Art is unquestionably one of the purest and highest elements in human happiness. It trains the mind through the eye, and the eye through the mind. As the sun colors flowers, so does art color life. "In true Art," says Ruskin, "the hand, the head, and the heart of man go together. But Art is no recreation: it cannot be learned at spare moments, nor pursued when we have nothing better to do." It is not only in the East that great works, really due to study and labor, have been attributed to magic. Study and labor cannot make every man an artist, but no one can succeed in art without them. In Art two and two do not make four, and no number of little things will make a great one. It has been said, and on high authority, that the end of art is to please. But this is a very imperfect definition. It might as well be said that a library is only intended for pleasure and ornament. Art has the advantage of nature, in so far as it introduces a human element, which is in some respects superior even to nature. "If," says Plato, "you take a man as he is made by nature and compare him with another who is the effect of art, the work of nature will always appear the less beautitiful, because art is more accurate than nature." Bacon also, in _The Advancement of Learning_, speaks of "the world being inferior to the soul, by reason whereof there is agreeable to the spirit of man a more ample greatness, a more exact goodness, and a more absolute variety than can be found in the nature of things." The poets tell us that Prometheus, having made a beautiful statue of Minerva, the goddess was so delighted that she offered to bring down anything from Heaven which could add to its perfection. Prometheus on this prudently asked her to take him there, so that he might choose for himself. This Minerva did, and Prometheus, finding that in heaven all things were animated by fire, brought back a spark, with which he gave life to his work. In fact, Imitation is the means and not the end of Art. The story of Zeuxis and Parrhasius is a pretty tale; but to deceive birds, or even man himself, is but a trifling matter compared with the higher functions of Art. To imitate the _Iliad_, says Dr. Young, is not imitating Homer, but as Sir J. Reynolds adds, the more the artist studies nature "the nearer he approaches to the true and perfect idea of art." "Following these rules and using these precautions, when you have clearly and distinctly learned in what good coloring consists, you cannot do better than have recourse to Nature herself, who is always at hand, and in comparison of whose true splendor the best colored pictures are but faint and feeble." [1]