An edition of Tennyson, lately published, contains wood-cuts from
drawings by Rossetti and other chief Pre-Raphaelite masters. They are
terribly spoiled in the cutting, and generally the best part, the
expression of feature, _entirely_ lost;[78] still they are full of
instruction, and cannot be studied too closely. But observe, respecting
these wood-cuts, that if you have been in the habit of looking at much
spurious work, in which sentiment, action, and style are borrowed or
artificial, you will assuredly be offended at first by all genuine work,
which is intense in feeling. Genuine art, which is merely art, such as
Veronese's or Titian's, may not offend you, though the chances are that
you will not care about it; but genuine works of feeling, such as "Maud"
or "Aurora Leigh" in poetry, or the grand Pre-Raphaelite designs in
painting, are sure to offend you: and if you cease to work hard, and
persist in looking at vicious and false art, they will continue to
offend you. It will be well, therefore, to have one type of entirely
false art, in order to know what to guard against. Flaxman's outlines to
Dante contain, I think, examples of almost every kind of falsehood and
feebleness which it is possible for a trained artist, not base in
thought, to commit or admit, both in design and execution. Base or
degraded choice of subject, such as you will constantly find in Teniers
and others of the Dutch painters, I need not, I hope, warn you against;
you will simply turn away from it in disgust; while mere bad or feeble
drawing, which makes mistakes in every direction at once, cannot teach
you the particular sort of educated fallacy in question. But, in these
designs of Flaxman's, you have gentlemanly feeling, and fair knowledge
of anatomy, and firm setting down of lines, all applied in the
foolishest and worst possible way; you cannot have a more finished
example of learned error, amiable want of meaning, and bad drawing with
a steady hand.[79] Retzsch's outlines have more real material in them
than Flaxman's, occasionally showing true fancy and power; in artistic
principle they are nearly as bad, and in taste, worse. All outlines from
statuary, as given in works on classical art, will be very hurtful to
you if you in the least like them; and _nearly_ all finished line
engravings. Some particular prints I could name which possess
instructive qualities, but it would take too long to distinguish them,
and the best way is to avoid line engravings of figures altogether.[80]
If you happen to be a rich person, possessing quantities of them, and if
you are fond of the large finished prints from Raphael, Correggio, etc.,
it is wholly impossible that you can make any progress in knowledge of
real art till you have sold them all,--or burnt them, which would be a
greater benefit to the world. I hope that, some day, true and noble
engravings will be made from the few pictures of the great schools,
which the restorations undertaken by the modern managers of foreign
galleries may leave us; but the existing engravings have nothing
whatever in common with the good in the works they profess to represent,
and, if you like them, you like in the originals of them hardly anything
but their errors.
258. Finally, your judgment will be, of course, much affected by your
taste in literature. Indeed, I know many persons who have the purest
taste in literature, and yet false taste in art, and it is a phenomenon
which puzzles me not a little; but I have never known any one with false
taste in books, and true taste in pictures. It is also of the greatest
importance to you, not only for art's sake, but for all kinds of sake,
in these days of book deluge, to keep out of the salt swamps of
literature, and live on a little rocky island of your own, with a spring
and a lake in it, pure and good. I cannot, of course, suggest the choice
of your library to you: every several mind needs different books; but
there are some books which we all need, and assuredly, if you read
Homer,[81] Plato, Æschylus, Herodotus, Dante,[82] Shakspeare, and
Spenser, as much as you ought, you will not require wide enlargement of
shelves to right and left of them for purposes of perpetual study. Among
modern books avoid generally magazine and review literature. Sometimes
it may contain a useful abridgment or a wholesome piece of criticism;
but the chances are ten to one it will either waste your time or mislead
you. If you want to understand any subject whatever, read the best book
upon it you can hear of: not a review of the book. If you don't like the
first book you try, seek for another; but do not hope ever to understand
the subject without pains, by a reviewer's help. Avoid especially that
class of literature which has a knowing tone; it is the most poisonous
of all. Every good book, or piece of book, is full of admiration and
awe; it may contain firm assertion or stern satire, but it never sneers
coldly, nor asserts haughtily, and it always leads you to reverence or
love something with your whole heart. It is not always easy to
distinguish the satire of the venomous race of books from the satire of
the noble and pure ones; but in general you may notice that the
cold-blooded, Crustacean and Batrachian books will sneer at sentiment;
and the warm-blooded, human books, at sin. Then, in general, the more
you can restrain your serious reading to reflective or lyric poetry,
history, and natural history, avoiding fiction and the drama, the
healthier your mind will become. Of modern poetry, keep to Scott,
Wordsworth, Keats, Crabbe, Tennyson, the two Brownings, Thomas Hood,
Lowell, Longfellow, and Coventry Patmore, whose "Angel in the House" is
a most finished piece of writing, and the sweetest analysis we possess
of quiet modern domestic feeling; while Mrs. Browning's "Aurora Leigh"
is, as far as I know, the greatest poem which the century has produced
in any language. Cast Coleridge at once aside, as sickly and useless;
and Shelley, as shallow and verbose; Byron, until your taste is fully
formed, and you are able to discern the magnificence in him from the
wrong. Never read bad or common poetry, nor write any poetry yourself;
there is, perhaps, rather too much than too little in the world already.
259. Of reflective prose, read chiefly Bacon, Johnson, and Helps.
Carlyle is hardly to be named as a writer for "beginners," because his
teaching, though to some of us vitally necessary, may to others be
hurtful. If you understand and like him, read him; if he offends you,
you are not yet ready for him, and perhaps may never be so; at all
events, give him up, as you would sea-bathing if you found it hurt you,
till you are stronger. Of fiction, read "Sir Charles Grandison," Scott's
novels, Miss Edgeworth's, and, if you are a young lady, Madame de
Genlis', the French Miss Edgeworth; making these, I mean, your constant
companions. Of course you must, or will, read other books for amusement
once or twice; but you will find that these have an element of
perpetuity in them, existing in nothing else of their kind; while their
peculiar quietness and repose of manner will also be of the greatest
value in teaching you to feel the same characters in art. Read little at
a time, trying to feel interest in little things, and reading not so
much for the sake of the story as to get acquainted with the pleasant
people into whose company these writers bring you. A common book will
often give you much amusement, but it is only a noble book which will
give you dear friends. Remember, also, that it is of less importance to
you in your earlier years, that the books you read should be clever than
that they should be right. I do not mean oppressively or repulsively
instructive; but that the thoughts they express should be just, and the
feelings they excite generous. It is not necessary for you to read the
wittiest or the most suggestive books: it is better, in general, to hear
what is already known, and may be simply said. Much of the literature of
the present day, though good to be read by persons of ripe age, has a
tendency to agitate rather than confirm, and leaves its readers too
frequently in a helpless or hopeless indignation, the worst possible
state into which the mind of youth can be thrown. It may, indeed, become
necessary for you, as you advance in life, to set your hand to things
that need to be altered in the world, or apply your heart chiefly to
what must be pitied in it, or condemned; but, for a young person, the
safest temper is one of reverence, and the safest place one of
obscurity. Certainly at present, and perhaps through all your life, your
teachers are wisest when they make you content in quiet virtue, and that
literature and art are best for you which point out, in common life, and
in familiar things, the objects for hopeful labor, and for humble love.