ceeded in juftnefs, or in fplendor and magnificence of compofition.

Sir Joshua Reynolds ufed to fay, that the moft grand as well as the moft perfect piece of compofition in the world, was that of Ruben's picture of the Fall of the Damned, in the Gallery of Duffeldorf. The fubject is dreadful; and the skill and artifice of defign which are difplayed in combining together fo varied, fo heterogeneous, and fo horrid a mass is wonderful, and exhibits the great invention no less than the compofition of the master.

Rubens is a ftriking inftance, how much eafier it is to give precepts than to practise them. In his "Treatife on Painting," he advises the ftudent to ftudy with the utmoft diligence the works of the Antients, in the remains of their ftatues and bas reliefs: yet in his Luxemburg Gallery, when he introduces the Apollo Belvidere, he makes rather an Apollo of Flanders than of Greece.

The Crucifixion of St. Peter with his head downwards, was the laft of Rubens' Works, and that which he admired the moft: he gave it to a Church in his native town of Cologne, The compofition of his celebrated Taking Down

from

from the Crofs is faid to have been borrowed exactly from an old Print: the original is indeed excellent; and Rubens, in a moment of idlenefs, might perhaps think that he could not. go beyond it.

To the talents of a Painter, Rubens added all the virtues of a Chriftian, and the graces of a Gentleman. He feems to have been extremely liberal, and to have painted many pictures for Churches and Convents from motives of piety and charity. Thefe appear to have been fome of the happiest efforts of his pencil, no lefs with refpect to their execution, than the motives which infpired them.

LE SUEUR.

THIS excellent Painter was pupil to Simon Vouet. He foon furpaffed his mafter, and, though he had never quitted France, became, in fome points of the art, one of the first painters of his time. His contemporary Le Brun appears to have been very jealous of his fuperior talents; for, on hearing of his death, he malignantly faid, "I feel now as if I had a thorn juft taken out of my foot."

Le

Le Sueur died young, and left behind him many works; fuch as The Cloister of the 'Chartreux at Paris, Alexander and his Phyfician, &c. that might rival the works of the greatest painters for elegance of defign, beauty of form, and truth of expreffion. In colouring he was defective, that meretricious and ambitious appendage of the art where it is exercifed upon great fubjects, and embraces extenfive compofitions, the appropriated effects of which can be as well produced in chiaro ofcuro.

BOUCHARDON.

A MORE unbiaffed and more unequivocal teftimony was never afforded to the merit of the Iliad of Homer, than that given by this fculptor. By fome accident he ftumbled on the old miferable tranflation of Homer into French verfe, and the images which it fupplied. to a man of his ardent imagination ftruck him fo forcibly, that he told one of his friends foon afterwards, "I met the other day with an old "French book that I had never feen before. "It is called Homer's Iliad, I think. I do

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not know how it is, but fince I have read it,

men appear to me to be fifteen feet high, "and I cannot get a wink of fleep at night." D'Alembert,

D'Alembert, who mentions this anecdote, fays, that he once heard an artist talk nearly the fame language to him, " and who," adds he, "in fpeaking like Bouchardon, did not speak "after him."

The fpeech of Bouchardon to his friend refpecting Homer induced the celebrated Count Caylus to fet about a little work, of great use to painters and to fculptors, entitled, "Tableaux "tirées d'Homere," octavo.-" Subjects for Ar"tifts, taken from the Iliad and the Odyffey of "Homer."

CHARLES THE FIFTH,

DUKE OF LORRAINE.

[1675-1690.]

THIS great and unfortunate Prince, according to Henault, fucceeded to his uncle Charles the Fourth, not fo much in his Duchy as in the hopes of recovering it, it having been wrefted from him by Louis the Fourteenth. He took as the motto to his ftandards, "Aut nunc, aut

nunquam;" but was not the more fuccefsful, the Marshal Crequi continually preventing his entrance into his dominions. He was more fortunate,

fortunate, however, when he fought for others, and gained for his relation Leopold Emperor of Germany (whose cause he had espoused) many victories, both over his rebellious fubjects and over the Turks. He was a Prince of great honour and piety, and, according to Marshal Berwick, fo difinterefted, that when the EmpeFor was difpofed to go to war with France (which was the only chance the Duke had of recovering his Duchy), he wrote to him to tell him, that he ought to prefer the general good of Christianity to his private animofities, and that if at that particular period he would employ all his forces in Hungary against the Turks, he could nearly promife him to drive those infidels out of Europe.

The Emperor agreed to this magnanimous propofal of the Duke of Lorraine, and fent to him to come to him at Vienna, to take the command of his armies. On his journey he was taken ill of a fever, and, a few hours before he died, wrote the following letter to the Emperor, which breathes the fpirit of a Man, a Hero, and a Chriftian:

"Sire,

"AUSSITOT que j'ai reçu vos ordres, je "fuis parti d'Infpruk pour me rendre à Vienne,

"mais