The Praeraphaelite Brothers entertained a deep respect and a sincere
affection for the works of some of the artists who had preceded
Raphael; and they thought that they should more or less be following
the lead of those artists if they themselves were to develop their
own individuality, disregarding school-rules. This was really the sum
and substance of their "Praeraphaelitism." It may freely be allowed
that, as they were very young, and fired by certain ideas impressive
to their own spirits, they unduly ignored some other ideas and
theories which have none the less a deal to say for themselves. They
contemned some things and some practitioners of art not at all
contemptible, and, in speech still more than in thought, they at
times wilfully heaped up the scorn. You cannot have a youthful rebel
with a faculty who is also a model head-boy in a school.
The P.R.B. was completed by the accession of three members to the
four already mentioned. These were James Collinson, a domestic
painter; Frederic George Stephens, an Academy-student of painting;
and myself, a Government-clerk. These again, when the P.R.B. was
formed towards September 1848, were all young, aged respectively
about twenty-three, twenty-one, and nineteen.
This Praeraphaelite Brotherhood was the independent creation of
Holman-Hunt, Millais, Rossetti, and (in perhaps a somewhat minor
degree) Woolner: it cannot be said that they were prompted or abetted
by any one.
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