Connecticut western news., 1899-06-22


 dead. I actually 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?
 Arts Divine Mission.
 It 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 lesson in morals was presented by Hogarth, the painter, in his two pictures, "The Rake's Progress" and 1.-The Miser's Feast" and by Thomas Coles engravings of the Voyage of Human Fife" and the Course of Elm pire," and by Turner's Slave Ship" God in art! Christ in art! Patri- archs, 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 semistarvation. West, the great painter, toiled in misrepresentation till, being a great skater, while on the ice he formed the acquaintance of General Howe of the English army, who, through coming to admire West as a clever skater, gradually came to appreciate as much that which he ac- compllshed by his hand as by his heel. Poussin, the mighty painter, was pur- sued and had nothing with which to defend himself against the mob but the artists portfolio, which he held over his head to keep off the stones hurled at him. The pictures of Rich ard Wilson of England were sold for fabulous sums of money after his death, but the living painter was glad to get for his "Alcyone" piece of Stilton cheese. From 164O to 1643 there were 4,60O pictures willfully de stroyed. In the reign of Queen Eliza beth 1t was the habit of some people to spend much of their time in knock ing pictures to pieces. In the reign of Charles it was ordered by par lament that all pictures of Christ 
 treated and humiliated in the begin ming of the eighteenth century that they were lowered clear down out of the sublimity of their art and obliged to give accounts of what they did with their colors. The oldest picture in England, portrait of Chaucer, though now of great value, was picked out of a lumber garret. Great were the trials of Quentin Matsys, who toiled on from he won wide recognition The first missionaries to Mexico made the fatal mistake of destroying pictures, for the loss of which art and religion must ever lament. But why go so far back when in this year of our Lord to be painter, except in rare occasions, means poverty and neglect, poorly fed, poorly clad, poorly housed, be- cause poorly appreciated?
 Value of Art Galleries.
 When I 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 has been in all departments of noble work. Some of the mightiest have been hardly be- stead. 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 renown- ed Bishop Asbury had salary of $64 a year. Painters are not the only ones who have endured the lack of appreci- ation. Let men of wealth take under their patronage the suffering men of art. They lift no complaint; they make no strike for higher wages. But with a keenness of nervous organiza- ton which almost always character iZes genius these artists suffer more than any one but God can realize. There needs be a concerted effort for the suffering artists of America, not sentimental discourse about what we eve to artists, but contracts that will give them a livelihood; for I am in full sympathy with the Christian farmer who was very busy gathering his fall apples, and some one asked him to pray for poor family, the father of whom had broken his leg, and the busy farmer said: "I cannot stop now to pray, but you can go down into the cellar and get some corned 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 heard scores of sermons for all other kinds of suffering men and wom- en, but we need sermons that make pleas for the suffering men and women of American art. Their work is more true to nature andllfe than some of the masterpieces that have become immortal on the other side of the sea, but 1t is the fashion of Americans to mention foreign artists and to know little or nothing about our own Copley and Allston, and Inman and Gree nough, and Kensett. Let the affluent fling out of their windows and into the backyard valueless daubs on canvas and call in these splendid but unre- warded men and tell them to adorn your walls, not only with that which shall please the taste, but enlarge the minds and improve the morals and save the souls of those who gaze upon them. All American cities need great galleries of art, not only open annually for few days on exhibition, but which shall stand open all the year round, and from early morning until 10 o'clock at night and free to all who would come and go.
 Build Art Galleries.
 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 a good thing the half hour of artistic opportunity on the way home in the evening from exhaustion that demands recuperation for mind and soul as we'll as body! Who will do for the city where you live what W. W. Corcoran did for