The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1897-01-23

much, he assures US, for his consum-
mate literary workmanship, as for "his
measured and living truth,-meas-
ured as compared to Homer, and liv-
ing as compared to everybody else"
Nor must this be considered the
opinion of an ignorant child. He had
already read Livy and knew what
close-set language was, and had
learned Pope by heart long before.
Reading the Bible constantly, too,
under his mothers direction, he knew
we'll the majesty and simplicity of
language in the grand poetry of the
Hebrew nation. He refers very often
to this early familiarity with the
Bible as one great source of the in
comparable beauty of his literary
style, and it was doubtless one of it's
formative elements.
The mother who insisted so siren
uously.upon this part of his educa
tion was woman of somewhat se-
we're character, who brought him up
in complete isolation from all other
children, and with none of the toys
or amusements of an ordinary child
hood. He says in relation to it: 81
had bunch of keys to play with as
long as | was capable only of pleas
ure in what glittered and jingled; as
! grew older l had cart and ball,
and when | was five or six years old
two boxes of wooden bricks. With
these modest, but, l still think, en-
tirely sufficient possessions, and be-
ing always summarily whipped if 1
cried, did not do as l was bid, or
tumbled on the stairs, | soon attained
serene and secure methods of life
and motion; and could pass my days
contentedly in tracing the square,
and comparing the colors of my car
pet, examining the knots in the wood
of the floors, or counting the bricks in
the opposite houses, with rapturous
intervals of excitement during the
filling of the water-cart, or the still
more admirable proceedings of the
turncock, when he turned and turned
till fountain sprang up in the mid
die of the street. But the carpet and
what patterns could find in the bed
covers, dresses, or wall papers to be
examined, were my chief resources"
The artist was embryotic even in the
little child, as can be seen by this,
and that the poet was also in the
soul was shown by his eaIly delight
in such glimpses of nature as came to
him in his early childhood.
He was once taken to Derwent Wat
er, and he tells of the intense Joy,
mingled with awe, that he had in
looking through the hollows in the
mossy roots, over the crag into the
dark lake, and which has associated
itself more or less with all twining
roots of trees ever since. He never
lived in the country in childhood, and
every small excursion was most in
tense delight. He remembers the
first time he ever walked on the grass,
as other children some important oc-
currence, and every such new intro
duction to nature was to him reve-
| lation.
His parents occasionally made
journey in their own coach, and these
ecstatic periods still linger in his
memory. He visited with them many
| of the famous castles and cathedrals
of his native land, and began that
study of architecture which has oc-
cupied SO much of the leisure of his
life. He took the greatest interest
and pleasure in it from the first, gain
ing much, no doubt, from the compan-
ionship OF man of taste and exper-
ience like the elder Ruskin.
John was also taken abroad while
quite young by his parents, visited
Switzerland and Italy, and learned
to revel in the joys of nature and art.
He continued the observation of ar
chitecture begun among the cathe-
drals of England, and saw for the first
time the incompatible splendor of
ancient art. He was already a keen
and minute observer, and came
home with many drawings, made
with little skill, perhaps, but much
truth. His first thought was to be
an artist, and he pursued the study
with much diligence for some years.
We come, now, to the beginning of
his life work in the Modern Painters.
The first volume was the expansion of
a magazine article, affirming that
Turner, who had been harshly criti-
cized by leading artists and critics,
was right and true, and that his crit
les were wrong, base, and false. At
that time, though he had been several
times in Italy, he delighted chiefly in
Northern art, beginning when boy
NTH Ruhens and Rembrandt and 90