum  and  scurf  of 
them  into  an  encircling  eruption  of  shame,  but  girded  each 
with  its  sacred  pomcerium,  and  with  garlands  of  gardens 
full  of  blossoming  trees  and  softly  guided  streams. 

That  is  impossible,  you  say!  it  may  be  so.  I  have 
nothing  to  do  with  its  possibility,  but  only  with  its  indis- 
pensability.'  More  than  that  must  be  possible,  however, 
before  you  can  have  a  school  of  art;  namely,  that  you  find 
places  elsewhere  than  in  England,  or  at  least  in  otherwise 
unserviceable  parts  of  England,  for  the  establishment  of 
manufactories  needing  the  help  of  fire,  that  is  to  say,  of 
all  the  Te)(y€u  fiayavtrucou  and  hrippnToi,  of  which  it  was  long 
ago  known  to  be  the  constant  nature  that  ^'aorxoX/a?  fAaki<rra 

ejfpuori  Koi  (jnXwv  kcu  TroXeto^  ovveTrtfieXeiadaij^^  and  to  reduce  SUch 

manufactures  to  their  lowest  limit,  so  that  nothing  may  ever 
be  made  of  iron  that  can  as  effectually  be  made  of  wood 
or  stone;  and  nothing  moved  by  steam  that  can  be  as 
effectually  moved  by  natural  forces.^  And  observe,  that 
for  all  mechanical  effort  required  in  social  life  and  in  cities, 
water  power  is  infinitely  more  than  enough;  for  anchored 
mills  on  the  large  rivers,  and  mills  moved  by  sluices  from 

1  [See  Vol.  VIII.  pp.  259  409.] 

>  |Here,  ngun,  compare  Set>en  Lamjn;  Vol.  VIII.  p.  265.] 

^  'Xenophon^  EeonomUi,  it.  2,  3:  ''the  arts  which  are  mechanical  and  infamous 
pecoliarly  involve  want  of  leiiure  for  caring  for  friends  or  city."  Compare  Munera 
PtOveru,  §  109  fi.  (VoL  XVII.  p.  235} ;  and  see  §  4,  ahore,  p.  21.] 

*  [Compare  Vol.  XVIL  pp.  c,  156,  543.] 

XX.  H 


/ 


114  LECTURES   ON  ART 

reservoirs  filled  by  the  tide,  wiU  give  you  command  of  any 
quantity  of  constant  motive  power  you  need« 

Agriculture  by  the  hand,  then,  and  absolute  refusal  or 
banishment  of  unnecessary  igneous  force,  are  the  first  con- 
ditions of  a  school  of  art  in  any  country.  And  until  you 
do  this,  be  it  soon  or  late,  things  will  continue  in  that 
triumphant  state  to  which,  for  want  of  finer  art,  your 
mechanism  has  brought  them;  —  that,  though  England  is 
deafened  with  spinning  wheels,^  her  people  have  not  clothes 
— ^though  she  is  black  with  digging  of  fiiel,  they  die  of 
cold — and  though  she  has  sold  her  soul  for  gain,  they  die 
of  hunger.  Stay  in  that  triumph,  if  you  choose;  but  be 
assured  of  this,  it  is  not  one  which  the  fine  arts  will  ever 
share  with  you. 

124).  Now,  I  have  given  you  my  message,  ccmtaining,  as 
I  know,  offence  enough,  and  itself,  it  may  seem  to  many, 
unnecessary  enough.  But  just  in  proportion  to  its  apparent 
non-necessity,  and  to  its  certain  ofience,  was  its  reid  need, 
and  my  real  duty  to  speak  it.  The  study  of  the  fine  arts 
could  not  be  rightly  associated  with  the  grave  work  of 
English  Universities,  without  due  and  clear  protest  against 
the  misdirection  of  national  energy,  which  for  the  present 
renders  all  good  results  of  such  study  on  a  great  scale,  im- 
possible. I  can  easily  teach  you,  as  any  other  moderately 
good  draughtsman  could,  how  to  hold  your  pencils,  and 
how  to  lay  your  colours ;  but  it  is  little  use  my  doing  that, 
while  the  nation  is  spending  millions  of  money  in  the  de- 
struction of  all  that  pencil  or  colour  has  to  represent,  and 
in  the  promotion  of  false  forms  of  art,  which  are  only  the 
costliest  and  the  least  enjoyable  of  follies.  And  therefore 
these  are  the  things  that  I  have  first  and  last  to  tell  you 
in  this  place; — that  the  fine  arts  are  not  to  be  learned  by 
Locomotion,  but  by  making  the  homes  we  live  in  lovely, 
and  by  staying  in  them; — that  the  fine  arts  are  not  to  be 
learned  by  Competition,  but  by  doing  our  quiet  best  in  our 

1  [Comuare  Modem  PaitUen,  toL  t.  (VoL  VII.  p.  425)^  and  Suame  and  JU/lsr, 
§  130  (Vol.  XVIIL  p.  177).] 


IV.  THE  RELATION  OF  ART  TO  USE     115 

own  way; — ^that  the  fine  arts  are  not  to  be  learned  by  Ex- 
hibition, but  by  doing  what  is  right,  and  making  what  is 
honest,  whether  it  be  exhibited  or  not; — ^and,  for  the  sum 
of  all,  that  men  must  paint  and  build  neither  for  pride  nor 
for  money,  but  for  love;  for  love  of  their  art,  for  love 
of  their  neighbour,  and  whatever  better  love  may  be  than 
these,  founded  on  these.  I  know  that  I  gave  some  pain, 
which  I  was  most  unwilling  to  give,  in  speaking  of  the  pos- 
sible abuses  of  religious  art ;  ^  but  there  can  be  no  danger  of 
any,  so  long  as  we  remember  that  God  inhabits  cottages  as 
well  as  churches,  and  ought  to  be  well  lodged  there  also. 
Begin  with  wooden  floors;  the  tessellated  ones  will  take 
care  of  themselves;  begin  with  thatching  roofis,  and  you 
shall  end  by  splendidly  vaulting  them;  begin  by  taking 
care  that  no  old  eyes  fiiil  over  their  Bibles,  nor  young  ones 
over  their  needles,  for  want  of  rushlight,  and  then  you 
may  have  whatever  true  good  is  to  be  got  out  of  coloured 
glass  or  wax  candles.'  And  in  thus  putting  the  arts  to  uni- 
versal use,  you  will  find  also  their  universal  inspiration,  their 
universal  benediction.  I  told  you  there  was  no  evidence  of 
a  special  Divineness  in  any  application  of  them;  that  they 
were  always  equally  human  and  equally  Divine;  and  in 
closing  this  inaugural  series  of  lectures,^  into  which  I  have 
endeavoured  to  compress  the  principles  that  are  to  be  the 
foundations  of  your  future  work,  it  is  my  last  duty  to  say 
some  positive  words  as  to  the  Divinity  of  all  art,  when  it 
is  truly  fidr,  or  truly  serviceable. 

125.  Every  seventh  day,  if  not  oftener,  the  greater 
number  of  well-meaning  persons  in  England  thankfidly  re- 
ceive from  their  teachers  a  benediction,  couched  in  those 
terms: — "The  grace  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  the 
Love  of  Gx>d,  and  the  Fellowship  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  be 
with  you."    Now  I   do  not  know  precisely  what  sense  is 


1 

s 


See  above,  §§  66  ieq,,  pp*  63  teq.] 

Commire  VoL  XIX.  p.  267.] 
*  [The  nrst  fbar  lectures  of  the  coarse  were  inauffund  and  addressed  to  a  general 
andienoe;  the  last  three  were  of  a  more  techniciu  character:  see  Bibliographical 
Note  abeve^  p.  6.] 


116  LECTURES  ON  ART 

attached  in  the  English  public  mind  to  those  expressions. 
But  what  I  have  to  tell  you  positively  is  that  the  three 
things  do  actually  exist,  and  can  be  known  if  you  care 
to  know  them,  and  possessed  if  you  care  to  possess  them; 
and  that  another  thing  exists,  besides  these,  of  which  we 
already  know  too  much. 

First,  by  simply  oheying  the  orders  of  the  Founder  of 
your  religion,  all  grace,  graciousness,  or  beauty  and  favour 
of  gentle  life,  will  be  given  to  you  in  mind  and  body,  in 
work  and  in  rest  The  Grace  of  Christ  exists,  and  can  be 
had  if  you  will.  Secondly,  as  you  know  more  and  more 
of  the  created  world,  you  will  find  that  the  true  will  of 
its  Maker  is  that  its  creatures  should  be  happy; — ^that  He 
has  made  everything  beautiful  in  its  time^  and  its  place, 
and  that  it  is  chiefly  by  the  fault  of  men,  when  they  are 
allowed  the  liberty  of  thwarting  His  laws,  that  Creation 
groans  or  travails  in  pain.'  The  Love  of  God  exists,  and 
you  may  see  it,  and  live  in  it  if  you  wilL  Lastly,  a  Spirit 
does  actually  exist  which  teaches  the  ant  her  path,  the  bird 
her  building,  and  men,  in  an  instinctive  and  marvellous 
way,  whatever  lovely  arts  and  noble  deeds  are  possible  to 
them.  Without  it  you  can  do  no  good  thing.  To  the 
grief  of  it  you  can  do  many  bad  ones.  In  the  possession 
of  it  is  your  peace  and  your  power. 

And  there  is  a  fourth  thing,  of  which  we  already  know 
too  much.  There  is  an  evil  spirit  whose  dominion  is  in 
blindness  and  in  cowardice,  as  the  dominion  of  the  Spirit 
of  wisdom  is  in  clear  sight  and  in  courage. 

And  this  blind  and  cowardly  spirit  is  for  ever  telling 
you  that  evil  things  are  pardonable,  and  you  shall  not  die 
for  them,  and  that  good  things  are  impossible,  and  you 
need  not  live  for  them;  and  that  gospel  of  his  is  now  the 
loudest  that  is  preached  in  your  Saxon  tongue.  You  will 
find  some  day,  to  your  cost,  if  you  believe  the  first  part 

^  [Eceletiastes  liL  11.    Ruskin  tmnsktes  accurately  (at  in  the  Reviaed  Vernon) ; 
the  Authorised  Version  has  '^in  his  time."] 
>  [Romans  viii.  22.] 


IV.  THE  RELATION   OF  ART  TO   USE      117 

of  it,  that  it  is  not  true;  but  you  may  never,  if  you  be- 
lieve the  second  part  of  it,  find,  to  your  gain,  that  also, 
untrue;  and  therefore  I  pray  you  with  all  earnestness  to 
prove,  and  know  within  your  hearts,  that  all  things  lovely 
and  righteous  are  possible  for  those  who  believe  in  their 
possibility,  and  who  determine  that,  for  their  part,  they 
will  make  every  day's  work  contribute  to  them.  Let  every 
dawn  of  morning  be  to  you  as  the  beginning  of  life,  and 
every  setting  sun  be  to  you  as  its  close: — ^then  let  every 
one  of  these  short  lives  leave  its  sure  record  of  some  kindly 
thing  done  for  others — some  goodly  strength  or  knowledge 
gained  for  yourselves;  so,  from  day  to  day,  and  strength 
to  strength,  you  shall  build  up  indeed,  by  Art,  by  Thought, 
and  by  Just  WiU,  an  Ecclesia  of  England,  of  which  it 
shall  not  be  said,  ''See  what  manner  of  stones  are  here,"^ 
but,  **  See  what  manner  of  men."  * 

1  [Mark  xiiL  1.] 

*  [Comparo  the  condiuion  of  Essay  ii.  in  Unto  thU  Ltut  (§  41),  VoL  XVII. 
p.  fift  J 


LECTURE  V* 

LINE2 

126,  liTou  will,  I  doubt  not,  willingly  permit  me  to  begin 
your  lessons  in  real  practice  of  art'  in  the  words  of  the 
greatest  of  English  painters:  one  also,  than  whom  there  is 
indeed  no  greater,  among  those  of  any  nation,  or  any  time, 
— our  own  gentle  Reynolds,* 

He  says  in  his  fost  discourse:  —  "The  Directors"  (of 
the  Academy)  ''ought  more  particularly  to  watch  over  the 
genius  of  those  students,  who  being  more  advanced,  are 
arrived  at  that  critical  period  of  study,  on  the  nice  manage- 
ment of  which  their  future  turn  of  taste  depends.  At  that 
age  it  is  natural  for  them  to  be  more  captivated  with 
what  is  brilliant,  than  with  what  is  solid,  and  to  prefer 
splendid  n^ligence  to  painful  and  humiUating  exactness." 

"  4-  f&cility  in  composing, — ^a  lively  and,  what  is  called, 
a  'masterly'  handling  of  the  chalk  or  pencil,  are,  it  must 
be  confessed,  captivating  qualities  to  young  minds,  and  be- 
come of  course  the  objects  of  their  ambition.  They  en- 
deavour to  imitate  these  dazzling  excellences,  which  they 
wlQ  find  no  great  labour  in  attaining.  After  much  time 
spent  in  these  frivolous  pursuits,  the  difficulty  will  be  to 
retreat ;  but  it  will  then  be  too  late ;  and  there  is  scarce  an 

1  rDeliverad  on  March  9,  1870.] 

'  [For  the  diviBioii  of  artistic  effects  into  line,  light  (Lecture  vi.),  and  colour 
(Ijecture  vii.),  compare  Ariadne  Fhrmtina^  §  18.] 

*  [Eds.  1-3  read  :— 

''.  .  .  practice  of  art  in  words  of  higher  authority  than  mine  (I  ought 
rather  to  say,  of  all  authority,  while  mine  are  of  none), — the  words  of  the 
greatest  .  .  ."] 

*  [On   the   gentleness   of  Reynolds,   compare    Two   Paths,   §    64   (Vol.    XVI. 
p.  308).] 

118 


V.  LINE  119 

instance  of  return  to  scrupulous  labour,  after  the  mind  has 
been  debauched  and  deceived  by  this  fallacious  mastery." 

127.  I  read  you  these  words,  chiefly  that  Sir  Joshua, 
who  founded,  as  first  President,  the  Academical  schools 
of  English  painting,  in  these  well-known  discourses,  may 
also  begin,  as  he  has  truest  right  to  do,  our  system  of 
instruction  in  this  University.  But  secondly,  I  read  them 
that  I  may  press  on  your  attention  these  singular  words, 
*' painful  and  humiliating  exactness."  Singular,  as  express- 
ing the  first  conditions  of  the  study  required  from  his  pupils 
by  the  master,  who,  of  all  men  except  Velasquez,  seems  to 
have  painted  with  the  greatest  ease.  It  is  true  that  he 
asks  this  pain,  this  humiliation,  only  from  youths  who  in- 
tend to  follow  the  profession  of  artists.  But  if  you  wish 
yourselves  to  know  anything  of  the  practice  of  art,  you 
must  not  suppose  that  because  your  study  will  be  more 
desultory  than  that  of  Academy  students,  it  may  therefore 
be  less  accurate.  The  shorter  the  time  you  have  to  give, 
the  more  careful  you  should  be  to  spend  it  profitably;  and 
I  would  not  wish  you  to  devote  one  hour  to  the  practice 
of  drawing,  unless  you  are  resolved  to  be  informed  in  it  of 
all  that  in  an  hour  can  be  taught. 

128.  I  speak  of  the  practice  of  drawiiig  only;  though 
elementary  study  of  modelling  may  perhaps  some  day  be 
advisably  connected  with  it;  but  I  do  not  wish  to  disturb, 
or  amuse,  you  with  a  formal  statement  of  the  manifold  ex- 
pectations I  have  formed  respecting  your  future  work.  You 
will  not,  I  am  sure,  imagine  that  I  have  begun  without  a 
plan,  nor  blame  my  reticence  as  to  the  parts  of  it  which 
cannot  yet  be  put  into  execution,  and  which  there  may 
occur  reason  afterwards  to  modify.  My  first  task  must  un- 
questionably be  to  lay  before  you  right  and  simple  methods 
of  drawing  and  colouring. 

I  use  the  word  "colouring"  without  reference  to  any 
particular  vehicle  of  colour,  for  the  laws  of  good  painting 
are  the  same,  whatever  Uquid  is  employed  to  dissolve  the 
pigments.     But  the  technical  management  of  oil  is  more 


120  LECTURES  ON  ART 

difficult  than  that  of  water-colour,  and  the  impossibility  of 
using  it  with  safety  anDiong  books  or  prints,^  and  its  unavail- 
ableness  for  note-book  sketches  and  memoranda,  are  suffi- 
cient reasons  for  not  introducing  it  in  a  course  of  practice 
intended  chiefly  for  students  of  literature.  On  the  contrary, 
in  the  exercises  of  artists,  oil  should  be  the  vehicle  of  colour 
employed  from  the  first.*  The  extended  practice  of  water- 
colour  painting,  as  a  separate  skill,  is  in  every  way  harmful 
to  the  arts:  its  pleasant  slightness  and  plausible  dexterity 
divert  the  genius  of  the  painter  from  its  proper  aims,  and 
withdraw  the  attention  of  the  public  from  excellence  of 
higher  claim;  nor  ought  any  man,  who  has  the  conscious- 
ness of  ability  for  good  work,  to  be  ignorant  of,  or  indolent 
in  employing,  the  methods  of  making  its  results  permanent 
as  long  as  the  laws  of  Nature  allow.  It  is  surely  a  severe 
lesson  to  us  in  this  matter,  that  the  best  works  of  Turner 
could  not  be  shown  to  the  public  for  six  months  without 
being  destroyed,' — and  that  Ins  most  ambitious  ones  for  the 
most  part  perished,  even  before  they  could  be  shown.  I 
will  break  through  my  law  of  reticence,  however,  so  far  as 
to  tell  you  that  I  have  hope  of  one  day  interesting  you 
greatly  (with  the  help  of  the  Flor^itine  masters),  in  the 
study  of  the  arts  of  moulding  and  painting  porcelain ;  and  to 
induce  some  of  you  to  use  your  future  power  of  patronage 
in  encouraging  the  various  branches  of  this  art,  and  turning 
the  attention  of  the  workmen  of  Italy  from  the  vulgar  tricks 
of  minute  and  perishable  mosaic  ^  to  the  exquisite  subtilties 
of  form  and  colour  possible  in  the  perfectly  ductile,  after- 
wards unalterable  clay.  And  one  of  the  ultimate  results  of 
such  craftsmanship  might  be  the  production  of  pictures  as 
brilliant  as  painted  glass, — as  delicate  as  the  most  subtle 
water-colours,  and  more  permanent  than  the  Pyramids. 

^  [Compftre  what  Raskin  sayt  of  his  own  early  experiences  with  oils^  Vol.*  I. 
p.  xzxii.] 

'  [Compare  The  Belatum  between  Michael  Angelo  arid  ThUoret^  §  19.] 

'  [For  other  passages  in  which  Raskin  calls  Tamer^s  water-coloars  his  best 
works^  see  VoL  XIII.  pp.  96^  130;  and  on  the  subject  of  their  Mmg,  ibid., 
pp.  589  <«9*] 

*  [Compare  Vol.  VIII.  p.  181 ;  Vol.  XV.  pp.  464-466.] 


V.  LINE  121 

129.  And  now  to  begin  our  own  work.  In  order  that 
we  may  know  how  rightly  to  learn  to  draw  and  to  paint, 
it  will  be  necessary,  will  it  not,  that  we  know  first  what 
we  are  to  aim  at  doing; — ^what  kind  of  representation  of 
nature  is  best? 

I  wiU  tell  you  in  the  words  of  Leonardo.  ''  That  is  the 
most  praiseworthy  painting  which  has  most  conformity  with 
the  thing  represented,"  ''quella  pittura  e  piu  laudabile,  la 
quale  ha  piu  conformita  con  la  cosa  mitata,"  (ch.  276).^  In 
plain  terms,  'Hhe  painting  which  is  likest  nature  is  the 
best."  And  you  will  find  by  referring  to  the  preceding 
chapter,  '^come  lo  specchio  e  maestro  de'  pittori,"  how  ab- 
solutely Leonardo  means  what  he  says.  Let  the  living 
thing,  (he  tells  us,)  be  reflected  in  a  mirror,  then  put  your 
picture  beside  the  reflection,  and  match  the  one  with  the 
other.  And  indeed,  the  very  best  painting  is  unquestion- 
ably so  like  the  mirrored  truth,  that  all  the  world  admits  its 
excellence.  Entirely  first-rate  work  is  so  quiet  and  natural 
that  there  can  be  no  dispute  over  it;  you  may  not  par- 
ticularly admire  it,  but  you  will  find  no  fault  with  it. 
Second-rate  painting  pleases  one  person  much,  and  dis- 
pleases another;  but  &rst-rate  painting  pleases  all  a  little, 
and  intensely  pleases  those  who  can  recognize  its  unosten- 
tatious skilL 

180.  This,  then,  is  what  we  have  first  got  to  do — to 
make  our  drawing  look  as  like  the  thing  we  have  to  draw 
as  we  can. 

Now,  all  objects  are  seen  by  the  eye  as^  patches  of 
colour  of  a  certain  shape,  with  gradations  of  colour  within 
them.*  And,  unless  their  colours  be  actually  luminous,  as 
those  of  the  sun,  or  of  fire,  these  patches  of  difierent  hues 
are   sufficiently   imitable,   except   so   far  as  they  are   seen 

*  [§  351  in  the  reammged  Engligh  version  by  Rigmud  (Bohn's  edition,  ^  160). 
For  another  reference  to  the  passage,  see  VoL  XIV.  p.  360.  The  '^  preceding 
chapter"  is  §  350.] 

^  [Compare  Araira  P^nteHci,  %  32  (below,  p.  222);  Elemeni$  ^  Drawing,  §  5, 
and  Lawi  iff  Fi9oU,  ch.  vii.  §  1  (VoL  XV.  pp.  27,  414) ;  and  Lecturet  en  Landseape, 
§  21  (Vol.  XXn.  p.  26).] 


122  LECTURES   ON  ART 

stereoscopically.  You  will  find  LecMiardo  again  and  again 
insisting  on  the  stereoscopic  power  of  the  double  sigfat:^ 
but  do  not  let  that  trouble  you ;  you  can  only  paint  what 
you  can  see  from  one  point  of  sight,  but  tiiat  is  quite 
enough.  So  seen,  then,  all  objects  appear  to  the  human 
eye  simply  as  masses  of  colour  of  variable  depth,  texture, 
and  outline.  The  outline  of  any  object  is  the  limit  of  its 
mass,  as  relieved  against  another  mass.  Take  a  crocus, 
and  lay  it  on  a  green  cloth.  You  will  see  it  detach  itself 
as  a  mere  space  of  yellow  from  the  green  behind  it,  as  it 
does  from  the  grass.  Hold  it  up  against  the  window — you 
will  see  it  detach  itself  as  a  dark  space  against  the  white 
or  blue  behind  it.  In  either  case  its  outline  is  the  limit 
of  the  space  of  light  or  dark  colour  by  which  it  expresses 
itself  to  your  sight.  That  outline  is  therefore  infinitely 
subtle — ^not  even  a  line,  but  the  place  of  a  line,  and  that, 
also,  made  soft  by  texture.  In  the  finest  painting  it  is 
therefore  slightly  softened ;  but  it  is  necessary  to  be  able  to 
draw  it  with  absolute  sharpness  and  precision.  The  art  of 
doing  this  is  to  be  obtained  by  drawing  it  as  an  actual 
line,  which  art  is  to  be  the  subject  of  our  immediate  en- 
quiry ;  but  I  must  first  lay  the  divisions  of  the  entire  sub- 
ject completely  before  you. 

181.  I  have  said  that  all  objects  detach  themselves  as 
masses  of  colour.  Usually,  light  and  shade  are  thought  of 
as  separate  from  colour;  but  the  fact  is  that  all  nature 
is  seen  as  a  mosaic  composed  of  gradated  portions  of  dif- 
ferent colours,  dark  or  light.  There  is  no  difference  in 
the  quality  of  these  colours,  except  as  affected  by  texture. 
You  will  constantly  hear  lights  and  shades  spoken  of  as  if 
these  were  different  in  their  nature,  and  to  be  painted  in 
different  ways.  But  every  light  is  a  shadow  compared  to 
higher  lights,  till  we  reach  the  brightness  of  the  sun;  and 
every  shadow  is  a  light  compared  to  lower  shadows,  till  we 
reach  the  darkness  of  night. 

Every  colour  used  in  painting,  except  pure  white  and 

^  [See  especially  §§  124,  348  in  Rigaud's  tnumlAtioii.] 


V.   LINE  128 

black,  is  therefore  a  light  and  shade  at  the  same  time.  It 
is  a  light  with  reference  to  all  below  it,  and  a  shade  with 
reference  to  all  above  it. 

182.  The  solid  forms  of  an  object,  that  is  to  say,  the 
projections  or  recessions  of  its  surface  within  the  outline, 
are,  for  the  most  part,  rendered  visible  by  variations  in  the 
intensity  or  quantity  of  light  falling  on  them.  The  study 
of  the  relations  between  the  quantities  of  this  light,  irre- 
spectively, of  its  colour,  is  the  second  division  of  the  regu- 
lated science  of  painting. 

188.  Finally,  the  qualities  and  relations  of  natural 
colours,  the  means  of  imitating  them,  and  the  laws  by 
which  they  become  separately  beautiful,  and  in  associa- 
tion harmonious,  are  the  subjects  of  the  third  and  final 
division  of  the  painter's  study.  I  shall  endeavour  at  once 
to  state  to  you  what  is  most  immediately  desirable  for  you 
to  know  on  each  of  these  topics,  in  this  and  the  two 
following  lectures.^ 

184.  What  we  have  to  do,  then,  from  beginning  to 
end,  is,  I  repeat  once  more,  simply  to  draw  spaces  of  their 
true  shape,  and  to  fill  them  with  colours  which  shall  match 
their  colours;  quite  a  simple  thing  in  the  definition  of  it, 
not  quite  so  easy  in  the  doing  of  it. 

But  it  is  something  to  get  this  simple  definition;  and 
I  wish  you  to  notice  that  the  terms  of  it  are  complete, 
though  I  do  not  introduce  the  term  "light,"  or  "shadow." 
Painters  who  have  no  eye  for  colour  have  greatly  confused 
and  fedsified  the  practice  of  art  by  the  theory  that  shadow 
is  an  absence  of  colour.  Shadow  is,  on  the  contrary, 
necessary  to  the  full  presence  of  colour;  for  every  colour 
is  a  diminished  quantity  or  energy  of  light;'  and,  prac- 
tically, it  follows  from  what  I  have  just  told  you — {that 
every  light  in  painting  is  a  shadow  to  higher  lights,  and 
every  shadow  a  light  to  lower  shadows) — ^that  also  every 

^  [In  one  of  his  copies  Ruskin  marks  the  end  of  §  ISO  ''A"  {i,e,,  outline)^ 
I  132  '^B"  (lin^t  and  shade),  and  §  133  ''C"  (colour);  adding,  ''but  in  practioe 


take  C  first,  B  last"-nas  explained  in  §  139,  below.] 
>  [Here,  again,  compare  Law  ^  Fitois,  ch.  vu.  §  1  (Vol  XV.  p.  414).] 


124  LECTURES   ON  ART 

colour  in  painting  must  be  a  shadow  to  some  brighter 
colour,  and  a  light  to  some  darker  one — ^all  the  while  being 
a  positive  colour  itself.  And  the  great  splendour  of  the 
Venetian  school  arises  from  their  having  seen  and  held  from 
the  beginning  this  great  fact — ^that  shadow  is  as  much 
colour  as  light,  often  much  more.  In  Titian's  fullest  red 
the  lights  are  pale  rose-colour,  passing  into  white  —  the 
shadows  warm  deep  crimson.  In  Veronese's  most  splendid 
orange,  the  lights  are  pale,  the  shadows  crocus  colour;  and 
so  on.  In  nature,  dark  sides  if  seen  by  reflected  lights,  are 
almost  always  fuller  or  warmer  in  colour  than  the  lights; 
and  the  practice  of  the  Bolognese  and  Roman  schools,  in 
drawing  their  shadows  always  dark  and  cold,^  is  false  from 
the  b^finning,  and  renders  perfect  painting  for  ever  im- 
possible in  those  schools,  and  to  all  who  follow  them. 

185.  Every  visible  space,  then,  be  it  dark  or  light,  is  a 
space  of  colour  of  some  kind,  or  of  black  or  white.  And 
you  have  to  enclose  it  with  a  true  outline,  and  to  paint  it 
with  its  true  colour. 

But  before  considering  how  we  are  to  draw  this  en- 
closing line,  I  must  state  to  you  something  about  the  use 
of  lines  in  general,  by  different  schools. 

I  said  just  now  that  there  was  no  difference  between 
the  masses  of  colour  of  which  all  visible  nature  is  com- 
posed, except  in  texture.  Now  textures  are  principally  of 
three  kinds: — 

(1)  Lustrous,  as  of  water  and  glass. 

(2)  Bloomy,  or  velvety,  as  of  a  rose-leaf  or  peach. 

(8)  Linear,  produced  by  filaments  or  threads,  as  in 
feathers,  fur,  hair,  and  woven  or  reticulated 
tissues. 

All  these  three  sources  of  pleasure  to  the  eye  in  texture 
are  united  in  the  best  ornamental  work.  A  fine  picture 
by  Fra  Angelico,  or  a  fine  illuminated  page  of  missal,  has 
liurge  spaces  of  gold,  partiy  burnished  and  lustrous,  partly 

^  ^Roflkm  in  one  of  hii  eopiet  for  reviaion  notes  here:  '^ Correct — ^Raphael  so 
only  in  his  piotnres,  not  the  frescoes.    Leonardo  always/'] 


V.  LINE  125 

dead; — some  of  it  chased  and  enriched  with  linear  texture, 
and  mingled  with  imposed  or  inlaid  colours,  soft  in  bloom 
like  that  of  the  rose-leaf.  But  many  schools  of  art  affect 
for  the  most  part  one  kind  of  texture  only,  and  a  vast 
quantity  of  the  art  of  all  ages  depends  for  great  part  of  its 
power  on  texture  produced  by  multitudinous  lines.  Thus, 
wood  engraving,  line  engraving  properly  so  called,  and 
countless  varieties  of  sculpture,  metal  work,  and  textile 
fabric,  depend  for  great  part  of  the  effect,  for  the  mystery, 
softness,  and  clearness  of  their  colours,  or  shades,  on  modi- 
fication of  the  surfaces  by  lines  or  threads.  Even  in  ad- 
vanced oil  painting,  the  work  often  depends  for  some  part 
of  its  effect  on  the  texture  of  the  canvas. 

186.  Again,  the  arts  of  etching  and  mezzotint  engrav- 
ing depend  principally  for  their  effect  on  the  velvety,  or 
bloomy  texture  of  their  darkness,  and  the  best  of  all  piunt^ 
ing  is  the  fresco  work  of  great  colourists,'  in  which  the 
colours  are  what  is  usually  called  dead;  but  they  are  any- 
thing but  dead,  they  glow  with  the  luminous  bloom  of  life. 
The  frescoes  of  Correggio,  when  not  repainted,  are  supreme 
in  this  quality.' 

187.  While,  however,  in  all  periods  of  art  these  different 
textures  are  thus  used  in  various  styles,  and  for  various 
purposes,  you  will  find  that  there  is  a  broad  historical  divi- 
sion of  schools,  which  will  materially  assist  you  in  under- 
standing them.  The  earliest  art  in  most  countries  is  linear,' 
consisting  of  interwoven,  or  richly  spiral  and  otherwise  in- 
volved arrangements  of  sculptured  or  painted  lines,  on 
stone,  wood,  metal  or  clay.     It  is  generaUy  characteristic 

1  [Compare  Two  Paihi,  §  74  (Vol.  XVI.  p.  321).] 
>  [Eds.  1-3  add  here  :— 

''.  .  .in  this  quality;  and  you  have  a  lovely  example  in  the  Uoiversity 
Galleries^  in  the  untouched  portion  of  the  female  head  hy  Raphael,  partly 
restored  hy  Lawrence." 
The  reference  was  to  the  drawing,  No.  179  in  Sir  J.  C.  Rohinson's  Oriikal  Aeeount 
qf  the  Drawings  by  Michel  Angela  and  RaffMh  m  the  Univeniiy  QaUeriei^  O^tferd, 
It  is  ascribed  by  Robinson  to  Federigo  Baroccio.  A  piece  of  the  original  drawings 
which  had  been  torn,  is  restored  by  a  later  hand ;  it  was  in  Sir  T.  Lawrence's 
collection.] 

*  [Compare  Ariadne  Florentma^  §  33.] 


126  LECTURES  ON  ART 

of  savage  life,  and  of  feverish  energy  of  imagination.  I 
shall  examine  these  schools  with  you  hereafter,  under  the 
general  head  of  the  "  Schools  of  Line."  * 

Secondly,  even  in  the  earliest  periods,  among  powerful 
nations,  this  linear  decoration  is  more  or  less  filled  with 
chequered  or  barred  shade,  and  begins  at  once  to  repre- 
sent animal  or  floral  form,  by  filling  its  outlines  with  flat 
shadow,  or  with  flat  colour.  And  here  we  instantly  find 
two  great  divisions  of  temper  and  thought.  The  Greeks 
look  upon  all  colour  first  as  light;  they  are,  as  compared 
with  other  races,  insensitive  to  hue,  exquisitely  sensitive  to 
phenomena  of  light.  And  their  linear .  school  passes  into 
one  of  flat  masses  of  light  and  darkness,  represented  in  the 
main  by  four  tints, — ^white,  black,  and  two  reds,  one  brick 
colour,  more  or  less  vivid,  the  other  dark  purple ;  these  two 
stainding  mentally  [for]^  their  favourite  irop<f>vp€09  colour,  in 
its  light  and  dark  powers.'  On  the  other  hand,  many  of 
the  Northern  nations  are  at  first  entirely  insensible  to  hght 
and  shade,  but  exquisitely  sensitive  to  colour,  and  their 
linear  decoration  is  filled  with  flat  tints,  infinitely  varied, 
but  with  no  expression  of  light  and  shade.  Both  these 
schools  have  a  limited  but  absolute  perfection  of  their  own, 
and  their  peculiar  successes  can  in  no  wise  be  imitated,  ex- 
cept by  the  strictest  observance  of  the  same  limitations. 

188.  You  have  then.  Line  for  the  earliest  art,  branching 
into — 

(1)  Greek,  Line  with  Light. 

(2)  Gothic,  Line  with  Colour.* 

Now,  as  art  completes  itself,  each  of  these  schools  retain 
their  separate  characters,  but  they  cease  to  depend  on  lines, 

*  See  Ariadne  FloretOma,  §  5.     [1887.] 

1  |ln  eds.  1-3  ''these  two  repreeentiiig " ;  which  in  1887  Ruskin  altered  into 
''standing  mentally  for/'  but  the  word  "for"  has  in  all  editions  hitherto  been 
omitted.] 

*  [On  the  Greek  conception  of  "purple/*  see  Qiuem  qf  the  Air,  §  91^  and  the 
notes  at  that  place  (Vol.  aDL  pp.  379^  380).] 

>  [On  the  characterisation  of  toe  Greek  school  in  these  lectures^  compare  Leeturee 
m  Landscape,  §  42  (Vol.  XXII.  p.  89);  and  AH  qf  England,  §  62.] 


V.  LINE  127 

and  learn  to  represent  masses  instead,  becoming  more  re- 
fined at  the  same  time  in  all  modes  of  perception  and 
execution. 

And  thus  there  arise  the  two  vast  mediaeval  schools; 
one  of  flat  and  infinitely  varied  colour,  with  exquisite  char- 
acter and  sentiment  added,  in  the  forms  represented;  but 
little  perception  of  shadow.  The  other,  of  light  and  shade, 
with  exquisite  drawing  of  solid  form,  and  little  perception 
of  colour :  sometimes  as  little  of  sentiment.^  Of  these,  the 
school  of  flat  colour  is  the  more  vital  one;  it  is  always 
natural  and  simple,  if  not  great; — ^and  when  it  is  great,  it 
is  very  great. 

The  school  of  light  and  shade  associates  itself  with  that 
of  engraving ;  it  is  essentially  an  academical  school,  broadly 
dividing  Ught  from  darkness,  and  begins  by  assuming  that 
the  light  side  of  all  objects  shall  be  represented  by  white, 
and  the  extreme  shadow  by  black.  On  this  conventional 
principle  it  reaches  a  limited  excellence  of  its  own,  in  which 
the  best  existing  types  of  engraving  are  executed,  and  ulti- 
mately, the  most  regular  expressions  of  organic  form  in 
painting. 

Then,  lastly, — the  schools  of  colour  advance  steadily, 
till  they  adopt  from  those  of  light  and  shade  whatever  is 
compatible  with  their  own  power,* — ^and  then  you  have 
perfect  art,  represented  centrally  by  that  of  the  great 
Venetians. 

The  schools  of  light  and  shade,  on  the  other  hand,  are 
partly,  in  their  academical  formulas,  too  haughty,  and 
partly,  in  their  narrowness  of  imagination,  too  weak,  to 
learn  much  from  the  schools  of  colour;  and  pass  into  a 
state  of  decadence,  consisting  partly  in  proud  endeavours 
to  give  painting  the  qualities  of  sculpture,  and  partly  in 
the  pursuit  of  effects  of  light  and  shade,  carried  at  last  to 

>  [Riukin^  in  referring  later  to  this  passage,  describes  it,  together  with  §§  147- 
148,  as  containing  ''  statements  which,  if  you  were  reading  the  book  by  yourselves, 
would  strike  you  probably  as  each  of  them  difficult,  and  in  some  degree  incon- 
sistent"   See  his  explanation  in  Ariadne  FhrenHna,  §§  200-262.] 

*  [Here,  again,  compare  Leoturee  en  Landioape^  %  60.] 


128  LECTURES  ON  ART 

extreme  sensational  subtlety  by  the  Dutch  schooL  In  their 
fall,  they  drag  the  schools  of  colour  down  with  them;  and 
the  recent  history  of  art  is  one  of  confused  effort  to  find 
lost  roads,  and  resume  allegiance  to  violated  principles* 

189.  That,  briefly,  is  the  map  of  the  great  schools,  easily 
remembered  in  this  hexagonal  form: — 

LiNB. 

Early  schools. 
2.  3, 

Line  and  Light.  Line  and  G>lour. 

Greek  clay.  Gothic  glass. 

4.  5. 

Mass  and  Light.  Mass  and  G>Louit. 

(Represented  by  Leonardo,  (Represented  by  Giorgione, 

and  his  schools.)  and  his  schools.) 

6. 

Mass^  Lioht^  and  Colour. 

(Represented  by  Titian, 
and  his  schools.) 

And^  I  wish  you  with  your  own  eyes  and  fingers  to  trace, 
and  in  your  own  progress  follow,  the  method  of  advance 
exemplified  by  these  great  schools.  I  wish  you  to  b^n 
by  getting  command  of  line,  that  is  to  say,  by  learning  to 
draw  a  steady  line,  limiting  with  absolute  correctness  the 
form  or  space  you  intend  it  to  limit ;  to  proceed  by  getting 
command  over  fiat  tints,  so  that  you  may  be  able  to  fill 
the  spaces  you  have  enclosed,  evenly,  either  with  shade 
or  colour  according  to  the  school  you  adopt;   and  finally 

1  [Eds.  1-3  read  :— 

''I  will  endeavour  hereafter  to  show  you  the  various  relations  of  all 
these  branches;  at  present,  I  am  only  concerned  with  your  own  practice. 
My  wish  is  that  you  should  with  your  own  eyes  ..." 
And  lower  down  eds.  1-3  omit  ^'acoor^ng  to  the  school  yon  adopt";  read 
^^ drawing"  for  '^ gradation,"  '^ undulation "  for  '' roundings,''  and  add  ''form  and" 
before  ''texture."  In  Ariadne  FlorenUna,  §  6,  where  the  passage  from  "I  wish 
you"  to  the  end  of  §  139  is  quoted,  tbe  earlier  version  is  given. J 


V,   LINE  129 

to  obtain  the  power  of  adding  such  fineness  of  gradation 
within  the  masses,  as  shall  express  their  roundings,  and 
their  characters  of  texture. 

140.  Those  who  are  familiar  with  the  methods  of  exist- 
ing schools  must  be  aware  that  I  thus  nearly  invert  their 
practice  of  teaching.  Students  at  present  learn  to  draw 
details  first,  and  to  colour  and  mass  them  afterwards.  I 
shall  endeavour  to  teach  you  to  arrange  broad  masses  and 
colours  first;  and  you  shall  put  the  details  into  them  after- 
wards. I  have  several  reasons  for  this  audacity,  of  which 
you  may  justly  require  me  to  state  the  principal  ones.  The 
furst  is  that,  as  I  have  shown  you,  this  method  I  wish  you 
to  follow,  is  the  natural  one.  All  great  artist  nations  have^ 
actually  learned  to  work  in  this  way,  and  I  believe  it  there- 
fore the  right,  as  the  hitherto  successful  one.  Secondly, 
you  will  find  it  less  irksome  than  the  reverse  method,  and 
more  definite.  When  a  beginner  is  set  at  once  to  draw 
details,  and  make  finished  studies  in  light  and  shade,  no 
master  can  correct  his  innumerable  errors,  or  rescue  him 
out  of  his  endless  difficulties.  But  in  the  natural  method, 
he  can  correct,  if  he  will,  his  own  errors.  You  will  have 
positive  lines  to  draw,  presenting  no  more  difficulty,  except 
in  requiring  greater  steadiness  of  hand,  than  the  outlines 
of  a  map.  They  will  be  generally  sweeping  and  simple, 
instead  of  being  jagged  into  promontories  and  bays;  but 
assuredly,  they  may  be  drawn  rightly  (with  patience),  and 
their  rightness  tested  with  mathematical  accuracy.  You 
have  only  to  follow  your  own  line  with  tracing  paper,  and 
apply  it  to  your  own  copy.  If  they  do  not  correspond, 
you  are  wrong,  and  you  need  no  master  to  show  you 
where.  Again;  in  washing  in  a  flat  tone  of  colour  or 
shade,  you  can  always  see  yourself  if  it  is  fiat,  and  kept 
well  within  the  edges;  and  you  can  set  a  piece  of  your 
colour  side  by  side  with  that  of  the  copy;  if  it  does  not 
match,  you  are  wrong;  and,  again,  you  need  no  one  to  tell 
you  so,  if  your  eye  for  colour  is  true.  It  happens,  indeed, 
more  frequently  than  would  be  supposed,  that  there  is  real 


180  LECTURES   ON   ART 

want  of  power  in  the  eye  to  distinguish  colours ;  ^  and  this 
I  even  suspect  to  be  a  condition  which  has  been  sometimes 
attendant  on  high  degrees  of  cerebral  sensitiveness  in  other 
directions;  but  such  want  of  faculty  would  be  detected  in 
yoiu*  first  two  or  three  exercises  by  this  simple  method, 
while,  otherwise,  you  might  go  on  for  years  endeavouring 
to  colour  from  nature  in  vain.  Lastly,  and  this  is  a  very 
weighty  collateral  reason,  such  a  method  enables  me  to 
show  you  many  things,  besides  the  art  of  drawing.  Every 
exercise  that  I  prepare  for  you  will  be  either  a  portion  of 
some  important  example  of  ancient  art,  or  of  some  natural 
object.*  However  rudely  or  unsuccessfully  you  may  draw 
it,  (though  I  anticipate  from  you  neither  want  of  care  nor 
success,)  you  will  nevertheless  have  learned  what  no  words 
could  have  so  forcibly  or  completely  taught  you,  either  re- 
specting early  art  or  organic  structure;  and  I  am  thus 
certain  that  not  a  moment  you  spend  attentively  will  be 
altogether  wasted,  and  that,  generally,  you  will  be  twice 
gainers  by  every  eflFort. 

141.  There  is,  however,  yet  another  point  in  which  I 
think  a  change  of  existing  methods  will  be  advisable.  You 
have  here  in  Oxford  one  of  the  finest  collections  in  Europe 
of  drawings  in  pen,  and  chalk,  by  Michael  Angelo  and 
Raphael.'  Of  the  whole  number,  you  cannot  but  have 
noticed  that  not  one  is  weak  or  studentlike — all  are  evi- 
dently master's  work. 

You  may  look  the  galleries  of  Europe  through,  and  so 
&r  as  I  know,  or  as  it  is  possible  to  make  with  safety 

i  [''Hie  perception  of  colour/'  says  Ruskin  elsewhere^  ''is  a  gift  just  as 
definitely  granted  to  one  person^  and  denied  to  another^  as  an  ear  for  music" 
(Vol.  X.  p.  97).j 

*  [Compare  §  22;  above,  p.  34.  But  with  the  opinion  of  the  collection  here 
expressed,  compare  what  Ruskin  said,  after  closer  examination,  in  The  Relation 
between  Michael  Angelo  and  Ttntoret,  §  2.] 

'  [Acauired  by  the  University  in  1845  (formerly  in  the  collection  of  Sir 
Thomas  Lawrence;.  They  have  been  catalogueid  by  Sir  J.  C.  Robinson  (^i  Critical 
Account  qf  the  Drawinge  bg  Michel  Angelo  and  Baffiaello  in  the  Univenity  QaUeriee^ 
O^ordf  1870.  Many  of  them  are  in  course  of  publication  in  Selected  Drawinge/rom 
Old  Maetere  in  the  UniverHty  Galleriee  and  in  the  Library  of  Chriet  Church,  Oa^fbrd, 
Choeen  and  Deecribed  by  Sidney  Cohin  (Clarendon  Press:  1903,  in  progress).] 


V.  LINE  181 

any  so  wide  generalization,  you  will  not  find  in  them  a 
childish  or  feeble  drawing,  by  these,  or  by  any  other  great 
master. 

And  farther: — by  the  grelitest  men — by  Titian,  Velas- 
quez, or  Veronese — ^you  will  hardly  find  an  authentic  draw- 
ing, at  all.  For  the  fact  is,  that  while  we  modems  have 
always  learned,  or  tried  to  learn,  to  paint  by  drawing, 
the  andents  learned  to  draw  by  painting — or  by  engraving, 
more  difficult  still.  The  brush  was  put  into  their  hands 
when  they  were  children,  and  they  were  forced  to  draw 
with  that,  until,  if  they  used  the  pen  or  crayon,  they  used 
it  either  with  the  lightiiess  of  a  brush  or  the  decision  of  a 
graver.  Michael  Angelo  uses  his  pen  like  a  chisel ;  ^  but  all 
of  them  seem  to  use  it  only  when  they  are  in  the  height 
of  their  power,  and  then  for  rapid  notation  of  thought  or 
for  study  of  models;  but  never  as  a  practice  helping  them 
to  paint.  Probably  exercises  of  the  severest  kind  were 
gone  through  in  minute  drawing  by  the  apprentices  of  the 
goldsmiths,  of  which  we  hear  and  know  little,  and  which 
were  entirely  matters  of  course.  To  these,  and  to  the  ex- 
quisiteness  of  care  and  touch  developed  in  working  precious 
metals,  may  probably  be  attributed  the  final  triumph  of 
Italian  sculpture.  Michael  Angelo,  when  a  boy,  is  said 
to  have  copied  engravings  by  Schongauer  and  others,  with 
his  pen,  in  facsimile  so  true  that  he  could  pass  his  draw- 
ings as  the  originals.'  But  I  should  only  discourage  you 
firom  all  fistrther  attempts  in  art,  if  I  asked  you  to  imi- 
tate any  of  these  accomplished  drawings  of  the  gem-arti- 
ficers. You  have,  fortunately,  a  most  interesting  collection 
of  them  already  in  your  galleries,  and  may  try  your  hands 

^  [Compare  The  BehHm  between  Miehael  Angeh  and  Tinieret,  §  1.] 
*  l'^  U  it  was  pofldble  to  Michelangelo  to  effect  so  much,  that  nappened  because 
all  the  gifts  of  nature  were  in  him  enhanced  and  strengthened  by  study  and  exercise ; 
wherefore  he  daily  produced  works  of  increased  ezc^ence,  as  began  clearly  to  be 
made  manifest  in  the  copy  which  he  made  of  a  plate  engraved  by  the  German 
Martino  fSchongauerl  ana  which  procured  him  a  very  great  nama  .  .  .  He  likewise 
copied  plates  from  the  hands  of  many  old  masters,  in  such  sort  that  the  copies 
could  not  be  distinguished  from  the  originals "  (Vasari's  Livee  qf  the  Painter»y  vol.  v. 
p.  232  in  Bohn's  translation).] 


182  LECTURES  ON  ART 

on  them  if  you  will.  But  I  desire  rather  that  you  should 
attempt  nothing  except  what  can  by  determination  be 
absolutely  accomplished,  and  be  known  and  felt  by  you 
to  be  accomplished  when  it  is  so.  Now,  therefore,  I  am 
going  at  once  to  comply  with  that  popular  instinct  which, 
I  hope,  so  far  as  you  care  for  drawing  at  all,  you  are 
still  boys  enough  to  feel,  the  desire  to  paint.  Faint  you 
shall;  but  remember,  I  understand  by  painting  what  you 
wiU  not  find  easy.  Paint  you  shall;  but  daub  or  blot 
you  shall  not:  and  there  will  be  even  more  care  required, 
though  care  of  a  pleasanter  kind,  to  follow  the  lines  traced 
for  you  with  the  point  of  the  brush  than  if  they  had  been 
drawn  with  that  of  a  crayon.  But  from  the  very  beginning 
(though  carrying  on  at  the  same  time  an  incidental  practice 
with  crayon  and  lead  pencil),  you  shall  try  to  draw  a  line 
of  absolute  correctness  with  the  point,  not  of  pen  or  crayon, 
but  of  the  brush,  as  ApeUes  did,^  and  as  all  coloured  lines 
are  drawn  on  Greek  vases.  A  Une  of  absolute  correctness, 
observe.  I  do  not  care  how  slowly  you  do  it,  or  with  how 
many  alterations,  junctions,  or  retouchings ;  the  one  thing 
I  ask  of  you  is,  that  the  line  shall  be  right,  and  right  by 
measurement,  to  the  same  minuteness  which  you  would 
have  to  give  in  a  Government  chart  to  the  map  of  a  dan- 
gerous shoal. 

142.  This  question  of  measurement  is,  as  you  are  pro- 
bably aware,  one  much  vexed  in  art  schools;  but  it  is 
determined  indisputably  by  the  very  first  words  written 
by  Leonardo :  '^  II  giovane  deve  prima  imparare  prospettiva, 
per  le  misure  dogni  cosa^^ 

Without  absolute  precision  of  measurement,  it  is  cer- 
tainly impossible  for  you  to  learn  perspective  rightly;  and, 
as  far  as  I  can  judge,  impossible  to  learn  anything  else 
rightly.    And  in  my  past  experience  of  teaching,  I   have 

»  [See  above,  §  74,  p.  81.] 

'  [The  opening  wordi  of  tlie  TrwJUn  on  F^tinHng.  For  other  passages  in  which 
Ruskin  insists  on  accurate  measurement,  and  admits  the  use  of  compasses,  sea 
ElemenU  qf  Drawing^  VoL  XV.  p.  38  and  n.] 


V.  LINE  188 

found  that  such  precision  is  of  all  things  the  most  diffi- 
cult to  enforce  on  the  pupils.  It  is  easy  to  persuade  to 
diligence,  or  provoke  to  enthusiasm;  but  I  have  found  it 
hitherto  impossible  to  humiliate  one  clever  student  into  per- 
fect accuracy. 

It  is,  therefore,  necessary,  in  beginning  a  system  of 
drawing  for  the  University,  that  no  opening  should  be  left 
for  failure  in  this  essential  matter.  I  hope  you  will  trust 
the  words  of  the  most  accomplished  draughtsman  of  Italy, 
and  the  painter  of  the  great  sacred  picture  which,  perhaps 
beyond  all  others,  has  influenced  the  mind  of  Europe,^ 
when  he  tells  you  that  your  first  duty  is  *'to  learn  per- 
spective by  the  measures  of  everjrthing."  For  perspective, 
I  will  undertake  that  it  shall  be  made,  practically,  quite 
easy  to  you;'  if  you  care  to  master  the  mathematics  of 
it,  they  are  carried  as  far  as  is  necessary  for  you  m  my 
treatise  written  in  1859,^  of  which  copies  shall  be  placed  at 
your  disposal  in  your  working  room.  But  the  habit  and 
dexterity  of  measurement  you  must  acquire  at  once,  and 
that  with  engineer's  accuracy.  I  hope  that  in  our  now 
gradually  developing  system  of  education,  elementary  archi* 
tectural  or  military  drawing  will  be  required  at  all  public 
schools;  so  that  when  youths  come  to  the  University,  it 
may  be  no  more  necessary  for  them  to  pass  through  the 
preliminary  exercises  of  perspective  than  of  grammar:  for 
the  present,  I  will  place  in  your  series  examples  simple 
and  severe  enough  for  all  necessary  practice.^ 

1  [Tor  other  references  to  ''The  Lut  Supper"  hy  Leonardo,  eee  Vol.  VII.  p.  328, 
and  voL  X.  p.  306.] 
s  [Bds.  1-^  add  :-- 

''.  .  .  easy  to  voa;  hut  I  wish  first  to  make  application  to  the  Trustees 
of  the  National  Gallery  for  the  loan  to  Oxford  of  Tamer's  perspectiye 
diajrramSj  which  are  at  present  lying  useless  in  a  folio  in  the  National 
Gallery ;  and  therefore  we  will  not  trouble  ourselves  about  perspective  till 
the  autumn ;  unless,  in  the  meanwhile,  you  care  to  master  the  mathematical 
theory  of  it,  which  I  have  carried  ..." 
A  large  loan  of  Turner's  drawings  was  ultimatelv  obtained  (see  VoL  XIII.  pp.  6W^ 
M8X  but  Uiey  did  not  include  uie  perspective  diagrams.] 
^  [See  7^  Element  nf  P^rnectvoe  in  VoL  XV.f 

*  [See,  for  example,  in  the  Educational  Series,  Nos.  214-216,  and  in  the  Working 
Series,  No.  26  in  Calnnet  II.  (VoL  XXI.).] 


184  LECTURES  ON  ART 

148.  And  while  you  are  learning  to  measure,  and  to 
draw,  and  lay  flat  tints,  with  the  brush,  you  must  also 
get  easy  command  of  the  pen;  for  that  is  not  only  the 
great  instrument  for  the  first  sketching,  but  its  right  use 
is  the  foundation  of  the  art  of  illumination.  In  nothing 
is  fine  art  more  directly  founded  on  utility  than  in  the 
dose  dependence  of  decorative  illumination  on  good  writ- 
ing. Perfect  illumination  is  only  writing  made  lovely ;  the 
moment  it  passes  into  picture-making  it  has  lost  its  dignity 
and  function.^  For  pictures,  small  or  great,  if  beautiful, 
ought  not  to  be  painted  on  leaves  of  books,  to  be  worn 
with  service;  and  pictures,  small  or  great,  not  beautiftil, 
should  be  painted  nowhere.  But  to  make  writing  itself 
beautiful, — to  make  the  sweep  of  the  pen  lovely, — ^is  the 
true  art  of  illumination;  and  I  particularly  wish  you  to 
note  this,  because  it  happens  continually  that  yoimg  girls 
who  are  incapable  of  tracing  a  single  curve  with  steadiness, 
much  more  of  delineating  any  ornamental  or  organic  form 
with  correctness,  think  that  work,  which  would  be  intoler- 
able in  ordinary  drawing,  becomes  tolerable  when  it  is  em- 
ployed for  the  decoration  of  texts ;  and  thus  they  render 
all  healthy  progress  impossible,  by  protecting  themselves  in 
inefficiency  under  the  shield  of  good  motive.  Whereas  the 
right  way  of  setting  to  work  is  to  make  themselves  first 
mistresses  of  the  art  of  writing  beautifully;  and  then  to 
apply  that  art  in  its  proper  degrees  of  development  to 
whatever  they  desire  permanently  to  write.  And  it  is  in- 
deed a  much  more  truly  religious  duty  for  girls  to  acquire 
a  habit  of  deliberate,  legible,  and  lovely  penmanship  in 
their  daily  use  of  the  pen,  than  to  illuminate  any  quantity 
of  texts.  Having  done  so,  they  may  next  discipline  their 
hands  into  the  control  of  lines  of  any  length,  and,  finally, 
add  the  beauty  of  colour  and  form  to  the  flowing  of  these 
perfect  lines.      But  it  is  only  after  years  of  practice  that 

^  [See  the  lecture  on  ''The  Distinction  between   Illumination  and  Painting," 
Vol.  All.  pp.  474  «ef.] 


V.   LINE  185 

they  will  be  able  to  illuminate  noble  words  rightly  for  the 
eyes,  as  it  is  only  after  years  of  practice  that  they  can 
make  them  melodious  rightly,  with  the  voice. 

144.  I  shall  not  attempt,  in  this  lectiu*e,  to  give  you 
any  account  of  the  use  of  the  pen  as  a  drawing  instru- 
ment.^ That  use  is  connected  in  many  ways  with  prin- 
ciples both  of  shading  and  of  engraving,  hereafter  to  be 
examined  at  length.  But  I  may  generally  state  to  you 
that  its  best  employment  is  in  giving  determination  to  the 
forms  in  drawings  washed  with  neutral  tint;  and  that,  in 
this  use  of  it,  Holbein  is  quite  without  a  rival.'  I  have 
therefore  placed  many  examples  of  his  work  among  your 
copies.'  It  is  employed  for  rapid  study  by  Raphael  and 
other  masters  of  delineation,  who,  in  such  cases,  give  with 
it  also  partial  indications  of  shadow ;  but  it  is  not  a  proper 
instrument  for  shading,  when  drawings  are  intended  to 
be  deliberate  and  complete,  nor  do  the  great  masters  so 
employ  it.  Its  virtue  is  the  power  of  producing  a  per- 
fectly delicate,  equal,  and  decisive  line  with  great  rapidity ; 
and  the  temptation  allied  with  that  virtue  is  the  licentious 
haste,  and  chance-swept,  instead  of  strictly-commanded,  cur- 
vature. In  the  hands  of  very  great  painters  it  obtains,  like 
the  etching  needle,  qualities  of  exquisite  charm  in  this 
free  use;  but  all  attempts  at  imitation  of  these  confused 
and  suggestive  sketches  must  be  absolutely  denied  to  your- 
selves while  students.  You  may  fancy  you  have  produced 
something  like  them  with  little  trouble;  but,  be  assured,  it 
is  in  reality  as  unlike  them  as  nonsense  is  unlike  sense; 
and  that,  if  you  persist  in  such  work,  you  will  not  only 
prevent  your  own  executive  progress,  but  you  will  never 
understand  in  all  yoiur  lives  what  good  painting  means. 
Whenever  you  take  a  pen  in  your  hand,  if  you  cannot 
count  every  line  you  lay  with  it,  and  say  why  you  make 


1 

s 

t 


Compare  Ariadne  Fhrentinaj  §  36.1 

Compare  Cuhu  (ff  Agiaia,  §§  19,  20  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  70).] 

See  #.  '' Holbein"  in  the  Index  to  the  Examplee  (Vol.  XXI.). 


186  LECTURES  ON  ART 

it  so  long  and  no  longer,  and  why  you  drew  it  in  that 
direction  and  no  other,  your  work  is  bad.  The  only 
man  who  can  put  his  pen  to  fiill  speed,  and  yet  retain 
command  over  every  separate  line  of  it,  is  Diirer.  He 
has  done  this  in  the  illustrations  of  a  missal  preserved  at 
Munich,  which  have  been  fairly  facsimiled ;  ^  and  of  these 
I  have  placed  several  in  your  copying  series,  with .  some 
of  Turner's  landscape  etchings,^  and  other  examples  of  de- 
liberate pen  work,  such  as  will  advantage  you  in  early 
study.  The  proper  use  of  them  you  will  find  explained  in 
the  catalogue.' 

145.  And,  now,  but  one  word  more  to-day.  Do  not 
impute  to  me  the  impertinence  of  setting  before  you  what 
is  new  in  this  system  of  practice  as  being  certainly  the 
best  method.  No  English  artists  are  yet  agreed  entirely 
on  early  methods;  and  even  Reynolds  expresses  mth  some 
hesitation  his  conviction  of  the  expediency  of  learning  to 
draw  with  the  brush.^  But  this  method  that  I  show  you 
rests  in  all  essential  points  on  his  authority,  on  Leonardo's, 
or  on  the  evident  as  well  as  recorded  practice  of  the  most 
splendid  Greek  and  Italian  draughtsmen;  and  you  may  be 
assured  it  will  lead  you,  however  slowly,  to  great  and 
certain  skill.  To  what  degree  of  skill,  must  depend  greatly 
on  yourselves;  but  I  know  that  in  practice  of  this  kind 
you  cannot  spend  an  hour  without  definitely  gaining,  both 
in  true  knowledge  of  art,  and  in  useful  power  of  hand; 
and  for  what  may  appear  in  it  too  difficult,  I  must  shelter 
or  support  myself,  as  in  beginning,  so  in  closing  this  first 
lecture    on    practice,    by    the    words    of   Reynolds:    *'The 

^  [Thii  is  the  Prayer-book,  with  sketches  by  DQrer  and  Cranach,  in  the  Royal 
library  at  Munich.  See  Albrecht  DUrei^s  Randaeich  nungen  atu  dem  Gebetbuche  des 
KaiierM  Maximilian  L:  Manchen,  ISdOj 

*  rSee,  again^  the  Index  in  Vol.  XaI.] 

*  [At  p.  51  of  the  first  Catalogue  qf  Eixamples:  see  now  Vol.  XXI.  pp.  66-66.] 

^  [See  the  Second  Discourse  (vol.  i.  pp.  dO^  31^  ed.  1820):  ''These  instructions 
I  have  ventured  to  offer  from  my  own  experience ;  but  as  they  deviate  widely  from 
received  opinions^  I  offer  them  with  diffidence.''  It  will  be  noted  in  the  passage 
referred  to  that  Reynolds  uses  the  word  ''pencU"  in  its  original  sense  of  ''brush" 
(compare  Vol.  XV.  p.  309).] 


V.  LINE  187 

impetuosity  of  youth  is  disgusted  at  the  slow  approaches 
of  a  regular  siege,  and  desires,  from  mere  impatience  of 
labour,  to  take  the  citadel  by  storm.  .  .  .  They  must 
therefore  be  told  again  and  again  that  labour  is  the  only 
price  of  solid  fame;  and  that,  whatever  their  force  of 
genius  may  be,  there  is  no  easy  method  of  becoming  a 
good  painter.' 


"1 


^  [DUoourMi,  L    A  sentence  is  omitted  by  Raskin,  where  dots  are  here  inserted.] 


LECTURE  VI  ^ 
LIGHT 

146.  The  plan  of  the  divisions  of  art-schools  which  I  gave 
you  in  the  last  lecture  is  of  course  only  a  first  germ  of 
classification,  on  which  we  are  to  found  farther  and  more 
defined  statement;  but  for  this  very  reason  it  is  necessary 
that  every  term  of  it  should  be  very  clear  in  your  minds. 

And  especially  I  mast  explain,  and  ask  you  to  note  the 
sense  in  which  I  use  the  word  **  mass/  Artists  usually  en^- 
ploy  that  word  to  express  the  spaces  of  light  and  darkness, 
or  of  colour,  into  which  a  picture  is  divided.  But  this 
habit  of  theirs  arises  partly  from  their  always  speaking  of 
pictures  in  which  the  lights  represent  solid  form.  If  they 
had  instead  been  speaking  of  flat  tints,  as,  for  instance,  of 
the  gold  and  blue  in  this  missal  page,'  they  would  not 
have  called  them  "masses,"  but  "spaces'*  of  colour.  Now 
both  for  accuracy  and  convenience'  sake,  you  will  find  it 
well  to  observe  this  distinction,^  and  to  call  a  simple  flat 
tint  a  space  of  colour;  and  only  the  representation  of  solid 
or  projecting  form  a  mass.^ 

1  [Delivered  on  March  16,  1870.] 

*  [Eds.  1^  add  ''S.  7"— a  page  of  Ruikin't  Beaupr^  Senrioe-book :  see  Standard 
Series,  No.  7  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  16).] 

*  [Compare  ArcUra  PenteUd,  §  15  (below^  p.  210).] 

*  [Eds.  1-3  read  here  :•— 

^'  At  all  events,  I  mean  myself  always  to  make  this  distinction ;  which 
I  think  you  will  see  the  use  of  by  comparing  the  missal  page  (S.  7)  with 
a  piece  of  finished  painting  (Edu.  2).    The  one  I  call  space  with  colour ; 
the  other,  mass  witn  colour:  I  use,  however,  the  word  ^line'  rather  than 
'space'  in  our  general  scheme,  because  you  cannot  ..." 
For  ^'S.  7     see  last  note.    ''Edu.  2"  was  a  wrong  reference;  a  slip  was  inserted 
at  the  end  of  some  copies  of  ed.  1  correcting  it  to  "Edu.  43"  (so  in  eds.  2  and 
3) — i.e,,  No.  43  in  the  first  Oatalogue  ^  Example$f  No.  213  in  the  ultimate  arrange- 
ment— ^the  example  in  question  being,  "Grapes  and  Pesch  (William  Hunt)"  :  see 
Vol.  XXI.  p.  137.] 

188 


VI,   LIGHT  189 

I  use,  however,  the  word  "line"  rather  than  "space" 
in  the  second  and  third  heads  of  our  general  scheme,  at 
p.  128,  because  you  cannot  limit  a  flat  tint  but  by  a  line, 
or  the  locus  of  a  line:  whereas  a  gradated  tint,  expressive 
of  mass,  may  be  lost  at  its  edges  in  another,  without 
any  fixed  limit;  and  practically  is  so,  in  the  works  of 
the  greatest  masters. 

147.  You  have  thus,  in  your  hexagonal  scheme,^  the 
expression  of  the  universal  manner  of  advance  in  paint- 
ing: Line  first;  then  line  enclosing  flat  spaces  coloured  or 
shaded;  then  the  lines  vanish,  and  the  solid  forms  are  seen 
within  the  spaces.  That  is  the  universal  law  of  advance : — 
1,  line ;  2,  flat  space ;  8,  massed  or  solid  space.  But  as  you 
see,  this  advance  may  be  made,  and  has  been  made,  by 
two  different  roads;  one  advancing  always  through  colour, 
the  other  through  light  and  shade.  And  these  two  roads 
are  taken  by  two  entirely  different  kinds  of  men.  The 
way  by  colour  is  taken  by  men  of  cheerful,  natural,  and 
entirely  sane  disposition  in  body  and  mind,  much  resem- 
bling, even  at  its  strongest,  the  temper  of  well-brought-up 
children: — ^too  happy  to  think  deeply,  yet  with  powers  of 
imagination  by  which  they  can  live  other  lives  than  their 
actual  ones:  make-believe  lives,  while  yet  they  remain  con- 
scious all  the  while  that  they  are  making  believe — ^there- 
fore entirely  sane.  They  are  also  absolutely  contented ;  they 
ask  for  no  more  light  than  is  inunediately  aroimd  them, 
and  cannot  see  anything  like  darkness,  but  only  green  and 
blue,  in  the  earth  and  sea. 

148.  The  way  by  light  and  shade  is,  on  the  contrary, 
taken  by  men  of  the  highest  powers  of  thought,'  and  most 
earnest  desire  for  truth ;  they  long  for  light,  and  for  know- 
ledge of  all  that  light  can  show.  But  seeking  for  light, 
they  perceive  also  darkness ;  seeking  for  truth  and  substance, 
they  find  vanity.     They  look  for  form  in  the  earth, — ^for 


'P 
•D 


See,  agmin,  §  ld8 ;  above,  p.  128.] 
See  the  note  on  §  138 ;  above,  p.  127.] 


140  LECTURES  ON  ART 

dawn  in  the  sky;  and  seeking  these,  they  find  formlessness 
in  the  earth,  and  night  in  the  sky. 

Now  remember,  in  these  introductory  lectures  I  am 
putting  before  you  the  roots  of  things,  which  are  strange, 
and  dark,  and  often,  it  may  seem,  unconnected  with  the 
branches.  You  may  not  at  present  think  these  meta- 
physical statements  necessaiy;  but  as  you  go  on,  you  will 
find  that  having  hold  of  the  clue  to  methods  of  work 
through  their  springs  in  human  character,  you  may  perceive 
unerringly  where  they  lead,  and  what  constitutes  their 
wrongness  and  rightness ;  and  when  we  have  the  main  prin- 
ciples laid  down,  all  others  will  develop  themselves  in  due 
succession,  and  everything  will  become  more  clearly  intelli- 
gible to  you  in  the  end,  for  having  been  apparently  vague 
in  the  beginning.  You  know  when  one  is  laying  the 
foundation  of  a  house,  it  does  not  show  directly  where  the 
rooms  are  to  be. 

149.  You  have  then  these  two  great  divisions  of  human 
mind:  one,  content  with  the  colours  of  things,  whether 
they  are  dark  or  light;  the  other  seeking  light  pure,  as 
such,  and  dreading  darkness  as  such.  One,  also,  content 
with  the  coloured  aspects  and  visionary  shapes  of  things; 
the  other  seeking  their  form  and  substance.  And,  as  I 
said,  the  school  of  knowledge,  seeking  light,  perceives,  and 
has  to  accept  and  deal  with  obscurity:  and  seeking  form, 
it  has  to  accept  and  deal  with  formlessness,  or  death. 

Farther,  the  school  of  colour  in  Eiurope,  using  the  word 
Grothic  in  its  broadest  sense,  is  essentially  Gothic  Christian; 
and  full  of  comfort  and  peace.  Again,  the  school  of  light 
is  essentially  Greek,  and  fall  of  sorrow.  I  cannot  tell  you 
which  is  right,  or  least  wrong.  I  tell  you  only  what  I 
know — ^this  vital  distinction  between  them:  the  Gothic  or 
colour  school  is  always  cheerfid,  the  Greek  always  oppressed 
by  the  shadow  of  death ;  and  the  stronger  its  masters  are, 
the  closer  that  body  of  death  grips  them.  The  strongest 
whose  work  I  can  show  you  in  recent  periods  is  Holbein; 
next  to  him  is  Leonardo ;  and  then  Diirer :  but  of  the  three 


VI.  LIGHT  141 

Holbein  is  the  strongest*  and  with  his  help  I  will  put  the 
two  schools  in  their  fall  character  beifore  you  in  a 
moment.^ 

150.  Here  is,  first,  the  photograph  of  an  entirely  char- 
acteristic piece  of  the  great  colour  schooL'  It  is  by  Cima 
of  ConegUano,  a  mountaineer,  like  Luini;  bom  under  the 
Alps  of  Friuli.  His  Christian  name  was  John  Baptist:  he 
is  here  painting  his  name-Saint;  the  whole  picture  full  of 
peace,  and  intense  faith  and  hope,  and  deep  joy  in  light 
of  sky,  and  firuit  and  flower  and  weed  of  earth.  It  was 
paint^  for  the  church  of  Our  Lady  of  the  Garden  at 
Venice,  La  Madonna  dell'  Orto'  (properly  Madonna  of  the 
Kitchen  Garden),  and  it  is  full  of  simple  flowers,  and  has 
the  wild  strawberry  of  Cima*s  native  mountains  gleaming 
through  the  grass. 

Beside  it  I  will  put  a  piece  of  the  strongest  work  of 
the  school  of  light  and  shade — strongest  because  Holbein 
was  a  oolourist  also;  but  he  belongs,  nevertheless,  essen- 
tially to  the  chiaroscuro  schooL  You  know  that  his  name 
is  connected,  in  ideal  work,  chiefly  with  his  *' Dance  of 
Death.*'  I  wiU  not  show  you  any  of  the  terror  of  that; 
only  a  photograph  of  his  well-known  ''Dead  Christ"^  It 
will  at  once  show  you  how  completely  the  Christian  art  of 
this  school  is  oppressed  by  its  veracity,  and  forced  to  see 
what  is  fearful,  even  in  what  it  most  trusts. 

You  may  think  I  am  showing  you  contrasts  merely  to 
fit  my  theories.     But  there  is  Durer's  **  Knight  and  Death,"  ^ 

*  n^uBkin  had  intended  (as  appears  from  markings  and  notes  in  one  of  his 
copies)  to  rearrange  a  good  deal  of  Lectures  v.  and  vi.  Here,  he  enclosed  the 
passage  ''The  strongest  ...  in  a  moment"  within  lines,  as  if  for  omission  or 
revision,  and  wrote  in  the  marg^:  ''Essential  shade  masters;  opposed  to  Giotto 
as  school  of  light.  The  distinction  between  point  and  brush  another  altogether — 
one  of  execution  and  care.  So  now  we  take  Holbein  for  Point-master  of  Shadow 
school ;  Botticelli  for  Point-master  of  lifht  school."] 

'  [No.  8  in  the  Standard  Series :  see  VoL  XXI.  p.  16.  For  another  reference  to 
the  picture,  see  Vol.  IIL  p.  176  (where  in  the  note  other  references  to  Cima  are 
given :  see  also  General  Index).] 

*  [It  hangs  over  the  first  altar  on  the  right.] 

^  [At  Basle.     No.   26  in  the  Catalogue  of  Btferenee$  .   .   .  m  lUuitraium  qf 
FlamSaifant  ArchUedure  (Vol  XIX.  p.  273).] 

*  [See  further,  below,  §  168  (p.  163).  The  plate  is  reproduced  in  VoL  VII. 
p.  310.] 


142  LECTURES   ON  ART 

his  greatest  plate ;  and  if  I  had  Leonardo's  *^  Medusa "  here/ 
which  he  painted  when  only  a  boy,  you  would  have  seen 
how  he  was  held  by  the  same  chain.  And  you  cannot  but 
wonder  why,  this  being  the  melancholy  temper  of  the  great 
Greek  or  naturalistic  school,  I  should  have  called  it  the 
school  of  light.  I  call  it  so  because  it  is  through  its  in- 
tense love  of  light  that  the  darkness  becomes  apparent 
to  it,  and  through  its  intense  love  of  truth  and  form  that 
all  mystery  becomes  attractive  to  it.  And  when,  having 
leamei  these  things,  it  is  joined  to  the  school  of  colour, 
you  have  the  perfect,  though  always,  as  I  will  show  you, 
pensive,  art  of  Titian  and  his  followers. 

161.  But  remember,  its  first  development,  and  all  its 
final  power,  depend  on  Greek  sorrow,  and  Greek  religion. 

The  school  of  light  is  founded  in  the  Doric  worship  of 
Apollo,  and  the  Ionic  worship  of  Athena,  as  the  spirits  of 
Ufe  in  the  light,  and  of  life  in  the  air,  opposed  each  to 
their  own  contrary  deity  of  death — Apollo  to  the  Python, 
Athena  to  the  Gorgon— Apollo  as  life  m  Ught,  to  the  earth 
spirit  of  corruption  in  darkness ; — Athena,  as  life  by  motion, 
to  the  Gorgon  spirit  of  death  by  pause,  fireezing  or  turning 
to  stone:  both  of  the  great  divinities  taking  their  glory 
from  the  evil  they  have  conquered;  both  of  them,  when 
angry,  taking  to  men  the  form  of  the  evil  which  is  their 
opposite — ^Apollo  slaying  by  poisoned  arrow,  by  pestilence; 
Athena  by  cold,  the  black  eegis  on  her  breast.' 

These  are  the  definite  and  direct  expressions  of  the 
Greek  thoughts  respecting  death  and  Ufe.  But  underljong 
both  these,  and  far  more  mysterious,  dreadful,  and  yet 
beautifrd,  there  is  the  Greek  conception  of  spirittud  dark- 
ness ;  of  the  anger  of  fate,  whether  foredoomed  or  avenging ; 

^  [The  picture  in  the  Uffizi;    Shelley'i  lines  upon  it  well  illostrate  Rntkin's 
point : — 

''  Its  horror  and  its  beauty  are  divine. 
Upon  its  lips  and  eyelids  seem  to  lie 

Loveliness  like  a  shadow,  from  which  shine, 
Fiery  and  lurid,  struggling  underneath, 
The  agonies  of  anguish  and  of  death."] 

'  [Compare  with  this  passage,  for  Apollo,  Vol.  V.  pp.  92,  227|  and  VoL  XIX. 
p.  64 ;  and  for  Athena,  below,  p.  399,  and  Pleawret  qf  England,  §  108.] 


VL  LIGHT  148 

the  root  and  theme  of  all  Greek  tragedy;  the  anger  of 
the  Erinnyes,  and  Demeter  Erinnys/  compared  to  which 
the  anger  either  of  Apollo  or  Atiiena  is  temporary  and 
partial: — ^and  also,  while  Apollo  or  Athena  only  slay,  the 
power  of  Demeter  and  the  Eumenides  is  over  the  whole 
life;  so  that  in  the  stories  of  Bellerophon,  of  Hippolytus,' 
of  Orestes,  of  (Edipus,  you  have  an  incomparably  deeper 
shadow  than  any  that  was  possible  to  the  thought  of  later 
ages,  when  the  hope  of  the  Resurrection  had  become  de- 
finite. And  if  you  keep  this  in  mind,  you  will  find  every 
name  and  legend  of  the  oldest  history  become  full  of  mean- 
ing to  you.  All  the  mythic  accounts  of  Greek  sculpture 
begin  in  the  l^^nds  of  the  family  of  Tantalus.'  The  main 
one  is  the  making  of  the  ivory  shoulder  of  Felops  aftar 
Demeter  has  eaten  the  shoulder  of  flesh.  With  Uiat  you 
have  Broteas,  the  brother  of  Pelops,  carving  the  first  statue 
of  the  mother  of  the  gods ;  and  you  have  his  sister,  Niobe, 
weeping  herself  to  stone  under  the  anger  of  the  deities  of 
light.  Then  Felops  himself,  the  dark-faced,  gives  name 
to  the  Peloponnesus,  which  you  may  therefore  read  as  the 
<<  isle  of  darkness " ;  but  its  central  city,  Sparta,  the  **  sown 
city,'*  is  connected  with  all  the  ideas  of  the  earth  as  life- 
giving.  And  from  her  you  have  Helen,  the  representa- 
tive of  light  in  beauty,  and  the  Fratres  Helenas — ''lucida 
sidera " ;  ^  and,  on  the  other  side  of  the  hiUs,  the  brightness 
of  Argos,^  with  its  correlative  darkness  over  the  Atreidas, 

^  rriutt  18,  Demeter  as  Avenger :  oompere  Fan  davigeroj  Letter  5.1 
>  fFor  the  story  of  Belleroplion,  see  Queen  of  the  Air,  §  29  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  324} : 
and  ror  a  reference  to  that  of  Hippolytus,  Aratra  PerUeiUn,  §  171  (below^  p.  321).] 
s  [See  Araira  PenteMei,  §  86  (below,  p.  268),  where  this  passage  is  rettrred  to 


and  explained;  and  compare  Q!ueen  qf  the  Air,  §  23  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  316).  The 
storr  or  the  ivory  shoulder  is  there  referred  to ;  for  Broteas  carving  the  first  statue 
of  the  mother  of  the  gods,  see  Pausanias,  iii  22,  4 ;  and  for  the  story  of  Niobe, 


ibid.,  viii.  2.] 

*  [Horace :  Odee,  L  3,  2.  Castor  and  PoUax  were  protectors  of  sailors,  who  saw 
these  brethren  of  Helen  in  the  lights  which  are  said  to  play  about  the  spars  of  a 
vessel  at  times  after  stormy  weather  in  the  Mediterranean,  and  which  are  now  called 
St  Elmo's  fire.] 

*  [Argos  (shining,  bright),  son  of  Zeus  and  ^Hobe,  ''gave  his  name  to  the 
district"  (Pausanias,  ii.  16,  JL);  for  Helios  turning  away  his  fiftoe  from  the  feast  at 
which  Atreus  served  up  to  Tnyestes  (son  of  Pelops)  the  bodies  of  his  own  children, 
see  Hyginus,  88 ;  Euripides,  Oreetee,  1008,  and  Electra,  727 ;  and  Plato,  Politicue,  268 ; 
and  compare  ''The  Tortoise  of  ^na,"  §  21  n.  (below,  p.  389).] 


144  LECTURES  ON  ART 


marked  to  you  by  Helios  turning  away  his  face  from  the 
feast  of  Thyestes. 

152.  Then  join  with  these  the  Northern  l^^ends  con- 
nected with  the  air.  It  does  not  matter  whether  you  take 
Dorus  as  the  son  of  Apollo  or  the  son  of  Hellen;^  he 
equally  symbolizes  the  power  of  light:  while  his  brother, 
^olus,  through  all  his  descendants,  chiefly  in  Sisjrphus,  is 
confused  or  associated  with  the  real  god  of  the  winds,  and 
represents  to  you  the  power  of  the  air.  And  then,  as 
this  conception  enters  into  art,  you  have  the  myths  of 
Dsedalus,  tiie  flight  of  Icarus,  and  the  story  of  Fhrixus 
and  Helle,  giving  you  continual  associations  of  the  physical 
air  and  light,  ending  in  the  power  of  Athena  over  Corinth 
as  well  as  over  Athens. 

Now,  once  having  the  due,  you  can  work  out  the  sequels 
for  yourselves  better  than  I  can  for  you;  and  you  will  soon 
find  even  the  earliest  or  slightest  grotesques  of  Greek  art 
become  full  of  interest.  For  nothing  is  more  wonderful 
than  the  depth  of  meaning  which  nations  in  their  first 
days  of  thought,  like  children,  can  attach  to  the  rudest 
symbols ; '  and  what  to  us  is  grotesque  or  ugly,  like  a  little 
child's  doll,  can  speak  to  them  the  loveUest  things.  I  have 
brought  you  to-day  a  few  more  examples  of  early  Greek 
vase  painting,  respecting  which  remember  generally  that  its 
finest  development  is  for  the  most  part  sepulchiaL  You 
have,  in  the  first  period,  always  energy  in  the  figures,  %ht 
in  the  sky  or  upon  the    figures;*'  in   the  second   period, 

*  See  Note  in  the  Catalogue  on  No.  201.* 


^  [Doraa^  the  mythical  ancestor  of  the  Dorians  (as  Hellen^  of  the  Hellenes), 
is  hy  some  called  the  son  of  Hellen,  hy  others  the  son  of  Apollo  (see  Herodotua,  i. 
56 ;  Diodonis^  iv.  37>  fi8 ;  Apollodoms,  i.  7).  The  legends  of  iBolas  and  Sisyphus 
are  discussed  in  Queen  qf  the  Air  (Vol.  XIX.  pp.  310-{)26).  For  the  myth  of 
Dndalus,  see  Araira  Pentelici,  §  206  (helow,  p.  362) ;  for  Icarus,  OeetuM  ^  AgMa, 
§  13  (VoL  XIX.  p.  66) ;  and  for  Phrizus  and  Helle,  (hieen  qf  the  Air,  §  29  (Vol  XIX. 
p.  326),  and  compare  Cfrown  qf  Wild  OUve  (Vol.  XVIII.  p.  630).] 

•  [See  above,  |  19  (p.  33);  ''the  ruder  the  symboL  the  deeper  the  meaninff."] 
s  [''The  Resurrection  of  Semele":  No.  183  in  the  Reference  Series  (VoL  XXI. 


VI.  LIGHT  145 

while  the  conception  of  the  divine  power  remains  the  same» 
it  is  thought  of  as  in  repose,  and  the  light  is  in  the  god, 
not  in  the  sky;  in  the  time  of  decline,  the  divine  power  is 
gradually  disbelieved,  and  all  form  and  li^t  are  lost  to- 
gether. With  that  period  I  wish  you  to  have  nothing  to 
do.  You  shall  not  have  a  single  example  of  it  set  before 
you,  but  shall  rather  learn  to  recognize  afterwards  what 
is  base  by  its  strangeness.  These,  which  are  to  come  early 
in  the  third  group  of  your  Standard  Series,  will  enough 
represent  to  you  the  elements  of  early  and  late  conception 
in  the  Greek  mind  of  the  deities  of  light. 

158.  First  (S.  204^),  you  have  Apollo  ascending  from 
the  sea;  thought  of  as  the  physical  sunrise:  only  a  circle 
of  light  for  his  head;  his  chiuriot  horses,  seen  for^ortened, 
black  against  the  day-break,  their  feet  not  yet  risen  above 
the  horizon.  Underneath  is  the  painting  from  the  oppo- 
site side  of  the  same  vase:  Athena  as  the  morning  breeze,, 
and  Hermes  as  the  morning  cloud,  flpng  across  the  waves 
before  the  sunrise.  At  the  distance  I  now  hold  them  from: 
you,  it  is  scarcely  possible  for  you  to  see  that  they  are 
figures  at  all,  so  like  are  they  to  broken  fragments  of 
flying  mist;  and  when  you  look  close,  you  will  see  that  as 
Apollo's  face  is  invisible  in  the  circle  of  light.  Mercury's  is 
invisible  in  the  broken  form  of  cloud:  but  I  can  tell  you 
that  it  is  conceived  as  reverted,  looking  back  to  Athena ; 
the  grotesque  appearance  of  feature  in  the  frt)nt  is  the  out- 
line of  his  hair. 

These  two  paintings  are  excessively  rude,  and  of  the 
archaic  period;  the  deities  being  yet  thought  of  chiefly  as 
physical  powers  in  violent  agency. 

Underneath  these  two'  are  Athena  and  Hermes,  in  the 
types  attained  about  the  time  of  Phidias;  but,  of  course. 


1  [Now  Reference  Series,  No.  186  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  49).  These  two  designs  from  a 
Greek  vase  are  also  discussed  in  Quien  qf  the  Air,  §  d9,  where  they  are  repro- 
duced (Vol.  XIX.  p.  340,  and  PUte  XVI.).] 

*  [That  is,  underneath  them  in  FVame  186.  The  teu^M  of  Athena  and  Hermes 
are  Plate  76  in  voL  i.  of  Lenormant  and  De  Witte.  They  are  not  here  shown,  as 
the  Athena  is  Plate  IV.  in  Araira  PenteHei  (see  below,  p.  242).] 


146  LECTUKES   ON  ART 

rudely  drawn  on  the  vase,  and  still  more  rudely  ia  this 
piint  from  Lenonnant  and  De  Witte.  For  it  is  impos- 
sible (as  you  will  soon  find  if  you  try  for  yourself)  to  give 
on  a  plane  sur£ace  the  grace  of  figures  drawn  on  one  of 
solid  curvature,  and  adapted  to  all  its  curves :  and  among 
ot^er  minor  differences,  Athena's  lance  is  in  the  original 
nearly  twice   as   tall    as  herself,  and  has  to  be  cut  shcnt 


to  come  into  the  print  at  all.  Still,  there  is  enough  here 
to  show  you  what  I  want  you  to  see — ^the  repose,  and 
entirely  realised  personality,  of  the  deities  as  conceived 
in  the  Phidian  period.  The  relation  of  the  two  deities  is, 
I  believe,  the  same  as  in  the  painting  above,  though  pro- 
bably there  is  another  added  of  more  definite  kind.  But 
the  physical  meaning  still  remains — ^Athena  unhelmeted,  as 
the  gentle  morning  wind,  commanding  the  cloud  Hermes  to 


VI.   LIGHT  147 

slow  fli^t.     His  petasus  is  slung  at  his  back,  meaning  that 
the  clouds  are  not  yet  opened  or  expanded  in  the  sky. 

154.  Next  (S.  205 '),  you  have  Athena,  again  unhekneted 
And   crowned   with  leaves,   walking   between   two  nymj^s, 


who  are  crowned  also  with  leaves ;  and  all  the  three  hold 
flowers  in  their  hands,  and  there  is  a  fawn  walking  at 
Athena's  feet. 

This  is  still  Athena  as  the  morning  air,  but  upon  the 
earth   instead    of  in   the   sky,   with   the   nymphs  of  the 

I  [Now  No.  187  in  the  R«fer«DC«  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  49).  Plate  81  in 
vol.  i.  of  Lonormuit  and  De  Witte,  from  which  the  woodcut  here  (Fig.  1}  ii 
reduced.] 


148  LECTURES  ON  ART 

dew  beside  her;  the  flowers  and  leaves  opening  as  they 
breathe  upon  them.  Note  the  white  gleam  of  light  on  the 
fawn's  breast ;  and  compare  it  with  the  next  following 
examples : — (underneath  this 
one  is  the  contest  of  Athena 
and  Fosesdon,  which  does 
not  bear  on  our  present 
subject). 

Next  (S.  20«  %  Artemis  as 
the  moon  of  morning,  walking 
low  on  the  hills,  and  singing 
to  her  lyre;  the  fawn  b^ide 
her,  with  the  gleam  of  light 
and  sunrise  on  its  ear  and 
breast.  Those  of  you  who  are 
often  out  in  the  dawn-time 
know  that  there  is  no  moon 
so  glorious  as  that  gleaming 
crescent,  though  in  its  wane, 
ascending  before  the  sun. 

Underneath,  Artemis,  and 
Apollo,  of  Phidian  time. 

Next  (S.  207*).  ApoUo 
walking  on  the  earth,  god  of 
the  morning,  singing  to  his 
lyre;  the  fawn  beside  him, 
again  with  the  gleam  of  light 
on  its  breast.  And  under- 
neath, ApoUo,  crossing  the 
sea  to  Delphi,  of  the  Phidian  time.' 

155.  Now  you  cannot  but  be  struck  in  these  three  ex- 
amples  with   the   similarity   of   action  in  Athena,   Apollo, 

I  [Now  No.  188  in  the  lUfareoc*  Seriaa  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  49).  Pkto  7  in  vol.  IL  of 
Lraomiant  and  Do  Witto,  from  which  the  woodcut  here  (Flf(.  2)  ii  reduced.] 

*  [Now  No.  180  in  the  Reference  Seriet  (Vol.  XXJ.  p.  49).  Plftt«  29  in  vol  ii. 
of  Lenormant  and  De  Witte,  from  which  th«  wcMtdcnt  of  Apollo  here  (Fig.  3) 
ie  reduced.] 

»  [See  rt.te  XV.  in  Vol.  XIX.  (p.  337).] 


VI.   LIGHT  140 

und  Artemis,  drawn  as  deities  of  the  morning;  and  with 
the  association  in  every  case  of  the  fawn  with  them.  It 
has  been  said  (I  will  not  interrupt  you  with  authorities)^ 
that  the  &vm  belongs  to  Apollo  and  Diana  because  stags 
are  sensitive  to  music;  (are  they?).  But  you  see  the  fawn 
is  here  [Fig.  1]  with  Athena  of  the  dew,  though  she  has 
no  lyre ;  and  I  have  myself  no  doubt  that  in  this  particular 
relation  to  the  gods  of  morning  it  always  stands  as  the 
symbol  of  wavering  and  glancing  motion  on  the  ground, 
as  well  as  of  the  light  and  shadow  through  the  leaves, 
chequering  the  ground  as  the  fawn  is  dappled.  Similarly 
the  spots  on  the  nebris  of  Dionysus,'  thought  of  sometimes 

as  stars  {airo  t59  t&v  arrfmv  irouciKia^^  Diodorus,  I.  11),  aS  well 

as  those  of  his  panthers,  and  the  cloudings  of  the  tortoise- 
shell  of  Hermes,'  are  all  significant  of  this  light  of  the  sky 
broken  by  cloud-shadow. 

156.  You  observe  also  that  in  all  the  three  examples 
the  fawn  has  light  on  its  ears,  and  face,  as  well  as  its 
breast.  In  the  earliest  Greek  drawings  of  animals,  bars  of 
white  are  used  as  one  means  of  detaching  the  figures  from 
the  ground ;  ordinarily  on  the  under  side  of  them,  mark- 
ing the  lighter  colour  of  the  hair  in  wild  animals.  But 
the  placing  of  this  bar  of  white,  or  the  direction  of  the 
tsuGt  in  deities  of  light,  (the  faces  and  flesh  of  women  being 
always  represented  as  white,)  may  become  expressive  of 
the  direction  of  the  light,  when  that  direction  is  important. 
Thus  we  are  enabled  at  once  to  read  the  intention  of  this 
Oreek  symbol  of  the  course  of  a  day  (in  the  centre-piece 
of  S.  208/  which  gives  you  the  types  of  Hermes).  At 
the  top^  you  have  an  archaic  representation  of  Hermes 
stealing  lo  from  Argus.     Argus   is   here  the   Night;    his 

1  [See  LtnormaQt  and  De  Witte,  vol.  xi.  p.  16,  where  reference  ie  made  to  iBlian. 
JM  Nat.  Amm.,  ziL  46.1 

s  [Compare  beloir,  §  180,  p.  171 ;  and  lSaple'9  Nut,  %  225.1 

*  [Compare  ''  The  Tortoiee  of  iEgina,"  §  20  (below,  p.  388),  where  this  paMage 
is  lerarred  to.] 

«  (Now  No.  190  in  the  Reference  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  60).] 

*  [Plate  99  in  rol.  iii.  of  Lenonnant  and  De  Witte,  from  which  the  woodcnt 
liere  (Fig.  4)  is  reduced.] 


150  LECTURES   ON   ART 

grotesque  features  monstrous ;  his  hair  overshadowing  his 
shoulders ;  Hermes  on  tiptoe,  stealing  upon  him,  and  taking 
the  cord  which  is  fastened  to  the  hom  of  lo  out  of  his 
hand  without  his  feeling  it.  Then,  underneath,  you  have 
the  course  of  an  entire  day.'  Apollo  first,  on  the  left, 
dark,  entering  his  chariot,  the  sim  not  yet  risen.  In  front 
of  him  Artemis,  as  the  moon,  ascending  before  him,  play- 
ing on  her  lyre,  and  looking  back  to  the  sun.  In  the 
centre,   behind  the  horses,  Hermes,  as  the  cumulus   cloud 


at  mid-day,  wearing  his  petasus  heightened  to  a  cone,  and 
holding  a  flower  in  his  right  hand ;  indicating  the  nourish- 
ment of  the  flowers  by  the  rain  from  the  heat  cloud. 
Finally,  on  the  right,  Latona,  going  down  as  the  evening, 
lighted  from  the  right  by  the  sun,  now  sunk;  and  with 
her  feet  reverted,  signiiying  the  reluctance  of  the  depart- 
ing day. 

Finally,  underneath,^  you  have  Hermes  of  the  Fhidiaa 
period,  as  the  floating  cumulus  cloud,  almost  shapeless  (as 
you  see  him  at  this  distance) ;  with  the  tortoise-shell  lyre 
in  his  hand,  barred  with  black,  and  a  fleece  of  white  cloud. 


'  [PUte  60 

are  (Fig.  fi)  is 

>  Plato  89  ii 


1  vol.  ii.  of  Lenormuit  aad  De  Witt«,  {rom  which  the  woodcut 
)  is  reduced.] 

tS  ia  vol.  iii.  of  Lenormant  and  De  Witto,  from  which  the  woodcut 
here  (Fig.  6)  ii  reduced.] 


VI.   LIGHT  151 

not  level  but  obUque,  under  his  feet.  (Compare  the  "Sia 
T»»'  KotXttv — irXo^ioi,"'  and  the  relations  of  the  "cuyiSot  vw'oxof 
'A$ava,"  with  the  clouds  as  the  moon's  messengers  in  Aristo- 
phanes; and  note  of  Hermes  generally,  that  you  never  find 
him  fiying  as  a  Victory  flies,  but  always,  if  moving  &st  at 
all,  clattering  along,  as  it  were,  as  a  cloud  gathers  and 
heaps  itself:  the  Grorgons  stretch  and  stride  in  their  flight. 


half  kneeling,  for  the  same  reason,  running  or  ghding  shape- 
lessly  along  in  this  stealthy  way.^) 

157.  And  now  take  this  last  illustration,  of  a  very  dif- 
fferent  kind.  Here  is  an  effect  of  morning  light  by  Tinner 
(S.  801  •),  on  the  rocks  of  Otley-hill,  near  Leeds,  drawn 
long  ago,  when  Apollo,  and  Artemis,  and  Athena,  still 
sometimes  were  seen,  and  felt,  even  near  Leeds.  The 
original  drawing  is  one  of  the  great  Famley  series,  and 
entirely  beautiful     I   have    shown,   in  the  last   volmne  of 

>  [Cloudt,  82S  and  602  (altCiot  .  .  .).    The  former  line  ie  quoted  alio  in  Modem 
iW)if«r«,  Tol.  t.  (Vol.  III.  p.  Zfl  n.).} 

■  [Compare  Ariadne  ftormfma,  %  160,  where  this  fi^re  of  Hermei  ia  agaia 
diaeoBaed.] 

■  [Provinonally  ao  numbered  bf  Rmkin,  but  the  example  (a  photOKnph  of  & 
dramng  at  Famle)')  waa  not  ultimate! j  placed  in  the  permanent  collecUoo.] 


152  LECTURES   ON   ART 

Modem  Paintera,  how  well  Turner  knew  the  meaning  of 
Greek  legends:' — he  was  not  thinking  of  them,  however, 
when  he  made  this  design;  hut,  unintentionally,  has  given 
us  the  very  effect  of  morning  li^t  we  want:  the  glitter- 
ing of  the  sunshine  on  dewy  grass,  half  dark ;  and  the 
narrow  gleam  of  it  on  the  sides  and  head  of  the  stag  and 
hind. 

158.  These  few  instances  will  be  enough  to  show  you 


how  we  may  read  in  the  early  art  of  the  Greeks  their 
strong  impressions  of  the  power  of  lig^t.  You  will  find 
the  subject  entered  into  at  somewhat  greater  length  in  my 
Queen  of  the  Air;*  and  if  you  will  look  at  the  begin- 
ning of  the  7th  book  of  Plato's  PoBty,  and  read  care- 
iiiUy  the  passages  in  the  context  respecting  the  sun  and 

>  [Sm  Vol  VII.  pp.  3B2  tM.] 
*  [8m  Vol  XIX.  ^  379.] 


VI.   LIGHT  158 

intellectual  sight,^  you  will  see  how  intimately  this  physical 
love  of  light  was  connected  with  their  philosophy,  in  its 
search,  as  blind  and  captive,  for  better  knowledge.  I  shall 
not  attempt  to  define  for  you  to-day  the  more  complex 
but  much  shallower  forms  which  this  love  of  light,  and 
the  philosophy  that  accompanies  it,  take  in  the  mediaeval 
mind;  only  remember  that  in  future,  when  I  briefly  speak 
of  the  Greek  school  of  art  with  reference  to  questions  of 
delineation,  I  mean  the  entire  range  of  the  schools,  fix>m 
Homer's  days  to  our  own,  which  concern  themselves  with 
the  representation  of  light,  and  the  effects  it  produces  on 
material  form — ^beginning  practically  for  us  with  these  Greek 
vase  paintings,  and  closing  practically  for  us  with  Tumer^s 
sunset  on  the  T6miraxre;^  being  throughout  a  school  of 
captivity  and  sadness,  but  of  intense  power;  and  which  in 
its  technical  method  of  shadow  on  material  form,*  as  well 
as  in  its  essential  temper,  is  centrally  represented  to  you 
by  Diirer's  two  great  engravings  of  tlie  '' Mdencolia "  and 
the  '' Knight  and  Death."  ^  On  the  otha  hand,  when  I 
briefly  speak  to  you  of  the  Grothic  school,  with  reference 
to  delineation,  I  mean  the  entire  and  much  more  extensive 
range  of  schools  extending  from  the  earliest  art  in  Central 
Asia  and  Egypt  down  to  our  own  day  in  India  and  China: 
— schools  which  have  been  content  to  obtain  beautifiil  har- 
monies of  colour  without  any  representation  of  light;  and 
which  have,  many  of  them,  rested  in  such  imperfect  ex- 
pressions of  form  as  could  be  so  obtained;  schools  usually 
in  some  measure  childish,  or  restricted  in  intellect,  and 
similarly  childish  or  restricted  in  their  philosophies  or  faiths : 
but  contented  in  the  restriction;  and  in  the  more  powerful 

1  [iSfl^puMlo,  TiL  616.  where  Plato  imacinee  ''hnman  beingv  living  in  a  lort  of 
tindergroiind  den  which  hat  a  month  wide  open  to  the  light,  and  Mhind  them  a 
breastwork  tnch  as  marionette  plaven  might  uie  for  a  screen ;  and  there  is  a  way 
iMfond  the  breastwork  along  whicn  passengers  are  moving,  holding  in  their  hand[s 
images  of  men  and  women.  *A  strange  parable  and  stiaiige  eaptires.'  Thejr  are 
•ourMlres,"  etc  (Jowett's  Summary).] 

>  [No.  624  in  the  National  Gallery :  see  Vol.  XIII.  pp.  107-172  for  a  description 
•of  the  picture.] 

*  [Compare  Arimdn€  Morentinaj  §24.] 

«  [Both  are  reproduced  in  Vol  Yll.  (pp.  810,  312).] 


154  LECTURES   ON  ART 

races,  capable  of  advance  to  nobler  development  than  the 
Greek  schools,  though  the  consummate  art  of  Europe  has 
only  been  accomplished  by  the  union  of  both.  How  that 
union  was  effected,  I  will  endeavour  to  show  you  in  my 
next  lecture ;  ^  to-day  I  shall  take  note  only  of  the  points 
bearing  on  our  immediate  practice. 

159.  A  certain  number  of  you,  by  faculty  and  natural 
disposition, — ^and  all,  so  far  as  you  are  interested  in  modem 
art, — ^will  necessarily  have  to  put  yourselves  under  the  dis- 
cipline of  the  Greek  or  chiaroscuro  school,  which  is  directed 
primarily  to  the  attainment  of  the  power  of  representing 
form  by  pure  contrast  of  light  and  shade.  I  say,  the 
"discipline"  of  the  Greek  school,  both  because,  followed 
faithfully,  it  is  indeed  a  severe  one,  and  because  to  follow 
it  at  iail  is,  for  persons  fond  of  colour,  often  a  course  of 
painful  self-denial,  from  which  young  students  are  eager  to 
escape.  And  yet,  when  the  laws  of  both  schools  are  rightly 
obeyed,  the  most  perfect  discipline  is  that  of  the  colourists ; 
for  they  see  and  draw  everything^  while  the  chiaroscurists 
must  leave  much  indeterminate  in  mystery,  or  invisible  in 
gloom:  and  there  are  therefore  many  licentious  and  vulgar 
forms  of  art  connected  with  the  chiaroscuro  school,  both  in 
painting  and  etching,  which  have  no  parallel  among  the 
colourists.  But  both  schools,  rightly  followed,  require  first 
of  all  absolute  accuracy  of  delineation.  This  you  need  not 
hope  to  escape.  Whether  you  fill  your  spaces  with  colours, 
or  with  shadows,  they  must  equally  be  of  the  true  outline 
and  in  true  gradations.  I  have  been  thirty  years  telling 
modem  students  of  art  this  in  vain.^  I  mean  to  say  it 
to  you  only  once,  for  the  statement  is  too  important  ta 
be  weakened  by  repetition. 

Without  perfect  delineation  of  form  and  perfect  grada-- 
tion  of  space,  neither  noble  colour  is  possible,  nor  noble  lights 

160.  It  may  make  this  more  believable  to  you  if  I  put 

^  [§§  177  9eq. ;  below,  pp.  170  seq."] 

s  rSee,  for  instance  (in  Mwiem  Pamtert),  Vol.  III.  pp.  270,  323,  and  Vol.  IV. 
pp.  8d-91 ;  and  compare  Vol.  XIX.  p.  67.1 

'  [The  lentenoe  ^'Without  .  .  .  light*'  was  put  into  capitals  in  1887.] 


VL   LIGHT  155 

beside  each  other  a  piece  of  detail  from  each  schooL  I 
gave  you  the  St.  John  of  Cima  da  Conegliano  for  a  type 
of  the  colour  schooL  Here  is  my  own  study  of  the  sprays 
of  oak  which  rise  against  the  sky  of  it  in  the  distance, 
enlarged  to  about  its  real  size  (Edu.  12^).  I  hope  to  draw 
it  better  for  you  at  Venice;^  but  this  will  show  you  with 
what  perfect  care  the  colourist  has  followed  the  outline  of 
every  leaf  in  the  sky.  Beside,  I  put  a  chiaroscurist  draw- 
ing (at  least,  a  photograph  of  one),  Diirer's,  from  nature, 
of  the  common  wild  wall-cabbage  (Edu.  82^).  It  is  the 
most  perfect  piece  of  delineation  by  flat  tint  I  have  ever 
seen,  in  its  mastery  of  the  perspective  of  every  leaf,  and 
its  attainment  ahnost  of  the  bloom  of  texture,  merely  by  its 
exquisitely  tender  and  decisive  laying  of  the  colour.  These 
two  examples  ought,  I  think,  to  satisfy  you  as  to  the  pre- 
cision of  outline  of  both  schools,  and  the  power  of  expres- 
sion which  may  be  obtained  by  flat  tints  laid  within  such 
outline. 

161.  Next,  here  are  two  examples  of  the  gradated  shad- 
ing expressive  of  the  forms  within  the  outUne,  by  two  mas- 
ters of  the  chiaroscuro  schooL  The  first  (S.  12)  shows 
you  Leonardo's  method  of  work,  both  with  chalk  and  the 
silver  point.*  The  second.  (S.  802),  Turner's  work  in  mezzo- 
tint;^ both  masters  doing  their  best.  Observe  that  this 
plate  of  Turner's,  which  he  worked  on  so  long  that  it 
was  never  published,  is  of  a  subject  peculiarly  depending 
on  effects  of  mystery  and  concealment,  the  fall  of  the 
Reuss  under  the  Devil's  Bridge  on  the  St.  Gothard  (the 
old  bridge;  you  may  still  see  it  under  the  existing  one, 
which  was  built  since  Turner's  drawing  was  made).     If  ever 

1  [In  the  final  arrangement^  Educational  Series^  No.  20  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  77).] 
, '  [Ruflkm  went  to  Venice  soon  after  the  delivery  of  theee  lectures,  hut  does  not 
appear  to  have  made  a  drawing  from  the  Cima:  his  main  study  was  devoted  to 
Tintoret  (see  Introduction^  ahove,  p.  li. ;  and  compare  Ariadne  FhrerUina,  §  163).] 

'  [No.  256  in  the  final  arrangement:  see  Vol.  XXI.  p.  141  for  the  name  given 
to  Diirer's  drawing.] 

«  [Standard  Series,  No.  12  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  18).] 

*  [The  example  is  not  now  in  the  Oxford  Collection,  hut  is  here  reproduced 

S^late  B).    It  is  the  unpublished  plate  for  Liber  Studiorum,  known  as  "  Swiss  Bridge, 
ont  St.  Gothard."    For  other  references  to  it,  see  Modem  Paintere^  vol.  iv.  (Vol.  vt. 
p.  40) ;  VoL  XIII.  pp.  96,  461 ;  and  Vol  XV.  p.  dO  n.] 


156  LECTURES  ON  ART 

outline  could  be  dispensed  with»  you  would  think  it  might 
be  so  in  this  confusion  of  cloud,  foam,  and  darkness.  But 
here  is  Turner's  own  etching  on  the  plate  (Edu.  85  f^), 
made  under  the  mezzotint;  and  of  all  the  studies  of  rock 
outline  made  by  his  hand,  it  is  the  most  decisive  and 
quietly  complete. 

162.  Again;  in  the  LfConardo  sketches,  many  parts  are 
lost  in  obscurity,  or  are  left  intentionally  uncertain  and 
mysterious,  even  in  the  Ught,  and  you  might  at  first  imagine 
some  permission  of  escape  had  been  here  given  you  from 
the  terrible  law  of  delineation.  But  the  sl^htest  attempts 
to  copy  them  will  show  you  that  the  terminal  lines  are  in- 
imitably subtle,  unaccusably  true,  and  filled  by  gradations 
of  shade  so  determined  and  measured  that  the  addition  of 
a  grain  of  the  lead  or  chalk  as  large  as  the  filament  of  a 
moth's  wing  would  make  an  appreciable  difference  in  theuL 

This  is  grievous,  you  think,  and  hopeless  ?  No,  it  is  de- 
lightful and  full  of  hope :  delightful,  to  see  what  marvellous 
things  can  be  done  by  men ;  and  full  of  hope,  if  your  hope 
is  the  right  one,  of  being  one  day  able  to  rejoice  more  in 
what  others  have  done,  than  in  what  you  can  yourself  do, 
and  more  in  the  strength  that  is  for  ever  above  you,  than 
in  that  you  can  ever  attain. 

168.  But  you  can  attain  much,  if  you  will  work  reve- 
rently and  patiently,  and  hope  for  no  success  through  ill- 
regulated  effort.  It  is,  however,  most  assuredly  at  this 
point  of  your  study  that  the  full  strain  on  your  patience 
will  begin.  The  exercises  in  line-drawing  and  flat  lajring 
of  colour  are  irksome ;  but  they  are  definite,  and  within  cer- 
tain limits,  sure  to  be  successful  if  practised  with  moderate 
care.  But  the  expression  of  form  by  shadow  requires  more 
subtle  patience,  and  involves  the  necessity  of  frequent  and 
mortifying  failure,  not  to  speak  of  the  self-denial  which  I 
said  was  needfid  in  persons  fond  of  colour,  to  draw  in  mere 
light  and  shade.     If,  indeed,  you  were  going  to  be  artists, 

^  [No.  244  in  the  Eduoational  Series  (Vol  XXI.  p.  96) ;  here  reprodaoed  (Plate  C) 
from  a  copy  by  Mr.  G.  Allen  (tee  abore.  Introduction,  p.  bt.).  For  another  refer- 
ence to  it,  tee  Vol.  XXI.  p.  226.] 


i 


VI.   LIGHT  157 

or  could  give  any  great  length  of  time  to  study,  it  might 
be  possible  for  you  to  learn  whoUy  in  the  Venetian  school, 
and  to  reach  form  through  colour.  But  without  the  most 
intense  application  this  is  not  possible;  and  practically,  it 
will  be  necessary  for  you,  as  soon  as  you  have  gained  the 
power  of  outlining  accurately,  and  of  laying  flat  colour,  to 
leam  to  express  solid  form  as  shown  by  light  and  shade 
only.  And  there  is  this  great  advantage  in  doing  so,  that 
many  forms  are  more  or  less  disguised  by  colour,  and  that 
we  can  only  represent  them  completely  to  others,  or  rapidly 
and  easily  record  them  for  ourselves,  by  the  use  of  shade 
alone.  A  single  instance  will  show  you  what  I  mean.  Per- 
haps there  are  few  flowers  of  which  the  impression  on  the 
eye  is  more  definitely  of  flat  colour,  than  the  scarlet  gera- 
nium. But  you  would  find,  if  you  were  to  try  to  paint  it, 
— ^first,  that  no  pigment  could  approach  the  beauty  of  its 
scarlet ;  and  secondly,  that  the  brightness  of  the  hue  dazzled 
the  eye,  and  prevented  its  following  the  real  arrangement 
of  the  cluster  of  flowers.  I  have  drawn  for  you  here  (at 
least  this  is  a  mezzotint  from  my  drawing),  a  single  cluster  of 
the  scarlet  geranium,  in  mere  light  and  shade  (Edu.  82  b^), 
and  I  think  you  will  feel  that  its  domed  form,  and  the  flat 
lying  of  the  petals  one  over  the  other,  in  the  vaulted  roof 
of  it,  can  be  seen  better  thus  than  if  they  had  been  painted 
scarlet. 

164.  Also  this  study  will  be  useful  to  you,  in  showing 
how  entirely  effects  of  light  depend  on  delineation,  and 
gradation  of  spaces,  and  not  on  methods  of  shading.  And 
this  is  the  second  great  practical  matter  I  want  you  to  re- 
member to-day.  All  effects  of  light  and  shade  depend  not 
on  the  method  or  execution  of  shadows,  but  on  their  rig^t- 
ness  of  place,  form,  and  depth.  There  is  indeed  a  loveli- 
ness of  execution  added  to  the  rightness,  by  the  great 
masters,  but  you  cannot  obtain  that  unless  you  become  one 
of  them.     Shadow  cannot  be  laid  thoroughly  well,  any  more 

1  [In  the  ultimate  amngement.  Rndimentary  Serias^  No.  2d3  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  234). 
The  engraving  was  published  as  Plate  XII.  in  Law  qf  FUcU  (Vol.  XV.  p.  478}.] 


168  LECTURES  ON  ART 

than  lines  can  be  drawn  steadily,  but  by  a  long  practised 
hand,  and  the  attempts  to  imitate  the  shading  of  fine 
draughtsmen,  by  dotting  and  hatching,  are  just  as  ridiculous 
as  it  would  be  to  endeavour  to  imitate  their  instantaneous 
lines  by  a  series  of  re-touchings.  You  will  often  indeed  see 
in  Leonardo's  work,  and  in  Michael  Angelo's,  shadow  wrought 
laboriously  to  an  extreme  of  fineness;  but  when  you  look 
into  it,  you  will  find  that  they  have  always  been  drawing 
more  and  more  form  within  the  space,  and  never  finishing 
for  the  sake  of  added  texture,  but  of  added  fact  And  iJl 
those  effects  of  transparency  and  reflected  light,  aimed  at 
in  common  chalk  drawings,  are  wholly  spurious/  For  since, 
as  I  told  you,'  all  lights  are  shades  compared  to  hi^^er 
lights,  and  lights  only  as  compared  to  lower  ones,  it  follows 
that  there  can  be  no  differoice  in  their  quality  as  such ;  but 
that  light  is  opaque  when  it  expresses  substance,  and  trans- 
parent when  it  expresses  space;  and  shade  is  also  opaque 
when  it  expresses  substance,  and  transparent  when  it  ex- 
presses space.  But  it  is  not,  even  then,  transparent  in  the 
common  sense  of  that  word;  nor  is  its  appearance  to  be 
obtained  by  dotting  or  cross  hatching,  but  by  touches  so 
tender  as  to  look  like  mist.  And  now  we  find  the  use  of 
having  Leonardo  for  our  guide.  He  is  supreme  in  all 
questions  of  execution,  and  in  his  28th  chapter,'  you  will 
find  that  shadows  are  to  be  ''  dolce  k  sfumose,"  to  be  tender, 
and  look  as  if  they  were  exhaled,  or  breathed  on  the  paper. 
Then,  look  at  any  of  Michael  Angelo's  finished  drawings, 
or  of  Correggio's  sketches,  and  you  will  see  that  the  true 
nurse  of  light  is  in  art,  as  in  nature,  the  cloud;  a  misty 
and  tender  darkness,  made  lovely  by  gradation. 

165.  And  how  absolutely  independent  it  is  of  mate- 
rial or  method  of  production,  how  absolutely  dependent  on 
rightness  of  place  and  depth,  there  are  now  before  you 
instances  enough  to  prove.     Here  is  Diirer's  work  in  flat 


1 

s 

a 


Compare  Xatot  qf  F^soie,  ch.  vii.  §  2  (Vol.  XV.  p.  414).] 

I  131 ;  above,  p.  122.] 

^  262  ia  Rigaud't  version  (BohD).] 


VI.   LIGHT  159 

colour,  represented  by  the  photograph  in  its  smoky  brown ; 
Turner's,  in  washed  sepia,  and  in  mezzotint;  Leonardo's,  in 
pencil  and  in  chalk;  on  the  screen  in  front  of  you  a  large 
study  in  charcoal.  In  every  one  of  these  drawings,  the 
material  of  shadow  is  absolutely  opaque.  But  photograph- 
stain,  chalk,  lead,  ink,  or  charcoal, — every  one  of  them,  laid 
by  the  master's  hand,  becomes  full  of  light  by  gradation 
only.  Here  is  a  moonlight  (Edu.  81  b^)  in  which  you 
would  think  the  moon  shone  through  every  cloud;  yet  the 
clouds  are  mere  single  dashes  of  sepia,  imitated  by  the 
brown  stain  of  a  photograph ;  similarly,  in  these  plates  from 
the  Liber  Studiorum  tiie  white  paper  becomes  transparent 
or  opaque,  exactly  as  the  master  chooses.  Here,  on  the 
granite  rock  of  the  St.  Gothard  (S.  802),'  in  white  paper 
made  opaque,  every  light  represents  solid  bosses  of  rock, 
or  balls  of  foam.  But  in  this  study  of  twilight  (S.  808'), 
the  same  white  paper  (coarse  old  stuff  it  is,  tool)  is  made 
as  transparent  as  crystal,  and  every  fragment  of  it  repre- 
sents dear  and  far  away  light  in  the  sky  of  evening  in 
Italy. 

From  all  which  the  practical  conclusion  for  you  is,  that 
you  are  never  to  trouble  yourselves  with  any  questions  as 
to  the  means  of  shade  or  light,  but  only  with  the  right 
government  of  the  means  at  your  disposal.  And  it  is 
a  most  grave  error  in  the  system  of  many  of  our  public 
drawing-schools,  that  the  students  are  permitted  to  spend 
weeks  of  labour  in  giving  attractive  appearance,  by  delicacy 
of  texture,  to  chiaroscuro  drawings  in  which  every  form 
is  false,  and  every  relation  of  depth,  untrue.  A  most  un- 
happy form  of  error;  for  it  not  only  delays,  and  often 
wholly  arrests,  their  advance  in  their  own  art;  but  it  pre- 
vents what  ought  to  take  place  correlatively  with  their  exe- 
cutive practice,  the  formation  of  their  taste  by  the  accurate 

^  ['' Moonlight  off  the  Needlas,  Ide  of  Wiffht";  the  example  U  photognph  of 
rner^s  eepia  sketch  for  the  tuhiect)  is  no  fomrer  in  the  Oxford  Colleetion:  eee 


Tumer^s  eepia  sketch  for  the  suhject)  is  no  longer 

XXL  p.  65.] 

^See  aiiore^  p.  155  n.] 

^'^' Etching  for  composi 
The  exmmple  is  no  longer  in  the  Obcford  Collection  i  see  Vol.  XXI.  p.  G.]' 


Vol.  XXL  p.  65.] 
«  [See  Aoy 
'  [^'  Etching  for  composition " ;  probably  the  '^  Apnleia  in  search  of  Apuleias.' 


160  LECTURES  ON  ART 

study  of  the  models  from  which  they  draw.^  And  I  must 
so  far  anticipate  what  we  shall  discover  when  we  come  to 
the  subject  of  sculpture,  as  to  tell  you  the  two  main  prin- 
ciples of  good  sculpture;  first,  that  its  masters  think  before 
all  other  matters  of  the  right  placing  of  masses ;  secondly, 
that  they  give  life  by  flexure  of  surface,  not  by  quantity  of 
detail;  for  sculpture  is  indeed  only  light  and  shade  drawing 
in  stone.' 

166.  Much  that  I  have  endeavoured  to  teach  on  this 
subject  has  been  gravely  misunderstood,  by  both  young 
painters  and  sculptors,  especially  by  the  latter.  Because  I 
am  always  urging  them  to  imitate  organic  forms,  they  think 
if  they  carve  quantities  of  flowers  and  leaves,  and  copy 
them  from  the  life,  they  have  done  all  that  is  needed. 
But  the  difficulty  is  not  to  carve  quantities  of  leaves.  Any- 
body can  do  that.  The  difficulty  is,  never  anjrwhere  to 
have  an  unnecessary  4eaf.  Over  the  arch  on  the  right,' 
you  see  there  is  a  cluster  of  seven,  with  their  short  stalks 
springing  from  a  thick  stem.  Now,  you  could  not  turn 
one  of  those  leaves  a  hair's-breadth  out  of  its  place,  nor 
thicken  one  of  their  stems,  nor  alter  the  angle  at  which 
each  slips  over  the  next  one,  without  spoiling  the  whole  as 
much  as  you  would  a  piece  of  melody  by  missing  a  note. 
That  is  disposition  of  masses.  Again,  in  the  group  on  the 
left,  while  the  placing  of  every  leaf  is  just  as  skilful,  they 
are  made  more  interesting  yet  by  the  lovely  undulation  of 
their  surfaces,  so  that  not  one  of  them  is  in  equal  light 

1  [Edf.  1-3  add  here  :— 

''.  .  .  they  draw.     I  do  not  doaht  hat  that  you  have  more  pleasure  in 

looking  at  the  large  drawing  of  the  arch  of  Bourges^  hehind  me  (Ref.  1)^ 

than  at  common  sketches  of  seolpture.    The  reason  you  like  it  is^  that  the 

whole  effort  of  the  workman  has  heen  to  show  you^  not  his  own  skill  in 

shadings  hat  the  play  of  the  light  on  the  snrfitees  of  the  leaves,  which  is 

lovely,  because  the  sculpture  itself  is  first-rate.    And  1  must  ..." 

For  ''  Ref.  1 " — a  drawing  by  A.  Burgess — see  now  under  Reforence  Series,  No.  6% 

(Vol.  XXI.  p.  30).    In  stnking  out  this  passage  in  1887,  Ruskin  omitted  to  notice  that 

he  referred  to  the  drawing  again  in  §  166 — a  reference  unintelligible  as  it  stands  in 

the  text] 

'  [Compare  Vol  d?Amo,  §  285,  where  this  statement  is  referred  to  and  illus- 
trated.] 

'  [In  the  drawing  of  Bourges :  see  note  above.] 


VI.  LIGHT  161 

with  another.  And  that  is  so  in  all  good  sculpture,  without 
exception.  From  the  Elgin  Marbles  down  to  the  lightest 
tendril  that  curls  round  a  capital  in  the  thirteenth  century, 
every  piece  of  stone  that  has  been  touched  by  the  hand 
of  a  master  becomes  soft  with  under-life,  not  resembling 
nature  merely  in  skin-texture,  nor  in  fibres  of  leaf,  or  veins 
of  flesh;  but  in  the  broad,  tender,  unspeakably  subtle  un- 
dulation of  its  organic  form. 

167.  Returning  then  to  the  question  of  our  own  prac- 
tice, I  believe  that  all  difficulties  in  method  will  vanish,  if 
only  you  cultivate  with  care  enough  the  habit  of  accurate 
observation,  and  if  you  think  only  of  making  your  light 
and  shade  true,  whether  it  be  delicate  or  not.  But  there 
are  three  divisions  or  degrees  of  truth  to  be  sought  for,  in 
light  and  shade,  by  three  several  modes  of  study,  which  I 
must  ask  you  to  distinguish  carefully. 

(I.)  When  objeets  are  lighted  by  the  direct  rays  of  the 
sun,  or  by  direct  light  entering  from  a  window,  one  side 
of  them  is  of  course  in  light,  the  other  in  shade,  and  the 
forms  in  the  mass  are  exhibited  systematically  by  the  force 
of  the  rays  falling  on  it;  (those  having  most  power  of 
illumination  which  strike  most  vertically;)  and  note  that 
there  is,  therefore,  to  every  solid  curvature  of  surface,  a 
necessarily  proportioned  gradation  c^  light,  the  gradation 
on  a  parabolic  solid  being  different  from  the  gradation  on 
an  eUiptical  or  spherical  one.  Now,  when  your  purpose  is 
to  represent  and  learn  the  anatomy,  or  otherwise  charac- 
t^stic  forms,  of  any  object,  it  is  best  to  place  it  in  this 
kind  of  direct  light,  and  to  draw  it  as  it  is  seen  when  we 
look  at  it  in  a  direction  at  right  angles  to  that  of  the 
ray.  This  is  the  ordinary  academical  way  of  studying  form. 
Leonardo  seldom  practises  any  other  in  his  real  work, 
though  he  directs  many  others  in  his  treatise. 

108.  The  great  importance  of  anatomical  knowledge  to 
the  painters  of  the  sixteenth  century  rendered  this  method 
of  study  very  frequent  with  them;  it  almost  wholly  regu- 
lated their  schools  of  engraving,  and   has   been  the  most 


162  LECTURES  ON  ART 

frequent  system  of  drawing  in  art-schools  since  (to  the 
very  inexpedient  exclusion  of  others).  When  you  study 
objects  in  this  way, — ^and  it  will  indeed  be  well  to  do  so 
often,  though  not  exclusively, — observe  always  one  main 
principle.  Divide  the  light  from  the  darkness  frankly  at 
first:  all  over  the  subject  let  there  be  no  doubt  which  is 
which.  Separate  them  one  from  the  other  as  they  are 
separated  in  the  moon,  or  on  the  world  itself,  in  day  and 
night.  Then  gradate  your  lights  with  the  utmost  subtilty 
possible  to  you;  but  let  your  shadows  alone,  until  near 
the  termination  of  the  drawing:  then  put  quickly  into 
them  what  farther  energy  they  need,  thus  gaining  the  re- 
flected lights  out  of  their  original  flat  gloom ;  but  generally 
not  looking  much  for  reflected  lights.  Nearly  all  young 
students  (and  too  many  advanced  masters)  exaggerate  them. 
It  is  good  to  see  a  drawing  come  out  of  its  ground  like  a 
vision  of  light  only;  the  shadows  lost,  or  disregarded  in 
the  vague  of  space.  In  vulgar  chiaroscuro  the  shades  are  so 
full  of  reflection  that  they  look  as  if  some  one  had  been 
walking  round  the  object  with  a  candle,  and  the  student, 
by  that  help,  peering  into  its  crannies.^ 

169.  (II.)  But,  in  the  reality  of  nature,  very  few  objects 
are  seen  in  this  accurately  lateral  manner,  or  lighted  by 
unconfused  direct  rays.  Some  are  all  in  shadow,  some  all 
in  light,  some  near,  and  vigorously  defined;  others  dim 
and  faint  in  aerial  distance.  The  study  of  these  various 
effects  and  forces  of  light,  which  we  may  call  aerial  chiaro* 
scuro,  is  a  far  more  subtle  one  than  that  of  the  rays  ex- 
hibiting organic  form  (which  for  distinction's  sake  we  may 
call  *' formal**  chiaroscuro),  since  the  degrees  of  light  front 
the  sun  itself  to  the  blackness  of  ni^t,  are  far  beyond 
any  literal  imitation.  In  order  to  produce  a  mental  impres- 
sion of  the  facts,  two  distinct  methods  may  be  followed: 
— the  first,  to  shade  downwards  from  the  lights,  making 
everything  darker  in  due  proportion,  until  the  scale  of  our 
power  being  ended,  the  mass  of  the  picture  is  lost  in  shade. 

<  [Compare  Law  qf  Fiwle,  ch.  x.  §  9  (Vol.  XV.  p.  467).] 


VI.  LIGHT  168 

The  second,  to  assume  the  points  of  extreme  darkness  for 
a  basis,  and  to  light  everything  above  these  in  due  propor- 
tion, till  the  mass  of  the  picture  is  lost  in  light. 

170.  Thus,  in  Turner's  sepia  drawing  "  Isis ""  (Edu.  81 '), 
he  begins  with  the  extreme  light  in  the  sky,  and  shades 
down  from  that  till  he  is  forced  to  represent  the  near  trees 
and  pool  as  one  mass  of  blackness.  In  his  drawing  of  the 
Greta  (S.  2),'  he  begins  with  the  dark  brown  shadow  of 
the  bank  on  the  left,  and  illuminates  up  from  that,  till, 
in  his  distance,  trees,  hills,  sky,  and  clouds,  are  all  lost  in 
broad  light,  so  that  you  can  hardly  see  the  distinction 
between  hills  and  sky.  The  second  of  these  methods  is  in 
general  the  best  for  colour,  thou^  great  painters  unite 
both  in  their  practice,  according  to  the  character  of  their 
subject.  The  first  method  is  never  pursued  in  colour  but 
by  inferior  painters.  It  is,  nevertheless,  of  great  import- 
ance to  make  studies  of  chiaroscuro  in  this  fii^t  manner 
for  some  time,  as  a  preparation  for  colouring;  and  this  for 
many  reasons,  which  it  would  take  too  long  to  state  now. 
I  shall  expect  you  to  have  confidence  in  me  when  I  assure 
you  of  the  necessity  of  this  study,  and  ask  you  to  make 
good  use  of  the  examples  from  the  Liber  Studiorum^  which 
I  have  placed  in  your  Educational  Series.^ 

171.  (III«)  Whether  in  formal  or  aerial  chiaroscuro,  it 
is  optional  with  the  student  to  make  the  local  colour  of  ob- 
jects a  part  of  his  shadow,  or  to  consider  the  high  lights 
of  every  colour  as  white.  For  instance,  a  chiaroscurist  of 
Leonardo's  school,  drawing  a  leopard,  would  take  no  notice 
whatever  of  the  spots,  but  only  give  the  shadows  which 
expressed  the  anatomy.  And  it  is  indeed  necessary  to  be 
able  to  do  this,  and  to  make  drawings  of  the  forms  of 
things  as  if  they  were  sculptured,  and  had  no  colour.     But 

1  [Now  No.  137  in  the  Educational  Senas  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  87) :  a  photograph  of 
Tamer's  sepia  sketeh  (No.  883  in  the  National  Gallery)  for  the  sahject  in  the  Liber 

*  rSee  above,  §  25  (p.  36),  and  Vol.  XXI.  p.  11.] 

'  [Compare  Lecture»  en  Landeeape,  §  35,  and  Vol.  XV.  p.  xxiv.] 

*  [For  a  list  of  examples  from  the  Liber  Studiorum  placed  in  the  Educationa! 
Series  and  elsewhere  in  tne  collection^  see  Index  in  Vol.  XXI.  p.  319.] 


1«4  LECTURES   ON  ART 

in  general,  and  more  especially  in  the  practice  i¥liich  is  to 
guide  you  to  colour,  it  is  better  to  re^uxl  the  local  colour 
as  part  of  the  general  dark  and  light  to  be  imitated ;  and, 
as  I  told  you  at  first,^  to  consider  all  nature  merely  as  a 
mosaic  of  different  colours,  to  be  imitated  one  by  one  in 
simplicity.  But  good  artists  vary  thdr  methods  according 
to  their  subject  and  material  In  general,  Diirer  takes  little 
account  of  local  colour;  but  in  woodcuts  of  armorial  bear- 
ings (one  with  peacock's  feathers  I  shall  get  for  you  some 
day ')  takes  great  delight  in  it ;  while  one  of  the  chief  merits 
of  Bewick  is  the  ease  and  vigour  with  which  he  uses  his 
black  and  white  for  the  colours  of  plumes.^  Also,  every 
great  artist  looks  for,  and  expresses,  that  character  of  his 
subject  which  is  best  to  be  rendered  by  the  instrument  in 
his  hand,  and  the  material  he  works  on/  Give  Velasquez 
or  Veronese  a  leopard  to  paint,  the  first  thing  they  think  of 
will  be  its  spots ;  give  it  to  Diirer  to  engrave,  and  he  will  set 
himself  at  the  fur  and  whiskers;  give  it  a  Gredk  to  carve, 
and  he  wiU  only  think  of  its  jaws  and  limbs ;  each  doing 
what  is  absolutely  best  with  the  means  at  his  disposal 

172.  The  details  of  practice  in  these  various  miethods  I 
will  endeavour  to  expliun  to  you  by  distinct  examples  in 
your  Educational  Series,  as  we  proceed  in  our  work;  for 
the  present,  let  me,  in  closing,  reconmiend  to  you  once 
more  with  great  earnestness  the  patient  endeavour  to  render 
the  chiaroscuro  of  landscape  in  the  manner  of  the  Liber 
StvMoTum;  and  this  the  rather,  because  you  might  easily 
suppose  that  the  facility  of  obtaining  photographs  which 
render  such  effects,  as  it  seems,  with  absolute  truth  and 
with   unapproachable   subtilty,  superseded  the  necessity  of 


iff 


190 ;  above,  p.  121.] 
lie  Anns  of  Rc^gendorf^  1A20.  ''Hie  two  Lords  of  Rocendorf  invited  me," 
writes  Durer  in  his  diary  at  Antwerp.  ''I  dined  onoe  with  them,  and  drew  their 
arms  large  on  a  wood-block  for  cuttinir"  (Sir  Martin  Conway's  lAJbtrary  Remains  oj 
Albrecht  Durer,  p.  103).  Ruskin  was  unable  to  keep  his  promise,  for  the  only  known 
impression  of  the  woodcut  is  preserved  in  the  Germanic  Museum  at  Nurnberg.] 

'  [For  an  example  of  Bewick's  plumage^  see  the  peacock  in  Frame  No.  188  of 
the  Educational  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  91).    For  other  raferanees  to  Bewick  in  this 


\ 


connexion^  see  Vol.  XV.  p.  410  and  n.] 
*  [Compare  Cambridge  Inavgurai  Add 


Addrm,  §  2  (Vol  XVI.  p.  178).] 


VI.   LIGHT  165 

study,  and  the  use  of  sketching.^  Let  me  assure  you,  once 
for  all,  that  photographs  supersede  no  single  quality  nor 
use  of  fine  art,  and  have  so  much  in  common  with  Nature, 
that  they  even  share  her  temper  of  parsimony,  and  will 
themselves  give  you  nothing  valuable  that  you  do  not  work 
for.  They  supersede  no  good  art,  for  the  definition  of  art 
is  ^^  human  labour  regulated  by  human  design,"  and  this 
design,  or  evidence  of  active  intellect  in  choice  and  arrange- 
ment, is  the  essential  part  of  the  work ;  which  so  long  as 
you  cannot  perceive,  you  perceive  no  art  whatsoever;  which 
when  once  you  do  perceive,  you  wiD  perceive  also  to  be 
rq>laoeable  by  no  mechanism.  But,  farther,  photographs 
will  give  you  nothing  you  do  not  work  for.  They  are  in- 
valuable for  record  of  some  kinds  of  facts,  and  for  giving 
transcripts  of  drawings  by  great  masters ;  but  neither  in  the 
photographed  scene,  nor  {^tographed  drawing,  will  you 
see  any  true  good,  more  than  in  the  things  themselves, 
until  you  have  given  the  appointed  price  in  your  own 
attention  and  toil.  And  when  once  you  have  paid  this 
price,  you  will  not  care  for  photographs  of  landscape. 
They  are  not  true,  though  they  seem  so.  They  are  merely 
spoiled  nature.  If  it  is  not  human  design  you  are  looking 
for,  there  is  more  beauty  in  the  next  wayside  bank  than  in 
all  the  sun*blackened  paper  you  could  collect  in  a  lifetime. 
Go  and  look  at  the  real  landscape,  and  take  care  of  it; 
do  not  think  you  can  get  the  good  of  it  in  a  black  stain 
portable  in  a  folio.  But  if  you  care  for  human  thought 
and  passion,  then  learn  yourselves  to  watch  the  course  and 
fall  of  the  light  by  whose  influence  you  live,  and  to  share 
in  the  joy  of  human  spirits  in  the  heavenly  gifts  of  sun- 
beam and  shade.  For  I  tell  you  truly,  that  to  a  quiet 
heart,  and  healthy  brain,  and  industrious  hand,  there  is 
more  delight,  and  use,  in  the  dappling  of  <me  wood-glade 
with  flowers  and  sunshine,  than  to  the  restless,  heartless, 
and  idle  could  be  brought  by  a  panorama  of  a  belt  of  the 
world,  photographed  round  the  equator. 

^  [Compare  Leeturet  an  Landtcape,  §  35,  where  this  passage  is  referred  to  and 
reinibroed.    See  also  above^  §  100,  p.  §6.] 


LECTURE  VII  ^ 

COLOUR 

178.  To-day  I  must  try  to  complete  our  elementary  sketch 
of  schools  of  art,  by  tracing  the  course  of  those  which  were 
distinguished  by  faculty  of  colour,  and  afterwards  to  de- 
duce from  the  entire  scheme  advisable  methods  of  imme- 
diate practice. 

You  remember  that,  for  the  type  of  the  early  schools 
of  colour,  I  chose  their  work  in  glass;'  as  for  that  of  the 
early  schools  of  chiaroscuro,  I  chose  their  work  in  day. 

I  had  two  reasons  for  this.  First,  that  the  peculiar 
skill  of  colourists  is  seen  most  intelligibly  in  their  work  in 
glass  or  in  enamel ;  secondly,  that  Nature  herself  produces 
all  her  loveliest  colours  in  some  kind  of  solid  or  liquid  glass 
or  crystal  The  rainbow  is  painted  on  a  shower  of  melted 
glass,  and  the  colours  of  the  opal  are  produced  in  vitreous 
flint  mixed  with  water;  the  green  and  blue,  and  golden 
or  amber  brown  of  flowing  water  is  in  surface  glassy,  and 
in  motion  ^* splendidior  vitro.*'*  And  the  loveliest  colours 
ever  granted  to  human  sight — ^those  of  morning  and  evening 
clouds  before  or  after  rain — ^are  produced  on  minute  par- 
ticles of  finely-divided  water,  or  perhaps  sometimes  ice.  But 
more  than  this.  If  you  examine  vnXh  a  lens  some  of  the 
richest  colours  of  flowers,  as,  for  instance,  those  of  the  gen- 
tian and  dianthus,^  you  will  find  their  texture  is  produced 


1 


Delivered  on  March  2d»  1870.] 
See  §  139 ;  above,  p.  128.] 
^    Horace,  0de9,  iii.  13,  1 :  '^  O  Font  BandosiaB,  iplendidior  vitro."] 
*  [Compare  (in  Vol.  XIII.   p.  117)  the  description  of  ''the  gentian's  peace  of 
pale,  ineff&ble  azure,  as  if  strange  stars  had  been  made  for  earth  out  of  the  bine 
light  of  heaven."    See  also  VoL  II.  p.  431,  and  the  other  references  there  noted. 
For  the  colour  of  the  mountain-pink  (dianthus),   see  Latoi  qf  FSsob,  Vol.  XV. 

p.  427.] 

166 


VII.   COLOUR  167 

by  a  crystalline  or  sugary  frost-work  upon  them.  In  the 
lychnis  of  the  high  Alps,  the  red  and  white  have  a  kind 
of  sugary  bloom,  as  rich  as  it  is  delicate.  It  is  indescrib- 
able; but  if  you  can  fancy  very  powdery  and  crystalline 
snow  mixed  with  the  softest  cream,  and  then  dashed  with 
carmine,  it  may  give  you  some  idea  of  the  look  of  it. 
There  are  no  colours,  either  in  the  nacre  of  sheUs,  or  the 
plumes  of  birds  and  insects,  which  are  so  pure  as  those  of 
clouds,  opal,  or  flowers;  but  the  force  ot  purple  and  blue 
in  some  butterflies,  and  the  methods  of  clouding,  and 
strength  of  burnished  lustre,  in  plumage  like  the  peacock^s, 
give  them  more  universal  interest;  in  some  birds,  also,  as 
in  our  own  kingfisher,^  the  colour  nearly  reaches  a  floral 
preciousness.  The  lustre  in  most,  however,  is  metallic 
rather  than  vitreous;  and  the  vitreous  always  gives  the 
purest  hue.  Entirely  common  and  vulgar  compared  with 
these,  yet  to  be  noticed  as  completing  the  crystalline  or 
vitreous  system,  we  have  the  colours  of  gems.  The  green 
of  the  emerald  is  the  best  of  these;  but  at  its  best  is  as 
vulgar  as  house-painting  beside  the  green  of  birds'  plumage 
or  of  clear  water.  No  diamond  shows  colour  so  pure  as  a 
dewdrop;  the  ruby  is  like  the  pink  of  an  ill-dyed  and 
half-washed-out  print,  compared  to  the  dianthus;  and  the 
carbuncle  is  usuidly  quite  dead  unless  set  with  a  foil,  and 
even  then  is  not  prettier  than  the  seed  of  a  pomegranate. 
The  opal  is,  however,  an  exception.*  When  pure  and  uncut 
in  its  native  rock,  it  presents  the  most  lovely  colours  that 
can  be  seen  in  the  world,  except  those  of  clouds. 

We  have  thus  in  nature,  chiefly  obtained  by  crystalline 
conditions,  a  series  of  groups  of  entirely  delicious  hues; 
and  it  is  one  of  the  best  signs  that  the  bodily  system  is 
in  a  healthy  state  when  we  can  see  these  clearly  in  their 
most  delicate  tints,  and  enjoy  them  fully  and  simply,  with 

^  [There  is  a  stady  by  Raskin  of  the  kingfisher,  "with  dominant  reference  to 
ooloar/'  in  the  Rudimentary  Series,  No.  SOI  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  227).  It  is  now  re- 
produced in  the  Eaglets  NeH,  §  185.] 

^  [For  other  references  to  the  beauty  of  the  opal^  see  VoL  VII.  p.  208  and  n. ; 
also  VoL  m  p.  268.] 


168  LECTURES  ON   ART 

the  kind  of  enjoyment  that  children  have  in  eating  sweet 
things.^ 

174.  Now,  the  course  of  our  main  colour  schools  is 
briefly  this: — First  we  have,  returning  to  our  hexagonal 
scheme,^  Une ;  then  spaces  filled  with  pure  colour ;  and  then 
masses  expressed  or  rounded  with  pure  colour.  And  dur- 
ing these  two  stages  the  masters  of  ocdour  delight  in  the 
purest  tints,  and  endeavour  as  far  as  possible  to  rival  those 
of  opals  and  flowers.  In  saying  **ihe  purest  tints>"  I  do 
not  mean  the  simplest  types  of  red,  blue,  and  yellow,  but 
the  most  pure  tints  obtainable  by  their  combinations. 

175.  You  remember  I  told  you,*  when  the  colourists 
painted  masses  or  projecting  spaces,  they,  aiming  always  at 
colour,  perceived  from  the  first  and  held  to  the  last  the 
fact  that  shadows,  though  of  course  darker  than  the  lights 
with  reference  to  which  they  are  shadows,  are  not  therefore 
necessarily  less  vigorous  colours,  but  perhaps  more  vigorous.^ 
Some  of  the  most  beautiful  blues  and  purples  in  nature, 
for  instance,  are  those  of  moimtains  in  shadow  against 
amber  sky;  and  the  darkness  of  the  hollow  in  the  centre 
of  a  wild  rose  is  one  glow  of  orange  fire,  owing  to  the 
quantity  of  its  yellow  stamens.  Well,  the  Venetians  atwajns 
saw  this,  and  all  great  colourists  see  it,  and  are  thus  sepa- 
rated from  the  non-colourists  or  schools  of  mere  chiaro- 
scuro, not  by  difierence  in  style  merely,  but  by  being  right 
while  the  others  are  wrong.  It  is  an  absolute  fact  that 
shadows  are  as  much  colours  as  lights  are;  and  whoever 
represents  them  by  merely  the  subdued  or  darkened  tint 
of  the  light,  represents  them  falsely.  I  particularly  want 
you  to  observe  that  this  is  no  matter  of  taste,  but  fact.  If 
you  are    especially  sober-minded,  you    may  indeed  choose 

1  [Eda.  1-3  add  :— 

'^  I -shall  place  a  piece  of  rock  opal  on  the  table  in  your  working  room ; 
if  on  fine  days  you  will  sometimes  dip  it  into  water,  take  it  into  sunshine, 
and  examine  it  with  a  •lens  of  moderate  power,  vou  may  always  test  your 
progress  in  sensibility  to  colour  by  the  degree  01  pleasure  it  gires  yon."} 
<  rsee  §  139 ;  above,  p.  128.] 
Above,  §  134,  p.  123.] 


*  [Compare  Lavf$  qf  Fitole,  ch.  vii.  §  1  (VoL  XV.  p.  414).] 


VII.   COLOUR  169 

sober  colours  where  Venetians  would  have  chosen  gay  ones ; 
that  is  a  matter  of  taste ;  you  may  think  it  proper  for  a 
hero  to  wear  a  dress  without  patterns  on  it,  rather  than 
aa  embroidered  one;  that  is  similarly  a  mattar  of  taste: 
but,  though  you  may  also  think  it  would  be  dignified  for 
a  hero's  limbs  to  be  all  black,  or  brown,  on  the  shaded  side 
of  them,  yet,  if  you  are  using  colour  at  all,  you  cannot  so 
hare  him  to  your  mind,  except  by  fedsehood;  ha  nerer, 
under  any  cbcumstances,  could  be  entirely  black  or  brown 
on  one  side  of  him. 

17ft.  In  this,  then,  the  V^ietians  are  separate  from  other 
schools  by  rightness,  and  they  are  so  to  their  last  days. 
Venetian  painting  is  in  this  matter  always  right.  But  abo, 
in  their  early  days,  the  cdk>urists  are  separated  from  other 
schools  by  their  contentment  with  tranquil  cheerfulness  of 
light;  by  their  never  wanting  to  be  dazzled.  None  of 
their  lights  are  flashing  <»*  blinding ;  they  are  soft,  winning, 
precious;  lights  of  pearl,  not  of  lime:  only,  you  know,  on 
this  condition  they  cannot  have  sunshine:  their  day  is  the 
day  of  Paradise;  they  need  no  candle,  neither  light  of  the 
sun,^  in  their  cities ;  and  everything  is  seen  clear,  as  through 
crystal,  &r  or  near. 

This  holds  to  the  end  of  the  fifteenth  century.  Then 
they  begin  to  see  that  this,  beautifbl  as  it  may  be,  is  still 
a  make-believe  light;  that  we  do  not  live  in  the  inside  of 
a  pearl;  but  in  an  atmosphere  through  which  a  burning 
sun  shines  thwartedly,  and  over  which  a  sorrowful  night 
must  &r  prevail  And  then  the  chiaroscimsts  succeed  in 
persuading  them  of  the  fact  that  there  is  a  mystery  in  the 
day  as  in  the  night,  and  show  them  how  constantly  to 
see  truly,  is  to  see  dimly.  And  also  they  teadi  them  the 
brilliancy  of  light,  and  the  degree  in  which  it  is  raised 
firom  the  darkness;  and  instead  of  their  sweet  and  pearly 
peace,  tempt  them  to  look  for  the  strength  of  flame  and 
coruscation  of  lightning,  and  flash  of  sunshine  on  armour 
and  on  points  of  spears. 

^  [Revelation  xxii.  5.] 


170  LECTURES   ON  ART 

177.  The  noble  painters  take  the  lesson  nobly,  alike  for 
gloom  or  flame.  Titian  with  deliberate  strength,  Tintoret 
with  stormy  passion,  read  it,  side  by  side.  Titian  deepens 
the  hues  of  his  Assumption,  as  of  his  Entombment,  into 
a  solemn  twilight;^  Tintoret  involves  his  earth  in  coils  of 
volcanic  cloud,  and  withdraws,  throu^  circle  flaming  above 
circle,  the  distant  light  of  Paradise.  Both  of  them,  be- 
coming naturalist  and  human,  add  the  veracity  of  Holbein's 
intense  portraiture  to  the  glow  and  dignity  they  had  them- 
selves  inherited  from  the  Masters  of  Peace:  at  the  same 
moment  another,  as  strong  as  they,  and  in  piu^e  felicity  of 
art-faculty,  even  greater  than  they,  but  trained  in  a  lower 
school, — ^Velasquez, — produced  the  miracles  of  colour  and 
shadow-painting,  which  made  Reynolds  say  of  him,  ^'What 
we  all  do  with  labour,  he  does  with  ease;"*  and  one  more, 
Correggio,  uniting  the  sensual  element  of  the  Greek  schools 
with  their  gloom,  and  their  light  with  their  beauty,  and  all 
these  with  the  Lombardic  colour,  became,  as  since  I  think 
it  has  been  admitted  vdthout  question,  the  captain  of  the 
painter's  art  as  such.  Other  men  have  nobler  or  more 
numerous  gifts,  but  as  a  painter,  master  of  the  art  of 
laying  colour  so  as  to  be  lovely,  Correggio  is  alone.' 

178.  I  said  the  noble  men  learned  their  lesson  nobly. 
The  base  men  also,  and  necessarily,  learn  it  basely.  The 
great  men  rise  from  colour  to  sunlight.  The  base  ones 
fall  from  colour  to  candlelight.  To-day,  **non  ragioniam 
di  lor,'**  but  let  us  see  what  this  great  change  which 
perfects  the  art  of  painting  mainly  consists  in,  and  means. 
For  though  we  are  only  at  present  speaking  of  technical 
matters,  every  one  of  them,  I  can  scarcely  too  often  repeat, 
is  the  outcome  and  sign  of  a  mental  character,  and  you 

1  [For  the  colouring  of  Titian's  ''Entombment"  in  the  Louvre^  mo  Vol.  IV. 
p.  86.  For  other  references  to  the  ''Assumption"  at  Venice,  see  Vol.  VII. 
p.  280  ».  For  the  "Paradise"  of  Tintoret,  as  for  the  other  painters  here  mentioned, 
see  Greneral  Index.] 

<  [See  Vol.  XVI.  p.  313  and  n.] 

'  [For  a  summary  of  Ruskin*s  views  on  Correggio,  see  Vol.  IV.  p.  197  nJ] 

^  [It^emo,  iii.  61.] 


VIL  COLOUR  171 

can  only  understand  the  folds  of  the  veil,  by  those  of  the 
form  it  veils. 

179.  The  complete  painters,  we  find,  have  brought  dim- 
ness and  mystery  into  their  method  of  colouring.  That 
means  that  the  world  all  round  them  has  resolved  to 
dream,  or  to  believe,  no  more;  but  to  know,  and  to  see. 
And  instantly  all  knowledge  and  sight  are  given,  no  more 
as  in  the  Gothic  times,  through  a  window  of  glass,  brightly, 
but  as  through  a  telescope-glass,  darkly.^  Your  cathedral 
vdndow  shut  you  from  tiie  true  sky,  and  illumined  you 
with  a  vision;  your  telescope  leads  you  to  the  sky,  but 
darkens  its  light,  and  reveals  nebula  beyond  nebula,  £u: 
and  farther,  and  to  no  conceivable  farthest — ^unresolvable. 
That  is  what  the  mystery  means. 

180.  Next,  what  does  that  Greek  opposition  of  black 
and  white  mean? 

In  the  sweet  crystalline  time  of  colour,  the  painters, 
whether  on  glass  or  canvas,  employed  intricate  patterns, 
in  order  to  mingle  hues  beautifully  with  each  other,  and 
make  one  perfect  melody  of  them  alL  But  in  the  great 
naturalist  school,  they  like  their  patterns  to  come  in  the 
Greek  way,  dashed  dark  on  light, — ^gleaming  light  out  of 
dark.  That  means  also  that  the  world  round  them  has 
again  returned  to  the  Greek  conviction,  that  all  nature, 
especially  human  nature,  is  not  entirely  melodious  nor  lumi- 
nous ;  but  a  barred  and  broken  thing :  that  saints  have 
their  foibles,  sinners  their  forces ;  that  the  most  luminous 
virtue  is  often  only  a  flash,  and  the  blackest-looking  fault 
is  sometimes  only  a  stain:  and,  without  confusing  in  the 
least  black  with  white,  they  can  forgive,  or  even  take  de- 
light in  things  that  are  like  the  vefipU,  dappled.* 

181.  You  have  then — ^first,  mystery.  Secondly,  oppo- 
sition of  dark  and  light.  Then,  lastly,  whatever  truth  of 
form  the  dark  and  light  can  show. 

That  is  to  say,  truth  altogether,  and  resignation  to  it, 

1  [See  1  Corinthians  xiii.  12.] 

*  [Compare  the  reference,  aliove,  to  the  nebris  of  Dionysus;  §  166,  p.  148.] 


172  LECTURES  ON  ART 

and  quiet  resolve  to  make  the  best  of  it.  And  therefore 
portraiture  of  living  men,  women,  and  children, — ^no  more 
of  saints,  cherubs,  or  demons.  So  here  I  have  brought 
for  your  standards  of  perfect  art,  a  little  maiden  of  the 
Strc^  family,  with  her  dog,  by  Titian ;  ^  and  a  little 
princess  of  the  house  of  Savoy,  by  Vandyke ;  and  Charles 
the  Fifth,  by  Titian;  and  a  queen,  by  Velasquez;  and 
an  English  girl  in  a  brocaded  gown,  by  Reynolds ;  and  an 
English  physician  in  his  plain  coat,  and  wig,  by  Reynolds : 
and  if  you  do  not  like  them,  I  cannot  help  myself,  for  I 
can  find  nothing  better  for  you.' 

182.  Better  ? — I  must  pause  at  the  word.  Nothing 
stronger,  certainly,  nor  so  strong.  Nothing  so  wonderful, 
so  inimitable,  so  keen  in  unprejudiced  and  unbiassed  sight. 

Yet  better,  perhaps,  the  sight  that  was  guided  by  a 
sacred  will;  the  power  that  could  be  taught  to  weaker 
hands ;  the  work  that  was  faultless,  though  not  inimitable, 
Imght  with  felicity  of  heart,  and  consummate  in  a  discip- 
lined and  companionable  skiU.  You  will  find,  when  I 
can  place  in  your  hands  the  notes  on  Verona,  which  I  read 
at  the  Royal  Institution,*  that  I  have  ventured  to  call  the 
rara  of  painting  represented  by  John  Bellini,  the  time  **of 
the  Masters."  Truly  they  deserved  the  name,  who  did 
nothing  but  what  was  lovely,  and  taught  only  what  was 
right.  These  mightier,  who  succeeded  them,  crowned,  but 
closed,  the  dynasties  of  art,  and  since  their  day,  painting 
has  never  flourished  more. 

188.  There  were  many  reasons  for  this,  without  fault 
of  theirs.  They  were  exponents,  in  the  first  place,  of  the 
change  in   all    men's    minds   from    civil    and    religious   to 

^  [In  one  of  his  copies  Raskin  notes  of  the  dog's  chain  in  this  picture  its 
''«iHietXia"  :  on  which  suhject,  see  helow,  p.  349  n.] 

'  [For  the  '^  little  maiden  of  the  StroasEi  family/'  see  Standard  Series,  No.  42 
(VoL^XI.  p.  26)^  and  EagU^s  NeH,  §  151  ^where  it  is  now  reproduced).  "Prinoeas" 
of  the  house  of  Savoy  should  he  "  prince '' :  see  Standard  Series,  No.  41  (Vol.  ZXI. 
p.  26).  For  other  references  to  Titian's  "Charles  V."  (ibid..  No.  47,  p.  27X  see 
Vol.  XIX.  p.  66.  The  ''queen  hy  Velasquez"  is  Margaret  of  Austria  {ibid.,  No.  45, 
p.  27);  the  ''English  girr'  (Und.,  No.  43,  p.  26)  is  Lady  Elizabeth  Keppel;  the 
''Eng^sh  physician"  (ibid.,  No.  44,  p.  27)  is  Dr.  Armstrong.] 

*  [Now  printed  in  Vol.  XIX. :  see  p.  443.] 


VII.  COLOUR  178 

merely  domestic  passion;  the  love  of  their  gods  and  their 
country  had  contracted  itself  now  into  that  of  their  domestic 
circle,  which  was  little  more  than  the  halo  of  themselves. 
You  wUl  see  the  reflection  of  this  change  in  painting  at 
once  by  comparing  the  two  Madonnas  (S.  87f  John  Bellini's, 
and  Raphaers,  called  **della  Seggiola"^).  Bellini's  Madonna 
cares  for  all  creatures  through  her  child;  Raphael's,  for  her 
child  only. 

Again,  the  world  roimd  these  painters  had  become  sad 
and  proud,  instead  of  happy  and  humble; — ^its  domestic 
peace  was  darkened  by  irrdigion,  its  national  action  fevered 
by  pride.  And  for  sign  of  its  Love,  the  Hymen,  whose 
statue  this  fair  English  girl,  according  to  Reynolds's  thought, 
has  to  decorate  (S.  4f8),  is  blind,  and  holds  a  coronet^ 

Again,  in  the  splendid  power  of  realization,  which  these 
greatest  of  artists  had  reached,  there  was  the  latent  possi- 
bility of  amusement  by  deception,  and  of  excitement  by 
sensualism.  And  Dutch  trickeries  of  base  resemblance,  and 
French  fancies  of  insidious  beauty,  soon  occupied  the  eyes 
of  the  populace  of  Europe,  too  restless  and  wretched  now 
to  care  for  the  sweet  earth-berries  and  Madonna's  ivy  of 
Cima,'  and  too  ignoble  to  perceive  Titian's  colour,  or  Cor- 
reggio's  shade. 

184.  Enough  sources  of  evil  were  here,  in  the  temper 
and  power  of  the  consununate  art.  In  its  practical  metliods 
there  was  another,  the  fatallest  of  alL  These  great  artists 
brought  with  them  mystery,  despondency,  domesticity,  sen- 
suality: of  all  these,  good  came,  as  well  as  eviL  One 
thing  more  they  brought,  of  which  nothing  but  evil  ever 
comes,  or  can  come — Libebty.* 

^  [Standard  Series,  No.  37  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  25);  and  for  the  Raphael,  aee  above^ 
p.  «2.JL 

2  [This  passage  was  revised  in  1887.    Eds.  1-3  read: — 

'^.  .  .  darkened  by  irreligion,  and  made  restless  by  pride.  And  the 
Hymen,  whose  statue  this  fair  English  girl  of  Reynolds'  thought  mut 
decorate  (§  43),  is  blind,  and  holds  a  coronet.''] 

•  rSee  §  160 ;  above,  p.  141.] 

*  [Ruskin,  it  may  be  noted,  ends  his  Inaugural  Lectures  on  Art  at  Oxford,  as 
he  did  the  Seven  Lanwi  of  Architecture,  with  an  attack  upon  liberty.  Compare 
Vol.  V.  p.  379 ;  VoL  Vm.  pp.  248-249,  261,  287 ;  Vol,  XV.  p.  387.] 


174  LECTURES  ON  ART 

By  the  discipline  of  five  hundred  years  they  had  learned 
and  inherited  such  power,  that  whereas  all  former  painters 
could  be  right  only  by  effort,  they  could  be  right  with 
ease;  and  whereas  all  former  painters  could  be  right  only 
under  restraint,  they  could  be  right,  free.  Tintoret's  touch, 
Luini's,  Correggio's,  Reynolds's,  and  Velasquez's,  are  all  as 
free  as  the  air,  and  yet  right.  "How  very  fine  I**  said 
everybody.  Unquestionably,  very  fine.  Next,  said  every- 
body, "What  a  grand  discovery!  Here  is  the  finest  work 
ever  done,  and  it  is  quite  free.  Let  us  all  be  free  then, 
and  what  fine  things  shall  we  not  do  alsol"  With  what 
results  we  too  well  know. 

Nevertheless,  remember  you  are  to  delight  in  the  free- 
dom won  by  these  mighty  men  through  obedience,  though 
you  are  not  to  covet  it.  Obey,  and  you  also  shall  be  free 
in  time ;  but  in  these  minor  things,  as  well  as  in  great,  it  is 
only  right  service  which  is  perfect  freedom.^ 

185.  This,  broadly,  is  the  history  of  the  early  and  late 
colour-schools.  The  first  of  these  I  shall  call  generally, 
henceforward,  the  school  of  crystal;  the  other  that  of 
clay:'  potter's  clay,  or  human,  are  too  sorrowfully  the 
same,  as  far  as  art  is  concerned.  But  remember,  in  practice, 
you  cannot  follow  both  these  schools;  you  must  distinctly 
adopt  the  principles  of  one  or  the  other.  I  will  put  the 
means  of  following  either  within  your  reach ;  and  according 
to  your  dispositions  you  will  choose  one  or  the  other:  all  I 
have  to  guard  you  against  is  the  mistake  of  thinking  you 
can  unite  the  two.  If  you  want  to  paint  (even  in  the 
most  distant  and  feeble  way)  in  the  Greek  School,  the 
school  of  Leonardo,  Correggio,  and  Turner,  you  cannot 
design  coloured  windows,  nor  Angelican  paradises.  If,  on 
the  other  hand,  you  choose  to  live  in  the  peace  of  para- 
dise, you  cannot  share  in  the  gloomy  triumphs  of  the 
earth. 

1  [See  VoL  VIII.  p.  249.] 

<  [On  ''the  tchool  of  oky/'  oompue  Aeademy  Natee,  1876  (Vol  XIV.  p.  272), 
and  Lecturer  on  Landscape,  §  61.] 


VII.   COLOUR  176 

186*  And,  incidentally  note,  as  a  practical  matter  of  im- 
mediate importance,  that  painted  windows  have  nothing  to 
do  with  chiaroscuro.^  The  virtue  of  glass  is  to  be  trans- 
parent ever3n>^here.^  If  you  care  to  build  a  palace  of  jewels, 
painted  gliuss  is  richer  than  aU  the  treasures  of  Aladdin's 
lamp ;  but  if  you  like  pictures  better  than  jewels,  you  must 
come  into  broad  daylight  to  paint  them.  A  picture  in 
coloured  glass  is  one  of  the  most  vulgar  of  barbarisms,  and 
only  fit  to  be  ranked  with  the  gauze  transparencies  and 
chemical  illuminations  of  the  sensational  stage. 

Also,  put  out  of  your  minds  at  once  all  question  about 
difficulty  of  getting  colour ;  in  glass  we  have  all  the  colours 
that  are  wanted,  only  we  do  not  know  either  how  to 
choose,  or  how  to  connect  them;  and  we  are  always  tr3ring 
to  get  them  bright,  when  their  real  virtues  are  to  be  deep, 
mysterious,  and  subdued.  We  will  have  a  thorough  study 
of  painted  glass  soon : '  meanwhile  I  merely  give  you  a  type 
of  its  perfect  style,  in  two  windows  from  Chalons-sur-Mame 
(S.  141'). 

187.  But^  for  my  own  part,  vdth  what  poor  gift  and 
skill  is  in  me,  I  belong  wholly  to  the  chiaroscurist  school; 
and  shall  teach  you  therefore  chiefly  that  which  I  am  best 
able  to  teach :  and  the  rather,  that  it  is  only  in  this  school 
that  you  can  follow  out  the  study  either  of  natund  history 
or  landscape.  The  form  of  a  wild  animal,  or  the  wrath 
of  a  mountain  torrent,  would  both  be  revolting  (or  in  a 
certain  sense  invisible)  to  the  calm  fantasy  of  a  painter  in 
the   schools  of  crystal.      He  must  lay  his  lion    asleep   in 

*  There  is  noble  chiaroseuro  in  the  TaiiationB  of  their  colour,  but  not  as 
representative  of  solid  form. 

1  [Compare  Law  of  F^wk,  eh.  iriL  §  3  (Vol.  XV.  p.  416),  and  Vol.  XVI. 
pp.  324,  417.] 

>  [This  inteDtion  was  not  carried  out  There  are  passing  allusions  to  the  sub* 
ject  in  JSagle's  Nut,  §§  33,  118,  226.1 

^  PThese  drawinn  are  no  longer  m  the  Oxford  Collection.] 

^  [Eds.  1-^3  read:  '^You  will  have  then  to  choose  between  these  two  modes  of 
tfaonght:  for  my  own  part  .  .  ."] 


176  LECTURES  ON  ART 

St.  Jeiome's  study  beside  his  tame  partridge  and  easy 
slippers;^  lead  the  appeased  river  by  alternate  azure  pro- 
montories, and  restrain  its  courtly  little  streamlets  with 
margins  of  marble.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  your  studies 
of  mythology  and  literature  may  best  be  connected  with 
these  schools  of  purest  and  calmest  imagination;  and  their 
discipline  will  be  useful  to  you  in  yet  another  direction, 
and  that  a  very  important  one.  It  will  teach  you  to  take 
delight  in  little  things,  and  develop  in  you  the  joy  which 
all  men  should  fed  in  purity  and  order,  not  only  in  pictures 
but  in  reality.  For,  indeed,  the  best  art  of  this  school  of 
fantasy  may  at  last  be  in  reality,  and  the  chiaroscurists, 
true  in  ideal,  may  be  less  helpful  in  act.  We  cannot  arrest 
sunsets  nor  carve  mountains,  but  we  may  turn  eveiy  English 
homestead,  if  we  choose,  into  a  picture  by  Cima  or  John 
Bellini,  which  shall  be  **no  counterfeit,  but  the  true  and 
perfect  image  of  life  indeed."  * 

188.  For  the  present,  however,  and  yet  for  some  little 
time  during  your  progress,  you  will  not  have  to  choose 
your  schooL  For  both,  as  we  have  seen,  begin  in  delinea- 
tion, and  both  proceed  by  filling  flat  spaces  with  an  ev^i 
tint.  And  therefore  this  following  will  be  the  course  of 
work  for  you,  founded  on  all  that  we  have  seen. 

Having  learned  to  measure,  and  draw  a  pen  line  with 
some  steadiness  (the  geometrical  exercises  for  this  purpose 
being  properly  school,  not  University  work),'  you  shall 
have  a  series  of  studies  from  the  plants  whidi  are  of  chief 
importance  in  the  history  of  art;  first  from  their  real 
forms,  and  then  from  the  conventional  and  heraldic  expres- 
sions of  them;  then  we  will  take  ^Lamples  of  the  filling  of 

1  [See  the  picture  in  the  NaUoiuJ  Gallery,  No.  604  (ascrihed  to  ''School  ai 

Bellini").] 

*  [1  Henry  IV.,  v.  4,  120.  Oompare  §  116,  ahoye,  p.  107.1 
'  rSeveral  of  such  exerciBes  are  placed  in  the  Rudimentary  Series  fsee  Vol.  XXI. 
pp.  173,  230  #09.  )y  Bome  of  them  heing  engraved  also  for  the  contemplated  "  Oxford 
Art  School  Series.''  Then  in  the  Educational  Series  come  the  Flower  Subjects; 
the  examples  of  flat  colour  are  partly  in  the  Reference  and  partly  in  the  Educa- 
tional Series.  Animal  subjects  are  in  the  Educational  and  the  Rudimentary 
Seriee.] 


VIL  COLOUR  177 

ornamental  forms  with  flat  colour  in  Egyptian^  Greek,  and 
Gothic  design;  and  then  we  will  advance  to  animal  forms 
treated  in  the  same  severe  way,  and  so  to  the  patterns  and 
colour  designs  on  animals  themselves.  And  when  we  are 
sure  of  our  firmness  of  hand  and  accuracy  of  eye,  we  will 
go  on  into  light  and  shade. 

189.  In  process  of  time,  this  series  of  exercises  will,  I 
hope,  be  sufficiently  complete  and  systematic  to  show  its 
purpose  at  a  glance.  But  during  the  present  year,  I  shall 
content  myself  vdth  placing  a  few  examples  of  these  differ- 
ent kinds  of  practice  in  your  rooms  for  work,  explaining 
in  the  catalogue^  the  position  they  wiU  ultimately  occupy, 
and  the  technical  points  of  process  into  which  it  is  useless 
to  enter  in  a  general  lecture.  After  a  little  time  spent  in 
copying  these,  your  own  predilections  must  determine  your 
fiiture  course  of  study;  only  remember,  whatever  sdiool 
you  follow,  it  must  be  only  to  learn  method,  not  to  imi- 
tate result,  and  to  acquaint  yourself  with  the  minds  of 
other  moi,  but  not  to  adopt  them  as  your  own.  Be  assured 
that  no  good  can  come  of  our  work  but  as  it  arises  simply 
out  of  our  own  true  natures,  and  the  necessities  of  the 
time  around  us,  thou^  in  many  respects  an  evil  one.  We 
live  in  an  age  of  base  conceit  and  baser  servility — an  age 
whose  intellect  is  chiefly  formed  by  pillage,  and  occupied 
in  desecration ;  one  day  mimicking,  the  next  destroying,  the 
works  of  all  the  noble  persons  who  made  its  intellectual  or 
art  life  possible  to  it: — an  age  vdthout  honest  confidence 
enough  in  itself  to  carve  a  cherry-stone  with  an  original 
£uicy,  but  with  insolence  enough  to  abolish  the  solar  S3rstem, 
if  it  were  allowed  to  meddle  with  it."*  In  the  midst  of  all 
this,  you  have  to  become  lowly  and  strong;  to  recognize 

*  Evexy  day  these  bitter  words  become  more  sorrowfully  true  (Sep- 
tember, 1887). 


^  [For  the  bibliography  of  the  suoeessive  catalogaee  prepared  by  Raskin,  see 
Vol.  XXI.  pp.  5,  65,  161.J 

M 


178  LECTURES  ON  ART 

the  powers  of  others  and  to  fulfil  your  own.  I  shall  try 
to  bring  before  you  every  form  of  ancient  art,  that  you 
may  read  and  profit  by  it,  not  imitate  it  You  shall  draw 
Egyptian  kings  dressed  in  colours  like  the  rainbow,  and 
Doric  gods,  and  Runic  monsters,  and  Gothic  monks — ^not 
that  you  may  draw  like  Egyptians  or  Norsemen,  nor  yield 
yourselves  passively  to  be  bound  by  the  devotion,  or  in- 
spired by  the  passion  of  the  past,  but  that  you  may  know 
truly  what  other  men  have  felt  during  their  poor  span  of 
life;  and  open  your  own  hearts  to  what  the  heavens  and 
earth  may  have  to  tell  you  in  yours.^ 

190.  In  closing  this  first  course  of  lectures,  I  have  one 
word  more  to  say  respecting  the  possible  consequence  of 
the  introduction  of  art  among  the  studies  of  the  University. 
What  art  may  do  for  scholarship,  I  have  no  right  to  con- 
jecture; but  what  scholarship  may  do  for  art,  I  may  in  all 
modesty  tell  you.  Hitherto,  great  artists,  though  alwajrs 
gentlemen,  have  yet  been  too  exclusively  craftsmen.  Art 
has  been  less  thoughtful  than  we  suppose;  it  has  taught 
much,  but  erred  much,  also.'  Many  of  the  greatest  pictures 
are  enigmas;  others,  beautiful  toys;  others,  harmAil  and 
corrupting  enchantments.'  In  the  loveliest,  there  is  some- 
thing weak;  in  the  greatest,  there  is  something  guilty. 
And  this,  gentlemen,  if  you  will,  is  the  new  thing  that 
may  come  to  pass, — ^that  the  scholars  of  England  may  re* 
solve  to  teach  also  with  the  silent  power  of  the  arts ;  and 
that  some  among  you  may  so  leain  and  use  them,  that 
pictures  may  be  painted  which  shall  not  be  enigmas  any 
more,  but  open  teachings  of  what  can  no  otherwise  be  so 
well  shown; — which  shall  not  be  fevered  or  broken  visions 

^  [Eda.  1-3  have  an  additional  paragraph  here : — 

'^Do  not  be  surprised^  therefore^  nor  provolced,  if  I  give  you  at  first 
strange  things  and  rude^  to  draw.  As  soon  as  you  tty  them,  you  will  find 
they  are  difficult  enough,  yet  with  care,  entirely  possible.  As  you  go  on 
drawing  them  they  will  become  interesting^  and,  as  soon  as  you  understand 
them,  you  will  be  on  the  way  to  understand  vourselves  also."] 

'  [In  eds.  1-3 :  '*  it  has  taught  much,  but  much,  also,  falsely."] 

'  [Eds.  1-3  read  ^^toys"  for  ^^enchantments."] 


VII.   COLOUR  179 

any  more,  but  filled  with  the  indwelling  light  of  self-pos- 
sessed imagination ; — ^which  shall  not  be  stained  or  enfeebled 
any  more  by  evil  passion,  but  glorious  with  the  strength 
and  chastity  of  noble  human  love; — and  which  shall  no 
more  degrade  or  disguise  the  work  of  God  in  heav^i,  but 
testify  of  Him  as  here  dwelling  with  men,  and  walking 
with  them,  not  angry,  in  the  garden  of  the  earth.^ 

^  [See  Genesis  iii.  8.] 


II 
ARATRA    PENTELICI 

(LECTURES  DELIVERED,   1870;  PUBLISHED   1872) 


ARATRA    PENTELICI. 


SIX  LECTURES 
ON  THE  ELEMENTS  OF 

SCULPTURE 


GIVEN  BEFORE  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  OXFORD 

IN   MICHAELMAS  TERM,  187a 


BY 

JOHN  RUSKIN, 

HONORARY  STUDENT  OP  CHRISTCHURCH,  AND  SLADB  PROFESSOR  OF  FINE  ART. 


LONDON : 

PRINTED    FOR    THE   AUTHOR 

BY  SMITH,  ELDER  &  CO,,  15  WATERLOO  PLACE; 

AND  SOLD  BY 

MR.  G.  ALLEN,  HEATHFIELD   COTTAGE,  KESTON,  KENT. 

1872. 


[Bibliographict;^  Note,— The  lectures^  pubiisbed  under  the  title  Aratra  Pentelicif 
were  delivered  at  Oxford  in  Micbaelmas  Term,  1870.  Tfaej  were  announced 
in  the  O:i^ord  Univernty  GazeUe  (of  October  14^  1870)  to  be  delivered 
ai  follows:  ''The  Eleznentarj  Principles  of  Sculpture.  I.  The  Division 
of  Arts  (November  24) ;  II.  Imagination  (November  26) ;  IIL  likenev 
(December  1) ;  IV.  Structure  (December  3) ;  V.  The  School  of  Athens 
(December  8);  and  VI.  The  School  of  Florence  (December  10)/'  The 
second  lecture  as  delivered  was  expanded  in  the  volume  into  Lectures  ii. 
and  iii.  A  short  report  of  the  second  lecture  as  delivered  appeared  in  the 
Athenaum  of  December  3,  1870,  and  the  report  shows  that  passages  from 
both  ''Lecture  II."  and  "Lecture  III."  (as  printed  in  the  book)  were 
included  in  it. 

The  lectures^  amplified^  rearranged^  and  revised,  were  prepared  for  the 
press  in  the  autumn  of  1871 ;  the  volume  was  originally  advertised  under 
the  title  of  Lectures  on  Sculpture.  Having,  as  already  stated,  expanded  his 
second  lecture  into  two,  Ruskin,  on  that  account  and  for  other  reasons, 
did  not  include  the  last  lecture — on  "The  School  of  Florence" — in  the 
volume.  He  preferred  to  limit  the  volume  to  general  principles  illustrated 
by  the  Greek  school  only  (Pre£Me,  §  2) ;  the  concluding  lecture,  dealing 
irith  "the  religious  temper  of  the  Florentine,"  was  reserved  for  publication 
in  another  intended  volume  (§  184  n.).  This  was  not  done^  and  the  lecture 
is  now  for  the  first  time  printed  (see  below,  pp.  355-d67)* 

In  the  foUowing  June  (1871)  Ruskin  delivered,  in  another  oonnexion 
and  for  another  purpose  (see  Vol.  XXII.  p.  71),  a  lecture  on  "The  Rela- 
tion between  Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret,"  and  tiiis  he  published  separately, 
calling  it  "Seventh  of  the  Course  of  Lectures  on  Sculpture,  delivered  at 
Oxford,  1870-71."  The  six  lectures,  as  published  in  Aratra,  were,  as  we 
have  seen,  the  first  five  as  delivered;  "The  School  of  Florence"  was  the 
sixth;  and  Ruskin  called  "Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret"  the  seventh. 
Eighteen  years  later,  in  forgetfulness  of  these  facts^  the  lecture  on  "Michael 
Angelo  and  Tintoret"  was  included  in  a  new  edition  of  Aratra,  though 
it  has  in  fact  little  connexion  with  the  other  lectures  in  that  volume. 
In  the  present  edition  the  lecture  is  published  in  its  chronological  place 
(VoL  XXn.),  not  with  the  lectures  of  1870,  but  with  those  of  1871. 

The  snocessive  editions  of  the  volume,  Aratra  FenieHei,  have  been  as 
follow : — 

First  Edition  (1872). — The  volume  was  issued  as  the  third  in  the 
Collected  Works  Series.    The  general  title-page  was: — 

The  I  Works  of  John  Ruskin,  |  Honorary  Student  of  Christchureh, 
Oxford.  I  Volume  III.  |  Aratra  Pentelici  |  [Rose]  \  London :  Printed  for 
the  Author  |  By  Smith,  Elder  &  Co.,  15,  Waterloo  Place ;  and  sold 
by  I  Mr.  G.  Allen,  Heathfield  Cottage,  Keston,  Kent.  |  1872. 

The  particular  title-page  is  as  shown  here  on  the  preceding  leaf.    Octavo, 

pp.  xii.+207.    Contents  (here  p.  191),  p.  v. ;  Preface  (here  pp.  193-197)« 

186 


186  ARATRA  PENTELICI 


pp.  TiL-zii. ;  Text,  pp.  1-207.  The  imprint  (on  the  reverse  of  pi  207)  is 
''  London :  Printed  hj  Smith,  Elder  and  Co.,  |  Old  BaUej,  E.C."  Headlines, 
■s  in  thb  edition.  There  was  no  list  of  illustrations.  Thej  consisted  of 
one  engraving  on  steel  (XII.)  and  twenty  autotype  plates  (although  Ruskin 
calls  them  engravings,  as  at  p.  214). 

Issaed  on  January  17^  1872,  in  '^  Ruskin  calf,"  lettered  across  the  hack 
''Ruskin.  |  Works.  |  Vol.  |  III.  |  Aratra  |  PenteUci."  Price  19s.,  increased 
on  January  1,  1874,  to  27s.  6d.    1000  copies. 

Second  SdUUm  (1879).— This,  though  dated  1879,  was  not  issued  till 
June  1880.  The  text  was  not  altered,  but  there  were  new  title-pages. 
The  general  title-page  reads : — 

The  I  Works  of  John  Ruskin,  |  Honorary  Student  of  Christ  Church,  and 
Honorary  Fellow  |  of  Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford.  |  Volume  III.  | 
Aratra  PentelicL  |  [Bote]  I  George  Allen,  |  Sunnyride,  Orpington,  Kent. 
I  1879. 

The  particular  title-page  reads : — 

Aratra  PentelicL  |  Six  Lectures  |  on  the  Elements  of  |  Sculpture,  |  given 
hefore  the  University  of  Oxford  in  |  Michaelmas  Term,  1870.  |  By  |  John 
Ruskin,  |  Honorary  Student  of  Christ  Church,  and  Honorary  Fellow  of 
I  Corpus  Christi  CoUc^,  Oxford.  |  Second  Thousand.  |  George  Allen, 
Sunnyside,  Orpington,  Kent.  |  1879.  j  [The  Right  qf  Tramlatum  it  re- 
eefvedmj 

Issaed  in  ''Ruskin  calf"  as  hefore,  price  27s.  6d.  In  July  1882  some 
copies  were  put  up  in  mottled-grey  hoards  with  white  paper  label  on  the 
back,  which  reads,  "Ruskin.  |  Works.  |  VoL  lU.  |  Aratra  |  PenteUci." 
Price  22b.  6d.  The  price  of  the  copies  in  calf  was  reduced  in  1893  to  20s., 
and  in  1900  to  19s.  In  1893  copies  were  also  put  up  in  green  cloth, 
price  14b.  6d.  (reduced  in  1900  to  12s.  6d.). 

Third  EdiHan,  in  "Works"  form  (1899).— This  is  an  edition  which 
follows  the  Small  Edition  of  1890  in  including  "  The  Relation  of  Michael 
Angelo  and  Untoret,"  and  the  later  issues  of  that  edition  in  including  also 
an  Index  (see  below).  The  general  title-page  is  the  same  as  in  the  pre- 
ceding edition,  except  for  the  publisher's  imprint,  which  now  becomes 
"George  AUen,  |  Orpington  and  London.  |  1899."  The  particular  title- 
page  reads: — 

Aratra  Pentelici.  |  Seven  Lectures  |  on  the  Elements  of  |  Sculpture,  | 
Given  before  the  University  of  Oxford  in  |  Michaelmas  Term,  1870.  | 
By  I  John  Ruskin,  |  Honorary  Student  of  Christ  Church,  and  Honorary 
Fellow  of  I  Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford.  |  Third  Edition.  |  George 
AUen,  I  Orpington  and  London.  |  1899.  |  [AU  rights  re§erved»] 

Octavo,  pp.  xvi.+279.  Imprint  at  the  foot  of  the  reverse  of  the  title-page, 
"Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  &  Co.  |  At  the  Ballantyne  Press";  im- 
print at  the  foot  of  the  last  page,  "  Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  &  Ca 
I  Edinburgh  A  London."  Contents  (altered  so  as  to  include  Pre&ce, 
Lecture  vii.,  and  Index),  pp.  vii.~viii. ;  "  List  of  Plates,"  pp.  ix.-x. ;  Pre- 
fiMse  (with  numbered  paragraphs),  pp.  xi.-xvi. ;  Text,  pp.  1-244 ;  Index, 
pp.  245-279. 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE  187 

laraed  in  May  1889  in  green  clotli  boards^  lettered  aoroae  the  bnck^ 
''Rnskin.  |  Vol.  III.  |  Aratrs  |  Pentelid."    Price  140.  6d.    (260  copies.) 

This  edition  seems  to  hare  been  set  from  a  copy  of  the  Small  Edition,  as 
the  misprints  (introduced  in  that  edition)  in  §§  112  and  195  occur  (see 
below). 

3maU  EdiiUm  (1890).— In  this  edition  (which  was  the  Third  in  order  of 
publication)  an  additional  lecture  on  "  The  Relation  between  Micliael  Angelo 
and  Untoret "  (see  abore)  was  included.    The  title-page  is : — 

Aratra  PentelicL  |  Seven  Lectures  |  on  the  |  Elements  of  Sculpture,  | 
given  before  the  University  of  Oxford  |  in  Michaelmas  Term,  1870.^ 
I  By  I  John  Ruskin,  LLi.D.|  |  Honorary  Student  of  Christ  Church,  and 
Honorary  Fellow  |  of  Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford.  |  George  Allen, 
I  Sunnyside,  Orpington,  |  and  |  8,  Bell  Yard,  Temple  Bar,  London  | 
189a  I  [AO  rights  reserved.] 

Small  crown  8vo,  pp.  xvi.-f  283.  Imprint  (at  the  foot  of  the  reverse  of  the 
title-page  and  on  the  reverse  of  p.  283):  '^Printed  by  Hazell,  Watson, 
and  Viney,  Ld.,  London  and  Aylesbury."  Pre&ce,  pp.  v.~xii. ;  Contents, 
p.  xiiL  Tlie  List  of  Plates,  p.  xv.,  is  as  follows.  As  the  plates  in  the 
present  edition  have  been  rearranged,  a  collation 'is  added  : — 

IntM§ 
To  foM  pagt  SdUhn 

1.  Porch  of  San  Zeoone,  Verona 26  No.      I. 

i.  Tba  Arethiua  of  Syracuse 37  m      H* 

9,  Tba  Warning  to  the  Kings,  San  Zenone,  Verona         .        .  29  ,,    III. 

4.  The  Nativity  of  Athena 81  „    VI. 

5.  Tomb  of  the  Dogea  Jaoopo  and  Lorenzo  l^epolo  ...  86  „  VII. 

6.  Arobaio  Athena  of  Athens  and  Corinth        ....  88  Figs.  4,  6. 

7.  Arohaio,  Central,  and  Declining  Art  of  Greece                    .  127  No.    VlII. 

8.  The  Ai^o  of  Syraoose  and  the  Self-made  Man  ...  148  „         IX. 

9.  ApoUo  (Arysocomes  of  ClaiomeoA 160  „          X. 

10.  Marble  Masonry  in  the  Daomo  of  Verona    ....    177  ,.        XL 

11.  The  First  Elements  of  Soolptore  (Incised  Outline  and  Open 

Space) 178  „      XII. 

12.  Branch  of  Phillyrea 194  „     Xm. 

15.  Greek  Flat  Relief,  and  Scnlptore  by  Edged  Inoision  .  .  196  „  XVL 
14.  Apollo  and  the  Python.    Heracles  and  tiae  Nemean  Lion  .  212  „    XVII. 

16.  Hera  of  Argos.    Zeus  of  Syracuse 214  „  XVIII. 

10.  Demeter  of  Messene.    Hera  of  Cnossus         ....  316  ,,  XVIIL 

17.  Athena  of  Thurium,  Siren  Ugeia 216        {    ^^^ 

18.  Artemis  of  Syracuse.    Hera  of  Lacinian  Cape                      .  217  No.     XX. 

19.  Zeus  of  Messene.    Ajax  of  Opus 221  „      XXI. 

20.  Greek  and  Barbarian  Sculpture 226  „    XXII. 

2L  The  Beginnings  of  OhiTaliy 229  „  XXIII. 

(Plates  IV*  and  V.  in  this  edition  have  hitherto  been  printed  as  fffurei. 

Plates  XIV.  and  XV.  are  added.) 

Text,  pp.  1-283.  Headlines,  as  in  prerions  editions.  The  same  negatives 
(except  in  the  case  of  Plates  I.  and  VII.,  which  were  reduced)  for  autotypes 
were  used  as  in  the  octavo  editions;  Plate  XII.  was  reduced  hy  photo- 
gravure. 

Issued  in  chocolate  and  in  dark  green  coloured  cloth,  lettered  across  the 
hack,  ''Ruskin.  |  Aratra  |  Pentelici."    Price  7s.  6d.    8000  copies. 

1  Thiiy  as  will  be  seen  from  the  facts  stated  above,  is  a  mistake— the  lecture  on 
"Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret"  now  included  had  no  reference  whatever  to  "the 
elements  of  soulptare."  and  was  not  delivered  in  "Michaelmas  Term,  1870,"  hut  in 
Trinity  Term,  1871. 


188  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

SMmd  Small  Edition  (1901).~Thi8  edition,  the  fourth  in  order  of  pnh- 
lication,  included  mxx  Index  (by  Mr.  Wedderbnm).  The  title-page  is  liie 
flame  as  in  the  preceding  edition,  except  that  the  words  *'  Sixth  Thousand" 
are  added,  and  that  the  publisher's  imprint  becomes  ^^ London:  |  George 
Allen,  166,  Charing  Cross  Road.  |  lOOl."*  Imprint  at  the  foot  of  the 
last  page,  '^  Printed  by  Ballantyne,  Hanson  &  Co.  |  Edinburgh  &  London." 
Index,  pp.  285-319.  Issued  in  October  1901  (1000  copies).  Price  78.  6d., 
reduced  in  January  1904  to  6s.    This  edition  is  still  current 

Various  UnatUharued  American  EdUiona  have  been  issued. 

An  Authorised  (^' Brantwood ")  American  Edition  (including  ''The  Re- 
lation between  Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret")  was  published  in  1891  by 
Messrs.  Charles  £.  Merrill  &  Co.,  New  York,  with  an  introduction  by 
Charles  Eliot  Norton  (pp.  v.~xii.). 

A  German  translation  of  five  of  the  lectures  ('' Structure '^  and  ''The 
Relation  between  Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret"  excluded)  forms  a  volume 
in  Jakob  Feis's  Series  "  Gedankenlese  aus  den  Werken  John  Ruskin's." 
The  title-page  is: — 

SGBege  jur  Jhtnft.  |  IV,  \  Aratra  PentelicL  |  SBorUfungen  fiber  bie  (Bninb> 
lagen  bet  bi(benbett  StwxfL  |  SBon  |  3o^n  (Rndfin.  |  KiK  bent  (SngUfd^en 
fiberfe^t  |  oon  |  2:(eoboc  Stnetx.  |  9kit  3  Safeln.  |  [Coat  of  Arms]  \  ©trafburg, 
I  3.  4.  (5b.  ^H  («ct(^  unb  9lfinbe(). 

Small  crown  8yo,  pp.  102.  Translator's  Prefiice,  pp.  7-9 ;  Text,  pp.  11-102. 
The  text  is  somewhat  curtailed,  and  the  translator  adds  a  few  notes.  On 
Plate  1  are  given  on  reduced  scale,  by  half-tone  process,  Plate  Q  and  Figs. 
2  and  6  of  the  English  Edition;  on  Plates  2  and  3,  the  various  coins. 
Price  2m.  50. 

No  revietoa  of  the  volume  appeared ;  it  was  not  sent  to  the  press. 


Varia  Lectionee. — ^The  only  intentional  alterations  (other  than  those 
already  described)  in  the  text  of  the  six  lectures  here  included  consist  of 
the  addition  of  a  few  footnotes  (supplying  references)  in  the  small  editions 
which  were  not  given  in  the  first  and  second  (octavo)  editions.  These 
footnotes  are  to  §§  75,  88,  97,  99,  138.  Also  in  Preface,  §  2,  a  footnote 
was  added  (see  p.  194  n.). 

In  the  present  edition  a  few  misprints  or  slips  of  the  pen  which  occur 
in  all  previous  editions  are  corrected.  Thus  accents  are  corrected  in 
§§  29,  70,  74,  96,  100,  106,  107,  109,  136,  138,  139,  141,  149,  180  and 
208.    The  other  alterations  are : — 

Prtface, — §  2,  author's  footnote,  ''Lenormant"  is  substituted  for  "Le 
Normand  "  ;  §  2,  line  8,  here  the  small  editions  appended  an  editorial  foot- 
note: "It  is  included  in  this  edition.  See  Lecture  VII.,  pp.  235-283"— 
an  erroneous  reference  to  the  lecture  on  Michael  Angelo  and  Tintoret  (see 
above,  p.  185).  §  3,  author's  second  footnote^  last  Hne,  "Henry  VI,"  is 
substituted  for  "Henry  IV." 


BIBLIOGRAPHICAL  NOTE  189 

Lecture  t.— §  12,  Une  28,  ^'HoUen"  for  '"Hellen";  §  15,  line  6, 
''Fifth''  for  ''Fourth ;"  §  17,  last  lines,  "fill"  and  "diamonds"  are  here 
italicised  in  accordance  with  marks  in  Ruskin's  own  copy. 

Lecture  Hi, — §  70,  n  in  the  quotation  from  Lucian  has  heen  misprinted 
r<M ;  §  95,  line  8,  "  monocondylous "  is  substituted  for  "  monochondylous," 
and  so  in  §  139,  line  9,  "monocondyloid"  for  "monochondyloid." 

Lecture  iv. — §  112,  line  11,  eds.  1-2  correctly  printed  r^xi^t — the  small 
editions  and  the  third  octavo  edition  have  r^i^f ;  §  131,  line  1,  "  181 "  has 
hitherto  heen  misprinted  "131." 

LeUure  v, — §  179,  see  p.  328  n. 

Let^re  vi.— §  185,  line  10,  "  Bandini "  is  here  corrected  to  "  Baldini " ; 
§  195,  the  small  editions  and  the  third  octavo  edition  misprint  ToTa  for  Paid  ; 
§  204,  line  24,  the  small  editions  read  "dry^ftw"  for  "dyyitM^"  but  the  mis- 
print is  corrected  in  the  third  octavo  edition. 

In  this  edition  the  numbering  of  the  Plates  and  Figures  has  been  in 
some  cases  altered,  and  consequential  alterations  are  made  in  the  refer- 
ences to  them  in  the  text.  For  example,  in  §  80,  in  connexion  with  the 
rearrangement  of  the  illustrations,  "Figures  10  and  11''  are  substituted 
for  "Plate  VI";  <" first  head"  for  "upper  head**;  and  a  reference  to 
'<[Fig.  11]"  for  "below"  ("The  two  smaller  impressions  below  .  .  . ").] 


CONTENTS 


PAQl 

Pretacb igs 


LECTURE  I 
Of  the  Division  of  Arts 199 

LECTURE   II 
Idolatry 220 

LECTURE  III 
Imagination 242 

LECTURE  IV 
Likeness 272 

LECTURE  V 

Structure 301 

LECTURE  VI 
The  School  op  Athens 881 


[Added  in  this  Edition] 

LECTURE  VII 

The  School  of  Florence 855 

191 


PREFACE 

1.  I  MUST  pray  the  readers  of  the  following  Lectures  to 
remember  that  the  duty  at  present  laid  on  me  at  Oxford 
is  of  an  exceptionally  complex  character.  Directly,  it  is  to 
awaken  the  interest  of  my  pupils  in  a  study  which  they 
have  hitherto  found  unattractive,  and  imagined  to  be  use- 
less; but  more  imperatively,  it  is  to  define  the  principles 
by  which  the  study  itself  should  be  guided;  and  to  vindi- 
cate their  security  against  the  doubts  with  which  frequent 
discussion  has  lately  encumbered  a  subject  which  all  think 
themselves  competent  to  discuss.  The  possibility  of  such 
vindication  is,  of  course,  implied  in  the  original  consent  of 
the  Universities  to  the  establishment  of  Art  Professorships. 
Nothing  can  be  made  an  element  of  education  of  which  it 
is  impossible  to  determine  whether  it  is  ill  done  or  well; 
and  the  clear  assertion  that  there  is  a  canon  law  in  forma- 
tive Art^  is,  at  this  time,  a  more  important  function  of  each 
University  than  the  instruction  of  its  younger  members  in 
any  branch  of  practical  skill.  It  matters  comparatively  little 
whether  few  or  many  of  our  students  learn  to  draw ;  but  it 
matters  much  that  all  who  learn  should  be  taught  with  ac- 
curacy. And  the  number  who  may  be  justifiably  advised 
to  give  any  part  of  the  time  they  spend  at  college  to  the 
study  of  painting  or  sculpture  ought  to  depend,  and  finally 
must  depend,  on  their  being  certified  that  painting  and  sculp- 
ture, no  less  than  language,  or  than  reasoning,  have  grammar 
and  method, — that  they  permit  a  recognizable  distinction 
between  scholarship  and  ignorance,  and  enforce  a  constant 
distinction  between  Right  and  Wrong. 

1  [Compare  Vol.  XVL  p.  290.] 
XX.  193  N 


194  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

2.  This  opening  course  of  Lectures  on  Sculpture  is  there- 
fore restricted  to  the  statement,  not  only  of  first  principles, 
but  of  those  which  were  illustrated  by  the  practice  of  one 
school,  and  by  that  practice  in  its  simplest  branch,  the  ana- 
lysis of  which  could  be  certified  by  easily  accessible  examples, 
and  aided  by  the  indisputable  evidence  of  photography.* 

The  exclusion  of  the  terminal  Lecture^  of  the  course 
from  the  series  now  published,  is  in  order  to  mark  more 
definitely  this  limitation  of  my  subject;  but  in  other  re- 
spects the  Lectures  have  been  ampMed  in  arranging  them 
for  the  press,  and  the  portions  of  them  trusted  at  the  time 
to  extempore  delivery  (not  through  indolence,  but  because 
explanations  of  detail  are  always  most  intelligible  when  most 
familiar)  have  been  in  substance  to  the  best  of  my  power 
set  down,  and  in  what  I  said  too  imperfectly,  completed. 

*  Photography  cannot  exhibit  the  character  of  large  and  finished  sculp- 
tare ;  but  its  audacity  of  shadow  is  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  more  roughly 
picturesque  treatment  necessary  in  coins.  For  the  rendering  of  all  sudi 
frank  relief,  and  for  the  better  explanation  of  forms  disturbed  by  the  lustre 
of  metal  or  polished  stone,  the  method  employed  in  the  plates  of  this 
volume  will  be  founds  I  believej  satisfactory.  Casts  are  first  taken  from 
the  coins,  in  white  plaster;  these  are  photographed,  and  the  photograph 
printed  by  the  autotype  process.^  Plate  XIII.  is  exceptional,  being  a  pure 
knezzotint  engraving  of  the  old  school,  excellently  carried  through  by  my 
assistant,  Mr.  Allen,  who  was  taught,  as  a  personal  favour  to  myself,  by  my 
friend,  and  Turner's  fellow-worker,  Thomas  Lupton.  Plate  VI.  was  intended 
to  be  a  photograph  from  the  superb  vase  in  the  British  Museum,  No.  564 
in  Mr.  Newton's  Catalogue;  but  its  variety  of  colour  defied  photography, 
and  after  the  sheets  had  gone  to  press  I  was  compelled  to  reduce  Lenormant's 
plate  of  it,  which  is  unsatisfactory,  but  answers  my  immediate  purpose. 

The  enlarged  photographs  for  use  in  the  Lecture  Room  were  made  for 
me  with  most  successful  skill  by  Sergeant  Spackman,  of  South  Kensington ; 
and  the  help  throughout  rendered  to  me  by  Mr.  Burgess  is  acknowledged 
in  the  course  of  the  Lectures;  though  with  thanks  which  must  remain 
inadequate  lest  they  should  become  tedious;  for  Mr.  Burgess  drew  the 
subjects  of  Plates  III.,  XL,  and  XVI. ;  and  drew  and  engraved  every  wood- 
cut in  the  book.^ 

^  [The  terminal  lecture  was  that  ou  '*  The  School  of  Florence/'  now  for  the  first 
time  printed ;  for  an  explanation  of  this  matter,  see  above,  Bibliographical  Note, 
p.  185.] 

'  [In  this  edition  by  the  photogravure  process.  For  details  see  Introduction, 
above,  p.  Ix.] 

'  rin  this  edition  (as  in  the  case  of  Lecturet  on  Art)  there  are  some  new  wood- 
cuts by  Mr.  H.  Uhlrich  at  pp.  Z62,  253.] 


PREFACE  195 

8.  In  one  essential  particular  I  have  felt  it  necessary  to 
write  what  I  would  not  have  spoken.  I  had  intended  to 
make  no  reference,  in  my  University  Lectures,  to  existing 
schools  of  Art,  except  in  cases  where  it  might  be  necessary 
to  point  out  some  undervalued  excellence.  The  objects 
specified  in  the  eleventh  paragraph  of  my  inaugural  Lec- 
ture'"' might,  I  hoped,  have  been  accomplished  without 
reference  to  any  works  deserving  of  blame ;  but  the  Exhibi- 
tion of  the  Royal  Academy  in  the  present  year  showed  me 
a  necessity  of  d^arting  from  my  original  intention.  The 
task  of  impartial  criticism  t  is  now,  unhappily,  no  longer  to 
rescue  modest  skill  from  neglect;  but  to  withstand  the 
errors  of  insolent  genius,  and  abate  the  influence  of  plausible 
mediocrity. 

The  Exhibition  of  1871  was  very  notable  in  this  im- 
portant particular,  that  it  embraced  some  representation  of 
the  modem  schools  of  nearly  every  country  in  Europe:^ 
and  I  am  well  assured  that,  looking  back  upon  it  after  the 
excitement  of  that  singular  interest  has  passed  away,  every 
thoughtful  judge  of  Art  will  confirm  my  assertion  that  it 
contained  not  a  single  picture  of  accompUshed  merit ;  while 
it  contained  many  that  were  disgraceful  to  Art,  and  some 
that  were  disgraceful  to  humanity. 

*  Lectures  on  Art,  1870  [above,  p.  27]. 

t  A  pamphlet  by  the  Earl  of  Southesk,  Britain's  Art  Paradise  (Edmon- 
ston  and  Douglas,  Edinburgh),  contains  an  entirely  admirable  criticism  of 
the  most  faultful  pictures  of  the  1871  Exhibition/  It  is  to  be  regretted 
that  Lord  Southesk  speaks  only  to  condemn ;  but  indeed,  in  my  own  three 
days'  KTiew  of  the  rooms,  I  found  nothing  deserving  of  notice  other- 
wise, except  Mr.  Hook's  always  pleasant  sketches  from  fisher-life,  and 
Mr.  Pettie's  graceful  and  powerful,  though  too  slightly  painted,  study  from 
Henrtf  VL^ 

^  [Among  the  foreign  exhibitors  were  Gerome,  Voilon,  Lecomte-Dunouy,  Laugee, 
Mesdag,  Israels,  Koberwein,  and  D'Epinay  (Rome).] 

'  \Britain*s  Art  Paradise:  or,  Notes  on  some  Pictures  in  the  Royal  Academy, 
jKDCooLxxi.  By  the  Earl  of  Southesk.  Edinburgh,  1871.  The  writer  specially  de- 
nounced Chrome's  '^Cl^opatre  apportee  k  Cesar  '  as  ''an  insult  to  decency  as  well 
as  to  good  art  and  common^ense."  Compare  Lectures  on  Landscape,  §  43;  JTie 
Relation  between  Mchael  Angeh  and  Tintoret^  §  32 ;  and  Eagle's  Nest,  §  89.1 

^  [Among  Hook's  pictures  in  the  Exhibition  were  ''Salmon-trappers:  Norway," 
and  other  Norwegian  subjects.  Pettie's  picture  was  of  a  "Scene  in  the  Temple 
Garden,"  from  Henry  VL,  first  part.  Act  il.  se.  4.] 


196  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

4.  It  becomes,  under  such  circumstances,  my  inevitable 
duty  to  speak  of  the  existing  conditions  of  Art  with  plain- 
ness enough  to  guard  the  youths  whose  judgments  I  am 
entrusted  to  form,  from  being  misled,  either  by  their  own 
naturally  vivid  interest  in  what  represents,  however  un- 
worthily, the  scenes  and  persons  of  their  own  day,  or  by 
the  cunningly  devised,  and,  without  doubt,  powerfiil  allure- 
ments of  Art  which  has  long  since  confessed  itself  to  have 
no  other  object  than  to  allure.  I  have,  therefore,  added 
to  the  second  of  these  Lectures  such  illustration  of  the 
motives  and  course  of  modem  industry  as  naturally  arose 
out  of  its  subject;  and  shall  continue  in  future  to  make 
similar  appUcations ;  rarely  mdeed,  permittmg  myself,  in  the 
Lectures  actually  read  before  the  University,  to  introduce 
subjects  of  instant,  and  therefore  too  exciting,  interest ;  but 
completing  the  addresses  which  I  prepare  for  publication  in 
these,  and  in  any  other,  particulars,  which  may  render  them 
more  widely  serviceable. 

5.  The  present  course  of  Lectiues  will  be  followed,  if 
I  am  able  to  fulfil  the  design  of  them,  by  one  of  a  like 
elementary  character  on  Architecture;  and  that  by  a  third 
series  on  Christian  Sculpture:^  but,  in  the  meantime,  my 
effort  is  to  direct  the  attention  of  the  resident  students  to 
Natural  History,  and  to  the  higher  branches  of  ideal  Land- 
scape: and  it  will  be,  I  trust,  accepted  as  sufficient  reason 
for  the  delay  which  has  occurred  in  preparing  the  following 
sheets  for  the  press,  that  I  have  not  only  been  interrupted 
by  a  dangerous  illness,'  but  engaged,  in  what  remained  to 
me  of  the  summer,  in  an  endeavour  to  deduce,  from  the 
overwhelming   complexity   of  modem    classification   in   the 

1  [This  echeme  waa^  however^  not  precisely  carried  out  (see  Ariadne  Fhreniina, 

L6)b  The  lectures  on  Greek  Sculpture  (ArtUra),  were  succeeded  by  (1)  a  course  on 
kiidscape;  (2)  a  lecture  on  '^Michael  An^elo  and  Tintoret";  courses  on  (3)  the 
Relation  of  Natural  Science  to  Art  {Eagi^^  iVe«/);  (4)  the  Florentine  Schools  of 
Engraving  (Ariadne) ;  (5)  the  Ornithology  of  Art  (Lov^s  Meinie) ;  (6)  the  Tuscan 
Art  immediately  antecedent  to  a.d.  12M  (Vol  d'Amo^  which  was  a  discourse  in 
part  on  the  elements  of  architecture  (see  Ariadne  Fiarentina,  §  67)»  ftnd  in  part  on 
Christian  sculpture) ;  and  so  forth  (see  the  list  at  p.  IxiiL).] 

>  [At  Matlock  in  August  1871.  (see  Praterita,  iL  §  207 ;  Anadne,  §§  212,  213}.] 


PREFACE  197 

Natural  Sciences,  some  forms  capable  of  easier  reference 
by  Art  students,  to  whom  the  anatomy  of  brutal  and  floral 
nature  is  often  no  less  important  than  that  of  the  human 
body.^ 

The  preparation  of  examples  for  manual  practice,  and 
the  arrangement  of  standards  for  reference,  both  in  Paint- 
ing and  Sculpture,  had  to  be  carried  on,  meanwhile,  as  I 
was  able.  For  what  has  already  been  done,  the  reader  is 
referred  to  the  Catalogue  of  the  EdtLcational  Series  pub- 
lished at  the  end  of  the  Spring  Term:^  of  what  remains 
to  be  done  I  will  make  no  anticipatory  statement,  being 
content  to  have  ascribed  to  me  rather  the  fault  of  narrow- 
ness in  design,  than  of  extravagance  in  expectation. 

Denmark  Hill^ 

25M  November,  1871. 

^  [Raskin  was  at  this  time  beginning  to  collect  material  for  The  Eagk*9  Nest, 
and  was  also  studying  the  classification  of  birds  and  fishes  (see  his  reference  to 
ichthyology  in  Lectures  on  Landscape,  §  1).] 


lyoiogy  in 
[See  Vol. 


XXI.] 


ARATRA    PENTELICI 

LECTURE  I 

OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS 
November,  1870 

1.  If,  as  is  commonly  believed,  the  subject  of  study  which 
it  is  my  special  function  to  bring  before  you  had  no  rela- 
tion to  the  great  interests  of  mankind,  I  should  have  less 
courage  in  asking  for  your  attention  to-day,  than  when  I 
first  addressed  you;  though,  even  then,  I  did  not  do  so 
without  painAd  diffidence.  For  at  this  moment,  even  sup- 
posing that  in  other  places  it  were  possible  for  men  to 
pursue  their  ordinary  avocations  undisturbed  by  indignation 
or  pity, — ^here,  at  least,  in  the  midst  of  the  deliberative  and 
religious  influences  of  England,  only  one  subject,  I  am  well 
assured,  can  seriously  occupy  your  thoughts— the  necessity, 
namely,  of  determining  how  it  has  come  to  pass  that,  in 
these  recent  days,  iniquity  the  most  reckless  and  monstrous 
can  be  committed  unanimously,  by  men  more  generous  than 
ever  yet  in  the  world's  history  were  deceived  into  deeds 
of  cruelty;  and  that  prolonged  agony  of  body  and  spirit, 
such  as  we  should  ^rink  from  inflicting  wilfully  on  a 
single  criminal,  has  become  the  appointed  and  accepted  por- 
tion of  unnumbered  multitudes  of  innocent  persons,  inhabit- 
ing the  districts  of  the  world  which,  of  all  others,  as  it 
seemed,  were  best  instructed  in  the  laws  of  civilization, 
and  most  richly  invested  with  the  honour,  and  indulged 
in  the  felicity,  of  peace.* 

^  [For  other  aUunons  to  the  Franco^Serman  war,  and  to  the  flabMonent  oat- 
ragei  by  tha  Paris  Commune,  lee  below,  pp.  90S  n.,  354  n.,  401 ;  ana  compare 
Va.  XVII.  p.  185 ;  Vol.  XVIIL  p.  85  n.) 


200  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Believe  me,  however,  the  subject  of  Art — instead  of 
being  foreign  to  these  deep  questions  of  social  duty  and 
peril, — ^is  so  vitally  connected  with  them,  that  it  would  be 
impossible  for  me  now  to  pursue  the  line  of  thought  in 
which  I  began  these  lectures,  because  so  ghastly  an  emphasis 
would  be  given  to  every  sentence  by  the  force  of  passing 
events.  It  is  well,  then,  that  in  the  plan  I  have  laid  down 
for  your  study,  we  shall  now  be  led  into  the  examination 
of  technical  details,  or  abstract  conditions  of  sentiment;  so 
that  the  hours  you  spend  with  me  may  be  times  of  repose 
from  heavier  thoughts.  But  it  chances  strangely  that,  in 
this  course  of  minutely  detailed  study,  I  have  first  to  set 
before  you  the  most  essential  piece  of  human  workman* 
ship,  the  plough,  at  the  very  moment  when  —  (you  may 
see  the  announcement  in  the  journals  either  of  yesterday  or 
the  day  before^) — ^the  swords  of  your  soldiers  have  been 
sent  for  to  be  sharpened^  and  not  at  all  to  be  beaten  into 
ploughshares.^  I  permit  myself,  therefore,  to  remind  you 
of  the  watchword  of  all  my  earnest  writings — "Soldiers  of 
the  Ploughshare,  instead  of  Soldiers  of  the  Sword,''* — and 
I  know  it  my  duty  to  assert  to  you  that  the  work  we  enter 
upon  to-day  is  no  trivial  one,  but  full  of  solemn  hope ;  the 
hope,  namely,  that  among  you  there  may  be  foimd  men 
wise  enough  to  lead  the  national  passions  towards  the  arts 
of  peace,  instead  of  the  arts  of  war. 

I  say,  the  work  "we  enter  upon,"  because  the  first  four 
lectures  I  gave  in  the  spring  were  wholly  prefatory;*  and 
the  following  three  only  defined  for  you  methods  of  practice. 
To-day  we  begin  the  systematic  analysis  and  progressive 
study  of  our  subject. 

2.  In  general,  the  three  great,  or  fine.  Arts  of  Paint- 
ing, Sculpture,  and  Architecture,  are  thought  of  as  distinct 

^  [At  thiB  time^  the  Franoo-^jerman  war  beinff  in  proirreis,  Russia  had  taken 
occasion  to  denounce  the  Black  Sea  clause  of  the  Treaty  or  Paris.  There  was  con- 
siderable indignation  in  this  county,  and  proposals  for  mobilisatitm  were  made 
{TimM,  November  22  and  23,  1870).J 


1 

3 
4 


See  Lectures  <m  Art,  §  116  (above,  p.  107).] 

A  Jay  far  Ever,  §  15  (Vol.  XVL  p.  25).] 

The  first  four  in  Leeturee  on  Art  (above,  pp.  17-117).] 


I,   OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  201 

from  the  lower  and  more  meehaDical  formative  arts,  such 
as  carpentry  or  pottery.  But  we  cannot,  either  verbally, 
or  with  any  practical  advantage,  admit  such  classification. 
How  are  we  to  distinguish  painting  on  canvas  from  paint* 
ing  on  china?  —  or  painting  on  china  from  painting  on 
glass? — or  painting  on  glass  from  infiision  of  colour  into 
any  vitreous  substance,  such  as  enamel  ? — or  the  infusion 
of  colour  into  glass  and  enamel  frx)m  the  infusion  of  colour 
into  wool  or  silk,  and  weaving  of  pictures  in  tapestry,  or 
patterns  in  dress?  You  will  find  that  although,  in  ulti- 
mately accurate  use  of  the  word,  painting  mtist  be  held 
to  mean  only  the  laying  of  a  pigment  on  a  surface  with  a 
soft  instrument;  yet,  in  broad  comparison  of  the  frmctions 
of  Art,  we  must  conceive  of  one  and  the  same  great  artistic 
fEUiulty,  as  governing  every  mode  of  disposing  colours  in  a 
permanent  relation  on,  or  in,  a  sotid  substance;  whether. it 
be  by  tinting  canvas,  or  dyeing  stuffs;  inlajdng  metals  with 
fiised  flint,  or  coating  walls  with  coloured  stone. 

8.  Simihirly,  the  word  «  Sculpture,"— though  in  ultunate 
accuracy  it  is  to  be  limited  to.  the  development  of  form 
in  hard  substances  by  cutting  away  portions  of  their  mass 
— ^in  broad  definition,  must  be  held  to  signify  the  redtiction 
of  any  shapeless  mass  of  soUd  matter  into  an  intended  shapes 
whatever  the  consistence  of  the  substance,  or  nature  of  the 
instrument  employed;  whether  we  carve  a  granite  moun- 
tain,  or  a  piece  of  box-wood,  and  whether  we  use,  for  our 
forming  instrument,  axe,  or  hammer,  or  chisel,  or  our  own 
hands,  or  water  to  soften,  or  fire  to  fuse; — ^whenever  and 
however  we  hring  a  shapeless  thini?  into  shape,  we  do  so 
«nd«  th.  Uws  i  the  onrgreat^rf  Sculpti^. 

4.  Having  thus  broadly  defined  painting  and  sculpture, 
we  shall  see  that  there  is,  in  the  third  place,  a  dass  of 
work  separated  from  both,  in  a  specific  manner,  and  includ- 
ing a  great  group  of  arts  which  neither,  of  necessity,  tint, 
nor  for  the  sake  of  form  merely,  shape  the  substances  they 
deal  with;  but  construct  or  arrange  them  with  a  view  to 
the  resistance  of  some  external  force.     We  construct,  for 


2<tt  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

instance,  a  table  with  a  flat  top,  and  some  support  of  prop, 
or  leg,  proportioned  in  strength  to  such  wei^ts  as  the 
table  is  intended  to  carry.  We  construct  a  ship  out  of 
planks,  or  plates  of  iron,  with  reference  to  certain  forces 
of  impact  to  be  sustained,  and  of  inertia  to  be  overcome; 
or  we  construct  a  wall  or  roof  with  distinct  reference  to 
forces  of  pressure  and  oscillation,  to  be  sustained  or  guarded 
against;  and,  therefore,  in  every  case,  with  especial  con* 
sideration  of  the  strength  of  our  materials,  and  the  nature 
of  that  strength,  elastic,  tenacious,  brittle,  and  the  like. 

Now  although  this  group  of  arts  nearly  always  involves 
the  putting  of  two  or  more  separate  pieces  together,  we 
must  not  define  it  by  that  accident*  The  blade  of  an  oar 
is  not  less  formed  with  reference  to  external  force  than  if 
it  were  made  of  many  pieces;  and  the  frame  of  a  boat, 
whether  hollowed  out  of  a  tree-trunk,  or  constructed  of 
planks  nailed  together,  is  essentially  the  same  piece  of  art, 
to  be  judged  by  its  buoyancy  and  capacity  of  progression. 
Still,  from  the  most  wonderfiil  piece  ol  all  architecture,  the 
human  skeleton,  to  this  simple  one,^  the  ploughshare,  on 
which  it  depends  for  its  subsistence,  the  putting  of  two  or 
mare  pieces  together  is  curiously  necessary  to  the  perfectness 
of  every  fine  instrument;  and  the  peculiar  mechanical  work 
of  Daedalus,^ — inlaying, — ^becomes  all  the  more  delightful 
to  us  in  external  aspect,  because,  as  in  the  jawbone  of  a 
Saurian,  or  the  wood  of  a  bow,  it  is  essential  to  the  finest 
capacities  of  tension  and  resistance. 

5.  And  observe  how  unbroken  the  ascent  from  this,  the 
simplest  architecture,  to  the  loftiest.  The  placing  of  the 
timbers  in  a  ship's  stem,  and  the  laying  of  the  stones  in  a 
Inidge  buttress,  are  similar  in  art  to  the  construction  of 
the  ploughshare,  differing  in   no  essential  point,  dther  in 

'*'  I  had  a  real  ploughshare  on  my  lecture-table;  but  it  would  interrupt 
the  drift  of  the  statements  in  the  text  too  long  if  I  attempted  here  to 
illustrate  by  figures  the  relation  of  the  coulter  to  the  share,  and  of  the  hard 
to  the  soft  pieces  of  metal  in  the  share  itself. 

I  ■  nil,  ,  ,    , 

1  [For  other  refereno^i  to  D«dalus,  see  Movr,  pp.  351*354.] 


I.   OF  THE  DIVISION  OP  ARTS  208 

that  they  deal  with  other  materials,  or  because,  of  the 
three  things  produced,  one  has  to  divide  earth  by  advanc- 
ing through  it,  another  to  divide  water  by  advancing 
through  it,  and  the  third  to  divide  water  which  advances 
against  it.  And  again,  the  buttress  of  a  bridge  differs  only 
from  that  of  a  cathedral  in  having  less  weight  to  sustain, 
and  more  to  resist.  We  can  imd  no  term  in  the  grada- 
tion, from  the  ploughshare  to  the  cathedral  buttress,  at 
which  we  can  set  a  logical  distinction. 

6.  Thus  then  we  have  simply  three  divisions  of  Art — 
«^Mme,  that  of  giving  colours  to  substance;  another,  that 
of  giving  form  to  it  without  question  of  resistance  to  force ; 
and  the  third,  that  of  giving  form  or  position  which  will 
make  it  capable  of  such  resistance.  All  the  fine  arts  are 
embraced  under  these  three  divisions.  Do  not  think  that 
it  is  only  a  logical  or  scientific  affectation  to  mass  them 
together  in  this  manner;  it  is,  on  the  contrary,  of  the 
first  practical  importance  to  understand  that  the  painter's 
faculty,  or  masterhood  over  colour,  being  as  subtle  as  a 
musician's  over  sound,  must  be  looked  to  for  the  govern- 
ment of  every  operation  in  which  colour  is  employed ;  and 
that,  in  the  same  manner,  the  appliance  of  any  art  what- 
soever to  minor  objects  cannot  hie  right,  unless  under  the 
direction  of  a  true  master  of  that  art.  Under  the  present 
system,  you  keep  your  Academician  occupied  only  in  pro- 
ducing tinted  pieces  of  canvas  to  be  shown  in  fi*ames,  and 
smootii  pieces  of  marble  to  be  placed  in  niches;  while 
you  expect  your  builder  or  constructor  to  design  coloured 
patterns  in  stone  and  brick,  and  your  china-ware  merchant 
to  keep  a  separate  body  of  workwomen  who  can  paint 
china,  but  nothing  else.  By  this  division  of  labour,  you 
ndn  all  the  arts  at  once.  The  work  of  the  Academician  be- 
comes mean  and  effeminate,  because  he  is  not  used  to  treat 
colour  on  a  grand  scale  and  in  rough  materials;  and  your 
manufactures  become  base,  because  no  well-educated  person 
sets  hand  to  them.  And  therefore  it  is  necessary  to  under- 
stand, not  merely  as  a  logical  statement,  but  as  a  practical 


204  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

necessity,  that  wherever  beautiful  colour  is  to  be  arranged, 
you  need  a  Master  of  Painting;  and  wherever  noble  form 
is  to  be  given,  a  Master  of  Sculpture;  and  wherever 
complex  mechanical  force  is  to  be  resisted,  a  Master  of 
Architecture. 

7.  But  over  this  triple  division  there  must  rule  another 
yet  more  important.  Any  of  these  three  arts  may  be 
either  imitative  of  natural  objects  or  limited  to  useful  ap- 
pliance. You  may  either  paint  a  picture  that  represents  a 
scene,  or  your  street  door,  to  keep  it  from  rotting;  you 
may  mould  a  statue,  or  a  plate;  build  the  resemblance  of 
a  cluster  of  lotus  stalks,  or  only  a  square  pier.  Generally 
speaking.  Fainting  and  Sculpture  will  be  imitative,  and 
Architecture  merely  useful;  but  there  is  a  great  deal  of 
Sculpture — ^as  this  crystal  baU,"^  for  instance,  which  is  not 
imitative,  and  a  great  deal  of  architecture  which,  to  some 
extent,  is  so,  as  the  so-called  foils  of  Gothic  apertures; 
and  for  many  other  reasons  you  will  find  it  necessary  to 
keep  distinction  clear  in  your  minds  between  the  arts — of 
whatever  kind — which  are  imitative,  and  produce  a  re- 
semblance or  image  of  something  which  is  not  present; 
and  those  which  are  limited  to  the  production  of  some 
useful  reality,  as  the  blade  of  a  knife,  or  the  wall  of  a 
house.  You  will  perceive  also,  as  we  advance,  that  sculp* 
ture  and  painting  are  indeed  in  this  respect  only  one  art; 
and  that  we  shidl  have  constantly  to  speak  and  think  of 
them  as  simply  graphic,  whether  with  chisel  or  colour, 
their  principal  function  being  to  make  us,  in  the  words  of 

Aristotle,     *^  Oewptrrucol    roS    irepi    to,     o-dfAara    jcoXXovf"     {PoUt. 

8,  8),^  ''  having  capacity  and  habit  of  contemplation  of  the 
beauty  that  is  in  material  things;"  while  architecture,  and 
its  correlative  arts,  are  to  be  practised  under  quite  other 
conditions  of  sentiment.' 

*  A  sphere  of  rock  crystal,  cut  in  Japan,  enough  imaginable  by  the 
reader,  without  a  figure. 

^  [Book  ▼.  in  tho  now  usual  arrangement] 

'  [See,  however,  on  the  essential  connexion  between  sculpture  and  architecture. 
Seven  Laimpe,  VoL  VIII.  p.  174;  and  Two  Pathe,  §  115  (Vol.  XVI.  p.  357).] 


I.   OF  THE  DIVISION  OP  ARTS  205 

8.  Now  it  is  obvious  that  so  far  as  the  fine  arts  con- 
sist either  in  imitation  or  mechanical  construction,  the  right 
judgment  of  them  must  depend  on  our  knowledge  of  the 
things  they  imitate^  and  forces  they  resist:  and  my  ftmc- 
tion  of  teaching  here  would  (for  instance)  so  far  resolve 
itself)  either  into  demonstration  that  this  painting  of  a 
peach*  does  resemble  a  peach,  or  explanation  of  the  way 
in  which  this  ploughshare  (for  instance)  is  shaped  so  as  to 
throw  the  earth  aside  with  least  force  of  thrust.  And  in 
both  of  these  methods  of  study,  though  of  course  your  own 
diligence  must  be  your  chief  master,  to  a  certain  extent 
your  Professor  of  Art  can  always  guide  you  securely,  and 
can  show  you,  either  that  the  image  does  truly  resemble 
what  it  attempts  to  resemble,  or  that  the  structure  is 
rightly  prepared  for  the  service  it  has  to  perform.  But 
there  is  yet  another  virtue  of  fine  art  which  is,  perhaps, 
exactly  that  about  which  you  will  expect  your  Professor 
to  teach  you  most,  and  which,  on  the  contrary,  is  exactly 
that  about  which  you  must  teach  yourselves  all  that  it 
is  essential  to  learn. 

9.  I  have  here  in  my  hand  one  of  the  simplest  pos- 
sible examples  of  the  union  of  the  graphic  and  construc- 
tive powers,— one  of  my  breakfast  plates.  Since  all  the 
finely  architectural  arts,  we  said,^  b^;an  in  the  shaping  of 
the  cup  and  the  platter,  we  will  begin,  ourselves,  with  the 
platter. 

Why  has  it  been  made  round?  For  two  structural 
reasons:  first,  that  the  greatest  holding  surface  may  be 
gathered  into  the  smallest  space;  and  secondly,  that  in 
being  pushed  past  other  things  on  the  table,  it  may  come 
into  least  contact  with  them. 

Next,   why   has    it  a   rim?    For  two   other   structural 

*  One  of  William  Hunt's  peaches;'  not,  I  am  afiraid,  imaginable  alto- 
gether^  but  still  less  representable  by  figure. 

1  [See  Lectures  on  AH,  §  117  (above,  p.  lOa)] 

>  [See  Educational  Series,  No.  213  (VoL  XXI.  pp.  94,  137).] 


206  ARATRA   PENTELICI 

reasons:  first,  that  it  is  conrenient  to  put  salt  or  mustard 
upon ;  but  secondly,  and  chiefly,  that  the  plate  may  be 
easily  laid  hold  of.  The  rim  is  the  simplest  form  of  con- 
tinuous handle. 

Futher,  to  keep  it  from  soiling  the  cloth,  it  will  be  wise  to 
put  this  ridge  beneath,  round  the  bottom  ;  for  as  the  rim  is 
the  simplest  possible  form  of 
continuous  handle,  so  this  is 
the  simplest  form  of  contin- 
uous le^.  And  we  get  the 
section  given  beneath  the 
figure  for  the  essential  one 
of  a  rightly  made  platter. 

10.  Thus  for  our  art 
has  been  strictly  utilitarian, 
having  respect  to  conditions 
of  collision,  of  carriage,  and 
of  support  But  now,  on 
tiie  surfoce  of  our  piece  of 
pottery,  here  are  various 
bands  and  spots  of  colour 
-"s,,^^  1^^      which   are   presumably   set 

^^^^"^^^"■■^"^▼^^  there  to  make  it  pleasanter 
^  J  to  the  eye.  Six  of  the 
spots,  seen  closely,  you  dis- 
cover are  intended  to  represent  flowers.  These  then  have 
as  distinctly  a  graphic  purpose  as  the  other  properties  of 
the  plate  hare  an  architectural  one,  and  the  first  critical 
question  we  have  to  ask  about  them  is,  whether  they  are 
like  roses  or  not.  I  will  anticipate  what  I  have  to  say  in 
subsequent  Lectures  so  fu-  as  to  assure  you  that,  if  they 
are  to  be  like  roses  at  all,  the  liker  they  can  be,  the  better. 
Do  not  suppose,  as  many  people  will  tell  you,  that  because 
this  is  a  common  manufactured  article,  yom-  roses  on  it  are 
the  better  for  being  ill-painted,  or  half-painted.  If  they 
had  been  painted  by  the  same  hand  that  did  this  peach, 
the  plate  would  have  been  all  the  better  f<»*  it;  but,  as  it 


I.  OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  207 

chanced,  there  was  no  hand  such  as  William  Hunt's  to 
paint  them,  and  their  graphic  power  is  not  distinguished. 
In  any  case,  however,  that  graphic  power  must  have  been 
subordinate  to  their  effect  as  pink  spots,  while  the  band 
of  green-blue  round  the  plate's  edge,  and  the  spots  of 
gold,  pretend  to  no  graphic  power  at  all,  but  are  meaning- 
less spaces  of  colour  or  metal.  Still  less  have  they  any 
mechanical  office :  they  add  nowise  to  the  serviceableness 
of  the  plate;  and  theu*  agreeableness,  if  they  possess  any, 
depends,  therefore,  neither  on  any  imitative,  nor  any  struc- 
tural, character ;  but  on  some  inherent  pleasantness  in  them- 
selves, either  of  mere  colours  to  the  eye,  (as  of  taste  to 
the  tongue,)  or  in  the  placing  of  those  colours  in  relations 
which  obey  some  mental  principle  of  order,  or  phjrsical  prin- 
ciple of  harmony. 

11.  These  abstract  relations  and  inherent  pleasantnesses, 
whether  in  space,  number,  or  time,  and  whether  of  colours 
or  sounds,  form  what  we  may  properly  term  the  musical 
or  harmonic  element  in  every  art;  and  the  study  of  them 
is  an  entirely  separate  science.  It  is  the  branch  of  art- 
philosophy  to  which  the  word  "  aesthetics  "  should  be  strictly 
limited,^  being  the  inquiry  into  the  nature  of  things  that 
in  themselves  are  pleasant  to  the  human  senses  or  instincts, 
though  they  represent  nothing,  and  serve  for  nothing,  their 
only  service  hdng  their  pleasantness.  Thus'  it  is  the  pro- 
vince of  aesthetics  to  tell  you,  (if  you  did  not  know  it 
before,)  that  the  taste  and  colour  of  a  peach  are  pleasant, 
and  to  ascertain,  if  it  be  ascertainable,  (and  you  have  any 
curiosity  to  know,)  why  they  are  so. 

12.  The  information  would,  I  presume,  to  most  of  you, 
be  gratuitous.     If  it  were  not,  and  you  chanced  to  be  in  a 

^  [On  Ruskin'B  use  of  this  term,  see  Low* 9  Meinie,   §  131 ;  and  compare  The 
uSsthkic  and  Mat  hematic  Schools  <if  Florence^  in  which  oonrse  of  lectures  he  employs 
^'sMthetie"  with  a  different  shade  of  meaning.] 
"  [In  the  first  draft  :— 

*^  Thus,  it  is  not  the  province  of  aesthetics,  rightly  so  called,  to  prove 
to  you,  or  to  enahle  you  to  discover^  that  this  picture  of  a  peach  is  like  a 
peach.    That  is  to  he  ascertained  hy  an  intellectual  process  of  comparison. 
But  it  is  the  province  ..." 
Here,  again  (<2/I  §  8),  Ruskin  showed  William  Hunt's  drawing  of  a  peach.] 


208  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

sick  state  of  body  in  which  you  disliked  peaches,  it  would 
be,  for  the  time,  to  you  false  information,  and,  so  fEur  as  it 
was  true  of  other  people,  to  you  useless.  Nearly  the  whole 
study  of  aesthetics  is  in  like  manner  either  gratuitous  or 
useless.  Either  you  like  the  right  things  without  being 
recommended  to  do  so,  or,  if  you  dislike  them,  your  mind 
cannot  be  changed  by  lectures  on  the  laws  of  taste.  You 
recollect  the  story  of  Thackeray,  provoked,  as  he  was  help- 
ing himself  to  strawberries,  by  a  young  coxcomb's  telling 
him  that  "  he  never  took  fruit  or  sweets."  "  That,"  replied, 
or  is  said  to  have  replied,  Thackeray,^  *^is  because  you  are 
a  sot,  and  a  glutton."  And  the  whole  science  of  aesthetics 
is,  in  the  depth  of  it,  expressed  by  one  passage  of  Groethe's 
in  the  end  of  the  second  part  of  Faust; — ^the  notable  one 
that  follows  the  song  of  the  Lemures,  when  the  angels 
enter  to  dispute  with  the  fiends  for  the  soul  of  Faust 
They  enter  singing — "  Pardon  to  sinners  and  life  to  the 
dust"  Mephistopheles  hears  them  first,  and  exclaims  to  his 
troop,  "Discord  I  hear,  and  filthy  jingling" — "Mis-tone 
hore  ich:  garstiges  Geklimper."*  This,  you  see,  is  the  ex- 
treme of  bad  taste  in  music.  Presently  the  angelic  host 
b^^in  strewing  roses,  which  discomfits  the  diabolic  crowd 
altogether.  Mephistopheles  in  vain  calls  to  them — "What 
do  you  duck  and  shrink  for — is  that  proper  hellish  be- 
haviour? Stand  fast,  and  let  them  strew" — "Was  duckt 
und  zuckt  ihr ;  ist  das  Hollenbrauch  ?  So  haltet  stand,  und 
lasst  sie  streuen."  There  you  have,  also,  the  extreme  of 
bad  taste  in  sight  and  smell  And  in  the  whole  passage  is 
a  brief  embodiment  for  you  of  the  tdtimate  fact  that  all 
aesthetics  depend  on  the  health  of  soul  and  body,  and  the 
proper  exercise  of  both,  not  only  through  years,  but  genera- 
tions.    Only  by  harmony  of  both  collateral  and  successive 


§  77  (Vol.  XVIII.  p.  130  n.).l 

>  [Compare  Eagte*s  Nest,  %  62,  where  this  passage  is  again  quoted ;  and  for 
other  references  to  the  second  part  of  Fautt,  see  Munera  Pulveris,  §  149  (Vol.  XVII. 
p.  272  n.).] 


I,   OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  209 

lives  can  the  great  doctrine  of  the  Muses  be  received  which 
enables  men  •* x^P^^^  opBrn^' — "  to  have  pleasure  rightly ;  " * 
and  there  is  no  other  definition  of  the  beautiful,  nor  of 
any  subject  of  delight  to  the  a^thetic  faculty,  than  that  it  is 
what  one  noble  spirit  has  created,  seen  and  felt  by  another 
of  similar  or  equal  nobihty.  So  much  as  there  is  in  you  of 
ox,  or  of  swine,  perceives  no  beauty,  and  creates  none :  what 
is  human  in  you,  in  exact  proportion  to  the  perfectness 
of  its  humanity,  can  create  it,  and  receive. 

18.  Returning  now  to  the  very  elementary  form  in 
which  the  appeal  to  our  aesthetic  virtue  is  made  in  our 
breakfast-plate,  you  notice  that  there  are  two  distinct  kinds 
of  pleasantness  attempted  One  by  hues  of  colour;  the 
other  by  proportions  of  space.  I  have  called  these  the 
musical  elements  of  the  arts  relating  to  sight ;  and  there 
are  indeed  two  complete  sciences,  one  of  the  combinations 
of  colour,  and  the  other  of  the  combinations  of  line  and 
form,  which  might  each  of  them  separately  engage  us  in 
as  intricate  study  as  that  of  the  science  of  music.  But  of 
the  two,  the  science  of  colour  is,  in  the  Greek  sense,  the 
more  musical,  being  one  of  the  divisions  of  the  Apolline 
power;  and  it  is  so  practically  educational,  that  if  we  are 
not  using  the  faculty  for  colour  to  discipline  nations,  they 
will  infallibly  use  it  themselves  as  a  means  of  corruption. 
Both  music  and  colour  are  naturally  influences  of  peace; 
but  in  the  war  trumpet,  and  the  war  shield,  in  the  battle 
song  and  battle  standard,  they  have  concentrated  by  beau- 
tiful imagination  the  cruel  passions  of  men ;  and  there  is 
nothing  in  all  the  Divina  Commedia  of  history  more  gro- 
tesque, yet  more  frightful,  than  the  fact  that,  from  the 
almost  fabulous  period  when  the  insanity  and  impiety  of 
war  wrote  themselves  in  the  s3nnbols  of  the  shields  of  the 
Seven  against  Thebes,  colours  have  been  the  sign  and  stimu- 
lus of  the  most  furious  and  fatal  passions  that  have  rent 
the    nations :   blue    against    green,    in    the    decline   of   the 

*  [Aristotle,  PoliHci,  viii.  5,4:^  ftSXKotf  •htriw  vpht  dper^  n  rtlwtuf  r^r  fiomiiciw,  i&f 
XX.  o 


210  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Roman  Empire ;  black  against  white,  in  that  of  Florence ; 
red  against  white,  in  the  wars  of  the  Royal  houses  in 
England;^  and  at  this  moment,  red  against  white,  in  the 
contest  of  anarchy  and  loyalty,  in  all  the  world. 

14.  On  the  other  hand,  the  directly  ethical  influence  of 
colour  in  the  sky,  the  trees,  flowers,  and  coloured  creatures 
round  us,  and  in  our  own  various  arts  massed  under  the 
one  name  of  painting,  is  so  essential  and  constant  that  we 
cease  to  recognize  it,  because  we  are  never  long  enough 
altogether  deprived  of  it  to  feel  our  need ;  and  tiie  mental 
diseases  induced  by  the  influence  of  corrupt  colour  are  as 
little  suspected,  or  traced  to  their  true  source,  as  the  bodily 
weaknesses  resulting  from  atmospheric  miasmata. 

15.  The  second  musical  science  which  belongs  peculiarly 
to  sculpture,  (and  to  painting,  so  far  as  it  represents  form,) 
consists  in  the  disposition  of  beautiful  masses.  That  is  to 
say,  beautiful  surfaces  limited  by  beautiful  lines.  Beautiftd 
surfaces^  observe ;  and  remember  what  is  noted  in  my  fifth 
Lecture  of  the  difierence  between  a  space  and  a  mass.'  If 
you  have  at  any  time  examined  carefully,  or  practised  fix>m, 
the  drawings  of  shells  placed  in  your  copying  series,'  you 
cannot  but  have  felt  the  difference  in  the  grace  between 
the  aspects  of  the  same  line,  when  enclosing  a  rounded  or 
unrounded  space.  The  exact  science  of  sculpture  is  that  of 
the  relations  between  outline  and  the  solid  form  it  limits; 
and  it  does  not  matter  whether  that  relation  be  indicated 
by  drawing  or  carving,  so  long  as  the  expression  of  solid 
form  is  the  mental  purpose ;  it  is  the  science  always  of  the 
beauty  of  relation  in  three  dimensions.  To  take  the  sim- 
plest possible  line  of  continuous  limit — ^the  circle:  the  flat 
disc   enclosed   by  it   may  indeed  be  made  an  element  of 

1  P^or  the  symbols  on  the  sbields  of  the  Seven  Argive  champions  in  their  war 
against  Thebes,  see  JEschylns,  Stptem  Contra  TMtu,  376  *eq. ;  for  the  blue  and 
green  fiictions  of  the  circus  at  Rome,  see  Gibbon,  ch.  xl. ;  for  the  feuds  of  the 
Bianchi  (Ghibelline)  and  Neri  (Guelph),  Villani,  lib.  viii.  ch.  xliv.  (referred  to  in 
the  Inferno,  xxiv.  143) ;  for  the  Wars  of  the  Roses,  Crown  i^  WUd  Olive,  §  142 
(Vol.  XVIII.  p.  601).] 

s  [See  Lectures  on  Art,  §  146  (above,  p.  138).] 

*  [See  Educational  Series,  Nos.  191  eeq.  (Vol.  XXI.  p,  92).] 


I.  OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  211 

decoration,  thoii^  a  very  meagre  one;  but  its  relative 
mass,  the  baU.  being  gradated  in  three  dimensions,  is  always 
delightftil.  Here  "^  is  at  once  the  simplest,  and,  in  mere 
patient  mechanism,  the  most  skilful,  piece  of  sculpture  I 
can  possibly  show  you, — a  piece  of  the  purest  rock-crystal, 
chisdled,  (I  believe,  by  mere  toU  of  huid,)  into  a  perfect 
sphere.  Imitating  nothing,  constructing  nothing;  sculpture 
for  sculpture's  sake  of  purest  natural  substance  into  simplest 
primary  form. 

16.  Again.  Out  of  the  nacre  of  any  mussel  or  oyster 
shell  you  might  cut,  at  your  pleasure,  any  quantity  of 
small  flat  circular  discs  of  the  prettiest  colour  and  lustre. 
To  some  extent,  such  tinsel  or  foil  of  shell  is  used  plea- 
santly for  decoration.  But  the  mussel  or  oyster  becoming 
itself  an  unwilling  modeller,  agglutinates  its  juice  into  three 
dimensions,  and  the  fact  of  the  surface  being  now  geo- 
metrically gradated,  together  with  the  savage  instinct  of 
attributing  value  to  what  is  difficult  to  obtain,  make  the 
little  boss  so  precious  in  men's  sight,  that  wise  eagerness  of 
search  for  the  kingdom  of  heaven  can  be  likened  to  their 
eagerness  of  search  for  it;^  and  the  gates  of  Paradise  can 
be  no  otherwise  rendered  so  fSEur  to  their  poor  intelligence, 
as  by  telling  them  that  every  gate  was  of  **  one  pearl." ' 

17.  But  take  note  here.  We  have  just  seen  that  the 
sum  of  the  perceptive  faculty  is  expressed  in  these  words 
of  Aristotle's,  "to  take  pleasure  rightly"  or  straightly — 
X€up€iv  opdios.  Now,  it  is  not  possible  to  do  the  direct  oppo- 
site of  that, — ^to  take  pleasure  iniquitously  or  obliquely — 
-j^alpeiv  aStK»9  or  orjcoXtw?, — more  than  you  do  in  enjoying  a 
thing  because  your  neighbour  cannot  get  it.  You  may 
enjoy  a  thing  legitimately  because  it  is  rare,  and  cannot  be 
seen  often  (as  you  do  a  fine  aurora,  or  a  sunset,  or  an  un- 
usually lovely  flower);  that  is  Nature's  way  of  stimulating 

*  The  crystal  ball  above  mentioned  [p.  204]. 

1  [See  Matthew  ziii.  4a] 
>  [Revektion  zxi.  21.] 


212  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

your  attention.  But  if  you  enjoy  it  because  your  neighbour 
cannot  have  it, — and,  remembo*,  all  value  attached  to  pearls 
more  than  glass  beads,  is  merely  and  purely  for  that  cause, 
— ^then  you  rejoice  through  the  worst  of  idolatries,  oovet- 
ousness ;  ^  and  neither  arithmetic,  nor  writing,  nor  any  other 
so-called  essential  of  education,  is  now  so  vitally  necessary 
to  the  population  of  Europe,  as  such  acquaintance  with  the 
principles  of  intrinsic  value,  as  may  result  in  the  icono* 
clasm  of  jewellery ;  and  in  the  clear  understanding  that  we 
are  not,  in  that  instinct,  civilized,  but  yet  remain  wholly 
savage,  so  far  as  we  care  for  display  of  this  selfish  kind. 

You  think,  perhaps,  I  am  quitting  my  subject,  and  pro- 
ceeding, as  it  is  too  often  with  appearance  of  justice  alleged 
against  me,'  into  irrelevant  matter.  Pardon  me;  the  end, 
not  only  of  these  Lectiures,  but  of  my  whole  Professorship, 
would  be  accomplished, — and  far  more  than  that, — if  only 
the  English  nation  could  be  made  to  understand  that  the 
beauty  which  is  indeed  to  be  a  joy  for  ever,  must  be  a  joy 
for  all;^  and  that  though  the  idolatry  may  not  have  been 
wholly  divine  which  sculptured  gods,  the  idolatry  is  wholly 
diabolic,  which,  for  vulgar  display,  sculptures  diaTnonds.^ 

18.  To  go  back  to  the  point  under  discussion.  A  pearl, 
or  a  glass  bead,  may  owe  its  pleasantness  in  some  degree 
to  its  lustre  as  well  as  to  its  roundness.  But  a  mere  and 
simple  ball  of  unpolished  stone  is  enough  for  sculpturesque 
value.  You  may  have  noticed  that  the  quatrefoil  used  in 
the  Ducal  Palace  of  Venice  owes  its  complete  loveliness  in 
distant  effect  to  the  finishing  of  its  cusps.'  The  extremity 
of  the  cusp  is  a  mere  ball  of  Istrian  marble ;  and  consider 


^  [In  Raskin's  copy  he  notes  against  this  word:  ^' Needs  correction:  'envious' 
ooretonsneM "  ;  for,  as  he  admits  Msewhere,  there  is  an  innocent  and  even  laadable 
covetonsness — as,  for  instance,  that  of  Venice  for  "  pillars  of  marble  and  granite 
and  the  relics  of  good  people  {St,  Mark*s  Rest,  §  3);  and  of  himself  he  says  that 
he  is  '^ naturally  as  covetous  a  person  as  lives  in  this  world"  {Time  and  Tide^  §  100^ 
Vol.  XVII.  p.  448).    On  covetousness  see  further  Fore  Clawgera,  Letter  62.] 

'  [Compare  the  Introduction;  above,  pp.  xxiii.,  xziv.l 

»  rSee  Vol.  XVI.  p.  11  ».] 

<  [Compare  Stones  qf  Venue,  vol.  ii.  (Vol.  X.  p.  198).1 

*  [On  this  point,  see  Seven  Lmnpe,  Vol.  VIIL  p.  132.J 


I.   OF  THE  DIVISION   OF  ARTS  218 

how  subtle  the  faculty  of  sight  must  be,  since  it  recognizes 
at  any  distance  and  is  gratified  by,  the  mystery  of  the 
termination  of  cusp  obtained  by  the  gradated  light  on  the 

In  that  Venetian  tracery  this  simplest  element  of  sculp- 
tured form  is  used  sparingly,  as  the  most  precious  that  can 
be  employed  to  finish  the  fa9ade.  But  alike  in  our  own, 
and  the  French,  central  Gothic,  the  ball-flower  is  lavished 
on  every  line — and  in  your  St  Mary's  spire,  and  the  Salis- 
bury spire,^  and  the  towers  of  Notre  Dame  of  Paris,  the 
rich  pleasantness  of  decoration, — ^indeed,  their  so-called  ^'de- 
corative style," — consists  only  in  being  daintily  beset  with 
stcme  balls.  It  is  true  the  balls  are  modified  into  dim  like- 
ness of  flowers;  but  do  you  trace  the  resemblance  to  the 
rose  in  their  distant,  which  is  their  intended,  e£fect? 

19.  But,  farther,  let  the  baU  have  motion;  then  the 
form  it  generates  will  be  that  of  a  cylinder.  You  have, 
perhaps,  thought  that  pure  early  English  architecture  de- 
pended for  its  charm  on  visibility  of  construction.  It  de- 
pends for  its  charm  altogether  on  the  abstract  harmony  of 
groups  of  cylinders,*  arbitrarily  bent  into  mouldings,  and 
arbitrarily  associated  as  shafts,  having  no  real  relation  to 
construction  whatsoever,  and  a  theoretical  relation  so  subtle 
that  none  of  us  had  seen  it  till  Professor  Willis  worked  it 
out  for  us.' 

20.  And  now,  proceeding  to  analysis  of  higher  sculpture, 

*  All  grandest  effects  in  moaldings  may  be,  and  for  the  most  part  have 
been,  obtained  by  rolls  and  cavettos  of  circular  (segmental)  section.  More 
refined  sections,  as  that  of  the  fluting  of  a  Doric  shafts  are  only  of  use  near 
the  eye  and  in  beautiful  stone;  and  the  pursuit  of  them  was  one  of  the 
many  errors  of  later  Gothic.  The  statement  in  the  text  that  the  mouldings, 
even  of  best  time,  *'  have  no  real  relation  to  construction,"  is  scarcely  strong 
enough :  they  in  fact  contend  with,  and  deny  the  construction,  their  princi* 
pal  purpose  seeming  to  be  the  concealment  of  the  joints  of  the  voussoirs. 

^  [For  another  refsrence  to  the  spires  of  St  Mary's  at  Oxford  and  of  Salisboryi 
sea  VbL  IX.  p.  332,  and  to  that  of  Salisbury,  VoL  XIX.  p.  266  n.1 

*  [In  his  Bemarkt  on  ike  ArekUeeiure  qf  the  Middle  Ageiy  1836.  For  other  refer* 
•noes  to  the  book  and  its  author,  see  YoL  VIII.  pp.  xzi.,  zl.,  87;  Vol.  IX. 
pp.  zlviL,  14,  133,  180,  228,  260,  348 ;  and  VoL  Xf L  p.  196.] 


214  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

you  may  have  observed  the  unportance  I  have  attached 
the  porch  of  San  Zenone,  at  Verona,  by  making  it,  amo) 
your  standards/  the  first  of  the  group  which  is  to  illustra 
the  system  of  sculpture  and  architecture  founded  on  fai^ 
in  a  future  life.    That  porch,  fortimately  represented  in  tl 
photograph,  from  which  Plate  I.  has  been  engraved,'  und^ 
a  clear  and  pleasant  light,  ftimishes  you  with  examples  < 
sculptm-e  of  every  kind,  from  the  flattest  incised  bas-reli4 
to  solid  statues,  both  in  marble  and  bronze.     And  the  tw 
points  I  have  been  pressing  upon  you  are  conclusively  ex 
hibited  here,  namely, — (1)  that  sculptm-e  is  essentially  th< 
production  of  a  pleasant  bossiness  or  roundness  of  surface; 
(2)  that  the  pleasantness  of  that  bossy  condition  to  the  ey< 
is  irrespective  of  imitation  on  one  side,  and  of  structure  on 
the  other. 

21.  (1.)  Sculpture  is  essentially  the  production  of  a  plea- 
sant bossiness  or  roundness  of  surface, 

If  you  look  from  some  distance  at  these  two  engravings 
of  Greek  coins,^  (place  the  book  open,  so  that  you  can  see 
the  opposite  plate  three  or  foiu*  yards  off,)  you  will  find 
the  relief  on  each  of  them  simplifies  itself  into  a  pearl-like 
portion  of  a  sphere,  with  exquisitely  gradated  light  on  its 
surface.  When  you  look  at  them  nearer,  you  will  see  that 
each  smaller  portion  into  which  they  are  divided — cheek, 
or  brow,  or  leaf,  or  tress  of  hair — ^resolves  itself  also  into 
a  rounded  or  undulated  surface,  pleasant  by  gradation  of 

1  [Reference  Series,  No.  69  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  32.  For  the  group  ''to  iUostnte  the 
system  .  .  .  founded  on  a  future  life^"  see  Und,,  p.  28  n.l 

'  [See,  however^  Bibliographical  Note,  above^  p.  186.J 

'  [Compare  ValtTAmo,^  286^  where  this  statement  is  referred  to  and  illustrated.] 

^  [Plate  II.  The  upper  coin  is  one  of  the  '^  Demareteia "  of  S3rracuse  (a  deca- 
drachm)^  so  called  because  they  were  coined  from  the  proceeds  of  a  present  given 
to  Demarete  (wife  of  Colon)  by  the  Carthaginians,  on  the  occasion  of  the  peace 
concluded  bv  her  intervention  in  b.o.  480.  The  head  is  that  of  Victory.  The 
reverse  of  the  coin  is  the  lower  figure  on  Plate  XXIII. :  the  coin  may  be  seen 
in  the  exhibition  of  electrotypes  at  the  British  Museum  (II.  C.  33).  The  lower 
coin  here  (British  Museum^  III.  C.  29)  is  a  later  work  (about  b.c.  388);  the  head 
is  of  Arethnsa;  on  one  of  the  surrounding  dolphins  is  the  artist's  name,  Cimon. 
Ruskin  included  a  study  of  this  coin  in  the  Exhibition  to  illustrate  his  lecture 
on  ''Flamboyant  Architecture";  see  Na  15  in  the  Catalogue  (VoL  XIX.  p.  271)^ 
where  he  explains  that  "tiie  hair  represents  typically  the  currents  of  the  fountain 
mingling  with  the  sea.''    See  also  Vol.  XIX.  p.  26.] 


Attached  k 
f  it,  aoKHf 
oillnsM 
d  on  fiii 
itedintk 

camples  i 
I  has-ieM 
1  the  tvo 
[sively  ei- 
itialljtiK 
suiftce;' 
)  theqt 
jctureoi 

f  apb 

can  see 
^M 
earl-iib 

on  its 
^ethst 

-cheek 

so  intc 
ion  d 

tntatk 


en* 

BCtlK 

M 


Till?   Arclhiisa  of  Syra 


m^^mtrnm^tm^^ 


■        I  ■  ■  mimmm^ 


"^■•^^i^i^^ 


^mmmm^m^nmmmg!^^mi^fm^fmmm^ct^^^sm8mmffss.^9ss"!'  .   J-"  "    ■    *  v. 


!•   OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  215 

light  Every  several  surface  is  delightful  in  itself,  as  a 
shell,  or  a  tuft  of  rounded  moss,  or  the  bossy  masses  of 
distant  forest  would  be.  That  these  intricately  ihodulated 
masses  present  some  resemblance  to  a  gh'l's  face,  such  as 
the  Syracusans  imagined  that  of  the  water-goddess  Arethusa, 
is  entirely  a  secondary  matter;  the  primary  condition  is 
that  the  masses  shall  be  beautifully  rounded,  and  disposed 
with  due  discretion  and  order. 

22.  (2.)  It  is  difficult  for  you,  at  first,  to  feel  this  order 
and  beauty  of  surface,  apart  from  the  imitation.  But  you 
can  see  there  is  a  pretty  disposition  of,  and  relation 
between,  the  projections  of  a  fir-cone,  though  the  studded 
spiral  imitates  nothing.  Order  exactly  the  same  in  kind, 
only  much  more  complex;  and  an  abstract  beauty  of  sur- 
face render^  definite  by  increase  and  decline  of  light — (for 
every  curve  of  surface  has  its  own  luminous  law,  and  the 
light  and  shade  on  a  paraboUc  solid  diflTers,  specificaUy, 
from  that  on  an  elliptical  or  spherical  one) — it  is  the 
essential  business  of  the  sculptor  to  obtain;  as  it  is  the 
essential  business  of  a  painter  to  get  good  colour,^  whether 
he  imitates  anything  or  not.  At  a  distance  from  the  pic- 
ture, or  carving,  where  the  things  represented  become  ab- 
solutely unintelligible,  we  must  yet  be  able  to  say,  at 
a  gknce,  «  That  is  good  painting,  or  good  carving." 

And  you  will  be  surprised  to  find,  when  you  try  the 
experiment,  how  much  the  eye  must  instinctively  judge  in 
this  manner.  Take  the  front  of  San  Zenone,  for  instance, 
Plate  I.  You  will  find  it  impossible,  without  a  lens,  to 
distinguish  in  the  bronze  gates,  and  in  great  part  of  the 
wall,  anything  that  their  bosses  represent.  You  cannot  tell 
whether  the  sculpture  is  of  men,  animals,  or  trees;  only 
you  feel  it  to  be  composed  of  pleasant  projecting  masses; 
you  acknowledge  that  both  gates  and  wall  are,  somehow, 
delightfully  roughened;  and  only  afterwards,  by  slow  de- 
grees, can  you  make  out  what  this  roughness  means;  nay, 

^  [Compare  Academp  Not€»,  Vol.  XIV.  p.  290.] 


216  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

though  here  (Plate  III.)  I  magnify"^  one  of  the  bronze 
plates  of  the  gate  to  a  scale,  which  gives  you  the  same 
advantage  as  if  you  saw  it  quite  close,  in  the  reality » — ^you 
may  still  be  obliged  to  me  for  the  information  that  this 
boss  represents  the  Madonna  asleep  in  her  little  bed;  and 
this  smaller  boss,  the  Infant  Christ  in  His ;  and  this  at  the 
top,  a  cloud  with  an  angel  coming  out  of  it;  and  these 
jagged  bosses,  two  of  the  Three  Kings,  with  their  crowns 
on,  looking  up.  to  the  star,  (which  is  intelligible  enough, 
I  admit);  but  what  this  straggling,  three-legged  boss  be* 
neath  signifies,  I  suppose  neither  you  nor  I  can  tell,  unless 
it  be  the  shepherd's  dog^  who  has  come  suddenly  upon  the 
Kings  with  their  crowns  on,  and  is  greatly  startled  at  them. 

28.  Farther,  and  much  more  definitely,  the  pleasantness 
of  the  surface  decoration  is  independent  of  structure;  that 
is  to  say,  of  any  architectiu*al  requirement  of  stability. 
The  greater  part  of  the  sculpture  here  is  exclusively  orna- 
mentation of  a  flat  waU,  or  of  door-panelling;  only  a  small 
portion  of  the  church  front  is  thus  treated,  and  the  sculp- 
ture has  no  more  to  do  with  the  form  of  the  building  than 
a  piece  of  lace  veil  would  have,  suspended  beside  its  gates 
on  a  festal  day:  the  proportions  of  shaft  and  arch  might 
be  altered  in  a  hundred  different  ways  without  diminishing 
their  stability;  and  the  pillars  would  stand  rxxcute  safely  on 
the  ground  than  on  the  backs  of  these  carved  animals. 

24.  I  wish  you  especially  to  notice  these  points,  because 
the  false  theory  that  ornamentation  should  be  merely  deco- 
rated structure  is  so  pretty  and  plausible,  that  it  is  likely 
to  take  away  your  attention  from  the  far  more  important 
abstract  conditions  of  design.     Structm-e  should   never  be 

*  Some  of  the  most  precious  work  d9ne  for  me  bj  my  Assistant^  Mr. 
Burgess^  during  the  course  of  these  Lectures,  consisted  in  making  enlarged 
drawings  from  portions  of  photographs/  Plate  III.  is  engraved  ^  from  a  draw- 
ing of  his^  enlarged  from  the  original  photograph  of  which  Plate  I.  is 
a  reduction. 

1  [Formerly  represented  by  photogravure ;  in  this  edition  by  wood  engraving.] 
s  [Reference  Series,  No.  70  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  82).] 


■^x^^mi 


mt 


OMVMi 


wm 


i3 


it 


I.   OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  217 

contradicted,  and  in  the  best  buildings  it  is  pleasantly 
exhibited  and  enforced:  in  this  very  porch  the  joints  of 
every  stone  are  visible,  and  you  Mali  find  me  in  the  Fifth 
Lecture^  insisting  on  this  clearness  of  its  anatomy  as  a 
merit;  yet  so  independent  is  the  mechanical  structure  of 
the  true  design,  that  when  I  begin  my  Lectures  on  Archi- 
tecture, the  first  building  I  shall  give  you  as  a  standard 
win  be  one  in  which  the  structure  is  wholly  concealed.'  It 
will  be  the  Baptistery  of  Florence,  which  is,  in  reality, 
as  much  a  buttressed  chapel  with  a  vaulted  roof,  as  the 
Chapter  House  of  York ; — but  round  it,  in  order  to  conceal 
that  buttressed  structure,  (not  to  decorate,  observe,  but  to 
conceal f)  a  flat  external  wall  is  raised;  simplifying  the  whole 
to  a  mere  hexagonal  box,  like  a  wooden  piece  of  Tunbridge 
ware,  on  the  surface  of  which  the  eye  and  intellect  are 
to  be  interested  by  the  relations  of  dimension  and  curve 
between  pieces  of  encrusting  marble  of  different  colours, 
which  have  no  more  to  do  with  the  real  make  of  the  build- 
ing than  the  diaper  of  a  Harlequin's  jacket  has  to  do  with 
his  bones. 

25.  The  sense  of  abstract  proportion,  on  which  the 
ei\}oyment  of  such  a  piece  of  art  entirely  depends,  is  one 
of  the  aesthetic  faculties  which  nothing  can  develop  but 
time  and  education.  It  belongs  only  to  highly  trained 
nations;  and,  among  them,  to  their  most  strictly  refined 
classes,  though  the  germs  of  it  are  found,  as  part  of  their 
innate  power,  in  every  people  capable  of  art.     It  has  for 

>  [See  below,  §  160^  p.  314.] 

'  [Raskin  never  delivered  any  course  of  lectures  exclusively  on  architecture. 
Two  Goursesi  however  (one  delivered  in  1873  and  published  as  Vol  tfAmo^  and  the 
other  in  1874  on  The  jBsthetie  and  Mathematic  Schools  qf  Florence),  dealt  largely  with 
architectural  matters^  and  Ruskin  refers  to  the  former  (Ariadne  Florentina,  §  60) 
as  being  on  architecture.  Both  these  sets  of  lectures,  the  latter  now  published  for 
the  first  time,  will  be  found  in  Vol.  XXIII.  of  this  edition.  There  are,  among 
Raskin's  MSS.,  some  sheets  of  notes  for  a  lecture  headed  "The  Baptistery  of 
Florence."  And  see  Ariadne  Florentina,  §§  67|  68,  where  he  says  ''my  wnole 
history  of  Christian  architecture  begins  wHa  this  Baptistery  of  Florence,''  and  de- 
scribes it  as  "  one  large  piece  of  engramng "  (comnsxe  Vol  d^Amo,  §§  148,  160) ; 
and  for  other  references  to  it  as  ''the  central  building  of  European  Christianity," 
see  Momingw  in  Florenee,  §§  6,  120,  and  The  jEetheHe  and  Mathematie  SehooU  qf 
Florence.'] 


218  ARATRA  PEXTELICI 

the  most  part  vanished  at  present  from  the  English  mind^ 
in  consequence  of  our  eager  desire  far  excitement,  and  for 
the  kind  of  splendour  that  exhibits  wealth,  careless  of 
dignity;  so  that,  I  suppose,  there  are  very  few  now  even 
of  our  best  trained  Londoners  who  know  the  difference 
betwe^i  the  design  of  Whitehall^  and  that  of  any  modem 
club-house  in  Pall  MalL  The  order  and  harmony  which, 
in  his  enthusiastic  account  of  the  Theatre  of  Epidaurus,* 
Pausanias  insists  on  before  beauty,  can  only  be  recognized 
by  stem  order  and  harmony  in  our  daily  lives;  and  the 
perception  of  them  is  as  little  to  be  compelled,  or  taught 
suddenly,  as  the  laws  of  still  finer  choice  in  the  conception 
of  dramatic  incident  which  regulate  poetic  sculpture. 

26.  And  now,  at  last,  I  think,  we  can  sketch  out  the 
subject  before  us  in  a  clear  light.  We  have  a  structural 
art,  divine  and  human,  of  which  the  investigation  comes 
under  the  general  term  Anatomy;  whether  the  junctions 
or  joints  be  in  mountains,  or  in  branches  of  trees,  or  in 
buildings,  or  in  bones  of  animals.  We  have  next  a  musical 
art,  falling  into  two  distinct  divisions — one  using  colours, 
the  other  masses,  for  its  elements  of  composition;  lastly, 
we  have  an  imitative  art,  concerned  with  the  representation 
of  the  outward  appearances  of  things.  And,  for  many 
re&sons,  I  think  it  best  to  begin  with  imitative  Sculpture; 
that  being  defined  as  the  art  xvfdck,  by  the  musical  disposi- 
tion of  masses^  imitates  anything  of  which  the  imitation  is 
pistly  pleasant  to  us;  and  does  so  in  accordance  with  struc- 
tural laws  having  due  reference  to  the  materials  employed. 

So  that  you  see  our  task  will  involve  the  immediate 
inquiry  what  the  things  are  of  which  the  imitation  is  justly 
pleasant  to  us :  what,  in  few  words, — ^if  we  are  to  be  occu- 
pied in  the  making  of  graven  images, — ^we  ought  to  like 

^  [For  other  referenees  to  the  Banquoting  Hall  (by  Inigo  Jones),  see  StmMt  qf 
Venice,  vol.  i.  (VoL  IX.  pp.  90,  245).] 

*  [PaiuaniM^  ii.  27,  6i  ^^  In  the  £mdaarian  sanctuary  there  is  a^  theatre  which 
in  my  opinion  is  most  especially  worth  seeing.  It  is  trae  that  in  size  the  theatre 
at  Megalopolis  in  Arcadia  surpasses  it,  and  uat  in  splendour  the  Roman  theatres 
fiir  transcend  all  the  theatres  in  the  world;  but  for  symmetry  and  beauty  what 
architect  could  vie  with  Polyclitus  ?    For  it  was  Polyclitus  who  made  this  theatre.'  ] 


L   OF  THE  DIVISION  OF  ARTS  219 

to  make  images  of}  Secondly,  after  having  determined  its 
subject,  what  degree  of  imitation  or  likeness  we  ought  to 
desire  in  our  graven  image;  and,  lastly,  under  what  limi- 
tations demanded  by  structure  and  material,  such  likeness 
may  be  obtained. 

These  inquiries  I  shall  endeavour  to  pursue  with  you  to 
some  practical  conclusion,  in  my  next  four  Lectures ;  and 
in  the  sixth,  I  will  briefly  sketch  the  actual  facts  that  have 
taken  place  in  the  development  of  sculpture  by  the  two 
greatest  schools  of  it  that  hitherto  have  existed  in  the 
world.* 

27.  The  tenor  of  our  next  Lecture,  then,  must  be  an 
inquiry  into  the  real  nature  of  Idolatry ;  that  is  to  say,  the 
invention  and  service  of  Idols:  and,  in  the  interval,  may  I 
commend  to  your  own  thoughts  this  question,  not  wholly 
irrelevant,  yet  which  I  cannot  pursue;  namely,  whether  the 
God  to  whom  we  have  so  habitually  prayed  for  deliverance 
^'from  battle,  murder,  and  sudden  death,"  is  indeed,  seeing 
that  the  present  state  of  Christendom  is  the  result  of  a 
thousand  years'  prajdng  to  that  effect,  ''  as  the  gods  of  the 
heathen  who  were  but  idols;"'  or  whether — (and  observe, 
one  or  other  of  these  things  must  be  true) — whether  our 
prayers  to  Him  have  been,  by  this  much,  worse  than 
Idolatry;  —  that  heathen  prayer  was  true  prayer  to  false 
gods ;  and  our  prayers  have  been  false  prayers  to  the  True 
One? 

^  [(1)  Lectures  ii.  and  iii. ;  (2)  Lecture  iv. ;  (3)  Lecture  v.] 

'  [The  School  of  Athens  and  the  School  of  Florence.    In  fact,  however,  Ruskin 

held  over  his  disciutton  of  the  latter  sehool :  see  above,  p.  194 ;  and  below,  §  184  n., 

p.  334J 

'  [For  another  quotation  from  the  Litany,  see  Vol.  XVIIL  p.  127 ;  the  other 

quotation  is  from  Psalms  zcvi.  6  (Prayer-booK  version).] 


LECTURE   II 

IDOLATRY 

Naoember,  1870 

28.  Beginning  with  the  simple  conception  of  sculpture  as 
the  art  of  fiction  in  solid  substance,  we  are  now  to  con- 
sider what  its  subject  should  be.  What — Shaving  the  gift 
of  imagery — should  we  by  preference  endeavour  to  image? 
A  question  which  is,  indeed,  subordinate  to  the  deeper  one 
— ^why  we  should  wish  to  image  anything  at  alL 

29.  Some  years  ago,  having  been  always  desirous  that 
the  education  of  women  should  begin  in  learning  how  to 
cook,^  I  got  leave,  one  day,  for  a  little  girl  of  eleven  years 
old  to  exchange,  much  to  her  satisfaction,  her  schoolroom 
for  the  kitchen.  But  as  ill-fortune  would  have  it,  there 
was  some  pastry  toward,  and  she  was  left  unadvisedly  in 
command  of  some  delicately  rolled  paste ;  whereof  she  made 
no  pies,  but  an  unlimited  quantity  of  cats  and  mice. 

Now  you  may  read  the  works  of  the  gravest  critics  of 
art  from  end  to  end;  but  you  wiU  find,  at  last,  they  can 
give  you  no  other  true  account  of  the  spirit  of  sculpture 
than  that  it  is  an  irresistible  human  instinct  for  the  making 
of  cats  and  mice,  and  other  imitable  living  creatures,  in 
such  permanent  form  that  one  may  play  with  the  images 
at  leisure. 

Play  with  them,  or  love  them,  or  fear  them,  or  wor- 
ship them.  The  cat  may  become  the  goddess  Fasht,^  and 
the  mouse,  in  the  hand  of  a  sculptured  king,  enforce  his 

*  [On  this  subject  compare  Setams  and  Lilies,  Preface,  §  10^  and  Eihia  qf  the 
I>^*^f  §  78  (Vol.  XVIII.  pp.  d9,  298);  Fw»  dawgera,  Letters  8,  94.] 
s  [For  the  goddess  Pasht,  see  Ethice  qf  the  Duet,  Vol.  XVIII.  p.  303.] 

220 


11.   IDOLATRY  221 

enduring  words  **  «f  ifxi  ng  opewp  mj<r€fiiif  e(rra> " ;  *  but  the  great 

mimetic  instinct  underlies  all  such  purpose;  and  is  zoo- 
plastic, —  life-shaping,  —  alike  in  the  reverent  and  the  im^ 
pious. 

80.  Is,  I  say,  and  has  been,  hitherto;  none  of  us  dare 
say  that  it  will  be«  I  shall  have  to  show  you  hereafter  that 
the  greater  part  of  the  technic  energy  of  men,  as  yet,  has 
indicated  a  kind  of  childhood ;  and  that  the  race  becomes, 
if  not  more  wise,  at  least  more  manly,^  with  every  gained 
century.  I  can  fimcy  that  aU  this  sculpturing  and  painting 
of  ours  may  be  looked  back  upon,  in  some  distant  time,  as 
a  kind  of  doll-making,  and  that  the  words  of  Sir  Isaac 
Newton'  may  be  smiled  at  no  more:  only  it  will  not  be 
for  stars  that  we  desert  our  stone  dolls,  but  for  men. 
When  the  day  comes,  as  come  it  must,  in  which  we  no 
more  deface  and  defile  God's  image  in  living  clay,  I  am 
not  sure  that  we  shall  any  of  us  care  so  much  for  the 
images  made  of  Him,  in  burnt  day. 

81.  But,  hitherto,  the  energy  of  growth  in  any  people 
may  be  almost  directly  measured  by  their  passion  for  imi* 
tative  art ;  namely,  for  sculpture,  or  for  the  drama,  which 
is  living  and  speaking  sculpture,  or,  as  in  Greece,  for  both ; 
and  in  national  as  in  actual  childhood,  it  is  not  merely  the 
makings  but  the  maJdng-believe ;  not  merely  the  acting  for 
the  sake  of  the  scene,  but  acting  for  the  sake  of  acting, 
that  is  delightful.  And,  of  the  two  mimetic  arts,  the 
drama,  being  more  passionate,  and  involving  conditions  of 
greater  excitement  and  luxury,  is  usually  in  its  excellence 
the  sign  of  culminating  strength  in  the  people;  while  fine 
sculpture,  requiring  always  submission  to  severe  law,  is  an 

*  Glance  forward  at  once  to  §  75,  read  it,  and  return  to  this, 

"  ■  ■  ■^■^^—    ■-  -  —  ■--■        .-  -..■- 

^  [Sm  Herodotus,  ii.  141,  in  the  account  of  King  Sethos  (who  defeated  Sana- 
charib) :  '*  And  at  the  present  time  this  Icing  stands  in  the  temple  of  Hephiestus 
in  stone,  holding  apon  his  hand  a  mouse,  and  bv  letters  inscriMd  he  lays  these 
words^  'Let  him  who  looks  upon  me  be  reverent.  "1 

*  L'^Sir  Isaac  does  not  appear  to  have  had  mucn  taste  for  the  fine  arts.  Re 
nsed  to  say  of  Us  Mend,  the  Eari  of  Pembroke,  that  '  he  was  a  lover  of  9ton$ 
doiU ' "  (Brewster's  Memoirs  qf  the  Life,  Writinge,  and  Dieeoveriee  ^  Sir  leaae 
Newian,  1866,  voL  ii.  p.  411).] 


222  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

unfailing  proof  of  their  being  in  early  and  active  progress. 
There  is  no  instance  of  fine  sculpture  being  produced  by  a 
nation  either  torpid^  weak^  or  in  decadence.  Their  drama 
ii^&y  gfti^  ^  grace  and  wit;  but  their  sculpture,  in  days  of 
dedine,  is  always  base. 

82.  If  my  Uttle  lady  in  the  kitchen  had  been  put  in 
command  of  colours,  as  well  as  of  dough,  and  if  the  paste 
would  have  taken  the  colours,  we  may  be  sure  her  mice 
would  have  been  painted  brown,  and  her  cats  tortoiseshell ; 
and  this,  partly  indeed  for  the  added  delight  and  prettiness 
of  colour  itself,  but  more  for  the  sake  of  absolute  realiza- 
tion to  her  eyes  and  mind.  Now  all  the  early  sculpture 
of  the  most  accomplished  nations  has  been  thus  coloured, 
rudely  or  finely;  and  therefore  you  see  at  once  how  neces- 
sary it  is  that  we  should  keep  the  term  *^ graphic"  for 
imitative  art  generally;  since  no  separation  can  at  first  be 
made  between  carving  and  painting,  with  reference  to  the 
mental  powers  exerted  in,  or  addressed  by,  them.  In  the 
earliest  known  art  of  the  world,  a  reindeer  hunt  may  be 
scratched  in  outline  on  the  flat  side  of  a  clean-picked  bone, 
and  a  reindeer's  head  carved  out  of  the  end  of  it ;  both 
these  are  flint-knife  work,  and,  strictly  speaking,  sculpture: 
but  the  scratched  outline  is  the  beginning  of  drawing,  and 
the  carved  head  of  sculpture  proper.  When  the  spaces 
enclosed  by  the  scratched  outline  are  filled  with  colour,  the 
colouring  soon  becomes  a  principal  means  of  effect ;  so  that, 
in  the  engraving  of  an  £gyptian--colour  bas-relief  (S.  101),^ 
Rosellini  has  been  content  to  miss  the  outlining  incisions 
altogether,  and  represent  it  as  a  painting  only.  Its  proper 
definition  is,  ''painting  accented  by  sculpture;"  on  the 
other  hand,  in  solid  coloured  statues, — Dresden  china  figures, 
for  example, — we  have  pretty  sculpture  accented  by  paint- 
ing; the  mental  purpose  in  both  kinds  of  art  being  to 
obtain  the  utmost  degree  of  realization  possible,  and  the 
ocular  impression  being  the  same,  whether  the  delineation 
is  obtained  by  engraving  or  painting.      For,  as   I   pointed 

^  [Afterwards  Reference  Series^  No.  176 :  see  Vol.  XXI.  p.  44.] 


Ih   IDOLATRY  228 

out  to  you  in  my  Fifth  Lecture/  everything  is  seen  by 
the  eye  as  patches  of  colour^  and  of  colour  only; — ^a  fact 
which  the  Greeks  knew  well;  so  that  when  it  becomes  a 
question  in  the  dialogue  of  Minos,*  **Tm  oim  rg  oy^ei  oparai 

ra  op&fuvd^^  the  answer  is  *^  altrOiiorei  TauTjj  T^  Sia   Twv  6<f>6oLK/iiiiv 

S^Xoupji  fifiiv  ra  -j^fjLaraJ' — "  What  kind  of  power  is  the  sight 
with  which  we  see  things  ?  It  is  that  sense  which,  through 
the  eyes,  can  reveal  colours  to  us," 

88.  And  now  observe  that,  while  the  graphic  arts  begin 
in  the  mere  mimetic  effort,  they  proceed,  as  they  obtain 
more  perfect  realization,  to  act  under  the  influence  of  a 
stronger  and  higher  instinct.  They  begin  by  scratching .  the 
reindeer,  the  most  interesting  object  of  sight.  But  pre- 
sently, as  the  human  creature  rises  in  scale  of  intellect,  it 
proceeds  to  scratch,  not  the  most  interesting  object  of  sight 
only,  but  the  most  interesting  object  of  imagination;  not 
the  reindeer,  but  the  Maker  and  Giver  of  the  reindeer. 
And  the  second  great  condition  for  the  advance  of  the  art 
of  sculpture  is  that  the  race  should  possess,  in  addition  to 
the  mimetic  instinct,  the  realistic  or  idolizing  instinct;  the 
desire  to  see  as  substantial  the  powers  that  are  unseen,  and 
bring  near  those  that  are  far  ofi^,  and  to  possess  and  cherish 
those  that  are  strange.  To  make  in  some  way  tangible  and 
visible  the  nature  of  the  gods — ^to  illustrate  and  explain  it 
by  symbols ;  to  bring  the  immortals  out  of  the  recesses  of 
the  clouds,  and  make  them  Penates ;  to  bring  back  the 
dead  from  darkness,  and  make  them  Lares. 

84.  Our  conception  of  this  tremendous  and  universal 
human  passion  has  been  altogether  narrowed  by  the  current 
idea  that  Pagan  religious  art  consisted  only,  or  chiefly,  in 
giving  personality  to  the  gods.  The  personality  was  never 
doubted ;  it  was  visibility,  interpretation,  and  possession  that 
the  hearts  of  men  sought.  Possession,  first  of  all — ^the  get- 
ting hold  of  some  hewn  log  of  wild  olive-wood  that  would 


iSee  Lectarea  m  Art,  §  ISO  (ftbove,  p.  121).] 
314  ▲  in  Stallbaum's  edition  of  Plato^  to  whom  the  dialogue  '' Mince  /  is  In* 
correctly  attributed.] 


224  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

fiiill  on  its  knees  if  it  was  puUed  from  its  pedestal — ^and, 
afterwards,  slowly  clearing  mluiifestation ;  the  exactly  right 
expression  is  used  in  Lucian's  dream/ — ^etilaf  eSei^  row  Ala ; 
*'  Showed  *  Zeus ; "  manifested  him ;  nay,  in  a  certain  sense, 
brought  forth,  or  created,  as  you  have  it,  in  Anac»%on*s  ode 
to  the  Rose,  of  the  birth  of  Athena  herself, — 

TokifiOKkovov  r    'Mrivrpf 

But  I  will  translate  the  passage  from  Ludan  to  you  at 
length — ^it  is  in  every  way  profitable. 

85.  "  There  came  to  me,  in  the  healing  t  night,  a  divine 
dream,  so  clear  that  it  missed  nothing  of  the  truth  itself; 
yes,  and  still  after  all  this  time,  the  shapes  of  what  I  saw 
remain  in  my  sight,  and  the  sound  of  what  I  heard  dwells 
in  my  ears" — (note  the  lovely  sense  of  IvavKo^ — the  sound 
being  as  of  a  stream  passing  always  by  in  the  same  channel) 
•^— "so  distinct  was  everything  to  me.  Two  women  laid 
hold  of  my  hands  and  pulled  me,  each  towards  herself,  so 
violently,  that  I  had  like  to  have  been  pulled  asunder ;  and 
they  cried  out  against  one  another, — ^the  one,  that  she  re- 
solved to  have  me  to  herself,  being  indeed  her  own;  and 
the  other,  that  it  was  vain  for  her  to  claim  what  belonged 
to  others ; — and  the  one  who  first  claimed  me  for  her  own 
was  like  a  hard  worker,  and  had  strength  as  a  man's ;  and 
her  hair  was  dusty,  and  her  hand  fiill  of  homy  places,  and 
her  dress  fastened  tight  about  her,  and  the  folds  of  it  loaded 

*  There  is  a  primafy  and  Tulgar  sense  of  "exhibited  "  in  Lucian's  mind ; 
hot  the  higher  meaning  is  involved  in  it 

t  In  the  Greeks  *'  ambrosial/'  Recollect  always  that  ambrosia^  as  food  of 
gods^  is  the  continual  restorer  of  strength  ;  that  all  food  is  ambrosial  when  it 
nourishes,  and  that  the  night  is  called  "ambrosial"  because  it  restores 
strength  to  the  soul  through  its  peace,  as,  in  the  23rd  Psalm,  the  stillness  of 
waters. 

1  [The  Dream,  8  (not  to  bs  confused  with  ''The  Cock  and  the  Cobbler,"  which 
is  also  sometimes  called  ''llie  Dream").  For  another  reference  to  it,  see  below, 
S  180  n.  (p.  329). 

*  [Anaereoniea,  63.    The  second  line  reads  «ro^v^t  fdei^er  6  Zt^,} 


IL   IDOLATRY  225 

marble-dust,  so  that  she  looked  just  as  my  unde 
used  to  look  when  he  was  filing  stones :  but  the  other  was 
pleasant  in  features,  and  delicate  in  form,  and  orderly  in 
her  dress ;  and  so,  in  the  end,  they  left  it  to  me  to  decide, 
after  hearing  what  they  had  to  say,  with  which  of  them  I 
would  go;  and  first  the  hard-featured  and  masculine  one 
spoke: — 

86.  "'Dear  child,  I  am  the  Art  of  Image-sculpture, 
which  yesterday  you  b^an  to  learn;  and  I  am  as  one  of 
your  own  people,  and  of  your  house,  for  your  grandfather' 
(and  she  named  my  mother^s  father)  'was  a  stone-cutter; 
and  both  your  uncles  had  good  name  through  me:  and  if 
you  will  keep  yourself  well  clear  of  the  sillinesses  and  fluent 
follies  that  come  firom  this  creature,'  (and  she  pointed  to 
the  other  woman,)  'and  will  follow  me,  and  live  with  me, 
first  of  all,  you  shall  be  brought  up  as  a  man  should  be, 
and  have  strong  shoulders;  and,  besides  that,  you  shall  be 
kept  well  quit  of  all  restless  desires,  and  you  shall  never 
be  obliged  to  go  away  into  any  foreign  places,  leaving  your 
own  country  and  the  people  of  your  house;  neither  shall  all 
mtfi  praise  you  for  your  talk.^  And  you  must  not  despise 
this  rude  serviceableness  of  my  body,  neither  this  meanness 
of  my  dusty  dress ;  for,  pushing  on  in  their  strength  from 
such  things  as  these,  that  great  Phidias  revealed  Zeus,  and 
Folyditus  wrought  out  Hera,  and  Myron  was  praised,  and 
Praxiteles  marvelled  at :  therefore  are  these  men  worshipped 
with  the  gods/" 

87.  There  is  a  beautiful  ambiguity  in  the  use  of  the  pre- 
position with  the  genitive  in  this  last  sentence.    "Pushing 

*  I  have  italicised  this  final  promise  of  blessedness,  given  by  the  noble 
Spirit  of  Workmanship.  Compare  Carlyle's  fifth  Latter-day  Pamphlet^ 
tnroaghout;  but  especially  pp.  12-14^  in  the  first  edition.^ 

^  [In  which  edition  (I860)  each  Pamphlet  is  separately  paged.  The  reference  is 
to  the  one  entitled  '' Stamp-Orator"  ;  the  passage  in  question  (p.  166  in  the  popular 
edition  of  1872)  is  that  which  ends  with  the  conclusion  that  ''  the  Art  of  SpeMh  is 
prohahly  definable  as  the  short  summary  of  all  the  Black  Arts  put  together."] 

XX.  P 


226  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

on  from  these  things "  means  indeed,  justly,  that  the  sculp- 
tors rose  from  a  mean  state  to  a  noble  one;  but  not  as 
leaving  the  mean  state, — ^not  as,  from  a  hard  life,  attain- 
ing to  a  soft  one, — ^but  as  being  helped  and  strengthened 
by  the  rough  life  to  do  what  was  greatest.  Again,  ^'wor- 
shipped with  the  gods  "  does  not  mean  that  they  are  thought 
of  as  in  any  sense  equal  to,  or  like  to,  the  gods,  but  as 
being  on  the  side  of  the  gods  against  what  is  base  and  im- 
godly;  and  that  the  kind  of  worth  which  is  in  them  is 
therefore  indeed  worshipful,  as  having  its  source  with  the 
gods.  Finally,  observe  that  every  one  of  the  expressions 
used  of  the  four  sculptors  is  definitely  the  best  that  Lucian 
could  have  chosen.  Phidias  carved  like  one  who  had  seen 
Zeus,  and  had  only  to  reveal  him ;  Polyditus,  in  labour  of 
intellect,  completed  his  sculpture  by  just  law,  and  xvrought 
out  Hera;  Myron  was  of  all  most  praised,  because  he  did 
best  what  pleased  the  vulgar ;  and  Praxiteles  the  most  xvon* 
dered  at,  or  admired,  because  he  bestowed  utmost  exquisite- 
ness  of  beauty.^ 

88.  I  am  sorry  not  to  go  on  with  the  dream:  the  more 
refined  lady,  as  you  may  remember,  is  liberal  or  gentle- 
manly Education,  and  prevails  at  last;  so  that  Lucian  be- 
comes an  author  instead  of  a  sculptor,  I  think  to  his  own 
regret,  though  to  our  present  benefit.  One  more  passage  of 
his'  I  must  refer  you  to,  as  illustrative  of  the  point  before 
us ;  the  description  of  the  temple  of  the  Sjrrian  Hieropolis, 
where  he  explains  the  absence  of  the  images  of  the  sun 
and  moon.  "In  the  temple  itself,*'  he  says,  "on  the  left 
hand  as  one  goes  in,  there  is  set  first  the  throne  of  the 
sun;  but  no  form  of  him  is  thereon,  for  of  these  two 
powers  alone,  the  sun  and  the  moon,  they  show  no  carved 
images.  And  I  also  learned  why  this  is  their  law,  for 
they  say  that  it  is  permissible,  indeed,  to  make  of  the 
other  gods,  graven  images,  since   the  forms  of  them  are 

^  [^ei^^of  l^ei^e  r^  A(a  koX  IIoXi^ffXetTvt  Hpf  *HpaM  elfryd^aro  koI   U^pw  hrgfifini  jcat 
*  [From  his  tract  ''  On  the  Syriui  GoddflM."] 


11.   IDOLATRY  227 

not  visible  to  all  men.  But  Helios  and  Seknaia  are  every- 
where clear-bright,  and  all  men  behold  them;  what  need 
is  there  therefore  for  sculptured  work  of  these,  who  appear 
in  the  air?" 

89.  This,  then,  is  the  second  instinct  necessary  to  sculp- 
ture; the  desire  for  the  manifestation,  description,  and  com- 
panionship of  unknown  powers;  and  for  possession  of  a 
bodily  substance — ^the  *^ bronze  Strasbourg,"^  which  you  can 
embrace,  and  hang  immortelles  on  the  head  of — ^instead  of 
an  abstract  idea.  But  if  you  get  nothing  more  in  the 
depth  of  the  national  mind  than  these  two  feelings,  the 
mimetic  and  idolizing  instincts,  there  may  be  still  no  pro- 
gress possible  for  the  arts  except  in  delicacy  of  manipula- 
tion and  accumulative  caprice  of  design.  You  must  have 
not  only  the  idolizing  instinct,  but  an  ^6o^^  which  chooses 
the  right  thing  to  idolize  1  Else,  you  will  get  states  of  art 
like  those  in  China  or  India,  non-progressive,  and  in  great 
part  diseased  and  firightfid,  being  wrought  under  the  influ- 
ence of  foolish  terror,  or  foolish  admiration.  So  that  a 
third  condition,  completing  and  confirming  both  the  others, 

*  [From  the  Paris  correspondence  in  the  Daify  Telegraph,  October  7, 1870 :  ''The 
following  decree  has  been  issued  by  the  Government  of  National  Defence : — 

'''THE  STATUE  OF  STRASBURG,   CAST  IN  BRONZE. 

'''Hie  Goyemment  of  National  Defence^  considering  that  the  noble  city  of 
Strasburg,  by  its  heroic  resistance  to  the  enemy  during  a  murderous  siege  of  fifty 
days,  has  drawn  more  closely  together  the  indissoluble  bonds  which  unite  Alsaoe  to 
France ;  considering  that,  since  the  commencement  of  the  siege  of  Strasburg,  the 
national  piety  of  the  Parisian  population  has  not  ceased  to  lavish  around  the  image 
of  the  capital  of  Alsace  tokens  of  the  most  touching  patriotism^  and  of  the  most 
ardent  gratitude  for  the  great  example  which  Strasburg  and  tiie  besieged  towns 
of  the  East  have  given  to  France ;  writing  to  perpetuate  at  the  same  time  the 
memoir  of  the  glorious  devotion  of  Strasbui^  and  the  towns  of  the  East  to  the 
indivisibility  of  the  Republic,  and  of  the  generous  sentiments  of  the  people  of  Paris — 

" '  Decxees :  Article  1.  The  statue  of  the  dty  of  Strasburg,  at  present  situated 
in  the  Place  de  la  Concorde,  will  be  cast  in  bronze,  and  retained  in  the  same  place, 
with  an  inscription  commemorating  the  noble  deeds  of  resistance  in  the  Depart- 
ments of  the  Esat 

" '  Article  2.  The  Minister  of  Public  Instruction  is  charged  with  the  execution 
of  the  present  decree. 

"'Made  in  Paris,  at  the  Hotel  de  ViUe,  2nd  October,  1870.'" 

For  a  reference  to  "the  tokens  lavished"  around  the  statue  of  Strasbourg,  see 
bdow.  §  44,  p.  229.1 
.     *  [Coupare  Vol  XIX.  pp.  171,  186.] 


r^^^ 


228  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

must  exist  in   order  to  the   development  of  the   creative 
power. 

40.  This  third  condition  is  that  the  heart  of  the  nation 
shall  be  set  on  the  discovery  of  just  or  equal  law,  and 
shall  be  from  day  to  day  developing  that  law  more  per- 
fectly. The  Greek  school  of  scidpture  is  formed  during, 
and  in  consequence  of,  the  national  effort  to  discover  the 
nature  of  justice ;  the  Tuscan,  during,  and  in  consequence 
of,  the  national  effort  to  discover  the  nature  of  justification. 
I  assert  to  you  at  present  briefly,  what  will,  I  hope,  be 
the  subject  of  prolonged  illustration  hereafter.^ 

41.  Now  when  a  nation  with  mimetic  instinct  and  ima- 
ginative longing  is  also  thus  occupied  earnestly  in  the  dis- 
covery of  Ethic  law,  that  effort  gradually  brings  precision 
and  truth  into  aU  its  manual  acts ;  and  the  physical  progress 
of  sculpture,  as  in  the  Greek,  so   in  ^  the   Tuscan,   school, 
consists  in  gradually  limiting  what  was  before  indefinite,  in 
verifying  what  was  inaccurate,  and  in  humanizing  what  was 
monstrous.     I  might  perhaps  content  you  by  showing  these 
external   phenomena,   and  by  dwelling   simply  on   the  in- 
creasing desire  of  naturalness,  which  compels,  in  every  suc- 
cessive decade  of  years,  literally,  in  the  sculptured  images, 
the  mimicked  bones  to  come  together,  bone  to  his  bone; 
and  the  flesh  to  come  up  upon  them,  until  from  a  flat- 
tened and  pinched  handful  of  clay,  respecting  which  you 
may  gravely  question  whether  it  was  intended  for  a  human 
form  at  all; — ^by  slow  degrees,  and  added  touch  to  touch, 
in  increasing  consciousness  of  the  bodily  truth, — at  last  the 
Aphrodite  of  Melos'  stands  before  you,  a  perfect  woman. 
But  all  that  search  for  physical  accuracy  is  merely  the  ex- 
ternal operation,  in  the  arts,  of  the  seeking  for  truth   in 
the  inner  soul;   it  is  impossible  without  that  higher  effort, 
and  the  demonstration  of  it  would   be  worse  than   useless 
to  you,  unless  I  made  you  aware  at  the  same  time  of  its 
spiritual  cause. 

^  [See  generally  the  course  of  lectures  entitled  Vol  ttAmo.] 

*  [For  another  reference  to  this  statue,  see  lime  and  Tide,  §  160  (Vol.  XVII. 
p.  448).] 


rxrs 


IL   IDOLATRY  229 

^  '  ^  42.  Observe  farther ;   the  increasmg  truth  in  representa- 

tion is  correlative  with  increasing  beauty  in  the  thing  to 
2=="  '  be  represented.  The  pursuit  of  justice  which  regulates  the 
-  ^^-  imitative  eflTort,  regulates  also  the  development  of  the  race 
>c  ^  -  into  dignity  of  person,  as  of  mind ;  and  their  culminating 
I  IS,  art-skill  attains  the  grasp  of  entire  truth  at  the  moment 
r  z  Ji  when  the  truth  becomes  most  lovely.  And  then,  ideal 
I  1  a  sculpture  may  go  on  safely  into  portraiture.  But  I  shall 
r  :  s  not  touch  on  the  subject  of  portrait  sculpture  to-day ;  it 
-L  :  introduces  many  questions  of  detail,  and  must  be  a  matter 
er  for  subsequent  consideration. 

48.  These,  then,  are  the  three  great  passions  which  are 
concerned  in  true  sculpture.  I  cannot  find  better,  or,  at 
least,  more  easily  remembered,  names  for  them  than  ''the 
Instincts  of  Mimicry,  Idolatry,  and  Discipline;"  meaning, 
by  the  last,  the  desire  of  equity  and  wholesome  restraint, 
in  all  acts  and  works  of  life.  Now  of  these,  there  is  no 
X  question  but  that  the  love  of  Mimicry  is  natural  and  right, 
and  the  love  of  Discipline  is  natural  and  right.  But  it  looks 
a  grave  question  whether  the  yearning  for  Idolatry  (the 
desire  of  companionship  with  images)  is  right.  Whether, 
indeed,  if  such  an  instinct  be  essential  to  good  sculpture, 
the  art  founded  on  it  can  possibly  be  "fine"  art. 

44.  I  must  now  beg  for  your  close  attention,  because  I 
have  to  point  out  distinctions  in  modes  of  conception  which 
will  appear  trivial  to  you,  unless  accurately  understood;  but 
of  an  importance  in  the  history  of  art  which  cannot  be 
overrated. 

WTien  the   populace   of  Paris    adorned    the    statue    of 
Strasbotirg  with  immortelles,   none,   even   the    simplest  of 
the  pious  decorators,  would  suppose  that  the  city  of  Stras- 
^  *^  bourg  itself,  or  any  spirit  or  ghost  of  the  city,  was  actually 

^'  there,   sitting  in  the  Place  de  la  Concorde.      The  figure 

^  was  delightful  to  them  as  a  visible  nucleus  for  their  fond 

^  *  thoughts  about   Strasbourg ;   but  never  for  a  moment  sup- 

posed to  be  Strasbourg. 

Similarly,  they  might   have   taken  delight   in   a  statue 


—  ■« 


280  ARATRA  PENTELICl 

purporting  to  represent  a  river  instead  of  a  city, — ^the 
Rhine,  or  Garonne,  suppose, — and  have  been  toueh^  with 
strong  emotion  in  looking  at  it,  if  the  real  river  were  dear 
to  them,  and  yet  never  think  for  an  instant  that  the  statue 
xvas  the  river. 

And  yet  again,  similarly,  but  much  more  distinctly,  they 
might  take  delight  in  the  beautifid  image  of  a  god,  because 
it  gathered  and  perpetuated  their  thoughts  about  that  god; 
and  yet  never  suppose,  nor  be  capable  of  being  deceived  by 
any  arguments  into  supposing,  that  the  statue  was  the  god. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  a  meteoric  stone  fell  from  the 
sky  in  the  sight  of  a  savage,  and  he  picked  it  up  hot,  he 
would  most  probably  lay  it  aside  in  some,  to  him,  sacred 
place,  and  believe  the  stone  itself  to  be  a  kind  of  god,  and 
offer  prayer  and  sacrifice  to  it. 

In  like  manner,  any  other  strange  or  terrifying  object, 
such,  for  instance,  as  a  powerfidly  noxious  animal  or  plant, 
he  would  be  apt  to  regard  in  the  same  way;  and  very 
possibly  also  construct  for  himself  frightful  idols  of  some 
kind,  calculated  to  produce  upon  him  a  vague  impression 
of  their  being  alive;  whose  imaginary  anger  he  might  de- 
precate or  avert  with  sacrifice,  although  incapable  of  con- 
ceiving in  them  any  one  attribute  of  exalted  intellectual  or 
moral  nature. 

46.  If  you  will  now  refer  to  §§  52-69  of  my  Introduc- 
tory Lectures,^  you  will  find  this  distinction  between  a  re- 
solute conception,  recognized  for  such,  and  an  involuntary 
apprehension  of  spiritual  existence,  already  insisted  on  at 
some  length.  And  you  will  see  more  and  more  clearly  as  we 
proceed,  that  the  deliberate  and  intellectually  commanded 
conception  is  not  idolatrous  in  any  evil  sense  whatever, 
but  is  one  of  the  grandest  and  wholesomest  functions  of 
the  human  soul;  and  that  the  essence  of  evil  idolatry 
begins  only  in  the  idea  or  belief  of  a  real  presence  of  any 
kind,  in  a  thing  in  which  there  is  no  such  presence. 

^  [Above,  pp.  60  seq.] 


II.   IDOLATRY  281 

46.  I  need  not  say  that  the  haim  of  the  idolatry  must 
depend  on  the  certainty  of  the  negative.  If  there  be  a  real 
presence  in  a  pillar  of  cloud,  in  an  unconsuming  flame,  or 
in  a  still  snudl  voice,  it  is  no  sin  to  bow  down  before 
these.^ 

But,  as  matter  of  historical  fact,  the  idea  of  such  pre- 
sence has  generally  been  both  ignoble  and  false,  and  con- 
fined to  nations  of  inferior  race,  who  are  often  condemned 
to  remain  for  ages  in  conditions  of  vile  terror,  destitute 
of  thought.  Nearly  all  Indian  architecture  and  Chinese 
design  arise  out  of  such  a  state:  so  also,  though  in  a  less 
gross  degree,  Ninevite  and  Phoenician  art,  early  Irish,  and 
Scandinavian;  the  latter,  however,  with  vital  elements  of 
high  intellect  mingled  in  it  from  the  first. 

But  the  greatest  races  are  never  grossly  subject  to  such 
terror,  even  in  their  childhood,  and  the  course  of  their 
minds  is  broadly  divisible  into  three  distinct  stages. 

47.  (I.)  In  their  infancy  they  begin  to  imitate  the  real 
animals  about  them,  as  my  litUe  girl  made  the  cats  and 
mice,  but  with  an  undercurrent  of  partial  superstition — a 
sense  that  there  must  be  more  in  the  creatures  than  they 
can  see;  also  they  catch  up  vividly  any  of  the  fancies  of 
the  baser  nations  round  them,  and  repeat  these  more  or 
less  apishly,  yet  rapidly  naturalizing  and  beautifying  them. 
They  then  connect  all  kinds  of  shapes  together,  compound- 
ing meanings  out  of  the  old  chimeras,  and  inventing  new 
ones  with  the  speed  of  a  running  wildfire;  but  always 
getting  more  of  man  into  their  images,  and  admitting  less 
of  monster  or  brute;  their  own  characters,  meanwhile, 
expanding  and  purging  themselves,  and  shaking  off  the 
feverish  fancy,  as  springing  flowers  shake  the  earth  off  their 
stalks. 

48.  (II.)  In  the  second  stage,  being  now  themselves 
perfect  men  and  women,  they  reach  the  conception  of  true 
and  great  gods  as  existent  in  the  universe;   and  absolutely 

i  [Exodus  xxxiiL  9^  iii.  2 ;  1  Kings  xix.  2.] 


282  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

cease  to  think  of  them  as  m  any  wise  present  in  statues  or 
images;  but  they  have  now  learned  to  make  these  statues 
beautifully  human,  and  to  surround  them  with  attributes 
that  may  concentrate  their  thoughts  of  the  gods.  This  is, 
in  Greece,  acciurately  the  Pindaric  time,  just  a  little  preced- 
ing the  Phidian;  the  Phidian  is  ah*eady  dimmed  with  a 
faint  shadow  of  infidelity ;  still,  the  Olympic  Zeus  ^  may  be 
taken  as  a  sufficiently  central  type  of  a  statue  which  was 
no  more  supposed  to  be  Zeus,  than  the  gold  or  elephants' 
tusks  it  was  made  of;  but  in  which  the  most  splendid 
powers  of  human  art  were  exhausted  in  representing  a  be- 
lieved and  honoured  God  to  the  happy  and  holy  imagina- 
tion of  a  sincerely  religious  people.^ 

49.  (III.)  The  third  stage  of  national  existence  follows, 
in  which,  the  imagination  having  now  done  its  utmost,  and 
being  partly  restrained  by  the  sanctities  of  tradition,  which 
permit  no  farther  change  in  the  conceptions  previously 
created,  begins  to  be  superseded  by  logical  deduction  and 
scientific  investigation.  At  the  same  moment,  the  elder 
artists  having  done  all  that  is  possible  in  realizing  the 
national  conceptions  of  the  gods,  the  younger  ones,  for^- 
bidden  to  change  the  scheme  of  existing  representations, 
and  incapable  of  doing  anything  better  in  that  kind,  betake 
themselves  to  refine  and  decorate  the  old  ideas  with  more 
attractive  skill.  Their  aims  are  thus  more  and  more  limited 
to  manual  dexterity,  and  their  fancy  paralyzed.  Also  in 
the  course  of  centuries,  the  methods  of  every  art  continu- 
ally improving,  and  being  made  subjects  of  popular  inquiry, 
praise  is  now  to  be  got,  for  eminence  in  these,  from  the 
whole  mob  of  the  nation ;  whereas  intellectual  design  can 
never  be  discerned  but  by  the  few.  So  that  in  this  third 
sera  we  find  every  kind  of  imitative  and  vulgar  dexterity 

^  [For  ftnother  reference  to  the  eelebntted  chryeeleph>ntine  statue  of  Zeat  bj 
Phidias  at  Olympia^  see  below,  p.  290.] 

*  [A  collection  of  passages  in  this  sense  from  ancient  literatare  may  be  read  in 
W.  C.  Perrjr's  Greek  and  Roman  ScuJpiure,  ch.  xviii.  C'  Pheidias  in  Olympia").  Sach 
work,  says  Qaintilian,  ''added  new  power  to  the  established  fiuth,  so  nearly  did  its 
grandeur  approach  to  the  majesty  of  the  Gods  themselves."] 


IL   IDOLATRY  288 

more  and  more  cultivated;  while  design  and  imagination 
are  every  day  less  cared  for,  and  less  possible. 

50.  Meanwhile,  as  I  have  just  said,  the  leading  minds 
in  literature  and  science  become  continually  more  logical 
and  investigative;  and  once  that  they  are  established  in 
the  habit  of  testing  fSncts  accurately,  a  very  few  years  are 
enough  to  convince  all  the  strongest  thinkers  that  the  old 
imaginative  religion  is  untenable,  and  cannot  any  longer 
be  honestly  taught  in  its  fixed  traditional  form,  except  by 
ignorant  persons.  And  at  this  point  the  fate  of  the  people 
absolutely  depends  on  the  degree  of  moral  strength  into 
which  their  hearts  have  been  already  trained.  If  it  be  a 
strong,  industrious,  chaste,  and  honest  race,  the  taking  its 
old  gods,  or  at  least  the  old  forms  of  them,  away  £rom  it, 
will  indeed  make  it  deeply  sorrowful  and  amazed;  but  will 
in  no  whit  shake  its  will,  nor  alter  its  practice.  Exceptional 
persons,  naturally  disposed  to  become  drunkards,  harlots, 
and  cheats,  but  who  had  been  previously  restrained  firom 
indulging  these  dispositions  by  their  fear  of  God,  will,  of 
course,  break  out  into  open  vice,  when  that  fear  is  removed. 
But  the  heads  of  the  families  of  the  people,  instructed  in 
the  pure  habits  and  perfect  delights  of  an  honest  life,  and 
to  whom  the  thought  of  a  Father  in  heaven  had  been  a 
comfort,  not  a  restraint,  will  assuredly  not  seek  relief  firom 
the  discomfort  of  their  orphanage  by  becoming  uncharitable 
and  vile.  Also  the  high  leaders  of  their  thought  gather 
their  whole  strength  together  in  the  gloom;  and  at  the 
first  entrance  to  this  Valley  of  the  Shadow  of  Death,  look 
their  new  enemy  fiill  in  the  eyeless  fiice  of  him,  and  subdue 
him,  and  his  terror,  under  their  feet.  ''Metus  omnes,  et 
inexorabile  fatum,  .  .  .  strepitumque  Acherontis  avari."^ 
This  is  the  condition  of  national  soul  expressed  by  the  art, 
and  the  words,  of  Holbein,  Diirer,  Shakespeare,  Pope,  and 
Goethe.* 

1  [VirgU :  Qeorjfiei,  u.  491,  492.] 

*  [For  Holbein  and  Durer  in  thit  connexion,  see  Lecturee  on  Art,  §  149  (above, 
p.  140),  VoL  V.  p.  131  and  Vol.  XIV.  p.  341 ;  for  Shakespeare,  Vol  VII.  p.  295 ; 
for  Pope,  FieHon,  Fair  and  Foul,  §  4e.J 


284  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

51.  But  if  the  people,  at  the  moment  when  the  trial  of 
darkness  approaches,  be  not  confirmed  in  moral  character, 
but  are  only  maintaining  a  superficial  virtue  by  the  aid  of 
a  spectral  religion ;  the  moment  the  staff  of  their  faith  is 
broken,  the  character  of  the  race  falls  like  a  climbing  plant 
cut  from  its  hold:  then  all  the  earthliest  vices  attack  it  as 
it  lies  in  the  dust;  every  form  of  sensual  and  insane  sin  is 
developed;  and  half  a  century  is  sometimes  enough  to 
close  in  hopeless  shame  the  career  of  the  nation  in  litera- 
ture, art,  and  war. 

52.  Notably,  within  the  last  hundred  years,  all  religion 
has  perished  fi*om  the  practically  active  national  mind  of 
France  and  England.  No  statesman  in  the  senate  of  either 
country  would  dare  to  use  a  sentence  out  of  their  acceptedly 
divine  Revelation,  as  having  now  a  literal  authority  over 
them  for  their  guidance,  or  even  a  suggestive  wisdom  for 
their  contemplation.^  England,  especially,  has  cast  her  Bible 
full  in  the  face  of  her  former  God;'  and  proclaimed,  with 
open  challenge  to  Him,  her  resolved  worship  of  His  de- 
clared enemy,  Mammon.  All  the  arts,  therefore,  founded 
on  religion  and  sculptiu*e  chiefly,  are  here  in  England  effete 
and  corrupt,  to  a  degree  which  arts  never  were  hitherto 
in  the  history  of  mankind;  and  it  is  possible  to  show  you 
the  condition  of  sculpture  living,  and  sculpture  dead,  in 
accurate  opposition,  by  simply  comparing  the  nascent  Fisan 
school  in  Italy  with  the  existing  school  in  England. 

58.  You  were  perhaps  surprised  at  my  placing  in  your 
educational  series,  as  a  type  of  original  Italian  sculpture, 
the  pulpit  by  Niccola  Fisano  in  the  Duomo  of  Siena*'  I 
would  rather,  had  it  been  possible,  have  given  the  pulpit 
by  Giovanni  Fisano  in  the  Duomo  of  Fisa ;  but  that  pulpit 
is  dispersed  in  fragments  through  the  upper  galleries  of  the 

^  [Com|Mire  Lectures  on  Architecture  and  PainHng,  §  119  (Vol.  XII.  p.  142),  and 

for  other  such  references^  Vol.  XVII.  p.  75  n.] 

'  [Compare  Fore  Clavigera^  Letter  40  (Notes  and  Correspondence).] 

*  [In   the    ultimate   arrangement,    Educational   Series^    No.    161    (VoL    XXI. 

p.  88^.] 


IL   IDOLATRY  285 

Duomo,  and  the  cloister  of  the  Campo  Santo ;  and  the 
casts  of  its  fragments  now  put  together  at  Kensington  are 
too  coarse  to  be  of  use  to  you.^  You  may  partly  judge, 
however,  of  the  method  of  their  execution  by  the  eagle's 
head,  which  I  have  sketched  from  the  marble  in  the  Campo 
Santo  (Edu.,  No.  118),  and  the  lioness  with  her  cubs 
(Edu.,  No.  108,'  more  carefully  studied  at  Siena);  and  I 
will  get  you  other  illustrations  in  due  time.  Meanwhile, 
I  want  you  to  compare  the  main  purpose  of  the  Cathedral 
of  Pisa,  and  its  associated  Bell  Tower,  Baptistery,  and  Holy 
Field,  with  the  main  purpose  of  the  principal  building  lately 
raised  for  the  people  of  London.  In  these  days,  we  indeed 
desire  no  cathedrdbs;  but  we  have  constructed  an  enormous 
and  costly  edifice,  which,  in  daiming  educational  influence 
over  the  whole  London  populace,  and  middle  class,  is  verily 
the  Metropolitan  cathednd  of  this  century, — ^the  Crystal 
Palace. 

54.  It  was  proclaimed,  at  its  erection,  an  example  of  a 
newly  discovered  style  of  architecture,  greater  than  any 
hitherto  known, — our  best  popular  writers,  in  their  enthu- 
siasm, describing  it  as  an  edifice  of  Fairyland.'  You  are 
nevertheless  to  observe  that  this  novel  production  of  fairy 
enchantment  is  destitute  of  every  kind  of  sculpture,  except 
the  bosses  produced  by  the  heads  of  nails  and  rivets ;  while 
the  Duomo  of  Pisa,  in  the  wreathen  work  of  its  doors,  in 
the  foliage  of  its  capitals,  inlaid  colour  designs  of  its  facade, 
embossed  panels  of  its  Baptistery  font,  and  figure  sculpture 
of  its  two  pulpits,^  contained  the  germ  of  a  school  of  sculp- 
ture which  was  to  maintain,  through  a  subsequent  period 

^  fThe  pulpit  in  the  Duomo  of  Pisa,  once  the  mMterpiece  of  Giovmnni  Pisano, 
was  damaged  in  the  fire  of  1696^  and  has  heen  poorly  restored.  Some  of  its  original 
panels  are  now  in  the  Museo  Civioo.  The  reproduction  of  the  pulpit  from  casts 
taken  in  1864  and  1865  is  in  the  Architecture  Court  at  the  Victoria  and  Albert 
(South  Kensington)  Museum.] 

'  [In  the  ultimate  arrangement,  Nob.  163  and  163  (Vol.  XXL  pp.  88,  89).  The 
lioness  is  shown  on  Plate  D  (below,  p.  363).] 

>  [For  this  reference  to  Dickens,  see  EthUa  qf  the  DuH,  §  32  (VoL  XVIII. 


p.  243  ft.).] 

[ie.,  tne  pulpit  by 
Pisano  in  the  Baptistery  (of  which  there  is  a  Plate  in  Vol  ^Anwy] 


*  [ie.,  tne  pulpit  by  Gioranni  Pisano,  mentioned  above,  and  that  by  Nicoolo 


286  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

of  four  hundred  years,  the  greatest  power  yet  reached  by 
the  arts  of  the  world,  in  description  of  Form,  and  expres- 
sion  of  Thought. 

55.  Now  it  is  easy  to  show  you  the  essential  cause  of 
the  vast  discrepancy  in  the  character  of  these  two  buildings. 

In  the  vault  of  the  apse  of  the  Duomo  of  Pisa  was  a 
colossal  image  of  Christ,  in  coloured  mosaic,^  bearing  to  the 
temple,  as  nearly  as  possible,  the  relation  which  the  statue 
of  Athena  bore  to  the  Parthenon ;  and  in  the  same  manner, 
concentrating  the  imagination  of  the  Pisan  on  the  attributes 
of  the  God  in  whom  he  believed. 

In  precisely  the  same  position  with  respect  to  the  nave 
of  the  building,  but  of  larger  size,  as  proportioned  to  the 
three  or  four  times  greater  scale  of  the  whole,  a  colossal 
piece  of  sculpture  was  placed  by  English  designers,  at  the 
extremity  of  the  Crystal  Palace,  in  preparation  for  their 
solemnities  in  honour  of  the  birthday  of  Christ,  in  December 
1867  or  1868. 

That  piece  of  sculpture  was  the  face  of  the  clown  in  a 
pantomime,  some  twelve  feet  high  from  brow  to  chin,  which 
face,  being  moved  by  the  mechanism  which  is  our  pride, 
every  half-minute  opened  its  mouth  £rom  ear  to  ear,  showed 
its  teeth,  and  revolved  its  eyes,  the  force  of  these  peri- 
odical seasons  of  expression  being  increased  and  expliuned 


^  [The  interior  of  the  Duomo  at  Pisa  had  made  a  strong  impression  on 
when  he  saw  it  in  1845.    He  attended  service  there  on  the  occasion  of  the  festival 
of  St  Raniero,  and  thas  describes  it  in  a  letter  to  his  fiither  (May  22) : — 

''  You  recollect  the  cathedral ;  you  know  it  is  very  dark^  and  that 
there  are  forty  massy  columns  of  granite  up  the  nave,  but  perhaps  yon 
foiget  that  at  the  end  of  it  over  the  altar  there  is  an  enormous  mosaic 
of  Christ,  at  least  sixty  feet  high,  desimed  by  Buffiilmacco  on  a  gold 

f  round ;  perhaps  also  you  forget  that  tne  windows,  though  small,  are 
lied  with  painted  glass  of  the  most  splendid  kind.  Under  the  mosaic 
at  the  high  altar  there  were  lighted  two  grettt  equilateral  solid  pyramids 
of  candles  :  ten  candles  each  side,  consisting,  therefore,  of  fifty-five  candles 
each.  Between  them  a  diamond  of  thirty-six  candles,  and  above  a  con- 
fused mass  oi  about  thirty  more.  It  threw  the  mosaic  almost  into  candle- 
light, but  at  the  west  end  twenty-one  narrow  windows  above  the  bronze 
doors  were  lighted  by  the  afternoon  sun  right  through,  burning  in  all 
their  colours,  a  fiery  jewellery.  ...  I  saw  nothing  at  Rome  comparable 
to  it" 
The  design  of  the  mosaic  of  Christ,  here  attributed  by  Ruskin  to  Cristofiini  Buon- 
amico  (1262-1361X  nicknamed  BufFalmacoo,  is  by  others  asrigned  to  Cimabue.] 


II.  IDOLATRY  287 

by  the  illuminated  inscription  underneath,  "Here  we  are 

•        W  1 

again.  ^ 

56.  When  it  is  assumed,  and  with  too  good  reason,  that 
the  mind  of  the  English  populace  is  to  he  addressed,  in  the 
principal  Sacred  Festival  of  its  year,  by  sculpture  such  as 
this,  I  need  scarcely  point  out  to  you  that  the  hope  is  ab- 
solutely futile  of  advancing  their  intelligence  by  collecting 
within  this  building  (itself  devoid  absolutely  of  every  kind 
of  art,  and  so  vilely  constructed  that  those  who  traverse 
it  are  continually  in  danger  of  falling  over  the  cross-bars 
that  bind  it  together,)  examples  of  sculpture  £Ached  indis- 
criminately from  the  past  work,  bad  and  good,  of  Turks, 
Greeks,  Romans,  Moors,  and  Christians,  miscoloured,  mis- 
placed, and  misinteipreted ;  *  here  thrust  into  unseemly 
comers,  and  there  morticed  together  into  mere  confusion 
of  heterogeneous  obstacle;  pronouncing  itself  hourly  more 
intolerable  in  weariness,  until  any  kind  of  relief  is  sought 
from  it  in  steam  wheelbarrows  or  cheap  toyshops;  and 
most  of  all  in  beer  and  meat,  the  corks  and  the  bones 
being  dropped  through  the  chinks  in  the  damp  deal  floor- 
ing of  the  English  Fairy  Palace.' 

57.  But  you  will  probably  think  me  unjust  in  assuming 
that  a  building  prepared  only  for  the  amusement  of  the 
people  can  typically  represent  the  architecture  or  sculpture 
of  modem  England.  You  may  urge  that  I  ought  rather 
to  describe  the  qualities  of  the  refined  sculpture  which  is 
executed  in  large  quantities  for  private  persons  belonging 

*  ''  Falsely  represented/'  would  be  the  better  expression.  In  the  cast  of 
the  tomb  of  Queen  Eleanor^  for  a  single  instance,  the  Gothic  foliage,  of  which 
one  essential  virtue  is  its  change  over  every  shield,  is  represented  by  a 
repetition  of  casts  fix>m  one  mould,  of  which  the  design  itself  is  entirely 
conjectural.' 

1  [Compare  the  lecture  on  "  Modem  Art."  §  25  (VoL  XIX.  p.  217).  The  true 
«late,  as  there  appears,  was  Christmas,  1866.J 

'  [Here,  again,  compare  '^Modern  Art"  (iMd,  p.  218).1 

'  ^A  cast  of  a  portion  of  the  tomb  of  Queen  Eleanor  of  Castile  is  in  the  Ruskin 
Drawing  School,  and  a  drawing  by  Ruskin  of  the  shield  is  in  the  Rudimentary  Series, 
No.  11  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  174).  The  tomb  is  described  and  illustrated  at  p.  66  of  the 
I\>fnUar  Guide  to  Weitmintter  Ahbey  (published  by  the  Pall  Mall  OaateiU).] 


288  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

to  the  upper  classes,  and  for  sepulchral  and  memorial  pur- 
poses. But  I  could  not  now  criticise  that  sculpture  with 
any  power  of  conviction  to  you,  because  I  have  not  yet 
stated  to  you  the  principles  of  good  sculpture  in  general 
I  will,  however,  in  some  points,  tell  you  the  fSacts  by  anti- 
cipation. 

58.  We  have  much  excellent  portrait  sculpture;  but 
portrait  sculpture,  which  is  nothing  more,  is  always  third- 
rate  work,  even  when  produced  by  men  of  genius; — nor 
does  it  in  the  least  require  men  of  genius  to  produce  it. 
To  paint  a  portrait,  indeed,  implies  the  very  highest  gifts 
of  painting ;  but  any  man,  of  ordinary  patience  and  artistic 
feeling,  can  carve  a  satisfactory  bust. 

59.  Of  our  powers  in  historical  sculpture,  I  am,  without 
question,  just,  in  taking  for  sufficient  evidence  the  monu- 
ments we  have  erected  to  otir  two  greatest  heroes  by  sea 
and  land ;  namely,  the  Nelson  Colunm,  and  the  statue  of 
the  Duke  of  Wellington  opposite  Apsley  House.^  Nor 
will  you,  I  hope,  think  me  severe, — certainly,  whatever 
you  may  think  me,  I  am  using  only  the  most  temperate 
language,  in  saying  of  both  these  monuments,  that  they 
are  absolutely  devoid  of  high  sculptural  merit.  But  con- 
sider how  much  is  involved  in  the  fiact  thus  dispassionately 
stated,  respecting  the  two  monuments  in  the  principal 
places  of  our  capital,  to  our  two  greatest  heroes. 

60.  Remember  that  we  have  before  our  eyes,  as  subjects 
of  perpetual  study  and  thought,  the  art  of  all  the  world 
for  three  thousand  years  past;  especially,  we  have  the  best 
sculpture  of  Greece,  for  example  of  bodily  perfection;  the 
best  of  Rome,  for  example  of  character  in  portraiture;  the 
best  of  Florence,  for  example  of  romantic  passion ;  we  have 
unlimited  access  to  books  and  other  sources  of  instruction; 
we  have  the  most  perfect  scientific  illustrations  of  anatomy, 
both  human  and  comparative;  and  we  have  bribes  for  the 

^  [For  other  referenoM  to  the  Nelson  Colmnii,  see  Stone*  qf  Veniee,  voL  L 
(VoL  IX.  pp.  112,  268,  261),  and  8t.  Mark's  But,  §  2;  for  the  Wellington  Statue, 
Vol.  IX.  p.  308.] 


IL   IDOLATRY  289 

reward  of  success,  large  in  the  proportion  of  at  least  twenty 
to  one>  as  compared  with  those  offered  to  the  artists  of 
any  other  period.  And  with  all  these  advantages,  and  the 
stimulus  also  of  fame  carried  instantly  by  the  press  to  the 
remotest  comers  of  Europe,  the  best  efforts  we  can  make, 
on  the  grandest  of  occasions,  result  in  work  which  it  is  im- 
possible in  any  one  particular  to  praise. 

Now  consider  for  yourselves  what  an  intensity  of  the 
n^ation  of  the  faculty  of  sculpture  this  implies  in  the 
national  mind  1  What  measure  can  be  assigned  to  the  gulf 
of  incapacity,  which  can  deliberately  swallow  up  in  the 
goi^  of  it  the  teaching  and  example  of  three  thousand 
years,  and  produce,  as  the  result  of  that  instruction,  what 
it  is  courteous  to  call  '^ nothing"? 

61.  That  is  the  conclusion  at  which  we  arrive  on  the 
evidence  presented  by  our  historical  sculpture.  To  com- 
plete the  measure  of  ourselves,  we  must  endeavour  to 
estimate  the  rank  of  the  two  opposite  schools  of  sculpture 
employed  by  us  in  the  nominal  service  of  religion,  and  in 
the  actual  service  of  vice. 

I  am  aware  of  no  statue  of  Christ,  nor  of  any  apostle 
of  Christ,  nor  of  any  scene  related  in  the  New  Testament, 
produced  by  us  within  the  last  three  hundred  years,  which 
has  possessed  even  superficial  merit  enough  to  attract  public 
attention. 

Whereas  the  steadily  immoral  effect  of  the  formative 
art  which  we  learn,  more  or  less  apishly,  from  the  French 
schools,  and  employ,  but  too  gladly,  in  manufacturing  articles 
for  the  amusement  of  the  luxurious  classes,  must  be  ranked 
as  one  of  the  chief  instruments  used  by  joyful  fiends  and 
angry  fates  for  the  ruin  of  our  civilization. 

If,  after  I  have  set  before  you  the  nature  and  principles 
of  true  sculpture,  in  Athens,  Pisa,  and  Florence,  you  con- 
sider these  facts, — (which  you  will  then  at  once  recognize 
as  such), — ^you  will  find  that  they  absolutely  justify  my 
assertion^  that  the  state  of  sculpture  in  modem  England, 

1  [Sm  above,  §  52.] 


240  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

as  compared  with  that  of  the  great  Ancients,  is  literally 
one  of  corrupt  and  dishonourable  death,  as  opposed  to  bright 
and  £ameful  life. 

62.  And  now,  will  you  bear  with  me  while  I  tell  you 
finally  why  this  is  so? 

The  cause  with  which  you  are  personally  concerned  is 
your  own  firivolity;  though  essentially  this  is  not  your 
fiftult,  but  that  of  the  system  of  your  early  training.  But 
the  fact  remains  the  same,  that  here,  in  Oxford,  you,  a 
chosen  body  of  English  youth,  in  nowise  care  for  the  his- 
tory of  your  country,  for  its  present  dangers,  or  its  present 
duties.  You  still,  like  children  of  seven  or  eight  years 
old,  are  interested  only  in  bats,  balls,  and  oars :  ^  nay,  in- 
cluding with  you  the  students  of  Germany  and  France,  it 
is  certain  that  the  general  body  of  modem  European  youth 
have  their  minds  occupied  more  seriously  by  the  sculpture 
and  painting  of  the  bowls  of  their  tobacco-pipes,  than  by 
all  the  divinest  workmanship  and  passionate  imagination  of 
Greece,  Rome,  and  Mediasval  Christendom. 

68.  But  the  elementary  causes,  both  of  this  Mvolity  in 
you,  and  of  worse  than  frivolity  in  older  persons,  are  the 
two  forms  of  deadly  Idolatry  which  are  now  all  but  universal 
in  England. 

The  first  of  these  is  the  worship  of  the  Eidolon,  or 
Phantasm  of  Wealth;  worship  of  which  you  will  find  the 
nature  partly  examined  in  the  thirty-seventh  paragraph  of 
my  Munera  JPulveris;^  but  which  is  briefly  to  be  defined 
as  the  servile  apprehension  of  an  active  power  in  Money, 
and  the  submission  to  it  as  the  God  of  our  life. 

64.  The  second  elementary  cause  of  the  loss  of  our 
nobly  imaginative  faculty,  is  the  worship  of  the  Letter, 
instead  of  the  Spirit,  in  what  we  chiefly  accept  as  the 
ordinance  and  teaching  of  Deity;  and  the  apprehension  of 
a  healing  sacredness  in  the  act  of  reading  the  Book  whose 
primal  commands  we  refuse  to  ob^. 

^  [For  other  reference!  by  Raikin  to  the  ethletic  eraie,  see  VoL  VII.  p.  341  n.] 
«  [VoL  XVII.  p.  168.] 


II.   IDOLATRY  241 

No  feather  idol  of  Polynesia  was  ever  a  sign  of  a  more 
shameful  idolatry  than  the  modem  notion  in  the  minds  of 
certainly  the  majority  of  English  religious  persons,  that  the 
Word  of  God,  by  which  the  heavens  were  of  old,  and  the 
earth,  standing  out  of  the  water  and  in  the  water,^ — ^the 
Word  of  God  which  came  to  the  prophets,  and  comes  still 
for  ever  to  all  who  will  hear  it  (and  to  many  who  will 
forbear) ;  and  which,  called  Faithful  and  True,  is  to  lead 
forth,  in  the  judgment,  the  armies  of  heaven, — ^that  this 
"  Word  of  God "  may  yet  be  bound  at  our  pleasure  in 
morocco,'  and  carried  about  in  a  young  lady*s  pocket,  with 
tasselled  ribands  to  mark  the  passages  she  most  approves  of. 

65.  Gentlemen,  there  has  hitherto  been  seen  no  instance, 
and  England  is  little  likely  to  give  the  unexampled  spec- 
tacle, of  a  country  successful  in  the  noble  arts,  yet  in 
which  the  youths  were  frivolous,  the  maidens  falsely  reli- 
gious; the  men,  slaves  of  money,  and  the  matrons,  of 
vanity.  Not  from  all  the  marble  of  the  hiUs  of  Luini  will 
such  a  people  ever  shape  one  statue  that  may  stand  nobly 
against  the  sky;  not  from  all  the  treasures  bequeathed  to 
them  by  the  great  dead,  will  they  gather,  for  their  own 
descendants,  any  inheritance  but  shame. 

^  [2  Peter  iii.  5 ;  and  for  the  following  Bible  references,  see  £zekiel  ii.  6,  7 ; 
Revelation  ziz.  11.] 

s  [ComiMre  Setatne  and  LUiei,  §  17  (Vol.  XVIIl.  p.  67).] 


LECTURE    III 

IMAGINATION 
November,  1870 

66.  The  principal  object  of  the  preceding  Lecture,  (and  1 
choose  ratiier  to  incur  your  blame  for  tediousness  in  repeat- 
ing, than  for  obscurity  in  defining  it,)  was  to  enforce  the 
distinction  between  the  ignoble  and  false  phase  of  Idolatry, 
which  cmisists  in  the  attribution  of  a  spiritual  power  to  a 
material  thing;  and  the  noble  and  truth-seekii^  phase  of 
it,  to  which  I  shall  in  these  Lectures*  give  the  general 
term  of  Imamnation ; — that  is  to  say,  the  invention  of 
material  symbols  which  may  lead  us  to  contemplate  the 
character  and  nature  of  gods,  spirits,  or  abstract  virtues  and 
powers,  without  in  the  least  implying  the  actual  presence 
of  such  Beings  amcmg  us,  or  even  their  possession,  in 
reality,  of  the  forms  we  attribute  to  them. 

67.  For  instance,  in  the  ordinarily  received  Greek  type 
of  Athena,  on  vases  of  the  Phidian  time,  (sufficiently  repre- 
sented in  the  opposite  woodcut,^)  no  Greek  would  have 
supposed  the  vase  on  which  this  was  painted  to  be 


*  I  shall  be  oMiged  in  future  Lectures,  as  hitherto  in  my  other  writings^' 
to  use  the  terms  Idolatry  and  Imagination  in  a  more  comprehensive  sense ; 
but  here  I  use  them  for  convenience'  sake,  limitedly,  to  avoid  the  oontinoal 
occurrence  of  the  terms  noble  and  ignoble,  or  false  and  true,  with  reference 
to  modes  of  conception. 

1  [Plate  IV.  From  a  red-figure  ampBora  in  the  British  Museum  (£.  268) :  the 
design  is  referred  to  in  Lectarea  en  Art,  §  IbQ  (above,  p.  146).  Rusldn  had  oopies 
of  uoM  woodcut  printed  separately  for  purchase  in  connexion  with  Far9  CUnigera, 
Letter  78,  where  he  compares  the  arrangement  of  the  hair  with  that  of  the 
Etruacan-Leneothea— one  of  his  four  '*  Lesson  Photogrsphs."] 

*  [See,  for  instance,  in  the  case  of  ''Idolatnr/'  Lecturea  oa  Arty  §  68  (above, 
p.  66),  and  SUmea  of  Venice,  vol.  ii.  Appendix  10  (VoL  X.  p.  451) ;  and  for  Raskin's 
wide  sense  of  ''Imagination,"  see  the  aathot's  note  in  hn  index  to  /brr  Clavigera 
and  Modem  PahUera,  vol.  ii.  jiocftfii.] 

34S 


I'he  Greek  Type  of  Athena 


Triptolei 


III.   IMAGINATION  248 

Athena,  nor  to  contain  Athena  inside  of  it»  as  the  Arabian 
fisherman's  casket  contained  the  genie ;  ^  neither  did  he  think 
that  this  rude  black  painting,  done  at  speed  as  the  potter's 
fancy  urged  his  hand,  represented  anything  like  the  form 
or  aspect  of  the  goddess  herself.  Nor  would  he  have 
thought  so,  even  had  the  image  been  ever  so  beautifully 
wrought.  The  goddess  might,  indeed,  visibly  appear  under 
the  form  of  an  armed  virgin,  as  she  might  under  that 
of  a  hawk  or  a  swallow,  when  it  pleased  her  to  give  such 
manifestation  of  her  presence;  but  it  did  not,  therefore, 
follow  that  she  was  constantly  invested  with  any  of  these 
forms,  or  that  the  best  which  human  skill  could,  even  by 
her  own  aid,  picture  of  her,  was,  indeed,  a  likeness  of  her. 
The  real  use,  at  all  events,  of  this  rude  image,  was  only 
to  signify  to  the  eye  and  heart  the  facts  of  the  existence, 
in  some  manner,  of  a  Spirit  of  wisdom,  perfect  in  gentle- 
ness, irresistible  in  anger;  having  also  physical  dominion 
over  the  air  which  is  the  life  and  breath  of  all  creatures, 
and  clothed,  to  human  eyes,  with  aegis  of  fiery  doud,  and 
raiment  of  falling  dew. 

68.  In  the  yet  more  abstract  conception  of  the  Spirit 
of  Agriculture,*  in  which  the  wings  of  the  chariot  represent 
the  winds  of  Spring,  and  its  crested  dragons  are  originally 
a  mere  type  of  the  seed  with  its  twisted  root  piercing  the 
ground,  and  sharp-edged  leaves  rising  above  it,  we  are  in 
still  less  danger  of  mistaking  the  symbol  for  the  presumed 
form  of  an  actual  Person.  But  I  must,  with  persistence, 
beg  of  you  to  observe  that  in  all  the  noble  actions  of 
imagination  in  this  kind,  the  distinction  from  idolatry  con- 
sists, not  in  the  denial  of  the  being,  or  presence,  of  the 
Spirit,  but  only  in  the  due  recognition  of  our  human  inca- 
pacity to  conceive  the  one,  or  compel  the  other. 

69.  Farther — ^and  for  this  statement  I  claim  your  atten- 
tion still  more  earnestly.    As  no  nation  has  ever  attained 

»  [Compare  Vol.  XVI.  p.  224.J 

'  [Plate   V. ;    engraved    from   Lenormant   and    De  Witte,   vol.  iii.   Plate  62. 
Compare  Queen  of  tKe  Air,  §  11  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  304).] 


244  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

real  greatness  during  periods  in  which  it  was  subject  to 
any  condition  of  Idolatry,  so  no  nation  has  ever  attained 
or  persevered  in  greatness,  except  in  reaching  and  main- 
taimng  a  passionate  Imagination  of  a  spiritual  estate  higher 
than  that  of  men;  and  of  spiritual  creatines  nobler  than 
men,  having  a  quite  real  and  personal  existence,  however 
imperfectly  apprehended  by  us. 

And  all  the  arts  of  the  present  age  deserving  to  be 
included  under  the  name  of  sculpture  have  been  degraded 
by  us,  and  all  principles  of  just  policy  have  vanished  from 
us, — ^and  that  totally, — ^for  this  double  reason;  that  we  are, 
on  one  side,  given  up  to  idolatries  of  the  most  servile 
kind,  as  I  showed  you  in  the  close  of  the  last  Lecture,^ — 
while,  on  the  other  hand,  we  have  absolutely  ceased  from  the 
exercise  of  faithful  imagination ;  and  the  only  remnants 
of  the  desire  of  truth  which  remain  in  us  have  been  cor- 
rupted into  a  prurient  itch  to  discover  the  origin  of  life 
in  the  nature  of  the  dust,  and  prove  that  the  source  of  the 
order  of  the  universe  is  the  accidental  concurrence  of  its 
atoms. 

70.  Under  these  two  calamities  of  our  time,  the  art  of 
sculpture  has  perished  more  totally  than  any  other,  because 
the  object  of  that  art  is  exclusively  the  representation  of 
form  as  the  exponent  of  life.  It  is  essentially  concerned 
only  with  the  human  form,  which  is  the  exponent  of  the 
highest  life  we  know;  and  with  all  subordinate  forms  only 
as  they  exhibit  conditions  of  vital  power  which  have  some 
certain  relation  to  humanity.  It  deals  with  the  '^particula 
undique  desecta " '  of  the  animal  nature,  and  itself  contem- 
plates, and  brings  forward  for  its  disciples'  contemplation, 
all  the  energies  of  creation  which  transform  the  ifn;Xop,  or, 
lower  stUl,  the  fiopfiofm  of  the  trivia,^  by  Athena's  help,  into 

1  m  63-64,  p.  240.] 

*  [Horace  :  Odes,  i.  16, 14,  in  an  account  of  the  legend  of  Prometheus — ''forced, 
they  sajr,  to  add  to  his  prime  clay  some  part  cut  i^f  frwn  every  animal."} 

'  [The  mud  and  dang  of  the  cross-ways :  see  Luclan's  ''  Prometheus  ee  in 
verhis,"  ch.  i.] 


III.  IMAGINATION  245 

forms  of  power; — (to  fiev  o\ov  apj^ireicTwy  aira^  ^v*  (rvvnpyaS^rro 
a  T(   Kcu   ^   ^ABi^va   i/JLTTveova'a    tov    mikov  Koi   €/i>f^^a  iroiwara   eTvau 

TO  irXacr/AOTo ;)  * — but  it  has  nothing  whatever  to  do  with 
the  representation  of  forms  not  living,  however  beauti^ 
(as  of  clouds  or  waves) ;  nor  may  it  condescend  to  use 
its  perfect  skill,  except  in  expressing  the  noblest  conditions 
of  life. 

These  laws  of  sculpture,  being  wholly  contrary  to  the 
practice  of  our  day,  I  cannot  expect  you  to  accept  on  my 
assertion,  nor  do  I  wish  you  to  do  so.  By  placing  de- 
finitely good  and  bad  sculpture  before  you,  I  do  not  doubt 
but  that  I  shall  gradually  prove  to  you  the  nature  of  all 
excelling  and  enduring  qualities;  but  to-day  I  will  only 
confirm  my  assertions  by  laying  before  you  the  statement 
of  the  Greeks  themselves  on  the  subject;  given  in  their 
own  noblest  time,  and  assuredly  authoritative,  in  every 
point  which  it  embraces,  for  all  time  to  come. 

71.  If  any  of  you  have  looked  at  the  explanation  I  have 
given  of  the  myth  o^  Athena  in  my  Queen  of  the  Air,  you 
cannot  but  have  been  surprised  that  I  took  scarcely  any 
note  of  the  story  of  her  birth.^  I  did  not,  because  that 
story  is  connected  intimately  with  the  Apolline  myths;  and 
is  told  of  Athena,  not  essentially  as  the  goddess  of  the  air, 
but  as  the  goddess  of  Art- Wisdom. 

You  have  probably  often  smiled  at  the  legend  itself>  or 
avoided  thinking  of  it,  as  revolting.  It  is,  indeed,  one  of 
the  most  painful  and  childish  of  sacred  myths;  yet  remem- 
ber, ludicrous  and  ugly  as  it  seems  to  us,  this  story  satisfied 
the  fancy  of  the  Athenian  people  in  their  highest  state ;  and 
if  it  did  not  satisfy,  yet  it  was  accepted  by,  all  later  myth- 
ologists :  you  may  also  remember  I  told  you '  to  be  prepared 

*  ''And  in  sum,  he  himself  (Prometheus)  was  the  master-maker^  and 
Athena  worked  together  with  him,  breathing  into  the  clay,  and  caused  the 
moulded  things  to  have  soul  (psyche)  in  them." — Lucian,  Prometheus.^ 

1  [See  the  passing  allusion  io  §  41  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  342).] 

'  'See,  again,  ''Prometheus  es  in  yerbis,"  ch.  iii.] 

s  [See  above,  Lectures  en  Art,  §§  19,  162  (above,  pp.  33^  141).] 


246  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

always  to  find  that,  given  a  certain  d^ree  of  national  in- 
tellect, the  ruder  the  symbol,  the  deeper  would  be  its  pur- 
pose. And  this  legend  of  the  birth  of  Athena  is  the  central 
myth  of  all  that  the  Greeks  have  left  us  respecting  the 
power  of  their  arts;  and  in  it  they  have  expressed,  as  it 
seemed  good  to  them,  the  most  important  things  they  had 
to  tell  us  on  these  matters.  We  may  read  them  wrongly; 
but  we  must  read  them  here,  if  anywhere. 

72.  There  are  so  many  threads  to  be  gathered  up  in  the 
legend,  that  I  cannot  hope  to  put  it  before  you  in  total 
clearness,  but  I  will  take  main  points.  Athena  is  bom  in 
the  island  of  Rhodes;  and  that  island  is  raised  out  of  the 
sea  by  Apollo,  after  he  had  been  left  without  inheritance 
among  the  gods.  Zeus  *^  would  have  cast  the  lot  again,  but 
Apollo  orders  the  golden-girdled  Lachesis  to  stretch  out  her 
hands;  and  not  now  by  chance  or  lot,  but  by  noble  en- 
chantment, the  island  rises  out  of  the  sea. 

Physically,  this  represents  the  action  of  heat  and  light 
on  chaos,  especially  on  the  deep  sea.  It  is  the  '^Fiat  lux'' 
of  Genesis,^  the  first  process  in  the  conquest  of  Fate  by 
Harmony.  The  island  is  dedicated  to  the  nymph  Rhodos, 
by  whom  Apollo  has  the  seven  sons  who  teach  (To^HHrrara 
vo^fiara;^  because  the  rose  is  the  most  beautiful  organism 
existing  in  matter  not  vital,  expressive  of  the  direct  action 
of  light  on  the  earth,'  giving  lovely  form  and  colour  at 
once,  (compare  the  use  of  it  by  Dante,  as  the  form  of 
the  sainted  crowd  in  highest  heaven);^  and  remember  that, 
therefore,  the  rose  is,  in  the  Greek  mind,  essentially  a 
Doric  flower,  expressing  the  worship  of  Light,  as  the  Iris 

*  His  relations  with  the  two  great  Titans,  Themis  and  Mnemosyne, 
belong  to  another  group  of  myths.  The  father  of  Athena  is  the  lower  and 
nearer  physical  Zeus,  from  whom  Metis,  the  mother  of  Athena,  long  with- 
draws and  disguises  herself. 


1 
s 
s 

4 


For  "  Fiat  lax "  (Genesis  i.  3),  see  Eagle'*  Nwt;  §  99.] 

'Pindar:  Olymp.  vii.  72.] 

Compare  Modem  Paintere,  vol.  iv.  (VoL  VI.  p.  62).] 

Paradieo,  xzx.,  xxzL :  see  Vol.  V.  p.  272,  where  also  the  passage  is  referred  to.] 


III.   IMAGINATION  247 

or  Ion  is  an  Ionic  one,  expressing  the  worship  of  the 
Winds  and  Dew.^ 

78.  To  understand  the  agency  of  Hephaestus  at  the  birth 
of  Athena,  we  must  again  return  to  the  founding  of  the 
arts  on  agriculture  by  the  hand.  Before  you  can  cultivate 
land,  you  must  clear  it;  and  the  characteristic  weapon  of 
Hephaestus, — ^which  is  as  much  his  attribute  as  the  trident 
is  of  Poseidon,  and  the  rhabdos  of  Hermes,  is  not,  as 
you  would  have  expected,  the  hammer,  but  the  clearing- 
axe — ^the  double-edged  xeXen/y,  the  same  that  Calypso  gives 
Ulysses  with  which  to  cut  down  the  trees  for  his  home 
voyage;^  so  that  both  the  naval  and  agricultural  strength 
of  the  Athenians  are  expressed  by  this  weapon,  with  which 
they  had  to  hew  out  their  fortune.  And  you  must  keep 
in  mind  this  agriculturally  laborious  character  of  Hephaes- 
tus,® even  when  he  is  most  distinctly  the  god  of  serviceable 
fire;  thus  Horace's  perfect  epithet  for  him,  "avidus,"  ex- 
presses at  once  the  devouring  eagerness  of  fire,  and  the  zeal 
of  progressive  labour,  for  Horace  gives  it  to  him  when  he 
is  fighting  against  the  giants/  And  this  rude  symbol  of 
his  cleaving  the  forehead  of  Zeus  with  the  axe,  and  giving 
birth  to  Athena,  signifies  indeed,  physically,  the  thrilling 
power  of  heat  in  the  heavens,  rending  the  clouds,  and  giving 
birth  to  the  blue  air ;  but  far  more  deeply  it  signifies  the 
subduing  of  adverse  Fate  by  true  labour;  until,  out  of  the 
chasm,  cleft  by  resolute  and  industrious  fortitude,  springs 
the  Spirit  of  Wisdom. 

74.  Here  (Fig.  8)^  is  an  early  drawing  of  the  myth, 
to  which  I  shall  have  to  refer  afterwards^  in  illustration  of 
the  childishness  of  the  Greek  mind  at  the  time  when  its 
art^symbols  were  first  fixed;    but  it  is  of  peculiar  value, 

1  [Compare  ''Notes  on  the  Educational  Series/'  Vol  XXI.  p.  lia] 

*  Odyueyy  ▼.  234.] 

3    Compare  Cuhu  qf  Agiaia,  Vol  XIX.  p.  66.] 

«  pde$,  iii.  4,  68.] 

'  [From  the  eztenor  of  a  black-figure  Kylix,  signed  by  Phrynos,  in  the  British 
Museum  (B.  424).  The  woodcut  was  made  from  the  drawing  in  Lenormant  and 
De  Witte,  vol.  i.  Plate  66.] 

*  [Compare  p.  406,  below.] 


248  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

because  the  phj^ical  character  of  Vulcan,  as  fire,  is  indicated 
by  his  wearing  the  ivSpo/xtSet  of  Hermes,  while  the  antagon- 
ism of  Zeus,  as  the  adverse  chaos,  either  of  cloud  or  of  fate, 
is  shown  by  his  striking  at  Hephsstus  with  his  thunder- 
bolt. But  Plate  VI.  gives  you  (as  far  as  the  li^t  on  the 
rounded  vase  will  allow  it  to  be  deciphered)  ^  a  characteristic 
representation  of  the  scene,  as  conceived  in  later  art. 

75.  I  told  you  in  a  former  Lecture  of  this  course  *  that 


the  entire  Greek  intellect  was  in  a  childish  phase  as  com- 
pared to  that  of  modem  times.  Observe,  however,  childish- 
ness does  not  necessarily  imply  universal  inferiority:  there 
may  be  a  vigorous,  acute,  pure,  and  solemn  childhood,  and 
there  may  be  a  weak,  foul,  and  ridiculous  condition  of 
advanced  life;  but  the  one  is  still  essentially  the  childish, 
and  the  other  the  adult  phase  of  existence. 

76.  You  will  find,  then,  that  the  Greeks  were  the  first 
people  that  were  bom  into  complete  humanity.  AH  nations 
before  them  had  been,  and  all  around  them  still  were,  partly 
savage,  bestial,   day-encumbered,   inhuman ;   still   semi-goat, 

•  Ante,  g  SO  [p.  S2l]. 

>  [Tbe  plats  U  from  a  drawing  in  LenOTDiant  and  De  Witte  (vol.  i.  PUU  9Sa)  : 
aee  aWe,  Prebce,  p.  19Jn.  The  deugn  ii  that  on  "the  Cailiai  Vua"  in  tbe 
British  Muteum  (B.  147 :  aaa  £.  T.  Cook'i  SaitMook,  p.  3S0).] 


^me 


III.  IMAGINATION 


249 


or  semi-ant,  or  semi-stone,  or  semi-cloud.  But  the  power 
of  a  new  spirit  came  upon  the  Greeks,  and  the  stones 
were  filled  with  breath,  and  the  clouds  clothed  with  flesh; 
and  then  came  the  great  spiritual  battle  between  the  Cen- 
taurs and  Lapithas ;  and  the  living  creatures  became  **  Chil- 
dren of  Men."  Taught,  yet  by  the  Centaur — sown,  as  they 
knew,  in  the  fang — ^from  the  dappled  skin  of  the  brute, 
from  the  leprous  scale  of  the  serpent,  their  flesh  came 
again  as  the  flesh  of  a  little  child,  and  they  were  clean. 

Fix  your  mind  on  this  as  the  very  central  character  of 
the  Greek  race — ^the  being  bom  pure  and  human  out  of 
the  brutal  misery  of  the  past,  and  looking  abroad,  for  the 
first  time,  with  their  children's  eyes,  wonderingly  open,  on 
the  strange  and  divine  world. 

77.  Make  some  efibrt  to  remember,  so  far  as  may  be 
possible  to  you,  either  what  you  felt  in  yourselves  when 
you  were  young,  or  what  you  have  observed  in  other  chil- 
dren, of  the  action  of  thought  and  fancy.  Children  are 
continually  represented  as  living  in  an  ideal  world  of  their 
own.  So  far  as  I  have  myself  observed,  the  distinctive 
character  of  a  child  is  to  live  always  in  the  tangible  present, 
having  little  pleasure  in  memory,  and  being  utterly  im- 
patient and  tormented  by  anticipation:  weak  alike  in  re- 
i!:^o,.  «.d  forethought/but  haLg  «.  intense  possession 
of  the  actual  present,  down  to  the  shortest  moments  and 
least  objects  of  it;  possessing  it,  indeed,  so  intensely  that 
the  sweet  childish  days  are  as  long  as  twenty  days  will 
be;  and  setting  all  the  faculties  of  heart  and  imagination 
on  little  things,  so  as  to  be  able  to  make  anything  out 
of  them  he  chooses.  Confined  to  a  little  garden,  he  does 
not  imagine  himself  somewhere  else,  but  makes  a  great 
garden  out  of  that ;  ^  possessed  of  an  acorn-cup,  he  will  not 
despise  it  and  throw  it  away,  and  covet  a  golden  one  in 
its  stead:  it  is  the  adult  who  does  so.  The  child  keeps 
his  acorn-cup  as  a  treasure,  and  makes  a  golden  one  out 

1  [Compare  Ruskin's  aoooant  of  his  own  childhood  and  the  Heme  HiU  irarden  : 
PraierUa,  1.  §  89.] 


250  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

of  it  in  his  mind;  so  that  the  wondering  grown-up  person 
standing  beside  hun  is  always  tempted  to  ask  concerning  his 
treasures,  not,  "What  would  you  have  more  than  these?" 
but  "What  possibly  can  you  see  in  these?"  for,  to  the 
bystander,  there  is  a  ludicrous  and  incomprehensible  in- 
consistency between  the  child's  words  and  the  reality.  The 
little  thing  tells  him  gravely,  holding  up  the  acorn-cup, 
that  "this  is  a  queen's  crown,**  or  "a  fairy's  boat,"  and, 
with  beautiful  effrontery,  expects  him  to  believe  the  same. 
But  observe — ^the  acorn-cup  must  be  there,  and  in  his  own 
hand.  "Give  it  me;  then  I  will  make  more  of  it  for 
myself."    That  is  the  child's  one  word,  always. 

78.  It  is  also  the  one  word  of  the  Greek — "Give  it 
me."  Give  me  any  thing  definite  here  in  my  sight,  then 
I  will  make  more  of  it. 

I  cannot  easily  express  to  you  how  strange  it  seems  to 
me  that  I  am  obliged,  here  in  Oxford,  to  take  the  position 
of  an  apologist  for  Greek  art;^  that  I  find,  in  spite  of  all 
the  devotion  of  the  admirable  scholars  who  have  so  long 
maintained  in  our  public  schools  the  authority  of  Greek 
literature,  our  younger  students  take  no  interest  in  the 
manual  work  of  the  people  upon  whose  thoughts  the  tone 
of  their  early  intellectual  life  has  exclusively  depended. 
But  I  am '  not  surprised  that  the  interest,  if  awakened, 
should  not  at  first  take  the  form  of  admiration.  The  in- 
consistency between  an  Homeric  description  of  a  piece  of 
furniture  or  armour,  and  the  actual  rudeness  of  any  piece 
of  art  approximating,  within  even  three  or  four  centuries, 
to  the  Homeric  period,  is  so  great,  that  we  at  first  cannot 
recognize  the  art  as  elucidatory  of,  or  in  any  way  related 
to,  the  poetic  language.' 

79.  You  will  find,  however,  exactly  the  same  kind  of 
discrepancy  between  early  sculpture,  and  the  languages  of 
deed  and  thought,  in  the  second  birth,  and  childhood,  of 

^  [Ruskin,  m  we  hare  leen^  was  a  pioneer  in  advocating  the  aasoeiation  of 
ArehflBology  with  the  other  studies  of  the  Unirenitr :  see  Vol.  XVL  p.  IxviiL] 
s  [Compare  ''Verona  and  its  Rivers/'  §  12  (VoL  XIX.  p.  436).] 


HI.  IMAGINATION  251 

the  world,  under  Christianity.    The  same  fair  thoughts  and 
bright  imaginations  arise  again ;  and,  similarly,  the  £ancy  is 
content  witii  the  rudest  symbols  by  which  they  can  be  for- 
malized to  the  eyes.     You  cannot  understand  that  the  rigid 
figure   [Plate  IV.]  with  chequers  or  spots  on  its   breast, 
and  sharp  lines  of  drapery  to  its  feet,  could  represent,  to 
the  Greek,  the  hewing  majesty 
of  heaven:  but  can  you  any 
better  understand  how  a  sym- 
bol so  haggard  as  this  (Fig. 
9),^    could    represent    to   the 
noblest  hearts  of  the  Christian 
ages  the  power  and  ministra- 
tion of  angels  ?    Yet  it  not 
only  did   so,  but  retained  in 
the  rude  undulatory  and  linear 
ornamentation  of  its  dress,  re- 
cord of  the  thoughts  intended 
to  be  conveyed  by  the  spot- 
ted  aegis   and   falling   chiton 
of  Athena,  eighteen  hundred 
years  before.   Greek  and  Vene- 
tian alike,  in  their  noble  child- 
hood,   knew   with   the   same 
terror  the   coiling  wind   and 
congealed  hail  in  heaven — saw 

with  the  same  thankfulness  the  dew  shed  softly  on  the 
earth,  and  on  its  flowers;  and  both  recognized,  ruHng  these, 
and  symbolized  by  them,  the  great  helpful  spirit  of  Wis- 
dom, which  leads  the  children  of  men  to  all  knowledge,  all 
courage,  and  all  art. 

80.  Read  the  inscription  written  on  the  sarcophagus 
(Plate  VII.),  at  the  extremity  of  which  this  angel  is  sculp- 
tured. It  stands  in  an  open  recess  in  the  rude  brick  wall 
of  the  west  front   of  the  church  of  St.   John  and  Paul  at 

^  [From  the  Barcophai^iu  deacribad  in  tb«  aezt  section.] 


252  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Venice,  being  the  tomb  of  the  two  doges,  father  and  scai, 
Jacopo  and  Lorenzo  Tiepolc*    This  is  the  inscription: — 

"Quos  Datura  pares  studiis,  virtutibus,  arte 
Edidit,  illustres  genitor  natusque,  sepulti 
Hie  sub  rupe  Duces.     Venetum  chariisima  proles 
Tlieupula  collatis  dedit  bos  celebranda  triumphis. 
Omnia  presentis  donavit  predia  templi 
Duz  Jacobus :  valido  fixit  modenunine  leges 
Urbis,  et  ingratam  redimens  certamine  Jadram 
Dalmatiosque  dedit  patrie.  post,  Marte  subactsa 
Graiorum  pelago  maculavit  san^ine  classes. 
Suscipit  oblatos  princepa  Laurentius  Istros, 
£t  domuit  rigidos,  ingenti  strage  cadcutes, 
Bononie  populos.     Hioc  subdita  Cervia  cessit. 
Fundavere  vias  pacis ;  fortique  relictl 
Re,  superos  sacris  petierunt  meutibus  ambo. 

Dominus  Jachobus  hobiit*  u.  ecu.     Dominus  Laurentius 
hobiit  H.  ccLxmnn." 

You  see,  therefore,  this  tomb  is  an  invaluable  example 
of  thirteenth-century   sculpture  in  Venice.     In  Figures  10 
and  11,  you  have  an  example  of  the 
(coin)  sculpture  of  the  date  accurately 
corresponding  in  Greece  to  the  thir- 
teenth century  in  Venice,  when  the 
meaning  of  symbols  was  everything, 
and  the  workmanship  comparatively 
nothing.     The  first  head  [Fig.  10]  is 
an  Athena,  of  Athenian  work  in  the 
seventh  or  sixth   century — (the  coin 
j^  ,£,    itself  may  have  bedn  struck  later,  but 
the  archaic  type  was  retained).*    The 
two  smaller  impressions  are  the  front  and  obverse  [Fig.  11] 
of  a  coin  of  the  same  age  &om  Corinth,  the  head  of  Athena 

*  The  Latin  verses  are  of  later  date ;  the  contemporaiy  plain  prose  re- 
tains the  Venetian  gutturals  and  aspirates. 

description  of  this  monument,  tee  Stoiut  qf  Venkt,  vol.  iii.  (Vol.  XL 


'  [Por  a  descrii 

1  [The  head  of 
lar  be  seen  in  thi 


r  Athena  is  from  a  coin  of  Athena,  date  abont  b.c  4B0-M0 ;  it 
may  be  seen  in  the  exhibition  of  electrotypea  at  the  British  Museum  (II.  B.  20). 
For  another  reference  to  it,  tee  below,  g  IM  (p.  341).      "Hie  archaic  style  and 


III.   IMAGINATION  2ff8 

OD  one  side,  and  Pegasus,  with  the  archaic  Koppa,  on  the 

other.    The  smaller  head  is   bare,  the  hair  being  looped  up 

at  the  back  and  closely  bound  with  an  olive  branch.  You 
are  to  note  this  general  outline  of  the  head, 
already  given  in  a  more  finished  type  in 
Plate  II.,  as  a  most  important  elementary 
form  in  the  finest  sculpture,  not  of  Greece 
only,  but  of  all  Christendom.  In  the  upper 
head  the  hair  is  restrained  still  more  closely 
by  a  round  helmet,  for  the  most  part  smooth, 
but  embossed  with  a  single  flower  tendril, 
having  one  bud,  one  flower,  and,  above  it, 
two  olive  leaves.  You  have  thus  the  most 
absolutely  restricted  symbol  possible  to  human 
"^ "    thought   of  the  power    of  Athena   over   the 

flowers    and    trees    of  the    earth.     An   olive   leaf  by  its^ 

could  not  have  stood  for  the  sign  of  a  tree,  but  the  two 

can,  when  set  in  position  of  growth. 

I  would  not  give  you  the  reverse  of  the   coin  on  the 

same  plate,  because  you  would  have 

looked  at  it  only,  laughed  at  it,  and 

not  examined   tiie  rest ;    but  here   it 

is,  wonderftiUy  engraved  for  you  (Fig. 

12) :   of  it  we  shall  have  more  to  say 

afterwards. 

81.  And    now    as    you    look    at 

these    rude    vestiges    of   the    religion 

of  Greece,   and   at  the   vestiges   still 

ruder,   on   the    Ducal    tomb,    of   the 

religion  of  Christendom,  take  warning  against  two  opposite 


exMntioD  of  tlia  AtbenUa  money  is  to  be  accounted  for  hy  the  &ot  tlut  cnj 
alteration  in  the  appearance  of  coins  having  so  wide  a  circulation  sa  thoM  of 
Athena  might  hare  damaged  their  credit  This  fixed  hieratic  character  of  the 
coinage  of  one  of  the  areateat  Hellenic  cities  remnini,  however,  an  isolated  fact  in 
Greek  numismatics"  {Barclay  V.  Head  :  Guide  to  the  Prineipai  Coint  ^f  the  Ancientt, 
p.  27).  The  coina  of  Corinth  retained  as  a  distinguishing  marlc  the  Koppa  with 
which  the  name  of  th«  ci^  waa  spelt  in  the  earliert  timea  ((j  instead  of  K).] 


254  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

There  is  a  school  of  teachers  who  will  tell  you  that 
nothing  but  Greek  art  is  deserving  of  study,  and  that  all 
our  work  at  this  day  should  be  an  imitation  of  it. 

Whenever  you  feel  tempted  to  believe  them,  think  of 
these  portraits  of  Athena  and  her  owl,  and  be  assured  that 
Greek  art  is  not  in  all  respects  perfect,  nor  exclusively 
deserving  of  imitation. 

There  is  another  school  of  teachers  who  wiU  tell  you 
that  Greek  art  is  good  for  nothing;  that  the  soul  of  the 
Greek  was  outcast,  and  that  Christianity  entirely  super- 
seded its  faith,  and  excelled  its  works. 

Whenever  you  feel  tempted  to  believe  them^  think  of 
this  angel  on  the  tomb  of  Jacopo  Tiepolo;  and  remember 
that  Christianity,  after  it  had  been  twelve  hundred  years 
existent  as  an  imaginative  power  on  the  earth,  could  do 
no  better  work  than  this,  though  with  all  the  former  power 
of  Greece  to  help  it;  nor  was  able  to  engrave  its  triumph 
in  having  stained  its  fleets  in  the  seas  of  Greece  with  the 
blood  of  her  people,  but  between  barbarous  imitations  of 
the  pillars  which  that  people  had  invented. 

82.  Receiving  these  two  warnings,  receive  also  this 
lesson.  In  both  examples,  childish  though  it  be,  this 
Heathen  and  Christian  art  is  alike  sincere,  and  alike  vividly 
imaginative:  the  actual  work  is  that  of  infancy;  the 
thoughts,  in  their  visionary  simplicity,  are  also  the  thoughts 
of  infancy,  but  in  their  solemn  virtue  they  are  the  thoughts 
of  men. 

We,  on  the  contrary,  are  now,  in  all  that  we  do,  abso- 
lutely without  sincerity ; — absolutely,  therefore,  without  ima- 
gination, and  without  virtue.  Our  hands  are  dexterous 
with  the  vile  and  deadly  dexterity  of  machines;  our  minds 
filled  with  incoherent  fragments  of  faith,  which  we  cling 
to  in  cowardice,  without  believing,  and  make  pictures  of 
in  vanity,  without  loving.  False  and  base  alike,  whether 
we  admire  or  imitate,  we  cannot  learn  from  the  Heathen's 
art,  but  only  pilfer  it;  we  cannot  revive  the  Christian's 
art,  but  only  galvanize  it;  we  are,  in  the  sum  of  us,  not 


wmmm 


III.   IMAGINATION  255 

human  artists  at  all,  but  mechanisms  of  conceited  clay, 
masked  in  the  furs  and  feathers  of  living  creatures,  and 
convulsed  with  voltaic  spasms,  in  mockery  of  animation. 

88.  You  think,  perhaps,  that  I  am  using  terms  unjusti- 
fiable in  violence.  They  would,  indeed,  be  unjustifiable, 
if,  spoken  fi*om  this  chair,  they  were  violent  at  alL  They 
are,  unhappily,  temperate  and  accurate, — except  in  short- 
coming of  blame.  For  we  are  not  only  impotent  to  restore, 
but  strong  to  defile,  the  work  of.  past  ages.  Of  the  impo- 
tence, take  but  this  one,  utterly  humiliatory,  and,  in  the 
fiill  meaning  of  it,  ghastly,  example.  We  have  lately  been 
busy  embanking,  in  the  capital  of  the  country,  the  river 
which,  of  all  its  waters,  the  imagination  of  our  ancestors 
had  made  most  sacred,  and  the  bounty  of  nature  most 
useful.  Of  all  architectural  features  of  the  metropolis,  that 
embankment  will  be  in  future,  the  most  conspicuous;  and 
in  its  position  and  purpose  it  was  the  most  capable  of  noble 
adornment.^ 

For  that  adornment,  nevertheless,  the  utmost  which  our 
modem  poetical  imagination  has  been  able  to  invent,  is  a 
row  of  gas-lamps.  It  has,  indeed,  farther  suggested  itself 
to  our  minds  as  appropriate  to  gas-lamps  set  beside  a  river, 
that  the  gas  should  come  out  of  fishes'  tails;  but  we  have 
not  ingenuity  enough  to  cast  so  much  as  a  smelt  or  a  sprat 
for  ourselves;  so  we  borrow  the  shape  of  a  Neapolitan 
marble,  which  has  been  the  refuse  of  the  plate  and  candle- 
stick shops  in  every  capital  in  Europe  for  the  last  fifty 
years.  We  cast  that  badly,  and  give  lustre  to  the  ill-cast 
fish  with  lacquer  in  imitation  of  bronze.  On  the  base  of 
their  pedestals,  towards  the  road,  we  put,  for  advertise- 
ment's sake,  the  initials  of  the  casting  firm ;  and,  for  farther 
originality  and  Christianity's  sake,  the  caduceus  of  Mercury : 
and  to  adorn  the  fi*ont  of  the  pedestals,  towards  the  river, 
being  now  wholly  at  our  wits'  end,  we  can  think  of  nothing 
better  than  to  borrow  the  door-knocker  which — ^again  for 

^  [The  Victoria  Embankment^  commenced  in  1864^  had  been  finished  in  the  year 
of  these  lectures  (1870).] 


1 


266  ARATRA  PENTELICl 

the  last  fifty  years — has  disturbed  and  decorated  two  or 
three  millions  of  London  street-doors;  and  magnifying  the 
marveUous  device  of  it.  a  lion's  head  withTS^  its 
mouth,  (still  borrowed  from  the  Greeks  we  complete  the 
embankment  with  a  row  of  heads  and  rings,  on  a  scale 
which  enables  them  to  produce,  at  the  distance  at  which 
only  they  can  be  seen,  the  exact  effect  of  a  row  of  sentry- 
boxes. 

84.  Farther,  In  the  very  centre  of  the  City,  and  at  the 
point  where  the  Embankment  commands  a  view  of  West- 
minster Abbey  on  one  side,  and  of  St.  Paul's  on  the  other, 
— ^that  is  to  say,  at  precisely  the  most  important  and  stately 
moment  of  its  whole  course, — it  has  to  pass  under  one  of 
the  arches  of  Waterloo  Bridge,  which,  in  the  sweep  of 
its  curve,  is  as  vast — ^it  alone — as  the  Rialto  at  Venice, 
and  scarcely  less  seemly  in  proportions.  But  over  the 
Rialto,  though  of  late  and  debased  Venetian  work,  there 
still  reigns  some  power  of  human  imagination:  on  the 
two  flanks  of  it  are  carved  the  Virgin  and  the  Angel  of 
the  Annunciation;  on  the  keystone,  the  descending  Dove.^ 
It  is  not,  indeed,  the  fault  of  living  designers  that  the 
Waterloo  arch  is  nothing  more  than  a  gloomy  and  hollow 
heap  of  wedged  blocks  of  blind  granite.  But  just  beyond 
the  damp  shadow  of  it,  the  new  Embankment  is  reached 
by  a  flight  of  stairs,  which  are,  in  point  of  fact,  the  prin- 
cipal approach  to  it,  afoot,  from  central  London;  the 
descent  from  the  very  midst  of  the  metropolis  of  England 
to  the  banks  of  the  chief  river  of  England;  and  for  this 
approach,  living  designers  are  answerable. 

85.  The  principal  decoration  of  the  descent  is  again  a 
gas-lamp,  but  a  idiattered  one,  with  a  brass  crown  on  the 
top  of  it,  or,  rather,  half-crown,  and  that  turned  the  wrong 
way,  the  back  of  it  to  the  river  and  causeway,  its  flame 
supplied  by  a  visible  pipe  far  wandering  along  the  wall; 
the  whole  apparatus  being  supported  by  a  rough  cross-beam. 

1  [Compare  Stanei  of  Venice^  vol.  Hi.  (Vol  XI.  p.  400).] 


. 1. 1'^  , .  ■■W."^  ■  '  ■      Ji."  .a  j.'i.m'i'JJU  IMP*  ■■■■-    >«■■ 


III.    IMAGINATION  257 

Fastened  to  the  centre  of  the  arch  above  is  a  large  pla- 
card, stating  that  the  Royal  Humane  Society's  drags  are  in 
constant  readiness,  and  that  their  office  is  at  4,  Trafalgar 
Square.  On  each  side  of  the  arch  are  temporary,  but  dis- 
mally old  and  battered  boardings,  across  two  angles  capable 
of  unseemly  use  by  the  British  public  Above  one  of  these 
is  another  placard,  stating  that  this  is  the  Victoria  Em- 
bankment. The  steps  themselves — ^some  forty  of  them — 
descend  under  a  tunnel,  which  the  shattered  gas-lamp  lights 
by  night,  and  nothing  by  day.  They  are  covereid  with 
filthy  dust,  shaken  off  from  in&iitude  of  filthy  feet ;  mixed 
up  with  shreds  of  paper,  orange-peel,  foul  straw,  rags,  and 
cigar-ends,  and  ashes ;  the  whole  agglutinated,  more  or  less» 
by  dry  saliva  into  slippery  blotches  and  patches;  or,  when 
not  so  fastened,  blown  dismally  by  the  sooty  wind  hither 
and  thither,  or  into  the  fieu^es  of  those  who  ascend  and 
descend.  The  place  is  worth  your  visit,  for  you  are  not 
likely  to  find  elsewhere  a  spot  which,  either  in  costly  and 
ponderous  brutality  of  building,  or  in  the  squalid  and  in* 
decent  accompaniment  of  it,  is  so  far  separated  from  the 
peace  and  grace  of  nature,  and  so  accurately  indicative 
of  the  methods  of  oiu*  national  resistance  to  the  Grace, 
Mercy,  and  Peace  of  Heaven.^ 

86.  I  am  obliged  always  to  use  the  English  word 
*^  Grace  "  in  two  senses,  but  remember  that  the  Greek  x^P^^ ' 
includes  them  both  (the  bestowing,  that  is  to  say,  of 
Beauty  and  Mercy);  and  especially  it  includes  these  in  the 
passage  of  Pindar's  first  ode,  which  gives  us  the  key  to  the 
right  interpretation  of  the  power  of  sculpture  in  Greece. 
You  remember  that  I  told  you,  in  my  Sixth  Introductory 
Lecture  (§  151),'  that  the  mythic  accounts  of  Greek  sculp- 
ture begin  in  the  legends  of  the  family  of  Tantalus;  and 

1  [The  deaciiption  is  ttill  (1905)  generally  applicable,  though  there  is  a  new 
lamp,  the  Roval  Humane  Society's  placard  is  removed,  and  the  cross  hoardings  have 
been  replaced  by  notices.] 

*  [See  above,  p.  90  n.  J    . 

»  [Above,  p.  142.] 


258  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

especially  in  the  most  grotesque  l^[end  of  them  all,  the 
inlaying  of  the  ivory  shoulder  of  Pelops,^  At  that  story 
Pindar  pauses, — ^not,  indeed,  without  achniration,  nor  alleg- 
ing any  impossibility  in  the  circumstances  themselves,  but 
doubting  the  careless  hunger  of  Demeter, — and  gives  his 
own  reading  of  the  event,  instead  of  the  ancient  one.  He 
justifies  this  to  himself,  and  to  his  hearers,  by  the  plea 
that  myths  have,  in  some  sort,  or  degree,  (xoJ  n,)  led  the 
mind  of  mortals  beyond  the  truth ;  and  then  he  goes  on : — 

'*  Grace,  which  creates  everything  that  is  kindly  and 
soothing  for  mortals,  adding  honour,  has  often  made  things, 
at  first  untrustworthy,  become  trustworthy  throu^  Love."  * 

87.  I  cannot,  except  in  these  lengthened  terms,  give 
you  the  complete  force  of  the  passage;  especially  of  the 
avurrov  ifjuia-aro  moTov — "made  it  trustworthy  by  passionate 
desire  that  it  should  be  so*" — ^which  exactly  describes  the 
temper  of  religious  persons  at  the  present  day,  who  are 
kindly  and  sincere,  in  clinging  to  the  forms  of  faith  which 
either  have  long  been  precious  to  themselves,  or  which  they 
feel  to  have  been  without  question  instrumental  in  advanc- 
ing the  dignity  of  mankind.  And  it  is  part  of  the  con- 
stitution of  humanity  —  a  part  which,  above  others,  you 
are  in  danger  of  unwisely  contemning  under  the  existing 
conditions  of  our  knowledge,  that  the  things  thus  sought 
for  belief  with  eager  passion,  do,  indeed,  become  trustworthy 
to  us;  that,  to  each  of  us,  they  verily  become  what  we 
would  have  them;  the  force  of  the  fi^n^  and  m^a^  with 
which  we  seek  after  them,  does,  indeed,  make  them  power- 
ful to  us  for  actual  good  or  evil;  and  it  is  thus  granted 
to  us  to  create  not  only  with  our  hands  things  that  exalt 
or  degrade  our  sight,  but  with  our  hearts  also,  things  that 
exalt  or  degrade  our  souls ;  giving  true  substance  to  all 
that  we  hoped  for;  evidence  to  things  that  we  have  not 
seen,  but  have  desired  to  see;'  and  calling,  in  the  sense  of 
creating,  things  that  are  not,  as  though  they  were. 


1 

8 


See  Queen  qf  the  Air,  §  23  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  316  n.).] 
'Oiympia,  i.  40,  60.] 
See  HebrewB  xi.  1.] 


III.  Imagination  259 

88.  You  remember  that  in  distinguishing  Imagination 
from  Idolatry,  I  referred*  you  to  the  forms  of  passionate 
affection  with  which  a  noble  pieople  commonly  regards  the 
rivers  and  springs  of  its  native  land.  Some  conception  of 
personality,  or  of  spiritual  power  in  the  stream,  is  almost 
necessarily  involved  in  such  emotion;  and  prolonged  x^P^^* 
in  the  form  of  gratitude,  the  return  of  Love  for  bene- 
fits continually  bestowed,  at  last  alike  in  all  the  highest 
and  the  simplest  minds,  when  they  are  honourable  and 
pure,  makes  this  untrue  thing  trustworthy;  airurrov  ifuwaro 
irurrov^  until  it  becomes  to  them  the  safe  basis  of  some  of 
the  happiest  impulses  of  their  moral  nature.  Next  to  the 
marbles  of  Verona,  given  you  as  a  primal  tjrpe  of  the 
sculpture  of  Christianity,  moved  to  its  best  energy  in  adorn- 
ing the  entrance  of  its  temples,  I  have  not  unwillingly 
placed,^  as  your  introduction  to  the  best  sculpture  of  the 
religion  of  Greece,  the  forms  under  which  it  represented 
the  personality  of  the  fountain  Arethusa.  But  without  re- 
striction to  those  days  of  absolute  devotion,  let  me  simply 
point  out  to  you  how  this  untrue  thing,  made  true  by 
Love,  has  intimate  and  heavenly  authority  even  over  the 
minds  of  men  of  the  most  practical  sense,  the  most  shrewd 
wit,  and  the  most  severe  precision  of  moral  temper.  The 
fair  vision  of  Sabrina  in  Comtis,  the  endearing  and  tender 
promise,  "Fies  nobilium  tu  quoque  fontium,"*  and  the 
joyful  and  proud  affection  of  the  great  Lombard's  address 
to  the  lakes  of  his  enchanted  land, — 

''Te^  Lari  maxume,  teque 
Fluctibus  et  fremitu  assurgens,  Benace,  marino,"  ' 

may  surely   be  remembered  by  you   with   regretful  piety, 

♦  Ante,  §  44  [p.  229]. 


1  [That  is,  in  the  plates  in  this  book,  the  head  of  Arethusa  from  a  Syracusan 
coin  (Pkte  II.)  following  the  porch  of  San  Zeno  (Plate  I.).] 
s  [Horace :  Otfew,  iii.  18,  13.] 
»  [Virgil :  Georgics,  ii,  160 ;  compare  Vol.  XV.  p.  400  «.] 


960  ABATRA  FEXTELICI 

when  yoo  stand  hy  the  Uuk  stones  wliicli  at  onoe  restnin 
and  di^^race  yoar  native  nwer,  as  the  final  wofsh^  rendered 
to  it  hy  modem  philosc^iy.  But  a  little  incident  wiudb  I 
saw  la^  smnmer  on  its  bndge  at  Waffin^ifiDid,  may  pot  the 
contrast  of  ancient  and  modem  feding  before  yon  still 
more  foreiUy* 

89.  Those  of  yoo  wlio  have  read  with  attention  (none 
of  OS  can  read  with  too  much  attention),  Meniere's  most 
perfect  wori^  T^  JUmnthrope^  most  remember  C^limdne's 
description  of  her  lovers,  and  her  exedlent  reason  fx  bdng 
nnaUe  to  regard  with  any  fiivom*,  **  notre  grand  flandrin  de 
yicomte,— ^lepins  que  je  Tai  vu,  trois  quarts  dlieore  durante 
eradiCT  dans  un  poits  pour  £ure  des  ronds."  ^  Hist  sentence 
is  worth  noting,  both  in  contrast  to  the  reverence  paid  by 
the  ancients  to  wells  and  springs,  and  as  one  of  the  most 
interesting  traces  of  the  extension  of  the  loathsome  halnt 
amcmg  the  upper  classes  of  Europe  and  America,  which 
now  renders  aU  external  grace,  d^^nity,  and  decency  im- 
possible  in  the  thoroughfares  of  their  jniQcipal  cities.  In 
connection  with  that  sentence  of  Moli^^s  you  may  advis- 
ably also  remember  this  fiict,  which  I  chanced  to  notice  on 
the  bridge  of  WallingfonL*  I  was  walking  from  end  to  end 
of  it,  and  back  again,  one  Sunday  afternoon  of  last  May, 
trying  to  conjecture  what  had  made  this  especial  bend  and 
ford  of  the  Thames  so  important  in  all  the  Anglo-Saxon 
wars*  It  was  one  of  the  few  sunny  afternoons  of  the  bitter 
spring,  and  I  was  very  thankful  for  its  light,  and  happy 
in  watching  beneath  it  the  flow  and  the  glittering  of  the 
classical  river,  when  I  noticed  a  well-dressed  boy,  apparently 
just  out  of  some  orderly  Sunday  school,  leaning  far  over 
the  parapet ;  watching,  as  I  conjectured,  some  bird  or  iusect 
on  the  bridge-buttress.  I  went  up  to  him  to  see  what  he 
was  looking  at ;  but  just  as  I  got  close  to  him,  he  started 
over  to  the  opposite  parapet,  and  put  himself  there  into  the 

'  FAct  T.  lie.  17.    Some  words  are  omitted  where  Ruskm  puts  s  dash.] 
'  [Compere  Eaglet  NeH,  §  240,  where  this  passage  is  referred  to.] 


^w 


III.   IMAGINATION  261 

tsame  position,  his  object  being,  as  I  then  perceived,  to  spit 
from  both  sides  upon  the  heads  of  a  pleasure  party  who 
were  passing  in  a  boat  below. 

90.  The  incident  may  seem  to  you  too  trivial  to  be 
noticed  in  this  place.  To  me,  gentlemen,  it  was  by  no 
means  trivial.  It  meant,  in  the  depth  of  it,  such  absence 
of  all  true  x^/^^»  reverence,  and  intellect,  as  it  is  very 
dreadful  to  trace  in  the  mind  of  any  human  creature,  much 
more  in  that  of  a  child  educated  with  apparently  every 
advantage  of  circumstance  in  a  beautiful  English  country 
town,  within  ten  miles  of  our  University.  Most  of  all 
is  it  terrific  when  we  regard  it  as  the  exponent  (and  this, 
in  truth,  it  is)  of  the  temper  which,  as  distinguished  from 
former  methods,  either  of  discipline  or  recreation,  the  pre- 
sent tenor  of  our  general  teaching  fosters  in  the  mind  of 
youth; — ^teaching  which  asserts  liberty  to  be  a  right,  and 
obedience  a  degradation ;  and  which,  regardless  alike  of  the 
fiumess  of  nature  and  the  grace  of  behaviour,  leaves  the 
insolent  spirit  and  degraded  senses  to  find  their  only  occupa- 
tion in  malice,  and  their  only  satisfaction  in  shame. 

91.  You  will,  I  hope,  proceed  with  me,  not  scornfully 
any  more,  to  trace,  in  the  early  art  of  a  noble  heathen 
nation,  the  feeling  of  what  was  at  least  a  better  childish- 
ness than  this  of  ours ;  and  the  efforts  to  express,  though 
with  hands  yet  failing,  and  minds  oppressed  by  ignorant 
phantasy,  the  first  truth  by  which  they  knew  that  they 
lived;  the  birth  of  wisdom  and  of  all  her  powers  of  help 
to  man,  as  the  reward  of  his  resolute  labour. 

92.  "'A^Ww  ri^yaun''  Note  that  word  of  Pindar  in  the 
Seventh  Olympic.^  This  axe-blow  of  Vulcan's  was  to  the 
Greek  mind  truly  what  Clytemnestra  falsely  asserts  hers  to 
have  been,  **t^  i^  ie^m  x^P^*  Spyov  Sucaiaf  Terrovo^  ** ;  *  physi- 
cally, it  meant  the  opening  of  the  blue  through  the  rent 
clouds  of  heaven,  by  the  action  of  local  terrestrial  heat  (of 
Hepheestus  as  opposed  to  Apollo,  who  shines  on  the  surfiace 

1  riine  65.] 

*  [JEschjlus :  Agamemnon,  1406.] 


262  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

of  the  upper  clouds,  but  cannot  pierce  them) ;  und,  spiri- 
tually, it  meant  the  first  birth  of  prudent  thought  out  of 
rude  labour,  the  clearing-axe^  in  the  hand  of  the  woodman 
being  the  practical  elementary  sign  of  his  difference  from 
the  wild  animals  of  the  wood.  Then  he  goes  on,*  "  From 
the  high  head  of  her  Father,  Athenaia  rushing  forth,  cried 
with  her  great  and  exceeding  cry ;  and  the  Heaven  trembled 
at  her,  and  the  Earth  Mother."  The  cry  of  Athena,  I 
have  before  pointed  out,'  physically  distinguishes  her,  as  the 
spirit  of  the  air,  from  silent  elemental  powers ;  but  in  this 
grand  passage  of  Pindar  it  is  again  the  mythic  cry  of  which 
he  thinks ;  that  is  to  say,  the  giving  articulate  words,  by 
intelligence,  to  the  silence  of  Fate,  "  Wisdom  crieth  aloud, 
she  uttereth  her  voice  in  the  streets,"^  and  Heaven  and 
Earth  tremble  at  her  reproof. 

98.  Uttereth  her  voice  in  the  "streets."  For  all  men, 
that  is  to  say ;  but  to  what  work  did  the  Greeks  think  that 
her  voice  was  to  call  them?  What  was  to  be  the  impulse 
communicated  by  her  prevaUing  presence ;  what  the  sign  of 
the  people's  obedience  to  her? 

This  was  to  be  the  sign — "  But  she,  the  goddess  herself, 
gave  to  them  to  prevail  over  the  dwellers  upon  earth,  with 
hest'labouring  hands  in  every  art.  And  by  their  paths  there 
were  the  likenesses  of  UxAng  and  of  creeping  things:  and 
the  glory  was  deep.  For  to  the  cunning  workman,  greater 
knowledge  comes,  undeceitful." 

94.  An  infinitely  pregnant  passage,  this,  of  which  to-day 
you  are  to  note  mainly  these  three  things:  First,  that 
Athena  is  the  goddess  of  Doing,  not  at  all  of  sentimental 
inaction.  She  is  begotten,  as  it  were,  of  the  woodman's 
axe;  her  purpose  is  never  in  a  word  only,  but  in  a  word 
and  a  blow.  She  guides  the  hands  that  labour  best,  in 
every  art 

»  [See  above,  §  73 ;  p.  247.] 

*  'Pindar:  Oiynipia,  vii.  66  9eq,] 

*  'See  Queen  qf  the  Air,  §  41  <Vol.  XIX.  p.  342).] 

^  [Proverbs  L  20 ;  Job  xxvi.  11 ;  compare  p.  70,  above.] 


III.  IMAGINATION  268 

95.  Secondly.  The  victory  given  by  Wisdom,  the  worker, 
to  the  hands  that  labour  best,  is  that  the  streets  and  ways, 
Kikevdoi,  shall  be  filled  by  likenesses  of  living  and  creeping 
things. 

Things  living,  and  creeping!  Are  the  Reptile  things 
not  alive  then?  You  think  Pindar  wrote  that  carelessly? 
or  that,  if  he  had  only  known  a  little  modem  anatomy, 
instead  of  '^  reptile "  things,  he  would  have  said  **  monocon- 
dylous  "  ^  things  ?  Be  patient,  and  let  us  attend  to  the  main 
points  first. 

Sculpture,  it  thus  appears,  is  the  only  work  of  wisdom 
that  the  Greeks  care  to  speak  of;  they  think  it  involves 
and  crowns  every  other.  Image-making  art ;  this  is  Athena's, 
as  queenliest  of  the  arts.  Literature,  the  order  and  the 
strength  of  word,  of  course  belongs  to  Apollo  and  the 
Muses;  under  Athena  are  the  Substances  and  the  Forms 
of  thii^. 

96.  Thirdly.  By  this  forming  of  Images  there  is  to  be 
gained  a  ^Meep" — ^that  is  to  say,  a  weighty,  and  prevailing, 
glory ;  not  a  floating  nor  fugitive  one.  For  to  the  cunning 
workman,  greater  knowledge  comes,  '^  undeceitful." 

**  AaivTi  * "  I  am  forced  to  use  two  English  words  to 
translate  that  single  Greek  one.  The  '* cunning'*  workman, 
thoughtful  in  experience,  touch,  and  vision  of  the  thing 
to  be  done ;  no  machine,  witless,  and  of  necessary  motion ; 
yet  not  cunning  only,  but  having  perfect  habitual  i^kill  of 
hand  also;  the  confirmed  reward  of  truthful  doing.  Recol- 
lect, in  connection  with  this  passage  of  Pindar,  Homer's 
three  verses  about  getting  the  lines  of  ship-timber  true  {IL 
XV.  410): 

TCKTovos  €V  irakafxrjuri  SarjfiovoSy  5^  pd  rt  irourns 

and  the  beautiful  epithet  of  Persephone, — ^'Saeipa,''^  as  the 

1  [That  19,  having  one  occipital  condyle  (ffdrdvXor,  a  joint)^  reptllee  and  birds 
being  daated  eoUeetively  as  ^'monooondyla."] 

>  [See  Lycophron,  710,  and  Scholiast  on  ApoUonios  Rhodius^  3,  847.] 


264  ARATKA  PENTELICI 

Tryer  and  Ejiower  of  good  work;  and  remembering  these, 
trust  Pindar  for  the  truth  of  his  sa3Hlng,  that  to  the  cun- 
ning workman — (and  let  me  solenmly  enforce  the  words  by 
adding — ^that  to  him  ordy,)  knowledge  comes  undeceitfliL 

97.  You  may  have  noticed,  perhaps,  and  with  a  smile, 
as  one  of  the  paradoxes  you  often  hear  me  blamed  for  too 
fondly  stating,^  what  I  told  you  in  the  close  of  my  Third 
Introductory  Lecture,*  that  "so  far  from  art's  being  im- 
moral, little  else  except  art  is  moral"  I  have  now  farther 
to  tell  you,  that  little  else,  except  art,  is  wise;  that  all 
knowledge,  unaccompanied  by  a  habit  of  useful  action,  is 
too  likely  to  become  deceitful,  and  that  every  habit  of  use- 
fid  action  must  resolve  itself  into  some  elementary  practice 
of  manual  labour.  And  I  would,  in  all  sober  and  direct 
earnestness,  advise  you,  whatever  may  be  the  aim,  predilec- 
tion, or  necessity  of  your  lives,  to  resolve  upon  this  one 
thii^  at  least,  that  you  will  enable  yourselves  daily  to  do 
actually  with  your  hands,  something  that  is  useful  to  man- 
kind.' To  do  anything  well  with  your  hands,  useful  or  not ; 
to  be,  even  in  trifling,  iraKafi^i<ri  Scai/Mov,  is  already  much. 
When  we  come  to  examine  the  art  of  the  Middle  Ages,  I 
shall  be  able  to  show  you  that  the  strongest  of  all  influ- 
ences of  right  then  brought  to  bear  upon  character  was  the 
necessity  for  exquisite  manual  dexterity  in  the  management 
of  the  spear  and  bridle ; '  and  in  your  own  experience  most 
of  you  will  be  able  to  recognize  the  wholesome  effect, 
alike  on  body  and  mind,  of  striving,  within  proper  limits 
of  time,  to  become  either  good  batsmen  or  good  oarsmen. 
But  the  bat  and  the  racer's  oar  are  children's  toys.  Re- 
solve that  you  wiU  be  men  in  usefulness,  as  well  as  in 
strength ;  and  you  will  find  that  then  also,  but  not  till  then, 
you  can  become  men  in  understanding;  and  that  every  fine 

*  Leciuret  on  Art,  §  95  [above,  p.  9S]. 


1 

9 


^Compare  FieHon,  Fair  and  Foul,  §  23.] 

[Compare  Vol.  vIL  p.  341  n. ;  and  the  Introdnctioii,  above,  p.  zxxiz.] 

Compare  p.  363,  Wow ;  and  Fort  Cbnigera,  Letters  9  and  28.] 


IIL  IMAGINATION  265 

vision  and  subtle  theorem  will  present  itself  to  you  thence- 
forward undeeeitfully,  wro^Moovi^aiv  Ad^i^. 

08.  But  there  is  more  to  be  gathered  yet  firom  the 
words  of  Pindar.  He  is  thinking,  in  his  brief  intense  way, 
at  once  of  Athena's  work  on  the  soul,  and  of  her  literal 
power  on  the  dust  of  the  Earth.  His  *<  iceXcvdoi  **  is  a  wide 
word,  meaning  all  the  paths  of  sea  and  land.  Consider, 
therefore,  what  Athena's  own  work  adtudly  u — ^in  the  literal 
fact  of  it.  The  blue,  clear  air  is  the  sculpturing  power 
upon  the  earth  and  sea.  Where  the  surface  of  the  earth 
is  reached  by  that,  and  its  matter  and  substance  inspired 
with  and  filled  by  that,  organic  form  becomes  possible. 
You  must  indeed  have  the  sun,  also,  and  moisture;  the 
kingdom  of  Apollo  risen  out  of  the  sea:  but  the  sculptur- 
ing  of  living  things,  shape  by  shape,  is  Athena's,  so  that 
under  the  brooding  spirit  of  the  air,  what  was  without  form, 
and  void,  brings  forth  the  moving  creature  that  hath  life.^ 

99.  That  is  her  work  then — ^the  giving  of  Form;  then 
the  separately  Apolline  work  is  the  giving  of  Light;  or, 
more  strictly.  Sight:  giving  that  feculty  to  the  retina  to 
which  we  owe  not  merely  the  idea  of  light,  but  the  exist- 
ence of  it;  for  light  is  to  be  defined  only  as  the  sensation 
produced  in  the  eye  of  an  animal,  under  given  conditions; 
those  same  conditions  being,  to  a  stcme,  only  warmth 
or  chemical  influence,  but  not  light.  And  that  power  of 
seeing,  and  the  other  various  personalities  and  authorities  of 
the  animal  body,  in  pleasure  and  pain,  have  never,  hitherto^ 
been,  I  do  not  say,  explained,  but  in  anywise  touched  or 
approached  by  scientific  discovery.  Some  of  the  conditions 
of  mere  external  animal  form  and  of  muscular  vitality  have 
been  shown;  but  for  the  most  part  that  is  true,  even  of 
external  form,  which  I  wrote  six  years  ago.  ''You  may 
always  stand  by  Form  against  Force.  To  a  painter,  the 
essential  character  of  anything  is  the  form  of  it,  and  the 
philosophers  cannot  touch  that.    They  come  and  tell  you, 

1  [Genesis  i.  2,  20.] 


266  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

for  instance,  that  there  is  as  much  heat,  or  motion,  or  calo^ 
rific  energy  (or  whatever  else  they  like  to  call  it),  in  a  tea- 
kettle, as  in  a  Gier-eagle.  Very  good :  that  is  so,  and  it  is 
very  interesting.  It  requires  just  as  much  heat  as  will  boil 
the  kettle,  to  take  the  Gier-eagle  up  to  his  nest,  and  as 
much  more  to  bring  him  down  again  on  a  hare  or  a  par- 
tridge. But  we  painters,  acknowledging  the  equaUty  and 
similarity  of  the  kettle  and  the  bird  in  all  scientific  respects, 
attach,  for  our  part,  our  principal  interest  to  the  diffisrence 
in  their  forms.  For  us,  the  primarily  cognizable  &cts,  in 
the  two  things,  are,  that  the  kettle  has  a  spout,  and  the 
eagle  a  beak;  the  one  a  lid  on  its  back,  the  other  a  pair 
of  wings;  not  to  speak  of  the  distinction  also  of  volition, 
which  the  philosophers  may  properly  call  merely  a  form 
or  mode  of  force — ^but  then,  to  an  artist,  the  form  or  mode 
is  the  gist  of  the  business."  ^ 

100.  As  you  will  find  that  it  is,  not  to  the  artist  only, 
but  to  all  of  us.  The  laws  under  which  matter  is  collected 
and  constructed  are  the  same  throughout  the  universe:  the 
substance  so  collected,  whether  for  the  making  of  the  eagle, 
or  the  worm,  may  be  analjrzed  into  gaseous  identity;  a 
diffusive  vital  force,  apparently  so  closely  related  to  mecha- 
nically measurable  heat  as  to  admit  the  conception  of  its 
being  itself  mechanically  measurable,  and  unchanging  in 
total  quantity,  ebbs  and  flows  alike  through  the  limbs  of 
men  and  the  fibres  of  insects.  But,  above  all  this,  and 
ruling  every  grotesque  or  degraded  accident  of  this,  are 
two  laws  of  beauty  in  form,  and  of  nobility  in  character, 
which  stand  in  the  chaos  of  creation  between  the  Living 
and  the  Dead,  to  separate  the  things  that  have  in  them  a 
sacred  and  helpfiil,  from  those  that  have  in  them  an  ac- 
cursed and  destroying,  nature;  and  the  power  of  Athena, 
first  physically  put   forth  in  the  sculpturii^  of  these  l^v^ 

*  Ethics  of  the  Dust,  Lecture  XI.^ 

^  [§  107,  Vol.  XVIII.  p.  342 ;  and  compare  Qiuen  qf  the  Air,  §  69  (Vol.  XIX. 
p.  366),  and  Vol  dTAmo,  §  141.] 


III.   IMAGINATION  267 

and  Spirera,  these  living  and  reptile  things,  is  put  forth, 
finally,  in  enabling  the  hearts  of  men  to  discern  the  one 
from  the  other;  to  know  the  unquenchable  fires  of  the 
Spirit  from  the  unquenchable  fires  of  Death ;  ^  and  to  choose, 
not  unaided,  between  submission  to  the  Love  that  cannot 
end,  or  to  the  Worm  that  cannot  die. 

101.  The  unconsciousness  of  their  antagonism  is  the 
most  notable  characteristic  of  the  modem  scientific  mind; 
and  I  believe  no  credulity  or  fiaUacy  admitted  by  the  weak- 
ness (or  it  may  sometimes  rather  have  been  the  strength) 
of  early  imagination,  indicates  so  strai^  a  depression  be- 
neath the  due  scale  of  human  intellect,  as  the  failure  of 
the  sense  of  beauty  in  form,  and  loss  of  £uth  in  heroism  of 
conduct,  which  have  become  the  curses  of  recetit  science,* 
art,  and  policy. 

102.  That  depression  of  intellect  has  been  aUke  ex- 
hibited in  the  mean  consternation  confessedly  felt  on  one 
side,  and  the  mean  triumph  apparently  felt  on  the  other, 
during  the  course  of  the  dispute  now  pending  as  to  the 
origin  of  man.  Dispute  for  the  present  not  to  be  decided, 
and  of  which  the  decision  is,  to  persons  in  the  modem 
temper  of  mind,  whoUy  without  significance :  and  I  earnestly 
desire  that  you,  my  pupils,  may  have  firmness  enough  to 
disengage  your  energies  from  investigation  so  premature 
and  so  fruitless,  and  sense  enough  to  perceive  that  it  does 
not  matter  how  you  have  been  made,  so  long  as  you  are 
satisfied  with  being  what  you  are.  If  you  are  dissatisfied 
with  yourselves,  it  ought  not  to  console,  but  humiliate  you, 
to  imagine  that  you  were  once  seraphs;  and  if  you  are 
pleased  with  yourselves,  it  is  not  any  ground  of  reasonable 

*  The  best  modem  illustrated  scientific  works  show  perfect  fiiculty  of 
representing  monkeys,  lisards,  and  insects;  absolute  incapability  of  repre- 
senting either  a  man,  a  horse,  or  a  lion.' 


1  [Isaiah  Ixvi.  24 ;  Mark  ix.  44.] 

*  rCompare  Art  of  England,  §  181 ;  and  see  Reference  Series,  No.  164  (VoL  XXI. 
p.  42).] 


268  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

shame  to  you  if,  by  no  fault  of  your  own,  you  have  passed 
through  the  elementary  condition  of  apes.^ 

108.  Remember,  therefore,  that  it  is  of  the  very  highest 
importance  that  you  should  know  what  you  are^  and  de- 
termine to  be  the  best  that  you  may  be;  but  it  is  of  no 
importance  whatever,  except  as  it  may  contribute  to  that 
end,  to  know  what  you  have  been.  Whether  your  Creator 
shaped  you  with  fingers,  or  tools,  as  a  sculptor  would  a 
lump  of  clay,  or  gradually  raised  you  to  manhood  through 
a  series  of  inferior  forms,  is  only  of  moment  to  you  in  this 
respect — ^that  in  the  one  case  you  cannot  expect  your  chil- 
dren to  be  nobler  creatures  than  you  are  yourselves — in  the 
other,  every  act  and  thought  of  your  present  life  may  be 
hastening  the  advent  of  a  race  which  will  look  back  to 
you,  their  fathers  (and  you  ought  at  least  to  have  attained 
the  dignity  of  desiring  that  it  may  be  so,)  with  incredulous 
disdain. 

104.  But  that  you  are  yourselves  capable  of  that  disdain 
and  dismay;  that  you  are  ashamed  of  having  been  apes,  if 
you  ever  were  so;  that  you  acknowledge,  instinctively,  a 
relation  of  better  and  worse,  and  a  law  respecting  what  is 
noble  and  base,  which  makes  it  no  question  to  you  that 
the  man  is  worthier  than  the  baboon, — tim  is  a  fact  of  in- 
finite significance.  This  law  of  preference  in  your  hearts  is 
the  true  essence  of  your  being,  and  the  consciousness  of 
that  iaw  is  a  more  positive  existence  than  any  dependent 
on  the  coherence  or  forms  of  matter. 

105.  Now,  but  a  few  words  more  of  mjiliology,  and  I 
have  done.  Remember  that  Athena  holds  the  weaver's 
shuttle,  not  merely  as  an  instrtmient  of  texture^  but  as  an 
instrument  of  picture;  the  ideas  of  clothing,  and  of  the 
warmth  of  life,  being  thus  inseparably  connected  with  those 
of  graphic  beauty,  and  the  brightness  of  life.  I  have  told 
you   that    no  art   could    be  recovered    among   us  without 

^  [Darwin's  Dewent  qf  Man  had  been  published  in  the  year  in  which  these 
lectures  were  printed ;  for  other  references  to  Darwinism  in  the  Oxford  lectures, 
see  Sagle'9  Nut,  §§  15d-166,  185,  207,  and  Vol  dtAmo,  g§  24,  74.] 


■1 


III.  IMAGINATION  269 

perfectness  in  dress,  nor  without  the  elementary  graphic  art 
of  women,  in  divers  colours  of  needlework.  There  has  been 
no  nation  of  any  art-energy,  but  has  strenuously  occupied 
and  interested  itself  in  this  household  picturing,  from  the 
web  of  Penelope  to  the  tapestry  of  Queen  Matilda,^  and 
the  meshes  of  Arras  and  Gobelins. 

106.  We  should  then  naturally  ask  what  kind  of  em- 
broidery   Athena    put    on    her    own    robe;    *'xe?rXov   ia^ov^ 

ToiKiXoVf  Sv  p*  avTfi  xoofaoro  kcu  Kafi€  \(epa'lv.^^ 

The  subject  of  that  trouciXla  of  hers,  as  you  know,  was 
the  war  of  the  giants  and  gods.'  Now  the  real  name  of 
these  giants,  remember,  is  that  used  by  Hesiod,^  **  t^Ao^ohm," 
'' mud-bqy^otten,'"  and  the  meaning  of  the  contest  between 
these  and  Zeus,  iniKiyyomv  VXar^/o,  is,  again,  the  inspiration 
of  life  into  the  day,  by  the  goddess  of  breath;  and  the 
actual  confusion  going  on  visibly  before  you,  daily,  of  the 
earth,  heaping  itself  into  cumbrous  war  with  the  powers 
above  it. 

107.  Thus,  briefly,  the  entire  material  of  Art,  under 
Athena's  hand,  is  the  contest  of  life  with  clay ;  and  all  my 
task  in  explaining  to  you  the  early  thought  of  both  the 
Athenian  and  Tuscan  schools  will  only  be  the  tracing  of 
this  battle  of  the  giants  into  its  full  heroic  form,  when,  not 
in  tapestry  only,  but  in  sculpture,  and  on  the  portal  of  the 
Temple  of  Delphi  itself,  you  have  the  *^kX6vo9  iv  tux^^ 
\atvouri  yiyarri0v^^  and  their  defeat  hailed  by  the  passionate 
cry  of  delight  from  the  Athenian  maids,  beholding  Pallas 
in  her  full  power,  •*Xewra'«  IlaXXdi*  ifrnv  $€ov,'*  my  own 
goddess.*  All  our  work,  I  repeat,  will  be  nothing  but  the 
inquiry  into  the  development  of  this  one  subject,  and  the 

^  TFor  another  reference]  to  the  ''Bejeux  tepestry"  attributed  to  Queen  Matilda, 
see  Vol.  X.  p.  76.] 

'  [Iliad,  T.  736 :  ''  a  fine  robe,  wrought  in  rariouB  colours,  whieh  she  herself 
had  made  and  wrought  bv  hand.  1 

'  [See  QuMn  iff  the  Atr,  §  15  (Vol  XIX.  p.  306) ;  and  compare  Fort  Ciavigera, 
Letter  26.] 

«  [Not  Hesiod^  but  CaUimachus :  JETymn  to  JupUer,  line  a] 

*  [Euripides:  Ian,  206 :  ''on  the  stone  walla  the  conflict  with  giants."] 

«  llbid.,  211.] 


270  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

pressing  fully  home  the  question  of  Plato  about  that  em- 
broidery*— "And  think  you  that  there  is  verily  war  with 
each  other  among  the  Gods?  and  dreadful  enmities  and 
battles,  such  as  the  poets  have  told,  and  such  as  our 
painters  set  forth  in  graven  scripture,  to  adorn  all  our 
sacred  rites  and  holy  places ;  yes,  and  in  the  great  Fan- 
athenasa  themselves,  the  Peplus,  full  of  such  wild  picturing, 
is  carried  up  into  the  Acropolis — ^shall  we  say  that  these 
things  are  true,  oh  Euthuphron,  right-minded  friend  ? '' 

108.  Yes,  we  say,  and  know,  that  these  things  are  true; 
and  true  for  ever:  battles  of  the  gods,  not  among  them- 
selves, but  against  the  earth-giants.  Battle  prevailing  age 
hy  age,  in  nobler  life  and  lovelier  imagery;  creation,  which 
no  theory  of  mechanism,  no  definition  of  force,  can  explain, 
the  adoption  and  completing  of  individual  form  by  indi- 
vidual animation,  breathed  out  of  the  lips  of  the  Father  of 
Spirits.  And  to  recognize  the  presence  in  every  knitted 
shape  of  dust,  by  which  it  lives  and  moves  and  has  its 
beii^^ — ^to  recognize  it,  revere,  and  show  it  forth,  is  to  be 
our  eternal  Idolatry. 

"Thou  shalt  not  bow  down  to  them,  nor  worship 
them." ' 

"Assuredly  no,"  we  answered  once,  in  our  pride;  and 
through  porch  and  aisle,  broke  down  the  carved  work 
thereof,  with  axes  and  hammers. 

Who  would  have  thought  the  day  so  near  when  we 
should  bow  down  to  worship,  not  the  creatures,  but  their 
atoms, — ^not  the  forces  that  form,  but  those  that  dissolve 
them?  Trust  me,  gentlemen,  the  command  which  is  strin- 
gent against  adoration  of  brutality,  is  stringent  no  less 
against  adoration  of  chaos,  nor  is  faith  in  an  image  fallen 
from  heaven  to  be  reformed  by  a  faith  only  in  the  pheno- 
menon of  decadence.  We  have  ceased  from  the  making  of 
monsters  to  be  appeased  by  sacrifice ; — it  is  well, — ^if  indeed 
we  have  also  ceased  from  making  them  in  our  thoughts. 


EkUkyphro,  6.1 
«  [Acts  xYii.  28.] 
Deateronomj  r.  9.] 


s 


III.  IMAGINATION  271 

We  have  learned  to  distrust  the  adoming  of  fair  phantasms, 
to  which  we  once  sought  for  succour; — it  is  well,  if  we 
learn  to  distrust  also  the  adoming  of  those  to  which  we 
seek,  for  temptation ;  but  the  verity  of  gains  like  these  can 
only  be  known  by  our  confession  of  the  divine  seal  of 
strength  and  beauty  upon  the  tempered  frame,  and  honour 
in  the  fervent  heart,  by  which,  increasing  visibly,  may  yet 
be  manifested  to  us  the  holy  presence,  and  the  approving 
love,  of  the  Loving  God,  who  visits  the  iniquities  of  the 
Fathers  upon  the  Children,  unto  the  third  and  fourth 
generaticm  of  them  that  hate  Him,  and  shows  mercy  unto 
thousiunids  in  them  that  love  Him,  and  keep  His  Com- 
mandments.^ 

*  [Deuteronomy  v.  9,  10.] 


LECTURE   IV 

LIKENESS 
Ncfvember,  1870 

109.  You  were  probably  vexed^  and  tired,  towards  the  dose 
of  my  last  Lecture,  by  the  time  it  took  us  to  anive  at 
the  apparently  simple  conclusion  that  sculpture  must  only 
represent  organic  fonn»  and  the  strength  c^  life  in  its  con- 
test with  matter.  But  it  is  no  small  thing  to  have  that 
<<  >Mcr<rm  HdKkaia  **  fixed  in  your  minds,  as  the  one  necessary 
sign  by  which  you  are  to  recognize  right  sculpture;  and, 
believe  me,  you  will  find  it  the  best  of  all  things,  if  you 
can  take  for  yourselves  the  saying  firom  the  lips  of  the 
Athenian  maids,  in  its  entirety,  and  say  also — \mrtrm  IlaXXaf 
ifjMv  Btov.  I  proceed  to-day  into  the  practical  appliance  of 
this  apparently  speculative,  but  in  reality  imperative,  law. 

110.  You  observe,  I  have  hitherto  spoken^  of  the  power 
of  Athena,  as  over  painting  no  less  than  sculpture.  But 
her  rule  over  both  arts  is  only  so  fiir  as  they  are  zoo- 
graphic; — ^representative,  that  is  to  say,  of  animal  life,  or 
of  such  order  and  discipline  among  other  elements,  as  may 
invigorate  and  purify  it.  Now  there  is  a  speciality  of  the 
art  of  painting  beyond  this,  namely,  the  representation  of 
phenomena  of  colour  and  shadow,  as  such,  without  question 
of  the  nature  of  the  things  that  receive  them.  I  am  now 
accordingly  obliged  to  speak  of  sculpture  and  painting  as 
distinct  arts,  but  the  laws  which  bind  sculpture,  bind  no 
less  the  painting  of  the  higher  schools,  which  has,  for  its 
main   purpose,   the   showing  beauty  in   human   or   animal 

»  [Abore,  §§  71,  107    pp.  246,  260.] 

272 


IV.  LIKENESS  278 

form;  and  which  is  therefore  placed  by  the  Greeks  equally 
under  the  rule  of  Athena,  as  the  Spirit,  first,  of  Life,  and 
then  of  Wisdom  in  conduct. 

111.  First,  I  say,  you  are  to  "see  Pallas'*  in  all  such 
work,  as  the  Queen  of  Life;  and  the  practical  law  which 
follows  from  this,  is  one  of  enormous  range  and  importance, 
namely,  that  nothing  must  be  represented  by  sculpture, 
external  to  any  living  form,  which  does  not  help  to  enforce 
or  illustrate  the  conception  of  life.  Both  dress  and  armour 
may  be  made  to  do  this,  by  great  sculptors,  and  are  con- 
tinually so  used  by  the  greatest.  One  of  the  essential  dis- 
tinctions between  the  Athenian  and  Florentine  schools  is 
dependent  on  their  treatment  of  drapery  in  this  respect; 
an  Athenian  always  sets  it  to  exhibit  the  action  of  the 
body,  by  flowing  with  it,  or  over  it,  or  from  it,  so  as  to 
illustrate  both  its  form  and  gesture;  a  Florentine,  on  the 
contrary,  always  uses  his  drapery  to  conceal  or  disguise  the 
forms  of  the  body,  and  exhibit  mental  emotion;  but  both 
use  it  to  enhance  the  life,  either  of  the  body  or  soul; 
Donatello  and  Michael  Angelo,  no  less  than  the  sculptors 
of  Grothic  chivalry,  ennoble  armour  in  the  same  way;  but 
base  sculptors  carve  drapery  and  armour  for  the  sake  of 
their  folds  and  picturesqueness  only,  and  forget  the  body 
beneath.  The  rule  is  so  stem — ^that  all  delight  in  mere 
incidental  beauty,  which  painting  often  triumphs  in,  is 
wholly  forbidden  to  sculpture; — for  instance,  in  painting 
the  branch  of  a  tree,  you  may  rightly  represent  and  enjoy 
the  lichens  and  moss  on  it,  but  a  sculptor  must  not  touch 
one  of  them:  they  are  inessential  to  the  tree's  life,  —  he 
must  give  the  flow  and  bending  of  the  branch  only,  else 
he  does  not  enough  "see  Pallas"  in  it.^ 

^  [In  one  of  the   MS.  drafts  of  these  lectures  Ruskin  treats   the  suhject  of 
drapery  more  at  length  : — 

"Question  of  dress.  How  should  it  he  done?  Well,  mainly,  it 
should  he  done  as  you  like  it — without  question.  But  first,  sculpture 
can't  do  all  dress — (and  what  it  can  do — if  it  does  too  well — it  is  wrongly 
and  hasely  employed,  hut  painting  should  do  dress  perfectly,  as  John 
Bellini  in  the  Frari).^    Then,  so  for  as  it  can  do  dress,  and  must,  whatever 

1  [For  other  refsrences  to  this  picture,  see  SUma  of  Venice,  to],  iii.  (VoL  XI. 
p.  979).] 

XX.  8 


274  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Or,  to  take  a  higher  instance,  here  is  an  exquisite  little 
painted  poem,  by  Edward  Fr6re;   a  cottage  interior,    one 

modem  dress  it  cannot  adopt  is  expressive  of  some  vice  in  the  national 
manners.  As  whatever  you  can't  sing  is  vicious^  whatever  you  can't  carre 
is  vicioas.     Modern  gentlemen's  evening  dress — exponent  of  social  falla43ies. 

'^  Universally  it  seems  then^  and  even  in  the  worst  times  of  art,  men 
like  to  see  simple  drapery;  and  like  it  so  much  that  both  painters  and 
sculptors  are  content  to  spend  great  part  of  their  time  in  its  disposition^ 
and  in  the  actual  working  of  it 

''I  believe  I  could  show  you  some  metaphysical  reasons  for  this  fkct^ 
plausible  enough,  and  others  dependent  on  an  elementary  beauty  of  curve 
and  shadow^  oDtained  always  by  the  unresisting  submission  to  the  force  of 
gravity,  which  is  possible  to  a  finely  woven  tissue.  Into  these  niceties, 
however,  I  do  not  wish  to  enter  at  present.  We  will  be  content  with  the 
fact  that  we  like  to  see  quietly  falling  folds  of  drapery^  and  would  in 
almost  all  cases  prefer  even  colourless  curtains  to  bare  walls. 

"  Now,  in  their  relation  to  the  human  form,  these  folds  of  drapery  have 
two  distinct  functions^  to  express  dignity  of  manner,  to  express  oeauty  of 
wider  form.  In  all  countries  where  the  finest  art  is  possible^  the  average 
temperature  of  the  air  must  be  as  high  as  that  of  the  human  body,  and 
dress  therefore  be  worn  not  for  warmth,  but  for  modesty,  or  protection 
from  sun,  or  an  armour ;  even  the  sandal  of  the  foot,  for  instance,  being 
an  armour  against  fiint  and  thorn.  Instinctively  a  finely  trained  instinct 
recognizes  this  character  in  dress,  and  refuses  to  admit  as  a  proper  subject 
for  sculpture  any  condition  of  wrapping  or  bandage  which  looks  like  a 
defence  against  cold  ;  but  admits  at  once  dress  which  will  be  a  defence 
against  sunshine  or  wounds,  but  especially  it  accepts  with  satisfiu^on  a 
dress  evidently  worn  for  modesty's  sake  more  than  tor  protection,  express- 
ing no  variety  in  its  decoration,  admitting  perfect  freedom  to  every 
movement,  and  so  fine  in  its  tissues  as  to  indicate  the  character  and 
rapidity  of  that  movement  by  its  own  compliance ;  finally,  light  enough  to 
be  a  sign  of  warmth  of  climate  and  of  the  pleasantness  of  every  passing 
breeze. 

"  You  see  that  there  are  here  causes  perfectly  rational,  simple,  and  con- 
stant for  our  preferences  of  the  kind  of  drapery  usually  called  classical, 
for  purposes  ot  sculpture,  and  we  prefer  it,  not  because  it  is  olassioal,  but 
because  it  is  decent  and  wise. 

''  But  there  is  a  deeper  reason  than  any  of  these  for  our  preference  of 
it,  which  has  distinct  powers  with  reference  to  Greek  and  Gothic  sculpture. 
I  have  before  pressed  on  your  notice  the  separation  between  them  in  that 
the  subject  of  Greek  art  is  the  body  only,  and  of  Gothic  art,  the  body 
as  affected  by  the  mind.  Now,  therefore,  when  a  Greek  sculptor  uses 
drapery,  he  indeed  uses  it  chiefly  as  a  veil,  for  the  sake  of  modesty  or 
dignity,  but  his  object  in  practically  dealing  with  it  is  nevertheless  to 
show  as  much  of  the  bodily  form  as  may  be  naturally  (or  even  sometimes 
by  violent  artifice)  expressed  beneath  ;  a  Gothic  sculptor,  on  the  contrary, 
desires  to  conceal,  with  his  draperv,  as  much  of  the  body  as  he  can,  and 
to  show  as  much  as  he  can  of  the  mind.  The  folds  of  Greek  drapery 
therefore,  are,  for  the  most  part,  used  to  express  bodily  form  and  motion ; 
those  of  Gothic  sculpture  to  express  mental  passion.  Of  course,  one 
shares  partly  the  character  of  the  other. 

''It  is  impossible  to  show  you,  until  we  address  ourselves  specially  to 
the  subject,  what  power  of  expression  exists  in  the  arrangement  of  mere 
folds  of  drapery  of  this  flowing  and  united  kind,  but  if,  henceforward,  you 
will  for  a  little  while  ask  yourselves  when  any  picture  forcibly  affects  you 


-.J. 


IV.   LIKENESS  275 

of  the  thousands  which  within  the  last  two  months*  have 
been  laid  desolate  in  unhappy  France.  Every  accessory  in 
the  painting  is  of  value — ^the  fireside,  the  tiled  floor,  the 
vegetables  lying  upon  it,  and  the  basket  hanging  from  the 
roof.     But  not  one  of  these  accessories  would  have  been 

*  See  date  of  delivery  of  Lecture.     The  picture  was  of  a  peasant  girl 
of  eleven  or  twelve  years  old,  peeling  carrots  by  a  cottage  fire.^ 

by  its  expression  of  character,  bow  far  tbe  effect  is  produced  by  this 
circumstance  alone,  you  will  be  greatly  surprised  to  find  tbat  artists  actu- 
ally differ  less  in  tbeir  power  over  the  features  of  the  countenance  than 
over  the  folds  of  drapery^  as  elements  of  expression ;  and  that  while  in- 
ferior painters  can  sometimes  render  in  a  true  and  moving  way,  some  of 
the  passions  as  they  are  read  in  the  face,  none  but  the  greatest  can  use  the 
lines  of  dress  to  full  advantage.  Here,  for  instance,  is  a  sketch  of  a 
kneeling  Madonna  by  Raphael.  The  fs^e  is  serene  and  sweet,  but  in  no 
wise  transcendent  in  any  Kind  of  expression ;  nearly  the  entire  charm  of 
the  figure  is  owing  to  the  disposition  of  the  drapery  in  accordance  with 
tender  and  quiet  gesture. 

'^To  give  you  a  very  simple  instance:  Michael  Angelo's  well-known 
statue  of  David  represents  him  watching  the  approach  of  Goliath,  and 
without  failure  of  resolution,  slightly  hesitating  and  at  pause — ^his  hand 
on  the  sling — but  his  attitude  uncertain;  his  enemy  is  drawing  near,  but 
it  is  not  time  for  him  yet  to  take  aim ;  and,  as  you  look  at  him,  you  do 
not  think  of  tbe  action  of  slinging,  but  of  the  entire  personiuity  of 
David  as  a  youth  under  Divine  inspiration,  the  Champion  of  the  armies 
of  €rod  opposed  to  the  Champion  of  the  armies  of  the  Heathen.  That  is 
the  largest  and  deepest  view  jou  can  have  of  the  contest — that  is  essenti- 
ally the  sculptor's  view  of  it.  The  taste,  discipline,  and  skill  of  the 
sculptor  as  such  will  be  shown  by  his  leading  you  through  every  line  of 
body  and  drapery  to  that  deepest  thought,  and  by  his  refusing  every  ac- 
cessory which  could  interfere  with  it 

''In  one  of  our  rising  schools  lately — I  forget  where — I  saw  a  some- 
what clever  study  of  David,  imagined  at  this  same  moment  by  one  of 
our  saner  young  students,  exhibited  under  the  title  of  "  David  fighting 
Goliath."  The  youth's  mind  being  full  of  his  own  rifle  practice,  he 
could  not  think  of  the  contest  with  the  giant  otherwise  than  as  a  momen- 
tary question  of  manipulation  of  thong  and  pebble.  All  that  he  thought 
of,  and  desired  the  spectator  to  think  of,  was  'Will  he  hit  him?'  ^^w 
that  is  essentially  an  unsculpturesque  view  of  the  matter ;  but  it  would  not 
be  of  the  least  use  to  give  the  young  volunteer  a  lecture  on  principles  of 
sculpture,  or  tell  him  that  he  should  study  Michael  Angelo's  statue  and 
endeavour  to  imitate  that.  In  his  heart  he  cannot  but  at  present  think 
— whatever  we  say  to  him — that  Michael  Angelo's  statue  is  stupid,  and  his 
own  much  more  interesting — were  he  to  mimic  Michael  Angelo,  he  would 
become  fislse  and  ridiculous,  while  in  his  present  sincerity  he  is  only 
shallow.  But  educate  him  in  his  general  life  wisely,  and  as  he  gains 
scholarship  and  modesty  he  will  gain  in  good  taste,  and  then,  according 
to  his  powers  of  imagination,  design  sculpture,  without  direction  from 
any  one,  but  by  his  own  instinct,  as  it  ought  to  be  designed."] 
^  [Ruskin  showed  the  picture  at  the  Royal  Institution  in  1869  (see  VoL  XIX. 

p.  270).    It  used  to  hang  in  his  rooms  at  Corpus,  and  is  now  at  Brantwood.     For 

fVere,  see  Vol.  XIV.  p.  83.] 


276  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

admissible  in  sculpture.  You  must  carve  nothing  but  what 
has  life.  "  Why  ? ""  you  probably  feel  instantly  inclined  to 
ask  me. — ^You  see  the  principle  we  have  got,  instead  of 
being  blunt  or  useless,  is  such  an  edged  tool  that  you  are 
startled  the  moment  I  apply  it.  "Must  we  refuse  every 
pleasant  accessory  and  picturesque  detail,  and  petrify  nothing 
but  living  creatures?"  *Even  so:  I  would  not  assert  it  on 
my  own  authority.  It  is  the  Greeks  who  say  it,  but  what- 
ever they  say  of  sculpture,  be  assured,  is  true. 

112.  That  then  is  the  first  law — ^you  must  see  PaUas 
as  the  Lady  of  Life;  the  second  is,  you  must  see  her  as 
the  Lady  of  Wisdom,  or  (ro<f>ta  —  and  this  is  the  chief 
matter  of  all.  I  cannot  but  think  that,  after  the  conside- 
rations into  which  we  have  now  entered,  you  will  find 
more  interest  than  hitherto  in  comparing  the  statements  of 
Aristotle,  in  the  Ethics^  with  those  of  Plato  in  the  PoKty, 
which  are  authoritative  as  Greek  definitions  of  goodness  in 
art,  and  which  you  may  safely  hold  authoritative  as  con- 
stant definitions  of  it.  You  remember,  doubtless,  that  the 
a'o(f>ia,  or  aperh  r^v^f,  for  the  sake  of  which  Phidias  is  called 
<roit>69  as  a  sculptor,  and  Polyclitus  as  an  image-maker, 
JEth.  6.  7.  (the  opposition  is  both  between  ideal  and  portrait 
sculpture,  and  between  working  in  stone  and  bronze),  con- 
sists in  the  "voCy  rHv  rt/jiutrrdrwv  r^  if>ua-€t^*^  ^  "the  mental  appre- 
hension of  the  things  that  are  most  honourable  in  their 
nature."  Therefore,  what  is  indeed  most  lovely,  the  true 
image-maker  will  most  love;  and  what  is  most  hateful, 
he  will  most  hate;  and  in  all  things  discern  the  best  and 
strongest  part  of  them,  and  represent  that  essentially,  or, 
if  the  opposite  of  that,  then  with  manifest  detestation  and 
horror.  That  is  his  art  wisdom;  the  knowledge  of  good 
and  evil,  and  the  love  of  good,  so  that  you  may  discern, 
even  in  his  representation  of  the  vilest  thing,  his  acknow- 
ledgment of  what  redemption  is  possible  for  it,  or  latent 
power  exists  in  it ;  and,  contrariwise,  his  sense  of  its  present 
misery.     But,  for  the  most  part,  he  will  idolize,  and  force 

1  [Compare  Eagie'i  Nett^  §  9.] 


IV.  LIKENESS  277 

us  also  to  idolize,  whatever  is  living,  and  virtuous,  and  vic- 
toriously right;  opposing  to  it  in  some  definite  mode  the 
image  of  the  conquered  ipirerov. 

118.  This  is  generally  true  of  both  the  great  arts;  but 
in  severity  and  precision,  true  of  sculpture.  To  return  to 
our  illustration :  this  poor  little  girl  was  more  interesting  to 
Edward  Fr^re,  he  being  a  painter,  because  she  was  poorly 
dressed,  and  wore  these  clumsy  shoes,  and  old  red  cap,  and 
patched  gown.  May  we  sculpture  her  so?  No.  We  may 
sculpture  her  naked,  if  we  like ;  but  not  in  rags. 

But  if  we  may  not  put  her  into  marble  in  rags,  may 
we  give  her  a  pretty  frock  with  ribands  and  flounces  to  it, 
and  put  her  into  marble  in  that?  No.  We  may  put  her 
simplest  peasant's  dress,  so  it  be  perfect  and  orderly,  into 
marble;  anything  finer  than  that  would  be  more  dishon- 
ourable in  the  eyes  of  Athena  than  rags.  If  she  were  a 
French  princess,  you  might  carve  her  embroidered  robe 
and  diadem ;  if  she  were  Joan  of  Arc,  you  might  carve  her 
armour — for  then  these  also  would  be  **twv  ri/uafTorwi'/' 
not  otherwise. 

114.  Is  not  this  an  edge-tool  we  have  got  hold  of, 
unawares?  and  a  subtle  one  too;  so  delicate  and  scimitar- 
like in  decision.  For  note  that  even  Joan  of  Arc's  armour 
must  be  only  sculptured,  if  she  has  it  on;  it  is  not  the 
honourableness  or  beauty  of  it  that  are  enough,  but  the 
direct  bearing  of  it  by  her  body.  You  might  be  deeply, 
even  pathetically,  interested  by  looking  at  a  good  knight's 
dinted  coat  of  mail,  lefb  in  his  desolate  hall.  May  you 
sculpture  it  where  it  hangs?  No;  the  helmet  for  his 
pillow,  if  you  will — no  more. 

You  see  we  did  not  do  our  dull  work  for  nothing  in 
last  Lecture.  I  define  what  we  have  gained  once  more, 
and  then  we  will  enter  on  our  new  ground. 

115.  The  proper  subject  of  sculpture,  we  have  deter- 
mined, is  the  spiritual  power  seen  in  the  form  of  any  living 
thing,  and  so  represented  as  to  give  evidence  that  the 
sculptor  has  loved  the  good  of  it  and  hated  the  evil. 


278 


ARATRA  PENTELICI 


"iSlo  represented/'  we  say;  but  how  is  that  to  be  done? 
Why  should  it  not  be  represented,  if  possible,  just  as  it 
is  seen?  What  mode  or  limit  of  representation  may  ire 
adopt?  We  are  to  carve  things  that  have  life; — shall  we 
try  so  to  imitate  them  that  they  may  indeed  seem  living, — 
or  only  half  living,  and  like  stone  instead  of  flesh  ? 

It  will  simplify  this  question  if  I  show  you  three 
examples  of  what  the  Greeks  actually  did:  three  typical 
pieces  of  their  sculpture,  in  order  of  perfection. 

116.  And  now,  observe  that  in  all  our  historical  work, 
I  will  endeavour  to  do,  myself,  what  I  have  asked  you  to 
do  in  your  drawing  exercises ;  namely,  to'  outline  firmly  in 
the  beginning,  and  then  fill  in  the  detail  more  minutely. 
I  will  give  you  first,  therefore,  in  a  symmetrical  form,  abso- 
lutely simple  and  easily  remembered,  the  large  chronology 
of  the  Greek  school;  within  that  unforgettable  scheme  we 
will  place,  as  we  discover  them,  the  minor  relations  of  arts 
and  times. 

I  number  the  nine  centuries  before  Christ  thus,  upwards, 
and  divide  them  into  three  groups  of  three  each. 


A.  Archaic. 


9 
8 
7 


B.  Best. 


6 
6 

4 


C.  COKKUPT. 


8 
2 


Then  the  ninth,  eighth,  and  seventh  centuries  are  the 
period  of  archaic  Greek  art,  steadily  progressive  wherever 
it  existed. 


IV,  LIKENESS  27» 

The  sixth,  fifth,  and  fourth  are  the  period  of  Central 
Greek  art;  the  fifth,  or  central,  century  producing  the 
finest.  That  is  easily  recollected  by  the  battle  of  Marathon. 
And  the  third,  second,  and  first  centuries  are  the  period  of 
steady  decline. 

Learn  this  ABC  thoroughly,  and  mark,  for  yourselves, 
what  you,  at  present,  think  the  vital  events  in  each  century. 
As  you  know  more,  you  will  think  other  events  the  vital 
ones;  but  the  best  historical  knowledge  only  approximates 
to  true  thought  in  that  matter;  only  be  sure  that  what  is 
truly  vital  in  the  character  which  governs  events,  is  always 
expressed  by  the  art  of  the  century ;  so  that  if  you  could 
interpret  that  art  rightly,  the  better  part  of  your  task  in 
reading  history  would  be  done  to  your  hand. 

117.  It  is  generally  impossible  to  date  with  precision 
art  of  the  archaic  period — often  difficult  to  date  even  that 
of  the  central  three  hundred  years.  I  will  not  weary  you 
with  futile  minor  divisions  of  time;  here  are  three  coins 
(Plate  VIII.)  roughly,  but  decisively,  characteristic  of  the 
three  ages.^  The  first  is  an  early  coin  of  Tarentum.  The 
city  was  foimded,  as  you  know,  by  the  Spartan  Phalanthus 
late  in  the  eighth  century.  I  believe  the  head  is  meant 
for  that  of  Apollo  Archegetes;  it  may  however  be  Taras, 
the  son  of  Poseidon ;  ^  it  is  no  matter  to  us  at  present  whom 
it  is  meant  for,  but  the  fact  that  we  cannot  know,  is  itself 
of  the  greatest  import.  We  cannot  say,  with  any  certainty, 
unless  by  discovery  of  some  collateral  evidence,  whether 
this  head  is  intended  for  that  of  a  god,  or  demigod,  or  a 
mortal  warrior.  Ought  not  that  to  disturb  some  of  your 
thoughts  respecting  Greek  idealism?  Farther,  if  by  in- 
vestigation we  discover  that  the  head  is  meant  for  that 
of  Phalanthus,  we  shall  know  nothing  of  the  character  of 

^  [The  coin  of  JEauf  maj  be  seen  in  the  BritiBh  Masenm  (III.  B.  4  in  the 
exhibited  series  of  electrotypes) :  date  b.c  400-^86.  The  third  coin  is  of  Pontns 
(b.c.  76) ;  the  head,  that  of  Mithridates.  It  may  be  seen  in  the  British  Museum 
(Vn.  A.  2).] 

*  [For  the  legends  of  Phaknthas  and  Taras,  see  the  lecture  on  ''The  Riders 
of  Tarentum "  (Mow,  p.  394).] 


280  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Phalanthus  from  the  face;  for  there  is  no  portraiture    at 
this  early  time. 

118.  The  second  coin  is  of  iEnus  in  Macedonia;    pro- 
bably of  the    fifth  or  early    fourth   century,   and    entirely 
characteristic  of  the  central  period.     This  we  know  to    re- 
present the  face  of  a  god — Hermes.     The  third  coin    is    a 
king's,  not  a  city's.     I  will  not  tell  you,  at  this  monaent, 
what  king's;  but  only  that  it  is  a  late  coin  of  the  third 
period,  and  that  it  is  as  distinct  in  purpose  as  the  coin  of 
Tarentum  is  obscure.    We  know  of  this  coin,  that  it    re- 
presents no  god    nor    demigod,  but   a    mere  mortal;    and 
we  know  precisely,  from  the  portrait,  what  that  mortal's 
face  was  like. 

119.  A  glance  at  the  three  coins,  as  they  are  set  side  by 
side,  will  now  show  you  the  main  differences  in  the  three 
great  Greek   styles.     The  archaic  coin  is  sharp  and  hard; 
every  line  decisive  and  numbered,  set  unhesitatingly  in  its 
place;    nothing    is    wrong,  though    ever}rthing    incomplete, 
and,  to    us  who    have  seen   finer   art,  ugly.     The   central 
coin  is  as  decisive  and  clear  in  arrangement  of  masses,  but 
its   contours   are  completely  rounded   and  finished.    There 
is    no  character  in   its   execution   so  prominent  that  you 
can  give  an  epithet  to  the  style.     It  is  not  hard,  it  is  not 
soft,   it  is   not    delicate,   it   is    not   coarse,  it   is   not  gro- 
tesque, it  is  not  beautiful;  and  I  am  convinced,  unless  you 
had    been  told    that  this  is    fine  central    Greek    art,  you 
would  have  seen  nothing  at  all  in  it  to  interest  you.    Do 
not  let  yourselves  be  anjrwise  forced  into  admiring  it;  there 
is,  indeed,  nothing  more  here  than  an  approximately  true 
rendering  of  a  healthy  youthful  face,  without  the  slightest 
attempt  to  give  an  expression  of  activity,  cunning,  nobi- 
lity, or  any  other  attribute  of  the  Mercurial  mind.     Extreme 
simpUcity,  unpretending  vigour  of  work,  which  claims  no  ad- 
miration either  for  minuteness   or  dexterity,  and  suggests 
no  idea  of  effort  at  all;   refusal  of  extraneous  ornament, 
and  perfectly  arranged  disposition  of  counted  masses  in  a 
sequent  order,  whether  in  the  beads,  or  the  ringlets  of  hair ; 


mtm 


Arohnic,  rcmrnl,  nnd  Declining  Art  of  Greer.e 


IV.  LIKENESS  281 

this  is  all  you  have  to  be  pleased  with;  neither  will  you 
ever  find,  in  the  best  Greek  Art,  more.  You  might  at  first 
suppose  that  the  chain  of  beads  round  the  cap  was  an  ex- 
traneous ornament;  but  I  have  little  doubt  that  it  is  as 
definitely  the  proper  fillet  for  the  head  of  Hermes,  as  the 
olive  for  Zeus,  or  com  for  Triptolemus.  The  cap  or  petasus 
cannot  have  expanded  edges;  there  is  no  room  for  them 
on  the  coin;  these  must  be  understood,  therefore;  but  the 
nature  of  the  cloud-petasus  is  explained  by  edging  it  with 
beads,  representing  either  dew  or  hail.  The  shield  of 
Athena  often  bears  white  pellets  for  hail,  in  like  manner. 

120.  The  third  coin  wiU,  I  think,  at  once  strike  you  by 
what  we  modems  should  call  its  '^  vigour  of  character." 
You  may  observe  also  that  the  features  are  finished  with 
great  care  and  subtlety,  but  at  the  cost  of  simplicity  and 
breadth.  But  the  essential  difference  between  it  and  the 
central  art,  is  its  disorder  in  design — you  see  the  locks  of 
hair  cannot  be  counted  any  longer — they  are  entirely  dis- 
hevelled and  irregular.  Now  the  individual  character  may, 
or  may  not,  be  a  sign  of  decline;  but  the  licentiousness, 
the  casting  loose  of  the  masses  in  the  design,  is  an  infallible 
one.^  The  effort  at  portraiture  is  good  for  art  if  the  men 
to  be  portrayed  are  good  men,  not  otherwise.  In  the 
instance  before  you,  the  head  is  that  of  Mithridates  VI. 
of  Pontus,  who  had,  indeed,  the  good  qualities  of  being 
a  linguist  and  a  patron  of  the  arts;  but,  as  you  will  re- 
member, murdered,  according  to  report,  his  mother,  cer- 
tainly his  brother,  certainly  his  wives  and  sisters,  I  have 
not  counted  how  many  of  his  children,  and  from  a  him- 
dred  to  a  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  persons  besides ;  these 
last  in  a  single  day's  massacre.  The  effort  to  represent  this 
kind  of  person  is  not  by  any  means  a  method  of  study 
from  life  ultimately  beneficial  to  art.' 

^  [Compare  Fon  Cknrigera,  Letter  78,  where  Rusldn  refers  to  this  pessage  and 
farther  illustrates  it] 

>  [Compare  Art  qf  Bngiand,  §  72,  where  Rusldn  again  refers  to  portraitare  as 
destmctiye  of  Greek  design.] 


282  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

121.  This,  however,  is  not  the  point  I  have  to  urge 
to-day.  What  I  want  you  to  observe  is,  that  though  the 
master  of  the  great  time  does  not  attempt  portraiture,  he 
does  attempt  animation.  And  as  far  as  his  means  will 
admit,  he  succeeds  in  making  the  face — ^you  might  almost 
think — vulgarly  animated;  as  like  a  real  face,  literally,  ''as 
it  can  stare."  Yes:  and  its  sculptor  meant  it  to  be  so; 
and  that  was  what  Phidias  meant  his  Jupiter  to  be,  if  he 
could  manage  it.  Not,  indeed,  to  be  taken  for  Zeus  him- 
self; and  yet,  to  be  as  Uke  a  living  Zeus  as  art  could 
make  it.  Perhaps  you  think  he  tried  to  make  it  look 
living  only  for  the  sake  of  the  mob,  and  would  not  have 
tried  to  do  so  for  connoisseurs.  Pardon  me;  for  real  con- 
noisseurs he  would,  and  did ;  and  herein  consists  a  truth 
which  belongs  to  all  the  arts,  and  which  I  will  at  once 
drive  home  in  your  minds,  as  firmly  as  I  can. 

122.  All  second-rate  artists — (and  remember,  the  second- 
rate  ones  are  a  loquacious  multitude,  while  the  great  come 
only  one  or  two  in  a  century;  and  then,  silently)  —  all 
second-rate  artists  will  tell  you  that  the  object  of  &ie  art 
is  not  resemblance,  but  some  kind  of  abstraction  more  re- 
fined than  reality.  Put  that  out  of  your  heads  at  once. 
The  object  of  the  great  Resemblant  Arts  is,  and  always 
has  been,  to  resemble;  and  to  resemble  as  closely  as  pos- 
sible.^ It  is  the  function  of  a  good  portrait  to  set  the  man 
before  you  in  habit  as  he  lived,*  and  I  would  we  had  a  few 
more  that  did  so.  It  is  the  function  of  a  good  landscape 
to  set  the  scene  before  you  in  its  reality;  to  make  you,  if 
it  may  be,  think  the  clouds  are  flying,  and  the  streams 
foaming.  It  is  the  function  of  the  best  sculptor — ^the  true 
Dsedalus — ^to  make  stillness  look  like  breathing,  and  marble 
look  like  flesh.' 


1 


Compare  Queen  qf  the  Air,  §  162  (VoL  XIX.  pp.  410-411).] 
«  'HanM,  iiL  4.  m.]  '  »  ^ 

'  [In  one  of  the  drafte  of  this  lecture  there  is  en  additional  passage : — 

^^Be  assured  first  that  you  may  understand  Leonardo's  sentence  just 
as  truly  of  sculpture  as  of  painting ;  and  that  not  only  queUa  pittura,  but 
auella  tcuUura  i  piu  laudabUe  la  qtutle  ha  ffiu  cof^ormUa  con  ia  cohi  imUeta* 
It  is  the  first  condition  of  good  sculpture  that  it  shall  be  like  life.    You 


% 


Hm.  t 


L- 


^ 


•^ 


f. 


IV,   LIKENESS  288 

128.  And  in  all  great  times  of  art,  this  purpose  is  as 
naively  expressed  as  it  is  steadily  held.  All  the  talk  about 
absti*action  belongs  to  periods  of  decadence.  In  living 
times,  people  see  something  living  that  pleases  them ;  and 
they  try  to  make  it  live  for  ever,  or  to  make  something  as 
like  it  as  possible,  that  MriU  last  for  ever.  They  paint 
their  statues,  and  inlay  the  eyes  with  jewels,  and  set  real 
crowns  on  the  heads;  they  finish,  in  their  pictures,  every 
thread  of  embroidery,  and  would  fain,  if  they  could,  draw 
every  leaf  upon  the  trees.  And  their  only  verbal  expres- 
sion of  conscious  success  is  that  they  have  made  their  work 
"look  real." 

124.  You  think  all  that  very  wrong.  So  did  I,  once; 
but  it  was  I  that  was  wrong.  A  long  time  ago,  before 
ever  I  had  seen  Oxford,  I  painted  a  picture  of  the  Lake 
of  Como,  for  my  father.  It  was  not  at  all  like  the  Lake 
of  Como ;  but  1  thought  it  rather  the  better  for  that.  My 
father  differed  with  me;  and  objected  particularly  to  a 
boat  with  a  red  and  yellow  awning,  which  I  had  put  into 
the  most  conspicuous  comer  of  my  drawing.  I  declared 
this  boat  to  be  "  necessary  to  the  composition."  My  father 
not  the  less  objected  that  he  had  never  seen  such  a  boat, 
either  at  Como  or  elsewhere ;  and  suggested  that  if  I  would 
make  the  lake  look  a  little  more  like  water,  I  should  be 
under  no  necessity  of  explaining  its  nature  by  the  presence 
of  floating  objects.  I  thought  him  at  the  time  a  very 
simple  person  for  his  pains ;  but  have  since  learned,  and  it 
is  the  very  gist  of  all  practical  matters,  which,  as  Professor 
of  Fine  Art,  I  have  now  to  tell  you,  that  the  great  point 
in  painting  a  lake  is — ^to  get  it  to  look  like  water. 

126.  So  far,  so  good.  We  lay  it  down  for  a  first  prin- 
ciple that   our  graphic   art,  whether  painting  or  sculpture, 

• 

may  alwairs  implicitly  trust  Virgil  to  give  you  the  leading  epithet  of  any- 
thing, and  his  spiratUia  9i^p%a  in  worth  any  nnmher  of  yolumes  of  common 
art  criticism.  Good  aculpture  looks  as  If  it  breathed^  and  as  if  it  could 
speak  and  moye,  and  is  so  like  the  reality  that  we  forget  the  absence  of 
colour." 
For  "  Leonardo's  sentence/'  see  Lectures  an  Art,  §  129  ^above,  p.  121).  For  Virgil's 
^^ejnrantia  eigna,'*  see  JSneid,  yiii.  848  ^excudent  alii  spirantia  mollius  ara")J] 


284  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

is  to  produce  something  which  shall  look  as  like  Nature 
as  possible.  But  now  we  must  go  one  step  farther,  and 
say  that  it  is  to  produce  what  shall  look  like  Nature  to 
people  who  know  what  Nature  is  like  I  You  see  this  is  at 
once  a  great  restriction,  as  well  as  a  great  exaltation  of 
our  aim.  Our  business  is  not  to  deceive  the  simple ;  but 
to  deceive  the  wise  I  Here,  for  instance,  is  a  modem 
Italian  print,  representing,  to  the  best  of  its  power,  St 
Cecilia,  in  a  brilliantly  realistic  manner.^  And  the  fault  of 
the  work  is  not  in  its  earnest  endeavour  to  show  St.  Cecilia 
in  habit  as  she  lived,  but  in  that  the  effort  could  only  be 
successful  with  persons  imaware  of  the  habit  St.  Cecilia 
lived  in.  And  this  condition  of  appeal  only  to  tlie  wise 
increases  the  difficulty  of  imitative  resemblance  so  greatly, 
that,  with  only  average  skill  or  materials,  we  must  surrender 
all  hope  of  it,  and  be  content  with  an  imperfect  representa- 
tion, true  as  far  as  it  reaches,  and  such  as  to  excite  the 
imagination  of  a  wise  beholder  to  complete  it ;  though 
falling  very  far  short  of  what  either  he  or  we  should  other- 
wise have  desired.  For  instance,  here  is  a  suggestion,  by 
Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  of  the  general  appearance  of  a  British 
Judge, — ^requiring  the  imagination  of  a  very  wise  beholder 
indeed  to  fill  it  up,  or  even  at  first  to  discover  what  it  is 
meant  for.'  Nevertheless,  it  is  better  art  than  the  Italian 
St.  Cecilia,  because  the  artist,  however  little  he  may  have 
done  to  represent  his  knowledge,  does,  indeed,  know  alto- 
gether what  a  Judge  is  like,  and  appeals  only  to  the  criti- 
cism of  those  who  know  also. 

126.  There  must  be,  therefore,  two  degrees  of  truth  to 
be  looked  for  in  the  good  graphic  arts ;  one,  the  commonest, 
which,  by  any  partial  or  imperfect  sign,  conveys  to  you 
an  idea  which  you  must  complete  for  yourself;  and  the 
other,  the  finest,  a  representation  so  perfect  as  to  leave  you 
nothing   to   be   farther  accomplished   by  this    independent 

^  (ThiB  example  does  not  seem  to  have  been  placed  in  the  Ruskin  Collection  at 
Oxford.] 

s  [A  study  for  a  picture :  Standard  Series,  No.  32  (see  Vol  XXI.  p.  24).] 


1 


IV.   LIKENESS  285 

exertion;  but  to  give  you  the  same  feeling  of  possession 
and  presence  which  you  would  experience  from  the  natural 
object  itself.  For  instance  of  the  first,  in  this  representa- 
tion of  a  rainbow,^  the  artist  has  no  hope  that,  by  the 
black  lines  of  engraving,  he  can  deceive  you  into  any  belief 
of  the  rainbow's  being  there,  but  he  gives  indication  enough 
of  what  he  intends,  to  enable  you  to  supply  the  rest  of  the 
idea  yourself,  providing  always  you  know  beforehand  what 
a  rainbow  is  like.  But  in  this  drawing  of  the  falls  of 
Terni,t  the  painter  has  strained  his  skill  to  the  utmost  to 
give  an  actually  deceptive  resemblance  of  the  iris,  dawning 
and  fading  among  the  foam.  So  far  as  he  has  not  actually 
deceived  you,  it  is  not  because  he  would  not  have  done 
so  if  he  could;  but  only  because  his  colours  and  science 
have  fallen  short  of  his  desire.  They  have  fallen  so  little 
short,  that,  in  a  good  light,  you  may  all  but  believe  the 
foam  and  the  sunshine  are  drifting  and  changing  among 
the  rocks. 

127.  And  after  looking  a  little  while,  you  will  begin  to 
regret  that  they  are  not  so:  you  will  feel  that,  lovely  as 
the  drawing  is,  you  would  like  far  better  to  see  the  real 
place,  and  the  goats  skipping  among  the  rocks,  and  the 
spray  floating  above  the  falL  And  this  is  the  true  sign 
of  the  greatest  art — ^to  part  voluntarily  with  its  greatness ; 
— ^to  make  itself  poor  and  unnoticed ;  but  so  to  exalt  and 
set  forth  its  theme,  that  you  may  be  fain  to  see  the  theme 
instead  of  it.  So  that  you  have  never  enough  admired  a 
great  workman's  doing,  tiU  you  have  begun  to  despise  it. 
The  best  homage  that  could  be  paid  to  the  Athena  of 
Phidias  would  be  to  desire  rather  to  see  the  living  goddess ; 

♦  In  Dttrer's  *' Melencolia."  ^ 

t  Turner's,  in  the  Hakewill  series.' 


1  [See  Plate  £  in  Vol.  VII.  (p.  312).  Compare  wliat  Ruskin  savs  of  the  sym- 
holic  character  of  this  design  in  Lecturet  en  Art,  §  63  (ahove^  p.  61;.] 

*  [Rttskin  had  hought  this  drawing  in  the  previous  year:  see  VoL  XIII. 
pp.  425,  605.] 


286  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

and  the  loveliest  Madonnas  of  Christian  art  fall  short  of 
their  due  power,  if  they  do  not  make  their  beholders  sick 
at  heart  to  see  the  living  Virgin.^ 

128,  We  have  then,  for  our  requirement  of  the  finest 
art,  (sculpture,  or  anything  else,)  that  it  shall  be  so  like 
the  thing  it  represents  as  to  please  those  who  best  know 
or  can  conceive  the  original;  and,  if  possible,  please  them 
deceptively  —  its  final  triumph  being  to  deceive  even  the 
wise;  and  (the  Greeks  thought)  to  please  even  the  Im- 
mortals, who  were  so  wise  as  to  be  undeceivable.  So  that 
you  get  the  Greek,  thus  far  entirely  true,  idea  of  perfect- 
ness  in  sculpture,  expressed  to  you  by  what  Fhalaris  says, 
at  first  sight  of  the  bull  of  Perilaus,  "  It  only  wanted  motion 
and  bellowing  to  seem  alive ;  and  as  soon  as  I  saw  it,  I 
cried  out,  it  ought  to  be  sent  to  the  god,"* — ^to  Apollo, 
for  only  he,  the  undeceivable,  could  thoroughly  understand 
such  sculpture,  and  perfectly  delight  in  it. 

129.  And  with  this  expression  of  the  Greek  ideal  of 
sculpture,  I  wish  you  to  join  the  early  Italian,  summed  in 
a  single  line  by  Dante — "non  vide  me'  di  me,  chi  vide  1 
vero."  Read  the  twelfth  canto  of  the  Purgatory ^  and  learn 
that  whole  passage  by  heart;  and  if  ever  you  chance  to 
go  to  Pistoja,  look  at  La  Robbia's  coloured  porcelain  bas- 
reliefs  of  the  seven  works  of  Mercy  on  the  front  of  the 
hospital  there;'  and  note  especially  the  faces  of  the  two 

1  [One  of  tbe  MS.  drafU  of  the  lecture  has  an  additional  passage  here : — 

''  But  it  is  only  by  consummate  masters^  and  once  or  twice  in  centuries 
of  toil^  that  this  passionate  veracity  can  be  reached.     For  the  most  part 
the  workman  can  entertain  no  hope  of  causing  himself  to  be  forgotten. 
He  must  resign  himself  to  be  thanked  for  having  raised  the  dim  fancy 
of  the  spectator  to  a  feeble  exertion,  and  content  that  the  pleasure  re- 
ceived should  be  often  rather  in  perception  of  the  smallness  of  the  means 
than  greatness  of  result.     Nearly  everything  we  produce  must  be  little 
more  than  a  sketch  in  marble,  or  colour  or  clay,  and  the  only  merit  it 
can  claim,  that  of  suggesting  rightly,  so  far  as  it  suggests  at  all."] 
3  [From  ''The  Oration  of  the  Ambassadors  of  Phalaris  to  the  Priests  of  Delphi," 
in  which  Lucian  makes  an  ironical  defence  of  the  tyrant  of  Agrigentum.    Tie 
story  of  the  brazen  bull  of  Perilaus,  or  Perillus — maae  to  hold  criminals  whose 
cries,  as  they  were  burnt  alive  within  it,  should  be  like  tbe  roaring  of  a  bull,  and 
of  the  tyrant  trying  the  first  experiment  with  the  sculptor  himself— is  told  also  by 
Pliny  {NaL  Hist,  xxxiv.  19),  ana  referred  to  by  other  authors.! 

'  [For  an  earlier  reference  to  these  bas-reliefs  (in  a  letter  of  1846),  see  Vol.  iV. 
pp.  300-^1  n.] 


IV.  LIKENESS  287 

sick  men— one  at  the  point  of  death,  and  the  other  in  the 
first  peace  and  long-drawn  breathing  of  health  after  fever 
— and  you  will  know  what  Dante  meant  by  the  preceding 
line,  *'Morti  li  morti,  e  i  vivi  par^n  vivi."^ 

180.  But  now,  may  we  not  ask  farther, — ^is  it  impossible 
for  art  such  as  this,  prepared  for  the  wise,  to  please  the 
simple  also?  Without  entering  on  the  awkward  questions 
of  degree,  how  many  the  wise  can  be,  or  how  much  men 
should  know,  in  order  to  be  rightly  called  wise,  may  we 
not  conceive  an  art  to  be  possible,  which  would  deceive 
everybody f  or  everybody  worth  deceiving?  I  showed  you  at 
my  First  Lecture,  a  little  ringlet  of  Japan  ivory,  as  a  type 
of  elementary  bas-relief  touched  with  colour;'  and  in  your 
Rudimentary  Series,  you  have  a  drawing,  by  Mr.  Burgess, 
of  one  of  the  little  fishes  enlarged,  with  every  touch  of  the 
chisel  facsimiled  on  the  more  visible  scale;  and  showing  the 
little  black  bead  inlaid  for  the  eye,  which  in  the  original 
is  hardly  to  be  seen  without  a  lens.  You  may,  perhaps, 
be  surprised  when  I  tell  you  that  (putting  the  question  of 
svhject  aside  for  the  moment,  and  speaking  only  of  the 
mode  of  execution  and  aim  at  resemblance)  you  have  there 
a  perfect  example  of  the  Greek  ideal  of  method  in  sculp- 
ture.    And   you  will  admit   that,  to   the  simplest  person 

^  \PurgatoriOy  zii.  67,  68,  thas  rendered  by  Gary: — 

''  Dead,  the  dead ; 
The  living  seem'd  alive :  with  clearer  view, 
His  eye  £$held  not,  who  beheld  the  truth."] 

>  [Rnakin  seems,  in  revising  the  first  lecture  for  the  press,  to  have  omitted 
the  reference  to  the  Japan  ivory.  He  mentions  it  in  a  letter  to  Professor  Norton 
(November  10,  1870)  :— 

''The  third  lecture,  on  coloured  sculpture,  will  be  amusing,  I  think. 
I  enlarge  first  one  of  the  fish  from  those  little  ivory  Japan  circlets  you 
bought  for  me  at  Paris;  then,  saying  simply  that  for  execution  it  is  an 
ideal  of  true  Greek  ideal  of  sculpture,  1  give  beside  the  fish  profile  the 
profile  of  the  self-made  man  from  Punch — enlarged  also  to  bas-relief  size — 
and  then  a  Greek  Apollo  beside  both,  to  show  them  how  all  real  design 

depends  on  i^oCs  rdr  rtfuurdriay" 
(Letters  of  John  Ruskin  to  Charles  EUot  Norton^  vol.  il.  p.  29 ;  reprinted  in  a  later 
volume  of  this  edition.)  The  "third"  is  the  present  lecture  (see  above,  p.  185). 
In  the  printed  lectures  the  Japan  ivory  was  not  given ;  for  the  other  illustra- 
tions, see  Plate  IX.  (below,  p.  294).  The  enlargement  of  the  fiidi  by  Burgess  is 
not  in  the  Ruskin  Art  Collection  at  Oxford.] 


288  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

whom  we  could  introduce  as  a  critic,  that  fish  would  be  a 
satisfactoiy,  nay,  almost  a  deceptive,  fish ;  while,  to  any  one 
caring  for  subtleties  of  art,  I  need  not  point  out  that  every 
touch  of  the  chisel  is  applied  with  consummate  knowledge, 
and  that  it  would  be  impossible  to  convey  more  truth  and 
life  with  the  given  quantity  of  workmanship. 

181.  Here  is,  indeed,  a  drawing  by  Turner  (Edu.  181),^ 
in  which,  with  some  fifty  times  the  quantity  of  labour,  and 
far  more  highly  educated  faculty  of  sight,  the  artist  has 
expressed  some  qualities  of  lustre  and  colour  which  only 
very  wise  persons  indeed  could  perceive  in  a  John  Dory; 
and  this  piece  of  paper  contains,  therefore,  much  more,  and 
more  subtle,  art,  than  the  Japan  ivory;  but  are  we  sure 
that  it  is  therefore  greater  art?  or  that  the  painter  was 
better  employed  in  producing  this  drawing,  which  only  one 
person  can  possess,  and  only  one  in  a  hundred  enjoy,  than 
he  would  have  been  in  producing  two  or  three  pieces  on  a 
larger  scale,  which  should  have  been  at  once  accessible  to, 
and  enjoyable  by,  a  number  of  simpler  persons?  Suppose, 
for  instance,  that  Turner,  instead  of  faintly  touching  this 
outline,  on  white  paper,  with  his  camel's-hair  pencil,  had 
struck  the  main  forms  of  his  fish  into  marble,  thus  (Fig.  18) ; ' 
and  instead  of  colouring  the  white  paper  so  delicately  that, 
perhaps,  only  a  few  of  the  most  keenly  observant  artists 
in  England  can  see  it  at  all,  had,  with  his  strong  hand, 
tinted  the  marble  with  a  few  colours,  deceptive  to  the 
people,  and  harmonious  to  the  initiated;  suppose  that  he 
had  even  conceded  so  much  to  the  spirit  of  popular  ap- 
plause as  to  allow  of  a  bright  glass  bead  being  inlaid  for 
the  eye,  in  the  Japanese  manner;  and  that  the  enlarged, 
deceptive,  and  popularly  pleasing  work  had  been  carved 
on  the  outside  of  a  great  building, — say  Fishmongers'  Hall, 
— ^where  everybody  commercially  connected  with  Billingsgate 
could  have  seen  it,  and  ratified  it  with  a  wisdom  of  the 

i  raee  Vol.  XXI.  p.  91.] 

*  t^he  bas-relief,  from  which  Fig.  13  is  reproduced,  was  made  for  Ruskin  by 
Burgess ;  it  may  still  be  seen  in  the  Ruskin  Drawing  School.] 


IV.   LIKENESS  289 

market; — ^might  not  the   art  have  been  greater,  worthier, 
and  kinder  in  such  use? 

182.  Perhaps  the  idea  does  not  at  once  approve  itself 
to  you  of  having  your  public  buildings  covered  with  orna- 
ments; but — pray  remember  that  the  choice  of  subject  is 
an  ethical  question,  not  now  before  us.  All  I  ask  you  to 
decide  is  whether  the  method  is  right,  and  would  be  plea- 
sant, in  giving  the  distinctiveness  to  pretty  things,  which  it 


has  here  ^ven  to  what,  I  suppose  it  may  be  assumed,  you 
feel  to  be  an  ugly  thing.  Of  course,  I  must  note  paren- 
thetically, such  realistic  work  is  impossible  in  a  coimtry 
where  the  buildings  are  to  be  discoloured  by  coal  smoke; 
but  so  is  all  fine  sculpture  whatsoever;  and  the  whiter,  the 
worse  its  chance.  For  that  which  is  prepared  for  private 
persons,  to  be  kept  under  cover,  will,  of  necessity,  degene- 
rate into  the  copyism  of  past  work,  or  merely  sensational  and 
sensual  forms  of  present  life,  unless  there  be  a  governing 


290  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

school  addressing  the  populace,  for  their  instruction,  on  the 
outside  of  buildings.  So  that,  as  I  partly  warned  you  in 
my  Third  Lecture/  you  can  simply  have  no  sculpture  in 
a  coal  country.  Whether  you  like  coals  or  carvings  best, 
is  no  business  of  mine.  I  merely  have  to  assure  you  of 
the  fact  that  they  are  incompatible. 

But,  assuming  that  we  are  again,  some  day,  to  become 
a  civilised  and  governing  race,  deputing  ironmongery,  coal- 
digging,  and  lucre-digging,  to  our  slaves  in  other  countries, 
it  is  quite  conceivable  that,  with  an  increasing  knowledge 
of  natural  history,  and  desire  for  such  knowledge,  what 
is  now  done  by  careful,  but  inefficient,  woodcuts,  and  in 
ill-coloured  engravings,  might  be  put  in  quite  permanent 
sculptures,  with  inlay  of  variegated  precious  stones,  on  the 
outside  of  buildings,  where  such  pictures  would  be  little 
costly  to  the  people;  and  in  a  more  popular  manner  still, 
by  Robbia  ware  and  Palissy  ware,  and  inlaid  majolica, 
which  would  differ  from  the  housewife's  present  favourite 
decoration  of  plates  above  her  kitchen  dresser,  by  being 
every  piece  of  it  various,  instructive,  and  universally  visible. 

188.  You  hardly  know,  I  suppose,  whether  I  am  speak- 
ing in  jest  or  earnest.  In  the  most  solemn  earnest,  I 
assure  you;  though  such  is  the  strange  course  of  our 
popular  life  that  all  the  irrational  arts  of  destruction  are  at 
once  felt  to  be  earnest ;  while  any  plan  for  those  of  instruc- 
tion on  a  grand  scale  sounds  like  a  dream,  or  jest.  Still, 
I  do  not  absolutely  propose  to  decorate  our  public  buildings 
with  sculpture  whoUy  of  this  character;  though  beast,  and 
fowl,  and  creeping  things,  and  fishes,  might  all  find  room 
on  such  a  building  as  the  Solomon's  House  of  a  New 
Atlantis;'  and  some  of  them  might  even  become  symbolic 
of  much  to  us  again.     Passing  through  the  Strand,  only 

^  [On  the  impossibility  of  sculpture  under  modem  conditions,  see  above,  p.  244 ; 
and  compare  Lecturei  on  Art,  §  116  (above,  p.  107).] 

s  [See  Bacon,  Nwf  AtiarUU  (voL  iii.  p.  145,  Spedding) :  '^  Ye  tball  understand, 
mj  dear  friends,  that  amongst  the  excellent  acts  of  tbat  king,  one  above  all  hath  the 
pre-eminence.  It  was  the  erection  and  institution  of  an  Onler  or  Society  which  we 
call  SMomcn's  Howe;  the  noblest  foundation  (as  we  think)  that  ever  was  upon  this 
kingdom.     It  is  dedicated  to  tiie  study  of  the  works  and  creatures  of  God,"  etc] 


IV.  LIKENESS  291 

the  ather  day,  for  instance,  I  saw  four  highly  finished  and 
delicately  coloured  pictures  of  cock-fighting,  which,  for 
imitative  quality,  were  nearly  all  that  could  be  desired, 
going  far  beyond  the  Greek  cock  of  Himera;  and  they 
would  have  delighted  a  Greek's  soul,  if  they  had  meant  as 
much  as  a  Greek  cock*figfat;  but  they  were  only  types  of 
the  "  ivSofMxa^  aXeicTw/),"  *  and  of  the  spirit  of  home  contest, 
which  has  been  so  fatal  lately  to  the  Bird  of  France;  and 
not  of  the  defence  of  one's  own  barnyard,  in  thought  of 
which  the  Olympians  set  the  cock  oa  the  pillars  of  their 
chariot  course;  and  gave  it  goodly  alliance  in  its  battle,  as 
you  may  see  here,  in  what  is  left  of  the  angle  of  moulder- 
ing marble  in  the  chair  of  the  priest  of  Dionusos.  The 
cast  of  it,  from  the  centre  of  the  theatre  under  the  Acro- 
polis, is  in  the  British  Museum;^  and  I  wanted  its  spiral 
for  you,  and  this  kneeling  Angel  of  Victory; — ^it  is  late 
Greek  art,  but  nobly  sjrstematic  flat  bas-rdief  So  I  set 
Mr.  Burgess  to  draw  it;  but  neither  he  nor  I,  for  a  little 
while,  could  make  out  what  the  Angel  of  Victory  was 
kneeling  for.  His  attitude  is  an  ancient  and  grandly  con- 
ventional one  among  the  Egyptians;  and  I  was  tracing  it 
back  to  a  kneeling  goddess  of  the  greatest  dynasty  of  the 
Pharaohs — ^a  goddess  of  Evening,  or  Death,  lajnng  down 
the  sun  out  of  her  right  hand; — ^when,  one  bright  day,  the 
shadows  came  out  clear  on  the  Athenian  throne,  and  I  saw 
that  my  Angel  of  Victory  was  only  backing  a  cock  at  a 
cock-fight. 

184.  Still,  as  I  have  said,  there  is  no  reason  why  sculp- 
ture, even  for  simplest  persons,  should  confine  itself  to 
imagery  of  fish,  or  fowl,  or  four-footed  things. 

We  go  back  to  our  first  principle:  we  ought  to  carve 
nothing  but  what  is  honourable.     And  you  are  offended, 

1  [Pindar,  Oiympia,  xii.  20,  tbe  ode  for  Ergoteles  of  Himera:  ''A  cock  that 
fighteth  but  at  home."  A  cook  was  the  badffe  on  the  early  coina  of  the  Greek 
colony  of  Himera :  see  in  the  exhibition  of  electrotirpes  at  the  British  Museum, 
L  C.  27.] 

'  [Now  (1905)  on  the  right  of  the  doorway  into  the  Ephesus  Room.  The 
drawing  of  it  by  Burgess  hung  at  one  time  on  the  waUs  of  the  Drawing  School, 
but  was  afterwards  removed  by  Ruskin.] 


29S  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

at  this  moment,  with  my  fish,  (as  I  believe,  when  the  first 
sculptures  appeared  on  the  windows  of  this  museum,  offence 
was  taken  at  the  unnecessary  introduction  of  cats,)  these 
dissatis£Etctions  being  properly  felt  by  your  **voih  tAv  rifuw- 
rarwv"^  For  indeed,  in  all  cases,  our  right  judgment  must 
depend  on  our  wish  to  give  honour  only  to  things  and 
creatures  that  deserve  it. 

185.  And  now  I  must  state  to  you  another  principle  of 
veracity,  both  in  sculpture,  and  all  following  arts,  of  vnder 
scope  than  any  hitherto  examined.  We  have  seen  that 
sculpture  is  to  be  a  true  representation  of  true  internal 
form.  Much  more  is  it  to  be  a  representation  of  true 
internal  emotion.  You  must  carve  only  what  you  yourself 
see  as  you  see  it;  but,  much  more,  you  must  carve  only 
what  you  yourself  feel,  as  you  feel  it.  You  may  no  more 
endeavour  to  feel  through  other  men's  souls,  than  to  see 
with  other  men's  eyes.  Whereas  generally  now,  in  Europe 
and  America,  every  man's  energy  is  bent  upon  acquiring 
some  false  emotion,  not  his  own,  but  belonging  to  the  past, 
or  to  other  persons,  because  he  has  been  taught  that  such 
and  such  a  result  of  it  will  be  fine.  Every  attempted  sen- 
timent in  relation  to  art  is  hypocritical;  our  notions  of 
sublimity,  of  grace,  or  pious  serenity,  are  all  second-hand: 
and  we  are  practically  incapable  of  designing  so  much  as 
a  bell-handle  or  a  door-knocker,  without  borrowing  the  first 
notion  of  it  from  those  who  are  gone — ^where  we  shall  not 
wake  them  with  our  knocking.     I  would  we  could. 

186.  In  the  midst  of  this  desolation  we  have  nothing 
to  count  on  for  real  growth  but  what  we  can  find  of  honest 
liking  and  longing,  in  ourselves  and  in  others.  We  must 
discover,  if  we  would  healthily  advance,  what  things  are 
verily  rifuArrara  among  us;  and  if  we  delight  to  honour 
the  dishonourable,  consider  how,  in  future,  we  may  better 
bestow  our  likings.  Now  it  appears  to  me,  from  all  our 
popular  declarations,  that  we,  at  present,  honour  nothing  so 
much  as  liberty  and  independence;  and  no  person  so  much 

^  [See  above,  S  112,  p.  276.] 


IV.   LIKENESS  298 

as  the  Free  man  and  Self-made  man,  who  will  be  ruled  by 

no  one,  and  has  been  taught,  or  helped,  by  no  one.     And  \ 

the  reason  I   chose  a  fish  for  you  as  the  first  subject  of 

sculpture,  was  that  in  men  who  are  free  and  self-made,  you  j 

have  the  nearest  approach,  humanly  possible,  to  the  state  < 

of  the  fish,^   and   finely  organized   epverov.      You   get  the  I 

exact   phrase   in    HabaJdcuk,   if   you   take   the   Septuagint 

text,—"  Toojccty  Toiff  avdpdirovg  m  t<W9  I'xOva^  r??  6a\d<r<rrj9y  Koi  W9 

Ta  ifyjrera  ra   ovk  ej^ovra   fiyovfuevovj^  ^      "  Thou   wilt   make  men  i 

as  the  fishes  of  the  sea,  and  as  the  reptile  things,  that  have 
no  ruler  over  them.''  And  it  chanced  that  as  I  was  pre- 
paring this  Lecture,  one  of  our  most  able  and  popular 
prints  gave  me  a  woodcut  of  the  **  self-made  man,"  speci- 
fied as  such,  so  vigorously  drawn,  and  with  so  few  touches, 
that  Phidias  or  Turner  himself  could  scarcely  have  done  it 
better;  so  that  I  had  only  to  ask  my  assistant  to  enlarge 
it  with  accuracy,  and  it  became  comparable  with  my  fish 
at  once.  Of  course  it  is  not  given  by  the  caricaturist  as 
bh  admirable  fSeice;  only,  I  am  enabled  by  his  skill  to  set 
before  you,  without  any  suspicion  of  unfairness  on  my  part, 
the  expression  to  which  the  life  we  profess  to  think  most 
honourable,  naturally  leads.  If  we  were  to  take  the  hat 
off,  you  see  how  nearly  the  profile  corresponds  with  that 
of  the  typical  fish. 

187.  Such,  then,  being  the  definition,  by  your  best 
popular  art,  of  the  ideal  of  feature  at  which  we  are  gradu- 
ally arriving  by  self-manufacture;  when  I  place  opposite  to 
it  (in  Plate  IX.)'  the  profile  of  a  man  not  in  an3rwise 
self-made,  neither  by  the  law  of  his  own  will,  nor  by  the 
love  of  his  own  interest — ^nor  capable,  for  a  moment,  of  any 

i  [For  the  fish  as  typical  of  freodom,  see  Two  Paths,  §  191  (Vol.  XVL  p.  407).] 
s  [Habakkuk  i.  14 ;  quoted  also  (in  EngUsh)  in  Unto  thU  Last,  §  46  (V^  XVII. 
p.  «3Xl 

*  [The  head  of  ''the  self-made  man"  is  taken  from  a  cartoon  by  Charles  Keene 
(1823-1881)  entitled  ''A  Capital  Answer/'  with  the  following  leffend:  "' Self-made* 
man  examining  eehool  ^  wftich  he  U  a  manager:  'Now,  boy,  what's  the  capital  oi 
'OUand?'  Boy:  'An  H,  sir.'"  The  cartoon  appeared  in  Punch  of  September  3, 
1870.  The  Greek  head  is  the  Apollo  not  of  Syracuse,  but  of  Croton  :  the  coin  may 
be  seen  in  the  Bri^h.  Museum  (IV.  C.  26).] 


Apollo  Chrysoco: 


IV.  LIKENESS  295 

present  Lecture — ^the  method  of  likeness-making, — and  let- 
ting myself  branch  into  the  discussion  of  what  things  we  are 
to  make  likeness  of.  But  you  shall  see  hereafter^  that  the 
method  of  imitating  a  beautiful  thing  must  be  different 
from  the  method  of  imitating  an  ugly  one ;  and  that,  with 
the  change  in  subject  from  what  is  dishonourable  to  what 
is  honourable,  there  will  be  involved  a  parallel  change  in 
the  management  of  tools,  of  lines,  and  of  colours.  So  that 
before  I  can  determine  for  you  hxm  you  are  to  imitate, 
you  must  tell  me  what  kind  of  face  you  wish  to  imitate. 
The  best  draughtsman  in  the  world  could  not  draw  this 
Apollo  in  ten  scratches,  though  he  can  draw  the  self-made 
man.  Still  less  this  nobler  ApoUo  of  Ionian  Greece  (Plate 
X.),'  in  which  the  incisions  are  softened  into  a  harmony 
like  that  of  Correggio's  painting.  So  that  you  see  the 
method  itself, — the  choice  between  black  incision  or  fine 
sculpture,  and  perhaps,  presently,  the  choice  between  colour 
or  no  colour,  wiU  depend  on  what  you  have  to  represent. 
Colour  may  be  expedient  for  a  glistening  dolphin  or  a 
spotted  fawn; — perhaps  inexpedient  for  white  Poseidon,  and 
gleaming  Dian.  So  that,  before  defining  the  laws  of  sculp- 
ture, I  am  compelled  to  ask  you,  what  you  mean  to  carve; 
and  that,  little  as  you  think  it,  is  asking  you  how  you 
mean  to  live,  and  what  the  laws  of  your  State  are  to  be, 
for  they  determine  those  of  your  statue.  You  can  only 
have  this  kind  of  face  to  study  from,  in  the  sort  of  state 
that  produced  it.  And  you  will  find  that  sort  of  state 
described  in  the  beginning  of  the  fourth  book  of  the  laws 
of  Plato;  as  founded,  for  one  thing,  on  the  conviction  that 
of  all  the   evils  that    can  happen  to  a  state,  quantity  of 

1  [Below,  §  140 ;  p.  297.] 

*  rrhis  is  a  coin  of  Clazomen»  (III.  A.  25  in  the  exhibition  of  electrotypes  at 
the  British  Museum).  For  another  reference  to  it,  see  below,  §  179  (p.  326). 
Raskin  in  his  tide  on  the  plate  gives  to  this  Apollo  Pindar's  epithet,  ''the  golden- 
haired  "  (piymjria,  vi.  71 ;  vii.  58).  On  the  reverse  of  the  coin  is  a  swan,  the 
symbol  of  Apollo.  In  the  territory  of  Clasomens  there  was  a  temple  of  the  god. 
''The  dcdta  of  the  Hermns  abounds  in  wild  swans,  and  the  name  of  Clazomenas 
may  have  been  due  to  their  shrill  cries"  (B.  V.  Head:  QtUde  to  the  Prindpat 
OaiM  qf  the  Aneient$,  1889,  p.  38).] 


^6  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

money  is  the  greatest  I  jneil^ov  kokov,  w9  Stto^  eliruv^  irokei  ouiev  Sv 
yiyvoiTO    €<V    yevvaiwv    kcu     Sucaiwv    ndtav    icTfi<riv^    **{OTf    tO    spe&k 

shortly,  no  greater  evil,  matching  each  against  each,  can 
possibly  happen  to  a  city,  as  adverse  to  its  forming  just  or 
generous  character/'  than  its  being  full  of  silver  and  gold. 
189.  Of  course  the  Greek  notion  may  be  wrong,  and 
ours  right,  only — w  ftroy  €<Vefi^ — ^you  can  have  Greek  sculp- 
ture only  on  that  Greek  theory:  shortly  expressed  by  the 
words  put  into  the  mouth  of  Poverty  herself,  in  the  Plutus 

of  Aristophanes,  **  Tov  UXovrov  irape^w  fiekrlopa^  avSpas  kou  riiv 

yvw/jLfiv  KOU  rhv  iSeav^''^  "I  deliver  to  you  better  men  than 
the  God  of  Money  can,  both  in  imagination  and  feature." 
So,  on  the  other  hand,  this  ichthyoid,  reptilian,  or  mono- 
condyloid'  ideal  of  the  self-made  man  can  only  be  reached, 
universally,  by  a  nation  which  holds  that  poverty,  either 
of  purse  or  spirit, — ^but  especially  the  spiritual  character 
of  being  xrwxo*  ry  ti/wmoti,* — ^is  the  lowest  of  degradations ; 
and  which  believes  that  the  desire  of  wealth  is  the  first  of 
manly  and  moral  sentiments.  As  I  have  been  able  to  get 
the  popular  ideal  represented  by  its  own  living  art,  so  I 
can  give  you  this  popular  faith  in  its  own  living  words; 
but  in  words  meant  seriously,  and  not  at  all  as  caricature, 
from  one  of  our  leading  journals,  professedly  aesthetic  also 
in  its  very  name,  the  Spectator ,  of  August  6,  1870. 

''Mr.  Ruskin's  plan,"  it  says,  ''would  make  England 
poor,  in  order  that  she  might  be  cultivated,  and  refined, 
and  artistic.  A  wilder  proposal  was  never  broached  by  a 
man  of  ability;  and  it  might  be  regarded  as  a  proof  that 
the  assiduous  study  of  art  emasculates  the  intellect,  and 
even  the  moral  sense.  Such  a  theory  almost  warrants  the 
contempt  with  which  art  is  often  regarded  by  essentially 
intellectual  natures,  like  Proudhon"  (sic).  "Art  is  noble 
as  the  flower  of  life,  and  the  creations  of  a  Titian  are  a 

1  [Lawi,  \y.  7()«  B.] 

s  [Plutut,  558,  559.J 

<  [See  Above,  §  95,  p.  268.] 

*  [Mfttthew  ▼.  a] 


IV.  LIKENESS  297 

great  heritage  of  the  race;  but  if  England  could  secure 
high  art  and  Venetian  glory  of  colour  only  by  the  sacri- 
fice of  her  manufacturing  supremacy,  and  by  the  accqpU 
ance  of  national  poverty^  then  the  pursuit  of  such  artistic 
achievements  would  imply  that  we  had  ceased  to  possess 
natures  of  manly  strength,  or  to  know  the  vieardng  of  moral 
akiM.  If  we  must  choose  between  a  Titian  and  a  Lanca- 
shire cotton  mill,  then,  in  the  name  of  manhood  and  of 
morality,  give  us  the  cotton  mill.  Only  the  dilettanteism 
of  the  studio;  that  dilettanteism  which  loosens  the  moral 
no  less  than  the  intellectual  fibre,  and  which  is  as  fatal  to 
rectitude  of  action  as  to  correctness  of  reasoning  power, 
would  make  a  different  choice."^ 

You  see  also,  by  this  interesting  and  most  memorable 
passage,  how  completely  the  question  is  admitted  to  be  one 
of  ethics — ^the  only  real  point  at  issue  being,  whether  this 
fSEtce  or  that  is  developed  on  the  truer  moral  principle. 

140.  I  assume,  however,  for  the  present,  that  this  Apol- 
line  type  is  the  kind  of  form  you  wish  to  reach  and  to 
represent.  And  now  observe,  instantly,  the  whole  question 
of  manner  of  imitation  is  altered  for  us.  The  fins  of  the 
fish,  the  plumes  of  the  swan,  and  the  flowing  of  the  Sun- 
€rod's  hair  are  all  represented  by  incisions — but  the  incisions 
do  sufficiently  represent  the  fin  and  feather, — ^they  insuffi- 
ciently represent  the  hair.  If  I  chose,  with  a  little  more 
care  and  labour,  I  could  absolutely  get  the  surface  of  the 
scales  and  spines  of  the  fish,  and  the  expression  of  its 
mouth;  but  no  quantity  of  labour  would  obtain  the  real 
surfiace  of  a  tress  of  ApoUo's  hair,  and  the  full  expression 
of  his  mouth.  So  that  we  are  compelled  at  once  to  caU 
the  imagination  to  help  us,  and  say  to  it,  Yofii  know  what 
the  Apollo  Chrjrsocomes  must  be  like;  finish  all  this  for 
yourself.  Now,  the  law  under  which  imagination  works,  is 
just  that  of  other  good  workers.  ''You  must  give  me 
dear  orders ;  show  me  what  I  have  to  do,  and  where  I  am 


^  [From  ft  nriew  of  Leetur$9  an  Art  (a%e  ftbove^  p.  7).    Ruildn  rotes  to  tho 
artido  again  in  Fon  Olavigera,  Letter  27.] 


298  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

to  begin,  and  let  me  alone.*"  And  the  orders  can  be  given, 
quite  clearly,  up  to  a  certain  point,  in  form;  but  they  can- 
not be  given  clearly  in  colour,  now  that  the  subject  is 
subtle.  All  beauty  of  this  high  kind  depends  on  harmony ; 
let  but  the  slightest  discord  come  into  it,  and  the  finer  the 
thing  is,  the  more  fatal  will  be  the  flaw.  Now,  on  a  flat 
surface,  I  can  command  my  colour  to  be  precisely  what 
and  where  I  mean  it  to  be;  on  a  round  one  I  cannot. 
For  all  harmony  depends,  first,  on  the  fixed  proportion  of 
the  colour  of  the  light  to  that  of  the  relative  shadow ;  and 
therefore  if  I  fasten  my  colour,  I  must  fasten  my  shade. 
But  on  a  round  surface  the  shadow  changes  at  every  hour 
of  the  day ;  and  therefore  all  colouring  which  is  expressive 
of  form,  is  impossible ;  and  if  the  form  is  fine,  (and  here 
there  is  nothing  but  what  is  fine,)  you  may  bid  farewell  to 
colour.^ 

141.  Farewell  to  colour;  that  is  to  say,  if  the  thing 
is  to  be  seen  distinctly,  and  you  have  only  wise  people  to 
show  it  to;  but  if  it  is  to  be  seen  indistinctly,  at  a  dis- 
tance, colour  may  become  explanatory;  and  if  you  have 
simple  people  to  show  it  to,  colour  may  be  necessary  to 
excite  their  imaginations,  though  not  to  excite  yours.  And 
the  art  is  great  always  by  meeting  its  conditions  in  the 
straightest  way ;  and  ^  it  is  to  please  a  multitude  of  inno- 
cent and  bluntly-minded  persons,  must  express  itself  in  the 
terms  that  will  touch  them;  else  it  is  not  good.'  And  I 
have  to  trace  for  you  through  the  history  of  the  past,  and 
possibilities  of  the  future,  the  expedients  used  by  great 
sculptors  to  obtain  clearness,  impressiveness,  or  splendour; 
and  the  manner  of  their  appeal  to  the  people,  under  various 
light  and  shadow,  and  with  reference  to  different  degrees 
of  public  intelligence:  such  investigation  resolving  itself 
again  and  again,  as  we  proceed,  into  questions  absolutely 

^  [On  the  relation  of  eolour  and  form,  see  Sewn  Lampt,  ch.  iv.  §§  36^  38 
(Vol.  VIII.  pp.  177,  180) ;  at<me$  of  Veniee,  vol.  L  (VoL  IX.  p.  466) ;  and  Modern^ 
Fointer9,  vol.  ir.  (Vol.  VI.  p.  71  n.).] 

*  [On  the  rule  that  ''great  art  must  be  populal>/'  compare  Ariadne  Florentina, 
%20.] 


IV.  LIKENESS  299 

cthieal;  as,  for  instance,  whether  colour  is  to  be  bright  or 
duU, — ^that  is  to  say,  for  a  popnkce  cheerful  or  heartless; 
— ^whether  it  is  to  be  delicate  or  strong, — ^that  is  to  say, 
for  a  populace  attentive  or  careless;  whether  it  is  to  be  a 
background  like  the  sky,  for  a  procession  of  young  men 
and  maidens,  because  your  populace  revere  life — or  the 
shadow  of  the  vault  behind  a  corpse  stained  with  drops  of 
blackened  blood,  for  a  populace  taught  to  worship  Death/ 
Every  critical  determination  of  rightness  depends  on  the 
obedience  of  some  ethic  law,  by  the  most  rational  and, 
therefore,  simplest  means.  And  you  see  how  it  depends 
most,  of  all  things,  on  whether  you  are  working  for  chosen 
persons,  or  for  the  mob;  for  the  joy  of  the  boudoir,  or 
of  the  Boigo.*  And  if  for  the  mob,  whether  the  mob  of 
Olympia,  or  of  St.  Antoine.'  Phidias,  showing  his  Jupiter 
for  the  first  time,  hides  behind  the  temple  door  to  listen, 

resolved  afterwards,  **  puOfju^eip  to  aycik^a  irpo^  to  tw  irXeitrrois 
ioKoSv^  ou  yap  nym-o  fuicpav  ttvai  avfifiovXriv  H/xou  To<rovTOUy^^  ^  and 

truly,  as  your  people  is,  in  judgment^  and  in  multitude,  so 
must  your  sculpture  be,  in  glory.  An  elementary  principle 
which  has  been  too  long  out  of  mind. 

142.  I  leave  you  to  consider  it,  since,  for  some  time,  we 
shall  not  again  be  able  to  take  up  the  inquiries  to  which 
it  leads.^  But,  ultimately,  I  do  not  doubt  that  you  will  rest 
satisfied  in  these  following  conclusions: 

1.  Not  only  sculpture,  but  all  the  other  fine  arts,  must 
be  for  the  people. 

1  [With  this  panag*  compure  VoL  XVIL  p.  287,  wh«re  Ruskin  (in  &  note  of 
1871)  refers  to  it] 

'  [The  reference  is  to  Cimehue^s  pietare  carried  in  glad  procession  through  the 
streets  of  Florence ;  whence  (says  Vasari)  ''  the  inhahitants  ever  afterwards  called 
that  pkce  Borgo  Allegri"  :  see  Vol.  III.  pp.  644-646  a] 

*  [A  reference  to  die  French  Revolutions  of  1789  and  1848,  and  (if  the  words 
were  inserted  hy  Ruskin  in  revising  the  lecture  as  delivered)  the  Communist  rising 
of  1871,  the  Place  de  la  Bastille  St.  Antoine  heing  a  centre  of  activity  on  all  those 
three  occasions.] 

^  [Ludan  :  Pro  Imaginibtti,  14,  resolved  ''to  adapt  the  statue  in  accordance  with 
the  opinion  of  the  majority,  for  he  deemed  that  the  advice  of  such  a  multitade 
was  no  small  thing."    The  passage  is  qaoted  again  helow,  p.  400.] 

^  [Such  inqoiries  were  toachM  upon  in  The  jEitketie  and  MaikemaHe  Sekooh  oj 
FlareneeJ] 


too  ARATRA  FENTELICI 

2.  Thejr  must  be  didactic  to  the  people,  and  that  as 
their  chief  end  The  structural  arts,  didactic  in  their 
manner;  the  graphic  arts,  in  their  matter  also. 

8.  And  duefly  the  great  representatiye  and  imaginative 
arts — that  is  to  say,  the  drama  and  sculpture — are  to  teach 
what  is  noble  in  past  histoiy,  and  lovely  in  existing  human 
and  oiganic  life. 

4.  And  the  test  of  right  manner  of  execution  in  these 
arts,  is  that  they  strike,  in  the  most  em[^tic  manner,  the 
rank  of  popular  minds  to  which  they  are  addressed. 

5.  And  the  test  of  utmost  fineness  in  execution  in  these 
arts,  is  that  they  make  themselves  be  forgotten  in  what 
they  represent;  and  so  fulfil  the  words  of  their  greatest 
Master, 


it 


The  best,  in  this  kind,  ake  bijt  shadows."^ 


1  [MuUummer  Siahfs  Dream,  ▼.  1,  213 ;  quoted  mko  in  AmIs'«  Nmi,  §  99,  and 
Ariadne  Fhrentina,  §  256.  In  hi«  first  notae  for  thii  {mmbw  Roskin  adds,  ''Com; 
pare  what  Froude  sajs  in  his  essay  on  Elizabetbui  heroes  or  Shakespeare's  models." 
The  reference  is  to  the  essay  entitled  ''  BngUmd's  Foigotten  Worthies^"  in  the  fint 
▼olume  of  Short  Studiee  upon  Great  SuhjeeU:  ''We  wonder  at  the  grandeur,  the 
moral  majestr  of  some  of  Shaicespeare^s  chaneters,  so  fiur  heyond  what  the  nohlcst 
among  ourselves  can  imitate,  and  at  first  thought  we  attribute  it  to  the  genias 
of  the  poet,  who  has  outstripped  nature  in  his  creations.  But  .  .  .  the  men  whom 
he  draws  were  sueh  men  as  ne  saw  and  knew.  .  .  v  Shakespeare's  great  poetry  is 
no  more  than  the  rhythmic  echo  of  the  lifo  which  it  depicts."] 


LECTURE  V 

STRUCTURE 

December^  1870 

148.^  Ok  previous  occasions  of  addressing  you,  I  have  en- 
deavoured to  show  you,  first,  how  sculpture  is  distinguished 
from  other  arts ;  then  its  proper  subjects ;  then  its  proper 
method  in  the  realization  of  these  subjects.  To-day,  we 
must,  in  the  fourth  place,  consider  the  means  at  its  com- 
mand for  the  accomplishment  of  these  ends;  the  nature 
of  its  materials ;  and  the  mechanical  or  other  difficulties  of 
their  treatment. 

And  however  doubtful  we  may  have  remained  as  to  the 
justice  of  Greek  ideals,  or  propriety  of  Greek  methods  of 
representing  them,  we  may  be  certain  that  the  example  of 

>  [One   of  the   drafts   of  this   lecture   began   differently   with   the  following 

''We  have  seen  in  the  preceding  lecture  that  there  is  no  difficulty  in 
distinguishing  between  the  pleasure  which  a  work  of  art  gives  by  its  imi- 
tative power,  and  that  which  we  take  in  its  actual  beauty.  But  there  is 
extreme  difficulty  in  distinguishing  between  purely  aesthetic  pleasure  in 
beauty,  and  that  which  depends  on  some  incipient  perception  ot  the  fitness 
of  construction.  When  you  speak  of  a  beautiful  saihng  vessel,  for  in- 
stance, it  is  almost  impossible  to  distinguish  between  the  pleasure  taken 
in  the  abstract  whiteness  and  curvature  of  her  sails  and  the  subtlety  of 
the  lines  of  her  hull,  from  that  which  depends  on  our  intelligence  of  their 
action  with  respect  to  the  forces  of  wind  and  sea.  But  you  must  not 
allow  yourselves^  because  these  sources  of  pleasure  are  perpetually  united, 
to  think  of  them  as  having  anything  in  common  with  each  other.  Sensible 
beauty  is  one  thing,  ingenious  construction  another,  and  the  delight  with 
which  a  child  looks  up  to  the  light  of  a  rainbow  has  nothing  whatever 
in  common  with  that  with  which  an  engineer  admires  the  arch  of  a  bridge. 
This  last  kind  of  pleasure,  or  of  interest,  however,  is  one  of  the  highest 
importance  in  its  own  sphere,  and  must  be  the  subject  to-day  of  our  most 
attentive  inquiry. 

'' Observe,  first,  that  it  takes  place  in  two  very  different  degrees,  with 
respect  to  the  treatment  by  our  own  skill,  of  inert  matter,  and  the  dis- 
position by  nature  of  organic  force.    The  admiration  with  which  we  look 

301 


802  ARATBA  FENTELICI 

the  Gtetks  will  be  instmctive  in  all  practical  matters  le- 
lating  to  this  great  art,  peculiarly  their  own.  I  think  even 
the  evidence  I  have  already  laid  before  you  is  enough  to 
convince  you  that  it  was  by  rightness  and  reality,  not  by 
idealism  or  ddig^tfulness  only,  that  their  minds  were  finally 
guided;  and  I  am  sure  that,  before  closing  the  presait 
course,  I  shall  be  able  so  fiu-  to  complete  that  evidence,  as 
to  prove  to  you  that  the  commonly  received  noti<ms  of 
classic  art  are,  not  only  unfounded,  but  even,  in  many  re^ 
spects,  directly  contrary  to  the  truth.  You  are  constantly 
told  that  Greece  idealized  whatever  she  contemplated.  She 
did  the  exact  ccmtrary:  she  realized  and  verified  it.  You 
are  constantly  told  she  soug^  only  the  beautifuL  She 
sou^t,  indeed,  with  all  her  heart;  but  she  found,  because 
she  never  doubted  that  the  aearch  was  to  be  consistent  with 
propriety  and  ccmunon  sense.  And  the  first  thing  you  will 
always  discern  in  Ghreek  work  is  the  first  which  you  ought 
to  discern  in  all  work;  namely,  that  the  object  of  it  has 
been  rational,  and  has  been  obtained  by  sample  and  unos- 
tentatious means. 

144.  ''That  the  object  of  the  work  has  been  rational"! 
Consider  how  much  that  implies.     That  it  should  be  by 

at  the  Alght  of  ft  swallow,  or  the  leap  of  a  leopard,  depends  aiaterially  on 
our  sense  of  the  distribution  of  mechanical  force  through  a  eomplez  and 
perfect  stracture.  But  oar  admiration  here  is  so  oonfyaed  with  wonder, 
and  with  the  sense  of  the  presence  of  a  mysterions  power  of  which  we 
cannot  logically  ressonu  nor  clearly  know  the  operation,  that  the  feeling 
of  delight  cannot  be  classed  with  that  which  we  have  to-day  to  consider 
as  received  from  works  of  structural  art.  For  this  ktter,  and  greatly 
inferior  sensation  of  pleasure  depends  not  on  any  mysterious  appiehensioa 
of  incognizable  power,  but  on  a  quite  clear  perception  of  the  strength  of 
inert  matter  being  accurately  disposed  so  as  to  resut  or  reeeive  the  impulie 
of  an  accurately  measurable  force. 

"  Our  pleasure  in  observing  this  consists,  in  reality,  in  the  aeknowled^ 
ment  of  human  skill  and  judgment,  executed  in  a  useful  way,  and  m 
order  to  its  being  rightly  felt,  the  following  main  conditions  are  neces- 
sary :  —  First.  Tlie  judgment  in  the  work  must  not  be  less  than  the 
mechanical  skill;  it  is  better  on  the  whole  that  it  should  be  a  little 
greater.  The  first  thing  to  be  required  is  therefore  that  the  object  of 
the  work  should  be  rational,  and  that  it  should  be  attained  by  simple 
and  unostentatious  means. 

''That   the   object   of  the   work    should   he   tatMual"  ...  (as  in 


V.  STRUCTURE  808 

all  means  seen  to  have  been  determined  upon,  and  carried 
through,  with  saise  and  discretion;  these  being  gifts  of 
intellect  far  more  precious  than  any  knowledge  of  mathe- 
matics, or  of  the  mechanical  resources  of  art.  Therefore, 
also,  that  it  should  be  a  modest  and  temperate  work,  a 
structure  fitted  to  the  actual  state  of  men ;  proportioned  to 
their  actual  size,  as  animals, — ^to  their  average  strength, — ^to 
their  true  necessities, — and  to  the  d^^ree  of  easy  command 
they  have  over  the  forces  and  substances  of  nature. 

145.  You  see  how  much  this  law  excludes  1  All  that 
is  fondly  magnificent,  insolently  ambitious,  or  vainly  diffi* 
cult.  There  is,  indeed,  such  a  thing  as  Magnanimity  in 
design,  but  never  unless  it  be  joined  also  with  modesty, 
and  EquBmadtj*  Nothing  extravagant,  monstrous,  strained, 
or  angular,  can  be  structurally  beautiful  No  towers  of 
Babel  envious  of  the  skies;  no  pyramids  in  mimicry  of 
the  mountains  of  the  earth;  no  streets  that  are  a  weari- 
ness to  traverse,  nor  temples  that  make  pigmies  of  the 
worshippers.^ 

It  is  one  of  the  primal  merits  and  decencies  of  Greek 
work,  that  it  was,  on  the  whole,  singularly  small  in  scale, 
and  wholly  within  reach  of  sight,  to  its  finest  details.    And, 

^  [The  MS.  drmft  of  the   leetiirei  above   quoted,  here  containt  en  additiooel 
paisage: — 

''Not  but  that,  in  the  principal  eitiee  of  a  great  people,  and  for  the 
requiremeats  of  their  moltitadea,  great  worki  may  not  oe  ondertaken  with 
a  certain  degree  of  enthnnaitic  ambition;  still  there  is  a  limit  always 
beyond  which  ambition  disappoints  itself,  and  the  oonfession  of  yanitv  Is 
clearer  than  the  exhibition  or  strength.  There  is  always  a  point  at  which 
the  difficulty  to  be  conquered  surpasses  the  value  of  any  possible  result ; 
then  is  the  time  to  pause.  You  Duild  a  tower  to  a  certain  height,  with 
comparative  ease^  high  enough  to  command  whatever  view  is  needful  of 
adjacent  country,  and  to  produce  an  impressive  sense  of  magnitude,  when 
seen  from  its  foot  Above  that  useful  and  moderate  height,  the  very 
lifting  of  the  stones  and  raising  of  the  scaffolding  becomes  tedious  and 
costly,  the  sculpture  of  detail  must  be  colossal  or  invisible  in  the  foundap 
tion,  buttressinff  and  masonry  then  are  innumerable  possibilities  of  failure 
and  danger.  You  may,  with  great  expense,  secure  vour  foundation  and 
put  another  tower  on  the  top  of  the  first,  but  it  would  be  even  wiser  and 
oetter  to  build  the  second  tower  upon  the  ground,  and  have  two  moderately 
higher  towers  instead  of  one  pre-eminent.  It  is  far  better  for  vou,  here  in 
Oxford,  to  have  Maffdalen  tower,  St.  Mar/s  and  Christ  Cnureh  spire, 
than  it  would  be  to  have  only  St  Mary's  three  times  as  high."] 


804  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

indeed,  the  best  buildings  that  I  know  are  thus  modest; 
and  some  of  the  best  are  minute  jewel  cases  for  sweet  sculp- 
ture. The  Parthenon  would  hardly  attract  notice,  if  it 
were  set  by  the  Charing  Cross  Railway  Station :  the  Church 
of  the  MiracoU,  at  Venice,  the  Chapel  of  the  Rose,  at 
Lucca,  and  the  Chapel  of  the  Thorn,  at  Pisa,^  would  not, 
I  suppose,  all  three  together,  fill  the  tenth  part,  cube,  of  a 
transept  of  the  Crystal  Palace.    And  they  are  better  so. 

146.  In  the  chapter  on  Power  in  the  Seven  Lamps  of 
Architecture^  I  have  stated  what  seems,  at  first,  the  re^ 
verse  of  what  I  am  sajring  now ;  *  namely,  that  it  is  better 
to  have  one  grand  building  than  any  number  of  mean  ones. 
And  that  is  true:  but  you  cannot  command  grandeur  by 
size  till  you  can  command  grace  in  minuteness;  and  least 
of  all,  remember,  will  you  so  command  it  to-day,  when 
magnitude  has  become  the  chief  exponent  of  folly  and 
misery,  co-ordinate  in  the  fraternal  enormities  of  the  Factory 
and  Poorhouse, — ^the  Barracks  and  Hospital.  And  the  final 
law  in  this  matter  is  that,  if  you  require  edifices  only  for 
the  grace  and  health  of  mankind,  and  build  them  without 
pretence  and  without  chicanery,  they  wiU  be  subUme  on  a 
modest  scale,  and  lovely  with  little  decoration. 

147.  From  these  principles  of  simplicity  and  temperance, 
two  very  severely  fixed  laws  of  construction  follow ;  namely^ 
first,  that  our  structure,  to  be  beautiful,  must  be  produced 
with  tools  of  men;  and,  secondly,  that  it  must  be  com- 
posed of  natural  substances.  First,  I  say,  produced  with 
tools  of  men.  All  fine  art  requires  the  application  of  the 
whole  strength  and  subtlety  of  the  body,  so  that  such  art 
is  not  possible  to  any  sickly  person,  but  involves  the  action 
and  force  of  a  strong  man's  arm  from  the  shoulder,  as  well 
as  the  delicatest  touch  of  his  fingers :  and  it  is  the  evidence 

1  [For  the  Church  of  the  Miracoli,  see  8t(me9  of  Venice,  vol.  iii.  (Vol.  XI.  p.  393)  ;. 
a  drawing  (by  J.  W.  Bunnev)  of  Sta.  Maria  deUa  Rosa  at  Lacca  is  No.  81  in  the 
Reference  Series  (see  Vol.  XXL  p.  33);  lor  a  drawing  by  Ruskin  of  the  Chapel 
of  Sta.  Maria  della  Spina  at  Pisa,  see  Plate  4  in  Modem  Painters,  vol.  ii.  (Vol.  IV, 
p.  136).] 

'  [See  in  this  edition  Vol.  VIII.  p.  104,  and  the  note  there  added.] 


V.   STRUCTURE  805 

that  this  full  and  fine  strength  has  been  spent  on  it  which 
makes  the  art  executively  noble;  so  that  no  instrument 
must  be  used,  habitually,  which  is  either  too  heavy  to  be 
delicately  restrained,  or  too  small  and  weak  to  transmit  a 
vigorous  impulse;  much  less  any  mechanical  aid,  such  as 
would  render  the  sensibility  of  the  fingers  ineffectuaL"*^ 

148.  Of  course,  any  kind  of  work  in  glass,  or  in  metal, 
on  a  large  scale,  involves  some  painful  endurance  of  heat; 
and  working  in  clay,  some  habitual  endurance  of  cold ;  but 
the  point  beyond  which  the  effort  must  not  be  carried  is 
marked  by  loss  of  power  of  manipulation.  As  long  as  the 
eyes  and  fingers  have  complete  command  of  the  material, 
(as  a  glass-blower  has,  for  instance,  in  doing  fine  orna- 
mental work,) — the  law  is  not  violated ;  but  all  our  great 
engine  and  furnace  work,  in  gun-making  and  the  like,  is 
degrading  to  the  intellect;  and  no  nation  can  long  persist 
in  it  without  losing  many  of  its  human  faculties.  Nay, 
even  the  use  of  machinery  other  than  the  common  rope 
and  pulley,  for  the  Lifting  of  weights,  is  degrading  to  archi- 
tecture; the  invention  of  expedients  for  the  raising  of 
enormous  stones  has  always  been  a  characteristic  of  partly 
savage  or  corrupted  races.  A  block  of  marble  not  larger 
than  a  cart  with  a  couple  of  oxen  could  carry,  and  a  cross- 
beam, with  a  couple  of  pulleys,  raise,  is  as  large  as  should 
generally  be  used  in  any  building.  The  employment  of 
large  masses  is  sure  to  lead  to  vulgar  exhibitions  of  geo- 
metrical arrangement,  t  and  to  draw  away  the  attention 
from  the  sculpture.     In  general,  rocks  naturally  break  into 

*  Nothing  is  more  wonderfol,  or  more  disgraceful,  among  the  fonns  of 
ignorance  engendered  by  modem  vulgar  occupations  in  pursuit  of  gain,  than 
the  unconsciousness,  now  total,  that  fine  art  is  essentially  Athletic.  I  re- 
ceived a  letter  from  Birmingham,  some  little  time  since,  inviting  me  to  see 
how  much,  in  glass  manu&cture,  ''machinery  excelled  rude  hand-work." 
The  writer  had  not  the  remotest  conception  that  he  might  as  well  have  asked 
me  to  come  and  see  a  mechanical  boat-race  rowed  by  automata,  and  "  how 
much  machinery  excelled  rude  arm-work." 

t  Such  as  the  Sculptureless  arch  of  Waterloo  Bridge,  for  instance,  referred 
to  in  the  Third  Lecture,  §  84  [p.  St56]. 

XX.  u 


806  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

such  pieces  as  the  human  beings  that  have  to  build  with 
them  can  easily  lift;  and  no  laiger  diould  be  sought  for. 

149.  In  this  respect,  and  in  many  other  subtle  ways, 
the  law  that  the  work  is  to  be  with  tools  of  men  is  ooih 
nected  with  the  farther  condition  of  its  modesty,  that  it  is 
to  be  wrought  in  substance  provided  by  Nature,  and  to 
have  a  faithful  respect  to  all  the  essential  qualities  of  such 
substance. 

And  here  I  must  ask  your  attention  to  the  idea,  and, 
more  than  idea, — ^the  fact,  involved  in  that  infinitely  mis- 
used term,  ^*  Provideada,"  when  applied  to  the  Divine  power. 
In  its  truest  sense  and  scholarly  use,  it  is  a  human  virtue, 
npofiiideia;  the  personal  type  of  it  is  in  Piometheus,  and 
all  the  first  power  of  rix^f  is  from  him,  as  compared  to 
the  weakness  of  dajrs  when  men  without  foresight  **i^po¥ 
wai  TravTo.''^  But,  SO  f ar  as  wc  use  the  word  "Providence'* 
as  an  attribute  of  the  Maker  and  Giver  of  all  things,  it 
does  not  mean  that  in  a  shipwreck  He  takes  care  of  the 
passengers  who  are  to  be  saved,  and  takes  none  of  those 
who  are  to  be  drowned;  but  it  does  mean  that  every  race 
of  creatures  is  bom  into  the  world  under  circumstances  oi 
approximate  adaptation  to  its  necessities;  and,  beyond  all 
others,  the  ingenious  and  observant  race  of  man  is  sur* 
rounded  with  elements  naturally  good  for  his  food,  pleasant 
to  his  sight,  and  suitable  for  the  subjects  of  his  ingenuity; 
— ^the  stone,  metal,  and  day  of  the  earth  he  walks  upon 
lending  themselves  at  once  to  his  hand,  for  aU  manner  of 
workmanship. 

150.  Thus,  his  truest  respect  for  the  law  of  the  entire 
creation  is  shown  by  his  making  the  most  of  what  he  can 
get  most  easily;  and  there  is  no  virtue  of  art,  nor  appli- 
cation of  common  sense,  more  sacredly  necessary  than  tiiis 
respect  to  the  beauty  of  natural  substance,  and  the  ease 
of  local  use;  neither  are  there  any  other  precepts  of  con- 
struction so  vital  as  these — that  you  show  all  the  strength 

&  [iEschylus^  l*r9m$th9U9^  450:  ''jumbled  all  tfaingB  tofether  at  random/'] 


-1 


V.  STRUCTURE  Wt 

of  your  material,  tempt  none  of  its  weaknesses,  and  do 
with  it  only  what  can  be  simply  and  permanently  done.^ 

151.  Thus,  all  good  building  will  be  with  rocks,  or 
pebbles,  or  burnt  clay,  but  with  no  artificial  compound ;  all 
good  painting  with  common  oils  and  pigments  on  conunon 
canvas,  paper,  plaster,  or  wood, — admitting  scnnetimes,  for 
precious  work,  precious  things,  but  all  applied  in  a  simple 
and  visible  way.  The  highest  imitative  art  should  not,  in- 
deed, at  first  sight,  call  attention  to  the  means  of  it;  but 
even  that,  at  length,  should  do  so  distinctly,  and  provoke 
the  observer  to  take  pleasure  in  seeing  how  completdy  the 
workman  is  master  of  the  particular  material  he  has  used, 
and  how  beautiful  and  desirable  a  substance  it  was,  for 
work  of  that  kind.  In  oil  painting,  its  unctuous  quality 
is  to  be  delighted  in ;  in  firesco,  its  chalky  quality ;  in  glass, 
its  transparency ;  in  wood,  its  grain ;  in  marble,  its  softness ; 
in  porphyry,  its  hardness ;  in  iron,  its  toughness.  In  a  flint 
country,  one  should  feel  the  delightfulness  of  having  flints 
to  pick  up,  and  fasten  together  into  rugged  walls.  In  a 
marble  country,  one  should  be  always  more  and  more 
astonished  at  the  exquisite  colour  and  structure  of  marble; 
in  a  slate  country,  one  should  fed  as  if  every  rock  deft 
itself  only  for  the  sake  of  being  built  with  conveniently. 

152.  Now,  for  sculpture,  there  are,  briefly,  two  materials 
— ^lay,  and  Stone;  for  glass  is  only  a  clay  that  gets  clear 
and  brittle  as  it  cools,  and  metal  a  clay  that  gets  opaque 
and  tough  as  it  cools.  Indeed,  the  true  use  of  gold  in 
this  world  is  only  as  a  very  pretty  and  very  ductile,  day, 
which  you  can  spread  as  flat  as  you  like,  spin  as  fine  as 
you  like,  and  which  will  ndther  crack  nor  tarnish.* 

All  the  arts  of  sculpture  in  clay  may  be  summed  up 
under  the  word  '*  Plastic,"  and  all  ci  those  in  stone,  under 
the  word  **  Glyptic." 

158.  Sculpture  in  clay  will  accordingly  include  all  cast 

1  rComiHire  Two  Patkt,  §§  100,  161  (VoL  XVI.  p.  386).] 
*  [Compure  A  Joy  for  Ever,  §  46  (Vol.  XVL  pp.  46-47).] 


808  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

brickwork,  pottery,  and  tile-work* — a  somewhat  important 
branch  of  human  skill.  Next  to  the  potter's  work,  you 
have  all  the  arts  in  porcelain,  glass,  enamel,  and  metid, — 
everjrthing,  that  is  to  say,  playful  and  familiar  in  design, 
mudi  of  what  is  most  felicitously  inventive,  and,  in  bronze 
or  gold,  most  precious  and  permanent. 

154.  Sculpture  in  stone,  whether  granite,  gem,  or  marble, 
while  we  accurately  use  the  general  term  "  glyptic "  for  it, 
may  be  thought  of  with,  perhaps,  the  most  clear  force 
under  the  English  word  "  engraving.*'  For,  from  the  mere 
angular  incision  which  the  Greek  consecrated  in  the  tri- 
glyphs  of  his  greatest  order  of  architecture,  grow  forth  aQ 
the  arts  of  bas-relief,  and  methods  of  localized  groups  of 
sculpture  connected  with  each  other  and  with  architecture: 
as,  in  another  direction,  the  arts  of  engraving  and  wood- 
cutting themselves.^ 

155.  Over  all  this  vast  field  of  human  skill  the  laws 
which  I  have  enunciated  to  you  rule  with  inevitable  autho- 
rity, embracing  the  greatest,  and  consenting  to  the  hum- 
blest, exertion;  strong  to  repress  the  ambition  of  nations, 
if  fantastic  and  vain,  but  gentle  to  approve  the  efforts  of 
children,  made  in  accordance  with  the  visible  intention  of 
the  Maker  of  all  flesh,  and  the  Giver  of  all  Intelligence. 
These  laws,  therefore,  I  now  repeat,  and  beg  of  you  to 
observe  them  as  irrefragable. 

1.  That  the  work  is  to  be  with  tools  of  men. 

2.  That  it  is  to  be  in  natural  materials. 

8.  That  it  is  to  exhibit  the  virtues  of  those  materials, 
and  aim  at  no  quality  inconsistent  with  them. 

4.  That  its  temper  is  to  be  quiet  and  gentle,  in  harmony 

*  It  is  strange,  at  this  day,  to  think  of  the  relation  of  the  Athenian 
Ceramicus  to  the  French  Tile-fields,  Tileries,  or  Tuileries :  and  how  these  last 
may  yet  become — have  already  partly  become — "the  Potter's  field,"  blood- 
bought     {December,  1870.2) 

^  [Compare  Ariadne  Fhrentina,  §  39,  on  the  relation  of  engraving  to  other  arts.} 
'  [For  other  references  to  these  events,  see  above,  p.  199  n.] 


V.   STRUCTURE  809 

with  common  needs,  and  in  consent  to  common  intelli* 
gence. 

We  will  now  observe  the  bearing  of  these  laws  on  the 
elementary  conditions  of  the  art  at  present  under  discussion.^ 

156.  There  is,  first,  work  in  baked  clay,  which  contracts, 

^  [In  one  of  the  MS.  drafts  of  this  lecture  Ruskin  illustrated  these  principles 
further  from  the  art  of  architecture.  Ultimately  he  held  the  passage  over,  noting 
it  for  use  in  the  ''Introduction  to  lectures  on  architecture  referring  to  former 
statement" — i.e.,  to  the  statement  of  genend  principles  in  the  present  lecture.  As 
the  lectures  on  architecture  were  not  written,  or  not  written  as  intended  (see 
ahove,  p.  217  n.),  the  passage  is  given  here : — 

''Extending  the  same  principle  to  the  third  art,  fou  will  find  that 

food  architecture  involves  the  intelligent  use  of  materials  ready  to  our 
and,  by  applying  average  human  strength  to  them^  and  due^  unforced 
and  unpresummg  ingenuity.  All  endeavours  to  display  an  unnecessary 
cleverness,  or  overcome  gratuitously  imposed  difficulties,  vulgarise  and 
degrade.  You  are  not  to  try  to  make  stone  look  like  lace,  nor  brick 
like  iron,  you  are  not  to  put  anything  in  positions  where  it  looks  as  if 
it  could  not  stand,  nor  even  to  allow  your  resources  to  seem  pushed  to 
their  utmost  for  its  security.  But  with  the  most  easily  obtained,  though 
carefully  chosen,  wood  and  stone,  you  are  to  construct  the  thing  requii^ 
in  the  simplest,  and  therefore,  truly,  the  most  scientific  way,  and,  as  &r 
as  possible,  to  point  out  by  what  subsequent  decoration  you  admit  this 
metnod  of  construction. 

"But  you  must  beware  even  with  respect  to  architecture,  of  pressing 
this  theory  of  visible  construction  too  far.  It  is  desirable,  nay,  in  the 
best  work  it  is  necessary,  that  the  method  of  building  should  be  visible, 
but  unless  the  edifice  be  otherwise  worthy  to  stand,  it  is  of  no  conse- 
quence by  what  measures  we  have  secured  its  stability.  There  is  nothing 
more  ingenious  in  architecture,  nothing  more  pleasant  to  an  eye  weU 
educated  in  perception  of  structural  laws,  than  the  common  arrangement  of 
buttress  and  pinnacle  round  the  apse  of  a  fine  Gothic  cathedral.  But  it 
presupposes  toe  requirement  of  the  interior  of  a  building  in  which  none  of 
these  means  for  its  support  are  to  be  recognized,  and  t£e  mind  is  to  rest 
in  the  perception  that  a  large  space  has  been  secured  from  the  violence 
of  the  elements,  and  surrounded  by  masonry,  graceful  in  its  divisions  and 
grand  in  its  elevation. 

"Again,  though  the  fluting  of  a  Doric  column,  the  moulding  of  an 
Early  English  pointed  arch,  and  the  divisions  of  stones  in  the  basement 
of  a  building  like  Whitehall,  are  all  of  them  more  grateful  to  the  eye 
because  they  explain  the  directions  of  force  to  be  resisted  and  direct 
attention  to  the  points  where  the  masonry  needs  to  be  adjusted  with  the 
greatest  care,  all  the  final  value  of  these  decorative  methods  of  treat- 
ment depends  on  a  proportion  of  masses  which  is  wholly  independent  of 
construction.  A  Doric  pillar  would  be  spoiled  if  it  had  twenty  flutinn 
instead  of  twelve,  though  its  vertical  action  would  be  even  more  definitely 
illustrated,  and  the  adoption  of  a  partly  elliptical  curve  for  the  flutings 
themselves  is  an  appeal  to  an  entireiv  abstract  source  of  SBsthetic  pleasure. 
"So  again,  in  the  Early  English  lancet  arch,  the  distribution  of  its 
channelled  mouldings  may  be  infinitely  varied  in  the  depth  and  groups 
of  shadows^  without  in  any  way  modifying  the  structural  conditions,  and 
the  eye  is  pleased  or  displeased  by  the  concentric  sequence  of  darks  and 
lights  without  the  slightest  reference  to  a  stability  which  there  is  no  cause 


510  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

as  it  dries,  and  is  very  easily  frangible.^  Then  you  must 
put  no  work  into  it  requiring  niceness  in  dimension,  nor 
any  so  elaborate  that  it  would  be  a  great  loss  if  it  were 
broken ;  but  as  the  clay  yields  at  once  to  the  hand,  and  the 
sculptor  can  do  anything  with  it  he  likes,  it  is  a  material 
for  him  to  sketch  with  and  play  with, — ^to  record  his  fJEtncies 
in,  before  they  escape  him, — ^and  to  express  roughly,  for 
people  who  can  enjoy  such  sketches,  what  he  has  not  time 

in  any  case  to  qaettion^  while  on  the  other  heod,  in  considering  with 
definite  purpose  the  probable  ■eonrity  of  two  arehee  propoaed  to  be  built 
OTor  a  wide  rirer^  in  nine  catee  out  of  ten  the  eye  will  determine  that  to 
be  meet  graoeful  which  is  apparency  the  least  sale. 

'^Finuly^  though  in  the  rustic  bases  of  Renaissance  buildings  there 
is  an  appeal  to  the  sense  of  constructive  adaptation  by  the  apparently 
securing  a  strong  foundation  with  many  courses  of  level  stone  before  the 
refined  adjustments  of  pillar  and  architecture  begin,  the  real  value  of 
those  divisions  of  the  murhet  is  founded  on  the  abetrect  sense  of  propor- 
tion^ and  by  no  means  on  any  consideration  of  stability.  To  lay,  or  to 
appear  to  have  laid,  the  first  storey  of  a  delicate  building  with  a  few  vast 
blocks  of  rough  stone,  would  in  no  wise  invalidato  the  impression  of 
security,  but  would  be  painful  to  the  higher  instincts  which  delight 
above  all  things  in  harmony,  and  demand  before  all  things  propriety  and 
common  sense. 

''Thus,  then,  is  the  common  law  for  all  the  arts  rigbtly  exerdsed ;  they 
are  to  be  directed  to  a  worthy  object,  within  reach  of  average  human 
pains,  and  they  are  to  use  the  natural  materiak  nearest  at  hand  of 
sterling  quality,  bringing  out  such  resulto  as  shall  be  completely  within 
reach  on  those  conditions."] 
^  [In  one  of  the  MS.  drafts  of  notes  for  this  lecture  there  is  the  following 

» 

''Olay  being  ductile  and  coherent  yields  itself  at  once  to  flowing  and 
fontastiG  form,  and  permite  the  instent  attainment  of  picturesque  project 
ing  masses.  It  is  especially  adapted  for  the  expression  of  movement  and 
of  fanciful  conceptions  of  ffroup,  but  not  for  receiving  finish,  which  it 
neither  merite  nor  is  capable  of.  In  studying  torra-cottas,  therisfore,  you 
are  to  look  only  for  the  sketch — a  rough  embodiment  of  the  sculptor^s 
thought,  and  for  rc^nement  and  grace  in  action,  but  not  in  surfiMO  or  in 
foature.  In  Greek  terrarcottas  you  wiU  often  find  a  diffused  and  melting 
softness  which  is  like  a  sketeh  of  Correggio;  in  modem  tsmKOttas  for 
the  most  part  you  will  find  picturesque  renderings  of  character,  often 
executed  with  ability  but  of  very  small  art  value,  being  vulgarly  imitetive. 

''Work  in  porcelain  is  subject  to  the  same  general  conditions,  bn^ 
hemf  more  permanent,  deserves,  and  is  capable  of,  higher  finish;  and 
admitting  also  the  addition  of  fixed  and  Deautiful  cofour,  lends  itself 
more  completely  to  imitetive  purposes  than  any  other  material.  Many 
noble  works  of  the  Florentine  school  are  executed  in  it  with  a  singular 
simplicity  of  heart  and  childlike  delight  in  realisation. 

''Work  in  hard  metals,  as  in  bronie  or  steel,  admite  every  grotesque- 
ness  of  form,  and  almost  provokes  to  vivacity  and  waywardness  of  inven- 
tion. It  may  realise  for,  without  being  vulgar,  for  ito  colour  prsserves  it 
from  becoming  merely  imitetive."] 


V.  STRUCTURE  811 

to  complete  in  marble.  The  day,  being  ductile,  lends  itself 
to  all  softness  of  line;  being  easily  frangible,  it  would 
be  ridiculous  to  give  it  sharp  edges,  so  that  a  blunt  and 
massive  rendering  of  graceful  gesture  wUl  be  its  natural 
function:  but  as  it  can  be  pinched,  or  pulled,  or  thrust 
in  a  moment  into  projection  which  it  would  take  hours 
of  chiselling  to  get  in  stone,  it  will  also  properly  be  used 
for  all  fantastic  and  grotesque  form,  not  involving  sharp 
edges.  Therefore,  what  is  true  of  chaUc  and  char^Md,  for 
painters,  is  equally  true  of  clay,  for  sculptors;  they  are 
all  most  precious  materials  for  true  masters,  but  tempt  the 
fiftlse  ones  into  fatal  license;  and  to  judge  rightly  of 
terra-'COtta  work  is  a  fiur  higher  reach  of  skill  in  sculp- 
ture-criticism than  to  distinguish  the  merits  of  a  finished 
statue. 

157.  We  have,  secondly,  work  in  bronze,  iron,  gold, 
and  other  metals;  in  which  the  laws  of  structure  are  still 
more  definite. 

AU  kinds  of  twisted  and  wreathen  work  on  every 
scale  become  delightful  when  wrought  in  ductile  or  tena- 
cious metal;  but  metal  which  is  to  be  hammered  into 
form  separates  itself  into  two  great  divisions — ^solid,  and 
flat 

A.  In  solid  metal-work,  s.^.,  metal  cast  thick  enough  to 
resist  bending,  whether  it  be  hoUow  or  not,  violent  and 
various  projection  may  be  admitted,  which  would  be  offen- 
sive in  marble;  but  no  sharp  edges,  because  it  is  difficult 
to  produce  them  with  the  hammer.  But  since  the  per- 
manence of  the  material  justifies  exquisiteness  of  workman- 
ship, whatever  delicate  ornamentation  can  be  wrought  with 
rounded  surfaces  may  be  advisedly  introduced;  and  since 
the  colour  of  bronze  or  any  other  metal  is  not  so  pleasantly 
representative  of  flesh  as  that  of  marble,  a  wise  sculptor 
wOl  depend  less  on  flesh  contour,  and  more  on  pictur- 
esque accessories,  which,  though  they  would  be  vulgar  if 
attempted  in  stone,  are  rightly  entertaining  in  bronze  or 
silver.    Verrocchio's  statue  of  Colleone  at  Venice,  Cellini's 


«12 


ARATRA  PENTELICI 


Perseus  at  Florence,  and  Ghiberti's  gates  at  Florence,  are 
models  of  bronze  treatment.^ 

B.  When  metal  is  beaten  thin,  it  becomes  what  is  tech- 
nically called  ''  plate,"  (the  flattened  thing,)  and  may  be 
treated  advisably  in  two  ways:  one,  by  beating  it  out  mto 
bosses,  the  other  by  cutting  it  into  strips  and  ramifications. 
The  vast  schools  of  goldsmiths'  work  and  of  iron  decora* 

tion,  founded  on  these  two  principles,  have  had 
the  most  powerful  influences  over  general  taste 
in  all  ages  and  countries.  One  of  the  simplest 
and  most  interesting  elementary  examples  of 
the  treatment  of  flat  metal  by  cutting  is  the 
common  branched  iron  bar.  Fig.  14,  used  to  dose 
small  apertures  in  countries  possessing  any  good 
primitive  style  of  ironwork,  formed  by  alternate 
cuts  on  its  sides,  and  the  bending  down  of  the 
severed  portions.  The  ordinary  domestic  window 
balcony  of  Verona  is  formed  by  mere  ribands  of 
iron,  bent  into  curves  as  studiously  refined  as 
those  of  a  Greek  vase,  and  decorated  merely  by 
their  own  terminations  in  spiral  volutes. 

All  cast  work  in  metal,  unfinished  by  hand, 
is  inadmissible^  in  any  school  of  living  art,  since  it  cannot 
possess  the  perfection  of  form  due  to  a  permanent  sub- 
stance ;  and  the  continual  sight  of  it  is  d^ructive  of  the 
faculty  of  taste:  but  metal  stamped  with  precision,  as  in 
coins,  is  to  sculpture  what  engraving  is  to  painting. 

158.  Thirdly.  Stone-sculpture  divides  itself  into  three 
schools:  one  in  very  hard  material;  one  in  very  soft;  and 
one  in  that  of  centrally  useful  consistence. 

A.  The  virtue  of  work  in  hard  material  is  the  expres- 
sion of  form  in  shallow  relief,  or  in  broad  contours:  deep 

1  [For  the  statue  of  CoUeone,  see  Vol.  XI.  p.  19 :  Raskin  placed  a  photognipli 
of  it  in  the  Educational  Series  (No.  95) ;  for  Ghiberti's  Gates,  see  Vol  IX.  p.  200, 
and  the  lecture  on  Ghiberti  in  The  jSHhetic  and  MathemaHc  Schools  qf  Florence, 
Of  these  gates  also  Ruskin  placed  a  photograph  in  his  Collection  of  Esnunples 
(No.  136  in  the  Reference  Series;  VoL  XXI.  p.  40).] 

*  [Compare  Seven  Lampe,  Vol.  VIII.  pp.  60,  86 ;  and  Lecturee  on  Art,  %  100 
(ahove,  p.  96).] 


JP^.14 


V.   STRUCTURE  818 

cutting  in  hard  material  is  inadmissible;  and  the  art,  at 
once  pompous  and  trivial,  of  gem  engraving,  has  been  in 
the  last  degree  destructive  of  the  honour  and  service  of 
sculpture. 

B.  The  virtue  of  work  in  soft  material  is  deep  cutting, 
with  studiously  graceful  disposition  of  the  masses  of  light 
and  shade.  The  greater  number  of  flamboyant  churches  of 
France  are  cut  out  of  an  adhesive  chalk;  and  the  fantasy 
of  their  latest  decoration  was,  in  great  part,  induced  by 
the  facility  of  obtaining  contrast  of  black  space,  undercut, 
with  white  tracery  easQy  left  in  sweepmg  and  interwoven 
rods — ^the  lavish  use  of  wood  in  domestic  architecture  mate- 
rially increasing  the  habit  of  delight  in  branched  complexity 
of  hne}  These  points,  however,  I  must  reserve  for  illustra- 
tion in  my  Lectures  on  Architecture.'  To-day,  I  shall  limit 
myself  to  the  illustration  of  elementary  sculptural  structure 
in  the  best  material, — ^that  is  to  say,  in  crystalline  marble, 
neither  soft  enough  to  encourage  the  caprice  of  the  work- 
man, nor  hard  enough  to  resist  his  wilL 

159.  c.  By  the  true  "Providence'*  of  Nature,  the  rock 
which  is  thus  submissive  has  been  in  some  places  stained 
with  the  fairest  colours,  and  in  others  blanched  into  the 
fairest  absence  of  colour  that  can  be  found  to  give  harmony 
to  inlaying,  or  dignity  to  form.  The  possession  by  the 
Greeks  of  their  Xeuxo^  \1609*  was  indeed  the  first  circum- 
stance regulating  the  development  of  their  art;  it  enabled 
them  at  once  to  express  their  passion  for  light  by  execut- 
ing the  faces,  hands,  and  feet  of  their  dark  wooden  statues 
in  white  marble,  so  that  what  we  look  upon  only  with 
pleasure  for  fineness  of  texture  was  to  them  an  imitation 
of  the  luminous  body  of  the  deity  shining  from  behind  its 
dark  robes;  and  ivory  afterwards  is  employed  in  their  best 
statues   for    its    yet    more    soft   and    flesh-like    brightness, 

i  rOn  this  nibject  lee  VoL  XIV.  p.  414,  and  VoL  XTX.  n.  261.] 

*  [AgBin    a   reference   to   an   intended   but   undeliverea    course :    see    aboTe, 
p.  217  n.] 

*  [The  white  Parian  marble :  so  Pindar  of  a  pillar — ^XIo^  \l$ov  \*vKcr4pv  {N$m, 
iv.  81).] 


814  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

receptive  also  of  the  most  delicate  colour — (therefore  to  this 
day  the  favourite  ground  of  miniature  painters).  In  like 
manner,  the  existence  of  quarries  of  peadi-coloured  marUe 
within  twelve  miles  of  Verona,^  and  of  white  marUe  and 
green  serpentine  between  Pisa  and  Grenoa,  defined  the 
manner  both  of  sculpture  and  architecture  for  all  the 
Grothic  buildings  of  Italy.  No  subtlety  of  education  could 
have  formed  a  high  school  of  art  without  these  materials.' 
160.  Next  to  the  colour,  the  fineness  of  substance  which 
will  take  a  perfectly  sharp  edge,  is  essential;  and  this  not 
merely  to  achnit  fine  delineation  in  the  sculpture  itself,  but 
to  secure  a  delightful  precision  in  placing  the  blocks  of 
which  it  is  composed.  For  the  possession  of  too  fine  marble, 
as  far  as  regards  the  work  itself,  is  a  temptation  instead  of 
an  advantage  to  an  inferior  sculptor;  and  the  abuse  of  the 
facility  of  undercutting,  especially  of  undercutting  so  as  to 
leave  profiles  defined  by  an  edge  against  shadow,  is  one  of 
the  chief  causes  of  decline  of  style  in  such  encrusted  has- 
relief  as  those  of  the  Certosa  of  Favia  and  its  contemporary 
monuments.'  But  no  undue  temptation  ever  exists  as  to 
the  fineness  of  block  fitting;  nothing  contributes  to  give 
so  pure  and  healthy  a  tone  to  sculpture  as  the  attention 
of  the  builder  to  the  jointing  of  his  stones ;  and  his  having 
both  the  power  to  make  them  fit  so  perfectly  as  not  to 
admit  of  the  slightest  portion  of  cement  showing  externally, 
and  the  skill  to  ensure,  if  needful,  and  to  suggest  always, 
their  stability  in  cementless  construction.  Flate  XI.  repre- 
sents a  piece  of  entirely  fine  Lombardic  building,  the  central 
portion  of  the  arch  in  the  Duomo  in  Verona,*  which  cor- 
responds to  that  of  the  porch  of  San  Zenone,  represented 
in  Flate  I.  In  both  these  pieces  of  building,  the  only 
line  that  traces  the  architrave  round  the  arch,  is  that  of 

>  [ComiMire  ''Verona  and  ito  Riven/'  §  6  (VoL  XIX.  p.  432).] 
s  Lpn  thie  •ulnect,  lee  8tone$  of  Veniee,  vol.  iii.  (Vol.  XL  p.  200^  and  the 
''Review  of  Lord  Lindsay/'  §  31  (Vol.  XII.  p.  200).] 

*  [Fdr  other  criticisms  of  this  buUding,  see  Seven  Lampe,  Vol.  VIII.  p.  60/! 

*  rrhe  drawing  of  this  snbject  is  Ko.  112  in  the  Reference  Series  (Vol.  XXI. 
p.  385.] 


.9 


The  First  Elements  of  Sculpture 
Incised  Outline  and  Opened  Space 


V.   STRUCTURE  815 

the  masonry  joint;  yet  this  line  is  drawn  with  extremest 
subtlety,  with  intention  of  delighting  the  eye  by  its  relation 
of  varied  curvature  to  the  arch  itself;  and  it  is  just  as  much 
considered  as  the  finest  pen-line  of  a  Raphael  drawing. 
Every  joint  of  the  stone  is  used,  in  like  manner,  as  a  thin 
black  line,  which  the  slightest  sign  of  cement  would  spoil 
like  a  blot.  And  so  proud  is  the  builder  of  his  fine  joint- 
ing, and  so  fearless  of  any  distortion  or  strain  spoiling  the 
adjustment  afterwards,  that  in  one  place  he  runs  his  joint 
quite  gratuitously  through  a  bas-relief,  and  gives  the  key- 
stone its  only  sign  of  pre-eminence  by  the  minute  inlaying 
of  the  head  of  the  Lamb  into  the  stone  of  the  course 
above. 

161.  Proceeding  from  this  fine  jointing  to  fine  draughts- 
manship, you  have,  in  the  very  outset  and  earliest  stage  of 
sculpture,  your  fiat  stone  sur&ce  given  you  as  a  sheet  of 
white  paper,  on  which  you  are  required  to  produce  the 
utmost  efiect  you  can  with  the  simplest  means,  cutting 
away  as  little  of  the  stone  as  may  be,  to  save  both  time 
and  trouble;  and  above  all,  leaving  the  block  itself,  when 
shaped,  as  solid  as  you  can,  that  its  surface  may  better 
resist  weather,  and  the  carved  parts  be  as  much  protected 
as  possible  by  the  masses  left  around  them. 

162.  The  first  thing  to  be  done  is  clearly  to  trace  the 
outline  of  subject  with  an  incision  approximating  in  section 
to  that  of  the  furrow  of  a  plough,  only  more  equal-sided. 
A  fine  sculptor  strikes  it,  as  his  chisd  leans,  freely,  on 
marble;  an  Egyptian,  in  hard  rock,  cuts  it  sharp,  as  in 
cuneiform  inscriptions.  In  any  case,  you  have  a  result 
somewhat  like  tiie  upper  figure,  Plate  XII.,  in  which  I 
show  you  the  most  dementary  indication  of  form  possible, 
by  cutting  the  outline  of  the  typical  archaic  Greek  head 
with  an  incision  like  that  of  a  Greek  triglyph,  only  not 
so  precise  in  edge  or  slope,  as  it  is  to  be  modified  after- 
wards. 

168*  Now,  the  simplest  thing  we  can  do  next  is  to 
round  off  the  fiat  surfiice  within  the  incision,  and  put  what 


816  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

form  we  can  get  into  the  feebler  projection  of  it  thus  ob- 
tained The  Egyptians  do  this,  often  with  exquisite  skill, 
and  then,  as  I  showed  you  in  a  former  Lecture,  colour  the 
whole — ^using  the  incision  as  an  outline.^  Such  a  method 
of  treatment  is  capable  of  good  service  in  representing,  at 
little  cost  of  pains,  subjects  in  distant  effect ;  and  common, 
or  merely  picturesque,  subjects  even  near.  To  show  you 
what  it  is  capable  of,  and  what  coloured  sculpture  would 
be  in  its  rudest  type,  I  have  prepared  the  colour  relief  of 
the  John  Dory*  as  a  natural  history  drawing  for  distant 
effect.  You  Imow,  also,  that  I  meant  him  to  be  ugly — as 
ugly  as  any  creature  can  well  be.  In  time,  I  hope  to  show 
you  prettier  things — ^peacocks  and  kingfishers,  butterflies  and 
flowers, — on  grounds  of  gold,  and  the  like,  as  they  were  in 
Byzantine  work.  I  shall  expect  you,  in  right  use  of  your 
aesthetic  faculties,  to  like  those  better  than  what  I  i^ow 
you  to-day.  But  it  is  now  a  question  of  method  only; 
and  if  you  will  look,  after  the  Lecture,  first  at  the  mere 
white  relief,  and  then  see  how  much  may  be  gained  by  a 
few  dashes  of  colour,  such  as  a  practised  workman  could 
lay  in  a  quarter  of  an  hour, — ^the  whole  forming,  if  well 
done,  almost  a  deceptive  image, — ^you  will,  at  least,  have 
the  range  of  power  in  Egyptian  sculpture  clearly  expressed 
to  you. 

164.  But  for  fine  sculpture,  we  must  advance  by  fur 
other  methods.  If  we  carve  the  subject  with  real  delicacy, 
the  cast  shadow  of  the  incision  will  interfere  with  its  out- 
line, so  that,  for  representation  of  beautiful  things  you  must 
dear  away  the  groimd  about  it,  at  all  events  for  a  little 
distance.  As  the  law  of  work  is  to  use  the  least  pains 
possible,  you  dear  it  only  just  as  far  back  as  you  need, 

*  This  relief  is  now  among  the  other  casts  which  I  have  placed  in  the 
lower  school  in  the  University  niUeries.' 

1  [See  above,  §  32,  p.  222.] 

*  rThe  plain  relief  (see  above,  p.  288)  remains  in  the  Rusldn  Drawing  School, 
but  the  coloured  relief  is  not  there.] 


V.  STRUCTURE  817 

then,  for  the  sake  of  order  and  finish,  you  give  the 
space  a  geometrical  outline.  By  taking,  in  this  case,  the 
simplest  I  can, — a  circle, — I  can  clear  the  head  with  little 
labour  in  the  removal  of  surface  round  it  (see  the  lower 
figure  in  Plate  XII.). 

165.  Now,  these  are  the  first  terms  of  all  well-constructed 
bas-relief.  The  mass  you  have  to  treat  consists,  of  a  piece 
of  stone  which,  however  you  afterwards  carve  it,  can  but, 
at  its  most  projecting  point,  reach  the  level  of  the  external 
plane  surface  out  of  which  it  was  mapped,  and  defined  by 
a  depression  roimd  it ;  that  depression  being  at  first  a  mere 
trench,  then  a  moat  of  a  certain  width,  of  which  the  outer 
sloping  bank  is  in  contact,  as  a  limiting  geometrical  line, 
with  the  laterally  salient  portions  of  sculpture.  This,  I 
repeat,  is  the  primal  construction  of  good  bas-relief,  imply- 
ing, first,  perfect  protection  to  its  surfiEU^  from  any  trans- 
verse blow,  and  a  geometrically  limited  space  to  be  occupied 
by  the  design,  into  which  it  shall  pleasantly  (and  as  you 
shall  ultimately  see,^  ingeniously)  contract  itself:  implying, 
secondly,  a  determined  depth  of  projection,  which  it  shall 
rarely  reach,  and  never  exceed:  and  implying,  finally,  the 
production  of  the  whole  piece  with  the  least  possible  labour 
of  chisel  and  loss  of  stone. 

166.  And  these,  which  are  the  first,  are  very  nearly  the 
last  constructive  laws  of  sculpture.  You  will  be  surprised 
to  find  how  much  they  include,  and  how  much  of  minor 
propriety  in  treatment  their  observance  involves. 

In  a  very  interesting  essay  on  the  architecture  of  the 
Parthenon,  by  the  Professor  of  Architecture  of  the  &cole 
Polytechnique,  M.  !^mile  Boutmy,*  you  will  find  it  noticed 
that  the  Greeks  do  not  usually  weaken,  by  carving,  the 
constructive  masses  of  their  building;   but  put  their  chief 

1  [See  §  173 ;  below,  p.  322.] 

s  [Philo9oplde  de  t Architecture  en  Oriee,  par  J^mile  Boutmy.  Paris,  1870,  p.  183; 
re-iasued  in  1897  under  the  title  Le  Parlhhwn  et  ie  OMe  Qrec.  For  a  criticism  of 
the  book,  see  Raskin's  letter  to  Professor  Norton  of  September  30, 1870  (reprinted 
in  a  later  volume  of  this  edition  from  the  Lettere,  yol.  iL  p.  26) ;  and  see  also 
Raskin's  Preface  to  the  Boadeide  Songe  iff  ^fViaeony.] 


818  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

sculpture  in  the  empty  spaces  between  the  triglyphs,  or 
beneath  the  roof.  This  is  true;  but  in  so  doing,  they 
merely  build  their  panel  instead  of  carving  it;  they  accepti 
no  less  than  the  Goths,  the  laws  of  recess  and  limitation^ 
as  being  vital  to  the  safety  and  dignity  of  their  design; 
and  their  noblest  recumbent  statues  are,  constructivdy, 
the  fillings  of  the  acute  extrraotty  of  a  panel  in  the  form 
of  an  obtusely  sununited  triangle. 

167.  In  gradual  descent  from  that  severest  type,  you 
will  find  that  an  immense  quantity  of  sculpture  of  all 
times  and  styles  may  be  generally  embraced  under  the 
notion  of  a  mass  hewn  out  of,  or,  at  least,  placed  in,  a 
panel  or  recess,  deepening,  it  may  be,  into  a  niche;  the 
sculpture  being  always  designed  with  refereace  to  its  posi- 
tion in  such  recess:  and,  therefore,  to  the  effect  of  the 
building  out  of  which  the  recess  is  hewn« 

But,  for  the  sake  of  simplifying  our  inquiry,  I  will  at 
first  suppose  no  surrounding  protective  ledge  to  exist,  and 
that  the  area  of  stone  we  have  to  deal  with-  is  simply  a 
flat  slab,  extant  from  a  flat  surface  depressed  all  round  it. 

168.  A  flat  slab,  observe.  The  flatness  of  surface  is 
essential  to  the  problem  of  bas-relief.^  The  lateral  limit  of 
the  panel  may,  or  may  not,  be  required;  but  the  vertical 
limit  of  surface  must  be  expressed;  and  the  art  of  bas- 
relief  is  to  give  the  effect  of  true  form  on  that  condition. 
For  observe,  if  nothing  more  were  needed  than  to  make 
first  a  cast  of  a  solid  form,  then  cut  it  in  half,  and  a{^ly 
the  half  of  it  to  the  flat  surface; — ^if,  for  instance,  to  carve 
a  bas-relief  of  an  apple,  all  I  had  to  do  was  to  cut  my 
sculpture  of  the  whole  apple  in  half,  and  pin  it  to  the 
wall,  any  ordinarily  trained  sculptor,  or  even  a  mechanical 
workman,  could  produce  bas-relief;  but  the  business  is  to 
carve  a  round  thing  out  of  B,Jlat  thing;  to  carve  an  apple 
out  of  a  biscuit! — ^to  conquer,  as  a  subtie  Florentine  has 

^  [For  other  discussioiM  of  the  treetment  of  bat-relief,  tee  8&mn  Lampt^  VoL  VIII. 
pp.  119  M9.,  183,  and  SUme9  of  Venice^  voL  i.  (VoL  DL  p.  259).] 


V.  STRUCTURE  819 

here  conquered,*  his  marble,  so  as  not  only  to  get  motion 
into  what  is  most  rigidly  fixed,  but  to  get  boundlessness 
into  what  is  most  narrowly  bounded;  and  carve  Madonna 
and  Child,  rolling  clouds,  flying  angels,  and  space  of 
heavenly  air  behind  all,  out  of  a  film  of  stone  not  the 
third  of  an  inch  thick  where  it  is  thickest 

169.  Carried,  however,  to  such  a  degree  of  subtlety  as 
this,  and  with  so  ambitious  and  extravagant  aim,  bas-relief 
becomes  a  tour-de-force;  and,  you  know,  I  have  just  told 
you  all  tours-de-force  are  wrong.  The  true  law  of  bas- 
relief  is  to  begin  with  a  depth  of  incision  proportioned 
justly  to  the  distance  of  the  observer  and  the  character  of 
the  subject,  and  out  of  that  rationally  determined  depth, 
neither  increased  for  ostentation  of  effect,  nor  diminii^ed 
for  ostentation  of  skill,  to  do  the  utmost  that  will  be  easily 
visible  to  an  observer,  suf^posing  him  to  give  an  average 
human  amount  of  attention,  but  not  to  peer  into,  or  criti- 
cally scrutinize,  the  work* 

170.  I  cannot  arrest  you  to-day  by  the  statement  of 
any  of  the  laws  of  sight  and  distance  which  determine  the 
proper  depth  of  bas-relief.  Suppose  that  depth  fixed;  then 
observe  what  a  pretty  problem,  or,  rather,  continually 
var3ring  cluster  of  problems,  wUl  be  offered  to  us.  You 
might,  at  first,  imagine  that,  given  what  we  may  call  our 
scale  of  solidity,  or  scale  of  depth,  the  diminution  from 
nature  would  be  in  regular  proportion,  as,  for  instance,  if 
the  real  depth  of  your  subject  be,  suppose,  a  £6ot,  and  the 
depth  of  your  bas-relief  an  inch,  then  the  parts  of  the 
real  subject  which  were  six  inches  round  the  side  of  it 
would  be  carved,  you  might  imagine,  at  the  depth  of  half 
an  inch,  and  so  Ihe  whole  thing  mechanically  reduced  to 
scale.    But  not  a  bit  of  it.    Here  is  a  Greek  bas-relief  of 

*  The  reference  is  to  a  cast  from  a  small  and  low  relief  of  Florentine 
work  in  the  Kensin||rton  Museum.^ 


1  [The  Virgin  and  Child,  aacrihed  to  Desiderio  da  Settignano;  formerly  in  the 
Palamo  Alberti,  Florence.] 


^    I 


820  ARATRA  PENTELICl 

a  chariot  with  two  horses  (upper  figure,  Plate  XXIII.).^ 
Your  whole  subject  has  therefore  the  depth  of  two  horses 
side  by  side,  say  six  or  eight  feet  Your  bas-relief  has,  on 
this  scale,*"  say  the  depth  of  the  third  of  an  inch.  Now, 
if  you  gave  only  the  sixth  of  an  inch  for  the  depth  of  the 
off  horse,  and,  dividing  him  again,  only  the  twelfth  of  an 
inch  for  that  of  each  foreleg,  you  would  make  him  look  a 
mile  away  from  the  other,  and  his  own  forelegs  a  mile 
apart.  Actually,  the  Greek  has  made  the  near  leg  of  the 
&ff  horse  project  much  beyond  the  off  leg  of  the  near  horse ; 
and  has  put  nearly  the  whole  depth  and  power  of  his  relief 
into  the  breast  of  the  off  horse,  while  for  the  whole  dis- 
tance from  the  head  of  the  nearest  to  the  neck  of  the 
other,  he  has  allowed  himself  only  a  shallow  line;  know- 
ing that,  if  he  deepened  that,  he  would  give  the  nearest 
horse  the  look  of  having  a  thick  nose ;  whereas,  by  keeping 
that  line  down,  he  has  not  only  made  the  head  itself  more 
delicate,  but  detached  it  from  the  other  by  giving  no  cast 
shadow,  and  left  the  shadow  below  to  serve  for  thickness 
of  breast,  cutting  it  as  sharp  down  as  he  possibly  can,  to 
make  it  bolder. 

171.  Here  is  a  fine  piece  of  business  we  have  got  into ! 
— even  supposing  that  all  this  selection  and  adaptation 
were  to  be  contrived  under  constant  laws,  and  related  only 
to  the  expression  of  given  forms.  But  the  Greek  sculptor, 
all  this  while,  is  not  only  debating  and  deciding  how  to 
show  what  he  wants,  but,  much  more,  debating  and  deciding 
what,  as  he  can't  show  everything,  he  will  choose  to  show 
at  all.  Thus,  being  himself  interested,  and  supposing  that 
you  will  be,  in  the  manner  of  the  driving,  he  takes  great 
pains  to  carve  the  reins,  to  show  you  where  they  are 
knotted,  and  how  they  are  fastened  round  the  driver's  waist 

*  Tlie  actual  bas-relief  is  on  a  coin,  and  the  projection  not  above  the 
twentieth  of  an  inch,  but  I  magnified  it  in  photomph>  for  this  Lecture^ 
io  as  to  represent  a  relief  with  about  the  third  of  an  inch  for  maximum 
projection. 

^  [See  below,  p.  361.] 


■p^i^p^l^^^^^""»^i^""  J  ■■  .  J»  J-  •    '  .^   «■»< 


V.  STRUCTURE  821 

(you  recollect  how  Hippolytus  was  lost  by  doing  that^); 
but  he  does  not  care  the  least  bit  about  the  chariot,  and 
having  rather  more  geometry  than  he  likes  in  the  cross 
and  circle  of  one  wheel  of  it,  entirely  omits  the  other  1 

172.  I  think  you  must  see  by  this  time  that  the  sculp- 
tor's is  not  quite  a  trade  which  you  can  teach  like  brick- 
making;  nor  its  produce  an  article  of  which  you  can  supply 
any  quantity  ''demanded"  for  the  next  railroad  waiting- 
room.  It  may  perhaps,  indeed,  seem  to  you  that,  in  the 
difficulties  thus  presented  by  it,  bas-relief  involves  more 
direct  exertion  of  intellect  tlmn  finished  solid  sculpture.  It 
is  not  so,  however.  The  questions  involved  by  bas-relief 
are  of  a  more  curious  and  amusing  kind,  requiring  great 
variety  of  expedients;  though  none  except  sudi  as  a  true 
workmanly  instinct  delights  in  inventing,  and  invents  easily; 
but  design  in  solid  sculpture  involves  considerations  of 
weight  in  mass,  of  balance,  of  perspective  and  opposition,, 
in  projecting  forms,  and  of  restraint  for  those  which  must 
not  project,  such  as  none  but  the  greatest  masters  have 
ever  completely  solved ;  and  they,  not  always ;  the  difficulty 
of  arranging  the  composition  so  as  to  be  agreeable  from 
points  of  view  on  aU  sides  of  it,  being,  itself,  arduous 
enough. 

178.  Thus  far,  I  have  been  speaking  only  of  the  laws 
of  structure  relating  to  the  projection  of  the  mass  which 
becomes  itself  the  sculpture.  Another  most  interesting 
group  of  constructive  laws  governs  its  relation  to  the  line 
that  contains  or  defines  it. 

In  your  Standard  Series  I  have  placed  a  photograph  of 
the  south  transept  of  Rouen  Cathedral.'  StricUy  speaking, 
all  standards  of  Gothic  are  of  the  thirteenth  century;  but» 
in  the  fourteenth,  certain  qualities  of  richness  are  obtained 
by  the  diminution  of  restraint ;  out  of  which  we  must  choose 
what  is  best  in  their  kinds.    The  pedestals  of  the  statues 

^  [See  the  Hippofytu9  of  Euripides.    A  painting  of  the  suhject  may  be  seen  on 
a  yase  in  the  British  Museum  (F.  279).] 

<  [No.  61  in  the  B^erence  Series  (Vol  XXI.  p.  29).] 


822  ARATRA  FENTELICI 

which  once  occupied  the  latanl  recesses  are,  as  you  see» 
covered  with  groups  of  figures,  enclosed  each  in  a  quatre- 
foil  panel;  the  spaces  between  this  panel  and  the  enclosing 
square  being  filled  with  sculptures  of  animals. 

You  cannot  anywhoe  find  a  m<»e  lovely  piece  of  fancy, 
or  more  illustrative  of  the  quantity  of  result,  than  may  be 
obtained  with  low  and  simple  chiselling.  The  figures  are 
all  perfectly  simple  in  drapery,  the  story  told  by  lines  of 
action  only  in  tiie  main  group,  no  accessories  being  ad- 
mitted«  There  is  no  underoutthig  anywhere,  nor  exhibition 
of  technical  skill,  but  the  fcmdest  and  tenderest  appliance 
of  it;  and  one  of  the  principal  charms  of  the  whole  is 
the  adaptation  of  every  subject  to  its  quaint  limit  The 
tale  must  be  told  witUn  the  four  petals  of  the  quatrefoil, 
and  the  wildest  and  plajrfuUest  beasts  must  never  come  out 
of  their  narrow  comers.  The  attention  with  which  spaces 
of  this  kind  are  fiUed  by  the  Gothic  designers  is  not  merely 
a  beautiful  compliance  with  aretiitectural  requirements,  but  a 
definite  assertion  of  thdbr  delight  in  the  restraint  of  law; 
for,  in  illuminating  books,  although,  if  they  chose  it,  they 
might  have  designed  floral  ornaments,  as  we  now  usually 
do,  rambling  loosely  over  the  leaves,  and  although,  in  later 
works,  such  license  is  often  taken  by  them,  in  all  books  of 
the  fine  time  the  wandering  tendrils  are  enclosed  by  limits 
approximately  rectilinear,  and  in  gracefullest  branching  often 
detach  themselves  from  the  right  line  only  by  curvature  of 
extreme  severity. 

174.  Since  the  darkness  and  extent  of  shadow  by  which 
the  sculpture  is  relieved  necessarily  vary  with  the  depth 
of  the  recess,  there  arise  a  series  of  problems,  in  deciding 
which  the  wholesome  desire  for  emphasis  by  means  of 
shadow  is  too  often  exaggerated  by  the  ambition  of  the 
sculptor  to  show  his  skill  in  imdereutting.  The  extreme 
of  vulgarity  is  usually  reached  when  the  entire  bas-relief  is 
cut  hollow  underneath,  as  in  much  Indian  and  Chinese 
work,  so  as  to  relieve  its  forms  against  on  absolute  dark- 
ness; but  no  formal  law  can  ever  be  given;  for  exactly 


V.  STRUCTURE  828 

the  same  thing  may  be  beautifully  done  for  a  wise  pur- 
pose, by  one  person,  which  is  basely  done,  and  to  no  pur- 
pose, or  to  a  bad  one,  by  another.  Thus,  the  desire  for 
emphasis  itself  may  be  the  craving  of  a  deadened  imagi- 
nation, or  the  passion  of  a  vigorous  one;  and  relief  against 
shadow  may  be  sought  by  one  man  only  for  sensation, 
and  by  another  for  intelligibility.  John  of  Pisa  undercuts 
fiercely,  in  order  to  bring  out  tibe  vigour  of  life  which  no 
level  contour  could  render ;  ^  the  Lombardi  of  Venice  under- 
cut delicately,  in  order  to  obtain  beautiful  lines  and  edges 
of  fiiultless  precision ;  but  the  base  Indian  craftsmen  under- 
cut only  that  people  may  wonder  how  the  chiselling  was 
done  through  the  holes,  or  that  they  may  see  every  monster 
white  against  black. 

175.  Yet,  here  again  we  are  met  by  another  necessity 
for  discrimination.  There  may  be  a  true  delight  in  the  in- 
laying of  white  on  dark,  as  there  is  a  true  delight  in 
vigorous  rounding.  Nevertheless,  the  general  law  is  always, 
that,  the  lighter  the  incisions,  and  the  broader  the  surface, 
the  grander,  caeteris  paribus,  will  be  the  work.  Of  the 
structural  terms  of  that  work  you  now  know  enough  to 
understand  that  the  schools  of  good  sculpture,  considered 
in  relation  to  projection,  divide  themselves  into  four  entirely 
distinct  groups :  «— 

1st  Flat  Relief,  in  which  the  surface  is,  in  many  places, 
absolutely  flat;  and  the  expression  depends  greatly 
on  the  lines  of  its  outer  contour,  and  on  fine 
incisions  within  them. 
2nd.  Round  Relief,  in  which,  as  in  the  best  coins,  the 
sculptured  mass  projects  so  as  to  be  capable  of 
complete  modulation  into  form,  but  is  not  any- 
where undercut.  The  formation  of  a  coin  by  the 
blow  of  a  die  necessitates,  of  course,  the  severest 
obedience  to  this  law. 

^  [For  GioTanni  Piiano,  lee  Vol  tFAmo,  pusim ;  for  the  work  of  the  Lombardii 
eee  VoL  V.  p.  76 ;  Vol.  X.  pp.  144,  354 ;  and  Vol.  XI.  p.  289.1 

*  [Compere  Vol  ^Am&,  §  288^  where  this  claMificetioii  is  rerorred  to.] 


824  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

8rd.  Edged   Relief.    Undercutting    admitted,    so    as    to 
throw   out  the   forms    against   a    background    oF 
shadow. 
4th.  Full  Relief.     The  statue  completely  solid  in  form^ 
and  unreduced  in  retreating  depth  of  it,  yet  con- 
nected  locally   with    some    definite  part   of   the 
building,    so   as    to    be    still    dependent    on   the 
shadow  of  its  background  and  direction  of  pro- 
tective line. 
176.    Let  me   recommend  you   at   once   to   take   what 
pains  may  be  needful  to  enable  you  to  distinguish  these 
four  kinds  of  sculpture,  for  the  distinctions  between  them 
are  not  founded  on  mere  differences  in  gradation  of  depth. 
They  are  truly  four  species,  or  orders,  of  sculpture,  sepa* 
rated  from  each  other  by  determined  characters.     I  have 
used,  you  may  have  noted,  hitherto  in  my  Lectures,  the 
word  ^'bas-relief  almost  indiscriminately  for  all,  because  the 
degree  of  lowness  or  highness  of  relief  is  not  the  question, 
but  the  method  of  relief.     Observe  again,  therefore — 

A.  If  a  portion  of  the  surface  is  absolutely  flat,  you 
have  the  first  order — Flat  Relief. 

B.  If  every  portion  of  the  surface  is  rounded,  but  none 
undercut,  you  have  Round  Relief — essentially  that  of  seals 
and  coins. 

c.  If  any  part  of  the  edges  be  undercut,  but  the  general 
protection  of  solid  form  reduced,  you  have  what  I  think 
you  may  conveniently  call  Foliate  Relief, — ^the  parts  of  the 
design  over-lapping  each  other,  in  places,  like  edges  of 
leaves. 

D.  If  the  undercutting  is  bold  and  deep,  and  the  pro- 
jection of  solid  form  unreduced,  you  have  Full  Relief. 
Learn  these  four  names  at  once  by  heart: — 
Flat  Relief. 
Round  Relief. 
Foliate  Relief. 
FuU  Relief. 
And  whenever  you  look  at  any  piece  of  sculpture,  determine 


^-  ^  * 


0  IS  b 
oandrf 

in  ixBif 

yetcoQ- 

oftk 

OD  tk 

of  p 

:e  vliit 
ihtlies 
•ntheB 
f  dqA 
e,sep 
Ikn 

usetk 


;  Dooe 
fseib 

thiot 
of* 

tfO' 


giDf 


V.   STRUCTURE  825 

first  to  which  of  these  classes  it  belongs ;  and  then  consider 
how  the  sculptor  |has  treated  it  with  reference  to  the  neces- 
sary structure — tJiat  reference,  remember,  being  partly  to 
the  mechanical  conditions  of  the  material,  partly  to  the 
means  of  light  andj^shade  at  his  command. 

177.  To  take   a  single  instance.     You   know,  for  these 
many    years,    I    have  . 

been  telling  our  archi-  hA  A 

tects,  with  all  the  force 
of  voice  I  had  in  me, 
that  they  could  de- 
sign nothing  until  they 
could  carve  natural 
forms  rightly.'  Many 
imagined  that  work 
was  easy;  but  judge 
for  yourselves  whether 
it  be  or  not  In  Plate 
Xm.,'  I  have  drawn, 
with  approximate  ac- 
curacy, a  cluster  of 
Phillyrea  leaves  as  they 
grow.  Now,  if  we 
wanted  to  cut  them 
in  bas-relief,  the  first 
thing  we  should  have 
to   consider   would   be  "'' " 

the  position  of  their  outline  on  the  marble; — here  it  is,  as 
iax  down  as  the  spring  of  the  leaves.  But  do  you  suppose 
that  is  what  an  ordinary  sculptor  could  either  lay  for  his 
first  sketch,  or  contemplate  as  a  limit  to  be  worked  down 
to  ?  Then  consider  how  the  interlacing  and  springing  of 
the  leaves  can  be  expressed  within  this  outline.  It  must  be 
done  by  leaving  such   projection  in  the  marble  as  will  take 

'  [See,  for  inrtanM,  Lmtur—  en  j1reUtes(ur«  and  Paintmg,  VoL  XII.  p.  U,  utd 
VoL  JtlX.  p.  20.] 

■  [The  dnwinff  u  No.  2C7  in  the  BdnoatJoiul  SeriM  (Vol  XXI.  p.  08).] 


828  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

the  light  in  the  same  proportion  as  the  drawing  does ; — ^and 
a  Florentine  workman  could  do  it,  for  close  sight,  with- 
out  driving  one  incision  deeper,  or  raising  a  single  surface 
higher,  than  the  eighth  of  an  inch.  Indeed,  no  sculptor 
of  the  finest  time  would  design  such  a  complex  cluster  of 
leaves  as  this,  except  for  bronze  or  iron  work ;  they  would 
take  simpler  contours  for  marble;  but  the  laws  of  treat- 
ment would,  under  these  conditions,  remain  just  as  strict : 
and  you  may,  perhaps,  believe  me  now  when  I  tell  you 
that,  in  any  piece  of  fine  structural  sculpture  by  the  great 
masters,  there  is  more  subtlety  and  noble  obedience  to 
lovely  laws  than  could  be  explained  to  you  if  I  took  twenty 
lectures  to  do  it  in,  instead  of  one. 

178.  There  remains  yet  a  point  of  mechanical  treatment 
on  which  I  have  not  yet  touched  at  all ;  nor  that  the  least 
important, — ^namely,  tibe  actual  method  and  style  of  hand- 
ling. A  great  sculptor  uses  his  tool  exactly  as  a  painter 
his  pencil,^  and  you  may  recognize  the  decision  of  his 
thought,  and  glow  of  his  temper,  no  less  in  the  workman- 
ship than  the  design.  The  modem  system  of  modelling 
the  work  in  clay,  getting  it  into  form  by  machinery,  and  by 
the  hands  of  subordinates,  and  touching  it  at  last,  if  indeed 
the  (so-caUed)  sculptor  touch  it  at  all,  only  to  correct  their 
inefficiencies,  renders  the  production  of  good  work  in  marble 
a  physical  impossibility.  The  first  resuJt  of  it  is  that  the 
sculptor  thinks  in  clay  instead  of  marble,  and  loses  his  in- 
stinctive sense  of  the  proper  treatment  of  a  brittle  substance. 
The  second  is  that  neither  he  nor  the  public  recognize  the 
touch  of  the  chisel  as  expressive  of  personal  feeling  or  power, 
and  that  nothing  is  looked  for  except  mechanical  polish. 

179.  The  perfectly  simple  piece  of  Greek  relief  repre- 
sented  in  Plate  XVI.,'  will  enable  you  to  understand  at 

^  [Com]Mire  Lectures  on  Art,  §  166  (above,  p.  168);  ''The  FUmbo^nt  Archi- 
ture  of  the  Somme/'  §  13:  ''all  the  loveliest  Italian  clDqai 
chiael-painting"  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  262);  and  Vol  d^Amo,  §  296.1 


tecture  of  the  Somme,"  §  13:  "all  the  loveliest  Italian  cinqaeeento  is  literally 
ael-jpainting"  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  262);  and  Vol  d^Amo,  §  296^ 
*  [Reprodaced  from  a  drawing  by  A.  Bur^eM  of  Slab  XXX.,  South  Friece  of 


the  Parthenon,  in  the  Elgin  Room  at  the  British  Museum  (see  £.  T.  Cook's  Papular 
Handbook  to  the  Oreek  and  Soman  AnHauUiee^  p.  186).  The  drawing  by  Buxgess  is 
No.  127  in  the  Reference  Series  at  Oxford.] 


L 


-1 


V.  STRUCTURE  827 

once, — examination  of  the  original,  at  your  leisure,  will 
prevent  you,  I  trust,  from  ever  forgetting, — ^what  is  meant 
by  the  virtue  of  handling  in  sculpture. 

The  projection  of  the  heads  of  the  four  horses,  one  be- 
hind the  other,  is  certainly  not  more,  altogether,  than  three- 
quarters  of  an  inch  from  the  flat  ground,  and  the  one  in 
front  does  not  in  reality  project  more  than  the  one  behind 
it,  yet,  by  mere  drawing,*  you  see  the  sculptor  has  got 
them  to  appear  to  recede  in  due  order,  and  by  the  soft 
rounding  of  the  flesh  surfaces,  and  modulation  of  the  veins, 
he  has  taken  away  aU  look  of  flatness  from  the  necks.  He 
has  drawn  the  eyes  and  nostrils  with  dark  incision,  careful 
as  the  finest  touches  of  a  painter's  pencil :  and  then,  at  last, 
when  he  comes  to  the  manes,  he  has  let  fly  hand  and  chisel 
with  their  fuU  force;  and  where  a  base  workman,  (above 
all,  if  he  had  modelled  the  thing  in  clay  first,)  would  have 
lost  himself  in  laborious  imitation  of  hair,  the  Greek  has 
struck  the  tresses  out  with  angular  incisions,  deep  driven, 
every  one  in  appointed  place  and  deliberate  curve,  yet 
flowing  so  free  under  his  noble  hand  that  you  cannot 
alter,  without  harm,  the  bending  of  any  single  ridge,  nor 
contract,  nor  extend,  a  point  of  them.  And  if  you  will 
look  back  to  Plate  X.  [p.  295]  you  will  see  the  difierence 
between  this  sharp  incision,  used  to  express  horse-hair,  and 
the  soft  incision  with  intervening  rounded  ridge,  used  to 
express  the  hair  of  Apollo  Chrysocomes;  and,  beneath,  the 
obliquely  ridged  incision  used  to  express  the  plumes  of  his 
swan ;  in  both  these  cases  the  handling  being  much  more 
slow,  because  the  engraving  is  in  metal;  but  the  struc- 
tural importance  of  incision,  as  the  means  of  efiect,  never 
lost  sight  of.  Finally,  here  are  two  actual  examples  of  the 
work  in  marble  of  the  two  great  schools  of  the  world ;  one, 
a  little  Fortune,  standing  tiptoe  on  the  globe  of  the  Earth, 

*  This  plate  has  been  executed  firom  a  drawing  by  Mr.  Burgess,  in  which 
he  has  followed  the  curves  of  incision  with  exquisite  care,  and  preserved 
the  effect  of  the  surfiice  of  the  stone,  where  a  photograph  would  have  lost 
it  by  exaggerating  accidental  stains. 


828  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

its  surfiace  traced  with  lines  in  hexagCMis ;  not  chaotic  under 
Fortune's  feet;  Greek,  this,  and  by  a  trained  workman; — 
dug  up  in  the  temple  of  Neptune  at  Corfa ; — and  here,  a 
Florentine  portrait-marble,  found  in  the  recent  alterations, 
fSftce  downwards,  under  the  pavement  of  Sta.  Maria  Novella ;  ^ 
both  of  them  first-rate  of  their  kind;  and  both  of  them, 
while  exquisitely  finished  at  the  telling  points,  showing,  on 
all  their  unregarded  surfaces,  the  rough  furrow  of  the  fast- 
drivoi  chisel,  as  distinctly  as  the  edge  of  a  common  paving- 
stone. 

180.  Let  me  suggest  to  you,  in  conclusion,  one  most 
interesting  point  of  mental  expression  in  these  necessary 
aspects  of  finely  executed  sculpture.  I  have  already  again 
and  again  pressed  on  your  attention  the  beginning  of  the 
arts  of  men  in  the  make  and  use  of  the  plough-share.* 
Read  more  carefully — ^you  might  indeed  do  well  to  learn 
at  once  by  heart, — the  twenty-seven  lines  of  the  Fourth 
Pythian^  which  describe  the  ploughing  of  Jason.'    There  is 

^  [In  ed.  1  a  footnote  was  here  added : — 

**  These  two  marbles  will  alwa3r8^  henceforward^  be  sufficiently  aoeessible 
for  reference  in  my  room  at  Corpus  Christi  College." 
The  Fortune^  or  Victory,  is  a  figure  22  inches  in  height ;  the  right  arm,  left  hand, 
and  wings  are  wanting.  The  portrait-piece  is  a  bas-rdief  profile  G  of  Dante)  carved 
out  of  a  flat  piece  of  Carrara  marble^  and  is  ascribed  to  I)onatello.  Both  marbles 
are  now  at  Brantwood.  The  '^ little  Fortune"  was  procured  for  Ruskin  by  Profeseor 
Norton :  see  Ruskin's  letter  of  May  18, 1871  (LeUert  to  NoHon,  voL  ii.  p.  34).  This 
passage  must  therefore  have  been  inserted  by  Ruskin  in  revising  the  lectures  of 
1870  for  publication.] 

«  rSee  above,  §§  1,  4.] 

*[<.«•»  lines  397-424  (224  to  238  in  Donaldson's  numbering);  thus  translated  by 
Mr.  Ernest  Myers  (The  Odet  (ff  Pindar,  1874)^  who  also  savs  of  this  Fourth  Pythian 
that  it  is  '^  unsurpassed  in  his  extant  works^  or  indeed  by  anvthing  in  all  extant 
poetry " :  '*  But  when  Aietes  had  set  in  the  midst  a  plou^^  of  adamant,  and  oxen 
that  from  tawny  jaws  breathed  flame  of  blaring  fire,  and  with  bronxe  hoofs  smote 
the  earth  in  alternate  steps,  and  had  led  them  and  yoked  them  single-handed,  he 
marked  out  in  a  line  straight  furrows,  and  for  a  fitthom's  length  clave  the  back  of 
the  loamy  earth;  then  she  spake  thus:  'This  work  let  your  king,  whoever  he  be 
that  hath  command  of  the  ship,  accomplish  me,  and  then  let  him  bear  away  with 
him  the  imperishable  coverlet,  the  fleece  glittering  with  tufts  of  gold.' 

''He  said,  and  Jasmi  flung  off  from  him  his  saffron  mantle,  and  putting  his 
trust  in  God  betook  himself  to  the  work ;  and  the  fire  made  him  not  to  shrink, 
for  that  he  had  had  heed  to  the  bidding  of  the  strange  maiden  skilled  in  all 
pharmacy.  So  he  drew  to  him  the  plough  and  made  fiwt  bv  force  tiie  bulls' 
necks  in  the  harness,  and  plunged  the  wounding  goad  into  the  Dulk  of  their  huge 
sides,  and  with  manful  strain  &lfilled  the  measure  of  his  work.  And  a  cry  wiu- 
out  speech  came  from  Aietes  in  his  agony,  at  the  marvel  of  the  power  he 
beheld."] 


SK ' - -^ 


V.   STRUCTURE  829 

nothing  grander  extant  in  human  fiuicy,  lior  set  down  in 
human  words:  but  this  great  mythical  expression  of  the 
conquest  of  the  earth-clay  and  bhite-force  by  vital  human 
energy,  will  become  yet  more  interesting  to  you  when  you 
reflect  what  enchantment  has  been  cut,  on  whiter  clay,  by 
the  tracing  of  finer  furrows; — what  the  delicate  and  con- 
summate arts  of  man  have  done  by  the  ploughing  of  marble, 
and  granite,  and  iron.  You  wiU  learn  daily  more  and 
more,  as  you  advance  in  actual  practice,  how  the  primary 
manual  art  of  engraving,  in  the  steadiness,  clearness,  and 
irrevocableness  of  it,  is  the  best  art-discipline  that  can  be 
given  either  to  mind  or  hand ;  *  you  will  recognize  one  law 
of  right,  pronouncing  itself  in  the  well-resolved  work  of 
every  age;  you  will  see  the  firmly  traced  and  irrevocable 
incision  determining,  not  only  the  forms,  but,  in  great  part, 
the  moral  temper,  of  all  vitally  progressive  art;  you  will 
trace  the  same  principle  and  power  in  the  furrows  which 
the  oblique  sun  shows  on  the  granite  of  his  own  Egyptian 
city,^ — ^in  the  white  scratch  of  the  stylus  through  the  colour 
on  a  Greek  vase — ^in  the  first  delineation,  on  the  wet  wall, 
of  the  groups  of  an  Italian  fresco;  in  the  unerring  and  un- 
alterable touch  of  the  great  engraver  of  Nuremberg, — and 
in  the  deep -driven  and  deep -bitten  ravines  of  metal  by 
which  Turner  closed,  in  embossed  limits,  the  shadows  of 
the  Liber  Studiorum. 

Learn,  therefore,  in  its  full  extent,  the  force  of  the  great 
Greek  word  x^P^^^^i — ^^d  give  me  pardon,  if  you  think 
pardon  needed,  that  I  ask  you  also  to  leam«the  full  mean- 
ing of  the  English  word  derived  from  it.  Here,  at  the 
Ford  of  the  Oxen  of  Jason,  are  other  furrows  to  be  driven 

*  That  it  was  also,  in  some  cases^  the  earliest  that  the  Greeks  gave,  is 
proved  by  Lacian's  accoant  of  his  first  lesson  at  liis  uncle's ;  the  cyfcorcvs, 
liteFallj  ^^in-cutter" — being  the  first  tool  put  into  his  hand,  and  an  earthen- 
-ware  tablet  to  cut  upon,  which  the  boy,  pressing  too  hard,  presently  breaks ; 
— ^gets  beaten — ^goes  home  dying,  and  becomes,  after  his  dream  above 
quoted,  (§§  85,  S6,)  a  philosopher  instead  of  a  sculptor. 

^  [Heliopolis.    The  red  granite  obelisk  there  is  the  oldest  extant] 


880  ARATRA  PENTELICI 


than  these  in  the  marble  of  Fentelicus.  The  fruitfullest, 
or  the  fatallest,  of  all  ploughing  is  that  by  the  thoughts 
of  your  youth,  on  the  white  field  of  its  Imagination.  For 
by  these,  either  down  to  the  disturbed  spirit,  ^'ic^oxTac  jcof 
Xapaa-ererai  iriSop;''^  or  around  the  quiet  spirit,  and  on  all 
the  laws  of  conduct  that  hold  it,  as  a  fair  vase  its  frank- 
incense, are  ordained  the  pure  colours,  and  engraved  the 
just  charact«s,  of  iSonian  life.' 

^  [iEschylus:  Perue^  683;  words  spoken  by  the  ghost  of  Darius  (''the  plsin  i» 
cut  up  and  ploughed").] 

*  [So  Tennyson  (in  Memoriam,  36)  of  the  everlasting  hills,  that  have  lasted  whole 
flBons.  But  perhaps  Ruskin,  in  choosing  the  word,  had  in  mind  also  its  use  by  the 
Gnostics  to  denote  the  emanations  from  the  IMvine  Essence.] 


LECTURE  VI 

THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS 

December,  1870 

181.^  It  can  scarcely  be  needful  for  me  to  tell  even  the 
younger  members  of  my  present  audience,  that  the  condi- 
tions necessary  for  the  production  of  a  perfect  school  of 
sculpture  have  only  twice  been  met  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  and  then  for  a  short  time;  nor  for  short  time  only, 
but  also  in   narrow  districts, — ^namely,  in   the  valleys  and 

^  [One  of  the  MS.  drafts  of  the  lecture  contains  a  longer  introduction  : — 

'' Having  now  seen  in  what  manner  the  fine  arts  are  connected  with 
each  other,  and  founded  on  a  rightly  trained  humanity,  expressive  both 
of  its  own  beautv  and  its  right  passion,  you  will  be  prepared  for  the 
statement  that  only  twice,  in  the  course  of  past  ages,  the  conditions  have 
been  met  by  any  race  of  men,  which  were  necessary  to  the  production  of  a 
perfect  art,  and  then  only  during  the  culminating  years — not  more  than 
fifty  in  each  case— of  a  phase  of  national  life  rising  from  infancy  of  mind 
to  manhood,  and  falling  back  from  manhood  to  dotage. 

''This  almost  momentary  nobleness  of  humanity  and  of  its  art  has 
occurred,  I  repeat,  only  twice  during  the  lapee  of  ages:  once  in  Greece, 
and  once  in  North  Italy — ^that  is  to  say,  in  the  valleys  of  Eridanns  and 
Amo— and  in  each  case  it  was  founded  priniMily  on  toe  right  cultivation 
of  every  faculty  of  the  body  and  soul,  and  secondarily  (I  mean  in  the 
sense  in  which  superstructure  is  second  to  foundation)  on  the  habitual 
exercise  of  the  imagination  on  subjects  presented  by  a  complex  Mvth- 
ol<M;y  sincerely  believed.  All  other  schools  but  these  two  are  imperiect, 
and  the  best  of  them  are  derivative,  these  two  schools  being  not  only  pre- 
eminent in  power  but  radical  in  invention,  consummate  in  themselves  and 
the  oriffin  of  what  is  best  in  others.  It  is  therefore  necessary  to  under- 
stand them  thoroughly  before  you  can  rightly  judge  of  any  subordinate 
styles. 

"Before  you  can  riffhtly  judge;  I  do  not  say  before  you  can  rightly 
enjoy.  Many  of  the  inferior  styles  are  healthily  developed  under  peculiar 
conditions  of  climate  and  race,  which  indeed  limit,  but  do  not  degrade  or 
prevent  them,  and  they  address  and  develop  variously  delightful  char- 
acters of  human  nature,  wholesome  and  precious,  though  incompatible  with 
the  highest  cultivation.  And  in  general  the  greatest  enjoyment  to  be 
received  from  the  arts  is  that  which  is  possible  to  idl  intelligent  men  with- 
out any  peculiar  advantages,  namely,  that  which  may  be  found  in  the 
study  of  the  special  art  of  their  native  land,  perhaps  even  of  their  nation, 
parish,  or  at  least  city,  the  study  of  that,  not  in  the  insolent  and  dull 
creed  that  it  must  be  best  because  our  own,  but  in  the  modest  certainty 


882  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

islands  of  Ionian  Greece,  and  in  the  strip  of  land  deposited 
by  the  Amo,  between  the  Apennine  crests  and  the  sea.* 

All  other  schools,  except  these  two,  led  severally  by 
Athens  in  the  fifth  century  before  Christ,  and  by  Florence 
in  the  fifteenth  of  our   own  era,  are   imperfect;   and  the 

that  it  is  best  fw  tu  because  it  is  oar  own  ;  that  we  assuredlf  have 
share  in  the  weaknesses,  and^  as  assuredly,  sjnnpathy  with  the  virtues  of 
our  fathers,  and  that  the  happiest  and  most  honourable  emplojinent  of 
their  children  will  be  in  bettering,  not  in  quitting  the  inheritance  of  their 
peculiar  wealth,  be  it  in  thought  or  in  work.  Nor  is  the  vitality  of  a 
great  leading  school  of  art  shown  in  anything  more  than  in  the  force  with 
which  it  stimulates  and  divides  the  local  species  of  surrounding  minor 
skill,  and  the  native  fragrance  of  the  inferior  blossom  in  less  nvoured 
fiTound.  The  trae  power  of  Lombardv  is  shown  by  the  school  of  Mantua 
being  distinct  from  that  of  Padua,  and  the  life  of  Tuscanv  by  there  being 
a  felt  distinction  between  the  blood  of  Florence  and  F^soie. 

'^  But  if,  for  purposes  of  general  scholarship,  we  are  to  comprehend  the 
essential  value  of  those  different  schools  of  art  in  the  history  of  mankind, 
we  must  at  once  endeavour  to  form  a  clear  conception  of  tne  two  schools 
of  Greece  and  Italy,  which  each  produced,  acoordiiiig  to  the  conditions  of 
their  times,  perfect  work.  Around  these  we  will  next  group,  in  both  the 
heathen  and  Christian  periods,  schools  of  practical  power,  nascent  or  bar- 
baric (some  of  them  apparently  of  more  importance  in  the  history  of 
mankind  than  those  of  central  excellence) ;  but  in  each  of  these  surround- 
ing or  preceding  styles  your  judgment  of  them  must  be  formed  rather  by 
noting  the  reasons  and  manner  of  their  shortcoming,  as  compared  with  the 
two  great  groups  of  master  work,  than  by  special  and  separate  inquiry. 
If  you  once  understand  the  main  qualities  of  Greek  and  Italian  art,  ail 
that  has  been  done  well  by  other  nations  will  at  once  be  manifSest  to 
you  ;  whereas  no  length  of  time  spent  in  the  study  of  Egyptians  or  Flemings 
will  enable  you  to  understand  the  merits  of  the  higher  schools. 

"And  here,  you  will  ask  me,  what  is  my  test  of  perfection,  and  how 
long  a  school  is  to  be  held  nascent  or  barbaric  As  long,  I  reply,  as  they 
have  not  produced  a  piece  of  art  of  which  it  can  be  said,  lookmff  at  it  on 
all  sides,  that  it  cannot  be  better  done.  On  one  side,  with  rererence  to 
some  special  end,  that  may  be  said  of  much  inferior  art,  but  on  aU  sides 
only  of  the  work  of  two  great  schools.  You  remember  that  I  told  you 
the  highest  art  could  do  no  more  than  rightly  represent  the  human  form. 
This  is  the  simple  test,  then,  of  a  perfect  school — that  it  has  represented  the 
human  form  so  that  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  of  its  being  better  done. 
And  that  has  been  accompliened  twice  only.  Here  is  a  piece  of  fifteenth- 
century  Florentine  sculpture,  not  quite  finished,  and  not  of  any  special 
excellence,  but  in  method,  and  such  workmanly  qualities  as  belong  to  the 
average  master  of  the  time,  it  is  characteristic,  and  it  is  simply  right,  and 
cannot  be  better  done,  and  from  no  other  Christian  school  of  any  oonntnr 
can  you  match  it.  You  may  produce  sculpture  more  pathetic,  but  it  will 
be  comparatively  affected ;  more  delicate,  but  it  will  be  comparatively 
feeble ;  more  inventive,  but  it  will  be  comparatively  forced  and  raise. 

"  So,  again,  you  have  casts  of  Greek  sculpture  accessible  to  you  within  a 

^ve  minutes'  walk,  of  which  you  have  heard  till  you  are  prolmbly  weary, 

that  it  has  not  been,  cannot  be  bettered.     That  is  entirely  true  of  it,  and 

among  the  work  of  Pafan  nations,  of  it  alone." 

The  specimen  of  Florentine  sculpture  was  no  doubt  the  piece  of  '*  portrait-marble  '* 

referred  to  in  §  179.    The  casts  of  Greek  sculpture  are  in  the  University  Galleries.] 

^  [Compare  Eagle* i  Nut^  §  82,  where  this  passage  is  referred  to.] 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  888 

best  of  them  are  derivative:  these  two  are  consummate  in 
themselves,  and  the  origin  oi^  what  is  best  in  others.^ 

182.  And  observe,  these  Athenian  and  Florentine  schools 
are  both  of  equal  rank,  as  essentially  original  and  inde- 
pendent. The  Florentine,  being  subsequent  to  the  Greek, 
borrowed  much  from  it ;  but  it  would  have  existed  just  as 
strongly — ^and,  perhaps,  in  some  respects  mc^re  nobly — ^had 
it  been  the  first,  instead  of  the  latter  of  the  two.  The  task 
set  to  each  of  these  mightiest  of  the  nations  was,  indeed, 
practically  the  same,  and  as  hard  to  the  one  as  to  the  other. 
The  Greeks  found  Phoenician  and  Etruscan  art  monstrous, 
and  had  to  make  them  human.  The  Italians  found  Byzan- 
tine and  Norman  art  monstrous,  and  had  to  make  them 
human.  The  original  power  in  the  one  case  is  easily 
traced;  in  the  other  it  has  partly  to  be  unmasked,  because 
the  change  at  Florence  was,  in  many  points,  suggested  and 
stimulated  by  the  former  school.  But  we  mistake  in  sup- 
posing that  Athens  taught  Florence  the  laws  of  design; 
she  taught  her,  in  reality,  only  the  duty  of  truth. 

188.  You  remember  that  I  told  you  the  highest  art 
could  do  no  more  than  rightly  represent  the  human  form.' 
This  is  the  simple  test,  then,  of  a  perfect  school, — ^that  it 
has  represented  the  hmnan  form,  so  that  it  is  impossible  to 
conceive  of  its  being  better  done.  And  that,  I  repeat,  has 
been  accomplished  twice  only:  once  in  Athens,  once  in 
Florence.  And  so  narrow  is  tiie  excellence  even  of  these 
two  exclusive  schools,  that  it  cannot  be  said  of  either  of 
them  that  they  represented  the  entire  human  form.  The 
Greeks  perfectly  drew,  and  perfectly  moulded,  the  body  and 
limbs;  but  there  is,  so  far  as  I  am  aware,  no  instance  of 
their  representing  the  face  as  well  as  any  great  Italian.^ 
On  the  other  hand,  the  Italian  painted  and  carved  the 
face  insuperably;  but  I  believe  there  is  no  instance  of  his 
having  perfectly  represented  the  body,  which,  by  command 

1  [Compare  Ariadne  FhrmHna,  \  162.] 

*  'Leeturti  on  Arty  §§  31,  103  (above,  pp.  45,  98.] 

'  [Compare  Lecturti  on  Landscape,  §  68  (Vol.  XSll,  p.  46\  There  is  a  dis- 
cossion  of  the  present  passage  in  J.  A.  Ssrmonds's  Life  qf  Michelangth^  yoL  i. 
pp.  268  eeq,"] 


884  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

of  his  religion^  it  became  his  pride  to  despise  and  his  safety 
to  mortify. 

184.  The  general  course  of  your  study  here  renders  it 
desirable  that  you  should  be  accurately  acquainted  with  the 
leading  principles  of  Greek  sculpture;  but  I  cannot  lay 
these  before  you  without  giving  undue  prominence  to  some 
of  the  special  merits  of  that  school,  unless  I  previously 
indicate  the  relation  it  holds  to  the  more  advanced,  though 
less  disciplined,  excellence  of  Christian  art. 

In  this  and  the  last  Lecture  of  the  present  course,"^  I 
shall  endeavour,  therefore,  to  mass  for  you,  in  such  rude 
and  diagram-like  outline  as  may  be  possible  or  intelligible, 
the  main  characteristics  of  the  two  sdiools,  completing  and 
correcting  the  details  of  comparison  afterwards;  and  not 
answering,  observe,  at  present,  for  any  generalization  I  give 
you,  except  as  a  ground  for  subsequent  closer  and  more 
qualified  statements. 

And  in  carrying  out  this  parallel,  I  shall  speak  indiffer- 
ently of  works  of  sculpture,  and  of  the  modes  of  painting 
which  propose  to  themselves  the  same  objects  as  sculp- 
ture. And  this,  indeed,  Florentine,  as  opposed  to  Venetian^ 
painting,  and  that  of  Athens  in  the  fifth  century,  nearly 
always  did. 

185.  I  begin,  therefore,  by  comparing  two  designs  of 
the  simplest  kind — engravings,  or,  at  least,  linear  drawings 
both;  one  on  clay,  one  on  copper,  made  in  the  central 
periods  of  each  style,  and  representing  the  same  goddess — 
Aphrodite.      They  are  now  set  beside  each  other  in  your 

*  The  dosing  Lecture,  on  the  religious  temper  of  the  Florentine,  though 
necessary  for  the  complete  explanation  of  the  subject  to  my  class,  at  the 
time,  introduced  new  points  of  inquiry  which  I  do  not  choose  to  lay  before 
the  general  reader  until  they  can  be  examined  in  fuller  sequence.  The 
present  volume,  therefore,  closes  with  the  Sixth  Lecture,  and  that  on 
Christian  art  will  be  given  as  the  first  of  the  pubkshed  course  on  Floren- 
tine Sculpture.^ 

^  [As  already  explained,  the  present  ^^  Sixth  Lecture "  was  the  Fifth  as  delivered 
(see  above,  p.  185);  the  Sixth  and  closing  Lecture  of  the  course  was  on  ''The 
School  of  Florence."  It  was  not  included  in  any  ''published  course  on  Florentine 
Sculpture"  (Le.,  Val  ^Attm),  but  is  now  printed  (below,  pp.  d55--d67)  from  the 
author's  manuscript.] 


VL  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  885 

Rudimentary  Series.^  The  first  is  from  a  patera  lately 
found  at  Camirus,  authoritatively  assigned  by  Mr.  Newton, 
in  his  recent  catalogue/  to  the  best  paiod  of  Greek  art. 
The  second  is  from  one  of  the  series  of  engravings  executed, 
probably,  by  Baccio  Baldini,  in  1485,'  out  of  which  I  chose 
your  first  practical  exercise  —  the  Sceptre  of  Apollo/  I 
cannot,  however,  make  the  comparison  accurate  in  all  re- 
spects, for  I  am  obliged  to  set  the  restricted  type  of  the 


^  [In  the  ultimate  ammgement  the  Greek  Aphrodite  was  No.  51  in  the  Radi- 
mentary  Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  180),  bat  the  Florentine  engraving  was  not  given.  The 
two  designs  (or  rather^  the  Greek  Aphrodite  and  a  small  piece  of  the  Florentine 
plate^  were  afterwards  enpaved  on  one  plate  in  Ariadne  U(MrenHna  (§  162) ;  but  as 
this  IS  the  passage  in  whieh  they  are  principally  discussed^  it  has  seemed  better  in 
a  complete  edition  of  the  Works  to  include  them  here— on  separate  plates,  and  on 
a  larger  scale  (Plates  XIV.,  XV.^ ;  the  whole  of  the  Florentine  engraving,  more- 
over, is  now  given,  instead  of  the  small  piece  presented  in  Ariadne,  The  Greek 
Aphrodite  is  painted  on  a  white  Athenian  vase,  found  in  1864  in  a  tomb.et  Camiras 
in  Rhodes.  It  is  in  the  Third  Vase  Room  of  the  British  Museum  (D.  2) ;  for  a 
collection  of  illustrative  psoaages  npon  it,  see  R.  T.  Cook's  JPopuhr  Handbook  to 
the  Qreek  and  Roman  AnHguitieo,  p.  373.] 

*  [Sipwpeie  qf  the  Ckmtente  ^  the  Britieh  Museum,  Department  qf  Qreek  and 
Soman  AnHguitiee:  FirH  Vaee  Boom^  4th  ed.,  1871,  p.  30.    See  now  A.  S.  Murray's 

White  Athenian  Vaeee,  p.  9.] 

*  [The  Italian  Venus  is  one  of  a  series  of  fifty  early  Italian  prints,  known  as 
Tarocchi  cards ;  they  are  a  set  for  tibe  game  of  tarocchi,  a  came  of  cards  in  which 
there  were  five  sets  or  suits  of  ten  cards  each,  the  cards  being  numbered  conse- 
cutively (1-60),  the  suits  being  lettraed  £  to  A.  Tlie  Venus  here  is  lettered 
"  A.  43,"  suit  A  Gonsistimr  of  representations  of  the  planets.  In  Ariadne  FtorenUna 
(Plates  XXVII.  and  XXvIII.  in  VoL  XXII.)  there  are  reproductions  of  two  cards 
belonging  to  suit  C,  which  consisted  of  the  arts  and  sciences  (see  Ottley's  IRetory  <^ 
Engraving,  vol.  L  pp.  379-400).    Mr.  Colvin  assigns  the  Tarocchi  cards  to  the  school 


assistant,  Baccio,  worked  together."  Ruskin  here  founds  himself  on  Vasari  (JU«et, 
voL  iii.  p.  486,  Bohn's  edition),  who  says:  ''Maso  di  Finiguerra  was  followed  by 
the  Florentine  goldsmith,  Baccio  Baldini,  who  had  no  great  power  of  design,  for 
which  reason  aU  that  he  did  was  witii  Uie  invention  and  design  of  Sandro  Biotti- 
celli."  Following  Vasari,  collectors  and  writers  have  been  in  uie  habit  of  classing 
together  all  early  Florentine  engravings  (1460-1480),  which  are  unsigned,  as  the 
work  of  Baldini.  Nothing,  however,  is  really  known  of  him,  and  modem  research 
is  inclined  to  depose  him  from  such  comprehensive  eminence,  if  not  even  to 
question  his  existence.  (See  Sidney  Colvin's  Florentine  Picture  Chronicle,  p.  34.) 
Some  of  the  fine  engravings,  hitherto  ascribed  to  Baldini,  greatly  resemble  the 
drawings  in  that  Chronicle  (for  which,  see  Vol.  XV.  p.  380),  and  Mr.  Colvin  is 
therefore  disposed  to  attribute  them  to  Maso  Finiguerra.  The  engravings  in 
question,  of  which  Rusldn  had  a  choice  collection,  are  very  rare;  but  the  Print 
Room  of  the  British  Museum  is  rich  in  them.  The  ''Venus"  here,  and  the 
other  ''  Baldini "  engravings  given  in  Ariadne  Florentina,  have  for  this  edition  been 
reproduced  irom  the  prints  in  the  Museum;  the  preeent  plate  is  in  vol.  xix.  ot 
the  Museum's  collection  of  Early  Italian  Prints.] 
«  [See  Leeturee  on  Art,  §  107  (above,  p.  101).] 


886  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Aphrodite  Urania  of  the  Greeks  beside  the  universal  JOeity 
conceived  by  the  Italian  as  governing  the  air,  eartliy    and 
sea ;  nevertheless,  the  restriction  in  the  mind  of  the  Greek, 
and  expatiation  in  that  of  the  Florentine,  are  both  cliarac- 
teristic.     The  Greek  Venus  Urania  is  flying  in  heaven,   her 
power  over  the  waters  symbolized  by  her  being  borne  by  a 
swan,  and  h»  powar  over  the  earth  by  a  single  flovirer  in 
her  right  hand ;  but  the  Italian  Aphrodite  is  rising  out    of 
the  actual  sea,  and  only  half  risen :  her  limbs  are  still   in 
the  sea,  her  merely  animal  strength  filling  the  waters    with 
their  life;  but  her  body  to  the  loins  is  in  the  sunshine,  her 
face  raised  to  the  sky;  her  hand  is  about  to  lay  a  garland 
of  flowers  on  the  earth. 

186.  The  Venus  Urania  of  the  Greeks,  in  her  relation 
to   men,  has  power  only  over   lawful  and  domestic    love; 
therefore,  she  is  fuUy  dressed,  and  not  only  quite  dressed^ 
but  most  damtily  and  trimly :  her  feet  delicately  sandalled, 
her   gown   spotted   with   little  stars,  her  hair  brushed   ex- 
quisitely  smooth  at  the  top  of  her  head,  trickling  in  minute 
waves   down  her   forehead;  and   though,   because  there   i& 
such   a   quantity  of  it,   she   can't   possibly  help   having   a 
chignon,  look  how  tightly  she  has  fastened  it  in  with  her 
broad  fillet.     Of  course  she  is  married,  so  she  must  wear  a 
cap  with  pretty  minute  pendent  jewels  at  the  border ;  and 
a  very  small  necklace,  all  that  her  husband  can  properly 
afibrd,  just  enough  to  go  closely  round  her  neck,  and  no 
more.     On  the  contrary,  the  Aphrodite  of  the  Italian,  being 
universal  love,  is  pure-naked;  and  her  long  hair  is  thrown 
wild  to  the  wind  and  sea. 

These  primal  difierences  in  the  symbolism,  observe,  are 
only  because  the  artists  are  thinking  of  separate  powers; 
they  do  not  necessarily  involve  any  national  distinction  in 
feeling.  But  the  difierences  I  have  next  to  indicate  are 
essential,  and  characterise  the  two  opposed  national  modes 
of  mind. 

187.  First,  and  chiefly.  The  Greek  Aphrodite  is  a  very 
pretty  person,  and  the  Italian  a  decidedly  plain  one.    That 


»tlDg| 

eartli,i]i| 
lieGitd 

flower  is 

iiDe,lKf 
gukd 

relitia 
c  loTc; 
iressed 
i<W 

QIDOfe 

ercB 
iogi 
^liff 
ears 
ioi 
pdf 
litf 

ire 

5' 

in 
t 
s 


^Aj  VENVyXXXXUI 


Aphrodite  TJialassia 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  887 

is  because  a  Greek  thought  no  one  could  possibly  love  any 
but  pretty  people;  but  an  Italian  thought  that  love  could 
give  dignity  to  the  meanest  form  that  it  inhabited,  and 
light  to  the  poorest  that  it  looked  upon.  So  his  Aphrodite 
wUl  not  condescend  to  be  pretty.^ 

188.  Secondly.  In  the  Greek  Venus  the  breasts  are 
broad  and  full,  though  perfectly  severe  in  their  almost 
conical  profile; — (you  are  allowed  on  purpose  to  see  the 
outline  of  the  right  breast,  under  the  chiton;) — also  the 
right  arm  is  left  bare,  and  you  can  just  see  the  contour  of 
the  front  of  the  right  limb  and  knee;  both  arm  and  limb 
pure  and  firm,  but  lovely.  The  plant  she  holds  in  her 
huid  is  a  branching  and  flowering  one,  the  seed-vessel  pro- 
minent.  These  signs  all  mean  that  her  essential  function 
is  child-bearing.^ 

On  the  contrary,  in  the  Italian  Venus  the  breasts  are 
so  small  as  to  be  scarcely  traceable ;  the  body  strong,  and 
almost  masculine  in  its  angles ;  the  arms  meagre  and  unat- 
tractive, and  she  lays  a  decorative  garland  of  flowers  on  the 
earth.  These  signs  mean  that  the  Italian  thought  of  love 
as  the  strength  of  an  eternal  spirit,  for  ever  helpful;  and 
for  ever  crowned  with  flowers,  that  neither  know  seed-time 
nor  harvest,  and  bloom  where  there  is  neither  death  nor 
birtii. 

189.  Thirdly.  The  Greek  Aphrodite  is  entirely  calm» 
and  looks  straight  forward.  Not  one  feature  of  her  face 
is  disturbed,  or  seems  ever  to  have  been  subject  to  emo- 
tion. The  Italian  Aphrodite  looks  up,  her  face  all  quiver- 
ing and  burning  with  passion  and  wasting  anxiety.  The 
Greek  one  is  quiet,  sdf-possessed,  and  self-satisfied:  the 
Italian  incapable  of  rest;  she  has  had  no  thought  nor 
care  for  herself;  her  hair  has  been  bound  by  a  fillet  like 
the  Greek's ;  but  it  is  now  all  fallen  loose,  and  clotted  with 
the  sea,  or  clinging  to  her  body;  only  the  front  tress 
of  it  is   caught   by  the  breeze  from   her  raised  forehead^ 

^  [For  an  additional  passage  in  this  connexion,  see  below,  p.  4K)6.] 
*  [See,  again,  below,  p.  407.] 


888  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

and  lifted,  in  the  place  where  the  tongues  of  fire  rest  on 
the  brows,  in  the  early  Christian  pictures  of  Pentecost, 
and 'the  waving  fires  abide  upon  the  heads  of  Angelico's 
seraphim/ 

190.  There  are  almost  endless  points  of  interest,  great 
and  small,  to  be  noted  in  these  differences  of  treatment. 
This  binding  of  the  hair  by  the  single  fiUet  marks  the 
straight  course  of  one  great  system  of  art  method,  from 
that  Greek  head  which  I  showed  you  on  the  archaic  coin 
of  the  seventh  century  before  Christ,^  to  this  of  the  fifteenth 
of  our  own  era; — ^nay,  when  you  look  dose,  you  will  see 
the  entire  action  of  the  head  depends  on  one  lock  of  hair 
falling  back  from  the  ear,  which  it  does  in  compliance  with 
the  old  Greek  observance  of  its  being  bent  there  by  the 
pressure  of  the  helmet  That  rippling  of  it  down  her 
shoulders  comes  from  the  Athena  of  Corinth ;  the  raising  of 
it  on  her  forehead,  from  the  knot  of  the  hair  of  Diana, 
changed  into  the  vestal  fire  of  the  angels.  But  chiefly,  the 
calmness  of  the  features  in  the  one  face,  and  their  anxiety 
in  the  other,  indicate  first,  indeed,  the  characteristic  differ- 
ence in  every  conception  of  the  schools,  the  Greek  never 
representing  expression,  the  Italian  primarily  seeking  it; 
but  far  more,  mark  for  us  here  the  utter  change  in  the 
conception  of  love ;  from  the  tranquil  guide  and  queen  of 
a  happy  terrestrial  domestic  life,  accepting  its  immediate 
pleasures  and  natural  duties,  to  the  agonizing  hope  of  an 
infinite  good,  and  the  ever  mingled  joy  and  terror  of  a  love 
divine  in  jealousy,  crying,  ''Set  me  as  a  seal  upon  thine 
heart,  as  a  seal  upon  thine  arm ;  for  love  is  strong  as  death, 
jealousy  is  cruel  as  the  grave."  • 

The  vast  issues  dependent  on  this  change  in  the  con- 
ception of  the  ruling  passion  of  the  human  soul,  I  will 
endeavour    to   show   you    on   a    future   occasion:^    in   my 

^  [Compare  the  description  at  the  end  of  Modem  Painten,  voL  ii.   (VoL   IV. 
p.  332).] 

*  [Fig.  11  (the  archaic  Athena  of  Corinth) ;  ahove,  p.  253.] 

*  Song  of  Solomon  Tiii.  6.] 

*  [Thig  was  partly  done  in  the  succeeding  Lecture :  see  now  pp.  364  #09.,  and 
compare  pp.  403  Asg.j 


Apollo  and  the  P>-tho 
Heracles  and  the  Nemoai 


VI.  THE   SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  889 

present  Lecture,  I  shall  limit  myself  to  the  definition  of 
the  temper  of  Greek  sculpture,  and  of  its  distinctions 
from  Florentine  in  the  treatment  of  any  subject  whatever, 
be  it  love  or  hatred,  hope  or  despair. 

These  great  differences  are  mainly  the  following.^ 

101.  First.  A  Greek  never  expresses  momentary  passion ; 
a  Florentine  looks  to  momentary  passion  as  the  ultimate 
object  of  his  skill. 

When  you  are  next  in  London,  look  carefully  in  the 
British  Museum  at  the  casts  from  the  statues  in  the  pedi- 
ment of  the  Temple  of  Minerva  at  iBgina.  You  have 
there  Greek  work  of  definite  date — ^about  600  B.C.,  certainly 
before  580— of  the  purest  kind ;  and  you  have  the  represen- 
tation of  a  noble  ideal  subject,  the  combats  of  the  Mscidm 
at  Troy,'  with  Athena  herself  looking  on.  But  there  is  no 
attempt  whatever  to  represent  expression  in  the  features, 
none  to  give  complexity  of  action  or  gesture;  there  is  no 
struggling,  no  anxiety,  no  visible  temporary  exertion  of 
muscles.  There  are  fallen  figures,  one  pulling  a  lance  out 
of  his  wound,  and  others  in  attitudes  of  attack  and  defence ; 
several  kneeling  to  draw  their  bows.  But  all  inflict  and 
suffer,  conquer  or  expire,  with  the  same  smile.* 

102.  Plate  XVII.  gives  you  examples,  from  more  ad- 
vanced art,  of  true  Greek  representation ;  the  subjects  being 
the  two  contests  of  leading  import  to  the  Greek  heart — 
that  of  Apollo  with  the  Python,  and  of  Hercules  with  the 
Nemean  Lion.^  You  see  that  in  neither  case  is  there  the 
slightest  effort  to  represent  the  Xwrtra,  or  agony  of  contest. 
No  good  Greek  artist  would  have  you  behold  the  suffering 
either  of  gods,  heroes,  or  men ;  nor  allow  you  to  be  appr^ 
hensive  of  the  issue  of  their  contest  with  evil  beasts,  or 
evil  spirits.    All  such  lower  sources  of  excitement  are  to 

^  [Compare  the  diacosBion  of  the  chancteriitioi  of  Greek  art  in  the  Queen  qf  the 
"  161  eeq,  (Vol.  XIX.  pp.  410  wj.).] 
a  this  subject  see  '^TTie  Tortoise  of  -ffigina,**  §  16 ;  below,  p.  387.] 
*  [The  reader  will  find  it  interesting  to  compare,  with  what  Ruskin  says  of  the 
iEgineUn  smUe,  Pater's  Greek  Studiei,  pp.  26^-282,  on  ''The  Marbles  of  .Sgina."] 
«  [The  ''Apollo  with  the  Python"  is  ^m  a  coin  of  Croton  (period;  b.o.  400-336) ; 
III.  C  19  in  the  British  Maseam.    The  Heracles  is  from  a  com  of  Heraclea  (before 
B.O.  326);  IV.  C.  16  in  the  British  Museum.] 


840  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

be  closed  to  you;  your  interest  is  to  be  in  the  thoughts 
involved  by  the  fact  of  the  war;  and  in  the  beauty  or 
rightness  of  form,  whether  active  or  inactive.  I  have  to 
work  out  this  subject  with  you  afterwurds,  and  to  compare 
Mrith  the  pure  Greek  method  of  thought  that  of  modem 
dramatic  passion,  engrafted  on  it,  as  typically  in  Turner's 
contest  of  Apollo  and  the  Python :  ^  in  the  meantime,  be 
content  ivith  the  statement  of  this  first  great  principle — 
that  a  Greek,  as  such,  never  expresses  momentary  passion. 

198.  Secondly.  The  Greek,  as  such,  never  expresses  pa- 
sonal  character,  while  a  Florentine  holds  it  to  be  the  ulti* 
mate  condition  of  beauty.  You  are  startled,  I  suppose,  at 
my  saying  this,  having  had  it  often  pointed  out  to  you,  as  a 
transcendent  piece  of  subtlety  in  Greek  art,  that  you  could 
distinguish  Hercules  from  Apollo  by  his  being  stout,  and 
Diana  from  Juno  by  her  being  slender.  That  is  very  true ; 
but  those  are  general  distinctions  of  class,  not  special  dis- 
tinctions of  personal  character.  Even  as  general,  they  are 
bodily,  not  mental.  They  are  the  distinctions,  in  fleshly  as- 
pect, between  an  athlete  and  a  musician, — between  a  matron 
and  a  huntress ;  but  in  nowise  distinguish  the  simple-hearted 
hero  from  the  subtle  Master  of  the  Muses,  nor  the  wilful 
and  fitful  girl-goddess  from  the  cruel  and  resolute  matron- 
goddess.  But  judge  for  yourselves.  In  the  successive 
plates,  XVIII.-XX.,  I  show  you,*  typically  represented  as 
the  protectresses  of  nations,  the  Argive,  Cretan,  and  Laci- 
nian  Hera,  the  Messenian  Demeter,  the  Athena  of  Corinth, 
the  Artemis  of  Syracuse ;  the  fountain  Arethusa  of  Syracuse, 

*  These  plates  of  coins  are  given  for  future  reference  and  examination, 
not  merely  for  the  use  made  of  them  in  this  place.  The  Lacinian  Heia^  if 
a  coin  could  be  found  unworn  in  sur&ce,  would  be  very  noble ;  her  hair  is 
thrown  free  because  she  is  the  goddess  of  the  cape  of  storms,  though  in 
her  temple,  there,  the  wind  never  moved  the  ashes  on  its  altar.  (Livy, 
xxiv.  S.«) 

i  [Compare  The  Relation  qf  Michael  Angelo  and  TitUoret,  §§  11,  13,  20 ;  and  see 
the  earlier  lecture  on  ''  Modem  Art,"  §  12,  where  Raskin  takes  this  same  illustra- 
tion as  typical  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  206).] 

>  [See  Queen  qf  the  Air,  §  26  n.  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  321),  where  the  passage  from 
livy  is  cited ;  and  for  storms  off  the  Lacinian  promontory  (Capo  delle  Colonne), 
see  JSneid,  iii.  651  eeq.    Compare  Ariadne  Florentina,  §  145.J 


n    of   Ar^os 
of   Syrncus 


er   of   Mes 
I   of   r.noss 


VL  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  841 

and  the  Siren  Ligeia  of  Terina.^  Now,  of  these  heads,  it 
is  true  that  some  are  more  delicate  in  feature  than  the 
rest,  and  some  softer  in  expression:  in  other  respects,  can 
you  trace  any  distinction  between  the  Goddesses  of  Earth 
and  Heaven,  or  between  the  Goddess  of  Wisdom  and  the 
Water  Nymph  of  Sjrracuse?  So  little  can  you  do  so,  that 
it  would  have  remained  a  disputed  question — had  not  the 
name  luckily  been  inscribed  on  some  Sjnracusan  coins — 
whether  the  head  upon  them  was  meant  for  Arethusa  at  all ; 
and,  continually,  it  becomes  a  question  respecting  finished 
statues,  if  without  attributes,  ^*Is  this  Bacchus  or  Apollo 
— ^Zeus  or  Poseidon  ? "  There  is  a  fact  for  you ;  note- 
worthy, I  think  I  There  is  no  personal  character  in  true 
Greek  art: — abstract  ideas  of  youth  and  age,  strength  and 
swiftness,  virtue  and  vice, — ^yes:  but  there  is  no  individu- 
ality, and  the  negative  holds  down  to  the  revived  conven- 
tionalism of  the  Greek  school  by  Leonardo,  when  he  tells 
you  how  you  are  to  paint  young  women,  and  how  old 
ones ;  though  a  Greek  would  hardly  have  been  so  discour- 
teous to  age  as  the  Italian  is  in  his  canon  of  it, — ''old 
women  should  be  represented  as  passionate  and  hasty,  after 
the  manner  of  Infernal  Furies/'* 

m 

194.  **  But  at  least,  if  the  Greeks  do  not  give  *  character, 
they  give  ideal  beauty?"  So  it  is  said,  without  contradic- 
tion. But  will  you  look  again  at  the  series  of  coins  of  the 
best  time  of  Greek  art,  which  I  have  just  set  before  you  ? 

^  [Raskin's  sammarjr  of  the  plates  here  does  not  accurately  correspond  with  their 
contents,  as  will  be  seen  from  the  following  note,  llie  '^Arffiye  Hera"  and  the 
'' Cretan  Hera"  (from  a  coin  of  Cnossus)  are  on  Plate  XVIII.  The  ''Lacinian 
Hera"  (from  a  coin  of  Pandosia^  in  the  territory  of  the  Bruttii)  is  on  Plate  XX.  The 
^'Messenian  Demeter"  (Plate  XVIII.)  is  discussed  below,  §  196.  The  ''Athena  of 
Corinth  "  (in  the  text)  is  perhaps  a  slip  of  the  pen  for  "  Athena  of  Thurium,"  which 
is  on  Plate  XX.  The  ''Artemis  of  Syracuse"  is  on  Plate  XX. ;  the  " Arethnsa  of 
Syracuse"  has  been  given  on  a  previous  plate  (the  lower  head  on  Plate  II.,  see 
p.  214).  The  "Zeus  of  Syracuse  (not  mentioned  in  the  text)  is  on  Plate  XVIH. 
The  "Siren  Ligeia"  (Plate  XIX.)  is  now  represented,  not  by  photographic  version 
of  the  coin  (as  in  previous  editions),  but  by  an  enlargement  arawn  by  Kuskin.  The 
head  is  from  a  com  of  Terina  (II.  C.  13  in  the  British  Museum),  and  represents 
not  the  Siren  Ligeia,  but  Nike.  "This  is  one  of  the  most  exauisite  productions  of 
the  art  of  die^ngraving.  The  4»  is  the  artist's  signature.  AU  the  finest  coins  of 
Teriaa  of  this  period  (b.o.  450)  are  by  him  "  (Barclay  V.  Head,  Guide  to  the  Principal 
Coim  of  the  Aneiente,  p.  30).] 

>  [§  108  in  Bohn's  translation  of  the  TrooHee  on  Painting.] 


842  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Are  any  of  these  goddesses  or  nymphs  very  beautifiil?. 
Certainly  the  Junos  are  not  Certainly  the  Demeters  are 
not.  The  Siren,  and  Arethusa,  have  weU-formed  and  regular 
features;  but  I  am  quite  sure  that  if  you  look  at  tiiem 
Mrithout  prejudice,  you  will  think  neither  reaches  even  the 
average  standard  of  pretty  English  girls.  The  Venus  Urania 
suggests  at  first  the  idea  of  a  very  charming  person,  but 
you  will  find  there  is  no  real  depth  nor  sweetness  in  the 
contours,  looked  at  closely.  And  remember,  these  are 
chosen  examples, — the  best  I  can  find  of  art  current  in 
Greece  at  the  great  time ;  and  if  even  I  were  to  take  the 
celebrated  statues,  of  which  only  two  or  three  are  extant, 
not  one  of  them  excels  the  Venus  of  Melos;  and  she,  as 
I  have  already  asserted,  in  the  Queen  of  the  Air,  has 
nothing  notable  in  feature  except  dignity  and  simplicity.^ 
Of  Athena  I  do  not  know  one  authentic  type  of  great 
beauty;  but  the  intense  ugliness  which  the  Greeks  could 
tolerate  in  their  symbolism  of  her  will  be  convincingly 
proved  to  you  by  the  coin  represented  in  Fig.  10  [p.  252]. 
You  need  only  look  at  two  or  three  vases  of  the  best  time 
to  assure  yourselves  that  beauty  of  feature  was,  in  popular 
art,  not  only  unattained,  but  unattempted ;  and,  finally, — 
and  this  you  may  accept  as  a  conclusive  proof  of  the  Greek 
insensitiveness  to  the  most  subtle  beauty, — ^there  is  little 
evidence  even  in  their  literature,  and  none  in  their  art,  of 
their  having  ever  perceived  any  beauty  in  infancy,  or  early 
childhood.' 

195.  The  Greeks,  then,  do  not  give  passion,  do  not  give 
character,  do  not  give  refined  or  naive  beauty.  But  you 
may  think  that  the  absence  of  these  is  intended  to  give 
dignity  to  the  gods  and  nymphs ;  and  that  their  calm  faces 
would  be  found,  if  you  long  observed  them,  instinct  with 
some  expression  of  divine  mystery  or  power. 

»  [Sm  Vol.  XIX.  p.  413.] 

*  LCompAre  what  Roflkin  sayf  In  The  Art  4if  England,  §  75  (^'  amon^  all  the  trM- 
•nres  of  Greek  antiquity  you  can  get  no  notion  of  what  a  Greek  httle  girl  wu 
like");  but  see  on  thia  subject  £.  T.  Cook's  Popular  Handbook  to  tke  Greek  and 
Soman  AnHquUiee  in  the  BritUh  Museum,  pp.  68,  672.] 


til 

te 

u 

£i 
so 
& 
ta 

K 

to 

P 
J" 

Ci 

(« 

tb 
A] 

dk 
of 
01 
of 
tb 


IT 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  848 

I  will  convince  you  of  the  narrow  range  of  Greek 
thought  in  these  respects,  by  showing  you,  from  the  two 
sides  of  one  and  the  same  coin,  images  of  the  most  mys- 
terious of  their  deities,  and  the  most  powerful, — Demeter, 
and  Zeus. 

Remember^  that  just  as  the  west  coasts  of  Ireland  and 
England  catch  first  on  their  hills  the  rain  of  the  Atlantic, 
so  the  Western  Peloponnese  arrests,  in  the  clouds  of  the 
first  mountain  ranges  of  Arcadia,  the  moisture  of  the  Medi- 
terranean ;  and  over  all  the  plains  of  Elis,  Pylos,  and  Mes- 
sene,  the  strength  and  sustenance  of  men  was  naturally  felt 
to  be  granted  by  Zeus ;  as,  on  the  east  coast  of  Greece,  the 
greater  deamess  of  the  air  by  the  power  of  Athena.  If 
you  wiU  recollect  the  prayer  of  Rhea,  in  the  single  line  of 

CallimachuS — **  Tcua    ^iXi;,  T&ce  kcu  av  *  recu   S^  iSiU€9  eKa<l>paif^^  ^ 

(compare  Pausanias,  iv.  88,  at  the  beginning ') — ^it  will  mark 
for  you  the  connection,  in  the  Greek  mind,  of  the  birth  of 
the  mountain  springs  of  Arcadia  ivith  the  birth  of  Zeus. 
And  the  centres  of  Greek  thought  on  this  western  coast 
are  necessarily  Elis,  and,  (after  the  time  of  Epaminondas,) 
Messene. 

196.  I  show  you  the  com  of  Messene,  because  the  splen- 
did height  and  form  of  Moimt  Ithome  were  more  expressive 
of  the  physical  power  of  Zeus  than  the  lower  hUls  of 
Olympia;  and  also  because  it  was  struck  just  at  the  time 
of  the  most  finished  and  delicate  Greek  art — a  little  after 
the  main  strength  of  Phidias,  but  before  decadence  had 
generally  pronounced  itself.    The  coin  is  a  silver  didrachm, 

^  [The  punga  from  ''Remember"  here  down  to  the  end  of  §  107  wu  written 
bjr  Rttskin  for  a  di£ler«nt,  and  nndelireredj  lecture  on  "The  Eagle  of  EUa" :  tee 
below^  D.  399.] 

*  (Hymn  to  JupUer,  line  29 :  "Dear  Earth,  do  thou  too  hear;  for  easy  are  thy 
throee."!' 

'  ["On  the  way  to  the  rammit  of  Ithome,  where  is  the  acropolis  of  Messene, 
there  is  a  spring  called  Clepsydra.  To  enumerate  sll  the  peoples  who  daim  that 
Zeus  was  bom  and  brought  up  among  them  would  be  impracticable,  OTen  if  the 
attempt  were  seriously  made.    But,  however  that  may  be,  the  Messenians  are  one 


of  the  peoples  who  adyance  the  claim ;  for  they  say  that  the  god  was  brou(^t  up 
amongst  them,  and  that  the  women  who  brou^t  him  up  were  Ithome  andNeda ; 
Neda,  so  they  say,  gave  her  name  to  the  nver,  and  Ithome  gave  hers  to  the 
mountain"  (J.  6.  Frazer's  translation).] 


844  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

bearing  on  one  side  a  head  of  Demeter  (Plate  XVIII.,  at 
the  top);  on  the  other  a  full  &gwe  of  Zeus  Aietophoros 
(Plate  XXL,  at  the  top);  the  two  together  signifying  the 
sustaining  strength  of  the  earth  and  heaven.^  Look  first 
at  the  head  of  Demeter.  It  is  merely  meant  to  personify 
fulness  of  harvest ;  there  is  no  mystery  in  it,  no  sadness,  no 
vestige  of  the  expression  which  we  should  have  looked  for 
in  any  effort  to  realize  the  Greek  thoughts  of  the  Earth 
Mother,  as  we  find  them  spoken  by  the  poets.  But  take 
it  merely  as  personified  Abundance, — ^the  goddess  of  black 
furrow  and  tawny  grass, — how  commonplace  it  is,  and  how 
poor  J  The  hair  is  grand,*  and  there  is  one  stalk  of  wheat 
set  in  it,  which  is  enough  to  indicate  the  goddess  who  is 
meant;  but,  in  that  very  office,  ignoble,  for  it  shows  that 
the  artist  could  only  inform  you  that  this  was  Demeter  by 
such  a  symbol.  How  easy  it  would  have  been  for  a  great 
designer  to  have  made  the  hair  lovely  with  fruitfid  flowers, 
and  the  features  noble  in  mystery  of  gloom,  or  of  tenderness. 
But  here  you  have  nothing  to  interest  you,  except  the  com- 
mon Greek  perfections  of  a  straight  nose  and  a  full  chin. 

197.  We  pass,  on  the  reverse  of  the  die,  to  the  figure 
of  Zeus  Aietophoros.  Think  of  the  invocation  to  Zeus  in 
the  Suppliants,  (525,)  **  King  of  Kings,  and  Happiest  of  the 
Happy,  Perfectest  of  the  Perfect  in  strength,  abounding  in 
all  things,  Jove — ^hear  us,  and  be  with  us;**  and  then,  con- 
sider what  strange  phase  of  mind  it  was,  which,  under  the 
very  mountain-home  of  the  god,  was  content  with  this 
symbol  of  him  as  a  well-fed  athlete,  holding  a  diminutive 
and  crouching  eagle  on  his  fist.  The  features  and  the  right 
hand  have  been  injured  in  this  coin,  but  the  action  of  the 
arm  shows  that  it  held  a  thunderbolt,  of  which,  I  believe, 

1  [Here  in  the  MS.  of  the  lecture  on   ''The  Eegle  of  Elis"   there  was  an 
additional  paasafe : — 

''  mw  you  know  I  have  warned  you  agun  and  again  that  in  genuine 

Greek  art  you  will  find  no  question  of  poetical  imagination.     AU  their 

poetry  is  in  their  literature ;  their  art  is  absolute  prose,  though  grare, 

dijpiiiied^  and  often  beautiful.    Look  first  .  .  ."] 

'  [In  the  MS.   of  ''The  Eagle  of  Elis":  "The  hair  is  deeply  wreathed,  but 

scarcely  more  so  than  in  any  other  fine  head-dress  of  the  time;    there  is  one 

•italk  .  .  /'] 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  845 

the  twisted  rays  were  triple.  In  the  presumably  earlier  coin 
engraved  by  MilUngen,  however,*  it  is  singly  pointed  only; 
and  the  added  inscription  ^'lOQM/'  in  tiie  field,  renders 
the  conjecture  of  Millingen^  probable,  that  this  is  a  rude 
representation  of  the  statue  of  Zeus  Ithomates,  made  by 
Ageladas,  the  master  of  Phidias ;  and  I  think  it  has,  indeed, 
the  aspect  of  the  endeavour,  by  a  workman  of  more  ad- 
vanced knowledge,  and  more  vulgar  temper,  to  put  the 
softer  anatomy  of  later  schools  into  the  simple  action  of  an 
archaic  figure.  Be  that  as  it  may,  here  is  one  of  the  most 
refined  cities  of  Greece  content  with  the  figure  of  an  athlete 
as  the  representative  of  their  own  mountain  god;  marked 
as  a  divine  power  merely  by  the  attributes  of  the  eagle  and 
thunderbolt. 

198.  Lastly.  The  Greeks  have  not,  it  appears^  in  any 
supreme  way,  given  to  their  statues  character,  beauty,  or 
divine  strength.  Can  they  give  divine  sadness?  Shall  we 
find  in  their  art-work  any  of  that  pensiveness  and  yearn- 
ing for  the  dead  which  fills  the  chants  of  their  tragedy  ?  I 
suppose,  if  anything  like  nearness  or  firmness  of  faith  in 
after-life  is  to  be  found  in  Greek  legend,  you  might  look 
for  it  in  the  stories  about  the  Island  of  Leuce,  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Danube,  inhabited  by  the  ghosts  of  Achilles, 
Patroclus,  Ajax  the  son  of  Oileus,  and  Helen ;  and  in  which 
the  pavement  of  the  Temple  of  Achilles  was  washed  daily 
by  the  sea-birds  with  their  wings,  dipping  them  in  the  sea.' 

Now  it  happens  that  we  have  actually  on  a  coin  of  the 
Liocrians  the  representation  of  the  ghost  of  the  Lesser  Ajax. 
There  is  nothing  in  the  history  of  human  imagination  more 

*  Ancieni  Cities  and  Kings,  Plate  IV.,  No.  20. 

^  [At  p.  63  of  Ancient  Coins  qf  Greek  OiHes  and  Kings  fnm  Varimu  CoOecHons 
prineUMUy  in  Great  Britain,  by  Jamet  Millingen^  1831.] 

*  [For  an  aeeoant  of  tbe  White  Isle  in  the  Eoxine,  see  Philostratos :  Seraica,  zz. 
32-40  (pp.  313-316  of  the  Didot  edition).  Philoetratus  (who  wrote  about  a.d.  237) 
records  that  on  this  island,  where  none  might  stav  after  sunset,  Achilles  and 
Helen  held  high  rerelry,  singing  of  their  loves  and  cnanting  the  verses  of  Homer, 
which  went  rinsing  over  the  sea,  thrilling  with  awe  the  mariners  who  heard  them. 
He  tells,  too,  how  white  sea-birds  attended  Achilles  on  the  island,  fanning  his 
sacred  ffrove  with  their  wings,  and  sprinkling  it  with  spray  as  they 
over  itj 


846  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

lovely  than  their  leaving  always  a  place  for  his  spirit, 
vacant  in  their  ranks  of  battle.^  But  here  is  their  sculptural 
representation  of  the  phantom  (lower  figure,  Plate  XXI.); 
and  I  think  you  will  at  once  agree  with  me  in  feeling  that 
it  would  be  impossible  to  conceive  anything  more  com- 
pletely  unspirituaL  You  might  more  than  doubt  that  it 
could  have  been  meant  for  the  departed  soul,  unless  you 
were  aware  of  the  meaning  of  this  little  circlet  between  the 
feet.  On  other  coins  you  find  his  name  inscribed  there, 
but  in  this  you  have  his  habitation,  the  haunted  Island  of 
Leuce  itself,  with  the  waves  flowing  round  it. 

199.  Again  and  again,  however,  I  have  to  remind  you, 
with  respect  to  these  apparently  frank  and  simple  failures, 
that  the  Greek  always  intends  you  to  think  for  yourself, 
and  understand,  more  than  he  can  speak.  Take  this  in- 
stance at  our  hands,  the  trim  little  circlet  for  the  Island  of 
Leuce.  The  workman  knows  very  well  it  is  not  like  the 
island,  and  that  he  could  not  make  it  so ;  that,  at  its  best, 
his  sculpture  can  be  little  more  than  a  letter;  and  yet,  in 
puttfagL,  oWet,  ««i  its  eneomp^dog  ftetwo*  of  L.ate 
waves,  he  does  more  than  if  he  had  merely  given  you  a 
letter  L,  or  written  ^^  Leuce."  If  you  know  anything  of 
beaches  and  sea,  this  symbol  will  set  your  imagination  at 
work  in  recalling  them ;  ^  then  you  wUl  think  of  the  temple 
service  of  the  novitiate  sea-birds,  and  of  the  ghosts  of 
Achilles  and  Fatroclus  appearing,  like  the  Dioscuri,*  above 
the  storm-clouds  of  the  Euxine.  And  the  artist,  throughout 
his  work,  never  for  an  instant  loses  faith  in  your  sympathy 
and  passion  being  ready  to  answer  his ; — if  you  have  none  ta 
give,  he  does  not  care  to  take  you  into  his  counsel ;  on  the 
whole,  would  rather  that  you  should  not  look  at  his  work. 

200.  But  if  you  have  this  sympathy  to  give,  you  may  be 
sure  that  whatever  he  does  for  you  will  be  right,  as  far  as 

^  [Conon:  iVarrattofMt,  18.  Aorpoi  fULxifuifctf  4w€l  o-inryvi^  oih-eSt  Atas  ^^  iw  rf 
vapari^i  'XJiipn9  jccr^r  ^wtf'v.] 

'  rWi&  this  pHMM  on  the  lymbolisiii  of  Greek  art,  compare  the  note  at 
Vol.  IX.  p.  406,  and  Fig.  71  on  p.  409.] 

'  [See  note  on  p.  143,  above.] 


ieiiB    of   Mess. 
Ajax   of   Oj.u 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  847 

he  can  render  it  so.  It  may  not  be  sublime,  nor  beautiful, 
nor  «nudng:  bat  it  ,riB  l4  ftdl  of  m««ung.  .nd  fiutUul 
in  guidance.  He  will  give  you  clue  to  myriads  of  things 
that  he  cannot  literally  teach;  and,  so  far  as  he  does  teach, 
you  may  trust  him.    Is  not  this  saying  much? 

And  as  he  strove  only  to  teach  what  was  true,  so,  in 
his  sculptured  symbol,  he  strove  only  to  carve  what  was — 
Right.  He  rules  over  the  arts  to  this  day,  and  will  for 
ever,  because  he  sought  not  first  for  beauty,  not  first  for 
passion,  or  for  invention,  but  for  Bightness;  striving  to 
display,  neither  himself  nor  his  art,  but  the  thing  that  he 
dealt  with,  in  its  simplicity.  That  is  his  specific  character 
as  a  Greek.  Of  course  every  nation's  character  is  connected 
with  that  of  others  surrounding  or  preceding  it;  and  in 
the  best  Greek  work  you  will  find  some  things  that  are 
stiU  false,  or  fanciful ;  but  whatever  in  it  is  fSalse,  or  fanciful, 
is  not  the  Greek  part  of  it — ^it  is  the  Phoenician,  or  Egyptian, 
or  Felasgian  part.  The  essential  Hellenic  stamp  is  veracity : 
— Eastern  nations  drew  their  heroes  with  eight  legs,  but  the 
Greeks  drew  them  with  two ; — Egyptians  drew  their  deities 
with  cats'  heads,  but  the  Greeks  drew  them  with  men's; 
and  out  of  all  fiiUacy,  disproportion,  and  indefiniteness,  they 
were,  day  by  day,  resolvedly  withdrawing  and  exalting  them- 
selves into  restricted  and  demonstrable  truth. 

201.  And  now,  having  cut  away  the  misconceptions 
which  encumbered  our  thoughts,  I  shall  be  able  to  put  the 
Greek  school  into  some  clearness  of  its  position  for  you, 
with  respect  to  the  art  of  the  world.  That  relation  is 
strangely  duplicate;  for,  on  one  side,  Greek  art  is  the  root 
of  all  simplicity ;  and,  on  the  other,  of  all  complexity. 

On  one  side,  I  say,  it  is  the  root  of  aU  simplicity. 
If  you  were  for  some  prolonged  period  to  study  Greek 
sculpture  exclusively  in  the  Elgin  Room  of  the  British 
Museum,  and  were  then  suddenly  transported  to  the  Hdtel 
de  Cluny,^  or  any  other  museum  of  Gothic  and  barbarian 

^  [Th«  Mnseam  of  Mediovml  Art  at  Pftrii.] 


848  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

workmanship,  you  would  imagine  the  Greeks  were  the 
masters  of  all  that  was  grand,  simple,  wise,  and  tendeiiy 
human,  opposed  to  the  pettiness  of  the  toys  of  the  rest 
of  mankind. 

202.  On  one  side  of  their  work  they  are  so.  From  all 
vain  and  mean  decoration — all  weak  and  monstrous  error, 
the  Greeks  rescue  the  forms  of  man  and  beast,  and  sculp- 
ture them  in  the  nakedness  of  their  true  flesh,  and  with 
the  fire  of  tiieir  living  soul.  Distinctively  from  other  races, 
as  I  have  now,  perhaps  to  your  weariness,  told  you,  tius 
is  the  work  of  the  Greek,  to  give  health  to  what  was  dis- 
eased, and  chastisement  to  what  was  untrue.  So  £gu*  as 
this  is  found  in  any  other  school,  hereafter,  it  belongs 
to  them  by  inheritance  from  the  Greeks,  or  invests  them 
with  the  brotherhood  of  the  Greek.  And  this  is  the  deep 
meaning  of  the  myth  of  Daedalus  as  the  giver  of  motion 
to  statues.^  The  literal  change  from  the  binding  together 
of  the  feet  to  their  separation,  and  the  other  modifications 
of  action  which  took  place,  either  in  progressive  skill,  or 
often,  as  the  mere  consequence  of  the  transition  from  wood 
to  stone,  (a  figure  carved  out  of  one  wooden  log  must  have 
necessarily  its  feet  near  each  other,  and  hands  at  its  sides,) 
these  literal  changes  are  as  nothing,  in  the  Greek  fable, 
compared  to  the  bestowing  of  apparent  life.  The  figures  of 
monstrous  gods  on  Indian  temples  have  their  legs  separate 
enough ;  but  they  are  infinitely  more  dead  than  the  rude 
figures  at  Branchidae  sitting  with  their  hands  on  their 
knees.'  And,  briefly,  the  work  of  Daedalus  is  the  giving 
of  deceptive  life,  as  that  of  Prometheus  the  giving  of  real 
life;'  and  I  can  put  the  relation  of  Greek  to  aU  other  art, 

^  ["  He  made  many  wonderful  pieces  of  work  in  several  parts  of  the  world,  and 
80  fitr  excelled  in  the  framing  and  catting  of  statues  that  those  who  came  after 
him  report  the  works  to  resemble  living  men.  .  .  .  For  he  was  the  first  that  in 
statues  expressed  the  direct  and  lively  aspect  of  the  eyes,  and  the  progressive  motion 
of  the  legs  and  thijg^hs,  and  stretdung  forth  of  the  heads  and  arms,  and  there- 
fore was  justly  admired  by  all "  (Diodorus  Siculus,  iv.  76).  For  other  accounts 
of  DsBdalus,  see  below^  p.  352/] 

<  [These  statues^  removed  from  Asia  Minor  by  Sir  Charles  Newton  in  1858,  are 
in  the  Room  of  Archaic  Greek  Sculpture  at  the  British  Museum  (see  £.  T.  Cook's 
Popular  Handbook,  pp.  93-96).] 

'  [Compare  §  206 ;  below,  p.  351.] 


fej 


■■■    . 


^ 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS     849 

in  this  function,  before  you,  in  easily  compared  and  remem* 
bered  examples. 

208.  Here,  on  the  right,  in  Plate  XXII.,  is  an  Indian 
bull,  colossal,  and  elaborately  carved,  which  you  may  take 
as  a  sufficient  type  of  the  bad  art  of  all  the  earth.  False 
in  form,  dead  in  heart,  and  loaded  with  wealth,  externally. 
We  will  not  ask  the  date  of  this;  it  may  rest  in  the 
eternal  obscurity .  of  evil  art,  everywhere,  and  for  ever.^ 
Now,  beside  this  colossal  bull,  here  is  a  bit  of  Daedalus- 
work,  enlarged  from  a  coin  not  bigger  than  a  shilling:' 
look  at  the  two  together,  and  you  ought  to  know,  hence* 
forward,  what  Greek  art  means,  to  the  end  of  your  days. 

204.  In  this  aspect  of  it,  then,  I  say  it  is  the  sim- 
plest and  nakedest  of  lovely  veracities.  But  it  has  another 
aspect,  or  rather  another  pole,  for  the  opposition  is  dia- 
metric. As  the  simplest,  so  also  it  is  the  most  complex 
of  human  art.  I  told  you  in  my  Fifth  Lecture,'  showing 
you  the  spotty  picture  of  Velasquez,  that  an  essential  Greek 
character  is  a  liking  for  things  that  are  dappled.^  And 
you  cannot  but  have  noticed  how  often  and  how  prevalently 
the  idea  which  gave  its  name  to  the  Porch  of  Polygnotus, 
"oToo  iro«c/Xj7,"*  occurs  to  the  Greeks  as  connected  with  the 
finest  art.  Thus,  when  the  luxurious  city  is  oj^sed  to  the 
simple  and  healthful  one,  in  the  second  book  of  Plato's 
PoUty,  you  find  that,  next  to  perfumes,  pretty  ladies,  and 

^  [It  is  from  Delhi,  m  Riukin  itates  in  Vol  ^Amo^  §  16,  where  he  refers  to 
this  plate.] 

>  XThe  Bull  of  Thurium  is  from  the  reverse  of  the  coin  (ill.  C.  17  in  the 
ezhihition  of  electrotypes  at  the  British  Museum),  of  which  the  ''Athena  of 
Thurium*'  (centre  on  Plate  XX.)  is  the  obyerse.  For  other  references  to  the  Bull, 
see  VoL  XIX.  p.  22 ;  and  ''The  Tortoise  of  iEgina/'  §  10  (below,  p.  384).] 

'  [Of  the  inaurund  course,  but  in  £su;t  the  Seventh  Lecture :  see  above,  pp.  170, 
171 1  172  A.  In  me  delivery  of  the  lecture  Ruskin  no  doubt  touched  upon  Uie 
spotty,  dappled  character  in  the  Velasques — a  character  very  conspicuous  in  the 
PhilipJV.  at  the  National  Gallery  (No.  1129).] 

*  [The  quality  of  vouaXla^  or  spottiness  in  art,  is  frequently  dwelt  upon  by 
Ruskin.  See,  in  this  volume,  Lectures  on  Art  (as  cited  in  the  preceding  note),  and 
Aratra  Fent^iei,  pp.  268,  362.  See  also  Modem  PairUere,  vol.  iL  (Vol.  IV.  pp.  96, 
134) ;  Catalogue  qf  the  Educaiumal  Seriei,  1878,  No.  26  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  148) ;  Lectures 
on  Landscape,  §  6  (Vol.  XXII.  p.  14) ;  and  Eagie's  Nest,  §  73.  See  also  the  refer- 
ences  to  the  spots  on  the  nebris  of  Pionysus  given  above,  p.  149  n.] 

^  [The  Poikil^  or  great  hall  at  Athens  adorned  with  frescoes  by  Polygnotus  of 
the  Battle  of  Marathon  (H^  rro^  i^  nocjciXip  69afUiovvi9  Pausanias,  i.  16,  1.) 


850  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

dice,  you  must  have  in  it  '' xoaaX/a,"  ^  which  observe,  both 
in  that  place  and  again  in  the  third  book,  is  the  sepa- 
rate art  of  joiners*  work,  or  inla3ring ;  but  the  idea  of  ex- 
quisitely divided  variegation  or  division,  both  in  sight  and 
sound — ^the  ''ravishing  division  to  the  lute,"*  as  in  Pindar*s 
"irouctXo*  vjULvoi*'^ — ^runs  through  the  compass  of  all  Greek 
art-description;  and  if,  instead  of  studying  that  art  among 
marbles,  you  were  to  look  at  it  only  on  vases  of  a  fine 
time,  (look  back,  for  instance,  to  Plate  IV.  here,)  your  im- 
pression of  it  would  be,  instead  of  breadth  and  simplicity, 
one  of  universal  spottiness  and  chequeredness,  ''ei^  ayyi^av 
€pK€<riv  irajjLirouclXoi^ ; "  ^  and  of  the  artist*s  delighting  in  nothing 
so  much  as  in  crossed  or  starred  or  spotted  things ;  which, 
in  right  places,  he  and  his  public  both  do  unlimitedly.  In- 
deed they  hold  it  complimentary  even  to  a  trout,  to  call 
him  a  "spotty."  Do  you  recollect  the  trout  in  the  tribu- 
taries of  the  Ladon,  which  Pausanias  says  were  spotted, 
so  that  they  were  like  thrushes,  and  which,  the  Arcadians 
told  him,  could  speak  ?  ^  In  this  last  iroucOita,  however,  they 
disappointed  him.  ''I,  indeed,  saw  some  of  them  caught," 
he  says,  ''  but  I  did  not  hear  any  of  them  speak,  though  I 
waited  beside  the  river  till  sunset." 

205.  I  must  sum  roughly  now,  for  I  have  detained  you 
too  long. 

The  Greeks  have  been  thus  the  origin,  not  only  of  all 
broad,  mighty,  and  calm  conception,  but  of  all  that  is 
divided,  delicate,  and  tremulous;  ''variable  as  the  shade,  by 
the  light  quivering  aspen  made."  ^  To  them,  as  first  leaders 
of  ornamental  design,  belongs,  of  right,  the  praise  of 
glistenings  in  gold,  piercings  in  ivory,  stainings  in  purple, 
fournishings  in  dark  blue  steel;  of  the  fSontasy  of  the 
Arabian  roof, — quartering  of  the    Christian   shield, — rubric 

1  [RepubUe,  iL  373  A. ;  and  iU.  401  A.] 
»   1  Henry  IV.,  Act  iii.  sc  1,  line  211.] 

*  Nemea,  v.  78.1 
«   iWrf.,  X.  ea] 

*  viiL  21,  1.] 

*  rScott,  MarmUm,  vi.  30 ;  quoted  also  in  8e$ame  and  lARei,  §  69  (VoL  XVIII. 
f.  123).] 


The  Beginnings  of  Chii 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  851 

and  arabesque  of  Christian  scripture;  in  fine,  all  enlarge- 
ment, and  all  diminution  of  adorning  thought,  from  the 
temple  to  the  toy,  and  from  the  moimtainous  pillars  of 
Agrigentum  to  the  last  fineness  of  fretwork  in  the  Fisan 
Chapel  of  the  Thom.^ 

And  in  their  doing  all  this,  they  stand  as  masters  of 
human  order  and  justice,  subduing  the  animal  nature,  guided 
by  the  spiritual  one,  as  you  see  the  Sicilian  Charioteer 
stands,  holding  his  horse-reins,  with  the  wild  Uon  racmg 
beneath  him,  and  the  flying  angel  above,  on  the  beautiful 
coin  of  early  Syracuse  (lowest  in  Flate  XXIII.).' 

And  the  beginnings  of  Christian  chivalry  were  in  that 
Greek  bridling  of  the  dark  and  the  white  horses.' 

206.  Not  that  a  Greek  never  made  mistakes.  He  made 
as  many  as  we  do  ourselves,  nearly; — ^he  died  of  his  mis- 
takes at  last — as  we  shall  die  of  them;  but  so  fSar  as  he 
was  separated  from  the  herd  of  more  mistaken  and  more 
wretched  nations — so  fur  as  he  was  Greek — ^it  was  by  his 
rightness.  He  lived,  and  worked,  and  was  satisfied  with 
the  £Ettness  of  his  land,  and  the  fame  of  his  deeds,  by  his 
justice,  and  reason,  and  modesty.  He  became  Grseculus 
esuriens,^  little,  and  hungry,  and  every  man's  errand-boy, 
by  his  iniquity,  and  his  competition,  and  his  love  of  talk. 
But  his  Graecism  was  in  having  done,  at  least  at  one  period 
of  his  dominion,  more  than  anybody  else,  what  was  modest, 
useful,  and  eternally  true;  and  as  a  workman,  he  verily 
did,  or  first  suggested  the  doing  of,  everything  possible  to 
man. 

Take  Dsedalus,  his  great  type  of  the  practically  exe- 
cutive craftsman,  and  the  inventor  of  expedients  in  crafts- 
manship (as  distinguished  frx>m  Frometheus,  the  institutor 

1  [For  the  mountainous  pillan  of  Agrigentum,  lee  next  page;  for  Sta.  Maria 
della  Spina  at  Pisa,  gee  above>  p.  d04w] 

s  [For  the  upper  coin  on  this  plate,  see  ahove,  §  170  (p.  319) ;  it  is  from  a 
Syracusan  tetradrachm  of  the  fifth  centuiy  (British  Museum,  II.  C.  37).  The  lower 
coin  is  from  a  Syracusan  deeadrachm^  b.c.  480  (British  Museum,  IL  C.  33).] 

s  [The  reference  is  to  Plato's  parable  (Phadrus,  253)  of  the  charioteer  of  the  soul, 
with  his  two  horses  one  white  and  the  other  dark.  Compare  jPort  CSaoigera, 
Letter  22,  where  Ruskin  refen  to  S  206  here ;  and  see  also  p.  284,  above.] 

*  [Juvenal,  iiL  78 ;  quoted  also  in  Vol  tTAmo,  §  8.] 


852  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

of    moral   order   in    art).      Daedalus    invents, —  he,    or     his 
nephew,^ 

The  potter's  wheel,  and  all  work  in  clay; 

The  saw,  and  all  work  in  wood; 

The  masts  and  sails  of  ships,  and  all  modes  of  motioii ; 

(wings  only  proving  too  dangerous!) 
The  entire  art  of  minute  ornament; 
And  the  deceptive  life  of  statues. 

By  his  personal  toil,  he  involves  the  fatal  labyrinth  for 
Minos;'  builds  an  impregnable  fortress  for  the  Agrigen- 
tines;  adorns  healing  baths  among  the  wild  parsley-fields 
of  Selinus;  buttresses  the  precipices  of  Eryx,  under  the 
temple  of  Aphrodite;  and  for  her  temple  itself — ^finishes  in 
exquisiteness  the  golden  honeycomb.' 

207.  Take  note  of  that  l&st  piece  of  his  art:  it  is  con- 
nected with  many  things  which  I  must  bring  before  you 
when  we  enter  on  the  study  of  architecture.  That  study 
we  shall  begin  at  the  foot  of  the  Baptistery  of  Florence,* 
which,  of  all  buildings  known  to  me,  unites  the  most  per- 
fect symmetry  Mrith  the  quaintest  xouccX/a.  Then,  fix>m  the 
tomb  of  your  own  Edward  the  Confessor,'  to  the  farthest 

^  rTaloi ;  to  whom  by  some  anciont  writers  the  inyention  of  the  saw  is  ascribed.] 

*  rCompare  F^r^  davkfera,  Letter  23.] 

s  [For  Bsdalus  as  "  Jack-of-all-trades/'  see  Fort  Clavigera,  Letter  23.     For  tte 
story  of  Dadalus  inventing  wings^  and  of  the  fate  of  his  son  Icarus  who  TentiiTed 
too  greatly,  see  VoL  XIX.  p.  66,  and  compare  L&cturei  an  Ari,  §  162  (above,  p.  144), 
and  Bible  if  Atuiem,  ch.  iv.  §  10.     For  his  building  of  the  labyrinth  for  Minos, 
see  Fan  Clavigera,  Letter  28^  and  compare  Leeiuru  on  Landicape,  §  95.    The  legends 
may  be  read  in  Diodonis  Siculus,  iv.  §§  76-78,  who  then  continues :  '*  He  buOt 
likewise  a  city  in  Agrigentinum  upon  a  rock  so  strong  that  it  was  inexpugnable. 
He  adorned  a  cave  in  &e  territory  of  Selinus  [so  called  from  its  beds  of  parsley, 
aiXaw],  in  which  he  utilised  a  warm  subterranean  sprinr  so  cleverly  that  the  per- 
spiration is  gradually  drawn  out  by  the  heat^  and  many  who  resort  thither  are  cured 
of  their  distempers  with  a  g^reat  deal  of  pleasure  and  without  any  uneasiness  from  the 
heat     And  whereas  there  was  a  high  and  craggy  rock  in  the  country  of  Eryx, 
and  no  room  to  build  but  upon  the  highest  and  craggiest  part  of  it,  by  reason  of 
the  strait  and  narrow  passages  about  the  temple  of  Venus,  he  drew  a  wall  round 
the  very  ton,  and  planned  and  enlarged  it  in  a  wonderful  manner.     They  sa^  he 
likewise  made  a  golden  honeycomb,  dedicated  to  Venus  Erycina,  with  such  exouisite 
art.  and  so  like  to  a  true  and  real  one,  that  none  could  ever  be  comparable  to 
it'     For  another  reference  to  the  honeycomb  of  D»dalus,  see  Cestui  of  AgkUa^ 
§  16  (Vol  XIX.  p.  68).    For  the  Dndalian  work  of  spottiness,  inlaying,  etc.,  com- 
pare Lectures  on  Landscape,  §§  6,  49.] 

«  rSee  above,  §  24 ;  p.  217  n.l 

*  [See   Dean   Stanley's   description   of   the   shrine   in   its   original  splendour 
(Memariais  qf  Westminster  Ai^,  p.  112).] 


VI.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  ATHENS  858 


H 


shrine  of  the  opposite  Arabian  and  Indian  world,  I  must 
show  you  how  the  glittering  and  iridescent  dominion  of 
Dasdalus  prevails;  and  his  ingenuity  in  division,  interposi- 
tion, and  labyrinthine  sequence,  more  widely  still.  Only 
this  last  summer  I  found  the  dark  red  masses  of  the  rough 
sandstone  of  Fumess  Abbey  had  been  fitted  by  him,  with 
no  less  pleasure  than  he  had  in  carving  them,  into  wedged 
hexagons — ^reminiscences  of  the  honeycomb  of  Venus  Ery- 
jtl^  cina.  His  ingenuity  plays  around  the  framework  of  all  the 
IkJ^  noblest  things;  and  yet  the  brightness  of  it  has  a  lurid 
jHj^  shadow.  The  spot  of  the  fawn,  of  the  bird,  and  the  moth, 
^  B^  inay  be  harmless.  But  Daedalus  reigns  no  less  over  the 
^  spot  of  the  leopard  and  snake.  That  cruel  and  venomous 
power  of  his  art  is  marked,  in  the  legends  of  him,  by  his  in- 
.'ii  vention  of  the  saw  from  the  serpent's  tooth;  and  his  seek- 
yi  ing  refuge,  under  blood-guiltiness,  with  Minos,^  who  can 
)^i  judge  evil,  and  measure,  or  remit,  the  penalty  of  it,  but 
f^  not  reward  good;  Rhadamanthus  only  can  measure  that; 
^  but  Minos  is  essentially  the  recognizer  of  evil  deeds  ^'con- 
jj  oscitor  delle  peccata,''  whom,  therefore,  you  find  in  Dante 
j^  under  the  form  of  the  ipirrrov.  '^Cignesi  con  la  coda 
tante  volte,  quantunque  gradi  vuol  che  giti  sia  messa.**' 
And  this  peril  of  the  influence  of  Daedalus  is  twofold; 
i^  first,  in  leading  us  to  delight  in  glitterings  and  semblances 
^^)  of  things,  more  than  in  ti^eir  form,  or  truth; — admire  the 
*f*  harlequin's  jacket  more  than  the  hero's  strength;  and  love 
jbi  the  finding  of  the  missal  more  than  its  words ; — ^but  farther, 
ft  and  worse,  the  ingenuity  of  Daedalus  may  even  become 
tkf  bestial,  an  instinct  for  mechanical  labour  only,  strangely 
?J^  involved  with  a  feverish  and  ghastly  cruelty: — (you  will 
f^  find  this  distinct  in  the  intensely  Daedal  work  of  the  Japa- 
^         nese*);   rebellious,  finally,  against  the  laws  of  nature  and 

^'  1  [Compare  '^  The  Tortoiae  of  iEgiaa/'  §  9  (below,  p.  383),  and  Vol  (PAmo, 

^;  §  199?) 

g  *  llf^emo,  Y,  9,  11,  12:  ''That  recognizer  of  evil  deeds,  who,  considering  what 

0  place  in  hell  snits  the  transgression,  encircles  himself  with  his  tail  as  niany  times 

as  the  degrees  beneath  it  is  doomed  to  descend."    Quoted  again  in  "  The  Tortoise 

of  Mftint^'  §  9  (below,  p.  384).] 
g  3  [On  Japanese  art,  see  Time  and  Tide,  §  26  (Vol.  XVII.  p.  341).] 

XX.  2 


f« 


854  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

honour,  and  building  labyrinths  for  monsters, — ^not  combs 
for  bees. 

208.  Gentlemen,  we  of  the  rough  northern  race  may 
never,  perhaps,  be  able  to  learn  from  the  Greek  his  rever- 
ence for  beauty;  but  we  may  at  least  learn  his  disdain  of 
mechanism : — of  all  work  which  he  felt  to  be  monstrous  and 
inhuman  in  its  imprudent  dexterities. 

We  hold  ourselves,  we  English,  to  be  good  workmen. 
I  do  not  think  I  speak  with  light  referaice  to  recast 
calamity,  (for  I  myself  lost  a  young  relation,  full  of  hope 
and  good  purpose,  in  the  foundered  ship  London^)  when  I 
say  that  either  an  Aeginetan  or  Ionian  shipwright  built 
ships  that  could  be  fought  from,  though  they  were  under 
water;  and  neither  of  them  would  have  been  proud  of 
having  built  one  that  would  fill  and  sink  helplessly  if  the 
sea  washed  over  her  deck,  or  turn  upside-down  if  a  squall 
struck  her  topsail. 

Believe  me,  gentlemen,  good  workmanship  consists  in 
continence  and  common  sense,  more  than  in  frantic  expatia- 
tion  of  mechanical  ingenuity;  and  if  you  would  be  conti- 
nent and  rational,  you  had  better  learn  more  of  Art  than 
you  do  now,  and  less  of  Engineering.  What  is  taking 
place  at  this  very  hour,"^  among  the  streets,  once  so  bright, 
and  avenues,  once  so  pleasant,  of  the  fairest  city  in  Europe, 
may  surely  lead  us  all  to  feel  that  the  skill  of  Daedalus, 
set  to  build  impregnable  fortresses,  is  not  so  wisely  applied 
as  in  framing  the  rprrrov  irovov^ — ^the  golden  honeycomb. 

*  The  siege  of  Paris,  at  the  time  of  the  delivery  of  this  Lecture,  was  in 
one  of  its  most  destructive  phases.^ 


1 

% 

8 


Compare  Oravm  of  Wild  Olwe,  §  107  (Vol.  XVIII.  p.  474).] 

Pindar,  ^kian,  vi.,  last  line :  fuXtffffaM  rfnrr^  r^or.j 

For  other  references  to  these  events,  see  above,  p.  190  n.] 


LECTURE   VII 

THE  SCHOOL  OF  FLORENCE 

[Being  the  concluding  lecture  of  the  course  published  as  ''  ArcUra  Pentelici" 

delivered  on  December  10,  1870] 

209.  I  THINK  you  must  have  felt  as  we  were  comparing  the  two  engravings 
of  Aphrodite  at  last  lecture,^  that  whatever  their  faults  or  merits,  they  each 
of  them  must  have  been  drawn  by  a  gentleman.  People  are  always  trying 
nowadays  to  explain  that  word  away,  and  impress  on  the  minds  of  youth 
that  anybody  may  be  a  gentleman  who  chooses  to  meet  the  criterion 
fixed  by  the  public  mind — as,  for  instance,  in  the  present  day,  if  he  smokes, 
behaves  politely  to  ladies,  and  keeps  a  private  hansom.  But  that  is  not 
so  at  all ;  and  what  is  worse,  a  man  cannot  make  himself  a  gentleman  even 
by  being  honest  and  kind.  There  are  very  honest  gentlemen  and  very 
dishonest  ones;  there  are  very  kind  gentlemen  and  very  cruel  ones;  and 
there  are  honest  and  dishonest  clowns;  there  are  kind  and  brutal  clowns. 
But  a  gentleman  and  a  doivn  are  evermore  different  personages  from  cradle 
to  grave.* 

210.  Now  it  has  been  lately  the  theory  of  English  persons  interested  in 
art  (and  indeed  much  their  practice  also)  that  a  clown  should  produce 
art,  and  a  gentleman  look  at  it  The  exact  reverse  of  that  is  the  law  of 
life  in  all  great  schools — ^namely,  that  the  gentleman  produces  art,  and 
the  clown  looks  at  it.  You  may  perhaps  think  you  are  nearer  this  proper 
state  of  things  now  that  we  pay  two  or  three  thousand  guineas  for  a 
picture,  so  as  to  enable  our  artists  to  live,  as  they  suppose,  like  gentle- 
men. Alas !  we  are  only  so  much  farther  off  from  it  than  you  were ;  we 
only  offer  a  bribe  to  the  bluntest  sort  of  clown — the  clown  that  cares  for 
noUiing  but  money — to  elbow  the  one  that  could  have  painted  out  of  our 
sight.  For  an  honest  clown  may  have  a  gift  for  painting,  and  do  great 
things  in  it :  one  of  our  Northumberland  clods,  for  instance,  notable  among 
the  few  quite  wise  and  quite  good  men  who  have  ever  lived  in  this  world 
— ^Thomas  Bewick.  I  asked  you  at  the  close  of  my  last  lecture  to  get  his 
autobiography.'    I  hope,  therefore,  some  of  you  have  it  and  have  profited 

1  [Plates  XIV.  and  XV. :  see  above,  §§  18^190,  pp.  335-338.] 
'  [For  other  passages  in  this  sense,  see  Genend  Index;  comparing  especially 
Modem  Painters,  vol.  v.  (Vol  VII.  pp.  343  seqX  and  Crovm  qf  Wild  OUve.  §  108 
(Vol.  XVIII.  p.  476).] 

'  [This  passage  must  be  a  reference  to  some  informal  words  at  the  end  of  the 
last  lecture,  sudi  as  Ruskin  often  added  to  what  he  had  written.  He  referred 
to  this  injunction,  in  Ariadne  Florentina,  §  100.  The  book  is  entitled  A  Memoir 
<lf  Thomas  Beunck,  written  by  himself,  embellished  by  numerous  Wood  Engravings 
Designed  and  Engraved  by  the  Author:  Newcastle-on-Tyne,  1862.] 

366 


aa 


856  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

bj  it.  And  may  profit  yet  more  as  you  grow  older  and  wiser.  He  eoald 
draw  at  least  it  he  couldn't  paint ;  the  inherent  cloddishness  of  him  is 
shown  in  this,  that  he  could  not  draw  an  Aphrodite.  He  could  draw  a 
pig,  if  you  liked ;  but  not  a  Venus.^ 

211.  On  the  table  I  lay  .£sop's  Fables,  with  illustrations  and  vignettes 
by  Bewick ;  ^  you  shall  enjoy  them  much  in  time,  and  I  hope  fulfil  Charles 
Kingsley's  requirement,  that  you  should  "  know  your  Bewick,"  *  as  well  as 
mine,  that  you  should  know  your  Luini.^  But  I  have  enlarged  portions  of 
two  vignettes  in  illustration  of  the  point  now  in  question.  This  firat  vignette 
is  of  a  turkey  cock  who  has  addressed  some  rude  observations  to  a  young 
litter  of  pigs.  They  all  rush  out  to  avenge  the  insult,  but  the  leader — 
on  getting  within  two  yards  of  the  turkey  cock — ^perceives  that  the  afiair 
is  more  serious  than  he  had  imagined,  stops  short,  and  thinks  that  he  will 
exercise  his  moral  influence.  Mr.  Burgess  has  enlarged  him  for  you.  I 
hope  to  enlarge,  pi^ce  by  piece,  these  vignettes,  and  to  get  endless  in- 
struction from  them,  but  it  will  not  be  in  ideal  character.  Here,  for 
instance,  is  Bewick's  Aphrodite,  in  which  he  has  indeed  the  Greek  type 
of  form,  but  not  quite  the  Greek  perfection  of  it 

212.  Now  if  we  had  not  left  him  without  teaching,  as  we  did  Turner — 
who  also  could  draw  a  pig  but  not  a  Venus — ^there  was  the  making  of  a 
perfect  gentleman  in  Bewick,  and  he  could  have  carved  the  Erymanthiaa 
boar  in  marble,  as  well  as  this  pigling  in  wood.  But  he  would  always  have 
been  English-Greek,  not  Florentine,  in  his  type  of  Aphrodite.  We  have  to 
examine  ta<lay  what  it  is  which  gives  that  higher  character  to  the  Floren- 
tines; we  must  know  therefore,  mrst,  what  all  gentlemen  or  persons,  who 
could  be  made  so,  have  in  common,  and  then  how  a  Florentine  difiered 
from  an  Athenian  or  English  one. 

218.  (i.)  EtUhutiatm.  The  first  character  common  to  all  is  capability  of 
enthusiasm,  either  sane  or  insane.  The  Greek  gentleman  is  enthusiastic, 
a  recognised  fULVids,  and  fierce  in  purpose — as  Orpheus  or  Amphion^ — ^to 
conquer  Hell  or  build  the  wall  of  Thebes;  but  the  mediaeval  one  works 
constantly  in  enthusiasm  of  loving  reverie,  hoping  to  win  either  a  holy  grail 
or  a  holy  sepulchre.  Capability  of  Enthusiasm — ^recognition  of  it  as  the 
highest  state  of  men :  that  is  the  first  characteristic  of  the  Grentleman. 

214.  (U.)  Obedience.  Then,  next,  habit  of  and  delight  in  Obedience  to 
Seen  and  Unseen  Authority.  Recognition  of  the  powers  above  him,  be 
they  of  spirits  or  men ;  chiefly,  the  sense  of  a  great  Ruling  Spirit  and  Ruling 

i  [Compare  VoL  XIV.  p.  494;  Ariadne  Ftorentina,  §§  101,  127,  164^  168,  162; 
and  Art  qf  England,  §  196.] 

'  [Raskin  aiterwards  placed  some  of  the  woodcata  in  his  Collection  of  Examples, 
Educational  Series,  Nos.  187,  188  (VoL  XXI.  p.  91).  The  enlargement  of  the  pig 
here  described,  and  the  Aphrodite,  were  engraved  in  Ariadne,  §  102  (Plate  XXV. 
in  Vol.  XXII.).  The  Venus  is  at  p.  861  of  Bewick's  JEsop  ;  the  turkev-cock  and  pigs 
at  p.  206.    For  another  reference  to  Bewick's  JB$Qp^  see  Ariadne,  §  105.] 

^  [Kingsley  used  to  speak  of  himself  as  '^ brought  up  on  Bewick's  Birds": 
see  Charles  Kingeley:  His  Letters  and  Memorials  qf  Ms  lAfe,  1877^  vol.  iL  pp.  222» 
235,  236.] 

*  [See  Lectures  on  Arty  §  92  (above,  p.  90).] 

*  [For  the  frenzy  of  Orpheus,  see  Cestus  qf  Aglaia,  §  13  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  66).  For 
Amphion  building  the  walls  of  Thebes,  "The  Story  of  Arachne/'  §  32  (below, 
p.  379).] 


VII.  THE  SCHOOL  OP  FLC 

Law,  such  as  you  get  in  perfect  soldiers,  in  Leonidas 
great  consul  of  Rome,  in  Alfred,  in  St.  Louis,  in  Sii 
Bideford,  in  Cromwell,  in  Havelock,  and  in  Stonewal 

215.  (iii.)  Fearleuneu.     The  habitual  passing  of 
Death — Death  to. be  dreaded,  not  sought  as  the  begin 

Observe  this,  I  beg  of  jou.  It  is  the  daily  expec 
comes  to  a  mortal,  not  to  an  immortal — which  consti 
the  Lacedaemonians  that  we  are  lying  here,  having  < 
that  is  the  Greek  epitaph  in  noble  times.'  ''Here 
Morosini — Duke "  :  that  is  a  Venetian  epitaph  in  nob 
epitaphs  proceed  either  into  praise  or  hope,  the  gr 
is  past. 

You  have  then: — 

(i)  Enthusiasm ;    (iL)  Obedience — to   unseen 
(iii.)  Acceptance  of  Death. 

These  three  characters  are  universal  in  the  gentle 

216.  (iv.)  Lowe,  The  fourth — the  imaginative  purity 
•^-I  believe  is  only  found  intense  in  Christian  gentle 
tinguishes  the  Florentine  and  other  Purist  schools  of 
Therefore,  I  chose  the  two  Aphrodites  as  the  best  1 
parison  between  the  two  schools — the  one  Aphrodite 
and  daily  affections  of  human  life,  and  the  other,  coi 
such  as  subsisted  between  Dante  and  Beatrice,  and 
every  good  Christian  knight  and  his  lady. 

217.  (v.)  Imagmaium  ofSpiriU,  And  then  the  fifth,  i 
the  Imaginative  (or  actual,  but  at  least  Imaginative)  dv 
of  spirits  of  pure  yet  changeable  passions  like  our  o^ 
as  we  are  tempted),  and  receiving  their  daily  comfort 
their  rebuke  and  resistance.  This  is  possible  onl} 
persons ;  it  is  quite  distinct  from  the  habit  of  simple  i 
to  be  conmion  to  all  gentlemen. 

218.  And  the  change  in  the  conception  of  the  c 
porting  spirit,  or  Father,  or  master,  or  lady,  and  of  tl 
associated  with  them,  is  the  final  clue  to  the  chai 
among  all  nations.  The  greatest  specific  difference 
and  Medical  imagination,  in  this  respect,  is  the  ac< 
of  the  idea  of  the  pardon  and  putting  away  of  sins 
the  two  essentiaUy  Christian  virtues  of  Hope  and  Y\ 
these  were  possible  to  a  Greek. 

1  [For  Leonidas  compare  Vol.  V.  p.  224,  VoL  XII.  p.  : 
Rome,  in  a  similar  connexion,  Fotm  CSavigerOy  Letter  38  (ad 


General  Index ;  for  St.  Louis,  Q^een  qf  the  Air,  §  46  I 
Cromwell,  Vol.  V.  n.  416 ;  for  Havelock,  Vol.  Vll.  p.  460 
Jackson,  Vol.  XVII.  p.  464  n.  For  the  Elixabethan  heroes, 
above,  p.  800  n.  To  the  Athenian  Fhocion,  ''the  Good 
refers  in  Fore  Ciavigeraf  Letter  64;  and  no  doubt  he  had  in 
— ''This  is  no  more  than  what  I  expeeted;  this  treatmei 
dtisens  have  received  before  me" — in  Vol  d^Amo,  §  180.] 

«  rSee  Vol.  V.  p.  412.] 

*  [See  Vol.  XI.  p.  118 ;  and  for  national  decay  as  evideii 
dues,  see  ihid.,  pp.  81  seq."] 


858  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Yoar  intnxlactory  tUacUrd  types,  therefore,  for  the  school  of  Florence 
will  be  Filippo  Lippi's  Annunciation  and  Giotto's  Hope.  I  hope  to  get  a 
better  photograph  than  this  of  the  Annonciation,  and  to  make  a  better 
drawing  of  the  head  of  the  Angel  Gabriel;  but  even  in  this  sketch  you 
will  trace  the  elements  of  the  expression  of  Humility  which  the  Gothic 
designers  always  give  to  the  true  Messengers  of  Heaven.^ 

219*  We  have  then  these  five  essential  chaiaeteristics  of  the  mind  of  a 
true  man,  or  gentleman,  in  Christian  periods: — 
Enthusiasm. 
Obedience. 
Coa«ge. 
Love. 
Spiritual  Imagination. 

And  warring  against  these,  we  have  continually  in  the  vast  migority 
of  men  the  base  and  carnal  or  profane  instincts,  which  are  summed 
by  Horace  in  his  three  epithets  for  the  rabble:  pro£snum,  malignum, 
scelestum.^ 

That  is  to  say,  we  have  against  Enthusiasm — Coldness  or  the  habit  of 
inane  scorn,  and  in  less  ignoble  persons,  languor  in  pursuit  of  good;  the 
sin  purged  in  the  fourth  circle  of  the  Pw^aiory* 

Against  Obedience — Disloyalty. 

Against  Courage — ^Effeminacy  of  various  kinds;  the  habit  of  over- 
anxiety  about  ones  own  soul  being  one  of  the  great  religious  basenenes 
— continually  causing  insanity  in  women. 

Against  Love — Lust. 

Against  Spiritual  Imagination — ^the  acknowledgment  only  of  Medianieal 
Powers. 

220.  Now,  you  are  to  remember  that  all  these  vilenesses  had  taken  pos- 
session of  the  civilised  world  under  the  Roman  Empire,  just  as  they  have 
done  at  this  present  time.  The  forms  of  Scorn,  Disobedience,  Cowardice, 
Lust,  and  Infidelity  correspond  in  the  closest  manner,  in  the  temper  of  the 
Romans  in  their  last  decline,  with  those  manifested  among  ourselves  at 
this  day;  what  cure  may  be  done  on  ourselves  remains  for  us  and  our 
children  to  feel,  and  already  it  is  becoming  sharp,  it  seems  to  me ;  but  the 
cure  of  the  Roman  degeneracy  was  in  the  descent  upon  them  of  the  Northern 

*  ''Qui  si  ribatte  '1  mal  tardato  remo.*' 

Note  the  beautiful  indication  of  Dante's  approach  to  this  cornice  :*- 

''  'O  virtu  mia,  perche  si  ti  dilegue?' 
Fra  me  stesso  dicea,  che  mi  sentiva 
La  possa  delle  gambe  posta  in  tregne.'^' 

^^— ^■— — ■  I        II    11     .  ■  .  I.  -.1 

1  [The  photograph  of  Lippi's  "  Annanciation  "  is  No.  97  in  the  Educational  Series ; 
Ruskm's  study  of  the  head  of  Gabriel  in  it,  No.  100.  Giotto's  " Hope"  is  No.  89  in 
the  RudimenUry  Series.    See  Vol.  XXI.  pp.  83,  84, 193.] 

'  [pde9,  iii.  1, 1,  ^'Odi  profanum  volgus  et  aroeo" ;  ii.  16|  40,  ''malignum  speruere 
volps"  (compare  Munera  PulverU,  §  103  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  228) ;  a  4,  17,  ''de  sceleela 
plebe."] 

•  [xvii.  73-76 ;  thus  rendered  by  Cary : — 

"'  Why  partest  from  me,  O  my  strength?' 
So  witii  mvself  I  communed ;  for  I  felt 
My  o'ertoii'd  sinews  slacken."] 


VII.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  FLORENCE         859 

tribes,  some  to  slaj  and  some  to  govern,  some  to  re-inhabit;  all  of  them 
alike  gifted  with  a  new  terrific  force  of  will  and  passion,  and  a  fertility  of 
savage  blood  which  was  again  to  give  Italy  suck  from  the  teat  of  the 
wolf. 

221.  Of  these  invasions  the  two  which  are  vital  to  the  history  of  Art 
are  those  of  the  Ostrogoths  and  Lombards.  Both  nations  enter  by  the 
plain  of  the  Adige  and  fasten  on  the  first  Roman  city  of  that  plain,  Verona, 
which,  with  its  peninsula  of  land  guarded  by  the  impassable  river  and 
opposite  crag,  almost  precipitous  on  both  sides,  became  precisely  such  a 
fortress  for  the  Northern  powers  in  Italy  as  the  tongue  of  land  enclosed 
between  the  Reuss  and  the  Aar  at  Vindonissa  ^  was  to  the  Romans  beyoAd 
the  Alps.  Verona,  from  whatever  source  it  received  its  Latin  name  (more 
or  less  related  to  the  syllable  which  becomes  principal  in  Iberia  instantly 
under  Theodoric),  begins  its  relation  to  the  north  under  the  name  of  Bern, 
its  title  in  the  Niebelungen  Lied;^  and  without  attaching  too  much  value 
to  mere  etymological  coincidence,  this  name  will  be  a  verbal  nucleus  to 
you  for  the  gathering  of  many  thoughts,  if  you  remember  that  the  true 
Arctic  element,  the  savage  force  of  the  white  bear  of  the  northern  ice, 
enters  with  the  Alpine  stream  of  the  Adige,  and  gives  to  the  loveliest  dty 
of  North  Italy  the  same  name  as  that  of  the  rude  capital  of  Switzerland ;  so 
that  you  may  think  (in  many  respects  with  great  advantaged  of  Mediaeval 
Venice  alwa3rs  as  of  the  City  of  the  Lion,  of  Milan  (Medioiannm)  as  the 
City  of  the  Swine,^  and  of  Verona  as  the  City  of  the  Bear,  guarded,  you 
will  afterwards  find,  or  baited,  by  the  dogs  of  La  Scala. 

S22.  But  for  our  own  work  to-day  I  wish  you  only  to  think  of  the  last 
of  the  two  invasions — ^that  of  the  Lombards;  and  the  essential  character  of 
that  may  be  easily  understood  by  you  if  you  will  only  fix  in  your  minds, 
as  symbols  of  it,  the  two  stories  of  Alboin  and  Rosamond,  and  of  Autharis 
and  Theodolinda.  I  name  these  two  histories  because  they  will  at  once 
mark  to  you  the  new  importance  which  is  henceforward  to  belong  to  women, 
the  newly  rising  art  being  not  so  much,  you  will  find  hereafter,  specially 
Christian  as  specially  feminine  —  feminine  in  its  principal  subject,  the 
Madonna,  and  in  its  principal  power,  that  of  Chivalry.  But  we  shall  find 
that  with  this  pre-eminence  of  women  a  fearful  element  of  evil  is  intro- 
duced as  well  as  of  good ;  and  that  the  state  of  modem  Christendom  is  not 
at  all  so  much  owing  to  any  special  phases  of  its  creed,  as  to  the  gentleness 
of  women  kindly  treated  in  their  purity,  and  to  their  crimes  when  sinned 
against  or  corrupt. 

228.  You  will  have  difficulty  in  extricating  the  story  of  Rosamond 
from  the  pompons  antitheses  of  Gibbon.*  I  will  tell  it  you  as  shortly  as 
I  can. 

1  [Now  Windisch.  Within  the  ancient  walls  of  Vindonissa  the  Castle  of  Habsburg 
was  afterwards  built:  see  Vol.  VII.  p.  164.] 

«  rCompare  «<  Verona  and  its  Rivers,"  §  8  (VoL  XIX.  p.  433).] 

'  [So  in  the  MS. ;  but  the  allusion  is  not  clear.  The  arms  of  the  duchy  of  Milan 
were  :  argent  a  thrice  bent  serpent  azure,  crowned,  with  a  child  gales  in  its  jaw  (JVotof 
mnd  Q!uerie9,  vol.  iv.  p.  336} ;  they  may  be  seen  in  Oarer's  cut  of  "  The  Investiture 
of  the  Duke  of  Milan."] 

^  [Chapter  xlv.  The  date  of  the  Lombard  invasion  under  Alboin  is  jud.  668. 
For  Ruskin's  attitude  to  Gibbon,  see  Vol.  XVIII.  p^  zxxiv.,  and  Bihie  of  Andent^ 
jMitffm.] 


860  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

Alboin,  afterwards  the  first  King  of  the  Lombards  in  Italy,  appears  first 
as  a  young  prince  fighting  in  his  father's  army  against  a  neighbouring 
Gothic  tribe,  the  Gepidae.  The  King  of  the  Gepidae  has  two  sons,  and  one 
of  these  has  a  little  daughter  named  Rosamond.  The  Lombaid  prince, 
Alboin,  kills  in  battle  one  of  these  two  princes  of  the  Gepidse,  Rosamond's 
uncle,  and  returns  in  triumph  to  his  own  Lombard  court,  where,  however, 
he  is  refused  admission  to  the  feast  of  victory  because  he  has  not  yet 
received  his  arms  from  a  foreign  and  Royal  hand.  Alboin  on  this  returns 
peacefully  to  the  court  of  the  King  whose  son  he  has  just  slain,  and  from 
his  hand  receives  knighthood  and  investiture  with  the  arms  of  the  dead 
prince. 

224.  You  see,  I  hope,  at  once,  what  an  inevitable  law  of  discipline,  of 
self-command,  of  tremendous  passions  under  curb  of  iron,  there  is  in  all 
this,  and  what  may  be  expected  of  these  when  the  curb  breaks.  At  the 
court  of  the  Gepidae  Alboin  had  seen  the  young  Rosamond;  her  &ther 
soon  after  becomes  king.  Alboin  in  vain  endeavours  to  obtain  Rosamond 
in  marriage,  and  war  is  declared  again  between  the  nations,  in  which  at 
last  Alboin, — invested,  remember,  with  the  arms  of  Rosamond's  unde, — 
kills  also  her  father,  makes  a  drinking-cup  of  his  skull,  and  Rosam<md  thus 
won  becomes  Queen  of  the  Lombards. 

Then  follows  the  great  invasion  of  Italy,  from  which  the  valley  of  the 
Po  receives  its  name  of  Lombardy;  Alboin,  feasting  at  Verona  and  wild 
with  wine,  commands  Rosamond  to  drink  out  of  her  father's  skull.  She 
obeys,  but  at  the  iostant  vows  the  destruction  of  her  husband.  The  story 
of  Aegisthus  and  Agamemnon  repeats  itself;  but  instead  of  the  veil  thrown 
over  the  victim's  head,^  her  husband's  sword  is  fastened  to  its  scabbard  by 
the  Clytemnestra  of  the  north,  who  afterwards  dies  by  the  hand  of  her 
lover. 

225.  In  the  course  of  this  tragic  history  we  may  trace  most  of  the  worldly 
conditions  under  which  Lombard  art  first  develops  itself,  and  they  are  o 
more  importance  than  the  unworldly  one&  That  the  King  of  the  Lombards 
had  been  educated  in  the  Arian  heresy  is  not  so  essential  a  circumstance 
for  us  in  analyzing  the  sculptures  of  Verona,  as  that  he  had  won  his  queen 
by  killing  her  father  and  uncle,  still  it  is  an  essential  one  also;  nor  less 
that  the  Catholics  were  permitted  in  their  public  worship  to  pray  for  his 
conversion  at  the  moment  that  his  queen  and  her  lover  were  contriving 
his  assassination,  all  being  set  before  you  as  a  sign,  and  sculptured,  as  it 
were,  on  the  foundation  of  the  throne  of  the  mightiest  kingdom  in  Italy. 

226.  Now  you  may  consider  this  Lombardic  era  in  Italy  as  correspondent 
nearly  to  the  Homeric  period  in  Greece,  and  you  have  to  contrast  the 
temper  of  Alboin  with  that  of  Atrides  in  order  to  understand  the  parallel  re- 
lations of  early  Christian  and  Greek  art ;  *  but  keeping  to  our  present  point, 
observe  that  all  really  barbaric  horror  among  the  Greeks  is  pAri;]ly  mythic 
and  symbolic,  while  with  the  Lombards  it  is  literal.     The  feast  of  Thyestes* 

^  [iEschylus:  Agamemrwiif  1854.1 

*  [The  first  draft  adds  :— 

'';  as  also  the  age  of  Michael  Angelo  corresponds  in  Italy  to  the  time 
of  Phidias,  and  we  shall  then  have  to  compare  the  paganism  of  Pericles 
with  the  Christianity  of  the  MedicL    (But  keeping)  .  .  ."] 

'  [See  above,  p.  144.] 


VII.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  FLORENCE         861 

is  nearly  as  legendary  as  the  devouring  of  his  children  by  Kronos ;  and  the 
actual  facts  of  the  Homeric  period  are  not  savage.  All  Greek  tragedy  is 
an  expression  of  horror  at  what  is  so;  and  the  infliction  of  death,  deliber- 
ately, by  the  grave  or  the  altar  ^  had  nothing  in  it  more  intemperate  in 
passion  than  Samuel's  hewing  of  Agag  in  pieces  before  the  Lord  in  Gilgal, 
or  the  interrupted  sacrifice  by  Abraham,  and  fulfilled  one  by  Jephthtdi.^ 
And  broadly  speaking,  though  either  Atrides,  Achilles,  or  Diomed  would 
have  unscrupulouslv  killed  Rosamond's  father,  and  carried  off  Rosamond,  no 
Greek  king  of  the  heroic  age  would  have  made  her  drink  from  her 
fieither's  skull  when  he  was  drunk,  nor  obstinately  denied  the  triplidty  of 
Artonis  when  he  was  sober. 

2S7.  You  have,  then,  in  the  Lombard,  observe,  a  far  more  cruel  and 
fierce  n>irit  than  the  Greek's,  subjected  to  a  more  subtle  and  intellectual 
law.  You  have  a  violent  and  unconquered  form  of  sin,  reconciled  to  the 
conscience  by  a  finely  constructed  theory  of  justification ;  nay,  the  jnstifi* 
cation  is  felt  in  some  way  to  be  dependent  for  its  gloiy  on  ihe  degree  of 
the  sin  it  effiices  or  remits.  And  that  condition  of  a  grotesque  and  ghastly 
brutality,  restrained  by  an  exquisitely  subtle  and  theoretic  law,  rules  the 
Teutonic  sculpture  from  the  founding  of  the  Lombardic  kingdom,  to  that 
of  the  founding  of  the  Lombardic  republic.  Briefly,  all  round-arched  Chris- 
tian architecture,  and  the  sculpture  and  painting  belonging  to  it,  ftom  the 
invasion  of  Alboin  to  the  battle  of  Legnano,^  is  significant  of  this  method 
of  balance  between  good  and  evil. 

I  have  outlined  for  you  here^  a  letter  out  of  a  Bible  of  the  twelfth 
century  of  the  purest  style,  in  which  the  two  elements  are  seen  in  simplicity ; 
you  have  the  jpircrdv  of  animal  life  and  the  c/nrcrov  of  vegetation;^  the 
coiling  dragon  and  coiling  tree  are  both  subdued  into  a  fantastic  but  dis- 
ciplined grace,  and  enclosed  by  lines  of  curvature  more  subtle  than  any 
esdsting  hn  Greek  art,  even  of  the  finest  time. 

228.  That  battle  of  Legnano  is  a  mark  of  the  close  of  the  Lombard  style, 
but  it  closes,  remember,  at  its  grandest.  The  Campanile  of  the  Church 
of  St.  Zeno  was  built  in  memoiy  of  the  battle  of  Legnano;  the  porch  of 
the  same  church  is  earlier.  And  now  your  porch  of  St  Zeno,^  from  these — 
irrelevant,  shall  we  call  them? — ^matten  will  take  another  value  to  you. 
You  must  note  in  it  the  extreme  subtlety  of  construction  in  the  tapering 
lines  of  the  arch,  perfect  proportion,  the  dragon  everywhere  subdued  yet 
necessarily  present,  the  wreaths  of  creeping  vegetation  surrounding  the 
door,  the  monstrous  heads  which  form  its  handles.     Central  in  the  tympanum, 

• 

1  [The  first  draft  adds  :— 

''£ither  on  eaptives,  as  at  the  grave  of  Patroclus;  on  culprits,  as  the 
male  servants  of  Ulysses;  or  to  appease  the  fittes,  as  in  the  sacrifice  of 
Iphigenia."] 
'  [Samuel  xv.  33 ;  Genesis  xxiL ;  Judges  xi.] 
'▲.D.  1176,  in  which  Frederic  Barbarossa  was  defeated  by  the  Milanese.] 
The  example  is  No.  203  in  the  Educational  Series  (Vol  XXI.  p.  93).] 
'Compare  Queen  qf  the  Air,  §§  08,  86  (Vol.  XTX.  pp.  362,  376).  J 
*  [That  is.  No.  69  in  the  Reference  Series,  already  described  and  reproduced 
(PUte  I.)  in  AnUra  PenteHci,  §  20  (above,  p.  214) ;  the  first  draft  baring,  "  Hera 
it  is  for  you,  therefbra,  among  your  standards  of  architectura  as  a  centm  type  ^ 
the  Lombard  style  at  its  finest"] 


s 

4 


862  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

St.  Michael  standing  on  the  Dragon.^  At  the  angles  of  the  gable,  St.  John 
Evangelist  with  ^'In  prindpio  erat  verbum/'  St  John  Baptist  with  ''Ecce 
Agnus  Dei " ;  for  kejrstone  of  arch,  the  Lamb  with  inscription — '^  Agnus  hie 
est  cuncti  qui  toUit  crimina  mnndi " ;  and  the  hand  of  God  raised  in  the 
act  of  Benediction,  with  the  legend — ^'Deztra  Dei  Gentes  benedicat  sacra 
petentes." 

229*  Finally,  here  is  one  of  the  sculptures  sustaining  the  pillars  of  the 
porch  of  the  Duomo,^  in  which  the  Griffin  representing  Christian  life  is  re- 
straining the  dragon  in  its  daws. 

I  must  interrupt  myself  for  an  instant  to  remind  you  that  the  Lion  is 
in  classic  art  a  solar  power,  and  that  the  combination  of  the  two '  receives 
everywhere,  according  to  the  intellect  of  the  people  treating  it,  part  of  the 
mythic  meaning  of  both  animals;  it  is  sometimes  an  evil  demon,  but  for 
the  most  part  a  solar  and  cloudy  type  connected  with  Apollo  and  Zeus  in 
classic  times,  and  with  Christ  as  the  light  and  strength  of  the  world  in 
CSiristian  times.^ 

2S0.  These  Lombardic  sculptures  express,  then,  the  true  Gothic  or 
Northern  spirit.  Now,  in  the  thirteenth  and  fourteenth  centuries  the  Gre^ 
school  meets  this  at  Pisa,  and  the  Great  Tuscan  art  instantly  develops  its^ 
Remember,  this  is  not  the  adoption  of  Ghreek  forms ;  it  is  the  vital  naturalistic 
and  sincere  element,  poured  into  the  hearts  now  ready  to  recdve  it.  Nicole 
Pisano  is  taught  with  the  veracity  and  humanity  of  Paganism,  and  the 
phantom  of  the  Lombard  is  in  his  hands  to  become  true,  and  his  cruelty 
to  become  gentle.  There  is  a  great  deal  of  both  yet  to  be  transformed. 
Here  is  one  of  the  supports  of  the  Pillars  of  Nicolo  Pisano's  pulpit  at 
Siena,  a  lion  eating  a  horse.*  It  goes  far  beyond  my  Lombard  griffin  in 
naturalistic  power,  but  it  is  still  fearfully  cruel — no  Greek  could  have 
borne  to  carve  the  jaws  crashing  into  the  horse's  skull,  exactly  throu^  its 
eye,  as  the  Italian  does;  and  this  cruelty,  however  modified,  will  remain 
an  unconquered  element  in  Christian  art,  to  this  very  day,  where  it  has 
subordinated  all  other  art  to  the  founding  of  cannon.  But  in  the  chivalric 
ages  it  was  subdued  by  another  and  a  mightier  influence,  that  of  woman- 
hood in  purity  of  body  as  the  condition  of  gentle  hereditary  feudal  race, 
and  in  purity  of  spirit  as  the  bestower  of  personal  love  through  Eternity. 

281.  The  Greek  influence  of  mere  naturalism  can,  of  course,  deal  only 
with  the  first  of  these  ideas;  in  this  pulpit  of  Siena  it  gives  you  ihit 
strongest  animal  tjrpes,  as  of  the  cruelty  so  of  the  maternity  of  feudal  ages ; 

1  [The  MS.  notes  in  the  margin  :-- 

''Give  here  Cbartres  Queen  against  dancing-girl;   Greek    Eleutheria 
and  republic  against  Gothic  law  and  morality." 
The  memorandum  means  that  Raskin  meant  at  this  point  in  the  lecture  to  show 
a  drawing  or  photograph  of  one  of  Uie  sculptured  queens  on  Chartrss  Cathedral 

gee  Plate  XV.    in  vol.  XVI.,  p.  280),  comparing  it   with  his  studies   (from    a 
reek  terra-cotta)  of  a  dancing-girl  (see  Lecturet  on  Landtet^,  §  64  (Plate  VIII. 

in  VoL  XXII.).] 

*  [Plate  D.    At  Verona ;  the  drawing  by  Ruskin  is  No.  81  in  the  Educational 

Series  (Vol.  XXI.  pp.  82,  123).] 

'  [{.«.,  as  the  first  draft  explains,  the  grifiin  (lion  and  eagle).] 

«  [Compare  ''Verona  and  its  Riven,"  §  14  n.  (VoL  XIX.  p.  487)0 

^  [Here  Ruskin  showed  the  photograph  which  is  No.  72  in  the  Rerorence  Series 

(Vol.  XXI.  p.  32).    A  photograph  of  the  whole  pulpit  is  No.  151  in  the  fidnoatioDal 

Series  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  88).] 


the  lioness  is  beside  the  lion.  I  have  shown  you  the  support  of  the  front 
column  of  the  Siena  pulpit ;  here  is  that  of  its  lateral  one.  I  have  sketched 
this  lioness  for  you  from  the  real  marble  myself,^  though  I  photographed 
it  also,  and  you  will  see,  which  will  be  a  lesson  to  you  in  other  respects, 
that  there  is  an  advantage  in  drawing  over  photography  in  that  a  draughts- 
man can  seize  the  delicatest  shadow  on  which  expression  of  form  depends, 
while  a  photograph  is  sure  to  miss  these  and  retain  many  violent  ones 
which  are  accidental  and  inharmonious.^ 

SS2.  I  have  just  asked  you  to  recollect,  as  symbols  of  all  that  is  to 
guide  the'  new  spirit  of  men,  those  two  love  stories  of  Verona — ^iong  before 
her  Juliet — the  marriage  of  Alboin  and  Rosamond,  and  of  Autharis  and 
Theodolinda.  In  the  expedition  of  Autharis  disguised  in  the  train  of  his 
own  ambassadors  to  see  the  princess,  in  the  touch  of  her  hand,  as  he  re- 
ceives the  cup,^  which  her  nurse  assures  her  none  but  her  future  husband 
would  have  dared,  and  in  the  beneficent  reign  of  the  widowed  queen,  com- 
memorated to  this  day  by  the  treasures  of  Monza,  you  have  indeed  a  perfect 
type  of  the  feminine  power  which  thenceforward,  in  the  Berthas,  Blanches, 
Maudes,  Mar3rs,  and  Elizabeths  of  Christendom,  whether  for  good  or  evil,  is 
dominant  over  the  souls  of  men, — ^their  animation  or  their  ruin.  No  less 
in  the  ride  of  Autharis  down  the  whole  length  of  Italy,  till  he  casts  his 
spear  against  the  pillar  in  the  straits  of  Messina,^  you  have  the  perfect 
sign  of  that  dominion  of  the  wandering  riders  who,  first  typified  by  the 
Greek  centaur,  and  distinguished  by  one  name  among  all  civilized  nations 
— lww€U  in  Athens,  Equites  in  Rome,  Hitters  in  Germany,  Chevaliers  in 
France,  and  Cavaliers  in  England  ^ — have  held  themselves  opposed  in  their 
violent,  illiterate,  and  more  or  less  animal  and  worldly  yet  beautiful  pride, 
to  the  inactive  scholar,  and  to  the  (so  far  as  he  was  a  priest  indeed)  sub- 
missive and  humble  priest. 

S33.  But  the  main  condition  in  the  new  birth  of  barbaric  chivaliy  is  re- 
covery not  only  of  absolute  chastity  of  body,  but  attaining  an  ideal  of  the 
sexual  relations  independent  of  the   body  altogether,   having  no   ofiice  of 

1  [PUte  £  here.  The  examples  are  in  the  Educational  Series,  Nos.  152-154, 
(VoL  XXI.  p.  88).] 

'  [On  the  limitations  of  p»hot4M^phy,  compare  Vol.  XIX.  p.  89  n.] 
'  [The  story  of  Autharis  is  torn  by  Gibbon,  also  in  ch.  zlv. :  ^'In  restorin|;  the 
cap  to  the  princess,  Autharis  secretly  touched  her  hand,  and  drew  his  own  fiiDger 
over  his  face  and  Ups.  In  the  evening,  Theodolinda  imparted  to  her  nurse  the 
indiscreet  £uniliarity  of  the  stranger,  and  was  comforted  by  the  assurance  that 
such  boldness  could  proceed  only  from  the  king  her  husband,  who,  by  his  beauty 
and  courage,  appearea  worthy  of  her  love.  .  .  .  The  marriage  was  consummated  in 
the  palace  of  Verona.  At  the  end  of  one  year,  it  was  diMolved  by  the  death  of 
Autharis ;  but  the  virtues  of  Theodolinda  had  endeared  her  to  the  nation,  and  she 
was  permitted  to  bestow,  with  her  hand,  the  sceptre  of  the  Italian  kingdom." 
The  treasury  of  the  Cathedral  of  Monza  contains  many  memorials  of  Queen  Theo- 
dolinda, and  the  fimous  Iron  Crown  is  said  to  have  been  given  to  her  by  Gregory 
the  Great] 

*  r^'The  victorious  Autharis  asserted  his  claim  to  the  dominion  of  Italv.  At 
the  foot  of  the  Rhntian  Alps  he  subdued  the  resistance,  and  rifled  the  udden 
treasures,  of  a  sequestered  island  in  the  lake  of  Comum.  At  the  extreme  point  of 
Calabria  he  touched  with  his  spear  a  column  on  the  seashore  of  Rhegium,  pro- 
claiming that  ancient  landmark  to  stand  the  immovable  boundary  of  his  kingdom " 
(Gibbon,  ch.  xlv.).1 

*  [See  below,  '^The  Riders  of  Tarentum,"  §  9,  p.  dd3.] 


864  ARATRA  PENTELICI 

child-bearing  and  as  enduring  as  it  was  pure.  And  this^  observe,  was  an 
inevitable  result  of  the  sincere  anticipation  of  Immortali^.  It  was  impos- 
sible for  any  true  husband  or  wife  to  look  forward  with  desire  to  a  state 
into  which  they  were  to  become  indifferent  to  each  other,  and  as  they 
were  told  it  was  to  be  one  in  which  they  neither  marry  nor  are  given  in 
marriage,  it  remained  only  for  them  to  anticipate  such  felicity  by  exalting 
themselves  into  an  affection  on  earth,  which  might  be  sexual  and  yet  not 
carnal. 

No  man  has  ever  felt  the  true  passion  of  Love,  as  distinguished  from 
the  mere  association  of  friendship  with  desire,  unless  he  can  at  least  believe 
in  the  occasional  success  of  such  an  effort;  and  however  interrupted  by 
grotesque  or  defiling  failure,  the  gentlemen  and  gentlewomen  of  Christendom 
did  indeed  reach  again  and  again  to  what  I  have  before  spoken  of  as  the 
Imaginative  purity  of  the  passion  of  Love,^  and  that  sometimes  in  so  great 
intensity  that  you  find  Dante  absolutely  without  the  animal  pain  of  Jealouty ; 
so  that  the  marriage  of  Beatrice  to  another  does  not  in  the  least  affect  hii 
own  relations  to  her,  and  death  only  exalts  and  makes  them  eternal.* 

234.  But  even  this  is  not  enough.  The  chivalric  idolatry  of  sentiment 
is  pushed  so  far  that  at  last  it  becomes  a  question  not  only  whether  the 
bodily  relations  are  separable  from,  but  even  whether  they  do  not  destroy, 
those  of  the  spirit;  and  in  the  year  1174  the  question  is  brought  before 
the  ''  Cour  d'Amour "  of  the  Comtesse  de  Champagne,  "  Whether  Love  can 
exist  between  Married  Persons  ?  " — "  Utrum  inier  confugatoi  amor  pomt  habtft 
locum  " — and  it  is  decided  in  the  negative,  and  decided  in  the  most  positive 
terms  by  the  assembled  council  of  the  highest  and  purest  Christian  ladies: 
Dicknui,  et  MabiUto  tenore  Jirmamus  amorem  non  pane  inter  duos  jttgoles  mat 
extendere  vires/'* 

Nor  is  this  enough,  but  the  two  feelings  of  love  and  of  conjugal  re- 
lationship are  declared  to  be  so  totally  distinct  that  no  comparison  can 
be  made  between  them ;  this  is  by  a  judgment  pronounced   in  the  court 

^  [See  Lectures  on  Artj  §  92  (above,  p.  90).] 

«  [The  MS.  notes,  "  Here  Mr.  Tyrnrhitt  and  Vittoria."  The  reference  is  to  the 
following  passage  in  Christian  Art  and  SymboHsm,  hy  the  Rev.  R.  St  John  Tyrwhitt, 
1872,  p.  170  (to  which  book  Rnskxn  contribnted  a  Prefitce,  now  reprinted  in 
Vol.  XXII.):  ''In  the  Oxford  collection  [i^,,  in  the  Universi^  Gallerieel  there  if  » 
drawing  of  Vittoria  Colonna,  the  one  woman  whom  Michael  Angelo  loved,  wbO| 
having  been  wedded  once  and  widowed  and  clinging  to  her  first  vows,  could  not 
accept  his  hand,  or  yet  reject  his  love.  It  is  a  noble  and  delicate  face,  hesxing  out 
what  we  know  of  her.  In  a  time  of  utter  licence  and  universal  temptation,  when 
all  sins  one  can  or  cannot  name  were  matter  of  pleasure  and  convenience  in  Ituyi 
these  two  lived  and  met  in  austere  purity  of  grave  affection ;  heading  the  ^^^ 
tant  feeling  of  Italy,  dwelling  with  their  Venetian  friends  on  prospects  of  reiom 
in  religion,  hoping  iilwa3ni  for  the  future  of  their  country,  and  dying  in  hope  de- 
ferred. That,  I  believe,  is  what  the  rapturous  school  call  frigid.  Anyhow  there  is 
much  honour  and  fidth  in  it  At  all  events  I  greatly  prefer  frigid  purity  to  viee, 
hot  or  cold.  Judge  of  their  love  by  this,  that  when  Vittoria  died,  the  stoietl 
master,  who  had  never  complained  to  man  before,  broke  out  in  utter  lamentstion 
and  bitter  weeping,  and  mourned  for  this  especially,  that  never  in  life,  not  till  now 
when  she  lay  dei^  before  him,  had  he  once  kissed  her  hand."]  . 

*  [Quoted  from  Ch&ix  des  PoSsies  Orunnaies  des  Troubadours,  par  M.  Raynouard, 
1817,  Introduction  to  vol.  ii.  p.  crii.  n.  The  following  quotations  are  from  the  same 
essay  on  Courts  of  Love,  pp.  cviii.  n.,  cix.  n.] 


of  love  by  Ennengarde,  Coimtess  of  Narbonne:  '^  Conjugal  affection  aad 
the  true  love  of  loven — 'maritaiu  affhctuSy  et  coanumiium  vera  dilectio,  penUw 
judiccmhtr  cue  dwersa' — are  judged  to  be  altogether  diverse,  and  to  have  their 
origin  in  a  totally  different  condition  of  manners,  so  that  no  comparison  is 
possible  between  them." 

Nor  is  this  a  merely  speculative  judgment,  but  it  becomes  part  of  a 
code  of  law  by  which  special  causes  are  afterwards  decided  for  a  young 
girl  having  honourably  loved  one  knight  and  being  married  to  another, 
and  refusing  to  grant  her  fonner  lover  any  of  the  grace  she  used  to  show 
him ;  and  he  claiming  it  still  by  right  of  love,  the  cause  is  brought  before 
Ermengarde  of  Narbonne,  by  whom  the  untruth  and  cruelty  of  that  woman, 
*'imprMUu  hijut  .muUerii"  are  condemned  in  these  terms:  '' The  supervenient 
marital  covenant  does  not  justly  exclude  the  former  love,  unless  the  w<muui 
ceases  altogether  from  the  admission  of  love,  and  resolves  by  no  manner 
of  means  to  love  any  more." 

Nor  are  these  judgments,  observe,  temporary  or  local;  but  one  court 
of  love  affirms  and  proceeds  by  the  judgments  of  the  rest,  and  so  the 
appeal  in  this  very  case  is  of  peculiar  interest  to  us.  For  this  judgment, 
that  love  was  impossible  between  married  persons,  and  possible  only  be- 
tween lovers,  was  reaffirmed  at  the  court  of  Love,  presided  over  by  the 
mother  of  Oieur  de  Lion,  the  poisoner  of  fair  Rosamond. 

SS5.  Of  the  various  inconsistencies,  splendours,  and  degradations,  which 
arose  out  of  this  various  contest  of  the  spirit  with  the  body,  I  will  speak 
no  more  to-day,  nor  of  all  the  conditions  of  ghostly  imagination  relating, 
among  the  norUiem  tribes,  to  the  future  state  of  the  dead. 

These  we  will  examine  in  our  introduction  to  painting,^  which,  as  the 
mission  of  sculpture  is  to  deal  with  things  that  have  shape,  is  distinguished 
from  her  by  dealing  with  those  which  shape  have  none.^  But  in  closing  let 
me  pray  you  earnestly  to  distinguish  between  the  Imaginative  affection  of 
which  we  have  been  speaking  and  the  unaffectionate  or  unnaturally  exalted 
states  of  monastic  or  silvan  chastity,  the  chastity  of  Atalanta  or  of  Ion,  of 
Joan  of  Arc  or  Sir  Galahad.^ 

The  good  and  evil  in  these  phases  of  enthusiasm  have  never  been  justly 
measured,  because  in  Christendom  }oyivl  continence  has  been  disguised  by 
the  abuses  of  enforced  celibacy,  and  this  again  has  been  imagined  essentia 
in  monastic  life,  whereas  the  true  monk's  life  is  indeed  no  more  of  neces- 
sity celibate,  than  of  necessity  founded  on  creeds  of  expiation,  or  hopes  of 
future  felicity.^    The  true  life  of  the   Religious  orders,  in  which  lay  the 

^  [A  referenee  to  an  intended,  but  unwritten,  course  of  lectures.] 

>    Paradite  Latt,  ii.  667.] 

'  [For  other  refereuoes  to  Atalanta,  who  freed  herself  from  her  saitors  by  ont- 
runuing  them,  see  Vol.  XIV.  p.  308.  For  references  to  Ion  (the  hallowed  attend- 
ant of  the  Delphic  temple,  in  the  play  of  Euripides),  see  Vol.  XXI.  p.  113,  and 
^.  Mark's  Rest,  §  87;  for  the  ''silvan"  Joan,  Vol.  XVIII.  p.  133;  and  for  a 
passing  reference  to  Sir  Galahad,  Val  tPAmo,  §  274.] 

*  [At  this   point   one  of  the  MS.    copies  of  the   lecture   breaks   off,  Ruskin 
adding  the  following  note :  ''  The  rest  of^  this  lecture  is  used  in  the  History  of 
Venice."    The  reference  is  presumably  to  some  unpublished  chapter  of  St,  Mark 
Best;  the  History  ^  Venice  written  far  the  Help  of  the  few  Travellers  who  still  eare/ 
Monuments.    Rusldn  mav  have  used  some  of  the  matter,  which  originally  conduf 
the  present  lecture,  in  his  account  of  Carpaccio's  theory  of  monastidsm  (§  181 


866  ARATRA  FENTELICI 

strength  of  the  Middle  Ages,  was  not  the  mortifiaition  of  the  body,  but 
the  satisfaction  of  the  spirit ;  it  was  not  the  refusal  of  the  pleasares  of  the 
world,  but  the  escape  from  its  tormenting  desires ;  chiefly,  it  was  the  laying 
down  the  crown  of  the  Proad  who  trouble  the  earth,  to  take  up  that  of 
the  Meek  who  inherit  it ;  ^  and  in  this  choice  of  loving  and  quiet,  instead 
of  envious  and  turbulent  existence,  the  vow  to  be  taught,  as  children, 
whatever  learning  could  be  read  by  the  light  of  the  Star  which  abode 
where  the  Young  Child  was,  and  to  do  whatever  simple  shepherd  labour 
might  be  cheered  by  the  vision  of  Angels,  and  obedient  to  their  message 
of  Gfoodwill  towards  men. 

2^.  And  now,  gentlemen,  permit  me  a  very  few  practical  words,  in 
dosing  my  year's  work  with  you,  respecting  the  seclusion,  or  cloister,  of 
colleges  as  in  certain  noble  ways  monastic. 

The  worthy  Fathers  of  youths  of  worth,  in  any  country,  desire  that 
there  should  be  a  place  in  that  country  where  their  sons  shall  be  sent 
at  a  certain  time  of  life  to  be  made  gentlemen  and  scholars^ — ^that  is  to 
say,  Inriefly,  to  love  Honour  and  Learning.  The  City  in  which  they  are 
taught  to  be  gentlemen  must  be  itself  Gentilis,  which  does  not  mean — 
as  I  will  endeavour  to  show  you  in  my  lectures  on  Architecture — a  collec- 
tion of  similarly  built  houses,  each  coming  under  the  Modem  English 
definition  of  "  a  Genteel  House  up  this  road."  '  It  does  mean  what  Oxford 
was  once^-what  she  has  new  ceased  to  be — what  English  sense  and  feeling 
must  either  again  make  her  or  make  some  other  place  to  be,  instead  of 
her.  The  City  or  place  in  which  the  youths  of  any  country  are  taught  to 
be  scholars  must  above  all  things  be  one  where  they  both  possess  and 
are  induced  to  love  <rypk'^,  quietness.  Whatever  turmoil  is  going  on  else- 
where, everything  must  be  quiet  there;  and  the  fint  lesson  to  every  youth 
be— to  hold  his  peace;  and  the  second — not  to  think  for  himself  but  to 
attend  to  what  he  is  told,  and  to  do  his  work  thoroughly. 

257.  And  under  these  conditions  you  are  to  love  honour  for  her  own 
sake,  and  your  neighbour's  as  much  as  your  own.  You  are  not  to  think 
your  honour  consists  in  his  disgrace  nor  your  learning  in  his  ignorance, 
nor  your  credit  at  all  in  being  a  better  man  than  he,  but  only  in  being 
as  good  a  man  as  you  can  be,^  with  what  gifts  you  have,  remembering  that 
not  one  oi  you,  by  taking  thought,  can  add  one  cubit  to  his  stature  ^ — the 
sculptress  Athena  having  made  you  great  or  small  from  the  first,  as  it 
pleased  her. 

Also,  you  are  to  love  learning  for  her  own  sake,  and  to  begin  here  the 
infinite  love  of  her  which  is  to  attend  you  through  your  lives.  You  do 
not  come  here  to  get  a  small  quantity  of  learning  which  may  be  puffed  up 
and  adulterated  into  saleable  packets,  but  a  seed  of  knowledge  which  will 
spring  up  into  everlasting  Itfe.^  The  English  public — up  to  this  time — has 
utterly  misunderstood  the  purpose  with  which  your  thoughtful  teachers  added 


1 


t 

3 
4 


Matthew  v.  6,  ii.  8,  9;  Luke  ii.  14.] 


Compare  Lecturti  on  Art,  §  2  and  n.  (above,  p.  18).] 

^Compare  Modem  Painters^  vol.  iv.  (Vol.  VI.  p.  12).] 

'Compare  the  injunctioQ   in  Raskin's  lecture  before  the  Uuiversity  of  Cam- 
bridge, Vol.  XIX.  p.  192.] 
»  [Matthew  vi.  27.] 
«  [John  iv.  14.] 


VII.  THE  SCHOOL  OF  FLOREJi 

physical  science  to  letters.     These  teachers  saw  that  there    i 
you  in  chemistry^  as  well  as  in  Greek,  and  they  invited  y<  . 
relations  of  matter,  as  well  as  the  relations  of  words,  bu 
invite  you,  as  the  public  supposes,  to  study  chemistry  that 
keep  apothecary's  shops. 

Therefore  be  assured  of  this,  that  if  you  come  to  Oxford  i 
shopkeeping  or  to  compete  with  each  other  for  places  of  <  i 
function  of  Oxford  as  a  University  of  England  is  at  an  ei  i 
fear  that  it  will  be  so,  but  if  it  should  come  to  pass,  some  <  I 
rise  in  England — or  in  some  happier  country — where  youtl  ! 
taste  the  first  sweetness  of  knowledge,  and  to  enter  on  the 
of  duty ;  and  where  old  men,  though  their  own  sun  be  at  I 
join  with  their  failing  voices  in  the  Eternal  Fiat  of  God'i 
which  was  Light.^ 

Shall  we  not  all  endeavour  that,  thus  here  in  our  oh  . 
true  religion  and  sound  learning  may  for  ever  flourish  and  i 

^  [For  this  qaotation  from  Bacon's  New  AUantU^  see  Vol.  XVl  I 
*  [A  guotation  from  tbe   Bidding   Prayer   always  used  before 
Sermons.] 


APPENDIX 

LECTURES  AND   NOTES  FOR  LECTUB  i 
GREEK  ART  AND   MYTHOLOGY 

I.  THE  STORY  OF  ARACHNE 

(A  Lecture  Delivered  at  Woolwich,  Dbcembi  ; 

II.  THE  TORTOISE  OF  AEGINA 

(An  Undelivered  Lecture  in  Continuation  c  ' 
Pentelici  ") 

IIL  THE  RIDERS  OF  TARENTUM 

IV.  THE  EAGLE  OF  ELIS 

(Notes  for  Lectures  in  the  same  Connexion 


V.  GREEK  AND  CHRISTIAN  ART:  AS  AFFECTEI 
IDEA  OF  IMMORTALITY 

VL  SOME    CHARACTERISTICS    OF    GREEK    ART, 
LATION    TO    CHRISTIAN 


XX.  ^^ 


Mm. 


I 

THE   STORY   OF   ARACHNE' 

(1870) 


tl.  After  apologising  for  the  hasty  preparation  of  his  Address,  Professor 
Luskin  went  on  to  speak  rather  to  those  who  had  not  succeeded  in  gaining 
prises  than  to  those  who  had  succeeded ;  urging  that  to  be  undistinguishea 
was  the  lot,  though  not  necessarily  the  misrortune,  of  many.  At  that 
moment,  every  one  had  set  his  heart  on  Education,  and  it  seemed  to  be 
taken  that  any  education  was  better  than  none.  But  no  education  was- 
not  always  the  worst  of  things,  for  one  of  the  best  companions  he  had 
ever  met  was  a  Savoyard  peasant  who  could  neither  read  nor  write,  but 
who  was  an  entertaining  talker  and  a  practical  philosopher.'  A  good 
education  was  usually  supposed  to  comprehend  reading,  writing,  arithmetic^ 
geography,  ffeology,  astronomy,  Latin,  Greek,  and  other  liinguages: — and 
after  tnis,  aU  that  was  to  be  done  was  to  grow  rich  and  happy.  He  knew 
something  of  most  of  these  things,  but  they  did  not  constitute  his  happi- 
ness ;  for  the  geologists  disputed  his  theories,  and  he  was  miserable  about 
the  smallness  of  his  collection  of  specimens.  When  he  was  a  boy,  and 
for  the  first  time  received  the  present  of  a  colour-box,  he  was  dehghted 
with  all  that  he  did  with  it.  **  You  don't  suppose/'  he  continued,  <'  getting 
a  colour-box  is  any  pleasure  to  me  now.  I'm  ashamed  to  spoil  the  look 
of  the  paints,  for  fear  I  shouldn't  make  a  good  picture  out  of  them."] 

2.  All  these  things, — Literature,  Science,  and  Art, — have  been  to  me, 
and  will  be  to  all  other  men,  good  or  evil,-^not  according  to  the  degree 
of  their  attainments  in  them,  but  according  to  the  use  they  make  of  them. 
And  that  depends  upon  quite  another  sort  of  Education,  which  indeed  is 
beyond  all  price,  and  therefore  which  all  parents  may  give  their  children 

^  ^n  address,  delivered  on  December  13,  1870,  at  the  distribution  of  prizes 

?uned  by  students  in  the  Woolwich  branch  of  the  Science  and  Art  Department; 
rince  Arthur  (Duke  of  Connaoght)  in  the  chair.  Reported  in  the  DaUy  Telegraph, 
December  14,  1870.  The  lecture  was  printed  from  the  author's  manuscript  in 
Verona  and  Other  Lectwee,  1894,  in  which  volume  it  formed  chapter  ii.  (pp.  3^64). 
A  few  pages  of  introduction  are  missing  from  the  MS.  It  is  clear  from  the  sum- 
mary in  ue  DaiUy  Teiegraph  that  Kuskin  detached  these  pages  for  use  at  the  begin- 
ning of  Letter  4  (April  1, 1871)  in  Fore  Clafrigera,  The  mtrednction  to  the  lecture 
was,  however,  founded  in  ''Verona  and  its  Rivers"  on  the  report  in  the  Daily 
Telmnraph,  and  is  here  reprinted  from  that  volume.] 

'  [Joseph  Couttet,  the  Chamouni  guide ;  for  whom  see  Vol.  lY.  p.  zxv.  and  n.] 

871 


872  APPENDIX 

if  they  choose.     I  hare  especially  to  thank  mine  for  foor  pieces  of  Ednea- 
tion,  to  which  I  owe  whatever  happiness  or  power  remains  to  me. 

3.  First,  I  was  taught  to  be  obedient.  That  discipline  began  veiy  eariy. 
One  evening, — ^my  mother  being  rather  prond  of  uiis  told  me  the  stoiy 
often, — ^when  I  was  yet  in  my  nurse's  arms«  I  wanted  to  touch  the  tea- 
urn,  which  was  boiling  merrily.  It  was  an  eariy  taste  for  bronaes,  I 
suppose:  but  I  was  resolute  about  it.  My  mother  bid  me  keep  my 
fingers  back :  I  insisted  on  putting  them  forward.  My  nurse  would  have 
taken  me  away  fitnn  the  urn,  but  my  mother  said — ''Let  him  touch  it. 
Nurse."  So  I  touched  it,— and  that  was  my  first  lesson  in  the  meaning 
of  the  word  Liberty.  It  was  the  first  piece  of  Liberty  I  got;  and  the 
last  which  for  some  time  I  asked  for. 

4.  Secondly,  I  was  taught  to  be  quiet. 

When  I  was  a  very  little  child,  my  parents  not  being  rich«  and  my 
mother  having  to  see  to  many  things  herself,  she  used  to  shut  me  into  a 
room  upstairs,  with  some  bits  of  wood  and  a  bunch  of  keys,  and  say — 
''John,  if  you  make  a  noise,  you  shall  be  whipped." 

To  that  piece  of  Education  I  owe  most  of  my  powers  of  thinking ;  and, 
— ^more  valuable  to  me  still, — of  amusing  myself  anywhere  and  wiUi  any- 
thing. 

5.  Thirdly;  as  soon  as  I  could  run,  I  was  taken  down  to  Croydon,  and 
left  to  play  by  the  river  Wandel;  and  afterwards,  when  I  was  older,  to 
Cumberland  and  Yorkshire.  And  that  was  the  most  important  part  of  my 
Science  and  Art  Education:  the  rest  I've  done  pretty  nearly  for  myself, 
with  help  of  books. 

6.  Then,  the  fourth  thing  I  was  taught  was  Kindness  to  Animals,  and 
curiosity  about  seeing  them, — not  stuffed  in  a  scientific  manner,  but  with 
their  heads  set  on  their  shoulders  in  their  own  way. 

Not  that  even  that's  always  a  graceful  way:  and  the  more  I  look  at 
them,  sometimes,  the  less  graceful  I  think  it.  Indeed,  I  once  got  into 
violent  disgrace  in  a  religious  journal,  for  having  alleged  that,  in  a  certain 
sense,  machines  were  more  perfect  things  than  animals. 

I  am  afraid  you  will  not  give  me  credit  for  understanding,  or  ap- 
preciating, anything  in  machinery,  unless  I  read  you  this  passage: — 

7.  "I  cannot  express  the  amazed  awe, — the  crushed  huinility, — ^with 
which  I  sometimes  watch  a  locomotive  take  its  breath  at  a  railway  station, 
and  think  what  work  there  is  in  its  bars  and  wheels,  and  what  manner  of 
men  they  must  be  who  dig  brown  ironstone  out  of  the  ground,  and  forge 
it  into  THAT !  What  assemblage  of  accurate  and  mighty  fiEu:ulties  in  them ; 
more  than  fieshly  power  over  melting  crag  and  coiling  fire,  fettered,  and 
finessed  at  last  into  the  precision  of  watchmaking ;  Titanian  hammer-strokes, 
beating,  out  of  lava,  these  glittering  cylinders  and  timely-respondent  valves, 
and  fine-ribbed  rods,  which  touch  each  other  as  a  serpent  writhes,  in 
noiseless  gliding,  and  omnipotence  of  grasp ;  infinitely  complex  anatomy  of 
active  steel,  compared  with  which  the  skeleton  of  a  living  creature  would 
seem,  to  a  careless  observer,  clumsy  and  vile, — a  mere  morbid  secretion 
and  phosphatous  prop  of  flesh!  What  would  the  men  who  thought  out 
this, — ^who  beat  it  out,  who  touched  it  into  its  polished  cahn  of  power, 
who  set  it  to  its  appointed  task,  and  triumphantly  saw  it  fulfil  this  task 
to  the  utmost  of  their  will, — feel  or  think  about  this  weak  hand  of  mine. 


THE  STORY  OF  ARACHNE  87» 

timidly  leading  a  little  stain  of  water-colour,  which  I  cannot  manage^  into 
an  imperfect  shadow  of  something  else, — mere  failure  in  every  motion,  and 
endless  disappointment, — ^What,  I  repeat,  would  these  Iron-dominant  Genii 
think  of  me  ? — and  what  ought  I  to  think  of  them  ?  "  ^ 

8.  That  was  what  I  felt  then,  and  feel  always;  and  I  wonder  often 
whether  you  dexterous  mechanists  share  with  me  in  this  feeling  of  the 
incompletion  and  rudeness  of  the  mechanical  arrangements  in  animals.  1 
am  nearly  always  disappointed  in  watching  the  way  they  set  about  things. 
Of  course,  allowance  must  be  made  for  their  languor  and  carelessness  in 
captivity;  but,  with  every  such  allowance,  I  still  am  impressed  with  their 
inefficiency  of  instrument. 

9.  Look  at  an  eagle  feeding!^  He  does  not  so  much  hold  or  grasp 
his  piece  of  meat,  as  stand  on  it.  He  pulls  languidly  at  it  from  between 
his  toes, — it  drags  through  his  toothless  beak.  He  pulls  harder  at  it,  and 
upsets  himself, — and  recovers  his  balance  with  a  frightened  flap  of  his  wing ; 
and  so  goes  on,  tearing  and  tottering  through  his  dinner, — an  ignoble,  un- 
comfortable creature, — a  most  weak  machine. 

Nay,  a  friend  of  mine  one  day  saw  two  eagles  trying  to  catch  a  mouse. 
One  pounced  down  upon  it,  and  it  got  through  the  hollow  of  his  claws; 
the  other  came  to  help  him, — but  tney  only  ran  against  each  other,  and 
the  mouse  got  away  between  them. 

10.  Look  at  a  peHcan  trying  to  get  a  fish  out  of  the  water ;  not  a  living 
fish, — that  would  be  too  much  to  expect  of  him, — ^but  a  stone  dead  one* 
He  gapes  at  it,  and  slobbers,  and  gets  half  hold  of  it,  and  lets  it  slip,  and 
tries,  and  tries  again,  with  a — ^not  exemplary,  but  stupid  patience.  I've 
only  once  seen  him  get  one  fairly  into  his  mouth :  I've  seen  him  again  and 
again  trying  to  catch  his  own  cast  feathers,  instead  of  fish;  which  does 
not  seem  much  in  fiivour  of  the  theory  which  my  much-respected  friend, 
Professor  Huxley,  asserted  to  me  only  the  other  day, — that  sight  was  a 
mechanical  operation.'  If  it  were  mechanical,  I  think,  it  would  be,  in 
some  cases,  worse  done, — ^in  many,  better;  and  pelicans  wouldn't  try  to 
catch  their  own  feathers. 

11.  And  so  throughout  the  inferior  races  of  animals;  there  is  not  so 
much,  really,  to  be  struck  with  in  the  beauty,  as  in  the  awkwardness  of 
their  mechanism.  They  stand  on  one  leg,  and  don't  know  what  to  do 
with  the  other;  they  hop  in  an  unseemly  manner;  they  waddle;  they 
squat;  they  try  to  scratch  themselves  where  they  can't  reach;  they  try 
to  eat  what  they  can't  swallow;  their  existence  is  an  alternation  between 
clumsy  effort  and  sulky  repose.  There  are  rare  exceptions: — a  swift  on 
the  wing,  for  instance ;  ^  even  then,  with  the  great  drawback  that  its  voice 
is  nearly  as  horrible  a  piece  of  mechanism  as  a  steam  whistle: — admirable 
exceptions,  on  the  perfect  side,  counterbalanced  by  agonies  of  awkwardness 
on  the  deficient  side ;  as,  for  instance,  the  unscrewed  joints  and  altogether 
ridiculous  over-leverage  in  the  frame-work  of  a  daddy-long-legs,  leaving  his 
legs  in  your  tea. 


again   recorded,  and 
controverted.]  - 

^  [Compare  Lecturea  en  Art,  §  113  (above,  p.  106).] 


874  APPENDIX 

12.  That's  what  I  feel,  and  what  I  must — if  I  say  anything — say  that 
I  feel.  And  so  I  get  into  final  disgrace  with  the  religious  joornal,  which 
dntifnlly  felt — as  it  was  expected  of  it  to  feel  on  all  occasions.  But  the 
religious  journal,  in  its  hasty  offence,  had  not  noticed  that  in  admitting  the 
deficient  mechanism,  I  had  been  only  the  more  asserting  the  presence  of  a 
strange  spirit  in  the  creatures,  and  contemplating,  with  ever  and  ever 
renewed  amazement,  something  infinitely  beyond  mechanism,  which  taught, 
— or,  more  accurately  speaking,  compelled  them  to  do  what  was  indeed 
essential  to  their  lives,  in  what  was  not  necessarily  a  beautiful — bat  was 
always  a  quite  incomprehensible  manner;  and  that,  not  merely  incompre- 
hensible in  the  instinct  of  it  (as  in  the  dexterity  with  which  a  bird  weaves 
the  twigs  in  its  nest,  and  fastens  it  securely  into  the  fork  of  a  tree  that 
swings  in  the  wind  like  a  pendulum) — ^not  in  the  mere  instinct  and  wit  <^ 
it  only  amazing,  but  after,  also,  in  an  inscrutable  mystery  of  method. 

19.  Take,  for  instance,  quite  one  of  the  simplest  pieces  of  the  art  of 
animals, — a  Cobweb.  It  is  one  of  which,  if  I  am  called  upon  in  my  capad^ 
of  Professor  of  Fine  Art  to  give  a  critical  opinion,  I  cannot  speak  in  tenaa 
of  too  strong  admiration;  though  also  one,  with  respect  to  which,  as  a 
political  economist,  I  entirely  concur  in  the  sentiments  of  the  exemplary 
British  House-wife  or  House-maiden. 

14.  But  have  you  ever  considered  how  a  spider  constructs  it  ?  You  see 
it  is  always  a  kind  of  suspension-bridge, — a  complex  system  of  wires, — ^hung 
across  a  space.  How  is  the  first  wire  cable  got  across  ?  Take  the  simplest 
instance, — a  cobweb  in  the  comer  of  a  room.  Do  you  think  the  spider 
apins  her  first  thread  along  the  walls  round  the  comer,  and  then,  when  she 
has  got  to  the  opposite  point,  pulk  it  tight?  Not  she.  Her  thread  is 
strongly  glutinous;  if  she  carried  it  round,  it  would  stick  to  the  wall  all 
the  way;  and  when  she  had  got  it  round,  and  had  to  pull  it  tight,  what 
would  she  do  with  the  length  to  spare?  She  has  no  windlass  to  wind  it 
on,  and  if  she  had,  couldn't  affi>rd  to  waste  all  that  cable ;  for  she  spins  her 
cable  out  of  her  life,  and  her  life  depends  on  her  having  enou^  of  it 
always  to  replace  the  housemaid's  ruin  of  her.  She  can't  afford  to  waste 
lengths  of  it  to  go  round  comers  with.  No!  She  goes  straight  across  in 
the  air.  But  how?  It  isn't  easy  to  see  her  at  her  woHe,  for  she  gets 
away,  or  feigns  dead,  if  you  look  too  close;  but  if  you  stay  quite  quiet 
when  she  is  spinning  among  trees,  until  she  takes  you  for  an  ugly  log 
rather  in  her  way,  she'll  go  on ;  and  then  you  will  see,  still  more,  how 
impossible  it  is  for  her  to  carry  her  cable  down  and  up,  as  you  do.  Fancy 
carrying  a  thin,  sticky  thread  of  gum,  in  and  out  among  tree  branches  and 
leaves,  six  feet  or  so  down  to  the  ground,  and  up  again  to  the  branch  she 
wants,  and  then  pulling  it  tight, — ^twelve  feet  of  stidcy,  slack  cable  among 
twigs,  for  six  inches  wanted  taut! 

15.  Not  she !  You  may  see  her  cross  as  calmly  as  if  there  was  a  rail- 
road in  the  air.  You  cannot  see  the  thread  she  crosses  on, — ^it  is  too  fine. 
Yet  that  fine  thread  she  has  thrown  out  first  before  her, — ^thrown  out  with 
an  aim,  as  a  chameleon  its  tongue  at  an  insect ;  struck  the  exact  leaf  she 
wants ;  will  go  on  with  her  cross-threads,  striking  the  point  she  wants  with 
the  end  of  her  thread  as  surely  as  you  would  with  a  rifle-shot, — ^literally 
"projecting"  her  geometrical  figures  that  way. 

Fancy  the  jugglery  there  is  in  that !    You  may  have  seen  a  juggler  wind 


--1 


THE  STORY  OF  ARACHNE 

I  tape  out  of  hit  mouth  before  now,  but  did  you  ever  see  I: 

I  cable  from  his  mouth,  fifty  yards  long,  straight  as  a  shot? 

i  16.  I  am  not  sure  how  far  this  contrivance  of  the  sp 

i  inexplicable ;  but  I  am  quite  sure  you  will  find  it  wonderful, 

sure  of  this,  which  is  the  thing  I  wish  to  impress  upon  yc 
I  art  begins  with  the  inexplicable;  that  only  in  the  thing  wl 

[  show  another  person  how  to  do,  is  there  anything  really  be 

j  is  the  great  mistake  we  English  make  about  art  and  nature 

I  science,  that  is) : — we  think  that  somehow  the  trick  of  both 

that  by  formal  rules  and  mechanical  work  we  can  turn  01 
Michael  Angelos,  as  we  do  locomotives;  and  that  by  caref 
shall  detect,  at  last,  how  a  spider — or  a  man — ^works,  as  1 
j  springs  of  a  Dutch  toy. 

17.  That  is  not  so;  but  these  are  not  the  first  days  i 
,                been  so  imagined.     This  very  spider's  web,  of  which  we  ha^ 

was  made  by  the  ancients  their  daily  lesson  in  this  matter 
heard  of  Araehne,  and  how  she  was  changed  into  a  spid 
you  never  have  heard  her  story  quite  through, — and  it  h 
and  thinking  of.^ 

18.  Araehne  was  a  Lydian  girl,  of  a  poor  family;  and,  ac 
do,  she  bad  learned  to  spin  and  to  weave;  and  not  mer 
knit  g^ood  stout  clothes,  but  to  make  pictures  upon,  or  in 
you  know,  Penelope  is  said  to  have  woven,  and  such  as  tli 
own  William  the  Conqueror  embroidered,  which  are  still  pres 
in  Normandy,  and  known  all  over  the  world  as  the  Bayeui 

Well,  Araehne  could  make  the  most  beautiful  pictures, 
or  shuttle,  that  ever  were  seen  in  those  days.     I  don't  kno 
still  sew  ''sampler";'  I  wish  they  did,  and  will  tell  you 
But  to  finish  with  Araehne. 

19.  She  was  so  proud  of  her  beautiful  sewing,  that 
goddess  Minerva  herself, — ^whom,  if  you  will  not  think  it  a 
rather  call  by  her  own  name  of  Athena, — would  come  ai 
against  her.  Now  the  goddess  Athena  always  wove  and  < 
own  dresses,  and  she  was  not  going  to  let  a  poor  little  Lydif 
her  at  her  own  special  work.  So  she  came  first  to  Ara< 
likeness  of  an  old  woman,  prudent  and  gentle;  and  s 
Araehne,  and  told  her  a  little  Lydian  girl  ought  not  to 
ought  not  to  challenge  goddesses.  But  Araehne,  on  thatj 
insolent;  told  the  oM  woman  to  hold  her  tongue,  and 
wished  Athena  would  come  herself  that  instant  So  Athen 
the  old  woman  into  herself,  and  accepted  the  challenge ;  an 
beside  each  other,  the  goddess  and  the  girl,  and  began  to  1 

20.  Now,  the  story,  as  it  is  carelessly  read,  ends,  as  it  s 
gracefully  for  the  goddess.      Arachne's  work  is  as  quickh 

^  [For  Another  reference  to  the  story  of  Arachnei  see  Ethic9 
(Vol  XVIII.  p.  319).] 

>  [See  above,  p.  269.] 

'  [An  exhibitian  of  samplers  was  held  in  the  rooms  of  the  Fii 
March  1900,  and  to  this  Mrs.  Severn  lent  a  sampler  made  by  Rusk 
as  well  as  his  own  ohristeniog  robe.] 


876  APPENDIX 

and  as  well.  It  is  surrounded  and  finished  with  an  exquisite  border  of 
ivy-leaves.  Athena  looks  close,  and  cannot  find  the  least  fault  with  it. 
Whereupon  she  loses  her  temper;  tears  her  rival's  tapestry  to  pieces;  and 
strikes  her  four  times  across  the  forehead  with  her  box-wood  shuttle. 
Arachnei  mad  with  anger,  hangs  herself;  and  Athena  changes  her  into  a 
venomous  spider.^ 

At  first  sight,  like  many  other  stories  of  the  kind,  this  seems  not  only 
degrading,  but  meaningless.  The  old  mythologists,  however,  always  made 
their  best  fables  rough  on  the  outside.^  If  you  chose  to  throw  them  away 
for  that,  so  much  the  worse  for  you.  You  did  not  deserve,  they  thought, 
to  understand  them. 

SI.  Let  us  look  into  the  story  a  little  closer. 

First,  you  may  be  surprised  at  the  Goddess  of  Wisdom  losing  her 
temper.  But,  of  all  the  goddesses,  she  always  is  the  angriest,  when  she 
is  angry;  and  if  ever  you  yourselves  go  on  doing  a  great  many  foolish 
things,  one  after  another,  and  obstinately  don't  attend  to  anything  she  says 
quietly,  you  will  find  she  bursts  out  upon  you  all  at  once;  and  when  she 
does,  I  can  tell  you,  you  won't  forget  it  in  a  hurry.^ 

22.  But  next,  why  are  you  told  that  Arachne's  work  was  bordered  with 
ivy-leaves  ? 

Because  ivy-leaves,  in  their  wanton  running  about  everywhere,  were  the 
emblem  of  the  wild  god,  Bacchus ;  and  were  put  there  in  express  imperti- 
nence to  Athena,  and  wilful  insult  to  her  trim-leaved  olive  of  peace.  *  But 
more  than  that.  Arachne  had  made  all  the  pictures  in  her  tapestry  of 
base  and  abominable  things;  while  Athena  had  woven  in  hers  the  council 
of  the  gods  about  Athens,  how  the  city  should  be  named. 

Nor  were  the  things  which  Arachne  had  pictured  abominable  merely, 
but  they  were  all  insulting  to  the  gods,  and  dwelt  on  every  legend  which 
could  make  sacred  and  solemn  things  despised  by  men.  That  was  why 
Athena  tore  the  tapestry  to  pieces,  not  because  she  was  jealous  of  it. 

2S.  Then,  thirdly,  we  are  told  she  could  find  no  fault  with  it 

Now,  one  of  the  things  I  have  always  tried  most  to  impress  on  the 
British  workman,  is  that  his  work  must  not  be  too  precise,— that  he  must 
not  think  of  avoiding  faults,  but  of  gaining  virtues.^  To  young  students, 
indeed,  I  have  always  said,  and  shall  always  say,  the  exact  reverse  of  that : 
''See  that  every  step  you  take  is  right;  it  does  not  matter  in  the  begin- 
ning how  small  your  merits,  so  only  that  you  commit,  wilfully,  no  errors."^ 
But  to  the  finished  Workman  or  artist^  though  it  will  be  wise  for  him  also 
often  to  hold  to  his  student's  rule,  still,  when  he  is  to  do  his  best,  he  need 
never  think  to  do  it  without  manifold  failure.  If  he  has  not  failed  some- 
where, he  has  only  tried  to  do,  as  Arachne  did, — ignoble  things.  Phidias 
had  faults;  Raphael  had  faults;  Reynolds  had  faults,  and  many,  and  bad 
ones.  Arachne,  in  the  outer  aspect  of  her  work,  had  none;  but  in  the 
inner  power  of  it,  it  was  fault  altogether. 

^  [Ovid :  Metamorpho9e»,  vi.  1-145.] 

*  [On  this  subject  compare  the  Introduction  to  The  Queen  qf  the  Air,  Vol.  XIX. 
p.  Ixviii.] 

»  [See  Queen  of  the  Air,  §  117  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  399).] 

*  [See,  for  example,  Stonee  of  Venice,  vol.  ii.,  chapter  on  ''The  Nature  of  Gothic" 
(Vol.  X.  p.  180).] 

*    [See,  for  instance,  Elements  of  Drawing,  §§  60,  67  (Vol.  XV.  pp.  59,  64).] 


Fault,  alao, — remember — of  a  pouonous  and  degrmding  kind,  •enBuol,  in- 
■olent,  and  foul ;  so  that  she  ii  changed  hj  Athena  into  the  meanest  of 
animals,  and  the  most  loathsomely  venomous;  whose  work,  instead  of  being 
an  honour  to  the  palaces  of  kings,  is  to  be  a  disgrace  to  the  room  of  the 
simplest  cottager. 

54.  That  is  the  stoiy  of  Arachne  in  the  sum  of  it :  and  now  I  must  go 
back  upon  two  minor  points  in  it ;  the  first,  the  value  of  this  tapeatr^-work 
itself;  the  second,  the  meaning  of  Athena's  picture  of  the  gods  taking 
counsel  about  the  name  of  the  ci^. 

First,  why  is  this  &ble  told  you  of  tapestry  ?  Why  is  Athena's  own 
special  work  of  honour — making  ner  own  dresses  f 

55.  I  have  been  now  at  least  these  ten  years  trying  to  convince  scien- 
tific and  artistic  persons  who  would  listen  to  me,  that  true  science  and  art 
must  begin  in  what,  from  time  immemorial,  has  been  among  the  most 
important  rights  of  men,  and  the  pleasantest  rights  of  women.  It  is  quite 
one  of  the  most  important  and  necessary  rights  of  man  to  have  a  good 
dinner,  well  cooked,  when  he  comes  in  from  his  work.  And  it  is  quite  one 
of  the  pleasantest  rights  of  woman  to  have  a  pretty  dress  to  put  on,  when 
she  has  done  hers.  The  first  of  sciences,  therefore,  is  that  of  cookery,  and 
the  first  of  arts,  that  of  dress.^ 

56.  Now  you  are  likely  to  laugh,  I  know  well  enough  beforehand,  when 
I  say  this ;  and  I'm  very  glad  that  you  should  laugh,  provided  only  you 
distinctly  understand  that  Fm  not  laughing,  but  in  most  absolute  and  accu- 
rate seriousness,  stating  to  you  what  I  believe  to  be  necessary  for  the 
prosperi^  of  this  and  of  every  other  nation ;  namely,  first,  diligent  purifi- 
cation and  kindly  distribution  of  food,  so  that  we  should  be  able,  not  only 
on  Sundays,  but  after  the  daily  labour,  which,  if  it  be  rightly  understood, 
is  a  constantly  recurrent  and  daily  divine  service, — that  we  should  be  able, 
I  Bay,  then  to  eat  the  &t,  and  drink  the  sweet,  and  send  portions  to  them 
for  whom  nothing  is  prepared.^  And,  secondly,  I  say  gravely  and  earnestly 
also,  and  with  assured  confidence  in  the  truth  of  it,  that  no  nation  is  healthy 
or  prosperous  unless  the  women  wear  tidy  dresses  for  their  morning's  work, 
and  pretty  ones  in  the  afternoon ;  which  means  many  things,  observe.  It 
means  that  their  morning  work  is  to  be  household -work,  or  fidd  or  garden- 
work,  and  not  —  I'll  venture  to  say  it,  even  in  this  room  —  not  packing 
cartridges.  It  means  also  that  the  men  of  England  are  not  to  stand  by 
idle,  or  drink  till  they  can't  stand,  idle  or  any  wise ;  nor  tramp  as  vaga- 
bonds about  the  country ;  nor  be  set  to  picking  oakum  ;  nor  be  sent  to 
prison  and  fed  there  at  the  country's  expense,  with  committees  to  see  that 
they  are  fatter  when  they  come  out  than  when  they  went  in ;  while  the 
women---poor,  simple  wretches — agitate  for  the  right  to  do  their  work  for 
them.     Inat's  what  tidy  and  clean  dressing  in  the  morning  means. 

57.  And  pretty  dressing  in  the  afternoon  means  that  they  are  to  have 
an  afternoon,  or  an  evening,  at  least,  for  the  fireside ;  and  that  they  are  to 
have  the  pride  and  pleasure  of  looking  as  nice  then  for  their  lovers,  and 

>  [Compara,  on  the  aubject  of  cookar;,  Ethici  qf  the  Duit,  g  78  (Vol.  XVIII. 
p.  298);  on  that  of  drsM,  Vol.  VII.  p.  428,  Vol.  XL  p.  22,%  and  Vol.  XVI. 
p.  4ai 

■  [Nahemiah  viU.  10 ;  quoted  also  at  the  end  of  the  chapter  "  liring  WavM " 
hi  DmMHon.] 


878  APPENDIX 

husbands,  as  rich  girls  like  to  look  for  theirs;  each  having  indeed  such 
dress  as  is  suited  for  their  rank  in  life;  but  pretty  and  bright  in  colour, 
and  substantial,  for  the  poor  as  well  as  the  rich :  so  that  for  kings  now,  no 
less  than  in  old  time,  it  may  be  one  of  the  praises  in  their  epitaph,  that 
they  clothed  the  daughters  of  their  people  in  scarlet,  with  other  delights, 
and  put  on  ornaments  of  gold  on  their  apparel.^ 

28.  The  words  may  sound  strange  to  you,  when  perhaps  for  the  first 
time  you  think  of  them  with  true  and  actire  application.  They  are,  never- 
theless, perfectly  literal  in  their  meaning.  Scarlet  is  a  delightful  colour, 
and  a  much  more  delightful  one-^again  I  beg  pardon  when  I  remember 
where  I  am  speaking — a  much  more  delightful  one  in  cloaks,  and  petticoats, 
than  in  regimentals.  And  ornaments  of  real  gold  and  silver  are  meant  to 
be  possessed  by  all  happy  peasantries,  and  handed  down  with  pride  from 
mother  to  daughter,  to  be  worn  at  weddings,  christenings,  and  Christmss 
merry-makings;  and  neither  to  be  sent  to  the  pawnbroker's,  nor  expose 
their  wearers  to  be  strangled  by  thieves  in  the  next  alley.  Among  a  happy 
people  there  are  no  thieves ;  and  there  used  to  be  villages  In  England,  and 
there  are  still  villages  in  Scotland,  Norway,  and,  I  believe,  Ireland,  where 
you  may  sleep  with  your  door  open. 

Ornaments  of  gold  for  everybody,  and  scarlet  petticoats,  and  nice  cos- 
tume ; — and  then  the  art  of  the  goldsmith  becomes  a  living  one,  and  goes 
on  into  true  sculpture.  That,  then,  is  why  Athena's  work  is  making  her 
own  dress. 

29.  But,  lastly,  why  does  she  embroider,  by  way  of  picture,  the  council 
of  the  gods  about  the  name  of  her  city  ? 

Will  you  let  me  tell  you  one  Greek  fable  more,  about  ants,  instead  of 
spiders  ? 

How  often  have  we  not  all  heard  of  the  word  ''Myrmidons"?  Yon 
know  that  eloquent  persons,  whenever  they  want  to  finish  a  sentence  sub- 
limely, bring  in  something  about  "Tyrants  and  their  Myrmidons." 

SO.  Now,  let  me  give  you  one  piece  of  advice,  which,  if  you  take  it,  will, 
I  assure  you,  one  day  make  you  feel  that  you  didn't  let  me  talk  to  you 
to-night  for  nothing. 

Never  read  any  piece  of  writing  unless  you  are  prepared  to  take  what- 
ever trouble  may  be  necessary  thoroughly  to  understand  it.  There's  a 
great  deal  of  the  best  and  most  useful  writing,  which  may  be  understood 
in  a  moment  But  as  soon  as  it  sets  up  for  being  fine,  see  that  you  find 
out  whether  it  is  fine  or  not;  and  to  that  end,  never  let  one  word  pass, 
without  considering,  and  finding  out,  if  possible,  what  it  means. 

31.  "Myrmidons"  are  usually  supposed  to  mean  the  men  who  execute 
the  will  of  a  savage  master.  But  first  of  all,  that  arises  from  one  of  the 
usual  popular  mistakes  about  character, — the  character  in  this  instance  of 
the  Achilles  of  Homer;  who  is  not  a  savage  person  at  all,  but  a  quite 
boundlessly  affectionate  and  faithful  one ;  only,  in  the  strongest  sense  of 
the  term,  "hot-headed."*  The  Myrmidons  were  his  soldiers,  and  so  have 
come  to  mean — servants  of  t3rrants,  and  what  else  they  are  supposed  to  be 
by  eloquent  persons.     But  in  its  first  and  pare  sense.  Myrmidon  does  not 

1  [2  Samuel  L  24] 

>  [Compare  Sesame  and  LiUee,  §  114  (Vol.  XVIIl.  p.  161).] 


k9  X  V/X1«  M.        VrX*        X1lX1«XXV/XXX^  Aid  «rf  <7 


mean  a  soldier  of  Achilles  at  all.  The  Myrmidons  were  the  inhabitants  of 
on  island  which  was  of  great  importance  in  Greece,  because,  among  other 
things,  money  was  first  coined  there;  and  a  king  reigned  over  it,  who 
I  was  the  most  just  of  kings,  and  counted  and  divid^  the  money  carefully; 

^  and  so  became  at  last  one  of  the  three  great  judges  of  the  dead.^    But 

his  own  island,  Aegina,  he  fortified  with  wath  of  rock,  and  did  justice 
there  always :  and  at  last  the  Fates  got  jealous  of  him,  and  sent  a  dragon, 
or  a  plague,  which  devoured  the  people  of  his  country,  and  left  it  desolate. 
And  he  prayed  to  Jupiter  wildly  to  restore  his  people;  and  fell  asleep, 
praying  in  l^s  sorrow.  And  as  he  slept,  he  saw  the  ants,  from  an  ants' 
nest  at  the  root  of  an  oak-tree,  climb  into  the  branches  of  the  tree ;  and 
there — they  changed  one  by  one  into  little  children,  and  fell  down  like  a 
shower  of  apples.  And  when  he  woke,  he  heard  a  murmur  as  of  an  army 
in  the  fields;  and  when  he  looked  out  in  the  morning  light,  the  island 
was  filled  with  new  multitudes.  And  they  were  called  Myrmidons, — Ant- 
bom.* 

32.  Now  the  meaning  of  that  fable  I  must  be  quick  in  telling  you. 

There  were  two  places  in  Greece,  renowned  for  their  strength.  One 
was  this  island  of  Aegina,  fortified  against  robbery,  as  the  centre  of  com- 
merce.    The  other  was  the  city  of  Thebes,  fortified  against  war. 

The  walls  of  Aegina  were  of  rock,  built  by  Aeacus,  who  is  the  Lord 
of  Justice. 

The  walls  of  Thebes  were  of  stones,  which  Amphion,  the  son  of 
Jupiter,  made  join  each  other  by  music;  and  the  first  queen  of  the  city 
was  Harmonia — Harmony.' 

And  together  the  fables  mean,  that  the  strength  of  states,  for  defence 
against  foreign  war,  consists  in  harmony ;  or  musical  and  joyful  concord 
among  all  the  orders  of  the  people:  and  that  the  strength  of  states  for 
multitude,  on  their  industry  being  humble,  and  directly  set  to  the  ground, 
and  ruled  by  justice  in  dividing. 

S3.  But  observe  chiefly;  your  walls  must  be  built  by  music.  All  your 
defences  of  iron  and  reserves  of  cold  shot  are  useless,  unless  Englishmen 
learn  to  love  and  trust  each  other,  in  all  classes.  The  only  way  to  be 
loved  is  to  become  lovable,  and  the  only  way  to  be  trusted  is  to  be  honest. 
No  forms  of  voting,  no  mechanism  of  constitution — for  of  all  contemptible 
faiths  in  mechanism,  that  is  the  basest,  that  a  country  is  like  a  watch  and 
can  go  on  tick  by  its  constitution,  without  having  any  soul : — no  goodliness 
of  form  or  strength  in  government  or  people  will  avail  against  enemies, 
unless  they  learn  to  be  faithful  to  each  other,  and  to  depend  upon  each 
other. 

34.  My  friends,  you  are  continually  advised  to  seek  for  independence. 

I  have  some  workmen  myself,  and  have  had,  for  many  years,  under  me. 
Heaven  knows  I  am  not  independent  of  them;  and  I  do  not  think  they 
either  are,  or  wish  to  be,  independent  of  me.  We  depend  heartily,  and 
always, — they  upon  my  word,  and  upon  my  desire  for  their  welfare; — I, 
upon  their  work,  and  their  pride  in  doing  it  well,  and  I  think,  also,  their 

^  [See,  for  the  character  of  Aeacus,  the  lecture  on  ''The  Tortoise  of  Aegina," 
§  10  (below,  p.  384).] 

>  [Ovid  :  Mttanwrphoies,  vii.  623-667.1 

>  [Compare  the  Rede  Lecture,  §  20  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  178).] 


880  APPENDIX 

desire  to  do  it  well  for  me.  BelieTe  me^  my  friends,  there  is  no  such 
thing  as  independence  till  we  die.  In  the  grmve  we  shall  be  independent 
to  purpose, — not  till  then.^  While  we  live,  the  defence  and  prosperity  of 
our  country  depends  less  even  on  hearts  of  oak  than  on  hearts  of  flesh ; 
on  the  patience  which  seeks  improvement  with  hope  but  not  with  haste; 
on  the  science  which  discerns  what  is  lovely  in  character  and  honourable 
in  act ;  and  on  the  Fine  Art  and  tact  of  happy  submission  to  the  guidance 
of  good  men,  and  the  laws  of  nature  and  of  heaven. 

^  [Compare  CeHui  ^  Aglaia,  §  79  (VoL  XIX.  p.  126).] 


'  n 

I 


I 


THE  TORTOISE  OF  AEGINA' 


1.  The  reign  of  Pheidon,  King  of  Argos^  referred  by  Mr.  Grote — probably 
— ''to  the  period  a  little  before^  and  a  little  after,  the  8th  Olympiad, — 
between  770  and  730  b.c./'  *  will  give,  I  think,  at  once  a  land-mark,  and  a 
sea-mark,  from  which  we  may  always  begin  our  study  of  Historic  Greece, 
as  opposed  to  Mythic  Greece.  I  suppose  everything  is  known  more  clearly 
now  than  in  my  underffraduate  days,  and  I  need  hardly  press  on  you  the 
importance  of  this  eighth  century,  and  the  beginning,  in  the  two  penin- 
sulas, almost  in  the  same  year,  of  the  powers  of  Greece  and  Rome. 

Pheidon  is  said  to  have  marched  to  Olympia  747  B.C.,  and  celebrated 
the  games  there  himself,  as  the  lineal  descendant  of  Herakles.  Recollect, 
then,  we  have  the  actual  historic  king  celebrating  the  games  as  the 
descendant  of  the  God.     And  real  history  begins. 

2.  Pheidon  of  Argos — I  now  use  Mr.  Grote's  words — '*  first  coined  both 
copper  and  silver  money  in  Aegina;"  and  he  presently  adds: — ''The  first 
coinage  of  copper  and  silver  money  is  a  capital  event  in  Grecian  history." ' 
It  is  so,  and  in  wider  history  thaii  that  of  Greece.  "First  coined,"  that 
is  to  say,  divided  into  given  weights,  and  stamped  these  weights  that 
they  might  be  of  all  men  known.  These  weights  chosen  by  Pheidon  were 
Babylonian,  approximating  closely  to  those  of  the  Hebrews,  Phcenicians, 
and  Egyptians;  but  first,  probably,  determined  by  "the  Chaldflean  priest- 
hood of  Babylon." 

You  will  find  presently  that  Mr.  Grote  disputes  the  statement,  that 
this  money  was  first  coined  actually  in  the  island  of  Aegina.  It  is  not 
the  least  consequence  whether  it  was  or  not.  But  this  &ct  is  of  conse- 
quence ; — Pheidon  fixed  measure  both  of  capacity  and  weight,  and  those 
measures  were  called  Pheidonian. 

But  the  measures  of  weight,  and  therefore  of  money,  were  afterwards 
specially  called  Aeginetan — ^partly  to  distinguish  them  from  the  standard  of 
Euboea,  but  much  more  because  of  the  early  commercial  power  of  Aegina. 

3.  I  have  just  said  it  was  of  no  consequence  whether  money  was  first 
actually  coined  in  Aegina  or  Argos.  Remember,  in  all  your  historical 
investigations,  there  are  two  entirely  distinct  branches  of  them.  One  is 
this  history  of  the  Acts  of  men ;  the  other,  the  history  of  their  Thoughts. 
In  general,  it  matters  to  the   fdture  veiy  little,  comparatively,  what  men 


1  [The  MS.  of  this  lecture  is  marked  by  the  author  "  Lect  7/'  showing  that  it 
was  intended  as  a  continuation  of  the  course  published  as  Aratra  PenteUei  (see  the 
Introduction,  above,  p.  Iviii.).  The  lecture  was  published  as  chapter  iii.  (pp.  67-76) 
of  Verona  and  Other  Lecturef^  1894.] 

>  [Grote :  SUtorv  of  Greece,  pt  iL  ch.  iv.1 

»  [Ilrid.] 

S81 


882  APPENDIX 

did;  but  it  matters  eveiything  to  know  why  they  did  it.  For  the  eTent 
to  them,  and  to  us,  depends  always  not  on  the  deed  merely,  but  the 
intent  of  it ;  so  that  even  the  truth  of  the  deed  itself  is  often  of  little 
importance,  compared  with  the  results  of  it. 

4.  Take  an  instance  in  comparatively  recent  history.  Modem  investi- 
gation has  shown  that  in  all  probability  no  such  person  ever  existed  as 
William  Tell,  and  that  all  the  acts  related  of  him  were  fables.^  Do  you 
think,  therefore,  that  you  could  be  wise,  as  historians  of  the  Swiss,  in 
omitting  all  mention  of  Tell,  and  of  their  belief  in  hun  ?  On  the  contrary ; 
for  the  vanished  &ct  of  the  hero's  existence,  you  get  the  much  more 
wonderful  and  important  fistct  of  the  Imagination  of  hia  existence;  you 
find  that  the  character  of  this  mountain  people  was,  at  one  time  of  their 
history,  such  that  they  could  takf  up  a  child's  &iry  tale, — ^repeat  it,  till 
it  became  a  veracity  to  them, — and  then  regulate  all  their  life  and  war  by 
their  trust  in  its  truth. 

5.  We  will  begin  the  mythic  histoiy  of  Aegina,  then,  with  the  splendid 
passage  in  the  8th  Olympian  ode  of  Pindar  :— 

"  Aeffina,  sweeping  with  her  oars,  where  Eternal  Law,  Saviour  of  men, 
throned  Deside  the  God  of  the  stranger,  is  obeyed  with  more  than  human 
truth.  For  it  is  hard  to  discern  uprightly* — of  things  that  are  warped 
greatly,  and  in  many  ways :  but  some  established  decree  of  the  immortals 
has  fixed  under  itself  a  divine  pillar,  and  trust  for  all  strange  people,—* 
this  place,  sea-ramparted,  measured  out  in  stewardship  by  Aeacus"^  to  the 
Dorian  people." 

6.  Now,  before  going  on  to  the  next  verses,  consider  who  Aeacus  was. 

Of  course  the  numbers,  two,  three,  four,  seven,  nine^  twelve^  and 
forty,  are  continually  used  vaguely  in  all  mythic  art;  nevertheless,  every 
writer  makes  his  own  "three,"  or  his  own  ''four,"  or  his  own  "seven,' 
express  some  special  division  of  the  subject  in  his  mind ;  and  when 
you  get  anything  like  a  consistent  adoption  of  any  given  number  by 
many  writers  for  a  long  time,  you  will  find,  at  last,  that  the  really  great 
ones  among  them  give  a  special  significance  to  each  of  the  names.  So, 
though  at  first  when  you  think  that  you  have  three  Gorgons — Graces-^ 
Fates — and  Judges,  you  may  feel  as  if  the  number  meant  nothing,  yet 
among  the  closely  thinking  writers,  every  Gorgon,  and  Grace,  and  Fate — 
and  Judge — has  a  special  function ;  and  the  functions  of  the  Three  Great 
Judges  are  specific,  in  a  clear  and  consistently  separate  way. 

7.  I  must  now  use  a  passage  of  mine  on  the  division  of  law,  written 
ten  years  ago. 

•  •  *••••••• 

8.  Observe,  then ;  the  reward  of  good  is  essentially  Life,  and  the  wages 
of  Sin  is  Death.*    Now  the  Rewarding  Judge  is  Rhadamanthus,^  *  ~     ' 


*  Note  that  i^  AlaKoO  has  a  double  force,  meaning  partly  ''from  the  time  of 
Aeacus,"  partly  ''as  out  of  his  power." 

1  rCompare  Vol.  XVIII.  p.  63a] 

'  [Munera  Pukserit^  ch.  v.  §§  116-120;  somewhat  varying  from  the  published 
text :  see  Vol.  XVII.  pp.  241-2^,  where  in  footnotes  the  variations  are  noted.] 
'  [Romans  vi.  23.] 

*  [For  other  references  to  Rhadamanthus,  see  note  on  p.  384.] 


THE  TORTOISE  OF  AEGINA  (M 

Rlutd4DiRnthu8 " — Xaniiot,  the  golden-haired,  loid  of  the  Elysian  fields.' 
And  the  punishing  or  Tonoentiog  Judge — the  worm  that  dies  not,  ftnd  fire 
that  is  not  quenched^ — is  Minos;  merciless,  and  in  his  nature  brutal  and 
rabid.     Never  forget  the  lines  of  Honce  '  — 

"Jam  galaam  PalUa  et  Mgida, 
Currusqne  el  rabiem  parol." 

Inevitable  I  The  serpents  of  the  Aegis  gathered  into  one  Immortal  ser- 
pent, whose  coils  are  close  according  to  the  sin  it  puniihes. 

9.  Now   hear  what  Dante   says  of  Minoa,   and  jou  will   understand  at 
<H)ce  more  of  the  Greek  and  Italian  mind  than 
you  can  usually  learn  in  a  summer's  daj. 

At  the  gate  of  Hell,  "Starvi  Uinos  onibil- 
mente,  e  ringhia,"* 

Frowned  horribly — frowned  as  a  beast  frowns 
— (you  shall  see  what  that  means  at  once— • 
here  is  a  Leontine  lion") — "quando  I'anima  mal 
nabi  li  vien  dinand,  tutta  si  confessa."  Obserre 
this  statement  by  Dante  of  the  strange  power 
that  the  penalty  of  crime  has,  in  making  it 
visible  to  the  culprit.  Until  the  pain  oomea, 
the  ill-bom  spirits  cannot  perceive  the  sin ; 
but  as  soon  as   they  suffer  for  it,  they   do  not 

merely  confess   it  to  others — they  feel  It  to  r%g.it 

be   lin   themselves,  as   they  never   did  before. 
On  the  contrary,  a  well-bom  or  noble  person  is  made  to  feel  his   sin  by 

>  lOdateg,  iv.  600-666. 

'AMJt  a'  it  'HXiJiria*  irtifof  jkoJ  rii^m  Y>Jqt 

T^  ittp  ^lani  piorii  iti\ti  irBpAwowir.^ 

*  [Iwuah  Uvi.  24;  Mark  \x.  M.] 
'  \Odet,  i.   IB,  11,  12.] 

*  [h^timo,  V.  4,  and  following  lines,  thus  renderad  by  Cmry : — 

"There  Minos  stands. 
Grinning  with  ebsitly  feature  :  he,  of  all 
Who  enter,  strict  examiniDg  the  crimes, 
Gives  seotence,  and  diBmiase*  them  beneath, 
According  ss  he  foldeth  bim  aronnd: 
For  when  before  him  cornea  the  lU-fatad  soul. 
It  all  eonfeeees;  and  thst  judge  severe 
Of  tins,  considering  what  place  in  hell 
Suits  the  transffresaion,  with  bis  tail  so  oft 
Himself  encircbs,  as  dsKreee  beueath 
He  dooms  it  to  desceod. 
Compare  Aratra  Pent*iid,   %   207   (above,  p.  3&3),   where  also  the   last  lines  are 

*  [llie  woodcut  here  given  (Fig.  16}  is  enlarged  (to  twice  the  use)  from  a  coin 
of  Leoutini  (I.  C.  28  in  the  British  Museum's  exhibition  of  electrotypes).  Rnskiu 
drew  an  enlargement  of  the  coin  for  the  Oxford  Schools  (Rudimentary  Seriee, 
No.  «B}:  see  Vol.  XXI.  pp^  17S,  2A3.  In  "Verona  and  ita  Rivers"  nSQi)  the  Lion 
and  the  Tortoise  (see  p.  388)  were  given  by  photogimvare,  on  FUte  XI.,  of  the  site 
of  the  actual  coina] 


884  APPENDIX 

the  pardon  of  it,  as  the  bate,  bj  panishment;  and  each  of  them  gets 
from  heaven  and  man  what  will  make  him  feel  it  in  his  own  way.  I 
go  on: — 

'^E  auel  conoscitor  delle  peccata 
Veae  qual  luogo  d'Infemo  e  da  etsa : 
Cignesi  con  la  coda  tante  volte 
Quantanque  gradi  yaol,  che  giu  sia 


Now  just  observe  how  much  Dante,  like  the  other  strong  men,  expects 
you  to  find  out  for  yourself  He  never  tells  you  even  what  shape  Minos 
is ;  but  you  find  with  a  start  at  the  end  of  the  passage  that  he  is  a  serpent ; 
and  then,  if  you  understand  the  true  nature  of  sin  and  its  punishment,  you 
can  enter  into  the  myth.  Observe,  once  more,  Minos'  warning: — ''Take 
care  that  the  breadth  of  the  way  does  not  deceive  thee."^  You  think 
that  you  may  escape  punishment  because  so  many  sin  with  you — ^that  it 
cannot  be  a  sin  that  many  commit. 

10.  When  we  come  to  the  coins  of  Thurium  and  the  bull,^  we  shall 
have  to  examine  farther  the  power  of  Minos  in  Crete.  In  the  meantime 
you  will  trust  me  for  this  general  aspect  of  the  two  judges  for  Condemna- 
tion and  Reward.'^ 

I  think  I  shall  best  fiisten  in  your  minds  this  distinct  function  of 
Aeacus  as  the  counting  or  measuring  judge,'  by  reading  you  a  bit  of  Ludan, 
which  may  give  you  a  little  rest.  With  him,  Rhadamanthus  is  the  great 
judge  of  the  evil  and  the  good;  Minos  not  appearing;  but  Aeacus  is  en- 
trusted— not  with  the  judgment,  but  the  numbering  of  the  dead.  This 
is  a  piece  of  the  dialogue  called  ''The  Ferry," ^  which  you  probably  all 
know  well,  but  will  not  mind  hearing,  with  reference  to  the  matter  in 
hand. 

*  Except  only — ^look  at  Pindar,  Oiymp,  ii.  137.^ 

^  [hi/erno,  v.  20.] 

^  [This  reference  shows  that  among  the  intended  lectures,  which  would  have 
formed  a  sequel  to  Aratra  Pentelici^  the  Bull  of  Thurium  was  to  have  been  dis- 
cussed. This  was  never  done,  though  the  plate  was  prepared  and  printed  in  Aratra 
(now  Plate  XXII.  p.  849,  above),  with  a  brief  paragraph  (§  203)  inserted  in  ex- 
planation.] 

^  [For  other  references  to  the  kinghoods  of  Minos,  Rhadamanthus,  and  Aeacus, 
see  For9  Clavigera,  Letter  23,  and  Val  (TAmo,  §  ld9 ;  and  for  Rhadamanthus,  Art 
Ciavigera,  Letter  82.1 

*  [KordrXovs,  or  '^Voyage  to  the  Lower  World,"  3,  4.  Raskin  translates  freely, 
compressing  here  and  there.] 

^  [The  passage  referred  to  is  thus  translated  by  £.  Myers:  '^Then  whosoever 
have  oeen  of  good  courage  to  the  abiding  steadfast  thrice  on  either  side  of  death 
and  have  refrained  their  souls  from  all  iniquitv,  travel  the  road  of  Zeus  unto  the 
tower  of  Kronos ;  there  round  the  islands  of  ^e  blest  the  Ocean-breezes  blow,  and 
golden  flowers  are  glowing,  some  from  the  land  on  trees  of  splendour,  and  some 
the  water  feedeth,  with  wreaths  whereof  they  entwine  their  hands :  so  orderetii 
Rhadamanthos'  just  decree,  whom  at  his  own  right  hand  hath  ever  the  father  of 
Kronos,  husband  of  Rhea,  throned  above  all  worlds."  Raskin  quotes  the  passage 
from  Pindsr  in  Queen  of  the  Air,  §  60.  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  350).] 


THE  TORTOISE  OF  AEGINA  885 

11.  Clotho  and  Charon  are  waiting  together  at  the  Feny-side  of  I^ethe. 
Hermes  is  late  for  the  boat,  and  Charon  is  cross.     Clotho  speaks — 

''Keep  thy  temper,  Charon,  here  he  is  at  last;  and  a  fine  set  he 
has  got  with  him — all  as  close  as  a  flock  of  goats.  Nay,  what  next  ? 
There's  some  one  bound  in  the  middle  of  them,  and  there's  one  keeping 
guard  over  him  with  a  stick  !  And  just  look  at  Hermes, — ^what  a  state 
he  is  in;  all  over  sweat,  and  panting  as  if  he  had  an  asthma,  and  his 
feet  covered  with  dust!     How  now,  Hermes,  what's  the  matter? 

Hermes,  What  should  be  the  matter,  Clotho?  but  that  I've  been 
running  after  this  fellow  who  had  got  away.  I  had  like  to  have  lost 
my  number  in  the  ship's  company  myself. 

Clotho,  But  who  is  he;  or  what  did  he  want  to  get  away  for? 

Hermes,  That's  clear  enough,  surely — ^that  he  would  rather  live 
than  die!  and  he  must  be  some  king  or  tjrrant  or  other;  and  by  the 
noise  he  makes,  it  seems  he  must  have  been  well  off  where  he  was. 

Clotho,  And  the  fool  ran  away,  as  if  he  could  have  lived  after  his 
thread  was  run  out? 

Hermes.  Run  away  he  did — assuredly !  And  if  this  fine  old  gentle- 
man with  the  stick  hadn't  helped  me,  he  would  have  got  off  alto- 
gether, for  firom  the  first  minute  that  Atropos  passed  him  to  me,  he 
pulled  and  struggled,  and  stood  with  his  feet  against  the  ground,  all 
along  the  road.  And  then  when  we  got  to  the  gate,  and  I  was 
counting  off  the  dead  to  Aeacus  as  usual,  and  he  was  checking  them 
off  by  your  sister's  list,  this  thrice  cursed  feUow  slipped  behind  some- 
how and  made  off;  so  there  was  one  dead  man  missing  fix>m  the 
reckoning.  And  Aeacus,  knitting  his  brows, — Hermes,  savs  he,  you 
must  keep  your  roguery  for  proper  times  and  places ;  you  have  games 
enough  up  in  heaven;  but  the  afiairs  of  the  dead  are  accurate,  and 
nothing  can  be  secret  in  those.  Here's  the  list,  as  you  see,  with  a 
thousand  and  four  set  down:  and  you  have  brought  me  one  too  few 
— unless  you  have  the  impudence  to  say  Atropos  has  made  a  mistake. 
So  I,  blushing  at  what  he  said,  recollected  instantly  what  had  been 

ring  on  all  the  way ;  and  looking  about  me,  I  missed  my  gentleman, 
went  after  him  as  fiist  as  I  could,  but  I  only  caught  him  as  he  was 
on  the  point  of  getting  out  at  Taenarus." 

12.  I  had  another  reason  for  detaining  you  with  the  reading  of  this 
passage:  — that  you  might  notice,  in  passing,  the  allusion  to  Meroury's 
power  as  the  cloud-god  distinct  from  that  of  the  herald  of  the  dead,^ 
''You  have  games  enough  up  in  heaven  there." 

You  have,  then,  these  three  offices  of  the  three  judges : — Rhadamanthus 
to  reward,  Minos  to  condemn,  Aeacus  to  count  and  divide.  Next  you 
must  remember  the  story  of  his  birth. 

IS.  He  is  a  son  of  Zeus,  by  the  nymph  Aegina ;  and  Aegina  is  one  of  the 
daughters  of  the  great  river-god  Asopus.  Or,  broadly,  the  Asopus  represents 
the  power  of  all  the  streams  of  Arcadia ;  and  the  marriage  of  Zeus  to  his 
daugnter,  in  the  phjrsical  meaning  of  it,  is  that  the  clouds  from  the  vaUeys 
of  Arcadia  feed  the  springs  of  the  islands,  and  on  the  highest  rocks.  Hence 
one  of  the  daughters  of  the  Asopus  gives  name  to  the  island  of  Salamis; 

1  [See  Queen  </  the  Air,  §  26  (Vol.  XIX.  pp.  319,  320) ;  and  compare  Lectures 
an  Art,  §  166  (above,  p.  160).] 

XX.  2  B 


88«  APPENDIX 

another  to  that  of  Aegina,  and  a  third  ^  to  Thebes,  so  fiir  as  Thebes  was 
dependent  on  the  springs  of  Dirce ;  while  finally,  Asopas  himself  gives  the 
fountain  of  Peirene  to  Sisyphus  on  the  crag  of  Corinth: — ^but  observe  for 
what  service  he  did  this.  When  Zeus  carried  off  his  daughter  Aegina, 
Asopus  was  seeking  for  her  in  vain,  until  Sisyphus  told  him  who  had  taken 
her.     For  that  help  he  got  his  fountain  on  Corinth,  and  his  stone  in  Hell.* 

14.  Now — (you  will  find  it  partly  traced  in  my  Queen  of  the  Air^ — Sisy- 
phus represents  always,  physically,  the  power  of  the  winds  in  transit  across 
the  isthmus;  and,  morally,  he  is  the  god  of  transit  or  trade, — MpSurra^ 
avSp&v,*  And  you  shall  see  presently  why  his  betrayal  of  the  flight  of 
Aegina  is  so  heavily  punished.^  But  first  fix  in  your  own  minds  this  char- 
acter of  Sisyphus  as  restless  and  cunning  beyond  all  men,  so  that  by 
his  cunninff  he  even  raised  himself  from  the  dead ;  ^  and  then  you  will 
find  that  uiroughout  subsequent  legends  there  is  an  antagonism  between 
the  power  of  the  Aeaddas,  in  justice,  and  of  the  descendants  of  Sisyphus, 
in  turbulence  and  the  defiance  of  justice,  as  the  opposition  of  a  pillar  to 
a  tempest;  and  which  you  will  find  hinted  even  in  such  short  passages  as 
the  speech  of  Philoctetes  to  Neoptolemus: — 

akk*  c^  'Ax^AAccoSy  6$  ftcra  ^iayriav  9  W  i}v 
ijicov'  aptoTa,  vvv  8^  riv  tc^vj^ic^Jtcov."  ^ 

You  find,  then,  that  in  spite  of  the  river-power,  Asopus,  and  of  the 
storm-power,  Sisyphus,  Aegina  is  carried  away  by  Zeus  to  the  quiet  island, 
and  bears  to  Zeus — this  son  Aeacus. 

15.  Now  let  us  collect  the  legends  about  him,  and  see  to  what  they 
all  point. 

First :  Aegina  is  difficult  of  access ;  and  he  increases  this  difficulty,  en- 
cumbering the  channeb  round  the  port  with  rocks,  so  as  to  defend  it, 
Pausanias  says,^  against  piracy ;  but  observe  always  the  sense  of  future  de- 
finition, enclosure,  and  peace,  which  connects  itself  with  his  name. 

16.  Then  you  find  him  joined  with  Apollo  and  Poseidon  to  build  the 
walls  of  Troy ;  and  in  the  ode  we  have  just  paused  at,^  you  find  that  having 
built  them,  there  appeared  three  dragons,  and  rushed  against  the  walls; 
that  the  part  built  by  Apollo  and  Poseidon  stood,  but  that  the  wall,  where 
built  by  Aeacus,  fell  before  the  snake.     Upon  which  Apollo  is  said  to  have 

1  [Thebe  or  Ismene,  who  was  married,  according  to  some  legends,  to  Amphioa 
(for  whom  see  above,  p.  370).] 
'  [Pausanias,  i.  5,  1.1 
»    Chap.  i.  §  29  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  325).] 
'    mad,  vi.  163.] 
'Ruskin  passes,  however,  to  another  subject,  in  §  18,  without  working  this  out] 
|The  story  is  that  Sisyphus  before  his  death  desired  his  wife  not  to  bury 
He  then,  in  the  lower  world,  complained  of  this  neglect,  and  begged  Pluto 
to  let  him  return  to  the  upper  world  to  punish  his  wife.    His  request  was  granted 
— and  then  he  refused  to  go  back  to  Hades,  so  that  Hermes  had  to  carry  him  off 
by  fbrce  (Eustathius,  ad  Ham.,  pp.  631,  1702.] 
7  [Souhocles:  Phihetetes,  1310-1313.] 

*  \"Oi  all  the  Greek  islands  Aegina  is  the  most  difficult  of  approach;  for 
sunken  rocks  and  reefs  rise  all  round  it.  They  say  that  Aeacus  contrived  that  it 
should  be  so,  from  fear  of  the  inroads  of  pirates  and  to  make  it  dangerous  for  a 
foe"  (ii.  29,  6).] 

*  [Pindar :  Olymokt,  viii.  41-52.] 


4 

6 
6 

him. 


THE  TORTOISE  OF  AEGINA  887 

ibfetold  the  destniction  of  Troy  by  the  Aeacidae;  but  you  will  easily  see 
tlMt  this  interpretatiim  must  be  a  late  gloss  on  the  myth,  for  it  is  no  in- 
teipretation  of  the  whole  of  it.  If  the  amgon  which  attacked  the  wall  of 
Aeactts  meant  the  descendants  of  Aeacus,  Uiat  which  attacked  the  wall  of 
Apollo  must  have  meant  the  descendants  of  Apollo;  which  is  wholly  in- 
adunissible.  The  natural  interpretation  is  that  the  work  of  each  beneficent 
power  of  defence  was  tried  by  the  passion,  or  demon,  that  was  antagonistic 
to  that  power;  and  that  Apollo  and  Poscddon  gave  strength  of  mind  and 
body,  which  would  be  unbroken  in  Troy ;  but  Aeacus  gave  justice  and  eon* 
tinence;  and  in  these  they  failed. 

17.  Next  you  have  the  story  of  the  depopulation  of  his  own  country  by 
a  dragon  sent  by  Juno :  and  then  the  birth  of  the  Myrmidons.^ 

Now,  you  will  be  told  by  modem  historians  that  tnis  transformation  of 
ants  into  men  signifies  only  Uie  peopling  of  the  island  by  a  new  tribe.  Well 
— of  course  it  does  mean  that;  and  it  would  equaUy  have  meant  that^ 
whether  you  had  been  told  that  the  new  inhabitants  were  made  of  ants, 
or  sticks,  or  leaves,  or  dust. 

But  what  you  have  to  discern,  in  any  of  the  myths  that  have  long^ 
dwelt  in  human  thought,  is  not,  what  fact  they  represented,  but  what 
colour  they  were  intended  to  give  to  it.  You  have  all  the  Deucalionidie 
of  the  earth  made  of  stones ;  ^  they  being,  in  the  sum  of  them,  little  more 
than  that — the  mob  of  common  men  being  as  the  shingle  to  the  wave. 
You  have  the  warrior-race  of  Thebes  made  of  dragon's  teeth.  ^  You  have 
the  commercial  race  of  Aegina  made  of  ants.^  And  out  of  this  industrial 
race,  governed  by  strict  justice,  you  have  at  last  a  warrior  strength  better 
than  that  of  Thebes ;  the  chief  strength  of  Greece ;  a  Peleus,  noble  enough 
to  have  granted  to  him  for  wife  the  sea^goddess  whom  the  immortals  dared 
not  wed,  lest  they  should  be  dethroned  by  their  children ;  and  from 
them  descended  the  chief  soldier  among  men :  ^ — ''  among  men,"  I  say,  as- 


See  **  The  Story  of  Arachne,"  above,  p.  378.] 

Henoe  the  title  of  Raskin's  book  on  Geology — DwcaRmi :  see  his  Introduction 


X 

s 

to  it] 

»  [Compare  Crwm  (/  Wild  Olive,  §  96  (Vol.  XVIII.  p.  464).] 

^  [^^  Mores,  quos  ante  gerebant, 
Nunc  quoque  habent;  parcumque  genus,  patiensque  laborum 
QusBsitique  tenax,  et  qui  qusesita  reservant." 

Ovid :  Metamorphoses,  viL  666.] 

^  [The  allusions  may  be  made  clearer,  as  Mr.  CoUiugwood  says  in  his  note  to 
the  passage,  by  drawing  out  the  genealogy  of  the  Aeacida : — 

Asopus 

I 


Zeus = Aegina  Salamis  ThebeaAmphion 

Aeacus  ȣndeiii,  daughter  of  Cheiron. 


Telamon  Peleus  •TbisTis,  daughter  of  Nereus, 

i 


Teueer  Ajaz  AcHiLUB^Deldamia 


I 


Neoptolemus.] 


.jt    I 


888  APPENDIX 

distinguished  from  the  half  divine  heio-natnre  of  the  Dioscuri,  or  Hentkles ; 
until  at  Isst  the  m}>th  changes  gradually  into  a  literal  historic  truth,  sod 
you  read  that — in  the  fight  of  Salamls.^ 

18.  And  now  I  must  pass — too  sharply,  but  necessarily — to  quite  another 
piece  of  mrthology.  We  all  recognise  the  importance,  not  only  in  the 
Greek  mina,  but  in  every  subsequent  conception,  of  the  three  great  Titan 
Goddesses,  Rhea,  Themis,  and  Mnemosuae.  In  a  less  degree  we  also 
acknowledge  the  powers  of  FhodM  and  of  Tethys.  But  the  sixth  of  the 
Titan  sisters,  and  the  one  who  is  first  named  by  Hesiod,*  we  usually  fbi^tf 
— Theia,  the  most  ancient  goddess  of  Light. 

19.  Now  the  marriage  of  Thcia  and  Hyperion,  and  the  birth  of  their 
children,  the  Sun,  the  Moon,  and  the  Dawn, — Helios,  Selene,  and  Eos, — is  a 
myth  of  even  higher  rank  and  impart  than  that  of  the  marriage  of  Ctonfx 
and  Rhea,  of  Occanus  and  Tethys,  and  of  Ccms  and  Phoebe ;  for  Theia  is 
in  a  certain  sense  the  greatest  of  all  the  Titans — she  is  the  origin  of  light 
and  hannony :  the  embodied  "  Let  there  be  light "  *  of  the  heattien  world ; 
and  while  uie  powers  of  the  other  Titans,  and  of  their  descendants,  relate 
chiefly  to  the  law  and  course  of  &te  in  this  world,  and  Themis  and 
MnemoBune  have  power  only  over  things  that  are  passing  or  passed,  Hieia 
rules  the  great  and  eternal  heavens,  and  the  course  of  the  sun  and  moon, 
and  the  seven  stars. 

20.  Now  you  remember  how,  in  my  first  course  of  lectures,*  I  dwelt 
again  and  again  on  the  laws  of  the  Greeks  for  light,  and  its  relation  to  their 

ideas  both  of  science  and  of  justice,  including  in 
the  word  "justice"  all  order  and  hannony.  I 
also  endeavoured  to  bring  before  you  some  of  the 
evidence  that  the  tortoise-shell  of  Hermes  meant 
the  concave  of  the  cloudy  heaven,  and  ultimately, 
that  of  the  starry  vault  in  which  Hermes  is  lord 
of  motion,*  But  when  the  lyre  of  Hermes  be- 
comes also  that  of  Orpheus,  it  has  to  express  not 
movement  only,  but  harmony  of  movement,  and 
pacification,  or  charming  of  all  irregular  impulse. 

21.  And  now  if  you  will  look  at  Lucian's  essay 

on  Astrology,  which  is  mythic,  not  merely  of  the 

j_  heaven  itself  or  of  its  stars,  but  of  the  truth  and 

divine  knowledge  which  from  them  enters  into  the 

life  of  men,  you  will  find  it  a  clue  to  what  I  think  is  the  ultimate  sense 

of  the  Orphic  legends.    The  seven  chords  of  the  lyre  are  there  spoken  of 

1  [The  reference  is  to  the  account  of  the  Battle  of  Salamia  in  Herodotus,  viii.  84 : 
"The  Aeginetans  say  that  the  ihip  which  went  away  to  Aegina  to  bring  the  sons 
of  AeacuB  was  that  which  began  the  fight,"] 

*  [8eij)f  «,  'Vt'iir  n,  QifUf  rt,  MnMtooTJnji'  t*, 

—I1teog<mg,  134. 
For  the  marriage  and  family  of  Theia,  see  TheogeTtg,  371-374.     She  is,  of  oonrss^ 
the  Thea  of  Keatt's  Hj/perion,} 

'  rGenesis  1.  3 ;  compare  p.  246,  aI>ove.] 

•  fSee  LectuTM  on  Art,  %%  IBl-lM,  180  (above,  pp^  142-164,  171).] 

*  [Ihid.,  g§  155,  156  {pp.  148-161).] 


SB  indicating  power  over  the  Beren  planets, — the  wild  creatures  who  are 
represented  surrounding  the  statue  of  Orpheus  are  the  circling  zodiacal 
signs, — and  the  legends  of  Teireaiaa  and  of  the  Atreidae  are  explained  in 
their  right  connectioD  with  this  principal  one.' 

The  legend  of  Orpheus,  however,  we  hare  to  examine  in  another  place ; 
for  the  present,  remember  onl}*  that  the  tortoise-ehell,  as  a  part  of  the  lyre, 
whether  of  Hermes  or  Orpheua,  signifies  the  measured  Harmony  and  spheric 
Order  of  Life.^ 

'  [Liidao,  "pl  T^t  ArrpoXoT-dw,  10-12.  The  pi«c8  ii  now  commonlj  believed  to 
be  apurions  and  excluded  ^m  the  body  of  Luelan'i  works.  It  is  also  comnionly  t^cen 
as  an  ironical  attack  upon  Astrology  rather  than  is  a  serious  defence.  The  writer, 
sayi  Mr.  OoUingwood  in  his  note  to  this  lecture  ("Verona  and  its  Rivers,"  p.  70), 
"  connects  Teiresias  with  tho«e  planets  which  were  called  epicene  or  hermaphrodite 
by  early  aitronomers  or  '  astral ogcrs,'  derivinK  their  ideas  nom  Babyloaisn  sources. 
Venus  as  evening  star  wu  a  female  in  Chaldtean  astrolofy ;  as  morning  star  she 
was  a  male,  or  hermaphrodite.  Thyestes,  agaio,  is  supposed  by  Lucian  to  represent 
Aries  of  the  sodiac,  and  Atreus  the  suu ;  whence  their  strife,  as  the  euu  seems  to 
nove  in  the  opposite  direction  to  the  Stan,  and  so  to  attack  them."  Compare 
Xsrfurs*  on  Art,  ^  Ifil  (above,  p.  143).] 

*  [Here  the  MS.  brtwdcs  off,  the  lecture  being  obviously  incomplete,  for  Ruskin 
has  as  yet  hardly  touched  on  "The  Tortoise  of  Ac^na."  Fig.  17  here  is  enlarged 
(again  to  twice  the  size)  from  a  coin  of  Aesina  (II.  B.  S4  in  the  British  Musenm). 
Ruskin  seems  to  connect  the  adoption  of  the  tortoise  as  the  type  of  Aegina  with 
legends  of  Hermes.  According  to  £.  Curtius,  the  sea-tortoise  is  placed  on  the 
corns  as  a  symbol  of  Astarta,  the  Phranidan  goddess  of  traders;  sccording  to  a 
recent  writer,  the  tortoiae-sbell  used  for  making  bowls  was  the  staple  prodnct  of 
the  island,  and  the  tortoise  on  her  coins  simply  indicated  that  the  old  monetary 
unit  of  the  island  was  the  shell  of  the  sea-tortoise  (see  Professor  Ridgewa/s 
MttaUie  Currmcy,  pp.  328-331).] 


Ill 

THE  RIDERS  OF  TARENTUM' 


1.  We  have  seen  in  the  story  of  the  Aeacidae^  how  ffreat  hnportance  was 
attached  in  the  Greek  mind  of  the  figure  or  shadow  of  the  unitj  of  human 
and  brutal  nature  in  the  great  Centaur,  Cheiron.  Not  only  you  find  the 
Aeaddae  descended  from  him  on  the  mother's  side,  but  to  him  you  have 
entrusted  in  their  youth  ^culapius,  Jason,  and  Achilles.  Physician,  sea- 
farer, and  soldier  must  alike  be  brought  up  at  the  feet  of  the  Centaur; 
and  stranger  still,  there  is  no  other  subject  of  sculpture  associated  with  the 
procession  in  her  own  honour,  represented  on  the  temple  of  Athena,  but 
the  war  of  the  Centaurs  and  Lapithae.' 

2.  Two  great  truths  are  hidden  under  this  myth  of  the  Centaur  as  it 
takes  possession  of  the  Greek  mind.  There  is  no  more  marked  instance  of 
the  force  of  a  vision,  which  is  scarcely  understood  by  the  dreamer,  but  is 
to  be  interpreted  by  the  whole  course  of  subsequent  history.  In  the  fint 
place  remember  that,  as  in  most  of  the  early  mythic  figures,  there  is  a 
good  and  evil  meaning  continually  mingled  in  it.  The  Centaurs,  as  the 
sons  of  Ixion  and  the  cloud,  are  images  of  wild,  unnatural,  and  disappointed 
passion ;  but  Cheiron,  as  the  son  of  Philyra  and  Chronos  [Saturn],  is  one  of 
the  great  group  of  Titans  opposed  to  the  injustice  of  Zeus.  We  are  too  apt 
to  rest  in  the  thought  that  he  was  the  tutor  of  .£sculapius  only  because 
he  knew  the  mountain  herbs,  and  of  Achilles  in  animal  strength;  but  the 
real  reason  of  his  being  their  tutor  is  perhaps  the  last  you  would  think  of, 
because  of  his  gentleness  and  justice.  You  get  the  two  ideas  together  where 
Eurjrpylus  asks  to  be  healed  by  Patroclus: — 

tv  Xflpw^  idldoL^,  diKoi&rarot  Ktrra^pwif,^ 

Then  Hyginus'  says  of  Cheiron,  ''etiam  homines  superabat  justitia."  You 
may  easily  remember  Ovid's  lines  about  his  death — 

^*  Nona  dies  aderat,  cum  to,  justissime  Cheiron, 
Bis  septem  stellis  corpora  cinctus  eras"* — 

^  [For  the  place  of   this  lecture  in  Raskin's  scheme  for  a  sequel  to  Aratra 
Pentwei^  see  Introduction,  above,  p.  Iviii.     It  is  here  printed  from  the  author^s  MS.] 
s  [See  ''Tortoise  of  Aegina,"  §  17  (above,  p.  387).] 

>   On  the  significance  of  this  legend,  see  Aratra  PeiUeUoi,  §  76  (above,  p.  240).] 
«  [niad,  xi.  830-632.] 

*  'PoeUwn  AHronomiccn,  ''De  Centauro":  ''Hie  dicitur  nomine  Chiron  Satumi 
et  Phillyro  filias  esse  :  qui  non  mode  cvteros  centauros  sad  homines  quoqoe 
justitia  superasse  existimatur."] 

•  [JF^uti,  5,  413.] 


THE  RIDEBS  OF  TARENTUM  891 

not  seven  stars  only^  bat  seven  baUnced  against  seven  others  and  you  get 
the  of^xisition  to  Zeus^  hinted  in  three  ways — ^first,  in  that  he  was  bom 
in  the  enchanted  island  of  Philyreis  while  Zeus  in  his  infancy  was  con- 
cealed by  Rhea;  secondly,  that  at  his  death  he  gives  up  his  immortality 
to  Prometheus;  and  thirdly,  though  with  less  distinctness,  in  the  death  of 
.Ssculapius  by  the  lightning  of  Zeus,  for  having  like  Prometheus,  in  another 
way,  brought  fire  from  heaven  and  restored  the  dead  to  life. 

8.  You  get  then,  first,  in  this  figure  of  the  Centaur,  the  type  of  the 
wisdom  and  justice  of  men  founded  on  right  training  of  the  animal  as  well  as 
the  spiritual  part  of  them ;  you  have  him  the  teacher  of  .£sculapias,  because 
animals  knew  by  instinct  the  virtue  of  the  herbs  necessary  for  their  life ; 
and  of  Achilles,  because  his  chief  force  is  to  be  an  instinctive  and  natural 
passion — ^his  love,  friendship,  and  sense  of  justice  all  native  and  uncultivated 
— fidthful  as  the  love  of  animals,  wild  as  their  anger;  and  you  have  all 
this  in  a  certain  degree  of  opposition  to  the  power  of  Zeus,  just  because 
it  is  wholly  animal  and  of  this  world,  and  the  dealings  of  the  spiritual 
gods  are,  so  far  as  it  can  discern,  unjust  with  reference  to  that  world. 

4.  And  this  you  will  find  to  be  the  key  to  the  Greek  temper  throughout 
its  heroism  as  well  as  theology.  The  Gothic  faith,  believing  that  the 
humiM^  soul  is  to  share  in  divine  existence,  assumes  that  whatever  is,  or 
appears  to  be,  unjust  here  will  be  rectified  in  the  world  to  come.  But  the 
Gpeek,  thinking  of  himself  as  an  animal  wholly  belonging  to  this  world, 
tries  eve^y  question  respecting  his  fate  on  its  own  ground  only;  and 
finding  one  man  fortunate  and  another  miserable,  and  one  wicked  and 
^escaping  punishment,  and  another  innocent  and  yet  afflicted,  he  confesses 
this  fact  for  simply  what  it  is  worth — the  gods  may  be  higher  creatures 
than  he  is,  and  may  have  other  and  better  conceptions  of  justice,  but  their 
ways  are  not  as  his  ways,^  and  to  his  poor,  half-bestial  sight,  do  not  seem 
justice ;  for  him,  short-lived  and  wretched,  there  is  another  justice,  oontiary 
to  theirs — ^which  it  is  his  part  as  long  as  he  lives  here  to  discern  for  him- 
self and  carry  out — ^the  Centaurs'  justice  against  Jove's. 

5.  And,  practically,  the  Centaurs'  justice  is  the  only  one  here  demon- 
strable, and  the  only  one  entirely  sjrmpathetic  and  tender.  A  man  bred 
in  the  Gothic  faith  is  saved  in  shipwreck,  and  says  it  is  by  Divine  Pro- 
vidence that  he  is  saved,  implying  that  it  is  by  Divine  Improvidence  that 
his  neighbour  perished.  But  a  man  bred  to  Centaurs'  justice,  and  taking 
merely  the  animal's  view  of  the  matter,  dares  to  assert  to  himself  and  in 
the  face  of  the  sky,  that  he  can  see  no  reason  why  he  should  be  saved 
rather  than  his  neighbours;  that,  providential  or  not,  it  is  unjust,  and  he 
will  strive  so  to  rule  the  fates  that  more  men  may  be  safe  from  danger 
and  more  men  equal  in  felicity. 

6.  But  note  &rther.  There  is  only  one  Titanic  Centaur  who  is  in  this 
manner  just,  and  it  is  only  the  greatest  heroes  who  are  permitted  to  be 
taught  by  him.  The  rest  of  the  Centaurs  are  only  types  of  lower  animal 
passion — they  are  true  children  of  Ixion,^  fantastic  and  wild,  rebellious 
against  higher  spirits  not  as  Prometheus,  but  only  in  vileness  of  nature  and 
incontinence  of  passion.     And  in  this  acceptation,  Izion,  you  will  find,  is  the 


^  [See  Isaiah  Iv.  9.1 


iOn  the  myth  of  Ixion,  compare  UtUo  this  Last,  §  74  (Vol  XVII.  p.  99)^  and 
que&n  qf  the  Air,  §  29  (Vol.  XIX.  p.  326).] 


892  APPENDIX 

Greek  Cain,  committing  the  first  domestic  murder^  and  afterwards  bound  to 
the  wheel  in  punishment,  of  which  the  chief  agony  is  its  restlessness ;  hence 
Dante,  the  prophet  of  the  Gothic  faith,  sees  this  meaning  onlj  in  the 
Centaur  sjrmbol,  and  makes  even  Cheiron  the  guardian  of  the  lake  of  blood, 
in  which  are  plunged  the  souls  that  have  perished  through  anger.^ 

7.  That  is  the  spiritual  meaning  of  the  mjrth.  I  will  not  long  detain 
you  to-day  in  speaking  of  the  physical  one ;  but  I  must  state  it  to  you 
briefly.  In  the  merely  physical  sense,  the  Centaurs  are  the  clouds  of  Pelion, 
children  of  Izion  by  Juno;  of  the  earth  in  its  cold  mountain  crests,  mis- 
taking cloud  for  sky.  Now  remember  Pelion  is  especially  in  the  Greek 
mind  the  woody  mountain  (€ivo(ri<f>vXXov^);  it  is  also  the  mountain  cloven 
by  dells — so  you  get  Cheiron  invoked  by  Pindar  for  the  sickness  of  Hiero: 
''  Wert  thou  but  again  in  the  dells  of  Pelion  "  (^dcrcrauri  IlaAiov  ') — and  the 
woods  of  it  were  chiefly  pine  and  oak.^  Now  it  is  precisely  in  the  aspect 
of  the  upper  pines  isolated  by  white  clouds  that  you  get  the  most  strange 
isolation  of  the  earth  in  the  air ;  the  seeming  of  Pelion  to  be  lifted  up  above 
Ossa;  the  contention  and  rebellion  of  earth  against  heaven,  and  straining 
as  it  were  to  get  lifted  up  into  the  firmament^  which  is  at  the  root  of  the 
mjrth  of  the  war  of  the  Giants.  So  that  it  is  even  more  in  the  physical 
than  the  moral  powers  of  the  fable  that  you  get  the  hem  of  Athena's  robe 
embroidered  with  the  wars  of  the  giants,^  and  the  frieze  of  the  Parthenon 
carved  with  the  Centaurs  and  Lapithae  (again  upon  her  throne,^  according 
to  Pliny),  for  these  Lapithae  are  spirits  of  the  earth  bom  of  Creusa  (Faias 
Svydrrfp  ^)  in  the  ravines  of  Pindus ;  and,  once  understanding  this,  you  get 
directly  at  the  meaning  of  one  of  the  most  important  stories  in  all  Myth- 
ology— the  rape  of  Cyrene  and  birth  of  Aristaeus;  for  Cjrent  is  only  the 
cold  air  of  Pelion  and  Pindus  drawn  by  the  heat  of  the  sun  to  Africa;  so 
when  Apollo  fiills  in  love  with  her,  he  goes  to  Cheiron  cunningly  to  ask 
about  her,  he  snatches  her  out  of  the  hollows  of  Pelion  roaring  with  the 
wind  (avcfUKr^paycDV  cic  IlaXcov  koXttiov*^),  but  with  wind  caused  by  the 
sun's  heat — the  same  word,  you  recollect,  is  used  of  the  hissing  of  the  hot 
brand  in  the  eye  of  the  Cyclops  ^^ — and  so  he  takes  her  in  his  golden  chariot 
to  Libya,  and  she  being  coldness  and  cloud  brought  into  the  glowing  land, 

*  And  note  the  epithets  of  her — irapBhw  dypcripop  and  xm/pa  eipvfila,^^ 


1 


3 


'Inferno,  canto  viii.] 


See,  e.g.,  Odystey,  xi.  310.] 

'Pyth.  iix.  1-4 :  ''  Fain  were  1  that  .  .  .  there  still  lorded  it  in  Pelion's  glens 
that  BMst  untamed,  whose  soul  was  loving  unto  men."] 

*  [Ovid,  FaHi,  v.  381  :— 

'^Pelion  Hiemonise  mons  est  obversus  in  austros: 
Summa  virent  pinu,  cetera  quercus  habet"] 

^  [Compare  the  description  of  the  pine  in  Modem  Pamtere^  vol.  v.  (Vol.  VII. 
p.  106).] 

•  (Compare  Aratra  Penteiiei,  §  100  (above,  p.  209).] 

^  [l^his  is  a  slip ;  Phidias  carved  on  the  concave  side  of  the  shield  the  fights  of 
the  gods  and  giants,  and  on  the  sandals  that  of  the  Centaurs  and  Lapithn  (in  eoieie 
vero  Lapitharum  et  Centauroniro.     Pliny,  Nat,  Hiet.,  xxzvi.  ch.  4}.] 
"  rPindar :  Pyth.  ix.  17.] 
'ibid.,  ix.  5.] 

Odyeeey,  ix.  380 :  a^apaytvirro  94  ol  vvpl  fil^di.] 
\Pyth.  ix.  0,  13.] 


8 

10 

u 


THE  RIDERS  OF  TABENTUM  898 

is  the  mother  of  Arirteeus  and  qneen  of  forests.  And  here  the  threads  of 
associated  thought  become  so  intricate^  that  I  cannot  hope  to  disentangle 
them  for  you,  or  even  give  you  all  the  ends  of  the  knot^  without  tedious- 
ness ;  the  best  part  of  Uie  work  you  will  have  to  do  for  yourselves. 

8.  First,  then,  note  that  Aristseus  and  Cyrene  hold  to  each  other,  as 
deities  of  the  forests,  nearly  the  same  relation  that  Triptolemiis  and  Demeter 
have  as  deities  of  harvest,  and  that  their  essential  power  is  in  the  blessing 
of  shade  and  woodland  moisture  under  too  hot  sun ;  while  Demeter  and 
Triptolemus  are  over  the  actual  mystery  of  seed  and  its  multiplication. 
Cjrrene  and  Aristaens,  then,  are  the  silvan  powers  of  cultivation — as  dis- 

«  tinguished  from  the  silvan  powers  of  wild  nature.  Pan  and  Faims,  the 
attendant  crowd  of  Pan  being  the  Satyr,  goat-footed  for  rough  places,  but 
the  attendant  crowd  of  Cyrene  being  the  Centaur,  horses-footed  for  the  glades 
of  rich  and  beautiful  lowland  wood,  and  the  soft  grass  that  grows  on  inlets 
among  the  mountain  pines.  You  remember  what  Lucian  says  of  the  Centaur 
of  Zeuzis :  hrl  xX.6ris  €v$a\ov^,^ 

9.  Next  recollect  that  this  wild  and  tame  woodland  has  been  through 
all  time,  and  must  be  through  all  time,  opposed  in  two  exactly  opposite 
ways,  as  it  nourishes  human  life,  to  the  life  of  cities.  In  the  savage  wood- 
land you  have  the  typical  wild  man  of  the  woods — whatever  is  rustic  or 
silvery  in  ignorant  and  dark  seclusion ;  but  in  the  tame  woodland,  of  which 
you  get  now  the  central  type  in  an  English  park,  you  (ind  in  all  civilized 
epochs  the  character  of  the  country  gentleman  establishing  itself,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  the  mere  farmer  on  the  one  hand,  and  from  the  citizen 
(in  the  sense  of  a  person  living  in  a  social  crowd)  on  the  other.  And  this 
is  in  all  nations  the  Equestrian  or  Centaurian  order — tinrcis  in  Greece,  Equites 
in  Rome,  Ritters  in  Grermany,  Chevaliers  in  France,  Cavaliers  in  England' — 
always  in  a  certain  degree  rough  and  wild,  even  ignorant;  so  that  in  our 
last  and  acntest  philosophical  analysis  of  their  character  the  philosopher 
gives  them  the  generic  name  of  barbarians,^  yet  having  a  better  gentleness 
than  that  of  other  men,  founded  on  their  roughness,  and  a  more  wholesome 
knowledge,  on  their  ignorance ;  in  their  physical  life  so  dependent  on  con- 
stant association  with  that  of  the  horse  that  all  their  laws  of  honour  and 
conduct  are  summed  up  in  the  word  chivalry ;  in  their  weapons — literally 
jcevrav/DOi — prickers,^  using  the  lance — ^that  is  to  say,  the  long  do/9v  or  beam, 
as  opposed  to  iyxos — so  exclusively  as  to  be  spoken  of  in  their  prime  of 
power  as  so  many  "Lances,"  and  having  as  the  sign  of  their  personal 
strength  characteristically  long  flowing  hair ;  being  lea/nyKo/xocovrcs,^  as  opposed 

1  [In  the  first  draft  Ruskin  continued : — 

''You  will  find  it  well  to  aasoeiate  partly  in  your  minds  the  two  maidens 
— Cyrene  and  Persephone-— one  of  forest^  the  other  of  flowers;  and  the 
snatching  away  bv  Apollo  from  Pelion,  and  by  Pluto  from  Etna."] 

*  [Zeiurie,  4 — ''on  fresh  green  sward  appears  the  mother  Centaur"  :  the  pas- 


sage occurs  in  Lucian's  description  of  the  picture  by  Zeuzis,  which  is  referrea  to 
in  Vol.  IV.  p.  286  and  n.,  and  Vol.  VII.  p.  339  n.t 

'  [These  words  were  also  used  in  the  lecture  on  "The  School  of  Florence,"  §  232 
(above,  p.  363).] 

^  [A  reference  to  Matthew  Arnold's  OuUure  and  Anarchy  (published  in  1869), 
p.  102.] 

*  [luvrav^^  derived  from  Ktvri^a,  to  prick,  to  goad.] 

*  [The  Homeric  epithet  for  the  long-haired  Achseans.] 


894  APPENDIX 

to  the  cropped  or  loand  heads  of  the  dtiiens,  and  the  shaTen  heada  of  the 
dergy^  their  two  essentiallj  antagonist  powers. 

[Here  the  MS.,  very  carefully  written  up  to  this  point,  breaks  off. 
Elsewhere  in  the  same  MS.  book  there  are  further  notes  for  the 
lecture  on  the  Coins  of  Tarentum,  which  enable  us  roughly  to  see 
how  the  theme  would  have  been  treated.  So  £sur,  Ruskin  has  been 
analyzing  the  Centaur  myths,  as  they  are  found  in  the  poets,  with 
a  view  to  drawing  out  from  them  the  Greek  conception  of  chivalry. 
The  student  of  Greek  coins  will  readily  understand  the  relevance  of 
this  discussion  to  a  lecture  on  the  Coins  of  Tarentum,  on  which  the 
Tarentine  horseman  is  so  fovourite  a  type.  The  fame  of  the  horses 
and  riders  of  Tarentum  is  embodied  in  the  verb  ra^vrt^civ,  ''to  ride 
like  a  Tarentine  horseman";  and  on  the  coins  of  the  city  the  type 
is  ''repeated/'  says  Sir  Charles  Newton,  "with  a  vivacity  and  endless 
felicity  of  invention  almost  worthy  of  the  friese  of  the  Parthenon."^ 
Hence  Ruskin's  selection  of  the  Tarentine  coins  as  types  of  the  fine 
drawing  of  horses  (see  Vol.  XIX.  p.  69),  and  the  discoturse  on  the  ideal 
of  Greek  chivalry  in  the  foregoing  sections. 

But  Tarentum  was  famous  for  its  ship|Mng  as  well  as  for  its  horse- 
men. "So  on  one  side  of  her  coins  Taras  rides  his  dolphin,  and  on 
the  other  Phalanthus  mounts  his  steed,  repeating  age  after  age  the 
exploits  by  which  they  were  supposed  to  have  won  fame,  and  furnishing 
a  constant  model  to  the  ambitious  youth  of  Tarentum."^  "Taren^ 
tum,"  says  Pausanias  (x.  10,  3,  4f\  "is  a  Lacedaemonian  colony:  the 
founder  was  Phalanthus.  .  .  .  They  say  that  the  hero  Taras  was  a 
son  of  Poseidon  and  a  native  nymph."  Ruskin  refers  to  Phalanthus 
in  Fors  Clavigera,  Letter  25;  to  Taras  in  Queen  of  the  Air,  §  89 
(Vol.  XIX.  p.  338);  and  to  the  coins  of  Tarentum  in  Araira  Penielicig 
§  117  (above,  p.  279)>  and  see  Vol.  XIX.  pp.  22,  69,  338.  Hence 
Ruskin  intended  next  to  trace  the  mythic  history  of  Tarentum,  in 
connexion  with  the  Dolphin  type  on  her  coins.  His  notes  for 
this  portion  of  the  lecture,  though  fragmentary,  give  an  idea  of 
the  intended  treatment,  and  they  are  of  some  further  interest  as  an 
example  of  the  first  outlines  which  he  used  to  jot  down  for  his 
lectures.] 

10.  You  have  seen  the  importance  of  the  position  of  Aegina  on  its  rocky 
island.'  Remember  in  connexion  with  that  fact  that  the  most  important 
Greek  colonies  in  Sicily  and  Italy,  Syracuse  and  Tarentum,  owed  their  power 
also  to  the  strength  of  the  small  islets  commanding  their  ports.  The  city 
of  Syracuse  was  at  first  founded  on,  and  limited  to,  the  island  of  Ortygia, 
and  in  its  full  power  the  town  on  the  plateau  of  Epipolse  was  always  caUed 
the  outer  town.  The  city  of  Tarentum  never  extended  itself  beyond  the 
island — low,  but  rocky — rairttvhv  c$a^s^ — extending  across  the  mouth  of 
its  harbour. 


^  [E^Mye  on  Art  and  Arckaolojfy,  p.  406.1 

s  [Professor  P.  Gardner  on  "  Countries  and  Gties  in  Ancient  Art,"  in  the  Journal 
of  HeUenie  Studies,  voL  ix.  p.  55.] 

s  [''Tortoise  of  Aegina,^  §  16  (above,  p.  386).] 
^  [Strabo,  book  iii. :  see  below,  p.  396.) 


THE  RIDERS  OF  TARENTUM  89S 

Now  give  sketch  of  the  entire  bay  of  Tarentam,  mod  Horace's  thought 
of  it. 

[Here  RuaUn  would  have  described  the  fitvourable  situation  of  the 
place  which  enabled  it  to  become  the  centre  of  the  commerce  of  the 
Adriatic,  Ionian,  and  Tyrrhenian  seas,  and  its  maritime  power  which 
endured  down  to  Roman  days.  For  Horace's  ^'thought  of  it,"  see 
Odes,  ii.  6  (Septimi,  Grades),  where  if  the  poet  could  not  end  his  days 
at  Tivoli,  then  he  would  seek  Tarentum — that  smiling  comer  of  the 
world,  the  happy  land  of  Spartan  Phalanthus.] 

11.  You  have,  then,  this  Tarentum  mainly  expressing  the  maritime  power 
of  Magna  Cnecia;  but  it  is  a  Doric  maritime  power,  as  opposed  to  the 
Attic;  it  is  essentially  Lacedaemomum  TarenJtum.'^  Therefore^  the  Dioscuri 
reign  over  Tarentum,  as  Athena  does  over  Attica;  but  the  Dioscuri  are 
associated  with  a  local  hero — Taras,  the  son  of  Neptune. 

12.  Now  Pausanias  says  that  the  Tarentines  sent  images  to  Delphi  (and 
a  tithe  of  the  spoil  of  the  Peucetians) :  "  And  the  offerings  were  the  art 
of  Onatas  the.  Aeginetan,  and  his  fellow-worker,  Calynthus.  And  Opis,  the 
King  of  the  lapygi,  is  coming  as  an  ally  to  the  Peucetians,  and  he  in 
the  fight  is  imaged  as  like  one  that  is  dead ;  and  standing  over  him  as  he 
lies  are  the  heroes  Taras  and  Phalanthus  of  Lacedaemon ;  and  not  £sr  from 
Phalanthus  is  a  dolphin.  For,  before  reaching  Italy,  he  is  said  to  have 
been  wrecked  in  the  Crisasan  Sea,  and  to  have  been  carried  by  a  dolphin 
to  ]«od."> 

[This  passage  further  explains  the  adoption  of  the  dolphin  as  the 
Tarentine  type  on  its  coins.  Taras,  or  Phalanthus,  is  represented  as 
riding  on  the  waves,  both  as  typifying  ''the  maritime  power"  of 
Tarentum,  and  as  recording  the  legend  of  her  founder.  Ruskin's 
memoranda  continue,  ''Then  the  great  Arion  place  in  Lucian"  —  a 
parallel  passage,  that  is,  to  the  story  of  Phalanthus.  It  is  in  the 
Deontm  Dialogi  (Neptuni  et  Delphines),  and  had  been  versified  by 
Ruskin  in  his  "Last  Song  of  Arion"  (see  Vol.  II.  p.  114) — a  piece 
founded  on  the  story,  told  in  Herodotus  and  Lucian,  of  Arion  leaping 
into  the  sea,  after  his  last  and  sweetest  song,  and  being  carried  safe 
ashore  by  a  dolphin.  Ruskin's  memoranda  next  say,  "Strabo  delicious 
about  helmet,  and  his  great  description" — a  reference  to  a  passage 
which  contains  a  general  account  of  the  finvoured  position  of  Taren- 
tum, and  which  explains  the  occurrence  of  a  helmet  on  the  coins  of 
the  dty  (see  §  IS,  and  compare  Fors  Clauigeroj  Letter  25).  The 
passage  in  Strabo  (book  iii.  ch.  3,  §§  1,  8)  is  as  follows :  "  The  Gulf  of 
Tarentum  is  for  the  most  part  destitute  of  a  port,  but  here  there  is 
a  spacious  and  commodious  harbour  closed  in  by  a  great  bridge.  It 
is  100  stadia  in  circuit  This  port,  at  the  head  of  its  basin  which 
recedes  most  inland,  forms,  with  the  exterior  sea,  an  isthmus  which 
connects  the  peninsula  with  the  land.  The  city  is  situated  upon  this 
peninsula.     The  neck  of  land  is  so  low  that  ships  are  easily  hauled 

^  fHorace :  Odei,  iii.  6,  66.1 

'  uBcNcause  Castor  and  Pollux  were  especiallv  worshipped  at  Sparta,  whither 
they  aad  oome  from  CTrene  as  to  "the  chamber  they  nad  loved  most  dearly 
whue  they  dwelt  among  men"  (Pausanias,  iii.  16,  2).] 

«  [x.  13,  6.] 


896  APPENDIX 

over  it  ftom  side  to  side.  The  rite  of  the  city  likewise  is  extremely 
low  {raw€ivhv  ^  koI  rh  rrjs  ir<$Xcois  JSo^^;  the  ground,  however,  rises 
slightly  towards  the  citadel.  The  old  wall  of  the  city  has  an  immense 
drcait,  but  now  the  portion  towards  the  isthmus  is  deserted/'  Strabo 
then  goes  on  to  give  an  account  of  the  founding  of  Tarentum.  Certain 
of  the  Spartans,  who  had  not  joined  the  army  in  the  Messenian  war, 
were  degraded  and  known  as  Parthenise.  They  detennined  to  rebel; 
'*  but  the  chief  magistrates  becoming  acquainted  with  the  existence  of 
the  plot,  employed  certain  persons  who,  by  feigning  friendship  to  the 
cause,  should  be  able  to  give  some  inteltigence  of  the  nature  of  it.  .  .  . 
It  was  agreed  that  at  the  Hyacinthine  games  they  should  make  a  simul- 
taneous attack  when  Pbalanthus  should  put  on  his  helmet.  Just  as 
the  chief  contest  came  off,  a  herald  came  forth  and  proclaimed,  'Let 
not  Phalanthus  put  on  his  helmet'  ^  The  conspirators  perceiving  that 
they  had  been  betrayed,  fled  and  prayed  for  mercy."  They  were  ulti- 
mately sent  under  Phalanthus  to  round  a  colony  in  Italy. 

Having  thus  traced  the  legend  and  history  connected  with  Greek 
ideas  of  the  horse  and  the  seaphorse,  and  having  explained  the  various 
types  on  coins  of  Tarentum,  Ruskin  intended  to  turn  to  actual  coins, 
and  to  discuss  the  treatment  of  the  types  from  an  artistic  point  of 
view.  In  yet  a  third  place  of  the  MS.  book  there  are  notes  for  this 
part  of  the  lecture,] 

IS.  The  first  thing  you  must  observe,  with  respect  to  the  Grreek  treat- 
ment of  horses  genenlly,  is  the  distinction  between  their  idea  of  the  form 
of  the  horses  of  the  land  and  sea.  Here,  on  a  coin  of  Syracuse,'  is  a  sharp 
and  dear  impresrion  of  a  central  type  of  the  sea-horse,  in  which  note, 
first,  the  wings  are  griffin's  wings,  they  are  round  instead  of  sharp  at  the 
extremities,  the  lines  turning  round  with  a  backward  swirl.  I  say  lines, 
-not  feathers,  expressly,  for  this  round  end  of  the  wing  is  given  to  it  just 
that  you  may  notice  that  it  does  not  represent  feathers,  but  the  vortex  of 
whirlwind.  I  put  beride  it  the  wing  of  a  Victory,  that  you  may  see  the 
difference.' 

Secondly,  his  body  ends  in  a  long  and  coiled  tail,  which  divides  at 
the  extremity  like  a  fish's,  to  distinguish  him  frxxm  a  serpent.  As  the 
wing  represents  the  coils  of  the  wind,  so  this  of  the  waves. 

Thirdly,  he  has  a  long  dorsal  crest  or  fin,  partly  resembling  the  ordi- 
nary crests  of  dragons,  but  in  the  conception  of  it,  founded  on  the  real 
spinous  dorsal  fins  of  fish,  and  on  the  long  dorsal  fin  of  the  true  hippo- 
campus. 

Fourthly,  he  has  here  a  short  pectoral  fin,  not  always  present;  but 
chiefly,  be  has  a  long  weak  neck  and  small  head,  being  altogether  mean 
and  feeble;  ia  this  forepart  of  his  body,  there  is  nearly  always  a  bridle 
hanging  loose  firom  his  mouth — as  of  a  creature  not  free — but  loose,  who 
ought  to  be  guided  and  is  not. 

14.  Now,  compare  with  this  the  typical  form  of  the  true  horse.  You 
have  usually,  on  the  Tarentum  coins,  a  warrior  armed  with  two  lances  and 

^  [Compare  below,  p.  411.1 
[Shown  on  the  centre  of  Plate  £ ;  from  a  coin  in  the  British  Museum.] 
'Not  shown   on   the   plate  here ;  for  the   flying  Victory  on  the  coins  of 
PUte  XXIII.  (see  above,  p.  361).] 


The  Rjdprs 


THE  RIDERS  OF  TARENTUM  897 

a  roand  shield,  otherwise  naked,  riding  a  noble  horse  with  a  richlj  knotted 
mane;  on  the  reverse  you  have  a  similarlj  naked  rider  of  a  dolphin,  bear- 
ing in  his  right  hand  a  helmet,  a  cap,  or  a  figure  of  Victory;  in  his  left 
hud  a  trident  or  round  buckler,  or  both,  and  with  a  symbol  in  the  field  of 
owl,  eagle,  thunderbolt,  or  star. 

Here  are  the  two  figures,^  from  the  two  sides  of  the  same  coin,  both 
well  preserved,  and  the  figure  on  the  dolphin  giving  you  an  unusually  fine 
type,  on  so  small  a  scale,  of  the  heroic  Grreek  head.  There  is  no  doubt  of 
the  meaning  of  this  figure — the  inscription  TARAS — ^that  it  is  the  son  of 
Poseidon ;  but  I  believe  that  there  is  an  undercurrent  of  intention  of  re- 
presenting the  city  itself  of  Taras,  and  it  is  in  this  ambiguous  character, 
half  as  the  personification  of  the  city,  half  as  its  protecting  spirit,  that 
Taras  holds  in  his  hand  this  helmet,  of  which  he  is  pulling  up  and  dress- 
ing the  crest  with  one  hand.  He  carries  two  spears  in  his  left  hand,  and 
strikes  downwards  with  a  third.  The  heads  of  the  two  spears  are  shown 
in  front  of  the  horse's  neck,  though  in  truth  they  are  to  be  understood 
as  behind  it,  for  they  never  could  come  into  this  position.  Secondly, 
observe  the  splendidly  knotted  mane  of  the  horse,  and  apparently  the 
rider's  hair  curled  or  knotted  in  the  same  way.  On  the  reverse  of  the 
coin  you  find  him  raising,  or  as  it  were  combing  out  the  crest  of  his 
helmet. 

^  [Shown  (Uiougb  not  all  the  details  are  discernible  in  these  specimens)  at  the 
top  of  Plate  F ;  from  a  coin  in  the  British  Museum  (IIL  C.  9  in  the  exhibited 
electrotypes).] 


IV 


THE  EAGLE  OF  ELIS' 


1.  I  9VVPOBK  that  in  the  clurin  of  oar  English  cathedrals  no  piece  of  their 
famitnre  is  looked  npon  by  peraons  trained  in  the  disciplines  of  the  Church 
more  reverently  than  the  gilded  eagle  which  supports  the  reading-desk  for 
the  lessons.  And  no  pieces  of  medieval  scolptare  are  more  valuable  than 
the  marble  eagles  supporting  the  desks  of  the  great  pulpits  on  which  the 
masters  of  the  Pisan  school^  who  restored  the  arts  in  Italj,  spent,  as  we 
shall  see  hereafter,*  their  heat  thought  and  skilL 

2.  We  are  so  accustomed  to  the  use  of  this  symbol  of  the  power  of 
preaching  that  it  hardly  excites  us  to  a  momentary  question  as  to  the 
reasm  of  the  choice,  which,  however,  if  we  do  think  of  it  more  than  a 
moment,  will  surely  appear  strange,  and  the  longer  we  think  of  it,  the 
more  stange.  That  the  spirit  of  the  gospel  of  Christianity  should  be 
thought  well  represented  by  a  creature  of  prey — entirely  voracious  and  cruel, 
solitary  and  gloomy  in  its  life,  and  foul  in  its  habits — is  singular  enough  at 
first;  and  that  this  ravenous  creature  should  be  further  imagined  to  be 
especially  the  expression  of  the  Spirit  of  the  Apostle  St  John,  and  that  by 
the  united  heart  and  intellect  of  long  ecclesiastical  ages,  is  assuredly  one 
of  the  most  curious  phenomena  recorded  in  the  history  of  human  mind.* 

S.  Be  that  as  it  may,  there  is  no  minor  subject  of  our  own  immediate 
study  more  interesting  than  the  treatment  of  the  power  of  this  bird  by  art 
appealing  to  imagination  under  the  influence  at  once  of  mihtary  and  re- 
l4^us  ardour,  and  carving  the  eagle  as  the  indication  of  religious  love 
above  every  church  porch  which  Christian  knights  entered,  stooping  the 
eagle  crests  on  their  helmets,  and  without  casting  off  the  falcon  from 
their  fists. 

4.  We  must  go  back  far  to  get  at  the  first  origin  of  the  conception. 

You  find  in  Egyptian  mythology,  briefly,  the  hawk  as  a  symbol  of  the 
sun,  the  vulture  as  a  symbol  of  the  air,  and  the  wing  merely  as  one  of 
general  power  and.  overshadowing  victory— either  of  God  or  Kings.  We 
will  put  for  the  present  out  of  question  this  mere  power  of  the  wing,  since, 
wheuier  it  be  fisstened  to  a  globe,  or  a  serpent,  or  a  buU,  or  a  human  form, 
in  Egypt,  Assyria,  Greece,  and  Quristendom  it  stands  vaguely  for  a  sign  of 
any  kind  of  spiritual  strength  or  for  the  ideal  strength  of  government.  But 
the  complete  forms  of  hawk  and  vulture  have  more  definite  purpose.     In 

^  [For  the  place  of  this  lecture  in  Raskin's  flcheme  for  a  sequel  to  Aratra  PmMci, 

see  Introduction ;  above,  p.  Iviii.] 

'  [See  the  account  of  Niecola  Pisano's  pulpit  in  Vol  iPAmo,  §  2i.] 

'  [On  the  symbols  of  the  Evangelists  (or  uieir  Gospels),  see  above,  Leduret  on 

Art,  §  38  (p.  60).] 


EAGLB  OF  ELIS  890 


your  Standard  Series  I  have  put  Ros^lini's  plate  of  Rameses  adoring  the 

•an  power  under  the  hawk  symboL^ 

[Here  the  MS.  breaks  off,  Ruskin  merely  noting,  '*  Fill  up,  as  I  have 
time,  with  change  to  griffin" — i.e.f  the  type  which  combined  the  Lion 
and  the  Eagle.  There  are  notes  under  this  head  elsewhere  in  i^ 
MS.  book,  but  they  do  not  explain  themselves.  The  reader  should, 
however,  refer  to  "  Verona  and  its  Rivers,"  §  14  (VoL  XIX.  p.  437), 
and  *'  The  School  of  Fk>ience,"  §  21  (above,  p.  362).  The  MS.  then 
resumes : — ] 

5.  But  the  more  important  mythic  power  of  the  eagle  is  that  which 
it  has  in  Greece  as  the  symbol  of  Zeus,  which  to  understand  you  must  first 
consider  the  real  character  of  Zeus  himself.  Briefly,  he  is  the  ph3rsical  power 
of  the  heavens  in  sustaining  and  governing  mankind — primarily,  in  sustain- 
ing them ;  he  is  the  giver  of  rain,  filling  th^  hearts  with  food  and  gladness  * 
— and  so  their  heavenly  Father,  the  &>d  who  ministers  to  and  rules  them. 
All  the  other  physical  powers  are  subordinate  to  his;  Demeter  can  feed 
only  as  she  receives  the  rain  into  her  bosom ;  Athena  is  the  kindness  of 
the  air,  and  its  anger* — a  part  of  the  power  of  Zeus — anticipating  in  the 
Greek  mind  the  myth  of  the  Christian  one — ''not  made  nor  begotten,  but 
proceeding;"  Hermes  is  the  force  of  the  cloud,  and  Poseidon  of  the 
gathered  weight  of  waters.  Zeus  is  the  source  of  all — ^the  entire  question 
of  the  life  and  death  being  summed  up  in  that  dXXa  rk  iSci.^ 

6.  Zeus  is  therefore  essentially  a  benevolent  power,  and  his  lightning 
is  not,  except  in  an  accidental  and  inessential  way,  used  for  chastisement. 
The  thunder  is  a  sign  not  of  his  anger  but  of  his  special  jhvour ;  it  is  ph3r8i- 
cally  the  besiiming  of  the  rain  that  feeds ;  mythically,  the  voice  of  fitvouring 
presence.  And  as  the  lightning  is  the  precursor,  so  the  eagle  is  the  actuu 
overshadowing  and  spreamng  forth,  of  his  power  in  the  clouds  of  heaven ;  it 
is  to  him  exactly  what  the  A^s  is  to  Minerva — borne  in  the  same  way  on 
the  left  arm,  but  by  Zeus  always  essentially  in  blessing,  not  in  punish- 
ment. 

f.  a  a  •  a  •  •  .  • 

[Here   follows  in  the   MS.   a  long  and  carefully  written  passage 

which  Ruskin  afterwards  embodied  in  Aratra  Penielici  (§§  195-197 :  see 

above,  pp.  343-345,  where  in  footnotes  a  few  additional  passages  have 

been  ffiven  from  the  MS.  of  the  present  lecture.     The  passage  ends 

with  tne  observation  that  on  Greek  coins  Zeus  is  often  ''marked  as  a 

divine  power  merely  by  the  attributes  of  the  eagle  and  thunderbolt."] 

8.  The  exact  meaning  and  connection  of  these  attributes  you  will  find, 

I  think,  best  given  in  one  passage  of  Pindar,  the  address  to  the  lyre— the 

power  of  the  Muses  in  the  begiiming  of  the  1st  Pythian :  "  And  thou  canst 

quench  the  spear-headed  lightning  of  ever  flowing  fire  [acvoov  irvpoi],  and 


^  [No.  180  in  the  Referance  Series  (Vol.  XXL  p.  44.] 
•  'Acts  xiv.  17.] 


t 

4 


Oomi>are  above,  p.  143.1 

''But  who  sends  rain?'^    Aristophanes  :  Clouds,  386-^968:— 

Stepiiadei,  6  Zedf  8'  lifuw^  ^pt,  irpdf  rfft  Vift,  oHM/iiriot  o^  $tht  49tw  ; 
Socrates*      xocot  Ztih;  oO  /iii  Xifft^ett'  otd'  i^n  Ze(^. 
Stepsiadei.  rl  \4yta  ^; 

4XXA  rtt  Ui ;] 


400  APPENDIX 

the  Eagle  of  Jore  sleeps  alxnre  the  bolt,  letting  his  swift  wings  decline 
at  his  sides,  monarch  of  birds,  and  thou  canst  pour  the  blade  cknid  of 
fWftyning  slumber  upon  his  hooked  head  [er'  dytcvkf  KparC],  and  he,  pleased 
and  possessed  by  Uie  quiyering  note,  lifts  up  his  back  wet  with  rain" — 
vyp!6v  vSfTow  aimpet  Obserre  this  epitiiet  as  well  as  the  acraos  said  of  the 
lightning,  the  very  same  word  whidi  Aristophanes  first  uses  of  the  clonds.^ 
You  will  find  when  once  you  have  got  the  due  of  it,  that  their  idea  of 
the  fire  and  the  rain  are  always  connected,  not  as  opposed  but  united  and 
beneficent  powers,  and  that  the  song  of  the  Muses  causing  them  to  rest  does 
not  mean  that  they  are  malignant  forces,  but  expresses  only  that  stmnge 
joy  and  peace  which  comes  over  earth  and  sky  when  a  summer  storm 
has  passed. 

9.  I  translated  cr'  dyicvXy  Kfiori  "  his  hooked  head " ;  it  is  a  better  word 
in  Greek  than  can  be  rendered  in  English,  and  we  will  let  the  (xreeks  show 
us  themselves  what  they  meant  by  it.  Here  are  the  two  attributes,  the 
lightning  and  eagle's  head,  as  they  are  g^iyen  on  opposite  sides  of  the  coins 
of  Ehs,'  the  purpose  in  each  case  being  to  give  in  the  eagle's  head  its 
overshadowing  brow  as  well  as  its  hooked  beak;  and  in  the  thunderbolt 
you  have  the  symbol  at  <me  end  of  fire,  at  the  other^  of  spiral  whirlwind : 
'^Rutili  tris  ignis,  et  alitis  Austri"* — you  get  Virgil's  twelve  rays  almost 
accurately  in  this  more  finished  type  of  thundeiholt  from  the  coins  of 
Syracuse,^  where  the  quivering  of  the  fire  is  more  deariy  expressed,  but 
this  is  the  essential  Greek  form — whirlwind  and  fire.  Then  in  this  coin  of 
Agrigentum  *^  you  have  the  eagle's  hooked  head  given  still  more  rightly,  in 
the  action  it  is  meant  for  of  tearing  the  fiesh. 

10.  Now  it  would  be  easy  for  us  to  dwell  on  some  of  the  quaKties  of 
these  eagles'  heads,  because  they  were  Chreek  until  we  fonded  them  entirdy 
fine.  But  they  are  nothing  of  the  kind;  they  are  very  rude  and  poor 
renderings  of  the  form  required ;  only  they  mark  for  you,  what  I  wish  you 
always  to  seize  first,  the  Greek  conception  of  things.  If  you  look  through 
the  casual  expression  relating  to  birds  in  Greek  poetry  you  will  find  the 
great  facts  felt  about  them  are  .that  they  have  bedcs  and  claws.  Nvw  you 
may  be  always  pretty  sure  that  a  Greek  abstraction  of  this  sort  will  be 
a  true  and  useful  one ;  and  accordingly  if  you  think  over  a  bird's  nature  you 
will  find  it  is  essentially  in  beak  and  claw — in  the  prolongation,  that  is,  of 
the  skull  into  a  hook  without  teeth,  and  the  arming  of  the  ends  of  the  toes 
with  talons,  which  are  not  so  much  to  scratch  and  wound  as  to  hold  fast, 
whether  it  be  branches  of  trees  or  prey.     It  is  not  the  wings  that  are  the 

»  {Chudg,  275.] 

'  ^wo  eagles  of  Elis  are  here  given  (below  on  Plate  £) ;  ftom  the  coin,  of 
which  an  electrotype  is  II.  C.  16  in  the  esutibition  at  the  British  Museum.  A  re- 
production of  the  type  of  lightning  is  not  here  included,  because  an  enlargement 
of  the  design  was  given  by  Ruskin  as  a  plate  in  Deucakon  (see  a  later  volume).] 

3  [Virgil:  uSneid,  viiL  4d0«  where  the  poet  describes  the  twelve  parts  of  the 
thunderbolt : — 

''Tris  imbris  torti  radios,  tris  nubis  aquoss, 
Addiderant,  rutili  tris  ignis  et  [tris]  alitis  AnstrL"] 

*  [Shown  here,  at  the  bottom  on  Plate  F ;  from  the  coin  of  Syracuse  which  is 
IV.  C.  do  in  the  exhibited  electrotypes  at  the  British  Museum.  Toe  inscription  is 
^'Agathocles,  King"  (b.c.  d06).] 

^  [Also  shown  on  Plate  F ;  from  the  coin  which  is  II.  C.  16  in  the  same  series.] 


THE  EAGLE  OF  ELIS  401 

essential  part  of  a  bird.  The  cockchafer  has  twice  the  wings  with  which 
the  eagles  fly ;  and  it  is  a  beetle,  not  a  bird,  that  Trygseus  must  harness  for 
heaven.^  But  it  is  the  carrying  forward  of  the  face  and  the  lower  hands 
into  crooked  weapons^  the  fact  that  the  head  is  dyicvXos^  and  the  feet 
ya/£^wic€s*  whicli  universally  impress  the  Greeks'  imagination;  and  you 
may  be  sure  that^  whatever  else  you  have  not  told  you,  these  two  points 
will  be  insisted  on  by  him. 

11.  They  were  made  notable  to  him,  remember,  by  a  condition  of  his 
life  which  we  happily  know  no  more,  unless  it  has  been  brought  back 
within  these  few  last  dreadful  months^ — the  continual  abandonment  of  the 
dead  to  dogs  and  birds.  Among  us  our  idea  of  the  dog  is  raised  by  his 
companionship, ,  and  of  the  bird  because  for  one  carnivorous  bird  of  prey 
we  see  a  thousand  insect  or  grain  eaters,  and  forget  that  their  time  is  passed 
more  in  eating  than  singing.  But  to  the  Gireek^  dog  and  bird  were  essen- 
tially tearers  up  of  flesh,  and  he  thinks  of  them  as  almost  the  same  creature 
in  varied  forms  or  power — im/vbs  Kwav,  Ba<f>oivh^  aier^s.^ 

12,  This  idea,  then,  he  is  certain  to  give  you,  and  yet  in  art  he  gives 
it  languidly.  The  best  part  of  these  Greek  eagles'  heads  is  the  rendering 
of  the  overshadowing  of  the  brow,  which  he  dwells  upon,  partly  because 
here  the  eagle  is  a  cloud  and  not  a  beast  of  prey,  but  also  with  his  fine 
instinct  for  muscular  and  bony  form.  And  it  will  show  you  in  an  interest- 
ing manner  the  separation  between  good  and  vulgar  art,  if  you  look  at 
these  modem  engravings  of  eagles  beside  the  old  coins.^ 

They  have  got  thS  brow,  then,  fairly;  for  the  rest,  neither  in  the 
beak  nor  body  have  they  reached  any  nicety.  There  is  no  nostril  in  the 
beak,  the  lower  mandible  is  hardly  marked,  and  in  their  full  figures  there 
is  really  no  understanding  at  all  of  the  bird's  form  or  action.  Not  that 
either  of  these  are  so  grand  as  one  fencies.  An  eagle  is  but  an  awkward 
beast  The  other  day  one  of  my  friends  saw  two  large  ones  in  a  state  of 
great  excitement  at  the  Gardens,  helping  each  other  to  catch  a  mouse,  and 
the  mouse  got  off  after  alL^  .  .  .* 

[At  this  point  the  MS.  breaks  off;  but  it  appears  from  notes  for 
the  lecture  in  the  earlier  draft  that  Ruskin  meant  to  conclude  with  a 
contrast  between  Italian  eagles  and  Greek,  deducing  from  them  after 
his  manner  a  contrast  between  the  characteristics  of  Italian  and  Greek 
art  severally.  ''The  in^ulse  of  good,  in  both  Greek  and  Italian, 
is  the  desire  to  give  more  life  and  veracity,   even  imitative   veracity 

*  [Trygwus,  the  old  vintager,  who  in  Aristophanes'  play— the  Peace  (81)— flies 
up  to  heaven  on  a  beetle  to  oriug  down  the  goddees.] 


*  [So  Pindar  of  the  eagle,  Ay K0iop  Kdpa_{Pyth.  i.  16).] 


With  crooked  talons."  So  in  iEschylus  {Pram^heiUy  488),  and  Homer 
(IHad~  xvi.  428,  etc.).] 

^  [Affain  a  reference  to  the  Franco-Germau  war;  compare  p.  100  n.] 

^  [j&chjlvLB  of  the  eagle,  ''the  winged  dog,  the  bloody  eagle"  (PrametheuSf 
1043) ;  quoted  again  in  Eagl^9  Nest,  §  157.] 

^  [Here  Ruskin  showed  (as  a  note  in  the  MS.  indicates)  some  engravings  from 
Morris's  Birde.'] 

^  [Compare  "The  Story  of  Arachne,"  §  0,  where  Ruskin  again  uses  this  incident 
(above,  p.  373).] 

^  [Here  Ruskin  notes :  '^  Fill  in,  dwelling  on  the  fi^t  that  an  eagle  never  looks 
at  anybody."] 

XX.  2c 


402  APPENDIX 

— state  this  broadly  here  [compare^  in  Aratra  Pentelici,  ''The  School 
of  Athens/'  p.  333  above].  Then  in  subsequent  lecture  on  Eagle 
of  £lis  take  it  up  for  perrect  illustration,  giving  Pisano's  Eagle,  San 
Giovanni  Battista,  Griffin  tomb,  etc."  But,  he  continues  in  noting 
the  heads  of  his  argument,  ''Thej  did  this  under  different  conditions 
— the  hope  or  not  of  immortality.  And,  therefore,  one  with  develop- 
ment of  emotion  and  imagination  to  its  highest  reach ;  the  other^ 
with  eminently  prosaic  rectitude.  Prose  of  Greeks:  want  of  imagina- 
tion in  perpetually  repeating  subject,  in  symbolic  treatment,  in  severity. 
In  Eagle  of  Ells  show  how  prosy  the  Greek  eagles  are  after  all." 

The  remarks  here  on  the  veracity  of  the  Greek  and  Italian  eagles 
should  be  compared  with  the  similar  discussion  in  The  Eagles  Nest, 
^  156,  157.  The  Greek  type  of  eagle  is  here  illustrated  from  a  coin 
of  Agrigentum  (Plate  F:  see  p.  400  n.).  The  engraving  of  an  Italian 
eagle  here  given  (Plate  G)  was  made  by  Mr.  Hugh  Allen  under 
Ruskin's  directions,  and  is  perhaps  one  of  the  examples  referred  to 
by  him  above. 

The  subject  of  *'  the  hope  or  not  of  immortality,"  as  affecting  methods 
and  ideals  of  art,  is  dealt  with  in  the  next  Appendix.] 


*- 


an   Type    of    Eag 


GREEK   AND    CHRISTIAN   ART 

AS  AFFECTED  BY  THE  IDEA   OF  IMMORTALITY  ^ 


1.  So  far,  then,  both  the  schools'  are  precisely  similar;  both  are  pursuers 
of  truth — ^vivid,  continual,  modest  in  their  hunger  and  thirst  after  this 
freshly  perceived  nature.  But  the  pursuit  took  place  under  very  opposite 
conditions.  You  recollect,  I  hope^  how  much^  in  the  course  of  my  lectures 
in  the  spring,^  I  dwelt  upon  the  distinction  between  the  men  who  work,  so 
far  as  they  are  sincere,  without  hope  of  a  future  life,  and  those  in  whom 
that  hope,  however  dim,  is  the  ground  of  their  chief  energies.  Of  every 
great  art  school  this  u  the  first  question  to  be  asked,  in  order  to  understand 
its  character — Does  it,  or  does  it  not,  believe  in  the  immortality  of  men  ? 
2.  And  observe  that  this  question  is  one  utterly  distinct  from  the  one 
so  often  put  with  it,  as  to  belief  in  the  existence  of  a  God,  or  Gods.  The 
two  subjects  of  faith  have  nothing  whatever  in  common,  or  of  necessary 
connection.  It  is  quite  possible  to  believe  in  the  immortality  of  men  with- 
out recognizing  the  existence  of  any  other  than  human  spirits.  And  it  is 
quite  possible  to  believe  in  the  annihilation  of  men,  or  of  grasshoppers, 
without  therefore  supposing  that  men  or  locusts  are  the  only  creatures 
possible;  or  denying  the  probability  that  there  may  be  living  around  us 
spirits  more  exalted  above  humanity  than  we  are  above  insects,  having  the 
power  of  Grods  over  us  now,  and  incapable  of  change  in  the  future.  Note 
therefore  distinctly,  once  for  all,  that  the  question  of  belief  or  disbelief  in 
Death  is  one ;  the  question  of  belief  or  disbelief  in  God  is  another.  There 
have  been  thousands  of  wise  men  who  have  trusted  the  love  of  Gods,  with- 
out expecting  to  be  ever  made  their  companions,  and  have  contemplated 
the  possibility  of  their  own  extinction,  without  imagining  that  it  must  involve 
that  of  the  stars.  And  although  even  reasonablest  men  are  apt  to  be  so 
overclouded  in  thought  by  the  instinct  of  their  own  value  as  to  fancy  that 
their  death  must  leave  a  blank  in  creation,  there  are  at  least  some  of  them 
logical  enough  to  perceive  that  they  have  no  right  to  reproach  a  Maker  who 
resolves  to  unmake,  any  more  than  a  Giver  who  resolves  to  resume. 

^  [The  discussion  in  this  Appendix  is  printed  from  the  first  draft  of  Ruskin^s  MS. 
of  the  course  of  lectures  afterwards  pubushed  as  Aratra  Penteiici^  It  connects  with 
various  passages  in  that  book  {e.g,,  §§  100,  215),  as  also  with  the  lecture  on  ''The 
Eagle  of  £li8"  (see  p.  402).] 

2  [The  Greek  and  the  Christian :  see  Aratra  PenteKei  (above,  p.  338).] 
^  [That  is,  Lecturei  on  Art:  see,  for  instance,  §  149  (above,  p.  140).J 

408 


404  APPENDIX 

5.  Now  the  Greek  and  Italian  schools,  as  thej  agree  in  their  puisuit 
of  tmth,  tkgree  also  in  their  acknowledgment  of  Divine  existence.  Both  of 
them  look  to  Natore,  and  both  of  them  worship  God.  But  they  differ  utterly 
in  their  selfish  imagination.  The  Greek,  practicaDy  and  earnestly,  expected 
no  future  for  himself;  and  the  Italian,  as  practically  and  earnestly,  r^fulated 
his  worldly  life  by  the  anticipation  of  an  eternal  one.  Neither  the  one  nor 
the  other  reached  an  integrity  of  creed ;  the  Greek  was  confused  and  con- 
tradicted by  glimpses  of  hope,  he  brought  upon  his  stage  images  of  foolish, 
incoherent,  and  unhappy  ghosts,  and  in  wayward  passion  of  unconquerable 
sorrow  foretold  peace  to  the  just,  and  punishment  to  the  impure.  So  also  the 
Italian  pride  in  his  eternal  spirit  was  thwarted  by  sickness  of  mortal  fear, 
and  the  Christian  inconsistently  mourned,  as  the  Pagan  inconsistently  rejoiced, 
beside  the  grave  of  his  fiiend.  But  the  law  of  their  being  and  thought  was 
for  the  one  humiliation  and  despair,  and  for  the  other  a  proud  and  infinite 
expectation. 

4.  Now  observe  the  practical  results  of  these  two  states  of  feeling.  First, 
a  good  Pagan's  imagination  of  God  was  nearly  disinterested.  If  wicked  and 
vulgar,  he  would  indeed  pray  to  his  God  fer  gold ;  or  heroic  soldiers  or  kings, 
who  desired  no  wealth,  and  only  useful  authority,  had  nothing  to  ask  of 
Heaven,  except  what  Solomon  asked — ^wisdom,  and  of  that  little,  and  of 
simple  kind.  The  Gods  could  not  do  much  for  him,  at  the  best.  To  give 
him  their  hands  for  a  little  while;  to  guide  him  according  to  their  will, 
then  leave  him  to  die — ^this  was  all  he  expected  of  them.  So  that  he  con- 
ceived of  their  Divine  state  (so  £ur  as  he  thought  of  it  at  all)  dispassionately. 
Their  ways  of  life  were  no  business  of  his,  and,  conceiving  of  them  thus 
without  the  excitement  of  personal  interest,  he  saw  no  dear  evidence  of 
their  Divinity's  being  faultless,  or  infinitely  exalted.  The  sky  was  indeed 
generaUy  blue,  but  sometimes  cloudy  and  contentious.  The  fittes  would,  for 
the  most  part,  assist  good  men,  but  sometimes  capriciously  betray  them; 
and  the  arrangements  of  natural  law,  however  beautiful,  were  not  so  perfect 
as  to  exclude  all  idea  of  disobedience  in  inert  matter. 

5.  Not  so  the  Christian.  His  own  destiny,  and  that  a  wide  one,  de- 
pended on  the  nature  of  Heaven.  All  his  conceptions  of  it  were  modified 
by  his  hopes.  No  vault  of  the  empjrrean  was  too  hi|^  for  the  abode  of  an 
ambition  which  had  become  as  meritorious  as  it  was  insatiable,  nor  any 
purity  too  perfect,  which  was  finally  to  be  communicated  to  himself  on  the 
easy  condition  of  belief,  without  efibrt.  His  mind  was  thus  thrown  into  a 
fever  of  mingled  gratitude,  admiration,  and  desire;  he  could  conceive  of 
no  weakness  in  a  Deity  who  had  done  so  much  for  mankind,  nor  of  any 
limits  to  the  bliss  which  must  surround  the  presence  and  accomplish  the 
promises,  of  an  omnipotent  Deity :  BiBerai  y^p  dvai&i  ikwtSi  yvia '  7rpofui$€ias 
o  diroKCiKTai  ^oaL^ 

6.  In  consequence  of  this  impartiality  of  heart,  the  £Acts,  from  the  con- 
templation of  which  the  Christian  could  at  once  escape  to  his  imagined 
futurity,  impressed  themselves  on  the  Greek  precisely  as  they  are;  and 
the  pdn  or  degradation,  which  modern  religion  ignores  as  a  dream  that  is 

^  [Here  Rosldn  illustrates  the  Christian  standpoint  from  Pindar  (thus  showing 
how  the  one  sometimes  passed  into  the  other,  §  3) :  "  for  by  greedv  hope  our 
bodies  are  enthralled,  but  the  courses  of  events  are  hidden  from  our  fbre-icnowJedge  " 
{Nemean,  xi.  ad  fin.)J\ 


t^m 


GREEK  AND  CHRISTIAN  ART  405 

to  vanish^  were  observed  and  registered  by  the  ancients  as  the  laws  of  their 
total  being.  Their  theology  might  thus  be  mean  or  comfortless,  but  it 
was  founded  on  a  sound  natural  history.  They  might  be  tempted  or  debased 
by  the  memory  of  their  relation  with  the  lower  animals^  but  they  at  least 
neither  evaded  the  fact  nor  expected  it  to  change.  They  examined  the 
conditions  of  all  pain^  without  assuming  groundlessly  that  it  was  to  be 
comforted ;  and  reasoned  of  the  calamities  of  age  and  decay,  without  ventur- 
ing to  anticipate  regeneration. 

7.  The  first  great  consequence  of  this  was,  that  as  they  only  reasoned 
of^  or  represented,  things  in  which  it  was  possible  to  know  whether  they 
were  right  or  wrong,  they  resolved  that  they  would  be  right,  and  would  not 
be  wrong.^  A  Christian  designer,  or  thinker,  was  occupied  in  subjects 
respecting  which  he  could  neither  be  convicted  in  error  nor  approved  in 
truth,  since  they  belonged  to  an  invisible  world.  But  a  Greek,  resolved 
to  confine  his  work  and  statement  to  the  world  he  lived  in,  could,  so  far 
as  he  reached,  know  assuredly  if  he  was  right  or  wrong,  and  concluded  that 
his  duty  was  to  be  by  all  means  the  one,  and  by  no  means  the  other. 

8.  You  will  find,  therefore,  that  so  far  from  Greek  work  being  ideal 
in  the  popular  sense,  it  is  distinguished  from  all  other  good  work  that  ever 
was  done  by  its  absence 'of  imagination;  not  that  the  Grreek  workman  was 
without  the  power,  but  that  he  would  not  trust  it :  he  was  resolved  that 
whatever  he  did  should  be  right,  and  would  not  permit  himself  the  least 
essay  in  any  direction  that  admitted  error.  In  verbal  expression,  and  in 
his  own  mind,  he  would  allow  the  imagination  its  full  power,  because  a 
verbal  statement  could  absolutely  define  nothing  falsely,  it  could  only  set 
the  hearer  thinking  for  himself.  But  when  it  came  to  delineation,  and 
every  line  must  either  be  true  or  false,  he  resolved  that  it  should  be  at  all 
costs  true,  and  that  he  would  attempt  nothing  which  it  was  not  in  his  power 
to  make  so.     That  is  his  specific  character  as  a  Greek. 

Of  course  any  one  nation's  work  is  connected  with  or  founded  on  that 
of  others  preceding  or  surrounding  it,  and  in  the  best  Greek  work  you  will 
find  some  things  that  are  still  barbarous,  and  in  most  Greek  work  you  will 
find  much  that  is  so.  But  whatever  in  it  is  barbarous  is  not  the  Greek  part 
of  it^  it  is  the  Phcenician,  or  Egyptian,  or  Pelasgian  part  of  it ;  the  essential 
and  distinctive  Grecian  of  it  is  its  veracity, — that  whereas  Eastern  nations 
drew  their  heroes  with  eight  legs,  the  Greeks  drew  them  with  two;  and 
where  Egyptians  drew  their  deities  with  cats'  heads,  the  Greeks  drew  them 
with  men's;  and  out  of  all  fallacy,  disproportion,  and  indefiniteness  were 
day  by  day  withdrawing,  exercising  and  exalting  themselves  into  a  restricted, 
simple,  exact,  and  demonstrable  truth.  This  cold,  but  safe,  precision  and 
rectitude,  then,  were  the  first  laws  of  Greek  work,  and  an  absence  of 
imagination,  sometimes  nearly  total. 

9.  But,  secondly,  so  far  as  imaginative  power  existed,  it  was  spent  by 
the  Greek  in  beautifying  or  animating  the  things  of  this  world,  and  there- 
fore often  on  curiously  inferior  subjects.  I  told  you,  in  my  opening  lecture 
of  this  course,  that  the  entire  Greek  intellect,  as  compared  to  mediaeval 
intellect,  was    in  a  childish  phase.'      But  observe,   childishness   does  not 

^  [See  ArtOra  PenteHci,  §  206  (above,  p.  851.] 

*  [Leetore  iL  of  Aratra,  as  finally  arranged :  see  p.  221.] 


406  APPENDIX 

necessarily  imply  inferiority.^  There  may  be  a  vigorous,  acute,  pure,  and 
solemn  childhood,  and  there  may  be  a  weak,  dull,  foul,  and  ridiculous  con- 
dition of  advanced  life,  but  the  one  is  still  essentially  the  childish,  and  the 
other  the  adult  stage,  though  the  first  is  in  such  conditions  the  noblest. 
On  the  other  hand  I  do  not  mean  to  imply  that  the  Gh-eek  childhood  was 
nearer  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven  than  the  mediaeval  youth.  I  mean  that  it 
was  an  inferior  state,  though  having  its  own  special  advantages  never  again 
to  be  recovered.  The  mediaeval  spirit  was  more  grown  up  than  the  Greek, 
and  ours  is  more  grown  up  than  the  mediaeval ;  and  there  has  been  a  steady 
gain  in  each  step,  and  an  inevitable  loss,  and  among  us  modems,  much  more 
loss,  than  was  inevitable  by  our  own  fault.     Of  that  hereafter. 

^  [The  passage  '*But  observe  .  .  .  adult  stage"  was  embodied  in  the  printed 
lectures  (above,  p.  248).] 


VI 

SOME     CHARACTERISTICS     OF    GREEK 
ART  IN  RELATION  TO  CHRISTIAN' 


Domesticity 

1.  The  essential  function  of  the  Greek  Venus  is  child-bearing.'  We  fancy^ 
many  of  us,  the  Greeks  were  not  a  domestic  people.  It  does  not  indeed 
follow  directly,  from  their  thought  of  woman  chiefly  as  a  bearer  of  children, 
that  their  life  should  be  domestic  in  our  sense.  But  it  wag  domestic  in 
our  sense,  and  its  strength  depended  on  its  being  so.  That,  and  the  power 
of  the  Roman  and  the  power  of  Feudalism  are  but  one  great  Papacy  or 
Fatherhood,  all  their  life  depending  on  the  love  and  obedience  rendered 
by  children  to  their  parents,  and  on  the  parents  looking  to  it  that  they 
deserved  the  obedience  they  claimed.  And  for  wifehood  I  know  not  in  all 
the  range  of  modem  novels,  anything  quite  so  pretty  in  domesticity  as  the 
scene  in  Xenophon's  (Economics  between  the  Athenian  husband  and  his 
bride  of  fifteen,  when  he  takes  her  first  to  see  all  his  cupboards  and  gives 
her  the  keys.^ 

2.  Now  all  Greek  art,  all  Venetian  art,  all  fine  German  art — Diirer  and 
Holbein  chiefly — and  all  fine  English  art — Gainsborough  and  Reynolds — is 
founded  on  Domesticity ;  and  all  Florentine  art,  as  such,  on  the  reverse  of 
domesticity — on  Monachism,  or  tbrms  of  Imaginative  Passion ;  and  the  entry 
of  the  Greek  blood  into  Tuscan  sculpture  is  in  nothing  more  marked  in 
Niccola  Pisano  than  by  his  instantly  making  the  very  beietsts  domestic,  and 
instead  of  grifiins  symbolical  of  the  sun,  and  dragons  symbolical  of  the 
devil,  supporting  the  pulpit  of  Siena  on  the  back  of  a  plain  lioness  with 
her  cubs.  There  she  is  for  you.  I  sketched  her  from  the  marble  this 
summer  at  Siena,  and  I  commend  her  heartily  to  the  study  of  the  British 
Lion.^ 

• 

^  [The  passages  in  this  Appendix  are  printed  from  loose  sheets  of  MS.  (now 
bound  up  at  Brantwood  in  a  volume  entitled  ''The  School  of  Florence,  etc."). 
A  first  draft  of  some  of  them  occurs  in  one  of  the  ledgers,  above  described  (p.  xliz.). 
The  passages  were  written  for  ArtUra  PerUelid,  and  may  have  been  given  in  the 
lectures  as  delivered.  Hie  passa^i^  are  here  numbered  for  convenience  of  reference, 
and  descriptive  headings  are  added  in  italics.] 

3  [See  Aratra  Penteiici,  §  188  (above,  p.  887).] 

'  'See  the  Econamiit,  ch.  ix.] 

*  [See  above,  Plate  E,  p.  d6a] 

407 


408  APPENDIX 


Body  and  Spirit 

S.  Next,  the  Greek  Aphrodite  is  a  pretty  person,  and  the  Florentine 
a  plain  one.^ 

And  yet  I  said  that  Greek  heauty  was,  as  distinct  from  Florentine, 
airpoa-inros,  without  face,  and  that  the  Italians  carved  the  face  only,  and 
the  Greeks  the  body.' 

I  must  take  two  other  subjects  for  comparison  now.  I  cannot  enlarge 
these  two  subjects  for  you,  but  I  shall  put  them  in  your  copying  series, 
to  be  thought  over  at  leisure.  Here  are  two  rough  sketches  of  a  Greek 
terra^cotta,  of  a  girl  dancing.*  She  is  leaping  up,  and  turning  as  she 
leaps;  her  dress  is  just  rippled  up  into  little  waves  as  she  descends  in 
the  air.  The  artist's  entire  purpose  in  the  drapery  is  to  show  either  the 
beauty  of  the  body  itself,  or  its  action.  He  has  no  thought  of  the  girl's 
mind  at  all;  she  is  merely  a  buoyant  human  creature,  entirely  innocent 
but  entirely  vacant.  The  face  is  so  slightly  indicated  in  the  terrarcotta 
itself  that  in  my  drawing,  coming  in  the  shadow,  I  left  it  out  altogether. 
If  I  could  get  the  shoulders  and  drapery  right  you  wouldn't  miss  it;  in 
the  real  statue  you  never  look  for  it. 

4.  Next,  here  is  a  successful  photograph  from  one  of  Raphael's  sketches 
now  at  Venice.*  At  the  first  glance  you  will  say.  How  lovely!  And  you 
will  say  truly ;  but  it  is  only  a  lovely  &ce,  with  a  drapery  below  it  hanging 
from  the  shoulders.  The  folds  of  this  dnpeiy  in  their  fall  are  exquisitely 
expressive  of  mental  character,  humility,  and  gentleness,  but  have  little  or 
nothing  to  do  with  the  contours  of  the  body  they  conceal,  and  the  rigid 
line  across  the  bosom  entirely  refuses  every  suggestion  of  female  form, 
exactly  where  the  Greek  most  insists  upon  it.  If  you  were  to  remove  the 
£»ce  from  this  sketch  you  would  leave  only  a  cloak  gracefully  disposed,  not 
a  figure  at  all.  This  is  still  more  strikingly  the  case  with  this  celebrated 
Madonna  of  AngeUco's,^  which  is  nothing  but  a  charming  piece  of  drapery 
on  a  stick,  with  a  thoughtful  face  upon  the  top  of  it.  A  thoughtful  &ce, 
not  a  pretty  one.  It  is  just  because  it  ventures  to  be  not  so  pretty  as 
the  Greek  one  at  first,  that  it  is  better,  and  capable  of  higher  beauty  at 
last. 

5.  The  youngest  of  you  cannot  recollect,  but  many  of  you  here  will, 
the  outcry  against  Pre-Raphaelitism  when  it  first  arose,  because  it  was 
supposed  to  idolise  ugliness.^    The  outcry  was  in  many  respects  just.    In 

^  [See  Aratra  Pmtelici,  §  187  (above,  pp.  336-337).] 

*  [See  Aratra  PenteHci,  §  183  (above,  p.  333) ;  and  compare  Vol.  XXII.  pp.  46, 

>  [Rudimentary  Series,  No.  62;  the  sketches  are  reproduced  in  VoL  XXII. 
(Plate  VIII.).] 

*  [This  example  was  not  placed  in  the  Oxford  Collection,  or  at  any  rate  is  not 
now  there.  For  a  general  referenee  to  the  drawings,  see  Ctuide  to  the  Academy 
at  Venice,  j 

^  [Here  Raskin  showed  the  example  which  is  No.  109  in  the  Rudimentary  Series 
(VoL  XXI.  p.  202) — the  Madonna  of  Perugia  (there  is  a  reproduction  of  it  between 
pp.  68  and  69  of  Langton  Douglas's  Fra  AngeHco  (1900).1 

*  [The  reference  is  to  the  criticisms  of  1851 ;  see  Vol.  XII.  pp.  324,  etc] 


SOME  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  GREEK  ART    400 

like  maimer  the  outcry  against  Turner  was  just — that  he  painted  his  skies 
with  flour  of  brimstone.  The  public  never  cry  out  without  being  hurt ;  the 
Pre-Raphaelites  did  paint  their  women  too  ugly^  and  Turner^  his  skies  too 
yellow.  Nevertheless^  of  all  the  pictures  of  those  years  none  were  of  any 
sterling  or  immortal  value  except  the  Huguenot^  the  Light  of  the  World, 
and  Turner's  Venices,  now  filling  the  windows  of  your  High  Street^  But 
the  artists  and  the  public  were  both  alike  wrong — the  artists  in  not  learn* 
ing  their  own  iaults  from  the  common  outcry^  nor  consenting  pvOfii^eiv  rh 
ayakfia  wp^  rh  rols  ^Xcmttois  Sokovv;^  and  the  public  in  fiistening  for 
their  idle  amusement  on  faults  which  the  slightest  attention  would  have 
enabled  them  to  perceive  were  associated  with  honest  energy  in  the  one 
case  and  boundless  experience  in  the  other,  and  which  were  only  inevitable 
failures  in  the  knowledge  of  youths  whom  they  had  left  without  teaching, 
and  in  the  faculties  of  an  old  age  which  they  had  left  without  sympathy. 
Turner  drew  his  skies  too  yellow — it  is  admitted — but  he  was  right  in 
drawing  them  yellow.  The  Pre-Raphaelites  drew  faces  too  ugly—- that  is 
admitted — but  they  were  right  in  drawing  them  ugly.  Right,  I  mean,  as 
true  followers  of  the  Christian  schools;  for  the  first  law  of  those  schools 
is  that  love  must  conquer — kindle — ^nay,  make  in  some  special  way  more 
beautiful  than  normal  beauty  the  faults  and  shortcomings  of  the  creatures 
beloved,  and  therefore  more  than  pardoned.  I  told  you  that  Greek  beauty 
was  wrought  out  in  the  search  for  justice,  and  medieval  in  the  search  for 
justification.  Do  not  you  see  now  how  far  that  law  will  reach?  And 
therefore  as  portraiture  was  the  bane  of  Greek  art,^  it  was  the  life  of  the 
schools  of  Italy.  Take  this  (Giotto's  Hope  ^),  for  the  symbol  of  them.  She 
is  not  pretty,  but  will  lead  us  to  some  beauty,  I  think,  when  we  have  time 
to  follow  her;  meantime,  let  me  show  you  quickly  that  this  Greek  face, 
founded  merely  on  calm  equity,  is  not  quite  so  pretty  as  it  seems  at  first 
sight.  Greek  beauty  is  founded  on  Justice,  the  Greeks  exercising,  with- 
drawing, and  exalting  themselves  into  a  restricted  and  demonstrable  truth. ^ 
Now  I  shall  show  you  the  actual  process  of  this  verification  in  the  profile 
of  the  face  which  has  been  recognized  as  characteristically  [Greek,  and  so 
called  ideal  and  imaginative.  And  indeed  when  you  first^  meet  with  it 
nothing  can  well  be  more  so;  this  is  a  very  imaginative  profile  indeed 
from  an  authoritative  early  Greek  vase.^ 

6.  Here,  then,  you  have  a  quite  trustworthy  example  of  the  ideal  of 
human  feature  which  was  to  be  the  foundation  of  all  subsequent  art.  And 
you  see  that  the  principal  feature  of  all  is  the  strong  angular  projecting 
nose;  next,  the  rounded  chin;  the  eye  is  large,  wide  open,  and  slightly 
raised — the  ordinary  action  is  that  of  looking  straight  forward.  In  Greek 
art  you  scarcely  ever  get  a  drooped  eyelid,  a  very  important  ethical  fact; 

^  [A  reference  to  engravings  in  Ryman's  window.] 

'  [For  this  quotation  from  Lucian's  notice  of  rhidias,  see  Aratra  PenteUci, 
§  141  (above,  p.  299).] 

'  [See  AnUra  PenteUeif  §  120  (above,  p.  281).] 

*  [Rudimentary  Series,  No.  89  (Vol.  XXI.  p.  193);  the  ''Hope"  is  engraved 
as  £rontispiece  to  lbr«  Claviffera,  Letter  5.] 

^  [Compare  Aratra  P^nt&Uci,  §  202  (above,  p.  348).] 

^  [Here  the  MS.  adds  "(Give  account  of  it — viva  voce)."  The  reader  must 
imagine  some  typical  Greek  profile.] 


HO  APPENDIX 

then  the  mouth  U  ■harp-cut,  the  forehead  low,  the  ear  mall  and  >et  raj 
tmr  back,  the  hair  floirjng  in  firm  ripples.  You  may  (utej  that  my  drawing 
exaggerates  or  involuntarily  caricatures  this  first  ezamjdc  of  Grcek  ideu 
beauty.  On  the  contrary,  I  give  yon  this  as  a  Epical  average  form  having 
the  peculiarities  of  feature  in  a  moderate  degree.  Here,  photographed  (rata 
the  coin  itself,  is  a  more  marked  example,  an  early  Bacchus  of  Thasos ;  and 
here,  an  early  Athena  of  Athens.* 

7.  You  know  I  told  you  the  power  of  Greek  art  apcHi  three  things : — 

1.  Limiting  what  was  indefinite. 

i.  Correcting  what  was  inaccurate. 

3.   Making  human  (or,  in   beasts,  naturally  bestial)  what  was   mon- 

Now,  in  order  to  see  this  process  beginning  we  will  take  an  Egyptian 
profile  of  fine  class.  Here  is  one  of  the  Queen  of  Amasis  II.,  which  I  have 
drawn  for  you  carefully  out  of  the 
bottom  of  her  sarcophagus.*  It  is  actu- 
ally later  in  date  than  the  Greek  coin, 
but  the  Egyptians  do  not  change  their 
types  materially ;  and  this  represents 
accurately  what  the  Greeks  dealt  with 
and  surpassed.  1  have  chosen  it  because 
it  includes  every  element  of  form  which 
you  will  have  in  future  to  consider  in 
treatment  of  heads;  that  is  to  say, 
fint,  the  covering  (veil  or  helmet) ; 
secondly,  the  fillet,  or  crown ;  and 
thirdly,  the  crest,  or  symbol  of  thought 
and  purpose. 

8.  Whenever  you  have   to  examine 
the  treatment  of  a  head  in  great  art, 
look  for  these  three  things  first,  for  all 
Fff.  18        ^^    strong    masters   hare    freemasoniy 
among  themselves  in  the  use  of  them. 
The  arrangement  of  the   hair  under  the  helmet  or  veil,   and  the  adap- 
tation of  either  to  the  ear,  is   the  first  question.     Then,  what  the  fillet 
is;  for   the   fillet  is  the   true   Crown,   a   crowo    being,  in    the   great  days 
of  Art   and    Life,    never  a   Dominant  thing,  but  a   Binding   thing.     It  is 
essentially  what   binds  the   hair,  and   the    hair  is  always  the  type  of  the 

'  [The  B«M!hu8  of  Thssot  is  here  )pveu  (Fig.  18) ;  the  woodcut  is  from  an 
enlars;eil  photograph  wliich  Rnskin  had  reproduced  on  an  unpublished  plate.  The 
coin  IS  II.  B.  7  in  the  exhibited  Blectrotypes  at  the  Britiah  Muwum.  For  an  early 
Athena  of  Athens,  see  Fife.  10  (above,  p.  2S2).] 

'  [Sep,  again,  Aratra  FerUeJici,  %  202  (above,  p.  348).] 

'  [Piste  H.  From  the  black  bawlt  aarcophagus  of  Anehnesranefenb,  daughter 
of  Fssmmeticu*  II.  and  Nitocris,  and  wife  of  Amasis  II. ;  in  the  Southern  ^yptian 
cilery  of  the  British  Museum  (No.  S2).  Buskin's  drawing  not  being  availaUe,  this  . 
plate  hss  been  eat  by  Mr.  Uhlrich  from  the  original,  with  isaiitanoe  from  the  drawing 
in  Dr.  Wallis  Budge's  monograph  on  the  sarcophagus.  For  other  references  to 
tbe  figure,  see  Ariadne  Flormlina,  %  146,  snd  Fort  datigera.  Letter  S4.] 


An  Egyptian  Queen 


SOME  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  GREEK  ART    411 

Life.  Then,  thirdly,  what  the  crest  is  (which  you  will  see  becomes  a 
singularly  important  question  presently  in  the  very  instance  before  us,  of 
Phalanthus  of  Tarentum  ^),  the  crest  being  in  mediseval  chivalry  (whatever 
the  heralds  may  say)  more  important  than  the  shield,  for  the  shield  is 
only  the  sign  of  the  race,  but  the  crest  of  the  personal  will;>  and  the 
Greek  types  are  deeply  connected  with  the  strange  conditions  of  it  added 
by  the  phantasy,  it  seems,  more  than  the  order,  of  nature  to  lower 
animal  forms,  as  in  the  manes  of  the  nobler  camivora  and  the  horse,  the 
head  plumage  of  birds,  and  the  varieties  of  dorsal  membrane  in  fish  and 
reptiles. 

9.  Examining  thus  in  sequence  the  head  of  the  Queen  of  Amasis,  you 
find,  first,  her  veil  falling  simply  in  nearly  a  vertical  line — absolutely  vertical 
in  most  early  Egyptian  work ;  thus  in  the  profile  of  the  Dog-god,  or 
Jackal-god,  Anubis,  if  of  good  time,  you  find  his  veil  absolutely  vertical 
in  the  edge  of  the  nearest  lappet,  and  the  upright  line  of  it  continued  in 
that  of  the  hollow  of  his  ear.  Generally  this  vertical  fall  at  the  edge,  and 
extreme  simplicity  on  the  top  of  the  head  continues  characteristic  of  fine 
work  down  to  the  fifteenth  century  of  our  own  sera.  Next,  you  see  the 
queen's  fillet  is  as  simple  as  her  veil,  a  perfectly  unadorned  taenia ;  and  you 
can  feel,  in  looking  at  it,  what  is  meant  by  the  sacredness  of  the  fillet, 
sacrificially,  and  as  a  crown  of  reward,  signifying  the  gathering  together 
and  noble  restraint  of  what  was  vague  or  wild. 

Next,  you  see  her  crest  is  a  very  notable  one:  this  pedestal  on  which 
her  hawk  stands  is  the  hieroglyph  for  the  House  of  Heaven,  and  her  hawk 
is  the  symbol  of  Immortality. 

Lastly,  her  fiice  gives  you  the  constant  Egyptian  profile  in  a  delicate 
type;  the  nose  is  always  a  little  arched  forward,  Jewish  and  vague  in 
contour,  not  finely  set  or  narrowed;  the  hair  of  the  eyebrow  is  represented 
by  a  vigorously  projecting  line;  the  bone  of  the  brow  little  thought 
of,  the  eye  is  narrow  or  almond-shaped,  partly  through  ill-managed  per- 
spective, but  more  in  Arabian  character;  the  mouth  hard  aud  altogether 
expressionless. 

10.  Now  let  us  see  what  changes  the  archaic  Greek  master  will  make. 
We  lose  the  veil  first,  not  merely  in  passing  from  feminine  to  male 

dress,  but  as  indicating  a  modesty  or  timidity  belonging  to  mystic  or  reli- 
gious feeling,  retained  therefore  in  Greece  for  such  expression,  but  rarely 
in  heroic  heads. 

The  fillet  is  almost  concealed  under  the  hair,  which  expands  instantly 
beneath  it  in  a  rounded  mass,  or  sometimes  in  free  curls ;  one  tress  of  these, 
cut  square  at  the  end,  fiills  in  front  of  the  ear.  This  luxuriant  wave  of 
hair  above  the  brow  is  essential  in  fine  Greek  work,  as  well  as  the  knot  of 
it  behind,  indicative  of  its  quantity.  This  knot  or  chignon  of  living  hair 
is  larger  in  proportion  to  the  passionateness  of  character;  in  this  early 
head  of  Apollo  it  breaks  forth  like  the  spray  of  a  wave ;  in  the  Aphrodite 
Urania^    it   evidently    is    a   ponderous   load    at   the    back   of   the   head; 

^  [Here  this  passage  connects  with  '^  The  Riders  of  Tarentum " :   see  above, 
p.  396.1 

3  [ComMre  Etufi^s  Nest,  §  228.] 

3  [See  Plate  XV. ;  above,  between  pp.  336,  337.] 


412  APPENDIX 

in  Giotto's  Hope^  it  becomes  a  spiral  like  a  long  shell;  Raphael  in  this 
Madonna^  first  tries  for  it  and  stops^  feeling  that  he  would  lose  the 
severity  of  the  head  and  its  humility  if  he  went  further.  Velasques  rej<Moes 
in  it,  finding  it  part  of  the  costume  of  his  time,  but  insiating  upon  it  by 
all  the  devices  of  his  art  as  indicaticm  of  reserved  and  tndned  kingly 
power.  The  Crest,  in  this  unhelmeted  head  of  course  not  visible,  never 
expresses  character  with  the  Greeks,  but  only  animal  or  elementary  power, 
the  character  being  given  by  the  sign  on  the  shield,  and  even  there 
the  sign  is  seldom  expressive  of  anything  but  the  passion  or  confusion 
of  war. 

In  all  these  changes  you  see  the  Greeks  are  reducing  the  mystic  sacred 
and  imaginative  symbols  of  former  art  into  clear  shape — ^natinal,  naked, 
and  fuU  of  animal  force. 

11.  Lastly,  note  their  treatment  of  the  face.  They  at  once  reduce  the 
line  of  the  hair  of  the  eyebrow,  but  much  insist  on  the  bone  of  it,  driving 
in  a  recess  beneath  so  as  to  make  the  nose  conspicuously  thin,  the  outer 
ridge  of  it  projecting  like  a  Norman  helmet's  guard;  they  straighten  this 
ridge  absolutely,  if  anything  inclining  to  give  a  retrousm^  outline  rather 
than  the  Egyptian  convex  one;  they  enlarge  the  eyeball  and  round  it; 
they  curve  the  lips,  and  throw  out  a  strongly  projecting  chin,  carried 
bade  to  the  neck  by  a  vigorous  and  sweeping  line  under  the  jaw.  All 
these  are  changes  in  the  direction  of  simplest  truth;  they  are  efibits  to 
represent  more  closely  what  the  Greek  saw;  they  are  done  in  defiance  of 
existing  conventionalisms,  and  with  a  force  indicative  of  the  strongest  art- 
instinct.  Giradually  the  hardness  of  execution  is  relaxed;  the  imitative 
power  increases,  and  gradually,  but  swiftly,  the  central  phase  of  design  is 
reached,  well  enough  represented  by  this  head  of  Hermes  of  probably  the 
fifth  century,  from  a  coin  of  JEnua  in  Macedonia.' 


Art  and  Character 

12.  No  words  can  possibly  be  incisive  or  severe  enough  to  speak  the 
absurdity  of  endeavouring  to  arrive  at  any  knowledge  of  the  history  of 
these  Greek  races,  without  the  knowledge  of  their  art,  and  the  power  of 
defining  the  moment  of  culmination  in  it. 

And  that  discernment  depends  first  on  being  able  to  sjrmpathise  with 
the  aims  of  all  artists,  great  and  mean,  and  clearly  knowing  which  is 
which. 

For  instance,  in  the  Elgin  Room,  at  its  end — No.  S9  of  the  frieze — there 
is  an  uninjured  fragment  of  the  foot  and  lower  part  of  the  limb  of  one  of 
the  youths  pulling  back  a  restive  bull.  The  foot  is  set  against  a  raised 
bit  of  rock,  and  the  limb  is  full  thrust  against  it.  This  action  is  expressed 
with  perfect  care  of  chiselling,  with  exactly  the  right  degree  lof  incision 
between  the  sole  of  the  foot  and  the  rock,  with  perfect  knowledge  and 
frank  pleasure  in  the  imaging  of  youthful  strength  and  beauty.      It  is  done 


1 

s 

3 


See  above,  p.  409  fi.] 

See  above,  p.  408.] 

See  the  central  head  on  Plate  VIII. ;  above,  p.  280.] 


SOME  CHARACTERISTICS  OF  GREEK  ART    418 

without  the  least  vanity,  for  the  sculptor  cut  it  as  easily  as  I  write  these 
words,  and  imagined  it  with  more  ease  than  I  put  them  together.  He 
is  perfect  in  skill,  temper,  conception.  He  appeals  to  no  lust,  asks  for  no 
praise,  desires  no  impossibility,  yields  to  no  difficulty;  he  is  integer  vitae, 
scelerisque  purus,^  a  culminating  master  in  the  Powers  of  Men.^ 

^  [Horace  :  Ode*,  i.  21,  1.] 

*  [Among  the  MSS.,  from  which  this  Appendix  is  printed,  are  several  sheets  of 
notes  on  Greek  history  and  Greek  heroes.  Kuskin  had  some  intention,  it  seems, 
of  writing  a  discourse  which  should  connect  characteristics  of  Greek  art  with  the 
Greek  national  character,  as  shown  in  some  of  her  nohlest  sons.] 


END   OF   VOLUME    XX 


Printed  by  BALLAyrvNi,  Hanmn  6^  Co, 
Edinburgh  ^  London