We could picture to ourselves what this art was even if no example of it remained. A peaceable, industrious, practical people, who, to use the words of a great German poet, were continually brought back to dull realities by the conditions of a vulgar bourgeois life; who cultivated their reason at the expense of their imagination, living in consequence on manifest ideas rather than beautiful images; who fled from the abstract, whose thoughts never rose beyond nature, with which they waged continual warfare--a people that saw only what exists, that enjoyed only what it possessed, whose happiness consisted in wealthy ease and an honest indulgence of the senses, although without violent passions or inordinate desires;--such a people would naturally be phlegmatic in their art,--they would love a style that pleased but did not arouse them, that spoke to the senses rather than to the imagination--a school of art placid, precise, full of repose, and thoroughly material like their life--an art, in a word, realistic and self-satisfied, in which they could see themselves reflected as they were and as they were content to remain. The first Dutch artists began by depicting that which was continually before their eyes--the home. The long winters, the stubborn rains, the humidity, the continual changes in the climate, compel the Hollander to spend a great part of the year and of the day in the house. He loves his little home, his nutshell, much more than we love our houses, because it is much more necessary to him, and he lives in it much more; he provides it with every comfort, caresses it, adorns it; he delights in looking at the falling snow and drenching rain from its tight windows, and in being able to say, "Let the storms rage--I am safe and warm." In his little nest, beside his good wife and surrounded by his children, he passes the long evenings of autumn and winter, eating much, drinking much, smoking much, and amusing himself with honest mirth after the fatigues of the day. Dutch artists paint these little houses and this home-life in little pictures adapted in size to the little walls they must adorn; bedrooms which make one drowsy; kitchens with tables ready spread; the fresh, kindly faces of mothers of families; men basking in the warmth of the hearth; and, as they are conscientious realists who omit nothing, they add blinking cats, gaping dogs, scratching hens, brooms, vegetables, crockery, and plucked chickens. This life is painted in every class of society and under every circumstance; evening-parties, dances, orgies, games, holidays, all are represented, and thus Ter Borch, Metsu, Netscher, Dou, Mieris, Steen, Brouwer, and Ostade became famous.