[Illustration: Cat and Dog Sending Letters.]
[Page 95--Drawing Land]
[Illustration: Our Lady Artist.]
[Illustration: Our Gentleman Artist.]
[Illustration: The Sunday Fisherman--A story with Symbols.]
[Illustration: Drawing Pussy's Likeness.]
[Illustration: Working for a Prize.]
[Page 96--Drawing Land]
Just cast your beautiful, your sparkling,
your penetrating, your discriminating
[Illustration: Eyes.]
Over this page, and read, mark, learn,
and inwardly digest its Contents.
[Illustration: A Room Hung With Pictures Is A Room Hung With
Thoughts.]
THE two greatest educating powers in the ancient world were Pictures
and Poetry--the two greatest educating powers are pictures and
poetry still, and pictures and poetry blended in an interesting
manner is the intended educating feature of this
PLEASANT-LEARNING-LAND, but my object in this place is to speak of
pictures only, as perhaps the greatest of all educating powers, and
to demonstrate that they are not sufficiently used for educational
purposes. Firstly: pictures are in a universal language--when they
are true to nature every person on the earth can understand them.
Show a picture of a person or a bird, a horse or a house, a ship, a
tree, or a landscape, and everyone knows what is meant, and this is
why most of the peoples of the ancient world conveyed their ideas in
picture language. FLETCHER, in his _Cyclopedia of Education_, says:--
"It has long been accepted as an axiom that the best explanation of a
thing is the sight and study of the thing itself, and the next best a
true picture of the thing." DRYDEN, speaking of poetry and painting
says:--
"The poets are confined to narrow space,
To speak the language of their native place;
The painter widely stretches his command,
_His pencil speaks the tongue of every land_."
Many writers, ancient and modern, have taught the great educational
power of pictures. HORACE says:--A picture is a poem without words".
SYDNEY SMITH says:--"Every good picture is the best of sermons and
lectures." O. S. FOWLER says:--"A single picture often conveys more
than volumes." W. M. HUNT says:--"From any picture we can learn
something." HENRY WARD BEECHER says:--"A picture that teaches any
affection or moral sentiment will speak in the language which men
understand, without any other education than that of being born and
of living." GARRICK, speaking of Hogarth, says:--
"His pictured morals mend the mind,
And through the eye improve the heart."
But pictures are not only a means of education, for they bring
pleasure, comfort, and education combined. STEELE says:--"Beautiful
pictures are the entertainment of pure minds." G. P. PUTMAN says:--
"How many an eye and heart have been fascinated by an enchanting
picture." CICERO says:--"The eyes are charmed by pictures, and the
ears by music." JOHN GILBERT says:--"Pictures are consolers of
loneliness; they are a sweet flattery to the soul, they are a relief
to the jaded mind; they are windows to the imprisoned thought; they
are books, they are histories and sermons, which we can read without
the trouble of turning over the leaves." UGO FOSCOLIO says:--
"Pictures are the chickweed to the gilded cage, and make up for the
want of many other enjoyments to those whose life is mostly passed
amid the smoke and din, the bustle and noise of an overcrowded city."
PANDOLFINI says:--Many an eye has been surprised into moisture by
pictured woe and heroism; and we are mistaken if the glow of pleasure
has not lighted in some hearts the flame of high resolve, or warmed
into life the seeds of honorable ambition."
Many pictures, particularly portraits, by bringing up reminiscences,
are a great source of consolation. In millions of houses the
most-loved and treasured possession is the photographic album
containing the likenesses of dear absent or departed friends. SHEE,
writing of the soothing influences of the portrait, says:--
"Mirror divine! which gives the soul to view,
Reflects the image, and retains it too!
Recalls to friendship's eye the fading face,
Revives each look, and rivals every grace:
In thee the banished lover finds relief,
His bliss in absence, and his balm in grief:
Affection, grateful, owns thy sacred power,
The father feels thee in affliction's hour;
When catching life ere some lov'd cherub flies.
To take its angel station in the skies,
The portrait soothes the loss it can't repair,
And sheds a comfort, even in despair."
Or--
"The widow'd husband sees his sainted wife
In pictures warm, and smiling as in life,--
And--
While he gazes with convulsive thrill,
And weeps, and wonders at the semblance still,
_He breathes a blessing on the pencil's aid,_
_That half restores the substance in the shade_."
But it is more particularly with pictures as a direct means of
education that I have to speak. MR. STEAD holds that in the coming
education of the world the magic lantern will play a very great part,
for through its aid you can portray any object you wish--pictures of
scenery, of buildings, of distant countries, of the microscopic
world, and in fact any kind of pictures you choose, in a most
beautiful, life-like, interesting, and educational manner. I think
and earnestly hope that MR. STEAD'S prediction will be fulfilled.
There are two other ways which I think that pictures should be used
for educational purposes. Firstly, in books, as in this one, and
secondly, on the walls of buildings--outside and inside if you like
--but I will speak only of the inside in this paper. Why should not
every room of every house be covered with pictures where it is not
covered with furniture? In millions of rooms there is a great waste
of opportunity. Many times I have thought why do they not have
varying patterns of different scenery, etc, in the different rooms of
the houses instead of the wall paper, with its uninteresting pattern
perpetually repeated. There is no reason why a house of twelve rooms
should not represent on its walls twelve different countries, or
twelve histories of striking events, etc. Possibly this may take
place later on. With respect to hanging pictures everywhere on the
walls, it may be objected that it would be too expensive--so it
would if they were costly pictures--but really good pictures are
produced by the million now so cheaply, that the objection of expense
vanishes. The walls can be covered now almost as cheaply with
intellectual pictures as with unintellectual wall paper. SIR JOSHUA
REYNOLDS says:--"A room hung with pictures, is a room hung with
thoughts." JOHN GILBERT says:--"A room with pictures in it, and a
room without pictures, differ by nearly as much as a room with
windows and a room without windows; for pictures are loopholes of
escape to the soul, leading it to other scenes and to other spheres,
as it were, through the frame of an exquisite picture, where the
fancy for a moment may revel, refreshed and delighted."
I was convinced many years ago of the almost criminal waste of wall
space, and issued the following doggerel lines, partly from trade and
partly from sentimental motives:--
Every cottage,
Two-roomed cottage,
Should contain full
Twenty PICTURES.
Every cottage,
Four-roomed cottage,
Should contain full
Forty PICTURES.
Every cottage,
Six-roomed cottage,
Should contain full
Sixty PICTURES.
Every villa,
Eight-roomed villa,
Should contain full
Eighty PICTURES.
Every mansion,
Ten-roomed mansion,
Should contain a
Hundred PICTURES.
Every large school
For instruction
Should contain a
THOUSAND PICTURES.
Walls are made to
Keep out weather
And also to
Display PICTURES.
Count your PICTURES
All your walls on.
See if you have
Quite the number,
You will want more
You will wish more,
You will get more
Shouldn't wonder.
PICTURES they are
Made to please you--
First to please you
When you buy them;
Next to please your
Own dear children,
Pictures please and
Teach them too.
Next to please your
Friends and neighbours
When they kindly
Call on you.
They'll admire them,
Then they'll praise them.
Then that pleases
You again.
PICTURES please and
Teach for ever,
All the Children,
Women, Men.
Even in the poorest houses pictures must always be a blessing. Many a
poor man's cheerless home would be made much more comfortable and
endurable if a few shilling's worth of good pictures were posted or
hung round its bare walls. If houses were universally decorated with
true speaking pictures what an immense influence for good it would
bring them. What intellectual and refined tastes it would create and
nurture. One most important thing in selecting pictures to cover the
walls it to always choose good subjects. A poor picture takes up as
much room as a good one, and generally costs as much. Always choose
live speaking pictures that will interest and instruct. There is an
immense multitude of poor, tame, an uninteresting pictures produced
in the world, and which in millions of instances keep out the good
ones. If these poor ones could be kept back or destroyed, and the
best ones only take their place, the world would be better for it.
In choosing materials to build up a bright, happy home, always select
the best--the best books--the best music--the best pictures. In
conclusion, there is one more suggestion I would make on the picture
question, and I think it is the most important of all; it is that a
good clear map of the world should be hung in every house in the
world, to give every person an idea of the world they live in. For it
is a most deplorable fact that ninety-nine out of every hundred of
the inhabitants, even of the civilized world, have a very poor
conception of the geography and ethnology of the world. And this
should not be, for every person ought to have a clear idea of their
world-fatherland, and of their fellow creatures, and a knowledge of
the map of the world is the first lesson to be learned in that most
desirable direction.
E W COLE, Book Arcade, Melbourne.
[Illustration: A Single Picture Often Conveys More Than Volumes.]
[Page 97--Drawing Land]
[Illustration: Drawing Doggy's Likeness.]