Jennie Ellis Keysor

In our study of Raphael, we had a glimpse of the golden age of art in Italy. In our work on Murillo, we saw what Spain was able to produce in pictures when the whole of Europe seemed to be trying its hand at painting. Moving north, we are to see in this sketch what the little country now known as Belgium produced in the same lines. For this we need hardly take more than the one name, Peter Paul Rubens, for he represented very completely the art of Flanders or Belgium, as we call it to-day.

“Of a truth this man would have surpassed us all if he had had the master-pieces of art constantly before him.” —Raphael.

In our study of the great artists so far, we have found that each glorified some particular city and that, whatever other treasures that city may have had in the past, it is the recollections of its great artist that hallow it most deeply today. Thus, to think of Antwerp is to think instantly of Rubens. Leyden and Amsterdam as quickly recall to our minds the name of Rembrandt.

“Velazquez is in art an eagle; Murillo is an angel. One admires Velazquez and adores Murillo. By his canvasses we know him as if he had lived among us. He was handsome, good and virtuous. Envy knew not where to attack him; around his crown of glory he bore a halo of love. He was born to paint the sky.” —De Amicis.

Spain was not blessed as Italy was with one generation after another of artists so great that all the world knows them even at this distant day. Spain has only two unquestionably great painters that stand out as world-artists. They are Velazquez and Murillo. The former painted with unrivalled skill the world of noblemen among whom he lived. The other, not surrounded by courtiers, looked into his own pure, religious soul, and into the sky above, and gave us visions of heaven—its saints and its angels.

by Jennie Ellis Keysor

• Life of Raphael by Bell.
• Life of Raphael by Sweetster.
• Life of Raphael by Vasari.
• Schools and Masters of Painting by Radcliffe.
• History of Art by Luebke.
• History of Art by Mrs. Heaton.
• Great Artists by Mrs. Shedd.
• The Fine Arts by Symonds.
• Early Italian Painters by Mrs. Jameson.

1. The Boy Raphael at Home.
2. My Favorite Madonna.
3. Stories of St.
   

1. Seville, the City of Music.
2. A Day in Seville.
3. Some Stories of the Alcazar.
4. The Giralda—Its History and Its Architecture.
5. The Children of Murillo’s Paintings.
6. Murillo and Velazquez.
7. Some Spanish Portraits.
8. My Favorite Picture by Murillo.
9. Some Visions Seen by Murillo.
10. The Escurial—Its History.

Rubens was par excellence the painter of the group that included the heroes of the Dutch Republic; and, like many of his contemporaries, whilst excelling in his own line, he was, in other respects also, a great man, in a time of and among great men. —Chas. W. Kett.