FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   2584   2585   2586   2587   2588   2589   2590   2591   2592   2593   2594   2595   2596   2597   2598   2599   2600   2601   2602   2603   2604   2605   2606   2607   2608  
2609   2610   2611   2612   2613   2614   2615   2616   2617   2618   2619   2620   2621   2622   2623   2624   2625   2626   2627   2628   2629   2630   2631   2632   2633   >>   >|  
vant of God preached and prayed, and here by his faithful and loving service he so endeared himself to all around him that he has been canonized by an epithet no other saint of the English Church has had bestowed upon him. His life as pictured by Izaak Walton is, to borrow one of his own lines, "A box where sweets compacted lie;" and I felt, as I left his little chapel and the parsonage which he rebuilt as a free-will offering, as a pilgrim might feel who had just left the holy places at Jerusalem. Among the places which I saw in my first visit was Longford Castle, the seat of the Earl of Radnor. I remembered the curious triangular building, constructed with reference to the doctrine of the Trinity, as churches are built in the form of the cross. I remembered how the omnipresent spire of the great cathedral, three miles away, looked down upon the grounds about the building as if it had been their next-door neighbor. I had not forgotten the two celebrated Claudes, Morning and Evening. My eyes were drawn to the first of these two pictures when I was here before; now they turned naturally to the landscape with the setting sun. I have read my St. Ruskin with due reverence, but I have never given up my allegiance to Claude Lorraine. But of all the fine paintings at Longford Castle, no one so much impressed me at my recent visit as the portrait of Erasmus by Hans Holbein. This is one of those pictures which help to make the Old World worth a voyage across the Atlantic. Portraits of Erasmus are not uncommon; every scholar would know him if he met him in the other world with the look he wore on earth. All the etchings and their copies give a characteristic presentation of the spiritual precursor of Luther, who pricked the false image with his rapier which the sturdy monk slashed with his broadsword. What a face it is which Hans Holbein has handed down to us in this wonderful portrait at Longford Castle! How dry it is with scholastic labor, how keen with shrewd scepticism, how worldly-wise, how conscious of its owner's wide-awake sagacity! Erasmus and Rabelais,--Nature used up all her arrows for their quivers, and had to wait a hundred years and more before she could find shafts enough for the outfit of Voltaire, leaner and keener than Erasmus, and almost as free in his language as the audacious creator of Gargantua and Pantagruel. I have not generally given descriptions of the curious objects which I saw in the great
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   2584   2585   2586   2587   2588   2589   2590   2591   2592   2593   2594   2595   2596   2597   2598   2599   2600   2601   2602   2603   2604   2605   2606   2607   2608  
2609   2610   2611   2612   2613   2614   2615   2616   2617   2618   2619   2620   2621   2622   2623   2624   2625   2626   2627   2628   2629   2630   2631   2632   2633   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Erasmus
 

Castle

 

Longford

 

curious

 
building
 

pictures

 

remembered

 

places

 

portrait

 
Holbein

etchings

 
pricked
 

language

 

spiritual

 

presentation

 

copies

 
precursor
 
characteristic
 

Luther

 
audacious

impressed

 

recent

 

creator

 

voyage

 
scholar
 

Atlantic

 

Portraits

 

uncommon

 

Nature

 

Rabelais


arrows

 

sagacity

 

Pantagruel

 

quivers

 

leaner

 

Voltaire

 
shafts
 

outfit

 

hundred

 

generally


conscious

 

handed

 

wonderful

 

objects

 

sturdy

 
rapier
 

slashed

 
broadsword
 

Gargantua

 

keener