letter the further he gets from the spirit; once get into that curious, prying, microscopic spirit, which, instead of holding converse with the elements, sets itself to picking out, counting, catechising every little object;-once demand statistics instead of poetry, and science instead of art-and the conclusion is of course inevitable. But is Art indeed to come to this?

CHAP. VI.

THE TURNER CONTROVERSY CONTINUED.

TRUTH OF CLOUDS.

TRUTH OF EARTH.-TRUTH OF VEGETATION.-TURNER THE
PHET."

"PRO"

ONE of the "truths" on which Mr. Ruskin lays special stress is entitled "truth of clouds." It occupies no less than sixty-three closely printed imperial octavo pages, of which twenty-six are elaborately given to "the rain cloud region."

Without losing ourselves in particulars which involve terrible charges, let us look at the following words:

"The specific character of clouds, a species of truth which is especially neglected by artists, first, because, as it is within the limits of possibility that a cloud may assume almost any form, it is difficult to point out, and not always easy to feel, wherein error consists; and, secondly, because it is totally impossible to study the form of clouds from nature with care and accuracy, as a change in the subject takes place between every touch of the following pencil." (Modern Painters, pt. ii. sec. iii. chap. ii. § 1.)

Who will felicitate even the love of truth that can act a judicial part under such conditions? Or envy the responsibility connected with the following congenial passages on "truth of earth?

"That such abandonment (of truth) is constant and total in the works of the old masters has escaped detection only because not one in a hundred of persons generally cognisant of Art have spent time enough in hill countries to perceive the certainty of the laws of hill anatomy, and because not one in a hundred even of those who possess such opportunities, ever think of the common earth beneath their feet as anything possessing specific form, or governed by stedfast principles." (Ibid. pt. ii. sec. iv. chap. i. § 2.)

I must beg attention to a further passage, and ask whether poetry is to be revolutionised as well as painting.

"Mountains are to the rest of the body of the earth what violent muscular action is to the body of man; the plains and the lower hills are the repose and the effortless motion of the frame. This then is the first grand principle of the truths of the earth. The spirit of the hills is action, that of the lowlands repose." (Ibid. § 3.)

I will not ask questions of the context; yet, since we are upon a judicial process, we adventure a moment's colloquy with the above. As to the geological fact, there can be again, of course, no doubt: and when we have become ourselves geologised, with all native perceptions stratified down into layers of rationale, we may learn to take it as a "first grand principle " that "the spirit of the hills is motion." Till then, what can we say, but that such a principle falsifies common speech, and flings a blot on the abiding page where we have read so long, "Thy truth is like the great mountains ?”

We may have occasion to speak elsewhere of what I venture to call microscopisms: it is impossible to withhold the following illustration as we go on:

Neither the stems nor the boughs of trees taper, except when they fork; . . . yet there is frequently a slight and delicate appearance of tapering in the trunk, and much more extensively in the branches; and in the upper portions of the tree the ramifications take place so constantly and delicately that the effect upon the eye is precisely the same as if the boughs actually tapered . . . Nature takes great care and pains to conceal the parallelism."” (Ibid. pt. ii. sec. vi. chap. i. §§ 2, 3, 4.)

Here, again, I will not dispute the fact: I only ask, How are painters to proceed, if "the effect upon the eye is precisely the same?" Which law are they to follow-that of sight, or that of science? Is it not, at all events, a bailable offence if they have not so far outstepped "the modesty of Nature," as to betray what she "takes great care and pains to conceal?" And this brings us directly to one great cardinal point at issue. Speaking of "truth" Mr. Ruskin says,

"The mind, on receiving one of the forms, dwells upon its own conception of the fact, or form, or feeling stated, considering it as real and existing, being all the while totally regardless of the signs or symbols by which the notion of it has been conveyed; but the mind, on receiving the idea of imitation, is wholly occupied in finding out that what has been suggested to it is not what it appears to be." (Ibid. pt. i. sec. i. chap. v. §.6.)

Now, not to repeat our uncomfortable sense of

66

SYMBOLISM-TURNER THE PROPHET." 47

this constant reiteration of the accusatory phrase“ideas of imitation," and not to ask for further note of the very singular spectators above referred to, let us confine ourselves to the great fact here admitted,

a fact very simple, and at the root of the whole question; I mean that, in exact proportion as Art avails herself of symbols, in the same proportion is she dependent on the spectator's knowledge of the thing symbolised. I am not overstating the fact: here is another passage passage that puts the matter in bold relief:

"There is, indeed, nothing in Turner not one dot nor line whose meaning can be understood without knowledge, because he never aims at sensual impressions, but at the deep final truth, which only meditation can discover, and only experience can recognise. . . . In every new insight which we obtain into the works of God, we shall find ourselves possessed of an interpretation and a guide to something in Turner's works. (Ibid. pt. ii. sec. vi. chap. ii. § 5.)

I will not quote expressions, some of them happily withdrawn from the later editions, describing Turner's qualifications for his prophetic mission. The claim is sufficiently asserted in the following admissions:

"There is in them (his syllables) the obscurity, but the truth of prophecy, the instructive and burning language which would express less if it uttered more." (Ibid. § 7.)

These are serious words: let us try to make out their meaning. Now, I need scarce say that the word "prophecy" is used in different senses. The prophet either foretold the future, or gave instruction