Page:Landscape Painting by Birge Harrison.djvu/78

LANDSCAPE PAINTING Piracy seemed the only way out of the dilemma; so I boldly seized upon the word refraction and forced it willy-nilly to assume the new rôle. And while it was necessary to twist it far from its original meaning I have faith that with growing years it will come to carry gracefully the full burden of definition. For the purposes of this paper therefore the reader will kindly assume refraction to stand for that intimate effect of one mass of color or value upon its adjoining mass which results in the "lost-edge," and a general diffusion of tone, thus giving to pictures their atmospheric quality. Now refraction is only in a very limited sense an objective fact. It is mainly a visual fact whose operation is due to the imperfect construction of the lens of the human eye. The scientific fact is [48]