esident took occasion to estimate the modern
predicament and general position of Art, as a prelude to the
consideration of its special developments, in later Discourses. "I wish
in so doing," he said, "to seek the solution of certain perplexities and
doubts which will often, in these days of restless self-questioning in
which we live, arise in the minds and weigh on the hearts of students
who think as well as work."

In answering the question of questions in Art for us to-day--that is,
what are its chances in the present, compared with the glory and
splendour of its achievement in the past?--Leighton provides us with
some memorable passages in his first Discourse. Speaking of the
"Evolution of Painting in Italy," he turned it to notable account in his
argument, as in this reference to the Florentine school:

"It is, perhaps," he said, "in Tuscany, and notably in Florence, that we
see the national temperament most clearly declared in its art, as indeed
in all its intellectual productions; here we see that strange mixture of
Attic subtlety and exquisiteness of taste, with a sombre fervour and a
rude Pelasgic strength which marks the Tuscans, sending forth a Dante, a
Brunelleschi, and a Michael Angelo,--a Fiesole, a Boccaccio, and a
Botticelli, and we find that eagerness in the pursuit of the
knowledge of men and things, which was so characteristic of them, summed
up in a Macchiavelli and a Lionardi da Vinci."

[Illustration: A CONTRAST]

How different the conditions when we turn to consider English Art, as it
stands to-day: "The whole current of human life setting resolutely in a
direction opposed to artistic production; no love of beauty, no sense of
the outward dignity and comeliness of things, calling on the part of the
public for expression at the artist's hands; and, as a corollary, no
dignity, no comeliness for the most part, in their outward aspect;
everywhere a narrow utilitarianism which does not include the
gratification of the artistic sense amongst things useful; the works of
artists sought for indeed, but too often as a profitable merchandise, or
a vehicle of speculation, too often on grounds wholly foreign to their
intrinsic worth as productions of a distinctive form of human genius,
with laws and conditions of its own."

The modern student may well question, whether the great artists of the
past, if they lived now under our different conditions, would achieve
all that they did then. For further bew