• THE ACADEMY DINNER.
IN such a universe as thisit is a great gain to lay. hold of some one thing that has permanence,—something that we can confidently count upon seeing reappear as the years come round, something to which to cling amid the whirl and con- fusion of continual change. In one particular world we find this blessing in the dinner of the Royal Academy. Were we to judge only by the pictures which hang upon the walls, we might sometimes be tempted to despair of English Art. Ex- hibition after exhibition is unfolded before our eyes, and we look in vain for evidence of new genius coming to the front or of established genius holding its own. The younger men grow more mannered ; the older men show more plainly that when a man once enters the Academy he becomes too con- tented with himself to care to do anything that he has not done before. If we let the ear rather than the eye guide us, we shall feel no uneasiness on this score. The language of Art may vary ; it may have been expressive yesterday and be common-place to-day. But,the language of compliment never varies. As each May comes round, speaker after speaker rises to congratulate the President on the splendid works which look down on the guests as they sit at dinner; and long habit has taught even the Hanging Committee to feign belief in the words they hear. It is. impossible that it should be otherwise. To dine sumptuously with the works of your hosts before, behind, and around you, and. then to rise and tell the plain truth about those works, would often be brutal. The breach of charity involved would more than outweigh any merit there might be in plainspokenness. We are rather inclined to hope that the considerations which influence the tongue may influence the eye also ; that the guests may not only say that what they see is good, but may see good in all that they look at In that case they will sometimes be wise in not repeating their visit.
At- each dinner there- is some one visitor to whom it is given to express with special felicity the thoughts of all who share with him in the hospitality of the Royal Academy. This time it fell to the lot of the Archbishop of Canterbury thus to sum up the general verdict. It is the eminent merit of Dr. Benson that he moves with the age, and this fact gives par- ticular value to his speech at Burlington Houle. The Arch:- bishop bf Canterbury does nit live in a fools' paradise. He knows that all around him great institutions are passing away and great revolutions impending. But he also knows where to turn for comfort. He thanked the Royal Academicians on Saturday, not only for what they are to England, bat for what to all time they will be to England. Change there may be in many things. ' The Constitution may be reconstructed, the Church may be Disestablished, property may be divided anew ; bat " the star of the 'Royal Academy will never set." Centuries hence it will fill the same exalted place in the thoughts and affections of Englishmen that- it does now.
Why is it that it will... do• this The Archbishop of Canter- bury seems to indicate two reasons for his conviction. The first is that the working-man is coming to love art morn ; and as the future belongs to the working-man, what he loves is likely to last. Greater opportunities for seeing great pictures are one •of the things which, according to the Archbishop of Canterbury, working-men most need. If to, it is .a little strange that they should have hitherto shown so little effective desire to have pictures brought within their reach at times when they are able to enjoy them. In the House of Lords the other day the Archbishop of Canterbury laid very great stress upon the fact that the proposal to open picture galleries on Sundays finds few supporters among working-men. So long as this remains- true, we shall take leave to doubt whether the Archbishop is not exaggerating the feeling which he describes. We have it on the authority of two holders of the office, that no Home Secretary would be responsible for the peace of London if the public-houses were shut on Sundays. We-do not expect working-men to turn rioters on the score that picture galleries are shut on Sundays ; but we do think that if the .working-men really cared about art they would not show themselves so indifferent to the prohibition which now stands in the way of their enjoying it. The second reason goes deeper into the roots of things. " We are made so,' " said the Archbishop, quoting from one of the guests of the evening, " that we love first what we see painted.' An
object which we may have passed perhaps hundreds of times .we may not have cared to see ; it is when the painter presents it to us that we first learn to love it." Art is the handmaid to Nature ; and, as other handmaids occasionally do, she succeeds in dressing her mistress out so well, that her dearest friends can hardly recognise her. We have hitherto doubted whether this process is always an improvement, but now that the Archbishop of Canterbury has set his imprimatur on the doctrine, we doubt no longer. If a layman had said it, we might have been tempted to adduce instances from the present Academy • tending to establish the precisely opposite conclusion,—that our love for natural objects some- times finds it hard to survive the presentation of them on the walls of a picture gallery. But against indulgence in theories of this profane kind the Archbishop has given us a
terrible warning. Angels, he says, " might fear to criti- cise " the Exhibition of the Royal Academy. That is a broad hint as to the- character of those who rush in when the very angels are kept back by a wise distrust of their own powers.
The President, by way of return for all the pretty things that the Archbishop had said, announced that next year there will be even more to admire at the Academy than there is now. The wall-space hitherto devoted to water-colours, drawings in black and white,, sculpture and architecture, will then be given up to oil paintings. By this means the Academy will be able to hang many a work of more than average merit which is now declined. In future exhibitions, therefore, we are to see much that has not hitherto been considered worthy to displace the poorest picture actually exhibited. Unfor- tunately, that is not a prospect which it is possible to regard with indifference.
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