As you have written on the Greek arts and artists, I wish you had made
your treatise as much the object of your caution as the Greek artists
made their works; which, before dismissing them, they exhibited to
publick view, in order to be examined by everybody, and especially by
competent judges of the art. The trial was held during the grand, chiefly
the Olympian, games; and all Greece was interested on Ætion’s producing
his picture of the nuptials of Alexander and Roxana. You, Sir, wanted a
Proxenidas to be judged by, as well as that artist; and had it not been
for your mysterious concealment, I might have communicated your treatise,
before its publication, to some learned men and connoisseurs of my
acquaintance, without mentioning the author’s name.
One of them visited Italy twice, where he devoted all his time to a most
anxious examination of painting, and particularly several months to each
eminent picture, at the very place where it was painted; the only method,
you know, to form a connoisseur. The judgment of a man able to tell you
which of Guido’s altar-pieces is painted on taffeta, or linnen, what sort
of wood Raphael chose for his transfiguration, &c. the judgment of such a
man, I fancy, must be allowed to be decisive.
Another of my acquaintance has studied antiquity: he knows it by the very
smell;
_Callet & Artificem solo deprendere Odore._
Sectan. Sat.
He can tell you the number of knots on Hercules’s club; has reduced
Nestor’s goblet to the modern measure: nay, is suspected of meditating
solutions to all the questions proposed by Tiberius to the grammarians.
A third, for several years past, has neglected every thing but hunting
after ancient coins. Many a new discovery we owe to him; especially some
concerning the history of the ancient coiners; and, as I am told, he is
to rouse the attention of the world by a Prodromus concerning the coiners
of Cyzicum.
What a number of reproaches might you have escaped, had you submitted
your Essay to the judgment of these gentlemen! they were pleased to
acquaint me with their objections, and I should be sorry, for your
honour, to see them published.
Among other objections, the first is surprized at your passing by the
two Angels, in your description of the Raphael in the royal cabinet at
Dresden; having been told, that a Bolognese painter, in mentioning this
piece, which he saw at St. Sixtus’s at Piacenza, breaks into these terms
of admiration: O! what Angels of Paradise[14]! by which he supposes those
Angels to be the most beautiful figures of the picture.
The same person would reproach you for having described that picture in
the manner of Raguenet[15].
The second concludes the beard of Laocoon to be as worthy of your
attention as his contracted belly: for every admirer of Greek works, says
he, must pay the same respect to the beard of Laocoon, which father Labat
paid to that of the Moses of Michael Angelo.
This learned Dominican,
_Qui mores hominum multorum vidit & urbes_,
has, after so many centuries, drawn from this very statue an evident
proof of the true fashion in which Moses wore his own individual beard,
and whose imitation must, of course, be the distinguishing mark of every
true Jew[16].
There is not the least spark of learning, says he, in your remarks on the
Peplon of the three vestals: he might perhaps, on the very inflection of
the veil, have discovered to you as many curiosities as Cuper himself
found on the edge of the veil of Tragedy in the Apotheosis of Homer[17].
We also want proof of the vestals being really Greek performances: our
reason fails us too often in the most obvious things. If unhappily the
marble of these figures should be proved to be no Lychnites, they are
lost, and your treatise too: had you but slightly told us their marble
was large-grained, that would have been a sufficient proof of their
authenticity; for it would be somewhat difficult to determine the bigness
of the grains with such exactness as to distinguish the Greek marble from
the Roman of Luna. But the worst is, they are even denied the title of
vestals.
The third mentioned some heads of Livia and Agrippina, without that
pretended profile of yours. Here he thinks you had the most lucky
occasion to talk of that kind of nose by the ancients called _Quadrata_,
as an ingredient of beauty. But you no doubt know, that the noses of
some of the most famous Greek statues, viz. the Medicean Venus, and
the Picchinian Meleager, are much too thick for becoming the model of
beauty, in that kind, to our artists.
I shall not, however, gall you with all the doubts and objections
raised against your treatise, and repeated to nauseousness, upon the
arrival of an Academician, the Margites of our days, who, being shewed
your treatise, gave it a slight glance, then laid it aside, offended
as it were at first sight. But it was easy to perceive that he wanted
his opinion to be asked, which we accordingly all did. “The author,
said he very peremptorily, seems not to have been at much pains with
this treatise: I cannot find above four or five quotations, and those
negligently inserted; no chapter, no page, cited; he certainly collected
his remarks from books which he is ashamed to produce.”
Yet cannot I help introducing another gentleman, sharp-sighted enough
to pick out something that had escaped all my attention; viz. that the
Greeks were the first inventors of Painting and Sculpture; an assertion,
as he was pleased to express himself, entirely false, having been told it
was the Egyptians, or some people still more ancient, and unknown to him.
Even the most whimsical humour may be turned to profit: nevertheless, I
think it manifest that you intended to talk only of good Taste in those
arts; and the first Elements of an art have the same proportion to good
Taste in it, as the seed has to the fruit. That the art was still in its
infancy among the Egyptians, when it had attained the highest degree of
perfection among the Greeks, may be seen by examining one single gem:
you need only consider the head of _Ptolomæus Philopator_ by Aulus, and
the two figures adjoining to it done by an Egyptian[18], in order to be
convinced of the little merit this nation could pretend to in point of
art.
The form and taste of their Painting have been ascertained by
Middleton.[19] The pictures of persons as big as life, on two mummies
in the royal cabinet of antiquities at Dresden, are evident instances
of their incapacity. But these relicks being curious, in several other
respects, I shall hereafter subjoin a short account of them.
I cannot, my friend, help allowing some reason for several of these
objections. Your negligence in your quotations was, no doubt, somewhat
prejudicial to your authenticity: the art of changing blue eyes to black
ones, certainly deserved an authority. You imitate Democritus; who
being asked, “What is man?” every body knows what was his reply. What
reasonable creature will submit to read all Greek scholiasts!
_Ibit eo, quo vis, qui Zonam perdidit_—
Hor.
Considering, however, how easily the human mind is biassed, either by
friendship or animosity, I took occasion from these objections to examine
your treatise with more exactness; and shall now, by the most impartial
censure, strive to clear myself from every imputation of prepossession in
your favour.
I will pass by the first and second page, though something might
be said on your comparison of the Diana with the Nausicaa, and the
application: nor would it have been amiss, had you thrown some more light
on the remark concerning the misused pictures of Corregio (very likely
borrowed from Count Tessin’s letters), by giving an account of the other
indignities which the pictures of the best artists, at the same time, met
with at Stockholm.
It is well known that, after the surrender of Prague to Count Konigsmark,
the 15th of July 1648, the most precious pictures of the Emperor Rodolph
II. were carried off to Sweden[20]. Among these were some pictures
of Corregio, which the Emperor had been presented with by their first
possessor, Duke Frederick of Mantua; two of them being the famous Leda,
and a Cupid handling his bow[21]. Christina, endowed at that time rather
with scholastic learning than taste, treated these treasures as the
Emperor Claudius did an Alexander of Apelles; who ordered the head to be
cut off, and that of Augustus to fill its place[22]. In the same manner
heads, hands, feet were here cut off from the most beautiful pictures;
a carpet was plastered over with them, and the mangled pieces fitted up
with new heads, &c. Those that fortunately escaped the common havock,
among which were the pieces of Corregio, came afterwards, together with
several other pictures, bought by the Queen at Rome, into the possession
of the Duke of Orleans, who purchased 250 of them, and among those eleven
of Corregio, for 9000 Roman crowns.
But I am not contented with your charging only the northern countries
with barbarism, on account of the little esteem they paid to the arts.
If good taste is to be judged in this manner, I am afraid for our French
neighbours. For having taken Bonn, the residence of the Elector of
Cologne, after the death of Max. Henry, they ordered the largest pictures
to be cut out of their frames, without distinction, in order to serve for
coverings to the waggons, in which the most valuable furniture of the
electoral castle was carried off for France. But, Sir, do not presume
on my continuing with mere historical remarks: I shall proceed with my
objections; after making the two following general observations.
I. You have written in a style too concise for being distinct. Were
you afraid of being condemned to the penalty of a Spartan, who could
not restrain himself to only three words, perhaps that of reading
Picciardin’s Pisan War? Distinctness is required where universal
instruction is the end. Meats are to suit the taste of the guests, rather
than that of the cooks,
——_Cœnæ fercula nostræ_
_Malim convivis quam placuisse coquis._
II. There appears, in almost every line of yours, the most passionate
attachment to antiquity; which perhaps I shall convince you of, by the
following remarks.
The first particular objection I have to make is against your third page.
Remember, however, that my passing by two pages is very generous dealing:
_non temere a me_
_Quivis ferret idem:_
Hor.
but let us now begin a formal trial.
The author talks of certain negligences in the Greek works, which ought
to be considered suitably to Lucian’s precepts concerning the Zeus of
Phidias: “Zeus himself, not his footstool;”[23] though perhaps he could
not be charged with any fault in the foot-stool, but with a very grievous
one in the statue.
Is it no fault that Phidias made his Zeus of so enormous a bulk, as
almost to reach the cieling of the temple, which must infallibly have
been thrown down, had the god taken it in his head to rise?[24] To have
left the temple without any cieling at all, like that of the Olympian
Jupiter at Athens, had been an instance of more judgment[25].
’Tis but justice to claim an explication of what the author means by
“negligences”. He perhaps might be pleased to get a passport, even for
the faults of the ancients, by sheltering them under the authority of
such titles; nay, to change them into beauties, as Alcæus did the spot
on the finger of his beloved boy. We too often view the blemishes of the
ancients, as a parent does those of his children:
_Strabonem_
_Appellat pætum pater, & pullum, male parvus_
_Si cui filius est._
Hor.
If these negligences were like those wished for in the Jalysus of
Protogenes, where the chief figure was out-shone by a partridge, they
might be considered as the agreeable negligée of a fine lady; but
this is the question. Besides, had the author consulted his interest,
he never would have ventured citing the Diomedes of Dioscorides: but
being too well acquainted with that gem, one of the most valued, most
finished monuments of Greek art; and being apprehensive of the prejudice
that might arise against the meaner productions of the ancients, on
discovering many faults in one so eminent as Diomedes; he endeavoured to
keep matters from being too nearly examined, and to soften every fault
into negligence.
How! if by argument I shall attempt to shew that Dioscorides understood
neither perspective, nor the most trivial rules of the motion of a human
body; nay, that he offended even against possibility? I’ll venture to do
it, though
_incedo per ignes_
_Suppositos cineri doloso._
Hor.
And perhaps I am not the first discoverer of his faults: yet I do not
remember to have seen any thing relative to them.
The Diomedes of Dioscorides is either a sitting, or a rising figure; for
the attitude is ambiguous. It is plain he is not sitting; and rising is
inconsistent with his action.
Our body endeavouring to raise itself from a seat, moves always
mechanically towards its sought-for centre of gravity, drawing back the
legs, which were advanced in sitting[26]; instead of which the figure
stretches out his right leg. Every erection begins with elevated heels,
and in that moment all the weight of the body is supported only by the
toes, which was observed by Felix[27], in his Diomedes: but here all
rests on the sole.
Nor can Diomedes, (if we suppose him to be a sitting figure, as he
touches with his left leg the bottom of his thigh) find, in raising
himself, the centre of his gravity, only by a retraction of his legs, and
of course cannot rise in that posture. His left hand resting upon the
bended leg, holds the palladion, whilst his right touches negligently the
pedestal with the point of a short sword; consequently he cannot rise,
neither moving his legs in the natural and easy manner required in any
erection, nor making use of his arms to deliver himself from that uneasy
situation.
There is at the same time a fault committed against the rules of
perspective.
The foot of the left bended leg, touching the cornice of the pedestal,
shews it over-reaching that part of the floor, on which the pedestal
and the right foot are situated, consequently the line described by the
hinder-foot is the fore on the gem, and _vice versa_.
But allowing even a possibility to that situation, it is contrary to the
Greek character, which is always distinguished by the natural and easy.
Attributes neither to be met with in the contortions of Diomedes, nor in
an attitude, the impossibility of which every one must be sensible of, in
endeavouring to put himself in it, without the help of former sitting.
Felix, supposed to have lived after Dioscorides, though preserving the
same attitude, has endeavoured to make its violence more natural, by
opposing to him the figure of Ulysses, who, as we are told, in order to
bereave him of the honour of having seized the Palladion, offered to rob
him of it, but being discovered, was repulsed by Diomedes; which being
his supposed action on the gem, allows violence of attitude[28].
Diomedes cannot be a sitting figure, for the Contour of his buttock and
thigh is free, and not in the least compressed: the foot of the bent leg
is visible, and the leg itself not bent enough.
The Diomedes represented by Mariette is absurd; the left leg resembling a
clasped pocket-knife, and the foot being drawn up so high as to make it
impossible in nature that it should reach the pedestal[29].
Faults of this kind cannot be called negligences, and would not be
forgiven in any modern artist.
Dioscorides, ’tis true, in this renowned performance did but copy
Polycletus, whose Doryphorus (as is commonly agreed) was the best rule
of human proportions[30]. But, though a copyist, Dioscorides escaped
a fault which his master fell into. For the pedestal, over which the
Diomedes of Polycletus leans, is contrary to the most common rules
of perspective; its cornices, which should be parallel, forming two
different lines.
I wonder at Perrault’s omitting to make objections against the ancient
gems.
I mean not to do any thing derogatory to the author, when I trace some of
his particular observations to their source.
The food prescribed to the young wrestlers, in the remoter times of
Greece, is mentioned by Pausanias[31]. But if the author alluded to the
passage which I have in view, why does he talk in general of milk-food,
when Pausanias particularly mentions soft cheese? Dromeus of Stymphilos,
we learn there, first introduced flesh meat.
My researches, concerning their mysterious art of changing blue eyes to
black ones, have not succeeded to my wish. I find it mentioned but once,
and that only by the bye by Dioscorides[32]. The author, by clearing up
this art, might perhaps have thrown a greater lustre over his treatise,
than by producing his new method of statuary. He had it in his power to
fix the eyes of the Newtons and Algarotti’s, on a problem worth their
attention, and to engage the fair sex, by a discovery so advantageous to
their charms, especially in Germany, where, contrary to Greece, large,
fine, blue eyes are more frequently met with than black ones.
There was a time when the fashion required to be green eyed:
_Et si bel oeil vert & riant & clair:_
Le Sire de Coucy, chans.
But I do not know whether art had any share in their colouring. And as to
the small-pox, Hippocrates might be quoted, if grammatical disquisitions
suited my purpose.
However, I think, no effects of the small-pox on a face can be so
much the reverse of beauty, as that defect which the Athenians were
reproachfully charged with, viz. a buttock as pitiful as their face was
perfect[33]. Indeed Nature, in so scantily supplying those parts, seemed
to derogate as much from the Athenian beauty, as, by her lavishness, from
that of the Indian Enotocets, whose ears, we are told, were large enough
to serve them for pillows.
As for opportunities to study the nudities, our times, I think, afford
as advantageous ones as the Gymnasies of the ancients. ’Tis the fault of
our artists to make no use of that[34] proposed to the Parisian artists,
viz. to walk, during the summer season, along the Seine, in order to have
a full view of the naked parts, from the sixth to the fiftieth year.
’Tis perhaps to Michael Angelo’s frequenting such opportunities that
we owe his celebrated Carton of the Pisan war[35], where the soldiers
bathing in a river, at the sound of a trumpet leap out of the water, and
make haste to huddle on their cloaths.
One of the most offensive passages of the treatise is, no doubt, the
unjust debasement of the modern sculptors beneath the ancients. These
latter times are possessed of several Glycons in muscular heroic figures,
and, in tender youthful female bodies, of more than one Praxiteles.
Michael Angelo, Algardi, and Sluter, whose genius embellished Berlin,
produced muscular bodies,
——_Invicti membra Glyconis,_
Hor.
in a style rivalling that of Glycon himself; and in delicacy the
Greeks are perhaps even outdone by _Bernini_, _Fiammingo_, _Le Gros_,
_Rauchmüller_, _Donner_.
The unskilfulness of the ancients, in shaping children, is agreed upon
by our artists, who, I suppose, would for imitation choose a Cupid of
Fiammingo rather than of Praxiteles himself. The story of M. Angelo’s
placing a Cupid of his own by the side of an antique one, in order to
inform our times of the superiority of the ancient art, is of no weight
here: for no work of Michael Angelo can bring us so near perfection as
Nature herself.
I think it no hyperbole to advance, that Fiammingo, like a new
Prometheus, produced creatures which art had never seen before him. For,
if from almost all the children on ancient gems[36] and reliefs[37], we
may form a conclusion of the art itself, it wanted the true expression
of childhood, as looser forms, more milkiness, and unknit bones. Faults
which, from the epoch of Raphael, all children laboured under, till the
appearance of _Francis Quesnoy_, called Fiammingo, whose children having
the advantages of suitable innocence and nature, became models to the
following artists, as in youthful bodies Apollo and Antinous are: an
honour which _Algardi_, his contemporary, may be allowed to share.
Their models in clay are, by our artists, esteemed superior to all the
antique marble children; and an artist of genius and talents assured me,
that during a stay of seven years at Vienna, he saw not one copy taken
from an ancient Cupid in that academy.
Neither do I know on what singular idea of beauty, the ancient artists
founded their custom, of hiding the foreheads of their children and
youths with hair. Thus a Cupid was represented by Praxiteles[38]; thus a
Patroclus, in a picture mentioned by Philostratus[39]: and there is no
statue nor bust, no gem nor coin of Antinous, in which we do not find him
thus dressed. Hence, perhaps, that gloom, that melancholy, with which all
the heads of this favourite of Hadrian are marked.
Is not there in a free open brow more nobleness and sublimity? and does
not _Bernini_ seem to have been better acquainted with beauty than the
ancients, when he removed the over-shadowing locks from the forehead
of young Lewis XIV. whose bust he was then executing? “Your Majesty,
said Bernini, is King, and may with confidence shew your brow to all
the world.” From that time King and court dressed their hair à la
Bernini[40].
His judgment of the bas-reliefs on the monument of Pope Alexander VI[41].
leads us to some remarks on those of antiquity. “The skill in bas-relief,
said he, consists in giving the air of relief to the flat: the figures of
that monument seem what they are indeed, not what they are not.”
The chief end of bas-relief is to deck those places that want historical
or allegorical ornaments, but which have neither cornices sufficiently
spacious, nor proportions regular enough to allow groupes of entire
statues: and as the cornice itself is chiefly intended to shelter the
subordinate parts from being directly or indirectly hurt, no bas-relief
must exceed the projection thereof; which would not only make the cornice
of no use, but endanger the figures themselves.
The figures of ancient bas-reliefs shoot commonly so much forward as to
become almost round. But bas-relief being founded on fiction, can only
counterfeit reality; its perfection is well to imitate; and a natural
mass is against its nature: if flat, it ought to appear projected, and
_vice versa_. If this be true, it must of course be allowed that figures
wholly round are inconsistent with it, and are to be considered as solid
marble pillars built upon the theatre, whose aim is mere illusion; for
art, as is said of tragedy, wins truth from fiction, and that by truth.
To art we often owe charms superior to those of nature: a real garden and
vegetating trees, on the stage, do not affect us so agreeably, as when
well expressed by the imitating art. A rose of _Van Huisum_, mallows of
_Veerendal_, bewitch us more than all the darlings of the most skilful
gardener: the most enticing landscape, nay, even the charms of the
Thessalian Tempe, would not, perhaps, affect us with that irresistible
delight which, flowing from _Dietrick_’s pencil, enchants our senses and
imagination.
By such instances we may safely form a judgment of the ancient
bas-reliefs: the royal cabinet at Dresden is possessed of two eminent
ones: a Bacchanal on a tomb, and a sacrifice to Priapus on a large marble
vase.
The bas-relief claims a particular kind of sculpture; a method that
few have succeeded in, of which _Matielli_ may be an instance. The
Emperor Charles VI. having ordered some models to be prepared by the
most renowned artists, in bas-relief, intended for the spiral columns
at the church of S. Charles Borromæo; _Matielli_, already famous, was
principally thought of; but however refused the honour of so considerable
a work, on account of the enormous bulk of his model, which requiring
too great cavities, would have diminished the mass of the stone, and of
course weakened the pillars. _Mader_ was the artist, whose models were
universally applauded, and who by his admirable execution proved that he
deserved that preference. These bas-reliefs represent the story of the
patron of this church.
It is in general to be observed, first, that this kind of sculpture
admits not indifferently of every attitude and action; as for instance,
of too strong projections of the legs. Secondly, That, besides disposing
of the several modelled figures in well-ranged groupes, the diameter of
every one ought to be applied to the bas-relief itself, by a lessened
scale: as for instance, the diameter of a figure in the model being one
foot, the profile of the same, according to its size, will be three
inches, or less: the rounder a figure of that diameter, the greater the
skill. Commonly the relief wants perspective, and thence arise most of
its faults.
Though I proposed to make only a few remarks on the ancient bas-relief,
I find myself, like a certain ancient Rhetor, almost under a necessity
of being new-tuned. I have strayed beyond my limits; though at the same
time I remembered that there is a law among commentators, to content
themselves with bare remarks on the contents of a treatise: and also
sensible that I am writing a letter, not a book, I consider that I may
draw some instructions for my own use,
——_ut vineta egomet cædam mea,_
Hor.
from some peoples impetuosity against the author; who, because they are
hired for it, seem to think that writing is confined to them alone.
The Romans, though they worshipped the deity Terminus (the guardian God
of limits and borders in general; and, if it please these gentlemen, of
the limits in arts and sciences too), allowed nevertheless an universal
unrestrained criticism: and the decisions of some Greeks and Romans,
in matters of an art, which they did not practise, seem nevertheless
authentick to our artists.
Nor can I find, that the keeper of the temple of peace at Rome, though
possessed of the register of the pictures there, pretended to monopolize
remarks and criticisms upon them; Pliny having described most of them.
_Publica materies privati juris sit_—
Hor.
’Tis to be wished, that, roused by a Pamphilus and an Apelles, artists
would take up the pen themselves, in order to discover the mysteries of
the art to those that know how to use them,
_Ma di costor’, che à lavorar s’accingono,_
_Quattro quinti, per Dio, non sanno leggere._
Salvator Rosa, Sat. III.
Two or three of these are to be commended; the rest contented themselves
with giving some historical accounts of the fraternity. But what could
appear more auspicious to the improvement of the art, even by the
remotest posterity, than the work attempted by the united forces of the
celebrated Pietro da Cortona[42] and Padre Ottonelli? Nevertheless this
same treatise, except only a few historical remarks, and these too to be
met with in an hundred books, seems good for nothing, but
_Ne scombris tunicæ desint, piperique cuculli._
Sectan. Sat.
How trivial, how mean are the great _Poussin_’s reflexions on painting,
published by Bellori, and annexed to his life of that artist[43]?
Another digression!—let me now again resume the character of your
Aristarchus.
You are bold enough to attack the authority of _Bernini_, and to
challenge a man, the bare mention of whose name would do honour to any
treatise. It was _Bernini_, you ought to recollect, Sir, who at the
same age in which Michael Angelo performed his _Studiolo_[44], viz. in
his eighteenth year, produced his Daphne, as a convincing instance of
his intimacy with the ancients, at an age in which perhaps the genius of
Raphael was yet labouring under darkness and ignorance!
_Bernini_ was one of those favourites of nature, who produce at the same
time vernal blossoms and autumnal fruits; and I think it by no means
probable, that his studying nature in riper years misled either him
or his disciples. The smoothness of his flesh was the result of that
study, and imparted to the marble the highest possible degree of life
and beauty. Indeed ’tis nature which endows art with life, and “vivifies
forms,” as Socrates says[45], and Clito the sculptor allows. The great
Lysippus, when asked which of his ancestors he had chosen for his
master, replied, “None; but nature alone.” It is not to be denied, that
the too close imitation of antiquity is very often apt to lead us to a
certain barrenness, unknown to those who imitate nature: various herself,
nature teaches variety, and no votary of her’s can be charged with a
sameness: whereas Guido, Le Brun, and some other votaries of antiquity,
repeated the same face in many of their works. A certain ideal beauty was
become so familiar to them, as to slide into their figures even against
their will.
But as for such an imitation of nature, as is quite regardless of
antiquity, I am entirely of the author’s opinion; though I should have
chosen other artists as instances of following nature in painting.
_Jordans_ certainly has not met with the regard due to his merit; let
me appeal to an authority universally allowed. “There is, says Mr.
d’Argenville, more expression and truth in Jordans, than even in Rubens.
“Truth is the basis and origin of perfection and beauty; nothing, of any
kind whatever, can be beautiful or perfect, without being truly what it
ought to be, without having all it ought to have.”
The solidity of this judgment presupposed, _Jordans_, according to
Rochefoucault’s maxims, ought rather to be ranked among the greatest
originals, than among the mimicks of common nature, where _Rembrandt_
may fill up his place, as _Raoux_ or _Vatteau_ that of _Stella_; though
all these painters do nothing but what Euripides did before them; they
draw man _ad vivum_. There are no trifles, no meannesses in the art, and
if we recollect of what use the _Caricatura_ was to Bernini, we should
be cautious how we pass judgment even on the Dutch forms. That great
genius, they say[46], owed to this monster of the art, a distinction for
which he was so eminent, the “Franchezza del Tocco.” When I reflect on
this, I am forced to alter my former opinion of the _Caricatura_, so far
as to believe that no artist ever acquired a perfection therein without
gaining a farther improvement in the art itself. “It is, says the author,
a peculiar distinction of the ancients to have gone beyond nature:” our
artists do the same in their _Caricaturas_: but of what avail to them are
the voluminous works they have published on that branch of the art?
The author lays it down, in the peremptory style of a legislator, that
“Precision of Contour can only be learned from the Greeks:” but our
academies unanimously agree, that the ancients deviate from a strict
Contour in the clavicles, arms, knees, &c. over which, in spite of
apophyses and bones, they drew their skin as smooth as over mere flesh;
whereas our academies teach to draw the bony and cartilaginous parts,
more angularly, but the fat and fleshy ones more smooth, and carefully to
avoid falling into the ancient style. Pray, Sir, can there be any error
in the advices of academies _in corpore_?
_Parrhasius_ himself, the father of Contour, was not, by Pliny’s
account[47], master enough to hit the line by which completeness is
distinguished from superfluity: shunning corpulency he fell into
leanness: and _Zeuxis_’s Contour was perhaps like that of Rubens, if it
be true that, to augment the majesty of his figures, he drew with more
completeness. His female figures he drew like those of Homer[48], of
robust limbs: and does not even the tenderest of poets, Theocritus, draw
his Helen as fleshy and tall[49] as the Venus of Raphael in the assembly
of the gods in the little Farnese? Rubens then, for painting like Homer
and Theocritus, needs no apology.
The character of Raphael, in the treatise, is drawn with truth and
exactness: but well may we ask the author, as Antalcidas the Spartan
asked a sophist, ready to burst forth in a panegyrick on Hercules, “Who
blames him?” The beauties however of the Raphael at Dresden, especially
the pretended ones of the Jesus, are still warmly disputed.
_What you admire, we laugh at._
Why did not he rather display his patriotism against those Italian
connoisseurs, whose squeamish stomachs rise against every Flemish
production?
_Turpis Romano Belgicus ore color._
Propert. L. II. Eleg. 8.
And indeed are not colours so essential, that without them no picture
can aspire to universal applause? Do not their bewitching charms cover
the most grievous faults? They are the harmonious melody of painting;
whatever is offensive vanishes by their splendor, and souls animated with
their beauties are absorbed in beholding, as the readers of Homer are
by his flowing harmony, so as to find no faults. These, joined to that
important science of Chiaro-Oscuro, are the characteristicks of Flemish
painting.
Agreeably to affect our eye is the first thing in a picture[50], which
to obtain, obvious charms are wanted; not such as spring only from
reflection. Colouring moreover belongs peculiarly to pictures; whereas
design ought to be in every draught, print, &c. and indeed seems easier
to be attained than colouring.
The best colourists, according to a celebrated writer[51], have always
come _after_ the inventors and contourists; we all know the vain attempts
of the famous Poussin. In short, all those
_Qui rem Romanam Latiumque augescere student,_
Ennius.
must here acknowledge the superiority of the Flemish art; the painter
being really but nature’s mimick, is the more perfect the better he
mimicks her.
_Ast heic, quem nunc tu tam turpiter increpuisti,_
Ennius.
the delicate _Van der Werf_, whose performances, worth their weight
in gold, are the ornaments of royal cabinets only, has made nature
inimitable to every Italian pencil; he allures the connoisseur’s eye
as well as that of the clown; and, as an English poet says, “that no
pleasing poet ever wrote ill,” surely the Flemish painter obtained that
applause which was denied to Poussin.
I should be glad to see many pictures as happily fancied, as well
composed, as enticingly painted as some of _Gherard Lairesse_: let me
appeal to every unprepossessed artist at Paris, acquainted with the
_Stratonice_, the most eminent, and no doubt the first ranked picture in
the cabinet of Mr. de la Boixieres[52].
The subject is of no trivial choice: King Seleucus I.[53] resigned
his wife Stratonice, a daughter of Demetrius Poliorcetes, to his son
Antiochus, whom a violent passion for his mother-in-law had thrown into
a dangerous sickness: after many unsuccessful inquiries, the physician
Erasistratus discovered the true cause, and found that the only means of
restoring the prince’s health, was, the condescension of the father to
the love of his son: the King resigned his Queen, and at the same time
declared Antiochus King of the East.
Stratonice, the chief person, is the noblest figure, a figure worthy
Raphael himself. The charming Queen,
_Colle sob idæo vincere digna deas,_
Ovid. Art.
with slow and hesitating steps, approaches the bed of her new lover; but
still with the countenance of a mother, or rather of a sacred vestal.
In the profile of her face you may read shame mingled with gentle
resignation to the will of her lord. She has the softness of her sex,
the majesty of a queen, an awful submission to the sacred ceremony, and
all the sageness required in so extraordinary and delicate a situation.
Dressed with a masterly skill, the artist, from the colour of her
cloaths, may learn how to paint the purple of the ancients; for it is not
generally known that it resembled fadeing, ruddy, vine-leaves[54].
Behind her stands the King, dressed in a darker habit, in order to give
the more relief to the Queen, to spare confusion to her, shame to the
Prince, and not to interrupt his joy. Expectation and acquiescence are
blended in his face, which is taken from the profile of his best coins.
The Prince, a beautiful half-naked youth, sitting in his bed, has some
resemblance of his father; his pale face bears witness of the fever,
that lately had raged in his veins; but fancy sees returning health, not
shame, in that soft-rising ruddiness diffused over his cheeks.
The physician and priest Erasistratus, venerable like the Calchas of
Homer, standing before the bed, is the only speaker, authorised by the
King, whose will he declares to the Prince; and whilst, with one hand, he
leads the Queen to the embraces of her lover, with the other he presents
him with the diadem. Joy and astonishment flash from the Prince’s face
on the approach of his Queen
——_darting all the soul in missive love_:
though nobly restrained by reverence, he bends his head, and seems to
comprise his happiness in a single thought.
The characters indeed are distributed with so much ingenuity, that they
seem to give a lustre and energy to each other.
The largest share of light is displayed on Stratonice: she claims our
first regard. The priest, though in a weaker light, is raised by his
gesture: he is the speaker, and around him reign solemn stillness and
attention.
The Prince, the second person, has a larger share of light; and though
the artist, led by his skill, chose rather to make a beautiful Queen the
chief support of his groupe than a sick Prince, He nevertheless maintains
his due rank, and becomes the most eminent person of the whole, by his
expression. His face contains the greatest secrets of the art,
_Quales nequeo monstrare & sentio tantum._
Juvenal. Sat. VII.
Even those motions of the soul, which otherwise seem opposite to each
other, mingle here with peaceful harmony; a timid red spreading over his
sickly face, announces health, like the faint glimmerings of the morn,
which, though veiled by night, announce the day, and even a bright one.
The genius and taste of the artist shines forth in every part of his
work: even the vases are copied from the best antique ones; the table
before the bed, is, like Homer’s, of ivory.
The distances behind the figures represent a magnificent Greek building,
whose decorations seem allegorical. The roof of a portal is supported
by Cariatides embracing each other, as images of the tender friendship
between father and son, and alluding, at the same time, to the nuptial
ceremony.
Though faithful to history, the painter was nevertheless a poet: in
order to represent some circumstances, he filled even the furniture with
sentiments. The Sphinxes by the Prince’s bed allude to his problematic
sickness, the enquiries of Erasistratus, and his sagacity in discovering
its true cause.
I have been told that some young Italian artists, when considering this
picture, and perceiving the Prince’s arm perhaps a trifle too big, went
off without enquiring into the subject itself. Should even Minerva
herself, as she once did to Diomedes, attempt to deliver some people from
the mist they labour under, by heaven! the attempt were vain!
——_pauci dignoscere possunt_
_Vera bona, atque illis multum diversa, remota_
_Erroris nebula._
Juv. X.
I have run into this long digression, in order to throw some light on one
of the first productions of the art, which is nevertheless but little
known.
The idea of noble simplicity and sedate grandeur in Raphael’s figures,
might rather, as two eminent authors express it[55], be called “still
life.” It is indeed the standard of the Greek art: however, indiscreetly
commended to young artists, it might beget as dangerous consequences, as
precepts of energetick conciseness in the style; the direct method to
make it barren and unpleasing.
“In youths, says Cicero[56], there must be some superfluity, something
to be taken off: prematurity spoils the juices, and it is easier to lop
the young rank branches of a vine, than to restore its vigour to a worn
out trunk.” Not to mention, that figures wanting gesture would, by the
bulk of mankind, be received as a speech before the Areopagites, where,
by a severe law, the speaker was forbid to raise any passions, though
ever so gentle[57]: nay, pictures of this kind would be so many portraits
of young Spartans, who, with hands hid under their coats, and down-cast
eyes, stalk forth in silent solemnity[58].
Neither am I quite of the author’s opinion with regard to allegory; the
applying of which would too frequently do in painting, what was done in
geometry by introducing algebra: the one would soon be as difficult as
the other, and painting would degenerate into Hieroglyphicks.
The author attempts, in vain, to persuade us, that the majority of the
Greeks thought as the Egyptians. There was no more learning in the
painting of the platfond of the temple of Juno at Samos, than in that
of the Farnese gallery. It represented the love-intrigues of Jupiter
and Juno[59]: and, in the front of a temple of Ceres at Eleusis, there
was nothing but representations of a ceremony at the rites of that
goddess[60].
How to represent abstract ideas I do not yet distinctly conceive.
There may be the same difficulties which attend the endeavours of
representing to the senses a mathematical point—perhaps nothing less than
impossibility; and Theodoretus[61] has some reason in confining painting
to the senses. For those Hieroglyphicks which hint at abstract ideas,
in such a manner as to express, for instance[62], _youth_ by the number
XVI; _impossibility_ by two feet standing on water: those, I say, are
monograms, not images: to indulge them in painting is fostering chimæras,
is adding to Chinese pictures Chinese explications.
An adversary of allegory believes that Parrhasius, without any help from
it, could represent the contradictions in the character of the Athenians;
that he did it perhaps in several pictures. Supposing which
_Et sapit, & mecum facit, & Jove judicat æquo._
Hor.
The sentence of death pronounced against the leaders of the Athenian
navy, after their victory over the Spartans near the Arginuses, afforded
the artist a very sensible and rich image, to represent the Athenians, at
the same time, merciful and cruel.
The famous Theramenes, one of the leaders, accused his fellow-chieftains
of having neglected to gather and bury the bodies of their slain
countrymen: a charge sufficient to rouse the rage of the mob against
the victors; only six of whom had returned to Athens, the rest having
declined the storm.
Theramenes harangued the people in the most pathetick manner; intermixing
his speech with frequent pauses, in order to give vent to the loud
plaints of those who, in the battle, had lost their parents or relations.
He, at the same time, produced a man, who protested he had heard the last
words of the drowned, imprecating the publick revenge on their leaders.
In vain did Socrates, then a member of the council, with a few others,
oppose the accusation: the brave chieftains, instead of the honours
they hoped for, were condemned to die. One of them was the only son of
_Pericles_ and _Aspasia_.
Was it not in the power of Parrhasius, who was then alive, to enlarge the
meaning of his picture beyond the extent of bare history, only by drawing
the true characters of the authors of this scene, without the least help
from allegory? It would have been in his power, had he lived in our days.
Your pretensions concerning allegory seem indeed as reasonable an
imposition upon the painter, as that of Columella upon his farmer;
who wished to find him a philosopher like Democritus, Pythagoras, or
Eudoxus[63].
No better success, in my opinion, is to be expected from applying
allegory to decorations: the author would, at least, meet with as many
difficulties as Virgil, when hammering on the names of a Vibius Caudex,
Tanaquil Lucumo, or Decius Mus; to fit them for his Hexameter.
Custom has given its sanction to the use of shells in decorations: and
is not there as much nature in them as in the Corinthian capital? You
know its origin: a basket set upon the tomb of a young Corinthian girl,
filled with some of her play-things, and covered with a large brick,
being overgrown with the creeping branches of an acanthus, which had
taken root under it, was the first occasion of forming that capital.
_Callimachus_[64] the sculptor, surprized at the elegant simplicity of
that composition, took thence a hint for enriching architecture with a
new order.
Thus this capital, destined to support all the entablature of the column,
is but a basket of flowers; something so apparently inconsistent with the
ideas of architecture, that there was no use made of it in the time of
Pericles: for Pocock[65] thinks it strange that the temple of Minerva at
Athens had Doric, instead of Corinthian pillars. But time soon changed
this seeming oddity into nature; the basket lost, by custom, all its
former offensiveness, and
_Quod fuerat vitium desinit esse mora._
Ovid. Art.
We acknowledge no Egyptian law to forbid arbitrary ornaments; and so
fond have the artists of all ages been, both of the growth and form of
shells, as to change even the chariot of Venus into an enormous one. The
ancile, that Palladium of the Romans, was scooped into the form of a
shell[66]: we find them on antique lamps[67]. Nay, nature herself seems
to have produced their immense variety, and marvellous sinuations, for
the benefit of the art.
I have no mind to plead the bad cause of our unskilful decorators: only
let me adduce the arguments used by a whole tribe, (if the artists will
forgive the term), in order to prove the reasonableness of their art.
The painters and sculptors of Paris, endeavouring to deprive the
decorators of the title of artists, by alledging that they employed
neither their own intellectual faculties, nor those of the connoisseurs,
upon works not produced by nature, but rather the offsprings of
capricious art; the others are said to have defended themselves in the
following manner: “We are the followers of nature: like the bark of a
tree, variously carved, our decorations grow into various forms: then art
joins sportive nature, and corrects her: we do what the ancients did:
consult their decorations.”
Variety is the great and only rule to which decorators submit. Perceiving
that there is no perfect resemblance between two things in nature,
they likewise forsake it in their decorations; and careless of anxious
twining, leave it to the parts themselves to find their like, as the
atoms of Epicurus did. This liberty we owe to the very nation, which,
after having nobly exceeded all the narrow bounds of social formalities,
bestows so much pains upon communicating her improvements to her
neighbours. This style in decorations got the epithet of _Barroque_
taste, derived from a word signifying pearls and teeth of unequal
size[68].
Shells have at least as good a claim for being admitted among our
decorations, as the heads of sheep and oxen. You know that the ancients
placed those heads, stript of the skin, on the frizes, especially of the
Doric order, between the Triglyphs, or on the Metopes. We even meet with
them on the Corinthian frise of an old temple of Vesta, at Tivoli[69];
on tombs, as on one of the Metellus-family near Rome, and another of
Munatius Plancus near Gaeta[70]; on vases, as on a pair in the royal
cabinet at Dresden. Some modern artists, finding them perhaps unbecoming,
changed them into thunderbolts, like Vignola, or to roses, like Palladio
and Scamozzi[71].
We conclude from all this, that learning never had, nor indeed ought
to have, any share in an art so nearly related to what we call _Lusus
Naturæ_.
Thus the ancients thought: for, pray, what could be meant by a lizard on
Mentor’s cup?[72] The
_Picti squallentia terga lacerti_
Virg. G. IV.
make, to be sure, a lovely image amidst the flowers of a Rachel Ruysch,
but a very poor figure on a cup. Of what mysterious meaning are birds
picking grapes from vines, on an urn?[73] Images, perhaps, as void of
sense, and as arbitrary, as the fable of Ganymede embroidered on the
mantle, which Æneas presented to Cloanthus, as a reward of his victory in
the naval games[74].
To conclude: is there any thing contradictory between trophies and
the hunting-house of a Prince? Surely the author, though so zealous a
champion for the Greek taste, cannot pretend to propose to us that of
King Philip and the Macedonians, who, by the account of Pausanias[75],
did not erect their own trophies. Diana perhaps, amidst her nymphs and
hunting-equipages,
_Qualis in Eurotæ ripis, aut per juga Cynthi,_
_Exercet Diana choros, quam mille secutæ,_
_Hinc atque hinc glomerantur, Oreades_—
Virg.
might better suit the place; but we know that the antient Romans hung up
the arms of their defeated enemies over the out-sides of their doors,
to be everlasting monitors of bravery to every succeeding owner of the
house. Can trophies, having the same design, ever be misplaced on any
building of the Great?
I wish for a speedy answer to this letter. You cannot be angry at seeing
it published. The tribe of authors now imitate the conduct of the stage,
where the lover, with his soliloquy, entertains the pit. For the same
reason I shall receive, with all my heart, an answer,
_Quam legeret tereretque viritim publicus usus:_
Hor.
for
_Hanc veniam petimusque damusque vicissim._
Id.
AN
ACCOUNT
OF A
MUMMY,
IN
The Royal Cabinet of Antiquities at DRESDEN.
Among the Egyptian Mummies of the royal cabinet, there are two preserved
perfectly entire, and not in the least damaged, viz. the bodies of a
man and woman. The former, among all those that were brought into, and
publickly known in Europe, is perhaps the only one of its kind; on
account of an inscription thereon, which none of those who have written
on Mummies, except Della Valle alone, discovered on those bodies; and
Kircher, among all the drawings of Mummies communicated to him, and
published in his Oedipus, has but one, (the same which Della Valle had
been possessed of,) with an inscription; though his wooden cut[76] is as
faulty as all the copies made afterwards[77]. On that Mummy there are
these letters ΕΥ✠ΥΧΙ.
This same inscription is on the royal Mummy, of which I propose to give a
brief account, and in examining which I have employed all my attention,
that I might be certain of its being genuine, and not drawn by a modern
hand from the inscription of Della Valle: for ’tis well known, that those
bodies frequently pass through the hands of Jews. But the letters are
evidently drawn with the same blackish colour with which the face, hands,
and feet are stained. The first letter on our Mummy has the form of a
large Greek ϵ, expressed by Della Valle with an E angular, the other not
being usual in printing-presses.
All the four Mummies of the royal cabinet being bought at Rome, I
proposed to examine whether the Mummy with the inscription, was that
which Della Valle was possessed of, and found that both the entire royal
Mummies were exact resemblances of those described by him.
Both, besides the linnen bandages, of a Barracan-texture, rolled
innumerable times around the bodies, are wrapt up in several (and,
according to an observation made in England[78], in three) kinds of
coarser linnen; which, by particular bandages of the girdle-kind, is
fastened in such a manner as to involve even the smallest prominence of
the face. The first covering is a nice bit of linnen, slightly tinged
with a certain ground, much gilt, decked with various figures, and with
a painted one of the deceased.
On the Mummy marked with the inscription, this figure represents a
man, who died in the flower of life, with a thin curled beard, not
as represented by Kircher, like an old man with a long pointed one.
The colour of the face and hands is brown: the head encircled with
gilt diadems, marked with the sockets of jewels. From the gold chain,
painted around the neck, a sort of medal hangs down, marked with various
characters, crescents, &c. and this over-reaches the neck of a bird, that
of a hawk perhaps, as on the breasts of other Mummies[79]. In the right
hand of the figure is a dish filled with a red stuff, which being like
that used by the sacrificers[80], the deceased may be supposed to have
been a priest. The first and last finger of the left hand have rings; and
in the hand itself there is something round, of a dark-brown colour;
which, as Della Valle pretends, is a well-known fruit. The feet and legs
are bare, with sandals; the strings of which appearing between the great
toes, are, with a slip, fastened on the foot itself.
The inscription, above-mentioned, is beneath the breast.
The second Mummy is the still more refined figure of a young woman.
Among a great many medals, seemingly gilt, and other figures, there are
certain birds, and quadrupeds something analogous to lions; and towards
the extremities of the body there is an ox, perhaps an apis: Down from
one of the neck-chains hangs a gilt image of the sun. She has ear-rings,
and double bracelets on both her arms: rings on each hand, and on every
finger of the left one, but two on the first: whereas the right hand has
but two: with this hand she holds, like Isis, a small gilt vessel, of the
Greek Spondeion-kind, which was a symbol of the fertility of the Nile,
when held by the goddess[81]. In the left hand there is a sort of fruit,
like an ear of corn, of a greenish cast. The leaden seals, mentioned by
Della Valle, still remain on the first Mummy.
Compare this description with that in his travels[82], and you’ll find
the Mummies of the royal cabinet to be the same with those, which were
taken out of a deep well or cave, covered with sand, and sold to this
celebrated traveller by an Egyptian; and I believe they were purchased
from his heirs at Rome, though in the manuscript catalogue, joined to
that cabinet of antiquities, there is not the least hint of any such
purchase.
I have no design to attempt an explication of the ornaments and figures;
some remarks of that kind having already been made by Della Valle. The
following observations concern only the inscription.
The Egyptians, we know, employed a double character in expressing
themselves[83], the _sacred_ and the _vulgar_: the first was what is
called hieroglyphick; the other contained the characters of their
national language, and this is commonly said to be lost. All we know is
confined to the twenty-five letters of their alphabet.[84] Della Valle
seems inclined to give an instance of the contrary, in that inscription;
which Kircher, pushing his conjectures still farther, endeavours to lay
down as a foundation for a new scheme of his; and to support it by two
other remains of the same kind. For, he attempts to prove[85], that
the dialect was the only difference between the old Egyptian and Greek
tongue. According to his talent of finding what no body looks for, he
makes free with some ancient historical accounts; upon which he obtrudes
a fictitious sense, in order to make them tally with his scheme.
Herodotus, according to him, tells us, that King Psammetichus desired
some Greeks, who were perfect masters of their language, to go over to
Egypt, in order to instruct his people in the purity of the tongue. Hence
he concludes, that there was but one language in both countries. But that
Greek historian[86] gives an account entirely opposite: he tells us, that
Psammetichus, having received some services from the Carians and Ionians,
permitted them to settle in Egypt, for the instruction of youth in the
Greek language, in order to bring up interpreters.
There is no solidity in the rest of the Kircherian arguments; such as
those deduced from the frequent voyages of the Greek sages into Egypt,
and the mutual commerce between the two nations; which have not even
the strength of conjectures. For the very skill of Democritus, in the
sacred tongue of the Babylonians and Egyptians[87], proves only, that the
travelling sages learned the languages of the nations they conversed with.
Nor does the testimony of Diodorus, that Attica was originally an
Egyptian colony[88], seem to be here of any weight.
The inscription of the Mummy might indeed admit of Kircherian, or such
like conjectures, were the Mummy itself of the antiquity pretended by
Kircher. Cambyses, the conqueror of Egypt, partly exiled, and partly
killed the priests; from which fact Kircher confidently deduces as
consequences, the total abolition of the sacred rites, and from that the
ceasing to embalm bodies. He again appeals to a passage of Herodotus[89],
which, upon his word alone, others have as confidently quoted. Nay, a
certain pedant went so far as to pretend, that the Egyptian custom of
painting their dead, upon the varnished linnen of the Mummies, ceased
with the epoch of Cyrus[90].
But Herodotus says not a word, either of the total abolition of the
sacred rites, or of the abolition of the custom of preserving the
dead from putrefaction, after the time of Cambyses; nor does Diodorus
Siculus give any such hint: we may, on the contrary, from his account of
the funeral rites of the Egyptians, rather conclude, that this custom
prevailed even in his time; that is to say, when Egypt was changed into a
Roman province.
Hence it cannot be demonstrated that our Mummy was embalmed before the
Persian conquest.—But supposing it to be of that date, is it a necessary
consequence that a body preserved in the Egyptian manner, or even taken
care of by their priests, should be marked with Egyptian words?
Perhaps it is the body of some naturalised Ionian or Carian. We know that
Pythagoras entered into the Egyptian confession; nay, even consented to
be circumcised[91], in order to shorten his way to the mysteries of their
priests. The Carians themselves observed the sacred solemnities of Isis,
and even went so far in their superstition, as to mangle their faces
during the sacrifices offered to that deity[92].
Change the letter ι, in the inscription, into the diphthong ει, and you
have a Greek word: such negligences are often to be met with in Greek
marbles[93], and still more in Greek manuscripts; and with the same
termination it is to be found on a gem, and signifies, “FAREWELL”[94],
which was the usual ejaculation addressed by the living to the deceased;
the same we meet with on ancient epitaphs[95]; public decrees[96]; and
of letters it was the final conclusion[97].
There is on an ancient epitaph the word ΕΥΨΥΧΙ[98]; the form of the Ψ on
ancient stones and manuscripts is exactly the same[99] with the third
letter of ΕΥ✠ΥΧΙ, which was perhaps confounded with it.
But supposing the Mummy to be of later times, the adoption of a Greek
word becomes yet easier. The round form of the ϵ might be something
suspicious, with regard to its pretended antiquity; that form being never
found on the gems or coins before Augustus[100]. But this suspicion
becomes of no weight, by supposing that the Egyptians continued their
embalming, even after the time of that Emperor.
However, the word cannot be an Egyptian one, being inconsistent with the
remains of that ancient tongue in the modern Coptick, as well as with
their manner of writing; which was from the right to the left, as the
Etrurians did[101]; whereas the word in question (like some Egyptian
characters[102],) is traced from the left to the right. As for the
inscription discovered by Maillet[103], no interpreter has yet been
found. The Grecians, on the contrary, wrote in the occidental manner,
for six hundred years before the christian æra, witness the Sigæan
inscription, which is said to be of that date[104].
What has been said relates also to an inscription upon a piece of
stone[105], with Egyptian figures, communicated to Kircher by Carolo
Vintimiglia, a Palerman patrician. The letters ΙΤΙΨΙΧΙ are two words,
and signify, “Let the soul come.” This stone has met with the same fate
as the gem engraved with the head of Ptolomæus Philopator: for here an
Egyptian has joined two random figures, and there the inscription may be
of a Greek hand. The litterati know what little change it wants to be
orthographical.
AN
ANSWER
TO THE FOREGOING
LETTER,
AND
A further EXPLICATION of the SUBJECT.
I could not presume that so small a treatise as mine would be thought
of consequence enough to be brought to a publick trial. As it was
written only for a few _connoisseurs_, it seemed superfluous to give it
a learned air, by multiplying quotations. Artists want but hints: their
task, according to an ancient Rhetor, is “to perform, not to peruse;”
consequently every author, who writes for them, ought to be brief. Being
besides convinced, that the beauties of the art are founded rather on a
quick sense, and refined taste, than on profound meditation, I cannot
help thinking that the principle of Neoptolemus[106], “to philosophize
only with the few,” ought to be the chief consideration in every treatise
of this kind.
Several passages of my Essay are susceptible of explications, and,
having been publickly tried by an anonymous author, should be explained
and defended at the same time, if my circumstances would permit me to
enlarge[107]. As to his other remarks, the author, I hope, will guess at
my answer, without my giving one explicitly.—Indeed they do not require
any.
I am not in the least moved by the clamours concerning those pieces of
_Corregio_, which, by undoubted accounts, were not only brought to
_Sweden_[108], but even hung up in the stables at _Stockholm_. Reasoning
is of no use here: arguments of this kind admit of no other evidence but
that of _Æmilius Scaurus_ against _Valerius_ of _Sucro_: “He denies; I
affirm: Romans! ’tis yours to judge.”
And why should there be any thing more derogatory to the honour of the
Swedes, in my repeating Count _Tessin_’s relation, than in his giving
it? Perhaps, because the learned author of the circumstantial life of
Queen _Christina_ omits her indiscreet generosity towards _Bourdon_,
and that bad treatment which the pictures of _Corregio_ met with? or
was _Härleman_[109] himself charged with indiscretion or malice, on his
relating that, at _Lincöping_, he found a college, and seven professors,
but not one physician or artificer?
It was my design to explain myself more particularly, concerning the
negligences of the Greeks, had I been allowed time. The Greeks, as their
criticism on the partridge of Protogenes, and his blotting it[110],
evidently shews, were not ignorant in learned negligence. But the Zeus
of Phidias was the standard of sublimity, the symbol of the omnipresent
Deity; like Homer’s Eris, he stood upon the earth, and reached heaven;
he was, in the style of sacred poesy, “_What encompasses him?_ &c.” And
the world has been candid enough to excuse, nay, even to justify on such
reasons, the disproportions in the Carton of Raphael, representing the
fishing of Peter[111]. The criticism on the _Diomedes_, though solid,
is not against me: his action, abstractedly considered, with his noble
and expressive contour, are standards of the art; and that was all I
advanced[112].
The reflections on the Painting and Sculpture of the Greeks may be
reduced to four heads, viz.