The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-10-29

staggered down the steps of the London art
gallery under the power of Dore's "Christ
Leaving the Praetorium." Profess you to
be christian man or woman, and see no
divine mission in art, and acknowledge you
no obligation either in thanks to God or
man!
1t is no more the word of God when put
before us in printers ink than by skillful
LAYING on of colors, or designs on metal
through incision or corrosion. What les
son in morals was presented by hogarth,
the painter, in his two pictures, The
Rakes Progress" and THE Misers Feast"
and by Thomas Coles engravlngs of the
t.Vovage of Human Life" and the Course
of Empire" and by Turner's Slave Ship"
God in art! Christ in art! Patriarchs,
prophets and apostles in art! Angels In
art! Heaven In art!
The world and the church ought to come
TO the higher appreciation of the divine
mission of pictures, yet the authors OF them
have generally been left to semi starvation.
West, the great painter, toiled in unappre-
citation till, being a great skater, while on
the ice he formed the acquaintance of Gen.
Howe of the English army, and through
coming to admire West as a skater, they
gradually came to appreciate as much that
which he accomplished by his hand as by his
heel. Poussin, the mighty painter, was
pursued and had nothing with which to de-
fend hims If against tine mob but the artists
portfolio, which he held over his head to
keep or the stones hurled at him. The
pictures of Richard Wilson of England was
sold for fabulous sums of money after his
death, but the living painter was glad to
get for his "Alcyonen a piece of Stilton
cheese From 1910 to 1913 there were 800
pictures willfully destroyed. Ia the reign
of Queen Eliz lbeth it was the habit of some
people to spend much of their time in knock
ing pictures to pieces. In the reighn of Charles
tie First it was ordered by parliament that
all pictures of Christ be burnt Painters
we're so badly treated and Inundated in
the beginning of the eighteenth century
Tat they were lowered clear down out of
the subiinity of their art, and obliged to
give minute accounts of what they did with
their colors, as painters hill which came 10
puI location IN Scotland, in 1907, indicated.
The painter had been touching up some old,
pictures in the church, and he sends in this
ifenized bill TO the vestry: ITO fiji & w
.nink Ia The Red sea and repairing the
damages to Pharaoh's hosts: ito new pair
of hands for Daniel i'll the lions den, and
new set of teeth for the lioness;" ''to
repairing Nebuchadnezza S beard" ito
giving blush to the cheek of Eve on pre-
senting the apple to Adam" Ito making a
bride for the God Samaritan's horse, and
mendng one of his legs" "to putting on a
new handle on Moses basket and fitting
bulrushes, and adding more fuel to the fire
in Nebuchadnezzar's furnace" SO painters
were Inundated clear down below the
majesty OF their art The oldest picture in
England, a portrait OF Chaucer, though
now of great value, was picked out of a
lumber garnet. Great were the trials of
Quentin Matsys, who tCiled on from black
smiths anvil till as n painter he won wide
recognition. The first missionaries to
Mexico made the fatal mistake of destroy
ing pictures, for the loss of which arJ and
religion must ever lament. But why e. so
far back when in this year of our Lord, 1888,
and within twelve years of the twentieth
century, to be IA painter, except in rare ex-
captions, means poverty and neglectl
poorly fed, poorly clad, poorly housed,
because poorly appreciated! When hear
a man is painter, have two feelings. one
of admiration for the greatness of his soul.
and the other of commiseration for the
needs of his body.
But so it mas been in all departments of
noble work. Some of the mightiest have
been hardly bestead. Oliver Goldsmith had
such big patch on the coat over his left
breast that when he went anywhere he kept
his hat in his hand closely pressed over the
patch. The world-renowned Bishop Asbury
had salary of $64 year. Painters are not
the only ones who have endured the lack of
appreciation Let men of wealth take under
their patronage the suffering men of art.
for higher wages. But with keenness of
nervous organization which almost always
characterizes genius, these artists suffer
more than any one but God can realize.
There needs to be a concerted effort for
the suffering artists of America, not
sentimental discourse about what we owe
TO artists, but contracts that will give them
a livelihood; for | am in full sympathy
with the chri tan farmer, who was very
busy gathering his fall apples, and some
one asked him to pray for a poor family
the father of which mad broken his leg; and
the busy farmer said: II cannot stop now
to pray, but you can go down into the cellar
and get SEINE cornei beef, and butter, and
eggs and potatoes; that is all can do now"
Artists may wish for our prayers,
but they also want practical help
from men who can give them work
You have heaxd scores of sermons for ali
other kinds of Suffering men and women,
but / think this is the first sermon ever
preached that made plea for the suffering
men and women of American art Their
work is more true to nature and life tina
any of the masterpieces that have become
immortal on the other side of the sea, but it
is the fashion of Americans to mention
foreign artists, and to know little or moth
ing about our own Copley, and Allston
and Inman, and Greenough, and kenset
let the affluent fling out of their windows
and into the back yard valueless daubs on
canvas, and call in these splendid but I'M
rewarded men, aud tell them to adorn your
walls. not only with that which shall please
the taste, but enlarge the mind, and i'm
prove the morals, and save the souls of
those who gaze upon them.
Brooklyn, and all other A merican cities
need great galleries of art, not only open
annually for a few days on exhibition, but
which shall stand open all the year round,
and from early morning until ten o'clock at
night, and free to all who would come and
go. What preparation for the wear and
tear Of the day five minutes look in the
morning at some picture that will open a
door into some larger realm than that in
which our population daily drudge Or
what good thing the half hour of artistic
opportunity on the way home i'll the even
ing from exhaustion that demands recu. err
alton for mind and soul as well as body
Who will do for Brooklyn or the city where
you live what w. w. Corcoran did for
Washington, and what | am told John
Wannamaker. by the donation of Dc
fiunkacsy's great picture, Christ be-
fore Plate" is going TO do for Phila-
delphial Men of wealth. if you are
too modest TO build and endow such place
during your lifetime, why not go TO your
iron safe, and take out your last will aud
testament, and make a codicil that shall
build for the city Of your residence, a
throne for American artl Take some of