42 Wisco7isi7i Acudemy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 



Now, all can learn to sing, except some rare individual with im- 

 perfect organ of hearing or voice. Not long since, no one could 

 learn to draw, without a special gift, and now, if a boy shows some 

 aptitude to imitate nature, the fond parents and friends say, 

 " what a gift the boy has ! " What a genius he is ! Because, per- 

 haps he has drawn a cat or a candlestick so that one may almost 

 immediately say that it was not intended for either a cow or a cap- 

 stan, A few years back, John. S. Chapman, artist, uttered the 

 truth, that " any one who can learn to write, can learn to draw." 

 And this we now begin to understand. Of course we require 

 gifts ; and thank God we have, all of us ; and one of the best 

 gifts we have, is the love of beauty, beauty in all its manifesta- 

 tions, in flowers, animal life, in trees and rocks, in streams and 

 skies, in form, and sound, and thought, and life is full of it. And 

 the power of enjoyment — which means the art-faculty is as uni- 

 versal as the material provided for it. 



"I know I could never be an artist." No, sir, you do not. '"I 

 know I have not the gift." Dear Madam, you are full of gifts. 

 You do not know what gifts you have ; and your knowledge of 

 them can come only by your development of them. 



Of course, these gifts vary in power, as do other gifts, which 

 are presumed to exist in all ; the judgment, memory, power of 

 comparison, etc. It often happens, however, that the person most 

 gifted, your genius, will be satisfied with mediocrity, and the 

 humble, slow, but earnest seeker for excellence will go far be- 

 yond him. "Nothing " says Sir Joshua Eeynolds, is ever denied 

 to well directed effort. When Domenichino was called " the ox," 

 by his fellow students, for his slowness and lack of gifts, his mas- 

 ter, Annibal Carracci said, " he is an ox who will till well the 

 field he plows," and he surpassed them all. 



What is needed, in my judgment, to make our system of edu- 

 cation more complete, so that we may be less onesided, and our 

 powers may be symmetrically developed, so that, as men and 

 women, we m y be rich with wealth, which long lay in us all un- 

 consciously is, 1. To introduce generally in our primary and 

 graded schools, such system of drawing, as that of Mr. Walter 

 Smith, supplemented by simple picturesque designs, with some 



