36 OBJECTS AND DUTIES OF THE ART SECTION. 



in itself be entirely devoid of any moral or intellectual 

 significance. 



All people will agree that the harmony between the 

 parts themselves, and between the parts and the whole, 

 is as necessary in the performance of a moral act as in a 

 painting or a statue. So, by the study of art, this love 

 for order, for proportion, for harmony, becomes a vir- 

 tue. Hence, it may be brought into every object with 

 which we are connected. This love for order becomes 

 taste in matters of pleasure and virtue when it is brought 

 into our moral life. If it is neglected in youth we shall 

 feel the bad results of the neglect through life. 



I would, for these reasons, impress this Section with 

 the importance of zealously watching the beginning and 

 growth of these intended exhibitions and this proposed 

 collection. I would suggest that a committee be ap- 

 pointed yearly as a jury, with power. It would be the 

 duty of this committee to refuse as a gift, or otherwise, 

 anything which was not artistically valuable. 



Institutions like this are always in danger of receiving 

 from good people gifts which are often of no value or 

 benefit to such an institution. Indeed, the very medioc- 

 rity of these gifts might in time make us the laughing- 

 stock of others. 



Hence, we see that with us as with the Greeks, art re- 

 quires to be beautiful in order to be useful or beneficial. 



The same thing was felt by the Council of Bishops in 

 the first centuries of Christianity. They recognized the 

 force and influence of painting, and they desired that 

 the paintings exhibited to the eyes of the faithful 

 should be so many teachers of order, wisdom, and true 

 devotion. 



I would suggest, then, that in beginning a collection 

 we should procure a number of plaster-casts from 

 ancient sculpture. 



But we have not yet come to this, and this suggestion 



