Page:The Obligations of the Universities Towards Art.djvu/44

 said, 'I don't call yours a climate at all, I call it a collection of samples.' Well, our Art at this period is a collection of samples, and some of the stormiest, like some of our meteorological disturbances, come from across the Atlantic, not bearing the pure odour of that earth on which our kindred found safety from persecution, but accompanied by all the perfumes of Paris, where young professors go whirlwinding in what they call study for a time, to their great destruction. Amid all the confusion caused by such like visitations, we possess native artists who are worthy compatriots of our great poets and honourable descendants of the founders of the English school.

I have endeavoured to unveil to you a state of matters which needs the overruling of a commanding power. I have dared to imagine that the Collegiates of the country should be prepared to exercise this, and I would venture to urge that 'The Obligations of the Universities towards Art' are to consider the position, and to take steps towards defending honest English Design.

The interests of Poetry and Literature are protected by the fiat which went forth for the diversity of tongues in the plain of Shinar. The idiom of each land receives its currency from the die of Collegiate authority, and all England's distinguished sons of letters who have not been children of Alma Mater have nevertheless indirectly imbibed her teaching.

The art of Design was, until after the days of Matthew