"During the first half of the present century those who visited and examined collections of Early Netherlandish Paintings were like explorers voyaging on a wild and unknown ocean without a chart; some of them making careful observations, and jotting down on their maps any land of the existence and extent of which they had acquired certain proof, and noting its characteristic features ; others, however, in their eagerness to make discoveries quickly, and to acquire renown, mistaking sandbanks and rocks seen through the mists for hitherto undiscovered countries, giving them names, dilating in elegant language on their beauties, and for a time obtaining the reputation of having added to the world's knowledge."