Albert Dürer. T. Sturge Moore
life in debt and necessitous straits, and kept him all his life long a vagrant, constantly upon the road--the man in whom none of these things could weaken a marvellous assiduity to learn and help others to learn. He it was who had most kinship with Dürer among the artists then alive; for Dürer is very eminent among them for this temper of docility. It is interesting to see how he once turned to Erasmus in a devout meditation, written in the journal he kept during his journey to the Netherlands. His voice comes to us from an atmosphere charged with the electric influence of the greatest Reformer, Martin Luther, who had just disappeared, no man knew why or whither; though all men suspected foul play. In his daily life, by sweetness of manner, by gentle dignity and modesty, Dürer showed his religion, the admiration and love that bound his life, in a way that at all times and in all places commands applause. The burning indignation of the following passage may in times of spiritual peace or somnolence appear over-wrought and uncouth. We must remember that all that Dürer loved had been bound by his religion to the teaching and inspiration of Jesus, and had become inseparable from it. All that he loved--learning, clear and orderly thought, honesty, freedom to express the worship of his heart without its being turned to a mockery by cynical monk, priest, or prelate;--these things directly, and indirectly art itself, seemed to him threatened by the corruption of the Papal power. We must remember this; for we shall naturally feel, as Erasmus did, that the path of martyrdom was really a short cut, which a wider view of the surrounding country would have shown him to be likely to prove the longest way in the end. Indeed the world is not altogether yet arrived where he thought Erasmus could bring it in less than two years. And Luther himself returned to the scene and was active, without any such result, a dozen years and more.
Oh all ye pious Christian men, help me deeply to bewail this man, inspired of God, and to pray Him yet again to send us an enlightened man. Oh Erasmus of Rotterdam, where wilt thou stop? Behold how the wicked tyranny of worldly power, the might of darkness, prevails. Hear, thou knight of Christ! Ride on by the side of the Lord Jesus. Guard the truth. Attain the martyr's crown. Already indeed art thou a little old man, and myself have heard thee say that thou givest thyself but two years more wherein thou mayest still be fit to accomplish somewhat. Lay out the same well for the good of the Gospel, and of the true Christian faith, and make thyself heard. So, as Christ says, shall the Gates of Hell in no wise prevail against thee. And if here below thou wert to be like thy master Christ, and sufferest infamy at the hands of the liars of this time, and didst die a little sooner, then wouldst thou the sooner pass from death unto life and be glorified in Christ. For if thou drinkest of the cup which He drank of, with Him shalt thou reign and judge with justice those who HAVE dealt unrighteously. Oh! Erasmus! cleave to this, that God Himself may be thy praise, even as it is written of David. For thou mayest, yea, verily thou mayest overthrow Goliath. Because God stands by the Holy Christian Church, even as He alone upholds the Roman Church, according to His godly will. May He help us to everlasting salvation, who is God the Father, the Son, and Holy Ghost, one eternal God! Amen!!
"With Him shalt thou reign and judge with justice those that have dealt unrighteously." This will seem to many a mere cry for revenge; and so perhaps it was. Still it may have been, as it seems to me to have been, uttered rather in the spirit of Moses' "Forgive their sin--and if not, blot me, I pray Thee, out of Thy book"; or the "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away" of Jesus. If the necessity for victory was uppermost, the opportunity for revenge may scarcely have been present to Dürer's mind.
It is now more generally recognised than in Luther's day that however sweet vengeance may be, it is not admirable, either in God or man.
The total impression produced by Dürer's life and work must help each to decide for himself which sense he considers most likely. The truth, as in most questions of history, remains for ever in the balance, and cannot be ascertained.
XIII
I have called docility the necessary midwife of Genius, for so it is; and religion is a discipline that constrains us to learn. The religion of Jesus constrains us to learn the most difficult things, binds us to the most arduous tasks that the mind of man sets itself, as a lover is bound by his affection to accomplish difficult feats for his mistress' sake. Such tasks as Michael Angelo and Dürer set themselves require that the lover's eagerness and zest shall not be exhausted; and to keep them fresh and abundant, in spite of cross circumstances, a discipline of the mind and will is required. This is what they found in the worship of Jesus. The influence of this religious hopefulness and self-discipline on the creative power prevents its being exhausted, perverted, or embittered; and in order that it may effect this perfectly, that influence must be abundant not only within the artist, as it was in Michael Angelo and Dürer, but in the world about them.
This, then, is the value of religious influence to creative art: and though we to-day necessarily regard the personages, localities, and events of the creed as coming under the category of "things that are not," we may still as fervently hope and expect that the things of that category may "bring to nought the things that are," including the superstitious reverence for the creed and its unprovable statements; for has not the victory in human things often been with the things that were not, but which were thus ardently desired and expected? To inquire which of those things are best calculated to advance and nourish creative power, and in what manner, should engage the artist's attention far more than it has of late years. For what he loves, what he hopes, and what he expects would seem, if we study past examples, to exercise as important an influence on a man's creative power as his knowledge of, and respect for, the materials and instruments which he controls do upon his executive capacity.
The universe in which man finds himself may be evil, but not everything it contains is so: then it must for ever remain our only wisdom to labour to transform those parts which we judge to be evil into likeness or conformity to those we judge to be good: and surely he who neglects the forces of hope and adoration in that effort, neglects the better half of his practical strength? The central proposition of Christianity, that this end can only be attained by contemplation and imitation of an example, is, we shall in another place (pp. [305–312]) find, maintained as true in regard to art by Dürer, and by Reynolds, our greatest writer on aesthetics. These great artists, so dissimilar in the outward aspects of their creations, agree in considering that the only way of advancement open to the aspirant is the attempt to form himself on the example of others, by imitating them not slavishly or mechanically, but in the same spirit in which they imitated their forerunners: even as the Christian is bound to seek union with Christ in the same spirit or way in which Jesus had achieved union with his Father--that is, by laying down life to take it again, in meekness and lowliness of heart. Docility is the sovran help to perfection for Dürer and Reynolds, and more or less explicitly for all other great artists who have treated of these questions.
FOOTNOTES:
Of course all that may have been meant by the phrase "the Evangelist of Art" is that Dürer illustrated the narrative of the Passion; but by this he is not distinguished from many others, and the phrase is suggestive of far more.
Froude's "Life of Erasmus," Lecture vi.
Wordsworth's Translation,
"Literary Remains of Albrecht Dürer," p. 176.
PART II