Victorian Approaches to Religion as Reflected in the Art of the Pre-Raphaelites jellemzők

John Ruskin, the dogmatic, but at heart deeply doubtful artcritic, William Holman Hunt, the moralist artist-preacher, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, the intuitive poet-painter, John Everett Millais, the conscientious realist then popular sentimentalist, and their numerous followers represent different aspects of Pre-Raphaelitism. Yet, they were all typical Victorians, whose religious ideas and biblical works give a fascinating insight into the momentous religious concerns of the age: the fervent sectarian debates of the middle of the mineteenth century, the spread of agnosticism, the new Bible-interpreations called forth by scientific discoveries, and the move towards reconciliation and secularisation at the end of the century.