American painters.

Although men who have not had "advantages" in life are naturally prone
to regret their deprivation, they frequently owe their success to this
seeming bar against opportunity. We have often seen illustrated in our
art the fact that favorable circumstances do not necessarily insure
success, and now from the life of Fuller we gain the still more
important truth, that power is never so well aroused as in the face of
obstacles. Few men endured more for art than he; none have waited more
uncomplainingly for a recognition that was sure to come by-and-by, or
received with greater serenity the approbation which the dull world came
at last to bestow. His history is most wholesome in its record of
steadfast resting upon conviction, and teaches quite as strongly as his
pictures do, the value of absorption in a lofty idea.

If the saying that those nations are the happiest that have no history
is true of men, Mr. Fuller's life must be regarded as exceptionally
fortunate. Considered by itself, it was quiet and uneventful, and had
little to excite general interest; but when viewed in its relation to
the practice of his art, it is found to be full of eloquent suggestions
to all who, like him, have been appointed to win success through
suffering. The narrative of his experience comprises two great
periods--the preparation, which covered thirty-four years, and the
achievement, to the enjoyment of which less than eight years were
permitted. The first period is subdivided into two, of which one
embraces eighteen years, from the time when, at the age of twenty, he
entered upon the study of his art, to his retirement from the world to
the exile of his Deerfield farm; the other including sixteen years of
seclusion, until, at the age of fifty-four, he came forth again to
proclaim a new revelation. The first part of his career may be dismissed