676 ON THE RELATION OF NATURAL SCIENCE TO ART. 
“The Relation of Natural Science to Art,” * given before the Univer- 
sity of Oxford. Even in the preface he deplores its pernicious influence 
on Mantegna and Diirer, as contrasted with Botticelli and Holbein, 
who kept free from it. “The habit of contemplating the anatomical 
structure of the human form,” he continues, ‘‘is not only a hindrance, 
but a degradation, and has been essentially destructive to every school 
of art in which it has been practiced.” According to him, it misleads 
painters, as for instance Diirer, to see and represent nothing in the 
human face but the skull. The artist should “ take every sort of view 
of animals, in fact, except one—the butcher’s view. He is never to 
think of them as bones and meat.” 
It would be waste of time and trouble to refute this false doctrine, 
and to set forth what an indispensable aid anatomy gives to artists, 
without which they are left to grope in the dark. It is all very well 
to trust one’s own eyes, but it is better still to know, for instance, how 
the male and female skeleton differ; why the kneecap follows the direc- 
tion of the foot during extension, and not during flexion of the leg; 
why the profile of the upper arm during supination of the hand differs 
from that during pronation; or how the folds and wrinkles of the face 
correspond to the muscles beneath. Campe’s facial angle, though 
superceded for higher purposes by Prof. Virchow’s basal angle, still 
reveals a world of information. It is hardly conceivable how, without 
knowledge of the skull, a forehead can be correctly modelled, or the 
shape of a forehead such as that of the “Jupiter of Otricoli” or the 
‘‘ Hermes” be rightly understood. Of course fanciful exaggeration of 
anatomical forms may lead to abuse, as is frequently the case with 
Michael Angelo’s successors; however, there is no better remedy against 
the Michael Angelesque manner than earnest study of the real. Finally, 
a superficial knowledge of comparative anatomy helps artists to avoid 
such errors as an illustrious master once fell into, who gave the hind- 
leg of a horse one joint too many; or such as amuses naturalists in the 
crocodile of the Fontaine Cuvier near the Jardin des Plantes, which 
turns its stiff neck so far back that the snout almost touches the flank. 
We are, however, less surprised at Mr. Ruskin’s opinions, on learn- 
ing that he similarly prohibits the study of the nude. It is to be con- 
fined to those parts of the body which health, custom, and decency 
permit to be left uncovered, a restriction which certainly renders 
anatomical studies somewhat superfluous. It is satisfactory to think 
that decency, custom, and health allowed the ancient Greeks more 
liberty in this respect. Fortunately, the English department of the 
Jerlin International Exhibition four years ago has convinced us that 
Mr. Ruskin’s dangerous paradoxes do not yet generally prevail, and 
that we are free to forget them in our admiration of Mr. Alma Tadema/’s 
and Mr. Herkomer’s paintings. Nor could Myr. Walter Crane’s charm- 
«<The Bagle’s Nest: Ten Lectures on the Relation of Natural Science to Art,” 
1887. 
