The higher life in art with a chapter on hobgoblins by the great masters

Front matter

Wn'H A CHAPTER ON HOBGOBLINS

WYKE BAYLTSS

BY THE SAME AUTHOR.

Preface

IT will not be necessary to detain the reader with many prefatory remarks. I am not quite sure, indeed, whether these few words should not rather be called an interlude than a preface. The real preface to this book, is the book which preceded it.

In “The Witness of Art,” I said, “Nature is God’s language, and Art is ours ; Nature is a poem written by God, and Art is man’s translation of it. It is thus that Art becomes a Witness ; and its witness is twofold. In every rendering of the splendour of creation it is a witness to us of the glory of the Creator ; in every gross conception that we place upon canvas or cut into marble it is a witness against us of the blindness of our eyes or the evil of our hearts.” This was my theme, and it led me to consider, —

(i). The distinctive characteristics of the Antique, the

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PREFACE.

Renascence, and the Modern Schools ; or Art as representing the Passion of our Lives. (2). Landscape Art in Poetry ; or Art as representing the World in which we live. (3). The Use of the Supernatural in Art ; or Art as representing the Chimeras of the imagination.

I do not think that such a study of Art in the light of its historical associations, can lead to any other conclusion than that as every sanatory influence of climate, of circumstance, of habit, which gives to the human race a higher perfection of physical development, tends to exalt Art as the representation of human beauty — so every advance in mental culture, in intellectual vigour, in purity of life and manners, tends in the like proportion to exalt Art as the representation of human life and action.

If, however, the truth of a proposition is to be judged by the universality of its acceptance, the position I have taken is hopelessly at fault. To one who has seen much of studio life in London and on the Continent there is nothing more sad than the constant surrender by the artist of his birthright in this matter. Always and everywhere the statement is met with doubt, if not by a direct negative. “The tendency of luxury is to demoralization. Art is luxury — therefore the tendency of Art is to demoralization ; ” or again, “ The decadence of morals begins when Art culminates.” These are the simple embodiments of arguments or sentiments very

PREFACE.

IX commonly expressed., But the syllogism is false, and the historical statement is misleading. The affirmation in the minor term is a petitio principii. And it is not shown, nor indeed can it be, that the decay of morals is consequent upon any high position to which Art may have attained ; while it is conveniently forgotten that when morals have declined Art has perished also.

It is not however by a syllogism or its analysis that the truth can be elicited in this instance ; not at least until those who discuss the question are a little more agreed as to the premises. Nor do I expect to prove my case by a brief resmne of this kind. But the steps I have already taken are the best indication of the direction in which I must travel if I pursue the subject further. To compare the Greek with the Mediaevalist, or the Landscapist with the painter of History, is to compare with each other different translations from the same poem. This I have done. But the question remains— Can any translation at all so nearly approach the divine original as to help us in our understanding of it }

There are two methods of dealing with this question. I might plead results. I might show, for instance, that since the day when David Cox laid down his blacksmith’s hammer, we have been steadily answering it in the affirmative, by receiving into our lives, through the interpretation of Nature given to us by him — and by

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men like him, whether painters or poets — a new happiness ; a happiness that creates no new evil, but rather strengthens us to resist the old. Or I might plead that God gave us the artist, as really as He gave us the landscape which the artist paints ; and show that David Cox never laid down his hammer at all — but only exchanged it for that of Thor.

Now I know that the Scylla and Charybdis of all writers on Art lie in the direction of attempting too much or of being content with too little. Such a subject therefore may well precipitate me upon the one, or overwhelm me with the other. Nay, I fear it must do so in the judgment of some of my readers. For the world of Art is simply commensurate with the universe. To include everything that comes within its range is impossible ; to exclude anything must be to sacrifice the very thing which to some eyes will seem most precious.

In this strait I have held steadily before me the following considerations. First, to write as an artist for artists. The painter who labours diligently in his calling cannot find time for the reading of elaborate treatises ; and yet there is no class of men who have better opportunities than have artists for thinking out the great problems of their profession. These problems briefly stated are the salt of studio life.

Secondly, amongst lovers of Art (and there are few

PREFACE.

XI who do not love Art) there is need for a greater catholicity of thought. If artists are divided into schools, amateurs are subdivided into classes. Like the peasant who knows nothing of the world beyond the hills which surround his village home, so they too often know nothing of the splendours of Art out of their own narrow circle of dilettanti. One of the most distinguished amateurs of London (a great authority amongst his friends) hearing me speak with regret of the death of George Mason, asked me what he painted. The horizon of this man was bounded by the walls of a single gallery in Pall Mall. But if the artist has little time to read books on Art, the amateur generally has still less. Art is not his profession. It only shares his attention with other pursuits ; and the leisure he can spare to it he naturally (though not always wisely) devotes to its practice. I have tried to deal with the subject therefore as I should like it to be dealt with for me, if I were an amateur, with limited time at my disposal, and yet desirous — so far as I could do so without hindrance to the main purpose of my life — to see a little of what is beyond the hills.”

And lastly, I have thought — How shall I write so that my words may not be without value to those who have not yet known or cared anything about Art ^ To them let me say, if they .will read these few pages, they will find that Art is not an occupation or an amusement only.

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xii

but a life to be lived. Art is to the soul what climate is to the body ; it carries with it life or death. Believing this I will hot trouble them with technicalities. I do not propose to teach them to sharpen a pencil or to mix colours on a palette, neither do I desire to force upon them any esoteric interpretation of Nature. My aim is to place before them a measure of the value of Art that is not to be found in the preciousness of the artist’s work as merchandise, nor in its beauty for purposes of decoration — but rather in an occult presence which goes with it, a communication of mind with mind, through which we gain a wider range of vision, a deeper penetration into the mysteries of life, a truer perception of our relationship with each other and with the world which is our home.

It is this occult presence which I have called “The Higher Life in Art.” As to the Hobgoblins, it will be time enough to speak of them when they appear upon the scene.

Contents

I’AGE

I. My Lady the Prologue 15

II. Three Sunsets 25

II. Three Sunsets

Nature and Art are always either allies or enemies ; there is no common i ground on which they can meet, each ignoring the presence of the other. Like the armies of a commonwealth, they may be divided by civil war — but if they meet they meet as forces that must either fraternize or fight.

Here, however, it is necessary for me to guard against a possible misunderstanding of my purpose. There are two elements in this question, namely, direction and force. Either of these may be variable or constant ; but they must be considered separately, and for the moment I have only to do with the question of direction. Where there is movement of any kind there must be force. Whether the delicate sails of the light-mill are driven or attracted by the solar ray may be a matter for experimental philosophy, but that they move at all is sufficient evidence that some force is acting upon them, the impetus of which may be calculated by a very simple

THE HIGHER LIFE IN ART.

process of arithmetic. That there is any movement is first to be established — its utilization will certainly follow. With what degree of cogency Nature and Art affect us, or how easily to be resisted are their influences, I am not now careful to inquire; but that they do affect us, really — not only in our emotions or feelings, but in our desires, in our dispositions, in our relationship with each other, in the success or failure of the purpose for which we live — this is the proposition which I place before my readers.

We have seen that Art and Nature are environments of our lives from which there is no escape ; let us consider for a moment the difference between our relationship with one and with the other.

Nature speaks to us in our own language, so that if we do not altogether understand her, yet we are comforted, as a child is comforted when his mother sings by his cradle at night, knowing nothing of “the time that shall come,” which is, nevertheless, the burden of her song, and that which gives to it its plaintive tenderness.

Art speaks to us in a language we have yet to learn, and until we have learned it we can neither understand it nor be comforted.

A hundred exquisite passages rise to the mind in illustration of the first of these truths, namely, the directness with which Nature speaks to us. I will refer

THREE SUNSETS.

to three only. The first is from the story of “Yvonne and Rohan,” in Wedmore’s “Pastorals of France” : —

“Yvonne rose to her feet — the dusk was gathering. Rohan, while she spoke, had looked out rather hopelessly on the last of the sunset ; but the beauty of it had not been lost upon him or on the girl. The poor never talk of scenery, but the finer spirits among them sometimes sit and watch it, with all its changing lights, reverently ; with placid hands crossed or folded, as in the act of devotion. Of it they have nothing to say, but it somehow speaks to them — things half understood, strange snatches of suggestion of wider life and thought as they wait with their eyes fixed in their grave loneliness.”

This is the cradle-song of Nature — what does it matter that the child does not understand It is enough that he recognizes his mother’s voice, and knows that she is singing to him.

And this influence of Nature upon the untaught is not limited to scenes of pastoral beauty, or restful quietude, or the grace of calm, any more than the influence of the mother’s voice is limited in its action to the child’s life, or is forgotten when the child becomes a man. To some, indeed, these influences attain their full strength only when they are felt through storms and tempest — through the storms that beat upon us from without, through the tempests of fire we raise within ourselves, through dark , nights and blinding days, through the exceeding great and bitter cry that goes up when we find that everything but these has failed us. And this leads me to my second illustration. It shall be

THE HIGHER LIFE IN ART.

from a poem by Rossetti. Again the sea-shore ; again two lovers stand there, but from Yvonne and Rohan how different : —

“ And, standing silent now at last, I looked Into her scornful face ; and heard the sea Still trying hard to din into my ears Some speech it knew which still might change her heart If only it could make me understand.”

“ If only it could make me understand.” It is no more a cradle-song then, this that the sea sings, whose very end is sleep. It is the cry rather of another Rizpah, which, beginning with sleep, the sleep of her children, the sleep of death, shall end only when breaks the morning of the resurrection : —

“ One moment thus. Another, and her face Seemed further off than the last line of sea.

So that I thought, if now she were to speak I could not hear her.”

What shall Rizpah do now ? — her children lost even to each other. The dusk is gathering ; the sun goes down ; a line of white surf is at their feet. Crimson, that is, to tell them of the love of God ; * white, to plead for their

* I do not know whether Mr. Rossetti intended any such symbolism in this passage. The passage is in itself so very beautiful that we may be well content to take it simply for a transcript from Nature ; yet it is also in perfect consonance with traditional usage; and coming from so great a master of colour it is difficult to believe that it has not some such occult meaning.

THREE SUNSETS.

own innocency ; the grey twilight to teach them to be humble. All this, and yet —

“ Then came a fire

That burn’d my hand ; and then the fire was blood,

And sea and sky were blood and fire, and all The day was one red blindness ; till it seemed,

Within the whirling brain’s eclipse, that she Or I or all things bled or burned to death.

And then I found her laid against my feet And knew that I had stabbed her.”

Even the great love of Rizpah cannot save her children now. If only she could make them understand ! If only when My Lady o’ the Prologue speaks to us we could tell what would be the ending of the drama — would it not be well for us ^

It would be well. But can Art help us in this ? In its Higher Life I think it can ; that, however, is the question I have set myself to answer.

Observe first how very indistinct is the impression ' that Nature makes on us. If the sunset speaks to Yvonne it is “ in strange snatches — of things half understood.” The first thing Art does is to give to these impressions a clearer and more definite shape. Let Yvonne and Rohan take to teaching in one of our Sunday Schools, and the sunset will very soon crystallize into the gates of “ Jerusalem the Golden.” Bring Yvonne and Rohan to London, and let them work six

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THE HIGHER LIFE IN ART.

months at a milliner’s in Oxford Street, and when next they take their holiday together you shall hear Rohan say to Yvonne, as they turn westward towards the Marble Arch, “Sweet thing in sunsets, pink centre with mauve trimmings.” * Nor is there anything strange in this ; it means only that Art, in two of its simplest forms, the arrangement of words and the arrangement of colours, will have given its own definiteness to their impressions.

But with this difference. In the one case Art will have been the ally of Nature, deepening the impression as well as defining it ; in the other case Art will have been the adversary of Nature, defining only to destroy.

Observe next the difficulty with which any impression is made. How hard the sea tries — with what iteration — with what persistence — if only it might make us under- .stand. See, also, how easily the impression is effaced. One moment it is heard — he cannot indeed understand, but he knows that it is on his side, it is pleading with him, and for him — it is dinning in his ears. Another moment and he takes the sea itself to express his sense of the immeasurable distance that separates him from

* I quote these words from memory, and regret very much that I cannot subpoena Mr. Punch, not only as a witness to the circumstances under which he heard them, but also to produce the little sketch to which they were attached.

THREE SUNSETS.

all that he loves on earth. And still, without travelling beyond these simple illustrations, note last of all to what terrible issues these impressions of Nature may be perverted. In Rossetti’s exquisite poem there is described another sunset, a sunset among the hills, where he (whose story the poem tells) first found the girl, a little child then, abandoned by her parents —

“ Who kissed her long, and wept and made her weep,

And gave her all the bread they had with them,

And then had gone together up the hill Where we were sitting now, and had walked on Into the great red light : ‘and so,’ she said,

‘ I have come up here too ; and when this evening They step out of the light as they stepped in,

I shall be here to kiss them.’ ”

Then he remembers the great famine ; how the church steps everywhere swarm with starved folk ; how the bread is weighed by armed men ; and he knows that the child has been left to charity, or God’s chance. What can he do — worn and sick as he is, hungry and hunted to the death, he cannot leave her to die.

“ With that God took my mother’s voice and spoke,

And sights and sounds came back and things long since, And all my childhood found me on the hills ;

And so I took her with me.”

So the third sunset closes. But this great red light — these clouds — that were to him as God speaking — are the same that at last drove him to madness. Does

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THE HIGHER LIFE IN ART.

Nature, then, like the rocks of the Loreley, only reflect our cries ? Is there no meaning in Nature except that which we put into her ourselves ? Even then the matter concerns us very greatly ; for in that case Art is the putting of this meaning into Nature, and the Higher Life in Art is where this meaning is good. Be this, however, as it may ; between these three sunsets lie all the possibilities of Nature and Art.

III. A Winters S Tale

But if what I have said be true, namely, that Nature speaks to us in our own language, while Art speaks in a language we have yet to learn, how can we reasonably turn to Art, the less known, to interpret the more familiar things of Nature ?

Because Art is the reflex and record of all that Nature has ever said to any or every one of us, at every time, in every place. To one an impression may have been blurred or indistinct ; but to another it will have been clear and well defined. To one it may have been only weakened by iteration ; to another each repetition will have come with accumulative force. To one it may have been evanescent as wave-marks on the sand ; to another it will have been indelible as the marks of the same waves on rocks of adamant. To one troubled ■with feverous dreams, a cloud stretched across the heavens may seem sinister in the extreme ; to another the same cloud will seem gracious with the coming rain. And then, even if our impressions are clear and strong

THE HIGHER LIFE IN ART.

and true, how few they are ; how very little do we know, each for himself, of the world in which we live, or of the great family of which we form a part ! A few voices speak to us out of the throng — but the many are dumb. A few eyes kindle as they look into ours —

“ Stars, stars,

And all eyes else dead coals.”

A br other y a sister, a wife, two or three friends ; this is, to most of us, the sum of our knowledge of mankind. It is more than the sum. See how large an abstract must be made from it. The friend is estranged, did we then really know him at all } The brother is in a far distant land, will he be the same to us when he returns ? The child, our sister, never will return — it is a long time since she died — should we not like to know a little more of her } Voices that used to speak to us are heard no more. Eyes that used to be bright have faded into the darkness, and we are left alone — with Nature. We understand her language very well, but she has nothing more to say to us ; nothing at least that we care to hear. Let us learn this other language of which you speak, this strange language of Art.

Listen then, and I will tell you what Art is. It is eyes to the blind ; it is strength to those who are weak ; it is gentleness to those who are strong ; it is manhood to the youth ; it is restitution to those who suffer wrong ; it is greeting to the absent ; it is faith to those who are

A WINTER'S TALE.

doubting ; it is hope to the desponding ; it is charity to all men. There is no state or condition in which we may be placed, but that Art will unfold to us the perfect complement of Life. Are we infirm with age, our spring-time long since past when we could “ apprehend nothing but jollity”.? — yet though sad memories crowd fast upon us, though our hands tremble as we turn the familiar page, our youth comes back to us with Florizel, and we can say —

“ I am but sorry, not afraid, delay’d But nothing alter’d, what I was, I am.”

Or are we young in years ? ardent with the untried friendship of —

^‘Two lads that think there is no more behind,

But such a day to-morrow as to-day,

And to be boy eternal.”

— then Bohemia and Sicilia shall teach us something of that which comes with manhood. The child our sister, lost long years ago, lives always in Perdita ; and the flowers which fall —

That come before the swallow dares, and take The winds of March with beauty ; violets, dim.

But sweeter than the lids of Juno’s eyes” —

— we take them all as from her hand. Have we been schooled hard by the suspicion of friends who wrong us .? then, as Leontes cries “ Lead me to these sorrows,” we

THE HIGHER LIFE IN ART.

find that it is not the wronged who suffer most. Are

we in authority } then the unrighteous judgment of the

mad king shall be our warning. Are we rich in wealth

and honours ? then the shepherd’s cottage shall reveal

to us a king’s daughter, or —

We may be councillors of state, but Autolycus shall go singing by —

“Jog on, jog on, the foot-path way.

And merrily hent the stile-a ;

A merry heart goes all the day,

Your sad tires in a mile-a ; ”

— and, rogue as he is, it shall go hard with us if we

cannot say with Camillo —

“ Whom have we here ?

We’ll make an instrument of this ; omit Nothing may give us aid.”

We may be wrapped to the chin in the closest garb of supercilious epicureanism ; but the country clown, enthralled with love, buying ribands and gloves for Mopsa, shall forbid us to think we have a monopoly of happiness. We may shrink from action because it is dangerous ; but the brave woman who bearded the king amidst his own courtiers, teaching him his duty, shall teach us also ours. And her husband — flap-dragoned by the sea, his shoulder bone torn out by the bear, the bear mocking him first and dining on him afterward, and both roaring

A WINTER’S TALE, louder than the sea and the storm together — shall not Antigonus teach us something of courage and fidelity ? And what of Hermione’s patient endurance of evil ? what of Leontes’ remorse ? what of the meeting of these two at last ? Paulina’s triumph — Polixenes’ reconciliation — Perdita kneeling for Hermione’s blessing — Florizel, the happy inheritor of honour and love ?

Only this — that it is nothing but a Winter’s Tale.

Or this — that my Lady the Prologue deals with us as children. She sings to us at first only her cradle-song. We do not understand its full meaning, but we know that there is music in Nature. And then Nature is silent, and we strive to reawaken the sounds that we have heard. This is Art. It is as though we laid our finger on the keyboard of an organ, touching a 7iote here and there. A flute voice a7tswers us, or a vox-hu77ta7ta, perhaps even a vox~a7tgelica ; but we do 7wt k7iow the i7istruine7it imtil the 77iaster 77iusicia7t sits dow7t before it and we hear the thunder of the diapason, the rush of 77iighty hari7to7iies, the te7ider strahis of 7nelody. This music, so awakened, is the Higher Life in Art.

IV. Art For Art^s Sake

*13 UT when we touch the keyboard of an organ or the string of a violin what is it that we hear ? Is it the shaking only of a length of catgut ? or the oscillation only of a column of air ? Yes, if when a friend speaks to us that which we hear is only the vibration of the larynx of his throat. But the truth is we hear much more than this. We hear harmonies or melodies that have perhaps never before been sounded, and yet have been shaped in the mind of the musician with perfect knowledge of all their parts and of the manner in which the hearing of them will affect us. We hear again the thunder which rolled through Westminster Abbey two hundred years ago when Purcell first waked its echoes with a fugue or anthem. We hear the singing of the birds and the sighing of the wind over the fields of Eisenach to which Bach listened. We hear what Beethoven never could have heard — that is, Beethoven’s music — since to him it must have

ART FOR ART’S SAKE.

remained to the last only a dream of heaven. We hear when our friend speaks more than his voice, we hear in it — or through it — love, or regret, or hesitation, or trust. The conception of the musician and the desire of the friend are self-existent and communicable without the intervention of catgut or windpipe. This — j

( — jfi-J

*

T®

-Or

! 1 - 1

i T^: i*

1— 1—

is sufficient to express the one, and this —

— is sufficient to express

the other.

Of course we know all this. It is indeed because we know it so well that I take it as the basis of what I have to say. Where there is movement of any kind there must be force. Whether the delicate sails of the light-mill are driven or attracted by the solar ray may be a matter for experimental philosophy^ but that they move at all is sufficient evidence that some force is acting upon them. Art is the movement, but Nature is the force. Art is the shaking of the column of air, but Nature is the melody. Art is the message, but Nature is the friend from whom it comes. And the different forms of Art we practise — poetry that is, or painting, or music, or architecture, or sculpture — are but so many different methods of saying the same thing, of telling the same story, or of raising the same passions in our hearts ; in a word, they are only so many channels of communication between ourselves and Nature.

And now see what this means. It means, first, that Nature and Art are always either allies or enemies ; that there is no common ground on which they can meet, each ignoring the presence of the other ; that, like the armies of a commonwealth, they may be divided by civil war — but if they meet, they meet as forces that must either fraternize or fight. Nor is this all ; for if it means this, it means also that of itself Art can do nothing: that apart from Nature Art is nothing. It means that “Art for Art’s sake” is about as vain a cry as “ war for war’s sake ” would be wicked. But it is not only a vain cry, it is a false cry. One who knows nothing of the Higher Life in Art may nevertheless follow Art as a trade, as a profession, or as an amusement, but no one ever yet gave his life to Art for Art’s sake. As surely as the soldier who is only a soldier is a butcher, so the artist who is only an artist is a failure as a man. “Art for Art’s sake ” is only a new synonym for dilettanteism ; but it is dilettanteism stripped of its higher meaning, robbed of everything that makes it respectable or that bears the least seeming of life. If it could give us a Florizel or a Perdita, a Leontes or a Hermione — the thing is