ADAM VAN, the teacher of Rubens, was born at Antwerp in 1557. His early style, acquired under the tuition of his father, was marked by careful and correct drawing, and raised him to a high place in his profession. He was employed to decorate many of the churches and public edifices in Flanders; he received into his school of painting such promising pupils as Rubens, Jordaeus, Franck, and Van Balen; and so excellent did his artistic skill become, that, according to the greatest of his scholars, a course of study at Rome was the only training requisite to render him the first historical painter of his day. But the loose moral character of Oort prevented his further success. His cruel outbreaks of passion drove away all his pupils except his future son-in-law Jordaeus; his intemperance palsied his hand and broke up his studious habits; and the pictures he executed before his death, in 1641, were full of negligence and mannerism.