,michelle ,shephard1 ,eric ,eldred1 ,charles ,franks and the ,online ,distributed ,proofreading ,team ,,the ,,two ,,paths ,by ,john ,ruskin1 ,m4,a4 ,,contents4 ,,the ,,two ,,paths4 ,,lecture ,i4 ,,the ,,deteriorative ,,power ,,of ,,conventional ,,art ,,over ,,nations ,,lecture ,,ii4 ,,the ,,unity ,,of ,,art ,,lecture ,,iii4 ,,modern ,,manufacture ,,and ,,design ,,lecture ,,iv4 ,,the ,,influence ,,of ,,imagination ,,in ,,architecture ,,lecture ,v4 ,,the ,,work ,,of ,,iron1 ,,in ,,nature1 ,,art1 ,,and ,,policy ,,appendices ,,list ,,of ,,illustrations4 ,,the ,,two ,,paths4 ,,the ,,ideal ,,of ,,an ,,angel ,,the ,,serpent ,,beguiling ,,eve ,,contrast ,,symmetry ,,ornament ,,classical ,,architecture ,,centrepiece ,,of ,,balcony ,,general ,,effect ,,of ,,masses ,,profile ,,teeth ,,of ,,the ,,border ,,border ,,at ,,the ,,side ,,of ,,balcony ,,outline ,,of ,,retracted ,,leaves ,,preface4 ,the following addresses1 though spoken at different times1 are intentionally connected in subject2 their aim being to set one or two main principles of art in simple light before the general student1 and to indicate their practical bearing on modern design4 ,the law which it has been my effort chiefly to illustrate is the dependence of all noble design1 in any kind1 on the sculpture or painting of ,organic ,form4 ,this is the vital law2 lying at the root of all that ,i have ever tried to teach respecting architecture or any other art4 ,it is also the law most generally disallowed4 ,i believe this must be so in every subject4 ,we are all of us willing enough to accept dead truths or blunt ones2 which can be fitted harmlessly into spare niches1 or shrouded and coffined at once out of the way1 we holding complacently the cemetery keys1 and supposing we have learned something4 ,but a sapling truth1 with earth at its root and blossom on its branches2 or a trenchant truth1 that can cut its way through bars and sods2 most men1 it seems to me1 dislike the sight or entertainment of1 if by any means such guest or vision may be avoided4 ,and1 indeed1 this is no wonder2 for one such truth1 thoroughly accepted1 connects itself strangely with others1 and there is no saying what it may lead us to4 ,and thus the gist of what ,i have tried to teach about architecture has been throughout denied by my architect readers1 even when they thought what ,i said suggestive in other particulars4 ,anything but that4 ,study ,italian ,gothic8--perhaps it would be as well3 build with pointed arches8--there is no objection3 use solid stone and well-burnt brick8-- by all means3 but--learn to carve or paint organic form ourselves6 ,how can such a thing be asked8 ,we are above all that4 ,the carvers and painters are our servants--quite subordinate people4 ,they ought to be glad if we leave room for them4 ,well3 on that it all turns4 ,for those who will not learn to carve or paint1 and think themselves greater men because they cannot1 it is wholly wasted time to read any words of mine2 in the truest and sternest sense they can read no words of mine2 for the most familiar ,i can use--form1 proportion1 beauty1 curvature1 colour--are used in a sense which by no effort ,i can communicate to such readers2 and in no building that ,i praise1 is the thing that ,i praise it for1 visible to them4 ,and it is the more necessary for me to state this fully2 because so- called ,gothic or ,romanesque buildings are now rising every day around us1 which might be supposed by the public more or less to embody the principles of those styles1 but which embody not one of them1 nor any shadow or fragment of them2 but merely serve to caricature the noble buildings of past ages1 and to bring their form into dishonour by leaving out their soul4 ,the following addresses are therefore arranged1 as ,i have just stated1 to put this great law1 and one or two collateral ones1 in less mistakeable light1 securing even in this irregular form at least clearness of assertion4 ,for the rest1 the question at issue is not one to be decided by argument1 but by experiment1 which if the reader is disinclined to make1 all demonstration must be useless to him4 ,the lectures are for the most part printed as they were read1 mending only obscure sentences here and there4 ,the parts which were trusted to extempore speaking are supplied1 as well as ,i can remember 7only with an addition here and there of things ,i forgot to say71 in the words1 or at least the kind of words1 used at the time2 and they contain1 at all events1 the substance of what ,i said more accurately than hurried journal reports4 ,i must beg my readers not in general to trust to such1 for even in fast speaking ,i try to use words carefully2 and any alteration of expression will sometimes involve a great alteration in meaning4 ,a little while ago ,i had to speak of an architectural design1 and called it elegant1 meaning1 founded on good and well elected models2 the printed report gave excellent design 7that is to say1 design excellingly good71 which ,i did not mean1 and should1 even in the most hurried speaking1 never have said4 ,the illustrations of the lecture on iron were sketches made too roughly to be engraved1 and yet of too elaborate subjects to allow of my drawing them completely4 ,those now substituted will1 however1 answer the purpose nearly as well1 and are more directly connected with the subjects of the preceding lectures2 so that ,i hope throughout the volume the student will perceive an insistance upon one main truth1 nor lose in any minor direction of inquiry the sense of the responsibility which the acceptance of that truth fastens upon him2 responsibility for choice1 decisive and conclusive1 between two modes of study1 which involve ultimately the development1 or deadening1 of every power he possesses4 ,i have tried to hold that choice clearly out to him1 and to unveil for him to its farthest the issue of his turning to the right hand or the left4 ,guides he may find many1 and aids many2 but all these will be in vain unless he has first recognised the hour and the point of life when the way divides itself1 one way leading to the ,olive mountains--one to the vale of the ,salt ,sea4 ,there are few cross roads1 that ,i know of1 from one to the other4 ,let him pause at the parting of ,,the ,,two ,,paths4 ,,the ,,two ,,paths ,,being ,,lectures ,,on ,,art1 ,,and ,,its ,,application ,,to ,,decoration ,,and ,,manufacture ,,delivered ,,in #aheh-i4 ,,lecture ,i4 ,,the ,,deteriorative ,,power ,,of ,,conventional ,,art ,,over ,,nations4 ,an ,inaugural ,lecture1 ,delivered at the ,kensington ,museum1 ,january1 #aheh4 ,footnote3 ,a few introductory words1 in which1 at the opening of this lecture1 ,i thanked the ,chairman 7,mr4 ,cockerell71 for his support on the occasion1 and asked his pardon for any hasty expressions in my writings1 which might have seemed discourteous towards him1 or other architects whose general opinions were opposed to mine1 may be found by those who care for preambles1 not much misreported1 in the ,building ,chronicle2 with such comments as the genius of that journal was likely to suggest to it4 ,as ,i passed1 last summer1 for the first time1 through the north of ,scotland1 it seemed to me that there was a peculiar painfulness in its scenery1 caused by the non-manifestation of the powers of human art4 ,i had never travelled in1 nor even heard or conceived of such a country before2 nor1 though ,i had passed much of my life amidst mountain scenery in the south1 was ,i before aware how much of its charm depended on the little gracefulnesses and tendernesses of human work1 which are mingled with the beauty of the ,alps1 or spared by their desolation4 ,it is true that the art which carves and colours the front of a ,swiss cottage is not of any very exalted kind2 yet it testifies to the completeness and the delicacy of the faculties of the mountaineer2 it is true that the remnants of tower and battlement1 which afford footing to the wild vine on the ,alpine promontory1 form but a small part of the great serration of its rocks2 and yet it is just that fragment of their broken outline which gives them their pathetic power1 and historical majesty4 ,and this element among the wilds of our own country ,i found wholly wanting4 ,the ,highland cottage is literally a heap of gray stones1 choked up1 rather than roofed over1 with black peat and withered heather2 the only approach to an effort at decoration consists in the placing of the clods of protective peat obliquely on its roof1 so as to give a diagonal arrangement of lines1 looking somewhat as if the surface had been scored over by a gigantic claymore4 ,and1 at least among the northern hills of ,scotland1 elements of more ancient architectural interest are equally absent4 ,the solitary peel- house is hardly discernible by the windings of the stream2 the roofless aisle of the priory is lost among the enclosures of the village2 and the capital city of the ,highlands1 ,inverness1 placed where it might ennoble one of the sweetest landscapes1 and by the shore of one of the loveliest estuaries in the world2--placed between the crests of the ,grampians and the flowing of the ,moray ,firth1 as if it were a jewel clasping the folds of the mountains to the blue zone of the sea1--is only distinguishable from a distance by one architectural feature1 and exalts all the surrounding landscape by no other associations than those which can be connected with its modern castellated gaol4 ,while these conditions of ,scottish scenery affected me very painfully1 it being the first time in my life that ,i had been in any country possessing no valuable monuments or examples of art1 they also forced me into the consideration of one or two difficult questions respecting the effect of art on the human mind2 and they forced these questions upon me eminently for this reason1 that while ,i was wandering disconsolately among the moors of the ,grampians1 where there was no art to be found1 news of peculiar interest was every day arriving from a country where there was a great deal of art1 and art of a delicate kind1 to be found4 ,among the models set before you in this institution1 and in the others established throughout the kingdom for the teaching of design1 there are1 ,i suppose1 none in their kind more admirable than the decorated works of ,india4 ,they are1 indeed1 in all materials capable of colour1 wool1 marble1 or metal1 almost inimitable in their delicate application of divided hue1 and fine arrangement of fantastic line4 ,nor is this power of theirs exerted by the people rarely1 or without enjoyment2 the love of subtle design seems universal in the race1 and is developed in every implement that they shape1 and every building that they raise2 it attaches itself with the same intensity1 and with the same success1 to the service of superstition1 of pleasure or of cruelty2 and enriches alike1 with one profusion on enchanted iridescence1 the dome of the pagoda1 the fringe of the girdle and the edge of the sword4 ,so then you have1 in these two great populations1 ,indian and ,highland-- in the races of the jungle and of the moor--two national capacities distinctly and accurately opposed4 ,on the one side you have a race rejoicing in art1 and eminently and universally endowed with the gift of it2 on the other you have a people careless of art1 and apparently incapable of it1 their utmost effort hitherto reaching no farther than to the variation of the positions of the bars of colour in square chequers4 ,and we are thus urged naturally to enquire what is the effect on the moral character1 in each nation1 of this vast difference in their pursuits and apparent capacities8 and whether those rude chequers of the tartan1 or the exquisitely fancied involutions of the ,cashmere1 fold habitually over the noblest hearts8 ,we have had our answer4 ,since the race of man began its course of sin on this earth1 nothing has ever been done by it so significative of all bestial1 and lower than bestial degradation1 as the acts the ,indian race in the year that has just passed by4 ,cruelty as fierce may indeed have been wreaked1 and brutality as abominable been practised before1 but never under like circumstances2 rage of prolonged war1 and resentment of prolonged oppression1 have made men as cruel before now2 and gradual decline into barbarism1 where no examples of decency or civilization existed around them1 has sunk1 before now1 isolated populations to the lowest level of possible humanity4 ,but cruelty stretched to its fiercest against the gentle and unoffending1 and corruption festered to its loathsomest in the midst of the witnessing presence of a disciplined civilization1-- these we could not have known to be within the practicable compass of human guilt1 but for the acts of the ,indian mutineer4 ,and1 as thus1 on the one hand1 you have an extreme energy of baseness displayed by these lovers of art2 on the other1--as if to put the question into the narrowest compass--you have had an extreme energy of virtue displayed by the despisers of art4 ,among all the soldiers to whom you owe your victories in the ,crimea1 and your avenging in the ,indies1 to none are you bound by closer bonds of gratitude than to the men who have been born and bred among those desolate ,highland moors4 ,and thus you have the differences in capacity and circumstance between the two nations1 and the differences in result on the moral habits of two nations1 put into the most significant--the most palpable--the most brief opposition4 ,out of the peat cottage come faith1 courage1 self- sacrifice1 purity1 and piety1 and whatever else is fruitful in the work of ,heaven2 out of the ivory palace come treachery1 cruelty1 cowardice1 idolatry1 bestiality1--whatever else is fruitful in the work of ,hell4 ,but the difficulty does not close here4 ,from one instance1 of however great apparent force1 it would be wholly unfair to gather any general conclusion--wholly illogical to assert that because we had once found love of art connected with moral baseness1 the love of art must be the general root of moral baseness2 and equally unfair to assert that1 because we had once found neglect of art coincident with nobleness of disposition1 neglect of art must be always the source or sign of that nobleness4 ,but if we pass from the ,indian peninsula into other countries of the globe2 and from our own recent experience1 to the records of history1 we shall still find one great fact fronting us1 in stern universality--namely1 the apparent connection of great success in art with subsequent national degradation4 ,you find1 in the first place1 that the nations which possessed a refined art were always subdued by those who possessed none3 you find the ,lydian subdued by the ,mede2 the ,athenian by the ,spartan2 the ,greek by the ,roman2 the ,roman by the ,goth2 the ,burgundian by the ,switzer3 but you find1 beyond this--that even where no attack by any external power has accelerated the catastrophe of the state1 the period in which any given people reach their highest power in art is precisely that in which they appear to sign the warrant of their own ruin2 and that1 from the moment in which a perfect statue appears in ,florence1 a perfect picture in ,venice1 or a perfect fresco in ,rome1 from that hour forward1 probity1 industry1 and courage seem to be exiled from their walls1 and they perish in a sculpturesque paralysis1 or a many-coloured corruption4 ,but even this is not all4 ,as art seems thus1 in its delicate form1 to be one of the chief promoters of indolence and sensuality1--so1 ,i need hardly remind you1 it hitherto has appeared only in energetic manifestation when it was in the service of superstition4 ,the four greatest manifestations of human intellect which founded the four principal kingdoms of art1 ,egyptian1 ,babylonian1 ,greek1 and ,italian1 were developed by the strong excitement of active superstition in the worship of ,osiris1 ,belus1 ,minerva1 and the ,queen of ,heaven4 ,therefore1 to speak briefly1 it may appear very difficult to show that art has ever yet existed in a consistent and thoroughly energetic school1 unless it was engaged in the propagation of falsehood1 or the encouragement of vice4 ,and finally1 while art has thus shown itself always active in the service of luxury and idolatry1 it has also been strongly directed to the exaltation of cruelty4 ,a nation which lives a pastoral and innocent life never decorates the shepherd's staff or the plough-handle1 but races who live by depredation and slaughter nearly always bestow exquisite ornaments on the quiver1 the helmet1 and the spear4 ,does it not seem to you1 then1 on all these three counts1 more than questionable whether we are assembled here in ,kensington ,museum to any good purpose8 ,might we not justly be looked upon with suspicion and fear1 rather than with sympathy1 by the innocent and unartistical public8 ,are we even sure of ourselves8 ,do we know what we are about8 ,are we met here as honest people8 or are we not rather so many ,catilines assembled to devise the hasty degradation of our country1 or1 like a conclave of midnight witches1 to summon and send forth1 on new and unexpected missions1 the demons of luxury1 cruelty1 and superstition8 ,i trust1 upon the whole1 that it is not so3 ,i am sure that ,mr4 ,redgrave and ,mr4 ,cole do not at all include results of this kind in their conception of the ultimate objects of the institution which owes so much to their strenuous and well-directed exertions4 ,and ,i have put this painful question before you1 only that we may face it thoroughly1 and1 as ,i hope1 out-face it4 ,if you will give it a little sincere attention this evening1 ,i trust we may find sufficiently good reasons for our work1 and proceed to it hereafter1 as all good workmen should do1 with clear heads1 and calm consciences4 ,to return1 then1 to the first point of difficulty1 the relations between art and mental disposition in ,india and ,scotland4 ,it is quite true that the art of ,india is delicate and refined4 ,but it has one curious character distinguishing it from all other art of equal merit in design--it never represents a natural fact4 ,it either forms its compositions out of meaningless fragments of colour and flowings of line2 or if it represents any living creature1 it represents that creature under some distorted and monstrous form4 ,to all the facts and forms of nature it wilfully and resolutely opposes itself2 it will not draw a man1 but an eight-armed monster2 it will not draw a flower1 but only a spiral or a zigzag4 ,it thus indicates that the people who practise it are cut off from all possible sources of healthy knowledge or natural delight2 that they have wilfully sealed up and put aside the entire volume of the world1 and have got nothing to read1 nothing to dwell upon1 but that imagination of the thoughts of their hearts1 of which we are told that it is only evil continually4 ,over the whole spectacle of creation they have thrown a veil in which there is no rent4 ,for them no star peeps through the blanket of the dark--for them neither their heaven shines nor their mountains rise--for them the flowers do not blossom-- for them the creatures of field and forest do not live4 ,they lie bound in the dungeon of their own corruption1 encompassed only by doleful phantoms1 or by spectral vacancy4 ,need ,i remind you what an exact reverse of this condition of mind1 as respects the observance of nature1 is presented by the people whom we have just been led to contemplate in contrast with the ,indian race8 ,you will find upon reflection1 that all the highest points of the ,scottish character are connected with impressions derived straight from the natural scenery of their country4 ,no nation has ever before shown1 in the general tone of its language--in the general current of its literature--so constant a habit of hallowing its passions and confirming its principles by direct association with the charm1 or power1 of nature4 ,the writings of ,scott and ,burns--and yet more1 of the far greater poets than ,burns who gave ,scotland her traditional ballads1--furnish you in every stanza--almost in every line--with examples of this association of natural scenery with the passions2 ,footnote3 ,the great poets of ,scotland1 like the great poets of all other countries1 never write dissolutely1 either in matter or method2 but with stern and measured meaning in every syllable4 ,here's a bit of first-rate work for example3 ,tweed said to ,till1 ',what gars ye rin sae still8' ,till said to ,tweed1 ',though ye rin wi' speed1 ,and ,i rin slaw1 ,whar ye droon ae man1 ,i droon twa4' but an instance of its farther connection with moral principle struck me forcibly just at the time when ,i was most lamenting the absence of art among the people4 ,in one of the loneliest districts of ,scotland1 where the peat cottages are darkest1 just at the western foot of that great mass of the ,grampians which encircles the sources of the ,spey and the ,dee1 the main road which traverses the chain winds round the foot of a broken rock called ,crag1 or ,craig ,ellachie4 ,there is nothing remarkable in either its height or form2 it is darkened with a few scattered pines1 and touched along its summit with a flush of heather2 but it constitutes a kind of headland1 or leading promontory1 in the group of hills to which it belongs--a sort of initial letter of the mountains2 and thus stands in the mind of the inhabitants of the district1 the ,clan ,grant1 for a type of their country1 and of the influence of that country upon themselves4 ,their sense of this is beautifully indicated in the war-cry of the clan1 ,stand fast1 ,craig ,ellachie4 ,you may think long over those few words without exhausting the deep wells of feeling and thought contained in them--the love of the native land1 the assurance of their faithfulness to it2 the subdued and gentle assertion of indomitable courage--,i may need to be told to stand1 but1 if ,i do1 ,craig ,ellachie does4 ,you could not but have felt1 had you passed beneath it at the time when so many of ,england's dearest children were being defended by the strength of heart of men born at its foot1 how often among the delicate ,indian palaces1 whose marble was pallid with horror1 and whose vermilion was darkened with blood1 the remembrance of its rough grey rocks and purple heaths must have risen before the sight of the ,highland soldier2 how often the hailing of the shot and the shriek of battle would pass away from his hearing1 and leave only the whisper of the old pine branches--,stand fast1 ,craig ,ellachie6 ,you have1 in these two nations1 seen in direct opposition the effects on moral sentiment of art without nature1 and of nature without art4 ,and you see enough to justify you in suspecting--while1 if you choose to investigate the subject more deeply and with other examples1 you will find enough to justify you in concluding--that art1 followed as such1 and for its own sake1 irrespective of the interpretation of nature by it1 is destructive of whatever is best and noblest in humanity2 but that nature1 however simply observed1 or imperfectly known1 is1 in the degree of the affection felt for it1 protective and helpful to all that is noblest in humanity4 ,you might then conclude farther1 that art1 so far as it was devoted to the record or the interpretation of nature1 would be helpful and ennobling also4 ,and you would conclude this with perfect truth4 ,let me repeat the assertion distinctly and solemnly1 as the first that ,i am permitted to make in this building1 devoted in a way so new and so admirable to the service of the art-students of ,england--,wherever art is practised for its own sake1 and the delight of the workman is in what he does and produces1 instead of what he interprets or exhibits1 --there art has an influence of the most fatal kind on brain and heart1 and it issues1 if long so pursued1 in the destruction both of intellectual power and moral principal2 whereas art1 devoted humbly and self- forgetfully to the clear statement and record of the facts of the universe1 is always helpful and beneficent to mankind1 full of comfort1 strength1 and salvation4 ,now1 when you were once well assured of this1 you might logically infer another thing1 namely1 that when ,art was occupied in the function in which she was serviceable1 she would herself be strengthened by the service1 and when she was doing what ,providence without doubt intended her to do1 she would gain in vitality and dignity just as she advanced in usefulness4 ,on the other hand1 you might gather1 that when her agency was distorted to the deception or degradation of mankind1 she would herself be equally misled and degraded--that she would be checked in advance1 or precipitated in decline4 ,and this is the truth also2 and holding this clue you will easily and justly interpret the phenomena of history4 ,so long as ,art is steady in the contemplation and exhibition of natural facts1 so long she herself lives and grows2 and in her own life and growth partly implies1 partly secures1 that of the nation in the midst of which she is practised4 ,but a time has always hitherto come1 in which1 having thus reached a singular perfection1 she begins to contemplate that perfection1 and to imitate it1 and deduce rules and forms from it2 and thus to forget her duty and ministry as the interpreter and discoverer of ,truth4 ,and in the very instant when this diversion of her purpose and forgetfulness of her function take place--forgetfulness generally coincident with her apparent perfection--in that instant1 ,i say1 begins her actual catastrophe2 and by her own fall--so far as she has influence--she accelerates the ruin of the nation by which she is practised4 ,the study1 however1 of the effect of art on the mind of nations is one rather for the historian than for us2 at all events it is one for the discussion of which we have no more time this evening4 ,but ,i will ask your patience with me while ,i try to illustrate1 in some further particulars1 the dependence of the healthy state and power of art itself upon the exercise of its appointed function in the interpretation of fact4 ,you observe that ,i always say interpretation1 never imitation4 ,my reason for so doing is1 first1 that good art rarely imitates2 it usually only describes or explains4 ,but my second and chief reason is that good art always consists of two things3 ,first1 the observation of fact2 secondly1 the manifesting of human design and authority in the way that fact is told4 ,great and good art must unite the two2 it cannot exist for a moment but in their unity2 it consists of the two as essentially as water consists of oxygen and hydrogen1 or marble of lime and carbonic acid4 ,let us inquire a little into the nature of each of the elements4 ,the first element1 we say1 is the love of ,nature1 leading to the effort to observe and report her truly4 ,and this is the first and leading element4 ,review for yourselves the history of art1 and you will find this to be a manifest certainty1 that no great school ever yet existed which had not for primal aim the representation of some natural fact as truly as possible4 ,there have only yet appeared in the world three schools of perfect art--schools1 that is to say1 that did their work as well as it seems possible to do it4 ,these are the ,athenian1 ,footnote3 ,see below1 the farther notice of the real spirit of ,greek work1 in the address at ,bradford4 ,florentine1 and ,venetian4 ,the ,athenian proposed to itself the perfect representation of the form of the human body4 ,it strove to do that as well as it could2 it did that as well as it can be done2 and all its greatness was founded upon and involved in that single and honest effort4 ,the ,florentine school proposed to itself the perfect expression of human emotion--the showing of the effects of passion in the human face and gesture4 ,i call this the ,florentine school1 because1 whether you take ,raphael for the culminating master of expressional art in ,italy1 or ,leonardo1 or ,michael ,angelo1 you will find that the whole energy of the national effort which produced those masters had its root in ,florence2 not at ,urbino or ,milan4 ,i say1 then1 this ,florentine or leading ,italian school proposed to itself human expression for its aim in natural truth2 it strove to do that as well as it could--did it as well as it can be done--and all its greatness is rooted in that single and honest effort4 ,thirdly1 the ,venetian school propose the representation of the effect of colour and shade on all things2 chiefly on the human form4 ,it tried to do that as well as it could--did it as well as it can be done--and all its greatness is founded on that single and honest effort4 ,pray1 do not leave this room without a perfectly clear holding of these three ideas4 ,you may try them1 and toss them about afterwards1 as much as you like1 to see if they'll bear shaking2 but do let me put them well and plainly into your possession4 ,attach them to three works of art which you all have either seen or continually heard of4 ,there's the 7so-called7 ,theseus of the ,elgin marbles4 ,that represents the whole end and aim of the ,athenian school--the natural form of the human body4 ,all their conventional architecture--their graceful shaping and painting of pottery--whatsoever other art they practised--was dependent for its greatness on this sheet-anchor of central aim3 true shape of living man4 ,then take1 for your type of the ,italian school1 ,raphael's ,disputa del ,sacramento2 that will be an accepted type by everybody1 and will involve no possibly questionable points3 the ,germans will admit it2 the ,english academicians will admit it2 and the ,english purists and pre-,raphaelites will admit it4 ,well1 there you have the truth of human expression proposed as an aim4 ,that is the way people look when they feel this or that--when they have this or that other mental character3 are they devotional1 thoughtful1 affectionate1 indignant1 or inspired8 are they prophets1 saints1 priests1 or kings8 then--whatsoever is truly thoughtful1 affectionate1 prophetic1 priestly1 kingly--that the ,florentine school tried to discern1 and show2 that they have discerned and shown2 and all their greatness is first fastened in their aim at this central truth--the open expression of the living human soul4 ,lastly1 take ,veronese's ,marriage in ,cana in the ,louvre4 ,there you have the most perfect representation possible of colour1 and light1 and shade1 as they affect the external aspect of the human form1 and its immediate accessories1 architecture1 furniture1 and dress4 ,this external aspect of noblest nature was the first aim of the ,venetians1 and all their greatness depended on their resolution to achieve1 and their patience in achieving it4 ,here1 then1 are the three greatest schools of the former world exemplified for you in three well-known works4 ,the ,phidian ,theseus represents the ,greek school pursuing truth of form2 the ,disputa of ,raphael1 the ,florentine school pursuing truth of mental expression2 the ,marriage in ,cana1 the ,venetian school pursuing truth of colour and light4 ,but do not suppose that the law which ,i am stating to you--the great law of art-life--can only be seen in these1 the most powerful of all art schools4 ,it is just as manifest in each and every school that ever has had life in it at all4 ,wheresoever the search after truth begins1 there life begins2 wheresoever that search ceases1 there life ceases4 ,as long as a school of art holds any chain of natural facts1 trying to discover more of them and express them better daily1 it may play hither and thither as it likes on this side of the chain or that2 it may design grotesques and conventionalisms1 build the simplest buildings1 serve the most practical utilities1 yet all it does will be gloriously designed and gloriously done2 but let it once quit hold of the chain of natural fact1 cease to pursue that as the clue to its work2 let it propose to itself any other end than preaching this living word1 and think first of showing its own skill or its own fancy1 and from that hour its fall is precipitate--its destruction sure2 nothing that it does or designs will ever have life or loveliness in it more2 its hour has come1 and there is no work1 nor device1 nor knowledge1 nor wisdom in the grave whither it goeth4 ,let us take for example that school of art over which many of you would perhaps think this law had but little power--the school of ,gothic architecture4 ,many of us may have been in the habit of thinking of that school rather as of one of forms than of facts--a school of pinnacles1 and buttresses1 and conventional mouldings1 and disguise of nature by monstrous imaginings--not a school of truth at all4 ,i think ,i shall be able1 even in the little time we have to-night1 to show that this is not so2 and that our great law holds just as good at ,amiens and ,salisbury1 as it does at ,athens and ,florence4 ,i will go back then first to the very beginnings of ,gothic art1 and before you1 the students of ,kensington1 as an impanelled jury1 ,i will bring two examples of the barbarism out of which ,gothic art emerges1 approximately contemporary in date and parallel in executive skill2 but1 the one1 a barbarism that did not get on1 and could not get on2 the other1 a barbarism that could get on1 and did get on2 and you1 the impanelled jury1 shall judge what is the essential difference between the two barbarisms1 and decide for yourselves what is the seed of life in the one1 and the sign of death in the other4 ,the first1--that which has in it the sign of death1--furnishes us at the same time with an illustration far too interesting to be passed by1 of certain principles much depended on by our common modern designers4 ,taking up one of our architectural publications the other day1 and opening it at random1 ,i chanced upon this piece of information1 put in rather curious ,english2 but you shall have it as it stands-- ,aristotle asserts1 that the greatest species of the beautiful are ,order1 ,symmetry1 and the ,definite4 ,i should tell you1 however1 that this statement is not given as authoritative2 it is one example of various ,architectural teachings1 given in a report in the ,building ,chronicle for ,may1 #aheg1 of a lecture on ,proportion2 in which the only thing the lecturer appears to have proved was that1-- ,the system of dividing the diameter of the shaft of a column into parts for copying the ancient architectural remains of ,greece and ,rome1 adopted by architects from ,vitruvius 7circa ,b4,c4 #be7 to the present period1 as a method for producing ancient architecture1 is entirely useless1 for the several parts of ,grecian architecture cannot be reduced or subdivided by this system2 neither does it apply to the architecture of ,rome4 ,still1 as far as ,i can make it out1 the lecture appears to have been one of those of which you will just at present hear so many1 the protests of architects who have no knowledge of sculpture--or of any other mode of expressing natural beauty--against natural beauty2 and their endeavour to substitute mathematical proportions for the knowledge of life they do not possess1 and the representation of life of which they are incapable4,illustration ,now1 this substitution of obedience to mathematical law for sympathy with observed life1 is the first characteristic of the hopeless work of all ages2 as such1 you will find it eminently manifested in the specimen ,i have to give you of the hopeless ,gothic barbarism2 the barbarism from which nothing could emerge--for which no future was possible but extinction4 ,the ,aristotelian principles of the ,beautiful are1 you remember1 ,order1 ,symmetry1 and the ,definite4 ,here you have the three1 in perfection1 applied to the ideal of an angel1 in a psalter of the eighth century1 existing in the library of ,st4 ,john's ,college1 ,cambridge4,footnote3 ,i copy this woodcut from ,westwood's ,palaeographia ,sacra4 ,now1 you see the characteristics of this utterly dead school are1 first the wilful closing of its eyes to natural facts2--for1 however ignorant a person may be1 he need only look at a human being to see that it has a mouth as well as eyes2 and secondly1 the endeavour to adorn or idealize natural fact according to its own notions3 it puts red spots in the middle of the hands1 and sharpens the thumbs1 thinking to improve them4 ,here you have the most pure type possible of the principles of idealism in all ages3 whenever people don't look at ,nature1 they always think they can improve her4 ,you will also admire1 doubtless1 the exquisite result of the application of our great modern architectural principle of beauty--symmetry1 or equal balance of part by part2 you see even the eyes are made symmetrical--entirely round1 instead of irregular1 oval2 and the iris is set properly in the middle1 instead of--as nature has absurdly put it--rather under the upper lid4 ,you will also observe the principle of the pyramid in the general arrangement of the figure1 and the value of series in the placing of dots4 ,from this dead barbarism we pass to living barbarism--to work done by hands quite as rude1 if not ruder1 and by minds as uninformed2 and yet work which in every line of it is prophetic of power1 and has in it the sure dawn of day4 ,you have often heard it said that ,giotto was the founder of art in ,italy4 ,he was not3 neither he1 nor ,giunta ,pisano1 nor ,niccolo ,pisano4 ,they all laid strong hands to the work1 and brought it first into aspect above ground2 but the foundation had been laid for them by the builders of the ,lombardic churches in the valleys of the ,adda and the ,arno4 ,it is in the sculpture of the round arched churches of ,north ,italy1 bearing disputable dates1 ranging from the eighth to the twelfth century1 that you will find the lowest struck roots of the art of ,titian and ,raphael4 ,footnote3 ,i have said elsewhere1 the root of all art is struck in the thirteenth century4 ,this is quite true3 but of course some of the smallest fibres run lower1 as in this instance4 ,i go1 therefore1 to the church which is certainly the earliest of these1 ,st4 ,ambrogio1 of ,milan1 said still to retain some portions of the actual structure from which ,st4 ,ambrose excluded ,theodosius1 and at all events furnishing the most archaic examples of ,lombardic sculpture in ,north ,italy4 ,i do not venture to guess their date2 they are barbarous enough for any date4 ,we find the pulpit of this church covered with interlacing patterns1 closely resembling those of the manuscript at ,cambridge1 but among them is figure sculpture of a very different kind4 ,it is wrought with mere incisions in the stone1 of which the effect may be tolerably given by single lines in a drawing4 ,remember1 therefore1 for a moment--as characteristic of culminating ,italian art--,michael ,angelo's fresco of the ,temptation of ,eve1 in the ,sistine chapel1 and you will be more interested in seeing the birth of ,italian art1 illustrated by the same subject1 from ,st4 ,ambrogio1 of ,milan1 the ,serpent beguiling ,eve4 ,footnote3 ,this cut is ruder than it should be3 the incisions in the marble have a lighter effect than these rough black lines2 but it is not worth while to do it better4 ,yet1 in that sketch1 rude and ludicrous as it is1 you have the elements of life in their first form4 ,the people who could do that were sure to get on4 ,for1 observe1 the workman's whole aim is straight at the facts1 as well as he can get them2 and not merely at the facts1 but at the very heart of the facts4 ,a common workman might have looked at nature for his serpent1 but he would have thought only of its scales4 ,but this fellow does not want scales1 nor coils2 he can do without them2 he wants the serpent's heart--malice and insinuation2--and he has actually got them to some extent4 ,so also a common workman1 even in this barbarous stage of art1 might have carved ,eve's arms and body a good deal better2 but this man does not care about arms and body1 if he can only get at ,eve's mind--show that she is pleased at being flattered1 and yet in a state of uncomfortable hesitation4 ,and some look of listening1 of complacency1 and of embarrassment he has verily got3-- note the eyes slightly askance1 the lips compressed1 and the right hand nervously grasping the left arm3 nothing can be declared impossible to the people who could begin thus--the world is open to them1 and all that is in it2 while1 on the contrary1 nothing is possible to the man who did the symmetrical angel--the world is keyless to him2 he has built a cell for himself in which he must abide1 barred up for ever-- there is no more hope for him than for a sponge or a madrepore4 ,i shall not trace from this embryo the progress of ,gothic art in ,italy1 because it is much complicated and involved with traditions of other schools1 and because most of the students will be less familiar with its results than with their own northern buildings4 ,so1 these two designs indicating ,death and ,life in the beginnings of mediaeval art1 we will take an example of the progress of that art from our northern work4 ,now1 many of you1 doubtless1 have been interested by the mass1 grandeur1 and gloom of ,norman architecture1 as much as by ,gothic traceries2 and when you hear me say that the root of all good work lies in natural facts1 you doubtless think instantly of your round arches1 with their rude cushion capitals1 and of the billet or zigzag work by which they are surrounded1 and you cannot see what the knowledge of nature has to do with either the simple plan or the rude mouldings4 ,but all those simple conditions of ,norman art are merely the expiring of it towards the extreme north4 ,do not study ,norman architecture in ,northumberland1 but in ,normandy1 and then you will find that it is just a peculiarly manly1 and practically useful1 form of the whole great ,french school of rounded architecture4 ,and where has that ,french school its origin8 ,wholly in the rich conditions of sculpture1 which1 rising first out of imitations of the ,roman bas-reliefs1 covered all the faades of the ,french early churches with one continuous arabesque of floral or animal life4 ,if you want to study round-arched buildings1 do not go to ,durham1 but go to ,poictiers1 and there you will see how all the simple decorations which give you so much pleasure even in their isolated application were invented by persons practised in carving men1 monsters1 wild animals1 birds1 and flowers1 in overwhelming redundance2 and then trace this architecture forward in central ,france1 and you will find it loses nothing of its richness--it only gains in truth1 and therefore in grace1 until just at the moment of transition into the pointed style1 you have the consummate type of the sculpture of the school given you in the west front of the ,cathedral of ,chartres4 ,from that front ,i have chosen two fragments to illustrate it4 ,footnote3 ,this part of the lecture was illustrated by two drawings1 made admirably by ,mr4 ,j4 ,t4 ,laing1 with the help of photographs from statues at ,chartres4 ,the drawings may be seen at present at the ,kensington ,museum3 but any large photograph of the west front of ,chartres will enable the reader to follow what is stated in the lecture1 as far as is needful4 ,these statues have been long1 and justly1 considered as representative of the highest skill of the twelfth or earliest part of the thirteenth century in ,france2 and they indeed possess a dignity and delicate charm1 which are for the most part wanting in later works4 ,it is owing partly to real nobleness of feature1 but chiefly to the grace1 mingled with severity1 of the falling lines of excessively thin drapery2 as well as to a most studied finish in composition1 every part of the ornamentation tenderly harmonizing with the rest4 ,so far as their power over certain tones of religious mind is owing to a palpable degree of non-naturalism in them1 ,i do not praise it--the exaggerated thinness of body and stiffness of attitude are faults2 but they are noble faults1 and give the statues a strange look of forming part of the very building itself1 and sustaining it--not like the ,greek caryatid1 without effort--nor like the ,renaissance caryatid1 by painful or impossible effort--but as if all that was silent and stern1 and withdrawn apart1 and stiffened in chill of heart against the terror of earth1 had passed into a shape of eternal marble2 and thus the ,ghost had given1 to bear up the pillars of the church on earth1 all the patient and expectant nature that it needed no more in heaven4 ,this is the transcendental view of the meaning of those sculptures4 ,i do not dwell upon it4 ,what ,i do lean upon is their purely naturalistic and vital power4 ,they are all portraits--unknown1 most of them1 ,i believe1 --but palpably and unmistakeably portraits1 if not taken from the actual person for whom the statue stands1 at all events studied from some living person whose features might fairly represent those of the king or saint intended4 ,several of them ,i suppose to be authentic3 there is one of a queen1 who has evidently1 while she lived1 been notable for her bright black eyes4 ,the sculptor has cut the iris deep into the stone1 and her dark eyes are still suggested with her smile4 ,there is another thing ,i wish you to notice specially in these statues --the way in which the floral moulding is associated with the vertical lines of the figure4 ,you have thus the utmost complexity and richness of curvature set side by side with the pure and delicate parallel lines1 and both the characters gain in interest and beauty2 but there is deeper significance in the thing than that of mere effect in composition2 significance not intended on the part of the sculptor1 but all the more valuable because unintentional4 ,i mean the close association of the beauty of lower nature in animals and flowers1 with the beauty of higher nature in human form4 ,you never get this in ,greek work4 ,greek statues are always isolated2 blank fields of stone1 or depths of shadow1 relieving the form of the statue1 as the world of lower nature which they despised retired in darkness from their hearts4 ,here1 the clothed figure seems the type of the ,christian spirit--in many respects feebler and more contracted--but purer2 clothed in its white robes and crown1 and with the riches of all creation at its side4 ,the next step in the change will be set before you in a moment1 merely by comparing this statue from the west front of ,chartres with that of the ,madonna1 from the south transept door of ,amiens4 ,footnote3 ,there are many photographs of this door and of its central statue4 ,its sculpture in the tympanum is farther described in the ,fourth ,lecture4 ,this ,madonna1 with the sculpture round her1 represents the culminating power of ,gothic art in the thirteenth century4 ,sculpture has been gaining continually in the interval2 gaining1 simply because becoming every day more truthful1 more tender1 and more suggestive4 ,by the way1 the old ,douglas motto1 ,tender and true1 may wisely be taken up again by all of us1 for our own1 in art no less than in other things4 ,depend upon it1 the first universal characteristic of all great art is ,tenderness1 as the second is ,truth4 ,i find this more and more every day3 an infinitude of tenderness is the chief gift and inheritance of all the truly great men4 ,it is sure to involve a relative intensity of disdain towards base things1 and an appearance of sternness and arrogance in the eyes of all hard1 stupid1 and vulgar people--quite terrific to such1 if they are capable of terror1 and hateful to them1 if they are capable of nothing higher than hatred4 ,dante's is the great type of this class of mind4 ,i say the first inheritance is ,tenderness-- the second ,truth1 because the ,tenderness is in the make of the creature1 the ,truth in his acquired habits and knowledge2 besides1 the love comes first in dignity as well as in time1 and that is always pure and complete3 the truth1 at best1 imperfect4 ,to come back to our statue4 ,you will observe that the arrangement of this sculpture is exactly the same as at ,chartres--severe falling drapery1 set off by rich floral ornament at the side2 but the statue is now completely animated3 it is no longer fixed as an upright pillar1 but bends aside out of its niche1 and the floral ornament1 instead of being a conventional wreath1 is of exquisitely arranged hawthorn4 ,the work1 however1 as a whole1 though perfectly characteristic of the advance of the age in style and purpose1 is in some subtler qualities inferior to that of ,chartres4 ,the individual sculptor1 though trained in a more advanced school1 has been himself a man of inferior order of mind compared to the one who worked at ,chartres4 ,but ,i have not time to point out to you the subtler characters by which ,i know this4 ,this statue1 then1 marks the culminating point of ,gothic art1 because1 up to this time1 the eyes of its designers had been steadily fixed on natural truth--they had been advancing from flower to flower1 from form to form1 from face to face1--gaining perpetually in knowledge and veracity--therefore1 perpetually in power and in grace4 ,but at this point a fatal change came over their aim4 ,from the statue they now began to turn the attention chiefly to the niche of the statue1 and from the floral ornament to the mouldings that enclosed the floral ornament4 ,the first result of this was1 however1 though not the grandest1 yet the most finished of northern genius4 ,you have1 in the earlier ,gothic1 less wonderful construction1 less careful masonry1 far less expression of harmony of parts in the balance of the building4 ,earlier work always has more or less of the character of a good solid wall with irregular holes in it1 well carved wherever there is room4 ,but the last phase of good ,gothic has no room to spare2 it rises as high as it can on narrowest foundation1 stands in perfect strength with the least possible substance in its bars2 connects niche with niche1 and line with line1 in an exquisite harmony1 from which no stone can be removed1 and to which you can add not a pinnacle2 and yet introduces in rich1 though now more calculated profusion1 the living element of its sculpture3 sculpture in the quatrefoils--sculpture in the brackets-- sculpture in the gargoyles--sculpture in the niches--sculpture in the ridges and hollows of its mouldings1--not a shadow without meaning1 and not a light without life4 ,footnote3 ,the two transepts of ,rouen ,cathedral illustrate this style4 ,there are plenty of photographs of them4 ,i take this opportunity of repeating what ,i have several times before stated1 for the sake of travellers1 that ,st4 ,ouen1 impressive as it is1 is entirely inferior to the transepts of ,rouen ,cathedral4 ,but with this very perfection of his work came the unhappy pride of the builder in what he had done4 ,as long as he had been merely raising clumsy walls and carving them like a child1 in waywardness of fancy1 his delight was in the things he thought of as he carved2 but when he had once reached this pitch of constructive science1 he began to think only how cleverly he could put the stones together4 ,the question was not now with him1 ,what can ,i represent8 but1 ,how high can ,i build--how wonderfully can ,i hang this arch in air1 or weave this tracery across the clouds8 ,and the catastrophe was instant and irrevocable4 ,architecture became in ,france a mere web of waving lines1--in ,england a mere grating of perpendicular ones4 ,redundance was substituted for invention1 and geometry for passion2 tho ,gothic art became a mere expression of wanton expenditure1 and vulgar mathematics2 and was swept away1 as it then deserved to be swept away1 by the severer pride1 and purer learning1 of the schools founded on classical traditions4 ,you cannot now fail to see1 how1 throughout the history of this wonderful art--from its earliest dawn in ,lombardy to its last catastrophe in ,france and ,england--sculpture1 founded on love of nature1 was the talisman of its existence2 wherever sculpture was practised1 architecture arose--wherever that was neglected1 architecture expired2 and1 believe me1 all you students who love this mediaeval art1 there is no hope of your ever doing any good with it1 but on this everlasting principle4 ,your patriotic associations with it are of no use2 your romantic associations with it--either of chivalry or religion--are of no use2 they are worse than useless1 they are false4 ,gothic is not an art for knights and nobles2 it is an art for the people3 it is not an art for churches or sanctuaries2 it is an art for houses and homes3 it is not an art for ,england only1 but an art for the world3 above all1 it is not an art of form or tradition only1 but an art of vital practice and perpetual renewal4 ,and whosoever pleads for it as an ancient or a formal thing1 and tries to teach it you as an ecclesiastical tradition or a geometrical science1 knows nothing of its essence1 less than nothing of its power4 ,leave1 therefore1 boldly1 though not irreverently1 mysticism and symbolism on the one side2 cast away with utter scorn geometry and legalism on the other2 seize hold of ,god's hand and look full in the face of ,his creation1 and there is nothing ,he will not enable you to achieve4 ,thus1 then1 you will find--and the more profound and accurate your knowledge of the history of art the more assuredly you will find--that the living power in all the real schools1 be they great or small1 is love of nature4 ,but do not mistake me by supposing that ,i mean this law to be all that is necessary to form a school4 ,there needs to be much superadded to it1 though there never must be anything superseding it4 ,the main thing which needs to be superadded is the gift of design4 ,it is always dangerous1 and liable to diminish the clearness of impression1 to go over much ground in the course of one lecture4 ,but ,i dare not present you with a maimed view of this important subject3 ,i dare not put off to another time1 when the same persons would not be again assembled1 the statement of the great collateral necessity which1 as well as the necessity of truth1 governs all noble art4 ,that collateral necessity is the visible operation of human intellect in the presentation of truth1 the evidence of what is properly called design or plan in the work1 no less than of veracity4 ,a looking-glass does not design--it receives and communicates indiscriminately all that passes before it2 a painter designs when he chooses some things1 refuses others1 and arranges all4 ,this selection and arrangement must have influence over everything that the art is concerned with1 great or small--over lines1 over colours1 and over ideas4 ,given a certain group of colours1 by adding another colour at the side of them1 you will either improve the group and render it more delightful1 or injure it1 and render it discordant and unintelligible4 ,design is the choosing and placing the colour so as to help and enhance all the other colours it is set beside4 ,so of thoughts3 in a good composition1 every idea is presented in just that order1 and with just that force1 which will perfectly connect it with all the other thoughts in the work1 and will illustrate the others as well as receive illustration from them2 so that the entire chain of thoughts offered to the beholder's mind shall be received by him with as much delight and with as little effort as is possible4 ,and thus you see design1 properly so called1 is human invention1 consulting human capacity4 ,out of the infinite heap of things around us in the world1 it chooses a certain number which it can thoroughly grasp1 and presents this group to the spectator in the form best calculated to enable him to grasp it also1 and to grasp it with delight4 ,and accordingly1 the capacities of both gatherer and receiver being limited1 the object is to make everything that you offer helpful and precious4 ,if you give one grain of weight too much1 so as to increase fatigue without profit1 or bulk without value--that added grain is hurtful2 if you put one spot or one syllable out of its proper place1 that spot or syllable will be destructive--how far destructive it is almost impossible to tell3 a misplaced touch may sometimes annihilate the labour of hours4 ,nor are any of us prepared to understand the work of any great master1 till we feel this1 and feel it as distinctly as we do the value of arrangement in the notes of music4 ,take any noble musical air1 and you find1 on examining it1 that not one even of the faintest or shortest notes can be removed without destruction to the whole passage in which it occurs2 and that every note in the passage is twenty times more beautiful so introduced1 than it would have been if played singly on the instrument4 ,precisely this degree of arrangement and relation must exist between every touch ,footnote3 ,literally4 ,i know how exaggerated this statement sounds2 but ,i mean it1--every syllable of it4--,see ,appendix ,,iv4 and line in a great picture4 ,you may consider the whole as a prolonged musical composition3 its parts1 as separate airs connected in the story2 its little bits and fragments of colour and line1 as separate passages or bars in melodies2 and down to the minutest note of the whole--down to the minutest touch1--if there is one that can be spared--that one is doing mischief4 ,remember therefore always1 you have two characters in which all greatness of art consists3--,first1 the earnest and intense seizing of natural facts2 then the ordering those facts by strength of human intellect1 so as to make them1 for all who look upon them1 to the utmost serviceable1 memorable1 and beautiful4 ,and thus great art is nothing else than the type of strong and noble life2 for1 as the ignoble person1 in his dealings with all that occurs in the world about him1 first sees nothing clearly1--looks nothing fairly in the face1 and then allows himself to be swept away by the trampling torrent1 and unescapable force1 of the things that he would not foresee1 and could not understand3 so the noble person1 looking the facts of the world full in the face1 and fathoming them with deep faculty1 then deals with them in unalarmed intelligence and unhurried strength1 and becomes1 with his human intellect and will1 no unconscious nor insignificant agent1 in consummating their good1 and restraining their evil4 ,thus in human life you have the two fields of rightful toil for ever distinguished1 yet for ever associated2 ,truth first--plan or design1 founded thereon2 so in art1 you have the same two fields for ever distinguished1 for ever associated2 ,truth first--plan1 or design1 founded thereon4 ,now hitherto there is not the least difficulty in the subject2 none of you can look for a moment at any great sculptor or painter without seeing the full bearing of these principles4 ,but a difficulty arises when you come to examine the art of a lower order1 concerned with furniture and manufacture1 for in that art the element of design enters without1 apparently1 the element of truth4 ,you have often to obtain beauty and display invention without direct representation of nature4 ,yet1 respecting all these things also1 the principle is perfectly simple4 ,if the designer of furniture1 of cups and vases1 of dress patterns1 and the like1 exercises himself continually in the imitation of natural form in some leading division of his work2 then1 holding by this stem of life1 he may pass down into all kinds of merely geometrical or formal design with perfect safety1 and with noble results4,footnote3 ,this principle1 here cursorily stated1 is one of the chief subjects of inquiry in the following ,lectures4 ,thus ,giotto1 being primarily a figure painter and sculptor1 is1 secondarily1 the richest of all designers in mere mosaic of coloured bars and triangles2 thus ,benvenuto ,cellini1 being in all the higher branches of metal work a perfect imitator of nature1 is in all its lower branches the best designer of curve for lips of cups and handles of vases2 thus ,holbein1 exercised primarily in the noble art of truthful portraiture1 becomes1 secondarily1 the most exquisite designer of embroideries of robe1 and blazonries on wall2 and thus ,michael ,angelo1 exercised primarily in the drawing of body and limb1 distributes in the mightiest masses the order of his pillars1 and in the loftiest shadow the hollows of his dome4 ,but once quit hold of this living stem1 and set yourself to the designing of ornamentation1 either in the ignorant play of your own heartless fancy1 as the ,indian does1 or according to received application of heartless laws1 as the modern ,european does1 and there is but one word for you--,death3--death of every healthy faculty1 and of every noble intelligence1 incapacity of understanding one great work that man has ever done1 or of doing anything that it shall be helpful for him to behold4 ,you have cut yourselves off voluntarily1 presumptuously1 insolently1 from the whole teaching of your ,maker in ,his ,universe2 you have cut yourselves off from it1 not because you were forced to mechanical labour for your bread--not because your fate had appointed you to wear away your life in walled chambers1 or dig your life out of dusty furrows2 but1 when your whole profession1 your whole occupation-- all the necessities and chances of your existence1 led you straight to the feet of the great ,teacher1 and thrust you into the treasury of ,his works2 where you have nothing to do but to live by gazing1 and to grow by wondering2--wilfully you bind up your eyes from the splendour-- wilfully bind up your life-blood from its beating--wilfully turn your backs upon all the majesties of ,omnipotence--wilfully snatch your hands from all the aids of love1 and what can remain for you1 but helplessness and blindness1--except the worse fate than the being blind yourselves--that of becoming ,leaders of the blind8 ,do not think that ,i am speaking under excited feeling1 or in any exaggerated terms4 ,i have written the words ,i use1 that ,i may know what ,i say1 and that you1 if you choose1 may see what ,i have said4 ,for1 indeed1 ,i have set before you tonight1 to the best of my power1 the sum and substance of the system of art to the promulgation of which ,i have devoted my life hitherto1 and intend to devote what of life may still be spared to me4 ,i have had but one steady aim in all that ,i have ever tried to teach1 namely--to declare that whatever was great in human art was the expression of man's delight in ,god's work4 ,and at this time ,i have endeavoured to prove to you--if you investigate the subject you may more entirely prove to yourselves--that no school ever advanced far which had not the love of natural fact as a primal energy4 ,but it is still more important for you to be assured that the conditions of life and death in the art of nations are also the conditions of life and death in your own2 and that you have it1 each in his power at this very instant1 to determine in which direction his steps are turning4 ,it seems almost a terrible thing to tell you1 that all here have all the power of knowing at once what hope there is for them as artists2 you would1 perhaps1 like better that there was some unremovable doubt about the chances of the future--some possibility that you might be advancing1 in unconscious ways1 towards unexpected successes--some excuse or reason for going about1 as students do so often1 to this master or the other1 asking him if they have genius1 and whether they are doing right1 and gathering1 from his careless or formal replies1 vague flashes of encouragement1 or fitfulnesses of despair4 ,there is no need for this--no excuse for it4 ,all of you have the trial of yourselves in your own power2 each may undergo at this instant1 before his own judgment seat1 the ordeal by fire4 ,ask yourselves what is the leading motive which actuates you while you are at work4 ,i do not ask you what your leading motive is for working--that is a different thing2 you may have families to support--parents to help--brides to win2 you may have all these1 or other such sacred and pre-eminent motives1 to press the morning's labour and prompt the twilight thought4 ,but when you are fairly at the work1 what is the motive then which tells upon every touch of it8 ,if it is the love of that which your work represents--if1 being a landscape painter1 it is love of hills and trees that moves you--if1 being a figure painter1 it is love of human beauty and human soul that moves you--if1 being a flower or animal painter1 it is love1 and wonder1 and delight in petal and in limb that move you1 then the ,spirit is upon you1 and the earth is yours1 and the fulness thereof4 ,but if1 on the other hand1 it is petty self-complacency in your own skill1 trust in precepts and laws1 hope for academical or popular approbation1 or avarice of wealth1--it is quite possible that by steady industry1 or even by fortunate chance1 you may win the applause1 the position1 the fortune1 that you desire2-- but one touch of true art you will never lay on canvas or on stone as long as you live4 ,make1 then1 your choice1 boldly and consciously1 for one way or other it must be made4 ,on the dark and dangerous side are set1 the pride which delights in self-contemplation--the indolence which rests in unquestioned forms--the ignorance that despises what is fairest among ,god's creatures1 and the dulness that denies what is marvellous in ,his working3 there is a life of monotony for your own souls1 and of misguiding for those of others4 ,and1 on the other side1 is open to your choice the life of the crowned spirit1 moving as a light in creation-- discovering always--illuminating always1 gaining every hour in strength1 yet bowed down every hour into deeper humility2 sure of being right in its aim1 sure of being irresistible in its progress2 happy in what it has securely done--happier in what1 day by day1 it may as securely hope2 happiest at the close of life1 when the right hand begins to forget its cunning1 to remember1 that there never was a touch of the chisel or the pencil it wielded1 but has added to the knowledge and quickened the happiness of mankind4 ,,lecture ,,ii4 ,,the ,,unity ,,of ,,art4 ,part of an ,address delivered at ,manchester1 #adth ,march1 #ahei4 ,footnote3 ,i was prevented1 by press of other engagements1 from preparing this address with the care ,i wished2 and forced to trust to such expression as ,i could give at the moment to the points of principal importance2 reading1 however1 the close of the preceding lecture1 which ,i thought contained some truths that would bear repetition4 ,the whole was reported1 better than it deserved1 by ,mr4 ,pitman1 of the ,manchester ,courier1 and published nearly verbatim4 ,i have here extracted1 from the published report1 the facts which ,i wish especially to enforce2 and have a little cleared their expression2 its loose and colloquial character ,i cannot now help1 unless by re-writing the whole1 which it seems not worth while to do4 ,it is sometimes my pleasant duty to visit other cities1 in the hope of being able to encourage their art students2 but here it is my pleasanter privilege to come for encouragement myself4 ,i do not know when ,i have received so much as from the report read this evening by ,mr4 ,hammersley1 bearing upon a subject which has caused me great anxiety4 ,for ,i have always felt in my own pursuit of art1 and in my endeavors to urge the pursuit of art on others1 that while there are many advantages now that never existed before1 there are certain grievous difficulties existing1 just in the very cause that is giving the stimulus to art--in the immense spread of the manufactures of every country which is now attending vigorously to art4 ,we find that manufacture and art are now going on always together2 that where there is no manufacture there is no art4 ,i know how much there is of pretended art where there is no manufacture3 there is much in ,italy1 for instance2 no country makes so bold pretence to the production of new art as ,italy at this moment2 yet no country produces so little4 ,if you glance over the map of ,europe1 you will find that where the manufactures are strongest1 there art also is strongest4 ,and yet ,i always felt that there was an immense difficulty to be encountered by the students who were in these centres of modern movement4 ,they had to avoid the notion that art and manufacture were in any respect one4 ,art may be healthily associated with manufacture1 and probably in future will always be so2 but the student must be strenuously warned against supposing that they can ever be one and the same thing1 that art can ever be followed on the principles of manufacture4 ,each must be followed separately2 the one must influence the other1 but each must be kept distinctly separate from the other4 ,it would be well if all students would keep clearly in their mind the real distinction between those words which we use so often1 ,manufacture1 ,art1 and ,fine ,art4 ,,manufacture is1 according to the etymology and right use of the word1 the making of anything by hands1--directly or indirectly1 with or without the help of instruments or machines4 ,anything proceeding from the hand of man is manufacture2 but it must have proceeded from his hand only1 acting mechanically1 and uninfluenced at the moment by direct intelligence4 ,then1 secondly1 ,,art is the operation of the hand and the intelligence of man together2 there is an art of making machinery2 there is an art of building ships2 an art of making carriages2 and so on4 ,all these1 properly called ,arts1 but not ,fine ,arts1 are pursuits in which the hand of man and his head go together1 working at the same instant4 ,then ,,fine ,,art is that in which the hand1 the head1 and the heart of man go together4 ,recollect this triple group2 it will help you to solve many difficult problems4 ,and remember that though the hand must be at the bottom of everything1 it must also go to the top of everything2 for ,fine ,art must be produced by the hand of man in a much greater and clearer sense than manufacture is4 ,fine ,art must always be produced by the subtlest of all machines1 which is the human hand4 ,no machine yet contrived1 or hereafter contrivable1 will ever equal the fine machinery of the human fingers4 ,thoroughly perfect art is that which proceeds from the heart1 which involves all the noble emotions2--associates with these the head1 yet as inferior to the heart2 and the hand1 yet as inferior to the heart and head2 and thus brings out the whole man4 ,hence it follows that since ,manufacture is simply the operation of the hand of man in producing that which is useful to him1 it essentially separates itself from the emotions2 when emotions interfere with machinery they spoil it3 machinery must go evenly1 without emotion4 ,but the ,fine ,arts cannot go evenly2 they always must have emotion ruling their mechanism1 and until the pupil begins to feel1 and until all he does associates itself with the current of his feeling1 he is not an artist4 ,but pupils in all the schools in this country are now exposed to all kinds of temptations which blunt their feelings4 ,i constantly feel discouraged in addressing them because ,i know not how to tell them boldly what they ought to do1 when ,i feel how practically difficult it is for them to do it4 ,there are all sorts of demands made upon them in every direction1 and money is to be made in every conceivable way but the right way4 ,if you paint as you ought1 and study as you ought1 depend upon it the public will take no notice of you for a long while4 ,if you study wrongly1 and try to draw the attention of the public upon you1--supposing you to be clever students--you will get swift reward2 but the reward does not come fast when it is sought wisely2 it is always held aloof for a little while2 the right roads of early life are very quiet ones1 hedged in from nearly all help or praise4 ,but the wrong roads are noisy1--vociferous everywhere with all kinds of demand upon you for art which is not properly art at all2 and in the various meetings of modern interests1 money is to be made in every way2 but art is to be followed only in one way4 ,that is what ,i want mainly to say to you1 or if not to you yourselves 7for1 from what ,i have heard from your excellent master to-night1 ,i know you are going on all rightly71 you must let me say it through you to others4 ,our ,schools of ,art are confused by the various teaching and various interests that are now abroad among us4 ,everybody is talking about art1 and writing about it1 and more or less interested in it2 everybody wants art1 and there is not art for everybody1 and few who talk know what they are talking about2 thus students are led in all variable ways1 while there is only one way in which they can make steady progress1 for true art is always and will be always one4 ,whatever changes may be made in the customs of society1 whatever new machines we may invent1 whatever new manufactures we may supply1 ,fine ,art must remain what it was two thousand years ago1 in the days of ,phidias2 two thousand years hence1 it will be1 in all its principles1 and in all its great effects upon the mind of man1 just the same4 ,observe this that ,i say1 please1 carefully1 for ,i mean it to the very utmost4 ,there is but one right way of doing any given thing required of an artist2 there may be a hundred wrong1 deficient1 or mannered ways1 but there is only one complete and right way4 ,whenever two artists are trying to do the same thing with the same materials1 and do it in different ways1 one of them is wrong2 he may be charmingly wrong1 or impressively wrong--various circumstances in his temper may make his wrong pleasanter than any person's right2 it may for him1 under his given limitations of knowledge or temper1 be better perhaps that he should err in his own way than try for anybody else's--but for all that his way is wrong1 and it is essential for all masters of schools to know what the right way is1 and what right art is1 and to see how simple and how single all right art has been1 since the beginning of it4 ,but farther1 not only is there but one way of doing things rightly1 but there is only one way of seeing them1 and that is1 seeing the whole of them1 without any choice1 or more intense perception of one point than another1 owing to our special idiosyncrasies4 ,thus1 when ,titian or ,tintoret look at a human being1 they see at a glance the whole of its nature1 outside and in2 all that it has of form1 of colour1 of passion1 or of thought2 saintliness1 and loveliness2 fleshly body1 and spiritual power2 grace1 or strength1 or softness1 or whatsoever other quality1 those men will see to the full1 and so paint1 that1 when narrower people come to look at what they have done1 every one may1 if he chooses1 find his own special pleasure in the work4 ,the sensualist will find sensuality in ,titian2 the thinker will find thought2 the saint1 sanctity2 the colourist1 colour2 the anatomist1 form2 and yet the picture will never be a popular one in the full sense1 for none of these narrower people will find their special taste so alone consulted1 as that the qualities which would ensure their gratification shall be sifted or separated from others2 they are checked by the presence of the other qualities which ensure the gratification of other men4 ,thus1 ,titian is not soft enough for the sensualist1 ,correggio suits him better2 ,titian is not defined enough for the formalist1--,leonardo suits him better2 ,titian is not pure enough for the religionist1--,raphael suits him better2 ,titian is not polite enough for the man of the world1--,vandyke suits him better2 ,titian is not forcible enough for the lovers of the picturesque1-- ,rembrandt suits him better4 ,so ,correggio is popular with a certain set1 and ,vandyke with a certain set1 and ,rembrandt with a certain set4 ,all are great men1 but of inferior stamp1 and therefore ,vandyke is popular1 and ,rembrandt is popular1 ,footnote3 ,and ,murillo1 of all true painters the narrowest1 feeblest1 and most superficial1 for those reasons the most popular4 but nobody cares much at heart about ,titian2 only there is a strange under-current of everlasting murmur about his name1 which means the deep consent of all great men that he is greater than they-- the consent of those who1 having sat long enough at his feet1 have found in that restrained harmony of his strength there are indeed depths of each balanced power more wonderful than all those separate manifestations in inferior painters3 that there is a softness more exquisite than ,correggio's1 a purity loftier than ,leonardo's1 a force mightier than ,rembrandt's1 a sanctity more solemn even than ,raffaelle's4 ,do not suppose that in saying this of ,titian1 ,i am returning to the old eclectic theories of ,bologna2 for all those eclectic theories1 observe1 were based1 not upon an endeavour to unite the various characters of nature 7which it is possible to do71 but the various narrownesses of taste1 which it is impossible to do4 ,rubens is not more vigorous than ,titian1 but less vigorous2 but because he is so narrow-minded as to enjoy vigour only1 he refuses to give the other qualities of nature1 which would interfere with that vigour and with our perception of it4 ,again1 ,rembrandt is not a greater master of chiaroscuro than ,titian2-- he is a less master1 but because he is so narrow-minded as to enjoy chiaroscuro only1 he withdraws from you the splendour of hue which would interfere with this1 and gives you only the shadow in which you can at once feel it4 ,now all these specialties have their own charm in their own way3 and there are times when the particular humour of each man is refreshing to us from its very distinctness2 but the effort to add any other qualities to this refreshing one instantly takes away the distinctiveness1 and therefore the exact character to be enjoyed in its appeal to a particular humour in us4 ,our enjoyment arose from a weakness meeting a weakness1 from a partiality in the painter fitting to a partiality in us1 and giving us sugar when we wanted sugar1 and myrrh when we wanted myrrh2 but sugar and myrrh are not meat3 and when we want meat and bread1 we must go to better men4 ,the eclectic schools endeavoured to unite these opposite partialities and weaknesses4 ,they trained themselves under masters of exaggeration1 and tried to unite opposite exaggerations4 ,that was impossible4 ,they did not see that the only possible eclecticism had been already accomplished2--the eclecticism of temperance1 which1 by the restraint of force1 gains higher force2 and by the self-denial of delight1 gains higher delight4 ,this you will find is ultimately the case with every true and right master2 at first1 while we are tyros in art1 or before we have earnestly studied the man in question1 we shall see little in him2 or perhaps see1 as we think1 deficiencies2 we shall fancy he is inferior to this man in that1 and to the other man in the other2 but as we go on studying him we shall find that he has got both that and the other2 and both in a far higher sense than the man who seemed to possess those qualities in excess4 ,thus in ,turner's lifetime1 when people first looked at him1 those who liked rainy1 weather1 said he was not equal to ,copley ,fielding2 but those who looked at ,turner long enough found that he could be much more wet than ,copley ,fielding1 when he chose4 ,the people who liked force1 said that ,turner was not strong enough for them2 he was effeminate2 they liked ,de ,wint1--nice strong tone2--or ,cox--great1 greeny1 dark masses of colour--solemn feeling of the freshness and depth of nature2--they liked ,cox--,turner was too hot for them4 ,had they looked long enough they would have found that he had far more force than ,de ,wint1 far more freshness than ,cox when he chose1--only united with other elements2 and that he didn't choose to be cool1 if nature had appointed the weather to be hot4 ,the people who liked ,prout said ,turner had not firmness of hand--he did not know enough about architecture--he was not picturesque enough4 ,had they looked at his architecture long1 they would have found that it contained subtle picturesquenesses1 infinitely more picturesque than anything of ,prout's4 ,people who liked ,callcott said that ,turner was not correct or pure enough--had no classical taste4 ,had they looked at ,turner long enough they would have found him as severe1 when he chose1 as the greater ,poussin2--,callcott1 a mere vulgar imitator of other men's high breeding4 ,and so throughout with all thoroughly great men1 their strength is not seen at first1 precisely because they unite1 in due place and measure1 every great quality4 ,now the question is1 whether1 as students1 we are to study only these mightiest men1 who unite all greatness1 or whether we are to study the works of inferior men1 who present us with the greatness which we particularly like8 ,that question often comes before me when ,i see a strong idiosyncrasy in a student1 and he asks me what he should study4 ,shall ,i send him to a true master1 who does not present the quality in a prominent way in which that student delights1 or send him to a man with whom he has direct sympathy8 ,it is a hard question4 ,for very curious results have sometimes been brought out1 especially in late years1 not only by students following their own bent1 but by their being withdrawn from teaching altogether4 ,i have just named a very great man in his own field--,prout4 ,we all know his drawings1 and love them3 they have a peculiar character which no other architectural drawings ever possessed1 and which no others can possess1 because all ,prout's subjects are being knocked down or restored4 7,prout did not like restored buildings any more than ,i do47 ,there will never be any more ,prout drawings4 ,nor could he have been what he was1 or expressed with that mysteriously effective touch that peculiar delight in broken and old buildings1 unless he had been withdrawn from all high art influence4 ,you know that ,prout was born of poor parents--that he was educated down in ,cornwall2--and that1 for many years1 all the art- teaching he had was his own1 or the fishermen's4 ,under the keels of the fishing-boats1 on the sands of our southern coasts1 ,prout learned all that he needed to learn about art4 ,entirely by himself1 he felt his way to this particular style1 and became the painter of pictures which ,i think we should all regret to lose4 ,it becomes a very difficult question what that man would have been1 had he been brought under some entirely wholesome artistic influence1 ,he had immense gifts of composition4 ,i do not know any man who had more power of invention than ,prout1 or who had a sublimer instinct in his treatment of things2 but being entirely withdrawn from all artistical help1 he blunders his way to that short-coming representation1 which1 by the very reason of its short-coming1 has a certain charm we should all be sorry to lose4 ,and therefore ,i feel embarrassed when a student comes to me1 in whom ,i see a strong instinct of that kind3 and cannot tell whether ,i ought to say to him1 ,give up all your studies of old boats1 and keep away from the sea-shore1 and come up to the ,royal ,academy in ,london1 and look at nothing but ,titian4 ,it is a difficult thing to make up one's mind to say that4 ,however1 ,i believe1 on the whole1 we may wisely leave such matters in the hands of ,providence2 that if we have the power of teaching the right to anybody1 we should teach them the right2 if we have the power of showing them the best thing1 we should show them the best thing2 there will always1 ,i fear1 be enough want of teaching1 and enough bad teaching1 to bring out very curious erratical results if we want them4 ,so1 if we are to teach at all1 let us teach the right thing1 and ever the right thing4 ,there are many attractive qualities inconsistent with rightness2--do not let us teach them1--let us be content to waive them4 ,there are attractive qualities in ,burns1 and attractive qualities in ,dickens1 which neither of those writers would have possessed if the one had been educated1 and the other had been studying higher nature than that of cockney ,london2 but those attractive qualities are not such as we should seek in a school of literature4 ,if we want to teach young men a good manner of writing1 we should teach it from ,shakspeare1--not from ,burns2 from ,walter ,scott1-- and not from ,dickens4 ,and ,i believe that our schools of painting are at present inefficient in their action1 because they have not fixed on this high principle what are the painters to whom to point2 nor boldly resolved to point to the best1 if determinable4 ,it is becoming a matter of stern necessity that they should give a simple direction to the attention of the student1 and that they should say1 ,this is the mark you are to aim at2 and you are not to go about to the print-shops1 and peep in1 to see how this engraver does that1 and the other engraver does the other1 and how a nice bit of character has been caught by a new man1 and why this odd picture has caught the popular attention4 ,you are to have nothing to do with all that2 you are not to mind about popular attention just now2 but here is a thing which is eternally right and good3 you are to look at that1 and see if you cannot do something eternally right and good too4 ,but suppose you accept this principle3 and resolve to look to some great man1 ,titian1 or ,turner1 or whomsoever it may be1 as the model of perfection in art2--then the question is1 since this great man pursued his art in ,venice1 or in the fields of ,england1 under totally different conditions from those possible to us now--how are you to make your study of him effective here in ,manchester8 how bring it down into patterns1 and all that you are called upon as operatives to produce8 how make it the means of your livelihood1 and associate inferior branches of art with this great art8 ,that may become a serious doubt to you4 ,you may think there is some other way of producing clever1 and pretty1 and saleable patterns than going to look at ,titian1 or any other great man4 ,and that brings me to the question1 perhaps the most vexed question of all amongst us just now1 between conventional and perfect art4 ,you know that among architects and artists there are1 and have been almost always1 since art became a subject of much discussion1 two parties1 one maintaining that nature should be always altered and modified1 and that the artist is greater than nature2 they do not maintain1 indeed1 in words1 but they maintain in idea1 that the artist is greater than the ,divine ,maker of these things1 and can improve them2 while the other party say that he cannot improve nature1 and that nature on the whole should improve him4 ,that is the real meaning of the two parties1 the essence of them2 the practical result of their several theories being that the ,idealists are always producing more or less formal conditions of art1 and the ,realists striving to produce in all their art either some image of nature1 or record of nature2 these1 observe1 being quite different things1 the image being a resemblance1 and the record1 something which will give information about nature1 but not necessarily imitate it4 ,footnote3 ,the portion of the lecture here omitted was a recapitulation of that part of the previous one which opposed conventional art to natural art4 99 99 99 99 99 ,you may separate these two groups of artists more distinctly in your mind as those who seek for the pleasure of art1 in the relations of its colours and lines1 without caring to convey any truth with it2 and those who seek for the truth first1 and then go down from the truth to the pleasure of colour and line4 ,marking those two bodies distinctly as separate1 and thinking over them1 you may come to some rather notable conclusions respecting the mental dispositions which are involved in each mode of study4 ,you will find that large masses of the art of the world fall definitely under one or the other of these heads4 ,observe1 pleasure first and truth afterwards1 7or not at all17 as with the ,arabians and ,indians2 or1 truth first and pleasure afterwards1 as with ,angelico and all other great ,european painters4 ,you will find that the art whose end is pleasure only is pre-eminently the gift of cruel and savage nations1 cruel in temper1 savage in habits and conception2 but that the art which is especially dedicated to natural fact always indicates a peculiar gentleness and tenderness of mind1 and that all great and successful work of that kind will assuredly be the production of thoughtful1 sensitive1 earnest1 kind men1 large in their views of life1 and full of various intellectual power4 ,and farther1 when you examine the men in whom the gifts of art are variously mingled1 or universally mingled1 you will discern that the ornamental1 or pleasurable power1 though it may be possessed by good men1 is not in itself an indication of their goodness1 but is rather1 unless balanced by other faculties1 indicative of violence of temper1 inclining to cruelty and to irreligion4 ,on the other hand1 so sure as you find any man endowed with a keen and separate faculty of representing natural fact1 so surely you will find that man gentle and upright1 full of nobleness and breadth of thought4 ,i will give you two instances1 the first peculiarly ,english1 and another peculiarly interesting because it occurs among a nation not generally very kind or gentle4 ,i am inclined to think that1 considering all the disadvantages of circumstances and education under which his genius was developed1 there was perhaps hardly ever born a man with a more intense and innate gift of insight into nature than our own ,sir ,joshua ,reynolds4 ,considered as a painter of individuality in the human form and mind1 ,i think him1 even as it is1 the prince of portrait painters4 ,titian paints nobler pictures1 and ,vandyke had nobler subjects1 but neither of them entered so subtly as ,sir ,joshua did into the minor varieties of human heart and temper2 arid when you consider that1 with a frightful conventionality of social habitude all around him1 he yet conceived the simplest types of all feminine and childish loveliness2--that in a northern climate1 and with gray1 and white1 and black1 as the principal colours around him1 he yet became a colourist who can be crushed by none1 even of the ,venetians2--and that with ,dutch painting and ,dresden china for the prevailing types of art in the saloons of his day1 he threw himself at once at the feet of the great masters of ,italy1 and arose from their feet to share their throne--,i know not that in the whole history of art you can produce another instance of so strong1 so unaided1 so unerring an instinct for all that was true1 pure1 and noble4 ,now1 do you recollect the evidence respecting the character of this man1--the two points of bright peculiar evidence given by the sayings of the two greatest literary men of his day1 ,johnson and ,goldsmith8 ,johnson1 who1 as you know1 was always ,reynolds' attached friend1 had but one complaint to make against him1 that he hated nobody3-- ,reynolds1 he said1 you hate no one living2 ,i like a good hater6 ,still more significant is the little touch in ,goldsmith's ,retaliation4 ,you recollect how in that poem he describes the various persons who met at one of their dinners at ,st4 ,james's ,coffee-house1 each person being described under the name of some appropriate dish4 ,you will often hear the concluding lines about ,reynolds ,quoted-- ,he shifted his trumpet1 c2-- less often1 or at least less attentively1 the preceding ones1 far more important-- ,still born to improve us in every part-- ,his pencil our faces1 his manners our heart2 and never1 the most characteristic touch of all1 near the beginning3-- ,our dean shall be venison1 just fresh from the plains2 ,our ,burke shall be tongue1 with a garnish of brains4 ,to make out the dinner1 full certain ,i am1 ,that ,rich is anchovy1 and ,reynolds is lamb4 ,the other painter whom ,i would give you as an instance of this gentleness is a man of another nation1 on the whole ,i suppose one of the most cruel civilized nations in the world--the ,spaniards4 ,they produced but one great painter1 only one2 but he among the very greatest of painters1 ,velasquez4 ,you would not suppose1 from looking at ,velasquez' portraits generally1 that he was an especially kind or good man2 you perceive a peculiar sternness about them2 for they were as true as steel1 and the persons whom he had to paint being not generally kind or good people1 they were stern in expression1 and ,velasquez gave the sternness2 but he had precisely the same intense perception of truth1 the same marvellous instinct for the rendering of all natural soul and all natural form that our ,reynolds had4 ,let me1 then1 read you his character as it is given by ,mr4 ,stirling1 of ,kier3-- ,certain charges1 of what nature we are not informed1 brought against him after his death1 made it necessary for his executor1 ,fuensalida1 to refute them at a private audience granted to him by the king for that purpose4 ,after listening to the defence of his friend1 ,philip immediately made answer3 ',i can believe all you say of the excellent disposition of ,diego ,velasquez4' ,having lived for half his life in courts1 he was yet capable both of gratitude and generosity1 and in the misfortunes1 he could remember the early kindness of ,olivares4 ,the friend of the exile of ,loeches1 it is just to believe that he was also the friend of the all-powerful favourite at ,buenretiro4 ,no mean jealousy ever influenced his conduct to his brother artists2 he could afford not only to acknowledge the merits1 but to forgive the malice1 of his rivals4 ,his character was of that rare and happy kind1 in which high intellectual power is combined with indomitable strength of will1 and a winning sweetness of temper1 and which seldom fails to raise the possessor above his fellow-men1 making his life a 'laurelled victory1 and smooth success ,be strewed before his feet4' ,i am sometimes accused of trying to make art too moral2 yet1 observe1 ,i do not say in the least that in order to be a good painter you must be a good man2 but ,i do say that in order to be a good natural painter there must be strong elements of good in the mind1 however warped by other parts of the character4 ,there are hundreds of other gifts of painting which are not at all involved with moral conditions1 but this one1 the perception of nature1 is never given but under certain moral conditions4 ,therefore1 now you have it in your choice2 here are your two paths for you3 it is required of you to produce conventional ornament1 and you may approach the task as the ,hindoo does1 and as the ,arab did1--without nature at all1 with the chance of approximating your disposition somewhat to that of the ,hindoos and ,arabs2 or as ,sir ,joshua and ,velasquez did1 with1 not the chance1 but the certainty1 of approximating your disposition1 according to the sincerity of your effort--to the disposition of those great and good men4 ,and do you suppose you will lose anything by approaching your conventional art from this higher side8 ,not so4 ,i called1 with deliberate measurement of my expression1 long ago1 the decoration of the ,alhambra detestable1 not merely because indicative of base conditions of moral being1 but because merely as decorative work1 however captivating in some respects1 it is wholly wanting in the real1 deep1 and intense qualities of ornamental art4 ,noble conventional decoration belongs only to three periods4 ,first1 there is the conventional decoration of the ,greeks1 used in subordination to their sculpture4 ,there are then the noble conventional decoration of the early ,gothic schools1 and the noble conventional arabesque of the great ,italian schools4 ,all these were reached from above1 all reached by stooping from a knowledge of the human form4 ,depend upon it you will find1 as you look more and more into the matter1 that good subordinate ornament has ever been rooted in a higher knowledge2 and if you are again to produce anything that is noble1 you must have the higher knowledge first1 and descend to all lower service2 condescend as much as you like1--condescension never does any man any harm1--but get your noble standing first4 ,so1 then1 without any scruple1 whatever branch of art you may be inclined as a student here to follow1--whatever you are to make your bread by1 ,i say1 so far as you have time and power1 make yourself first a noble and accomplished artist2 understand at least what noble and accomplished art is1 and then you will be able to apply your knowledge to all service whatsoever4 ,i am now going to ask your permission to name the masters whom ,i think it would be well if we could agree1 in our ,schools of ,art in ,england1 to consider our leaders4 ,the first and chief ,i will not myself presume to name2 he shall be distinguished for you by the authority of those two great painters of whom we have just been speaking--,reynolds and ,velasquez4 ,you may remember that in your ,manchester ,art ,treasures ,exhibition the most impressive things were the works of those two men-- nothing told upon the eye so much2 no other pictures retained it with such a persistent power4 ,now1 ,i have the testimony1 first of ,reynolds to ,velasquez1 and then of ,velasquez to the man whom ,i want you to take as the master of all your ,english schools4 ,the testimony of ,reynolds to ,velasquez is very striking4 ,i take it from some fragments which have just been published by ,mr4 ,william ,cotton--precious fragments--of ,reynolds' diaries1 which ,i chanced upon luckily as ,i was coming down here3 for ,i was going to take ,velasquez' testimony alone1 and then fell upon this testimony of ,reynolds to ,velasquez1 written most fortunately in ,reynolds' own hand-you may see the manuscript4 ,what we are all1 said ,reynolds1 attempting to do with great labor1 ,velasquez does at once4 ,just think what is implied when a man of the enormous power and facility that ,reynolds had1 says he was trying to do with great labor what ,velasquez did at once4 ,having thus ,reynolds' testimony to ,velasquez1 ,i will take ,velasquez' testimony to somebody else4 ,you know that ,velasquez was sent by ,philip of ,spain to ,italy1 to buy pictures for him4 ,he went all over ,italy1 saw the living artists there1 and all their best pictures when freshly painted1 so that he had every opportunity of judging2 and never was a man so capable of judging4 ,he went to ,rome and ordered various works of living artists2 and while there1 he was one day asked by ,salvator ,rosa what he thought of ,raphael4 ,his reply1 and the ensuing conversation1 are thus reported by ,boschini1 in curious ,italian verse1 which1 thus translated by ,dr4 ,donaldson1 is quoted in ,mr4 ,stirling's ,life of ,velasquez3-- ,the master ,velasquez stiffly bowed his figure tall ,and said1 ',for ,rafael1 to speak the truth-- ,i always was plain-spoken from my youth-- ,i cannot say ,i like his works at all4' ',well1' said the other ,salvator1 'if you can run down ,so great a man1 ,i really cannot see ,what you can find to like in ,italy2 ,to him we all agree to give the crown4' ,diego answered thus3 ',i saw in ,venice ,the true test of the good and beautiful2 ,first in my judgment1 ever stands that school1 ,and ,titian first of all ,italian men is4' ,tizian ze quel die porta la bandiera ,learn that line by heart and act1 at all events for some time to come1 upon ,velasquez' opinion in that matter4 ,titian is much the safest master for you4 ,raphael's power1 such as it characters in his mind2 it is ,raphaelesque1 properly so called2 but ,titian's power is simply the power of doing right4 ,whatever came before ,titian1 he did wholly as it ought to be done4 ,do not suppose that now in recommending ,titian to you so strongly1 and speaking of nobody else to-night1 ,i am retreating in anywise from what some of you may perhaps recollect in my works1 the enthusiasm with which ,i have always spoken of another ,venetian painter4 ,there are three ,venetians who are never separated in my mind--,titian1 ,veronese1 and ,tintoret4 ,they all have their own unequalled gifts1 and ,tintoret especially has imagination and depth of soul which ,i think renders him indisputably the greatest man2 but1 equally indisputably1 ,titian is the greatest painter2 and therefore the greatest painter who ever lived4 ,you may be led wrong by ,tintoret ,footnote3 ,see ,appendix ,i4--,right and ,wrong4 in many respects1 wrong by ,raphael in more2 all that you learn from ,titian will be right4 ,then1 with ,titian1 take ,leonardo1 ,rembrandt1 and ,albert ,drer4 ,i name those three masters for this reason3 ,leonardo has powers of subtle drawing which are peculiarly applicable in many ways to the drawing of fine ornament1 and are very useful for all students4 ,rembrandt and ,drer are the only men whose actual work of hand you can have to look at2 you can have ,rembrandt's etchings1 or ,drer's engravings actually hung in your schools2 and it is a main point for the student to see the real thing1 and avoid judging of masters at second-hand4 ,as1 however1 in obeying this principle1 you cannot often have opportunities of studying ,venetian painting1 it is desirable that you should have a useful standard of colour1 and ,i think it is possible for you to obtain this4 ,i cannot1 indeed1 without entering upon ground which might involve the hurting the feelings of living artists1 state exactly what ,i believe to be the relative position of various painters in ,england at present with respect to power of colour4 ,but ,i may say this1 that in the peculiar gifts of colour which will be useful to you as students1 there are only one or two of the pre-,raphaelites1 and ,william ,hunt1 of the old ,water ,colour ,society1 who would be safe guides for you3 and as quite a safe guide1 there is nobody but ,william ,hunt1 because the pre-,raphaelites are all more or less affected by enthusiasm and by various morbid conditions of intellect and temper2 but old ,william ,hunt--,i am sorry to say old1 but ,i say it in a loving way1 for every year that has added to his life has added also to his skill--,william ,hunt is as right as the ,venetians1 as far as he goes1 and what is more1 nearly as inimitable as they4 ,and ,i think if we manage to put in the principal schools of ,england a little bit of ,hunt's work1 and make that somewhat of a standard of colour1 that we can apply his principles of colouring to subjects of all kinds4 ,until you have had a work of his long near you2 nay1 unless you have been labouring at it1 and trying to copy it1 you do not know the thoroughly grand qualities that are concentrated in it4 ,simplicity1 and intensity1 both of the highest character2-- simplicity of aim1 and intensity of power and success1 are involved in that man's unpretending labour4 ,finally1 you cannot believe that ,i would omit my own favourite1 ,turner4 ,i fear from the very number of his works left to the nation1 that there is a disposition now rising to look upon his vast bequest with some contempt4 ,i beg of you1 if in nothing else1 to believe me in this1 that you cannot further the art of ,england in any way more distinctly than by giving attention to every fragment that has been left by that man4 ,the time will come when his full power and right place will be acknowledged2 that time will not be for many a day yet3 nevertheless1 be assured--as far as you are inclined to give the least faith to anything ,i may say to you1 be assured--that you can act for the good of art in ,england in no better way than by using whatever influence any of you have in any direction to urge the reverent study and yet more reverent preservation of the works of ,turner4 ,i do not say the exhibition of his works1 for we are not altogether ripe for it3 they are still too far above us2 uniting1 as ,i was telling you1 too many qualities for us yet to feel fully their range and their influence2-- but let us only try to keep them safe from harm1 and show thoroughly and conveniently what we show of them at all1 and day by day their greatness will dawn upon us more and more1 and be the root of a school of art in ,england1 which ,i do not doubt may be as bright1 as just1 and as refined as even that of ,venice herself4 ,the dominion of the sea seems to have been associated1 in past time1 with dominion in the arts also3 ,athens had them together2 ,venice had them together2 but by so much as our authority over the ocean is wider than theirs over the gean or ,adriatic1 let us strive to make our art more widely beneficent than theirs1 though it cannot be more exalted2 so working out the fulfilment1 in their wakening as well as their warning sense1 of those great words of the aged ,tintoret3 ,sempre si fa il mare maggiore4 ,,lecture ,,iii4 ,,modern ,,manufacture ,,and ,,design4 ,a ,lecture delivered at ,bradford1 ,march1 #ahei4 ,it is with a deep sense of necessity for your indulgence that ,i venture to address you to-night1 or that ,i venture at any time to address the pupils of schools of design intended for the advancement of taste in special branches of manufacture4 ,no person is able to give useful and definite help towards such special applications of art1 unless he is entirely familiar with the conditions of labour and natures of material involved in the work2 and indefinite help is little better than no help at all4 ,nay1 the few remarks which ,i propose to lay before you this evening will1 ,i fear1 be rather suggestive of difficulties than helpful in conquering them3 nevertheless1 it may not be altogether unserviceable to define clearly for you 7and this1 at least1 ,i am able to do7 one or two of the more stern general obstacles which stand at present in the way of our success in design2 and to warn you against exertion of effort in any vain or wasteful way1 till these main obstacles are removed4 ,the first of these is our not understanding the scope and dignity of ,decorative design4 ,with all our talk about it1 the very meaning of the words ,decorative art remains confused and undecided4 ,i want1 if possible1 to settle this question for you to-night1 and to show you that the principles on which you must work are likely to be false1 in proportion as they are narrow2 true1 only as they are founded on a perception of the connection of all branches of art with each other4 ,observe1 then1 first--the only essential distinction between ,decorative and other art is the being fitted for a fixed place2 and in that place1 related1 either in subordination or command1 to the effect of other pieces of art4 ,and all the greatest art which the world has produced is thus fitted for a place1 and subordinated to a purpose4 ,there is no existing highest-order art but is decorative4 ,the best sculpture yet produced has been the decoration of a temple front--the best painting1 the decoration of a room4 ,raphael's best doing is merely the wall- colouring of a suite of apartments in the ,vatican1 and his cartoons were made for tapestries4 ,correggio's best doing is the decoration of two small church cupolas at ,parma2 ,michael ,angelo's of a ceiling in the ,pope's private chapel2 ,tintoret's1 of a ceiling and side wall belonging to a charitable society at ,venice2 while ,titian and ,veronese threw out their noblest thoughts1 not even on the inside1 but on the outside of the common brick and plaster walls of ,venice4 ,get rid1 then1 at once of any idea of ,decorative art being a degraded or a separate kind of art4 ,its nature or essence is simply its being fitted for a definite place2 and1 in that place1 forming part of a great and harmonious whole1 in companionship with other art2 and so far from this being a degradation to it--so far from ,decorative art being inferior to other art because it is fixed to a spot--on the whole it may be considered as rather a piece of degradation that it should be portable4 ,portable art--independent of all place--is for the most part ignoble art4 ,your little ,dutch landscape1 which you put over your sideboard to-day1 and between the windows tomorrow1 is a far more contemptible piece of work than the extents of field and forest with which ,benozzo has made green and beautiful the once melancholy arcade of the ,campo ,santo at ,pisa2 and the wild boar of silver which you use for a seal1 or lock into a velvet case1 is little likely to be so noble a beast as the bronze boar who foams forth the fountain from under his tusks in the market-place of ,florence4 ,it is1 indeed1 possible that the portable picture or image may be first-rate of its kind1 but it is not first-rate because it is portable2 nor are ,titian's frescoes less than first-rate because they are fixed2 nay1 very frequently the highest compliment you can pay to a cabinet picture is to say--,it is as grand as a fresco4 ,keeping1 then1 this fact fixed in our minds1--that all art may be decorative1 and that the greatest art yet produced has been decorative1--we may proceed to distinguish the orders and dignities of decorative art1 thus3-- ,i4 ,the first order of it is that which is meant for places where it cannot be disturbed or injured1 and where it can be perfectly seen2 and then the main parts of it should be1 and have always been made1 by the great masters1 as perfect1 and as full of nature as possible4 ,you will every day hear it absurdly said that room decoration should be by flat patterns--by dead colours--by conventional monotonies1 and ,i know not what4 ,now1 just be assured of this--nobody ever yet used conventional art to decorate with1 when he could do anything better1 and knew that what he did would be safe4 ,nay1 a great painter will always give you the natural art1 safe or not4 ,correggio gets a commission to paint a room on the ground floor of a palace at ,parma3 any of our people--bred on our fine modern principles--would have covered it with a diaper1 or with stripes or flourishes1 or mosaic patterns4 ,not so ,correggio3 he paints a thick trellis of vine-leaves1 with oval openings1 and lovely children leaping through them into the room2 and lovely children1 depend upon it1 are rather more desirable decorations than diaper1 if you can do them--but they are not quite so easily done4 ,in like manner ,tintoret has to paint the whole end of the ,council ,hall at ,venice4 ,an orthodox decorator would have set himself to make the wall look like a wall--,tintoret thinks it would be rather better1 if he can manage it1 to make it look a little like ,paradise2-- stretches his canvas right over the wall1 and his clouds right over his canvas2 brings the light through his clouds--all blue and clear--zodiac beyond zodiac2 rolls away the vaporous flood from under the feet of saints1 leaving them at last in infinitudes of light--unorthodox in the last degree1 but1 on the whole1 pleasant4 ,and so in all other cases whatever1 the greatest decorative art is wholly unconventional--downright1 pure1 good painting and sculpture1 but always fitted for its place2 and subordinated to the purpose it has to serve in that place4 ,,ii4 ,but if art is to be placed where it is liable to injury--to wear and tear2 or to alteration of its form2 as1 for instance1 on domestic utensils1 and armour1 and weapons1 and dress2 in which either the ornament will be worn out by the usage of the thing1 or will be cast into altered shape by the play of its folds2 then it is wrong to put beautiful and perfect art to such uses1 and you want forms of inferior art1 such as will be by their simplicity less liable to injury2 or1 by reason of their complexity and continuousness1 may show to advantage1 however distorted by the folds they are cast into4 ,and thus arise the various forms of inferior decorative art1 respecting which the general law is1 that the lower the place and office of the thing1 the less of natural or perfect form you should have in it2 a zigzag or a chequer is thus a better1 because a more consistent ornament for a cup or platter than a landscape or portrait is3 hence the general definition of the true forms of conventional ornament is1 that they consist in the bestowal of as much beauty on the object as shall be consistent with its ,material1 its ,place1 and its ,office4 ,let us consider these three modes of consistency a little4 7,a47 ,conventionalism by cause of inefficiency of material4 ,if1 for instance1 we are required to represent a human figure with stone only1 we cannot represent its colour2 we reduce its colour to whiteness4 ,that is not elevating the human body1 but degrading it2 only it would be a much greater degradation to give its colour falsely4 ,diminish beauty as much as you will1 but do not misrepresent it4 ,so again1 when we are sculpturing a face1 we can't carve its eyelashes4 ,the face is none the better for wanting its eyelashes--it is injured by the want2 but would be much more injured by a clumsy representation of them4 ,neither can we carve the hair4 ,we must be content with the conventionalism of vile solid knots and lumps of marble1 instead of the golden cloud that encompasses the fair human face with its waving mystery4 ,the lumps of marble are not an elevated representation of hair--they are a degraded one2 yet better than any attempt to imitate hair with the incapable material4 ,in all cases in which such imitation is attempted1 instant degradation to a still lower level is the result4 ,for the effort to imitate shows that the workman has only a base and poor conception of the beauty of the reality--else he would know his task to be hopeless1 and give it up at once2 so that all endeavours to avoid conventionalism1 when the material demands it1 result from insensibility to truth1 and are among the worst forms of vulgarity4 ,hence1 in the greatest ,greek statues1 the hair is very slightly indicated--not because the sculptor disdained hair1 but because he knew what it was too well to touch it insolently4 ,i do not doubt but that the ,greek painters drew hair exactly as ,titian does4 ,modern attempts to produce finished pictures on glass result from the same base vulgarism4 ,no man who knows what painting means1 can endure a painted glass window which emulates painter's work4 ,but he rejoices in a glowing mosaic of broken colour3 for that is what the glass has the special gift and right of producing4 ,footnote3 ,see ,appendix ,,ii41 ,sir ,joshua ,reynolds's disappointment4 7,b47 ,conventionalism by cause of inferiority of place4 ,when work is to be seen at a great distance1 or in dark places1 or in some other imperfect way1 it constantly becomes necessary to treat it coarsely or severely1 in order to make it effective4 ,the statues on cathedral fronts1 in good times of design1 are variously treated according to their distances3 no fine execution is put into the features of the ,madonna who rules the group of figures above the south transept of ,rouen at #aej feet above the ground2 but in base modern work1 as ,milan ,cathedral1 the sculpture is finished without any reference to distance2 and the merit of every statue is supposed to consist in the visitor's being obliged to ascend three hundred steps before he can see it4 7,c47 ,conventionalism by cause of inferiority of office4 ,when one piece of ornament is to be subordinated to another 7as the moulding is to the sculpture it encloses1 or the fringe of a drapery to the statue it veils71 this inferior ornament needs to be degraded in order to mark its lower office2 and this is best done by refusing1 more or less1 the introduction of natural form4 ,the less of nature it contains1 the more degraded is the ornament1 and the fitter for a humble place2 but1 however far a great workman may go in refusing the higher organisms of nature1 he always takes care to retain the magnificence of natural lines2 that is to say1 of the infinite curves1 such as ,i have analyzed in the fourth volume of ,modern ,painters4 ,his copyists1 fancying that they can follow him without nature1 miss precisely the essence of all the work2 so that even the simplest piece of ,greek conventional ornament loses the whole of its value in any modern imitation of it1 the finer curves being always missed4 ,perhaps one of the dullest and least justifiable mistakes which have yet been made about my writing1 is the supposition that ,i have attacked or despised ,greek work4 ,i have attacked ,palladian work1 and modern imitation of ,greek work4 ,of ,greek work itself ,i have never spoken but with a reverence quite infinite3 ,i name ,phidias always in exactly the same tone with which ,i speak of ,michael ,angelo1 ,titian1 and ,dante4 ,my first statement of this faith1 now thirteen years ago1 was surely clear enough4 ,we shall see by this light three colossal images standing up side by side1 looming in their great rest of spirituality above the whole world horizon4 ,phidias1 ,michael ,angelo1 and ,dante1--from these we may go down step by step among the mighty men of every age1 securely and certainly observant of diminished lustre in every appearance of restlessness and effort1 until the last trace of inspiration vanishes in the tottering affectation or tortured insanities of modern times4 7,modern ,painters1 vol4 ii41 p4 #bec47 ,this was surely plain speaking enough1 and from that day to this my effort has been not less continually to make the heart of ,greek work known than the heart of ,gothic3 namely1 the nobleness of conception of form derived from perpetual study of the figure2 and my complaint of the modern architect has been not that he followed the ,greeks1 but that he denied the first laws of life in theirs as in all other art4 ,the fact is1 that all good subordinate forms of ornamentation ever yet existent in the world have been invented1 and others as beautiful can only be invented1 by men primarily exercised in drawing or carving the human figure4 ,i will not repeat here what ,i have already twice insisted upon1 to the students of ,london and ,manchester1 respecting the degradation of temper and intellect which follows the pursuit of art without reference to natural form1 as among the ,asiatics3 here1 ,i will only trespass on your patience so far as to mark the inseparable connection between figure-drawing and good ornamental work1 in the great ,european schools1 and all that are connected with them4 ,tell me1 then1 first of all1 what ornamental work is usually put before our students as the type of decorative perfection8 ,raphael's arabesques2 are they not8 ,well1 ,raphael knew a little about the figure1 ,i suppose1 before he drew them4 ,i do not say that ,i like those arabesques2 but there are certain qualities in them which are inimitable by modern designers2 and those qualities are just the fruit of the master's figure study4 ,what is given the student as next to ,raphael's work8 ,cinquecento ornament generally4 ,well1 cinquecento generally1 with its birds1 and cherubs1 and wreathed foliage1 and clustered fruit1 was the amusement of men who habitually and easily carved the figure1 or painted it4 ,all the truly fine specimens of it have figures or animals as main parts of the design4 ,nay1 but1 some anciently or medivally minded person will exclaim1 we don't want to study cinquecento4 ,we want severer1 purer conventionalism4 ,what will you have8 ,egyptian ornament8 ,why1 the whole mass of it is made up of multitudinous human figures in every kind of action--and magnificent action2 their kings drawing their bows in their chariots1 their sheaves of arrows rattling at their shoulders2 the slain falling under them as before a pestilence2 their captors driven before them in astonied troops2 and do you expect to imitate ,egyptian ornament without knowing how to draw the human figure8 ,nay1 but you will take ,christian ornament--purest mediaeval ,christian--thirteenth century6 ,yes3 and do you suppose you will find the ,christian less human8 ,the least natural and most purely conventional ornament of the ,gothic schools is that of their painted glass2 and do you suppose painted glass1 in the fine times1 was ever wrought without figures8 ,we have got into the way1 among our other modern wretchednesses1 of trying to make windows of leaf diapers1 and of strips of twisted red and yellow bands1 looking like the patterns of currant jelly on the top of ,christmas cakes2 but every casement of old glass contained a saint's history4 ,the windows of ,bourges1 ,chartres1 or ,rouen have ten1 fifteen1 or twenty medallions in each1 and each medallion contains two figures at least1 often six or seven1 representing every event of interest in the history of the saint whose life is in question4 ,nay1 but1 you say those figures are rude and quaint1 and ought not to be imitated4 ,why1 so is the leafage rude and quaint1 yet you imitate that4 ,the coloured border pattern of geranium or ivy leaf is not one whit better drawn1 or more like geraniums and ivy1 than the figures are like figures2 but you call the geranium leaf idealized--why don't you call the figures so8 ,the fact is1 neither are idealized1 but both are conventionalized on the same principles1 and in the same way2 and if you want to learn how to treat the leafage1 the only way is to learn first how to treat the figure4 ,and you may soon test your powers in this respect4 ,those old workmen were not afraid of the most familiar subjects4 ,the windows of ,chartres were presented by the trades of the town1 and at the bottom of each window is a representation of the proceedings of the tradesmen at the business which enabled them to pay for the window4 ,there are smiths at the forge1 curriers at their hides1 tanners looking into their pits1 mercers selling goods over the counter--all made into beautiful medallions4 ,therefore1 whenever you want to know whether you have got any real power of composition or adaptation in ornament1 don't be content with sticking leaves together by the ends1--anybody can do that2 but try to conventionalize a butcher's or a greengrocer's1 with ,saturday night customers buying cabbage and beef4 ,that will tell you if you can design or not4 ,i can fancy your losing patience with me altogether just now4 ,we asked this fellow down to tell our workmen how to make shawls1 and he is only trying to teach them how to caricature4 ,but have a little patience with me1 and examine1 after ,i have done1 a little for yourselves into the history of ornamental art1 and you will discover why ,i do this4 ,you will discover1 ,i repeat1 that all great ornamental art whatever is founded on the effort of the workman to draw the figure1 and1 in the best schools1 to draw all that he saw about him in living nature4 ,the best art of pottery is acknowledged to be that of ,greece1 and all the power of design exhibited in it1 down to the merest zigzag1 arises primarily from the workman having been forced to outline nymphs and knights2 from those helmed and draped figures he holds his power4 ,of ,egyptian ornament ,i have just spoken4 ,you have everything given there that the workman saw2 people of his nation employed in hunting1 fighting1 fishing1 visiting1 making love1 building1 cooking--everything they did is drawn1 magnificently or familiarly1 as was needed4 ,in ,byzantine ornament1 saints1 or animals which are types of various spiritual power1 are the main subjects2 and from the church down to the piece of enamelled metal1 figure1--figure1--figure1 always principal4 ,in ,norman and ,gothic work you have1 with all their quiet saints1 also other much disquieted persons1 hunting1 feasting1 fighting1 and so on2 or whole hordes of animals racing after each other4 ,in the ,bayeux tapestry1 ,queen ,matilda gave1 as well as she could1--in many respects graphically enough1--the whole history of the conquest of ,england4 ,thence1 as you increase in power of art1 you have more and more finished figures1 up to the solemn sculptures of ,wells ,cathedral1 or the cherubic enrichments of the ,venetian ,madonna dei ,miracoli4 ,therefore1 ,i will tell you fearlessly1 for ,i know it is true1 you must raise your workman up to life1 or you will never get from him one line of well-imagined conventionalism4 ,we have at present no good ornamental design4 ,we can't have it yet1 and we must be patient if we want to have it4 ,do not hope to feel the effect of your schools at once1 but raise the men as high as you can1 and then let them stoop as low as you need2 no great man ever minds stooping4 ,encourage the students1 in sketching accurately and continually from nature anything that comes in their way--still life1 flowers1 animals2 but1 above all1 figures2 and so far as you allow of any difference between an artist's training and theirs1 let it be1 not in what they draw1 but in the degree of conventionalism you require in the sketch4 ,for my own part1 ,i should always endeavour to give thorough artistical training first2 but ,i am not certain 7the experiment being yet untried7 what results may be obtained by a truly intelligent practice of conventional drawing1 such as that of the ,egyptians1 ,greeks1 or thirteenth century ,french1 which consists in the utmost possible rendering of natural form by the fewest possible lines4 ,the animal and bird drawing of the ,egyptians is1 in their fine age1 quite magnificent under its conditions2 magnificent in two ways--first1 in keenest perception of the main forms and facts in the creature2 and1 secondly1 in the grandeur of line by which their forms are abstracted and insisted on1 making every asp1 ibis1 and vulture a sublime spectre of asp or ibis or vulture power4 ,the way for students to get some of this gift again 7some only1 for ,i believe the fulness of the gift itself to be connected with vital superstition1 and with resulting intensity of reverence2 people were likely to know something about hawks and ibises1 when to kill one was to be irrevocably judged to death7 is never to pass a day without drawing some animal from the life1 allowing themselves the fewest possible lines and colours to do it with1 but resolving that whatever is characteristic of the animal shall in some way or other be shown4 ,footnote3 ,plate #ge in ,vol4 ,v4 of ,wilkinson's ,ancient ,egypt will give the student an idea of how to set to work4 ,i repeat1 it cannot yet be judged what results might be obtained by a nobly practised conventionalism of this kind2 but1 however that may be1 the first fact1--the necessity of animal and figure drawing1 is absolutely certain1 and no person who shrinks from it will ever become a great designer4 ,one great good arises even from the first step in figure drawing1 that it gets the student quit at once of the notion of formal symmetry4 ,if you learn only to draw a leaf well1 you are taught in some of our schools to turn it the other way1 opposite to itself2 and the two leaves set opposite ways are called a design3 and thus it is supposed possible to produce ornamentation1 though you have no more brains than a looking-glass or a kaleidoscope has4 ,but if you once learn to draw the human figure1 you will find that knocking two men's heads together does not necessarily constitute a good design2 nay1 that it makes a very bad design1 or no design at all2 and you will see at once that to arrange a group of two or more figures1 you must1 though perhaps it may be desirable to balance1 or oppose them1 at the same time vary their attitudes1 and make one1 not the reverse of the other1 but the companion of the other4 ,i had a somewhat amusing discussion on this subject with a friend1 only the other day2 and one of his retorts upon me was so neatly put1 and expresses so completely all that can either be said or shown on the opposite side1 that it is well worth while giving it you exactly in the form it was sent to me4 ,my friend had been maintaining that the essence of ornament consisted in three things3--contrast1 series1 and symmetry4 ,i replied 7by letter7 that none of them1 nor all of them together1 would produce ornament4 ,here--7making a ragged blot with the back of my pen on the paper7--you have contrast2 but it isn't ornament3 here1 #a1 #b1 #c1 #d1 #e1 #f1--7writing the numerals7--,you have series2 but it isn't ornament3 and here1--7sketching a rough but symmetrical stick- figure sketch of a human body at the side7--you have symmetry2 but it isn't ornament4 ,my friend replied3-- ,your materials were not ornament1 because you did not apply them4 ,i send them to you back1 made up into a choice sporting neckerchief3 ,illustration3 ,sketch of a square of cloth decorated with a diagonal grid pattern of stick-figure human forms1 with repeated and reflected ink-blot shapes at the corners and the digits #a through #f arranged into simple symmetrical shapes and repeated around the border4 ,symmetrical figure ,unit of diaper4 ,contrast ,corner ornaments4 ,series ,border ornaments4 ,each figure is converted into a harmony by being revolved on its two axes1 the whole opposed in contrasting series4 ,my answer was--or rather was to the effect 7for ,i must expand it a little1 here7--that his words1 because you did not apply them1 contained the gist of the whole matter2--that the application of them1 or any other things1 was precisely the essence of design2 the non- application1 or wrong application1 the negation of design3 that his use of the poor materials was in this case admirable2 and that if he could explain to me1 in clear words1 the principles on which he had so used them1 he would be doing a very great service to all students of art4 ,tell me1 therefore 7,i asked71 these main points3 #a4 ,how did you determine the number of figures you would put into the neckerchief8 ,had there been more1 it would have been mean and ineffective1--a pepper-and-salt sprinkling of figures4 ,had there been fewer1 it would have been monstrous4 ,how did you fix the number8 #b4 ,how did you determine the breadth of the border and relative size of the numerals8 #c4 ,why are there two lines outside of the border1 and one only inside8 ,why are there no more lines8 ,why not three and two1 or three and five8 ,why lines at all to separate the barbarous figures2 and why1 if lines at all1 not double or treble instead of single8 #d4 ,why did you put the double blots at the corners8 ,why not at the angles of the chequers1--or in the middle of the border8 ,it is precisely your knowing why not to do these things1 and why to do just what you have done1 which constituted your power of design2 and like all the people ,i have ever known who had that power1 you are entirely unconscious of the essential laws by which you work1 and confuse other people by telling them that the design depends on symmetry and series1 when1 in fact1 it depends entirely on your own sense and judgment4 ,this was the substance of my last answer--to which 7as ,i knew beforehand would be the case7 ,i got no reply2 but it still remains to be observed that with all the skill and taste 7especially involving the architect's great trust1 harmony of proportion71 which my friend could bring to bear on the materials given him1 the result is still only--a sporting neckerchief--that is to say1 the materials addressed1 first1 to recklessness1 in the shape of a mere blot2 then to computativeness in a series of figures2 and then to absurdity and ignorance1 in the shape of an ill-drawn caricature--such materials1 however treated1 can only work up into what will please reckless1 computative1 and vulgar persons1--that is to say1 into a sporting neckerchief4 ,the difference between this piece of ornamentation and ,correggio's painting at ,parma lies simply and wholly in the additions 7somewhat large ones71 of truth and of tenderness3 in the drawing being lovely as well as symmetrical-- and representative of realities as well as agreeably disposed4 ,and truth1 tenderness1 and inventive application or disposition are indeed the roots of ornament--not contrast1 nor symmetry4 ,it ought yet farther to be observed1 that the nobler the materials1 the less their symmetry is endurable4 ,in the present case1 the sense of fitness and order1 produced by the repetition of the figures1 neutralizes1 in some degree1 their reckless vulgarity2 and is wholly1 therefore1 beneficent to them4 ,but draw the figures better1 and their repetition will become painful4 ,you may harmlessly balance a mere geometrical form1 and oppose one quatrefoil or cusp by another exactly like it4 ,but put two ,apollo ,belvideres back to back1 and you will not think the symmetry improves them4 ,whenever the materials of ornament are noble1 they must be various2 and repetition of parts is either the sign of utterly bad1 hopeless1 and base work2 or of the intended degradation of the parts in which such repetition is allowed1 in order to foil others more noble4 ,such1 then1 are a few of the great principles1 by the enforcement of which you may hope to promote the success of the modern student of design2 but remember1 none of these principles will be useful at all1 unless you understand them to be1 in one profound and stern sense1 useless4 ,footnote3 ,i shall endeavour for the future to put my self- contradictions in short sentences and direct terms1 in order to save sagacious persons the trouble of looking for them4 ,that is to say1 unless you feel that neither you nor ,i1 nor any one1 can1 in the great ultimate sense1 teach anybody how to make a good design4 ,if designing could be taught1 all the world would learn3 as all the world reads--or calculates4 ,but designing is not to be spelled1 nor summed4 ,my men continually come to me1 in my drawing class in ,london1 thinking ,i am to teach them what is instantly to enable them to gain their bread4 ,please1 sir1 show us how to design4 ,make designers of us4 ,and you1 ,i doubt not1 partly expect me to tell you to-night how to make designers of your ,bradford youths4 ,alas6 ,i could as soon tell you how to make or manufacture an ear of wheat1 as to make a good artist of any kind4 ,i can analyze the wheat very learnedly for you--tell you there is starch in it1 and carbon1 and silex4 ,i can give you starch1 and charcoal1 and flint2 but you are as far from your ear of wheat as you were before4 ,all that can possibly be done for any one who wants ears of wheat is to show them where to find grains of wheat1 and how to sow them1 and then1 with patience1 in ,heaven's time1 the ears will come--or will perhaps come--ground and weather permitting4 ,so in this matter of making artists--first you must find your artist in the grain2 then you must plant him2 fence and weed the field about him2 and with patience1 ground and weather permitting1 you may get an artist out of him--not otherwise4 ,and what ,i have to speak to you about1 tonight1 is mainly the ground and the weather1 it being the first and quite most material question in this matter1 whether the ground and weather of ,bradford1 or the ground and weather of ,england in general1--suit wheat4 ,and observe in the outset1 it is not so much what the present circumstances of ,england are1 as what we wish to make them1 that we have to consider4 ,if you will tell me what you ultimately intend ,bradford to be1 perhaps ,i can tell you what ,bradford can ultimately produce4 ,but you must have your minds clearly made up1 and be distinct in telling me what you do want4 ,at present ,i don't know what you are aiming at1 and possibly on consideration you may feel some doubt whether you know yourselves4 ,as matters stand1 all over ,england1 as soon as one mill is at work1 occupying two hundred hands1 we try1 by means of it1 to set another mill at work1 occupying four hundred4 ,that is all simple and comprehensive enough--but what is it to come to8 ,how many mills do we want8 or do we indeed want no end of mills8 ,let us entirely understand each other on this point before we go any farther4 ,last week1 ,i drove from ,rochdale to ,bolton ,abbey2 quietly1 in order to see the country1 and certainly it was well worth while4 ,i never went over a more interesting twenty miles than those between ,rochdale and ,burnley4 ,naturally1 the valley has been one of the most beautiful in the ,lancashire hills2 one of the far away solitudes1 full of old shepherd ways of life4 ,at this time there are not1--,i speak deliberately1 and ,i believe quite literally1--there are not1 ,i think1 more than a thousand yards of road to be traversed anywhere1 without passing a furnace or mill4 ,now1 is that the kind of thing you want to come to everywhere8 ,because1 if it be1 and you tell me so distinctly1 ,i think ,i can make several suggestions to-night1 and could make more if you give me time1 which would materially advance your object4 ,the extent of our operations at present is more or less limited by the extent of coal and ironstone1 but we have not yet learned to make proper use of our clay4 ,over the greater part of ,england1 south of the manufacturing districts1 there are magnificent beds of various kinds of useful clay2 and ,i believe that it would not be difficult to point out modes of employing it which might enable us to turn nearly the whole of the south of ,england into a brickfield1 as we have already turned nearly the whole of the north into a coal-pit4 ,i say nearly the whole1 because1 as you are doubtless aware1 there are considerable districts in the south composed of chalk renowned up to the present time for their downs and mutton4 ,but1 ,i think1 by examining carefully into the conceivable uses of chalk1 we might discover a quite feasible probability of turning all the chalk districts into a limekiln1 as we turn the clay districts into a brickfield4 ,there would then remain nothing but the mountain districts to be dealt with2 but1 as we have not yet ascertained all the uses of clay and chalk1 still less have we ascertained those of stone2 and ,i think1 by draining the useless inlets of the ,cumberland1 ,welsh1 and ,scotch lakes1 and turning them1 with their rivers1 into navigable reservoirs and canals1 there would be no difficulty in working the whole of our mountain districts as a gigantic quarry of slate and granite1 from which all the rest of the world might be supplied with roofing and building stone4 ,is this1 then1 what you want8 ,you are going straight at it at present2 and ,i have only to ask under what limitations ,i am to conceive or describe your final success8 ,or shall there be no limitations8 ,there are none to your powers2 every day puts new machinery at your disposal1 and increases1 with your capital1 the vastness of your undertakings4 ,the changes in the state of this country are now so rapid1 that it would be wholly absurd to endeavour to lay down laws of art education for it under its present aspect and circumstances2 and therefore ,i must necessarily ask1 how much of it do you seriously intend within the next fifty years to be coal-pit1 brickfield1 or quarry8 ,for the sake of distinctness of conclusion1 ,i will suppose your success absolute3 that from shore to shore the whole of the island is to be set as thick with chimneys as the masts stand in the docks of ,liverpool3 and there shall be no meadows in it2 no trees2 no gardens2 only a little corn grown upon the housetops1 reaped and threshed by steam3 that you do not leave even room for roads1 but travel either over the roofs of your mills1 on viaducts2 or under their floors1 in tunnels3 that1 the smoke having rendered the light of the sun unserviceable1 you work always by the light of your own gas3 that no acre of ,english ground shall be without its shaft and its engine2 and therefore1 no spot of ,english ground left1 on which it shall be possible to stand1 without a definite and calculable chance of being blown off it1 at any moment1 into small pieces4 ,under these circumstances1 7if this is to be the future of ,england17 no designing or any other development of beautiful art will be possible4 ,do not vex your minds1 nor waste your money with any thought or effort in the matter4 ,beautiful art can only be produced by people who have beautiful things about them1 and leisure to look at them2 and unless you provide some elements of beauty for your workmen to be surrounded by1 you will find that no elements of beauty can be invented by them4 ,i was struck forcibly by the bearing of this great fact upon our modern efforts at ornamentation in an afternoon walk1 last week1 in the suburbs of one of our large manufacturing towns4 ,i was thinking of the difference in the effect upon the designer's mind1 between the scene which ,i then came upon1 and the scene which would have presented itself to the eyes of any designer of the middle ages1 when he left his workshop4 ,just outside the town ,i came upon an old ,english cottage1 or mansion1 ,i hardly know which to call it1 set close under the hill1 and beside the river1 perhaps built somewhere in the ,charles's time1 with mullioned windows and a low arched porch2 round which1 in the little triangular garden1 one can imagine the family as they used to sit in old summer times1 the ripple of the river heard faintly through the sweetbrier hedge1 and the sheep on the far-off wolds shining in the evening sunlight4 ,there1 uninhabited for many and many a year1 it had been left in unregarded havoc of ruin2 the garden-gate still swung loose to its latch2 the garden1 blighted utterly into a field of ashes1 not even a weed taking root there2 the roof torn into shapeless rents2 the shutters hanging about the windows in rags of rotten wood2 before its gate1 the stream which had gladdened it now soaking slowly by1 black as ebony1 and thick with curdling scum2 the bank above it trodden into unctuous1 sooty slime3 far in front of it1 between it and the old hills1 the furnaces of the city foaming forth perpetual plague of sulphurous darkness2 the volumes of their storm clouds coiling low over a waste of grassless fields1 fenced from each other1 not by hedges1 but by slabs of square stone1 like gravestones1 riveted together with iron4 ,that was your scene for the designer's contemplation in his afternoon walk at ,rochdale4 ,now fancy what was the scene which presented itself1 in his afternoon walk1 to a designer of the ,gothic school of ,pisa--,nino ,pisano1 or any of his men4 ,on each side of a bright river he saw rise a line of brighter palaces1 arched and pillared1 and inlaid with deep red porphyry1 and with serpentine2 along the quays before their gates were riding troops of knights1 noble in face and form1 dazzling in crest and shield2 horse and man one labyrinth of quaint colour and gleaming light--the purple1 and silver1 and scarlet fringes flowing over the strong limbs and clashing mail1 like sea-waves over rocks at sunset4 ,opening on each side from the river were gardens1 courts1 and cloisters2 long successions of white pillars among wreaths of vine2 leaping of fountains through buds of pomegranate and orange3 and still along the garden-paths1 and under and through the crimson of the pomegranate shadows1 moving slowly1 groups of the fairest women that ,italy ever saw--fairest1 because purest and thoughtfullest2 trained in all high knowledge1 as in all courteous art--in dance1 in song1 in sweet wit1 in lofty learning1 in loftier courage1 in loftiest love--able alike to cheer1 to enchant1 or save1 the souls of men4 ,above all this scenery of perfect human life1 rose dome and bell-tower1 burning with white alabaster and gold2 beyond dome and bell-tower the slopes of mighty hills1 hoary with olive2 far in the north1 above a purple sea of peaks of solemn ,apennine1 the clear1 sharp-cloven ,carrara mountains sent up their steadfast flames of marble summit into amber sky2 the great sea itself1 scorching with expanse of light1 stretching from their feet to the ,gorgonian isles2 and over all these1 ever present1 near or far-- seen through the leaves of vine1 or imaged with all its march of clouds in the ,arno's stream1 or set with its depth of blue close against the golden hair and burning cheek of lady and knight1--that untroubled and sacred sky1 which was to all men1 in those days of innocent faith1 indeed the unquestioned abode of spirits1 as the earth was of men2 and which opened straight through its gates of cloud and veils of dew into the awfulness of the eternal world2--a heaven in which every cloud that passed was literally the chariot of an angel1 and every ray of its ,evening and ,morning streamed from the throne of ,god4 ,what think you of that for a school of design8 ,i do not bring this contrast before you as a ground of hopelessness in our task2 neither do ,i look for any possible renovation of the ,republic of ,pisa1 at ,bradford1 in the nineteenth century2 but ,i put it before you in order that you may be aware precisely of the kind of difficulty you have to meet1 and may then consider with yourselves how far you can meet it4 ,to men surrounded by the depressing and monotonous circumstances of ,english manufacturing life1 depend upon it1 design is simply impossible4 ,this is the most distinct of all the experiences ,i have had in dealing with the modern workman4 ,he is intelligent and ingenious in the highest degree--subtle in touch and keen in sight3 but he is1 generally speaking1 wholly destitute of designing power4 ,and if you want to give him the power1 you must give him the materials1 and put him in the circumstances for it4 ,design is not the offspring of idle fancy3 it is the studied result of accumulative observation and delightful habit4 ,without observation and experience1 no design-- without peace and pleasurableness in occupation1 no design--and all the lecturings1 and teachings1 and prizes1 and principles of art1 in the world1 are of no use1 so long as you don't surround your men with happy influences and beautiful things4 ,it is impossible for them to have right ideas about colour1 unless they see the lovely colours of nature unspoiled2 impossible for them to supply beautiful incident and action in their ornament1 unless they see beautiful incident and action in the world about them4 ,inform their minds1 refine their habits1 and you form and refine their designs2 but keep them illiterate1 uncomfortable1 and in the midst of unbeautiful things1 and whatever they do will still be spurious1 vulgar1 and valueless4 ,i repeat1 that ,i do not ask you nor wish you to build a new ,pisa for them4 ,we don't want either the life or the decorations of the thirteenth century back again2 and the circumstances with which you must surround your workmen are those simply of happy modern ,english life1 because the designs you have now to ask for from your workmen are such as will make modern ,english life beautiful4 ,all that gorgeousness of the middle ages1 beautiful as it sounds in description1 noble as in many respects it was in reality1 had1 nevertheless1 for foundation and for end1 nothing but the pride of life--the pride of the so-called superior classes2 a pride which supported itself by violence and robbery1 and led in the end to the destruction both of the arts themselves and the ,states in which they nourished4 ,the great lesson of history is1 that all the fine arts hitherto--having been supported by the selfish power of the noblesse1 and never having extended their range to the comfort or the relief of the mass of the people--the arts1 ,i say1 thus practised1 and thus matured1 have only accelerated the ruin of the ,states they adorned2 and at the moment when1 in any kingdom1 you point to the triumphs of its greatest artists1 you point also to the determined hour of the kingdom's decline4 ,the names of great painters are like passing bells3 in the name of ,velasquez1 you hear sounded the fall of ,spain2 in the name of ,titian1 that of ,venice2 in the name of ,leonardo1 that of ,milan2 in the name of ,raphael1 that of ,rome4 ,and there is profound justice in this2 for in proportion to the nobleness of the power is the guilt of its use for purposes vain or vile2 and hitherto the greater the art1 the more surely has it been used1 and used solely1 for the decoration of pride1 ,footnote3 ,whether religious or profane pride1--chapel or banqueting room1--is no matter4 or the provoking of sensuality4 ,another course lies open to us4 ,we may abandon the hope--or if you like the words better--we may disdain the temptation1 of the pomp and grace of ,italy in her youth4 ,for us there can be no more the throne of marble--for us no more the vault of gold--but for us there is the loftier and lovelier privilege of bringing the power and charm of art within the reach of the humble and the poor2 and as the magnificence of past ages failed by its narrowness and its pride1 ours may prevail and continue1 by its universality and its lowliness4 ,and thus1 between the picture of too laborious ,england1 which we imagined as future1 and the picture of too luxurious ,italy1 which we remember in the past1 there may exist--there will exist1 if we do our duty--an intermediate condition1 neither oppressed by labour nor wasted in vanity--the condition of a peaceful and thoughtful temperance in aims1 and acts1 and arts4 ,we are about to enter upon a period of our world's history in which domestic life1 aided by the arts of peace1 will slowly1 but at last entirely1 supersede public life and the arts of war4 ,for our own ,england1 she will not1 ,i believe1 be blasted throughout with furnaces2 nor will she be encumbered with palaces4 ,i trust she will keep her green fields1 her cottages1 and her homes of middle life2 but these ought to be1 and ,i trust will be enriched with a useful1 truthful1 substantial form of art4 ,we want now no more feasts of the gods1 nor martyrdoms of the saints2 we have no need of sensuality1 no place for superstition1 or for costly insolence4 ,let us have learned and faithful historical painting--touching and thoughtful representations of human nature1 in dramatic painting2 poetical and familiar renderings of natural objects and of landscape2 and rational1 deeply-felt realizations of the events which are the subjects of our religious faith4 ,and let these things we want1 as far as possible1 be scattered abroad and made accessible to all men4 ,so also1 in manufacture3 we require work substantial rather than rich in make2 and refined1 rather than splendid in design4 ,your stuffs need not be such as would catch the eye of a duchess2 but they should be such as may at once serve the need1 and refine the taste1 of a cottager4 ,the prevailing error in ,english dress1 especially among the lower orders1 is a tendency to flimsiness and gaudiness1 arising mainly from the awkward imitation of their superiors4 ,footnote3 ,if their superiors would give them simplicity and economy to imitate1 it would1 in the issue1 be well for themselves1 as well as for those whom they guide4 ,the typhoid fever of passion for dress1 and all other display1 which has struck the upper classes of ,europe at this time1 is one of the most dangerous political elements we have to deal with4 ,its wickedness ,i have shown elsewhere 7,polit4 ,economy of ,art1 p4 #fb1 et seq472 but its wickedness is1 in the minds of most persons1 a matter of no importance4 ,i wish ,i had time also to show them its danger4 ,i cannot enter here into political investigation2 but this is a certain fact1 that the wasteful and vain expenses at present indulged in by the upper classes are hastening the advance of republicanism more than any other element of modern change4 ,no agitators1 no clubs1 no epidemical errors1 ever were1 or will be1 fatal to social order in any nation4 ,nothing but the guilt of the upper classes1 wanton1 accumulated1 reckless1 and merciless1 ever overthrows them ,of such guilt they have now much to answer for--let them look to it in time4 ,it should be one of the first objects of all manufacturers to produce stuffs not only beautiful and quaint in design1 but also adapted for every-day service1 and decorous in humble and secluded life4 ,and you must remember always that your business1 as manufacturers1 is to form the market1 as much as to supply it4 ,if1 in shortsighted and reckless eagerness for wealth1 you catch at every humour of the populace as it shapes itself into momentary demand--if1 in jealous rivalry with neighbouring ,states1 or with other producers1 you try to attract attention by singularities1 novelties1 and gaudinesses--to make every design an advertisement1 and pilfer every idea of a successful neighbour's1 that you may insidiously imitate it1 or pompously eclipse --no good design will ever be possible to you1 or perceived by you4 ,you may1 by accident1 snatch the market2 or1 by energy1 command it2 you may obtain the confidence of the public1 and cause the ruin of opponent houses2 or you may1 with equal justice of fortune1 be ruined by them4 ,but whatever happens to you1 this1 at least1 is certain1 that the whole of your life will have been spent in corrupting public taste and encouraging public extravagance4 ,every preference you have won by gaudiness must have been based on the purchaser's vanity2 every demand you have created by novelty has fostered in the consumer a habit of discontent2 and when you retire into inactive life1 you may1 as a subject of consolation for your declining years1 reflect that precisely according to the extent of your past operations1 your life has been successful in retarding the arts1--tarnishing the virtues1 and confusing the manners of your country4 ,but1 on the other hand1 if you resolve from the first that1 so far as you can ascertain or discern what is best1 you will produce what is best1 on an intelligent consideration of the probable tendencies and possible tastes of the people whom you supply1 you may literally become more influential for all kinds of good than many lecturers on art1 or many treatise-writers on morality4 ,considering the materials dealt with1 and the crude state of art knowledge at the time1 ,i do not know that any more wide or effective influence in public taste was ever exercised than that of the ,staffordshire manufacture of pottery under ,william ,wedgwood1 and it only rests with the manufacturer in every other business to determine whether he will1 in like manner1 make his wares educational instruments1 or mere drugs of the market4 ,you all should1 be1 in a certain sense1 authors3 you must1 indeed1 first catch the public eye1 as an author must the public ear2 but once gain your audience1 or observance1 and as it is in the writer's power thenceforward to publish what will educate as it amuses--so it is in yours to publish what will educate as it adorns4 ,nor is this surely a subject of poor ambition4 ,i hear it said continually that men are too ambitious3 alas6 to me1 it seems they are never enough ambitious4 ,how many are content to be merely the thriving merchants of a state1 when they might be its guides1 counsellors1 and rulers--wielding powers of subtle but gigantic beneficence1 in restraining its follies while they supplied its wants4 ,let such duty1 such ambition1 be once accepted in their fulness1 and the best glory of ,european art and of ,european manufacture may yet be to come4 ,the paintings of ,raphael and of ,buonaroti gave force to the falsehoods of superstition1 and majesty to the imaginations of sin2 but the arts of ,england may have1 for their task1 to inform the soul with truth1 and touch the heart with compassion4 ,the steel of ,toledo and the silk of ,genoa did but give strength to oppression and lustre to pride3 let it be for the furnace and for the loom of ,england1 as they have already richly earned1 still more abundantly to bestow1 comfort on the indigent1 civilization on the rude1 and to dispense1 through the peaceful homes of nations1 the grace and the preciousness of simple adornment1 and useful possession4 ,,lecture ,,iv4 ,,influence ,,of ,,imagination ,,in ,,architecture ,an ,address ,delivered to the ,members of the ,architectural ,association1 in ,lyon's ,inn ,hall1 #aheg4 ,if we were to be asked abruptly1 and required to answer briefly1 what qualities chiefly distinguish great artists from feeble artists1 we should answer1 ,i suppose1 first1 their sensibility and tenderness2 secondly1 their imagination2 and thirdly1 their industry4 ,some of us might1 perhaps1 doubt the justice of attaching so much importance to this last character1 because we have all known clever men who were indolent1 and dull men who were industrious4 ,but though you may have known clever men who were indolent1 you never knew a great man who was so2 and1 during such investigation as ,i have been able to give to the lives of the artists whose works are in all points noblest1 no fact ever looms so large upon me--no law remains so steadfast in the universality of its application1 as the fact and law that they are all great workers3 nothing concerning them is matter of more astonishment than the quantity they have accomplished in the given length of their life2 and when ,i hear a young man spoken of1 as giving promise of high genius1 the first question ,i ask about him is always-- ,does he work8 ,but though this quality of industry is essential to an artist1 it does not in anywise make an artist2 many people are busy1 whose doings are little worth4 ,neither does sensibility make an artist2 since1 as ,i hope1 many can feel both strongly and nobly1 who yet care nothing about art4 ,but the gifts which distinctively mark the artist--without which he must be feeble in life1 forgotten in death--with which he may become one of the shakers of the earth1 and one of the signal lights in heaven--are those of sympathy and imagination4 ,i will not occupy your time1 nor incur the risk of your dissent1 by endeavouring to give any close definition of this last word4 ,we all have a general and sufficient idea of imagination1 and of its work with our hands and in our hearts3 we understand it1 ,i suppose1 as the imaging or picturing of new things in our thoughts2 and we always show an involuntary respect for this power1 wherever we can recognize it1 acknowledging it to be a greater power than manipulation1 or calculation1 or observation1 or any other human faculty4 ,if we see an old woman spinning at the fireside1 and distributing her thread dexterously from the distaff1 we respect her for her manipulation--if we ask her how much she expects to make in a year1 and she answers quickly1 we respect her for her calculation--if she is watching at the same time that none of her grandchildren fall into the fire1 we respect her for her observation--yet for all this she may still be a commonplace old woman enough4 ,but if she is all the time telling her grandchildren a fairy tale out of her head1 we praise her for her imagination1 and say1 she must be a rather remarkable old woman4 ,precisely in like manner1 if an architect does his working-drawing well1 we praise him for his manipulation--if he keeps closely within his contract1 we praise him for his honest arithmetic--if he looks well to the laying of his beams1 so that nobody shall drop through the floor1 we praise him for his observation4 ,but he must1 somehow1 tell us a fairy tale out of his head beside all this1 else we cannot praise him for his imagination1 nor speak of him as we did of the old woman1 as being in any wise out of the common way1 a rather remarkable architect4 ,it seemed to me1 therefore1 as if it might interest you to-night1 if we were to consider together what fairy tales are1 in and by architecture1 to be told--what there is for you to do in this severe art of yours out of your heads1 as well as by your hands4 ,perhaps the first idea which a young architect is apt to be allured by1 as a head-problem in these experimental days1 is its being incumbent upon him to invent a new style worthy of modern civilization in general1 and of ,england in particular2 a style worthy of our engines and telegraphs2 as expansive as steam1 and as sparkling as electricity4 ,but1 if there are any of my hearers who have been impressed with this sense of inventive duty1 may ,i ask them first1 whether their plan is that every inventive architect among us shall invent a new style for himself1 and have a county set aside for his conceptions1 or a province for his practice8 ,or1 must every architect invent a little piece of the new style1 and all put it together at last like a dissected map8 ,and if so1 when the new style is invented1 what is to be done next8 ,i will grant you this ,eldorado of imagination--but can you have more than one ,columbus8 ,or1 if you sail in company1 and divide the prize of your discovery and the honour thereof1 who is to come after you clustered ,columbuses8 to what fortunate islands of style are your architectural descendants to sail1 avaricious of new lands8 ,when our desired style is invented1 will not the best we can all do be simply--to build in it8-- and cannot you now do that in styles that are known8 ,observe1 ,i grant1 for the sake of your argument1 what perhaps many of you know that ,i would not grant otherwise--that a new style can be invented4 ,i grant you not only this1 but that it shall be wholly different from any that was ever practised before4 ,we will suppose that capitals are to be at the bottom of pillars instead of the top2 and that buttresses shall be on the tops of pinnacles instead of at the bottom2 that you roof your apertures with stones which shall neither be arched nor horizontal2 and that you compose your decoration of lines which shall neither be crooked nor straight4 ,the furnace and the forge shall be at your service3 you shall draw out your plates of glass and beat out your bars of iron till you have encompassed us all1--if your style is of the practical kind1--with endless perspective of black skeleton and blinding square1--or if your style is to be of the ideal kind--you shall wreathe your streets with ductile leafage1 and roof them with variegated crystal--you shall put1 if you will1 all ,london under one blazing dome of many colours that shall light the clouds round it with its flashing1 as far as to the sea4 ,and still1 ,i ask you1 ,what after this8 ,do you suppose those imaginations of yours will ever lie down there asleep beneath the shade of your iron leafage1 or within the coloured light of your enchanted dome8 ,not so4 ,those souls1 and fancies1 and ambitions of yours1 are wholly infinite2 and1 whatever may be done by others1 you will still want to do something for yourselves2 if you cannot rest content with ,palladio1 neither will you with ,paxton3 all the metal and glass that ever were melted have not so much weight in them as will clog the wings of one human spirit's aspiration4 ,if you will think over this quietly by yourselves1 and can get the noise out of your ears of the perpetual1 empty1 idle1 incomparably idiotic talk about the necessity of some novelty in architecture1 you will soon see that the very essence of a ,style1 properly so called1 is that it should be practised for ages1 and applied to all purposes2 and that so long as any given style is in practice1 all that is left for individual imagination to accomplish must be within the scope of that style1 not in the invention of a new one4 ,if there are any here1 therefore1 who hope to obtain celebrity by the invention of some strange way of building which must convince all ,europe into its adoption1 to them1 for the moment1 ,i must not be understood to address myself1 but only to those who would be content with that degree of celebrity which an artist may enjoy who works in the manner of his forefathers2--which the builder of ,salisbury ,cathedral might enjoy in ,england1 though he did not invent ,gothic2 and which ,titian might enjoy at ,venice1 though he did not invent oil painting4 ,addressing myself then to those humbler1 but wiser1 or rather1 only wise students who are content to avail themselves of some system of building already understood1 let us consider together what room for the exercise of the imagination may be left to us under such conditions4 ,and1 first1 ,i suppose it will be said1 or thought1 that the architect's principal field for exercise of his invention must be in the disposition of lines1 mouldings1 and masses1 in agreeable proportions4 ,indeed1 if you adopt some styles of architecture1 you cannot exercise invention in any other way4 ,and ,i admit that it requires genius and special gift to do this rightly4 ,not by rule1 nor by study1 can the gift of graceful proportionate design be obtained2 only by the intuition of genius can so much as a single tier of faade be beautifully arranged2 and the man has just cause for pride1 as far as our gifts can ever be a cause for pride1 who finds himself able1 in a design of his own1 to rival even the simplest arrangement of parts in one by ,sanmicheli1 ,inigo ,jones1 or ,christopher ,wren4 ,invention1 then1 and genius being granted1 as necessary to accomplish this1 let me ask you1 ,what1 after all1 with this special gift and genius1 you have accomplished1 when you have arranged the lines of a building beautifully8 ,in the first place you will not1 ,i think1 tell me that the beauty there attained is of a touching or pathetic kind4 ,a well-disposed group of notes in music will make you sometimes weep and sometimes laugh4 ,you can express the depth of all affections by those dispositions of sound3 you can give courage to the soldier1 language to the lover1 consolation to the mourner1 more joy to the joyful1 more humility to the devout4 ,can you do as much by your group of lines8 ,do you suppose the front of ,whitehall1 a singularly beautiful one ever inspires the two ,horse ,guards1 during the hour they sit opposite to it1 with military ardour8 ,do you think that the lovers in our ,london walk down to the front of ,whitehall for consolation when mistresses are unkind2 or that any person wavering in duty1 or feeble in faith1 was ever confirmed in purpose or in creed by the pathetic appeal of those harmonious architraves8 ,you will not say so4 ,then1 if they cannot touch1 or inspire1 or comfort any one1 can your architectural proportions amuse any one8 ,christmas is just over2 you have doubtless been at many merry parties during the period4 ,can you remember any in which architectural proportions contributed to the entertainment of the evening8 ,proportions of notes in music were1 ,i am sure1 essential to your amusement2 the setting of flowers in hair1 and of ribands on dresses1 were also subjects of frequent admiration with you1 not inessential to your happiness4 ,among the juvenile members of your society the proportion of currants in cake1 and of sugar in comfits1 became subjects of acute interest2 and1 when such proportions were harmonious1 motives also of gratitude to cook and to confectioner4 ,but did you ever see either young or old amused by the architrave of the door8 ,or otherwise interested in the proportions of the room than as they admitted more or fewer friendly faces8 ,nay1 if all the amusement that there is in the best proportioned architecture of ,london could be concentrated into one evening1 and you were to issue tickets for nothing to this great proportional entertainment2--how do you think it would stand between you and the ,drury pantomine8 ,you are1 then1 remember1 granted to be people of genius--great and admirable2 and you devote your lives to your art1 but you admit that you cannot comfort anybody1 you cannot encourage anybody1 you cannot improve anybody1 and you cannot amuse anybody4 ,i proceed then farther to ask1 ,can you inform anybody8 ,many sciences cannot be considered as highly touching or emotional2 nay1 perhaps not specially amusing2 scientific men may sometimes1 in these respects1 stand on the same ground with you4 ,as far as we can judge by the results of the late war1 science helps our soldiers about as much as the front of ,whitehall2 and at the ,christmas parties1 the children wanted no geologists to tell them about the behaviour of bears and dragons in ,queen ,elizabeth's time4 ,still1 your man of science teaches you something2 he may be dull at a party1 or helpless in a battle1 he is not always that2 but he can give you1 at all events1 knowledge of noble facts1 and open to you the secrets of the earth and air4 ,will your architectural proportions do as much8 ,your genius is granted1 and your life is given1 and what do you teach us8--,nothing1 ,i believe1 from one end of that life to the other1 but that two and two make four1 and that one is to two as three is to six4 ,you cannot1 then1 it is admitted1 comfort any one1 serve or amuse any one1 nor teach any one4 ,finally1 ,i ask1 ,can you be of ,use to any one8 ,yes1 you reply2 certainly we are of some use--we architects--in a climate like this1 where it always rains4 ,you are of use certainly2 but1 pardon me1 only as builders--not as proportionalists4 ,we are not talking of building as a protection1 but only of that special work which your genius is to do2 not of building substantial and comfortable houses like ,mr4 ,cubitt1 but of putting beautiful faades on them like ,inigo ,jones4 ,and1 again1 ,i ask--,are you of use to any one8 ,will your proportions of the faade heal the sick1 or clothe the naked8 ,supposing you devoted your lives to be merchants1 you might reflect at the close of them1 how many1 fainting for want1 you had brought corn to sustain2 how many1 infected with disease1 you had brought balms to heal2 how widely1 among multitudes of far-away nations1 you had scattered the first seeds of national power1 and guided the first rays of sacred light4 ,had you been1 in fine1 anything else in the world but architectural designers1 you might have been of some use or good to people4 ,content to be petty tradesmen1 you would have saved the time of mankind2--rough-handed daily labourers1 you would have added to their stock of food or of clothing4 ,but1 being men of genius1 and devoting your lives to the exquisite exposition of this genius1 on what achievements do you think the memories of your old age are to fasten8 ,whose gratitude will surround you with its glow1 or on what accomplished good1 of that greatest kind for which men show no gratitude1 will your life rest the contentment of its close8 ,truly1 ,i fear that the ghosts of proportionate lines will be thin phantoms at your bedsides--very speechless to you2 and that on all the emanations of your high genius you will look back with less delight than you might have done on a cup of cold water given to him who was thirsty1 or to a single moment when you had prevented with your bread him that fled4 ,do not answer1 nor think to answer1 that with your great works and great payments of workmen in them1 you would do this2 ,i know you would1 and will1 as ,builders2 but1 ,i repeat1 it is not your building that ,i am talking about1 but your brains2 it is your invention and imagination of whose profit ,i am speaking4 ,the good done through the building1 observe1 is done by your employers1 not by you--you share in the benefit of it4 ,the good that you personally must do is by your designing2 and ,i compare you with musicians who do good by their pathetic composing1 not as they do good by employing fiddlers in the orchestra2 for it is the public who in reality do that1 not the musicians4 ,so clearly keeping to this one question1 what good we architects are to do by our genius2 and having found that on our proportionate system we can do no good to others1 will you tell me1 lastly1 what good we can do to ourselves8 ,observe1 nearly every other liberal art or profession has some intense pleasure connected with it1 irrespective of any good to others4 ,as lawyers1 or physicians1 or clergymen1 you would have the pleasure of investigation1 and of historical reading1 as part of your work3 as men of science you would be rejoicing in curiosity perpetually gratified respecting the laws and facts of nature3 as artists you would have delight in watching the external forms of nature3 as day labourers or petty tradesmen1 supposing you to undertake such work with as much intellect as you are going to devote to your designing1 you would find continued subjects of interest in the manufacture or the agriculture which you helped to improve2 or in the problems of commerce which bore on your business4 ,but your architectural designing leads you into no pleasant journeys1--into no seeing of lovely things1--no discerning of just laws1--no warmths of compassion1 no humilities of veneration1 no progressive state of sight or soul4 ,our conclusion is--must be--that you will not amuse1 nor inform1 nor help anybody2 you will not amuse1 nor better1 nor inform yourselves2 you will sink into a state in which you can neither show1 nor feel1 nor see1 anything1 but that one is to two as three is to six4 ,and in that state what should we call ourselves8 ,men8 ,i think not4 ,the right name for us would be--numerators and denominators4 ,vulgar ,fractions4 ,shall we1 then1 abandon this theory of the soul of architecture being in proportional lines1 and look whether we can find anything better to exert our fancies upon8 ,may we not1 to begin with1 accept this great principle--that1 as our bodies1 to be in health1 must be generally exercised1 so our minds1 to be in health1 must be generally cultivated8 ,you would not call a man healthy who had strong arms but was paralytic in his feet2 nor one who could walk well1 but had no use of his hands2 nor one who could see well1 if he could not hear4 ,you would not voluntarily reduce your bodies to any such partially developed state4 ,much more1 then1 you would not1 if you could help it1 reduce your minds to it4 ,now1 your minds are endowed with a vast number of gifts of totally different uses--limbs of mind as it were1 which1 if you don't exercise1 you cripple4 ,one is curiosity2 that is a gift1 a capacity of pleasure in knowing2 which if you destroy1 you make yourselves cold and dull4 ,another is sympathy2 the power of sharing in the feelings of living creatures1 which if you destroy1 you make yourselves hard and cruel4 ,another of your limbs of mind is admiration2 the power of enjoying beauty or ingenuity1 which1 if you destroy1 you make yourselves base and irreverent4 ,another is wit2 or the power of playing with the lights on the many sides of truth2 which if you destroy1 you make yourselves gloomy1 and less useful and cheering to others than you might be4 ,so that in choosing your way of work it should be your aim1 as far as possible1 to bring out all these faculties1 as far as they exist in you2 not one merely1 nor another1 but all of them4 ,and the way to bring them out1 is simply to concern yourselves attentively with the subjects of each faculty4 ,to cultivate sympathy you must be among living creatures1 and thinking about them2 and to cultivate admiration1 you must be among beautiful things and looking at them4 ,all this sounds much like truism1 at least ,i hope it does1 for then you will surely not refuse to act upon it2 and to consider farther1 how1 as architects1 you are to keep yourselves in contemplation of living creatures and lovely things4 ,you all probably know the beautiful photographs which have been published within the last year or two of the porches of the ,cathedral of ,amiens4 ,i hold one of these up to you1 7merely that you may know what ,i am talking about1 as of course you cannot see the detail at this distance1 but you will recognise the subject47 ,have you ever considered how much sympathy1 and how much humour1 are developed in filling this single doorway ,footnote3 ,the tympanum of the south transcept door2 it is to be found generally among all collections of architectural photographs with these sculptures of the history of ,st4 ,honor 7and1 by the way1 considering how often we ,english are now driving up and down the ,rue ,st4 ,honor1 we may as well know as much of the saint as the old architect cared to tell us74 ,you know in all legends of saints who ever were bishops1 the first thing you are told of them is that they didn't want to be bishops4 ,so here is ,st4 ,honor1 who doesn't want to be a bishop1 sitting sulkily in the corner2 he hugs his book with both hands1 and won't get up to take his crosier2 and here are all the city aldermen of ,amiens come to poke him up2 and all the monks in the town in a great puzzle what they shall do for a bishop if ,st4 ,honor won't be2 and here's one of the monks in the opposite corner who is quite cool about it1 and thinks they'll get on well enough without ,st ,honor1--you see that in his face perfectly4 ,at last ,st4 ,honor consents to be bishop1 and here he sits in a throne1 and has his book now grandly on his desk instead of his knees1 and he directs one of his village curates how to find relics in a wood2 here is the wood1 and here is the village curate1 and here are the tombs1 with the bones of ,st4 ,victorien and ,gentien in them4 ,after this1 ,st4 ,honor performs grand mass1 and the miracle occurs of the appearance of a hand blessing the wafer1 which occurrence afterwards was painted for the arms of the abbey4 ,then ,st4 ,honor dies2 and here is his tomb with his statue on the top2 and miracles are being performed at it--a deaf man having his ear touched1 and a blind man groping his way up to the tomb with his dog4 ,then here is a great procession in honour of the relics of ,st4 ,honor2 and under his coffin are some cripples being healed2 and the coffin itself is put above the bar which separates the cross from the lower subjects1 because the tradition is that the figure on the crucifix of the ,church of ,st4 ,firmin bowed its head in token of acceptance1 as the relics of ,st4 ,honor passed beneath4 ,now just consider the amount of sympathy with human nature1 and observance of it1 shown in this one bas-relief2 the sympathy with disputing monks1 with puzzled aldermen1 with melancholy recluse1 with triumphant prelate1 with palsy-stricken poverty1 with ecclesiastical magnificence1 or miracle-working faith4 ,consider how much intellect was needed in the architect1 and how much observance of nature before he could give the expression to these various figures--cast these multitudinous draperies--design these rich and quaint fragments of tombs and altars--weave with perfect animation the entangled branches of the forest4 ,but you will answer me1 all this is not architecture at all--it is sculpture4 ,will you then tell me precisely where the separation exists between one and the other8 ,we will begin at the very beginning4 ,i will show you a piece of what you will certainly admit to be a piece of pure architecture2 ,footnote3 ,see ,appendix ,,iii41 ,classical ,architecture4 it is drawn on the back of another photograph1 another of these marvellous tympana from ,notre ,dame1 which you call1 ,i suppose1 impure4 ,well1 look on this picture1 and on this4 ,don't laugh2 you must not laugh1 that's very improper of you1 this is classical architecture4 ,i have taken it out of the essay on that subject in the ,encyclopdia ,britannica4 ,yet ,i suppose none of you would think yourselves particularly ingenious architects if you had designed nothing more than this2 nay1 ,i will even let you improve it into any grand proportion you choose1 and add to it as many windows as you choose2 the only thing ,i insist upon in our specimen of pure architecture is1 that there shall be no mouldings nor ornaments upon it4 ,and ,i suspect you don't quite like your architecture so pure as this4 ,we want a few mouldings1 you will say--just a few4 ,those who want mouldings1 hold up their hands4 ,we are unanimous1 ,i think4 ,will1 you1 then1 design the profiles of these mouldings yourselves1 or will you copy them8 ,if you wish to copy them1 and to copy them always1 of course ,i leave you at once to your authorities1 and your imaginations to their repose4 ,but if you wish to design them yourselves1 how do you do it8 ,you draw the profile according to your taste1 and you order your mason to cut it4 ,now1 will you tell me the logical difference between drawing the profile of a moulding and giving that to be cut1 and drawing the folds of the drapery of a statue and giving those to be cut4 ,the last is much more difficult to do than the first2 but degrees of difficulty constitute no specific difference1 and you will not accept it1 surely1 as a definition of the difference between architecture and sculpture1 that architecture is doing anything that is easy1 and sculpture anything that is difficult4 ,it is true1 also1 that the carved moulding represents nothing1 and the carved drapery represents something2 but you will not1 ,i should think1 accept1 as an explanation of the difference between architecture and sculpture1 this any more than the other1 that sculpture is art which has meaning1 and architecture art which has none4 ,where1 then1 is your difference8 ,in this1 perhaps1 you will say2 that whatever ornaments we can direct ourselves1 and get accurately cut to order1 we consider architectural4 ,the ornaments that we are obliged to leave to the pleasure of the workman1 or the superintendence of some other designer1 we consider sculptural1 especially if they are more or less extraneous and incrusted--not an essential part of the building4 ,accepting this definition1 ,i am compelled to reply1 that it is in effect nothing more than an amplification of my first one--that whatever is easy you call architecture1 whatever is difficult you call sculpture4 ,for you cannot suppose the arrangement of the place in which the sculpture is to be put is so difficult or so great a part of the design as the sculpture itself4 ,for instance3 you all know the pulpit of ,niccolo ,pisano1 in the baptistry at ,pisa4 ,it is composed of seven rich relievi1 surrounded by panel mouldings1 and sustained on marble shafts4 ,do you suppose ,niccolo ,pisano's reputation--such part of it at least as rests on this pulpit 7and much does7--depends on the panel mouldings1 or on the relievi8 ,the panel mouldings are by his hand2 he would have disdained to leave even them to a common workman2 but do you think he found any difficulty in them1 or thought there was any credit in them8 ,having once done the sculpture1 those enclosing lines were mere child's play to him2 the determination of the diameter of shafts and height of capitals was an affair of minutes2 his work was in carving the ,crucifixion and the ,baptism4 ,or1 again1 do you recollect ,orcagna's tabernacle in the church of ,san ,michele1 at ,florence8 ,that1 also1 consists of rich and multitudinous bas-reliefs1 enclosed in panel mouldings1 with shafts of mosaic1 and foliated arches sustaining the canopy4 ,do you think ,orcagna1 any more than ,pisano1 if his spirit could rise in the midst of us at this moment1 would tell us that he had trusted his fame to the foliation1 or had put his soul's pride into the panelling8 ,not so2 he would tell you that his spirit was in the stooping figures that stand round the couch of the dying ,virgin4 ,or1 lastly1 do you think the man who designed the procession on the portal of ,amiens was the subordinate workman8 that there was an architect over him1 restraining him within certain limits1 and ordering of him his bishops at so much a mitre1 and his cripples at so much a crutch8 ,not so4 ,here1 on this sculptured shield1 rests the ,master's hand2 this is the centre of the ,master's thought2 from this1 and in subordination to this1 waved the arch and sprang the pinnacle4 ,having done this1 and being able to give human expression and action to the stone1 all the rest--the rib1 the niche1 the foil1 the shaft--were mere toys to his hand and accessories to his conception3 and if once you also gain the gift of doing this1 if once you can carve one fronton such as you have here1 ,i tell you1 you would be able--so far as it depended on your invention--to scatter cathedrals over ,england as fast as clouds rise from its streams after summer rain4 ,nay1 but perhaps you answer again1 our sculptors at present do not design cathedrals1 and could not4 ,no1 they could not2 but that is merely because we have made architecture so dull that they cannot take any interest in it1 and1 therefore1 do not care to add to their higher knowledge the poor and common knowledge of principles of building4 ,you have thus separated building from sculpture1 and you have taken away the power of both2 for the sculptor loses nearly as much by never having room for the development of a continuous work1 as you do from having reduced your work to a continuity of mechanism4 ,you are essentially1 and should always be1 the same body of men1 admitting only such difference in operation as there is between the work of a painter at different times1 who sometimes labours on a small picture1 and sometimes on the frescoes of a palace gallery4 ,this conclusion1 then1 we arrive at1 must arrive at2 the fact being irrevocably so3--that in order to give your imagination and the other powers of your souls full play1 you must do as all the great architects of old time did--you must yourselves be your sculptors4 ,phidias1 ,michael ,angelo1 ,orcagna1 ,pisano1 ,giotto1--which of these men1 do you think1 could not use his chisel8 ,you say1 ,it is difficult2 quite out of your way4 ,i know it is2 nothing that is great is easy2 and nothing that is great1 so long as you study building without sculpture1 can be in your way4 ,i want to put it in your way1 and you to find your way to it4 ,but1 on the other hand1 do not shrink from the task as if the refined art of perfect sculpture were always required from you4 ,for1 though architecture and sculpture are not separate arts1 there is an architectural manner of sculpture2 and it is1 in the majority of its applications1 a comparatively easy one4 ,our great mistake at present1 in dealing with stone at all1 is requiring to have all our work too refined2 it is just the same mistake as if we were to require all our book illustrations to be as fine work as ,raphael's4 ,john ,leech does not sketch so well as ,leonardo da ,vinci2 but do you think that the public could easily spare him2 or that he is wrong in bringing out his talent in the way in which it is most effective8 ,would you advise him1 if he asked your advice1 to give up his wood-blocks and take to canvas8 ,i know you would not2 neither would you tell him1 ,i believe1 on the other hand1 that because he could not draw as well as ,leonardo1 therefore he ought to draw nothing but straight lines with a ruler1 and circles with compasses1 and no figure- subjects at all4 ,that would be some loss to you2 would it not8 ,you would all be vexed if next week's ,punch had nothing in it but proportionate lines4 ,and yet1 do not you see that you are doing precisely the same thing with your powers of sculptural design that he would be doing with his powers of pictorial design1 if he gave you nothing but such lines4 ,you feel that you cannot carve like ,phidias2 therefore you will not carve at all1 but only draw mouldings2 and thus all that intermediate power which is of especial value in modern days1--that popular power of expression which is within the attainment of thousands1--and would address itself to tens of thousands1--is utterly lost to us in stone1 though in ink and paper it has become one of the most desired luxuries of modern civilization4 ,here1 then1 is one part of the subject to which ,i would especially invite your attention1 namely1 the distinctive character which may be wisely permitted to belong to architectural sculpture1 as distinguished from perfect sculpture on one side1 and from mere geometrical decoration on the other4 ,and first1 observe what an indulgence we have in the distance at which most work is to be seen4 ,supposing we were able to carve eyes and lips with the most exquisite precision1 it would all be of no use as soon as the work was put far above the eye2 but1 on the other hand1 as beauties disappear by being far withdrawn1 so will faults2 and the mystery and confusion which are the natural consequence of distance1 while they would often render your best skill but vain1 will as often render your worst errors of little consequence2 nay1 more than this1 often a deep cut1 or a rude angle1 will produce in certain positions an effect of expression both startling and true1 which you never hoped for4 ,not that mere distance will give animation to the work1 if it has none in itself2 but if it has life at all1 the distance will make that life more perceptible and powerful by softening the defects of execution4 ,so that you are placed1 as workmen1 in this position of singular advantage1 that you may give your fancies free play1 and strike hard for the expression that you want1 knowing that1 if you miss it1 no one will detect you2 if you at all touch it1 nature herself will help you1 and with every changing shadow and basking sunbeam bring forth new phases of your fancy4 ,but it is not merely this privilege of being imperfect which belongs to architectural sculpture4 ,it has a true privilege of imagination1 far excelling all that can be granted to the more finished work1 which1 for the sake of distinction1 ,i will call1--and ,i don't think we can have a much better term--furniture sculpture2 sculpture1 that is1 which can be moved from place to furnish rooms4 ,for observe1 to that sculpture the spectator is usually brought in a tranquil or prosaic state of mind2 he sees it associated rather with what is sumptuous than sublime1 and under circumstances which address themselves more to his comfort than his curiosity4 ,the statue which is to be pathetic1 seen between the flashes of footmen's livery round the dining-table1 must have strong elements of pathos in itself2 and the statue which is to be awful1 in the midst of the gossip of the drawing- room1 must have the elements of awe wholly in itself4 ,but the spectator is brought to your work already in an excited and imaginative mood4 ,he has been impressed by the cathedral wall as it loomed over the low streets1 before he looks up to the carving of its porch--and his love of mystery has been touched by the silence and the shadows of the cloister1 before he can set himself to decipher the bosses on its vaulting4 ,so that when once he begins to observe your doings1 he will ask nothing better from you1 nothing kinder from you1 than that you would meet this imaginative temper of his half way2--that you would farther touch the sense of terror1 or satisfy the expectation of things strange1 which have been prompted by the mystery or the majesty of the surrounding scene4 ,and thus1 your leaving forms more or less undefined1 or carrying out your fancies1 however extravagant1 in grotesqueness of shadow or shape1 will be for the most part in accordance with the temper of the observer2 and he is likely1 therefore1 much more willingly to use his fancy to help your meanings1 than his judgment to detect your faults4 ,again4 ,remember that when the imagination and feelings are strongly excited1 they will not only bear with strange things1 but they will look into minute things with a delight quite unknown in hours of tranquillity4 ,you surely must remember moments of your lives in which1 under some strong excitement of feeling1 all the details of visible objects presented themselves with a strange intensity and insistance1 whether you would or no2 urging themselves upon the mind1 and thrust upon the eye1 with a force of fascination which you could not refuse4 ,now1 to a certain extent1 the senses get into this state whenever the imagination is strongly excited4 ,things trivial at other times assume a dignity or significance which we cannot explain2 but which is only the more attractive because inexplicable3 and the powers of attention1 quickened by the feverish excitement1 fasten and feed upon the minutest circumstances of detail1 and remotest traces of intention4 ,so that what would at other times be felt as more or less mean or extraneous in a work of sculpture1 and which would assuredly be offensive to the perfect taste in its moments of languor1 or of critical judgment1 will be grateful1 and even sublime1 when it meets this frightened inquisitiveness1 this fascinated watchfulness1 of the roused imagination4 ,and this is all for your advantage2 for1 in the beginnings of your sculpture1 you will assuredly find it easier to imitate minute circumstances of costume or character1 than to perfect the anatomy of simple forms or the flow of noble masses2 and it will be encouraging to remember that the grace you cannot perfect1 and the simplicity you cannot achieve1 would be in great part vain1 even if you could achieve them1 in their appeal to the hasty curiosity of passionate fancy2 but that the sympathy which would be refused to your science will be granted to your innocence3 and that the mind of the general observer1 though wholly unaffected by the correctness of anatomy or propriety of gesture1 will follow you with fond and pleased concurrence1 as you carve the knots of the hair1 and the patterns of the vesture4 ,farther yet4 ,we are to remember that not only do the associated features of the larger architecture tend to excite the strength of fancy1 but the architectural laws to which you are obliged to submit your decoration stimulate its ingenuity4 ,every crocket which you are to crest with sculpture1--every foliation which you have to fill1 presents itself to the spectator's fancy1 not only as a pretty thing1 but as a problematic thing4 ,it contained1 he perceives immediately1 not only a beauty which you wished to display1 but a necessity which you were forced to meet2 and the problem1 how to occupy such and such a space with organic form in any probable way1 or how to turn such a boss or ridge into a conceivable image of life1 becomes at once1 to him as to you1 a matter of amusement as much as of admiration4 ,the ordinary conditions of perfection in form1 gesture1 or feature1 are willingly dispensed with1 when the ugly dwarf and ungainly goblin have only to gather themselves into angles1 or crouch to carry corbels2 and the want of skill which1 in other kinds of work would have been required for the finishing of the parts1 will at once be forgiven here1 if you have only disposed ingeniously what you have executed roughly1 and atoned for the rudeness of your hands by the quickness of your wits4 ,hitherto1 however1 we have been considering only the circumstances in architecture favourable to the development of the powers of imagination4 ,a yet more important point for us seems1 to me1 the place which it gives to all the objects of imagination4 ,for1 ,i suppose1 you will not wish me to spend any time in proving1 that imagination must be vigorous in proportion to the quantity of material which it has to handle2 and that1 just as we increase the range of what we see1 we increase the richness of what we can imagine4 ,granting this1 consider what a field is opened to your fancy merely in the subject matter which architecture admits4 ,nearly every other art is severely limited in its subjects--the landscape painter1 for instance1 gets little help from the aspects of beautiful humanity2 the historical painter1 less1 perhaps1 than he ought1 from the accidents of wild nature2 and the pure sculptor1 still less1 from the minor details of common life4 ,but is there anything within range of sight1 or conception1 which may not be of use to you1 or in which your interest may not be excited with advantage to your art8 ,from visions of angels1 down to the least important gesture of a child at play1 whatever may be conceived of ,divine1 or beheld of ,human1 may be dared or adopted by you3 throughout the kingdom of animal life1 no creature is so vast1 or so minute1 that you cannot deal with it1 or bring it into service2 the lion and the crocodile will couch about your shafts2 the moth and the bee will sun themselves upon your flowers2 for you1 the fawn will leap2 for you1 the snail be slow2 for you1 the dove smooth her bosom2 and the hawk spread her wings toward the south4 ,all the wide world of vegetation blooms and bends for you2 the leaves tremble that you may bid them be still under the marble snow2 the thorn and the thistle1 which the earth casts forth as evil1 are to you the kindliest servants2 no dying petal1 nor drooping tendril1 is so feeble as to have no more help for you2 no robed pride of blossom so kingly1 but it will lay aside its purple to receive at your hands the pale immortality4 ,is there anything in common life too mean1--in common too trivial1--to be ennobled by your touch8 ,as there is nothing in life1 so there is nothing in lifelessness which has not its lesson for you1 or its gift2 and when you are tired of watching the strength of the plume1 and the tenderness of the leaf1 you may walk down to your rough river shore1 or into the thickest markets of your thoroughfares1 and there is not a piece of torn cable that will not twine into a perfect moulding2 there is not a fragment of cast-away matting1 or shattered basket-work1 that will not work into a chequer or capital4 ,yes3 and if you gather up the very sand1 and break the stone on which you tread1 among its fragments of all but invisible shells you will find forms that will take their place1 and that proudly1 among the starred traceries of your vaulting2 and you1 who can crown the mountain with its fortress1 and the city with its towers1 are thus able also to give beauty to ashes1 and worthiness to dust4 ,now1 in that your art presents all this material to you1 you have already much to rejoice in4 ,but you have more to rejoice in1 because all this is submitted to you1 not to be dissected or analyzed1 but to be sympathized with1 and to bring out1 therefore1 what may be accurately called the moral part of imagination4 ,we saw that1 if we kept ourselves among lines only1 we should have cause to envy the naturalist1 because he was conversant with facts2 but you will have little to envy now1 if you make yourselves conversant with the feelings that arise out of his facts4 ,for instance1 the naturalist coming upon a block of marble1 has to begin considering immediately how far its purple is owing to iron1 or its whiteness to magnesia2 he breaks his piece of marble1 and at the close of his day1 has nothing but a little sand in his crucible and some data added to the theory of the elements4 ,but you approach your marble to sympathize with it1 and rejoice over its beauty4 ,you cut it a little indeed2 but only to bring out its veins more perfectly2 and at the end of your day's work you leave your marble shaft with joy and complacency in its perfectness1 as marble4 ,when you have to watch an animal instead of a stone1 you differ from the naturalist in the same way4 ,he may1 perhaps1 if he be an amiable naturalist1 take delight in having living creatures round him2--still1 the major part of his work is1 or has been1 in counting feathers1 separating fibres1 and analyzing structures4 ,but your work is always with the living creature2 the thing you have to get at in him is his life1 and ways of going about things4 ,it does not matter to you how many cells there are in his bones1 or how many filaments in his feathers2 what you want is his moral character and way of behaving himself2 it is just that which your imagination1 if healthy1 will first seize--just that which your chisel1 if vigorous1 will first cut4 ,you must get the storm spirit into your eagles1 and the lordliness into your lions1 and the tripping fear into your fawns2 and in order to do this1 you must be in continual sympathy with every fawn of them2 and be hand-in-glove with all the lions1 and hand-in-claw with all the hawks4 ,and don't fancy that you will lower yourselves by sympathy with the lower creatures2 you cannot sympathize rightly with the higher1 unless you do with those3 but you have to sympathize with the higher1 too-- with queens1 and kings1 and martyrs1 and angels4 ,yes1 and above all1 and more than all1 with simple humanity in all its needs and ways1 for there is not one hurried face that passes you in the street that will not be impressive1 if you can only fathom it4 ,all history is open to you1 all high thoughts and dreams that the past fortunes of men can suggest1 all fairy land is open to you--no vision that ever haunted forest1 or gleamed over hill-side1 but calls you to understand how it came into men's hearts1 and may still touch them2 and all ,paradise is open to you--yes1 and the work of ,paradise2 for in bringing all this1 in perpetual and attractive truth1 before the eyes of your fellow-men1 you have to join in the employment of the angels1 as well as to imagine their companies4 ,and observe1 in this last respect1 what a peculiar importance1 and responsibility1 are attached to your work1 when you consider its permanence1 and the multitudes to whom it is addressed4 ,we frequently are led1 by wise people1 to consider what responsibility may sometimes attach to words1 which yet1 the chance is1 will be heard by few1 and forgotten as soon as heard4 ,but none of your words will be heard by few1 and none will be forgotten1 for five or six hundred years1 if you build well4 ,you will talk to all who pass by2 and all those little sympathies1 those freaks of fancy1 those jests in stone1 those workings-out of problems in caprice1 will occupy mind after mind of utterly countless multitudes1 long after you are gone4 ,you have not1 like authors1 to plead for a hearing1 or to fear oblivion4 ,do but build large enough1 and carve boldly enough1 and all the world will hear you2 they cannot choose but look4 ,i do not mean to awe you by this thought2 ,i do not mean that because you will have so many witnesses and watchers1 you are never to jest1 or do anything gaily or lightly2 on the contrary1 ,i have pleaded1 from the beginning1 for this art of yours1 especially because it has room for the whole of your character--if jest is in you1 let the jest be jested2 if mathematical ingenuity is yours1 let your problem be put1 and your solution worked out1 as quaintly as you choose2 above all1 see that your work is easily and happily done1 else it will never make anybody else happy2 but while you thus give the rein to all your impulses1 see that those impulses be headed and centred by one noble impulse2 and let that be ,love--triple love--for the art which you practise1 the creation in which you move1 and the creatures to whom you minister4 ,i4 ,i say1 first1 ,love for the art which you practise4 ,be assured that if ever any other motive becomes a leading one in your mind1 as the principal one for exertion1 except your love of art1 that moment it is all over with your art4 ,i do not say you are to desire money1 nor to desire fame1 nor to desire position2 you cannot but desire all three2 nay1 you may--if you are willing that ,i should use the word ,love in a desecrated sense--love all three2 that is1 passionately covet them1 yet you must not covet or love them in the first place4 ,men of strong passions and imaginations must always care a great deal for anything they care for at all2 but the whole question is one of first or second4 ,does your art lead you1 or your gain lead you8 ,you may like making money exceedingly2 but if it come to a fair question1 whether you are to make five hundred pounds less by this business1 or to spoil your building1 and you choose to spoil your building1 there's an end of you4 ,so you may be as thirsty for fame as a cricket is for cream2 but1 if it come to a fair question1 whether you are to please the mob1 or do the thing as you know it ought to be done2 and you can't do both1 and choose to please the mob1 it's all over with you--there's no hope for you2 nothing that you can do will ever be worth a man's glance as he passes by4 ,the test is absolute1 inevitable--,is your art first with you8 ,then you are artists2 you may be1 after you have made your money1 misers and usurers2 you may be1 after you have got your fame1 jealous1 and proud1 and wretched1 and base3 but yet1 as long as you won't spoil your work1 you are artists4 ,on the other hand--,is your money first with you1 and your fame first with you8 ,then1 you may be very charitable with your money1 and very magnificent with your money1 and very graceful in the way you wear your reputation1 and very courteous to those beneath you1 and very acceptable to those above you2 but you are not artists4 ,you are mechanics1 and drudges4 ,,ii4 ,you must love the creation you work in the midst of4 ,for1 wholly in proportion to the intensity of feeling which you bring to the subject you have chosen1 will be the depth and justice of our perception of its character4 ,and this depth of feeling is not to be gained on the instant1 when you want to bring it to bear on this or that4 ,it is the result of the general habit of striving to feel rightly2 and1 among thousands of various means of doing this1 perhaps the one ,i ought specially to name to you1 is the keeping yourselves clear of petty and mean cares4 ,whatever you do1 don't be anxious1 nor fill your heads with little chagrins and little desires4 ,i have just said1 that you may be great artists1 and yet be miserly and jealous1 and troubled about many things4 ,so you may be2 but ,i said also that the miserliness or trouble must not be in your hearts all day4 ,it is possible that you may get a habit of saving money2 or it is possible1 at a time of great trial1 you may yield to the temptation of speaking unjustly of a rival1--and you will shorten your powers arid dim your sight even by this2--but the thing that you have to dread far more than any such unconscious habit1 or--any such momentary fall--is the constancy of small emotions2--the anxiety whether ,mr4 ,so-and-so will like your work2 whether such and such a workman will do all that you want of him1 and so on2--not wrong feelings or anxieties in themselves1 but impertinent1 and wholly incompatible with the full exercise of your imagination4 ,keep yourselves1 therefore1 quiet1 peaceful1 with your eyes open4 ,it doesn't matter at all what ,mr4 ,so-and-so thinks of your work2 but it matters a great deal what that bird is doing up there in its nest1 or how that vagabond child at the street corner is managing his game of knuckle-down4 ,and remember1 you cannot turn aside from your own interests1 to the birds' and the children's interests1 unless you have long before got into the habit of loving and watching birds and children2 so that it all comes at last to the forgetting yourselves1 and the living out of yourselves1 in the calm of the great world1 or if you will1 in its agitation2 but always in a calm of your own bringing4 ,do not think it wasted time to submit yourselves to any influence which may bring upon you any noble feeling4 ,rise early1 always watch the sunrise1 and the way the clouds break from the dawn2 you will cast your statue-draperies in quite another than your common way1 when the remembrance of that cloud motion is with you1 and of the scarlet vesture of the morning4 ,live always in the springtime in the country2 you do not know what leaf-form means1 unless you have seen the buds burst1 and the young leaves breathing low in the sunshine1 and wondering at the first shower of rain4 ,but above all1 accustom yourselves to look for1 and to love1 all nobleness of gesture and feature in the human form2 and remember that the highest nobleness is usually among the aged1 the poor1 and the infirm2 you will find1 in the end1 that it is not the strong arm of the soldier1 nor the laugh of the young beauty1 that are the best studies for you4 ,look at them1 and look at them reverently2 but be assured that endurance is nobler than strength1 and patience than beauty2 and that it is not in the high church pews1 where the gay dresses are1 but in the church free seats1 where the widows' weeds are1 that you may see the faces that will fit best between the angels' wings1 in the church porch4 ,,iii4 ,and therefore1 lastly1 and chiefly1 you must love the creatures to whom you minister1 your fellow-men2 for1 if you do not love them1 not only will you be little interested in the passing events of life1 but in all your gazing at humanity1 you will be apt to be struck only by outside form1 and not by expression4 ,it is only kindness and tenderness which will ever enable you to see what beauty there is in the dark eyes that are sunk with weeping1 and in the paleness of those fixed faces which the earth's adversity has compassed about1 till they shine in their patience like dying watchfires through twilight4 ,but it is not this only which makes it needful for you1 if you would be great1 to be also kind2 there is a most important and all-essential reason in the very nature of your own art4 ,so soon as you desire to build largely1 and with addition of noble sculpture1 you will find that your work must be associative4 ,you cannot carve a whole cathedral yourself--you can carve but few and simple parts of it4 ,either your own work must be disgraced in the mass of the collateral inferiority1 or you must raise your fellow-designers to correspondence of power4 ,if you have genius1 you will yourselves take the lead in the building you design2 you will carve its porch and direct its disposition4 ,but for all subsequent advancement of its detail1 you must trust to the agency and the invention of others2 and it rests with you either to repress what faculties your workmen have1 into cunning subordination to your own2 or to rejoice in discovering even the powers that may rival you1 and leading forth mind after mind into fellowship with your fancy1 and association with your fame4 ,i need not tell you that if you do the first--if you endeavour to depress or disguise the talents of your subordinates--you are lost2 for nothing could imply more darkly and decisively than this1 that your art and your work were not beloved by you2 that it was your own prosperity that you were seeking1 and your own skill only that you cared to contemplate4 ,i do not say that you must not be jealous at all2 it is rarely in human nature to be wholly without jealousy2 and you may be forgiven for going some day sadly home1 when you find some youth1 unpractised and unapproved1 giving the life-stroke to his work which you1 after years of training1 perhaps1 cannot reach2 but your jealousy must not conquer--your love of your building must conquer1 helped by your kindness of heart4 ,see--,i set no high or difficult standard before you4 ,i do not say that you are to surrender your pre-eminence in mere unselfish generosity4 ,but ,i do say that you must surrender your pre-eminence in your love of your building helped by your kindness2 and that whomsoever you find better able to do what will adorn it than you1--that person you are to give place to2 and to console yourselves for the humiliation1 first1 by your joy in seeing the edifice grow more beautiful under his chisel1 and secondly1 by your sense of having done kindly and justly4 ,but if you are morally strong enough to make the kindness and justice the first motive1 it will be better2--best of all1 if you do not consider it as kindness at all1 but bare and stern justice2 for1 truly1 such help as we can give each other in this world is a debt to each other2 and the man who perceives a superiority or a capacity in a subordinate1 and neither confesses1 nor assists it1 is not merely the withholder of kindness1 but the committer of injury4 ,but be the motive what you will1 only see that you do the thing2 and take the joy of the consciousness that1 as your art embraces a wider field than all others--and addresses a vaster multitude than all others--and is surer of audience than all others--so it is profounder and holier in ,fellowship than all others4 ,the artist1 when his pupil is perfect1 must see him leave his side that he may declare his distinct1 perhaps opponent1 skill4 ,man of science wrestles with man of science for priority of discovery1 and pursues in pangs of jealous haste his solitary inquiry4 ,you alone are called by kindness1-- by necessity1--by equity1 to fraternity of toil2 and thus1 in those misty and massive piles which rise above the domestic roofs of our ancient cities1 there was--there may be again--a meaning more profound and true than any that fancy so commonly has attached to them4 ,men say their pinnacles point to heaven4 ,why1 so does every tree that buds1 and every bird that rises as it sings4 ,men say their aisles are good for worship4 ,why1 so is every mountain glen1 and rough sea-shore4 ,but this they have of distinct and indisputable glory1--that their mighty walls were never raised1 and never shall be1 but by men who love and aid each other in their weakness2--that all their interlacing strength of vaulted stone has its foundation upon the stronger arches of manly fellowship1 and all their changing grace of depressed or lifted pinnacle owes its cadence and completeness to sweeter symmetries of human soul4 ,,lecture ,v4 ,,the ,,work ,,op ,,iron1 ,,in ,,nature1 ,,art1 ,,and ,,policy4 ,a ,lecture ,delivered at ,tunbridge ,wells1 ,february1 #aheh4 ,when first ,i heard that you wished me to address you this evening1 it was a matter of some doubt with me whether ,i could find any subject that would possess any sufficient interest for you to justify my bringing you out of your comfortable houses on a winter's night4 ,when ,i venture to speak about my own special business of art1 it is almost always before students of art1 among whom ,i may sometimes permit myself to be dull1 if ,i can feel that ,i am useful3 but a mere talk about art1 especially without examples to refer to 7and ,i have been unable to prepare any careful illustrations for this lecture71 is seldom of much interest to a general audience4 ,as ,i was considering what you might best bear with me in speaking about1 there came naturally into my mind a subject connected with the origin and present prosperity of the town you live in2 and1 it seemed to me1 in the out-branchings of it1 capable of a very general interest4 ,when1 long ago 7,i am afraid to think how long71 ,tunbridge ,wells was my ,switzerland1 and ,i used to be brought down here in the summer1 a sufficiently active child1 rejoicing in the hope of clambering sandstone cliffs of stupendous height above the common1 there used sometimes1 as1 ,i suppose1 there are in the lives of all children at the ,wells1 to be dark days in my life--days of condemnation to the pantiles and band--under which calamities my only consolation used to be in watching1 at every turn in my walk1 the welling forth of the spring over the orange rim of its marble basin4 ,the memory of the clear water1 sparkling over its saffron stain1 came back to me as the strongest image connected with the place2 and it struck me that you might not be unwilling1 to-night1 to think a little over the full significance of that saffron stain1 and of the power1 in other ways and other functions1 of the steelly element to which so many here owe returning strength and life2--chief as it has been always1 and is yet more and more markedly so day by day1 among the precious gifts of the earth4 ,the subject is1 of course1 too wide to be more than suggestively treated2 and even my suggestions must be few1 and drawn chiefly from my own fields of work2 nevertheless1 ,i think ,i shall have time to indicate some courses of thought which you may afterwards follow out for yourselves if they interest you2 and so ,i will not shrink from the full scope of the subject which ,i have announced to you--the functions of ,iron1 in ,nature1 ,art1 and ,policy4 ,without more preface1 ,i will take up the first head4 ,i4 ,,iron ,,in ,,nature4--,you all probably know that the ochreous stain1 which1 perhaps1 is often thought to spoil the basin of your spring1 is iron in a state of rust3 and when you see rusty iron in other places you generally think1 not only that it spoils the places it stains1 but that it is spoiled itself--that rusty iron is spoiled iron4 ,for most of our uses it generally is so2 and because we cannot use a rusty knife or razor so well as a polished one1 we suppose it to be a great defect in iron that it is subject to rust4 ,but not at all4 ,on the contrary1 the most perfect and useful state of it is that ochreous stain2 and therefore it is endowed with so ready a disposition to get itself into that state4 ,it is not a fault in the iron1 but a virtue1 to be so fond of getting rusted1 for in that condition it fulfils its most important functions in the universe1 and most kindly duties to mankind4 ,nay1 in a certain sense1 and almost a literal one1 we may say that iron rusted is ,living2 but when pure or polished1 ,dead4 ,you all probably know that in the mixed air we breathe1 the part of it essentially needful to us is called oxygen2 and that this substance is to all animals1 in the most accurate sense of the word1 breath of life4 ,the nervous power of life is a different thing2 but the supporting element of the breath1 without which the blood1 and therefore the life1 cannot be nourished1 is this oxygen4 ,now it is this very same air which the iron breathes when it gets rusty4 ,it takes the oxygen from the atmosphere as eagerly as we do1 though it uses it differently4 ,the iron keeps all that it gets2 we1 and other animals1 part with it again2 but the metal absolutely keeps what it has once received of this aerial gift2 and the ochreous dust which we so much despise is1 in fact1 just so much nobler than pure iron1 in so far as it is iron and the air4 ,nobler1 and more useful--for1 indeed1 as ,i shall be able to show you presently--the main service of this metal1 and of all other metals1 to us1 is not in making knives1 and scissors1 and pokers1 and pans1 but in making the ground we feed from1 and nearly all the substances first needful to our existence4 ,for these are all nothing but metals and oxygen--metals with breath put into them4 ,sand1 lime1 clay1 and the rest of the earths--potash and soda1 and the rest of the alkalies--are all of them metals which have undergone this1 so to speak1 vital change1 and have been rendered fit for the service of man by permanent unity with the purest air which he himself breathes4 ,there is only one metal which does not rust readily2 and that1 in its influence on ,man hitherto1 has caused ,death rather than ,life2 it will not be put to its right use till it is made a pavement of1 and so trodden under foot4 ,is there not something striking in this fact1 considered largely as one of the types1 or lessons1 furnished by the inanimate creation8 ,here you have your hard1 bright1 cold1 lifeless metal--good enough for swords and scissors--but not for food4 ,you think1 perhaps1 that your iron is wonderfully useful in a pure form1 but how would you like the world1 if all your meadows1 instead of grass1 grew nothing but iron wire--if all your arable ground1 instead of being made of sand and clay1 were suddenly turned into flat surfaces of steel--if the whole earth1 instead of its green and glowing sphere1 rich with forest and flower1 showed nothing but the image of the vast furnace of a ghastly engine--a globe of black1 lifeless1 excoriated metal8 ,it would be that1--probably it was once that2 but assuredly it would be1 were it not that all the substance of which it is made sucks and breathes the brilliancy of the atmosphere2 and as it breathes1 softening from its merciless hardness1 it falls into fruitful and beneficent dust2 gathering itself again into the earths from which we feed1 and the stones with which we build2-- into the rocks that frame the mountains1 and the sands that bind the sea4 ,hence1 it is impossible for you to take up the most insignificant pebble at your feet1 without being able to read1 if you like1 this curious lesson in it4 ,you look upon it at first as if it were earth only4 ,nay1 it answers1 ,i am not earth--,i am earth and air in one2 part of that blue heaven which you love1 and long for1 is already in me2 it is all my life--without it ,i should be nothing1 and able for nothing2 ,i could not minister to you1 nor nourish you--,i should be a cruel and helpless thing2 but1 because there is1 according to my need and place in creation1 a kind of soul in me1 ,i have become capable of good1 and helpful in the circles of vitality4 ,thus far the same interest attaches to all the earths1 and all the metals of which they are made2 but a deeper interest1 and larger beneficence belong to that ochreous earth of iron which stains the marble of your springs4 ,it stains much besides that marble4 ,it stains the great earth wheresoever you can see it1 far and wide--it is the colouring substance appointed to colour the globe for the sight1 as well as subdue it to the service of man4 ,you have just seen your hills covered with snow1 and1 perhaps1 have enjoyed1 at first1 the contrast of their fair white with the dark blocks of pine woods2 but have you ever considered how you would like them always white--not pure white1 but dirty white--the white of thaw1 with all the chill of snow in it1 but none of its brightness8 ,that is what the colour of the earth would be without its iron2 that would be its colour1 not here or there only1 but in all places1 and at all times4 ,follow out that idea till you get it in some detail4 ,think first of your pretty gravel walks in your gardens1 yellow and fine1 like plots of sunshine between the flower- beds2 fancy them all suddenly turned to the colour of ashes4 ,that is what they would be without iron ochre4 ,think of your winding walks over the common1 as warm to the eye as they are dry to the foot1 and imagine them all laid down suddenly with gray cinders4 ,then pass beyond the common into the country1 and pause at the first ploughed field that you see sweeping up the hill sides in the sun1 with its deep brown furrows1 and wealth of ridges all a-glow1 heaved aside by the ploughshare1 like deep folds of a mantle of russet velvet--fancy it all changed suddenly into grisly furrows in a field of mud4 ,that is what it would be without iron4 ,pass on1 in fancy1 over hill and dale1 till you reach the bending line of the sea shore2 go down upon its breezy beach--watch the white foam flashing among the amber of it1 and all the blue sea embayed in belts of gold3 then fancy those circlets of far sweeping shore suddenly put into mounds of mourning--all those golden sands turned into gray slime1 the fairies no more able to call to each other1 ,come unto these yellow sands2 but1 ,come unto these drab sands4 ,that is what they would be1 without iron4 ,iron is in some sort1 therefore1 the sunshine and light of landscape1 so far as that light depends on the ground2 but it is a source of another kind of sunshine1 quite as important to us in the way we live at present--sunshine1 not of landscape1 but of dwelling-place4 ,in these days of swift locomotion ,i may doubtless assume that most of my audience have been somewhere out of ,england--have been in ,scotland1 or ,france1 or ,switzerland4 ,whatever may have been their impression1 on returning to their own country1 of its superiority or inferiority in other respects1 they cannot but have felt one thing about it--the comfortable look of its towns and villages4 ,foreign towns are often very picturesque1 very beautiful1 but they never have quite that look of warm self-sufficiency and wholesome quiet1 with which our villages nestle themselves down among the green fields4 ,if you will take the trouble to examine into the sources of this impression1 you will find that by far the greater part of that warm and satisfactory appearance depends upon the rich scarlet colour of the bricks and tiles4 ,it does not belong to the neat building--very neat building has an uncomfortable rather than a comfortable look--but it depends on the warm building2 our villages are dressed in red tiles as our old women are in red cloaks2 and it does not matter how worn the cloaks1 or how bent and bowed the roof may be1 so long as there are no holes in either one or the other1 and the sobered but unextinguishable colour still glows in the shadow of the hood1 and burns among the green mosses of the gable4 ,and what do you suppose dyes your tiles of cottage roof8 ,you don't paint them4 ,it is nature who puts all that lovely vermilion into the clay for you2 and all that lovely vermilion is this oxide of iron4 ,think1 therefore1 what your streets of towns would become--ugly enough1 indeed1 already1 some of them1 but still comfortable-looking-- if instead of that warm brick red1 the houses became all pepper-and- salt colour4 ,fancy your country villages changing from that homely scarlet of theirs which1 in its sweet suggestion of laborious peace1 is as honourable as the soldiers' scarlet of laborious battle--suppose all those cottage roofs1 ,i say1 turned at once into the colour of unbaked clay1 the colour of street gutters in rainy weather4 ,that's what they would be1 without iron4 ,there is1 however1 yet another effect of colour in our ,english country towns which1 perhaps1 you may not all yourselves have noticed1 but for which you must take the word of a sketcher4 ,they are not so often merely warm scarlet as they are warm purple2--a more beautiful colour still3 and they owe this colour to a mingling with the vermilion of the deep grayish or purple hue of our fine ,welsh slates on the more respectable roofs1 made more blue still by the colour of intervening atmosphere4 ,if you examine one of these ,welsh slates freshly broken1 you will find its purple colour clear and vivid2 and although never strikingly so after it has been long exposed to weather1 it always retains enough of the tint to give rich harmonies of distant purple in opposition to the green of our woods and fields4 ,whatever brightness or power there is in the hue is entirely owing to the oxide of iron4 ,without it the slates would either be pale stone colour1 or cold gray1 or black4 ,thus far we have only been considering the use and pleasantness of iron in the common earth of clay4 ,but there are three kinds of earth which in mixed mass and prevalent quantity1 form the world4 ,those are1 in common language1 the earths of clay1 of lime1 and of flint4 ,many other elements are mingled with these in sparing quantities2 but the great frame and substance of the earth is made of these three1 so that wherever you stand on solid ground1 in any country of the globe1 the thing that is mainly under your feet will be either clay1 limestone1 or some condition of the earth of flint1 mingled with both4 ,these being what we have usually to deal with1 ,nature seems to have set herself to make these three substances as interesting to us1 and as beautiful for us1 as she can4 ,the clay1 being a soft and changeable substance1 she doesn't take much pains about1 as we have seen1 till it is baked2 she brings the colour into it only when it receives a permanent form4 ,but the limestone and flint she paints1 in her own way1 in their native state3 and her object in painting them seems to be much the same as in her painting of flowers2 to draw us1 careless and idle human creatures1 to watch her a little1 and see what she is about--that being on the whole good for us1--her children4 ,for ,nature is always carrying on very strange work with this limestone and flint of hers3 laying down beds of them at the bottom of the sea2 building islands out of the sea2 filling chinks and veins in mountains with curious treasures2 petrifying mosses1 and trees1 and shells2 in fact1 carrying on all sorts of business1 subterranean or submarine1 which it would be highly desirable for us1 who profit and live by it1 to notice as it goes on4 ,and apparently to lead us to do this1 she makes picture-books for us of limestone and flint2 and tempts us1 like foolish children as we are1 to read her books by the pretty colours in them4 ,the pretty colours in her limestone-books form those variegated marbles which all mankind have taken delight to polish and build with from the beginning of time2 and the pretty colours in her flint-books form those agates1 jaspers1 cornelians1 bloodstones1 onyxes1 cairngorms1 chrysoprases1 which men have in like manner taken delight to cut1 and polish1 and make ornaments of1 from the beginning of time2 and yet1 so much of babies are they1 and so fond of looking at the pictures instead of reading the book1 that ,i question whether1 after six thousand years of cutting and polishing1 there are above two or three people out of any given hundred1 who know1 or care to know1 how a bit of agate or a bit of marble was made1 or painted4 ,how it was made1 may not be always very easy to say2 but with what it was painted there is no manner of question4 ,all those beautiful violet veinings and variegations of the marbles of ,sicily and ,spain1 the glowing orange and amber colours of those of ,siena1 the deep russet of the ,rosso antico1 and the blood-colour of all the precious jaspers that enrich the temples of ,italy2 and1 finally1 all the lovely transitions of tint in the pebbles of ,scotland and the ,rhine1 which form1 though not the most precious1 by far the most interesting portion of our modern jewellers' work2--all these are painted by nature with this one material only1 variously proportioned and applied--the oxide of iron that stains your ,tunbridge springs4 ,but this is not all1 nor the best part of the work of iron4 ,its service in producing these beautiful stones is only rendered to rich people1 who can afford to quarry and polish them4 ,but ,nature paints for all the world1 poor and rich together3 and while1 therefore1 she thus adorns the innermost rocks of her hills1 to tempt your investigation1 or indulge your luxury1--she paints1 far more carefully1 the outsides of the hills1 which are for the eyes of the shepherd and the ploughman4 ,i spoke just now of the effect in the roofs of our villages of their purple slates3 but if the slates are beautiful even in their flat and formal rows on house-roofs1 much more are they beautiful on the rugged crests and flanks of their native mountains4 ,have you ever considered1 in speaking as we do so often of distant blue hills1 what it is that makes them blue8 ,to a certain extent it is distance2 but distance alone will not do it4 ,many hills look white1 however distant4 ,that lovely dark purple colour of our ,welsh and ,highland hills is owing1 not to their distance merely1 but to their rocks4 ,some of their rocks are1 indeed1 too dark to be beautiful1 being black or ashy gray2 owing to imperfect and porous structure4 ,but when you see this dark colour dashed with russet and blue1 and coming out in masses among the green ferns1 so purple that you can hardly tell at first whether it is rock or heather1 then you must thank your old ,tunbridge friend1 the oxide of iron4 ,but this is not all4 ,it is necessary for the beauty of hill scenery that ,nature should colour not only her soft rocks1 but her hard ones2 and she colours them with the same thing1 only more beautifully4 ,perhaps you have wondered at my use of the word purple1 so often of stones2 but the ,greeks1 and still more the ,romans1 who had profound respect for purple1 used it of stone long ago4 ,you have all heard of porphyry as among the most precious of the harder massive stones4 ,the colour which gave it that noble name1 as well as that which gives the flush to all the rosy granite of ,egypt--yes1 and to the rosiest summits of the ,alps themselves--is still owing to the same substance--your humble oxide of iron4 ,and last of all3 ,a nobler colour than all these--the noblest colour ever seen on this earth--one which belongs to a strength greater than that of the ,egyptian granite1 and to a beauty greater than that of the sunset or the rose--is still mysteriously connected with the presence of this dark iron4 ,i believe it is not ascertained on what the crimson of blood actually depends2 but the colour is connected1 of course1 with its vitality1 and that vitality with the existence of iron as one of its substantial elements4 ,is it not strange to find this stern and strong metal mingled so delicately in our human life1 that we cannot even blush without its help8 ,think of it1 my fair and gentle hearers2 how terrible the alternative--sometimes you have actually no choice but to be brazen- faced1 or iron-faced6 ,in this slight review of some of the functions of the metal1 you observe that ,i confine myself strictly to its operations as a colouring element4 ,i should only confuse your conception of the facts1 if ,i endeavoured to describe its uses as a substantial element1 either in strengthening rocks1 or influencing vegetation by the decomposition of rocks4 ,i have not1 therefore1 even glanced at any of the more serious uses of the metal in the economy of nature4 ,but what ,i wish you to carry clearly away with you is the remembrance that in all these uses the metal would be nothing without the air4 ,the pure metal has no power1 and never occurs in nature at all except in meteoric stones1 whose fall no one can account for1 and which are useless after they have fallen3 in the necessary work of the world1 the iron is invariably joined with the oxygen1 and would be capable of no service or beauty whatever without it4 ,,ii4 ,,iron ,,in ,,art4--,passing1 then1 from the offices of the metal in the operations of nature to its uses in the hands of man1 you must remember1 in the outset1 that the type which has been thus given you1 by the lifeless metal1 of the action of body and soul together1 has noble antitype in the operation of all human power4 ,all art worthy the name is the energy--neither of the human body alone1 nor of the human soul alone1 but of both united1 one guiding the other3 good craftsmanship and work of the fingers1 joined with good emotion and work of the heart4 ,there is no good art1 nor possible judgment of art1 when these two are not united2 yet we are constantly trying to separate them4 ,our amateurs cannot be persuaded but that they may produce some kind of art by their fancy or sensibility1 without going through the necessary manual toil4 ,that is entirely hopeless4 ,without a certain number1 and that a very great number1 of steady acts of hand--a practice as careful and constant as would be necessary to learn any other manual business--no drawing is possible4 ,on the other side1 the workman1 and those who employ him1 are continually trying to produce art by trick or habit of fingers1 without using their fancy or sensibility4 ,that also is hopeless4 ,without mingling of heart-passion with hand-power1 no art is possible4 ,footnote3 ,no fine art1 that is4 ,see the previous definition of fine art at p4 #ch4 ,the highest art unites both in their intensest degrees3 the action of the hand at its finest1 with that of the heart at its fullest4 ,hence it follows that the utmost power of art can only be given in a material capable of receiving and retaining the influence of the subtlest touch of the human hand4 ,that hand is the most perfect agent of material power existing in the universe2 and its full subtlety can only be shown when the material it works on1 or with1 is entirely yielding4 ,the chords of a perfect instrument will receive it1 but not of an imperfect one2 the softly bending point of the hair pencil1 and soft melting of colour1 will receive it1 but not even the chalk or pen point1 still less the steel point1 chisel1 or marble4 ,the hand of a sculptor may1 indeed1 be as subtle as that of a painter1 but all its subtlety is not bestowable nor expressible3 the touch of ,titian1 ,correggio1 or ,turner1 ,footnote3 ,see ,appendix ,,iv41 ,subtlety of ,hand4 is a far more marvellous piece of nervous action than can be shown in anything but colour1 or in the very highest conditions of executive expression in music4 ,in proportion as the material worked upon is less delicate1 the execution necessarily becomes lower1 and the art with it4 ,this is one main principle of all work4 ,another is1 that whatever the material you choose to work with1 your art is base if it does not bring out the distinctive qualities of that material4 ,the reason of this second law is1 that if you don't want the qualities of the substance you use1 you ought to use some other substance3 it can be only affectation1 and desire to display your skill1 that lead you to employ a refractory substance1 and therefore your art will all be base4 ,glass1 for instance1 is eminently1 in its nature1 transparent4 ,if you don't want transparency1 let the glass alone4 ,do not try to make a window look like an opaque picture1 but take an opaque ground to begin with4 ,again1 marble is eminently a solid and massive substance4 ,unless you want mass and solidity1 don't work in marble4 ,if you wish for lightness1 take wood2 if for freedom1 take stucco2 if for ductility1 take glass4 ,don't try to carve leathers1 or trees1 or nets1 or foam1 out of marble4 ,carve white limbs and broad breasts only out of that4 ,so again1 iron is eminently a ductile and tenacious substance-- tenacious above all things1 ductile more than most4 ,when you want tenacity1 therefore1 and involved form1 take iron4 ,it is eminently made for that4 ,it is the material given to the sculptor as the companion of marble1 with a message1 as plain as it can well be spoken1 from the lips of the earth-mother1 ,here's for you to cut1 and here's for you to hammer4 ,shape this1 and twist that4 ,what is solid and simple1 carve out2 what is thin and entangled1 beat out4 ,i give you all kinds of forms to be delighted in2--fluttering leaves as well as fair bodies2 twisted branches as well as open brows4 ,the leaf and the branch you may beat and drag into their imagery3 the body and brow you shall reverently touch into their imagery4 ,and if you choose rightly and work rightly1 what you do shall be safe afterwards4 ,your slender leaves shall not break off in my tenacious iron1 though they may be rusted a little with an iron autumn4 ,your broad surfaces shall not be unsmoothed in my pure crystalline marble--no decay shall touch them4 ,but if you carve in the marble what will break with a touch1 or mould in the metal what a stain of rust or verdigris will spoil1 it is your fault--not mine4 ,these are the main principles in this matter2 which1 like nearly all other right principles in art1 we moderns delight in contradicting as directly and specially as may be4 ,we continually look for1 and praise1 in our exhibitions the sculpture of veils1 and lace1 and thin leaves1 and all kinds of impossible things pushed as far as possible in the fragile stone1 for the sake of showing the sculptor's dexterity4 ,footnote3 ,i do not mean to attach any degree of blame to the effort to represent leafage in marble for certain expressive purposes4 ,the later works of ,mr4 ,munro have depended for some of their most tender thoughts on a delicate and skilful use of such accessories4 ,and in general1 leaf sculpture is good and admirable1 if it renders1 as in ,gothic work1 the grace and lightness of the leaf by the arrangement of light and shadow --supporting the masses well by strength of stone below2 but all carving is base which proposes to itself slightness as an aim1 and tries to imitate the absolute thinness of thin or slight things1 as much modern wood carving does1 ,i saw in ,italy1 a year or two ago1 a marble sculpture of birds' nests4 ,on the other hand1 we cast our iron into bars--brittle1 though an inch thick--sharpen them at the ends1 and consider fences1 and other work1 made of such materials1 decorative6 ,i do not believe it would be easy to calculate the amount of mischief done to our taste in ,england by that fence iron-work of ours alone4 ,if it were asked of us by a single characteristic1 to distinguish the dwellings of a country into two broad sections2 and to set1 on one side1 the places where people were1 for the most part1 simple1 happy1 benevolent1 and honest2 and1 on the other side1 the places where at least a great number of the people were sophisticated1 unkind1 uncomfortable1 and unprincipled1 there is1 ,i think1 one feature that you could fix upon as a positive test3 the uncomfortable and unprincipled parts of a country would be the parts where people lived among iron railings1 and the comfortable and principled parts where they had none4 ,a broad generalization1 you will say6 ,perhaps a little too broad2 yet1 in all sobriety1 it will come truer than you think4 ,consider every other kind of fence or defence1 and you will find some virtue in it2 but in the iron railing none4 ,there is1 first1 your castle rampart of stone--somewhat too grand to be considered here among our types of fencing2 next1 your garden or park wall of brick1 which has indeed often an unkind look on the outside1 but there is more modesty in it than unkindness4 ,it generally means1 not that the builder of it wants to shut you out from the view of his garden1 but from the view of himself3 it is a frank statement that as he needs a certain portion of time to himself1 so he needs a certain portion of ground to himself1 and must not be stared at when he digs there in his shirt- sleeves1 or plays at leapfrog with his boys from school1 or talks over old times with his wife1 walking up and down in the evening sunshine4 ,besides1 the brick wall has good practical service in it1 and shelters you from the east wind1 and ripens your peaches and nectarines1 and glows in autumn like a sunny bank4 ,and1 moreover1 your brick wall1 if you build it properly1 so that it shall stand long enough1 is a beautiful thing when it is old1 and has assumed its grave purple red1 touched with mossy green4 ,next to your lordly wall1 in dignity of enclosure1 comes your close-set wooden paling1 which is more objectionable1 because it commonly means enclosure on a larger scale than people want4 ,still it is significative of pleasant parks1 and well-kept field walks1 and herds of deer1 and other such aristocratic pastoralisms1 which have here and there their proper place in a country1 and may be passed without any discredit4 ,next to your paling1 comes your low stone dyke1 your mountain fence1 indicative at a glance either of wild hill country1 or of beds of stone beneath the soil2 the hedge of the mountains--delightful in all its associations1 and yet more in the varied and craggy forms of the loose stones it is built of2 and next to the low stone wall1 your lowland hedge1 either in trim line of massive green1 suggested of the pleasances of old ,elizabethan houses1 and smooth alleys for aged feet1 and quaint labyrinths for young ones1 or else in fair entanglement of eglantine and virgin's bower1 tossing its scented luxuriance along our country waysides2--how many such you have here among your pretty hills1 fruitful with black clusters of the bramble for boys in autumn1 and crimson hawthorn berries for birds in winter4 ,and then last1 and most difficult to class among fences1 comes your handrail1 expressive of all sorts of things2 sometimes having a knowing and vicious look1 which it learns at race-courses2 sometimes an innocent and tender look1 which it learns at rustic bridges over cressy brooks2 and sometimes a prudent and protective look1 which it learns on passes of the ,alps1 where it has posts of granite and bars of pine1 and guards the brows of cliffs and the banks of torrents4 ,so that in all these kinds of defence there is some good1 pleasant1 or noble meaning4 ,but what meaning has the iron railing8 ,either1 observe1 that you are living in the midst of such bad characters that you must keep them out by main force of bar1 or that you are yourself of a character requiring to be kept inside in the same manner4 ,your iron railing always means thieves outside1 or ,bedlam inside2 it can mean nothing else than that4 ,if the people outside were good for anything1 a hint in the way of fence would be enough for them2 but because they are violent and at enmity with you1 you are forced to put the close bars and the spikes at the top4 ,last summer ,i was lodging for a little while in a cottage in the country1 and in front of my low window there were1 first some beds of daisies1 then a row of gooseberry and currant bushes1 and then a low wall about three feet above the ground1 covered with stone-cress4 ,outside1 a corn-field1 with its green ears glistening in the sun1 and a field path through it1 just past the garden gate4 ,from my window ,i could see every peasant of the village who passed that way1 with basket on arm for market1 or spade on shoulder for field4 ,when ,i was inclined for society1 ,i could lean over my wall1 and talk to anybody2 when ,i was inclined for science1 ,i could botanize all along the top of my wall-- there were four species of stone-cress alone growing on it2 and when ,i was inclined for exercise1 ,i could jump over my wall1 backwards and forwards4 ,that's the sort of fence to have in a ,christian country2 not a thing which you can't walk inside of without making yourself look like a wild beast1 nor look at out of your window in the morning without expecting to see somebody impaled upon it in the night4 ,and yet farther1 observe that the iron railing is a useless fence--it can shelter nothing1 and support nothing2 you can't nail your peaches to it1 nor protect your flowers with it1 nor make anything whatever out of its costly tyranny2 and besides being useless1 it is an insolent fence2--it says plainly to everybody who passes--,you may be an honest person1--but1 also1 you may be a thief3 honest or not1 you shall not get in here1 for ,i am a respectable person1 and much above you2 you shall only see what a grand place ,i have got to keep you out of--look here1 and depart in humiliation4 ,this1 however1 being in the present state of civilization a frequent manner of discourse1 and there being unfortunately many districts where the iron railing is unavoidable1 it yet remains a question whether you need absolutely make it ugly1 no less than significative of evil4 ,you must have railings round your squares in ,london1 and at the sides of your areas2 but need you therefore have railings so ugly that the constant sight of them is enough to neutralise the effect of all the schools of art in the kingdom8 ,you need not4 ,far from such necessity1 it is even in your power to turn all your police force of iron bars actually into drawing masters1 and natural historians4 ,not1 of course1 without some trouble and some expense2 you can do nothing much worth doing1 in this world1 without trouble1 you can get nothing much worth having without expense4 ,the main question is only--what is worth doing and having3--,consider1 therefore1 if this be not4 ,here is your iron railing1 as yet1 an uneducated monster2 a sombre seneschal1 incapable of any words1 except his perpetual ,keep out6 and ,away with you6 ,would it not be worth some trouble and cost to turn this ungainly ruffian porter into a well-educated servant2 who1 while he was severe as ever in forbidding entrance to evilly-disposed people1 should yet have a kind word for well-disposed people1 and a pleasant look1 and a little useful information at his command1 in case he should be asked a question by the passers-by8 ,we have not time to-night to look at many examples of ironwork2 and those ,i happen to have by me are not the best2 ironwork is not one of my special subjects of study2 so that ,i only have memoranda of bits that happened to come into picturesque subjects which ,i was drawing for other reasons4 ,besides1 external ironwork is more difficult to find good than any other sort of ancient art2 for when it gets rusty and broken1 people are sure1 if they can afford it1 to send it to the old iron shop1 and get a fine new grating instead2 and in the great cities of ,italy1 the old iron is thus nearly all gone3 the best bits ,i remember in the open air were at ,brescia2--fantastic sprays of laurel- like foliage rising over the garden gates2 and there are a few fine fragments at ,verona1 and some good trellis-work enclosing the ,scala tombs2 but on the whole1 the most interesting pieces1 though by no means the purest in style1 are to be found in out-of-the-way provincial towns1 where people do not care1 or are unable1 to make polite alterations4 ,the little town of ,bellinzona1 for instance1 on the south of the ,alps1 and that of ,sion on the north1 have both of them complete schools of ironwork in their balconies and vineyard gates4 ,that of ,bellinzona is the best1 though not very old--,i suppose most of it of the seventeenth century2 still it is very quaint and beautiful4 ,here1 for example1 are two balconies1 from two different houses2 one has been a cardinal's1 and the hat is the principal ornament of the balcony2 its tassels being wrought with delightful delicacy and freedom2 and catching the eye clearly even among the mass of rich wreathed leaves4 ,these tassels and strings are precisely the kind of subject fit for ironwork--noble in ironwork1 they would have been entirely ignoble in marble1 on the grounds above stated4 ,the real plant of oleander standing in the window enriches the whole group of lines very happily4 ,the other balcony1 from a very ordinary-looking house in the same street1 is much more interesting in its details4 ,it is shown in the plate as it appeared last summer1 with convolvulus twined about the bars1 the arrow-shaped living leaves mingled among the leaves of iron2 but you may see in the centre of these real leaves a cluster of lighter ones1 which are those of the ironwork itself4 ,this cluster is worth giving a little larger to show its treatment4 ,fig4 #b 7in ,appendix ,v47 is the front view of it3 ,fig4 #d1 its profile4 ,it is composed of a large tulip in the centre2 then two turkscap lilies2 then two pinks1 a little conventionalized2 then two narcissi2 then two nondescripts1 or1 at least1 flowers ,i do not know2 and then two dark buds1 and a few leaves4 ,i say1 dark buds1 for all these flowers have been coloured in their original state4 ,the plan of the group is exceedingly simple3 it is all enclosed in a pointed arch 7,fig4 #c1 ,appendix ,v473 the large mass of the tulip forming the apex2 a six-foiled star on each side2 then a jagged star2 then a five-foiled star2 then an unjagged star or rose2 finally a small bud1 so as to establish relation and cadence through the whole group4 ,the profile is very free and fine1 and the upper bar of the balcony exceedingly beautiful in effect2--none the less so on account of the marvellously simple means employed4 ,a thin strip of iron is bent over a square rod2 out of the edge of this strip are cut a series of triangular openings--widest at top1 leaving projecting teeth of iron 7,appendix1 ,fig4 #e72 then each of these projecting pieces gets a little sharp tap with the hammer in front1 which beaks its edge inwards1 tearing it a little open at the same time1 and the thing is done4 ,the common forms of ,swiss ironwork are less naturalistic than these ,italian balconies1 depending more on beautiful arrangements of various curve2 nevertheless1 there has been a rich naturalist school at ,fribourg1 where a few bell-handles are still left1 consisting of rods branched into laurel and other leafage4 ,at ,geneva1 modern improvements have left nothing2 but at ,annecy1 a little good work remains2 the balcony of its old htel de ville especially1 with a trout of the lake --presumably the town arms--forming its central ornament4 ,i might expatiate all night--if you would sit and hear me--on the treatment of such required subject1 or introduction of pleasant caprice by the old workmen2 but we have no more time to spare1 and ,i must quit this part of our subject--the rather as ,i could not explain to you the intrinsic merit of such ironwork without going fully into the theory of curvilinear design2 only let me leave with you this one distinct assertion--that the quaint beauty and character of many natural objects1 such as intricate branches1 grass1 foliage 7especially thorny branches and prickly foliage71 as well as that of many animals1 plumed1 spined1 or bristled1 is sculpturally expressible in iron only1 and in iron would be majestic and impressive in the highest degree2 and that every piece of metal work you use might be1 rightly treated1 not only a superb decoration1 but a most valuable abstract of portions of natural forms1 holding in dignity precisely the same relation to the painted representation of plants1 that a statue does to the painted form of man4 ,it is difficult to give you an idea of the grace and interest which the simplest objects possess when their forms are thus abstracted from among the surrounding of rich circumstance which in nature disturbs the feebleness of our attention4 ,in ,plate #b1 a few blades of common green grass1 and a wild leaf or two--just as they were thrown by nature1--are thus abstracted from the associated redundance of the forms about them1 and shown on a dark ground3 every cluster of herbage would furnish fifty such groups1 and every such group would work into iron 7fitting it1 of course1 rightly to its service7 with perfect ease1 and endless grandeur of result4 ,,iii4 ,,iron in ,,policy4--,having thus obtained some idea of the use of iron in art1 as dependent on its ductility1 ,i need not1 certainly1 say anything of its uses in manufacture and commerce2 we all of us know enough1--perhaps a little too much--about them4 ,so ,i pass lastly to consider its uses in policy2 dependent chiefly upon its tenacity-- that is to say1 on its power of bearing a pull1 and receiving an edge4 ,these powers1 which enable it to pierce1 to bind1 and to smite1 render it fit for the three great instruments1 by which its political action may be simply typified2 namely1 the ,plough1 the ,fetter1 and the ,sword4 ,on our understanding the right use of these three instruments1 depend1 of course1 all our power as a nation1 and all our happiness as individuals4 ,i4 ,,the ,,plough4--,i say1 first1 on our understanding the right use of the plough1 with which1 in justice to the fairest of our labourers1 we must always associate that feminine plough--the needle4 ,the first requirement for the happiness of a nation is that it should understand the function in this world of these two great instruments3 a happy nation may be defined as one in which the husband's hand is on the plough1 and the housewife's on the needle2 so in due time reaping its golden harvest1 and shining in golden vesture3 and an unhappy nation is one which1 acknowledging no use of plough nor needle1 will assuredly at last find its storehouse empty in the famine1 and its breast naked to the cold4 ,perhaps you think this is a mere truism1 which ,i am wasting your time in repeating4 ,i wish it were4 ,by far the greater part of the suffering and crime which exist at this moment in civilized ,europe1 arises simply from people not understanding this truism--not knowing that produce or wealth is eternally connected by the laws of heaven and earth with resolute labour2 but hoping in some way to cheat or abrogate this everlasting law of life1 and to feed where they have not furrowed1 and be warm where they have not woven4 ,i repeat1 nearly all our misery and crime result from this one misapprehension4 ,the law of nature is1 that a certain quantity of work is necessary to produce a certain quantity of good1 of any kind whatever4 ,if you want knowledge1 you must toil for it3 if food1 you must toil for it2 and if pleasure1 you must toil for it4 ,but men do not acknowledge this law1 or strive to evade it1 hoping to get their knowledge1 and food1 and pleasure for nothing2 and in this effort they either fail of getting them1 and remain ignorant and miserable1 or they obtain them by making other men work for their benefit2 and then they are tyrants and robbers4 ,yes1 and worse than robbers4 ,i am not one who in the least doubts or disputes the progress of this century in many things useful to mankind2 but it seems to me a very dark sign respecting us that we look with so much indifference upon dishonesty and cruelty in the pursuit of wealth4 ,in the dream of ,nebuchadnezzar it was only the feet that were part of iron and part of clay2 but many of us are now getting so cruel in our avarice1 that it seems as if1 in us1 the heart were part of iron1 and part of clay4 ,from what ,i have heard of the inhabitants of this town1 ,i do not doubt but that ,i may be permitted to do here what ,i have found it usually thought elsewhere highly improper and absurd to do1 namely1 trace a few ,bible sentences to their practical result4 ,you cannot but have noticed how often in those parts of the ,bible which are likely to be oftenest opened when people look for guidance1 comfort1 or help in the affairs of daily life1 namely1 the ,psalms and ,proverbs1 mention is made of the guilt attaching to the ,oppression of the poor4 ,observe3 not the neglect of them1 but the ,oppression of them3 the word is as frequent as it is strange4 ,you can hardly open either of those books1 but somewhere in their pages you will find a description of the wicked man's attempts against the poor3 such as--,he doth ravish the poor when he getteth him into his net4 ,he sitteth in the lurking places of the villages2 his eyes are privily set against the poor4 ,in his pride he doth persecute the poor1 and blesseth the covetous1 whom ,god abhorreth4 ,his mouth is full of deceit and fraud2 in the secret places doth he murder the innocent4 ,have the workers of iniquity no knowledge1 who eat up my people as they eat bread8 ,they have drawn out the sword1 and bent the bow1 to cast down the poor and needy4 ,they are corrupt1 and speak wickedly concerning oppression4 ,pride compasseth them about as a chain1 and violence as a garment4 ,their poison is like the poison of a serpent4 ,ye weigh the violence of your hands in the earth4 ,yes3 ,ye weigh the violence of your hands3--weigh these words as well4 ,the last things we ever usually think of weighing are ,bible words4 ,we like to dream and dispute over them2 but to weigh them1 and see what their true contents are--anything but that4 ,yet1 weigh these2 for ,i have purposely taken all these verses1 perhaps more striking to you read in this connection1 than separately in their places1 out of the ,psalms1 because1 for all people belonging to the ,established ,church of this country these ,psalms are appointed lessons1 portioned out to them by their clergy to be read once through every month4 ,presumably1 therefore1 whatever portions of ,scripture we may pass by or forget1 these at all events1 must be brought continually to our observance as useful for direction of daily life4 ,now1 do we ever ask ourselves what the real meaning of these passages may be1 and who these wicked people are1 who are murdering the innocent8 ,you know it is rather singular language this6--rather strong language1 we might1 perhaps1 call it-- hearing it for the first time4 ,murder6 and murder of innocent people6-- nay1 even a sort of cannibalism4 ,eating people1--yes1 and ,god's people1 too--eating ,my people as if they were bread6 swords drawn1 bows bent1 poison of serpents mixed6 violence of hands weighed1 measured1 and trafficked with as so much coin6 where is all this going on8 ,do you suppose it was only going on in the time of ,david1 and that nobody but ,jews ever murder the poor8 ,if so1 it would surely be wiser not to mutter and mumble for our daily lessons what does not concern us2 but if there be any chance that it may concern us1 and if this description1 in the ,psalms1 of human guilt is at all generally applicable1 as the descriptions in the ,psalms of human sorrow are1 may it not be advisable to know wherein this guilt is being committed round about us1 or by ourselves8 and when we take the words of the ,bible into our mouths in a congregational way1 to be sure whether we mean merely to chant a piece of melodious poetry relating to other people--7we know not exactly to whom7--or to assert our belief in facts bearing somewhat stringently on ourselves and our daily business4 ,and if you make up your minds to do this no longer1 and take pains to examine into the matter1 you will find that these strange words1 occurring as they do1 not in a few places only1 but almost in every alternate psalm and every alternate chapter of proverb1 or prophecy1 with tremendous reiteration1 were not written for one nation or one time only2 but for all nations and languages1 for all places and all centuries2 and it is as true of the wicked man now as ever it was of ,nabal or ,dives1 that his eyes are set against the poor4 ,set against the poor1 mind you4 ,not merely set away from the poor1 so as to neglect or lose sight of them1 but set against1 so as to afflict and destroy them4 ,this is the main point ,i want to fix4 your attention upon4 ,you will often hear sermons about neglect or carelessness of the poor4 ,but neglect and carelessness are not at all the points4 ,the ,bible hardly ever talks about neglect of the poor4 ,it always talks of oppression of the poor--a very different matter4 ,it does not merely speak of passing by on the other side1 and binding up no wounds1 but of drawing the sword and ourselves smiting the men down4 ,it does not charge us with being idle in the pest-house1 and giving no medicine1 but with being busy in the pest-house1 and giving much poison4 ,may we not advisedly look into this matter a little1 even tonight1 and ask first1 ,who are these poor8 ,no country is1 or ever will be1 without them3 that is to say1 without the class which cannot1 on the average1 do more by its labour than provide for its subsistence1 and which has no accumulations of property laid by on any considerable scale4 ,now there are a certain number of this class whom we cannot oppress with much severity4 ,an able-bodied and intelligent workman--sober1 honest1 and industrious1 will almost always command a fair price for his work1 and lay by enough in a few years to enable him to hold his own in the labour market4 ,but all men are not able-bodied1 nor intelligent1 nor industrious2 and you cannot expect them to be4 ,nothing appears to me at once more ludicrous and more melancholy than the way the people of the present age usually talk about the morals of labourers4 ,you hardly ever address a labouring man upon his prospects in life1 without quietly assuming that he is to possess1 at starting1 as a small moral capital to begin with1 the virtue of ,socrates1 the philosophy of ,plato1 and the heroism of ,epaminondas4 ,be assured1 my good man1--you say to him1--that if you work steadily for ten hours a day all your life long1 and if you drink nothing but water1 or the very mildest beer1 and live on very plain food1 and never lose your temper1 and go to church every ,sunday1 and always remain content in the position in which ,providence has placed you1 and never grumble nor swear2 and always keep your clothes decent1 and rise early1 and use every opportunity of improving yourself1 you will get on very well1 and never come to the parish4 ,all this is exceedingly true2 but before giving the advice so confidently1 it would be well if we sometimes tried it practically ourselves1 and spent a year or so at some hard manual labour1 not of an entertaining kind--ploughing or digging1 for instance1 with a very moderate allowance of beer2 nothing hut bread and cheese for dinner2 no papers nor muffins in the morning2 no sofas nor magazines at night2 one small room for parlour and kitchen2 and a large family of children always in the middle of the floor4 ,if we think we could1 under these circumstances1 enact ,socrates or ,epaminondas entirely to our own satisfaction1 we shall be somewhat justified in requiring the same behaviour from our poorer neighbours2 but if not1 we should surely consider a little whether among the various forms of the oppression of the poor1 we may not rank as one of the first and likeliest--the oppression of expecting too much from them4 ,but let this pass2 and let it be admitted that we can never be guilty of oppression towards the sober1 industrious1 intelligent1 exemplary labourer4 ,there will always be in the world some who are not altogether1 intelligent and exemplary2 we shall1 ,i believe1 to the end of time find the majority somewhat unintelligent1 a little inclined to be idle1 and occasionally1 on ,saturday night1 drunk2 we must even be prepared to hear of reprobates who like skittles on ,sunday morning better than prayers2 and of unnatural parents who send their children out to beg instead of to go to school4 ,now these are the kind of people whom you can oppress1 and whom you do oppress1 and that to purpose1--and with all the more cruelty and the greater sting1 because it is just their own fault that puts them into your power4 ,you know the words about wicked people are1 ,he doth ravish the poor when he getteth him into his net4 ,this getting into the net is constantly the fault or folly of the sufferer--his own heedlessness or his own indolence2 but after he is once in the net1 the oppression of him1 and making the most of his distress1 are ours4 ,the nets which we use against the poor are just those worldly embarrassments which either their ignorance or their improvidence are almost certain at some time or other to bring them into3 then1 just at the time when we ought to hasten to help them1 and disentangle them1 and teach them how to manage better in future1 we rush forward to pillage them1 and force all we can out of them in their adversity4 ,for1 to take one instance only1 remember this is literally and simply what we do1 whenever we buy1 or try to buy1 cheap goods-- goods offered at a price which we know cannot be remunerative for the labour involved in them4 ,whenever we buy such goods1 remember we are stealing somebody's labour4 ,don't let us mince the matter4 ,i say1 in plain ,saxon1 ,,stealing--taking from him the proper reward of his work1 and putting it into our own pocket4 ,you know well enough that the thing could not have been offered you at that price1 unless distress of some kind had forced the producer to part with it4 ,you take advantage of this distress1 and you force as much out of him as you can under the circumstances4 ,the old barons of the middle ages used1 in general1 the thumbscrew to extort property2 we moderns use1 in preference1 hunger or domestic affliction3 but the fact of extortion remains precisely the same4 ,whether we force the man's property from him by pinching his stomach1 or pinching his fingers1 makes some difference anatomically2-- morally1 none whatsoever3 we use a form of torture of some sort in order to make him give up his property2 we use1 indeed1 the man's own anxieties1 instead of the rack2 and his immediate peril of starvation1 instead of the pistol at the head2 but otherwise we differ from ,front de ,buf1 or ,dick ,turpin1 merely in being less dexterous1 more cowardly1 and more cruel4 ,more cruel1 ,i say1 because the fierce baron and the redoubted highwayman are reported to have robbed1 at least by preference1 only the rich2 we steal habitually from the poor4 ,we buy our liveries1 and gild our prayer-books1 with pilfered pence out of children's and sick men's wages1 and thus ingeniously dispose a given quantity of ,theft1 so that it may produce the largest possible measure of delicately distributed suffering4 ,but this is only one form of common oppression of the poor--only one way of taking our hands off the plough handle1 and binding another's upon it4 ,this first way of doing it is the economical way--the way preferred by prudent and virtuous people4 ,the bolder way is the acquisitive way3--the way of speculation4 ,you know we are considering at present the various modes in which a nation corrupts itself1 by not acknowledging the eternal connection between its plough and its pleasure2--by striving to get pleasure1 without working for it4 ,well1 ,i say the first and commonest way of doing so is to try to get the product of other people's work1 and enjoy it ourselves1 by cheapening their labour in times of distress3 then the second way is that grand one of watching the chances of the market2--the way of speculation4 ,of course there are some speculations that are fair and honest-- speculations made with our own money1 and which do not involve in their success the loss1 by others1 of what we gain4 ,but generally modern speculation involves much risk to others1 with chance of profit only to ourselves3 even in its best conditions it is merely one of the forms of gambling or treasure hunting2 it is either leaving the steady plough and the steady pilgrimage of life1 to look for silver mines beside the way2 or else it is the full stop beside the dice-tables in ,vanity ,fair --investing all the thoughts and passions of the soul in the fall of the cards1 and choosing rather the wild accidents of idle fortune than the calm and accumulative rewards of toil4 ,and this is destructive enough1 at least to our peace and virtue4 ,but is usually destructive of far more than our peace1 or our virtue4 ,have you ever deliberately set yourselves to imagine and measure the suffering1 the guilt1 and the mortality caused necessarily by the failure of any large-dealing merchant1 or largely-branched bank8 ,take it at the lowest possible supposition- count1 at the fewest you choose1 the families whose means of support have been involved in the catastrophe4 ,then1 on the morning after the intelli- gence of ruin1 let us go forth amongst them in earnest thought2 let us use that imagination which we waste so often on fictitious sorrow1 to measure the stern facts of that multitudinous distress2 strike open the private doors of their chambers1 and enter silently into the midst of the domestic misery2 look upon the old men1 who had reserved for their failing strength some remainder of rest in the evening-tide of life1 cast helplessly back into its trouble and tumult2 look upon the active strength of middle age suddenly blasted into incapacity--its hopes crushed1 and its hardly earned rewards snatched away in the same instant--at once the heart withered1 and the right arm snapped2 look upon the piteous children1 delicately nurtured1 whose soft eyes1 now large with wonder at their parents' grief1 must soon be set in the dimness of famine2 and1 far more than all this1 look forward to the length of sorrow beyond--to the hardest labour of life1 now to be undergone either in all the severity of unexpected and inexperienced trial1 or else1 more bitter still1 to be begun again1 and endured for the second time1 amidst the ruins of cherished hopes and the feebleness of advancing years1 embittered by the continual sting and taunt of the inner feeling that it has all been brought about1 not by the fair course of appointed circumstance1 but by miserable chance and wanton treachery2 and1 last of all1 look beyond this--to the shattered destinies of those who have faltered under the trial1 and sunk past recovery to despair4 ,and then consider whether the hand which has poured this poison into all the springs of life be one whit less guiltily red with human blood than that which literally pours the hemlock into the cup1 or guides the dagger to the heart8 ,we read with horror of the crimes of a ,borgia or a ,tophana2 but there never lived ,borgias such as live now in the midst of us4 ,the cruel lady of ,ferrara slew only in the strength of passion--she slew only a few1 those who thwarted her purposes or who vexed her soul2 she slew sharply and suddenly1 embittering the fate of her victims with no foretastes of destruction1 no prolongations of pain2 and1 finally and chiefly1 she slew1 not without remorse1 nor without pity4 ,but we1 in no storm of passion--in no blindness of wrath1--we1 in calm and clear and untempted selfishness1 pour our poison--not for a few only1 but for multitudes2--not for those who have wronged us1 or resisted1--but for those who have trusted us and aided3--we1 not with sudden gift of merciful and unconscious death1 but with slow waste of hunger and weary rack of disappointment and despair2--we1 last and chiefly1 do our murdering1 not with any pauses of pity or scorching of conscience1 but in facile and forgetful calm of mind--and so1 forsooth1 read day by day1 complacently1 as if they meant any one else than ourselves1 the words that forever describe the wicked3 ,the poison of asps is under their lips1 and their feet are swift to shed blood4 ,you may indeed1 perhaps1 think there is some excuse for many in this matter1 just because the sin is so unconscious2 that the guilt is not so great when it is unapprehended1 and that it is much more pardonable to slay heedlessly than purposefully4 ,i believe no feeling can be more mistaken1 and that in reality1 and in the sight of heaven2 the callous indifference which pursues its own interests at any cost of life1 though it does not definitely adopt the purpose of sin1 is a state of mind at once more heinous and more hopeless than the wildest aberrations of ungoverned passion4 ,there may be1 in the last case1 some elements of good and of redemption still mingled in the character2 but1 in the other1 few or none4 ,there may be hope for the man who has slain his enemy in anger2 hope even for the man who has betrayed his friend in fear2 but what hope for him who trades in unregarded blood1 and builds his fortune on unrepented treason8 ,but1 however this may be1 and wherever you may think yourselves bound in justice to impute the greater sin1 be assured that the question is one of responsibilities only1 not of facts4 ,the definite result of all our modern haste to be rich is assuredly1 and constantly1 the murder of a certain number of persons by our hands every year4 ,i have not time to go into the details of another--on the whole1 the broadest and terriblest way in which we cause the destruction of the poor--namely1 the way of luxury and waste1 destroying1 in improvidence1 what might have been the support of thousands2 ,footnote3 ,the analysis of this error will be found completely carried out in my lectures on the political economy of art4 ,and it is an error worth analyzing2 for until it is finally trodden under foot1 no healthy political1 economical1 or moral action is possible in any state4 ,i do not say this impetuously or suddenly1 for ,i have investigated this subject as deeply2 and as long1 as my own special subject of art2 and the principles of political economy which ,i have stated in those lectures are as sure as the principles of ,euclid4 ,foolish readers doubted their certainty1 because ,i told them ,i had never read any books on ,political ,economy ,did they suppose ,i had got my knowledge of art by reading books8 but if you follow out the subject for yourselves at home--and what ,i have endeavoured to lay before you to-night will only be useful to you if you do--you will find that wherever and whenever men are endeavouring to make money hastily1 and to avoid the labour which ,providence has appointed to be tho only source of honourable profit2--and also wherever and whenever they permit themselves to spend it luxuriously1 without reflecting how far they are misguiding the labour of others2--there and then1 in either case1 they are literally and infallibly causing1 for their own benefit or their own pleasure1 a certain annual number of human deaths2 that1 therefore1 the choice given to every man born into this world is1 simply1 whether he will be a labourer1 or an assassin2 and that whosoever has not his hand on the ,stilt of the plough1 has it on the ,hilt of the dagger4 ,it would also be quite vain for me to endeavour to follow out this evening the lines of thought which would be suggested by the other two great political uses of iron in the ,fetter and the ,sword3 a few words only ,i must permit myself respecting both4 #b4 ,,the ,,fetter4--,as the plough is the typical instrument of industry1 so the fetter is the typical instrument of the restraint or subjection necessary in a nation--either literally1 for its evil-doers1 or figuratively1 in accepted laws1 for its wise and good men4 ,you have to choose between this figurative and literal use2 for depend upon it1 the more laws you accept1 the fewer penalties you will have to endure1 and the fewer punishments to enforce4 ,for wise laws and just restraints are to a noble nation not chains1 but chain mail--strength and defence1 though something also of an incumbrance4 ,and this necessity of restraint1 remember1 is just as honourable to man as the necessity of labour4 ,you hear every day greater numbers of foolish people speaking about liberty1 as if it were such an honourable thing3 so far from being that1 it is1 on the whole1 and in the broadest sense1 dishonourable1 and an attribute of the lower creatures4 ,no human being1 however great or powerful1 was ever so free as a fish4 ,there is always something that he must1 or must not do2 while the fish may do whatever he likes4 ,all the kingdoms of the world put together are not half so large as the sea1 and all the railroads and wheels that ever were1 or will be1 invented are not so easy as fins4 ,you will find1 on fairly thinking of it1 that it is his ,restraint which is honourable to man1 not his ,liberty2 and1 what is more1 it is restraint which is honourable even in the lower animals4 ,a butterfly is much more free than a bee2 but you honour the bee more1 just because it is subject to certain laws which fit it for orderly function in bee society ,and throughout the world1 of the two abstract things1 liberty and restraint1 restraint is always the more honourable4 ,it is true1 indeed1 that in these and all other matters you never can reason finally from the abstraction1 for both liberty and restraint are good when they are nobly chosen1 and both are bad when they are basely chosen2 but of the two1 ,i repeat1 it is restraint which characterizes the higher creature1 and betters the lower creature3 and1 from the ministering of the archangel to the labour of the insect1--from the poising of the planets to the gravitation of a grain of dust1--the power and glory of all creatures1 and all matter1 consist in their obedience1 not in their freedom4 ,the ,sun has no liberty--a dead leaf has much4 ,the dust of which you are formed has no liberty4 ,its liberty will come--with its corruption4 ,and1 therefore1 ,i say boldly1 though it seems a strange thing to say in ,england1 that as the first power of a nation consists in knowing how to guide the ,plough1 its second power consists in knowing how to wear the ,fetter3-- #c4 ,,the ,,sword4--,and its third power1 which perfects it as a nation1 consist in knowing how to wield the sword1 so that the three talismans of national existence are expressed in these three short words--,labour1 ,law1 and ,courage4 ,this last virtue we at least possess2 and all that is to be alleged against us is that we do not honour it enough4 ,i do not mean honour by acknowledgment of service1 though sometimes we are slow in doing even that4 ,but we do not honour it enough in consistent regard to the lives and souls of our soldiers4 ,how wantonly we have wasted their lives you have seen lately in the reports of their mortality by disease1 which a little care and science might have prevented2 but we regard their souls less than their lives1 by keeping them in ignorance and idleness1 and regarding them merely as instruments of battle4 ,the argument brought forward for the maintenance of a standing army usually refers only to expediency in the case of unexpected war1 whereas1 one of the chief reasons for the maintenance of an army is the advantage of the military system as a method of education4 ,the most fiery and headstrong1 who are often also the most gifted and generous of your youths1 have always a tendency both in the lower and upper classes to offer themselves for your soldiers3 others1 weak and unserviceable in a civil capacity1 are tempted or entrapped into the army in a fortunate hour for them3 out of this fiery or uncouth material1 it is only a soldier's discipline which can bring the full value and power4 ,even at present1 by mere force of order and authority1 the army is the salvation of myriads2 and men who1 under other circumstances1 would have sunk into lethargy or dissipation1 are redeemed into noble life by a service which at once summons and directs their energies4 ,how much more than this military education is capable of doing1 you will find only when you make it education indeed4 ,we have no excuse for leaving our private soldiers at their present level of ignorance and want of refinement1 for we shall invariably find that1 both among officers and men1 the gentlest and best informed are the bravest2 still less have we excuse for diminishing our army1 either in the present state of political events1 or1 as ,i believe1 in any other conjunction of them that for many a year will be possible in this world4 ,you may1 perhaps1 be surprised at my saying this2 perhaps surprised at my implying that war itself can be right1 or necessary1 or noble at all4 ,nor do ,i speak of all war as necessary1 nor of all war as noble4 ,both peace and war are noble or ignoble according to their kind and occasion4 ,no man has a profounder sense of the horror and guilt of ignoble war than ,i have3 ,i have personally seen its effects1 upon nations1 of unmitigated evil1 on soul and body1 with perhaps as much pity1 and as much bitterness of indignation1 as any of those whom you will hear continually declaiming in the cause of peace4 ,but peace may be sought in two ways4 ,one way is as ,gideon sought it1 when he built his altar in ,ophrah1 naming it1 ,god send peace1 yet sought this peace that he loved1 as he was ordered to seek it1 and the peace was sent1 in ,god's way3--the country was in quietness forty years in the days of ,gideon4 ,and the other way of seeking peace is as ,menahem sought it when he gave the ,king of ,assyria a thousand talents of silver1 that his hand might be with him4 ,that is1 you may either win your peace1 or buy it3--win it1 by resistance to evil2--buy it1 by compromise with evil4 ,you may buy your peace1 with silenced consciences2--you may buy it1 with broken vows1--buy it1 with lying words1--buy it1 with base connivances1--buy it1 with the blood of the slain1 and the cry of the captive1 and the silence of lost souls--over hemispheres of the earth1 while you sit smiling at your serene hearths1 lisping comfortable prayers evening and morning1 and counting your pretty ,protestant beads 7which are flat1 and of gold1 instead of round1 and of ebony1 as the monks' ones were71 and so mutter continually to yourselves1 ,peace1 peace1 when there is ,no peace2 but only captivity and death1 for you1 as well as for those you leave unsaved2--and yours darker than theirs4 ,i cannot utter to you what ,i would in this matter2 we all see too dimly1 as yet1 what our great world-duties are1 to allow any of us to try to outline their enlarging shadows4 ,but think over what ,i have said1 and as you return to your quiet homes to-night1 reflect that their peace was not won for you by your own hands2 but by theirs who long ago jeoparded their lives for you1 their children2 and remember that neither this inherited peace1 nor any other1 can be kept1 but through the same jeopardy4 ,no peace was ever won from ,fate by subterfuge or agreement2 no peace is ever in store for any of us1 but that which we shall win by victory over shame or sin2--victory over the sin that oppresses1 as well as over that which corrupts4 ,for many a year to come1 the sword of every righteous nation must be whetted to save or subdue2 nor will it be by patience of others' suffering1 but by the offering of your own1 that you ever will draw nearer to the time when the great change shall pass upon the iron of the earth2--when men shall beat their swords into ploughshares1 and their spears into pruning-hooks2 neither shall they learn war any more4 ,,appendices4 ,,appendix ,i4 ,,right ,,and ,,wrong4 ,readers who are using my ,elements of ,drawing may be surprised by my saying here that ,tintoret may lead them wrong2 while in the ,elements he is one of the six men named as being always right4 ,i bring the apparent inconsistency forward at the beginning of this ,appendix1 because the illustration of it will be farther useful in showing the real nature of the self-contradiction which is often alleged against me by careless readers4 ,it is not only possible1 but a frequent condition of human action1 to do right and be right--yet so as to mislead other people if they rashly imitate the thing done4 ,for there are many rights which are not absolutely1 but relatively right--right only for that person to do under those circumstances1--not for this person to do under other circumstances4 ,thus it stands between ,titian and ,tintoret4 ,titian is always absolutely ,right4 ,you may imitate him with entire security that you are doing the best thing that can possibly be done for the purpose in hand4 ,tintoret is always relatively ,right--relatively to his own aims and peculiar powers4 ,but you must quite understand ,tintoret before you can be sure what his aim was1 and why he was then right in doing what would not be right always4 ,if1 however1 you take the pains thus to understand him1 he becomes entirely instructive and exemplary1 just as ,titian is2 and therefore ,i have placed him among those are always right1 and you can only study him rightly with that reverence for him4 ,then the artists who are named as admitting question of right and wrong1 are those who from some mischance of circumstance or short- coming in their education1 do not always do right1 even with relation to their own aims and powers4 ,take for example the quality of imperfection in drawing form4 ,there are many pictures of ,tintoret in which the trees are drawn with a few curved flourishes of the brush instead of leaves4 ,that is 7absolutely7 wrong4 ,if you copied the tree as a model1 you would be going very wrong indeed4 ,but it is relatively1 and for ,tintoret's purposes1 right4 ,in the nature of the superficial work you will find there must have been a cause for it4 ,somebody perhaps wanted the picture in a hurry to fill a dark corner4 ,tintoret good-naturedly did all he could--painted the figures tolerably--had five minutes left only for the trees1 when the servant came4 ,let him wait another five minutes4 ,and this is the best foliage we can do in the time4 ,entirely1 admirably1 unsurpassably right1 under the conditions4 ,titian would not have worked under them1 but ,tintoret was kinder and humbler2 yet he may lead you wrong if you don't understand him4 ,or1 perhaps1 another day1 somebody came in while ,tintoret was at work1 who tormented ,tintoret4 ,an ignoble person6 ,titian would have been polite to him1 and gone on steadily with his trees4 ,tintoret cannot stand the ignobleness2 it is unendurably repulsive and discomfiting to him4 ,the ,black ,plague take him--and the trees1 too6 ,shall such a fellow see me paint6 ,and the trees go all to pieces4 ,this1 in you1 would be mere ill-breeding and ill-temper4 ,in ,tintoret it was one of the necessary conditions of his intense sensibility2 had he been capable1 then1 of keeping his temper1 he could never have done his greatest works4 ,let the trees go to pieces1 by all means2 it is quite right they should2 he is always right4 ,but in a background of ,gainsborough you would find the trees unjustifiably gone to pieces4 ,the carelessness of form there is definitely purposed by him2--adopted as an advisable thing2 and therefore it is both absolutely and relatively wrong2--it indicates his being imperfectly educated as a painter1 and not having brought out all his powers4 ,it may still happen that the man whose work thus partially erroneous is greater far1 than others who have fewer faults4 ,gainsborough's and ,reynolds' wrongs are more charming than almost anybody else's right4 ,still1 they occasionally are wrong--but the ,venetians and ,velasquez1 ,footnote3 ,at least after his style was formed2 early pictures1 like the ,adoration of the ,magi in our ,gallery1 are of little value4 never4 ,i ought1 perhaps1 to have added in that ,manchester address 7only one does not like to say things that shock people7 some words of warning against painters likely to mislead the student4 ,for indeed1 though here and there something may be gained by looking at inferior men1 there is always more to be gained by looking at the best2 and there is not time1 with all the looking of human life1 to exhaust even one great painter's instruction4 ,how then shall we dare to waste our sight and thoughts on inferior ones1 even if we could do so1 which we rarely can1 without danger of being led astray8 ,nay1 strictly speaking1 what people call inferior painters are in general no painters4 ,artists are divided by an impassable gulf into the men who can paint1 and who cannot4 ,the men who can paint often fall short of what they should have done2--are repressed1 or defeated1 or otherwise rendered inferior one to another3 still there is an everlasting barrier between them and the men who cannot paint--who can only in various popular ways pretend to paint4 ,and if once you know the difference1 there is always some good to be got by looking at a real painter--seldom anything but mischief to be got out of a false one2 but do not suppose real painters are common4 ,i do not speak of living men2 but among those who labour no more1 in this ,england of ours1 since it first had a school1 we have had only five real painters2--,reynolds1 ,gainsborough1 ,hogarth1 ,richard ,wilson1 and ,turner4 ,the reader may1 perhaps1 think ,i have forgotten ,wilkie4 ,no4 ,i once much overrated him as an expressional draughtsman1 not having then studied the figure long enough to be able to detect superficial sentiment4 ,but his colour ,i have never praised2 it is entirely false and valueless4 ,and it would tie unjust to ,english art if ,i did not here express my regret that the admiration of ,constable1 already harmful enough in ,england1 is extending even into ,france4 ,there was1 perhaps1 the making1 in ,constable1 of a second or third-rate painter1 if any careful discipline had developed in him the instincts which1 though unparalleled for narrowness1 were1 as far as they went1 true4 ,but as it is1 he is nothing more than an industrious and innocent amateur blundering his way to a superficial expression of one or two popular aspects of common nature4 ,and my readers may depend upon it1 that all blame which ,i express in this sweeping way is trustworthy4 ,i have often had to repent of over- praise of inferior men2 and continually to repent of insufficient praise of great men2 but of broad condemnation1 never4 ,for ,i do not speak it but after the most searching examination of the matter1 and under stern sense of need for it3 so that whenever the reader is entirely shocked by what ,i say1 he may be assured every word is true4,footnote3 ,he must1 however1 be careful to distinguish blame-- however strongly expressed1 of some special fault or error in a true painter1--from these general statements of inferiority or worthlessness4 ,thus he will find me continually laughing at ,wilson's tree-painting2 not because ,wilson could not paint1 but because he had never looked at a tree4 ,it is just because it so much offends him1 that it was necessary3 and knowing that it must offend him1 ,i should not have ventured to say it1 without certainty of its truth4 ,i say certainty1 for it is just as possible to be certain whether the drawing of a tree or a stone is true or false1 as whether the drawing of a triangle is2 and what ,i mean primarily by saying that a picture is in all respects worthless1 is that it is in all respects ,false3 which is not a matter of opinion at all1 but a matter of ascertainable fact1 such as ,i never assert till ,i have ascertained4 ,and the thing so commonly said about my writings1 that they are rather persuasive than just2 and that though my language may be good1 ,i am an unsafe guide in art criticism1 is1 like many other popular estimates in such matters1 not merely untrue1 but precisely the reverse of the truth2 it is truth1 like reflections in water1 distorted much by the shaking receptive surface1 and in every particular1 upside down4 ,for my language1 until within the last six or seven years1 was loose1 obscure1 and more or less feeble2 and still1 though ,i have tried hard to mend it1 the best ,i can do is inferior to much contemporary work4 ,no description that ,i have ever given of anything is worth four lines of ,tennyson2 and in serious thought1 my half-pages are generally only worth about as much as a single sentence either of his1 or of ,carlyle's4 ,they are1 ,i well trust1 as true and necessary2 but they are neither so concentrated nor so well put4 ,but ,i am an entirely safe guide in art judgment3 and that simply as the necessary result of my having given the labour of life to the determination of facts1 rather than to the following of feelings or theories4 ,not1 indeed1 that my work is free from mistakes2 it admits many1 and always must admit many1 from its scattered range2 but1 in the long run1 it will be found to enter sternly and searchingly into the nature of what it deals with1 and the kind of mistake it admits is never dangerous1 consisting1 usually1 in pressing the truth too far4 ,it is quite easy1 for instance1 to take an accidental irregularity in a piece of architecture1 which less careful examination would never have detected at all1 for an intentional irregularity2 quite possible to misinterpret an obscure passage in a picture1 which a less earnest observer would never have tried to interpret4 ,but mistakes of this kind--honest1 enthusiastic mistakes--are never harmful2 because they are always made in a true direction1--falls forward on the road1 not into the ditch beside it2 and they are sure to be corrected by the next comer4 ,but the blunt and dead mistakes made by too many other writers on art--the mistakes of sheer inattention1 and want of sympathy--are mortal4 ,the entire purpose of a great thinker may be difficult to fathom1 and we may be over and over again more or less mistaken in guessing at his meaning2 but the real1 profound1 nay1 quite bottomless1 and unredeemable mistake1 is the fool's thought--that he had no meaning4 ,i do not refer1 in saying this1 to any of my statements respecting subjects which it has been my main work to study3 as far as ,i am aware1 ,i have never yet misinterpreted any picture of ,turner's1 though often remaining blind to the half of what he had intended3 neither have ,i as yet found anything to correct in my statements respecting ,venetian architecture2 ,footnote3 ,the subtle portions of the ,byzantine ,palaces1 given in precise measurements in the second volume of the ,stones of ,venice1 were alleged by architects to be accidental irregularities4 ,they will be found1 by every one who will take the pains to examine them1 most assuredly and indisputably intentional1--and not only so1 but one of the principal subjects of the designer's care4 but in casual references to what has been quickly seen1 it is impossible to guard wholly against error1 without losing much valuable observation1 true in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred1 and harmless even when erroneous4 ,,appendix ,,ii4 ,,reynolds' ,,disappointment4 ,it is very fortunate that in the fragment of ,mason's ,,mss41 published lately by ,mr4 ,cotton in his ,sir ,joshua ,reynolds' ,notes1 ,footnote3 ,smith1 ,soho ,square1 #ahei4 record is preserved of ,sir ,joshua's feelings respecting the paintings in the window of ,new ,college1 which might otherwise have been supposed to give his full sanction to this mode of painting on glass4 ,nothing can possibly be more curious1 to my mind1 than the great painter's expectations2 or his having at all entertained the idea that the qualities of colour which are peculiar to opaque bodies could be obtained in a transparent medium2 but so it is3 and with the simplicity and humbleness of an entirely great man he hopes that ,mr4 ,jervas on glass is to excel ,sir ,joshua on canvas4 ,happily1 ,mason tells us the result4 ,with the copy ,jervas made of this picture he was grievously disappointed4 ',i had frequently1' he said to me1 'pleased myself by reflecting1 after ,i had produced what ,i thought a brilliant effect of light and shadow on my canvas1 how greatly that effect would be heightened by the transparency which the painting on glass would be sure to produce4 ,it turned out quite the reverse4' ,,appendix ,,iii4 ,,classical ,,architecture4 ,this passage in the lecture was illustrated by an enlargement of the woodcut1 ,fig4 #a2 but ,i did not choose to disfigure the middle of this book with it4 ,it is copied from the #dith plate of the third edition of the ,encyclopdia ,britannica 7,edinburgh1 #agig71 and represents an ,english farmhouse arranged on classical principles4 ,if the reader cares to consult the work itself1 he will find in the same plate another composition of similar propriety1 and dignified by the addition of a pediment1 beneath the shadow of which a private gentleman who has a small family may find conveniency4 ,,appendix ,,iv4 ,,subtlety ,,of ,,hand4 ,i had intended in one or other of these lectures to have spoken at some length of the quality of refinement in ,colour1 but found the subject would lead me too far4 ,a few words are1 however1 necessary in order to explain some expressions in the text4 ,refinement in colour is indeed a tautological expression1 for colour1 in the true sense of the word1 does not exist until it is refined4 ,dirt exists1--stains exist1--and pigments exist1 easily enough in all places2 and are laid on easily enough by all hands2 but colour exists only where there is tenderness1 and can be laid on only by a hand which has strong life in it4 ,the law concerning colour is very strange1 very noble1 in some sense almost awful4 ,in every given touch laid on canvas1 if one grain of the colour is inoperative1 and does not take its full part in producing the hue1 the hue will be imperfect4 ,the grain of colour which does not work is dead4 ,it infects all about it with its death4 ,it must be got quit of1 or the touch is spoiled4 ,we acknowledge this instinctively in our use of the phrases dead colour1 killed colour1 foul colour4 ,those words are1 in some sort1 literally true4 ,if more colour is put on than is necessary1 a heavy touch when a light one would have been enough1 the quantity of colour that was not wanted1 and is overlaid by the rest1 is as dead1 and it pollutes the rest4 ,there will be no good in the touch4 ,the art of painting1 properly so called1 consists in laying on the least possible colour that will produce the required result1 and this measurement1 in all the ultimate1 that is to say1 the principal1 operations of colouring1 is so delicate that not one human hand in a million has the required lightness4 ,the final touch of any painter properly so named1 of ,correggio--,titian--,turner--or ,reynolds--would be always quite invisible to any one watching the progress of the work1 the films of hue being laid thinner than the depths of the grooves in mother-of-pearl4 ,the work may be swift1 apparently careless1 nay1 to the painter himself almost unconscious4 ,great painters are so organized that they do their best work without effort3 but analyze the touches afterwards1 and you will find the structure and depth of the colour laid mathematically demonstrable to be of literally infinite fineness1 the last touches passing away at their edges by untraceable gradation4 ,the very essence of a master's work may thus be removed by a picture- cleaner in ten minutes4 ,observe1 however1 this thinness exists only in portions of the ultimate touches1 for which the preparation may often have been made with solid colours1 commonly1 and literally1 called dead colouring1 but even that is always subtle if a master lays it--subtle at least in drawing1 if simple in hue2 and farther1 observe that the refinement of work consists not in laying absolutely little colour1 but in always laying precisely the right quantity4 ,to lay on little needs indeed the rare lightness of hand2 but to lay much1--yet not one atom too much1 and obtain subtlety1 not by withholding strength1 but by precision of pause1--that is the master's final sign-manual--power1 knowledge1 and tenderness all united4 ,a great deal of colour may often be wanted2 perhaps quite a mass of it1 such as shall project from the canvas2 but the real painter lays this mass of its required thickness and shape with as much precision as if it were a bud of a flower which he had to touch into blossom2 one of ,turner's loaded fragments of white cloud is modelled and gradated in an instant1 as if it alone were the subject of the picture1 when the same quantity of colour1 under another hand1 would be a lifeless lump4 ,the following extract from a letter in the ,literary ,gazette of #acth ,november1 #aheh1 which ,i was obliged to write to defend a questioned expression respecting ,turner's subtlety of hand from a charge of hyperbole1 contains some interesting and conclusive evidence on the point1 though it refers to pencil and chalk drawing only3-- ,i must ask you to allow me yet leave to reply to the objections you make to two statements in my catalogue1 as those objections would otherwise diminish its usefulness4 ,i have asserted that1 in a given drawing 7named as one of the chief in the series71 ,turner's pencil did not move over the thousandth of an inch without meaning2 and you charge this expression with extravagant hyperbole4 ,on the contrary1 it is much within the truth1 being merely a mathematically accurate description of fairly good execution in either drawing or engraving4 ,it is only necessary to measure a piece of any ordinary good work to ascertain this4 ,take1 for instance1 ,finden's engraving at the #ahjth page of ,rogers' poems2 in which the face of the figure1 from the chin to the top of the brow1 occupies just a quarter of an inch1 and the space between the upper lip and chin as nearly as possible one-seventeenth of an inch4 ,the whole mouth occupies one-third of this space1 say one- fiftieth of an inch1 and within that space both the lips and the much more difficult inner corner of the mouth are perfectly drawn and rounded1 with quite successful and sufficiently subtle expression4 ,any artist will assure you that in order to draw a mouth as well as this1 there must be more than twenty gradations of shade in the touches2 that is to say1 in this case1 gradations changing1 with meaning1 within less than the thousandth of an inch4 ,but this is mere child's play compared to the refinement of a first- rate mechanical work--much more of brush or pencil drawing by a master's hand4 ,in order at once to furnish you with authoritative evidence on this point1 ,i wrote to ,mr4 ,kingsley1 tutor of ,sidney-,sussex ,college1 a friend to whom ,i always have recourse when ,i want to be precisely right in any matter2 for his great knowledge both of mathematics and of natural science is joined1 not only with singular powers of delicate experimental manipulation1 but with a keen sensitiveness to beauty in art4 ,his answer1 in its final statement respecting ,turner's work1 is amazing even to me1 and will1 ,i should think1 be more so to your readers4 ,observe the successions of measured and tested refinement3 here is ,no4 #a3-- ',the finest mechanical work that ,i know1 which is not optical1 is that done by ,nobert in the way of ruling lines4 ,i have a series ruled by him on glass1 giving actual scales from 4#jjjjbd and 4#jjjjaf of an inch1 perfectly correct to these places of decimals1 and he has executed others as fine as 4#jjjjab1 though ,i do not know how far he could repeat these last with accuracy4' ,this is ,no4 #a of precision4 ,mr4 ,kingsley proceeds to ,no4 #b3-- ',but this is rude work compared to the accuracy necessary for the construction of the object-glass of a microscope such as ,rosse turns out4' ,i am sorry to omit the explanation which follows of the ten lenses composing such a glass1 'each of which must be exact in radius and in surface1 and all have their axes coincident3' but it would not be intelligible without the figure by which it is illustrated2 so ,i pass to ,mr4 ,kingsley's ,no4 #c3-- ',i am tolerably familiar1' he proceeds1 'with the actual grinding and polishing of lenses and specula1 and have produced by my own hand some by no means bad optical work1 and ,i have copied no small amount of ,turner's work1 and ,i still look with awe at the combined delicacy and precision of his hand2 ,,it ,,beats ,,optical ,,work ,,out ,,of ,,sight4 ,in optical work1 as in refined drawing1 the hand goes beyond the eye1 and one has to depend upon the feel2 and when one has once learned what a delicate affair touch is1 one gets a horror of all coarse work1 and is ready to forgive any amount of feebleness1 sooner than that boldness which is akin to impudence4 ,in optics the distinction is easily seen when the work is put to trial2 but here too1 as in drawing1 it requires an educated eye to tell the difference when the work is only moderately bad2 but with bold work1 nothing can be seen but distortion and fog3 and ,i heartily wish the same result would follow the same kind of handling in drawing2 but here1 the boldness cheats the unlearned by looking like the precision of the true man4 ,it is very strange how much better our ears are than our eyes in this country3 if an ignorant man were to be bold with a violin1 he would not get many admirers1 though his boldness was far below that of ninety-nine out of a hundred drawings one sees4' ,the words which ,i have put in italics in the above extract are those which were surprising to me4 ,i knew that ,turner's was as refined as any optical work1 but had no idea of its going beyond it4 ,mr4 ,kingsley's word 'awe' occurring just before1 is1 however1 as ,i have often felt1 precisely the right one4 ,when once we begin at all to understand the handling of any truly great executor1 such as that of any of the three great ,venetians1 of ,correggio1 or ,turner1 the awe of it is something greater than can be felt from the most stupendous natural scenery4 ,for the creation of such a system as a high human intelligence1 endowed with its ineffably perfect instruments of eye and hand1 is a far more appalling manifestation of ,infinite ,power1 than the making either of seas or mountains4 ,after this testimony to the completion of ,turner's work1 ,i need not at length defend myself from the charge of hyperbole in the statement that1 'as far as ,i know1 the galleries of ,europe may be challenged to produce one sketch footnote3 ,a sketch1 observe1--not a finished drawing4 ,sketches are only proper subjects of comparison with each other when they contain about the same quantity of work3 the test of their merit is the quantity of truth told with a given number of touches4 ,the assertion in the ,catalogue which this letter was written to defend1 was made respecting the sketch of ,rome1 ,no4 #aja4 that shall equal the chalk study ,no4 #de1 or the feeblest of the memoranda in the #gast and following frames2' which memoranda1 however1 it should have been observed1 are stated at the #ddth page to be in some respects 'the grandest work in grey that he did in his life4' ,for ,i believe that1 as manipulators1 none but the four men whom ,i have just named 7the three ,venetians and ,correggio7 were equal to ,turner2 and1 as far as ,i know1 none of those four ever put their full strength into sketches4 ,but whether they did or not1 my statement in the catalogue is limited by my own knowledge3 and1 as far as ,i can trust that knowledge1 it is not an enthusiastic statement1 but an entirely calm and considered one4 ,it may be a mistake but it is not a hyperbole4 ,,appendix ,v4 ,i can only give1 to illustrate this balcony1 fac-similes of rough memoranda made on a single leaf of my note-book1 with a tired hand2 but it may be useful to young students to see them1 in order that they may know the difference between notes made to get at the gist and heart of a thing1 and notes made merely to look neat4 ,only it must be observed that the best characters of free drawing are always lost even in the most careful facsimile2 and ,i should not show even these slight notes in woodcut imitation1 unless the reader had it in his power1 by a glance at the #bast or #ceth plates in ,modern ,painters 7and yet better1 by trying to copy a piece of either of them71 to ascertain how far ,i can draw or not4 ,i refer to these plates1 because1 though ,i distinctly stated in the preface that they1 together with the #abth1 #bjth1 #cdth1 and #cgth1 were executed on the steel by my own hand1 7the use of the dry point in the foregrounds of the #abth and #bast plates being moreover wholly different from the common processes of etching7 ,i find it constantly assumed that they were engraved for me--as if direct lying in such matters were a thing of quite common usage4 ,fig4 #b is the centre-piece of the balcony1 but a leaf-spray is omitted on the right-hand side1 having been too much buried among the real leaves to be drawn4 ,fig4 #c shows the intended general effect of its masses1 the five-leaved and six-leaved flowers being clearly distinguishable at any distance4 ,fig4 #d is its profile1 rather carefully drawn at the top1 to show the tulip and turkscap lily leaves4 ,underneath there is a plate of iron beaten into broad thin leaves1 which gives the centre of the balcony a gradual sweep outwards1 like the side of a ship of war4 ,the central profile is of the greatest importance in ironwork1 as the flow of it affects the curves of the whole design1 not merely in surface1 as in marble carving1 but in their intersections1 when the side is seen through the front4 ,the lighter leaves1 b b1 are real bindweed4 ,fig4 #e shows two of the teeth of the border1 illustrating their irregularity of form1 which takes place quite to the extent indicated4 ,fig4 #f is the border at the side of the balcony1 showing the most interesting circumstance in the treatment of the whole1 namely1 the enlargement and retraction of the teeth of the cornice1 as it approaches the wall4 ,this treatment of the whole cornice as a kind of wreath round the balcony1 having its leaves flung loose at the back1 and set close at the front1 as a girl would throw a wreath of leaves round her hair1 is precisely the most finished indication of a good workman's mind to be found in the whole thing4 ,fig4 #g shows the outline of the retracted leaves accurately4 ,it was noted in the text that the whole of this ironwork had been coloured4 ,the difficulty of colouring ironwork rightly1 and the necessity of doing it in some way or other1 have been the principal reasons for my never having entered heartily into this subject2 for all the ironwork ,i have ever seen look beautiful was rusty1 and rusty iron will not answer modern purposes4 ,nevertheless it may be painted1 but it needs some one to do it who knows what painting means1 and few of us do--certainly none1 as yet1 of our restorers of decoration or writers on colour4 ,it is a marvellous thing to me that book after book should appear on this last subject1 without apparently the slightest consciousness on the part of the writers that the first necessity of beauty in colour is gradation1 as the first necessity of beauty in line is curvature1--or that the second necessity in colour is mystery or subtlety1 as the second necessity in line is softness4 ,colour ungradated is wholly valueless2 colour unmysterious is wholly barbarous4 ,unless it looses itself and melts away towards other colours1 as a true line loses itself and melts away towards other lines1 colour has no proper existence1 in the noble sense of the word4 ,what a cube1 or tetrahedron1 is to organic form1 ungradated and unconfused colour is to organic colour2 and a person who attempts to arrange colour harmonies without gradation of tint is in precisely the same category1 as an artist who should try to compose a beautiful picture out of an accumulation of cubes and parallelepipeds4 ,the value of hue in all illuminations on painted glass of fine periods depends primarily on the expedients used to make the colours palpitate and fluctuate2 inequality of brilliancy being the condition of brilliancy1 just as inequality of accent is the condition of power and loveliness in sound4 ,the skill with which the thirteenth century illuminators in books1 and the ,indians in shawls and carpets1 use the minutest atoms of colour to gradate other colours1 and confuse the eye1 is the first secret in their gift of splendour3 associated1 however1 with so many other artifices which are quite instinctive and unteachable1 that it is of little use to dwell upon them4 ,delicacy of organization in the designer given1 you will soon have all1 and without it1 nothing4 ,however1 not to close my book with desponding words1 let me set down1 as many of us like such things1 five ,laws to which there is no exception whatever1 and which1 if they can enable no one to produce good colour1 are at least1 as far as they reach1 accurately condemnatory of bad colour4 #a4 ,,all ,,good ,,colour ,,is ,,gradated4 ,a blush rose 7or1 better still1 a blush itself71 is the type of rightness in arrangement of pure hue4 #b4 ,,all ,,harmonies ,,of ,,colour ,,depend ,,for ,,their ,,vitality ,,on ,,the ,,action ,,and ,,helpful ,,operation ,,of ,,every ,,particle ,,of ,,colour ,,they ,,contain4 #c4 ,,the ,,final ,,particles ,,of ,,colour ,,necessary ,,to ,,the ,,completeness ,,of ,a ,,colour ,,harmony ,,are ,,always ,,infinitely ,,small2 either laid by immeasurably subtle touches of the pencil1 or produced by portions of the colouring substance1 however distributed1 which are so absolutely small as to become at the intended distance infinitely so to the eye4 #d4 ,,no ,,colour ,,harmony ,,is ,,of ,,high ,,order ,,unless ,,it ,,involves ,,indescribable ,,tints4 ,it is the best possible sign of a colour when nobody who sees it knows what to call it1 or how to give an idea of it to any one else4 ,even among simple hues the most valuable are those which cannot be defined2 the most precious purples will look brown beside pure purple1 and purple beside pure brown2 and the most precious greens will be called blue if seen beside pure green1 and green if seen beside pure blue4 #e4 ,,the ,,finer ,,the ,,eye ,,for ,,colour1 ,,the ,,less ,,it ,,will ,,require ,,to ,,gratify ,,it ,,intensely4 ,but that little must be supremely good and pure1 as the finest notes of a great singer1 which are so near to silence4 ,and a great colourist will make even the absence of colour lovely1 as the fading of the perfect voice makes silence sacred4