on the subject which I care that my
pupils should read, and there is no man (whom I have not personally
known) whose image is so vivid in my constant affection.--Ever your
faithful servant,

"JOHN RUSKIN."--[ED.]

* * * * *

ART.

I.

HISTORY AND CRITICISM.

LORD LINDSAY'S "CHRISTIAN ART."

(_Quarterly Review, June 1847._)

EASTLAKE'S "HISTORY OF OIL PAINTING."

(_Quarterly Review, March 1848._)

SAMUEL PROUT.

(_Art Journal, March 1849._)

SIR JOSHUA AND HOLBEIN.

(_Cornhill Magazine, March 1860._)

* * * * *

"THE HISTORY OF CHRISTIAN ART."[4]

BY LORD LINDSAY.

16. There is, perhaps, no phenomenon connected with the history of the
first half of the nineteenth century, which will become a subject of
more curious investigation in after ages, than the coincident
development of the Critical faculty, and extinction of the Arts of
Design. Our mechanical energies, vast though they be, are not singular
nor characteristic; such, and so great, have before been manifested--and
it may perhaps be recorded of us with wonder rather than respect, that
we pierced mountains and excavated valleys, only to emulate the activity
of the gnat and the swiftness of the swallow. Our discoveries in
science, however accelerated or comprehensive, are but the necessary
development of the more wonderful reachings into vacancy of past
centuries; and they who struck the piles of the bridge of Chaos will
arrest the eyes of Futurity rather than we builders of its towers and
gates--theirs the authority of Light, ours but the ordering of courses
to the Sun and Moon.

17. But the Negative character of the age is distinctive.
There has not before appeared a race like that of civilized
Europe at this day, thoughtfully unproductive of all
art--ambitious--industrious--investigative--reflective, and incapable.
Disdained by the savage, or scattered by the soldier, dishonored by the
voluptuary, or forbidden by the fanatic, the arts have not, till now,
been extinguished by analysis and paralyzed by protection. Our
lecturers, learned in history, exhibit the descents of excellence from
school to school, and clear from doubt the pedigrees of powers which
they cannot re-establish, and of virtues no more to be revived: the
scholar is early acquainted with every department of the Impossible, and
expresses in