{"id":"01KG6G8ADC8K0FFS9CSNXH5TKF","cid":"bafkreidovzfk6rxtok5owizmjekg2ytzxg3puneq2bdinnqv6euwikak6u","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":11388,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:16.153Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 3","source_file":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","start_line":11337,"text":"according to hallowed authority, originally created but a little lower\r\nthan the angels. Almost invariably these men have physical beauty; and\r\nthe moral charm is in keeping with that, apparently a spontaneous\r\nemanation from it. It is as golden wine down in a golden chalice, where,\r\nseen through the lustre suffusing the shadow, the delicious fluid looks\r\nto be the exuded gathered sap of the precious metal.\r\n\r\nIt was of the Marquis de Grandvin that the landscape painter, B. Hobbema\r\nBrown, an inoffensive sort of theoretical misanthrope, with a\r\ntreacherous flow of loving-kindness in him--to borrow one of his own\r\neccentric phrases; the same B. Hobbema who, were his significant\r\nreticence on the point, no unwise thing in him, by the way,\r\nconjecturally rendered into words, would seem in his own private\r\njudgment to have been treated illiberally enough by the art-dealers,\r\nart-critics, and academic hanging-committees, to say nothing of the art\r\npublic; well, it was of some other than the Marquis that Hobbema B.,\r\nreturning in moonlight from a choice assemblage, where he had been\r\nintroduced to him, and undergone the inevitable fascination of the\r\ncontact; it was of him that Brown enthusiastically exclaimed to his\r\ncompanion: ‘What a godsend to meet such a man! He is a set-off against\r\nthe battalions of his contraries. Between you and me, mankind taken in a\r\nlump are the gods’ job-lot; but, by heaven, the race that can produce a\r\nMarquis de Grandvin is not promiscuously to be contemned!’\r\n\r\nSee there how the talismanic something in the sort of nature here\r\nindicated can operate upon another nature though of a temper not\r\nfavourably disposed to receive its benign influence.\r\n\r\nIn the casual outcome of such a character, gay fancies and suggestions\r\nwithout stint, sallies of wit and bonhomie, all sharing more or less in\r\na certain lyric glow; herein the spiritual bounty to us would seem to be\r\nan unconsciousness in the almoner, involving, too, an indifference or\r\nunconcern as to who may appropriate, or as to what purpose the\r\nappropriation may be applied. In this particular, what recks the Marquis\r\nde Grandvin, for example? He is the ripe peach-tree shedding its\r\nabundance, careless of the garner; he is the Prince of Golconda at the\r\nball, some of whose innumerable diamond buttons drop from his raiment\r\nunheeded by him in the chance fleeting rubs and collisions of the dance.\r\n\r\nBut how transitory these prodigal improvident ones can prove!--and once\r\ngone, how soon all but good as forgotten! True, were an example here\r\ndemanded, one adapted for popular illustration, not readily could it be\r\nsupplied. Literature will not furnish it, since these natures, never\r\ndirectly expressing themselves in literature, have no memorial place in\r\nits records. Neither are they Alexanders and Napoleons that the fame\r\nwhich is all but independent of literature should trumpet them.\r\nNevertheless, in local tradition, and comparatively recent, I do find a\r\ncitable instance which, though below the grade, say, of a de Grandvin,\r\nand but in a minor way to the purpose, may perhaps for these reasons\r\nserve the better to actualise the general truth, in a measure bring it\r\nhome.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 3"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG6G6RFZ78NXTBC0B5M5HQR0","peer_type":"article","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG6FXSCNX5F3D880P3YP3PKR","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG2T49K0H5GDRB0G4YDTPG8H","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG6G8ADCYXZBDP4JEFS2M4PE","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"prev"},{"peer":"01KG6G8ADMA537J19EKQ5EY0YB","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T03:48:22.572Z","ts":"2026-01-30T03:48:32.351Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}