00000179 |
Previous | 179 of 445 | Next |
|
small (250x250 max)
medium (500x500 max)
Large
Extra Large
large ( > 500x500)
Full Resolution
All (PDF)
|
V. BYZANTINE PALACES. 149
§ xxxvi. And we have never yet looked with enough reverence upon the separate gift which was thus bestowed upon
her; We have never enough considered what an inheritance
she has left us, in the works of those mighty painters who
were the chief of her children. That inheritance is indeed
less than it ought to have been, and other than it ought to
have been ; for before Titian and Tintoret arose,—the men in
whom her work and her glory should have been together consummated,—she had already ceased to lead her sons in the way
of truth and life, and they erred much, and fell short of that
which was appointed for them. There is no subject of thought
more melancholy, more wonderful, than the way in which God
permits so often His best gifts to be trodden under foot of
men, His richest treasures to be wasted by the moth, and the
mightiest influences of His Spirit, given but once in the world's
history, to be quenched and shortened by miseries of chance
and guilt. I do not wonder at what men Suffer, but I wonder
often at what they Lose. We may see how good rises out of
pain and evil; but the dead, naked, eyeless loss, what good
comes of that ? The fruit struck to the earth before its ripeness ; the glowing life and goodly purpose dissolved away in
sudden death; the words, half spoken, choked upon the lips
with clay for ever ; or, stranger than all, the whole majesty of
humanity raised to its fulness, and every gift and power necessary for a given purpose, at a given moment, centred in one
man, and all this perfected blessing permitted to be refused,
perverted, crushed, cast aside by those who need it most,—
the city which is Not set on a hill, the candle that giveth light
to None that are in the house :—these are the heaviest mysteries
of this strange world, and, it seems to me, those which mark
its curse the most. And it is true that the power with which
this Venice had been entrusted, was perverted, when at its
highest, in a thousand miserable ways; still, it was possessed
by her alone; to her all hearts have turned which could be
moved by its manifestation, and none without being made
stronger and nobler by what her hand had wrought. That
mighty Landscape, of dark mountains that guard the horizon
| Title | The stones of Venice - 2 |
| Creator | Ruskin, John |
| Publisher | J. Wiley |
| Place of Publication | New York |
| Date | 1889 |
| Language | eng |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Title | 00000179 |
| Type | Books/Pamphlets |
| Transcript | V. BYZANTINE PALACES. 149 § xxxvi. And we have never yet looked with enough reverence upon the separate gift which was thus bestowed upon her; We have never enough considered what an inheritance she has left us, in the works of those mighty painters who were the chief of her children. That inheritance is indeed less than it ought to have been, and other than it ought to have been ; for before Titian and Tintoret arose,—the men in whom her work and her glory should have been together consummated,—she had already ceased to lead her sons in the way of truth and life, and they erred much, and fell short of that which was appointed for them. There is no subject of thought more melancholy, more wonderful, than the way in which God permits so often His best gifts to be trodden under foot of men, His richest treasures to be wasted by the moth, and the mightiest influences of His Spirit, given but once in the world's history, to be quenched and shortened by miseries of chance and guilt. I do not wonder at what men Suffer, but I wonder often at what they Lose. We may see how good rises out of pain and evil; but the dead, naked, eyeless loss, what good comes of that ? The fruit struck to the earth before its ripeness ; the glowing life and goodly purpose dissolved away in sudden death; the words, half spoken, choked upon the lips with clay for ever ; or, stranger than all, the whole majesty of humanity raised to its fulness, and every gift and power necessary for a given purpose, at a given moment, centred in one man, and all this perfected blessing permitted to be refused, perverted, crushed, cast aside by those who need it most,— the city which is Not set on a hill, the candle that giveth light to None that are in the house :—these are the heaviest mysteries of this strange world, and, it seems to me, those which mark its curse the most. And it is true that the power with which this Venice had been entrusted, was perverted, when at its highest, in a thousand miserable ways; still, it was possessed by her alone; to her all hearts have turned which could be moved by its manifestation, and none without being made stronger and nobler by what her hand had wrought. That mighty Landscape, of dark mountains that guard the horizon |
|
|
|
|
|
|
| B |
|
| C |
|
| G |
|
| H |
|
| M |
|
| T |
|
| U |
|
| Y |
|
|
|
