10 SEPTEMBER 1927, Page 19

Mr. Finberg is certainly to be congratulated on his abridg-

ment of Ruskin's Modern Painters (Bell. 105.). Ruskin's prose, as he says, is so fearless and uncompromising, so clear, eloquent and delightful that even his errors are illuminated. But the bulk of Modern Painters is certainly against it in this flippant age ; besides, Ruskin himself said that if he had thought only of his future fame he would have written one volume, not five. Here then we may find a thoughtfully winnowed Ruskin, giving us the stately march of his argument, his high vision of beauty, better than any superficial reading of his five books could do.

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