om many of you probably have never heard,
and of whom, through me, you shall not hear, until I have tried to get
some picture by him over to England.

74. Observe then, this Puritanism in the worship of beauty, though
sometimes weak, is always honourable and amiable, and the exact reverse
of the false Puritanism, which consists in the dread or disdain of
beauty. And in order to treat my subject rightly, I ought to proceed
from the skill of art to the choice of its subject, and show you how the
moral temper of the workman is shown by his seeking lovely forms and
thoughts to express, as well as by the force of his hand in expression.
But I need not now urge this part of the proof on you, because you are
already, I believe, sufficiently conscious of the truth in this matter,
and also I have already said enough of it in my writings; whereas I have
not at all said enough of the infallibleness of fine technical work as a
proof of every other good power. And indeed it was long before I myself
understood the true meaning of the pride of the greatest men in their
mere execution, shown for a permanent lesson to us, in the stories
which, whether true or not, indicate with absolute accuracy the general
conviction of great artists;--the stories of the contest of Apelles and
Protogenes in a line only, (of which I can promise you, you shall know
the meaning to some purpose in a little while),--the story of the circle
of Giotto, and especially, which you may perhaps not have observed, the
expression of Duerer in his inscription on the drawings sent him by
Raphael. These figures, he says, "Raphael drew and sent to Albert Duerer
in Nuernberg, to show him"--What? Not his invention, nor his beauty of
expression, but "sein Hand zu weisen," "To show him his _hand_." And you
will find, as you examine farther, that all inferior artists are
continually trying to escape from the necessity of sound work, and
either indulging themselves in their delights in subject, or pluming
themselves on their noble motives for attempting what they cannot
perform; (and observe, by the way, that a great deal of what is mistaken
for conscientious motive is nothing but a very pestilent, because very
subtle, condition of vanity); whereas the great men always understand at
once that the first morality of a painter, as of everybody else, is to
know his business; and so earnest are they in this, that many, whose
lives you would think, by the results of their work, ha