The most superficial acquaintance with Dürer's drawings will have
prepared us for the sight of his simple, unpretentious house and its
contents. In his "Birth of the Virgin" he gives us a picture of the
German home of his day, where there were few superfluous knick-knacks,
but everything which served for daily use was well and strongly made and
of good design. Ceilings, windows, doors and door-handles, chests,
locks, candlesticks, banisters, waterpots, the very cooking utensils,
all betray the fine taste and skilled labor, the personal interest of
the man who made them. So in Dürer's house, as it is preserved to-day,
we can still see and admire the careful simplicity of domestic
furniture, which distinguishes that in the "Birth of the Virgin." The
carved coffers, the solid tables, the spacious window-seats, the
well-fitting cabinets let into the walls, the carefully wrought
metal-work we see there are not luxurious; their merit is quite other
than that. In workmanship as in design, how utterly do they put to shame
the contents of the ordinary "luxuriously furnished apartments" of the
present day!

And what manner of man was he who lived in this house that nestles
beneath the ancient castle? In the first place a singularly loveable
man, a man of sweet and gentle spirit, whose life was one of high ideals
and noble endeavor. In the second place an artist who, both for his
achievements and for his influence on art, stands in the very front rank
of artists, and of German artists is "facile princeps." At whatever
point we may study Dürer and his works we are never conscious of
disappointment. As painter, as author, as engraver, or simple citizen,
the more we know of him the more we are morally and intellectually
satisfied. Fortunately, through his letters and writings, his journals
and autobiographical memoirs we know a good deal about his personal
history and education.