BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH 17 



after spending a week or more in New York studying these 

 paintings. It was published under the pen name of Celen Sab- 

 brin. Copies were sent to the various art journals, and to the 

 New York Art Exhibition, and many were sold at the door of 

 the gallery as supplementary to the catalogues. This article 

 was afterwards translated into French by the editor of "La 

 Vogue." 



Some of the Impressionist paintings especially emphasized 

 the pitilessness of natural forces or of Nature where all human 

 interests were lost to view. It was as if the universe were a huge 

 scientific demonstration, with feeling, mental response, and all 

 that goes to form religion eliminated. It was the inevitable 

 onward march of the physical life of the world, as each aeon 

 brought it nearer and nearer to cold, death, and annihilation. 



Such thoughts may have been due to an overwrought, sen- 

 sitive mental organization, but it was all very real, and even 

 the sunlight shining on the green trees and grass brought with 

 it a suggestion of the steel-blue light that astronomers tell us 

 prevails beyond this earth's atmosphere. To break the spell 

 of this mood, I gave up the study of the Impressionist paintings 

 at the time, and even the study of the physical sciences be- 

 came so painful to me that I felt obliged to discontinue it and 

 find relief in literature, poetry, and whatever else suggested 

 sentiency. 



It happened to be Holy Week, and often in the late after- 

 noon, I would drive to some church and sit there in meditation 

 in the deepening twilight under the spell of the solitary altar- 

 lamp, symbolical of everlasting light, and the slowly-fading 

 colors of the stained-glass windows, as one by one they settled 

 into the common tone of the early evening dusk. 



Especially in the domain of poetry were many hours at 

 this season spent. The works of Goethe received due share 

 of attention. Alfred de Musset, Murger, Beranger, Shelley, 

 and later, Browning, all contributed their delightful compan- 

 ionship. Spinosa and Novalis were constantly referred to and 

 read. 



Dr. Brinton had a happy way of selecting passages from 

 his favorite authors and copying them in his own handwriting 



