Each painting must be treated according to its special needs which are, in part, a result of its history. To determine this history is difficult due to the lack of reliable records. Changing at- titudes towards deterioration and towards preservation, changes in fashion, and, of course, the type and quality of the treatment itself have affected a painting's structure and appearance. Two other important influences on the care of pictures have been the unfortunate view that the lining process is separate from the rest of the treatment procedure, and the pressure from dealers and collectors to have a painting appear to be undamaged. If a picture is to be properly cared for, its surface ap- pearance cannot be the only consideration. If a painting is not structurally secure, it will not sur- vive. The present move to eliminate the lining process ignores such structural problems as inner cleavage and the additional stress put on pictures today by subjecting them to travel. Of all the methods of lining and the adhesives available, not one is suitable for all paintings. The choice must be based on each painting's particular structural problems and on a knowledge of the effects of the method and material over a period of time. The advantage of wax-resin linings is that, when properly used, the adhesive penetrates and consolidates the structure. Furthermore, this process has been in use for a long time and most paintings so treated have shown a good survival rate. Those of us who aspire toward professional status adhere to the maxim that the artifact in treatment makes the rules. Where paintings are concerned, their state should dictate the procedures which we mayor may not undertake to help them survive. Supposedly, canvas paintings are lined to make them last longer and/or diminish the ravages they have suffered from neglect and abuse. Our most uncontroversial source for operative directives should be the paintings themselves. This does not happen to be true. Any painting old enough to boast a role in history can present such an adulterated structure that its technical examination is bound to be strongly colored by interpretation. There is a woeful lack of objective realities in evaluating the requisites of a canvas painting. We have too often been unwilling to admit that we are faced with incomplete understanding of the kin.Q and extent of alterations a canvas painting may have experienced. We have been unwilling to build case histories slowly and with open minds. I do not mean to imply that ours is the only field in which practitioners have rushed to find answers first and then looked about for supporting evidence, but I do feel that a vast proportion of our disagreements may, be placed at the doorstep of impatience. As Jacques Guillerme emphasizes in his very amusing book, L'atelier du temps,2 the ele- ment of time has been viewed with an unacknowledged ambiguity. Art historians, art lovers should have good reason to hate what destroys, decomposes paintings, but oddly enough they seem to find the marks of wear and tear enchanting. A venerable object which emerges from the abyss of centuries without being tarnished by a curious reaction invites a kind of suspicion. The author of this entertaining volume makes the cynical point that art lovers exhibit a vein of necrophilia: they cherish the ravages of time as sweet and precious, not seeing it for the embalming it truly is. There is no question but what the passage of time inscribes itself cruelly on the body of a painting, nor that man's part in this calvary is any less crucial than that of natural forces. What we ignore is that the quality of seeing what has already happened fluctuates with the norms of time. Aesthetic evaluations are no less