has hardly ever been equalled in religious expression. In fact it was one of those outpourings of the sanctified imagination of man which occur but once in the same form. The spirit may appear again, but, the outer world being different, the form of the beauty cannot be repeated. The attempt to reproduce such work is childish, We have seen its result in modern times.

It is recorded * of one of these great painters "that he never painted for money; that he might have gained wealth and honour, but, for the peace of his soul," he preferred to be a poor brother, and work for love. "He never began his work without prayer; and so entirely did his subject fill his soul, that he was frequently interrupted by tears when representing the sufferings of the Redeemer. He considered what he had painted as a gift from heaven, and never ventured to improve it." This painter was called the "Blessed Angelic Brother," Beato Fra Angelico da Fiesole.

The glorious subject of the revival of painting in Italy must scarcely be followed another step, for fear it should lead us too far. Suffice it only to say, that the Angelic painter last spoken of was not long afterwards succeeded by the great men with whose names every one is familiar: Leonardo da Vinci, the painter of the Last Supper; Michael Angelo, the painter of the Sistine Chapel; Raffaelle, perhaps best known to the ordinary reader by the Transfiguration, or by the Madonna and Infant Saviour. That any or all of these men may have been supassed in some particular by other artists, that they had their respective frailties of character, is only to say that they were men, and therefore imperfect. But in their greatness of thought, in their power of bursting through the trammels of fashion, of seizing the broad view of human nature, and of embodying the great facts of our redemption for all future ages, they mark a period in the history of the world; and, for good or for evil, according as we use what has been given to us through them, society will be influenced by them as long as the civilization of the world lasts.

The great fact of the revival of Art in the 13th century was simultaneous with the invention of printing and the discovery of gunpowder. Gunpowder,† by destroying the impregnable security of barons' castles, put an end to reckless plunder, and the consequent growth of towns enabled the people to devote themselves to commerce and the arts in comparative security. The effect of printing towards promoting a general spirit of inquiry needs no remark. The discovery of remains of ancient Greek

and Roman art had, no doubt, some effect in leading the artists to Nature and to graceful execution. But the main cause of their greatness is to be found in the intense intellectual energy of the age of which they were the types, an activity which produced the Reformation in England and Germany, and consolidated the Papal system in the south with renewed energy. Leonardo and Michael Angelo were architects, sculptors, and poets, as well as painters. Raffaelle was especially remarkable for the spirit in which he lived with those around him. It is related that the painters who worked with him lived in perfect harmony, as if all bad feeling were extinguished in his presence, and every base, unworthy thought had passed from their minds; he always had a great number of artists working for him, helping them with the kindness of a father. When he went to court he was followed from his door by perhaps fifty painters, all clever in their way, to whom it was a pleasure to do him honour.*

After these great men came a host of inferior imitators. The world was for a while torn by fierce religious struggles. The times were unfavourable to the efforts of great artists; but it is needless to trace the stages or the decline of the efforts to revive the form after the spirit was lost, and to teach elaborate details of execution, when the real principles of art were perverted.

It must not, however, be omitted that in conjunction with the revival of painting in Italy there arose a corresponding development of Architectural and Decorative Art known by the name of the Renaissance, or New Birth, which to some readers would be better indicated by the term Palladian. The writer cannot profess any very hearty sympathy with it, but it would be a foolish affectation to pass over slightingly a school of architecture of which St. Peter's at Rome is one great example, and St. Paul's in London, at a later period, another.

As a school of ornament the Renaissance is even more highly reputed than as an architectural school, owing to its perfectly free imitation of nature. Some samples of this work, or at least copies of it, may be seen in the South Kensington collection, and in Messrs. Elkington's case at the Barnstaple Exhibition.

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After the Renaissance (we quote Mr. Wornum's words), came the final decline, mere love of display, gold, and glitter;" then followed a still worse style made up of incoherent details without meaning, called the Rococo, which may be recognized in certain very inconvenient wardrobes and clumsy fireplaces in our old manor-houses, the intense ugliness of which passes description: they remain a hideous record of the taste of the Squire Westerns of the last century.

These monstrosities produced a reaction to the opposite extreme of an affected Grecian purity, from the coldness of which we are now recovering to the free use of colour in ornament.

Of the history of the rise and growth of the modern English school of painting it is impossible here to speak in detail. Suffice it to say, that perhaps the greatest name of the English school, Sir Joshua Reynolds, belongs to Devonshire, as does that of Sir C. Eastlake, the present President of the Royal Academy. It is remarkable also that among professed painters few have equalled, none have surpassed, these two distinguished artists in their contributions to the literature of their art. We shall speak presently of landscape and of that peculiarly English art, watercolour. Its greatest name is Turner; some of whose most remarkable works owe their suggestion to Devonshire scenery.

Before we pass to our own times, let us note some of the lessons to be learnt from this scanty outline of the history of Art. 1. That Art is intimately connected with peace, with national life and energy, with manly literature, and free institutions.

2. That Art, to be great, must be honest; it must rest on Truth and Nature.

3. That nothing great in Art will come of mere imitation of the style of former artists.

4. That mere fashion, or the display of wealth as a motive for the possession of works of art, does not lead to a genuine love of what is beautiful and true. And the artist who panders to such a motive, though he may make his fortune, will be a lost man.

THE CONNEXION OF ART WITH AGRICULTURAL IMPROVEMENT.

And now we must turn from these lofty subjects to the homely topics of our own immediate work in the West of England, in order to show the connexion between that work and the Arts.

For some years past, a number of persons in various occupations and situations in life have taken a warm interest in the improvement of the art of Agriculture.

They have been led to pay great attention to appliances of Mechanics, and some attention to the laws of Vegetable and Animal Life, and to the principles of Chemistry.

These practical subjects have induced a strong sense of the value of general education. We now embark in the improvement of the Arts; or, at any rate, in the improvement of our own power of appreciating the Arts.

What are our qualifications for such a task, and what are our opportunities?

Is it not true that, in the course of our endeavours to understand our own practical art of food-supplying, we have been led imperceptibly to discover-faintly, it may be, but truly-the beauty, the harmony, the proportion of God's laws in nature?

And do we not also frequently speak of beauty in mechanical contrivances, and in animal forms, in a way which shows that there is something worth caring about beyond the mere question, "Will it pay?"-important as that question is?

The first step in Art, as we have seen, is to produce what is useful; the next is to produce a tool or implement which will do useful work effectually.

But the work, though done, and done well, may be done at too great a cost of human labour, or of money and time. A further step in Art is to bring mind to bear on matter: to accomplish by skill and by science what we used to do only by force. Thus far we deal only with the useful and mechanical arts, such as have already found encouragement in our annual exhibitions.

THE PURPOSES OF DECORATION.

The embellishment of what is useful follows next, but this requires leisure.* A remarkable instance of the connexion between leisure and art may be noticed in the Swiss cottage, where the forced repose of the winter, burying the land for months in snow, leads a hardy and hard-working people to spend much time in the decoration of wood-work by the knife or chisel.

But Decoration implies love and sympathy. In surrounding our English homes with the flower-garden and the shrubbery, in decorating our living-rooms and social tables, we stamp our love on familiar scenes. If this be done in a right and unselfish spirit, we open a door to sympathy by providing for the pleasure of others.

There is thus introduced, at once, a touch of something beyond a mere regard to profit; there is an appeal to the sense of beauty. To be really successful, such Decorations must not minister to self-exaltation or personal vanity. When this taint comes over the mind, farewell to all good taste, whether it be in dress, in furniture, in gardening, or in any other form of Decorative Art.

It has been said that the essence of the Fine Arts begins when the useful ends. This also is true. Beauty and ornament cannot be had for nothing; and yet a tender spirit and a true heart will find time, if not money, to make the little sacrifices which are necessary to lend a charm to life, and to add to the happiness of those who are loved. How many a cottager's wife is a proof of this! The LAMP OF SACRIFICE" may be kindled from the poor man's fireside.

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It would be a great mistake to suppose that the Fine Arts do not tend to practical utility in a very real and important sense. Their noblest use is, doubtless, to "purify enjoyment," and to cull from Nature noble suggestions as types of a higher state of things.

But, in a lower sense also, the Fine Arts prove their utility. In proportion as they are cultivated by a nation in a right spirit, the taste developed by the higher artist gradually influences various kinds of manufactures; and, in certain states of the world, taste is so intimately connected with manufacturing prosperity, that a nation which neglects the cultivation of taste runs a serious risk of being beaten in the race of competition.*

THE CONNECTION BETWEEN THE USEFUL AND THE FINE ARTS.

We thus arrive at the close relation subsisting between the Fine Arts and the Decorative and Useful Arts.

The Useful in the present state of society cannot be separated from the Decorative; and the Decorative derive their guiding principles from a prevailing taste in the Fine Arts.

In the first place, the workman who has not in some degree the feeling of an artist will not be a good decorator. But, in the second place, what is still more important, wealthy employers, if they are insensible to the higher notes and harmonies of the Fine Arts, will be so entirely devoted to their own personal comfort on the one hand, or to a love of vulgar display on the other, that the artist workman will find no encouragement.

THE NATURE OF THE WEST OF ENGLAND EXHIBITION.

The Exhibition at Barnstaple contains a collection of Decorative Art in the form of pottery, china, glass, metal-work, and woodwork; but it would be incomplete if it did not also contain an exhibition of the Fine Arts.

It has been thought well, however, to begin on a small scale, and to give a decided preference to one branch of Art which is peculiarly English, and which has been cultivated with remarkable success in the West of England, namely, Water-colour Drawing.

For this selection there are several reasons. The mechanical arrangements are more easily made; frames can be to a great extent dispensed with, whereby much expense is saved to the artist and to the Society, and much risk of damage and annoyance avoided. Water-colour art, even of moderate excellence, is