TREES IN MODERN PAINTING 293 



tree-painting of G. F. Watts. The importance 

 of his landscapes has, I think, been under- 

 estimated, and I have elsewhere given reasons 

 for so thinking. Watts saw all things in their 

 large relations : the world as one of a myriad 

 worlds, time as a moment of eternity, man in 

 relation to humanity, humanity as reaching up 

 into God. If he painted a flower, it also 

 seemed to be a wonderful thing, strangely 

 emblematic of life ; and his trees were as if he 

 had seen through their material form and sub- 

 stance to the life and power that brought them 

 into being and maintained them with their roots 

 down in the earth and their utmost branches 

 pressing up towards heaven. 



Ruskin, it is said, tried to persuade Watts to 

 study botany. What he would have gained 

 by such study would have been far outweighed 

 by what he would have lost. He declared his 

 preference for trees as compared with flowers ; 

 and if we wish for a parallel in literature for 

 his feeling towards trees, it is in the Bible we 

 shall most readily find it. "He watereth the 

 hills from His chambers : the earth is satisfied 

 with the fruit of Thy works. He causeth the 

 grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the 



