Sorrow is the source of most great works of art. In his sorrow Durer produced his three most famous, best-wrought engravings, works full of imagination and of thought, works in which, expressed in exquisite draughtsmanship, lies his whole philosophy. Through _St. Jerome in his Library_, _The Knight_, _Death and the Devil_, and _Melencolia_, Durer has more than elsewhere revealed himself to us and shown us his outlook upon things, his manner of regarding the world, his criticism of life. On the death of Maximilian Durer travelled to the Court of Charles V. in order to get his pension confirmed. He succeeded in his object, and, after travelling through the Netherlands, where he was accorded a great reception, he returned to Nuremberg in 1521, having refused the pressing invitation of the Council of Antwerp that he should take up his residence in their city. When he returned he received another commission from the Rat--to design decorative paintings for the great hall of the Council-house. But Durer's health was broken and his prolific imagination was flagging. He seems to have taken little interest in this commission. He chose the time-worn subject of the _Calumny_ of Apelles for one design, and used his unfinished sketch of Maximilian's _Triumphal Car_ for the other. The painting was carried out by Georg Pencz and others of his pupils. Durer's last great imaginative effort was the painting of the Four Preachers, two large upright panels with figures of St. Peter and St. John on the one, and St. Mark and St. Paul on the other. These, as his final message to his native town, he presented in 1526 to his _gunstigen und gnädigen Herren_, the Council of Nuremberg. Painter, designer, engraver, mathematician, Durer was also an author. The year before he died, he published his "Instructions how to Use the Compass" and "Instructions how to Fortify Towns, Castles, and Villages," and after his death appeared the four books of his life-long work on "The Human Proportions." His life had been passed in a strenuous endeavour to perfect his art: he died amid a universal chorus of regret, on April 6th, 1528. His grave is in St. John's Churchyard (No. 649). A plain bronze plate on the headstone bears his well-known monogram and the following inscription:-- ME(ister) AL(brecht) DU(rer) QUICQUID ALBERTI DVRERI MORTALE FUIT, SVB HOC CONDITUR TUMULO. EMIGRAVIT, VIII, IDUS APRILE, M., D. XXVIII.