Mr. Gladstone and the Archbishop of Canterbury both spoke,
and were rather curiously in conflict with each other. Mr. Glad- stone, in answering for "Literature," remarked that Art teaches that no disproportionate development of the different faculties can secure real progress, and he illustrated by saying that a sudden growth of wealth and luxury leads to deformity in Art, not progress. Dr. Tait, however, declared that with "fewer colos- sal fortunes " there would be no prizes for the genius which sustains itself " amid many difficulties for ever fresh exertions in the service of art." That might be so, if the prizes furnished by the " colossal fortunes " went to the right persons. But do they ? We suspect the prizes furnished by the "colossal fortunes" too frequently go to the painters of " Derby-Day " pictures, or of transcripts of the vacant smiles and insipid attractions of vulgar men and women. Mr. Gladstone, we suspect, was much nearer the mark than Dr. Tait.
Previous page
