Lectures on Art | Page 4

admire.
7. Connected also with some of the worst parts of our social system,
but capable of being directed to better result than this commercial
endeavour, we see lately a most powerful impulse given to the
production of costly works of art, by the various causes which promote
the sudden accumulation of wealth in the hands of private persons. We
have thus a vast and new patronage, which, in its present agency, is
injurious to our schools; but which is nevertheless in a great degree
earnest and conscientious, and far from being influenced chiefly by
motives of ostentation. Most of our rich men would be glad to promote
the true interests of art in this country: and even those who buy for
vanity, found their vanity on the possession of what they suppose to be
best.
It is therefore in a great measure the fault of artists themselves if they
suffer from this partly unintelligent, but thoroughly well-intended,
patronage. If they seek to attract it by eccentricity, to deceive it by
superficial qualities, or take advantage of it by thoughtless and facile
production, they necessarily degrade themselves and it together, and
have no right to complain afterwards that it will not acknowledge
better-grounded claims. But if every painter of real power would do
only what he knew to be worthy of himself, and refuse to be involved
in the contention for undeserved or accidental success, there is indeed,
whatever may have been thought or said to the contrary, true instinct
enough in the public mind to follow such firm guidance. It is one of the

facts which the experience of thirty years enables me to assert without
qualification, that a really good picture is ultimately always approved
and bought, unless it is wilfully rendered offensive to the public by
faults which the artist has been either too proud to abandon or too weak
to correct.
8. The development of whatever is healthful and serviceable in the two
modes of impulse which we have been considering, depends however,
ultimately, on the direction taken by the true interest in art which has
lately been aroused by the great and active genius of many of our living,
or but lately lost, painters, sculptors, and architects. It may perhaps
surprise, but I think it will please you to hear me, or (if you will forgive
me, in my own Oxford, the presumption of fancying that some may
recognise me by an old name) to hear the author of "Modern Painters"
say, that his chief error in earlier days was not in over estimating, but in
too slightly acknowledging the merit of living men. The great painter
whose power, while he was yet among us, I was able to perceive, was
the first to reprove me for my disregard of the skill of his fellow-artists;
and, with this inauguration of the study of the art of all time,--a study
which can only by true modesty end in wise admiration,--it is surely
well that I connect the record of these words of his, spoken then too
truly to myself, and true always more or less for all who are untrained
in that toil,--"You don't know how difficult it is."
You will not expect me, within the compass of this lecture, to give you
any analysis of the many kinds of excellent art (in all the three great
divisions) which the complex demands of modern life, and yet more
varied instincts of modern genius, have developed for pleasure or
service. It must be my endeavour, in conjunction with my colleagues in
the other Universities, hereafter to enable you to appreciate these
worthily; in the hope that also the members of the Royal Academy, and
those of the Institute of British Architects, may be induced to assist,
and guide, the efforts of the Universities, by organising such a system
of art-education for their own students, as shall in future prevent the
waste of genius in any mistaken endeavours; especially removing doubt
as to the proper substance and use of materials; and requiring
compliance with certain elementary principles of right, in every picture

and design exhibited with their sanction. It is not indeed possible for
talent so varied as that of English artists to be compelled into the
formalities of a determined school; but it must certainly be the function
of every academical body to see that their younger students are guarded
from what must in every school be error; and that they are practised in
the best methods of work hitherto known, before their ingenuity is
directed to the invention of others.
9. I need scarcely refer, except for the sake of completeness in my
statement, to one form of demand for art which is wholly unenlightened,
and powerful only for evil;--namely, the demand of the classes
occupied solely in