Ruskin says, "When Titian or Tintoret look at a human being, they see at a glance the whole of its nature, outside and in; all that it has of form, of color, of passion, or of thought; saintliness and loveliness; fleshly power and spiritual power; grace, or strength, or softness, or whatsoever other quality, those men will see to the full, and so paint that, when narrower people come to look at what they have done, every one may, if he chooses, find his own special pleasure in the work. The sensualist will find sensuality in Titian; the thinker will find thought; the saint, sanctity; the colorist, color; the anatomist, form; and yet the picture will never be a popular one in the full sense, for none of these narrower people will find their special taste so alone consulted as that the qualities which would insure their gratification shall be sifted or separated from others; they are checked by the presence of the other qualities, which insure the gratification of other men.... Only there is a strange undercurrent of everlasting murmur about the name of Titian, which means the deep consent of all great men that he is greater than they." Strong praise indeed!--"the deep consent of all great men that he is greater than they;"--strong praise for the tireless worker, of whom Ludovico Dolce wrote, who knew him personally, that "he was most modest; that he never spoke reproachfully of other painters; that, in his discourse, he was ever ready to give honor where honor was due; that he was, moreover, an eloquent speaker, having an excellent wit and a perfect judgment in all things; of a most sweet and gentle nature, affable and most courteous in manner; so that whoever once conversed with him could not choose but love him thenceforth forever." He was remarkably calm and self-poised through life, saying that a painter should never be agitated. And yet he was a man of strong feelings and tender affections. Titian, the lover of the beautiful, was born at Arsenale, in the Valley of Cadore, in the heart of the Venetian Alps, in the year 1477. His father, Gregorio Vecelli, was a brave soldier, a member of the Council of Cadore, inspector of mines, superintendent of the castle, and, though probably limited in means, was universally esteemed for wisdom and uprightness. Of the mother, Lucia, little is known, save that she bore to Gregorio four children, Caterina, Francesco, Orsa, and Titian. In this Alpine country, with its waterfalls and its rushing river, Piave, with its mountain wild-flowers, its jagged rocks and nestling cottages, the boy Titian grew to be passionately fond of nature; to idolize beauty of form and face, and to revel in color. The clouds, the sky, the cliffs, the greensward, were a constant delight. In after years he put all these changing scenes upon canvas, becoming the most famous idealist as well as the "greatest landscape-painter of the Venetian school."