Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 8.djvu/181

Rh found that Paris was something better than a city of profligates, and France than a land of infidels. In that gay metropolis his exclamation is, "How much more still and leisurely everything moves here than in London! . . . . It is more a city of loungers; and life moves on at a more rational pace." On another occasion he declared Paris "better than London, in not being a place of extreme and high-pressure work in all the departments of industry. More favourable to intellect, to man in his loftier capacities, to all the better and higher purposes of our nature." It was not wonderful, therefore, that with such frankness and warmth of heart he was soon at one with the choicest of that literary and intellectual society with which the city at all times abounds, and delighted with its buildings, its public walks, and museums of science and art. Dr. Chalmers made no pretension to taste in the fine arts, and its critical phraseology he detested as cant and jargon; but it was well known by his friends that he had a love of fine statues and pictures, and an innate natural perception of their beauties, that might well have put those who prate learnedly about Raffaele and Titian to the blush. This will at once be apparent in his notices of the Louvre, where his remarks are full of life and truthfulness: "Struck with the picture of one of Bonaparte's battles in his retreat from Moscow. The expression of Napoleon very striking—as if solemnized by the greatness of the coming disaster, yet with an air of full intelligence, and serenity, and majesty, and a deep mournful expression withal. The long gallery of the Louvre superb; impressed at once with the superiority of its pictures. Very much interested in the Flemish pictures, of which there were some very admirable ones by David Teniers. I am fond of Rembrandt's portraits; and was much pleased in recognizing the characteristics of Rubens, Poussin, and Claude Lorrain. I also remarked that in most of the Italian schools, with the exception of the Venetian, there was a total want of shading off; yet the separate figures, though not harmonized with the back-ground, very striking in themselves. The statuary of painting perhaps expresses the style of the Roman and other such schools. There is a quadrangle recently attached to the east end of the gallery, filled with the models of towns, ships, and machinery; the towns very instructive. But the most interesting part of this department is the Spanish pictures, in all of which the strong emotions are most powerfully expressed. There is quite a stamp of national peculiarity in these works. The walls which contain them seem all alive with the passions and thoughts of living men." Thus far Dr. Chalmers in a new character, as a critic in painting—not of the schools, however, but of nature's own teaching. After a short residence of three weeks in Paris, during which he noticed everything with a benevolent and observant eye, and read before the Institute a lecture of initiation, having for its title, the "Distinction, both in Principle and Effect, between a Legal Charity for the Relief of Indigence, and a Legal Charity for the Relief of Disease," Dr. Chalmers set off on a short tour through some of the inland provinces, which he was induced to make by the persuasion of his English friends. On finishing it, he characterized it as a most interesting journey, in which his hopes for the futurity of France had been materially improved. He then returned to Edinburgh, where sterner events awaited his arrival.

The first task of Dr. Chalmers, on returning home, was the augmentation of the Church Extension Fund. No hope was now to be derived from Government grants, and therefore, while old age was stealing upon him, and the weariness of a life of toil demanding cessation and repose, he felt as if the struggle V.