4i6 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



To the stor}^ element in pictures as a cause of our enjoyment of them 

 we must add another element closely allied to it, that of history. The 

 historical picture is always a story picture; but it usually tells to an 

 observer more than a mere story. If we are ourselves already familiar 

 with the incident depicted, we gain from looking at the picture the 

 recognition-pleasure already noted. If we are not familiar with it we 

 take pleasure in adding to our historical knowledge the particular inci- 

 dent set forth in the picture. That is, in looking at historical pictures 

 we either pride ourselves on a recognition which assures us that we 

 are so far well-informed, or we please ourselves by adding to the sum 

 of our knowledge. 



Knowledge of the life of an artist, of his peculiarities, of striking 

 incidents in his career, of the country and the time in which he lived 

 — this knowledge adds much to the pleasure gained from pictures. A 

 glance at one, if it is recognized as by an artist of whom the observer 

 already has some knowledge, gives first the pleasure of identification 

 cr naming — not different from that which one has who can name on 

 sight a distant mountain peak — and next, through association the 

 pleasure of recalling, even though vaguely, facts in the artist's life. 

 Much of the pleasure won from pictures lies in this identification- 

 emotion. 



The pleasures thus far noted as derived from pictures are not de- 

 rived from pictures only. We get the same enjoyment from looking 

 at scenes upon the stage, at photographs of nature, at nature herself, 

 at incidents in real life about us and from poetry, story and literature 

 in general. This is equivalent to saying, and the saying is a true one, 

 that most' of the enjoyment of pictures is due to effects not at all asso- 

 ciated with or flowing from 'art' as that word is generally used by 

 artists. The artist himself, however, is by no means free from the 

 influence of the factors already enumerated. From time to time, in 

 his development as an artist, he has undoubtedly tried to free himself 

 from what seemed to him the embarrassing limitations of the habit, 

 fonned in youth, of getting from pictures pleasures born of fashion, 

 curiosity, sympathy and story. He never succeeds in doing this. He 

 sees all pictures as he does all art — as I have said in discussing the 

 presence of the story element in all art — through the medium of his 

 own past experiences and of his own character. He sees them first as 

 an animal, as a social being, as a person fashioned by the age and 

 country in which he lives. As an artist, however, as a person skilled 

 in his calling, the things that usually most interest him are technique, 

 design, color, light and shade, line, and manner of laying the paint on 

 the canvas. It has probably always been the fashion for artists them- 

 selves to speak rather scornfully of the interests aroused by and the 

 pleasure taken in pictures from the point of view of the story or of 



