VIII. THE STATE OF DENMARK 389

159. But to these particulars I must return by-and-bye;¹ for my business in this chapter is only to give account of the materials and mental resources with which, in my new study at Denmark Hill, looking out on the meadow and the two cows, I settled myself, in the winter of 1845, to write, as my father now justly expected me to do without farther excuse, the second volume of Modern Painters.²

It is extremely difficult to define, much more to explain, the religious temper in which I designed that second volume. Whatever I know or feel, now, of the justice of God, the nobleness of man, and the beauty of nature, I knew and felt then, nor less strongly; but these firm faiths were confused by the continual discovery, day by day, of error or limitation in the doctrines I had been taught, and follies or inconsistencies in their teachers: while for myself, it seemed to me quite sure, since my downfall of heart on last leaving France, that I had no part nor lot in the service or privileges of the saints; but, on the contrary, had such share only in the things of God, as well-conducted beasts and serenely-minded birds had: while, even among the beasts, I had no claim to represent myself figuratively as a lion couchant, or eagle volant, but was, at my best and proudest, only of a doggish and piggish temper, content in my dog’s chain, and with my pig’s-wash, in spite of Carlyle;³ and having no mind whatever to win Heaven at the price of conversion like St. Ranieri’s,⁴ or mortification like St. Bruno’s.

160. And that my father much concurred with me in these, partly stubborn, partly modest, sentiments, appeared curiously on the occasion of registering his arms at the Heralds’ College for painting, as those of the Bardi,⁵ and no more under the Long Acre limitation,⁶ “vix ea nostra,”

¹ [There is, however, no further reference to Melvill, or to Ruskin’s study of the Bible.]

² [Ruskin returned home on November 4, 1845, and the second volume was published on April 24, 1846: see Vol. IV. p. xxxix.]

³ [See “Pig Philosophy” in Latter-Day Pamphlets, No. viii.]

⁴ [See § 120; above, p. 354; and for St. Bruno, below, p. 481.]

⁵ [See Vol. XXII. p. 267.]

⁶ [See above, i. § 124 (p. 107).]

[Version 0.04: March 2008]