ing is to see certain old waxen effigies
that are here. [In its original form this essay had the good fortune to
accompany two very romantic drawings by William Nicholson--one of Queen
Elizabeth's effigy, the other of Charles II.'s.] A key grates in the
lock of a little door in the wall of (what I am told is) the North
Ambulatory; and up a winding wooden staircase I am ushered into a tiny
paven chamber. The light is dim, through the deeply embrased and narrow
window, and the space is so obstructed that I must pick my way warily.
All around are deep wooden cupboards, faced with glass; and I become
dimly aware that through each glass some one is watching me. Like
sentinels in sentry-boxes, they fix me with their eyes, seeming as
though they would challenge me. How shall I account to them for my
presence? I slip my note-book into my pocket, and try, in the dim
light, to look as unlike a spy as possible. But I cannot, try as I
will, acquit myself of impertinence. Who am I that I should review this
'ragged regiment'? Who am I that I should come peering in upon this
secret conclave of the august dead? Immobile and dark, very gaunt and
withered, these personages peer out at me with a malign dignity,
through the ages which separate me from them, through the twilight in
which I am so near to them. Their eyes... Come, sir, their eyes are
made of glass. It is quite absurd to take wax-works seriously.
Wax-works are not a serious form of art. The aim of art is so to
imitate life as to produce in the spectator an illusion of life.
Wax-works, at best, can produce no such illusion. Don't pretend to be
illuded. For its power to illude, an art depends on its limitations.
Art never can be life, but it may seem to be so if it do but keep far
enough away from life. A statue may seem to live. A painting may seem
to live. That is because each is so far away from life that you do not
apply the test of life to it. A statue is of bronze or marble, than
either of which nothing could be less flesh-like. A painting is a thing
in two dimensions, whereas man is in three. If sculptor or painter
tried to dodge these conventions, his labour would be undone. If a
painter swelled his canvas out and in according to the convexities and
concavities of his model, or if a sculptor overlaid his material with
authentic flesh-tints, then you would demand that the painted or
sculptured figure should blink, or stroke its chin, or kick its foot in
the air. That it co