In short, art that so long had been at the service only of the Church and the proud, became suddenly, without losing any of its divinity, a fireside friend.

That is what Holland did for painting.
It would have been a great enjoyment to me to have made this chapter a companion to the Ryks Museum: to have said a few words about all the pictures which I like best.

But had I done so the rest of the book would have had to go, for all my space would have been exhausted.

And therefore, as I cannot say all I want to say, I propose to say very little, keeping only to the most importunate pictures.

Here and there in this book, particularly in the chapters on Dordrecht, Haarlem, and Leyden's painters, I have already touched on many of them.
The particular shining glory of the Ryks Museum is Rembrandt's "Night Watch," and it is well, I think, to make for that picture at once.