235. And if at first--or even always to careless sight--the third of these pictures seem opposite to the two others in the very point of choice, between what is and what is not; insomuch that while _they_ with all their strength avouch realities, _this_ with simplest confession dwells upon a dream,--yet in this very separation from them it sums their power and seals their brotherhood; reaching beyond them to the more perfect truth of things, not only that once were,--not only that now are,--but which are the same yesterday, to-day, and forever;--the love by whose ordaining the world itself, and all that dwell therein, live, and move, and have their being; by which the Morning stars rejoice in their courses--in which the virgins of deathless Israel rejoice in the dance--and in whose constancy the Giver of light to stars, and love to men, Himself is glad in the creatures of His hand,--day by new day proclaiming to His Church of all the ages, "As the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy Lord rejoice over thee." Such, the reader will find, if he cares to learn it, is indeed the purport and effort of these three designs--so far as, by youthful hands and in a time of trouble and rebuke, such effort could be brought to good end. Of their visible weaknesses, with the best justice I may,--of their veritable merits with the best insight I may, and of the farther history of the school which these masters founded, I hope to be permitted to speak more under the branches that do not "remember their green felicity"; adding a corollary or two respecting the other pieces of art above named[43] as having taken part in the tenor of my country hours of idleness. FOOTNOTES: [42] _Nineteenth Century_, NOV.-DEC. 1878.--ED. [43] May I in the meantime recommend any reader interested in these matters to obtain for himself such photographic representation as may be easily acquirable of the tomb of Ilaria? It is in the north transept of the Cathedral of Lucca; and is certainly the most beautiful work existing by the master who wrought it,--Jacopo della Quercia. THE THREE COLORS OF PRE-RAPHAELITISM. II. 236. The feeling which, in the foregoing notes on the pictures that entertained my vacation, I endeavored to illustrate as dominant over early Pre-Raphaelite work, is very far from being new in the world. Demonstrations in support of fact against fancy have been periodical motives of earthquake and heartquake, under the two rigidly incumbent burdens of drifted tradition, which, throughout the history of humanity, during phases of languid thought, cover the vaults of searching fire that must at last try every man's work, what it is.