These refine the feelings,
and cultivate the taste; they would be particularly useful in America
in counteracting that tendency to a sordid materialism, which is one
of our great national dangers.
We went over the Berlin Museum. In general style Greek--but Greek
vitalized by the infusion of the German mind. In its general
arrangements one of the most gorgeous and impressive combinations of
art which I have seen. Here are the great frescoes of Kaulbach,
Cornelius, and other German artists, who have so grafted Grecian ideas
into the German stock that the growth has the foliage and coloring of
a new plant. One set of frescoes, representing the climate and scenery
of Greece, had on me a peculiar and magical effect. Alas! there never
has been the Greece that we conceive; we see it under the soft, purple
veil of distance, like an Alpine valley embraced by cloudy mountains;
but there was the same coarse dust and _debris_ of ordinary life
there as with us. The true Arcadia lies beyond the grave. The
collection of pictures is rich in historic curiosities--valuable as
marking the progress of art. One Claude Lorraine here was a matchless
specimen--a perfect victory over all the difficulties of green
landscape painting.
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