Lectures on Art

For Washington Allston, the truest experience of beauty leaves the artist unsatisfied—not disappointed, but yearning for something higher that can never be fully attained. What is the unseen ideal that makes even the loveliest work feel incomplete?

In these early-nineteenth-century reflections, painter and poet Allston asks what connects the things we see with the truths we sense but cannot grasp. He distinguishes the mind’s ideas from mere notions, and considers how art gives form to what is real, beautiful, and good. The senses may supply the materials, he argues, but some deeper power must shape them into meaning—and our longing for beauty may point beyond the work of art itself. Where does that longing lead?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.