Page:The Obligations of the Universities Towards Art.djvu/27

 knew a writer before as possessing qualities endearing him to you, and directly you see his handwriting you hail it as a part of that gentle and beloved individual. He could not help making a picture of himself; when he wrote with his own hand, he inadvertently even made a sign of his transient condition. If we were profound enough we might see if he were well or ill, grave or gay, when he took pen in hand, and the writing would remain ever thus speaking; but there have been knightly heroes sans peur et sans reproche who could not write at all, and there are nations that have done grand actions which have had no individual art at all, the kings whereof, wanting to put on record their deeds, have had to call in strangers to their aid (the public letter-writer from the market-place); but in these days is such a nation enviable?

It is certain that our nation was for some unhappy generations in this position. We have to understand why this was so, and how far we still suffer the consequences.

It will be seen that in other nations there is a singular uniformity of history in all branches of Art. The sister arts have flourished coincidently. Architecture, sculpture, decoration, and painting have grown simultaneously with letters; painting coming to full perfection somewhat later than literature, yet with this tardiness in her progress, who needs so many handmaids of science, perspective, the laws of light and shade, of colour and of optics, it may still be said that our art in all her ways (the art of shaping materials into living thoughts), walks in step with poetry and