HIS PERSONALITY AND OPINIONS
The personality of Constable was not romantic. In writing of him one
has no moods of wonderment or bafflement, and the pen is not tempted to
flights of wonder or fancy. The life of Turner might inspire a poem;
but plain prose is the only vehicle for a consideration of the life of
Constable. He was a sane, level-headed man compact of common-sense and
practicality, a man of one great, embracive idea: that having studied
the science of picture-making from the earlier masters, the landscape
painter must learn from Nature and not from the derivative pictures of
his contemporaries. Constable pursued that course with the
single-heartedness of a man who devotes his life to some great
commercial undertaking. Indeed the portraits of Constable might
represent a prosperous and cultured banker, especially those of his
later years, were it not for the full, observant eye that you feel
surveys a wider domain than Lombard Street. Religious in the true
sense, dutiful, humble before the mysteries of things; old-fashioned in
the true sense, a lover and a quoter of good poetry and of the Bible,
he had on occasion a sharp and shrewd tongue, but the sting was salved
by the absolute sincerity of his intention. Leslie devotes
considerable space to a record of Constable's opinions and sayings,
many of which have been quoted in these pages. Of a certain
contemporary he said--"More over-bearing meekness I never met with in
any one man." Of his own pictures he said--"They will never be
popular, for they have no handling. But I do not see any handling in
Nature."
Here is a saying about his art which sums up the whole tendency of his
life--"Whatever may be thought of my art, it is my own; and I would
rather possess a freehold, though but a cottage, than live in a palace
belonging to another." And here is his comment on the unintelligent
connoisseurship of his time--"The old rubbish of art, the musty,
commonplace, wretched pictures which gentlemen collect, hang up, and
display to their friends, may be compared to Shakespeare's--
'Beggarly account of empty boxes,
Alligators stuffed,' etc.
Nature is anything but this, either in poetry, painting, or in the
fields."
The lectures on Landscape Painting that he delivered at the Royal
Institution in Albemarle Street, at the Hampstead Assembly Rooms, and
at Worcester were never written, although an abstract of the first was
found among his papers. He spoke from brief notes and made much use of
a number of copies and engravings affixed to the walls. The notes
taken by Leslie and embodied in his _Life of Constable_ are the only
record we have apart from the abstract of the first lecture. The
belittlers of Claude should make a note of Constable's idolatry for
him:--"In Claude's landscape all is lovely--all amiable--all is amenity
and repose;--the calm sunshine of the heart. He carried landscape,
indeed, to perfection, that is, human perfection." Constable selected
four works as marking four memorable points in the history of
landscape--Titian's "Peter Martyr," Poussin's "Deluge," Rubens'
"Rainbow," and Rembrandt's "Mill." In the choice of the Rubens and the
Rembrandt everybody must concur. As Constable never visited Italy he
can only have known the "Peter Martyr" from engravings. It was
destroyed by fire in 1867, but a copy exists at S. Giovanni Paolo in
Venice. Constable had the courage of his opinions, and of all his
opinions the most astonishing is his strong disapproval of a national
collection of pictures. In 1822 he wrote--"should there be a National
Gallery (which is talked of) there will be an end of the art in poor
old England, and she will become, in all that relates to painting, as
much a nonentity as every other country that has one. The reason is
plain; the manufacturers of pictures are then made the criterions of
perfection, instead of Nature."
As a lecturer Constable seems to have relied in a great measure on the
inspiration of the moment. Leslie also records the charm of a most
agreeable voice, although pitched somewhat too low, and the play of his
very expressive countenance. His survey of the history of landscape
painting closed with an eulogy of Wilson, Gainsborough, Cozens, and
Girtin, and I may close with a brief passage, essential Constable, from
the lecture delivered at Hampstead on 25th July 1836. "The landscape
painter must walk in the fields with a humble mind. No arrogant man
was ever permitted to see Nature in all her beauty. If I may be
allowed to use a very solemn quotation, I would say most emphatically
to the student--'Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth.'"
The plates are printed by BEMROSE & SONS, LTD., Derby and London
The text at the BALLANTYNE PRESS, Edinburgh
"MASTERPIECES IN COLOUR" SERIES
ARTIST. AUTHOR.
VELAZQUEZ. S. L. Bensusan.
REYNOLDS. S. L. Bensusan.
TURNER. C. Lewis Hind.
ROMNEY. C. Lewis Hind.
GREUZE. Alys Eyre Macklin.
BOTTICELLI. Henry E. Binns.
ROSSETTI. Lucien Pissarro.
BELLINI. George Hay.
FRA ANGELICO. James Mason.
REMBRANDT. Josef Israels.
LEIGHTON. A. Lys Baldry.
RAPHAEL. Paul G. Konody.
HOLMAN HUNT. Mary E. Coleridge.
TITIAN. S. L. Bensusan.
MILLAIS. A. Lys Baldry.
CARLO DOLCI. George Hay.
GAINSBOROUGH. Max Rothschild.
TINTORETTO. S. L. Bensusan.
LUINI. James Mason.
FRANZ HALS. Edgcumbe Staley.
VAN DYCK. Percy M. Turner.
LEONARDO DA VINCI. M. W. Brockwell.
RUBENS. S. L. Bensusan.
WHISTLER. T. Martin Wood.
HOLBEIN. S. L. Bensusan.
BURNE-JONES. A. Lys Baldry.
VIGEE LE BRUN. C. Haldane Macfall.
CHARDIN. Paul G. Konody.
FRAGONARD. C. Haldane Macfall.
MEMLINC. W. H. J. & J. C. Weale.
CONSTABLE. C. Lewis Hind.
RAEBURN. James L. Caw.
JOHN S. SARGENT. T. Martin Wood.
LAWRENCE. S. L. Bensusan.
DUeRER. H. E. A. Furst.
MILLET. Percy M. Turner.
WATTEAU. C. Lewis Hind.
HOGARTH. C. Lewis Hind.
MURILLO. S. L. Bensusan.
WATTS. W. Loftus Hare.
INGRES. A. J. Finberg.
_Others in Preparation_.