“We don’t go to art for information. Rather it’s the experience.”—Roger Scruton, philosopher Piero della Francesca’s “The Baptism of Christ,” which hangs in the National Gallery in London’s Trafalgar Square, was rather like a personal shrine to me. I visited it frequently “for the experience.” When the newsroom became too much of a gallimaufry, I would jump on the Tube to the National Gallery. Ten minutes later I would stand and stare at the painting. A soothing quiet would course through my veins. The painting was reminder, like that hymn by the Quaker John Greenleaf Whittier: “Drop Thy still dews of quietness…all our strivings cease; Take from our souls the strain and stress…let our ordered lives confess the beauty of Thy peace.” Piero provided that still, small voice of calm. A Man of Genius Piero della Francesca, originally named Piero di Benedetto, was an Italian painter of the Early Renaissance. Although …