y present strength;
help all the more precious because my friend can bring to the
investigation of early Christian Art, and its influence, the integrity
and calmness of the faith in which it was wrought, happier than I in
having been a personal comforter and helper of men, fulfilling his life
in daily and unquestionable duty; while I have been, perhaps wrongly,
always hesitatingly, persuading myself that it was my duty to do the
things which pleased me.

255. Also, it has been necessary to much of my analytical work that I
should regard the art of every nation as much as possible from their own
natural point of view; and I have striven so earnestly to realize belief
which I supposed to be false, and sentiment which was foreign to my
temper, that at last I scarcely know how far I think with other people's
minds, and see with anyone's eyes but my own. Even the effort to recover
my temporarily waived conviction occasionally fails; and what was once
secured to me becomes theoretical like the rest.

But my old scholar has been protected by his definitely directed life
from the temptations of this speculative equity; and I believe his
writings to contain the truest expression yet given in England of the
feelings with which a Christian gentleman of sense and learning should
regard the art produced in ancient days, by the dawn of the faiths which
still guide his conduct and secure his peace.

256. On all the general principles of Art, Mr. Tyrwhitt and I are
absolutely at one; but he has often the better of me in his acute
personal knowledge of men and their ways. When we differ in our thoughts
of things, it is because we know them on contrary sides; and often his
side is that most naturally seen, and which it is most desirable to see.
There is one important matter, for instance, on which we are thus
apparently at issue, and yet are not so in reality. These lectures show,
throughout, the most beautiful and just reverence for Michael Angelo,
and are of especial value in their account of him; while the last
lecture on Sculpture,[16] which I gave at Oxford, is entirely devoted to
examining the modes in which his genius failed, and perverted that of
other men. But Michael Angelo is great enough to make praise and blame
alike necessary, and alike inadequate, in any true record of him. My
friend sees him as a traveler sees from a distance some noble mountain
range, obscure in golden clouds and purple shade; and I see him as a
sulle