Does it
affect me? Not at all. Why so? Because this is a subject requiring
earnestness; yet, after all, there is no earnestness of religious
feeling expressed. It is a _surface_ picture, exquisitely
painted - the feeling goes no deeper than the canvas. But how do I know
Murillo has no earnestness in the religious idea of this piece? How do
I know, when reading Pope's Messiah, that _he_ was not in
earnest - that he was only most exquisitely reproducing what others had
thought? Does he not assume, in the most graceful way, the language of
inspiration and holy rapture? But, through it all, we feel the
satisfied smirk of the artist, and the fine, sharp touch of his
diamond file. What is done from a genuine, strong, inward emotion,
whether in writing or painting, always mesmerizes the paper, or the
canvas, and gives it a power which every body must feel, though few
know why. The reason why the Bible has been omnipotent, in all ages,
has been because there were the emotions of GOD in it; and of
paintings nothing is more remarkable than that some preserve in them
such a degree of genuine vital force that one can never look on them
with indifference; while others, in which every condition of art seems
to be met, inspire no strong emotion.
Yet this picture is immensely popular. Hundreds stand enchanted before
it, and declare it imbodies their highest ideal of art and religion;
and I suppose it does.
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