brush-work, and the mule has been bred in and in with open brush-work,
and fresh strains have been sought in the execution at the angle of
forty-five; art has become infinitely hybrid and definitely sterile.

Must we then conclude that all education is an evil? Why exaggerate;
why outstrip the plain telling of the facts? For those who are
thinking of adopting art as a profession it is sufficient to know that
the one irreparable evil is a bad primary education. Be sure that
after five years of the Beaux Arts you cannot become a great painter.
Be sure that after five years of Kensington you can never become a
painter at all. "If not at Kensington nor at the Beaux Arts, where am
I to obtain the education I stand in need of?" cries the embarrassed
student. I do not propose to answer that question directly. How the
masters of Holland and Flanders obtained their marvellous education is
not known. We neither know how they learned nor how they painted. Did
the early masters paint first in monochrome, adding the colouring
matter afterwards? Much vain conjecturing has been expended in
attempting to solve this question. Did Ruysdale paint direct from
nature or from drawings? Unfortunately on this question history has no
single word to say. We know that Potter learned his trade in the
fields in lonely communication with nature. We know too that Crome was
a house-painter, and practised painting from nature when his daily
work was done. Nevertheless he attained as perfect a technique as any
painter that ever lived. Morland, too, was self-taught: he practised
painting in the fields and farmyards and the country inns where he
lived, oftentimes paying for board and lodging with a picture. Did his
art suffer from want of education? Is there any one who believes that
Morland would have done better work if he had spent three or four
years stippling drawings from the antique at South Kensington?