Page images
PDF
EPUB

genius from implying an absence of faults, that they are confidered by many as infeparable companions; that fome perfons go fuch lengths as to take indications from them, and not only excufe faults on account of genius, but prefume genius from the exiftence of certain faults.

It is certainly true, Sir Joshua further obferves, that a work may juftly claim the character of genius though full of errors; and it is equally true, he fays, that it may be faultless, and yet not exhibit the least spark of genius. This naturally leads to an enquiry, what qualities of a work and of a workman may juftly entitle a Painter to that character.

I have (continues he), in a former Difcourfe (the 3d), endea voured to imprefs you with a fixed opinion, that a comprehenfive and critical knowledge of the works of nature, is the only fource of beauty and grandeur. But when we fpeak to painters, we must always confider this rule, and all rules, with a reference to the mechanical practice of their own particular art. It is not properly in the learning, the tafte, and the dignity of the ideas, that genius appears as belonging to a painter. There is a genius particular and appropriated in his own trade (as I may call it), diftinguished from all others. For that power, which enables the artit to conceive his fubject with dignity, may be faid to belong to general education; and is as much the genius of a poet, or the profeffor of any other liberal art, or even of a good critic in any of those arts, as of a painter. Whatever fublime ideas may fill his mind, he is a painter only as he can put in practice what he knows, and communicate thofe ideas by visible reprefentation.

[ocr errors]

If my expreffion can convey my idea, I with to diftinguith excellence of this kind, by calling it the genius of mechanical performance. This genius confifls, I conceive, in the power of expreffing that which employs your pencil, whatever it may be, as a whole; fo as that the general effect and power of the whole may take poffeffion of the mind, and for a while fufpend the confideration of the fubordinate and particular beauties or defects.

The advantage of this method of confidering objects, is what I with now more particularly to enforce. At the fame time I do not forget, that a painter must have the power of contracting, as well as dilating, his fight; because, he that does not at all exprefs particulars, expreffes nothing; yet it is certain, that a nice difcrimination of minute circumstances, and a punctilious delineation of them, whatever excellence it may have (and I do not mean to detract from it), never did confer on the artist the character of Genius.

Befide thofe minute differences in things which are frequently not obferved at all, and when they are, make little impreffion, there are in all confiderable objects great characterillic diftinétions, which prefs ftrongly on the fenfes, and therefore fix the imagination.Thefe are by no means, as fome people think, an aggregate of all the fmall difcriminating particulars; nor will fuch an accumulation of particulars ever exprefs them. Thefe anfwer to what I have heard great lawyers call, the leading points in a cafe, or the leading cafes relative to these points. < The

The detail of particulars, which does not affift the expression of the main characteristic, is worfe than useless, it is mischievous, as it diffipates the attention, and draws it from the principal point. It may be remarked, that the impreffion which is left on our mind, even of things which are familiar to us, is feldom more than their general effect; beyond which we do not look in recognizing fuch objects. To exprefs this in painting, is to express what is congenial and natural to the mind of man, and what gives him by reflection his own mode of conceiving. The other prefuppofes nicety and research, which are only the bufinefs of the curious and attentive, and therefore does not speak to the general fenfe of the whole fpecies; in which common, and, as I may fo call it, mother tongue, every thing grand and comprehenfive must be uttered.

I do not mean to prefcribe what degree of attention ought to be paid to the minute parts; this it is hard to fettle. We are fure that it is expreffing the general effect of the whole which can give to objects their true and touching character; and wherever this is obferved, whatever is neglected, we acknowledge the hand of a mafter. We may even go farther, and obferve, that when the general effect only is prefented to us by a fkilful hand, it appears to express that object in a more lively manner than the minutest resemblance would do'

The properties of all objects, Sir Joshua obferves, as far as a painter is concerned with them, are, the outline, or drawing, the colour, and the light and fhade. The drawing gives the form, the colour its vifible quality, and the light and fhade its folidity. Excellence in any one of thefe parts of art, we are told, will never be acquired by an artift, unless he has the habit of looking upon objects at large, and obferving the effect which they have on the eye when it is dilated, and employed upon the whole, without feeing any one of the parts diftinctly. It is by this, our Author fays, that we obtain the ruling characteristic, and that we learn to imitate it by fhort and dexterous methods. He does not mean by dexterity, a trick or mechanical habit, formed by guefs, and eftablifhed by cuftom; but that fcience, which, by a profound knowledge of ends and means, difcovers the fhorteft and fureft way to its own purpose.

If we examine with a critical view the manner of those artists whom we confider as patterns, we fhall find, Sir Joshua says, that their great fame does not proceed from their works being more highly finished, or from a more minute attention to details, but from that enlarged comprehenfion which fees the whole object at once, and that energy of art which gives its characteristic effect by adequate expreffion.

This great and leading idea of his whole difcourfe he goes on to illuftrate and establish by obfervations on the works of RAFFAELLE and TITIAN, two names which stand the highest in the Art of Painting; one for drawing, the other for painting.

The

The most confiderable and the most esteemed works of Raffaelle (fays he), are the Cartoons, and his Frefco Works, in the Vatican ; thofe, as we all know, are far from being minutely finished; his principal care and attention feems to be fixed upon the adjustment of the whole, whether it was the general compofition, or the compofition of each individual figure; for every figure may be faid to be a leffer whole, though in regard to the general work to which it belongs, it is but a part; the fame may be faid of the head, of the hands, or feet. Though he poffeffed this art of feeing and comprehending the whole, as far as form is concerned, he did not exert the fame faculty in regard to the general effect, which is presented to the eye by colour, and light, and shade. Of this the deficiency of his oil pictures, where this excellence is more expected than in fresco, is a fufficient proof.

It is to Titian we must turn our eyes to find excellence with regard to colour, and light and fhade, in the highest degree. He was both the first and the greatest mafter of this art. By a few frokes he knew how to mark the general image and character of whatever object he attempted, and produced by this alone a truer reprefentation than his mafter Giam. Bellino, or any of his predeceffors, who finished every hair. His great care was to express the general colour, to preserve the maffes of light and fhade, and to give by oppofition the idea of that folidity which is infeparable from natural objects. When thofe are preferved, though with nothing more, the work will have, in a proper place, its complete effect; but where any of thefe are wanting, however minutely laboured the picture may be in the detail, the whole will have a falfe and even an unfinished appearance, at whatever diftance, or in whatever light, it can be fhewn. It is vain to attend to the variation of tints, if, in that attention, the general hue of flesh is loft; or to finish ever fo minutely the parts, if the maffes are not observed, or the whole not well put together.

Vafari feems to have no great difpofition to favour the Venetian Painters; yet he every where justly commends the admirable manner and practice of that fchool.-This manner was then new to the world; but that unshaken truth on which it is founded, has fixed it as a model to all fucceeding painters; and those who will examine into the artifice, will find it to confift in the power of generalising, and in the fhortnefs and fimplicity of the means.'

Excellence in every part, and in every province of the Art of Painting, from the higheft ftile of hiftory down to the refemblances of ftill-life, depends, Sir Jofhua fays, on this power of extending the attention at once to the whole, without which the greatest diligence is vain. By a whole, he does not mean fimply a whole as belonging to compofition, but a whole with refpect to the general ftile of colouring; a whole with regard to the light and fhade; a whole of every thing which may separately become the main purpofe of a Painter.

The great advantage, he fays, of this idea of a whole is, that a greater quantity of truth may be faid to be contained and expreffed in a few lines or touches, than in the most laborious'

finishing

finishing of the parts, where this is not regarded. It is upon this foundation, we are told, that it ftands; and the juftnefs of the obfervation, our Author fays, would be confirmed by the ignorant in art, if it were poffible to take their opinions, unfeduced by fome falfe idea of what they imagine they ought to fee in a picture.

The Students of the Royal Academy will, we hope, pay due attention to what is fo earneftly recommended to them in this excellent Difcourfe. If, inftead of employing their labour on minute objects of little confequence, they endeavour to acquire the art, and perfect the habit, of feeing nature in an extensive view, in its proper proportions, and its due fubordination of parts, we may expect to see many of them rife to eminence in the different provinces of their art, fome in landfcape, fome in portrait, and fome in hiftory-painting.

Before we conclude this Article, we cannot help exprefling our wishes, that all who have the direction of the studies of youth, would imitate our Author's example, by pointing the diligence and industry of thofe committed to their care to proper objects. How many young men, of excellent parts, when tudying philofophy and theology, are permitted, by injudicious tutors, to waste their ftrength, and the prime of their faculties, on questions which are too large for the grasp of the human understanding, instead of being directed and encouraged to profecute fuch studies only as have a manifeft tendency to make them happy in themselves, and useful to fociety!

FOREIGN LITERATURE.

ART. I.

VERHANDELINGEN, &c. i. e. Differtations relative to Natural and Revealed Religion. Publifhed by Teyler's Theological Society at Haarlem. Vol. II. Concluded.

We gave, in our last Appendix (juft published) a pretty full account of M. DE CASTILLON'S Prize-Differtation concerning Providence, and our Readers will recollect the ingenious manner in which this learned Profeffor maintained the doctrine of a General Providence, as fufficient to account for all actions, events, and phenomena, both in the moral and natural world; without our being obliged to recur to any particular interpofition of the Deity, unconnected with the general laws by which he governs

the universe.

A different hypothefis is laboriously maintained by Profeffor PAP DE FAGARAS, whofe Difcourfe obtained the fecond prize, or filver medal. This fenfible and learned Writer pleads the caule of a Particular Providence, and endeavours to prove, that the Supreme Being governs the univerfe, not only by the influ

ence of general stated laws, but alfo by a particular interpofition, at certain times, when goodness and wildom require it. He acknowledges, that it is neither in the perpetual act of the Deity, to which the creatures owe the continuation of their existence and powers, nor in the Divine concurrence with their operations and actions, that this particular interpofition takes place; but only in the direction of certain actions and events, which, according to him, do not come within the province of the general and eftablished laws of Nature. To prove his point, he firft enlarges, without neceffity, on the dependence of all created beings upon the fupreme direction and government of the Deity, which none but the Atheist denies; he then comes nearer to the matter in question, by attempting to prove, that general laws, and a general Providence, are not fufficient to account for all the phenomena of the natural and moral world; and that the connection between these two worlds renders this infufficiency palpable. His arguments, drawn from the refpective motions of the celeftial bodies appear to us totally inconclufive: they only prove, that all thefe motions do not originate from fixed laws, or effects of fixed laws known to us, and not that there are really no fixed laws, which are effectual for their production and direction: his arguments prove only a wife and admirable direction, which may be as well exerted by the operation of general laws, as by that of a particular interpofition, according to the ideas attached to these two methods of government in the queftion proposed. All this part of his differtation is a popular and fatisfactory demonftration of a governing, but affords no proof of (what is called) a Particular, Providence: it is copious, nay redundant and declamatory; and fhews, that the Writer is better acquainted with the science of aftronomy than with the rules of logic. His reafonings in favour of a Particular Providence, drawn from the conftitution of the moral world, prove, perfectly, a wife moral government of the universe, and nothing farther; but this does not answer the question propofed; for, on both fides of the controverfy, this is acknowledged and maintained; and M. PAP, if we do not mistake the matter, was not called to combat the filly fiction of a famous French philofophical painter, that Providence (or rather old Mistress Nature) takes care of the fpecies without minding the individual,— that is to fay, takes care of a univerfal idea, and gives no attention to the real beings from which it is extracted. Rifum teneatis amici !— M. Caftillon's doctrine of a general Providence and general Laws leaves no object, not even an atom, independent on, or neglected by, the Divine care. The only question then is, whether a fyftem of general fixed laws, once formed by a fingle act of the Supreme Will, can extend their influence to all thefe objects? That there are fuch laws we know, both by obferva

« PreviousContinue »