Excerpt from Velasquez<br><br>Rembrandt, Claude - he was the newest, and certainly the truest, from our point of View; SO new and SO true, indeed, that two hundred years after he had Shown the mystery of light as God made it, we still hear that Velasquez was a sordid soul who never saw beauty, a mere master of technique, wholly lacking in imagina tion. SO say those whose necks are stifi with looking at Italy and Raphael. Delacroix1 complains of them, in his Letters, that they see beauty only in lines, and therefore refuse to believe that others may receive a different kind Of impression. The opinion of these people is not to be controverted by words alone, and, as nature is a hard teacher, a student may save himself trouble by studying Velasquez at Madrid. A man Of genius learns from a mere hint, it is true, and such an one without going farther than Paris or London may understand how Velasquez saw the world: a more ordinary eye, however, must take the Spaniard's greatness half on trust, if he has not seen Madrid. But with the best will in the world some eyes really cannot see the side of nature that Velasquez saw; While others are SO bandaged by Italian prejudice that they may save themselves the trouble of a journey.<br><br>About the Publisher<br><br>Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com<br><br>This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.