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Title: The Stones of Venice, Volume 3 (of 3)

Author: John Ruskin

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Volume I

Volume II

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN RUSKIN

VOLUME IX

STONES OF VENICE

VOLUME III

THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS.
FROM A PHOTOGRAPH.

Library Edition

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN RUSKIN

STONES OF VENICE
Volume III
GIOTTO
LECTURES ON ARCHITECTURE
HARBOURS OF ENGLAND
A JOY FOREVER

NATIONAL LIBRARY
ASSOCIATION

NEW
CHICAGO
YORK

THE

STONES OF VENICE
VOLUME III.

THE FALL

CONTENTS.

THIRD, OR RENAISSANCE, PERIOD.

CHAPTER I.
page

Early Renaissance, 1
CHAPTER II.
Roman Renaissance, 32
CHAPTER III.
Grotesque Renaissance, 112
CHAPTER IV.
Conclusion, 166

APPENDIX.

1. Architect of the Ducal Palace, 199
2. Theology of Spenser, 205
3. Austrian Government in Italy, 209
4. Date of the Palaces of the Byzantine Renaissance, 211
5. Renaissance Side of Ducal Palace, 212
6. Character of the Doge Michele Morosini, 213
7. Modern Education, 214
8. Early Venetian Marriages, 222
9. Character of the Venetian Aristocracy, 223
10. Final Appendix, 224

INDICES.

I. Personal Index, 263
II. Local Index, 268
III. Topical Index, 271
IV. Venetian Index, 287

LIST OF PLATES.

Facing Page

Plate 1. Temperance and Intemperance in Ornament, 6
" 2. Gothic Capitals, 8
" 3. Noble and Ignoble Grotesque, 125

" 4. Mosaic of Olive Tree and Flowers, 179
" 5. Byzantine Bases, 225
" 6. Byzantine Jambs, 229
" 7. Gothic Jambs, 230
" 8. Byzantine Archivolts, 244
" 9. Gothic Archivolts, 245
" 10. Cornices, 248
" 11. Tracery Bars, 252
" 12. Capitals of Fondaco de Turchi, 304

THE

STONES OF VENICE.

THIRD, OR RENAISSANCE, PERIOD.

CHAPTER I.

EARLY RENAISSANCE.

§ I. I trust that the reader has been enabled, by the preceding chapters, to
form some conception of the magnificence of the streets of Venice during
the course of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Yet by all this
magnificence she was not supremely distinguished above the other cities of
the middle ages. Her early edifices have been preserved to our times by the
circuit of her waves; while continual recurrences of ruin have defaced the
glory of her sister cities. But such fragments as are still left in their lonely
squares, and in the corners of their streets, so far from being inferior to the
buildings of Venice, are even more rich, more finished, more admirable in
invention, more exuberant in beauty. And although, in the North of Europe,
civilization was less advanced, and the knowledge of the arts was more
confined to the ecclesiastical orders, so that, for domestic architecture, the
period of perfection must be there placed much later than in Italy, and
considered as extending to the middle of the fifteenth century; yet, as each
city reached a certain point in civilization, its streets became decorated with
the same magnificence, varied only in style according to the materials at
hand, and temper of the people. And I am not aware of any town of wealth
and importance in the middle ages, in which some proof does not exist, that,
at its period of greatest energy and prosperity, its streets were inwrought

with rich sculpture, and even (though in this, as before noticed, Venice
always stood supreme) glowing with color and with gold. Now, therefore,
let the reader,— forming for himself as vivid and real a conception as he is
able, either of a group of Venetian palaces in the fourteenth century, or, if he
likes better, of one of the more fantastic but even richer street scenes of
Rouen, Antwerp, Cologne, or Nuremberg, and keeping this gorgeous image
before him,—go out into any thoroughfare, representative, in a general and
characteristic way, of the feeling for domestic architecture in modern times;
let him, for instance, if in London, walk once up and down Harley Street, or
Baker Street, or Gower Street; and then, looking upon this picture and on
this, set himself to consider (for this is to be the subject of our following
and final inquiry) what have been the causes which have induced so vast a
change in the European mind.

§ II. Renaissance architecture is the school which has conducted men’s
inventive and constructive faculties from the Grand Canal to Gower Street;
from the marble shaft, and the lancet arch, and the wreathed leafage, and
the glowing and melting harmony of gold and azure, to the square cavity in
the brick wall. We have now to consider the causes and the steps of this
change; and, as we endeavored above to investigate the nature of Gothic,
here to investigate also the nature of Renaissance.

§ III. Although Renaissance architecture assumes very different forms
among different nations, it may be conveniently referred to three heads:—
Early Renaissance, consisting of the first corruptions introduced into the
Gothic schools: Central or Roman Renaissance, which is the perfectly
formed style: and Grotesque Renaissance, which is the corruption of the
Renaissance itself.

§ IV. Now, in order to do full justice to the adverse cause, we will
consider the abstract nature of the school with reference only to its best or
central examples. The forms of building which must be classed generally

under the term early Renaissance are, in many cases, only the
extravagances and corruptions of the languid Gothic, for whose errors the
classical principle is in no wise answerable. It was stated in the second
chapter of the “Seven Lamps,” that, unless luxury had enervated and
subtlety falsified the Gothic forms, Roman traditions could not have
prevailed against them; and, although these enervated and false conditions
are almost instantly colored by the classical influence, it would be utterly
unfair to lay to the charge of that influence the first debasement of the
earlier schools, which had lost the strength of their system before they could
be struck by the plague.

§ V. The manner, however, of the debasement of all schools of art, so far
as it is natural, is in all ages the same; luxuriance of ornament, refinement
of execution, and idle subtleties of fancy, taking the place of true thought
and firm handling: and I do not intend to delay the reader long by the
Gothic sick-bed, for our task is not so much to watch the wasting of fever in
the features of the expiring king, as to trace the character of that Hazael
who dipped the cloth in water, and laid it upon his face, Nevertheless, it is
necessary to the completeness of our view of the architecture of Venice, as
well as to our understanding of the manner in which the Central
Renaissance obtained its universal dominion, that we glance briefly at the
principal forms into which Venetian Gothic first declined. They are two in
number: one the corruption of the Gothic itself; the other a partial return to
Byzantine forms; for the Venetian mind having carried the Gothic to a point
at which it was dissatisfied, tried to retrace its steps, fell back first upon
Byzantine types, and through them passed to the first Roman. But in thus
retracing its steps, it does not recover its own lost energy. It revisits the
places through which it had passed in the morning light, but it is now with
wearied limbs, and under the gloomy shadows of evening.

§ VI. It has just been said that the two principal causes of natural decline
in any school, are over-luxuriance and over-refinement. The corrupt Gothic
of Venice furnishes us with a curious instance of the one, and the corrupt
Byzantine of the other. We shall examine them in succession.

Now, observe, first, I do not mean by luxuriance of ornament, quantity of
ornament. In the best Gothic in the world there is hardly an inch of stone
left unsculptured. But I mean that character of extravagance in the ornament
itself which shows that it was addressed to jaded faculties; a violence and
coarseness in curvature, a depth of shadow, a lusciousness in arrangement
of line, evidently arising out of an incapability of feeling the true beauty of
chaste form and restrained power. I do not know any character of design
which may be more easily recognized at a glance than this over-
lusciousness; and yet it seems to me that at the present day there is nothing
so little understood as the essential difference between chasteness and
extravagance, whether in color, shade, or lines. We speak loosely and
inaccurately of “overcharged” ornament, with an obscure feeling that there
is indeed something in visible Form which is correspondent to
Intemperance in moral habits; but without any distinct detection of the
character which offends us, far less with any understanding of the most
important lesson which there can be no doubt was intended to be conveyed
by the universality of this ornamental law.

§ VII. In a word, then, the safeguard of highest beauty, in all visible work,
is exactly that which is also the safeguard of conduct in the soul,—
Temperance, in the broadest sense; the Temperance which we have seen
sitting on an equal throne with Justice amidst the Four Cardinal Virtues,
and, wanting which, there is not any other virtue which may not lead us into
desperate error. Now, observe: Temperance, in the nobler sense, does not
mean a subdued and imperfect energy; it does not mean a stopping short in
any good thing, as in Love or in Faith; but it means the power which

governs the most intense energy, and prevents its acting in any way but as it
ought. And with respect to things in which there may be excess, it does not
mean imperfect enjoyment of them; but the regulation of their quantity, so
that the enjoyment of them shall be greatest. For instance, in the matter we
have at present in hand, temperance in color does not mean imperfect or
dull enjoyment of color; but it means that government of color which shall
bring the utmost possible enjoyment out of all hues. A bad colorist does not
love beautiful color better than the best colorist does, nor half so much. But
he indulges in it to excess; he uses it in large masses, and unsubdued; and
then it is a law of Nature, a law as universal as that of gravitation, that he
shall not be able to enjoy it so much as if he had used it in less quantity. His
eye is jaded and satiated, and the blue and red have life in them no more.
He tries to paint them bluer and redder, in vain: all the blue has become
grey, and gets greyer the more he adds to it; all his crimson has become
brown, and gets more sere and autumnal the more he deepens it. But the
great painter is sternly temperate in his work; he loves the vivid color with
all his heart; but for a long time he does not allow himself anything like it,
nothing but sober browns and dull greys, and colors that have no
conceivable beauty in them; but these by his government become lovely:
and after bringing out of them all the life and power they possess, and
enjoying them to the uttermost,—cautiously, and as the crown of the work,
and the consummation of its music, he permits the momentary crimson and
azure, and the whole canvas is in a flame.

§ VIII. Again, in curvature, which is the cause of loveliness in all form; the
bad designer does not enjoy it more than the great designer, but he indulges
in it till his eye is satiated, and he cannot obtain enough of it to touch his
jaded feeling for grace. But the great and temperate designer does not allow
himself any violent curves; he works much with lines in which the
curvature, though always existing, is long before it is perceived. He dwells
on all these subdued curvatures to the uttermost, and opposes them with still

severer lines to bring them out in fuller sweetness; and, at last, he allows
himself a momentary curve of energy, and all the work is, in an instant, full
of life and grace.

The curves drawn in Plate VII. of the first volume, were chosen entirely
to show this character of dignity and restraint, as it appears in the lines of
nature, together with the perpetual changefulness of the degrees of
curvature in one and the same line; but although the purpose of that plate
was carefully explained in the chapter which it illustrates, as well as in the
passages of “Modern Painters” therein referred to (vol. ii. pp. 43, 79), so
little are we now in the habit of considering the character of abstract lines,
that it was thought by many persons that this plate only illustrated
Hogarth’s reversed line of beauty, even although the curve of the salvia leaf,
which was the one taken from that plate for future use, in architecture, was
not a reversed or serpentine curve at all. I shall now, however, I hope, be
able to show my meaning better.

§ IX. Fig. 1 in Plate I., opposite, is a piece of ornamentation from a
Norman-French manuscript of the thirteenth century, and fig. 2 from an
Italian one of the fifteenth. Observe in the first its stern moderation in
curvature; the gradually united lines nearly straight, though none quite
straight, used for its main limb, and contrasted with the bold but simple
offshoots of its leaves, and the noble spiral from which it shoots, these in
their turn opposed by the sharp trefoils and thorny cusps. And see what a
reserve of resource there is in the whole; how easy it would have been to
make the curves more palpable and the foliage more rich, and how the
noble hand has stayed itself, and refused to grant one wave of motion more.

I.

TEMPERANCE AND INTEMPERANCE.
IN CURVATURE.

§ X. Then observe the other example, in which, while the same idea is
continually repeated, excitement and interest are sought for by means of
violent and continual curvatures wholly unrestrained, and rolling hither and

thither in confused wantonness. Compare the character of the separate lines
in these two examples carefully, and be assured that wherever this
redundant and luxurious curvature shows itself in ornamentation, it is a sign
of jaded energy and failing invention. Do not confuse it with fulness or
richness. Wealth is not necessarily wantonness: a Gothic moulding may be
buried half a foot deep in thorns and leaves, and yet will be chaste in every
line; and a late Renaissance moulding may be utterly barren and poverty-
stricken, and yet will show the disposition to luxury in every line.

§ XI. Plate XX., in the second volume, though prepared for the special
illustration of the notices of capitals, becomes peculiarly interesting when
considered in relation to the points at present under consideration. The four
leaves in the upper row are Byzantine; the two middle rows are transitional,
all but fig. 11, which is of the formed Gothic; fig. 12 is perfect Gothic of the
finest time (Ducal Palace, oldest part), fig. 13 is Gothic beginning to
decline, fig. 14 is Renaissance Gothic in complete corruption.

Now observe, first, the Gothic naturalism advancing gradually from the
Byzantine severity; how from the sharp, hard, formalized conventionality of
the upper series the leaves gradually expand into more free and flexible
animation, until in fig. 12 we have the perfect living leaf as if fresh gathered
out of the dew. And then, in the last two examples and partly in fig. 11,
observe how the forms which can advance no longer in animation, advance,
or rather decline, into luxury and effeminacy as the strength of the school
expires.

§ XII. In the second place, note that the Byzantine and Gothic schools,
however differing in degree of life, are both alike in temperance, though the
temperance of the Gothic is the nobler, because it consists with entire
animation. Observe how severe and subtle the curvatures are in all the
leaves from fig. 1 to fig. 12, except only in fig. 11; and observe especially
the firmness and strength obtained by the close approximation to the

straight line in the lateral ribs of the leaf, fig. 12. The longer the eye rests on
these temperate curvatures the more it will enjoy them, but it will assuredly
in the end be wearied by the morbid exaggeration of the last example.

II.

GOTHIC CAPITALS.

§ XIII. Finally, observe—and this is very important—how one and the
same character in the work may be a sign of totally different states of mind,
and therefore in one case bad, and in the other good. The examples, fig. 3.
and fig. 12., are both equally pure in line; but one is subdivided in the
extreme, the other broad in the extreme, and both are beautiful. The
Byzantine mind delighted in the delicacy of subdivision which nature
shows in the fern-leaf or parsley-leaf; and so, also, often the Gothic mind,
much enjoying the oak, thorn, and thistle. But the builder of the Ducal
Palace used great breadth in his foliage, in order to harmonize with the
broad surface of his mighty wall, and delighted in this breadth as nature
delights in the sweeping freshness of the dock-leaf or water-lily. Both
breadth and subdivision are thus noble, when they are contemplated or
conceived by a mind in health; and both become ignoble, when conceived
by a mind jaded and satiated. The subdivision in fig. 13 as compared with
the type, fig. 12, which it was intended to improve, is the sign, not of a
mind which loved intricacy, but of one which could not relish simplicity,
which had not strength enough to enjoy the broad masses of the earlier
leaves, and cut them to pieces idly, like a child tearing the book which, in
its weariness, it cannot read. And on the other hand, we shall continually
find, in other examples of work of the same period, an unwholesome
breadth or heaviness, which results from the mind having no longer any
care for refinement or precision, nor taking any delight in delicate forms,
but making all things blunted, cumbrous, and dead, losing at the same time
the sense of the elasticity and spring of natural curves. It is as if the soul of
man, itself severed from the root of its health, and about to fall into
corruption, lost the perception of life in all things around it; and could no
more distinguish the wave of the strong branches, full of muscular strength
and sanguine circulation, from the lax bending of a broken cord, nor the

sinuousness of the edge of the leaf, crushed into deep folds by the
expansion of its living growth, from the wrinkled contraction of its decay.1
Thus, in morals, there is a care for trifles which proceeds from love and
conscience, and is most holy; and a care for trifles which comes of idleness
and frivolity, and is most base. And so, also, there is a gravity proceeding
from thought, which is most noble; and a gravity proceeding from dulness
and mere incapability of enjoyment, which is most base. Now, in the
various forms assumed by the later Gothic of Venice, there are one or two
features which, under other circumstances, would not have been signs of
decline; but, in the particular manner of their occurrence here, indicate the
fatal weariness of decay. Of all these features the most distinctive are its
crockets and finials.

§ XIV. There is not to be found a single crocket or finial upon any part of
the Ducal Palace built during the fourteenth century; and although they
occur on contemporary, and on some much earlier, buildings, they either
indicate detached examples of schools not properly Venetian, or are signs of
incipient decline.

The reason of this is, that the finial is properly the ornament of gabled
architecture; it is the compliance, in the minor features of the building, with
the spirit of its towers, ridged roof, and spires. Venetian building is not
gabled, but horizontal in its roots and general masses; therefore the finial is
a feature contradictory to its spirit, and adopted only in that search for
morbid excitement which is the infallible indication of decline. When it
occurs earlier, it is on fragments of true gabled architecture, as, for instance,
on the porch of the Carmini.

In proportion to the unjustifiableness of its introduction was the
extravagance of the form it assumed; becoming, sometimes, a tuft at the top
of the ogee windows, half as high as the arch itself, and consisting, in the
richest examples, of a human figure, half emergent out of a cup of leafage,

as, for instance, in the small archway of the Campo San Zaccaria: while the
crockets, as being at the side of the arch, and not so strictly connected with
its balance and symmetry, appear to consider themselves at greater liberty
even than the finials, and fling themselves, hither and thither, in the wildest
contortions. Fig. 4. in Plate I, is the outline of one, carved in stone, from the
later Gothic of St. Mark’s; fig. 3. a crocket from the fine Veronese Gothic;
in order to enable the reader to discern the Renaissance character better by
comparison with the examples of curvature above them, taken from the
manuscripts. And not content with this exuberance in the external
ornaments of the arch, the finial interferes with its traceries. The increased
intricacy of these, as such, being a natural process in the developement of
Gothic, would have been no evil; but they are corrupted by the enrichment
of the finial at the point of the cusp,—corrupted, that is to say, in Venice: for
at Verona the finial, in the form of a fleur-de-lis, appears long previously at
the cusp point, with exquisite effect; and in our own best Northern Gothic it
is often used beautifully in this place, as in the window from Salisbury,
Plate XII. (Vol. II.), fig. 2. But in Venice, such a treatment of it was utterly
contrary to the severe spirit of the ancient traceries; and the adoption of a
leafy finial at the extremity of the cusps in the door of San Stefano, as
opposed to the simple ball which terminates those of the Ducal Palace, is an
unmistakable indication of a tendency to decline.

In like manner, the enrichment and complication of the jamb mouldings,
which, in other schools, might and did take place in the healthiest periods,
are, at Venice, signs of decline, owing to the entire inconsistency of such
mouldings with the ancient love of the single square jamb and archivolt.
The process of enrichment in them is shown by the successive examples
given in Plate VII., below. They are numbered, and explained in the
Appendix.

§ XV. The date at which this corrupt form of Gothic first prevailed over
the early simplicity of the Venetian types can be determined in an instant,
on the steps of the choir of the Church of St. John and Paul. On our left
hand, as we enter, is the tomb of the Doge Marco Cornaro, who died in
1367. It is rich and fully developed Gothic, with crockets and finials, but
not yet attaining any extravagant developement. Opposite to it is that of the
Doge Andrea Morosini, who died in 1382. Its Gothic is voluptuous, and
over-wrought; the crockets are bold and florid, and the enormous finial
represents a statue of St. Michael. There is no excuse for the antiquaries
who, having this tomb before them, could have attributed the severe
architecture of the Ducal Palace to a later date; for every one of the
Renaissance errors is here in complete developement, though not so grossly
as entirely to destroy the loveliness of the Gothic forms. In the Porta della
Carta, 1423, the vice reaches its climax.

§ XVI. Against this degraded Gothic, then, came up the Renaissance
armies; and their first assault was in the requirement of universal perfection.
For the first time since the destruction of Rome, the world had seen, in the
work of the greatest artists of the fifteenth century,—in the painting of
Ghirlandajo, Masaccio, Francia, Perugino, Pinturicchio, and Bellini; in the
sculpture of Mino da Fiesole, of Ghiberti, and Verrocchio,—a perfection of
execution and fulness of knowledge which cast all previous art into the
shade, and which, being in the work of those men united with all that was
great in that of former days, did indeed justify the utmost enthusiasm with
which their efforts were, or could be, regarded. But when this perfection
had once been exhibited in anything, it was required in everything; the
world could no longer be satisfied with less exquisite execution, or less
disciplined knowledge. The first thing that it demanded in all work was, that
it should be done in a consummate and learned way; and men altogether
forgot that it was possible to consummate what was contemptible, and to
know what was useless. Imperatively requiring dexterity of touch, they

gradually forgot to look for tenderness of feeling; imperatively requiring
accuracy of knowledge, they gradually forgot to ask for originality of
thought. The thought and the feeling which they despised departed from
them, and they were left to felicitate themselves on their small science and
their neat fingering. This is the history of the first attack of the Renaissance
upon the Gothic schools, and of its rapid results, more fatal and immediate
in architecture than in any other art, because there the demand for
perfection was less reasonable, and less consistent with the capabilities of
the workman; being utterly opposed to that rudeness or savageness on
which, as we saw above, the nobility of the elder schools in great part
depends. But inasmuch as the innovations were founded on some of the
most beautiful examples of art, and headed by some of the greatest men that
the world ever saw, and as the Gothic with which they interfered was
corrupt and valueless, the first appearance of the Renaissance feeling had
the appearance of a healthy movement. A new energy replaced whatever
weariness or dulness had affected the Gothic mind; an exquisite taste and
refinement, aided by extended knowledge, furnished the first models of the
new school; and over the whole of Italy a style arose, generally now known
as cinque-cento, which in sculpture and painting, as I just stated, produced
the noblest masters which the world ever saw, headed by Michael Angelo,
Raphael, and Leonardo; but which failed of doing the same in architecture,
because, as we have seen above, perfection is therein not possible, and
failed more totally than it would otherwise have done, because the classical
enthusiasm had destroyed the best types of architectural form.

§ XVII. For, observe here very carefully, the Renaissance principle, as it
consisted in a demand for universal perfection, is quite distinct from the
Renaissance principle as it consists in a demand for classical and Roman
forms of perfection. And if I had space to follow out the subject as I should
desire, I would first endeavor to ascertain what might have been the course
of the art of Europe if no manuscripts of classical authors had been

recovered, and no remains of classical architecture left, in the fifteenth
century; so that the executive perfection to which the efforts of all great
men had tended for five hundred years, and which now at last was reached,
might have been allowed to develope itself in its own natural and proper
form, in connexion with the architectural structure of earlier schools. This
refinement and perfection had indeed its own perils, and the history of later
Italy, as she sank into pleasure and thence into corruption, would probably
have been the same whether she had ever learned again to write pure Latin
or not. Still the inquiry into the probable cause of the enervation which
might naturally have followed the highest exertion of her energies, is a
totally distinct one from that into the particular form given to this
enervation by her classical learning; and it is matter of considerable regret
to me that I cannot treat these two subjects separately: I must be content
with marking them for separation in the mind of the reader.

§ XVIII. The effect, then, of the sudden enthusiasm for classical literature,
which gained strength during every hour of the fifteenth century, was, as far
as respected architecture, to do away with the entire system of Gothic
science. The pointed arch, the shadowy vault, the clustered shaft, the
heaven-pointing spire, were all swept away; and no structure was any
longer permitted but that of the plain cross-beam from pillar to pillar, over
the round arch, with square or circular shafts, and a low-gabled roof and
pediment: two elements of noble form, which had fortunately existed in
Rome, were, however, for that reason, still permitted; the cupola, and,
internally, the waggon vault.

§ XIX. These changes in form were all of them unfortunate; and it is
almost impossible to do justice to the occasionally exquisite ornamentation
of the fifteenth century, on account of its being placed upon edifices of the
cold and meagre Roman outline. There is, as far as I know, only one Gothic
building in Europe, the Duomo of Florence, in which, though the ornament

be of a much earlier school, it is yet so exquisitely finished as to enable us
to imagine what might have been the effect of the perfect workmanship of
the Renaissance, coming out of the hands of men like Verrocchio and
Ghiberti, had it been employed on the magnificent framework of Gothic
structure. This is the question which, as I shall note in the concluding
chapter, we ought to set ourselves practically to solve in modern times.

§ XX. The changes effected in form, however, were the least part of the
evil principles of the Renaissance. As I have just said, its main mistake, in
its early stages, was the unwholesome demand for perfection, at any cost. I
hope enough has been advanced, in the chapter on the Nature of Gothic, to
show the reader that perfection is not to be had from the general workman,
but at the cost of everything,—of his whole life, thought, and energy. And
Renaissance Europe thought this a small price to pay for manipulative
perfection. Men like Verrocchio and Ghiberti were not to be had every day,
nor in every place; and to require from the common workman execution or
knowledge like theirs, was to require him to become their copyist. Their
strength was great enough to enable them to join science with invention,
method with emotion, finish with fire; but, in them, the invention and the
fire were first, while Europe saw in them only the method and the finish.
This was new to the minds of men, and they pursued it to the neglect of
everything else. “This,” they cried, “we must have in all our work
henceforward:” and they were obeyed. The lower workman secured method
and finish, and lost, in exchange for them, his soul.

§ XXI. Now, therefore, do not let me be misunderstood when I speak
generally of the evil spirit of the Renaissance. The reader may look through
all I have written, from first to last, and he will not find one word but of the
most profound reverence for those mighty men who could wear the
Renaissance armor of proof, and yet not feel it encumber their living limbs,2
—Leonardo and Michael Angelo, Ghirlandajo and Masaccio, Titian and

Tintoret. But I speak of the Renaissance as an evil time, because, when it
saw those men go burning forth into the battle, it mistook their armor for
their strength: and forthwith encumbered with the painful panoply every
stripling who ought to have gone forth only with his own choice of three
smooth stones out of the brook.

§ XXII. This, then, the reader must always keep in mind when he is
examining for himself any examples of cinque-cento work. When it has
been done by a truly great man, whose life and strength could not be
oppressed, and who turned to good account the whole science of his day,
nothing is more exquisite. I do not believe, for instance, that there is a more
glorious work of sculpture existing in the world than that equestrian statue
of Bartolomeo Colleone, by Verrocchio, of which, I hope, before these
pages are printed, there will be a cast in England. But when the cinque-
cento work has been done by those meaner men, who, in the Gothic times,
though in a rough way, would yet have found some means of speaking out
what was in their hearts, it is utterly inanimate,—a base and helpless copy
of more accomplished models; or, if not this, a mere accumulation of
technical skill, in gaining which the workman had surrendered all other
powers that were in him.

There is, therefore, of course, an infinite gradation in the art of the
period, from the Sistine Chapel down to modern upholstery; but, for the
most part, since in architecture the workman must be of an inferior order, it
will be found that this cinque-cento painting and higher religious sculpture
is noble, while the cinque-cento architecture, with its subordinate sculpture,
is universally bad; sometimes, however, assuming forms, in which the
consummate refinement almost atones for the loss of force.

§ XXIII. This is especially the case with that second branch of the
Renaissance which, as above noticed, was engrafted at Venice on the
Byzantine types. So soon as the classical enthusiasm required the

banishment of Gothic forms, it was natural that the Venetian mind should
turn back with affection to the Byzantine models in which the round arches
and simple shafts, necessitated by recent law, were presented under a form
consecrated by the usage of their ancestors. And, accordingly, the first
distinct school of architecture3 which arose under the new dynasty, was one
in which the method of inlaying marble, and the general forms of shaft and
arch, were adopted from the buildings of the twelfth century, and applied
with the utmost possible refinements of modern skill. Both at Verona and
Venice the resulting architecture is exceedingly beautiful. At Verona it is,
indeed, less Byzantine, but possesses a character of richness and tenderness
almost peculiar to that city. At Venice it is more severe, but yet adorned
with sculpture which, for sharpness of touch and delicacy of minute form,
cannot be rivalled, and rendered especially brilliant and beautiful by the
introduction of those inlaid circles of colored marble, serpentine, and
porphyry, by which Phillippe de Commynes was so much struck on his first
entrance into the city. The two most refined buildings in this style in Venice
are, the small Church of the Miracoli, and the Scuola di San Marco beside
the Church of St. John and St. Paul. The noblest is the Rio Façade of the
Ducal Palace. The Casa Dario, and Casa Manzoni, on the Grand Canal, are
exquisite examples of the school, as applied to domestic architecture; and,
in the reach of the canal between the Casa Foscari and the Rialto, there are
several palaces, of which the Casa Contarini (called “delle Figure”) is the
principal, belonging to the same group, though somewhat later, and
remarkable for the association of the Byzantine principles of color with the
severest lines of the Roman pediment, gradually superseding the round
arch. The precision of chiselling and delicacy of proportion in the ornament
and general lines of these palaces cannot be too highly praised; and I
believe that the traveller in Venice, in general, gives them rather too little
attention than too much. But while I would ask him to stay his gondola
beside each of them long enough to examine their every line, I must also

warn him to observe, most carefully, the peculiar feebleness and want of
soul in the conception of their ornament, which mark them as belonging to
a period of decline; as well as the absurd mode of introduction of their
pieces of colored marble: these, instead of being simply and naturally
inserted in the masonry, are placed in small circular or oblong frames of
sculpture, like mirrors or pictures, and are represented as suspended by
ribands against the wall; a pair of wings being generally fastened on to the
circular tablets, as if to relieve the ribands and knots from their weight, and
the whole series tied under the chin of a little cherub at the top, who is
nailed against the façade like a hawk on a barn door.

But chiefly let him notice, in the Casa Contarini delle Figure, one most
strange incident, seeming to have been permitted, like the choice of the
subjects at the three angles of the Ducal Palace, in order to teach us, by a
single lesson, the true nature of the style in which it occurs. In the intervals
of the windows of the first story, certain shields and torches are attached, in
the form of trophies, to the stems of two trees whose boughs have been cut
off, and only one or two of their faded leaves left, scarcely observable, but
delicately sculptured here and there, beneath the insertions of the severed
boughs.

It is as if the workman had intended to leave us an image of the expiring
naturalism of the Gothic school. I had not seen this sculpture when I wrote
the passage referring to its period, in the first volume of this work (Chap.
XX. § XXXI.):—“Autumn came,—the leaves were shed,—and the eye was
directed to the extremities of the delicate branches. The Renaissance frosts
came, and all perished!”

§ XXIV. And the hues of this autumn of the early Renaissance are the last
which appear in architecture. The winter which succeeded was colorless as
it was cold; and although the Venetian painters struggled long against its
influence, the numbness of the architecture prevailed over them at last, and

the exteriors of all the latter palaces were built only in barren stone. As at
this point of our inquiry, therefore, we must bid farewell to color, I have
reserved for this place the continuation of the history of chromatic
decoration, from the Byzantine period, when we left it in the fifth chapter of
the second volume, down to its final close.

§ XXV. It was above stated, that the principal difference in general form
and treatment between the Byzantine and Gothic palaces was the
contraction of the marble facing into the narrow spaces between the
windows, leaving large fields of brick wall perfectly bare. The reason for
this appears to have been, that the Gothic builders were no longer satisfied
with the faint and delicate hues of the veined marble; they wished for some
more forcible and piquant mode of decoration, corresponding more
completely with the gradually advancing splendor of chivalric costume and
heraldic device. What I have said above of the simple habits of life of the
thirteenth century, in no wise refers either to costumes of state, or of
military service; and any illumination of the thirteenth and early fourteenth
centuries (the great period being, it seems to me, from 1250 to 1350), while
it shows a peculiar majesty and simplicity in the fall of the robes (often
worn over the chain armor), indicates, at the same time, an exquisite
brilliancy of color and power of design in the hems and borders, as well as
in the armorial bearings with which they are charged; and while, as we have
seen, a peculiar simplicity is found also in the forms of the architecture,
corresponding to that of the folds of the robes, its colors were constantly
increasing in brilliancy and decision, corresponding to those of the
quartering of the shield, and of the embroidery of the mantle.

§ XXVI. Whether, indeed, derived from the quarterings of the knights’
shields, or from what other source, I know not; but there is one magnificent
attribute of the coloring of the late twelfth, the whole thirteenth, and the
early fourteenth century, which I do not find definitely in any previous

work, nor afterwards in general art, though constantly, and necessarily, in
that of great colorists, namely, the union of one color with another by
reciprocal interference: that is to say, if a mass of red is to be set beside a
mass of blue, a piece of the red will be carried into the blue, and a piece of
the blue carried into the red; sometimes in nearly equal portions, as in a
shield divided into four quarters, of which the uppermost on one side will
be of the same color as the lowermost on the other; sometimes in smaller
fragments, but, in the periods above named, always definitely and grandly,
though in a thousand various ways. And I call it a magnificent principle, for
it is an eternal and universal one, not in art only,4 but in human life. It is the
great principle of Brotherhood, not by equality, nor by likeness, but by
giving and receiving; the souls that are unlike, and the nations that are
unlike, and the natures that are unlike, being bound into one noble whole by
each receiving something from, and of, the others’ gifts and the others’
glory. I have not space to follow out this thought,—it is of infinite extent
and application,—but I note it for the reader’s pursuit, because I have long
believed, and the whole second volume of “Modern Painters” was written
to prove, that in whatever has been made by the Deity externally delightful
to the human sense of beauty, there is some type of God’s nature or of
God’s laws; nor are any of His laws, in one sense, greater than the
appointment that the most lovely and perfect unity shall be obtained by the
taking of one nature into another. I trespass upon too high ground; and yet I
cannot fully show the reader the extent of this law, but by leading him thus
far. And it is just because it is so vast and so awful a law, that it has rule
over the smallest things; and there is not a vein of color on the lightest leaf
which the spring winds are at this moment unfolding in the fields around us,
but it is an illustration of an ordainment to which the earth and its creatures
owe their continuance, and their Redemption.

§ XXVII. It is perfectly inconceivable, until it has been made a subject of
special inquiry, how perpetually Nature employs this principle in the

distribution of her light and shade; how by the most extraordinary
adaptations, apparently accidental, but always in exactly the right place, she
contrives to bring darkness into light, and light into darkness; and that so
sharply and decisively, that at the very instant when one object changes
from light to dark, the thing relieved upon it will change from dark to light,
and yet so subtly that the eye will not detect the transition till it looks for it.
The secret of a great part of the grandeur in all the noblest compositions is
the doing of this delicately in degree, and broadly in mass; in color it may
be done much more decisively than in light and shade, and, according to the
simplicity of the work, with greater frankness of confession, until, in purely
decorative art, as in the illumination, glass-painting, and heraldry of the
great periods, we find it reduced to segmental accuracy. Its greatest masters,
in high art, are Tintoret, Veronese, and Turner.

§ XXVIII. Together with this great principle of quartering is introduced
another, also of very high value as far as regards the delight of the eye,
though not of so profound meaning. As soon as color began to be used in
broad and opposed fields, it was perceived that the mass of it destroyed its
brilliancy, and it was tempered by chequering it with some other color or
colors in smaller quantities, mingled with minute portions of pure white.
The two moral principles of which this is the type, are those of Temperance
and Purity; the one requiring the fulness of the color to be subdued, and the
other that it shall be subdued without losing either its own purity or that of
the colors with which it is associated.

§ XXIX. Hence arose the universal and admirable system of the diapered
or chequered background of early ornamental art. They are completely
developed in the thirteenth century, and extend through the whole of the
fourteenth gradually yielding to landscape, and other pictorial backgrounds,
as the designers lost perception of the purpose of their art, and of the value
of color. The chromatic decoration of the Gothic palaces of Venice was of

course founded on these two great principles, which prevailed constantly
wherever the true chivalric and Gothic spirit possessed any influence. The
windows, with their intermediate spaces of marble, were considered as the
objects to be relieved, and variously quartered with vigorous color. The
whole space of the brick wall was considered as a background; it was
covered with stucco, and painted in fresco, with diaper patterns.

§ XXX. What? the reader asks in some surprise,—Stucco! and in the great
Gothic period? Even so, but not stucco to imitate stone. Herein lies all the
difference; it is stucco confessed and understood, and laid on the bricks
precisely as gesso is laid on canvas, in order to form them into a ground for
receiving color from the human hand,—color which, if well laid on, might
render the brick wall more precious than if it had been built of emeralds.
Whenever we wish to paint, we may prepare our paper as we choose; the
value of the ground in no wise adds to the value of the picture. A Tintoret on
beaten gold would be of no more value than a Tintoret on coarse canvas; the
gold would merely be wasted. All that we have to do is to make the ground
as good and fit for the color as possible, by whatever means.

§ XXXI. I am not sure if I am right in applying the term “stucco” to the
ground of fresco; but this is of no consequence; the reader will understand
that it was white, and that the whole wall of the palace was considered as
the page of a book to be illuminated: but he will understand also that the sea
winds are bad librarians; that, when once the painted stucco began to fade
or to fall, the unsightliness of the defaced color would necessitate its
immediate restoration; and that therefore, of all the chromatic decoration of
the Gothic palaces, there is hardly a fragment left.

Happily, in the pictures of Gentile Bellini, the fresco coloring of the
Gothic palaces is recorded, as it still remained in his time; not with rigid
accuracy, but quite distinctly enough to enable us, by comparing it with the

existing colored designs in the manuscripts and glass of the period, to
ascertain precisely what it must have been.

§ XXXII. The walls were generally covered with chequers of very warm
color, a russet inclining to scarlet, more or less relieved with white, black,
and grey; as still seen in the only example which, having been executed in
marble, has been perfectly preserved, the front of the Ducal Palace. This,
however, owing to the nature of its materials, was a peculiarly simple
example; the ground is white, crossed with double bars of pale red, and in
the centre of each chequer there is a cross, alternately black with a red
centre and red with a black centre where the arms cross. In painted work the
grounds would be, of course, as varied and complicated as those of
manuscripts; but I only know of one example left, on the Casa Sagredo,
where, on some fragments of stucco, a very early chequer background is
traceable, composed of crimson quatrefoils interlaced, with cherubim
stretching their wings filling the intervals. A small portion of this ground is
seen beside the window taken from the palace, Vol. II. Plate XIII. fig. 1.

§ XXXIII. It ought to be especially noticed, that, in all chequered patterns
employed in the colored designs of these noble periods, the greatest care is
taken to mark that they are grounds of design rather than designs
themselves. Modern architects, in such minor imitations as they are
beginning to attempt, endeavor to dispose the parts in the patterns so as to
occupy certain symmetrical positions with respect to the parts of the
architecture. A Gothic builder never does this: he cuts his ground into pieces
of the shape he requires with utter remorselessness, and places his windows
or doors upon it with no regard whatever to the lines in which they cut the
pattern: and, in illuminations of manuscripts, the chequer itself is constantly
changed in the most subtle and arbitrary way, wherever there is the least
chance of its regularity attracting the eye, and making it of importance. So
intentional is this, that a diaper pattern is often set obliquely to the vertical

lines of the designs, for fear it should appear in any way connected with
them.

§ XXXIV. On these russet or crimson backgrounds the entire space of the
series of windows was relieved, for the most part, as a subdued white field
of alabaster; and on this delicate and veined white were set the circular
disks of purple and green. The arms of the family were of course blazoned
in their own proper colors, but I think generally on a pure azure ground; the
blue color is still left behind the shields in the Casa Priuli and one or two
more of the palaces which are unrestored, and the blue ground was used
also to relieve the sculptures of religious subject. Finally, all the mouldings,
capitals, cornices, cusps, and traceries, were either entirely gilded or
profusely touched with gold.

The whole front of a Gothic palace in Venice may, therefore, be simply
described as a field of subdued russet, quartered with broad sculptured
masses of white and gold; these latter being relieved by smaller inlaid
fragments of blue, purple, and deep green.

§ XXXV. Now, from the beginning of the fourteenth century, when
painting and architecture were thus united, two processes of change went on
simultaneously to the beginning of the seventeenth. The merely decorative
chequerings on the walls yielded gradually to more elaborate paintings of
figure-subject; first small and quaint, and then enlarging into enormous
pictures filled by figures generally colossal. As these paintings became of
greater merit and importance, the architecture with which they were
associated was less studied; and at last a style was introduced in which the
framework of the building was little more interesting than that of a
Manchester factory, but the whole space of its walls was covered with the
most precious fresco paintings. Such edifices are of course no longer to be
considered as forming an architectural school; they were merely large
preparations of artists’ panels; and Titian, Giorgione, and Veronese no more

conferred merit on the later architecture of Venice, as such, by painting on
its façades, than Landseer or Watts could confer merit on that of London by
first whitewashing and then painting its brick streets from one end to the
other.

§ XXXVI. Contemporarily with this change in the relative values of the
color decoration and the stone-work, one equally important was taking
place in the opposite direction, but of course in another group of buildings.
For in proportion as the architect felt himself thrust aside or forgotten in one
edifice, he endeavored to make himself principal in another; and, in
retaliation for the painter’s entire usurpation of certain fields of design,
succeeded in excluding him totally from those in which his own influence
was predominant. Or, more accurately speaking, the architects began to be
too proud to receive assistance from the colorists; and these latter sought for
ground which the architect had abandoned, for the unrestrained display of
their own skill. And thus, while one series of edifices is continually
becoming feebler in design and richer in superimposed paintings, another,
that of which we have so often spoken as the earliest or Byzantine
Renaissance, fragment by fragment rejects the pictorial decoration; supplies
its place first with marbles, and then, as the latter are felt by the architect,
daily increasing in arrogance and deepening in coldness, to be too bright for
his dignity, he casts even these aside one by one: and when the last
porphyry circle has vanished from the façade, we find two palaces standing
side by side, one built, so far as mere masonry goes, with consummate care
and skill, but without the slightest vestige of color in any part of it; the other
utterly without any claim to interest in its architectural form, but covered
from top to bottom with paintings by Veronese. At this period, then, we bid
farewell to color, leaving the painters to their own peculiar field; and only
regretting that they waste their noblest work on walls, from which in a
couple of centuries, if not before, the greater part of their labor must be
effaced. On the other hand, the architecture whose decline we are tracing,

has now assumed an entirely new condition, that of the Central or True
Renaissance, whose nature we are to examine in the next chapter.

§ XXXVII. But before leaving these last palaces over which the Byzantine
influence extended itself, there is one more lesson to be learned from them
of much importance to us. Though in many respects debased in style, they
are consummate in workmanship, and unstained in honor; there is no
imperfection in them, and no dishonesty. That there is absolutely no
imperfection, is indeed, as we have seen above, a proof of their being
wanting in the highest qualities of architecture; but, as lessons in masonry,
they have their value, and may well be studied for the excellence they
display in methods of levelling stones, for the precision of their inlaying,
and other such qualities, which in them are indeed too principal, yet very
instructive in their particular way.

§ XXXVIII. For instance, in the inlaid design of the dove with the olive
branch, from the Casa Trevisan (Vol. I. Plate XX. p. 369), it is impossible
for anything to go beyond the precision with which the olive leaves are cut
out of the white marble; and, in some wreaths of laurel below, the rippled
edge of each leaf is as finely and easily drawn, as if by a delicate pencil. No
Florentine table is more exquisitely finished than the façade of this entire
palace; and as ideals of an executive perfection, which, though we must not
turn aside from our main path to reach it, may yet with much advantage be
kept in our sight and memory, these palaces are most notable amidst the
architecture of Europe. The Rio Façade of the Ducal Palace, though very
sparing in color, is yet, as an example of finished masonry in a vast
building, one of the finest things, not only in Venice, but in the world. It
differs from other work of the Byzantine Renaissance, in being on a very
large scale; and it still retains one pure Gothic character, which adds not a
little to its nobleness, that of perpetual variety. There is hardly one window
of it, or one panel, that is like another; and this continual change so

increases its apparent size by confusing the eye, that, though presenting no
bold features, or striking masses of any kind, there are few things in Italy
more impressive than the vision of it overhead, as the gondola glides from
beneath the Bridge of Sighs. And lastly (unless we are to blame these
buildings for some pieces of very childish perspective), they are
magnificently honest, as well as perfect. I do not remember even any
gilding upon them; all is pure marble, and of the finest kind.5

And therefore, in finally leaving the Ducal Palace,6 let us take with us
one more lesson, the last which we shall receive from the Stones of Venice,
except in the form of a warning.

§ XXXIX. The school of architecture which we have just been examining
is, as we have seen above, redeemed from severe condemnation by its
careful and noble use of inlaid marbles as a means of color. From that time
forward, this art has been unknown, or despised; the frescoes of the swift
and daring Venetian painters long contended with the inlaid marbles,
outvying them with color, indeed more glorious than theirs, but fugitive as
the hues of woods in autumn; and, at last, as the art itself of painting in this
mighty manner failed from among men,7 the modern decorative system
established itself, which united the meaninglessness of the veined marble
with the evanescence of the fresco, and completed the harmony by
falsehood.

§ XL. Since first, in the second chapter of the “Seven Lamps,” I
endeavored to show the culpableness, as well as the baseness, of our
common modes of decoration by painted imitation of various woods or
marbles, the subject has been discussed in various architectural works, and
is evidently becoming one of daily increasing interest. When it is
considered how many persons there are whose means of livelihood consist
altogether in these spurious arts, and how difficult it is, even for the most

candid, to admit a conviction contrary both to their interests and to their
inveterate habits of practice and thought, it is rather a matter of wonder, that
the cause of Truth should have found even a few maintainers, than that it
should have encountered a host of adversaries. It has, however, been
defended repeatedly by architects themselves, and so successfully, that I
believe, so far as the desirableness of this or that method of ornamentation
is to be measured by the fact of its simple honesty or dishonesty, there is
little need to add anything to what has been already urged upon the subject.
But there are some points connected with the practice of imitating marble,
which I have been unable to touch upon until now, and by the consideration
of which we may be enabled to see something of the policy of honesty in
this matter, without in the least abandoning the higher ground of principle.

§ XLI. Consider, then, first, what marble seems to have been made for.
Over the greater part of the surface of the world, we find that a rock has
been providentially distributed, in a manner particularly pointing it out as
intended for the service of man. Not altogether a common rock, it is yet rare
enough to command a certain degree of interest and attention wherever it is
found; but not so rare as to preclude its use for any purpose to which it is
fitted. It is exactly of the consistence which is best adapted for sculpture:
that is to say, neither hard nor brittle, nor flaky nor splintery, but uniform,
and delicately, yet not ignobly, soft,—exactly soft enough to allow the
sculptor to work it without force, and trace on it the finest lines of finished
form; and yet so hard as never to betray the touch or moulder away beneath
the steel; and so admirably crystallized, and of such permanent elements,
that no rains dissolve it, no time changes it, no atmosphere decomposes it:
once shaped, it is shaped for ever, unless subjected to actual violence or
attrition. This rock, then, is prepared by Nature for the sculptor and
architect, just as paper is prepared by the manufacturer for the artist, with as
great—nay, with greater—care, and more perfect adaptation of the material
to the requirements. And of this marble paper, some is white and some

colored; but more is colored than white, because the white is evidently
meant for sculpture, and the colored for the covering of large surfaces.

§ XLII. Now, if we would take Nature at her word, and use this precious
paper which she has taken so much care to provide for us (it is a long
process, the making of that paper; the pulp of it needing the subtlest
possible solution, and the pressing of it—for it is all hot-pressed—having to
be done under the saw, or under something at least as heavy); if, I say, we
use it as Nature would have us, consider what advantages would follow.
The colors of marble are mingled for us just as if on a prepared palette.
They are of all shades and hues (except bad ones), some being united and
even, some broken, mixed, and interrupted, in order to supply, as far as
possible, the want of the painter’s power of breaking and mingling the color
with the brush. But there is more in the colors than this delicacy of
adaptation. There is history in them. By the manner in which they are
arranged in every piece of marble, they record the means by which that
marble has been produced, and the successive changes through which it has
passed. And in all their veins and zones, and flame-like stainings, or broken
and disconnected lines, they write various legends, never untrue, of the
former political state of the mountain kingdom to which they belonged, of
its infirmities and fortitudes, convulsions and consolidations, from the
beginning of time.

Now, if we were never in the habit of seeing anything but real marbles,
this language of theirs would soon begin to be understood; that is to say,
even the least observant of us would recognize such and such stones as
forming a peculiar class, and would begin to inquire where they came from,
and, at last, take some feeble interest in the main question, Why they were
only to be found in that or the other place, and how they came to make a
part of this mountain, and not of that? And in a little while, it would not be
possible to stand for a moment at a shop door, leaning against the pillars of

it, without remembering or questioning of something well worth the
memory or the inquiry, touching the hills of Italy, or Greece, or Africa, or
Spain; and we should be led on from knowledge to knowledge, until even
the unsculptured walls of our streets became to us volumes as precious as
those of our libraries.

§ XLIII. But the moment we admit imitation of marble, this source of
knowledge is destroyed. None of us can be at the pains to go through the
work of verification. If we knew that every colored stone we saw was
natural, certain questions, conclusions, interests, would force themselves
upon us without any effort of our own; but we have none of us time to stop
in the midst of our daily business, to touch and pore over, and decide with
painful minuteness of investigation, whether such and such a pillar be
stucco or stone. And the whole field of this knowledge, which Nature
intended us to possess when we were children, is hopelessly shut out from
us. Worse than shut out, for the mass of coarse imitations confuses our
knowledge acquired from other sources; and our memory of the marbles we
have perhaps once or twice carefully examined, is disturbed and distorted
by the inaccuracy of the imitations which are brought before us continually.

§ XLIV. But it will be said, that it is too expensive to employ real marbles
in ordinary cases. It may be so: yet not always more expensive than the
fitting windows with enormous plate glass, and decorating them with
elaborate stucco mouldings and other useless sources of expenditure in
modern building; nay, not always in the end more expensive than the
frequent repainting of the dingy pillars, which a little water dashed against
them would refresh from day to day, if they were of true stone. But,
granting that it be so, in that very costliness, checking their common use in
certain localities, is part of the interest of marbles, considered as history.
Where they are not found, Nature has supplied other materials,—clay for
brick, or forest for timber,—in the working of which she intends other

characters of the human mind to be developed, and by the proper use of
which certain local advantages will assuredly be attained, while the
delightfulness and meaning of the precious marbles will be felt more
forcibly in the districts where they occur, or on the occasions when they
may be procured.

§ XLV. It can hardly be necessary to add, that, as the imitation of marbles
interferes with and checks the knowledge of geography and geology, so the
imitation of wood interferes with that of botany; and that our acquaintance
with the nature, uses, and manner of growth of the timber trees of our own
and of foreign countries, would probably, in the majority of cases, become
accurate and extensive, without any labor or sacrifice of time, were not all
inquiry checked, and all observation betrayed, by the wretched labors of the
“Grainer.”

§ XLVI. But this is not all. As the practice of imitation retards knowledge,
so also it retards art.

There is not a meaner occupation for the human mind than the imitation
of the stains and striæ of marble and wood. When engaged in any easy and
simple mechanical occupation, there is still some liberty for the mind to
leave the literal work; and the clash of the loom or the activity of the fingers
will not always prevent the thoughts from some happy expatiation in their
own domains. But the grainer must think of what he is doing; and veritable
attention and care, and occasionally considerable skill, are consumed in the
doing of a more absolute nothing than I can name in any other department
of painful idleness. I know not anything so humiliating as to see a human
being, with arms and limbs complete, and apparently a head, and assuredly
a soul, yet into the hands of which when you have put a brush and pallet, it
cannot do anything with them but imitate a piece of wood. It cannot color, it
has no ideas of color; it cannot draw, it has no ideas of form; it cannot
caricature, it has no ideas of humor. It is incapable of anything beyond

knots. All its achievement, the entire result of the daily application of its
imagination and immortality, is to be such a piece of texture as the sun and
dew are sucking up out of the muddy ground, and weaving together, far
more finely, in millions of millions of growing branches, over every rood of
waste woodland and shady hill.

§ XLVII. But what is to be done, the reader asks, with men who are
capable of nothing else than this? Nay, they may be capable of everything
else, for all we know, and what we are to do with them I will try to say in
the next chapter; but meanwhile one word more touching the higher
principles of action in this matter, from which we have descended to those
of expediency. I trust that some day the language of Types will be more read
and understood by us than it has been for centuries; and when this language,
a better one than either Greek or Latin, is again recognized amongst us, we
shall find, or remember, that as the other visible elements of the universe—
its air, its water, and its flame—set forth, in their pure energies, the life-
giving, purifying, and sanctifying influences of the Deity upon His
creatures, so the earth, in its purity, sets forth His eternity and His Truth. I
have dwelt above on the historical language of stones; let us not forget this,
which is their theological language; and, as we would not wantonly pollute
the fresh waters when they issue forth in their clear glory from the rock, nor
stay the mountain winds into pestilential stagnancy, nor mock the sunbeams
with artificial and ineffective light; so let us not by our own base and barren
falsehoods, replace the crystalline strength and burning color of the earth
from which we were born, and to which we must return; the earth which,
like our own bodies, though dust in its degradation, is full of splendor when
God’s hand gathers its atoms; and which was for ever sanctified by Him, as
the symbol no less of His love than of His truth, when He bade the high
priest bear the names of the Children of Israel on the clear stones of the
Breastplate of Judgment.

1 There is a curious instance of this in the modern imitations of the Gothic capitals of
the Casa d’ Oro, employed in its restorations. The old capitals look like clusters of leaves,
the modern ones like kneaded masses of dough with holes in them.

2 Not that even these men were able to wear it altogether without harm, as we shall see
in the next chapter.

3 Appendix 4, “Date of Palaces of Byzantine Renaissance.”

4 In the various works which Mr. Prout has written on light and shade, no principle will
be found insisted on more strongly than this carrying of the dark into the light, and vice
versa. It is curious to find the untaught instinct of a merely picturesque artist in the
nineteenth century, fixing itself so intensely on a principle which regulated the entire sacred
composition of the thirteenth. I say “untaught” instinct, for Mr. Prout was, throughout his
life, the discoverer of his own principles; fortunately so, considering what principles were
taught in his time, but unfortunately in the abstract, for there were gifts in him, which, had
there been any wholesome influences to cherish them, might have made him one of the
greatest men of his age. He was great, under all adverse circumstances, but the mere wreck
of what he might have been, if, after the rough training noticed in my pamphlet on Pre-
Raphaelitism, as having fitted him for his great function in the world, he had met with a
teacher who could have appreciated his powers, and directed them.

5 There may, however, be a kind of dishonesty even in the use of marble, if it is
attempted to make the marble look like something else. See the final or Venetian Index
under head “Scalzi.”

6 Appendix 5, “Renaissance Side of Ducal Palace.”

7 We have, as far as I know, at present among us, only one painter, G. F. Watts, who is
capable of design in color on a large scale. He stands alone among our artists of the old
school, in his perception of the value of breadth in distant masses, and in the vigor of
invention by which such breadth must be sustained; and his power of expression and depth
of thought are not less remarkable than his bold conception of color effect. Very probably
some of the Pre-Raphaelites have the gift also; I am nearly certain that Rosetti has it, and I

think also Millais; but the experiment has yet to be tried. I wish it could be made in Mr.
Hope’s church in Margaret Street.

CHAPTER II.

ROMAN RENAISSANCE.

§ I. Of all the buildings in Venice, later in date than the final additions to
the Ducal Palace, the noblest is, beyond all question, that which, having
been condemned by its proprietor, not many years ago, to be pulled down
and sold for the value of its materials, was rescued by the Austrian
government, and appropriated—the government officers having no other
use for it—to the business of the Post-Office; though still known to the
gondolier by its ancient name, the Casa Grimani. It is composed of three
stories of the Corinthian order, at once simple, delicate, and sublime; but on
so colossal a scale, that the three-storied palaces on its right and left only
reach to the cornice which marks the level of its first floor. Yet it is not at
first perceived to be so vast; and it is only when some expedient is
employed to hide it from the eye, that by the sudden dwarfing of the whole
reach of the Grand Canal, which it commands, we become aware that it is
to the majesty of the Casa Grimani that the Rialto itself, and the whole
group of neighboring buildings, owe the greater part of their
impressiveness. Nor is the finish of its details less notable than the grandeur
of their scale. There is not an erring line, nor a mistaken proportion,
throughout its noble front; and the exceeding fineness of the chiselling
gives an appearance of lightness to the vast blocks of stone out of whose

perfect union that front is composed. The decoration is sparing, but delicate:
the first story only simpler than the rest, in that it has pilasters instead of
shafts, but all with Corinthian capitals, rich in leafage, and fruited
delicately; the rest of the walls flat and smooth, and the mouldings sharp
and shallow, so that the bold shafts look like crystals of beryl running
through a rock of quartz.

§ II. This palace is the principal type at Venice, and one of the best in
Europe, of the central architecture of the Renaissance schools; that carefully
studied and perfectly executed architecture to which those schools owe their
principal claims to our respect, and which became the model of most of the
important works subsequently produced by civilized nations. I have called it
the Roman Renaissance, because it is founded, both in its principles of
superimposition, and in the style of its ornament, upon the architecture of
classic Rome at its best period. The revival of Latin literature both led to its
adoption, and directed its form; and the most important example of it which
exists is the modern Roman basilica of St. Peter’s. It had, at its Renaissance
or new birth, no resemblance either to Greek, Gothic, or Byzantine forms,
except in retaining the use of the round arch, vault, and dome; in the
treatment of all details, it was exclusively Latin; the last links of connexion
with mediæval tradition having been broken by its builders in their
enthusiasm for classical art, and the forms of true Greek or Athenian
architecture being still unknown to them. The study of these noble Greek
forms has induced various modifications of the Renaissance in our own
times; but the conditions which are found most applicable to the uses of
modern life are still Roman, and the entire style may most fitly be
expressed by the term “Roman Renaissance.”

§ III. It is this style, in its purity and fullest form,—represented by such
buildings as the Casa Grimani at Venice (built by San Micheli), the Town
Hall at Vicenza (by Palladio), St. Peter’s at Rome (by Michael Angelo), St.

Paul’s and Whitehall in London (by Wren and Inigo Jones),—which is the
true antagonist of the Gothic school. The intermediate, or corrupt conditions
of it, though multiplied over Europe, are no longer admired by architects, or
made the subjects of their study; but the finished work of this central school
is still, in most cases, the model set before the student of the nineteenth
century, as opposed to those Gothic, Romanesque, or Byzantine forms
which have long been considered barbarous, and are so still by most of the
leading men of the day. That they are, on the contrary, most noble and
beautiful, and that the antagonistic Renaissance is, in the main, unworthy
and unadmirable, whatever perfection of a certain kind it may possess, it
was my principal purpose to show, when I first undertook the labor of this
work. It has been attempted already to put before the reader the various
elements which unite in the Nature of Gothic, and to enable him thus to
judge, not merely of the beauty of the forms which that system has
produced already, but of its future applicability to the wants of mankind,
and endless power over their hearts. I would now endeavor, in like manner,
to set before the reader the Nature of Renaissance, and thus to enable him to
compare the two styles under the same light, and with the same enlarged
view of their relations to the intellect, and capacities for the service, of man.

§ IV. It will not be necessary for me to enter at length into any
examination of its external form. It uses, whether for its roofs of aperture or
roofs proper, the low gable or circular arch: but it differs from Romanesque
work in attaching great importance to the horizontal lintel or architrave
above the arch; transferring the energy of the principal shafts to the
supporting of this horizontal beam, and thus rendering the arch a
subordinate, if not altogether a superfluous, feature. The type of this
arrangement has been given already at c, Fig. XXXVI., p. 145, Vol. I.: and I
might insist at length upon the absurdity of a construction in which the
shorter shaft, which has the real weight of wall to carry, is split into two by
the taller one, which has nothing to carry at all,—that taller one being

strengthened, nevertheless, as if the whole weight of the building bore upon
it; and on the ungracefulness, never conquered in any Palladian work, of the
two half-capitals glued, as it were, against the slippery round sides of the
central shaft. But it is not the form of this architecture against which I
would plead. Its defects are shared by many of the noblest forms of earlier
building, and might have been entirely atoned for by excellence of spirit.
But it is the moral nature of it which is corrupt, and which it must,
therefore, be our principal business to examine and expose.

§ V. The moral, or immoral, elements which unite to form the spirit of
Central Renaissance architecture are, I believe, in the main, two,—Pride
and Infidelity; but the pride resolves itself into three main branches,—Pride
of Science, Pride of State, and Pride of System: and thus we have four
separate mental conditions which must be examined successively.

§ VI. 1. Pride of Science. It would have been more charitable, but more
confusing, to have added another element to our list, namely the Love of
Science; but the love is included in the pride, and is usually so very
subordinate an element that it does not deserve equality of nomenclature.
But, whether pursued in pride or in affection (how far by either we shall see
presently), the first notable characteristic of the Renaissance central school
is its introduction of accurate knowledge into all its work, so far as it
possesses such knowledge; and its evident conviction, that such science is
necessary to the excellence of the work, and is the first thing to be
expressed therein. So that all the forms introduced, even in its minor
ornament, are studied with the utmost care; the anatomy of all animal
structure is thoroughly understood and elaborately expressed, and the whole
of the execution skilful and practised in the highest degree. Perspective,
linear and aerial, perfect drawing and accurate light and shade in painting,
and true anatomy in all representations of the human form, drawn or
sculptured, are the first requirements in all the work of this school.

§ VII. Now, first considering all this in the most charitable light, as
pursued from a real love of truth, and not from vanity, it would, of course,
have been all excellent and admirable, had it been regarded as the aid of art,
and not as its essence. But the grand mistake of the Renaissance schools lay
in supposing that science and art are the same things, and that to advance in
the one was necessarily to perfect the other. Whereas they are, in reality,
things not only different, but so opposed, that to advance in the one is, in
ninety-nine cases out of the hundred, to retrograde in the other. This is the
point to which I would at present especially bespeak the reader’s attention.

§ VIII. Science and art are commonly distinguished by the nature of their
actions; the one as knowing, the other as changing, producing, or creating.
But there is a still more important distinction in the nature of the things they
deal with. Science deals exclusively with things as they are in themselves;
and art exclusively with things as they affect the human senses and human
soul.8 Her work is to portray the appearance of things, and to deepen the
natural impressions which they produce upon living creatures. The work of
science is to substitute facts for appearances, and demonstrations for
impressions. Both, observe, are equally concerned with truth; the one with
truth of aspect, the other with truth of essence. Art does not represent things
falsely, but truly as they appear to mankind. Science studies the relations of
things to each other: but art studies only their relations to man; and it
requires of everything which is submitted to it imperatively this, and only
this,—what that thing is to the human eyes and human heart, what it has to
say to men, and what it can become to them: a field of question just as
much vaster than that of science, as the soul is larger than the material
creation.

§ IX. Take a single instance. Science informs us that the sun is ninety-five
millions of miles distant from, and 111 times broader than, the earth; that
we and all the planets revolve round it; and that it revolves on its own axis

in 25 days, 14 hours and 4 minutes. With all this, art has nothing
whatsoever to do. It has no care to know anything of this kind. But the
things which it does care to know, are these: that in the heavens God hath
set a tabernacle for the sun, “which is as a bridegroom coming out of his
chamber, and rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race. His going forth is from
the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of it, and there is
nothing hid from the heat thereof.”

§ X. This, then, being the kind of truth with which art is exclusively
concerned, how is such truth as this to be ascertained and accumulated?
Evidently, and only, by perception and feeling. Never either by reasoning,
or report. Nothing must come between Nature and the artist’s sight; nothing
between God and the artist’s soul. Neither calculation nor hearsay,—be it
the most subtle of calculations, or the wisest of sayings,—may be allowed
to come between the universe, and the witness which art bears to its visible
nature. The whole value of that witness depends on its being eye-witness;
the whole genuineness, acceptableness, and dominion of it depend on the
personal assurance of the man who utters it. All its victory depends on the
veracity of the one preceding word, “Vidi.”

The whole function of the artist in the world is to be a seeing and feeling
creature; to be an instrument of such tenderness and sensitiveness, that no
shadow, no hue, no line, no instantaneous and evanescent expression of the
visible things around him, nor any of the emotions which they are capable
of conveying to the spirit which has been given him, shall either be left
unrecorded, or fade from the book of record. It is not his business either to
think, to judge, to argue, or to know. His place is neither in the closet, nor
on the bench, nor at the bar, nor in the library. They are for other men and
other work. He may think, in a by-way; reason, now and then, when he has
nothing better to do; know, such fragments of knowledge as he can gather

without stooping, or reach without pains; but none of these things are to be
his care. The work of his life is to be twofold only: to see, to feel.

§ XI. Nay, but, the reader perhaps pleads with me, one of the great uses of
knowledge is to open the eyes; to make things perceivable which, never
would have been seen, unless first they had been known.

Not so. This could only be said or believed by those who do not know
what the perceptive faculty of a great artist is, in comparison with that of
other men. There is no great painter, no great workman in any art, but he
sees more with the glance of a moment than he could learn by the labor of a
thousand hours. God has made every man fit for his work; He has given to
the man whom he means for a student, the reflective, logical, sequential
faculties; and to the man whom He means for an artist, the perceptive,
sensitive, retentive faculties. And neither of these men, so far from being
able to do the other’s work, can even comprehend the way in which it is
done. The student has no understanding of the vision, nor the painter of the
process; but chiefly the student has no idea of the colossal grasp of the true
painter’s vision and sensibility.

The labor of the whole Geological Society, for the last fifty years, has but
now arrived at the ascertainment of those truths respecting mountain form
which Turner saw and expressed with a few strokes of a camel’s hair pencil
fifty years ago, when he was a boy. The knowledge of all the laws of the
planetary system, and of all the curves of the motion of projectiles, would
never enable the man of science to draw a waterfall or a wave; and all the
members of Surgeons’ Hall helping each other could not at this moment
see, or represent, the natural movement of a human body in vigorous action,
as a poor dyer’s son did two hundred years ago.9

§ XII. But surely, it is still insisted, granting this peculiar faculty to the
painter, he will still see more as he knows more, and the more knowledge

he obtains, therefore, the better. No; not even so. It is indeed true, that, here
and there, a piece of knowledge will enable the eye to detect a truth which
might otherwise have escaped it; as, for instance, in watching a sunrise, the
knowledge of the true nature of the orb may lead the painter to feel more
profoundly, and express more fully, the distance between the bars of cloud
that cross it, and the sphere of flame that lifts itself slowly beyond them into
the infinite heaven. But, for one visible truth to which knowledge thus
opens the eyes, it seals them to a thousand: that is to say, if the knowledge
occur to the mind so as to occupy its powers of contemplation at the
moment when the sight work is to be done, the mind retires inward, fixes
itself upon the known fact, and forgets the passing visible ones; and a
moment of such forgetfulness loses more to the painter than a day’s thought
can gain. This is no new or strange assertion. Every person accustomed to
careful reflection of any kind, knows that its natural operation is to close his
eyes to the external world. While he is thinking deeply, he neither sees nor
feels, even though naturally he may possess strong powers of sight and
emotion. He who, having journeyed all day beside the Leman Lake, asked
of his companions, at evening, where it was,10 probably was not wanting in
sensibility; but he was generally a thinker, not a perceiver. And this instance
is only an extreme one of the effect which, in all cases, knowledge,
becoming a subject of reflection, produces upon the sensitive faculties. It
must be but poor and lifeless knowledge, if it has no tendency to force itself
forward, and become ground for reflection, in despite of the succession of
external objects. It will not obey their succession. The first that comes gives
it food enough for its day’s work; it is its habit, its duty, to cast the rest
aside, and fasten upon that. The first thing that a thinking and knowing man
sees in the course of the day, he will not easily quit. It is not his way to quit
anything without getting to the bottom of it, if possible. But the artist is
bound to receive all things on the broad, white, lucid field of his soul, not to
grasp at one. For instance, as the knowing and thinking man watches the

sunrise, he sees something in the color of a ray, or the change of a cloud,
that is new to him; and this he follows out forthwith into a labyrinth of
optical and pneumatical laws, perceiving no more clouds nor rays all the
morning. But the painter must catch all the rays, all the colors that come,
and see them all truly, all in their real relations and succession; therefore,
everything that occupies room in his mind he must cast aside for the time,
as completely as may be. The thoughtful man is gone far away to seek; but
the perceiving man must sit still, and open his heart to receive. The
thoughtful man is knitting and sharpening himself into a two-edged sword,
wherewith to pierce. The perceiving man is stretching himself into a four-
cornered sheet wherewith to catch. And all the breadth to which he can
expand himself, and all the white emptiness into which he can blanch
himself, will not be enough to receive what God has to give him.

§ XIII. What, then, it will be indignantly asked, is an utterly ignorant and
unthinking man likely to make the best artist? No, not so neither.
Knowledge is good for him so long as he can keep it utterly, servilely,
subordinate to his own divine work, and trample it under his feet, and out of
his way, the moment it is likely to entangle him.

And in this respect, observe, there is an enormous difference between
knowledge and education. An artist need not be a learned man, in all
probability it will be a disadvantage to him to become so; but he ought, if
possible, always to be an educated man: that is, one who has understanding
of his own uses and duties in the world, and therefore of the general nature
of the things done and existing in the world; and who has so trained
himself, or been trained, as to turn to the best and most courteous account
whatever faculties or knowledge he has. The mind of an educated man is
greater than the knowledge it possesses; it is like the vault of heaven,
encompassing the earth which lives and flourishes beneath it: but the mind
of an educated and learned man is like a caoutchouc band, with an

everlasting spirit of contraction in it, fastening together papers which it
cannot open, and keeps others from opening.

Half our artists are ruined for want of education, and by the possession of
knowledge; the best that I have known have been educated, and illiterate.
The ideal of an artist, however, is not that he should be illiterate, but well
read in the best books, and thoroughly high bred, both in heart and in
bearing. In a word, he should be fit for the best society, and should keep out
of it.11

§ XIV. There are, indeed, some kinds of knowledge with which an artist
ought to be thoroughly furnished; those, for instance, which enable him to
express himself; for this knowledge relieves instead of encumbering his
mind, and permits it to attend to its purposes instead of wearying itself
about means. The whole mystery of manipulation and manufacture should
be familiar to the painter from a child. He should know the chemistry of all
colors and materials whatsoever, and should prepare all his colors himself,
in a little laboratory of his own. Limiting his chemistry to this one object,
the amount of practical science necessary for it, and such accidental
discoveries as might fall in his way in the course of his work, of better
colors or better methods of preparing them, would be an infinite
refreshment to his mind; a minor subject of interest to which it might turn
when jaded with comfortless labor, or exhausted with feverish invention,
and yet which would never interfere with its higher functions, when it chose
to address itself to them. Even a considerable amount of manual labor,
sturdy color-grinding and canvas-stretching, would be advantageous;
though this kind of work ought to be in great part done by pupils. For it is
one of the conditions of perfect knowledge in these matters, that every great
master should have a certain number of pupils, to whom he is to impart all
the knowledge of materials and means which he himself possesses, as soon
as possible; so that, at any rate, by the time they are fifteen years old, they

may know all that he knows himself in this kind; that is to say, all that the
world of artists know, and his own discoveries besides, and so never be
troubled about methods any more. Not that the knowledge even of his own
particular methods is to be of purpose confined to himself and his pupils,
but that necessarily it must be so in some degree; for only those who see
him at work daily can understand his small and multitudinous ways of
practice. These cannot verbally be explained to everybody, nor is it needful
that they should, only let them be concealed from nobody who cares to see
them; in which case, of course, his attendant scholars will know them best.
But all that can be made public in matters of this kind should be so with all
speed, every artist throwing his discovery into the common stock, and the
whole body of artists taking such pains in this department of science as that
there shall be no unsettled questions about any known material or method:
that it shall be an entirely ascertained and indisputable matter which is the
best white, and which the best brown; which the strongest canvas, and
safest varnish; and which the shortest and most perfect way of doing
everything known up to that time: and if any one discovers a better, he is to
make it public forthwith. All of them taking care to embarrass themselves
with no theories or reasons for anything, but to work empirically only: it not
being in any wise their business to know whether light moves in rays or in
waves; or whether the blue rays of the spectrum move slower or faster than
the rest; but simply to know how many minutes and seconds such and such
a powder must be calcined, to give the brightest blue.

§ XV. Now it is perhaps the most exquisite absurdity of the whole
Renaissance system, that while it has encumbered the artist with every
species of knowledge that is of no use to him, this one precious and
necessary knowledge it has utterly lost. There is not, I believe, at this
moment, a single question which could be put respecting pigments and
methods, on which the body of living artists would agree in their answers.
The lives of artists are passed in fruitless experiments; fruitless, because

undirected by experience and uncommunicated in their results. Every man
has methods of his own, which he knows to be insufficient, and yet
jealously conceals from his fellow-workmen: every colorman has materials
of his own, to which it is rare that the artist can trust: and in the very front
of the majestic advance of chemical science, the empirical science of the
artist has been annihilated, and the days which should have led us to higher
perfection are passed in guessing at, or in mourning over, lost processes;
while the so-called Dark ages, possessing no more knowledge of chemistry
than a village herbalist does now, discovered, established, and put into daily
practice such methods of operation as have made their work, at this day, the
despair of all who look upon it.

§ XVI. And yet even this, to the painter, the safest of sciences, and in some
degree necessary, has its temptations, and capabilities of abuse. For the
simplest means are always enough for a great man; and when once he has
obtained a few ordinary colors, which he is sure will stand, and a white
surface that will not darken nor moulder, nor rend, he is master of the
world, and of his fellow-men. And, indeed, as if in these times we were bent
on furnishing examples of every species of opposite error, while we have
suffered the traditions to escape us of the simple methods of doing simple
things, which are enough for all the arts, and to all the ages, we have set
ourselves to discover fantastic modes of doing fantastic things,—new
mixtures and manipulations of metal, and porcelain, and leather, and paper,
and every conceivable condition of false substance and cheap work, to our
own infinitely multiplied confusion,—blinding ourselves daily more and
more to the great, changeless, and inevitable truth, that there is but one
goodness in art; and that is one which the chemist cannot prepare, nor the
merchant cheapen, for it comes only of a rare human hand, and rare human
soul.

§ XVII. Within its due limits, however, here is one branch of science
which the artist may pursue; and, within limits still more strict, another also,
namely, the science of the appearances of things as they have been
ascertained and registered by his fellow-men. For no day passes but some
visible fact is pointed out to us by others, which, without their help, we
should not have noticed; and the accumulation and generalization of visible
facts have formed, in the succession of ages, the sciences of light and shade,
and perspective, linear and aerial: so that the artist is now at once put in
possession of certain truths respecting the appearances of things, which, so
pointed out to him, any man may in a few days understand and
acknowledge; but which, without aid, he could not probably discover in his
lifetime. I say, probably could not, because the time which the history of art
shows us to have been actually occupied in the discovery and
systematization of such truth, is no measure of the time necessary for such
discovery. The lengthened period which elapsed between the earliest and
the perfect developement of the science of light (if I may so call it) was not
occupied in the actual effort to ascertain its laws, but in acquiring the
disposition to make that effort. It did not take five centuries to find out the
appearance of natural objects; but it took five centuries to make people care
about representing them. An artist of the twelfth century did not desire to
represent nature. His work was symbolical and ornamental. So long as it
was intelligible and lovely, he had no care to make it like nature. As, for
instance, when an old painter represented the glory round a saint’s head by
a burnished plate of pure gold, he had no intention of imitating an effect of
light. He meant to tell the spectator that the figure so decorated was a saint,
and to produce splendor of effect by the golden circle. It was no matter to
him what light was like. So soon as it entered into his intention to represent
the appearance of light, he was not long in discovering the natural facts
necessary for his purpose.

§ XVIII. But, this being fully allowed, it is still true that the accumulation
of facts now known respecting visible phenomena, is greater than any man
could hope to gather for himself, and that it is well for him to be made
acquainted with them; provided always, that he receive them only at their
true value, and do not suffer himself to be misled by them. I say, at their
true value; that is, an exceedingly small one. All the information which men
can receive from the accumulated experience of others, is of no use but to
enable them more quickly and accurately to see for themselves. It will in no
wise take the place of this personal sight. Nothing can be done well in art,
except by vision. Scientific principles and experiences are helps to the eye,
as a microscope is; and they are of exactly as much use without the eye. No
science of perspective, or of anything else, will enable us to draw the
simplest natural line accurately, unless we see it and feel it. Science is soon
at her wits’ end. All the professors of perspective in Europe, could not, by
perspective, draw the line of curve of a sea beach; nay, could not outline
one pool of the quiet water left among the sand. The eye and hand can do it,
nothing else. All the rules of aerial perspective that ever were written, will
not tell me how sharply the pines on the hill-top are drawn at this moment
on the sky. I shall know if I see them, and love them; not till then. I may
study the laws of atmospheric gradation for fourscore years and ten, and I
shall not be able to draw so much as a brick-kiln through its own smoke,
unless I look at it; and that in an entirely humble and unscientific manner,
ready to see all that the smoke, my master, is ready to show me, and
expecting to see nothing more.

§ XIX. So that all the knowledge a man has must be held cheap, and
neither trusted nor respected, the moment he comes face to face with
Nature. If it help him, well; if not, but, on the contrary, thrust itself upon
him in an impertinent and contradictory temper, and venture to set itself in
the slightest degree in opposition to, or comparison with, his sight, let it be
disgraced forthwith. And the slave is less likely to take too much upon

herself, if she has not been bought for a high price. All the knowledge an
artist needs, will, in these days, come to him almost without his seeking; if
he has far to look for it, he may be sure he does not want it. Prout became
Prout, without knowing a single rule of perspective to the end of his days;
and all the perspective in the Encyclopædia will never produce us another
Prout.

§ XX. And observe, also, knowledge is not only very often unnecessary,
but it is often untrustworthy. It is inaccurate, and betrays us where the eye
would have been true to us. Let us take the single instance of the knowledge
of aerial perspective, of which the moderns are so proud, and see how it
betrays us in various ways. First by the conceit of it, which often prevents
our enjoying work in which higher and better things were thought of than
effects of mist. The other day I showed a line impression of Albert Durer’s
“St. Hubert” to a modern engraver, who had never seen it nor any other of
Albert Durer’s works. He looked at it for a minute contemptuously, then
turned away: “Ah, I see that man did not know much about aerial
perspective!” All the glorious work and thought of the mighty master, all
the redundant landscape, the living vegetation, the magnificent truth of line,
were dead letters to him, because he happened to have been taught one
particular piece of knowledge which Durer despised.

§ XXI. But not only in the conceit of it, but in the inaccuracy of it, this
science betrays us. Aerial perspective, as given by the modern artist, is, in
nine cases out of ten, a gross and ridiculous exaggeration, as is
demonstrable in a moment. The effect of air in altering the hue and depth of
color is of course great in the exact proportion of the volume of air between
the observer and the object. It is not violent within the first few yards, and
then diminished gradually, but it is equal for each foot of interposing air.
Now in a clear day, and clear climate, such as that generally presupposed in
a work of fine color, objects are completely visible at a distance of ten

miles; visible in light and shade, with gradations between the two. Take,
then, the faintest possible hue of shadow, or of any color, and the most
violent and positive possible, and set them side by side. The interval
between them is greater than the real difference (for objects may often be
seen clearly much farther than ten miles, I have seen Mont Blanc at 120)
caused by the ten miles of intervening air between any given hue of the
nearest, and most distant, objects; but let us assume it, in courtesy to the
masters of aerial perspective, to be the real difference. Then roughly
estimating a mile at less than it really is, also in courtesy to them, or at 5000
feet, we have this difference between tints produced by 50,000 feet of air.
Then, ten feet of air will produce the 5000th part of this difference. Let the
reader take the two extreme tints, and carefully gradate the one into the
other. Let him divide this gradated shadow or color into 5000 successive
parts; and the difference in depth between one of these parts and the next is
the exact amount of aerial perspective between one object, and another, ten
feet behind it, on a clear day.

§ XXII. Now, in Millais’ “Huguenot,” the figures were standing about
three feet from the wall behind them; and the wise world of critics, which
could find no other fault with the picture, professed to have its eyes hurt by
the want of an aerial perspective, which, had it been accurately given (as,
indeed, I believe it was), would have amounted to the 10⁄35000th, or less than
the 15,000th part of the depth of any given color. It would be interesting to
see a picture painted by the critics, upon this scientific principle. The aerial
perspective usually represented is entirely conventional and ridiculous; a
mere struggle on the part of the pretendedly well-informed, but really
ignorant, artist, to express distances by mist which he cannot by drawing.

It is curious that the critical world is just as much offended by the true
presence of aerial perspective, over distances of fifty miles, and with
definite purpose of representing mist, in the works of Turner, as by the true

absence of aerial perspective, over distances of three feet, and in clear
weather, in those of Millais.

§ XXIII. “Well but,” still answers the reader, “this kind of error may here
and there be occasioned by too much respect for undigested knowledge;
but, on the whole, the gain is greater than the loss, and the fact is, that a
picture of the Renaissance period, or by a modern master, does indeed
represent nature more faithfully than one wrought in the ignorance of old
times.” No, not one whit; for the most part less faithfully. Indeed, the
outside of nature is more truly drawn; the material commonplace, which
can be systematized, catalogued, and taught to all pains-taking mankind,—
forms of ribs and scapulæ,12 of eyebrows and lips, and curls of hair.
Whatever can be measured and handled, dissected and demonstrated,—in a
word, whatever is of the body only,—that the schools of knowledge do
resolutely and courageously possess themselves of, and portray. But
whatever is immeasurable, intangible, indivisible, and of the spirit, that the
schools of knowledge do as certainly lose, and blot out of their sight, that is
to say, all that is worth art’s possessing or recording at all; for whatever can
be arrested, measured, and systematized, we can contemplate as much as
we will in nature herself. But what we want art to do for us is to stay what is
fleeting, and to enlighten what is incomprehensible, to incorporate the
things that have no measure, and immortalize the things that have no
duration. The dimly seen, momentary glance, the flitting shadow of faint
emotion, the imperfect lines of fading thought, and all that by and through
such things as these is recorded on the features of man, and all that in man’s
person and actions, and in the great natural world, is infinite and wonderful;
having in it that spirit and power which man may witness, but not weigh;
conceive, but not comprehend; love, but not limit; and imagine, but not
define;—this, the beginning and the end of the aim of all noble art, we have,
in the ancient art, by perception; and we have not, in the newer art, by
knowledge. Giotto gives it us, Orcagna gives it us. Angelico, Memmi,

Pisano, it matters not who,—all simple and unlearned men, in their measure
and manner,—give it us; and the learned men that followed them give it us
not, and we, in our supreme learning, own ourselves at this day farther from
it than ever.

§ XXIV. “Nay,” but it is still answered, “this is because we have not yet
brought our knowledge into right use, but have been seeking to accumulate
it, rather than to apply it wisely to the ends of art. Let us now do this, and
we may achieve all that was done by that elder ignorant art, and infinitely
more.” No, not so; for as soon as we try to put our knowledge to good use,
we shall find that we have much more than we can use, and that what more
we have is an encumbrance. All our errors in this respect arise from a gross
misconception as to the true nature of knowledge itself. We talk of learned
and ignorant men, as if there were a certain quantity of knowledge, which to
possess was to be learned, and which not to possess was to be ignorant;
instead of considering that knowledge is infinite, and that the man most
learned in human estimation is just as far from knowing anything as he
ought to know it, as the unlettered peasant. Men are merely on a lower or
higher stage of an eminence, whose summit is God’s throne, infinitely
above all; and there is just as much reason for the wisest as for the simplest
man being discontented with his position, as respects the real quantity of
knowledge he possesses. And, for both of them, the only true reasons for
contentment with the sum of knowledge they possess are these: that it is the
kind of knowledge they need for their duty and happiness in life; that all
they have is tested and certain, so far as it is in their power; that all they
have is well in order, and within reach when they need it; that it has not cost
too much time in the getting; that none of it, once got, has been lost; and
that there is not too much to be easily taken care of.

§ XXV. Consider these requirements a little, and the evils that result in our
education and polity from neglecting them. Knowledge is mental food, and

is exactly to the spirit what food is to the body (except that the spirit needs
several sorts of food, of which knowledge is only one), and it is liable to the
same kind of misuses. It may be mixed and disguised by art, till it becomes
unwholesome; it may be refined, sweetened, and made palatable, until it has
lost all its power of nourishment; and, even of its best kind, it may be eaten
to surfeiting, and minister to disease and death.

§ XXVI. Therefore, with respect to knowledge, we are to reason and act
exactly as with respect to food. We no more live to know, than we live to
eat. We live to contemplate, enjoy, act, adore; and we may know all that is
to be known in this world, and what Satan knows in the other, without being
able to do any of these. We are to ask, therefore, first, is the knowledge we
would have fit food for us, good and simple, not artificial and decorated?
and secondly, how much of it will enable us best for our work; and will
leave our hearts light, and our eyes clear? For no more than that is to be
eaten without the old Eve-sin.

§ XXVII. Observe, also, the difference between tasting knowledge, and
hoarding it. In this respect it is also like food; since, in some measure, the
knowledge of all men is laid up in granaries, for future use; much of it is at
any given moment dormant, not fed upon or enjoyed, but in store. And by
all it is to be remembered, that knowledge in this form may be kept without
air till it rots, or in such unthreshed disorder that it is of no use; and that,
however good or orderly, it is still only in being tasted that it becomes of
use; and that men may easily starve in their own granaries, men of science,
perhaps, most of all, for they are likely to seek accumulation of their store,
rather than nourishment from it. Yet let it not be thought that I would
undervalue them. The good and great among them are like Joseph, to whom
all nations sought to buy corn; or like the sower going forth to sow beside
all waters, sending forth thither the feet of the ox and the ass: only let us
remember that this is not all men’s work. We are not intended to be all

keepers of granaries, nor all to be measured by the filling of a storehouse;
but many, nay, most of us, are to receive day by day our daily bread, and
shall be as well nourished and as fit for our labor, and often, also, fit for
nobler and more divine labor, in feeding from the barrel of meal that does
not waste, and from the cruse of oil that does not fail, than if our barns were
filled with plenty, and our presses bursting out with new wine.

§ XXVIII. It is for each man to find his own measure in this matter; in great
part, also, for others to find it for him, while he is yet a youth. And the
desperate evil of the whole Renaissance system is, that all idea of measure
is therein forgotten, that knowledge is thought the one and the only good,
and it is never inquired whether men are vivified by it or paralyzed. Let us
leave figures. The reader may not believe the analogy I have been pressing
so far; but let him consider the subject in itself, let him examine the effect
of knowledge in his own heart, and see whether the trees of knowledge and
of life are one now, any more than in Paradise. He must feel that the real
animating power of knowledge is only in the moment of its being first
received, when it fills us with wonder and joy; a joy for which, observe, the
previous ignorance is just as necessary as the present knowledge. That man
is always happy who is in the presence of something which he cannot know
to the full, which he is always going on to know. This is the necessary
condition of a finite creature with divinely rooted and divinely directed
intelligence; this, therefore, its happy state,—but observe, a state, not of
triumph or joy in what it knows, but of joy rather in the continual discovery
of new ignorance, continual self-abasement, continual astonishment. Once
thoroughly our own, the knowledge ceases to give us pleasure. It may be
practically useful to us, it may be good for others, or good for usury to
obtain more; but, in itself, once let it be thoroughly familiar, and it is dead.
The wonder is gone from it, and all the fine color which it had when first
we drew it up out of the infinite sea. And what does it matter how much or
how little of it we have laid aside, when our only enjoyment is still in the

casting of that deep sea line? What does it matter? Nay, in one respect, it
matters much, and not to our advantage. For one effect of knowledge is to
deaden the force of the imagination and the original energy of the whole
man: under the weight of his knowledge he cannot move so lightly as in the
days of his simplicity. The pack-horse is furnished for the journey, the war-
horse is armed for war; but the freedom of the field and the lightness of the
limb are lost for both. Knowledge is, at best, the pilgrim’s burden or the
soldier’s panoply, often a weariness to them both: and the Renaissance
knowledge is like the Renaissance armor of plate, binding and cramping the
human form; while all good knowledge is like the crusader’s chain mail,
which throws itself into folds with the body, yet it is rarely so forged as that
the clasps and rivets do not gall us. All men feel this, though they do not
think of it, nor reason out its consequences. They look back to the days of
childhood as of greatest happiness, because those were the days of greatest
wonder, greatest simplicity, and most vigorous imagination. And the whole
difference between a man of genius and other men, it has been said a
thousand times, and most truly, is that the first remains in great part a child,
seeing with the large eyes of children, in perpetual wonder, not conscious of
much knowledge,—conscious, rather, of infinite ignorance, and yet infinite
power; a fountain of eternal admiration, delight, and creative force within
him meeting the ocean of visible and governable things around him.

That is what we have to make men, so far as we may. All are to be men
of genius in their degree,—rivulets or rivers, it does not matter, so that the
souls be clear and pure; not dead walls encompassing dead heaps of things
known and numbered, but running waters in the sweet wilderness of things
unnumbered and unknown, conscious only of the living banks, on which
they partly refresh and partly reflect the flowers, and so pass on.

§ XXIX. Let each man answer for himself how far his knowledge has
made him this, or how far it is loaded upon him as the pyramid is upon the

tomb. Let him consider, also, how much of it has cost him labor and time
that might have been spent in healthy, happy action, beneficial to all
mankind; how many living souls may have been left uncomforted and
unhelped by him, while his own eyes were failing by the midnight lamp;
how many warm sympathies have died within him as he measured lines or
counted letters; how many draughts of ocean air, and steps on mountain-
turf, and openings of the highest heaven he has lost for his knowledge; how
much of that knowledge, so dearly bought, is now forgotten or despised,
leaving only the capacity of wonder less within him, and, as it happens in a
thousand instances, perhaps even also the capacity of devotion. And let him,
—if, after thus dealing with his own heart, he can say that his knowledge
has indeed been fruitful to him,—yet consider how many there are who
have been forced by the inevitable laws of modern education into toil
utterly repugnant to their natures, and that in the extreme, until the whole
strength of the young soul was sapped away; and then pronounce with
fearfulness how far, and in how many senses, it may indeed be true that the
wisdom of this world is foolishness with God.

§ XXX. Now all this possibility of evil, observe, attaches to knowledge
pursued for the noblest ends, if it be pursued imprudently. I have assumed,
in speaking of its effect both on men generally and on the artist especially,
that it was sought in the true love of it, and with all honesty and directness
of purpose. But this is granting far too much in its favor. Of knowledge in
general, and without qualification, it is said by the Apostle that “it puffeth
up;” and the father of all modern science, writing directly in its praise, yet
asserts this danger even in more absolute terms, calling it a
“venomousness” in the very nature of knowledge itself.

§ XXXI. There is, indeed, much difference in this respect between the
tendencies of different branches of knowledge; it being a sure rule that
exactly in proportion as they are inferior, nugatory, or limited in scope, their

power of feeding pride is greater. Thus philology, logic, rhetoric, and the
other sciences of the schools, being for the most part ridiculous and trifling,
have so pestilent an effect upon those who are devoted to them, that their
students cannot conceive of any higher sciences than these, but fancy that
all education ends in the knowledge of words: but the true and great
sciences, more especially natural history, make men gentle and modest in
proportion to the largeness of their apprehension, and just perception of the
infiniteness of the things they can never know. And this, it seems to me, is
the principal lesson we are intended to be caught by the book of Job; for
there God has thrown open to us the heart of a man most just and holy, and
apparently perfect in all things possible to human nature except humility.
For this he is tried: and we are shown that no suffering, no self-
examination, however honest, however stern, no searching out of the heart
by its own bitterness, is enough to convince man of his nothingness before
God; but that the sight of God’s creation will do it. For, when the Deity
himself has willed to end the temptation, and to accomplish in Job that for
which it was sent, He does not vouchsafe to reason with him, still less does
He overwhelm him with terror, or confound him by laying open before his
eyes the book of his iniquities. He opens before him only the arch of the
dayspring, and the fountains of the deep; and amidst the covert of the reeds,
and on the heaving waves, He bids him watch the kings of the children of
pride,—“Behold now Behemoth, which I made with thee:” And the work is
done.

§ XXXII. Thus, if, I repeat, there is any one lesson in the whole book
which stands forth more definitely than another, it is this of the holy and
humbling influence of natural science on the human heart. And yet, even
here, it is not the science, but the perception, to which the good is owing;
and the natural sciences may become as harmful as any others, when they
lose themselves in classification and catalogue-making. Still, the principal
danger is with the sciences of words and methods; and it was exactly into

those sciences that the whole energy of men during the Renaissance period
was thrown. They discovered suddenly that the world for ten centuries had
been living in an ungrammatical manner, and they made it forthwith the end
of human existence to be grammatical. And it mattered thenceforth nothing
what was said, or what was done, so only that it was said with scholarship,
and done with system. Falsehood in a Ciceronian dialect had no opposers;
truth in patois no listeners. A Roman phrase was thought worth any number
of Gothic facts. The sciences ceased at once to be anything more than
different kinds of grammars,—grammar of language, grammar of logic,
grammar of ethics, grammar of art; and the tongue, wit, and invention of the
human race were supposed to have found their utmost and most divine
mission in syntax and syllogism, perspective and five orders.

Of such knowledge as this, nothing but pride could come; and, therefore,
I have called the first mental characteristic of the Renaissance schools, the
“pride” of science. If they had reached any science worth the name, they
might have loved it; but of the paltry knowledge they possessed, they could
only be proud. There was not anything in it capable of being loved.
Anatomy, indeed, then first made a subject of accurate study, is a true
science, but not so attractive as to enlist the affections strongly on its side:
and therefore, like its meaner sisters, it became merely a ground for pride;
and the one main purpose of the Renaissance artists, in all their work, was
to show how much they knew.

§ XXXIII. There were, of course, noble exceptions; but chiefly belonging
to the earliest periods of the Renaissance, when its teaching had not yet
produced its full effect. Raphael, Leonardo, and Michael Angelo were all
trained in the old school; they all had masters who knew the true ends of
art, and had reached them; masters nearly as great as they were themselves,
but imbued with the old religious and earnest spirit, which their disciples
receiving from them, and drinking at the same time deeply from all the

fountains of knowledge opened in their day, became the world’s wonders.
Then the dull wondering world believed that their greatness rose out of their
new knowledge, instead of out of that ancient religious root, in which to
abide was life, from which to be severed was annihilation. And from that
day to this, they have tried to produce Michael Angelos and Leonardos by
teaching the barren sciences, and still have mourned and marvelled that no
more Michael Angelos came; not perceiving that those great Fathers were
only able to receive such nourishment because they were rooted on the rock
of all ages, and that our scientific teaching, nowadays, is nothing more nor
less than the assiduous watering of trees whose stems are cut through. Nay,
I have even granted too much in saying that those great men were able to
receive pure nourishment from the sciences; for my own conviction is, and I
know it to be shared by most of those who love Raphael truly,—that he
painted best when he knew least. Michael Angelo was betrayed, again and
again, into such vain and offensive exhibition of his anatomical knowledge
as, to this day, renders his higher powers indiscernible by the greater part of
men; and Leonardo fretted his life away in engineering, so that there is
hardly a picture left to bear his name. But, with respect to all who followed,
there can be no question that the science they possessed was utterly
harmful; serving merely to draw away their hearts at once from the
purposes of art and the power of nature, and to make, out of the canvas and
marble, nothing more than materials for the exhibition of petty dexterity
and useless knowledge.

§ XXXIV. It is sometimes amusing to watch the naïve and childish way in
which this vanity is shown. For instance, when perspective was first
invented, the world thought it a mighty discovery, and the greatest men it
had in it were as proud of knowing that retiring lines converge, as if all the
wisdom of Solomon had been compressed into a vanishing point. And,
accordingly, it became nearly impossible for any one to paint a Nativity, but
he must turn the stable and manger into a Corinthian arcade, in order to

show his knowledge of perspective; and half the best architecture of the
time, instead of being adorned with historical sculpture, as of old, was set
forth with bas-relief of minor corridors and galleries, thrown into
perspective.

Now that perspective can be taught to any schoolboy in a week, we can
smile at this vanity. But the fact is, that all pride in knowledge is precisely
as ridiculous, whatever its kind, or whatever its degree. There is, indeed,
nothing of which man has any right to be proud; but the very last thing of
which, with any show of reason, he can make his boast is his knowledge,
except only that infinitely small portion of it which he has discovered for
himself. For what is there to be more proud of in receiving a piece of
knowledge from another person, than in receiving a piece of money?
Beggars should not be proud, whatever kind of alms they receive.
Knowledge is like current coin. A man may have some right to be proud of
possessing it, if he has worked for the gold of it, and assayed it, and
stamped it, so that it may be received of all men as true; or earned it fairly,
being already assayed: but if he has done none of these things, but only had
it thrown in his face by a passer-by, what cause has he to be proud? And
though, in this mendicant fashion, he had heaped together the wealth of
Crœsus, would pride any more, for this, become him, as, in some sort, it
becomes the man who has labored for his fortune, however small? So, if a
man tells me the sun is larger than the earth, have I any cause for pride in
knowing it? or, if any multitude of men tell me any number of things,
heaping all their wealth of knowledge upon me, have I any reason to be
proud under the heap? And is not nearly all the knowledge of which we
boast in these days cast upon us in this dishonorable way; worked for by
other men, proved by them, and then forced upon us, even against our wills,
and beaten into us in our youth, before we have the wit even to know if it be
good or not? (Mark the distinction between knowledge and thought.) Truly
a noble possession to be proud of! Be assured, there is no part of the

furniture of a man’s mind which he has a right to exult in, but that which he
has hewn and fashioned for himself. He who has built himself a hut on a
desert heath, and carved his bed, and table, and chair out of the nearest
forest, may have some right to take pride in the appliances of his narrow
chamber, as assuredly he will have joy in them. But the man who has had a
palace built, and adorned, and furnished for him, may, indeed, have many
advantages above the other, but he has no reason to be proud of his
upholsterer’s skill; and it is ten to one if he has half the joy in his couches of
ivory that the other will have in his pallet of pine.

§ XXXV. And observe how we feel this, in the kind of respect we pay to
such knowledge as we are indeed capable of estimating the value of. When
it is our own, and new to us, we cannot judge of it; but let it be another’s
also, and long familiar to us, and see what value we set on it. Consider how
we regard a schoolboy, fresh from his term’s labor. If he begin to display his
newly acquired small knowledge to us, and plume himself thereupon, how
soon do we silence him with contempt! But it is not so if the schoolboy
begins to feel or see anything. In the strivings of his soul within him he is
our equal; in his power of sight and thought he stands separate from us, and
may be a greater than we. We are ready to hear him forthwith. “You saw
that? you felt that? No matter for your being a child; let us hear.”

§ XXXVI. Consider that every generation of men stands in this relation to
its successors. It is as the schoolboy: the knowledge of which it is proudest
will be as the alphabet to those who follow. It had better make no noise
about its knowledge; a time will come when its utmost, in that kind, will be
food for scorn. Poor fools! was that all they knew? and behold how proud
they were! But what we see and feel will never be mocked at. All men will
be thankful to us for telling them that. “Indeed!” they will say, “they felt
that in their day? saw that? Would God we may be like them, before we go
to the home where sight and thought are not!”

This unhappy and childish pride in knowledge, then, was the first
constituent element of the Renaissance mind, and it was enough, of itself, to
have cast it into swift decline: but it was aided by another form of pride,
which was above called the Pride of State; and which we have next to
examine.

§ XXXVII. II. Pride of State. It was noticed in the second volume of
“Modern Painters,” p. 122, that the principle which had most power in
retarding the modern school of portraiture was its constant expression of
individual vanity and pride. And the reader cannot fail to have observed that
one of the readiest and commonest ways in which the painter ministers to
this vanity, is by introducing the pedestal or shaft of a column, or some
fragment, however simple, of Renaissance architecture, in the background
of the portrait. And this is not merely because such architecture is bolder or
grander than, in general, that of the apartments of a private house. No other
architecture would produce the same effect in the same degree. The richest
Gothic, the most massive Norman, would not produce the same sense of
exaltation as the simple and meagre lines of the Renaissance.

§ XXXVIII. And if we think over this matter a little, we shall soon feel that
in those meagre lines there is indeed an expression of aristocracy in its
worst characters; coldness, perfectness of training, incapability of emotion,
want of sympathy with the weakness of lower men, blank, hopeless,
haughty self-sufficiency. All these characters are written in the Renaissance
architecture as plainly as if they were graven on it in words. For, observe,
all other architectures have something in them that common men can enjoy;
some concession to the simplicities of humanity, some daily bread for the
hunger of the multitude. Quaint fancy, rich ornament, bright color,
something that shows a sympathy with men of ordinary minds and hearts;
and this wrought out, at least in the Gothic, with a rudeness showing that
the workman did not mind exposing his own ignorance if he could please

others. But the Renaissance is exactly the contrary of all this. It is rigid,
cold, inhuman; incapable of glowing, of stooping, of conceding for an
instant. Whatever excellence it has is refined, high-trained, and deeply
erudite; a kind which the architect well knows no common mind can taste.
He proclaims it to us aloud. “You cannot feel my work unless you study
Vitruvius. I will give you no gay color, no pleasant sculpture, nothing to
make you happy; for I am a learned man. All the pleasure you can have in
anything I do is in its proud breeding, its rigid formalism, its perfect finish,
its cold tranquillity. I do not work for the vulgar, only for the men of the
academy and the court.”

§ XXXIX. And the instinct of the world felt this in a moment. In the new
precision and accurate law of the classical forms, they perceived something
peculiarly adapted to the setting forth of state in an appalling manner:
Princes delighted in it, and courtiers. The Gothic was good for God’s
worship, but this was good for man’s worship. The Gothic had fellowship
with all hearts, and was universal, like nature: it could frame a temple for
the prayer of nations, or shrink into the poor man’s winding stair. But here
was an architecture that would not shrink, that had in it no submission, no
mercy. The proud princes and lords rejoiced in it. It was full of insult to the
poor in its every line. It would not be built of the materials at the poor
man’s hand; it would not roof itself with thatch or shingle, and black oak
beams; it would not wall itself with rough stone or brick; it would not
pierce itself with small windows where they were needed; it would not
niche itself, wherever there was room for it, in the street corners. It would
be of hewn stone; it would have its windows and its doors, and its stairs and
its pillars, in lordly order, and of stately size; it would have its wings and its
corridors, and its halls and its gardens, as if all the earth were its own. And
the rugged cottages of the mountaineers, and the fantastic streets of the
laboring burgher were to be thrust out of its way, as of a lower species.

§ XL. It is to be noted also, that it ministered as much to luxury as to
pride. Not to luxury of the eye, that is a holy luxury; Nature ministers to
that in her painted meadows, and sculptured forests, and gilded heavens; the
Gothic builder ministered to that in his twisted traceries, and deep-wrought
foliage, and burning casements. The dead Renaissance drew back into its
earthliness, out of all that was warm and heavenly; back into its pride, out
of all that was simple and kind; back into its stateliness, out of all that was
impulsive, reverent, and gay. But it understood the luxury of the body; the
terraced and scented and grottoed garden, with its trickling fountains and
slumbrous shades; the spacious hall and lengthened corridor for the summer
heat; the well-closed windows, and perfect fittings and furniture, for
defence against the cold; and the soft picture, and frescoed wall and roof,
covered with the last lasciviousness of Paganism;—this is understood and
possessed to the full, and still possesses. This is the kind of domestic
architecture on which we pride ourselves, even to this day, as an infinite and
honorable advance from the rough habits of our ancestors; from the time
when the king’s floor was strewn with rushes, and the tapestries swayed
before the searching wind in the baron’s hall.

§ XLI. Let us hear two stories of those rougher times.

At the debate of King Edwin with his courtiers and priests, whether he
ought to receive the Gospel preached to him by Paulinus, one of his nobles
spoke as follows:

“The present life, O king! weighed with the time that is unknown, seems
to me like this. When you are sitting at a feast with your earls and thanes in
winter time, and the fire is lighted, and the hall is warmed, and it rains and
snows, and the storm is loud without, there comes a sparrow, and flies
through the house. It comes in at one door and goes out at the other. While
it is within, it is not touched by the winter’s storm; but it is but for the
twinkling of an eye, for from winter it comes and to winter it returns. So

also this life of man endureth for a little space; what goes before or what
follows after, we know not. Wherefore, if this new lore bring anything more
certain, it is fit that we should follow it.”13

That could not have happened in a Renaissance building. The bird could
not have dashed in from the cold into the heat, and from the heat back again
into the storm. It would have had to come up a flight of marble stairs, and
through seven or eight antechambers; and so, if it had ever made its way
into the presence chamber, out again through loggias and corridors
innumerable. And the truth which the bird brought with it, fresh from
heaven, has, in like manner, to make its way to the Renaissance mind
through many antechambers, hardly, and as a despised thing, if at all.

§ XLII. Hear another story of those early times.

The king of Jerusalem, Godfrey of Bouillon, at the siege of Asshur, or
Arsur, gave audience to some emirs from Samaria and Naplous. They found
him seated on the ground on a sack of straw. They expressing surprise,
Godfrey answered them: “May not the earth, out of which we came, and
which is to be our dwelling after death, serve us for a seat during life?”

It is long since such a throne has been set in the reception chambers of
Christendom, or such an answer heard from the lips of a king.

Thus the Renaissance spirit became base both in its abstinence and its
indulgence. Base in its abstinence; curtailing the bright and playful wealth
of form and thought, which filled the architecture of the earlier ages with
sources of delight for their hardy spirit, pure, simple, and yet rich as the
fretwork of flowers and moss, watered by some strong and stainless
mountain stream: and base in its indulgence; as it granted to the body what
it withdrew from the heart, and exhausted, in smoothing the pavement for
the painless feet, and softening the pillow for the sluggish brain, the powers

of art which once had hewn rough ladders into the clouds of heaven, and set
up the stones by which they rested for houses of God.

§ XLIII. And just in proportion as this courtly sensuality lowered the real
nobleness of the men whom birth or fortune raised above their fellows, rose
their estimate of their own dignity, together with the insolence and
unkindness of its expression, and the grossness of the flattery with which it
was fed. Pride is indeed the first and the last among the sins of men, and
there is no age of the world in which it has not been unveiled in the power
and prosperity of the wicked. But there was never in any form of slavery, or
of feudal supremacy, a forgetfulness so total of the common majesty of the
human soul, and of the brotherly kindness due from man to man, as in the
aristocratic follies in the Renaissance. I have not space to follow out this
most interesting and extensive subject; but here is a single and very curious
example of the kind of flattery with which architectural teaching was
mingled when addressed to the men of rank of the day.

§ XLIV. In St. Mark’s library there is a very curious Latin manuscript of
the twenty-five books of Averulinus, a Florentine architect, upon the
principles of his art. The book was written in or about 1460, and translated
into Latin, and richly illuminated for Corvinus, king of Hungary, about
1483. I extract from the third book the following passage on the nature of
stones. “As there are three genera of men,—that is to say, nobles, men of
the middle classes, and rustics,—so it appears that there are of stones. For
the marbles and common stones of which we have spoken above, set forth
the rustics. The porphyries and alabasters, and the other harder stones of
mingled quality, represent the middle classes, if we are to deal in
comparisons: and by means of these the ancients adorned their temples with
incrustations and ornaments in a magnificent manner. And after these come
the chalcedonies and sardonyxes, &c., which are so transparent that there

can be seen no spot in them.14 Thus men endowed with nobility lead a life
in which no spot can be found.”

Canute or Cœur de Lion (I name not Godfrey or St. Louis) would have
dashed their sceptres against the lips of a man who should have dared to
utter to them flattery such as this. But in the fifteenth century it was
rendered and accepted as a matter of course, and the tempers which
delighted in it necessarily took pleasure also in every vulgar or false means,
of taking worldly superiority. And among such false means largeness of
scale in the dwelling-house was of course one of the easiest and most direct.
All persons, however senseless or dull, could appreciate size: it required
some exertion of intelligence to enter into the spirit of the quaint carving of
the Gothic times, but none to perceive that one heap of stones was higher
than another.15 And therefore, while in the execution and manner of work
the Renaissance builders zealously vindicated for themselves the attribute
of cold and superior learning, they appealed for such approbation as they
needed from the multitude, to the lowest possible standard of taste; and
while the older workman lavished his labor on the minute niche and narrow
casement, on the doorways no higher than the head, and the contracted
angles of the turreted chamber, the Renaissance builder spared such cost
and toil in his detail, that he might spend it in bringing larger stones from a
distance; and restricted himself to rustication and five orders, that he might
load the ground with colossal piers, and raise an ambitious barrenness of
architecture, as inanimate as it was gigantic, above the feasts and follies of
the powerful or the rich. The Titanic insanity extended itself also into
ecclesiastical design: the principal church in Italy was built with little idea
of any other admirableness than that which was to result from its being
huge; and the religious impressions of those who enter it are to this day
supposed to be dependent, in a great degree, on their discovering that they
cannot span the thumbs of the statues which sustain the vessels for holy
water.

§ XLV. It is easy to understand how an architecture which thus appealed
not less to the lowest instincts of dulness than to the subtlest pride of
learning, rapidly found acceptance with a large body of mankind; and how
the spacious pomp of the new manner of design came to be eagerly adopted
by the luxurious aristocracies, not only of Venice, but of the other countries
of Christendom, now gradually gathering themselves into that insolent and
festering isolation, against which the cry of the poor sounded hourly in
more ominous unison, bursting at last into thunder (mark where,—first
among the planted walks and plashing fountains of the palace wherein the
Renaissance luxury attained its utmost height in Europe, Versailles); that
cry, mingling so much piteousness with its wrath and indignation, “Our soul
is filled with the scornful reproof of the wealthy, and with the despitefulness
of the proud.”

§ XLVI. But of all the evidence bearing upon this subject presented by the
various arts of the fifteenth century, none is so interesting or so conclusive
as that deduced from its tombs. For, exactly in proportion as the pride of life
became more insolent, the fear of death became more servile; and the
difference in the manner in which the men of early and later days adorned
the sepulchre, confesses a still greater difference in their manner of
regarding death. To those he came as the comforter and the friend, rest in
his right hand, hope in his left; to these as the humiliator, the spoiler, and
the avenger. And, therefore, we find the early tombs at once simple and
lovely in adornment, severe and solemn in their expression; confessing the
power, and accepting the peace, of death, openly and joyfully; and in all
their symbols marking that the hope of resurrection lay only in Christ’s
righteousness; signed always with this simple utterance of the dead, “I will
lay me down in peace, and take my rest; for it is thou, Lord, only that
makest me dwell in safety.” But the tombs of the later ages are a ghastly
struggle of mean pride and miserable terror: the one mustering the statues
of the Virtues about the tomb, disguising the sarcophagus with delicate

sculpture, polishing the false periods of the elaborate epitaph, and filling
with strained animation the features of the portrait statue; and the other
summoning underneath, out of the niche or from behind the curtain, the
frowning skull, or scythed skeleton, or some other more terrible image of
the enemy in whose defiance the whiteness of the sepulchre had been set to
shine above the whiteness of the ashes.

§ XLVII. This change in the feeling with which sepulchral monuments
were designed, from the eleventh to the eighteenth centuries, has been
common to the whole of Europe. But, as Venice is in other respects the
centre of the Renaissance system, so also she exhibits this change in the
manner of the sepulchral monument under circumstances peculiarly
calculated to teach us its true character. For the severe guard which, in
earlier times, she put upon every tendency to personal pomp and ambition,
renders the tombs of her ancient monarchs as remarkable for modesty and
simplicity as for their religious feeling; so that, in this respect, they are
separated by a considerable interval from the more costly monuments
erected at the same periods to the kings or nobles of other European states.
In later times, on the other hand, as the piety of the Venetians diminished,
their pride overleaped all limits, and the tombs which in recent epochs,
were erected for men who had lived only to impoverish or disgrace the
state, were as much more magnificent than those contemporaneously
erected for the nobles of Europe, as the monuments for the great Doges had
been humbler. When, in addition to this, we reflect that the art of sculpture,
considered as expressive of emotion, was at a low ebb in Venice in the
twelfth century, and that in the seventeenth she took the lead in Italy in
luxurious work, we shall at once see the chain of examples through which
the change of feeling is expressed, must present more remarkable extremes
here than it can in any other city; extremes so startling that their
impressiveness cannot be diminished, while their intelligibility is greatly

increased, by the large number of intermediate types which have fortunately
been preserved.

It would, however, too much weary the general reader if, without
illustrations, I were to endeavor to lead him step by step through the aisles
of St. John and Paul; and I shall therefore confine myself to a slight notice
of those features in sepulchral architecture generally which are especially
illustrative of the matter at present in hand, and point out the order in
which, if possible, the traveller should visit the tombs in Venice, so as to be
most deeply impressed with the true character of the lessons they convey.

§ XLVIII. I have not such an acquaintance with the modes of entombment
or memorial in the earliest ages of Christianity as would justify me in
making any general statement respecting them: but it seems to me that the
perfect type of a Christian tomb was not developed until toward the
thirteenth century, sooner or later according to the civilization of each
country; that perfect type consisting in the raised and perfectly visible
sarcophagus of stone, bearing upon it a recumbent figure, and the whole
covered by a canopy. Before that type was entirely developed, and in the
more ordinary tombs contemporary with it, we find the simple sarcophagus,
often with only a rough block of stone for its lid, sometimes with a low-
gabled lid like a cottage roof, derived from Egyptian forms, and bearing,
either on the sides or the lid, at least a sculpture of the cross, and sometimes
the name of the deceased, and date of erection of the tomb. In more
elaborate examples rich figure-sculpture is gradually introduced; and in the
perfect period the sarcophagus, even when it does not bear any recumbent
figure, has generally a rich sculpture on its sides representing an angel
presenting the dead, in person and dress as he lived, to Christ or to the
Madonna, with lateral figures, sometimes of saints, sometimes—as in the
tombs of the Dukes of Burgundy at Dijon—of mourners; but in Venice
almost always representing the Annunciation, the angel being placed at one

angle of the sarcophagus, and the Madonna at the other. The canopy, in a
very simple foursquare form, or as an arch over a recess, is added above the
sarcophagus, long before the life-size recumbent figure appears resting
upon it. By the time that the sculptors had acquired skill enough to give
much expression to this figure, the canopy attains an exquisite symmetry
and richness; and, in the most elaborate examples, is surmounted by a
statue, generally small, representing the dead person in the full strength and
pride of life, while the recumbent figure shows him as he lay in death. And,
at this point, the perfect type of the Gothic tomb is reached.

§ XLIX. Of the simple sarcophagus tomb there are many exquisite
examples both at Venice and Verona; the most interesting in Venice are
those which are set in the recesses of the rude brick front of the Church of
St. John and Paul, ornamented only, for the most part, with two crosses set
in circles, and the legend with the name of the dead, and an “Orate pro
anima” in another circle in the centre. And in this we may note one great
proof of superiority in Italian over English tombs; the latter being often
enriched with quatrefoils, small shafts, and arches, and other ordinary
architectural decorations, which destroy their seriousness and solemnity,
render them little more than ornamental, and have no religious meaning
whatever; while the Italian sarcophagi are kept massive, smooth, and
gloomy,—heavy-lidded dungeons of stone, like rock-tombs,—but bearing
on their surface, sculptured with tender and narrow lines, the emblem of the
cross, not presumptuously nor proudly, but dimly graven upon their granite,
like the hope which the human heart holds, but hardly perceives in its
heaviness.

§ L. Among the tombs in front of the Church of St. John and Paul there is
one which is peculiarly illustrative of the simplicity of these earlier ages. It
is on the left of the entrance, a massy sarcophagus with low horns as of an
altar, placed in a rude recess of the outside wall, shattered and worn, and

here and there entangled among wild grass and weeds. Yet it is the tomb of
two Doges, Jacopo and Lorenzo Tiepolo, by one of whom nearly the whole
ground was given for the erection of the noble church in front of which his
unprotected tomb is wasting away. The sarcophagus bears an inscription in
the centre, describing the acts of the Doges, of which the letters show that it
was added a considerable period after the erection of the tomb: the original
legend is still left in other letters on its base, to this effect,

“Lord James, died 1251. Lord Laurence, died 1288.”

At the two corners of the sarcophagus are two angels bearing censers;
and on its lid two birds, with crosses like crests upon their heads. For the
sake of the traveller in Venice the reader will, I think, pardon me the
momentary irrelevancy of telling the meaning of these symbols.

§ LI. The foundation of the church of St. John and Paul was laid by the
Dominicans about 1234, under the immediate protection of the Senate and
the Doge Giacomo Tiepolo, accorded to them in consequence of a
miraculous vision appearing to the Doge; of which the following account is
given in popular tradition:

“In the year 1226, the Doge Giacomo Tiepolo dreamed a dream; and in
his dream he saw the little oratory of the Dominicans, and, behold, the
ground all around it (now occupied by the church) was covered with roses
of the color of vermilion, and the air was filled with their fragrance. And in
the midst of the roses, there were seen flying to and fro a crowd of white
doves, with golden crosses upon their heads. And while the Doge looked,
and wondered, behold, two angels descended from heaven with golden
censers, and passing through the oratory, and forth among the flowers, they
filled the place with the smoke of their incense. Then the Doge heard
suddenly a clear and loud voice which proclaimed, ‘This is the place that I
have chosen for my preachers;’ and having heard it, straightway he awoke

and went to the Senate, and declared to them the vision. Then the Senate
decreed that forty paces of ground should be given to enlarge the
monastery; and the Doge Tiepolo himself made a still larger grant
afterwards.”

There is nothing miraculous in the occurrence of such a dream as this to
the devout Doge; and the fact, of which there is no doubt, that the greater
part of the land on which the church stands was given by him, is partly a
confirmation of the story. But, whether the sculptures on the tomb were
records of the vision, or the vision a monkish invention from the sculptures
on the tomb, the reader will not, I believe, look upon its doves and crosses,
or rudely carved angels, any more with disdain; knowing how, in one way
or another, they were connected with a point of deep religious belief.

§ LII. Towards the beginning of the fourteenth century, in Venice, the
recumbent figure begins to appear on the sarcophagus, the first dated
example being also one of the most beautiful; the statue of the prophet
Simeon, sculptured upon the tomb which was to receive his relics in the
church dedicated to him under the name of San Simeone Grande. So soon
as the figure appears, the sarcophagus becomes much more richly
sculptured, but always with definite religious purpose. It is usually divided
into two panels, which are filled with small bas-reliefs of the acts or
martyrdom of the patron saints of the deceased: between them, in the
centre, Christ, or the Virgin and Child, are richly enthroned, under a
curtained canopy; and the two figures representing the Annunciation are
almost always at the angles; the promise of the Birth of Christ being taken
as at once the ground and the type of the promise of eternal life to all men.

§ LIII. These figures are always in Venice most rudely chiselled; the
progress of figure sculpture being there comparatively tardy. At Verona,
where the great Pisan school had strong influence, the monumental
sculpture is immeasurably finer; and, so early as about the year 1335,16 the

consummate form of the Gothic tomb occurs in the monument of Can
Grande della Scala at Verona. It is set over the portal of the chapel anciently
belonging to the family. The sarcophagus is sculptured with shallow bas-
reliefs, representing (which is rare in the tombs with which I am acquainted
in Italy, unless they are those of saints) the principal achievements of the
warrior’s life, especially the siege of Vicenza and battle of Placenza; these
sculptures, however, form little more than a chased and roughened
groundwork for the fully relieved statues representing the Annunciation,
projecting boldly from the front of the sarcophagus. Above, the Lord of
Verona is laid in his long robe of civil dignity, wearing the simple bonnet,
consisting merely of a fillet bound round the brow, knotted and falling on
the shoulder. He is laid as asleep; his arms crossed upon his body, and his
sword by his side. Above him, a bold arched canopy is sustained by two
projecting shafts, and on the pinnacle of its roof is the statue of the knight
on his war-horse; his helmet, dragon-winged and crested with the dog’s
head, tossed back behind his shoulders, and the broad and blazoned drapery
floating back from his horse’s breast,—so truly drawn by the old workman
from the life, that it seems to wave in the wind, and the knight’s spear to
shake, and his marble horse to be evermore quickening its pace, and starting
into heavier and hastier charge, as the silver clouds float past behind it in
the sky.

§ LIV. Now observe, in this tomb, as much concession is made to the
pride of man as may ever consist with honor, discretion, or dignity. I do not
enter into any question respecting the character of Can Grande, though
there can be little doubt that he was one of the best among the nobles of his
time; but that is not to our purpose. It is not the question whether his wars
were just, or his greatness honorably achieved; but whether, supposing them
to have been so, these facts are well and gracefully told upon his tomb. And
I believe there can be no hesitation in the admission of its perfect feeling
and truth. Though beautiful, the tomb is so little conspicuous or intrusive,

that it serves only to decorate the portal of the little chapel, and is hardly
regarded by the traveller as he enters. When it is examined, the history of
the acts of the dead is found subdued into dim and minute ornament upon
his coffin; and the principal aim of the monument is to direct the thoughts to
his image as he lies in death, and to the expression of his hope of
resurrection; while, seen as by the memory far away, diminished in the
brightness of the sky, there is set the likeness of his armed youth, stately, as
it stood of old, in the front of battle, and meet to be thus recorded for us,
that we may now be able to remember the dignity of the frame, of which
those who once looked upon it hardly remembered that it was dust.

§ LV. This, I repeat, is as much as may ever be granted, but this ought
always to be granted, to the honor and the affection of men. The tomb
which stands beside that of Can Grande, nearest it in the little field of sleep,
already shows the traces of erring ambition. It is the tomb of Mastino the
Second, in whose reign began the decline of his family. It is altogether
exquisite as a work of art; and the evidence of a less wise or noble feeling
in its design is found only in this, that the image of a virtue, Fortitude, as
belonging to the dead, is placed on the extremity of the sarcophagus,
opposite to the Crucifixion. But for this slight circumstance, of which the
significance will only be appreciated as we examine the series of later
monuments, the composition of this monument of Can Mastino would have
been as perfect as its decoration is refined. It consists, like that of Can
Grande, of the raised sarcophagus, bearing the recumbent statue, protected
by a noble foursquare canopy, sculptured with ancient Scripture history. On
one side of the sarcophagus is Christ enthroned, with Can Mastino kneeling
before Him; on the other, Christ is represented in the mystical form, half-
rising from the tomb, meant, I believe, to be at once typical of His passion
and resurrection. The lateral panels are occupied by statues of saints. At one
extremity of the sarcophagus is the Crucifixion; at the other, a noble statue
of Fortitude, with a lion’s skin thrown over her shoulders, its head forming

a shield upon her breast, her flowing hair bound with a narrow fillet, and a
three-edged sword in her gauntleted right hand, drawn back sternly behind
her thigh, while, in her left, she bears high the shield of the Scalas.

§ LVI. Close to this monument is another, the stateliest and most
sumptuous of the three; it first arrests the eye of the stranger, and long
detains it,—a many-pinnacled pile surrounded by niches with statues of the
warrior saints.

It is beautiful, for it still belongs to the noble time, the latter part of the
fourteenth century; but its work is coarser than that of the other, and its
pride may well prepare us to learn that it was built for himself, in his own
lifetime, by the man whose statue crowns it, Can Signorio della Scala. Now
observe, for this is infinitely significant. Can Mastino II. was feeble and
wicked, and began the ruin of his house; his sarcophagus is the first which
bears upon it the image of a virtue, but he lays claim only to Fortitude. Can
Signorio was twice a fratricide, the last time when he lay upon his death-
bed: his tomb bears upon its gables the images of six virtues,—Faith, Hope,
Charity, Prudence, and (I believe) Justice and Fortitude.

§ LVII. Let us now return to Venice, where, in the second chapel counting
from right to left, at the west end of the Church of the Frari, there is a very
early fourteenth, or perhaps late thirteenth, century tomb, another exquisite
example of the perfect Gothic form. It is a knight’s; but there is no
inscription upon it, and his name is unknown. It consists of a sarcophagus,
supported on bold brackets against the chapel wall, bearing the recumbent
figure, protected by a simple canopy in the form of a pointed arch,
pinnacled by the knight’s crest; beneath which the shadowy space is painted
dark blue, and strewn with stars. The statue itself is rudely carved; but its
lines, as seen from the intended distance, are both tender and masterly. The
knight is laid in his mail, only the hands and face being bare. The hauberk
and helmet are of chain-mail, the armor for the limbs of jointed steel; a

tunic, fitting close to the breast, and marking the noble swell of it by two
narrow embroidered lines, is worn over the mail; his dagger is at his right
side; his long cross-belted sword, not seen by the spectator from below, at
his left. His feet rest on a hound (the hound being his crest), which looks up
towards its master. In general, in tombs of this kind, the face of the statue is
slightly turned towards the spectator; in this monument, on the contrary, it
is turned away from him, towards the depth of the arch: for there, just above
the warrior’s breast, is carved a small image of St. Joseph bearing the infant
Christ, who looks down upon the resting figure; and to this image its
countenance is turned. The appearance of the entire tomb is as if the warrior
had seen the vision of Christ in his dying moments, and had fallen back
peacefully upon his pillow, with his eyes still turned to it, and his hands
clasped in prayer.

§ LVIII. On the opposite side of this chapel is another very lovely tomb, to
Duccio degli Alberti, a Florentine ambassador at Venice; noticeable chiefly
as being the first in Venice on which any images of the Virtues appear. We
shall return to it presently, but some account must first be given of the more
important among the other tombs in Venice belonging to the perfect period.
Of these, by far the most interesting, though not the most elaborate, is that
of the great Doge Francesco Dandolo, whose ashes, it might have been
thought, were honorable enough to have been permitted to rest undisturbed
in the chapter-house of the Frari, where they were first laid. But, as if there
were not room enough, nor waste houses enough in the desolate city to
receive a few convent papers, the monks, wanting an “archivio,” have
separated the tomb into three pieces: the canopy, a simple arch sustained on
brackets, still remains on the blank walls of the desecrated chamber; the
sarcophagus has been transported to a kind of museum of antiquities,
established in what was once the cloister of Santa Maria della Salute; and
the painting which filled the lunette behind it is hung far out of sight, at one
end of the sacristy of the same church. The sarcophagus is completely

charged with bas-reliefs: at its two extremities are the types of St. Mark and
St. John; in front, a noble sculpture of the death of the Virgin; at the angles,
angels holding vases. The whole space is occupied by the sculpture; there
are no spiral shafts or panelled divisions; only a basic plinth below, and
crowning plinth above, the sculpture being raised from a deep concave field
between the two, but, in order to give piquancy and picturesqueness to the
mass of figures, two small trees are introduced at the head and foot of the
Madonna’s couch, an oak and a stone pine.

§ LIX. It was said above,17 in speaking of the frequent disputes of the
Venetians with the Pontifical power, which in their early days they had so
strenuously supported, that “the humiliation of Francesco Dandolo blotted
out the shame of Barbarossa.” It is indeed well that the two events should
be remembered together. By the help of the Venetians, Alexander III. was
enabled, in the twelfth century, to put his foot upon the neck of the emperor
Barbarossa, quoting the words of the Psalm, “Thou shalt tread upon the lion
and the adder.” A hundred and fifty years later, the Venetian ambassador,
Francesco Dandolo, unable to obtain even an audience from the Pope,
Clement V., to whom he had been sent to pray for a removal of the sentence
of excommunication pronounced against the republic, concealed himself
(according to the common tradition) beneath the Pontiff’s dining-table; and
thence coming out as he sat down to meat, embraced his feet, and obtained,
by tearful entreaties, the removal of the terrible sentence.

I say, “according to the common tradition;” for there are some doubts
cast upon the story by its supplement. Most of the Venetian historians assert
that Francesco Dandolo’s surname of “Dog” was given him first on this
occasion, in insult, by the cardinals; and that the Venetians, in remembrance
of the grace which his humiliation had won for them, made it a title of
honor to him and to his race. It has, however, been proved18 that the
surname was borne by the ancestors of Francesco Dandolo long before; and

the falsity of this seal of the legend renders also its circumstances doubtful.
But the main fact of grievous humiliation having been undergone, admits of
no dispute; the existence of such a tradition at all is in itself a proof of its
truth; it was not one likely to be either invented or received without
foundation: and it will be well, therefore, that the reader should remember,
in connection with the treatment of Barbarossa at the door of the Church of
St. Mark’s, that in the Vatican, one hundred and fifty years later, a Venetian
noble, a future Doge, submitted to a degradation, of which the current
report among his people was, that he had crept on his hands and knees from
beneath the Pontiff’s table to his feet, and had been spurned as a “dog” by
the cardinals present.

§ LX. There are two principal conclusions to be drawn from this: the
obvious one respecting the insolence of the Papal dominion in the thirteenth
century; the second, that there were probably most deep piety and humility
in the character of the man who could submit to this insolence for the sake
of a benefit to his country. Probably no motive would have been strong
enough to obtain such a sacrifice from most men, however unselfish; but it
was, without doubt, made easier to Dandolo by his profound reverence for
the Pontifical office; a reverence which, however we may now esteem those
who claimed it, could not but have been felt by nearly all good and faithful
men at the time of which we are speaking. This is the main point which I
wish the reader to remember as we look at his tomb, this, and the result of
it,—that, some years afterwards, when he was seated on the throne which
his piety had saved, “there were sixty princes’ ambassadors in Venice at the
same time, requesting the judgment of the Senate on matters of various
concernment, so great was the fame of the uncorrupted justice of the
Fathers.”19

Observe, there are no virtues on this tomb. Nothing but religious history
or symbols; the Death of the Virgin in front, and the types of St. Mark and

St. John at the extremities.

§ LXI. Of the tomb of the Doge Andrea Dandolo, in St. Mark’s, I have
spoken before. It is one of the first in Venice which presents, in a canopy,
the Pisan idea of angels withdrawing curtains, as of a couch, to look down
upon the dead. The sarcophagus is richly decorated with flower-work; the
usual figures of the Annunciation are at the sides; an enthroned Madonna in
the centre; and two bas-reliefs, one of the martyrdom of the Doge’s patron
saint, St. Andrew, occupy the intermediate spaces. All these tombs have
been richly colored; the hair of the angels has here been gilded, their wings
bedropped with silver, and their garments covered with the most exquisite
arabesques. This tomb, and that of St. Isidore in another chapel of St.
Mark’s, which was begun by this very Doge, Andrea Dandolo, and
completed after his death in 1354, are both nearly alike in their treatment,
and are, on the whole, the best existing examples of Venetian monumental
sculpture.

§ LXII. Of much ruder workmanship, though still most precious, and
singularly interesting from its quaintness, is a sarcophagus in the
northernmost chapel, beside the choir of St. John and Paul, charged with
two bas-reliefs and many figures, but which bears no inscription. It has,
however, a shield with three dolphins on its brackets; and as at the feet of
the Madonna in its centre there is a small kneeling figure of a Doge, we
know it to be the tomb of the Doge Giovanni Dolfino, who came to the
throne in 1356.

He was chosen Doge while, as provveditore, he was in Treviso,
defending the city against the King of Hungary. The Venetians sent to the
besiegers, praying that their newly elected Doge might be permitted to pass
the Hungarian lines. Their request was refused, the Hungarians exulting that
they held the Doge of Venice prisoner in Treviso. But Dolfino, with a body
of two hundred horse, cut his way through their lines by night, and reached

Mestre (Malghera) in safety, where he was met by the Senate. His bravery
could not avert the misfortunes which were accumulating on the republic.
The Hungarian war was ignominiously terminated by the surrender of
Dalmatia: the Doge’s heart was broken, his eyesight failed him, and he died
of the plague four years after he had ascended the throne.

§ LXIII. It is perhaps on this account, perhaps in consequence of later
injuries, that the tomb has neither effigy nor inscription: that it has been
subjected to some violence is evident from the dentil which once crowned
its leaf-cornice being now broken away, showing the whole front. But,
fortunately, the sculpture of the sarcophagus itself is little injured.

There are two saints, male and female, at its angles, each in a little niche;
a Christ, enthroned in the centre, the Doge and Dogaressa kneeling at his
feet; in the two intermediate panels, on one side the Epiphany, on the other
the Death of the Virgin; the whole supported, as well as crowned, by an
elaborate leaf-plinth. The figures under the niches are rudely cut, and of
little interest. Not so the central group. Instead of a niche, the Christ is
seated under a square tent, or tabernacle, formed by curtains running on
rods; the idea, of course, as usual, borrowed from the Pisan one, but here
ingeniously applied. The curtains are opened in front, showing those at the
back of the tent, behind the seated figure; the perspective of the two retiring
sides being very tolerably suggested. Two angels, of half the size of the
seated figure, thrust back the near curtains, and look up reverently to the
Christ; while again, at their feet, about one third of their size, and half-
sheltered, as it seems, by their garments, are the two kneeling figures of the
Doge and Dogaressa, though so small and carefully cut, full of life. The
Christ raising one hand as to bless, and holding a book upright and open on
the knees, does not look either towards them or to the angels, but forward;
and there is a very noticeable effort to represent Divine abstraction in the
countenance: the idea of the three magnitudes of spiritual being,—the God,

the Angel, and the Man,—is also to be observed, aided as it is by the
complete subjection of the angelic power to the Divine; for the angels are in
attitudes of the most lowly watchfulness of the face of Christ, and appear
unconscious of the presence of the human beings who are nestled in the
folds of their garments.

§ LXIV. With this interesting but modest tomb of one of the kings of
Venice, it is desirable to compare that of one of her senators, of exactly the
same date, which is raised against the western wall of the Frari, at the end
of the north aisle. It bears the following remarkable inscription:

“Anno MCCCLX. prima die Julii Sepultura . Domini . Simonii Dandolo . amador . de . Justisia . e .
desiroso . de . acrese . el . ben . chomum.”

The “Amador de Justitia” has perhaps some reference to Simon Dandolo’s
having been one of the Giunta who condemned the Doge Faliero. The
sarcophagus is decorated merely by the Annunciation group, and an enthroned
Madonna with a curtain behind her throne, sustained by four tiny angels, who look
over it as they hold it up; but the workmanship of the figures is more than usually
beautiful.

§ LXV. Seven years later, a very noble monument was placed on the north side
of the choir of St. John and Paul, to the Doge Marco Cornaro, chiefly, with respect
to our present subject, noticeable for the absence of religious imagery from the
sarcophagus, which is decorated with roses only; three very beautiful statues of
the Madonna and two saints are, however, set in the canopy above. Opposite this
tomb, though about fifteen years later in date, is the richest monument of the
Gothic period in Venice; that of the Doge Michele Morosini, who died in 1382. It
consists of a highly florid canopy,—an arch crowned by a gable, with pinnacles at
the flanks, boldly crocketed, and with a huge finial at the top representing St.
Michael,—a medallion of Christ set in the gable; under the arch, a mosaic,
representing the Madonna presenting the Doge to Christ upon the cross; beneath,
as usual, the sarcophagus, with a most noble recumbent figure of the Doge, his
face meagre and severe, and sharp in its lines, but exquisite in the form of its
small and princely features. The sarcophagus is adorned with elaborate wrinkled
leafage, projecting in front of it into seven brackets, from which the statues are
broken away; but by which, for there can be no doubt that these last statues
represented the theological and cardinal Virtues, we must for a moment pause.

§ LXVI. It was noticed above, that the tomb of the Florentine ambassador,
Duccio, was the first in Venice which presented images of the Virtues. Its small
lateral statues of Justice and Temperance are exquisitely beautiful, and were, I
have no doubt, executed by a Florentine sculptor; the whole range of artistical
power and religious feeling being, in Florence, full half a century in advance of

that of Venice. But this is the first truly Venetian tomb which has the Virtues; and
it becomes of importance, therefore, to know what was the character of Morosini.

The reader must recollect, that I dated the commencement of the fall of Venice
from the death of Carlo Zeno, considering that no state could be held as in decline,
which numbered such a man amongst its citizens. Carlo Zeno was a candidate for
the Ducal bonnet together with Michael Morosini; and Morosini was chosen. It
might be anticipated, therefore, that there was something more than usually
admirable or illustrious in his character. Yet it is difficult to arrive at a just
estimate of it, as the reader will at once understand by comparing the following
statements:

§ LXVI. 1. “To him (Andrea Contarini) succeeded Morosini, at the age of seventy-four years; a most
learned and prudent man, who also reformed several laws.”—Sansovino, Vite de’ Principi.

2. “It was generally believed that, if his reign had been longer, he would have dignified the state by many
noble laws and institutes; but by so much as his reign was full of hope, by as much was it short in duration,
for he died when he had been at the head of the republic but four months.”—Sabellico, lib. viii.

3. “He was allowed but a short time to enjoy this high dignity, which he had so well deserved by his rare
virtues, for God called him to Himself on the 15th of October.”—Muratori, Annali de’ Italia.

4. “Two candidates presented themselves; one was Zeno, the other that Michael Morosini who, during
the war, had tripled his fortune by his speculations. The suffrages of the electors fell upon him, and he was
proclaimed Doge on the 10th of June.”—Daru, Histoire de Venise, lib. x.

5. “The choice of the electors was directed to Michele Morosini, a noble of illustrious birth, derived from
a stock which, coeval with the republic itself, had produced the conqueror of Tyre, given a queen to
Hungary, and more than one Doge to Venice. The brilliancy of this descent was tarnished in the present
chief representative of the family by the most base and grovelling avarice; for at that moment, in the recent
war, at which all other Venetians were devoting their whole fortunes to the service of the state, Morosini
sought in the distresses of his country an opening for his own private enrichment, and employed his ducats,
not in the assistance of the national wants, but in speculating upon houses which were brought to market at
a price far beneath their real value, and which, upon the return of peace, insured the purchaser a fourfold
profit. ‘What matters the fall of Venice to me, so as I fall not together with her?’ was his selfish and sordid
reply to some one who expressed surprise at the transaction.”—Sketches of Venetian History. Murray, 1831.

§ LXVIII. The writer of the unpretending little history from which the last
quotation is taken has not given his authority for this statement, and I could not
find it, but believed, from the general accuracy of the book, that some authority
might exist better than Daru’s. Under these circumstances, wishing if possible to
ascertain the truth, and to clear the character of this great Doge from the
accusation, if it proved groundless, I wrote to the Count Carlo Morosini, his
descendant, and one of the few remaining representatives of the ancient noblesse
of Venice; one, also, by whom his great ancestral name is revered, and in whom it
is exalted. His answer appears to me altogether conclusive as to the utter fallacy of
the reports of Daru and the English history. I have placed his letter in the close of
this volume (Appendix 6), in order that the reader may himself be the judge upon
this point; and I should not have alluded to Daru’s report, except for the purpose
of contradicting it, but that it still appears to me impossible that any modern
historian should have gratuitously invented the whole story, and that, therefore,
there must have been a trace in the documents which Daru himself possessed, of
some scandal of this kind raised by Morosini’s enemies, perhaps at the very time
of the disputed election with Carlo Zeno. The occurrence of the Virtues upon his
tomb, for the first time in Venetian monumental work, and so richly and
conspicuously placed, may partly have been in public contradiction of such a
floating rumor. But the face of the statue is a more explicit contradiction still; it is
resolute, thoughtful, serene, and full of beauty; and we must, therefore, for once,
allow the somewhat boastful introduction of the Virtues to have been perfectly
just: though the whole tomb is most notable, as furnishing not only the exact
intermediate condition in style between the pure Gothic and its final Renaissance
corruption, but, at the same time, the exactly intermediate condition of feeling
between the pure calmness of early Christianity, and the boastful pomp of the
Renaissance faithlessness; for here we have still the religious humility remaining
in the mosaic of the canopy, which shows the Doge kneeling before the cross,
while yet this tendency to self-trust is shown in the surrounding of the coffin by
the Virtues.

§ LXIX. The next tomb by the side of which they appear is that of Jacopo
Cavalli, in the same chapel of St. John and Paul which contains the tomb of the

Doge Delfin. It is peculiarly rich in religious imagery, adorned by boldly cut types
of the four evangelists, and of two saints, while, on projecting brackets in front of
it, stood three statues of Faith, Hope, and Charity, now lost, but drawn in
Zanotto’s work. It is all rich in detail, and its sculptor has been proud of it, thus
recording his name below the epitaph:

“Qst opera dintalgio e fatto in piera,
Unvenician lafe chanome Polo,
Nato di Jachomel chataiapiera.”

This work of sculpture is done in stone;
A Venetian did it, named Paul,
Son of Jachomel the stone-cutter.

Jacopo Cavalli died in 1384. He was a bold and active Veronese soldier, did the
state much service, was therefore ennobled by it, and became the founder of the
house of the Cavalli; but I find no especial reason for the images of the Virtues,
especially that of Charity, appearing at his tomb, unless it be this: that at the siege
of Feltre, in the war against Leopold of Austria, he refused to assault the city,
because the senate would not grant his soldiers the pillage of the town. The feet of
the recumbent figure, which is in full armor, rest on a dog, and its head on two
lions; and these animals (neither of which form any part of the knight’s bearings)
are said by Zanotto to be intended to symbolize his bravery and fidelity. If,
however, the lions are meant to set forth courage, it is a pity they should have
been represented as howling.

§ LXX. We must next pause for an instant beside the tomb of Michael Steno,
now in the northern aisle of St. John and Paul, having been removed there from
the destroyed church of the Servi: first, to note its remarkable return to the early
simplicity, the sarcophagus being decorated only with two crosses in quatrefoils,
though it is of the fifteenth century, Steno dying in 1413; and, in the second place,
to observe the peculiarity of the epitaph, which eulogises Steno as having been
“amator justitie, pacis, et ubertatis,” “a lover of justice, peace, and plenty.” In the
epitaphs of this period, the virtues which are made most account of in public men

are those which were most useful to their country. We have already seen one
example in the epitaph on Simon Dandolo; and similar expressions occur
constantly in laudatory mentions of their later Doges by the Venetian writers. Thus
Sansovino of Marco Cornaro, “Era savio huomo, eloquente, e amava molto la
pace e l’ abbondanza della citta;” and of Tomaso Mocenigo, “Huomo oltre modo
desideroso della pace.”

Of the tomb of this last-named Doge mention has before been made. Here, as in
Morosini’s, the images of the Virtues have no ironical power, although their great
conspicuousness marks the increase of the boastful feeling in the treatment of
monuments. For the rest, this tomb is the last in Venice which can be considered
as belonging to the Gothic period. Its mouldings are already rudely classical, and
it has meaningless figures in Roman armor at the angles; but its tabernacle above
is still Gothic, and the recumbent figure is very beautiful. It was carved by two
Florentine sculptors in 1423.

§ LXXI. Tomaso Mocenigo was succeeded by the renowned Doge, Francesco
Foscari, under whom, it will be remembered, the last additions were made to the
Gothic Ducal Palace; additions which, in form only, not in spirit, corresponded to
the older portions; since, during his reign, the transition took place which permits
us no longer to consider the Venetian architecture as Gothic at all. He died in
1457, and his tomb is the first important example of Renaissance art.

Not, however, a good characteristic example. It is remarkable chiefly as
introducing all the faults of the Renaissance at an early period, when its merits,
such as they are, were yet undeveloped. Its claim to be rated as a classical
composition is altogether destroyed by the remnants of Gothic feeling which cling
to it here and there in their last forms of degradation; and of which, now that we
find them thus corrupted, the sooner we are rid the better. Thus the sarcophagus is
supported by a species of trefoil arches; the bases of the shafts have still their
spurs; and the whole tomb is covered by a pediment, with crockets and a pinnacle.
We shall find that the perfect Renaissance is at least pure in its insipidity, and
subtle in its vice; but this monument is remarkable as showing the refuse of one

style encumbering the embryo of another, and all principles of life entangled
either in the swaddling clothes or the shroud.

§ LXXII. With respect to our present purpose, however, it is a monument of
enormous importance. We have to trace, be it remembered, the pride of state in its
gradual intrusion upon the sepulchre; and the consequent and correlative
vanishing of the expressions of religious feeling and heavenly hope, together with
the more and more arrogant setting forth of the virtues of the dead. Now this tomb
is the largest and most costly we have yet seen; but its means of religious
expression are limited to a single statue of Christ, small and used merely as a
pinnacle at the top. The rest of the composition is as curious as it is vulgar. The
conceit, so often noticed as having been borrowed from the Pisan school, of
angels withdrawing the curtains of the couch to look down upon the dead, was
brought forward with increasing prominence by every succeeding sculptor; but, as
we draw nearer to the Renaissance period, we find that the angels become of less
importance, and the curtains of more. With the Pisans, the curtains are introduced
as a motive for the angels; with the Renaissance sculptors, the angels are
introduced merely as a motive for the curtains, which become every day more
huge and elaborate. In the monument of Mocenigo, they have already expanded
into a tent, with a pole in the centre of it: and in that of Foscari, for the first time,
the angels are absent altogether; while the curtains are arranged in the form of an
enormous French tent-bed, and are sustained at the flanks by two diminutive
figures in Roman armor; substituted for the angels, merely that the sculptor might
show his knowledge of classical costume. And now observe how often a fault in
feeling induces also a fault in style. In the old tombs, the angels used to stand on
or by the side of the sarcophagus; but their places are here to be occupied by the
Virtues, and therefore, to sustain the diminutive Roman figures at the necessary
height, each has a whole Corinthian pillar to himself, a pillar whose shaft is eleven
feet high, and some three or four feet round: and because this was not high
enough, it is put on a pedestal four feet and a half high; and has a spurred base
besides of its own, a tall capital, then a huge bracket above the capital, and then
another pedestal above the bracket, and on the top of all the diminutive figure who
has charge of the curtains.

§ LXXIII. Under the canopy, thus arranged, is placed the sarcophagus with its
recumbent figure. The statues of the Virgin and the saints have disappeared from
it. In their stead, its panels are filled with half-length figures of Faith, Hope, and
Charity; while Temperance and Fortitude are at the Doge’s feet, Justice and
Prudence at his head, figures now the size of life, yet nevertheless recognizable
only by their attributes: for, except that Hope raises her eyes, there is no difference
in the character or expression of any of their faces,—they are nothing more than
handsome Venetian women, in rather full and courtly dresses, and tolerably well
thrown into postures for effect from below. Fortitude could not of course be
placed in a graceful one without some sacrifice of her character, but that was of no
consequence in the eyes of the sculptors of this period, so she leans back
languidly, and nearly overthrows her own column; while Temperance, and Justice
opposite to her, as neither the left hand of the one nor the right hand of the other
could be seen from below, have been left with one hand each.

§ LXXIV. Still these figures, coarse and feelingless as they are, have been
worked with care, because the principal effect of the tomb depends on them. But
the effigy of the Doge, of which nothing but the side is visible, has been utterly
neglected; and the ingenuity of the sculptor is not so great, at the best, as that he
can afford to be slovenly. There is, indeed, nothing in the history of Foscari which
would lead us to expect anything particularly noble in his face; but I trust,
nevertheless, it has been misrepresented by this despicable carver; for no words
are strong enough to express the baseness of the portraiture. A huge, gross, bony
clown’s face, with the peculiar sodden and sensual cunning in it which is seen so
often in the countenances of the worst Romanist priest; a face part of iron and part
of clay, with the immobility of the one, and the foulness of the other, double
chinned, blunt-mouthed, bony-cheeked, with its brows drawn down into meagre
lines and wrinkles over the eyelids; the face of a man incapable either of joy or
sorrow, unless such as may be caused by the indulgence of passion, or the
mortification of pride. Even had he been such a one, a noble workman would not
have written it so legibly on his tomb; and I believe it to be the image of the
carver’s own mind that is there hewn in the marble, not that of the Doge Foscari.
For the same mind is visible enough throughout, the traces of it mingled with

those of the evil taste of the whole time and people. There is not anything so small
but it is shown in some portion of its treatment; for instance, in the placing of the
shields at the back of the great curtain. In earlier times, the shield, as we have
seen, was represented as merely suspended against the tomb by a thong, or if
sustained in any other manner, still its form was simple and undisguised. Men in
those days used their shields in war, and therefore there was no need to add
dignity to their form by external ornament. That which, through day after day of
mortal danger, had borne back from them the waves of battle, could neither be
degraded by simplicity, nor exalted by decoration. By its rude leathern thong it
seemed to be fastened to their tombs, and the shield of the mighty was not cast
away, though capable of defending its master no more.

§ LXXV. It was otherwise in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The changed
system of warfare was rapidly doing away with the practical service of the shield;
and the chiefs who directed the battle from a distance, or who passed the greater
part of their lives in the council-chamber, soon came to regard the shield as
nothing more than a field for their armorial bearings. It then became a principal
object of their Pride of State to increase the conspicuousness of these marks of
family distinction by surrounding them with various and fantastic ornament,
generally scroll or flower work, which of course deprived the shield of all
appearance of being intended for a soldier’s use. Thus the shield of the Foscari is
introduced in two ways. On the sarcophagus, the bearings are three times
repeated, enclosed in circular disks, which are sustained each by a couple of naked
infants. Above the canopy, two shields of the usual form are set in the centre of
circles filled by a radiating ornament of shell flutings, which give them the effect
of ventilators; and their circumference is farther adorned by gilt rays, undulating
to represent a glory.

§ LXXVI. We now approach that period of the early Renaissance which was
noticed in the preceding chapter as being at first a very visible improvement on
the corrupted Gothic. The tombs executed during the period of the Byzantine
Renaissance exhibit, in the first place, a consummate skill in handling the chisel,
perfect science of drawing and anatomy, high appreciation of good classical
models, and a grace of composition and delicacy of ornament derived, I believe,

principally from the great Florentine sculptors. But, together with this science,
they exhibit also, for a short time, some return to the early religious feeling,
forming a school of sculpture which corresponds to that of the school of the
Bellini in painting; and the only wonder is that there should not have been more
workmen in the fifteenth century doing in marble what Perugino, Francia, and
Bellini did on canvas. There are, indeed, some few, as I have just said, in whom
the good and pure temper shows itself: but the sculptor was necessarily led sooner
than the painter to an exclusive study of classical models, utterly adverse to the
Christian imagination; and he was also deprived of the great purifying and sacred
element of color, besides having much more of merely mechanical and therefore
degrading labor to go through in the realization of his thought. Hence I do not
know any example in sculpture at this period, at least in Venice, which has not
conspicuous faults (not faults of imperfection, as in early sculpture, but of purpose
and sentiment), staining such beauties as it may possess; and the whole school
soon falls away, and merges into vain pomp and meagre metaphor.

§ LXXVII. The most celebrated monument of this period is that to the Doge
Andrea Vendramin, in the Church of St. John and Paul, sculptured about 1480,
and before alluded to in the first chapter of the first volume. It has attracted public
admiration, partly by its costliness, partly by the delicacy and precision of its
chiselling; being otherwise a very base and unworthy example of the school, and
showing neither invention nor feeling. It has the Virtues, as usual, dressed like
heathen goddesses, and totally devoid of expression, though graceful and well
studied merely as female figures. The rest of its sculpture is all of the same kind;
perfect in workmanship, and devoid of thought. Its dragons are covered with
marvellous scales, but have no terror nor sting in them; its birds are perfect in
plumage, but have no song in them; its children lovely of limb, but have no
childishness in them.

§ LXXVIII. Of far other workmanship are the tombs of Pietro and Giovanni
Mocenigo, in St. John and Paul, and of Pietro Bernardo in the Frari; in all which
the details are as full of exquisite fancy, as they are perfect in execution; and in the
two former, and several others of similar feeling, the old religious symbols return;
the Madonna is again seen enthroned under the canopy, and the sarcophagus is

decorated with legends of the saints. But the fatal errors of sentiment are,
nevertheless, always traceable. In the first place, the sculptor is always seen to be
intent upon the exhibition of his skill, more than on producing any effect on the
spectator’s mind; elaborate backgrounds of landscape, with tricks of perspective,
imitations of trees, clouds, and water, and various other unnecessary adjuncts,
merely to show how marble could be subdued; together with useless under-
cutting, and over-finish in subordinate parts, continually exhibiting the same cold
vanity and unexcited precision of mechanism. In the second place, the figures
have all the peculiar tendency to posture-making, which, exhibiting itself first
painfully in Perugino, rapidly destroyed the veracity of composition in all art. By
posture-making I mean, in general, that action of figures which results from the
painter’s considering, in the first place, not how, under the circumstances, they
would actually have walked, or stood, or looked, but how they may most
gracefully and harmoniously walk or stand. In the hands of a great man, posture,
like everything else, becomes noble, even when over-studied, as with Michael
Angelo, who was, perhaps, more than any other, the cause of the mischief; but,
with inferior men, this habit of composing attitudes ends necessarily in utter
lifelessness and abortion. Giotto was, perhaps, of all painters, the most free from
the infection of the poison, always conceiving an incident naturally, and drawing
it unaffectedly; and the absence of posture-making in the works of the Pre-
Raphaelites, as opposed to the Attitudinarianism of the modern school, has been
both one of their principal virtues, and of the principal causes of outcry against
them.

§ LXXIX. But the most significant change in the treatment of these tombs, with
respect to our immediate object, is in the form of the sarcophagus. It was above
noted, that, exactly in proportion to the degree of the pride of life expressed in any
monument, would be also the fear of death; and therefore, as these tombs increase
in splendor, in size, and beauty of workmanship, we perceive a gradual desire to
take away from the definite character of the sarcophagus. In the earliest times, as
we have seen, it was a gloomy mass of stone; gradually it became charged with
religious sculpture; but never with the slightest desire to disguise its form, until
towards the middle of the fifteenth century. It then becomes enriched with flower-

work and hidden by the Virtues; and, finally, losing its foursquare form, it is
modelled on graceful types of ancient vases, made as little like a coffin as
possible, and refined away in various elegancies, till it becomes, at last, a mere
pedestal or stage for the portrait statue. This statue, in the meantime, has been
gradually coming back to life, through a curious series of transitions. The
Vendramin monument is one of the last which shows, or pretends to show, the
recumbent figure laid in death. A few years later, this idea became disagreeable to
polite minds; and, lo! the figures which before had been laid at rest upon the tomb
pillow, raised themselves on their elbows, and began to look round them. The soul
of the sixteenth century dared not contemplate its body in death.

§ LXXX. The reader cannot but remember many instances of this form of
monument, England being peculiarly rich in examples of them; although, with her,
tomb sculpture, after the fourteenth century, is altogether imitative, and in no
degree indicative of the temper of the people. It was from Italy that the authority
for the change was derived; and in Italy only, therefore, that it is truly
correspondent to the change in the national mind. There are many monuments in
Venice of this semi-animate type, most of them carefully sculptured, and some
very admirable as portraits, and for the casting of the drapery, especially those in
the Church of San Salvador; but I shall only direct the reader to one, that of
Jacopo Pesaro, Bishop of Paphos, in the Church of the Frari; notable not only as a
very skilful piece of sculpture, but for the epitaph, singularly characteristic of the
period, and confirmatory of all that I have alleged against it:

“James Pesaro, Bishop of Paphos, who conquered the Turks in war, himself in peace, transported from a
noble family among the Venetians to a nobler among the angels, laid here, expects the noblest crown,
which the just Judge shall give to him in that day. He lived the years of Plato. He died 24th March,
1547.”20

The mingled classicism and carnal pride of this epitaph surely need no
comment. The crown is expected as a right from the justice of the judge, and the
nobility of the Venetian family is only a little lower than that of the angels. The
quaint childishness of the “Vixit annos Platonicos” is also very notable.

§ LXXXI. The statue, however, did not long remain in this partially recumbent
attitude. Even the expression of peace became painful to the frivolous and
thoughtless Italians, and they required the portraiture to be rendered in a manner
that should induce no memory of death. The statue rose up, and presented itself in
front of the tomb, like an actor upon a stage, surrounded now not merely, or not at
all, by the Virtues, but by allegorical figures of Fame and Victory, by genii and
muses, by personifications of humbled kingdoms and adoring nations, and by
every circumstance of pomp, and symbol of adulation, that flattery could suggest,
or insolence could claim.

§ LXXXII. As of the intermediate monumental type, so also of this, the last and
most gross, there are unfortunately many examples in our own country; but the
most wonderful, by far, are still at Venice. I shall, however, particularize only two;
the first, that of the Doge John Pesaro, in the Frari. It is to be observed that we
have passed over a considerable interval of time; we are now in the latter half of
the seventeenth century; the progress of corruption has in the meantime been
incessant, and sculpture has here lost its taste and learning as well as its feeling.
The monument is a huge accumulation of theatrical scenery in marble: four
colossal negro caryatides, grinning and horrible, with faces of black marble and
white eyes, sustain the first story of it; above this, two monsters, long-necked, half
dog and half dragon, sustain an ornamental sarcophagus, on the top of which the
full-length statue of the Doge in robes of state stands forward with its arms
expanded, like an actor courting applause, under a huge canopy of metal, like the
roof of a bed, painted crimson and gold; on each side of him are sitting figures of
genii, and unintelligible personifications gesticulating in Roman armor; below,
between the negro caryatides, are two ghastly figures in bronze, half corpse, half
skeleton, carrying tablets on which is written the eulogium: but in large letters
graven in gold, the following words are the first and last that strike the eye; the
first two phrases, one on each side, on tablets in the lower story, the last under the
portrait statue above:

Vixit annos LXX. Devixit anno MDCLIX.
“Hic revixit anno MDCLXIX.”

We have here, at last, the horrible images of death in violent contrast with the
defiant monument, which pretends to bring the resurrection down to earth, “Hic
revixit;” and it seems impossible for false taste and base feeling to sink lower. Yet
even this monument is surpassed by one in St. John and Paul.

§ LXXXIII. But before we pass to this, the last with which I shall burden the
reader’s attention, let us for a moment, and that we may feel the contrast more
forcibly, return to a tomb of the early times.

In a dark niche in the outer wall of the outer corridor of St. Mark’s—not even in
the church, observe, but in the atrium or porch of it, and on the north side of the
church,—is a solid sarcophagus of white marble, raised only about two feet from
the ground on four stunted square pillars. Its lid is a mere slab of stone; on its
extremities are sculptured two crosses; in front of it are two rows of rude figures,
the uppermost representing Christ with the Apostles: the lower row is of six
figures only, alternately male and female, holding up their hands in the usual
attitude of benediction; the sixth is smaller than the rest, and the midmost of the
other five has a glory round its head. I cannot tell the meaning of these figures, but
between them are suspended censers attached to crosses; a most beautiful
symbolic expression of Christ’s mediatorial function. The whole is surrounded by
a rude wreath of vine leaves, proceeding out of the foot of a cross.

On the bar of marble which separates the two rows of figures are inscribed
these words:

“Here lies the Lord Marin Morosini, Duke.”

It is the tomb of the Doge Marino Morosini, who reigned from 1249 to 1252.

§ LXXXIV. From before this rude and solemn sepulchre let us pass to the
southern aisle of the church of St. John and Paul; and there, towering from the
pavement to the vaulting of the church, behold a mass of marble, sixty or seventy
feet in height, of mingled yellow and white, the yellow carved into the form of an
enormous curtain, with ropes, fringes, and tassels, sustained by cherubs; in front
of which, in the now usual stage attitudes, advance the statues of the Doge

Bertuccio Valier, his son the Doge Silvester Falier, and his son’s wife, Elizabeth.
The statues of the Doges, though mean and Polonius-like, are partly redeemed by
the Ducal robes; but that of the Dogaressa is a consummation of grossness, vanity,
and ugliness,—the figure of a large and wrinkled woman, with elaborate curls in
stiff projection round her face, covered from her shoulders to her feet with ruffs,
furs, lace, jewels, and embroidery. Beneath and around are scattered Virtues,
Victories, Fames, genii,—the entire company of the monumental stage assembled,
as before a drop scene,—executed by various sculptors, and deserving attentive
study as exhibiting every condition of false taste and feeble conception. The
Victory in the centre is peculiarly interesting; the lion by which she is
accompanied, springing on a dragon, has been intended to look terrible, but the
incapable sculptor could not conceive any form of dreadfulness, could not even
make the lion look angry. It looks only lachrymose; and its lifted forepaws, there
being no spring nor motion in its body, give it the appearance of a dog begging.
The inscriptions under the two principal statues are as follows:

“Bertucius Valier, Duke,
Great in wisdom and eloquence,
Greater in his Hellespontic victory,
Greatest in the Prince his son.
Died in the year 1658.”

“Elisabeth Quirina,
The wife of Silvester,
Distinguished by Roman virtue,
By Venetian piety,
And by the Ducal crown,
Died 1708.”

The writers of this age were generally anxious to make the world aware that
they understood the degrees of comparison, and a large number of epitaphs are
principally constructed with this object (compare, in the Latin, that of the Bishop
of Paphos, given above): but the latter of these epitaphs is also interesting from its
mention, in an age now altogether given up to the pursuit of worldly honor, of that

“Venetian piety” which once truly distinguished the city from all others; and of
which some form and shadow, remaining still, served to point an epitaph, and to
feed more cunningly and speciously the pride which could not be satiated with the
sumptuousness of the sepulchre.

§ LXXXV. Thus far, then, of the second element of the Renaissance spirit, the
Pride of State; nor need we go farther to learn the reason of the fall of Venice. She
was already likened in her thoughts, and was therefore to be likened in her ruin, to
the Virgin of Babylon. The Pride of State and the Pride of Knowledge were no
new passions: the sentence against them had gone forth from everlasting. “Thou
saidst, I shall be a lady for ever; so that thou didst not lay these things to thine
heart ... Thy wisdom and thy knowledge, it hath perverted thee; and thou hast said
in thine heart, I am, and none else beside me. Therefore shall evil come upon thee
...; thy merchants from thy youth, they shall wander every one to his quarter; none
shall save thee.”21

§ LXXXVI. III. Pride of System. I might have illustrated these evil principles
from a thousand other sources, but I have not time to pursue the subject farther,
and must pass to the third element above named, the Pride of System. It need not
detain us so long as either of the others, for it is at once more palpable and less
dangerous. The manner in which the pride of the fifteenth century corrupted the
sources of knowledge, and diminished the majesty, while it multiplied the
trappings, of state, is in general little observed; but the reader is probably already
well and sufficiently aware of the curious tendency to formulization and system
which, under the name of philosophy, encumbered the minds of the Renaissance
schoolmen. As it was above stated, grammar became the first of sciences; and
whatever subject had to be treated, the first aim of the philosopher was to subject
its principles to a code of laws, in the observation of which the merit of the
speaker, thinker, or worker, in or on that subject, was thereafter to consist; so that
the whole mind of the world was occupied by the exclusive study of Restraints.
The sound of the forging of fetters was heard from sea to sea. The doctors of all
the arts and sciences set themselves daily to the invention of new varieties of
cages and manacles; they themselves wore, instead of gowns, a chain mail, whose
purpose was not so much to avert the weapon of the adversary as to restrain the

motions of the wearer; and all the acts, thoughts, and workings of mankind,—
poetry, painting, architecture, and philosophy,—were reduced by them merely to
so many different forms of fetter-dance.

§ LXXXVII. Now, I am very sure that no reader who has given any attention to
the former portions of this work, or the tendency of what else I have written, more
especially the last chapter of the “Seven Lamps,” will suppose me to underrate the
importance, or dispute the authority, of law. It has been necessary for me to allege
these again and again, nor can they ever be too often or too energetically alleged,
against the vast masses of men who now disturb or retard the advance of
civilization; heady and high-minded, despisers of discipline, and refusers of
correction. But law, so far as it can be reduced to form and system, and is not
written upon the heart,—as it is, in a Divine loyalty, upon the hearts of the great
hierarchies who serve and wait about the throne of the Eternal Lawgiver,—this
lower and formally expressible law has, I say, two objects. It is either for the
definition and restraint of sin, or the guidance of simplicity; it either explains,
forbids, and punishes wickedness, or it guides the movements and actions both of
lifeless things and of the more simple and untaught among responsible agents.
And so long, therefore, as sin and foolishness are in the world, so long it will be
necessary for men to submit themselves painfully to this lower law, in proportion
to their need of being corrected, and to the degree of childishness or simplicity by
which they approach more nearly to the condition of the unthinking and inanimate
things which are governed by law altogether; yet yielding, in the manner of their
submission to it, a singular lesson to the pride of man,—being obedient more
perfectly in proportion to their greatness.22 But, so far as men become good and
wise, and rise above the state of children, so far they become emancipated from
this written law, and invested with the perfect freedom which consists in the
fulness and joyfulness of compliance with a higher and unwritten law; a law so
universal, so subtle, so glorious, that nothing but the heart can keep it.

§ LXXXVIII. Now pride opposes itself to the observance of this Divine law in two
opposite ways: either by brute resistance, which is the way of the rabble and its
leaders, denying or defying law altogether; or by formal compliance, which is the
way of the Pharisee, exalting himself while he pretends to obedience, and making

void the infinite and spiritual commandment by the finite and lettered
commandment. And it is easy to know which law we are obeying: for any law
which we magnify and keep through pride, is always the law of the letter; but that
which we love and keep through humility, is the law of the Spirit: And the letter
killeth, but the Spirit giveth life.

§ LXXXIX. In the appliance of this universal principle to what we have at present
in hand, it is to be noted, that all written or writable law respecting the arts is for
the childish and ignorant: that in the beginning of teaching, it is possible to say
that this or that must or must not be done; and laws of color and shade may be
taught, as laws of harmony are to the young scholar in music. But the moment a
man begins to be anything deserving the name of an artist, all this teachable law
has become a matter of course with him; and if, thenceforth, he boast himself
anywise in the law, or pretend that he lives and works by it, it is a sure sign that he
is merely tithing cummin, and that there is no true art nor religion in him. For the
true artist has that inspiration in him which is above all law, or rather, which is
continually working out such magnificent and perfect obedience to supreme law,
as can in no wise be rendered by line and rule. There are more laws perceived and
fulfilled in the single stroke of a great workman, than could be written in a
volume. His science is inexpressibly subtle, directly taught him by his Maker, not
in any wise communicable or imitable.23 Neither can any written or definitely
observable laws enable us to do any great thing. It is possible, by measuring and
administering quantities of color, to paint a room wall so that it shall not hurt the
eye; but there are no laws by observing which we can become Titians. It is
possible so to measure and administer syllables, as to construct harmonious verse;
but there are no laws by which we can write Iliads. Out of the poem or the picture,
once produced, men may elicit laws by the volume, and study them with
advantage, to the better understanding of the existing poem or picture; but no
more write or paint another, than by discovering laws of vegetation they can make
a tree to grow. And therefore, wheresoever we find the system and formality of
rules much dwelt upon, and spoken of as anything else than a help for children,
there we may be sure that noble art is not even understood, far less reached. And
thus it was with all the common and public mind in the fifteenth and sixteenth

centuries. The greater men, indeed, broke through the thorn hedges; and, though
much time was lost by the learned among them in writing Latin verses and
anagrams, and arranging the framework of quaint sonnets and dexterous
syllogisms, still they tore their way through the sapless thicket by force of intellect
or of piety; for it was not possible that, either in literature or in painting, rules
could be received by any strong mind, so as materially to interfere with its
originality: and the crabbed discipline and exact scholarship became an advantage
to the men who could pass through and despise them; so that in spite of the rules
of the drama we had Shakspeare, and in spite of the rules of art we had Tintoret,—
both of them, to this day, doing perpetual violence to the vulgar scholarship and
dim-eyed proprieties of the multitude.

§ XC. But in architecture it was not so; for that was the art of the multitude, and
was affected by all their errors; and the great men who entered its field, like
Michael Angelo, found expression for all the best part of their minds in sculpture,
and made the architecture merely its shell. So the simpletons and sophists had
their way with it: and the reader can have no conception of the inanities and
puerilities of the writers, who, with the help of Vitruvius, re-established its “five
orders,” determined the proportions of each, and gave the various recipes for
sublimity and beauty, which have been thenceforward followed to this day, but
which may, I believe, in this age of perfect machinery, be followed out still farther.
If, indeed, there are only five perfect forms of columns and architraves, and there
be a fixed proportion to each, it is certainly possible, with a little ingenuity, so to
regulate a stonecutting machine, as that it shall furnish pillars and friezes to the
size ordered, of any of the five orders, on the most perfect Greek models, in any
quantity; an epitome, also, of Vitruvius, may be made so simple, as to enable any
bricklayer to set them up at their proper distances, and we may dispense with our
architects altogether.

§ XCI. But if this be not so, and there be any truth in the faint persuasion which
still lurks in men’s minds that architecture is an art, and that it requires some
gleam of intellect to practise it, then let the whole system of the orders and their
proportions be cast out and trampled down as the most vain, barbarous, and paltry
deception that was ever stamped on human prejudice; and let us understand this

plain truth, common to all work of man, that, if it be good work, it is not a copy,
nor anything done by rule, but a freshly and divinely imagined thing. Five orders!
There is not a side chapel in any Gothic cathedral but it has fifty orders, the worst
of them better than the best of the Greek ones, and all new; and a single inventive
human soul could create a thousand orders in an hour.24 And this would have been
discovered even in the worst times, but that, as I said, the greatest men of the age
found expression for their invention in the other arts, and the best of those who
devoted themselves to architecture were in great part occupied in adapting the
construction of buildings to new necessities, such as those developed by the
invention of gunpowder (introducing a totally new and most interesting science of
fortification, which directed the ingenuity of Sanmicheli and many others from its
proper channel), and found interest of a meaner kind in the difficulties of
reconciling the obsolete architectural laws they had consented to revive, and the
forms of Roman architecture which they agreed to copy, with the requirements of
the daily life of the sixteenth century.

§ XCII. These, then, were the three principal directions in which the Renaissance
pride manifested itself, and its impulses were rendered still more fatal by the
entrance of another element, inevitably associated with pride. For, as it is written,
“He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool,” so also it is written, “The fool hath
said in his heart, There is no God;” and the self-adulation which influenced not
less the learning of the age than its luxury, led gradually to the forgetfulness of all
things but self, and to an infidelity only the more fatal because it still retained the
form and language of faith.

§ XCIII. IV. Infidelity. In noticing the more prominent forms in which this
faithlessness manifested itself, it is necessary to distinguish justly between that
which was the consequence of respect for Paganism, and that which followed
from the corruption of Catholicism. For as the Roman architecture is not to be
made answerable for the primal corruption of the Gothic, so neither is the Roman
philosophy to be made answerable for the primal corruption of Christianity. Year
after year, as the history of the life of Christ sank back into the depths of time, and
became obscured by the misty atmosphere of the history of the world,—as
intermediate actions and incidents multiplied in number, and countless changes in

men’s modes of life, and tones of thought, rendered it more difficult for them to
imagine the facts of distant time,—it became daily, almost hourly, a greater effort
for the faithful heart to apprehend the entire veracity and vitality of the story of its
Redeemer; and more easy for the thoughtless and remiss to deceive themselves as
to the true character of the belief they had been taught to profess. And this must
have been the case, had the pastors of the Church never failed in their
watchfulness, and the Church itself never erred in its practice or doctrine. But
when every year that removed the truths of the Gospel into deeper distance, added
to them also some false or foolish tradition; when wilful distortion was added to
natural obscurity, and the dimness of memory was disguised by the fruitfulness of
fiction; when, moreover, the enormous temporal power granted to the clergy
attracted into their ranks multitudes of men who, but for such temptation, would
not have pretended to the Christian name, so that grievous wolves entered in
among them, not sparing the flock; and when, by the machinations of such men,
and the remissness of others, the form and administrations of Church doctrine and
discipline had become little more than a means of aggrandizing the power of the
priesthood, it was impossible any longer for men of thoughtfulness or piety to
remain in an unquestioning serenity of faith. The Church had become so mingled
with the world that its witness could no longer be received; and the professing
members of it, who were placed in circumstances such as to enable them to
become aware of its corruptions, and whom their interest or their simplicity did
not bribe or beguile into silence, gradually separated themselves into two vast
multitudes of adverse energy, one tending to Reformation, and the other to
Infidelity.

§ XCIV. Of these, the last stood, as it were, apart, to watch the course of the
struggle between Romanism and Protestantism; a struggle which, however
necessary, was attended with infinite calamity to the Church. For, in the first
place, the Protestant movement was, in reality, not reformation but reanimation. It
poured new life into the Church, but it did not form or define her anew. In some
sort it rather broke down her hedges, so that all they who passed by might pluck
off her grapes. The reformers speedily found that the enemy was never far behind
the sower of good seed; that an evil spirit might enter the ranks of reformation as

well as those of resistance; and that though the deadly blight might be checked
amidst the wheat, there was no hope of ever ridding the wheat itself from the
tares. New temptations were invented by Satan wherewith to oppose the revived
strength of Christianity: as the Romanist, confiding in his human teachers, had
ceased to try whether they were teachers sent from God, so the Protestant,
confiding in the teaching of the Spirit, believed every spirit, and did not try the
spirits whether they were of God. And a thousand enthusiasms and heresies
speedily obscured the faith and divided the force of the Reformation.

§ XCV. But the main evils rose out of the antagonism of the two great parties;
primarily, in the mere fact of the existence of an antagonism. To the eyes of the
unbeliever the Church of Christ, for the first time since its foundation, bore the
aspect of a house divided against itself. Not that many forms of schism had not
before arisen in it; but either they had been obscure and silent, hidden among the
shadows of the Alps and the marshes of the Rhine; or they had been outbreaks of
visible and unmistakable error, cast off by the Church, rootless, and speedily
withering away, while, with much that was erring and criminal, she still retained
within her the pillar and ground of the truth. But here was at last a schism in
which truth and authority were at issue. The body that was cast off withered away
no longer. It stretched out its boughs to the sea and its branches to the river, and it
was the ancient trunk that gave signs of decrepitude. On one side stood the
reanimated faith, in its right hand the book open, and its left hand lifted up to
heaven, appealing for its proof to the Word of the Testimony and the power of the
Holy Ghost. On the other stood, or seemed to stand, all beloved custom and
believed tradition; all that for fifteen hundred years had been closest to the hearts
of men, or most precious for their help. Long-trusted legend; long-reverenced
power; long-practised discipline; faiths that had ruled the destiny, and sealed the
departure, of souls that could not be told or numbered for multitude; prayers, that
from the lips of the fathers to those of the children had distilled like sweet
waterfalls, sounding through the silence of ages, breaking themselves into
heavenly dew to return upon the pastures of the wilderness; hopes, that had set the
face as a flint in the torture, and the sword as a flame in the battle, that had
pointed the purposes and ministered the strength of life, brightened the last

glances and shaped the last syllables of death; charities, that had bound together
the brotherhoods of the mountain and the desert, and had woven chains of pitying
or aspiring communion between this world and the unfathomable beneath and
above; and, more than these, the spirits of all the innumerable, undoubting, dead,
beckoning to the one way by which they had been content to follow the things that
belonged unto their peace;—these all stood on the other side: and the choice must
have been a bitter one, even at the best; but it was rendered tenfold more bitter by
the natural, but most sinful animosity of the two divisions of the Church against
each other.

§ XCVI. On one side this animosity was, of course, inevitable. The Romanist
party, though still including many Christian men, necessarily included, also, all
the worst of those who called themselves Christians. In the fact of its refusing
correction, it stood confessed as the Church of the unholy; and, while it still
counted among its adherents many of the simple and believing,—men
unacquainted with the corruption of the body to which they belonged, or incapable
of accepting any form of doctrine but that which they had been taught from their
youth,—it gathered together with them whatever was carnal and sensual in
priesthood or in people, all the lovers of power in the one, and of ease in the other.
And the rage of these men was, of course, unlimited against those who either
disputed their authority, reprehended their manner of life, or cast suspicion upon
the popular methods of lulling the conscience in the lifetime, or purchasing
salvation on the death-bed.

§ XCVII. Besides this, the reassertion and defence of various tenets which before
had been little more than floating errors in the popular mind, but which, definitely
attacked by Protestantism, it became necessary to fasten down with a band of iron
and brass, gave a form at once more rigid, and less rational, to the whole body of
Romanist Divinity. Multitudes of minds which in other ages might have brought
honor and strength to the Church, preaching the more vital truths which it still
retained, were now occupied in pleading for arraigned falsehoods, or magnifying
disused frivolities; and it can hardly be doubted by any candid observer, that the
nascent or latent errors which God pardoned in times of ignorance, became
unpardonable when they were formally defined and defended; that fallacies which

were forgiven to the enthusiasm of a multitude, were avenged upon the
stubbornness of a Council; that, above all, the great invention of the age, which
rendered God’s word accessible to every man, left all sins against its light
incapable of excuse or expiation; and that from the moment when Rome set
herself in direct opposition to the Bible, the judgment was pronounced upon her,
which made her the scorn and the prey of her own children, and cast her down
from the throne where she had magnified herself against heaven, so low, that at
last the unimaginable scene of the Bethlehem humiliation was mocked in the
temples of Christianity. Judea had seen her God laid in the manger of the beasts of
burden; it was for Christendom to stable the beasts of burden by the altar of her
God.

§ XCVIII. Nor, on the other hand, was the opposition of Protestantism to the
Papacy less injurious to itself. That opposition was, for the most part, intemperate,
undistinguishing, and incautious. It could indeed hardly be otherwise. Fresh
bleeding from the sword of Rome, and still trembling at her anathema, the
reformed churches were little likely to remember any of her benefits, or to regard
any of her teaching. Forced by the Romanist contumely into habits of irreverence,
by the Romanist fallacies into habits of disbelief, the self-trusting, rashly-
reasoning spirit gained ground among them daily. Sect branched out of sect,
presumption rose over presumption; the miracles of the early Church were denied
and its martyrs forgotten, though their power and palm were claimed by the
members of every persecuted sect; pride, malice, wrath, love of change, masked
themselves under the thirst for truth, and mingled with the just resentment of
deception, so that it became impossible even for the best and truest men to know
the plague of their own hearts; while avarice and impiety openly transformed
reformation into robbery, and reproof into sacrilege. Ignorance could as easily
lead the foes of the Church, as lull her slumber; men who would once have been
the unquestioning recipients, were now the shameless inventors of absurd or
perilous superstitions; they who were of the temper that walketh in darkness,
gained little by having discovered their guides to be blind; and the simplicity of
the faith, ill understood and contumaciously alleged, became an excuse for the
rejection of the highest arts and most tried wisdom of mankind: while the learned

infidel, standing aloof, drew his own conclusions, both from the rancor of the
antagonists, and from their errors; believed each in all that he alleged against the
other; and smiled with superior humanity, as he watched the winds of the Alps
drift the ashes of Jerome, and the dust of England drink the blood of King Charles.

§ XCIX. Now all this evil was, of course, entirely independent of the renewal of
the study of Pagan writers. But that renewal found the faith of Christendom
already weakened and divided; and therefore it was itself productive of an effect
tenfold greater than could have been apprehended from it at another time. It acted
first, as before noticed, in leading the attention of all men to words instead of
things; for it was discovered that the language of the middle ages had been
corrupt, and the primal object of every scholar became now to purify his style. To
this study of words, that of forms being added, both as of matters of the first
importance, half the intellect of the age was at once absorbed in the base sciences
of grammar, logic, and rhetoric; studies utterly unworthy of the serious labor of
men, and necessarily rendering those employed upon them incapable of high
thoughts or noble emotion. Of the debasing tendency of philology, no proof is
needed beyond once reading a grammarian’s notes on a great poet: logic is
unnecessary for men who can reason; and about as useful to those who cannot, as
a machine for forcing one foot in due succession before the other would be to a
man who could not walk: while the study of rhetoric is exclusively one for men
who desire to deceive or be deceived; he who has the truth at his heart need never
fear the want of persuasion on his tongue, or, if he fear it, it is because the base
rhetoric of dishonesty keeps the truth from being heard.

§ C. The study of these sciences, therefore, naturally made men shallow and
dishonest in general; but it had a peculiarly fatal effect with respect to religion, in
the view which men took of the Bible. Christ’s teaching was discovered not to be
rhetorical, St. Paul’s preaching not to be logical, and the Greek of the New
Testament not to be grammatical. The stern truth, the profound pathos, the
impatient period, leaping from point to point and leaving the intervals for the
hearer to fill, the comparatively Hebraized and unelaborate idiom, had little in
them of attraction for the students of phrase and syllogism; and the chief
knowledge of the age became one of the chief stumbling-blocks to its religion.

§ CI. But it was not the grammarian and logician alone who was thus retarded or
perverted; in them there had been small loss. The men who could truly appreciate
the higher excellences of the classics were carried away by a current of
enthusiasm which withdrew them from every other study. Christianity was still
professed as a matter of form, but neither the Bible nor the writings of the Fathers
had time left for their perusal, still less heart left for their acceptance. The human
mind is not capable of more than a certain amount of admiration or reverence, and
that which was given to Horace was withdrawn from David. Religion is, of all
subjects, that which will least endure a second place in the heart or thoughts, and a
languid and occasional study of it was sure to lead to error or infidelity. On the
other hand, what was heartily admired and unceasingly contemplated was soon
brought nigh to being believed; and the systems of Pagan mythology began
gradually to assume the places in the human mind from which the unwatched
Christianity was wasting. Men did not indeed openly sacrifice to Jupiter, or build
silver shrines for Diana, but the ideas of Paganism nevertheless became
thoroughly vital and present with them at all times; and it did not matter in the
least, as far as respected the power of true religion, whether the Pagan image was
believed in or not, so long as it entirely occupied the thoughts. The scholar of the
sixteenth century, if he saw the lightning shining from the east unto the west,
thought forthwith of Jupiter, not of the coming of the Son of Man; if he saw the
moon walking in brightness, he thought of Diana, not of the throne which was to
be established for ever as a faithful witness in heaven; and though his heart was
but secretly enticed, yet thus he denied the God that is above.25

And, indeed, this double creed, of Christianity confessed and Paganism
beloved, was worse than Paganism itself, inasmuch as it refused effective and
practical belief altogether. It would have been better to have worshipped Diana
and Jupiter at once, than to have gone on through the whole of life naming one
God, imagining another, and dreading none. Better, a thousandfold, to have been
“a Pagan suckled in some creed outworn,” than to have stood by the great sea of
Eternity and seen no God walking on its waves, no heavenly world on its horizon.

§ CII. This fatal result of an enthusiasm for classical literature was hastened and
heightened by the misdirection of the powers of art. The imagination of the age

was actively set to realize these objects of Pagan belief; and all the most exalted
faculties of man, which, up to that period, had been employed in the service of
Faith, were now transferred to the service of Fiction. The invention which had
formerly been both sanctified and strengthened by laboring under the command of
settled intention, and on the ground of assured belief, had now the reins laid upon
its neck by passion, and all ground of fact cut from beneath its feet; and the
imagination which formerly had helped men to apprehend the truth, now tempted
them to believe a falsehood. The faculties themselves wasted away in their own
treason; one by one they fell in the potter’s field; and the Raphael who seemed
sent and inspired from heaven that he might paint Apostles and Prophets, sank at
once into powerlessness at the feet of Apollo and the Muses.

§ CIII. But this was not all. The habit of using the greatest gifts of imagination
upon fictitious subjects, of course destroyed the honor and value of the same
imagination used in the cause of truth. Exactly in the proportion in which Jupiters
and Mercuries were embodied and believed, in that proportion Virgins and Angels
were disembodied and disbelieved. The images summoned by art began gradually
to assume one average value in the spectator’s mind; and incidents from the Iliad
and from the Exodus to come within the same degrees of credibility. And, farther,
while the powers of the imagination were becoming daily more and more languid,
because unsupported by faith, the manual skill and science of the artist were
continually on the increase. When these had reached a certain point, they began to
be the principal things considered in the picture, and its story or scene to be
thought of only as a theme for their manifestation. Observe the difference. In old
times, men used their powers of painting to show the objects of faith; in later
times, they used the objects of faith that they might show their powers of painting.
The distinction is enormous, the difference incalculable as irreconcilable. And
thus, the more skilful the artist, the less his subject was regarded; and the hearts of
men hardened as their handling softened, until they reached a point when sacred,
profane, or sensual subjects were employed, with absolute indifference, for the
display of color and execution; and gradually the mind of Europe congealed into
that state of utter apathy,—inconceivable, unless it had been witnessed, and
unpardonable, unless by us, who have been infected by it,—which permits us to

place the Madonna and the Aphrodite side by side in our galleries, and to pass,
with the same unmoved inquiry into the manner of their handling, from a
Bacchanal to a Nativity.

Now all this evil, observe, would have been merely the necessary and natural
operation of an enthusiasm for the classics, and of a delight in the mere science of
the artist, on the most virtuous mind. But this operation took place upon minds
enervated by luxury, and which were tempted, at the very same period, to
forgetfulness or denial of all religious principle by their own basest instincts. The
faith which had been undermined by the genius of Pagans, was overthrown by the
crimes of Christians; and the ruin which was begun by scholarship, was completed
by sensuality. The characters of the heathen divinities were as suitable to the
manners of the time as their forms were agreeable to its taste; and Paganism again
became, in effect, the religion of Europe. That is to say, the civilized world is at
this moment, collectively, just as Pagan as it was in the second century; a small
body of believers being now, as they were then, representative of the Church of
Christ in the midst of the faithless: but there is just this difference, and this very
fatal one, between the second and nineteenth centuries, that the Pagans are
nominally and fashionably Christians, and that there is every conceivable variety
and shade of belief between the two; so that not only is it most difficult
theoretically to mark the point where hesitating trust and failing practice change
into definite infidelity, but it has become a point of politeness not to inquire too
deeply into our neighbor’s religious opinions; and, so that no one be offended by
violent breach of external forms, to waive any close examination into the tenets of
faith. The fact is, we distrust each other and ourselves so much, that we dare not
press this matter; we know that if, on any occasion of general intercourse, we turn
to our next neighbor, and put to him some searching or testing question, we shall,
in nine cases out of ten, discover him to be only a Christian in his own way, and as
far as he thinks proper, and that he doubts of many things which we ourselves do
not believe strongly enough to hear doubted without danger. What is in reality
cowardice and faithlessness, we call charity; and consider it the part of
benevolence sometimes to forgive men’s evil practice for the sake of their
accurate faith, and sometimes to forgive their confessed heresy for the sake of

their admirable practice. And under this shelter of charity, humility, and
faintheartedness, the world, unquestioned by others or by itself, mingles with and
overwhelms the small body of Christians, legislates for them, moralizes for them,
reasons for them; and, though itself of course greatly and beneficently influenced
by the association, and held much in check by its pretence to Christianity, yet
undermines, in nearly the same degree, the sincerity and practical power of
Christianity itself, until at last, in the very institutions of which the administration
may be considered as the principal test of the genuineness of national religion,
those devoted to education, the Pagan system is completely triumphant; and the
entire body of the so-called Christian world has established a system of instruction
for its youth, wherein neither the history of Christ’s Church, nor the language of
God’s law, is considered a study of the smallest importance; wherein, of all
subjects of human inquiry, his own religion is the one in which a youth’s
ignorance is most easily forgiven;26 and in which it is held a light matter that he
should be daily guilty of lying, or debauchery, or of blasphemy, so only that he
write Latin verses accurately, and with speed.

I believe that in few years more we shall wake from all these errors in
astonishment, as from evil dreams; having been preserved, in the midst of their
madness, by those hidden roots of active and earnest Christianity which God’s
grace has bound in the English nation with iron and brass. But in the Venetian,
those roots themselves had withered; and, from the palace of their ancient
religion, their pride cast them forth hopelessly to the pasture of the brute. From
pride to infidelity, from infidelity to the unscrupulous and insatiable pursuit of
pleasure, and from this to irremediable degradation, the transitions were swift, like
the falling of a star. The great palaces of the haughtiest nobles of Venice were
stayed, before they had risen far above their foundations, by the blast of a penal
poverty; and the wild grass, on the unfinished fragments of their mighty shafts,
waves at the tide-mark where the power of the godless people first heard the
“Hitherto shalt thou come.” And the regeneration in which they had so vainly
trusted,—the new birth and clear dawning, as they thought it, of all art, all
knowledge, and all hope,—became to them as that dawn which Ezekiel saw on the
hills of Israel: “Behold the day; behold, it is come. The rod hath blossomed, pride

hath budded, violence is risen up into a rod of wickedness. None of them shall
remain, nor of their multitude; let not the buyer rejoice, nor the seller mourn, for
wrath is upon all the multitude thereof.”

8 Or, more briefly, science has to do with facts, art with phenomena. To science, phenomena are
of use only as they lead to facts; and to art facts are of use only as they lead to phenomena. I use the
word “art” here with reference to the fine arts only, for the lower arts of mechanical production I
should reserve the word “manufacture.”

9 Tintoret.

10 St. Bernard.

11 Society always has a destructive influence upon an artist: first by its sympathy with his
meanest powers; secondly, by its chilling want of understanding of his greatest; and, thirdly, by its
vain occupation of his time and thoughts. Of course a painter of men must be among men; but it
ought to be as a watcher, not as a companion.

12 I intended in this place to have introduced some special consideration of the science of
anatomy, which I believe to have been in great part the cause of the decline of modern art; but I
have been anticipated by a writer better able to treat the subject. I have only glanced at his book;
and there is something in the spirit of it which I do not like, and some parts of it are assuredly
wrong; but, respecting anatomy, it seems to me to settle the question indisputably, more especially
as being written by a master of the science. I quote two passages, and must refer the reader to the
sequel.

“The scientific men of forty centuries have failed to describe so accurately, so beautifully, so
artistically, as Homer did, the organic elements constituting the emblems of youth and beauty, and
the waste and decay which these sustain by time and age. All these Homer understood better, and
has described more truthfully than the scientific men of forty centuries....

“Before I approach this question, permit me to make a few remarks on the pre-historic period of
Greece; that era which seems to have produced nearly all the great men.

“On looking attentively at the statues within my observation, I cannot find the slightest
foundation for the assertion that their sculptors must have dissected the human frame and been well
acquainted with the human anatomy. They, like Homer, had discovered Nature’s secret, and

bestowed their whole attention on the exterior. The exterior they read profoundly, and studied
deeply—the living exterior and the dead. Above all, they avoided displaying the dead and dissected
interior, through the exterior. They had discovered that the interior presents hideous shapes, but not
forms. Men during the philosophic era of Greece saw all this, each reading the antique to the best of
his abilities. The man of genius rediscovered the canon of the ancient masters, and wrought on its
principles. The greater number, as now, unequal to this step, merely imitated and copied those who
preceded them.”—Great Artists and Great Anatomists. By R. Knox, M.D. London, Van Voorst,
1852.

Respecting the value of literary knowledge in general as regards art, the reader will also do well
to meditate on the following sentences from Hallam’s “Literature of Europe;” remembering at the
same time what I have above said, that “the root of all great art in Europe is struck in the thirteenth
century,” and that the great time is from 1250 to 1350:

“In Germany the tenth century, Leibnitz declares, was a golden age of learning compared with
the thirteenth.”

“The writers of the thirteenth century display an incredible ignorance, not only of pure idiom, but
of common grammatical rules.”

The fourteenth century was “not superior to the thirteenth in learning.... We may justly praise
Richard of Bury for his zeal in collecting books. But his erudition appears crude, his style
indifferent, and his thoughts superficial.”

I doubt the superficialness of the thoughts: at all events, this is not a character of the time, though
it may be of the writer; for this would affect art more even than literature.

13 Churton’s “Early English Church.” London, 1840.

14 “Quibus nulla macula inest quæ non cernatur. Ita viri nobilitate præditi eam vitam peragant
cui nulla nota possit inviri.” The first sentence is literally, “in which there is no spot that may not be
seen.” But I imagine the writer meant it as I have put it in the text, else his comparison does not
hold.

15 Observe, however, that the magnitude spoken of here and in the following passages, is the
finished and polished magnitude sought for the sake of pomp: not the rough magnitude sought for
the sake of sublimity: respecting which see the “Seven Lamps,” chap. iii. § 5, 6, and 8.

16 Can Grande died in 1329: we can hardly allow more than five years for the erection of his
tomb.

17 Vol. I. Chap. I.

18 Sansovino, lib. xiii.

19 Tentori, vi. 142, i. 157.

20 “Jacobus Pisaurius Paphi Episcopus qui Turcos bello, se ipsum pace vincebat, ex nobili inter
Venetas, ad nobiliorem inter Angelos familiam delatus, nobilissimam in illa die Coronam justo
Judice reddente, hic situs expectat Vixit annos Platonicos. Obijt MDXLVII. IX. Kal. Aprilis.”

21 Isaiah xlvii. 7, 10, 11, 15.

22 Compare “Seven Lamps,” chap. vii. § 3.

23 See the farther remarks on Inspiration, in the fourth chapter.

24 That is to say, orders separated by such distinctions as the old Greek ones: considered with
reference to the bearing power of the capital, all orders may be referred to two, as long ago stated;
just as trees may be referred to the two great classes, monocotyledonous and dicotyledonous.

25 Job xxi: 26-28; Psalm lxxxix. 37.

26 I shall not forget the impression made upon me at Oxford, when, going up for my degree,
and mentioning to one of the authorities that I had not had time enough to read the Epistles
properly, I was told, that “the Epistles were separate sciences, and I need not trouble myself about
them.”

The reader will find some farther notes on this subject in Appendix 7, “Modern Education.”

CHAPTER III.

GROTESQUE RENAISSANCE.

§ I. In the close of the last chapter it was noted that the phases of transition in
the moral temper of the falling Venetians, during their fall, were from pride to
infidelity, and from infidelity to the unscrupulous pursuit of pleasure. During the
last years of the existence of the state, the minds both of the nobility and the
people seem to have been set simply upon the attainment of the means of self-
indulgence. There was not strength enough in them to be proud, nor forethought
enough to be ambitious. One by one the possessions of the state were abandoned
to its enemies; one by one the channels of its trade were forsaken by its own
languor, or occupied and closed against it by its more energetic rivals; and the
time, the resources, and the thoughts of the nation were exclusively occupied in
the invention of such fantastic and costly pleasures as might best amuse their
apathy, lull their remorse, or disguise their ruin.

§ II. The architecture raised at Venice during this period is amongst the worst
and basest ever built by the hands of men, being especially distinguished by a
spirit of brutal mockery and insolent jest, which, exhausting itself in deformed and
monstrous sculpture, can sometimes be hardly otherwise defined than as the
perpetuation in stone of the ribaldries of drunkenness. On such a period, and on
such work, it is painful to dwell, and I had not originally intended to do so; but I
found that the entire spirit of the Renaissance could not be comprehended unless it
was followed to its consummation; and that there were many most interesting
questions arising out of the study of this particular spirit of jesting, with reference
to which I have called it the Grotesque Renaissance. For it is not this period alone
which is distinguished by such a spirit. There is jest—perpetual, careless, and not
unfrequently obscene—in the most noble work of the Gothic periods; and it
becomes, therefore, of the greatest possible importance to examine into the nature
and essence of the Grotesque itself, and to ascertain in what respect it is that the
jesting of art in its highest flight, differs from its jesting in its utmost degradation.

§ III. The place where we may best commence our inquiry is one renowned in
the history of Venice, the space of ground before the Church of Santa Maria
Formosa; a spot which, after the Rialto and St. Mark’s Place, ought to possess a
peculiar interest in the mind of the traveller, in consequence of its connexion with
the most touching and true legend of the Brides of Venice. That legend is related

at length in every Venetian history, and, finally, has been told by the poet Rogers,
in a way which renders it impossible for any one to tell it after him. I have only,
therefore, to remind the reader that the capture of the brides took place in the
cathedral church, St. Pietro di Castello; and that this of Santa Maria Formosa is
connected with the tale, only because it was yearly visited with prayers by the
Venetian maidens, on the anniversary of their ancestors’ deliverance. For that
deliverance, their thanks were to be rendered to the Virgin; and there was no
church then dedicated to the Virgin, in Venice, except this.27

Neither of the cathedral church, nor of this dedicated to St. Mary the Beautiful,
is one stone left upon another. But, from that which has been raised on the site of
the latter, we may receive a most important lesson, introductory to our immediate
subject, if first we glance back to the traditional history of the church which has
been destroyed.

§ IV. No more honorable epithet than “traditional” can be attached to what is
recorded concerning it, yet I should grieve to lose the legend of its first erection.
The Bishop of Uderzo, driven by the Lombards from his Bishopric, as he was
praying, beheld in a vision the Virgin Mother, who ordered him to found a church
in her honor, in the place where he should see a white cloud rest. And when he
went out, the white cloud went before him; and on the place where it rested he
built a church, and it was called the Church of St. Mary the Beautiful, from the
loveliness of the form in which she had appeared in the vision.28

The first church stood only for about two centuries. It was rebuilt in 864, and
enriched with various relics some fifty years later; relics belonging principally to
St. Nicodemus, and much lamented when they and the church were together
destroyed by fire in 1105.

It was then rebuilt in “magnifica forma,” much resembling, according to
Corner, the architecture of the chancel of St. Mark;29 but the information which I
find in various writers, as to the period at which it was reduced to its present
condition, is both sparing and contradictory.

§ V. Thus, by Corner, we are told that this church, resembling St. Mark’s,
“remained untouched for more than four centuries,” until, in 1689, it was thrown
down by an earthquake, and restored by the piety of a rich merchant, Turrin
Toroni, “in ornatissima forma;” and that, for the greater beauty of the renewed
church, it had added to it two façades of marble. With this information that of the
Padre dell’ Oratoria agrees, only he gives the date of the earlier rebuilding of the
church in 1175, and ascribes it to an architect of the name of Barbetta. But Quadri,
in his usually accurate little guide, tells us that this Barbetta rebuilt the church in
the fourteenth century; and that of the two façades, so much admired by Corner,
one is of the sixteenth century, and its architect unknown; and the rest of the
church is of the seventeenth, “in the style of Sansovino.”

§ VI. There is no occasion to examine, or endeavor to reconcile, these
conflicting accounts. All that is necessary for the reader to know is, that every
vestige of the church in which the ceremony took place was destroyed at least as
early as 1689; and that the ceremony itself, having been abolished in the close of
the fourteenth century, is only to be conceived as taking place in that more ancient
church, resembling St. Mark’s, which, even according to Quadri, existed until that
period. I would, therefore, endeavor to fix the reader’s mind, for a moment, on the
contrast between the former and latter aspect of this plot of ground; the former,
when it had its Byzantine church, and its yearly procession of the Doge and the
Brides; and the latter, when it has its Renaissance church “in the style of
Sansovino,” and its yearly honoring is done away.

§ VII. And, first, let us consider for a little the significance and nobleness of that
early custom of the Venetians, which brought about the attack and the rescue of
the year 943: that there should be but one marriage day for the nobles of the whole
nation,30 so that all might rejoice together; and that the sympathy might be full,
not only of the families who that year beheld the alliance of their children, and
prayed for them in one crowd, weeping before the altar, but of all the families of
the state, who saw, in the day which brought happiness to others, the anniversary
of their own. Imagine the strong bond of brotherhood thus sanctified among them,
and consider also the effect on the minds of the youth of the state; the greater
deliberation and openness necessarily given to the contemplation of marriage, to

which all the people were solemnly to bear testimony; the more lofty and
unselfish tone which it would give to all their thoughts. It was the exact contrary
of stolen marriage. It was marriage to which God and man were taken for
witnesses, and every eye was invoked for its glance, and every tongue for its
prayers.31

§ VIII. Later historians have delighted themselves in dwelling on the pageantry
of the marriage day itself, but I do not find that they have authority for the
splendor of their descriptions. I cannot find a word in the older Chronicles about
the jewels or dress of the brides, and I believe the ceremony to have been more
quiet and homely than is usually supposed. The only sentence which gives color
to the usual accounts of it is one of Sansovino’s, in which he says that the
magnificent dress of the brides in his day was founded “on ancient custom.”32
However this may have been, the circumstances of the rite were otherwise very
simple. Each maiden brought her dowry with her in a small “cassetta,” or chest;
they went first to the cathedral, and waited for the youths, who having come, they
heard mass together, and the bishop preached to them and blessed them: and so
each bridegroom took his bride and her dowry and bore her home.

§ IX. It seems that the alarm given by the attack of the pirates put an end to the
custom of fixing one day for all marriages: but the main objects of the institution
were still attained by the perfect publicity given to the marriages of all the noble
families; the bridegroom standing in the Court of the Ducal Palace to receive
congratulations on his betrothal, and the whole body of the nobility attending the
nuptials, and rejoicing, “as at some personal good fortune; since, by the
constitution of the state, they are for ever incorporated together, as if of one and
the same family.”33 But the festival of the 2nd of February, after the year 943,
seems to have been observed only in memory of the deliverance of the brides, and
no longer set apart for public nuptials.

§ X. There is much difficulty in reconciling the various accounts, or
distinguishing the inaccurate ones, of the manner of keeping this memorable
festival. I shall first give Sansovino’s, which is the popular one, and then note the
points of importance in the counter-statements. Sansovino says that the success of

the pursuit of the pirates was owing to the ready help and hard fighting of the men
of the district of Sta. Maria Formosa, for the most part trunkmakers; and that they,
having been presented after the victory to the Doge and the Senate, were told to
ask some favor for their reward. “The good men then said that they desired the
Prince, with his wife and the Signory, to visit every year the church of their
district, on the day of its feast. And the Prince asking them, ‘Suppose it should
rain?’ they answered, ‘We will give you hats to cover you; and if you are thirsty,
we will give you to drink.’ Whence is it that the Vicar, in the name of the people,
presents to the Doge, on his visit, two flasks of malvoisie34 and two oranges; and
presents to him two gilded hats, bearing the arms of the Pope, of the Prince, and of
the Vicar. And thus was instituted the Feast of the Maries, which was called noble
and famous because the people from all round came together to behold it. And it
was celebrated in this manner:....” The account which follows is somewhat prolix;
but its substance is, briefly, that twelve maidens were elected, two for each
division of the city; and that it was decided by lot which contrade, or quarters of
the town, should provide them with dresses. This was done at enormous expense,
one contrada contending with another, and even the jewels of the treasury of St.
Mark being lent for the occasion to the “Maries,” as the twelve damsels were
called. They, being thus dressed with gold, and silver, and jewels, went in their
galley to St. Mark’s for the Doge, who joined them with the Signory, and went
first to San Pietro di Castello to hear mass on St. Mark’s day, the 31st of January,
and to Santa Maria Formosa on the 2nd of February, the intermediate day being
spent in passing in procession through the streets of the city; “and sometimes there
arose quarrels about the places they should pass through, for every one wanted
them to pass by his house.”

§ XI. Nearly the same account is given by Corner, who, however, does not say
anything about the hats or the malvoisie. These, however, we find again in the
Matricola de’ Casseleri, which, of course, sets the services of the trunkmakers and
the privileges obtained by them in the most brilliant light. The quaintness of the
old Venetian is hardly to be rendered into English. “And you must know that the
said trunkmakers were the men who were the cause of such victory, and of taking
the galley, and of cutting all the Triestines to pieces, because, at that time, they

were valiant men and well in order. The which victory was on the 2nd February,
on the day of the Madonna of candles. And at the request and entreaties of the said
trunkmakers, it was decreed that the Doge, every year, as long as Venice shall
endure, should go on the eve of the said feast to vespers in the said church, with
the Signory. And be it noted, that the vicar is obliged to give to the Doge two
flasks of malvoisie, with two oranges besides. And so it is observed, and will be
observed always.” The reader must observe the continual confusion between St.
Mark’s day the 31st of January, and Candlemas the 2nd of February. The fact
appears to be, that the marriage day in the old republic was St. Mark’s day, and the
recovery of the brides was the same day at evening; so that, as we are told by
Sansovino, the commemorative festival began on that day, but it was continued to
the day of the Purification, that especial thanks might be rendered to the Virgin;
and, the visit to Sta. Maria Formosa being the most important ceremony of the
whole festival, the old chroniclers, and even Sansovino, got confused, and
asserted the victory itself to have taken place on the day appointed for that
pilgrimage.

§ XII. I doubt not that the reader who is acquainted with the beautiful lines of
Rogers is as much grieved as I am at the interference of the “casket-makers” with
the achievement which the poet ascribes to the bridegrooms alone; an interference
quite as inopportune as that of old Le Balafré with the victory of his nephew, in
the unsatisfactory conclusion of “Quentin Durward.” I am afraid I cannot get the
casket-makers quite out of the way; but it may gratify some of my readers to know
that a chronicle of the year 1378, quoted by Galliciolli, denies the agency of the
people of Sta. Maria Formosa altogether, in these terms: “Some say that the
people of Sta. M. Formosa were those who recovered the spoil (“predra;” I may
notice, in passing, that most of the old chroniclers appear to consider the recovery
of the caskets rather more a subject of congratulation than that of the brides), and
that, for their reward, they asked the Doge and Signory to visit Sta. M. Formosa;
but this is false. The going to Sta. M. Formosa was because the thing had
succeeded on that day, and because this was then the only church in Venice in
honor of the Virgin.” But here is again the mistake about the day itself; and
besides if we get rid altogether of the trunkmakers, how are we to account for the

ceremony of the oranges and hats, of which the accounts seem authentic? If,
however, the reader likes to substitute “carpenters” or “house-builders” for casket-
makers, he may do so with great reason (vide Galliciolli, lib. ii. § 1758); but I fear
that one or the other body of tradesmen must be allowed to have had no small
share in the honor of the victory.

§ XIII. But whatever doubt attaches to the particular circumstances of its origin,
there is none respecting the splendor of the festival itself, as it was celebrated for
four centuries afterwards. We find that each contrada spent from 800 to 1000
zecchins in the dress of the “Maries” entrusted to it; but I cannot find among how
many contrade the twelve Maries were divided; it is also to be supposed that most
of the accounts given refer to the later periods of the celebration of the festival. In
the beginning of the eleventh century, the good Doge Pietro Orseolo II. left in his
will the third of his entire fortune “per la Festa della Marie;” and, in the fourteenth
century, so many people came from the rest of Italy to see it, that special police
regulations were made for it, and the Council of Ten were twice summoned before
it took place.35 The expense lavished upon it seems to have increased till the year
1379, when all the resources of the republic were required for the terrible war of
Chiozza, and all festivity was for that time put an end to. The issue of the war left
the Venetians with neither the power nor the disposition to restore the festival on
its ancient scale, and they seem to have been ashamed to exhibit it in reduced
splendor. It was entirely abolished.

§ XIV. As if to do away even with its memory, every feature of the surrounding
scene which was associated with that festival has been in succeeding ages
destroyed. With one solitary exception,36 there is not a house left in the whole
Piazza of Santa Maria Formosa from whose windows the festa of the Maries has
ever been seen: of the church in which they worshipped, not a stone is left, even
the form of the ground and direction of the neighboring canals are changed; and
there is now but one landmark to guide the steps of the traveller to the place where
the white cloud rested, and the shrine was built to St. Mary the Beautiful. Yet the
spot is still worth his pilgrimage, for he may receive a lesson upon it, though a
painful one. Let him first fill his mind with the fair images of the ancient festival,
and then seek that landmark the tower of the modern church, built upon the place

where the daughters of Venice knelt yearly with her noblest lords; and let him look
at the head that is carved on the base of the tower,37 still dedicated to St. Mary the
Beautiful.

§ XV. A head,—huge, inhuman, and monstrous,—leering in bestial degradation,
too foul to be either pictured or described, or to be beheld for more than an
instant: yet let it be endured for that instant; for in that head is embodied the type
of the evil spirit to which Venice was abandoned in the fourth period of her
decline; and it is well that we should see and feel the full horror of it on this spot,
and know what pestilence it was that came and breathed upon her beauty, until it
melted away like the white cloud from the ancient fields of Santa Maria Formosa.

§ XVI. This head is one of many hundreds which disgrace the latest buildings of
the city, all more or less agreeing in their expression of sneering mockery, in most
cases enhanced by thrusting out the tongue. Most of them occur upon the bridges,
which were among the very last works undertaken by the republic, several, for
instance, upon the Bridge of Sighs; and they are evidences of a delight in the
contemplation of bestial vice, and the expression of low sarcasm, which is, I
believe, the most hopeless state into which the human mind can fall. This spirit of
idiotic mockery is, as I have said, the most striking characteristic of the last period
of the Renaissance, which, in consequence of the character thus imparted to its
sculpture, I have called grotesque; but it must be our immediate task, and it will be
a most interesting one, to distinguish between this base grotesqueness, and that
magnificent condition of fantastic imagination, which was above noticed as one of
the chief elements of the Northern Gothic mind. Nor is this a question of
interesting speculation merely: for the distinction between the true and false
grotesque is one which the present tendencies of the English mind have rendered
it practically important to ascertain; and that in a degree which, until he has made
some progress in the consideration of the subject, the reader will hardly anticipate.

§ XVII. But, first, I have to note one peculiarity in the late architecture of Venice,
which will materially assist us in understanding the true nature of the spirit which
is to be the subject of our inquiry; and this peculiarity, singularly enough, is first
exemplified in the very façade of Santa Maria Formosa which is flanked by the

grotesque head to which our attention has just been directed. This façade, whose
architect is unknown, consists of a pediment, sustained on four Corinthian
pilasters, and is, I believe, the earliest in Venice which appears entirely destitute of
every religious symbol, sculpture, or inscription; unless the Cardinal’s hat upon
the shield in the centre of the impediment be considered a religious symbol. The
entire façade is nothing else than a monument to the Admiral Vincenzo Cappello.
Two tablets, one between each pair of flanking pillars, record his acts and honors;
and, on the corresponding spaces upon the base of the church, are two circular
trophies, composed of halberts, arrows, flags, tridents, helmets, and lances:
sculptures which are just as valueless in a military as in an ecclesiastical point of
view; for, being all copied from the forms of Roman arms and armor, they cannot
even be referred to for information respecting the costume of the period. Over the
door, as the chief ornament of the façade, exactly in the spot which in the
“barbarous” St. Mark’s is occupied by the figure of Christ, is the statue of
Vincenzo Cappello, in Roman armor. He died in 1542; and we have, therefore, the
latter part of the sixteenth century fixed as the period when, in Venice, churches
were first built to the glory of man, instead of the glory of God.

§ XVIII. Throughout the whole of Scripture history, nothing is more remarkable
than the close connection of punishment with the sin of vain-glory. Every other
sin is occasionally permitted to remain, for lengthened periods, without definite
chastisement; but the forgetfulness of God, and the claim of honor by man, as
belonging to himself, are visited at once, whether in Hezekiah, Nebuchadnezzar,
or Herod, with the most tremendous punishment. We have already seen, that the
first reason for the fall of Venice was the manifestation of such a spirit; and it is
most singular to observe the definiteness with which it is here marked,—as if so
appointed, that it might be impossible for future ages to miss the lesson. For, in
the long inscriptions38 which record the acts of Vincenzo Cappello, it might, at
least, have been anticipated that some expressions would occur indicative of
remaining pretence to religious feeling, or formal acknowledgement of Divine
power. But there are none whatever. The name of God does not once occur; that of
St. Mark is found only in the statement that Cappello was a procurator of the
church: there is no word touching either on the faith or hope of the deceased; and

the only sentence which alludes to supernatural powers at all, alludes to them
under the heathen name of fates, in its explanation of what the Admiral Cappello
would have accomplished, “nisi fata Christianis adversa vetuissent.”

§ XIX. Having taken sufficient note of all the baseness of mind which these facts
indicate in the people, we shall not be surprised to find immediate signs of dotage
in the conception of their architecture. The churches raised throughout this period
are so grossly debased, that even the Italian critics of the present day, who are
partially awakened to the true state of art in Italy, though blind, as yet, to its true
cause, exhaust their terms of reproach upon these last efforts of the Renaissance
builders. The two churches of San Moisè and Santa Maria Zobenigo, which are
among the most remarkable in Venice for their manifestation of insolent atheism,
are characterized by Lazari, the one as “culmine d’ogni follia architettonica,” the
other as “orrido ammasso di pietra d’Istria,” with added expressions of contempt,
as just as it is unmitigated.

§ XX. Now both these churches, which I should like the reader to visit in
succession, if possible, after that of Sta. Maria Formosa, agree with that church,
and with each other, in being totally destitute of religious symbols, and entirely
dedicated to the honor of two Venetian families. In San Moisè, a bust of Vincenzo
Fini is set on a tall narrow pyramid, above the central door, with this marvellous
inscription:

“OMNE FASTIGIVM
VIRTVTE IMPLET
VINCENTIVS FINI.”

It is very difficult to translate this; for fastigium, besides its general sense, has a
particular one in architecture, and refers to the part of the building occupied by the
bust; but the main meaning of it is that “Vincenzo Fini fills all height with his
virtue.” The inscription goes on into farther praise, but this example is enough.
Over the two lateral doors are two other laudatory inscriptions of younger
members of the Fini family, the dates of death of the three heroes being 1660,
1685, and 1726, marking thus the period of consummate degradation.

III.

NOBLE AND IGNOBLE GROTESQUE.

§ XXI. In like manner, the Church of Santa Maria Zobenigo is entirely dedicated
to the Barbaro family; the only religious symbols with which it is invested being
statues of angels blowing brazen trumpets, intended to express the spreading of
the fame of the Barbaro family in heaven. At the top of the church is Venice
crowned, between Justice and Temperance, Justice holding a pair of grocer’s
scales, of iron, swinging in the wind. There is a two-necked stone eagle (the
Barbaro crest), with a copper crown, in the centre of the pediment. A huge statue
of a Barbaro in armor, with a fantastic head-dress, over the central door; and four
Barbaros in niches, two on each side of it, strutting statues, in the common stage
postures of the period,—Jo. Maria Barbaro, sapiens ordinum; Marinus Barbaro,
Senator (reading a speech in a Ciceronian attitude); Franc. Barbaro, legatus in
classe (in armor, with high-heeled boots, and looking resolutely fierce); and
Carolus Barbaro, sapiens ordinum: the decorations of the façade being completed
by two trophies, consisting of drums, trumpets, flags and cannon; and six plans,

sculptured in relief, of the towns of Zara, Candia, Padua, Rome, Corfu, and
Spalatro.

§ XXII. When the traveller has sufficiently considered the meaning of this
façade, he ought to visit the Church of St. Eustachio, remarkable for the dramatic
effect of the group of sculpture on its façade, and then the Church of the
Ospedaletto (see Index, under head Ospedaletto); noticing, on his way, the heads
on the foundations of the Palazzo Corner della Regina, and the Palazzo Pesaro,
and any other heads carved on the modern bridges, closing with those on the
Bridge of Sighs.

He will then have obtained a perfect idea of the style and feeling of the
Grotesque Renaissance. I cannot pollute this volume by any illustration of its
worst forms, but the head turned to the front, on the right-hand in the opposite
Plate, will give the general reader an idea of its most graceful and refined
developments. The figure set beside it, on the left, is a piece of noble grotesque,
from fourteenth century Gothic; and it must be our present task to ascertain the
nature of the difference which exists between the two, by an accurate inquiry into
the true essence of the grotesque spirit itself.

§ XXIII. First, then, it seems to me that the grotesque is, in almost all cases,
composed of two elements, one ludicrous, the other fearful; that, as one or other of
these elements prevails, the grotesque falls into two branches, sportive grotesque
and terrible grotesque; but that we cannot legitimately consider it under these two
aspects, because there are hardly any examples which do not in some degree
combine both elements; there are few grotesques so utterly playful as to be
overcast with no shade of fearfulness, and few so fearful as absolutely to exclude
all ideas of jest. But although we cannot separate the grotesque itself into two
branches, we may easily examine separately the two conditions of mind which it
seems to combine; and consider successively what are the kinds of jest, and what
the kinds of fearfulness, which may be legitimately expressed in the various walks
of art, and how their expressions actually occur in the Gothic and Renaissance
schools.

First, then, what are the conditions of playfulness which we may fitly express in
noble art, or which (for this is the same thing) are consistent with nobleness in
humanity? In other words, what is the proper function of play, with respect not to
youth merely, but to all mankind?

§ XXIV. It is a much more serious question than may be at first supposed; for a
healthy manner of play is necessary in order to a healthy manner of work: and
because the choice of our recreation is, in most cases, left to ourselves, while the
nature of our work is generally fixed by necessity or authority, it may be well
doubted whether more distressful consequences may not have resulted from
mistaken choice in play than from mistaken direction in labor.

§ XXV. Observe, however, that we are only concerned, here, with that kind of
play which causes laughter or implies recreation, not with that which consists in
the excitement of the energies whether of body or mind. Muscular exertion is,
indeed, in youth, one of the conditions of recreation; “but neither the violent
bodily labor which children of all ages agree to call play,” nor the grave
excitement of the mental faculties in games of skill or chance, are in anywise
connected with the state of feeling we have here to investigate, namely, that
sportiveness which man possesses in common with many inferior creatures, but to
which his higher faculties give nobler expression in the various manifestations of
wit, humor, and fancy.

With respect to the manner in which this instinct of playfulness is indulged or
repressed, mankind are broadly distinguishable into four classes: the men who
play wisely; who play necessarily; who play inordinately; and who play not at all.

§ XXVI. First: Those who play wisely. It is evident that the idea of any kind of
play can only be associated with the idea of an imperfect, childish, and fatigable
nature. As far as men can raise that nature, so that it shall no longer be interested
by trifles or exhausted by toils, they raise it above play; he whose heart is at once
fixed upon heaven, and open to the earth, so as to apprehend the importance of
heavenly doctrines, and the compass of human sorrow, will have little disposition
for jest; and exactly in proportion to the breadth and depth of his character and
intellect, will be, in general, the incapability of surprise, or exuberant and sudden

emotion, which must render play impossible. It is, however, evidently not
intended that many men should even reach, far less pass their lives in, that solemn
state of thoughtfulness, which brings them into the nearest brotherhood with their
Divine Master; and the highest and healthiest state which is competent to ordinary
humanity appears to be that which, accepting the necessity of recreation, and
yielding to the impulses of natural delight springing out of health and innocence,
does, indeed, condescend often to playfulness, but never without such deep love
of God, of truth, and of humanity, as shall make even its slightest words reverent,
its idlest fancies profitable, and its keenest satire indulgent. Wordsworth and Plato
furnish us with, perhaps, the finest and highest examples of this playfulness: in the
one case, unmixed with satire, the perfectly simple effusion of that spirit—in

“Which gives to all the self-same bent,
Whose life is wise, and innocent;”

Plato, and, by the by, in a very wise book of our own times, not unworthy of
being named in such companionship, “Friends in Council,” mingled with an
exquisitely tender and loving satire.

§ XXVII. Secondly: The men who play necessarily. That highest species of
playfulness, which we have just been considering, is evidently the condition of a
mind, not only highly cultivated, but so habitually trained to intellectual labor that
it can bring a considerable force of accurate thought into its moments even of
recreation. This is not possible, unless so much repose of mind and heart are
enjoyed, even at the periods of greatest exertion, that the rest required by the
system is diffused over the whole life. To the majority of mankind, such a state is
evidently unattainable. They must, perforce, pass a large part of their lives in
employments both irksome and toilsome, demanding an expenditure of energy
which exhausts the system, and yet consuming that energy upon subjects
incapable of interesting the nobler faculties. When such employments are
intermitted, those noble instincts, fancy, imagination, and curiosity, are all hungry
for the food which the labor of the day has denied to them, while yet the weariness
of the body, in a great degree, forbids their application to any serious subject.

They therefore exert themselves without any determined purpose, and under no
vigorous restraint, but gather, as best they may, such various nourishment, and put
themselves to such fantastic exercise, as may soonest indemnify them for their
past imprisonment, and prepare them to endure their recurrence. This sketching of
the mental limbs as their fetters fall away,—this leaping and dancing of the heart
and intellect, when they are restored to the fresh air of heaven, yet half paralyzed
by their captivity, and unable to turn themselves to any earnest purpose,—I call
necessary play. It is impossible to exaggerate its importance, whether in polity, or
in art.

§ XXVIII. Thirdly: The men who play inordinately. The most perfect state of
society which, consistently with due understanding of man’s nature, it may be
permitted us to conceive, would be one in which the whole human race were
divided, more or less distinctly, into workers and thinkers; that is to say, into the
two classes, who only play wisely, or play necessarily. But the number and the toil
of the working class are enormously increased, probably more than doubled, by
the vices of the men who neither play wisely nor necessarily, but are enabled by
circumstances, and permitted by their want of principle, to make amusement the
object of their existence. There is not any moment of the lives of such men which
is not injurious to others; both because they leave the work undone which was
appointed for them, and because they necessarily think wrongly, whenever it
becomes compulsory upon them to think at all. The greater portion of the misery
of this world arises from the false opinions of men whose idleness has physically
incapacitated them from forming true ones. Every duty which we omit obscures
some truth which we should have known; and the guilt of a life spent in the
pursuit of pleasure is twofold, partly consisting in the perversion of action, and
partly in the dissemination of falsehood.

§ XXIX. There is, however, a less criminal, though hardly less dangerous
condition of mind; which, though not failing in its more urgent duties, fails in the
finer conscientiousness which regulates the degree, and directs the choice, of
amusement, at those times when amusement is allowable. The most frequent error
in this respect is the want of reverence in approaching subjects of importance or
sacredness, and of caution in the expression of thoughts which may encourage like

irreverence in others: and these faults are apt to gain upon the mind until it
becomes habitually more sensible to what is ludicrous and accidental, than to what
is grave and essential, in any subject that is brought before it; or even, at last,
desires to perceive or to know nothing but what may end in jest. Very generally
minds of this character are active and able; and many of them are so far
conscientious, that they believe their jesting forwards their work. But it is difficult
to calculate the harm they do, by destroying the reverence which is our best guide
into all truth; for weakness and evil are easily visible, but greatness and goodness
are often latent; and we do infinite mischief by exposing weakness to eyes which
cannot comprehend greatness. This error, however, is more connected with abuses
of the satirical than of the playful instinct; and I shall have more to say of it
presently.

§ XXX. Lastly: The men who do not play at all: those who are so dull or so
morose as to be incapable of inventing or enjoying jest, and in whom care, guilt,
or pride represses all healthy exhilaration of the fancy; or else men utterly
oppressed with labor, and driven too hard by the necessities of the world to be
capable of any species of happy relaxation.

§ XXXI. We have now to consider the way in which the presence or absence of
joyfulness, in these several classes, is expressed in art.

1. Wise play. The first and noblest class hardly ever speak through art, except
seriously; they feel its nobleness too profoundly, and value the time necessary for
its production too highly, to employ it in the rendering of trivial thoughts. The
playful fancy of a moment may innocently be expressed by the passing word; but
he can hardly have learned the preciousness of life, who passes days in the
elaboration of a jest. And, as to what regards the delineation of human character,
the nature of all noble art is to epitomize and embrace so much at once, that its
subject can never be altogether ludicrous; it must possess all the solemnities of the
whole, not the brightness of the partial, truth. For all truth that makes us smile is
partial. The novelist amuses us by his relation of a particular incident; but the
painter cannot set any one of his characters before us without giving some glimpse
of its whole career. That of which the historian informs us in successive pages, it

is the task of the painter to inform us of at once, writing upon the countenance not
merely the expression of the moment, but the history of the life: and the history of
a life can never be a jest.

Whatever part, therefore, of the sportive energy of these men of the highest
class would be expressed in verbal wit or humor finds small utterance through
their art, and will assuredly be confined, if it occur there at all, to scattered and
trivial incidents. But so far as their minds can recreate themselves by the
imagination of strange, yet not laughable, forms, which, either in costume, in
landscape, or in any other accessaries, may be combined with those necessary for
their more earnest purposes, we find them delighting in such inventions; and a
species of grotesqueness thence arising in all their work, which is indeed one of its
most valuable characteristics, but which is so intimately connected with the
sublime or terrible form of the grotesque, that it will be better to notice it under
that head.

§ XXXII. 2. Necessary play. I have dwelt much in a former portion of this work,
on the justice and desirableness of employing the minds of inferior workmen, and
of the lower orders in general, in the production of objects of art of one kind or
another. So far as men of this class are compelled to hard manual labor for their
daily bread, so far forth their artistical efforts must be rough and ignorant, and
their artistical perceptions comparatively dull. Now it is not possible, with blunt
perceptions and rude hands, to produce works which shall be pleasing by their
beauty; but it is perfectly possible to produce such as shall be interesting by their
character or amusing by their satire. For one hard-working man who possesses the
finer instincts which decide on perfection of lines and harmonies of color, twenty
possess dry humor or quaint fancy; not because these faculties were originally
given to the human race, or to any section of it, in greater degree than the sense of
beauty, but because these are exercised in our daily intercourse with each other,
and developed by the interest which we take in the affairs of life, while the others
are not. And because, therefore, a certain degree of success will probably attend
the effort to express this humor or fancy, while comparative failure will assuredly
result from an ignorant struggle to reach the forms of solemn beauty, the working-
man, who turns his attention partially to art, will probably, and wisely, choose to

do that which he can do best, and indulge the pride of an effective satire rather
than subject himself to assured mortification in the pursuit of beauty; and this the
more, because we have seen that his application to art is to be playful and
recreative, and it is not in recreation that the conditions of perfection can be
fulfilled.

§ XXXIII. Now all the forms of art which result from the comparatively
recreative exertion of minds more or less blunted or encumbered by other cares
and toils, the art which we may call generally art of the wayside, as opposed to
that which is the business of men’s lives, is, in the best sense of the word,
Grotesque. And it is noble or inferior, first, according to the tone of the minds
which have produced it, and in proportion to their knowledge, wit, love of truth,
and kindness; secondly, according to the degree of strength they have been able to
give forth; but yet, however much we may find in it needing to be forgiven,
always delightful so long as it is the work of good and ordinarily intelligent men.
And its delightfulness ought mainly to consist in those very imperfections which
mark it for work done in times of rest. It is not its own merit so much as the
enjoyment of him who produced it, which is to be the source of the spectator’s
pleasure; it is to the strength of his sympathy, not to the accuracy of his criticism,
that it makes appeal; and no man can indeed be a lover of what is best in the
higher walks of art, who has not feeling and charity enough to rejoice with the
rude sportiveness of hearts that have escaped out of prison, and to be thankful for
the flowers which men have laid their burdens down to sow by the wayside.

§ XXXIV. And consider what a vast amount of human work this right
understanding of its meaning will make fruitful and admirable to us, which
otherwise we could only have passed by with contempt. There is very little
architecture in the world which is, in the full sense of the words, good and noble.
A few pieces of Italian Gothic and Romanesque, a few scattered fragments of
Gothic cathedrals, and perhaps two or three of Greek temples, are all that we
possess approaching to an ideal of perfection. All the rest—Egyptian, Norman,
Arabian, and most Gothic, and, which is very noticeable, for the most part all the
strongest and mightiest—depend for their power on some developement of the
grotesque spirit; but much more the inferior domestic architecture of the middle

ages, and what similar conditions remain to this day in countries from which the
life of art has not yet been banished by its laws. The fantastic gables, built up in
scroll-work and steps, of the Flemish street; the pinnacled roofs set with their
small humorist double windows, as if with so many ears and eyes, of Northern
France; the blackened timbers, crossed and carved into every conceivable
waywardness of imagination, of Normandy and old England; the rude hewing of
the pine timbers of the Swiss cottage; the projecting turrets and bracketed oriels of
the German street; these, and a thousand other forms, not in themselves reaching
any high degree of excellence, are yet admirable, and most precious, as the fruits
of a rejoicing energy in uncultivated minds. It is easier to take away the energy,
than to add the cultivation; and the only effect of the better knowledge which
civilized nations now possess, has been, as we have seen in a former chapter, to
forbid their being happy, without enabling them to be great.

§ XXXV. It is very necessary, however, with respect to this provincial or rustic
architecture, that we should carefully distinguish its truly grotesque from its
picturesque elements. In the “Seven Lamps” I defined the picturesque to be
“parasitical sublimity,” or sublimity belonging to the external or accidental
characters of a thing, not to the thing itself. For instance, when a highland cottage
roof is covered with fragments of shale instead of slates, it becomes picturesque,
because the irregularity and rude fractures of the rocks, and their grey and gloomy
color, give to it something of the savageness, and much of the general aspect, of
the slope of a mountain side. But as a mere cottage roof, it cannot be sublime, and
whatever sublimity it derives from the wildness or sternness which the mountains
have given it in its covering, is, so far forth, parasitical. The mountain itself would
have been grand, which is much more than picturesque; but the cottage cannot be
grand as such, and the parasitical grandeur which it may possess by accidental
qualities, is the character for which men have long agreed to use the inaccurate
word “Picturesque.”

§ XXXVI. On the other hand, beauty cannot be parasitical. There is nothing so
small or so contemptible, but it may be beautiful in its own right. The cottage may
be beautiful, and the smallest moss that grows on its roof, and the minutest fibre
of that moss which the microscope can raise into visible form, and all of them in

their own right, not less than the mountains and the sky; so that we use no peculiar
term to express their beauty, however diminutive, but only when the sublime
element enters, without sufficient worthiness in the nature of the thing to which it
is attached.

§ XXXVII. Now this picturesque element, which is always given, if by nothing
else, merely by ruggedness, adds usually very largely to the pleasurableness of
grotesque work, especially to that of its inferior kinds; but it is not for this reason
to be confounded with the grotesqueness itself. The knots and rents of the timbers,
the irregular lying of the shingles on the roofs, the vigorous light and shadow, the
fractures and weather-stains of the old stones, which were so deeply loved and so
admirably rendered by our lost Prout, are the picturesque elements of the
architecture: the grotesque ones are those which are not produced by the working
of nature and of time, but exclusively by the fancy of man; and, as also for the
most part by his indolent and uncultivated fancy, they are always, in some degree,
wanting in grandeur, unless the picturesque element be united with them.

§ XXXVIII. 3. Inordinate play. The reader will have some difficulty, I fear, in
keeping clearly in his mind the various divisions of our subject; but, when he has
once read the chapter through, he will see their places and coherence. We have
next to consider the expression throughout of the minds of men who indulge
themselves in unnecessary play. It is evident that a large number of these men will
be more refined and more highly educated than those who only play necessarily;
the power of pleasure-seeking implies, in general, fortunate circumstances of life.
It is evident also that their play will not be so hearty, so simple, or so joyful; and
this deficiency of brightness will affect it in proportion to its unnecessary and
unlawful continuance, until at last it becomes a restless and dissatisfied
indulgence in excitement, or a painful delving after exhausted springs of pleasure.

The art through which this temper is expressed will, in all probability, be
refined and sensual,—therefore, also, assuredly feeble; and because, in the failure
of the joyful energy of the mind, there will fail, also, its perceptions and its
sympathies, it will be entirely deficient in expression of character, and acuteness
of thought, but will be peculiarly restless, manifesting its desire for excitement in

idle changes of subject and purpose. Incapable of true imagination, it will seek to
supply its place by exaggerations, incoherencies, and monstrosities; and the form
of the grotesque to which it gives rise will be an incongruous chain of hackneyed
graces, idly thrown together,—prettinesses or sublimities, not of its own
invention, associated in forms which will be absurd without being fantastic, and
monstrous without being terrible. And because, in the continual pursuit of
pleasure, men lose both cheerfulness and charity, there will be small hilarity, but
much malice, in this grotesque; yet a weak malice, incapable of expressing its own
bitterness, not having grasp enough of truth to become forcible, and exhausting
itself in impotent or disgusting caricature.

§ XXXIX. Of course, there are infinite ranks and kinds of this grotesque,
according to the natural power of the minds which originate it, and to the degree
in which they have lost themselves. Its highest condition is that which first
developed itself among the enervated Romans, and which was brought to the
highest perfection of which it was capable, by Raphael, in the arabesques of the
Vatican. It may be generally described as an elaborate and luscious form of
nonsense. Its lower conditions are found in the common upholstery and
decorations which, over the whole of civilized Europe, have sprung from this
poisonous root; an artistical pottage, composed of nymphs, cupids, and satyrs,
with shreddings of heads and paws of meek wild beasts, and nondescript
vegetables. And the lowest of all are those which have not even graceful models to
recommend them, but arise out of the corruption of the higher schools, mingled
with clownish or bestial satire, as is the case in the latter Renaissance of Venice,
which we were above examining. It is almost impossible to believe the depth to
which the human mind can be debased in following this species of grotesque. In a
recent Italian garden, the favorite ornaments frequently consist of stucco images,
representing, in dwarfish caricature, the most disgusting types of manhood and
womanhood which can be found amidst the dissipation of the modern
drawingroom; yet without either veracity or humor, and dependent, for whatever
interest they possess, upon simple grossness of expression and absurdity of
costume. Grossness, of one kind or another, is, indeed, an unfailing characteristic
of the style; either latent, as in the refined sensuality of the more graceful

arabesques, or, in the worst examples, manifested in every species of obscene
conception and abominable detail. In the head, described in the opening of this
chapter, at Santa Maria Formosa, the teeth are represented as decayed.

§ XL. 4. The minds of the fourth class of men who do not play at all, are little
likely to find expression in any trivial form of art, except in bitterness of mockery;
and this character at once stamps the work in which it appears, as belonging to the
class of terrible, rather than of playful, grotesque. We have, therefore, now to
examine the state of mind which gave rise to this second and more interesting
branch of imaginative work.

§ XLI. Two great and principal passions are evidently appointed by the Deity to
rule the life of man; namely, the love of God, and the fear of sin, and of its
companion—Death. How many motives we have for Love, how much there is in
the universe to kindle our admiration and to claim our gratitude, there are, happily,
multitudes among us who both feel and teach. But it has not, I think, been
sufficiently considered how evident, throughout the system of creation, is the
purpose of God that we should often be affected by Fear; not the sudden, selfish,
and contemptible fear of immediate danger, but the fear which arises out of the
contemplation of great powers in destructive operation, and generally from the
perception of the presence of death. Nothing appears to me more remarkable than
the array of scenic magnificence by which the imagination is appalled, in myriads
of instances, when the actual danger is comparatively small; so that the utmost
possible impression of awe shall be produced upon the minds of all, though direct
suffering is inflicted upon few. Consider, for instance, the moral effect of a single
thunder-storm. Perhaps two or three persons may be struck dead within the space
of a hundred square miles; and their deaths, unaccompanied by the scenery of the
storm, would produce little more than a momentary sadness in the busy hearts of
living men. But the preparation for the Judgment by all that mighty gathering of
clouds; by the questioning of the forest leaves, in their terrified stillness, which
way the winds shall go forth; by the murmuring to each other, deep in the
distance, of the destroying angels before they draw forth their swords of fire; by
the march of the funeral darkness in the midst of the noon-day, and the rattling of
the dome of heaven beneath the chariot-wheels of death;—on how many minds do

not these produce an impression almost as great as the actual witnessing of the
fatal issue! and how strangely are the expressions of the threatening elements
fitted to the apprehension of the human soul! The lurid color, the long, irregular,
convulsive sound, the ghastly shapes of flaming and heaving cloud, are all as true
and faithful in their appeal to our instinct of danger, as the moaning or wailing of
the human voice itself is to our instinct of pity. It is not a reasonable calculating
terror which they awake in us; it is no matter that we count distance by seconds,
and measure probability by averages. That shadow of the thunder-cloud will still
do its work upon our hearts, and we shall watch its passing away as if we stood
upon the threshing-floor of Araunah.

§ XLII. And this is equally the case with respect to all the other destructive
phenomena of the universe. From the mightiest of them to the gentlest, from the
earthquake to the summer shower, it will be found that they are attended by
certain aspects of threatening, which strike terror into the hearts of multitudes
more numerous a thousandfold than those who actually suffer from the ministries
of judgment; and that, besides the fearfulness of these immediately dangerous
phenomena, there is an occult and subtle horror belonging to many aspects of the
creation around us, calculated often to fill us with serious thought, even in our
times of quietness and peace. I understand not the most dangerous, because most
attractive form of modern infidelity, which, pretending to exalt the beneficence of
the Deity, degrades it into a reckless infinitude of mercy, and blind obliteration of
the work of sin; and which does this chiefly by dwelling on the manifold
appearances of God’s kindness on the face of creation. Such kindness is indeed
everywhere and always visible; but not alone. Wrath and threatening are
invariably mingled with the love; and in the utmost solitudes of nature, the
existence of Hell seems to me as legibly declared by a thousand spiritual
utterances, as that of Heaven. It is well for us to dwell with thankfulness on the
unfolding of the flower, and the falling of the dew, and the sleep of the green
fields in the sunshine; but the blasted trunk, the barren rock, the moaning of the
bleak winds, the roar of the black, perilous, merciless whirlpools of the mountain
streams, the solemn solitudes of moors and seas, the continual fading of all beauty
into darkness, and of all strength into dust, have these no language for us? We

may seek to escape their teaching by reasonings touching the good which is
wrought out of all evil; but it is vain sophistry. The good succeeds to the evil as
day succeeds the night, but so also the evil to the good. Gerizim and Ebal, birth
and death, light and darkness, heaven and hell, divide the existence of man, and
his Futurity.39

§ XLIII. And because the thoughts of the choice we have to make between these
two, ought to rule us continually, not so much in our own actions (for these
should, for the most part, be governed by settled habit and principle) as in our
manner of regarding the lives of other men, and our own responsibilities with
respect to them; therefore, it seems to me that the healthiest state into which the
human mind can be brought is that which is capable of the greatest love, and the
greatest awe: and this we are taught even in our times of rest; for when our minds
are rightly in tone, the merely pleasurable excitement which they seek with most
avidity is that which rises out of the contemplation of beauty or of terribleness.
We thirst for both, and, according to the height and tone of our feeling, desire to
see them in noble or inferior forms. Thus there is a Divine beauty, and a
terribleness or sublimity coequal with it in rank, which are the subjects of the
highest art; and there is an inferior or ornamental beauty, and an inferior
terribleness coequal with it in rank, which are the subjects of grotesque art. And
the state of mind in which the terrible form of the grotesque is developed, is that
which in some irregular manner, dwells upon certain conditions of terribleness,
into the complete depth of which it does not enter for the time.

§ XLIV. Now the things which are the proper subjects of human fear are
twofold; those which have the power of Death, and those which have the nature of
Sin. Of which there are many ranks, greater or less in power and vice, from the
evil angels themselves down to the serpent which is their type, and which though
of a low and contemptible class, appears to unite the deathful and sinful natures in
the most clearly visible and intelligible form; for there is nothing else which we
know, of so small strength and occupying so unimportant a place in the economy
of creation, which yet is so mortal and so malignant. It is, then, on these two
classes of objects that the mind fixes for its excitement, in that mood which gives
rise to the terrible grotesque; and its subject will be found always to unite some

expression of vice and danger, but regarded in a peculiar temper; sometimes (A) of
predetermined or involuntary apathy, sometimes (B) of mockery, sometimes (C) of
diseased and ungoverned imaginativeness.

§ XLV. For observe, the difficulty which, as I above stated, exists in
distinguishing the playful from the terrible grotesque arises out of this cause; that
the mind, under certain phases of excitement, plays with terror, and summons
images which, if it were in another temper, would be awful, but of which, either in
weariness or in irony, it refrains for the time to acknowledge the true terribleness.
And the mode in which this refusal takes place distinguishes the noble from the
ignoble grotesque. For the master of the noble grotesque knows the depth of all at
which he seems to mock, and would feel it at another time, or feels it in a certain
undercurrent of thought even while he jests with it; but the workman of the
ignoble grotesque can feel and understand nothing, and mocks at all things with
the laughter of the idiot and the cretin.

To work out this distinction completely is the chief difficulty in our present
inquiry; and, in order to do so, let us consider the above-named three conditions of
mind in succession, with relation to objects of terror.

§ XLVI. (A). Involuntary or predetermined apathy. We saw above that the
grotesque was produced, chiefly in subordinate or ornamental art, by rude, and in
some degree uneducated men, and in their times of rest. At such times, and in such
subordinate work, it is impossible that they should represent any solemn or
terrible subject with a full and serious entrance into its feeling. It is not in the
languor of a leisure hour that a man will set his whole soul to conceive the means
of representing some important truth, nor to the projecting angle of a timber
bracket that he would trust its representation, if conceived. And yet, in this
languor, and in this trivial work, he must find some expression of the serious part
of his soul, of what there is within him capable of awe, as well as of love. The
more noble the man is, the more impossible it will be for him to confine his
thoughts to mere loveliness, and that of a low order. Were his powers and his time
unlimited, so that, like Frà Angelico, he could paint the Seraphim, in that order of
beauty he could find contentment, bringing down heaven to earth. But by the

conditions of his being, by his hard-worked life, by his feeble powers of
execution, by the meanness of his employment and the languor of his heart, he is
bound down to earth. It is the world’s work that he is doing, and world’s work is
not to be done without fear. And whatever there is of deep and eternal
consciousness within him, thrilling his mind with the sense of the presence of sin
and death around him, must be expressed in that slight work, and feeble way,
come of it what will. He cannot forget it, among all that he sees of beautiful in
nature; he may not bury himself among the leaves of the violet on the rocks, and
of the lily in the glen, and twine out of them garlands of perpetual gladness. He
sees more in the earth than these,—misery and wrath, and discordance, and
danger, and all the work of the dragon and his angels; this he sees with too deep
feeling ever to forget. And though when he returns to his idle work,—it may be to
gild the letters upon the page, or to carve the timbers of the chamber, or the stones
of the pinnacle,—he cannot give his strength of thought any more to the woe or to
the danger, there is a shadow of them still present with him: and as the bright
colors mingle beneath his touch, and the fair leaves and flowers grow at his
bidding, strange horrors and phantasms rise by their side; grisly beasts and
venomous serpents, and spectral fiends and nameless inconsistencies of ghastly
life, rising out of things most beautiful, and fading back into them again, as the
harm and the horror of life do out of its happiness. He has seen these things; he
wars with them daily; he cannot but give them their part in his work, though in a
state of comparative apathy to them at the time. He is but carving and gilding, and
must not turn aside to weep; but he knows that hell is burning on, for all that, and
the smoke of it withers his oak-leaves.

§ XLVII. Now, the feelings which give rise to the false or ignoble grotesque, are
exactly the reverse of these. In the true grotesque, a man of naturally strong
feeling is accidentally or resolutely apathetic; in the false grotesque, a man
naturally apathetic is forcing himself into temporary excitement. The horror which
is expressed by the one, comes upon him whether he will or not; that which is
expressed by the other, is sought out by him, and elaborated by his art. And
therefore, also, because the fear of the one is true, and of true things, however
fantastic its expression may be, there will be reality in it, and force. It is not a

manufactured terribleness, whose author, when he had finished it, knew not if it
would terrify any one else or not: but it is a terribleness taken from the life; a
spectre which the workman indeed saw, and which, as it appalled him, will appal
us also. But the other workman never felt any Divine fear; he never shuddered
when he heard the cry from the burning towers of the earth,

“Venga Medusa; sì lo farem di smalto.”

He is stone already, and needs no gentle hand laid upon his eyes to save him.

§ XLVIII. I do not mean what I say in this place to apply to the creations of the
imagination. It is not as the creating but as the seeing man, that we are here
contemplating the master of the true grotesque. It is because the dreadfulness of
the universe around him weighs upon his heart, that his work is wild; and
therefore through the whole of it we shall find the evidence of deep insight into
nature. His beasts and birds, however monstrous, will have profound relations
with the true. He may be an ignorant man, and little acquainted with the laws of
nature; he is certainly a busy man, and has not much time to watch nature; but he
never saw a serpent cross his path, nor a bird flit across the sky, nor a lizard bask
upon a stone, without learning so much of the sublimity and inner nature of each
as will not suffer him thenceforth to conceive them coldly. He may not be able to
carve plumes or scales well; but his creatures will bite and fly, for all that. The
ignoble workman is the very reverse of this. He never felt, never looked at nature;
and if he endeavor to imitate the work of the other, all his touches will be made at
random, and all his extravagances will be ineffective; he may knit brows, and
twist lips, and lengthen beaks, and sharpen teeth, but it will be all in vain. He may
make his creatures disgusting, but never fearful.

§ XLIX. There is, however, often another cause of difference than this. The true
grotesque being the expression of the repose or play of a serious mind, there is a
false grotesque opposed to it, which is the result of the full exertion of a frivolous
one. There is much grotesque which is wrought out with exquisite care and pains,
and as much labor given to it as if it were of the noblest subject; so that the
workman is evidently no longer apathetic, and has no excuse for unconnectedness

of thought, or sudden unreasonable fear. If he awakens horror now, it ought to be
in some truly sublime form. His strength is in his work; and he must not give way
to sudden humor, and fits of erratic fancy. If he does so, it must be because his
mind is naturally frivolous, or is for the time degraded into the deliberate pursuit
of frivolity. And herein lies the real distinction between the base grotesque of
Raphael and the Renaissance, above alluded to, and the true Gothic grotesque.
Those grotesques or arabesques of the Vatican, and other such work, which have
become the patterns of ornamentation in modern times, are the fruit of great minds
degraded to base objects. The care, skill, and science, applied to the distribution of
the leaves, and the drawing of the figures, are intense, admirable, and accurate;
therefore, they ought to have produced a grand and serious work, not a tissue of
nonsense. If we can draw the human head perfectly, and are masters of its
expression and its beauty, we have no business to cut it off, and hang it up by the
hair at the end of a garland. If we can draw the human body in the perfection of its
grace and movement, we have no business to take away its limbs, and terminate it
with a bunch of leaves. Or rather our doing so will imply that there is something
wrong with us; that, if we can consent to use our best powers for such base and
vain trifling, there must be something wanting in the powers themselves; and that,
however skilful we may be, or however learned, we are wanting both in the
earnestness which can apprehend a noble truth, and in the thoughtfulness which
can feel a noble fear. No Divine terror will ever be found in the work of the man
who wastes a colossal strength in elaborating toys; for the first lesson which that
terror is sent to teach us, is the value of the human soul, and the shortness of
mortal time.

§ L. And are we never, then, it will be asked, to possess a refined or perfect
ornamentation? Must all decoration be the work of the ignorant and the rude? Not
so; but exactly in proportion as the ignorance and rudeness diminish, must the
ornamentation become rational, and the grotesqueness disappear. The noblest
lessons may be taught in ornamentation, the most solemn truths compressed into
it. The Book of Genesis, in all the fulness of its incidents, in all the depth of its
meaning, is bound within the leaf-borders of the gates of Ghiberti. But Raphael’s

arabesque is mere elaborate idleness. It has neither meaning nor heart in it; it is an
unnatural and monstrous abortion.

§ LI. Now, this passing of the grotesque into higher art, as the mind of the
workman becomes informed with better knowledge, and capable of more earnest
exertion, takes place in two ways. Either, as his power increases, he devotes
himself more and more to the beauty which he now feels himself able to express,
and so the grotesqueness expands, and softens into the beautiful, as in the above-
named instance of the gates of Ghiberti; or else, if the mind of the workman be
naturally inclined to gloomy contemplation, the imperfection or apathy of his
work rises into nobler terribleness, until we reach the point of the grotesque of
Albert Durer, where, every now and then, the playfulness or apathy of the painter
passes into perfect sublime. Take the Adam and Eve, for instance. When he gave
Adam a bough to hold, with a parrot on it, and a tablet hung to it, with “Albertus
Durer Noricus faciebat, 1504,” thereupon, his mind was not in Paradise. He was
half in play, half apathetic with respect to his subject, thinking how to do his work
well, as a wise master-graver, and how to receive his just reward of fame. But he
rose into the true sublime in the head of Adam, and in the profound truthfulness of
every creature that fills the forest. So again in that magnificent coat of arms, with
the lady and the satyr, as he cast the fluttering drapery hither and thither around
the helmet, and wove the delicate crown upon the woman’s forehead, he was in a
kind of play; but there is none in the dreadful skull upon the shield. And in the
“Knight and Death,” and in the dragons of the illustrations to the Apocalypse,
there is neither play nor apathy; but their grotesque is of the ghastly kind which
best illustrates the nature of death and sin. And this leads us to the consideration
of the second state of mind out of which the noble grotesque is developed; that is
to say, the temper of mockery.

§ LII. (B). Mockery, or Satire. In the former part of this chapter, when I spoke of
the kinds of art which were produced in the recreation of the lower orders, I only
spoke of forms of ornament, not of the expression of satire or humor. But it seems
probable, that nothing is so refreshing to the vulgar mind as some exercise of this
faculty, more especially on the failings of their superiors; and that, wherever the
lower orders are allowed to express themselves freely, we shall find humor, more

or less caustic, becoming a principal feature in their work. The classical and
Renaissance manufacturers of modern times having silenced the independent
language of the operative, his humor and satire pass away in the word-wit which
has of late become the especial study of the group of authors headed by Charles
Dickens; all this power was formerly thrown into noble art, and became
permanently expressed in the sculptures of the cathedral. It was never thought that
there was anything discordant or improper in such a position: for the builders
evidently felt very deeply a truth of which, in modern times, we are less
cognizant; that folly and sin are, to a certain extent, synonymous, and that it would
be well for mankind in general, if all could be made to feel that wickedness is as
contemptible as it is hateful. So that the vices were permitted to be represented
under the most ridiculous forms, and all the coarsest wit of the workman to be
exhausted in completing the degradation of the creatures supposed to be subjected
to them.

§ LIII. Nor were even the supernatural powers of evil exempt from this species
of satire. For with whatever hatred or horror the evil angels were regarded, it was
one of the conditions of Christianity that they should also be looked upon as
vanquished; and this not merely in their great combat with the King of Saints, but
in daily and hourly combats with the weakest of His servants. In proportion to the
narrowness of the powers of abstract conception in the workman, the nobleness of
the idea of spiritual nature diminished, and the traditions of the encounters of men
with fiends in daily temptations were imagined with less terrific circumstances,
until the agencies which in such warfare were almost always represented as
vanquished with disgrace, became, at last, as much the objects of contempt as of
terror.

The superstitions which represented the devil as assuming various contemptible
forms of disguises in order to accomplish his purposes aided this gradual
degradation of conception, and directed the study of the workman to the most
strange and ugly conditions of animal form, until at last, even in the most serious
subjects, the fiends are oftener ludicrous than terrible. Nor, indeed, is this
altogether avoidable, for it is not possible to express intense wickedness without
some condition of degradation. Malice, subtlety, and pride, in their extreme,

cannot be written upon noble forms; and I am aware of no effort to represent the
Satanic mind in the angelic form, which has succeeded in painting. Milton
succeeds only because he separately describes the movements of the mind, and
therefore leaves himself at liberty to make the form heroic; but that form is never
distinct enough to be painted. Dante, who will not leave even external forms
obscure, degrades them before he can feel them to be demoniacal; so also John
Bunyan: both of them, I think, having firmer faith than Milton’s in their own
creations, and deeper insight into the nature of sin. Milton makes his fiends too
noble, and misses the foulness, inconstancy, and fury of wickedness. His Satan
possesses some virtues, not the less virtues for being applied to evil purpose.
Courage, resolution, patience, deliberation in council, this latter being eminently a
wise and holy character, as opposed to the “Insania” of excessive sin: and all this,
if not a shallow and false, is a smooth and artistical, conception. On the other
hand, I have always felt that there was a peculiar grandeur in the indescribable,
ungovernable fury of Dante’s fiends, ever shortening its own powers, and
disappointing its own purposes; the deaf, blind, speechless, unspeakable rage,
fierce as the lightning, but erring from its mark or turning senselessly against
itself, and still further debased by foulness of form and action. Something is
indeed to be allowed for the rude feelings of the time, but I believe all such men
as Dante are sent into the world at the time when they can do their work best; and
that, it being appointed for him to give to mankind the most vigorous realization
possible both of Hell and Heaven, he was born both in the country and at the time
which furnished the most stern opposition of Horror and Beauty, and permitted it
to be written in the clearest terms. And, therefore, though there are passages in the
“Inferno” which it would be impossible for any poet now to write, I look upon it
as all the more perfect for them. For there can be no question but that one
characteristic of excessive vice is indecency, a general baseness in its thoughts and
acts concerning the body,40 and that the full portraiture of it cannot be given
without marking, and that in the strongest lines, this tendency to corporeal
degradation; which, in the time of Dante, could be done frankly, but cannot now.
And, therefore, I think the twenty-first and twenty-second books of the “Inferno”
the most perfect portraitures of fiendish nature which we possess; and at the same
time, in their mingling of the extreme of horror (for it seems to me that the silent

swiftness of the first demon, “con l’ali aperte e sovra i pie leggiero,” cannot be
surpassed in dreadfulness) with ludicrous actions and images, they present the
most perfect instances with which I am acquainted of the terrible grotesque. But
the whole of the “Inferno” is full of this grotesque, as well as the “Faërie Queen;”
and these two poems, together with the works of Albert Durer, will enable the
reader to study it in its noblest forms, without reference to Gothic cathedrals.

§ LIV. Now, just as there are base and noble conditions of the apathetic
grotesque, so also are there of this satirical grotesque. The condition which might
be mistaken for it is that above described as resulting from the malice of men
given to pleasure, and in which the grossness and foulness are in the workman as
much as in his subject, so that he chooses to represent vice and disease rather than
virtue and beauty, having his chief delight in contemplating them; though he still
mocks at them with such dull wit as may be in him, because, as Young has said
most truly,

“’Tis not in folly not to scorn a fool.”

§ LV. Now it is easy to distinguish this grotesque from its noble counterpart, by
merely observing whether any forms of beauty or dignity are mingled with it or
not; for, of course, the noble grotesque is only employed by its master for good
purposes, and to contrast with beauty: but the base workman cannot conceive
anything but what is base; and there will be no loveliness in any part of his work,
or, at the best, a loveliness measured by line and rule, and dependent on legal
shapes of feature. But, without resorting to this test, and merely by examining the
ugly grotesque itself, it will be found that, if it belongs to the base school, there
will be, first, no Horror in it; secondly, no Nature in it; and, thirdly, no Mercy in it.

§ LVI. I say, first, no Horror. For the base soul has no fear of sin, and no hatred
of it: and, however it may strive to make its work terrible, there will be no
genuineness in the fear; the utmost it can do will be to make its work disgusting.

Secondly, there will be no Nature in it. It appears to be one of the ends
proposed by Providence in the appointment of the forms of the brute creation, that

the various vices to which mankind are liable should be severally expressed in
them so distinctly and clearly as that men could not but understand the lesson;
while yet these conditions of vice might, in the inferior animal, be observed
without the disgust and hatred which the same vices would excite, if seen in men,
and might be associated with features of interest which would otherwise attract
and reward contemplation. Thus, ferocity, cunning, sloth, discontent, gluttony,
uncleanness, and cruelty are seen, each in its extreme, in various animals; and are
so vigorously expressed, that when men desire to indicate the same vices in
connexion with human forms, they can do it no better than by borrowing here and
there the features of animals. And when the workman is thus led to the
contemplation of the animal kingdom, finding therein the expressions of vice
which he needs, associated with power, and nobleness, and freedom from disease,
if his mind be of right tone he becomes interested in this new study; and all noble
grotesque is, therefore, full of the most admirable rendering of animal character.
But the ignoble workman is capable of no interest of this kind; and, being too dull
to appreciate, and too idle to execute, the subtle and wonderful lines on which the
expression of the lower animal depends, he contents himself with vulgar
exaggeration, and leaves his work as false as it is monstrous, a mass of blunt
malice and obscene ignorance.

§ LVII. Lastly, there will be no Mercy in it. Wherever the satire of the noble
grotesque fixes upon human nature, it does so with much sorrow mingled amidst
its indignation: in its highest forms there is an infinite tenderness, like that of the
fool in Lear; and even in its more heedless or bitter sarcasm, it never loses sight
altogether of the better nature of what it attacks, nor refuses to acknowledge its
redeeming or pardonable features. But the ignoble grotesque has no pity: it
rejoices in iniquity, and exists only to slander.

§ LVIII. I have not space to follow out the various forms of transition which exist
between the two extremes of great and base in the satirical grotesque. The reader
must always remember, that, although there is an infinite distance between the
best and worst, in this kind the interval is filled by endless conditions more or less
inclining to the evil or the good; impurity and malice stealing gradually into the

nobler forms, and invention and wit elevating the lower, according to the
countless minglings of the elements of the human soul.

§ LIX. (C). Ungovernableness of the imagination. The reader is always to keep in
mind that if the objects of horror, in which the terrible grotesque finds its
materials, were contemplated in their true light, and with the entire energy of the
soul, they would cease to be grotesque, and become altogether sublime; and that
therefore it is some shortening of the power, or the will, of contemplation, and
some consequent distortion of the terrible image in which the grotesqueness
consists. Now this distortion takes place, it was above asserted, in three ways:
either through apathy, satire, or ungovernableness of imagination. It is this last
cause of the grotesque which we have finally to consider; namely, the error and
wildness of the mental impressions, caused by fear operating upon strong powers
of imagination, or by the failure of the human faculties in the endeavor to grasp
the highest truths.

§ LX. The grotesque which comes to all men in a disturbed dream is the most
intelligible example of this kind, but also the most ignoble; the imagination, in this
instance, being entirely deprived of all aid from reason, and incapable of self-
government. I believe, however, that the noblest forms of imaginative power are
also in some sort ungovernable, and have in them something of the character of
dreams; so that the vision, of whatever kind, comes uncalled, and will not submit
itself to the seer, but conquers him, and forces him to speak as a prophet, having
no power over his words or thoughts.41 Only, if the whole man be trained
perfectly, and his mind calm, consistent and powerful, the vision which comes to
him is seen as in a perfect mirror, serenely, and in consistence with the rational
powers; but if the mind be imperfect and ill trained, the vision is seen as in a
broken mirror, with strange distortions and discrepancies, all the passions of the
heart breathing upon it in cross ripples, till hardly a trace of it remains unbroken.
So that, strictly speaking, the imagination is never governed; it is always the
ruling and Divine power: and the rest of the man is to it only as an instrument
which it sounds, or a tablet on which it writes; clearly and sublimely if the wax be
smooth and the strings true, grotesquely and wildly if they are stained and broken.
And thus the “Iliad,” the “Inferno,” the “Pilgrim’s Progress,” the “Faërie Queen,”

are all of them true dreams; only the sleep of the men to whom they came was the
deep, living sleep which God sends, with a sacredness in it, as of death, the
revealer of secrets.

§ LXI. Now, observe in this matter, carefully, the difference between a dim
mirror and a distorted one; and do not blame me for pressing the analogy too far,
for it will enable me to explain my meaning every way more clearly. Most men’s
minds are dim mirrors, in which all truth is seen, as St. Paul tells us, darkly: this is
the fault most common and most fatal; dulness of the heart and mistiness of sight,
increasing to utter hardness and blindness; Satan breathing upon the glass, so that
if we do not sweep the mist laboriously away, it will take no image. But, even so
far as we are able to do this, we have still the distortion to fear, yet not to the same
extent, for we can in some sort allow for the distortion of an image, if only we can
see it clearly. And the fallen human soul, at its best, must be as a diminishing
glass, and that a broken one, to the mighty truths of the universe round it; and the
wider the scope of its glance, and the vaster the truths into which it obtains an
insight, the more fantastic their distortion is likely to be, as the winds and vapors
trouble the field of the telescope most when it reaches farthest.

§ LXII. Now, so far as the truth is seen by the imagination42 in its wholeness and
quietness, the vision is sublime; but so far as it is narrowed and broken by the
inconsistencies of the human capacity, it becomes grotesque; and it would seem to
be rare that any very exalted truth should be impressed on the imagination without
some grotesqueness in its aspect, proportioned to the degree of diminution of
breadth in the grasp which is given of it. Nearly all the dreams recorded in the
Bible,—Jacob’s, Joseph’s, Pharaoh’s, Nebuchadnezzar’s,—are grotesques; and
nearly the whole of the accessary scenery in the books of Ezekiel and the
Apocalypse. Thus, Jacob’s dream revealed to him the ministry of angels; but
because this ministry could not be seen or understood by him in its fulness, it was
narrowed to him into a ladder between heaven and earth, which was a grotesque.
Joseph’s two dreams were evidently intended to be signs of the steadfastness of
the Divine purpose towards him, by possessing the clearness of special prophecy;
yet were couched in such imagery, as not to inform him prematurely of his
destiny, and only to be understood after their fulfilment. The sun, and moon, and

stars were at the period, and are indeed throughout the Bible, the symbols of high
authority. It was not revealed to Joseph that he should be lord over all Egypt; but
the representation of his family by symbols of the most magnificent dominion,
and yet as subject to him, must have been afterwards felt by him as a distinctly
prophetic indication of his own supreme power. It was not revealed to him that the
occasion of his brethren’s special humiliation before him should be their coming
to buy corn; but when the event took place, must he not have felt that there was
prophetic purpose in the form of the sheaves of wheat which first imaged forth
their subjection to him? And these two images of the sun doing obeisance, and the
sheaves bowing down,—narrowed and imperfect intimations of great truth which
yet could not be otherwise conveyed,—are both grotesque. The kine of Pharaoh
eating each other, the gold and clay of Nebuchadnezzar’s image, the four beasts
full of eyes, and other imagery of Ezekiel and the Apocalypse, are grotesques of
the same kind, on which I need not further insist.

§ LXIII. Such forms, however, ought perhaps to have been arranged under a
separate head, as Symbolical Grotesque; but the element of awe enters into them
so strongly, as to justify, for all our present purposes, their being classed with the
other varieties of terrible grotesque. For even if the symbolic vision itself be not
terrible, the sense of what may be veiled behind it becomes all the more awful in
proportion to the insignificance or strangeness of the sign itself; and, I believe,
this thrill of mingled doubt, fear, and curiosity lies at the very root of the delight
which mankind take in symbolism. It was not an accidental necessity for the
conveyance of truth by pictures instead of words, which led to its universal
adoption wherever art was on the advance; but the Divine fear which necessarily
follows on the understanding that a thing is other and greater than it seems; and
which, it appears probable, has been rendered peculiarly attractive to the human
heart, because God would have us understand that this is true not of invented
symbols merely, but of all things amidst which we live; that there is a deeper
meaning within them than eye hath seen, or ear hath heard; and that the whole
visible creation is a mere perishable symbol of things eternal and true. It cannot
but have been sometimes a subject of wonder with thoughtful men, how fondly,
age after age, the Church has cherished the belief that the four living creatures

which surrounded the Apocalyptic throne were symbols of the four Evangelists,
and rejoiced to use those forms in its picture-teaching; that a calf, a lion, an eagle,
and a beast with a man’s face, should in all ages have been preferred by the
Christian world, as expressive of Evangelistic power and inspiration, to the
majesty of human forms; and that quaint grotesques, awkward and often ludicrous
caricatures even of the animals represented, should have been regarded by all
men, not only with contentment, but with awe, and have superseded all endeavors
to represent the characters and persons of the Evangelistic writers themselves
(except in a few instances, confined principally to works undertaken without a
definite religious purpose);—this, I say, might appear more than strange to us,
were it not that we ourselves share the awe, and are still satisfied with the symbol,
and that justly. For, whether we are conscious of it or not, there is in our hearts, as
we gaze upon the brutal forms that have so holy a signification, an
acknowledgment that it was not Matthew, nor Mark, nor Luke, nor John, in whom
the Gospel of Christ was unsealed: but that the invisible things of Him from the
beginning of the creation are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are
made; that the whole world, and all that is therein, be it low or high, great or
small, is a continual Gospel; and that as the heathen, in their alienation from God,
changed His glory into an image made like unto corruptible man, and to birds, and
four-footed beasts, the Christian, in his approach to God, is to undo this work, and
to change the corruptible things into the image of His glory; believing that there is
nothing so base in creation, but that our faith may give it wings which shall raise
us into companionship with heaven; and that, on the other hand, there is nothing
so great or so goodly in creation, but that it is a mean symbol of the Gospel of
Christ, and of the things He has prepared for them that love Him.

§ LXIV. And it is easy to understand, if we follow out this thought, how, when
once the symbolic language was familiarized to the mind, and its solemnity felt in
all its fulness, there was no likelihood of offence being taken at any repulsive or
feeble characters in execution or conception. There was no form so mean, no
incident so commonplace, but, if regarded in this light, it might become sublime;
the more vigorous the fancy and the more faithful the enthusiasm, the greater
would be the likelihood of their delighting in the contemplation of symbols whose

mystery was enhanced by apparent insignificance, or in which the sanctity and
majesty of meaning were contrasted with the utmost uncouthness of external
form: nor with uncouthness merely, but even with every appearance of malignity
or baseness; the beholder not being revolted even by this, but comprehending that,
as the seeming evil in the framework of creation did not invalidate its Divine
authorship, so neither did the evil or imperfection in the symbol invalidate its
Divine message. And thus, sometimes, the designer at last became wanton in his
appeal to the piety of his interpreter, and recklessly poured out the impurity and
the savageness of his own heart, for the mere pleasure of seeing them overlaid
with the fine gold of the sanctuary, by the religion of their beholder.

§ LXV. It is not, however, in every symbolical subject that the fearful grotesque
becomes embodied to the full. The element of distortion which affects the intellect
when dealing with subjects above its proper capacity, is as nothing compared with
that which it sustains from the direct impressions of terror. It is the trembling of
the human soul in the presence of death which most of all disturbs the images on
the intellectual mirror, and invests them with the fitfulness and ghastliness of
dreams. And from the contemplation of death, and of the pangs which follow his
footsteps, arise in men’s hearts the troop of strange and irresistible superstitions
which, more or less melancholy or majestic according to the dignity of the mind
they impress, are yet never without a certain grotesqueness, following on the
paralysis of the reason and over-excitement of the fancy. I do not mean to deny the
actual existence of spiritual manifestations; I have never weighed the evidence
upon the subject; but with these, if such exist, we are not here concerned. The
grotesque which we are examining arises out of that condition of mind which
appears to follow naturally upon the contemplation of death, and in which the
fancy is brought into morbid action by terror, accompanied by the belief in
spiritual presence, and in the possibility of spiritual apparition. Hence are
developed its most sublime, because its least voluntary, creations, aided by the
fearfulness of the phenomena of nature which are in any wise the ministers of
death, and primarily directed by the peculiar ghastliness of expression in the
skeleton, itself a species of terrible grotesque in its relation to the perfect human
frame.

§ LXVI. Thus, first born from the dusty and dreadful whiteness of the charnel
house, but softened in their forms by the holiest of human affections, went forth
the troop of wild and wonderful images, seen through tears, that had the mastery
over our Northern hearts for so many ages. The powers of sudden destruction
lurking in the woods and waters, in the rocks and clouds;—kelpie and gnome,
Lurlei and Hartz spirits; the wraith and foreboding phantom; the spectra of second
sight; the various conceptions of avenging or tormented ghost, haunting the
perpetrator of crime, or expiating its commission; and the half fictitious and
contemplative, half visionary and believed images of the presence of death itself,
doing its daily work in the chambers of sickness and sin, and waiting for its hour
in the fortalices of strength and the high places of pleasure;—these, partly
degrading us by the instinctive and paralyzing terror with which they are attended,
and partly ennobling us by leading our thoughts to dwell in the eternal world, fill
the last and the most important circle in that great kingdom of dark and distorted
power, of which we all must be in some sort the subjects until mortality shall be
swallowed up of life; until the waters of the last fordless river cease to roll their
untransparent volume between us and the light of heaven, and neither death stand
between us and our brethren, nor symbols between us and our God.

§ LXVII. We have now, I believe, obtained a view approaching to completeness
of the various branches of human feeling which are concerned in the
developement of this peculiar form of art. It remains for us only to note, as briefly
as possible, what facts in the actual history of the grotesque bear upon our
immediate subject.

From what we have seen to be its nature, we must, I think, be led to one most
important conclusion; that wherever the human mind is healthy and vigorous in all
its proportions, great in imagination and emotion no less than in intellect, and not
overborne by an undue or hardened preëminence of the mere reasoning faculties,
there the grotesque will exist in full energy. And, accordingly, I believe that there
is no test of greatness in periods, nations, or men, more sure than the
developement, among them or in them, of a noble grotesque, and no test of
comparative smallness or limitation, of one kind or another, more sure than the
absence of grotesque invention, or incapability of understanding it. I think that the

central man of all the world, as representing in perfect balance the imaginative,
moral, and intellectual faculties, all at their highest, is Dante; and in him the
grotesque reaches at once the most distinct and the most noble developement to
which it was ever brought in the human mind. The two other greatest men whom
Italy has produced, Michael Angelo and Tintoret, show the same element in no
less original strength, but oppressed in the one by his science, and in both by the
spirit of the age in which they lived; never, however, absent even in Michael
Angelo, but stealing forth continually in a strange and spectral way, lurking in
folds of raiment and knots of wild hair, and mountainous confusions of craggy
limb and cloudy drapery; and, in Tintoret, ruling the entire conceptions of his
greatest works to such a degree that they are an enigma or an offence, even to this
day, to all the petty disciples of a formal criticism. Of the grotesque in our own
Shakspeare I need hardly speak, nor of its intolerableness to his French critics; nor
of that of Æschylus and Homer, as opposed to the lower Greek writers; and so I
believe it will be found, at all periods, in all minds of the first order.

§ LXVIII. As an index of the greatness of nations, it is a less certain test, or,
rather, we are not so well agreed on the meaning of the term “greatness”
respecting them. A nation may produce a great effect, and take up a high place in
the world’s history, by the temporary enthusiasm or fury of its multitudes, without
being truly great; or, on the other hand, the discipline of morality and common
sense may extend its physical power or exalt its well-being, while yet its creative
and imaginative powers are continually diminishing. And again: a people may
take so definite a lead over all the rest of the world in one direction, as to obtain a
respect which is not justly due to them if judged on universal grounds. Thus the
Greeks perfected the sculpture of the human body; threw their literature into a
disciplined form, which has given it a peculiar power over certain conditions of
modern mind; and were the most carefully educated race that the world has seen;
but a few years hence, I believe, we shall no longer think them a greater people
than either the Egyptians or Assyrians.

§ LXIX. If, then, ridding ourselves as far as possible of prejudices owing merely
to the school-teaching which remains from the system of the Renaissance, we set
ourselves to discover in what races the human soul, taken all in all, reached its

highest magnificence, we shall find, I believe, two great families of men, one of
the East and South, the other of the West and North: the one including the
Egyptians, Jews, Arabians, Assyrians, and Persians; the other, I know not whence
derived, but seeming to flow forth from Scandinavia, and filling the whole of
Europe with its Norman and Gothic energy. And in both these families, wherever
they are seen in their utmost nobleness, there the grotesque is developed in its
utmost energy; and I hardly know whether most to admire the winged bulls of
Nineveh, or the winged dragons of Verona.

§ LXX. The reader who has not before turned his attention to this subject may,
however, at first have some difficulty in distinguishing between the noble
grotesque of these great nations, and the barbarous grotesque of mere savages, as
seen in the work of the Hindoo and other Indian nations; or, more grossly still, in
that of the complete savage of the Pacific islands; or if, as is to be hoped, he
instinctively feels the difference, he may yet find difficulty in determining
wherein that difference consists. But he will discover, on consideration, that the
noble grotesque involves the true appreciation of beauty, though the mind may
wilfully turn to other images or the hand resolutely stop short of the perfection
which it must fail, if it endeavored, to reach; while the grotesque of the Sandwich
islander involves no perception or imagination of anything above itself. He will
find that in the exact proportion in which the grotesque results from an
incapability of perceiving beauty, it becomes savage or barbarous; and that there
are many stages of progress to be found in it even in its best times, much truly
savage grotesque occurring in the fine Gothic periods, mingled with the other
forms of the ignoble grotesque resulting from vicious inclinations or base
sportiveness. Nothing is more mysterious in the history of the human mind, than
the manner in which gross and ludicrous images are mingled with the most
solemn subjects in the work of the middle ages, whether of sculpture or
illumination; and although, in great part, such incongruities are to be accounted
for on the various principles which I have above endeavored to define, in many
instances they are clearly the result of vice and sensuality. The general greatness
of seriousness of an age does not effect the restoration of human nature; and it
would be strange, if, in the midst of the art even of the best periods, when that art

was entrusted to myriads of workmen, we found no manifestations of impiety,
folly, or impurity.

§ LXXI. It needs only to be added that in the noble grotesque, as it is partly the
result of a morbid state of the imaginative power, that power itself will be always
seen in a high degree; and that therefore our power of judging of the rank of a
grotesque work will depend on the degree in which we are in general sensible of
the presence of invention. The reader may partly test this power in himself by
referring to the Plate given in the opening of this chapter, in which, on the left, is a
piece of noble and inventive grotesque, a head of the lion-symbol of St. Mark,
from the Veronese Gothic; the other is a head introduced as a boss on the
foundation of the Palazzo Corner della Regina at Venice, utterly devoid of
invention, made merely monstrous by exaggerations of the eyeballs and cheeks,
and generally characteristic of that late Renaissance grotesque of Venice, with
which we are at present more immediately concerned.43

§ LXXII. The developement of that grotesque took place under different laws
from those which regulate it in any other European city. For, great as we have seen
the Byzantine mind show itself to be in other directions, it was marked as that of a
declining nation by the absence of the grotesque element; and, owing to its
influence, the early Venetian Gothic remained inferior to all other schools in this
particular character. Nothing can well be more wonderful than its instant failure in
any attempt at the representation of ludicrous or fearful images, more especially
when it is compared with the magnificent grotesque of the neighboring city of
Verona, in which the Lombard influence had full sway. Nor was it until the last
links of connexion with Constantinople had been dissolved, that the strength of
the Venetian mind could manifest itself in this direction. But it had then a new
enemy to encounter. The Renaissance laws altogether checked its imagination in
architecture; and it could only obtain permission to express itself by starting forth
in the work of the Venetian painters, filling them with monkeys and dwarfs, even
amidst the most serious subjects, and leading Veronese and Tintoret to the most
unexpected and wild fantasies of form and color.

§ LXXIII. We may be deeply thankful for this peculiar reserve of the Gothic
grotesque character to the last days of Venice. All over the rest of Europe it had
been strongest in the days of imperfect art; magnificently powerful throughout the
whole of the thirteenth century, tamed gradually in the fourteenth and fifteenth,
and expiring in the sixteenth amidst anatomy and laws of art. But at Venice, it had
not been received when it was elsewhere in triumph, and it fled to the lagoons for
shelter when elsewhere it was oppressed. And it was arrayed by the Venetian
painters in robes of state, and advanced by them to such honor as it had never
received in its days of widest dominion; while, in return, it bestowed upon their
pictures that fulness, piquancy, decision of parts, and mosaic-like intermingling of
fancies, alternately brilliant and sublime, which were exactly what was most
needed for the developement of their unapproachable color-power.

§ LXXIV. Yet, observe, it by no means follows that because the grotesque does
not appear in the art of a nation, the sense of it does not exist in the national mind.
Except in the form of caricature, it is hardly traceable in the English work of the
present day; but the minds of our workmen are full of it, if we would only allow
them to give it shape. They express it daily in gesture and gibe, but are not
allowed to do so where it would be useful. In like manner, though the Byzantine
influence repressed it in the early Venetian architecture, it was always present in
the Venetian mind, and showed itself in various forms of national custom and
festival; acted grotesques, full of wit, feeling, and good-humor. The ceremony of
the hat and the orange, described in the beginning of this chapter, is one instance
out of multitudes. Another, more rude, and exceedingly characteristic, was that
instituted in the twelfth century in memorial of the submission of Woldaric, the
patriarch of Aquileia, who, having taken up arms against the patriarch of Grado,
and being defeated and taken prisoner by the Venetians, was sentenced, not to
death, but to send every year on “Fat Thursday” sixty-two large loaves, twelve fat
pigs, and a bull, to the Doge; the bull being understood to represent the patriarch,
and the twelve pigs his clergy: and the ceremonies of the day consisting in the
decapitation of these representatives, and a distribution of their joints among the
senators; together with a symbolic record of the attack upon Aquileia, by the
erection of a wooden castle in the rooms of the Ducal Palace, which the Doge and

the Senate attacked and demolished with clubs. As long as the Doge and the
Senate were truly kingly and noble, they were content to let this ceremony be
continued; but when they became proud and selfish, and were destroying both
themselves and the state by their luxury, they found it inconsistent with their
dignity, and it was abolished, as far as the Senate was concerned, in 1549.44

§ LXXV. By these and other similar manifestations, the grotesque spirit is
traceable through all the strength of the Venetian people. But again: it is necessary
that we should carefully distinguish between it and the spirit of mere levity. I said,
in the fifth chapter, that the Venetians were distinctively a serious people, serious,
that is to say, in the sense in which the English are a more serious people than the
French; though the habitual intercourse of our lower classes in London has a tone
of humor in it which I believe is untraceable in that of the Parisian populace. It is
one thing to indulge in playful rest, and another to be devoted to the pursuit of
pleasure: and gaiety of heart during the reaction after hard labor, and quickened by
satisfaction in the accomplished duty or perfected result, is altogether compatible
with, nay, even in some sort arises naturally out of, a deep internal seriousness of
disposition; this latter being exactly the condition of mind which, as we have seen,
leads to the richest developements of the playful grotesque; while, on the contrary,
the continual pursuit of pleasure deprives the soul of all alacrity and elasticity, and
leaves it incapable of happy jesting, capable only of that which is bitter, base, and
foolish. Thus, throughout the whole of the early career of the Venetians, though
there is much jesting, there is no levity; on the contrary there is an intense
earnestness both in their pursuit of commercial and political successes, and in
their devotion to religion,45 which led gradually to the formation of that highly
wrought mingling of immovable resolution with secret thoughtfulness, which so
strangely, sometimes so darkly, distinguishes the Venetian character at the time of
their highest power, when the seriousness was left, but the conscientiousness
destroyed. And if there be any one sign by which the Venetian countenance, as it
is recorded for us, to the very life, by a school of portraiture which has never been
equalled (chiefly because no portraiture ever had subjects so noble),—I say, if
there be one thing more notable than another in the Venetian features, it is this
deep pensiveness and solemnity. In other districts of Italy, the dignity of the heads

which occur in the most celebrated compositions is clearly owing to the feeling of
the painter. He has visibly raised or idealized his models, and appears always to be
veiling the faults or failings of the human nature around him, so that the best of
his work is that which has most perfectly taken the color of his own mind; and the
least impressive, if not the least valuable, that which appears to have been
unaffected and unmodified portraiture. But at Venice, all is exactly the reverse of
this. The tone of mind in the painter appears often in some degree frivolous or
sensual; delighting in costume, in domestic and grotesque incident, and in studies
of the naked form. But the moment he gives himself definitely to portraiture, all is
noble and grave; the more literally true his work, the more majestic; and the same
artist who will produce little beyond what is commonplace in painting a Madonna
or an apostle, will rise into unapproachable sublimity when his subject is a
member of the Forty, or a Master of the Mint.

Such, then, were the general tone and progress of the Venetian mind, up to the
close of the seventeenth century. First, serious, religious, and sincere; then, though
serious still, comparatively deprived of conscientiousness, and apt to decline into
stern and subtle policy: in the first case, the spirit of the noble grotesque not
showing itself in art at all, but only in speech and action; in the second case,
developing itself in painting, through accessories and vivacities of composition,
while perfect dignity was always preserved in portraiture. A third phase rapidly
developed itself.

§ LXXVI. Once more, and for the last time, let me refer the reader to the
important epoch of the death of the Doge Tomaso Mocenigo in 1423, long ago
indicated as the commencement of the decline of the Venetian power. That
commencement is marked, not merely by the words of the dying Prince, but by a
great and clearly legible sign. It is recorded, that on the accession of his successor,
Foscari, to the throne, “Si festeggio dalla citta uno anno intero:” “The city kept
festival for a whole year.” Venice had in her childhood sown, in tears, the harvest
she was to reap in rejoicing. She now sowed in laughter the seeds of death.

Thenceforward, year after year, the nation drank with deeper thirst from the
fountains of forbidden pleasure, and dug for springs, hitherto unknown, in the

dark places of the earth. In the ingenuity of indulgence, in the varieties of vanity,
Venice surpassed the cities of Christendom, as of old she surpassed them in
fortitude and devotion; and as once the powers of Europe stood before her
judgment-seat, to receive the decisions of her justice, so now the youth of Europe
assembled in the halls of her luxury, to learn from her the arts of delight.

It is as needless, as it is painful, to trace the steps of her final ruin. That ancient
curse was upon her, the curse of the cities of the plain, “Pride, fulness of bread,
and abundance of idleness.” By the inner burning of her own passions, as fatal as
the fiery reign of Gomorrah, she was consumed from her place among the nations;
and her ashes are choking the channels of the dead salt sea.

27 Mutinelli, Annali Urbani, lib. i. p. 24; and the Chronicle of 1738, quoted by Galliciolli:
“attrovandosi allora la giesia de Sta. Maria Formosa sola giesia del nome della gloriosa Vergine
Maria.”

28 Or from the brightness of the cloud, according to the Padre who arranged the “Memorie delle
Chiese di Venezia,” vol. iii. p. 7. Compare Corner, p. 42. This first church was built in 639.

29 Perhaps both Corner and the Padre founded their diluted information on the short sentence of
Sansovino: “Finalmente, l’anno 1075, fu ridotta a perfezione da Paolo Barbetta, sul modello del
corpo di mezzo della chiesa di S. Marco.” Sansovino, however, gives 842, instead of 864, as the
date of the first rebuilding.

30 Or at least for its principal families. Vide Appendix 8, “Early Venetian Marriages.”

31 “Nazionale quasi la ceremonia, perciocche per essa nuovi difensori ad acquistar andava la
patria, sostegni nuovi le leggi, la Liberta.”—Mutinelli.

32 “Vestita, per antico uso, di bianco, e con chiome sparse giù per le spalle, conteste con fila
d’oro.” “Dressed according to ancient usage in white, and with her hair thrown down upon her
shoulders, interwoven with threads of gold.” This was when she was first brought out of her
chamber to be seen by the guests invited to the espousals. “And when the form of the espousal has
been gone through, she is led, to the sound of pipes and trumpets, and other musical instruments,
round the room, dancing serenely all the time, and bowing herself before the guests (ballando
placidamente, e facendo inchini ai convitati); and so she returns to her chamber: and when other
guests have arrived, she again comes forth, and makes the circuit of the chamber. And this is
repeated for an hour or somewhat more; and then, accompanied by many ladies who wait for her,
she enters a gondola without its felze (canopy), and, seated on a somewhat raised seat covered with
carpets, with a great number of gondolas following her, she goes to visit the monasteries and
convents, wheresoever she has any relations.”

33 Sansovino.

34 English, “Malmsey.” The reader will find a most amusing account of the negotiations
between the English and Venetians, touching the supply of London with this wine, in Mr. Brown’s
translation of the Giustiniani papers. See Appendix IX.

35 “XV. diebus et octo diebus ante festum Mariarum omni anno.”—Galliciolli. The same
precautions were taken before the feast of the Ascension.

36 Casa Vittura.

37 The keystone of the arch on its western side, facing the canal.

38 The inscriptions are as follows:

To the left of the reader.

“VINCENTIUS CAPELLUS MARITIMARUM
RERUM PERITISSIMUS ET ANTIQUORUM
LAUDIBUS PAR, TRIREMIUM ONERARIA
RUM PRÆFECTUS, AB HENRICO VII. BRI
TANNIÆ REGE INSIGNE DONATUS CLAS
SIS LEGATUS V. IMP. DESIG. TER CLAS
SEM DEDUXIT, COLLAPSAM NAVALEM DIS
CIPLINAM RESTITUIT, AD ZACXINTHUM
AURIÆ CÆSARIS LEGATO PRISCAM
VENETAM VIRTUTEM OSTENDIT.”

To the right of the reader.

“IN AMBRACIO SINU BARBARUSSUM OTTHO
MANICÆ CLASSIS DUCEM INCLUSIT
POSTRIDIE AD INTERNITIONEM DELETU
RUS NISI FATA CHRISTIANIS ADVERSA
VETUISSENT. IN RYZONICO SINU CASTRO NOVO
EXPUGNATO DIVI MARCI PROCUR
UNIVERSO REIP CONSENSU CREATUS
IN PATRIA MORITUR TOTIUS CIVITATIS
MŒRORE, ANNO ÆTATIS LXXIV. MDCXLII. XIV. KAL SEPT.”

39 The Love of God is, however, always shown by the predominance, or greater sum, of good,
in the end; but never by the annihilation of evil. The modern doubts of eternal punishment are not

so much the consequence of benevolence as of feeble powers of reasoning. Every one admits that
God brings finite good out of finite evil. Why not, therefore, infinite good out of infinite evil?

40 Let the reader examine, with special reference to this subject, the general character of the
language of Iago.

41 This opposition of art to inspiration is long and gracefully dwelt upon by Plato, in his
“Phædrus,” using, in the course of his argument, almost the words of St Paul: καλλιον
μαρτυροῦσιν οἱ παλαιοὶ μανίαν σωφροσυνης τὴν ἐκ Θεοῦ τῆς παῤ ἀνθρώπων γιγνομένης:
“It is the testimony of the ancients, that the madness which is of God is a nobler thing than the
wisdom which is of men;” and again, “He who sets himself to any work with which the Muses have
to do,” (i. e. to any of the fine arts,) “without madness, thinking that by art alone he can do his work
sufficiently, will be found vain and incapable, and the work of temperance and rationalism will be
thrust aside and obscured by that of inspiration.” The passages to the same effect, relating especially
to poetry, are innumerable in nearly all ancient writers; but in this of Plato, the entire compass of the
fine arts is intended to be embraced.

No one acquainted with other parts of my writings will suppose me to be an advocate of idle trust
in the imagination. But it is in these days just as necessary to allege the supremacy of genius as the
necessity of labor; for there never was, perhaps, a period in which the peculiar gift of the painter
was so little discerned, in which so many and so vain efforts have been made to replace it by study
and toil. This has been peculiarly the case with the German school, and there are few exhibitions of
human error more pitiable than the manner in which the inferior members of it, men originally and
for ever destitute of the painting faculty, force themselves into an unnatural, encumbered, learned
fructification of tasteless fruit, and pass laborious lives in setting obscurely and weakly upon canvas
the philosophy, if such it be, which ten minutes’ work of a strong man would have put into healthy
practice, or plain words. I know not anything more melancholy than the sight of the huge German
cartoon, with its objective side, and subjective side; and mythological division, and symbolical
division, and human and Divine division; its allegorical sense, and literal sense; and ideal point of
view, and intellectual point of view; its heroism of well-made armor and knitted brows; its
heroinism of graceful attitude and braided hair; its inwoven web of sentiment, and piety, and
philosophy, and anatomy, and history, all profound: and twenty innocent dashes of the hand of one
God-made painter, poor old Bassan or Bonifazio, were worth it all, and worth it ten thousand times
over.

Not that the sentiment or the philosophy is base in itself. They will make a good man, but they
will not make a good painter,—no, nor the millionth part of a painter. They would have been good
in the work and words of daily life; but they are good for nothing in the cartoon, if they are there
alone. And the worst result of the system is the intense conceit into which it cultivates a weak mind.
Nothing is so hopeless, so intolerable, as the pride of a foolish man who has passed through a
process of thinking, so as actually to have found something out. He believes there is nothing else to
be found out in the universe. Whereas the truly great man, on whom the Revelations rain till they
bear him to the earth with their weight, lays his head in the dust, and speaks thence—often in
broken syllables. Vanity is indeed a very equally divided inheritance among mankind; but I think
that among the first persons, no emphasis is altogether so strong as that on the German Ich. I was
once introduced to a German philosopher-painter before Tintoret’s “Massacre of the Innocents.” He
looked at it superciliously, and said it “wanted to be restored.” He had been himself several years
employed in painting a “Faust” in a red jerkin and blue fire; which made Tintoret appear somewhat
dull to him.

42 I have before stated (“Modern Painters” vol. ii.) that the first function of the imagination is
the apprehension of ultimate truth.

43 Note especially, in connexion with what was advanced in Vol. II. respecting our English
neatness of execution, how the base workman has cut the lines of the architecture neatly and
precisely round the abominable head: but the noble workman has used his chisel like a painter’s
pencil, and sketched the glory with a few irregular lines, anything rather than circular; and struck
out the whole head in the same frank and fearless way, leaving the sharp edges of the stone as they
first broke, and flinging back the crest of hair from the forehead with half a dozen hammer-strokes,
while the poor wretch who did the other was half a day in smoothing its vapid and vermicular curls.

44 The decree is quoted by Mutinelli, lib. i. p. 46.

45 See Appendix 9.

CHAPTER IV.

CONCLUSION.

§ I. I fear this chapter will be a rambling one, for it must be a kind of
supplement to the preceding pages, and a general recapitulation of the things I
have too imperfectly and feebly said.

The grotesques of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the nature of which
we examined in the last chapter, close the career of the architecture of Europe.
They were the last evidences of any feeling consistent with itself, and capable of
directing the efforts of the builder to the formation of anything worthy the name of
a style or school. From that time to this, no resuscitation of energy has taken
place, nor does any for the present appear possible. How long this impossibility
may last, and in what direction with regard to art in general, as well as to our
lifeless architecture, our immediate efforts may most profitably be directed, are
the questions I would endeavor briefly to consider in the present chapter.

§ II. That modern science, with all its additions to the comforts of life, and to
the fields of rational contemplation, has placed the existing races of mankind on a
higher platform than any that preceded them, none can doubt for an instant; and I
believe the position in which we find ourselves is somewhat analogous to that of
thoughtful and laborious youth succeeding a restless and heedless infancy. Not
long ago, it was said to me by one of the masters of modern science: “When men
invented the locomotive, the child was learning to go; when they invented the
telegraph, it was learning to speak.” He looked forward to the manhood of
mankind, as assuredly the nobler in proportion to the slowness of its
developement. What might not be expected from the prime and middle strength of
the order of existence whose infancy had lasted six thousand years? And, indeed, I
think this the truest, as well as the most cheering, view that we can take of the
world’s history. Little progress has been made as yet. Base war, lying policy,
thoughtless cruelty, senseless improvidence,—all things which, in nations, are
analogous to the petulance, cunning, impatience, and carelessness of infancy,—
have been, up to this hour, as characteristic of mankind as they were in the earliest
periods; so that we must either be driven to doubt of human progress at all, or look
upon it as in its very earliest stage. Whether the opportunity is to be permitted us

to redeem the hours that we have lost; whether He, in whose sight a thousand
years are as one day, has appointed us to be tried by the continued possession of
the strange powers with which He has lately endowed us; or whether the periods
of childhood and of probation are to cease together, and the youth of mankind is to
be one which shall prevail over death, and bloom for ever in the midst of a new
heaven and a new earth, are questions with which we have no concern. It is indeed
right that we should look for, and hasten, so far as in us lies, the coming of the
Day of God; but not that we should check any human efforts by anticipations of
its approach. We shall hasten it best by endeavoring to work out the tasks that are
appointed for us here; and, therefore, reasoning as if the world were to continue
under its existing dispensation, and the powers which have just been granted to us
were to be continued through myriads of future ages.

§ III. It seems to me, then, that the whole human race, so far as their own reason
can be trusted, may at present be regarded as just emergent from childhood; and
beginning for the first time to feel their strength, to stretch their limbs, and explore
the creation around them. If we consider that, till within the last fifty years, the
nature of the ground we tread on, of the air we breathe, and of the light by which
we see, were not so much as conjecturally conceived by us; that the duration of
the globe, and the races of animal life by which it was inhabited, are just
beginning to be apprehended; and that the scope of the magnificent science which
has revealed them, is as yet so little received by the public mind, that presumption
and ignorance are still permitted to raise their voices against it unrebuked; that
perfect veracity in the representation of general nature by art has never been
attempted until the present day, and has in the present day been resisted with all
the energy of the popular voice;46 that the simplest problems of social science are
yet so little understood, as that doctrines of liberty and equality can be openly
preached, and so successfully as to affect the whole body of the civilized world
with apparently incurable disease; that the first principles of commerce were
acknowledged by the English Parliament only a few months ago, in its free trade
measures, and are still so little understood by the million, that no nation dares to
abolish its custom-houses;47 that the simplest principles of policy are still not so
much as stated, far less received, and that civilized nations persist in the belief that

the subtlety and dishonesty which they know to be ruinous in dealings between
man and man, are serviceable in dealings between multitude and multitude;
finally, that the scope of the Christian religion, which we have been taught for two
thousand years, is still so little conceived by us, that we suppose the laws of
charity and of self-sacrifice bear upon individuals in all their social relations, and
yet do not bear upon nations in any of their political relations;—when, I say, we
thus review the depth of simplicity in which the human race are still plunged with
respect to all that it most profoundly concerns them to know, and which might, by
them, with most ease have been ascertained, we can hardly determine how far
back on the narrow path of human progress we ought to place the generation to
which we belong, how far the swaddling clothes are unwound from us, and
childish things beginning to be put away.

On the other hand, a power of obtaining veracity in the representation of
material and tangible things, which, within certain limits and conditions, is
unimpeachable, has now been placed in the hands of all men,48 almost without
labor. The foundation of every natural science is now at last firmly laid, not a day
passing without some addition of buttress and pinnacle to their already
magnificent fabric. Social theorems, if fiercely agitated, are therefore the more
likely to be at last determined, so that they never can be matters of question more.
Human life has been in some sense prolonged by the increased powers of
locomotion, and an almost limitless power of converse. Finally, there is hardly any
serious mind in Europe but is occupied, more or less, in the investigation of the
questions which have so long paralyzed the strength of religious feeling, and
shortened the dominion of religious faith. And we may therefore at least look
upon ourselves as so far in a definite state of progress, as to justify our caution in
guarding against the dangers incident to every period of change, and especially to
that from childhood into youth.

§ IV. Those dangers appear, in the main, to be twofold; consisting partly in the
pride of vain knowledge, partly in the pursuit of vain pleasure. A few points are
still to be noticed with respect to each of these heads.

Enough, it might be thought, had been said already, touching the pride of
knowledge; but I have not yet applied the principles, at which we arrived in the
third chapter, to the practical questions of modern art. And I think those principles,
together with what were deduced from the consideration of the nature of Gothic in
the second volume, so necessary and vital, not only with respect to the progress of
art, but even to the happiness of society, that I will rather run the risk of
tediousness than of deficiency, in their illustration and enforcement.

In examining the nature of Gothic, we concluded that one of the chief elements
of power in that, and in all good architecture, was the acceptance of uncultivated
and rude energy in the workman. In examining the nature of Renaissance, we
concluded that its chief element of weakness was that pride of knowledge which
not only prevented all rudeness in expression, but gradually quenched all energy
which could only be rudely expressed; nor only so, but, for the motive and matter
of the work itself, preferred science to emotion, and experience to perception.

§ V. The modern mind differs from the Renaissance mind in that its learning is
more substantial and extended, and its temper more humble; but its errors, with
respect to the cultivation of art, are precisely the same,—nay, as far as regards
execution, even more aggravated. We require, at present, from our general
workmen, more perfect finish than was demanded in the most skilful Renaissance
periods, except in their very finest productions; and our leading principles in
teaching, and in the patronage which necessarily gives tone to teaching, are, that
the goodness of work consists primarily in firmness of handling and accuracy of
science, that is to say, in hand-work and head-work; whereas heart-work, which is
the one work we want, is not only independent of both, but often, in great degree,
inconsistent with either.

§ VI. Here, therefore, let me finally and firmly enunciate the great principle to
which all that has hitherto been stated is subservient:—that art is valuable or
otherwise, only as it expresses the personality, activity, and living perception of a
good and great human soul; that it may express and contain this with little help
from execution, and less from science; and that if it have not this, if it show not
the vigor, perception, and invention of a mighty human spirit, it is worthless.

Worthless, I mean, as art; it may be precious in some other way, but, as art, it is
nugatory. Once let this be well understood among us, and magnificent
consequences will soon follow. Let me repeat it in other terms, so that I may not
be misunderstood. All art is great, and good, and true, only so far as it is
distinctively the work of manhood in its entire and highest sense; that is to say, not
the work of limbs and fingers, but of the soul, aided, according to her necessities,
by the inferior powers; and therefore distinguished in essence from all products of
those inferior powers unhelped by the soul. For as a photograph is not a work of
art, though it requires certain delicate manipulations of paper and acid, and subtle
calculations of time, in order to bring out a good result; so, neither would a
drawing like a photograph, made directly from nature, be a work of art, although it
would imply many delicate manipulations of the pencil and subtle calculations of
effects of color and shade. It is no more art49 to manipulate a camel’s hair pencil,
than to manipulate a china tray and a glass vial. It is no more art to lay on color
delicately, than to lay on acid delicately. It is no more art to use the cornea and
retina for the reception of an image, than to use a lens and a piece of silvered
paper. But the moment that inner part of the man, or rather that entire and only
being of the man, of which cornea and retina, fingers and hands, pencils and
colors, are all the mere servants and instruments;50 that manhood which has light
in itself, though the eyeball be sightless, and can gain in strength when the hand
and the foot are hewn off and cast into the fire; the moment this part of the man
stands forth with its solemn “Behold, it is I,” then the work becomes art indeed,
perfect in honor, priceless in value, boundless in power.

§ VII. Yet observe, I do not mean to speak of the body and soul as separable.
The man is made up of both: they are to be raised and glorified together, and all
art is an expression of the one, by and through the other. All that I would insist
upon is, the necessity of the whole man being in his work; the body must be in it.
Hands and habits must be in it, whether we will or not; but the nobler part of the
man may often not be in it. And that nobler part acts principally in love,
reverence, and admiration, together with those conditions of thought which arise
out of them. For we usually fall into much error by considering the intellectual
powers as having dignity in themselves, and separable from the heart; whereas the

truth is, that the intellect becomes noble and ignoble according to the food we give
it, and the kind of subjects with which it is conversant. It is not the reasoning
power which, of itself, is noble, but the reasoning power occupied with its proper
objects. Half of the mistakes of metaphysicians have arisen from their not
observing this; namely, that the intellect, going through the same processes, is yet
mean or noble according to the matter it deals with, and wastes itself away in
mere rotatory motion, if it be set to grind straws and dust. If we reason only
respecting words, or lines, or any trifling and finite things, the reason becomes a
contemptible faculty; but reason employed on holy and infinite things, becomes
herself holy and infinite. So that, by work of the soul, I mean the reader always to
understand the work of the entire immortal creature, proceeding from a quick,
perceptive, and eager heart, perfected by the intellect, and finally dealt with by the
hands, under the direct guidance of these higher powers.

§ VIII. And now observe, the first important consequence of our fully
understanding this preëminence of the soul, will be the due understanding of that
subordination of knowledge respecting which so much has already been said. For
it must be felt at once, that the increase of knowledge, merely as such, does not
make the soul larger or smaller; that, in the sight of God, all the knowledge man
can gain is as nothing: but that the soul, for which the great scheme of redemption
was laid, be it ignorant or be it wise, is all in all; and in the activity, strength,
health, and well-being of this soul, lies the main difference, in His sight, between
one man and another. And that which is all in all in God’s estimate is also, be
assured, all in all in man’s labor; and to have the heart open, and the eyes clear,
and the emotions and thoughts warm and quick, and not the knowing of this or the
other fact, is the state needed for all mighty doing in this world. And therefore
finally, for this, the weightiest of all reasons, let us take no pride in our
knowledge. We may, in a certain sense, be proud of being immortal; we may be
proud of being God’s children; we may be proud of loving, thinking, seeing, and
of all that we are by no human teaching: but not of what we have been taught by
rote; not of the ballast and freight of the ship of the spirit, but only of its pilotage,
without which all the freight will only sink it faster, and strew the sea more richly
with its ruin. There is not at this moment a youth of twenty, having received what

we moderns ridiculously call education, but he knows more of everything, except
the soul, than Plato or St. Paul did; but he is not for that reason a greater man, or
fitter for his work, or more fit to be heard by others, than Plato or St. Paul. There
is not at this moment a junior student in our schools of painting, who does not
know fifty times as much about the art as Giotto did; but he is not for that reason
greater than Giotto; no, nor his work better, nor fitter for our beholding. Let him
go on to know all that the human intellect can discover and contain in the term of
a long life, and he will not be one inch, one line, nearer to Giotto’s feet. But let
him leave his academy benches, and, innocently, as one knowing nothing, go out
into the highways and hedges, and there rejoice with them that rejoice, and weep
with them that weep; and in the next world, among the companies of the great and
good, Giotto will give his hand to him, and lead him into their white circle, and
say, “This is our brother.”

§ IX. And the second important consequence of our feeling the soul’s
preëminence will be our understanding the soul’s language, however broken, or
low, or feeble, or obscure in its words; and chiefly that great symbolic language of
past ages, which has now so long been unspoken. It is strange that the same cold
and formal spirit which the Renaissance teaching has raised amongst us, should be
equally dead to the languages of imitation and of symbolism; and should at once
disdain the faithful rendering of real nature by the modern school of the Pre-
Raphaelites, and the symbolic rendering of imagined nature in the work of the
thirteenth century. But so it is; and we find the same body of modern artists
rejecting Pre-Raphaelitism because it is not ideal! and thirteenth century work,
because it is not real!—their own practice being at once false and un-ideal, and
therefore equally opposed to both.

§ X. It is therefore, at this juncture, of much importance to mark for the reader
the exact relation of healthy symbolism and of healthy imitation; and, in order to
do so, let us return to one of our Venetian examples of symbolic art, to the central
cupola of St. Mark’s. On that cupola, as has been already stated, there is a mosaic
representing the Apostles on the Mount of Olives, with an olive-tree separating
each from the other; and we shall easily arrive at our purpose, by comparing the
means which would have been adopted by a modern artist bred in the Renaissance

schools,—that is to say, under the influence of Claude and Poussin, and of the
common teaching of the present day,—with those adopted by the Byzantine
mosaicist to express the nature of these trees.

§ XI. The reader is doubtless aware that the olive is one of the most
characteristic and beautiful features of all Southern scenery. On the slopes of the
northern Apennines, olives are the usual forest timber; the whole of the Val
d’Arno is wooded with them, every one of its gardens is filled with them, and they
grow in orchard-like ranks out of its fields of maize, or corn, or vine; so that it is
physically impossible, in most parts of the neighborhood of Florence, Pistoja,
Lucca, or Pisa, to choose any site of landscape which shall not owe its leading
character to the foliage of these trees. What the elm and oak are to England, the
olive is to Italy; nay, more than this, its presence is so constant, that, in the case of
at least four fifths of the drawings made by any artist in North Italy, he must have
been somewhat impeded by branches of olive coming between him and the
landscape. Its classical associations double its importance in Greece; and in the
Holy Land the remembrances connected with it are of course more touching than
can ever belong to any other tree of the field. Now, for many years back, at least
one third out of all the landscapes painted by English artists have been chosen
from Italian scenery; sketches in Greece and in the Holy Land have become as
common as sketches on Hampstead Heath; our galleries also are full of sacred
subjects, in which, if any background be introduced at all, the foliage of the olive
ought to have been a prominent feature.

And here I challenge the untravelled English reader to tell me what an olive-
tree is like?

§ XII. I know he cannot answer my challenge. He has no more idea of an olive-
tree than if olives grew only in the fixed stars. Let him meditate a little on this one
fact, and consider its strangeness, and what a wilful and constant closing of the
eyes to the most important truths it indicates on the part of the modern artist.
Observe, a want of perception, not of science. I do not want painters to tell me any
scientific facts about olive-trees. But it had been well for them to have felt and
seen the olive-tree; to have loved it for Christ’s sake, partly also for the helmed

Wisdom’s sake which was to the heathen in some sort as that nobler Wisdom
which stood at God’s right hand, when He founded the earth and established the
heavens. To have loved it, even to the hoary dimness of its delicate foliage,
subdued and faint of hue, as if the ashes of the Gethsemane agony had been cast
upon it for ever; and to have traced, line by line, the gnarled writhing of its
intricate branches, and the pointed fretwork of its light and narrow leaves, inlaid
on the blue field of the sky, and the small rosy-white stars of its spring
blossoming, and the beads of sable fruit scattered by autumn along its topmost
boughs—the right, in Israel, of the stranger, the fatherless, and the widow,—and,
more than all, the softness of the mantle, silver grey, and tender like the down on a
bird’s breast, with which, far away, it veils the undulation of the mountains;—
these it had been well for them to have seen and drawn, whatever they had left
unstudied in the gallery.

§ XIII. And if the reader would know the reason why this has not been done (it is
one instance only out of the myriads which might be given of sightlessness in
modern art), and will ask the artists themselves, he will be informed of another of
the marvellous contradictions and inconsistencies in the base Renaissance art; for
it will be answered him, that it is not right, nor according to law, to draw trees so
that one should be known from another, but that trees ought to be generalized into
a universal idea of a tree: that is to say, that the very school which carries its
science in the representation of man down to the dissection of the most minute
muscle, refuses so much science to the drawing of a tree as shall distinguish one
species from another; and also, while it attends to logic, and rhetoric, and
perspective, and atmosphere, and every other circumstance which is trivial,
verbal, external, or accidental, in what it either says or sees, it will not attend to
what is essential and substantial,—being intensely solicitous, for instance, if it
draws two trees, one behind the other, that the farthest off shall be as much
smaller as mathematics show that it should be, but totally unsolicitous to show,
what to the spectator is a far more important matter, whether it is an apple or an
orange tree.

§ XIV. This, however, is not to our immediate purpose. Let it be granted that an
idea of an olive-tree is indeed to be given us in a special manner; how, and by

what language, this idea is to be conveyed, are questions on which we shall find
the world of artists again divided; and it was this division which I wished
especially to illustrate by reference to the mosaics of St. Mark’s.

Now the main characteristics of an olive-tree are these. It has sharp and slender
leaves of a greyish green, nearly grey on the under surface, and resembling, but
somewhat smaller than, those of our common willow. Its fruit, when ripe, is black
and lustrous; but of course so small, that, unless in great quantity, it is not
conspicuous upon the tree. Its trunk and branches are peculiarly fantastic in their
twisting, showing their fibres at every turn; and the trunk is often hollow, and
even rent into many divisions like separate stems, but the extremities are
exquisitely graceful, especially in the setting on of the leaves; and the notable and
characteristic effect of the tree in the distance is of a rounded and soft mass or ball
of downy foliage.

§ XV. Supposing a modern artist to address himself to the rendering of this tree
with his best skill: he will probably draw accurately the twisting of the branches,
but yet this will hardly distinguish the tree from an oak: he will also render the
color and intricacy of the foliage, but this will only confuse the idea of an oak
with that of a willow. The fruit, and the peculiar grace of the leaves at the
extremities, and the fibrous structure of the stems, will all be too minute to be
rendered consistently with his artistical feeling of breadth, or with the amount of
labor which he considers it dexterous and legitimate to bestow upon the work: but,
above all, the rounded and monotonous form of the head of the tree will be at
variance with his ideas of “composition;” he will assuredly disguise or break it,
and the main points of the olive-tree will all at last remain untold.

§ XVI. Now observe, the old Byzantine mosaicist begins his work at enormous
disadvantage. It is to be some one hundred and fifty feet above the eye, in a dark
cupola; executed not with free touches of the pencil, but with square pieces of
glass; not by his own hand, but by various workmen under his superintendence;
finally, not with a principal purpose of drawing olive-trees, but mainly as a
decoration of the cupola. There is to be an olive-tree beside each apostle, and their
stems are to be the chief lines which divide the dome. He therefore at once gives

up the irregular twisting of the boughs hither and thither, but he will not give up
their fibres. Other trees have irregular and fantastic branches, but the knitted
cordage of fibres is the olive’s own. Again, were he to draw the leaves of their
natural size, they would be so small that their forms would be invisible in the
darkness; and were he to draw them so large as that their shape might be seen,
they would look like laurel instead of olive. So he arranges them in small clusters
of five each, nearly of the shape which the Byzantines give to the petals of the lily,
but elongated so as to give the idea of leafage upon a spray; and these clusters,—
his object always, be it remembered, being decoration not less than
representation,—he arranges symmetrically on each side of his branches, laying
the whole on a dark ground most truly suggestive of the heavy rounded mass of
the tree, which, in its turn, is relieved against the gold of the cupola. Lastly, comes
the question respecting the fruit. The whole power and honor of the olive is in its
fruit; and, unless that be represented, nothing is represented. But if the berries
were colored black or green, they would be totally invisible; if of any other color,
utterly unnatural, and violence would be done to the whole conception. There is
but one conceivable means of showing them, namely to represent them as golden.
For the idea of golden fruit of various kinds was already familiar to the mind, as in
the apples of the Hesperides, without any violence to the distinctive conception of
the fruit itself.51 So the mosaicist introduced small round golden berries into the
dark ground between each leaf, and his work was done.

IV.

Mosaics of Olive-tree and Flowers.

§ XVII. On the opposite plate, the uppermost figure on the left is a tolerably
faithful representation of the general effect of one of these decorative olive-trees;
the figure on the right is the head of the tree alone, showing the leaf clusters,
berries, and interlacing of the boughs as they leave the stem. Each bough is
connected with a separate line of fibre in the trunk, and the junctions of the arms
and stem are indicated, down to the very root of the tree, with a truth in structure
which may well put to shame the tree anatomy of modern times.

§ XVIII. The white branching figures upon the serpentine band below are two of
the clusters of flowers which form the foreground of a mosaic in the atrium. I
have printed the whole plate in blue, because that color approaches more nearly
than black to the distant effect of the mosaics, of which the darker portions are
generally composed of blue, in greater quantity than any other color. But the
waved background in this instance, is of various shades of blue and green
alternately, with one narrow black band to give it force; the whole being intended
to represent the distant effect and color of deep grass, and the wavy line to express
its bending motion, just as the same symbol is used to represent the waves of
water. Then the two white clusters are representative of the distinctly visible
herbage close to the spectator, having buds and flowers of two kinds, springing in
one case out of the midst of twisted grass, and in the other out of their own proper
leaves; the clusters being kept each so distinctly symmetrical, as to form, when set
side by side, an ornamental border of perfect architectural severity; and yet each
cluster different from the next, and every flower, and bud, and knot of grass,
varied in form and thought. The way the mosaic tesseræ are arranged, so as to
give the writhing of the grass blades round the stalks of the flowers, is
exceedingly fine.

The tree circles below are examples of still more severely conventional forms,
adopted, on principle, when the decoration is to be in white and gold, instead of
color; these ornaments being cut in white marble on the outside of the church, and
the ground laid in with gold, though necessarily here represented, like the rest of
the plate, in blue. And it is exceedingly interesting to see how the noble workman,
the moment he is restricted to more conventional materials, retires into more
conventional forms, and reduces his various leafage into symmetry, now nearly
perfect; yet observe, in the central figure, where the symbolic meaning of the
vegetation beside the cross required it to be more distinctly indicated, he has given
it life and growth by throwing it into unequal curves on the opposite sides.

§ XIX. I believe the reader will now see, that in these mosaics, which the
careless traveller is in the habit of passing by with contempt, there is a depth of
feeling and of meaning greater than in most of the best sketches from nature of
modern times; and, without entering into any question whether these conventional

representations are as good as, under the required limitations, it was possible to
render them, they are at all events good enough completely to illustrate that mode
of symbolical expression which appeals altogether to thought, and in no wise
trusts to realization. And little as, in the present state of our schools, such an
assertion is likely to be believed, the fact is that this kind of expression is the only
one allowable in noble art.

§ XX. I pray the reader to have patience with me for a few moments. I do not
mean that no art is noble but Byzantine mosaic; but no art is noble which in any
wise depends upon direct imitation for its effect upon the mind. This was asserted
in the opening chapters of “Modern Painters,” but not upon the highest grounds;
the results at which we have now arrived in our investigation of early art, will
enable me to place it on a loftier and firmer foundation.

§ XXI. We have just seen that all great art is the work of the whole living
creature, body and soul, and chiefly of the soul. But it is not only the work of the
whole creature, it likewise addresses the whole creature. That in which the perfect
being speaks, must also have the perfect being to listen. I am not to spend my
utmost spirit, and give all my strength and life to my work, while you, spectator or
hearer, will give me only the attention of half your soul. You must be all mine, as I
am all yours; it is the only condition on which we can meet each other. All your
faculties, all that is in you of greatest and best, must be awake in you, or I have no
reward. The painter is not to cast the entire treasure of his human nature into his
labor, merely to please a part of the beholder: not merely to delight his senses, not
merely to amuse his fancy, not merely to beguile him into emotion, not merely to
lead him into thought, but to do all this. Senses, fancy, feeling, reason, the whole
of the beholding spirit, must be stilled in attention or stirred with delight; else the
laboring spirit has not done its work well. For observe, it is not merely its right to
be thus met, face to face, heart to heart; but it is its duty to evoke its answering of
the other soul; its trumpet call must be so clear, that though the challenge may by
dulness or indolence be unanswered, there shall be no error as to the meaning of
the appeal; there must be a summons in the work, which it shall be our own fault
if we do not obey. We require this of it, we beseech this of it. Most men do not
know what is in them, till they receive this summons from their fellows: their

hearts die within them, sleep settles upon them, the lethargy of the world’s
miasmata; there is nothing for which they are so thankful as for that cry, “Awake,
thou that sleepest.” And this cry must be most loudly uttered to their noblest
faculties; first of all to the imagination, for that is the most tender, and the soonest
struck into numbness by the poisoned air; so that one of the main functions of art
in its service to man, is to arouse the imagination from its palsy, like the angel
troubling the Bethesda pool; and the art which does not do this is false to its duty,
and degraded in its nature. It is not enough that it be well imagined, it must task
the beholder also to imagine well; and this so imperatively, that if he does not
choose to rouse himself to meet the work, he shall not taste it, nor enjoy it in any
wise. Once that he is well awake, the guidance which the artist gives him should
be full and authoritative: the beholder’s imagination must not be suffered to take
its own way, or wander hither and thither; but neither must it be left at rest; and
the right point of realization, for any given work of art, is that which will enable
the spectator to complete it for himself, in the exact way the artist would have
him, but not that which will save him the trouble of effecting the completion. So
soon as the idea is entirely conveyed, the artist’s labor should cease; and every
touch which he adds beyond the point when, with the help of the beholder’s
imagination, the story ought to have been told, is a degradation to his work. So
that the art is wrong, which either realizes its subject completely, or fails in giving
such definite aid as shall enable it to be realized by the beholding imagination.

§ XXII. It follows, therefore, that the quantity of finish or detail which may
rightly be bestowed upon any work, depends on the number and kind of ideas
which the artist wishes to convey, much more than on the amount of realization
necessary to enable the imagination to grasp them. It is true that the differences of
judgment formed by one or another observer are in great degree dependent on
their unequal imaginative powers, as well as their unequal efforts in following the
artist’s intention; and it constantly happens that the drawing which appears clear
to the painter in whose mind the thought is formed, is slightly inadequate to
suggest it to the spectator. These causes of false judgment, or imperfect
achievement, must always exist, but they are of no importance. For, in nearly
every mind, the imaginative power, however unable to act independently, is so

easily helped and so brightly animated by the most obscure suggestion, that there
is no form of artistical language which will not readily be seized by it, if once it
set itself intelligently to the task; and even without such effort there are few
hieroglyphics of which, once understanding that it is to take them as
hieroglyphics, it cannot make itself a pleasant picture.

§ XXIII. Thus, in the case of all sketches, etchings, unfinished engravings, &c.,
no one ever supposes them to be imitations. Black outlines on white paper cannot
produce a deceptive resemblance of anything; and the mind, understanding at
once that it is to depend on its own powers for great part of its pleasure, sets itself
so actively to the task that it can completely enjoy the rudest outline in which
meaning exists. Now, when it is once in this temper, the artist is infinitely to be
blamed who insults it by putting anything into his work which is not suggestive:
having summoned the imaginative power, he must turn it to account and keep it
employed, or it will run against him in indignation. Whatever he does merely to
realize and substantiate an idea is impertinent; he is like a dull story-teller,
dwelling on points which the hearer anticipates or disregards. The imagination
will say to him: “I knew all that before; I don’t want to be told that. Go on; or be
silent, and let me go on in my own way. I can tell the story better than you.”

Observe, then, whenever finish is given for the sake of realization, it is wrong;
whenever it is given for the sake of adding ideas it is right. All true finish consists
in the addition of ideas, that is to say, in giving the imagination more food; for
once well awaked, it is ravenous for food: but the painter who finishes in order to
substantiate takes the food out of its mouth, and it will turn and rend him.

§ XXIV. Let us go back, for instance, to our olive grove,—or, lest the reader
should be tired of olives, let it be an oak copse,—and consider the difference
between the substantiating and the imaginative methods of finish in such a
subject. A few strokes of the pencil, or dashes of color, will be enough to enable
the imagination to conceive a tree; and in those dashes of color Sir Joshua
Reynolds would have rested, and would have suffered the imagination to paint
what more it liked for itself, and grow oaks, or olives, or apples, out of the few
dashes of color at its leisure. On the other hand, Hobbima, one of the worst of the

realists, smites the imagination on the mouth, and bids it be silent, while he sets to
work to paint his oak of the right green, and fill up its foliage laboriously with
jagged touches, and furrow the bark all over its branches, so as, if possible, to
deceive us into supposing that we are looking at a real oak; which, indeed, we had
much better do at once, without giving any one the trouble to deceive us in the
matter.

§ XXV. Now, the truly great artist neither leaves the imagination to itself, like Sir
Joshua, nor insults it by realization, like Hobbima, but finds it continual
employment of the happiest kind. Having summoned it by his vigorous first
touches, he says to it: “Here is a tree for you, and it is to be an oak. Now I know
that you can make it green and intricate for yourself, but that is not enough: an oak
is not only green and intricate, but its leaves have most beautiful and fantastic
forms which I am very sure you are not quite able to complete without help; so I
will draw a cluster or two perfectly for you, and then you can go on and do all the
other clusters. So far so good: but the leaves are not enough; the oak is to be full
of acorns, and you may not be quite able to imagine the way they grow, nor the
pretty contrast of their glossy almond-shaped nuts with the chasing of their cups;
so I will draw a bunch or two of acorns for you, and you can fill up the oak with
others like them. Good: but that is not enough; it is to be a bright day in summer,
and all the outside leaves are to be glittering in the sunshine as if their edges were
of gold: I cannot paint this, but you can; so I will really gild some of the edges
nearest you,52 and you can turn the gold into sunshine, and cover the tree with it.
Well done: but still this is not enough; the tree is so full foliaged and so old that
the wood birds come in crowds to build there; they are singing, two or three under
the shadow of every bough. I cannot show you them all; but here is a large one on
the outside spray, and you can fancy the others inside.”

§ XXVI. In this way the calls upon the imagination are multiplied as a great
painter finishes; and from these larger incidents he may proceed into the most
minute particulars, and lead the companion imagination to the veins in the leaves
and the mosses on the trunk, and the shadows of the dead leaves upon the grass,
but always multiplying thoughts, or subjects of thought, never working for the
sake of realization; the amount of realization actually reached depending on his

space, his materials, and the nature of the thoughts he wishes to suggest. In the
sculpture of an oak-tree, introduced above an Adoration of the Magi on the tomb
of the Doge Marco Dolfino (fourteenth century), the sculptor has been content
with a few leaves, a single acorn, and a bird; while, on the other hand, Millais’
willow-tree with the robin, in the background of his “Ophelia,” or the foreground
of Hunt’s “Two Gentlemen of Verona,” carries the appeal to the imagination into
particulars so multiplied and minute, that the work nearly reaches realization. But
it does not matter how near realization the work may approach in its fulness, or
how far off it may remain in its slightness, so long as realization is not the end
proposed, but the informing one spirit of the thoughts of another. And in this
greatness and simplicity of purpose all noble art is alike, however slight its means,
or however perfect, from the rudest mosaics of St. Mark’s to the most tender
finishing of the “Huguenot” or the “Ophelia.”

§ XXVII. Only observe, in this matter, that a greater degree of realization is often
allowed, for the sake of color, than would be right without it. For there is not any
distinction between the artists of the inferior and the nobler schools more definite
than this; that the first color for the sake of realization, and the second realize for
the sake of color. I hope that, in the fifth chapter, enough has been said to show
the nobility of color, though it is a subject on which I would fain enlarge
whenever I approach it: for there is none that needs more to be insisted upon,
chiefly on account of the opposition of the persons who have no eye for color, and
who, being therefore unable to understand that it is just as divine and distinct in its
power as music (only infinitely more varied in its harmonies), talk of it as if it
were inferior and servile with respect to the other powers of art;53 whereas it is so
far from being this, that wherever it enters it must take the mastery, and, whatever
else is sacrificed for its sake, it, at least, must be right. This is partly the case even
with music: it is at our choice, whether we will accompany a poem with music, or
not; but, if we do, the music must be right, and neither discordant nor
inexpressive. The goodness and sweetness of the poem cannot save it, if the music
be harsh or false; but, if the music be right, the poem may be insipid or
inharmonious, and still saved by the notes to which it is wedded. But this is far
more true of color. If that be wrong, all is wrong. No amount of expression or

invention can redeem an ill-colored picture; while, on the other hand, if the color
be right, there is nothing it will not raise or redeem; and, therefore, wherever color
enters at all, anything may be sacrificed to it, and, rather than it should be false or
feeble, everything must be sacrificed to it: so that, when an artist touches color, it
is the same thing as when a poet takes up a musical instrument; he implies, in so
doing, that he is a master, up to a certain point, of that instrument, and can
produce sweet sound from it, and is able to fit the course and measure of his
words to its tones, which, if he be not able to do, he had better not have touched it.
In like manner, to add color to a drawing is to undertake for the perfection of a
visible music, which, if it be false, will utterly and assuredly mar the whole work;
if true, proportionately elevate it, according to its power and sweetness. But, in no
case ought the color to be added in order to increase the realization. The drawing
or engraving is all that the imagination needs. To “paint” the subject merely to
make it more real, is only to insult the imaginative power and to vulgarize the
whole. Hence the common, though little understood feeling, among men of
ordinary cultivation, that an inferior sketch is always better than a bad painting;
although, in the latter, there may verily be more skill than in the former. For the
painter who has presumed to touch color without perfectly understanding it, not
for the color’s sake, nor because he loves it, but for the sake of completion merely,
has committed two sins against us; he has dulled the imagination by not trusting it
far enough, and then, in this languid state, he oppresses it with base and false
color; for all color that is not lovely, is discordant; there is no mediate condition.
So, therefore, when it is permitted to enter at all, it must be with the
predetermination that, cost what it will, the color shall be right and lovely: and I
only wish that, in general, it were better understood that a painter’s business is to
paint, primarily; and that all expression, and grouping, and conceiving, and what
else goes to constitute design, are of less importance than color, in a colored
work. And so they were always considered in the noble periods; and sometimes all
resemblance to nature whatever (as in painted windows, illuminated manuscripts,
and such other work) is sacrificed to the brilliancy of color; sometimes
distinctness of form to its richness, as by Titian, Turner, and Reynolds; and, which
is the point on which we are at present insisting, sometimes, in the pursuit of its
utmost refinements on the surfaces of objects, an amount of realization becomes

consistent with noble art, which would otherwise be altogether inadmissible, that
is to say, which no great mind could otherwise have either produced or enjoyed.
The extreme finish given by the Pre-Raphaelites is rendered noble chiefly by their
love of color.

§ XXVIII. So then, whatever may be the means, or whatever the more immediate
end of any kind of art, all of it that is good agrees in this, that it is the expression
of one soul talking to another, and is precious according to the greatness of the
soul that utters it. And consider what mighty consequences follow from our
acceptance of this truth! what a key we have herein given us for the interpretation
of the art of all time! For, as long as we held art to consist in any high manual
skill, or successful imitation of natural objects, or any scientific and legalized
manner of performance whatever, it was necessary for us to limit our admiration
to narrow periods and to few men. According to our own knowledge and
sympathies, the period chosen might be different, and our rest might be in Greek
statues, or Dutch landscapes, or Italian Madonnas; but, whatever our choice, we
were therein captive, barred from all reverence but of our favorite masters, and
habitually using the language of contempt towards the whole of the human race to
whom it had not pleased Heaven to reveal the arcana of the particular
craftsmanship we admired, and who, it might be, had lived their term of seventy
years upon the earth, and fitted themselves therein for the eternal world, without
any clear understanding, sometimes even with an insolent disregard, of the laws of
perspective and chiaroscuro.

But let us once comprehend the holier nature of the art of man, and begin to
look for the meaning of the spirit, however syllabled, and the scene is changed;
and we are changed also. Those small and dexterous creatures whom once we
worshipped, those fur-capped divinities with sceptres of camel’s hair, peering and
poring in their one-windowed chambers over the minute preciousness of the
labored canvas; how are they swept away and crushed into unnoticeable darkness!
And in their stead, as the walls of the dismal rooms that enclosed them, and us, are
struck by the four winds of Heaven, and rent away, and as the world opens to our
sight, lo! far back into all the depths of time, and forth from all the fields that have
been sown with human life, how the harvest of the dragon’s teeth is springing!

how the companies of the gods are ascending out of the earth! The dark stones
that have so long been the sepulchres of the thoughts of nations, and the forgotten
ruins wherein their faith lay charnelled, give up the dead that were in them; and
beneath the Egyptian ranks of sultry and silent rock, and amidst the dim golden
lights of the Byzantine dome, and out of the confused and cold shadows of the
Northern cloister, behold, the multitudinous souls come forth with singing, gazing
on us with the soft eyes of newly comprehended sympathy, and stretching their
white arms to us across the grave, in the solemn gladness of everlasting
brotherhood.

§ XXIX. The other danger to which, it was above said, we were primarily
exposed under our present circumstances of life, is the pursuit of vain pleasure,
that is to say, false pleasure; delight, which is not indeed delight; as knowledge
vainly accumulated, is not indeed knowledge. And this we are exposed to chiefly
in the fact of our ceasing to be children. For the child does not seek false pleasure;
its pleasures are true, simple, and instinctive: but the youth is apt to abandon his
early and true delight for vanities,—seeking to be like men, and sacrificing his
natural and pure enjoyments to his pride. In like manner, it seems to me that
modern civilization sacrifices much pure and true pleasure to various forms of
ostentation from which it can receive no fruit. Consider, for a moment, what kind
of pleasures are open to human nature, undiseased. Passing by the consideration
of the pleasures of the higher affections, which lie at the root of everything, and
considering the definite and practical pleasures of daily life, there is, first, the
pleasure of doing good; the greatest of all, only apt to be despised from not being
often enough tasted: and then, I know not in what order to put them, nor does it
matter,—the pleasure of gaining knowledge; the pleasure of the excitement of
imagination and emotion (or poetry and passion); and, lastly, the gratification of
the senses, first of the eye, then of the ear, and then of the others in their order.

§ XXX. All these we are apt to make subservient to the desire of praise; nor
unwisely, when the praise sought is God’s and the conscience’s: but if the sacrifice
is made for man’s admiration, and knowledge is only sought for praise, passion
repressed or affected for praise, and the arts practised for praise, we are feeding on
the bitterest apples of Sodom, suffering always ten mortifications for one delight.

And it seems to me, that in the modern civilized world we make such sacrifice
doubly: first, by laboring for merely ambitious purposes; and secondly, which is
the main point in question, by being ashamed of simple pleasures, more especially
of the pleasure in sweet color and form, a pleasure evidently so necessary to man’s
perfectness and virtue, that the beauty of color and form has been given lavishly
throughout the whole of creation, so that it may become the food of all, and with
such intricacy and subtlety that it may deeply employ the thoughts of all. If we
refuse to accept the natural delight which the Deity has thus provided for us, we
must either become ascetics, or we must seek for some base and guilty pleasures
to replace those of Paradise, which we have denied ourselves.

Some years ago, in passing through some of the cells of the Grand Chartreuse,
noticing that the window of each apartment looked across the little garden of its
inhabitant to the wall of the cell opposite, and commanded no other view, I asked
the monk beside me, why the window was not rather made on the side of the cell
whence it would open to the solemn fields of the Alpine valley. “We do not come
here,” he replied, “to look at the mountains.”

§ XXXI. The same answer is given, practically, by the men of this century, to
every such question; only the walls with which they enclose themselves are those
of pride, not of prayer. But in the middle ages it was otherwise. Not, indeed, in
landscape itself, but in the art which can take the place of it, in the noble color and
form with which they illumined, and into which they wrought, every object
around them that was in any wise subjected to their power, they obeyed the laws
of their inner nature, and found its proper food. The splendor and fantasy even of
dress, which in these days we pretend to despise, or in which, if we even indulge,
it is only for the sake of vanity, and therefore to our infinite harm, were in those
early days studied for love of their true beauty and honorableness, and became
one of the main helps to dignity of character, and courtesy of bearing. Look back
to what we have been told of the dress of the early Venetians, that it was so
invented “that in clothing themselves with it, they might clothe themselves also
with modesty and honor;”54 consider what nobleness of expression there is in the
dress of any of the portrait figures of the great times, nay, what perfect beauty, and
more than beauty, there is in the folding of the robe round the imagined form even

of the saint or of the angel; and then consider whether the grace of vesture be
indeed a thing to be despised. We cannot despise it if we would; and in all our
highest poetry and happiest thought we cling to the magnificence which in daily
life we disregard. The essence of modern romance is simply the return of the heart
and fancy to the things in which they naturally take pleasure; and half the
influence of the best romances, of Ivanhoe, or Marmion, or the Crusaders, or the
Lady of the Lake, is completely dependent upon the accessaries of armor and
costume. Nay, more than this, deprive the Iliad itself of its costume, and consider
how much of its power would be lost. And that delight and reverence which we
feel in, and by means of, the mere imagination of these accessaries, the middle
ages had in the vision of them; the nobleness of dress exercising, as I have said, a
perpetual influence upon character, tending in a thousand ways to increase dignity
and self-respect, and together with grace of gesture, to induce serenity of thought.

§ XXXII. I do not mean merely in its magnificence; the most splendid time was
not the best time. It was still in the thirteenth century,—when, as we have seen,
simplicity and gorgeousness were justly mingled, and the “leathern girdle and
clasp of bone” were worn, as well as the embroidered mantle,—that the manner of
dress seems to have been noblest. The chain mail of the knight, flowing and
falling over his form in lapping waves of gloomy strength, was worn under full
robes of one color in the ground, his crest quartered on them, and their borders
enriched with subtle illumination. The women wore first a dress close to the form
in like manner, and then long and flowing robes, veiling them up to the neck, and
delicately embroidered around the hem, the sleeves, and the girdle. The use of
plate armor gradually introduced more fantastic types; the nobleness of the form
was lost beneath the steel; the gradually increasing luxury and vanity of the age
strove for continual excitement in more quaint and extravagant devices; and in the
fifteenth century, dress reached its point of utmost splendor and fancy, being in
many cases still exquisitely graceful, but now, in its morbid magnificence, devoid
of all wholesome influence on manners. From this point, like architecture, it was
rapidly degraded; and sank through the buff coat, and lace collar, and jack-boot, to
the bag-wig, tailed coat, and high-heeled shoes; and so to what it is now.

§ XXXIII. Precisely analogous to this destruction of beauty in dress, has been that
of beauty in architecture; its color, and grace, and fancy, being gradually sacrificed
to the base forms of the Renaissance, exactly as the splendor of chivalry has faded
into the paltriness of fashion. And observe the form in which the necessary
reaction has taken place; necessary, for it was not possible that one of the
strongest instincts of the human race could be deprived altogether of its natural
food. Exactly in the degree that the architect withdrew from his buildings the
sources of delight which in early days they had so richly possessed, demanding, in
accordance with the new principles of taste, the banishment of all happy color and
healthy invention, in that degree the minds of men began to turn to landscape as
their only resource. The picturesque school of art rose up to address those
capacities of enjoyment for which, in sculpture, architecture, or the higher walks
of painting, there was employment no more; and the shadows of Rembrandt, and
savageness of Salvator, arrested the admiration which was no longer permitted to
be rendered to the gloom or the grotesqueness of the Gothic aisle. And thus the
English school of landscape, culminating in Turner, is in reality nothing else than
a healthy effort to fill the void which the destruction of Gothic architecture has
left.

§ XXXIV. But the void cannot thus be completely filled; no, nor filled in any
considerable degree. The art of landscape-painting will never become thoroughly
interesting or sufficing to the minds of men engaged in active life, or concerned
principally with practical subjects. The sentiment and imagination necessary to
enter fully into the romantic forms of art are chiefly the characteristics of youth;
so that nearly all men as they advance in years, and some even from their
childhood upwards, must be appealed to, if at all, by a direct and substantial art,
brought before their daily observation and connected with their daily interests. No
form of art answers these conditions so well as architecture, which, as it can
receive help from every character of mind in the workman, can address every
character of mind in the spectator; forcing itself into notice even in his most
languid moments, and possessing this chief and peculiar advantage, that it is the
property of all men. Pictures and statues may be jealously withdrawn by their
possessors from the public gaze, and to a certain degree their safety requires them

to be so withdrawn; but the outsides of our houses belong not so much to us as to
the passer-by, and whatever cost and pains we bestow upon them, though too
often arising out of ostentation, have at least the effect of benevolence.

§ XXXV. If, then, considering these things, any of my readers should determine,
according to their means, to set themselves to the revival of a healthy school of
architecture in England, and wish to know in few words how this may be done,
the answer is clear and simple. First, let us cast out utterly whatever is connected
with the Greek, Roman, or Renaissance architecture, in principle or in form. We
have seen above, that the whole mass of the architecture, founded on Greek and
Roman models, which we have been in the habit of building for the last three
centuries, is utterly devoid of all life, virtue, honorableness, or power of doing
good. It is base, unnatural, unfruitful, unenjoyable, and impious. Pagan in its
origin, proud and unholy in its revival, paralyzed in its old age, yet making prey in
its dotage of all the good and living things that were springing around it in their
youth, as the dying and desperate king, who had long fenced himself so strongly
with the towers of it, is said to have filled his failing veins with the blood of
children;55 an architecture invented, as it seems, to make plagiarists of its
architects, slaves of its workmen, and Sybarites of its inhabitants; an architecture
in which intellect is idle, invention impossible, but in which all luxury is gratified,
and all insolence fortified;—the first thing we have to do is to cast it out, and
shake the dust of it from our feet for ever. Whatever has any connexion with the
five orders, or with any one of the orders,—whatever is Doric, or Ionic, or Tuscan,
or Corinthian, or Composite, or in any way Grecized or Romanized; whatever
betrays the smallest respect for Vitruvian laws, or conformity with Palladian work,
—that we are to endure no more. To cleanse ourselves of these “cast clouts and
rotten rags” is the first thing to be done in the court of our prison.

§ XXXVI. Then, to turn our prison into a palace is an easy thing. We have seen
above, that exactly in the degree in which Greek and Roman architecture is
lifeless, unprofitable, and unchristian, in that same degree our own ancient Gothic
is animated, serviceable, and faithful. We have seen that it is flexible to all duty,
enduring to all time, instructive to all hearts, honorable and holy in all offices. It is
capable alike of all lowliness and all dignity, fit alike for cottage porch or castle

gateway; in domestic service familiar, in religious, sublime; simple, and playful,
so that childhood may read it, yet clothed with a power that can awe the mightiest,
and exalt the loftiest of human spirits: an architecture that kindles every faculty in
its workman, and addresses every emotion in its beholder; which, with every stone
that is laid on its solemn walls, raises some human heart a step nearer heaven, and
which from its birth has been incorporated with the existence, and in all its form is
symbolical of the faith, of Christianity. In this architecture let us henceforward
build, alike the church, the palace, and the cottage; but chiefly let us use it for our
civil and domestic buildings. These once ennobled, our ecclesiastical work will be
exalted together with them: but churches are not the proper scenes for experiments
in untried architecture, nor for exhibitions of unaccustomed beauty. It is certain
that we must often fail before we can again build a natural and noble Gothic: let
not our temples be the scenes of our failures. It is certain that we must offend
many deep-rooted prejudices, before ancient Christian architecture56 can be again
received by all of us: let not religion be the first source of such offence. We shall
meet with difficulties in applying Gothic architecture to churches, which would in
no wise affect the designs of civil buildings, for the most beautiful forms of
Gothic chapels are not those which are best fitted for Protestant worship. As it was
noticed in the second volume, when speaking of the Cathedral of Torcello it seems
not unlikely, that as we study either the science of sound, or the practice of the
early Christians, we may see reason to place the pulpit generally at the extremity
of the apse or chancel; an arrangement entirely destructive of the beauty of a
Gothic church, as seen in existing examples, and requiring modifications of its
design in other parts with which we should be unwise at present to embarrass
ourselves; besides, that the effort to introduce the style exclusively for
ecclesiastical purposes, excites against it the strong prejudices of many persons
who might otherwise be easily enlisted among its most ardent advocates. I am
quite sure, for instance, that if such noble architecture as has been employed for
the interior of the church just built in Margaret Street57 had been seen in a civil
building, it would have decided the question with many men at once; whereas, at
present, it will be looked upon with fear and suspicion, as the expression of the
ecclesiastical principles of a particular party. But, whether thus regarded or not,
this church assuredly decides one question conclusively, that of our present

capability of Gothic design. It is the first piece of architecture I have seen, built in
modern days, which is free from all signs of timidity or incapacity. In general
proportion of parts, in refinement and piquancy of mouldings, above all, in force,
vitality, and grace of floral ornament, worked in a broad and masculine manner, it
challenges fearless comparison with the noblest work of any time. Having done
this, we may do anything; there need be no limits to our hope or our confidence;
and I believe it to be possible for us, not only to equal, but far to surpass, in some
respects, any Gothic yet seen in Northern countries. In the introduction of figure-
sculpture, we must, indeed, for the present, remain utterly inferior, for we have no
figures to study from. No architectural sculpture was ever good for anything
which did not represent the dress and persons of the people living at the time; and
our modern dress will not form decorations for spandrils and niches. But in floral
sculpture we may go far beyond what has yet been done, as well as in refinement
of inlaid work and general execution. For, although the glory of Gothic
architecture is to receive the rudest work, it refuses not the best; and, when once
we have been content to admit the handling of the simplest workman, we shall
soon be rewarded by finding many of our simple workmen become cunning ones:
and, with the help of modern wealth and science, we may do things like Giotto’s
campanile, instead of like our own rude cathedrals; but better than Giotto’s
campanile, insomuch as we may adopt the pure and perfect forms of the Northern
Gothic, and work them out with the Italian refinement. It is hardly possible at
present to imagine what may be the splendor of buildings designed in the forms of
English and French thirteenth century surface Gothic, and wrought out with the
refinement of Italian art in the details, and with a deliberate resolution, since we
cannot have figure sculpture, to display in them the beauty of every flower and
herb of the English fields, each by each; doing as much for every tree that roots
itself in our rocks, and every blossom that drinks our summer rains, as our
ancestors did for the oak, the ivy, and the rose. Let this be the object of our
ambition, and let us begin to approach it, not ambitiously, but in all humility,
accepting help from the feeblest hands; and the London of the nineteenth century
may yet become as Venice without her despotism, and as Florence without her
dispeace.

46 In the works of Turner and the Pre-Raphaelites.

47 Observe, I speak of these various principles as self-evident, only under the present
circumstances of the world, not as if they had always been so; and I call them now self-evident, not
merely because they seem so to myself, but because they are felt to be so likewise by all the men in
whom I place most trust. But granting that they are not so, then their very disputability proves the
state of infancy above alleged, as characteristic of the world. For I do not suppose that any Christian
reader will doubt the first great truth, that whatever facts or laws are important to mankind, God has
made ascertainable by mankind; and that as the decision of all these questions is of vital importance
to the race, that decision must have been long ago arrived at, unless they were still in a state of
childhood.

48 I intended to have given a sketch in this place (above referred to) of the probable results of
the daguerreotype and calotype within the next few years, in modifying the application of the
engraver’s art, but I have not had time to complete the experiments necessary to enable me to speak
with certainty. Of one thing, however, I have little doubt, that an infinite service will soon be done
to a large body of our engravers; namely, the making them draughtsmen (in black and white) on
paper instead of steel.

49 I mean art in its highest sense. All that men do ingeniously is art, in one sense. In fact, we
want a definition of the word “art” much more accurate than any in our minds at present. For,
strictly speaking, there is no such thing as “fine” or “high” art. All art is a low and common thing,
and what we indeed respect is not art at all, but instinct or inspiration expressed by the help of art.

50

“Socrates. This, then, was what I asked you; whether that which puts anything else to service,
and the thing which is put to service by it, are always two different things?

Alcibiades. I think so.

Socrates. What shall we then say of the leather-cutter? Does he cut his leather with his
instruments only, or with his hands also?

Alcibiades. With his hands also.

Socrates. Does he not use his eyes as well as his hands?

Alcibiades. Yes.

Socrates. And we agreed that the thing which uses and the thing which is used, were different
things?

Alcibiades. Yes.

Socrates. Then the leather-cutter is not the same thing as his eyes or hands?

Alcibiades. So it appears.

Socrates. Does not, then, man make use of his whole body?

Alcibiades. Assuredly.

Socrates. Then the man is not the same thing as his body?

Alcibiades. It seems so.

Socrates. What, then, is the man?

Alcibiades. I know not.”

Plato, Alcibiades I.

51 Thus the grapes pressed by Excesse are partly golden (Spenser, book ii. cant. 12.):

“Which did themselves amongst the leaves enfold,
As lurking from the view of covetous guest,
That the weake boughes, with so rich load opprest
Did bow adowne as overburdened.”

52 The reader must not suppose that the use of gold, in this manner, is confined to early art.
Tintoret, the greatest master of pictorial effect that ever existed, has gilded the ribs of the fig-leaves
in his “Resurrection,” in the Scuola di San Rocco.

53 Nothing is more wonderful to me than to hear the pleasure of the eye, in color, spoken of
with disdain as “sensual,” while people exalt that of the ear in music. Do they really suppose the
eye is a less noble bodily organ than the ear,—that the organ by which nearly all our knowledge of
the external universe is communicated to us, and through which we learn the wonder and the love,
can be less exalted in its own peculiar delight than the ear, which is only for the communication of
the ideas which owe to the eye their very existence? I do not mean to depreciate music: let it be

loved and reverenced as is just; only let the delight of the eye be reverenced more. The great power
of music over the multitude is owing, not to its being less but more sensual than color; it is so
distinctly and so richly sensual, that it can be idly enjoyed; it is exactly at the point where the lower
and higher pleasures of the senses and imagination are balanced; so that pure and great minds love
it for its invention and emotion, and lower minds for its sensual power.

54 Vol. II. Appendix 7.

55 Louis the Eleventh. “In the month of March, 1481, Louis was seized with a fit of apoplexy at
St. Bénoit-du-lac-mort, near Chinon. He remained speechless and bereft of reason three days; and
then but very imperfectly restored, he languished in a miserable state.... To cure him,” says a
contemporary historian, “wonderful and terrible medicines were compounded. It was reported
among the people that his physicians opened the veins of little children, and made him drink their
blood, to correct the poorness of his own.”—Bussey’s History of France. London, 1850.

56 Observe, I call Gothic “Christian” architecture, not “ecclesiastical.” There is a wide
difference. I believe it is the only architecture which Christian men should build, but not at all an
architecture necessarily connected with the services of their church.

57 Mr. Hope’s Church, in Margaret Street, Portland Place. I do not altogether like the
arrangements of color in the brickwork; but these will hardly attract the eye, where so much has
been already done with precious and beautiful marble, and is yet to be done in fresco. Much will
depend, however, upon the coloring of this latter portion. I wish that either Holman Hunt or Millais
could be prevailed upon to do at least some of these smaller frescoes.

APPENDIX.

1. ARCHITECT OF THE DUCAL PALACE.

Popular tradition and a large number of the chroniclers ascribe the building of
the Ducal Palace to that Filippo Calendario who suffered death for his share in the

conspiracy of Faliero. He was certainly one of the leading architects of the time,
and had for several years the superintendence of the works of the Palace; but it
appears, from the documents collected by the Abbé Cadorin, that the first designer
of the Palace, the man to whom we owe the adaptation of the Frari traceries to
civil architecture, was Pietro Baseggio, who is spoken of expressly as “formerly
the Chief Master of our New Palace,”58 in the decree of 1361, quoted by Cadorin,
and who, at his death, left Calendario his executor. Other documents collected by
Zanotto, in his work on “Venezia e le sue Lagune,” show that Calendario was for a
long time at sea, under the commands of the Signory, returning to Venice only
three or four years before his death; and that therefore the entire management of
the works of the Palace, in the most important period, must have been entrusted to
Baseggio.

It is quite impossible, however, in the present state of the Palace, to distinguish
one architect’s work from another in the older parts; and I have not in the text
embarrassed the reader by any attempt at close definition of epochs before the
great junction of the Piazzetta Façade with the older palace in the fifteenth
century. Here, however, it is necessary that I should briefly state the observations I
was able to make on the relative dates of the earlier portions.

In the description of the Fig-tree angle, given in the eighth chapter of Vol. II., I
said that it seemed to me somewhat earlier than that of the Vine, and the reader
might be surprised at the apparent opposition of this statement to my supposition
that the Palace was built gradually round from the Rio Façade to the Piazzetta. But
in the two great open arcades there is no succession of work traceable; from the
Vine angle to the junction with the fifteenth century work, above and below, all
seems nearly of the same date, the only question being of the accidental
precedence of workmanship of one capital or another; and I think, from its style,
that the Fig-tree angle must have been first completed. But in the upper stories of
the Palace there are enormous differences of style. On the Rio Façade, in the
upper story, are several series of massive windows of the third order,
corresponding exactly in mouldings and manner of workmanship to those of the
chapter-house of the Frari, and consequently carrying us back to a very early date
in the fourteenth century: several of the capitals of these windows, and two richly

sculptured string-courses in the wall below, are of Byzantine workmanship, and in
all probability fragments of the Ziani Palace. The traceried windows on the Rio
Façade, and the two eastern windows on the Sea Façade, are all of the finest early
fourteenth century work, masculine and noble in their capitals and bases to the
highest degree, and evidently contemporary with the very earliest portions of the
lower arcades. But the moment we come to the windows of the Great Council
Chamber the style is debased. The mouldings are the same, but they are coarsely
worked, and the heads set amidst the leafage of the capitals quite valueless and
vile.

I have not the least doubt that these window-jambs and traceries were restored
after the great fire;59 and various other restorations have taken place since,
beginning with the removal of the traceries from all the windows except the
northern one of the Sala del Scrutinio, behind the Porta della Carta, where they are
still left. I made out four periods of restoration among these windows, each baser
than the preceding. It is not worth troubling the reader about them, but the
traveller who is interested in the subject may compare two of them in the same
window; the one nearer the sea of the two belonging to the little room at the top of
the Palace on the Piazzetta Façade, between the Sala del Gran Consiglio and that
of the Scrutinio. The seaward jamb of that window is of the first, and the opposite
jamb of the second, period of these restorations. These are all the points of
separation in date which I could discover by internal evidence. But much more
might be made out by any Venetian antiquary whose time permitted him
thoroughly to examine any existing documents which allude to or describe the
parts of the Palace spoken of in the important decrees of 1340, 1342, and 1344;
for the first of these decrees speaks of certain “columns looking towards the
Canal”60 or sea, as then existing, and I presume these columns to have been part
of the Ziani Palace, corresponding to the part of that palace on the Piazzetta where
were the “red columns” between which Calendario was executed; and a great deal
more might be determined by any one who would thoroughly unravel the obscure
language of those decrees.

Meantime, in order to complete the evidence respecting the main dates stated in
the text, I have collected here such notices of the building of the Ducal Palace as

appeared to me of most importance in the various chronicles I examined. I could
not give them all in the text, as they repeat each other, and would have been
tedious; but they will be interesting to the antiquary, and it is to be especially
noted in all of them how the Palazzo Vecchio is invariably distinguished, either
directly or by implication, from the Palazzo Nuovo. I shall first translate the piece
of the Zancarol Chronicle given by Cadorin, which has chiefly misled the
Venetian antiquaries. I wish I could put the rich old Italian into old English, but
must be content to lose its raciness, as it is necessary that the reader should be
fully acquainted with its facts.

“It was decreed that none should dare to propose to the Signory of Venice to
ruin the old palace and rebuild it new and more richly, and there was a penalty of
one thousand ducats against any one who should break it. Then the Doge, wishing
to set forward the public good, said to the Signory, ... that they ought to rebuild the
façades of the old palace, and that it ought to be restored, to do honor to the
nation: and so soon as he had done speaking, the Avogadori demanded the penalty
from the Doge, for having disobeyed the law; and the Doge with ready mind paid
it, remaining in his opinion that the said fabric ought to be built. And so, in the
year 1422, on the 20th day of September, it was passed in the Council of the
Pregadi that the said new palace should be begun, and the expense should be
borne by the Signori del Sal; and so, on the 24th day of March, 1424, it was begun
to throw down the old palace, and to build it anew.”—Cadorin, p. 129.

The day of the month, and the council in which the decree was passed, are
erroneously given by this Chronicle. Cadorin has printed the words of the decree
itself, which passed in the Great Council on the 27th September: and these words
are, fortunately, much to our present purpose. For as more than one façade is
spoken of in the above extract, the Marchese Selvatico was induced to believe that
both the front to the sea and that to the Piazzetta had been destroyed; whereas, the
“façades” spoken of are evidently those of the Ziani Palace. For the words of the
decree (which are much more trustworthy than those of the Chronicle, even if
there were any inconsistency between them) run thus: “Palatium nostrum
fabricetur et fiat in forma decora et convenienti, quod respondeat solemnissimo
principio palatii nostri novi.” Thus the new council chamber and façade to the sea

are called the “most venerable beginning of our New Palace;” and the rest was
ordered to be designed in accordance with these, as was actually the case as far as
the Porta della Carta. But the Renaissance architects who thenceforward
proceeded with the fabric, broke through the design, and built everything else
according to their own humors.

The question may be considered as set at rest by these words of the decree,
even without any internal or any farther documentary evidence. But rather for the
sake of impressing the facts thoroughly on the reader’s mind, than of any
additional proof, I shall quote a few more of the best accredited Chronicles.

The passage given by Bettio, from the Sivos Chronicle, is a very important
parallel with that from the Zancarol above:

“Essendo molto vecchio, e quasi rovinoso el Palazzo sopra la piazza, fo
deliberato di far quella parte tutta da novo, et continuarla com’ è quella della Sala
grande, et cosi il Lunedi 27 Marzo 1424 fu dato principio a ruinare detto Palazzo
vecchio dalla parte, ch’ è verso panateria cioè della Giustizia, ch’ è nelli occhi di
sopra le colonne fino alla Chiesa et fo fatto anco la porta grande, com’ è al
presente, con la sala che si addimanda la Libraria.”61

We have here all the facts told us in so many words: the “old palace” is
definitely stated to have been “on the piazza,” and it is to be rebuilt “like the part
of the great saloon.” The very point from which the newer buildings commenced
is told us; but here the chronicler has carried his attempt at accuracy too far. The
point of junction is, as stated above, at the third pillar beyond the medallion of
Venice; and I am much at a loss to understand what could have been the
disposition of these three pillars where they joined the Ziani Palace, and how they
were connected with the arcade of the inner cortile. But with these difficulties, as
they do not bear on the immediate question, it is of no use to trouble the reader.

The next passage I shall give is from a Chronicle in the Marcian Library,
bearing title, “Supposta di Zancaruol;” but in which I could not find the passage
given by Cadorin from, I believe, a manuscript of this Chronicle at Vienna. There
occurs instead of it the following thus headed:—

“Come la parte nova del Palazzo fuo hedificata novamente.

“El Palazzo novo de Venesia quella parte che xe verso la Chiesia de S. Marcho
fuo prexo chel se fesse del 1422 e fosse pagado la spexa per li officiali del sal. E
fuo fatto per sovrastante G. Nicolo Barberigo cum provision de ducati X doro al
mexe e fuo fabricado e fatto nobelissimo. Come fin ancho di el sta e fuo grande
honor a la Signoria de Venesia e a la sua Citta.”

This entry, which itself bears no date, but comes between others dated 22nd
July and 27th December, is interesting, because it shows the first transition of the
idea of newness, from the Grand Council Chamber to the part built under Foscari.
For when Mocenigo’s wishes had been fulfilled, and the old palace of Ziani had
been destroyed, and another built in its stead, the Great Council Chamber, which
was “the new palace” compared with Ziani’s, became “the old palace” compared
with Foscari’s; and thus we have, in the body of the above extract, the whole
building called “the new palace of Venice;” but in the heading of it, we have “the
new part of the palace” applied to the part built by Foscari, in contradistinction to
the Council Chamber.

The next entry I give is important, because the writing of the MS. in which it
occurs, No. 53 in the Correr Museum, shows it to be probably not later than the
end of the fifteenth century:

“El palazo nuovo de Venixia zoe quella parte che se sora la piazza verso la
giesia di Miss. San Marcho del 1422 fo principiado, el qual fo fato e finito molto
belo, chome al presente se vede nobilissimo, et a la fabricha de quello fo deputado
Miss. Nicolo Barberigo, soprastante con ducati dieci doro al mexe.”

We have here the part built by Foscari distinctly called the Palazzo Nuovo, as
opposed to the Great Council Chamber, which had now completely taken the
position of the Palazzo Vecchio, and is actually so called by Sansovino. In the
copy of the Chronicle of Paolo Morosini, and in the MSS. numbered respectively
57, 59, 74, and 76 in the Correr Museum, the passage above given from No. 53 is
variously repeated with slight modifications and curtailments; the entry in the
Morosini Chronicle being headed, “Come fu principiato il palazo che guarda

sopra la piaza grande di S. Marco,” and proceeding in the words, “El Palazo
Nuovo di Venetia, cioè quella parte che e sopra la piaza,” &c., the writers being
cautious, in all these instances, to limit their statement to the part facing the
Piazza, that no reader might suppose the Council Chamber to have been built or
begun at the same time; though, as long as to the end of the sixteenth century, we
find the Council Chamber still included in the expression “Palazzo Nuovo.” Thus,
in the MS. No. 75 in the Correr Museum, which is about that date, we have “Del
1422, a di 20 Settembre fu preso nel consegio grando de dover compir el Palazo
Novo, e dovesen fare la spessa li officialli del Sal (61. M. 2. B.).” And, so long as
this is the case, the “Palazzo Vecchio” always means the Ziani Palace. Thus, in the
next page of this same MS. we have “a di 27 Marzo (1424 by context) fo principia
a butar zosso, el Palazzo Vecchio per refarlo da novo, e poi se he” (and so it is
done); and in the MS. No. 81, “Del 1424, fo gittado zoso el Palazzo Vecchio per
refarlo de nuovo, a di 27 Marzo.” But in the time of Sansovino the Ziani Palace
was quite forgotten; the Council Chamber was then the old palace, and Foscari’s
part was the new. His account of the “Palazzo Publico” will now be perfectly
intelligible; but, as the work itself is easily accessible, I shall not burden the reader
with any farther extracts, only noticing that the chequering of the façade with red
and white marbles, which he ascribes to Foscari, may or may not be of so late a
date, as there is nothing in the style of the work which can be produced as
evidence.

2. THEOLOGY OF SPENSER.

The following analysis of the first books of the “Faërie Queen,” may be
interesting to readers who have been in the habit of reading the noble poem too
hastily to connect its parts completely together; and may perhaps induce them to
more careful study of the rest of the poem.

The Redcrosse Knight is Holiness,—the “Pietas” of St. Mark’s, the “Devotio”
of Orcagna,—meaning, I think, in general, Reverence and Godly Fear.

This Virtue, in the opening of the book, has Truth (or Una) at its side, but
presently enters the Wandering Wood, and encounters the serpent Error; that is to

say, Error in her universal form, the first enemy of Reverence and Holiness; and
more especially Error as founded on learning; for when Holiness strangles her,

“Her vomit full of bookes and papers was,
With loathly frogs and toades, which eyes did lacke.”

Having vanquished this first open and palpable form of Error, as Reverence and
Religion must always vanquish it, the Knight encounters Hypocrisy, or
Archimagus; Holiness cannot detect Hypocrisy, but believes him, and goes home
with him; whereupon Hypocrisy succeeds in separating Holiness from Truth; and
the Knight (Holiness) and Lady (Truth) go forth separately from the house of
Archimagus.

Now observe: the moment Godly Fear, or Holiness, is separated from Truth, he
meets Infidelity, or the Knight Sans Foy; Infidelity having Falsehood, or Duesa,
riding behind him. The instant the Redcrosse Knight is aware of the attack of
Infidelity, he

“Gan fairly couch his speare, and towards ride.”

He vanquishes and slays Infidelity; but is deceived by his companion,
Falsehood, and takes her for his lady: thus showing the condition of Religion,
when, after being attacked by Doubt, and remaining victorious, it is nevertheless
seduced, by any form of Falsehood, to pay reverence where it ought not. This,
then, is the first fortune of Godly Fear separated from Truth. The poet then returns
to Truth, separated from Godly Fear. She is immediately attended by a lion, or
Violence, which makes her dreaded wherever she comes; and when she enters the
mart of Superstition, this Lion tears Kirkrapine in pieces: showing how Truth,
separated from Godliness, does indeed put an end to the abuses of Superstition,
but does so violently and desperately. She then meets again with Hypocrisy,
whom she mistakes for her own lord, or Godly Fear, and travels a little way under
his guardianship (Hypocrisy thus not unfrequently appearing to defend the Truth),
until they are both met by Lawlessness, or the Knight Sans Loy, whom Hypocrisy
cannot resist. Lawlessness overthrows Hypocrisy, and seizes upon Truth, first

slaying her lion attendant: showing that the first aim of licence is to destroy the
force and authority of Truth. Sans Loy then takes Truth captive, and bears her
away. Now this Lawlessness is the “unrighteousness,” or “adikia,” of St. Paul; and
his bearing Truth away captive, is a type of those “who hold the truth in
unrighteousness,”—that is to say, generally, of men who, knowing what is true,
make the truth give way to their own purposes, or use it only to forward them, as
is the case with so many of the popular leaders of the present day. Una is then
delivered from Sans Loy by the satyrs, to show that Nature, in the end, must work
out the deliverance of the truth, although, where it has been captive to
Lawlessness, that deliverance can only be obtained through Savageness, and a
return to barbarism. Una is then taken from among the satyrs by Satyrane, the son
of a satyr and a “lady myld, fair Thyamis,” (typifying the early steps of renewed
civilization, and its rough and hardy character “nousled up in life and manners
wilde,”) who, meeting again with Sans Loy, enters instantly into rough and
prolonged combat with him: showing how the early organization of a hardy nation
must be wrought out through much discouragement from Lawlessness. This
contest the poet leaving for the time undecided, returns to trace the adventures of
the Redcrosse Knight, or Godly Fear, who, having vanquished Infidelity, presently
is led by Falsehood to the house of Pride: thus showing how religion, separated
from truth, is first tempted by doubts of God, and then by the pride of life. The
description of this house of Pride is one of the most elaborate and noble pieces in
the poem; and here we begin to get at the proposed system of Virtues and Vices.
For Pride, as queen, has six other vices yoked in her chariot; namely, first,
Idleness, then Gluttony, Lust, Avarice, Envy, and Anger, all driven on by “Sathan,
with a smarting whip in hand.” From these lower vices and their company, Godly
Fear, though lodging in the house of Pride, holds aloof; but he is challenged, and
has a hard battle to fight with Sans Joy, the brother of Sans Foy: showing, that
though he has conquered Infidelity, and does not give himself up to the
allurements of Pride, he is yet exposed, so long as he dwells in her house, to
distress of mind and loss of his accustomed rejoicing before God. He, however,
having partly conquered Despondency, or Sans Joy, Falsehood goes down to
Hades, in order to obtain drugs to maintain the power or life of Despondency; but,

meantime, the Knight leaves the house of Pride: Falsehood pursues and overtakes
him, and finds him by a fountain side, of which the waters are

“Dull and slow,
And all that drinke thereof do faint and feeble grow.”

Of which the meaning is, that Godly Fear, after passing through the house of
Pride, is exposed to drowsiness and feebleness of watch; as, after Peter’s boast,
came Peter’s sleeping, from weakness of the flesh, and then, last of all, Peter’s
fall. And so it follows: for the Redcrosse Knight, being overcome with faintness
by drinking of the fountain, is thereupon attacked by the giant Orgoglio, overcome
and thrown by him into a dungeon. This Orgoglio is Orgueil, or Carnal Pride; not
the pride of life, spiritual and subtle, but the common and vulgar pride in the
power of this world: and his throwing the Redcrosse Knight into a dungeon, is a
type of the captivity of true religion under the temporal power of corrupt
churches, more especially of the Church of Rome; and of its gradually wasting
away in unknown places, while carnal pride has the preëminence over all things.
That Spenser means, especially, the pride of the Papacy, is shown by the 16th
stanza of the book; for there the giant Orgoglio is said to have taken Duessa, or
Falsehood, for his “deare,” and to have set upon her head a triple crown, and
endowed her with royal majesty, and made her to ride upon a seven-headed beast.

In the meantime, the dwarf, the attendant of the Redcrosse Knight, takes his
arms, and finding Una tells her of the captivity of her lord. Una, in the midst of
her mourning, meets Prince Arthur, in whom, as Spenser himself tells us, is set
forth generally Magnificence; but who, as is shown by the choice of the hero’s
name, is more especially the magnificence, or literally, “great doing” of the
kingdom of England. This power of England, going forth with Truth, attacks
Orgoglio, or the Pride of Papacy, slays him; strips Duessa, or Falsehood, naked;
and liberates the Redcrosse Knight. The magnificent and well-known description
of Despair follows, by whom the Redcrosse Knight is hard bested, on account of
his past errors and captivity, and is only saved by Truth, who, perceiving him to be
still feeble, brings him to the house of Cœlia, called, in the argument of the canto,

Holiness, but properly, Heavenly Grace, the mother of the Virtues. Her “three
daughters, well up-brought,” are Faith, Hope, and Charity. Her porter is Humility;
because Humility opens the door of Heavenly Grace. Zeal and Reverence are her
chamberlains, introducing the new comers to her presence; her groom, or servant,
is Obedience; and her physician, Patience. Under the commands of Charity, the
matron Mercy rules over her hospital, under whose care the Knight is healed of
his sickness; and it is to be especially noticed how much importance Spenser,
though never ceasing to chastise all hypocrisies and mere observances of form,
attaches to true and faithful penance in effecting this cure. Having his strength
restored to him, the Knight is trusted to the guidance of Mercy, who, leading him
forth by a narrow and thorny way, first instructs him in the seven works of Mercy,
and then leads him to the hill of Heavenly Contemplation; whence, having a sight
of the New Jerusalem, as Christian of the Delectable Mountains, he goes forth to
the final victory over Satan, the old serpent, with which the book closes.

3. AUSTRIAN GOVERNMENT IN ITALY.

I cannot close these volumes without expressing my astonishment and regret at
the facility with which the English allow themselves to be misled by any
representations, however openly groundless or ridiculous, proceeding from the
Italian Liberal party, respecting the present administration of the Austrian
Government. I do not choose here to enter into any political discussion, or express
any political opinion; but it is due to justice to state the simple facts which came
under my notice during my residence in Italy. I was living at Venice through two
entire winters, and in the habit of familiar association both with Italians and
Austrians, my own antiquarian vocations rendering such association possible
without exciting the distrust of either party. During this whole period, I never once
was able to ascertain, from any liberal Italian, that he had a single definite ground
of complaint against the Government. There was much general grumbling and
vague discontent; but I never was able to bring one of them to the point, or to
discover what it was that they wanted, or in what way they felt themselves
injured; nor did I ever myself witness an instance of oppression on the part of the
Government, though several of much kindness and consideration. The indignation

of those of my own countrymen and countrywomen whom I happened to see
during their sojourn in Venice was always vivid, but by no means large in its
grounds. English ladies on their first arrival invariably began the conversation
with the same remark: “What a dreadful thing it was to be ground under the iron
heel of despotism!” Upon closer inquiries it always appeared that being “ground
under the heel of despotism” was a poetical expression for being asked for one’s
passport at San Juliano, and required to fetch it from San Lorenzo, full a mile and
a quarter distant. In like manner, travellers, after two or three days’ residence in
the city, used to return with pitiful lamentations over “the misery of the Italian
people.” Upon inquiring what instances they had met with of this misery, it
invariably turned out that their gondoliers, after being paid three times their proper
fare, had asked for something to drink, and had attributed the fact of their being
thirsty to the Austrian Government. The misery of the Italians consists in having
three festa days a week, and doing in their days of exertion about one fourth as
much work as an English laborer.

There is, indeed, much true distress occasioned by the measures which the
Government is sometimes compelled to take in order to repress sedition; but the
blame of this lies with those whose occupation is the excitement of sedition. So
also there is much grievous harm done to works of art by the occupation of the
country by so large an army; but for the mode in which that army is quartered, the
Italian municipalities are answerable, not the Austrians. Whenever I was shocked
by finding, as above-mentioned at Milan, a cloister, or a palace, occupied by
soldiery, I always discovered, on investigation, that the place had been given by
the municipality; and that, beyond requiring that lodging for a certain number of
men should be found in such and such a quarter of the town, the Austrians had
nothing to do with the matter. This does not, however, make the mischief less: and
it is strange, if we think of it, to see Italy, with all her precious works of art, made
a continual battle-field; as if no other place for settling their disputes could be
found by the European powers, than where every random shot may destroy what a
king’s ransom cannot restore.62 It is exactly as if the tumults in Paris could he
settled no otherwise than by fighting them out in the Gallery of the Louvre.

4. DATE OF THE PALACES OF THE BYZANTINE RENAISSANCE.

In the sixth article of the Appendix to the first volume, the question of the date
of the Casa Dario and Casa Trevisan was deferred until I could obtain from my
friend Mr. Rawdon Brown, to whom the former palace once belonged, some more
distinct data respecting this subject than I possessed myself.

Speaking first of the Casa Dario, he says: “Fontana dates it from about the year
1450, and considers it the earliest specimen of the architecture founded by Pietro
Lombardo, and followed by his sons, Tullio and Antonio. In a Sanuto autograph
miscellany, purchased by me long ago, and which I gave to St. Mark’s Library, are
two letters from Giovanni Dario, dated 10th and 11th July, 1485, in the
neighborhood of Adrianople; where the Turkish camp found itself, and Bajazet II.
received presents from the Soldan of Egypt, from the Schah of the Indies (query
Grand Mogul), and from the King of Hungary: of these matters, Dario’s letters
give many curious details. Then, in the printed Malipiero Annals, page 136 (which
err, I think, by a year), the Secretary Dario’s negotiations at the Porte are alluded
to; and in date of 1484 he is stated to have returned to Venice, having quarrelled
with the Venetian bailiff at Constantinople: the annalist adds, that ‘Giovanni Dario
was a native of Candia, and that the Republic was so well satisfied with him for
having concluded peace with Bajazet, that he received, as a gift from his country,
an estate at Noventa, in the Paduan territory, worth 1500 ducats, and 600 ducats in
cash for the dower of one of his daughters.’ These largesses probably enabled him
to build his house about the year 1486, and are doubtless hinted at in the
inscription, which I restored A.D. 1837; it had no date, and ran thus, URBIS . GENIO .
JOANNES . DARIVS. In the Venetian history of Paolo Morosini, page 594, it is also
mentioned, that Giovanni Dario was, moreover, the Secretary who concluded the
peace between Mahomet, the conqueror of Constantinople, and Venice, A.D. 1478;
but, unless he build his house by proxy, that date has nothing to do with it; and in
my mind, the fact of the present, and the inscription, warrant one’s dating it 1486,
and not 1450.

“The Trevisan-Cappello House, in Canonica, was once the property (A.D. 1578)
of a Venetian dame, fond of cray-fish, according to a letter of hers in the archives,

whereby she thanks one of her lovers for some which he had sent her from Treviso
to Florence, of which she was then Grand Duchess. Her name has perhaps found
its way into the English annuals. Did you ever hear of Bianca Cappello? She
bought that house of the Trevisana family, by whom Selva (in Cicognara) and
Fontana (following Selva) say it was ordered of the Lombardi, at the
commencement of the sixteenth century: but the inscription on its façade, thus,

SOLI HONOR. ET

DEO GLORIA.

reminding one both of the Dario House, and of the words NON NOBIS DOMINE
inscribed on the façade of the Loredano Vendramin Palace at S. Marcuola (now
the property of the Duchess of Berri), of which Selva found proof in the
Vendramin Archives that it was commenced by Sante Lombardo, A.D. 1481, is in
favor of its being classed among the works of the fifteenth century.”

5. RENAISSANCE SIDE OF DUCAL PALACE.

In passing along the Rio del Palazzo the traveller ought especially to observe
the base of the Renaissance building, formed by alternately depressed and raised
pyramids, the depressed portions being casts of the projecting ones, which are
truncated on the summits. The work cannot be called rustication, for it is cut as
sharply and delicately as a piece of ivory, but it thoroughly answers the end which
rustication proposes, and misses: it gives the base of the building a look of
crystalline hardness, actually resembling, and that very closely, the appearance
presented by the fracture of a piece of cap quartz; while yet the light and shade of
its alternate recesses and projections are so varied as to produce the utmost
possible degree of delight to the eye, attainable by a geometrical pattern so simple.
Yet, with all this high merit, it is not a base which could be brought into general
use. Its brilliancy and piquancy are here set off with exquisite skill by its
opposition to mouldings, in the upper part of the building, of an almost effeminate
delicacy, and its complexity is rendered delightful by its contrast with the ruder
bases of the other buildings of the city; but it would look meagre if it were

employed to sustain bolder masses above, and would become wearisome if the
eye were once thoroughly familiarized with it by repetition.

6. CHARACTER OF THE DOGE MICHELE MOROSINI.

The following extracts from the letter of Count Charles Morosini, above
mentioned, appear to set the question at rest.

“It is our unhappy destiny that, during the glory of the Venetian republic, no
one took the care to leave us a faithful and conscientious history: but I hardly
know whether this misfortune should be laid to the charge of the historians
themselves, or of those commentators who have destroyed their trustworthiness by
new accounts of things, invented by themselves. As for the poor Morosini, we
may perhaps save his honor by assembling a conclave of our historians, in order to
receive their united sentence; for, in this case, he would have the absolute majority
on his side, nearly all the authors bearing testimony to his love for his country and
to the magnanimity of his heart. I must tell you that the history of Daru is not
looked upon with esteem by well-informed men; and it is said that he seems to
have no other object in view than to obscure the glory of all actions. I know not on
what authority the English writer depends; but he has, perhaps, merely copied the
statement of Daru.... I have consulted an ancient and authentic MS. belonging to
the Venieri family, a MS. well known, and certainly better worthy of confidence
than Daru’s history, and it says nothing of M. Morosini but that he was elected
Doge to the delight and joy of all men. Neither do the Savina or Dolfin Chronicles
say a word of the shameful speculation; and our best informed men say that the
reproach cast by some historians against the Doge perhaps arose from a mistaken
interpretation of the words pronounced by him, and reported by Marin Sanuto,
that ‘the speculation would sooner or later have been advantageous to the
country.’ But this single consideration is enough to induce us to form a favorable
conclusion respecting the honor of this man, namely, that he was not elected Doge
until after he had been entrusted with many honorable embassies to the Genoese
and Carrarese, as well as to the King of Hungary and Amadeus of Savoy; and if in
these embassies he had not shown himself a true lover of his country, the republic
not only would not again have entrusted him with offices so honorable, but would

never have rewarded him with the dignity of Doge, therein to succeed such a man
as Andrea Contarini; and the war of Chioggia, during which it is said that he
tripled his fortune by speculations, took place during the reign of Contarini, 1379,
1380, while Morosini was absent on foreign embassies.”

7. MODERN EDUCATION.

The following fragmentary notes on this subject have been set down at different
times. I have been accidentally prevented from arranging them properly for
publication, but there are one or two truths in them which it is better to express
insufficiently than not at all.

By a large body of the people of England and of Europe a man is called
educated if he can write Latin verses and construe a Greek chorus. By some few
more enlightened persons it is confessed that the construction of hexameters is not
in itself an important end of human existence; but they say, that the general
discipline which a course of classical reading gives to the intellectual powers, is
the final object of our scholastical institutions.

But it seems to me, there is no small error even in this last and more
philosophical theory. I believe, that what it is most honorable to know, it is also
most profitable to learn; and that the science which it is the highest power to
possess, it is also the best exercise to acquire.

And if this be so, the question as to what should be the materiel of education,
becomes singularly simplified. It might be matter of dispute what processes have
the greatest effect in developing the intellect; but it can hardly be disputed what
facts it is most advisable that a man entering into life should accurately know.

I believe, in brief, that he ought to know three things:

First. Where he is.
Secondly. Where he is going.

Thirdly. What he had best do, under those circumstances.

First. Where he is.—That is to say, what sort of a world he has got into; how
large it is; what kind of creatures live in it, and how; what it is made of, and what
may be made of it.

Secondly. Where he is going.—That is to say, what chances or reports there are
of any other world besides this; what seems to be the nature of that other world;
and whether, for information respecting it, he had better consult the Bible, Koran,
or Council of Trent.

Thirdly. What he had best do under those circumstances.—That is to say, what
kind of faculties he possesses; what are the present state and wants of mankind;
what is his place in society; and what are the readiest means in his power of
attaining happiness and diffusing it. The man who knows these things, and who
has had his will so subdued in the learning them, that he is ready to do what he
knows he ought, I should call educated; and the man who knows them not,—
uneducated, though he could talk all the tongues of Babel.

Our present European system of so-called education ignores, or despises, not
one, nor the other, but all the three, of these great branches of human knowledge.

First: It despises Natural History.—Until within the last year or two, the
instruction in the physical sciences given at Oxford consisted of a course of
twelve or fourteen lectures on the Elements of Mechanics or Pneumatics, and
permission to ride out to Shotover with the Professor of Geology. I do not know
the specialties of the system pursued in the academies of the Continent; but their
practical result is, that unless a man’s natural instincts urge him to the pursuit of
the physical sciences too strongly to be resisted, he enters into life utterly ignorant
of them. I cannot, within my present limits, even so much as count the various
directions in which this ignorance does evil. But the main mischief of it is, that it
leaves the greater number of men without the natural food which God intended for
their intellects. For one man who is fitted for the study of words, fifty are fitted for
the study of things, and were intended to have a perpetual, simple, and religious
delight in watching the processes, or admiring the creatures, of the natural

universe. Deprived of this source of pleasure, nothing is left to them but ambition
or dissipation; and the vices of the upper classes of Europe are, I believe, chiefly
to be attributed to this single cause.

Secondly: It despises Religion.—I do not say it despises “Theology,” that is to
say, Talk about God. But it despises “Religion;” that is to say, the “binding” or
training to God’s service. There is much talk and much teaching in all our
academies, of which the effect is not to bind, but to loosen, the elements of
religious faith. Of the ten or twelve young men who, at Oxford, were my especial
friends, who sat with me under the same lectures on Divinity, or were punished
with me for missing lecture by being sent to evening prayers,63 four are now
zealous Romanists,—a large average out of twelve; and while thus our own
universities profess to teach Protestantism, and do not, the universities on the
Continent profess to teach Romanism, and do not,—sending forth only rebels and
infidels. During long residence on the Continent, I do not remember meeting with
above two or three young men, who either believed in revelation, or had the grace
to hesitate in the assertion of their infidelity.

Whence, it seems to me, we may gather one of two things; either that there is
nothing in any European form of religion so reasonable or ascertained, as that it
can be taught securely to our youth, or fastened in their minds by any rivets of
proof which they shall not be able to loosen the moment they begin to think; or
else, that no means are taken to train them in such demonstrable creeds.

It seems to me the duty of a rational nation to ascertain (and to be at some pains
in the matter) which of these suppositions is true; and, if indeed no proof can be
given of any supernatural fact, or Divine doctrine, stronger than a youth just out of
his teens can overthrow in the first stirrings of serious thought, to confess this
boldly; to get rid of the expense of an Establishment, and the hypocrisy of a
Liturgy; to exhibit its cathedrals as curious memorials of a by-gone superstition,
and, abandoning all thoughts of the next world, to set itself to make the best it can
of this.

But if, on the other hand, there does exist any evidence by which the probability
of certain religious facts may be shown, as clearly, even, as the probabilities of

things not absolutely ascertained in astronomical or geological science, let this
evidence be set before all our youth so distinctly, and the facts for which it
appears inculcated upon them so steadily, that although it may be possible for the
evil conduct of after life to efface, or for its earnest and protracted meditation to
modify, the impressions of early years, it may not be possible for our young men,
the instant they emerge from their academies, to scatter themselves like a flock of
wild fowl risen out of a marsh, and drift away on every irregular wind of heresy
and apostasy.

Lastly: Our system of European education despises Politics.—That is to say, the
science of the relations and duties of men to each other. One would imagine,
indeed, by a glance at the state of the world, that there was no such science. And,
indeed, it is one still in its infancy.

It implies, in its full sense, the knowledge of the operations of the virtues and
vices of men upon themselves and society; the understanding of the ranks and
offices of their intellectual and bodily powers in their various adaptations to art,
science, and industry; the understanding of the proper offices of art, science, and
labor themselves, as well as of the foundations of jurisprudence, and broad
principles of commerce; all this being coupled with practical knowledge of the
present state and wants of mankind.

What, it will be said, and is all this to be taught to schoolboys? No; but the first
elements of it, all that are necessary to be known by an individual in order to his
acting wisely in any station of life, might be taught, not only to every schoolboy,
but to every peasant. The impossibility of equality among men; the good which
arises from their inequality; the compensating circumstances in different states
and fortunes; the honorableness of every man who is worthily filling his appointed
place in society, however humble; the proper relations of poor and rich, governor
and governed; the nature of wealth, and mode of its circulation; the difference
between productive and unproductive labor; the relation of the products of the
mind and hand; the true value of works of the higher arts, and the possible amount
of their production; the meaning of “Civilization,” its advantages and dangers; the
meaning of the term “Refinement;” the possibilities of possessing refinement in a

low station, and of losing it in a high one; and, above all, the significance of
almost every act of a man’s daily life, in its ultimate operation upon himself and
others;—all this might be, and ought to be, taught to every boy in the kingdom, so
completely, that it should be just as impossible to introduce an absurd or licentious
doctrine among our adult population, as a new version of the multiplication table.
Nor am I altogether without hope that some day it may enter into the heads of the
tutors of our schools to try whether it is not as easy to make an Eton boy’s mind as
sensitive to falseness in policy, as his ear is at present to falseness in prosody.

I know that this is much to hope. That English ministers of religion should ever
come to desire rather to make a youth acquainted with the powers of nature and of
God, than with the powers of Greek particles; that they should ever think it more
useful to show him how the great universe rolls upon its course in heaven, than
how the syllables are fitted in a tragic metre; that they should hold it more
advisable for him to be fixed in the principles of religion than in those of syntax;
or, finally, that they should ever come to apprehend that a youth likely to go
straight out of college into parliament, might not unadvisably know as much of
the Peninsular as of the Peloponnesian War, and be as well acquainted with the
state of Modern Italy as of old Etruria;—all this however unreasonably, I do hope,
and mean to work for. For though I have not yet abandoned all expectation of a
better world than this, I believe this in which we live is not so good as it might be.
I know there are many people who suppose French revolutions, Italian
insurrections, Caffre wars, and such other scenic effects of modern policy, to be
among the normal conditions of humanity. I know there are many who think the
atmosphere of rapine, rebellion, and misery which wraps the lower orders of
Europe more closely every day, is as natural a phenomenon as a hot summer. But
God forbid! There are ills which flesh is heir to, and troubles to which man is
born; but the troubles which he is born to are as sparks which fly upward, not as
flames burning to the nethermost Hell. The Poor we must have with us always,
and sorrow is inseparable from any hour of life; but we may make their poverty
such as shall inherit the earth, and the sorrow, such as shall be hallowed by the
hand of the Comforter, with everlasting comfort. We can, if we will but shake off
this lethargy and dreaming that is upon us, and take the pains to think and act like

men, we can, I say, make kingdoms to be like well-governed households, in
which, indeed, while no care or kindness can prevent occasional heart-burnings,
nor any foresight or piety anticipate all the vicissitudes of fortune, or avert every
stroke of calamity, yet the unity of their affection and fellowship remains
unbroken, and their distress is neither embittered by division, prolonged by
imprudence, nor darkened by dishonor.

* * * * * * *

The great leading error of modern times is the mistaking erudition for
education. I call it the leading error, for I believe that, with little difficulty, nearly
every other might be shown to have root in it; and, most assuredly, the worst that
are fallen into on the subject of art.

Education then, briefly, is the leading human souls to what is best, and making
what is best out of them; and these two objects are always attainable together, and
by the same means; the training which makes men happiest in themselves, also
makes them most serviceable to others. True education, then, has respect, first to
the ends which are proposable to the man, or attainable by him; and, secondly, to
the material of which the man is made. So far as it is able, it chooses the end
according to the material: but it cannot always choose the end, for the position of
many persons in life is fixed by necessity; still less can it choose the material; and,
therefore, all it can do, is to fit the one to the other as wisely as may be.

But the first point to be understood, is that the material is as various as the ends;
that not only one man is unlike another, but every man is essentially different from
every other, so that no training, no forming, nor informing, will ever make two
persons alike in thought or in power. Among all men, whether of the upper or
lower orders, the differences are eternal and irreconcilable, between one
individual and another, born under absolutely the same circumstances. One man is
made of agate, another of oak; one of slate, another of clay. The education of the
first is polishing; of the second, seasoning; of the third, rending; of the fourth,
moulding. It is of no use to season the agate; it is vain to try to polish the slate; but
both are fitted, by the qualities they possess, for services in which they may be
honored.

Now the cry for the education of the lower classes, which is heard every day
more widely and loudly, is a wise and a sacred cry, provided it be extended into
one for the education of all classes, with definite respect to the work each man has
to do, and the substance of which he is made. But it is a foolish and vain cry, if it
be understood, as in the plurality of cases it is meant to be, for the expression of
mere craving after knowledge, irrespective of the simple purposes of the life that
now is, and blessings of that which is to come.

One great fallacy into which men are apt to fall when they are reasoning on this
subject is: that light, as such, is always good; and darkness, as such, always evil.
Far from it. Light untempered would be annihilation. It is good to them that sit in
darkness and in the shadow of death; but, to those that faint in the wilderness, so
also is the shadow of the great rock in a weary land. If the sunshine is good, so
also the cloud of the latter rain. Light is only beautiful, only available for life,
when it is tempered with shadow; pure light is fearful, and unendurable by
humanity. And it is not less ridiculous to say that the light, as such, is good in
itself, than to say that the darkness is good in itself. Both are rendered safe,
healthy, and useful by the other; the night by the day, the day by the night; and we
could just as easily live without the dawn as without the sunset, so long as we are
human. Of the celestial city we are told there shall be “no night there,” and then
we shall know even as also we are known: but the night and the mystery have
both their service here; and our business is not to strive to turn the night into day,
but to be sure that we are as they that watch for the morning.

Therefore, in the education either of lower or upper classes, it matters not the
least how much or how little they know, provided they know just what will fit
them to do their work, and to be happy in it. What the sum or the nature of their
knowledge ought to be at a given time or in a given case, is a totally different
question: the main thing to be understood is, that a man is not educated, in any
sense whatsoever, because he can read Latin, or write English, or can behave well
in a drawingroom; but that he is only educated if he is happy, busy, beneficent,
and effective in the world; that millions of peasants are therefore at this moment
better educated than most of those who call themselves gentlemen; and that the

means taken to “educate” the lower classes in any other sense may very often be
productive of a precisely opposite result.

Observe: I do not say, nor do I believe, that the lower classes ought not to be
better educated, in millions of ways, than they are. I believe every man in a
Christian kingdom ought to be equally well educated. But I would have it
education to purpose; stern, practical, irresistible, in moral habits, in bodily
strength and beauty, in all faculties of mind capable of being developed under the
circumstances of the individual, and especially in the technical knowledge of his
own business; but yet, infinitely various in its effort, directed to make one youth
humble, and another confident; to tranquillize this mind, to put some spark of
ambition into that; now to urge, and now to restrain: and in the doing of all this,
considering knowledge as one only out of myriads of means in its hands, or
myriads of gifts at its disposal; and giving it or withholding it as a good
husbandman waters his garden, giving the full shower only to the thirsty plants,
and at times when they are thirsty, whereas at present we pour it upon the heads of
our youth as the snow falls on the Alps, on one and another alike, till they can bear
no more, and then take honor to ourselves because here and there a river descends
from their crests into the valleys, not observing that we have made the loaded hills
themselves barren for ever.

Finally: I hold it for indisputable, that the first duty of a state is to see that every
child born therein shall be well housed, clothed, fed, and educated, till it attain
years of discretion. But in order to the effecting this, the government must have an
authority over the people of which we now do not so much as dream; and I cannot
in this place pursue the subject farther.

8. EARLY VENETIAN MARRIAGES.

Galliciolli, lib. ii. § 1757, insinuates a doubt of the general custom, saying “it
would be more reasonable to suppose that only twelve maidens were married in
public on St. Mark’s day;” and Sandi also speaks of twelve only. All evidence,
however, is clearly in favor of the popular tradition; the most curious fact
connected with the subject being the mention, by Herodotus, of the mode of

marriage practised among the Illyrian “Veneti” of his time, who presented their
maidens for marriage on one day in each year; and, with the price paid for those
who were beautiful, gave dowries to those who had no personal attractions.

It is very curious to find the traces of this custom existing, though in a softened
form, in Christian times. Still, I admit that there is little confidence to be placed in
the mere concurrence of the Venetian Chroniclers, who, for the most part, copied
from each other: but the best and most complete account I have read, is that
quoted by Galliciolli from the “Matricola de’ Casseleri,” written in 1449; and, in
that account, the words are quite unmistakable. “It was anciently the custom of
Venice, that all the brides (novizze) of Venice, when they married, should be
married by the bishop, in the Church of S. Pietro di Castello, on St. Mark’s day,
which is the 31st of January.” Rogers quotes Navagiero to the same effect; and
Sansovino is more explicit still. “It was the custom to contract marriages openly;
and when the deliberations were completed, the damsels assembled themselves in
St. Pietro di Castello, for the feast of St. Mark, in February.”

9. CHARACTER OF THE VENETIAN ARISTOCRACY.

The following noble answer of a Venetian ambassador, Giustiniani, on the
occasion of an insult offered him at the court of Henry the Eighth, is as illustrative
of the dignity which there yet remained in the character and thoughts of the
Venetian noble, as descriptive, in few words, of the early faith and deeds of his
nation. He writes thus to the Doge, from London, on the 15th of April, 1516:

“By my last, in date of the 30th ult., I informed you that the countenances of
some of these lords evinced neither friendship nor goodwill, and that much
language had been used to me of a nature bordering not merely on arrogance, but
even on outrage; and not having specified this in the foregoing letters, I think fit
now to mention it in detail. Finding myself at the court, and talking familiarly
about other matters, two lay lords, great personages in this kingdom, inquired of
me ‘whence it came that your Excellency was of such slippery faith, now favoring
one party and then the other?’ Although these words ought to have irritated me, I
answered them with all discretion, ‘that you did keep, and ever had kept your

faith; the maintenance of which has placed you in great trouble, and subjected you
to wars of longer duration than you would otherwise have experienced;
descending to particulars in justification of your Sublimity.’ Whereupon one of
them replied, ‘Isti Veneti sunt piscatores.’64 Marvellous was the command I then
had over myself in not giving vent to expressions which might have proved
injurious to your Signory; and with extreme moderation I rejoined, ‘that had he
been at Venice, and seen our Senate, and the Venetian nobility, he perhaps would
not speak thus; and moreover, were he well read in our history, both concerning
the origin of our city and the grandeur of your Excellency’s feats, neither the one
nor the other would seem to him those of fishermen; yet,’ said I, ‘did fishermen
found the Christian faith, and we have been those fishermen who defended it
against the forces of the Infidel, our fishing-boats being galleys and ships, our
hooks the treasure of St. Mark, and our bait the life-blood of our citizens, who
died for the Christian faith.’”

I take this most interesting passage from a volume of despatches addressed
from London to the Signory of Venice, by the ambassador Giustiniani, during the
years 1516-1519; despatches not only full of matters of historical interest, but of
the most delightful every-day description of all that went on at the English court.
They were translated by Mr. Brown from the original letters, and will, I believe,
soon be published, and I hope also, read and enjoyed: for I cannot close these
volumes without expressing a conviction, which has long been forcing itself upon
my mind, that restored history is of little more value than restored painting or
architecture; that the only history worth reading is that written at the time of
which it treats, the history of what was done and seen, heard out of the mouths of
the men who did and saw. One fresh draught of such history is worth more than a
thousand volumes of abstracts, and reasonings, and suppositions, and theories; and
I believe that, as we get wiser, we shall take little trouble about the history of
nations who have left no distinct records of themselves, but spend our time only in
the examination of the faithful documents which, in any period of the world, have
been left, either in the form of art or literature, portraying the scenes, or recording
the events, which in those days were actually passing before the eyes of men.

10. FINAL APPENDIX.

The statements respecting the dates of Venetian buildings made throughout the
preceding pages, are founded, as above stated, on careful and personal
examination of all the mouldings, or other features available as evidence, of every
palace of importance in the city. Three parts, at least, of the time occupied in the
completion of the work have been necessarily devoted to the collection of these
evidences, of which it would be quite useless to lay the mass before the reader;
but of which the leading points must be succinctly stated, in order to show the
nature of my authority for any of the conclusions expressed in the text.

I have therefore collected in the plates which illustrate this article of the
Appendix, for the examination of any reader who may be interested by them, as
many examples of the evidence-bearing details as are sufficient for the proof
required, especially including all the exceptional forms; so that the reader may rest
assured that if I had been able to lay before him all the evidence in my possession,
it would have been still more conclusive than the portion now submitted to him.

V.

BYZANTINE BASES.

We must examine in succession the Bases, Doorways and Jambs, Capitals,
Archivolts, Cornices, and Tracery Bars, of Venetian architecture.

I. Bases.

The principal points we have to notice are the similarity and simplicity of the
Byzantine bases in general, and the distinction between those of Torcello and
Murano, and of St. Mark’s, as tending to prove the early dates attributed in the
text to the island churches. I have sufficiently illustrated the forms of the Gothic
bases in Plates X., XI., and XIII. of the first volume, so that I here note chiefly the
Byzantine or Romanesque ones, adding two Gothic forms for the sake of
comparison.

The most characteristic examples, then, are collected in Plate V. opposite;
namely:

1, 2, 3, 4. In the upper gallery of apse of Murano.
5. Lower shafts of apse. Murano.
6. Casa Falier.
7. Small shafts of panels. Casa Farsetti.
8. Great shafts and plinth. Casa Farsetti.
9. Great lower shafts. Fondaco de’ Turchi.
10. Ducal Palace, upper arcade.
11. General late Gothic form.
Plate V. 12. Tomb of Dogaressa Vital Michele, in St. Mark’s atrium.
Vol. III. 13. Upper arcade of Madonnetta House.
14. Rio-Foscari House.
15. Upper arcade. Terraced House.
16, 17, 18. Nave. Torcello.
19, 20. Transepts. St. Mark’s.
21. Nave. St. Mark’s.
22. External pillars of northern portico. St. Mark’s.
23, 24. Clustered pillars of northern portico. St. Mark’s.
25, 26. Clustered pillars of southern portico. St. Mark’s.

Now, observe, first, the enormous difference in style between the bases 1 to 5,
and the rest in the upper row, that is to say, between the bases of Murano and the
twelfth and thirteenth century bases of Venice; and, secondly, the difference
between the bases 16 to 20 and the rest in the lower row, that is to say, between
the bases of Torcello (with those of St. Mark’s which belong to the nave, and
which may therefore be supposed to be part of the earlier church), and the later
ones of the St. Mark’s Façade.

Secondly: Note the fellowship between 5 and 6, one of the evidences of the
early date of the Casa Falier.

Thirdly: Observe the slurring of the upper roll into the cavetto, in 13, 14, and
15, and the consequent relationship established between three most important
buildings, the Rio-Foscari House, Terraced House, and Madonnetta House.

Fourthly: Byzantine bases, if they have an incision between the upper roll and
cavetto, are very apt to approach the form of fig. 23, in which the upper roll is cut
out of the flat block, and the ledge beneath it is sloping. Compare Nos. 7, 8, 9, 21,
22, 23, 24, 25, 26. On the other hand, the later Gothic base, 11, has always its
upper roll well developed, and, generally, the fillet between it and the cavetto
vertical. The sloping fillet is indeed found down to late periods; and the vertical
fillet, as in No. 12, in Byzantine ones; but still, when a base has such a sloping
fillet and peculiarly graceful sweeping cavetto, as those of No. 10, looking as if
they would run into one line with each other, it is strong presumptive evidence of
its belonging to an early, rather than a late period.

The base 12 is the boldest example I could find of the exceptional form in early
times; but observe, in this, that the upper roll is larger than the lower. This is never
the case in late Gothic, where the proportion is always as in fig. 11. Observe that
in Nos. 8 and 9 the upper rolls are at least as large as the lower, an important
evidence of the dates of the Casa Farsetti and Fondaco de’ Turchi.

Lastly: Note the peculiarly steep profile of No. 22, with reference to what is
said of this base in Vol. II. Appendix 9.

II. Doorways and Jambs.

The entrances to St. Mark’s consist, as above mentioned, of great circular or
ogee porches; underneath which the real open entrances, in which the valves of
the bronze doors play, are square headed.

The mouldings of the Fig. 1
jambs of these doors are
highly curious, and the
most characteristic are
therefore represented in
one view. The outsides of
the jambs are lowest.

a. Northern lateral door.
b. First northern door of
the façade.
c. Second door of the
façade.
d. Fourth door of the
façade.
e. Central door of the
façade.

I wish the reader especially to note the arbitrary character of the curves and
incisions; all evidently being drawn by hand, none being segments of circles, none
like another, none influenced by any visible law. I do not give these mouldings as
beautiful; they are, for the most part, very poor in effect, but they are singularly
characteristic of the free work of the time.

The kind of door to which these mouldings belong, is shown, with the other
groups of doors, in Plate XIV. Vol. II. fig. 6 a. Then 6 b, 6 c, 6 d represent the
groups of doors in which the Byzantine influence remained energetic, admitting
slowly the forms of the pointed Gothic; 7 a, with the gable above, is the
intermediate group between the Byzantine and Gothic schools; 7 b, 7 c, 7 d, 7 e
are the advanced guards of the Gothic and Lombardic invasions, representative of
a large number of thirteenth century arcades and doors. Observe that 6 d is shown
to be of a late school by its finial, and 6 e of the latest school by its finial,
complete ogee arch (instead of round or pointed), and abandonment of the lintel.

These examples, with the exception of 6 a, which is a general form, are all
actually existing doors; namely:

6 b. In the Fondamenta Venier, near St. Maria della Salute.
6 c. In the Calle delle Botteri, between the Rialto and San Cassan.
6 d. Main door of San Gregorio.
6 e. Door of a palace in Rio San Paternian.
7 a. Door of a small courtyard near house of Marco Polo.
7 b. Arcade in narrow canal, at the side of Casa Barbaro.
7 c. At the turn of the canal, close to the Ponte dell’ Angelo.
7 d. In Rio San Paternian (a ruinous house).
7 e. At the turn of the canal on which the Sotto Portico della Stua opens, near
San Zaccaria.

If the reader will take a magnifying glass to the figure 6 d, he will see that its
square ornaments, of which, in the real door, each contains a rose, diminish to the
apex of the arch; a very interesting and characteristic circumstance, showing the
subtle feeling of the Gothic builders. They must needs diminish the
ornamentation, in order to sympathize with the delicacy of the point of the arch.
The magnifying glass will also show the Bondumieri shield in No. 7 d, and the
Leze shield in No. 7 e, both introduced on the keystones in the grand early
manner. The mouldings of these various doors will be noticed under the head
Archivolt.

VI.

BYZANTINE JAMBS.

Now, throughout the city we find a number of doors resembling the square
doors of St. Mark, and occurring with rare exceptions either in buildings of the
Byzantine period, or imbedded in restored houses; never, in a single instance,
forming a connected portion of any late building; and they therefore furnish a
most important piece of evidence, wherever they are part of the original structure

of a Gothic building, that such building is one of the advanced guards of the
Gothic school, and belongs to its earliest period.

On Plate VI., opposite, are assembled all the important examples I could find in
Venice of these mouldings. The reader will see at a glance their peculiar character,
and unmistakable likeness to each other. The following are the references:

1. Door in Calle Mocenigo.
2. Angle of tomb of Dogaressa Vital Michele.
3. Door in Sotto Portico, St. Apollonia (near Ponte di Canonica).
4. Door in Calle della Verona (another like it is close by).
5. Angle of tomb of Doge Marino Morosini.
6, 7. Door in Calle Mocenigo.
8. Door in Campo S. Margherita.
Plate VI. 9. Door at Traghetto San Samuele, on south side of Grand Canal.
Vol. III. 10. Door at Ponte St. Toma.
11. Great door of Church of Servi.
12. In Calle della Chiesa, Campo San Filippo e Giacomo.
13. Door of house in Calle di Rimedio (Vol. II.).
14. Door in Fondaco de’ Turchi.
15. Door in Fondamenta Malcanton, near Campo S. Margherita.
16. Door in south side of Canna Reggio.
17, 18. Doors in Sotto Portico dei Squellini.

The principal points to be noted in these mouldings are their curious differences
of level, as marked by the dotted lines, more especially in 14, 15, 16, and the
systematic projection of the outer or lower mouldings in 16, 17, 18. Then, as
points of evidence, observe that 1 is the jamb and 6 the archivolt (7 the angle on a
larger scale) of the brick door given in my folio work from Ramo di rimpetto
Mocenigo, one of the evidences of the early date of that door; 8 is the jamb of the
door in Campo Santa Margherita (also given in my folio work), fixing the early
date of that also; 10 is from a Gothic door opening off the Ponte St. Toma; and 11
is also from a Gothic building. All the rest are from Byzantine work, or from
ruins. The angle of the tomb of Marino Morosini (5) is given for comparison only.

The doors with the mouldings 17, 18, are from the two ends of a small dark
passage, called the Sotto Portico dei Squellini, opening near Ponte Cappello, on
the Rio-Marin: 14 is the outside one, arranged as usual, and at a, in the rough
stone, are places for the staples of the door valve; 15, at the other end of the
passage, opening into the little Corte dei Squellini, is set with the part a outwards,
it also having places for hinges; but it is curious that the rich moulding should be
set in towards the dark passage, though natural that the doors should both open
one way.

VII.

GOTHIC JAMBS.

The next Plate, VII., will show the principal characters of the Gothic jambs, and
the total difference between them and the Byzantine ones. Two more Byzantine
forms, 1 and 2, are given here for the sake of comparison; then 3, 4, and 5 are the
common profiles of simple jambs of doors in the Gothic period; 6 is one of the
jambs of the Frari windows, continuous into the archivolt, and meeting the
traceries, where the line is set upon it at the extremity of its main slope; 7 and 8
are jambs of the Ducal Palace windows, in which the great semicircle is the half

shaft which sustains the traceries, and the rest of the profile is continuous in the
archivolt; 17, 18, and 19 are the principal piers of the Ducal Palace; and 20, from
St. Fermo of Verona, is put with them in order to show the step of transition from
the Byzantine form 2 to the Gothic chamfer, which is hardly represented at
Venice. The other profiles on the plate are all late Gothic, given to show the
gradual increase of complexity without any gain of power. The open lines in 12,
14, 16, etc., are the parts of the profile cut into flowers or cable mouldings; and so
much incised as to show the constant outline of the cavetto or curve beneath them.
The following are the references:

1. Door in house of Marco Polo.
2. Old door in a restored church of St. Cassan.
3, 4, 5. Common jambs of Gothic doors.
6. Frari windows.
7, 8. Ducal Palace windows.
9. Casa Priuli, great entrance.
10. San Stefano, great door.
Plate 11. San Gregorio, door opening to the water.
VII. 12. Lateral door, Frari.
Vol. III. 13. Door of Campo San Zaccaria.
14. Madonna dell’Orto.
15. San Gregorio, door in the façade.
16. Great lateral door, Frari.
17. Pilaster at Vine angle, Ducal Palace.
18. Pier, inner cortile, Ducal Palace.
19. Pier, under the medallion of Venice, on the Piazetta façade of the
Ducal Palace.

III. Capitals.

I shall here notice the various facts I have omitted in the text of the work.

First, with respect to the Byzantine Capitals represented in Plate VII. Vol. II., I
omitted to notice that figs. 6 and 7 represent two sides of the same capital at
Murano (though one is necessarily drawn on a smaller scale than the other). Fig. 7
is the side turned to the light, and fig. 6 to the shade, the inner part, which is quite
concealed, not being touched at all.

We have here a conclusive proof that these capitals were cut for their place in
the apse; therefore I have always considered them as tests of Venetian
workmanship, and, on the strength of that proof, have occasionally spoken of
capitals as of true Venetian work, which M. Lazari supposes to be of the Lower
Empire. No. 11, from St. Mark’s, was not above noticed. The way in which the
cross is gradually left in deeper relief as the sides slope inwards and away from it,
is highly picturesque and curious.

No. 9 has been reduced from a larger drawing, and some of the life and
character of the curves lost in consequence. It is chiefly given to show the
irregular and fearless freedom of the Byzantine designers, no two parts of the
foliage being correspondent; in the original it is of white marble, the ground being
colored blue.

Plate X. Vol. II. represents the four principal orders of Venetian capitals in their
greatest simplicity, and the profiles of the most interesting examples of each. The
figures 1 and 4 are the two great concave and convex groups, and 2 and 3 the
transitional. Above each type of form I have put also an example of the group of
flowers which represent it in nature: fig. 1 has a lily; fig. 2 a variety of the Tulipa
sylvestris; figs. 3 and 4 forms of the magnolia. I prepared this plate in the early
spring, when I could not get any other examples,65 or I would rather have had two
different species for figs. 3 and 4; but the half-open magnolia will answer the
purpose, showing the beauty of the triple curvature in the sides.

I do not say that the forms of the capitals are actually taken from flowers,
though assuredly so in some instances, and partially so in the decoration of nearly
all. But they were designed by men of pure and natural feeling for beauty, who
therefore instinctively adopted the forms represented, which are afterwards proved
to be beautiful by their frequent occurrence in common flowers.

The convex forms, 3 and 4, are put lowest in the plate only because they are
heaviest; they are the earliest in date, and have already been enough examined.

I have added a plate to this volume (Plate XII.), which should have appeared in
illustration of the fifth chapter of Vol. II., but was not finished in time. It
represents the central capital and two of the lateral ones of the Fondaco de’ Turchi,
the central one drawn very large, in order to show the excessive simplicity of its
chiselling, together with the care and sharpness of it, each leaf being expressed by
a series of sharp furrows and ridges. Some slight errors in the large tracings from
which the engraving was made have, however, occasioned a loss of spring in the
curves, and the little fig. 4 of Plate X. Vol. II. gives a truer idea of the distant
effect of the capital.

The profiles given in Plate X. Vol. II. are the following:

1. a. Main capitals, upper arcade, Madonnetta House.
b. Main capitals, upper arcade, Casa Falier.
c. Lateral capitals, upper arcade, Fondaco de’ Turchi.
d. Small pillars of St. Mark’s Pulpit.
e. Casa Farsetti.
f. Inner capitals of arcade of Ducal Palace.
g. Plinth of the house66 at Apostoli.
h. Main capitals of house at Apostoli.
i. Main capitals, upper arcade, Fondaco de’ Turchi.
2. a. Lower arcade, Fondaco de’ Turchi.
b, c. Lower pillars, house at Apostoli.
d. San Simeon Grande.
e. Restored house on Grand Canal. Three of the old arches left.
Plate X.
f. Upper arcade, Ducal Palace.
vol. II.
g. Windows of third order, central shaft, Ducal Palace.
h. Windows of third order, lateral shaft, Ducal Palace.
i. Ducal Palace, main shafts.
k. Piazzetta shafts.
3. a. St. Mark’s Nave.

b, c. Lily capitals, St. Mark’s.
4. a. Fondaco de’ Turchi, central shaft, upper arcade.
b. Murano, upper arcade.
c. Murano, lower arcade.
d. Tomb of St. Isidore.
e. General late Gothic profile.

The last two sections are convex in effect, though not in reality; the bulging
lines being carved into bold flower-work.

The capitals belonging to the groups 1 and 2, in the Byzantine times, have
already been illustrated in Plate VIII. Vol. II.; we have yet to trace their succession
in the Gothic times. This is done in Plate II. of this volume, which we will now
examine carefully. The following are the capitals represented in that plate:

1. Small shafts of St. Mark’s Pulpit.
2. From the transitional house in the Calle di Rimedio (conf. Vol. II.).
3. General simplest form of the middle Gothic capital.
4. Nave of San Giacomo de Lorio.
5. Casa Falier.
6. Early Gothic house in Campo Sta. Ma. Mater Domini.
7. House at the Apostoli.
Plate II.
8. Piazzetta shafts.
Vol. III.
9. Ducal Palace, upper arcade.
10. Palace of Marco Querini.
11. Fondaco de’ Turchi.
12. Gothic palaces in Campo San Polo.
13. Windows of fourth order, Plate XVI. Vol. II.
14. Nave of Church of San Stefano.
15. Late Gothic Palace at the Miracoli.

The two lateral columns form a consecutive series: the central column is a
group of exceptional character, running parallel with both. We will take the lateral
ones first. 1. Capital of pulpit of St. Mark’s (representative of the simplest

concave forms of the Byzantine period). Look back to Plate VIII. Vol. II., and
observe that while all the forms in that plate are contemporaneous, we are now
going to follow a series consecutive in time, which begins from fig. 1, either in
that plate or in this; that is to say, with the simplest possible condition to be found
at the time; and which proceeds to develope itself into gradually increasing
richness, while the already rich capitals of the old school die at its side. In the
forms 14 and 15 (Plate VIII.) the Byzantine school expired; but from the
Byzantine simple capital (1, Plate II. above) which was coexistent with them,
sprang another hardy race of capitals, whose succession we have now to trace.

The form 1, Plate II. is evidently the simplest conceivable condition of the
truncated capital, long ago represented generally in Vol. I., being only rounded a
little on its side to fit it to the shaft. The next step was to place a leaf beneath each
of the truncations (fig. 4, Plate II., San Giacomo de Lorio), the end of the leaf
curling over at the top in a somewhat formal spiral, partly connected with the
traditional volute of the Corinthian capital. The sides are then enriched by the
addition of some ornament, as a shield (fig. 7) or rose (fig. 10), and we have the
formed capital of the early Gothic. Fig. 10, being from the palace of Marco
Querini, is certainly not later than the middle of the thirteenth century (see Vol.
II.), and fig. 7, is, I believe, of the same date; it is one of the bearing capitals of the
lower story of the palace at the Apostoli, and is remarkably fine in the treatment of
its angle leaves, which are not deeply under-cut, but show their magnificent
sweeping under surface all the way down, not as a leaf surface, but treated like the
gorget of a helmet, with a curved line across it like that where the gorget meets the
mail. I never saw anything finer in simple design. Fig. 10 is given chiefly as a
certification of date, and to show the treatment of the capitals of this school on a
small scale. Observe the more expansive head in proportion to the diameter of the
shaft, the leaves being drawn from the angles, as if gathered in the hand, till their
edges meet; and compare the rule given in Vol. I. Chap. IX. § XIV. The capitals of
the remarkable house, of which a portion is represented in Fig. XXXI. Vol. II., are
most curious and pure examples of this condition; with experimental trefoils,
roses, and leaves introduced between their volutes. When compared with those of

the Querini Palace, they form one of the most important evidences of the date of
the building.

Fig. 13. One of the bearing capitals, already drawn on a small scale in the
windows represented in Plate XVI. Vol. II.

Now, observe. The capital of the form of fig. 10 appeared sufficient to the
Venetians for all ordinary purposes; and they used it in common windows to the
latest Gothic periods, but yet with certain differences which at once show the
lateness of the work. In the first place, the rose, which at first was flat and
quatrefoiled, becomes, after some experiments, a round ball dividing into three
leaves, closely resembling our English ball flower, and probably derived from it;
and, in other cases, forming a bold projecting bud in various degrees of
contraction or expansion. In the second place, the extremities of the angle leaves
are wrought into rich flowing lobes, and bent back so as to lap against their own
breasts; showing lateness of date in exact proportion to the looseness of curvature.
Fig. 3 represents the general aspect of these later capitals, which may be
conveniently called the rose capitals of Venice; two are seen on service, in Plate
VIII. Vol. I., showing comparatively early date by the experimental form of the
six-foiled rose. But for elaborate edifices this form was not sufficiently rich; and
there was felt to be something awkward in the junction of the leaves at the bottom.
Therefore, four other shorter leaves were added at the sides, as in fig. 13, Plate II.,
and as generally represented in Plate X. Vol. II. fig. 1. This was a good and noble
step, taken very early in the thirteenth century; and all the best Venetian capitals
were thenceforth of this form. Those which followed, and rested in the common
rose type, were languid and unfortunate: I do not know a single good example of
them after the first half of the thirteenth century.

But the form reached in fig. 13 was quickly felt to be of great value and power.
One would have thought it might have been taken straight from the Corinthian
type; but it is clearly the work of men who were making experiments for
themselves. For instance, in the central capital of Fig. XXXI. Vol. II., there is a
trial condition of it, with the intermediate leaf set behind those at the angles (the
reader had better take a magnifying glass to this woodcut; it will show the

character of the capitals better). Two other experimental forms occur in the Casa
Cicogna (Vol. II.), and supply one of the evidences which fix the date of that
palace. But the form soon was determined as in fig. 13, and then means were
sought of recommending it by farther decoration.

The leaves which are used in fig. 13, it will be observed, have lost the
Corinthian volute, and are now pure and plain leaves, such as were used in the
Lombardic Gothic of the early thirteenth century all over Italy. Now in a round-
arched gateway at Verona, certainly not later than 1300; the pointed leaves of this
pure form are used in one portion of the mouldings, and in another are enriched by
having their surfaces carved each into a beautiful ribbed and pointed leaf. The
capital, fig. 6, Plate II., is nothing more than fig. 13 so enriched; and the two
conditions are quite contemporary, fig. 13 being from a beautiful series of fourth
order windows in Campo Sta. M^{a.} Mater Domini, already drawn in my folio
work.

Fig. 13 is representative of the richest conditions of Gothic capital which
existed at the close of the thirteenth century. The builder of the Ducal Palace
amplified them into the form of fig. 9, but varying the leafage in disposition and
division of lobes in every capital; and the workmen trained under him executed
many noble capitals for the Gothic palaces of the early fourteenth century, of
which fig. 12, from a palace in the Campo St. Polo, is one of the most beautiful
examples. In figs. 9 and 12 the reader sees the Venetian Gothic capital in its
noblest developement. The next step was to such forms as fig. 15, which is
generally characteristic of the late fourteenth and early fifteenth century Gothic,
and of which I hope the reader will at once perceive the exaggeration and
corruption.

This capital is from a palace near the Miracoli, and it is remarkable for the
delicate, though corrupt, ornament on its abacus, which is precisely the same as
that on the pillars of the screen of St. Mark’s. That screen is a monument of very
great value, for it shows the entire corruption of the Gothic power, and the style of
the later palaces accurately and completely defined in all its parts, and is dated
1380; thus at once furnishing us with a limiting date, which throws all the noble