CHAPTER VIII.
“The Four Apostles.”—Dürer’s Later Literary Works.—Four Books of Proportion.—Last Sickness and Death.—Agnes Dürer.—Dürer described by a Friend.
Schlegel says that “Albert Dürer may be called the Shakespeare of Painting;” and it is doubtless true that he filled out the narrow capabilities of early German art with a full measure of deep and earnest thought and powerful originality. The equal homage which was offered to him at Venice and Antwerp, the two art-antipodes, shows how highly he was regarded in his own day. His earlier works were executed in the crude and angular methods of Wohlgemuth and his contemporaries; and most of the pictures now attributed to him, often incorrectly, are of this character. But in his later works he swung clear of these trammelling archaisms, and produced brilliant and memorable compositions.
“The Four Apostles,” now in the Munich Pinakothek, were Dürer’s last and noblest works, and fairly justify Pirkheimer’s assurance, that if he had lived longer the master would have done “many more wonderful, strange, and artistic things.” They are full of grand thought and clear insight, free from exaggeration or conventionalism, perfect in execution and harmonious simplicity, and so distinct in individuality that it has been generally believed that the Four Temperaments are here impersonated. On one panel are Sts. John and Peter, in life-size, the former deeply meditating, with the Scriptures in his hand, and the latter bending forward and earnestly reading the Holy Book. The other panel shows the stately St. Paul, robed in white, standing before the ardent and impassioned St. Mark. Kugler calls these panels “the first complete work of art produced by Protestantism;” and the truth and simplicity of the paintings prefigured the return of a pure and incorrupt faith.
Late in 1526, Dürer sent these pictures to the Rath of Nuremberg, with the following letter: “Provident, Honorable, Wise, Dear Lords,—I have been for some time past minded to present your Wisdoms with something of my unworthy painting as a remembrance; but I have been obliged to give this up on account of the defects of my poor work, for I knew that I should not have been well able to maintain the same before your Wisdoms. During this past time, however, I have painted a picture, and bestowed more diligence upon it than upon any other painting; therefore I esteem no one worthier than your Wisdoms to keep it as a remembrance; on which account I present the same to you herewith, begging you with humble diligence to accept my little present graciously and favorably, and to be and remain my favorable and dear Lords, as I have always hitherto found you. This, with the utmost humility, I will sedulously endeavor to merit from your Wisdoms.”
The Rath eagerly accepted this noble gift, and hung the two panels in the Rath-haus, sending also a handsome present of money to Dürer and his wife. A century afterwards Maximilian of Bavaria saw and coveted the pictures, and used bribery and threats alike to secure them. In 1627 he accomplished his purpose; and the Rath, fearful of his wrath and dreading his power, sent the panels to Munich.
The woodcut portrait of Dürer, dated 1527, shows the worn face of a man of fifty-six years, whose life has been stormy and sometimes unhappy. It is much less beautiful than the earlier pictures, for his long flowing hair and beard have both been cut short, perhaps on account of sickness, or in deference to the new puritan ideas. The face is delicate and melancholy, and seems to rest under the shadow of approaching death, which is to be met with a calm and simple faith.