Now I know that in what I am here saying I skirt the burning ground of controversy long and hotly waged—skirt it only, for that controversy touches but the borders of my subject, and I shall of course not pursue it here. I will, nevertheless, to avoid misrepresentation in either sense, state, as briefly as I can, one or two definite principles on which it appears to me safe to stand. It is given to form and to colour to elicit in men powerful and exquisite emotions, emotions covering a very wide range of sensibility, and to which they alone have the key. The chords within us which vibrate to these emotions are the instrument on which art plays, and a work of art deserves that name, as I have said, in proportion as, and in the extent to which, it sets those chords in motion. The power and solemnity of a simple appeal of form as such is seen in a noble building of imposing mass and stately outlines. When, however, form in arts is connected with the human frame, and when combinations of human forms are among the materials with which a beautiful design is built up, then another element is added to the sum of our sensations—an element due to the absorbing interest of man in all that belongs to his kind; and the emotion primarily produced by the force of a purely æsthetic appeal is enhanced and heightened by elements of a more intimate and universal order, one more nearly touching our affections, but not, therefore, necessarily of a higher order. Thus the episode, for instance, of Paolo and Francesca, clothed in the rare, grave melody of Dante's verse, entrances us with its pathos; but our emotion, intensely human as it is, is not therefore of a higher kind than that which holds us as we listen to sounds sublimely woven by some great musician; nor are the impressions received in watching from the floor of some great Christian church the gathering of the gloom within a dome's receding curves of less noble order than those aroused by a supreme work of sculpture or a painting—by, say, the "Notte" of Michael Angelo or the "Monna Lisa" of Lionardo; and yet in both of these last the chord of human sympathy is strongly swept, though in different ways—in the "Notte" by the poetic and pathetic suggestiveness of certain forms and movements of the human body; in the "Monna Lisa" by a more definitely personal charm and feminine sorcery which haunts about her shadowy eyes, and the subtle curling of her mysterious lips.
I say, then, that in a work of art the elements of emotion based on human sympathies are not of a loftier order than those arising out of abstract sublimity or loveliness of form, but that the presence of these elements in such a work, while not raising it as an artistic creation, does impart to it an added power of appeal, and that, therefore, a work in which these elements are combined will be with the great majority of mankind a more potent engine of delight than one which should rest exclusively on abstract qualities. And it follows, therefore, that while a work of art earns its title to that name on condition only, once again I say, of the purely æsthetic element being present in it, and will rank as such in exact proportion to the degree in which this element prevails in it; and while, further, this element, carrying with it, as it does, imaginative suggestiveness of the highest order and of the widest scope, is all-sufficient in those branches of art in which the human form plays no part, the element which is inseparable in a work of art from the introduction of human beings is one which it is not possible for us to ignore in our appreciation of that work as a source and vehicle of emotion.
Every attempt at succinct exposition of a complex question risks being unsatisfactory and obscure, and I am painfully alive to the inadequacy of what I have just said. I trust, however, that I have conveyed my meaning, if roughly, yet sufficiently to shield me from misconception in regard to the special emphasis I am laying on the importance of a proper estimation of the essentially æsthetic quality in a work of art, an importance which I urge upon you, not so much here on account of the effect its absence may have exercised on the development of painting, as on account of the significant fact that its want—the lack of a perception that certain qualities are the very essence of art, and link into one great family every work of the hands of men in which they are found—has led with us to a disastrous divorce between what is considered as art proper and the arts which are called industrial. I say advisedly "disastrous," for the lowering among us in the present day of the status of forms of art, in the service of which such men as Albert Dürer, for example, and Holbein (men, by-the-by, of kindred blood with ourselves), Cellini and Lionardo, were glad to labour and create—and that not as a concession, but in the joyful exercise of their fullest powers—is one of its results, and carrying with it, as is natural, a lowering of standard in these arts, has generated the marvellous notion, not expressed in words, but too largely acted on, that art in any serious sense is not to be looked for at all in certain places—where, in truth, alas! neither is it often found—and led to the holding aloof to a great extent, until comparatively recent years, of much of the best talent from very delightful forms of artistic creation; and this notion has led further to the virtual banishment from certain provinces of designing of the human figure, or where it is not banished, to its defacement, too often, in the hands of the untrained or the inept.
We are to a wonderful degree creatures of habit, our thoughts are prone to run—or shall I say rather to stagnate?—within grooves; and if we are a people of many and great endowments, a swift and free play of thought is, as we have been forcibly told by a voice that we shall hear no more, and can ill miss, not a distinguishing feature among us. Is it not an amazing thing, for example, that human shapes, which in clay or plaster would be ignominiously excluded from a second-rate exhibition, are not only accepted, but displayed with a chuckle of elated pride, when cast in the precious metals, flanked, say by a palm-tree, borne aloft on a rock, and presented in the guise of a piece of ornamental plate? But is this even rare? Is it not of constant occurrence? Do you demur? Well, let me ask you a plain question: Of all the nymphs and goddesses, the satyrs, and the tritons, that disport themselves on the ceremonial goldsmithery of the United Kingdom, how many if cast in vulgar plaster, and not in glittering gold, would pass muster before the jury of an average exhibition? And if few, I ask why is this so? In the name of Cellini—nay, in the name of common sense, why? And is it on account of the low ebb of figure modelling for decorative purposes that on our carved furniture—what we mysteriously describe as "art furniture"—the human form is hardly ever seen? Then why is the best talent not enlisted in this work? Certain it is that the absence of living forms imparts to much of the furniture now made in England, unsurpassed as it is in regard to delicacy and finish of handiwork, and frequently elegant in design, a certain look of slightness and flimsy, faddy dilettantism which prevent it from taking that rank in the province of applied art in which it might and should aspire.
But I have, I fear, already unduly drawn upon your patience, and I must bring to a close these too disjointed prefatory words, leaving it to the accomplished gentlemen who head the various sections of this Congress to amplify and enrich as they will out of the wide fund of their knowledge and experience the bald outline I have sketched before you. They, in their turn, taking up, no doubt, our common parable, will emphasise and press on you the fact that by cultivating its æsthetic sense in a more comprehensive and harmoniously consistent spirit than hitherto, and with a clearer vision of the nature of all art and a more catholic receptiveness as to its charms, and by stimulating in a right direction the abundant productive energy which lies to its hand, this nation will not only be adding infinitely to the adornment and dignity of its public and private life, not only providing for itself an increasing and manifold source of delight and renovating repose, mental and spiritual, in a day in which such resting and regenerating elements are more and more called for by our jaded nervous systems, and more and more needed for our intellectual equilibrium, but will be dealing with a subject which is every day becoming more and more important in relation to certain sides of the waning material prosperity of the country. For, as they will no doubt remind you, the industrial competition between this and other countries—a competition, keen and eager, which means to certain industries almost a race for life—runs, in many cases, no longer exclusively or mainly on the lines of excellence of material and solidity of workmanship, but greatly nowadays on the lines of artistic charm and beauty of design. This, to you, vital fact is one which they will, I am convinced, not suffer to fall into the background.
One last word in anticipation of certain objections not unlikely to be raised against an assumption which may seem to be implied in the existence of our Association—the assumption that the evils and shortcomings of which I have spoken with such unsparing frankness can be removed or remedied by the gathering togetherof a number of persons to listen to a series of addresses. The causes of these evils, we may be told, and their antidote, are not on the surface of things, but rest on conditions of a complex character, and are fundamental. "Who," I hear some one say, "is this dreamer of dreams, who hopes to cure by talking such deep-seated evils? Who is this shallow and unphilosophical thinker who does not see that the same primary conditions are operative in making the purchaser indifferent what he gets and the supplier indifferent to what he produces, and who attributes the circumstance that good work is not generally produced in certain forms of industry to the lack of demand, rather than to the deeper-lying fact that suppliers and demanders are of the same stock, having the same congenital failings; and satisfied with the same standards?" My answer to this imaginary, or I ought, perhaps, to say this foreseen objector would be, first, this—that I am not the visionary for whom he takes me, and that I do not believe in the efficacy of words either directly to remedy the state of things I have been deploring, or to create a love of art and a delicate sensitiveness to its charms in those to whom the responsive chords have been refused; neither is the eloquence, trumpet-toned and triumphant, conceivable by me before which the walls of the Jericho of the Philistine shall crumble in abrupt ruin to the ground; least of all do I believe in sudden developments of the human intellect. But it has nevertheless seemed to me, as it has seemed to the framers of this Association, that words, if they be judicious and sincere, may rally and strengthen and prompt to action instincts and impulses which only await a signal to assert themselves—instincts, sometimes, perhaps, not fully conscious of themselves—and that a favouring temperature may be thus created within which, by the operation of natural laws, in due time, but by no stroke of the wand, a new and better order may arise. Neither, indeed, do I ignore the force of my critic's contention that the causes of mischief lie deep, and are not to be touched by surface-tinkering, if they are to be removed at all; although I demur to his pessimistic estimate of them as a final bar to our hopes. It is true that certain specific attributes are, or seem to be, feeble in our race; it is true, too true—I have it on the repeated assurance of apologetic vendors—that with us the ugliest objects—often, oh! how ugly—have the largest market; nevertheless, the amount of good artistic production in connection with industry—I purposely speak of this first—has grown within the last score or so of years, and through the initiative, mind, of a mere handful of enthusiastic and highly gifted men in an extraordinary degree; and in a proportionate degree has the number increased, also, of those who accept and desire it; and this growth has been steady and organic, and is of the best augury. Now, the increase in the number of those who desire good work, and the concurrent development of their critical sensitiveness in matters of taste, stimulate, in their turn, the energies, and sustain the upward efforts, of the producers, and thus, through action and reaction, a condition of things should be slowly but surely evolved which shall more nearly approach that general level of artistic culture and artistic production so anxiously looked for by us all. It is in the hastening of this desired result that we invoke, not your sympathy alone, but your patient, strenuous aid. And if I am further asked how, in my view, this association can best contribute to the furtherance of our common end, I would say, not merely by seeking to fan and kindle a more general interest in the things of art, but mainly by seeking to awaken a clearer perception of the true essence of a work of art, by insisting on the fundamental identity of all manifestations of the artistic creative impulse through whatever channels it may express itself, and by setting forth and establishing this pregnant truth—that whatever degrees of dignity and rank may exist in the scale of artistic productions, according to the order of emotion to which they minister in us, they are in one kind; for the various and many channels through which beauty is made manifest to us in art are but the numerous several stops of one and the same divine instrument.
And if in what I have said I have laid especial stress on that branch of art which is called industrial, it is not solely to develop this cardinal doctrine, neither only because of the pressing, practical, paramount national importance of this part of our subject, but also because I, in truth, believe that it is in a great measure through these very forms of art that the improvement, to which I look with a steadfast faith, will be mainly operated. The almost unlimited area which they cover in itself constitutes them an engine of immense power, and I believe that through them, if at all, the sense of beauty and the love for it will be stimulated in, and communicated to, constantly increasing numbers. I believe that the day may come when public opinion, thus slowly but definitely moulded, will make itself loudly heard; when men will insist that what they do for the gracing and adornment of their homes shall be done also for the public buildings and thoroughfares of their cities; when they will remind their municipal representatives and the controllers of their guilds of what similar bodies of men did for the cities of Italy in the days of their proud prosperity in trade, and will ask why the walls of our public edifices are blank and silent, instead of being adorned and made delightful with things beautiful to see, or eloquent of whatever great deeds or good work enrich and honour the annals of the places of our birth. And lastly, I believe that an art desired by the whole people and fostered by the whole people's desire would reflect—for such art must be sincere—some of the best qualities of our race; its love of Nature, its imaginative force, its healthfulness, its strong simplicity.
And now, ladies and gentlemen, my task is ended. My duties to-night were purely prefatory; my words are but the prologue of the proceedings which begin to-morrow—a prologue which I undertook to speak less from any faith in its possible efficacy than in the belief that the first word spoken at such a time should be heard from the lips of one to whom, from the nature of the office he is privileged to fill, as well as from the whole bent of his mind, everything that concerns art, from end to end of its enchanting field, must be, and is, a source of deep, of constant, and engrossing interest. The curtain is now raised, the stage is spread before you, and I step aside to make room for others, leaving with you the expression of my fervent wish that the hopes which have brought us together in this place may not have been entertained in vain.