III. TURNER AND HIS WORKS 129

unlock it fot the first time. But of all three, though not the greatest, Turner was the most unprecedented in his work. Bacon did what Aristotle had attempted; Shakspeare did perfectly what Æschylus did partially; but none before Turner had lifted the veil from the face of nature; the majesty of the hills and forests had received no interpretation, and the clouds passed unrecorded from the face of the heaven which they adorned, and of the earth to which they ministered.

102. And now let me tell you something of his personal character. You have heard him spoken of as illnatured, and jealous of his brother artists. I will tell you now jealous he was. I knew him for ten years, and during that time had much familiar intercourse with him. I never once heard him say an unkind thing of a brother artist and I never once heard him find a fault with another man’s work.¹ I could say this of no other artist whom I have ever known.

But I will add a piece of evidence on this matter of peculiar force. Probably many here have read a book which has been lately published, to me to my mind one of extreme interest and value, the life of the unhappy artist, Benjamin Haydon.² Whatever may have been his faults, I belive no person can read his journal without coming to the conclusion that his heart was honest, and that he does not wilfuly misrepresent any fact or any person. Even supposing otherwise, the expression I am going to quote to you would have all the more force, because, as you know, Haydon passed his whole life in war with the Royal Academy, of which Turner was one of the most influential members. Yet in the midst of one of his most violent

¹ [Ruskin repeat this testimony in Modern Painters, vol. v. pt. ix. ch. xii. § 4 n. ; It is confirmed by the reminiscences of many of his contemporaries which have since seen the light. W. P. Firth R.A., mentions instances of Turner’s a appreciation of the work of young artists, and adds, “The severest criticism Turner was ever heard to make was upon a landscape of a brother Academician, whose works somtimes showed signs of waekness. Turner joined a group who were discussing a certain picture’s shortcomings, and after hearing much unpleasant remark from which he dissented, he was forced to confess that a very bad passage, to which the malcontents drew his attention,’ was a poor bit“‘ (Autobiography, 1857, i. 127)]

² [For other refrences to Haydon (1786- 1846), see Modren Painters, vol.v. pt. viii. ch. iii. § 3; Academy Notes, 1858, No. 101; Queen of the Air, § 159.]

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