On which Prospero remarks,--

"Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling

Of their afflictions?"

Now, whether Shakspeare intended it or not, it is not possible after

this for the reader to think of Ariel but in a human form; for slight

as these hints are, if they do not indicate the moral affections, they

at least imply something akin to them, which in a manner compels us to

invest the gentle Spirit with a general likeness to our own physical

exterior, though, perhaps, as indistinct as the emotion that called

for it.

We have thus considered the human being in his complex condition, of

body and spirit, or physical and moral; showing the impossibility of

even thinking of him in the one, to the exclusion of the other. We

may, indeed, successively think first of the form, and then of

the moral character, as we may think of any one part of either

analytically; but we cannot think of the _human being_ except

as a _whole_. It follows, therefore, as a consequence, that no

imitation of man can be true which is not addressed to us in this

double condition. And here it may be observed, that in Art there is

this additional requirement, that there be no discrepancy between the

form and the character intended,--or rather, that the form _must_

express the character, or it expresses nothing: a necessity which is

far from being general in actual nature. But of this hereafter.

Let us now endeavour to form some general notion of Man in his various

aspects, as presented by the myriads which people the earth. But whose

imagination is equal to the task,--to the setting in array before it

the countless multitudes, each individual in his proper form, his

proper character? Were this possible, we should stand amazed at the

interminable differences, the hideous variety; and that, too, no less

in the moral, than in the physical; nay, so opposite and appalling in

the former as hardly to be figured by a chain of animals, taking for

the extremes the fierce and filthy hyena and the inoffensive lamb.

This is man in the concrete,--to which, according to some, is to be

applied the _abstract Ideal!_

Now let us attempt to conceive of a being that shall represent all the

diversities of mind, affections, and dispositions, that fleck this

heterogeneous mass of humanity, and then to conceive of a Form that

shall be in such perfect affinity with it as to indicate them all. The

bare statement of the proposition shows its absurdity. Yet this must

be the office of a Standard Form; and this it must do, or it will be

a falsehood. Nor should we find it easier with any given number, with

twenty, fifty, nay, an hundred (so called) generic forms. We do not

hesitate to affirm, that, were it possible, it would be quite as easy

with one as with a thousand.

But to this it may be replied, that the Standard Form was never

intended to represent the vicious or degraded, but man in his most

perfect developement of mind, affections, and body. This is certainly

narrowing its office, and, unfortunately, to the representing of but

_one_ man; consequently, of no possible use beyond to the Painter

or Sculptor of Humanity, since every repetition of this perfect form

would be as the reflection of one multiplied by mirrors. But such

repetitions, it may be further answered, were never contemplated, that

Form being given only as an exemplar of the highest, to serve as a

guide in our approach to excellence; as we could not else know to a

certainty to what degree of elevation our conceptions might rise.

Still, in that case its use would be limited to a single object, that

is, to itself, its own perfectness; it would not aid the Artist in the

intermediate ascent to it,--unless it contained within itself all the

gradations of human character; which no one will pretend.

But let us see how far it is possible to _realize_ the Idea of a

_perfect_ Human Form.

We have already seen that the mere physical structure is not man, but

only a part; the Idea of man including also an internal moral being.

The external, then, in an _actually disjoined_ state, cannot,

strictly speaking, be the human form, but only a diagram of it. It is,

in fact, but a partial condition, becoming human only when united with

the internal moral; which, in proof of the union, it must of necessity

indicate. If we would have a true Idea of it, therefore, it must be as

a whole; consequently, the perfect physical exterior must have, as an

essential part, the perfect moral. Now come two important questions.

First, In what consists Moral Perfection? We use the word _moral_

here (from a want in our language) in its most comprehensive sense,

as including the spiritual and the intellectual. With respect to that

part of our moral being which pertains to the affections, in all their

high relations to God and man, we have, it is true, a sure and holy

guide. In a Christian land, the humblest individual may answer as

readily as the most profound scholar, and express its perfection in

the single word, Holiness. But what will be the reply in regard to the

Intellect? For what is a perfect Intellect? Is it the Dialectic, the

Speculative, or the Imaginative? Or, rather, would it not include them

all?

We proceed next to the Physical. What, then, constitutes its

Perfection? Here, it might seem, there can be no difficulty, and the

reply will probably be in naming all the excellent qualities in our

animal nature, such as strength, agility, fleetness, with every other

that can be thought of. The bare enumeration of these few qualities

may serve to show the nature of the task; yet a physically perfect

form requires them all; none must be omitted; it would else be

imperfect; nay, they must not only be there, but all be developed in

their highest degrees. We might here exclaim with Hamlet, though in a

very different sense,

"A combination and a form indeed!"

And yet there is no other way to express physical perfection. But

can it be so expressed? The reader must reply for himself. We will,

however, suppose it possible; still the task is incomplete without the

adjustment of these to the perfect Moral, in the highest known degrees

of its several elements. To those who can imagine _such_ a form

as shall be the sure exponent of _such_ a moral being,--and such

it must be, or it will be nothing,--we leave the task of constructing

this universal exemplar for multitudinous man. We may add, however,

one remark; that, supposing it possible thus to concentrate, and

with equal prominence, all the qualities of the species into one

individual, it can only be done by supplanting Providence, in other

words, by virtually overruling the great principle of subordination

so visibly impressed on all created life. For although, as we have

elswhere observed, there can be no sound mind (and the like may be

affirmed of the whole man), which is deficient in any one essential,

it does not therefore follow, that each of these essentials may not be

almost indefinitely differenced in the degrees of their developement

without impairing the human integrity. And such is the fact in actual

nature; nor does this in any wise affect the individual unity,--as

will be noticed hereafter.

We will now briefly examine the pretensions of what are called the

Generic Forms. And here we are met by another important characteristic

of the human being, namely, his essential individuality.

It is true that the human family, so called, is divided into many

distinct races, having each its peculiar conformation, color, and so

forth, which together constitute essential differences; but it is

to be remembered that these essentials are all physical; and _so

far_ they are properly generic, as implying a difference in kind.

But, though a striking difference is also observable in their moral

being, it is by no means of the same nature with that which marks

their physical condition, the difference in the moral being only of

degree; for, however fierce, brutal, stupid, or cunning, or gentle,

generous, or heroic, the same characteristics may each be paralleled

among ourselves; nay, we could hardly name a vice, a passion, or

a virtue, in Asia, Africa, or America, that has not its echo in

civilized Europe. And what is the inference? That climate and

circumstance, if such are the causes of the physical variety, have no

controlling power, except in degree, over the Moral. Does not this

undeniable fact, then, bring us to the fair conclusion, that the moral

being has no genera? To affirm otherwise would be virtually to

deny its responsible condition; since the law of its genus must be

paramount to all other laws,--to education, government, religion. Nor

can the result be evaded, except by the absurd supposition of generic

responsibilities! To us, therefore, it seems conclusive that a moral

being, as a free agent, cannot be subject to a generic law; nor

could he now be--what every man feels himself to be, in spite of

his theory--the fearful architect of his own destiny. In one sense,

indeed, we may admit a human genus,--such as every man must be in his

individual entireness.

Man has been called a microcosm, or little world. And such, however

mean and contemptible to others, is man to himself; nay, such he must

ever be, whether he wills it or not. He may hate, he may despise, yet

he cannot but cling to that without which he is not; he is the centre

and the circle, be it of pleasure or of pain; nor can he be other.

Touch him with misery, and he becomes paramount to the whole

world,--to a thousand worlds; for the beauty and the glory of the

universe are as nothing to him who is all darkness. Then it is that he

will _feel_, should he have before doubted, that he is not a mere

part, a fraction, of his kind, but indeed a world; and though little

in one sense, yet a world of awful magnitude in its capacity of

suffering. In one word, Man is a whole, _an Individual_.

If the preceding argument be admitted, it will be found to have

relieved the student of two delusive dogmas,--and the more delusive,

as carrying with them a plausible show of science.

As to the flowery declamations about Beauty, they would not here be

noticed, were they not occasionally met with in works of high merit,

and not unfrequently mixed up with philosophic truth. If they have

any definite meaning, it amounts to this,--that the Beautiful is the

summit of every possible excellence! The extravagance, not to say

absurdity, of such a proposition, confounding, as it does, all

received distinctions, both in the moral and the natural world, needs

no comment. It is hardly to be believed, however, that the writers in

question could have deliberately intended this. It is more probable,

that, in so expressing themselves, they were only giving vent to an

enthusiastic feeling, which we all know is generally most vague when

associated with admiration; it is not therefore strange that the

ardent expression of it should partake of its vagueness. Among the

few critical works of authority in which the word is so used, we may

mention the (in many respects admirable) Discourses of Sir Joshua

Reynolds, where we find the following sentence:--"The _beauty_ of

the Hercules is one, of the Gladiator another, of the Apollo another;

which, of course, would present three different Ideas of Beauty." If

this had been said of various animals, differing in _kind_, the

term so applied might, perhaps, have been appropriate. But the same

term is here applied to objects of the same kind, differing not

essentially even in age; we say _age_, inasmuch as in the three

great divisions, or periods, of human life, namely, childhood,

youth, and maturity, the characteristic conditions of each are so

_essentially_ distinct, as virtually to separate them into

positive kinds.

But it is no less idle than invidious to employ our time in

overturning the errors of others; if we establish Truth, they will

fall of themselves. There cannot be two right sides to any question;

and, if we are right, what is opposed to us must of necessity he

wrong. Whether we are so or not must be determined by those who admit

or reject what has already been advanced on the subject of Beauty, in

the first Discourse. It will be remembered, that, in the course of our

argument there, we were brought to the conclusion, that Beauty was

the Idea of a certain physical _condition_, both general and

ultimate; general, as presiding over objects of many kinds, and

ultimate, as being the _perfection_ of that peculiar condition in

each, and therefore not applicable to, or representing, its degrees

in any; which, as approximations only to the one supreme Idea, should

truly be distinguished by other terms. Accordingly, we cannot,

strictly speaking, say of two persons of the same age and sex,

differing from each other, that they are equally beautiful. We hear

this, indeed, almost daily; it is nevertheless not the true expression

of the actual impression made on the speaker, though he may not take

the trouble to examine and compare them. But let him do so, and we

doubt not that he would find the one to rise (in however slight a

degree) above the other; and, if he did not assign a different term

to the lower, it would be only because he was not in the habit of

marking, or did not think it worth his while to note, such nice

distinctions.

If there is a _first_ and a _last_ to any thing, the

intermediates can be neither one nor the other; and, if we so name

them, we speak falsely. It is no less so with Beauty, which, being at

the head, or first in a series, admits no transference of its title.

We mean, if speaking strictly; which, however, we freely acknowledge,

no one can; but that is owing to the insufficiency of language, which

in no dialect could supply a hundredth part of the terms needed to

mark every minute shade of difference. Perhaps no subject requiring a

wider nomenclature has one so contracted; and the consequence is,

that no subject is more obscured by vague expressions. But it is the

business of the Artist, if he cannot form to himself the corresponding

terms, to be prepared at least to perceive and to note these various

shades. We do not say, that an actual acquaintance with all the nice

distinctions is an essential requisite, but only that it will not be

altogether useless to be aware of their existence; at any rate, it

may serve to shield him from the annoyance of false criticism, when

censured for wanting beauty where its presence would have been an

impertinence.

Before we quit the subject, it may not be amiss to observe, that, in

the preceding remarks, our object has been not so much to insist on

correct speaking as correct thinking. The poverty of language,

as already admitted, has made the former impossible; but, though

constrained in this, as in many other cases where a subordinate is put

for its principal, to apply the term Beautiful to its various degrees,

yet a right apprehension of what Beauty _is_ may certainly

prevent its misapplication as to other objects having no relation to

it. Nor is this a small matter where the avoiding of confusion is an

object desirable; and there is clearly some difference between an

approach to precision and utter vagueness.

We have now to consider how far the Correspondence between the

outward form and the inward being, which is assumed by the Artist, is

supported by fact.

In a fair statement, then, of facts, it cannot be denied that with

the mass of men the outward intimation of character is certainly very

faint, with many obscure, and with some ambiguous, while with others

it has often seemed to express the very reverse of the truth. Perhaps

a stronger instance of the latter could hardly occur than that cited

in a former discourse in illustration of the physical relation of

Beauty; where it was shown that the first and natural impression from

a beautiful form was not only displaced, but completely reversed, by

the revolting discovery of a moral discrepancy. But while we admit, on

the threshold, that the Correspondence in question cannot be sustained

as universally obvious, it is, nevertheless, not apprehended that this

admission can affect our argument, which, though in part grounded

on special cases of actual coincidence, is yet supported by other

evidences, which lead us to regard all such discrepancies rather as

exceptions, and as so many deviations from the original law of our

nature, nay, which lead us also rationally to infer at least a future,

potential correspondence in every individual. To the past, indeed, we

cannot appeal; neither can the past be cited against us, since little

is known of the early history of our race but a chronicle of their

actions; of their outward appearance scarcely any thing, certainly not

enough to warrant a decision one way or the other. Should we assume,

then, the Correspondence as a primeval law, who shall gainsay it? It

is not, however, so asserted. We may nevertheless hold it as a matter

of _faith_; and simply as such it is here submitted. But faith of

any kind must have some ground to rest on, either real or supposed,

either that of authority or of inference. Our ground of faith, then,

in the present instance, is in the universal desire amongst men to

_realize_ the Correspondence. Nothing is more common than,

on hearing or reading of any remarkable character, to find this

instinctive craving, if we may so term it, instantly awakened, and

actively employed in picturing to the imagination some corresponding

form; nor is any disappointment more general, than that which follows

the detection of a discrepancy on actual acquaintance. Indeed, we can

hardly deem it rash, should we rest the validity of this universal

desire on the common experience of any individual, taken at

random,--provided only that he has a particle of imagination. Nor

is its action dependent on our caprice or will. Ask any person of

ordinary cultivation, not to say refinement, how it is with him,

when, his imagination has not been forestalled by some definite fact;

whether he has never found himself _involuntarily_ associating

the good with the beautiful, the energetic with the strong, the

dignified with the ample, or the majestic with the lofty; the refined

with the delicate, the modest with the comely; the base with the

ugly, the brutal with the misshapen, the fierce with the coarse and

muscular, and so on; there being scarcely a shade of character to

which the imagination does not affix some corresponding form.

In a still more striking form may we find the evidence of the law

supposed, if we turn to the young, and especially to those of a poetic

temperament,--to the sanguine, the open, and confiding, the creatures

of impulse, who reason best when trusting only to the spontaneous

suggestions of feeling. What is more common than implicit faith in

their youthful day-dreams,--a faith that lives, though dream after

dream vanish into common air when the sorcerer Fact touches their

eyes? And whence this pertinacious faith that _will_ not die, but

from a spring of life, that neither custom nor the dry understanding

can destroy? Look at the same Youth at a more advanced age, when the

refining intellect has mixed with his affections, adding thought and

sentiment to every thing attractive, converting all things fair to

things also of good report. Let us turn, at the same time, to one

still more advanced,--even so far as to have entered into the

conventional valley of dry bones,--one whom the world is preparing,

by its daily practical lessons, to enlighten with unbelief. If we see

them together, perhaps we shall hear the senior scoff at his younger

companion as a poetic dreamer, as a hunter after phantoms that never

were, nor could be, in nature: then may follow a homily on the virtues

of experience, as the only security against disappointment. But there

are some hearts that never suffer the mind to grow old. And such we

may suppose that of the dreamer. If he is one, too, who is accustomed

to look into himself,--not as a reasoner,--but with an abiding faith

in his nature,--we shall, perhaps, hear him reply,--Experience, it is

true, has often brought me disappointment; yet I cannot distrust those

dreams, as you call them, bitterly as I have felt their passing off;

for I feel the truth of the source whence they come. They could not

have been so responded to by my living nature, were they but phantoms;

they could not have taken such forms of truth, but from a possible

ground.

By the word _poetic_ here, we do not mean the visionary or

fanciful,--for there may be much fancy where there is no poetic

feeling,--but that sensibility to _harmony_ which marks the

temperament of the Artist, and which is often most active in his

earlier years. And we refer to such natures, not only as being more

peculiarly alive to all existing affinities, but as never satisfied

with those merely which fall within their experience; ever striving,

on the contrary, as if impelled by instinct, to supply the deficiency

wherever it is felt. From such minds proceed what are called romantic

imaginings, but what we would call--without intending a paradox--the

romance of Truth. For it is impossible that the mind should ever have

this perpetual craving for the False.

But the desire in question is not confined to any particular age or

temperament, though it is, doubtless, more ardent in some than in

others. Perhaps it is only denied to the habitually vicious. For who,

not hardened by vice, has ever looked upon a sleeping child in its

first bloom of beauty, and seen its pure, fresh hues, its ever

varying, yet according lines, moulding and suffusing, in their playful

harmony, its delicate features,--who, not callous, has ever looked

upon this exquisite creature, (so like what a poet might fancy of

visible music, or embodied odors,) and has not felt himself carried,

as it were, out of this present world, in quest of its moral

counterpart? It seems to us perfect; we desire no change,--not a line

or a hue but as it is; and yet we have a paradoxical feeling of a

want,--for it is all _physical_; and we supply that want by

endowing the child with some angelic attribute. Why do we this? To

make it a _whole_,--not to the eye, but to the mind.

Nor is this general disposition to find a coincidence between a fair

exterior and moral excellence altogether unsupported by facts of, at

least, a partial realization. For, though a perfect correspondence

cannot be looked for in a state where all else is imperfect, he

is most unfortunate who has never met with many, and very near,

approximations to the desired union. But we have a still stronger

assurance of their predetermined affinity in the peculiar activity of

this desire where there is no such approximation. For example, when we

meet with an instance of the higher virtues in an unattractive form,

how natural the wish that that form were beautiful! So, too, on

beholding a beautiful person, how common the wish that the mind

it clothed were also good! What are these wishes but unconscious

retrospects to our primitive nature? And why have we them, if they be

not the workings of that universal law, which gathers to itself all

scattered affinities, bodying them forth in the never-ending forms of

harmony,--in the flower, in the tree, in the bird, and the animal,--if

they be not the evidence of its continuous, though fruitless, effort

to evolve too in _man_ its last consummate work, by the perfect

confluence of the body and the spirit? In this universal yearning (for

it seems to us no less) to connect the physical with its appropriate

moral,--to say nothing of the mysterious intuition that points to

the appropriate,--is there not something like a clew to what was

originally natural? And, again, in the never-ceasing strivings of the

two great elements of our being, each to supply the deficiencies of

the other, have we not also an intimation of something that _once

was_, that is now lost, and would be recovered? Surely there must

be more in this than a mere concernment of Art;--if, indeed, there be

not in Art more of the prophetic than we are now aware of. To us

it seems that this irrepressible desire to find the good in the

beautiful, and the beautiful in the good, implies an end, both

beyond and above the trifling present; pointing to deep and dark

questions,--to no less than where the mysteries which surround us will

meet their solution. One great mystery we see in part resolving itself

here. We see the deformities of the body sometimes giving place to

its glorious tenant. Some of us may have witnessed this, and felt

the spiritual presence gaining daily upon us, till the outward shape

seemed lost in its brightness, leaving no trace in the memory.

Whether the position we have endeavoured to establish be disputed or

not, the absolute correspondence between the Moral and the Physical

is, at any rate, the essential ground of the Plastic arts; which could

not else exist, since through _Form alone_ they have to convey,

not only thought and emotion, but distinct and permanent character.

For our own part, we cannot but consider their success in this as

having settled the question.

From the view here presented, what is the inference in relation to

Art? That Man, as a compound being, cannot be represented without an

indication as well of Mind as of body; that, by a natural law which we

cannot resist, we do continually require that they be to us as mutual

exponents, the one of the other; and, finally, that, as a responsible

being, and therefore a free agent, he cannot be truly represented,

either to the memory or to the imagination, but as an Individual.

It would seem, also, from the indefinite varieties in men, though

occasioned only by the mere difference of degrees in their common

faculties and powers, that the coincidence of an equal developement of

all was never intended in nature; but that some one or more of them,

becoming dominant, should distinguish the individual. It follows,

therefore, if this be the case, that only through the phase of such

predominance can the human being ever be contemplated. To the Artist,

then, it becomes the only safe ground; the starting-point from

whence to ascend to a true Ideal,--which is no other than a partial

individual truth made whole in the mind: and thus, instead of one

Ideal, and that baseless, he may have a thousand,--nay, as many as

there are marked or apprehensible _individuals_.

But we must not be understood as confining Art to actual portraits.

Within such limits there could not be Art,--certainly not Art in its

highest sense; we should have in its place what would be little better

than a doubtful empiricism; since the most elevated subject, in the

ablest hands, would depend, of necessity, on the chance success of a

search after models. And, supposing that we bring together only the

rarest forms, still those forms, simply as circumscribed portraits,

and therefore insulated parts, would instantly close every avenue

to the imagination; for such is the law of the imagination, that it

cannot admit, or, in other words, recognize as a whole, that which

remains unmodified by some imaginative power, which alone can give

unity to separate and distinct objects. Yet, as it regards man,

all true Art does, and must, find its proper object in the

_Individual_: as without individuality there could not be

character, nor without character, the human being.

But here it may be asked, In what manner, if we resort not to actual

portrait, is the Individual Man to be expressed? We answer, By

carrying out the natural individual predominant _fragment_ which

is visible to us in actual Form, to its full, consistent developement.

The Individual is thus idealized, when, in the complete accordance of

all its parts, it is presented to the mind as a _whole_.

When we apply the term _fragment_ to a human being, we do not

mean in relation to his species, (in regard to which we have already

shown him to be a distinct whole,) but in relation to the Idea, to

which his predominant characteristic suggests itself but as a

partial manifestation, and made partial because counteracted by

some inadequate exponent, or else modified by other, though minor,

characteristics.

How this is effected must be left to the Artist himself. It is

impossible to prescribe a rule that would be to much purpose for any

one who stands in need of such instruction; if his own mind does not

suggest the mode, it would not even be intelligible. Perhaps our

meaning, however, may be made more obvious, if we illustrate it by

example. We would refer, then, to the restoration of a statue, (a

thing often done with success,) where, from a single fragment, the

unknown Form has been completely restored, and so remoulded, that the

parts added are in perfect unity with the suggestive fragment. Now the

parts wanting having never been seen, this cannot be called a mere

act of the memory. Nevertheless, it is not from nothing that man can

produce even the _semblance_ of any thing. The materials of the

Artist are the work of Him who created the Artist himself; but over

these, which his senses and mind are given him to observe and collect,

he has a _delegated power_, for the purpose of combining and

modifying, as unlimited as mysterious. It is by the agency of this

intuitive and assimilating Power, elsewhere spoken of, that he is able

to separate the essential from the accidental, to proceed also from a

part to the whole; thus educing, as it were, an Ideal nature from the

germs of the Actual.

Nor does the necessity of referring to Nature preclude the

Imaginative, or any other class of Art that rests its truth in the

desires of the mind. In an especial manner must the personification

of Sentiment, of the Abstract, which owe their interest to the common

desire of rendering permanent, by embodying, that which has given us

pleasure, take its starting-point from the Actual; from something

which, by universal association or particular expression, shall recall

the Sentiment, Thought, or Time, and serve as their exponents; there

being scarcely an object in Nature which the spirit of man has not, as

it were, impressed with sympathy, and linked with his being. Of this,

perhaps, we could not have a more striking example than in the Aurora

of Michael Angelo: which, if not universal, is not so only because

the faculty addressed is by no means common. For, as the peculiar

characteristic of the Imaginative is its suggestive power, the effect

of this figure must of necessity differ in different minds. As in many

other cases, there must needs be at least some degree of sympathy with

the mind that imagined it, in order to any impression; and the degree

in which that is made will always be in proportion to the congeniality

between the agent and the recipient. Should it appear, then, to any

one as a thing of no meaning, it is not therefore conclusive that the

Artist has failed. For, if there be but one in a thousand to whose

mind it recalls the deep stillness of Night, gradually broken by the

awakening stir of Day, with its myriad forms of life emerging into

motion, while their lengthened shadows, undistinguished from their

objects, seem to people the earth with gigantic beings; then the dim,

gray monotony of color transforming them to stone, yet leaving them

in motion, till the whole scene becomes awful and mysterious as with

moving statues;--if there be but one in ten thousand who shall have

thus imagined, as he stands before this embodied Dawn, then is it, for

every purpose of feeling through the excited imagination, as true and

real as if instinct with life, and possessing the mind by its living

will. Nor is the number so rare of those who have thus felt the

suggestive sorcery of this sublime Statue. But the mind so influenced

must be one to respond to sublime emotions, since such was the

emotion which inspired the Artist. If susceptible only to the gay and

beautiful, it will not answer. For this is not the Aurora of golden

purple, of laughing flowers and jewelled dew-drops; but the dark

Enchantress, enthroned on rocks, or craggy mountains, and whose proper

empire is the shadowy confines of light and darkness.

How all this is done, we shall not attempt to explain. Perhaps the

Artist himself could not answer; as to the _quo modo_ in every

particular, we doubt if it were possible to satisfy another. He may

tell us, indeed, that having imagined certain appearances and effects

peculiar to the Time, he endeavoured to imbue, as it were, some

_human form_ with the sentiment they awakened, so that the

embodied sentiment should associate itself in the spectator's mind

with similar images; and further endeavoured, that the _form_

selected should, by its air, attitude, and gigantic proportions, also

excite the ideas of vastness, solemnity, and repose; adding to this

that indefinite expression, which, while it is felt to act, still

leaves no trace of its indistinct action. So far, it is true, he may

retrace the process; but of the _informing life_ that quickened

his fiction, thus presenting the presiding Spirit of that ominous

Time, he knows nothing but that he felt it, and imparted it to the

insensible marble.

And now the question will naturally occur, Is all that has been done

by the learned in Art, to establish certain canons of Proportion,

utterly useless? By no means. If rightly applied, and properly

considered,--as it seems to us they must have been by the great

artists of Antiquity,--as _expedient fictions_, they undoubtedly

deserve at least a careful examination. And, inasmuch as they are the

result of a comparison of the finest actual forms through successive

ages, and as they indicate the general limits which Nature has been

observed to assign to her noblest works, they are so far to be valued.

But it must not be forgotten, that, while a race, or class, may be

generally marked by a certain average height and breadth, or curve and

angle, still is every class and race composed of _Individuals_,

who must needs, as such, differ from each other; and though the

difference be slight, yet is it "the little more, or the little less,"

which often separates the great from the mean, the wise from the

foolish, in human character;--nay, the widest chasms are sometimes

made by a few lines: so that, in every individual case, the limits in

question are rather to be departed from, than strictly adhered to.

The canon of the Schools is easily mastered by every student who has

only memory; yet of the hundreds who apply it, how few do so to any

purpose! Some ten or twenty, perhaps, call up life from the quarry,

and flesh and blood from the canvas; the rest conjure in vain with

their canon; they call up nothing but the dead measures. Whence the

difference? The answer is obvious,--In the different minds they each

carry to their labors.

But let us trace, with the Artist, the beginning and progress of a

successful work; a picture, for instance. His method of proceeding may

enable us to ascertain how far he is assisted by the science, so called,

of which we are speaking. He adjusts the height and breadth of his figures

according to the canon, either by the division of heads or faces, as most

convenient. By these means, he gets the general divisions in the easiest

and most expeditious way. But could he not obtain them without such aid?

He would answer, Yes, by the eye alone; but it would be a waste of time

were he so to proceed, since he would have to do, and undo, perhaps twenty

times, before he could erect this simple scaffolding; whereas, by applying

these rules, whose general truth is already admitted, he accomplishes his

object in a few minutes. Here we admit the use of the canon, and admire

the facility with which it enables his hand, almost without the aid of a

thought, thus to lay out his work. But here ends the science; and here

begins what may seem to many the work of mutilation: a leg, an arm, a

trunk, is increased, or diminished; line after line is erased, or

retrenched, or extended, again and again, till not a trace remains of the

original draught. If he is asked now by what he is guided in these

innumerable changes, he can only answer, By the feeling within me. Nor can

he better tell _how_ he knows when he has _hit the mark_. The same feeling

responds to its truth; and he repeats his attempts until that is

satisfied.

It would appear, then, that in the Mind alone is to be found the true

or ultimate Rule,--if, indeed, that can be called a rule which

changes its measure with every change of character. It is therefore

all-important that every aid be sought which may in any way contribute

to the due developement of the mental powers; and no one will doubt

the efficiency here of a good general education. As to the course of

study, that must be left in a great measure to be determined by the

student; it will be best indicated by his own natural wants. We

may observe, however, that no species of knowledge can ever be

_oppressive_ to real genius, whose peculiar privilege is that of

subordinating all things to the paramount desire. But it is not likely

that a mind so endowed will be long diverted by any studies that do

not either strengthen its powers by exercise, or have a direct bearing

on some particular need.

If the student be a painter, or a sculptor, he will not need to be

told that a knowledge of the human being, in all his complicated

springs of action, is not more essential to the poet than to him. Nor

will a true Artist require to be reminded, that, though _himself_

must be his ultimate dictator and judge, the allegiance of the world

is not to be commanded either by a dreamer or a dogmatist. And

nothing, perhaps, would be more likely to secure him from either

character, than the habit of keeping his eyes open,--nay, his very

heart; nor need he fear to open it to the whole world, since nothing

not kindred will enter there to abide; for

"Evil into the mind ...

May come and go, so unapproved, and leave

No spot or blame behind."

And he may also be sure that a pure heart will shed a refining light

on his intellect, which it may not receive from any other source.

It cannot be supposed that an Artist, so disciplined, will overlook

the works of his predecessors,--especially those exquisite remains of

Antiquity which time has spared to us. But to his own discretion must

be left the separating of the factitious from the true,--a task of

some moment; for it cannot be denied that a mere antiquarian respect

for whatever is ancient has preserved, with the good, much that is

worthless. Indeed, it is to little purpose that the finest forms are

set before us, if we _feel_ not their truth. And here it may be

well to remark, that an injudicious _word_ has often given a

wrong direction to the student, from which he has found it difficult

to recover when his maturer mind has perceived the error. It is a

common thing to hear such and such statues, or pictures, recommended

as _models_. If the advice is followed,--as it too often is

_literally_,--the consequence must be an offensive mannerism;

for, if repeating himself makes an artist a mannerist, he is still

more likely to become one if he repeat another. There is but one model

that will not lead him astray,--which is Nature: we do not mean what

is merely obvious to the senses, but whatever is so acknowledged by

the mind. So far, then, as the ancient statues are found to represent

her,--and the student's own feeling must be the judge of that,--they

are undoubtedly both true and important objects of study, as

presenting not only a wider, but a higher view of Nature, than might

else be commanded, were they buried with their authors; since, with

the finest forms of the fairest portion of the earth, we have also in

them the realized Ideas of some of the greatest minds. In like manner

may we extend our sphere of knowledge by the study of all those

productions of later ages which have stood this test. There is no

school from which something may not be learned. But chiefly to the

Italian should the student be directed, who would enlarge his views

on the present subject, and especially to the works of Raffaelle and

Michael Angelo; in whose highest efforts we have, so to speak,

certain revelations of Nature which could only have been made by her

privileged seers. And we refer to them more particularly, as to the

two great sovereigns of the two distinct empires of Truth,--the

Actual and the Imaginative; in which their claims are acknowledged

by _that_ within us, of which we know nothing but that it

_must_ respond to all things true. We refer to them, also, as

important examples in their mode of study; in which it is evident

that, whatever the source of instruction, it was never considered as a

law of servitude, but rather as the means of giving visible shape to

their own conceptions.

From the celebrated antique fragment, called the Torso, Michael Angelo

is said to have constructed his forms. If this be true,--and we have

no reason to doubt it,--it could nevertheless have been to him little

more than a hint. But that is enough to a man of genius, who stands

in need, no less than others, of a point to start from. There was

something in this fragment which he seems to have felt, as if of a

kindred nature to the unembodied creatures in his own mind; and he

pondered over it until he mastered the spell of its author. He then

turned to his own, to the germs of life that still awaited birth,

to knit their joints, to attach the tendons, to mould the

muscles,--finally, to sway the limbs by a mighty will. Then emerged

into being that gigantic race of the Sistina,--giants in mind no less

than in body, that appear to have descended as from another planet.

His Prophets and Sibyls seem to carry in their persons the commanding

evidence of their mission. They neither look nor move like beings to

be affected by the ordinary concerns of life; but as if they could

only be moved by the vast of human events, the fall of empires, the

extinction of nations; as if the awful secrets of the future had

overwhelmed in them all present sympathies. As we have stood before

these lofty apparitions of the painter's mind, it has seemed to us

impossible that the most vulgar spectator could have remained there

irreverent.

With many critics it seems to have been doubted whether much that

we now admire in Raffaelle would ever have been but for his great

contemporary. Be this as it may, it is a fact of history, that, after

seeing the works of Michael Angelo, both his form and his style

assumed a breadth and grandeur which they possessed not before.

And yet these great artists had little, if any thing, in common;

a sufficient proof that an original mind may owe, and even freely

acknowledge, its impetus to another without any self-sacrifice.

As Michael Angelo adopted from others only what accorded with his

own peculiar genius, so did Raffaelle; and, wherever collected, the

materials of both could not but enter their respective minds as their

natural aliment.

The genius of Michael Angelo was essentially _Imaginative_. It

seems rarely to have been excited by the objects with which we are

daily familiar; and when he did treat them, it was rather as things

past, as they appear to us through the atmosphere of the hallowing

memory. We have a striking instance of this in his statue of Lorenzo

de' Medici; where, retaining of the original only enough to mark the

individual, and investing the rest with an air of grandeur that should

accord with his actions, he has left to his country, not a mere

effigy of the person, but an embodiment of the mind; a portrait

for posterity, in which the unborn might recognize Lorenzo the

Magnificent.

But the mind of Raffaelle was an ever-flowing fountain of human

sympathies; and in all that concerns man, in his vast varieties and

complicated relations, from the highest forms of majesty to the

humblest condition of humanity, even to the maimed and misshapen, he

may well be called a master. His Apostles, his philosophers, and most

ordinary subordinates, are all to us as living beings; nor do we feel

any doubt that they all had mothers, and brothers, and kindred. In

the assemblage of the Apostles (already referred to) at the Death of

Ananias, we look upon men whom the effusion of the Spirit has equally

sublimated above every unholy thought; a common power seems to have

invested them all with a preternatural majesty. Yet not an iota of the

_individual_ is lost in any one; the gentle bearing and amenity

of John still follow him in his office of almoner; nor in Peter does

the deep repose of the erect attitude of the Apostle, as he deals the

death-stroke to the offender by a simple bend of his finger, subdue

the energetic, sanguine temperament of the Disciple.

If any man may be said to have reigned over the hearts of his fellows,

it was Raffaelle Sanzio. Not that he knew better what was in the

hearts and minds of men than many others, but that he better

understood their relations to the external. In this the greatest names

in Art fall before him; in this he has no rival; and, however derived,

or in whatever degree improved by study, in him it seems to have risen

to intuition. We know not how he touches and enthralls us; as if he

had wrought with the simplicity of Nature, we see no effort; and we

yield as to a living influence, sure, yet inscrutable.

It is not to be supposed that these two celebrated Artists were at all

times successful. Like other men, they had their moments of weakness,

when they fell into manner, and gave us diagrams, instead of life.

Perhaps no one, however, had fewer lapses of this nature than

Raffaelle; and yet they are to be found in some of his best works. We

shall notice now only one instance,--the figure of St. Catherine in

the admirable picture of the Madonna di Sisto; in which we see an

evident rescript from the Antique, with all the received lines of

beauty, as laid down by the analyst,--apparently faultless, yet

without a single inflection which the mind can recognize as allied to

our sympathies; and we turn from it coldly, as from the work of an

artificer, not of an Artist. But not so can we turn from the intense

life, that seems almost to breathe upon us from the celestial group of

the Virgin and her Child, and from the Angels below: in these we have

the evidence of the divine afflatus,--of inspired Art.

In the works of Michael Angelo it were easy to point out numerous

examples of a similar failure, though from a different cause; not from

mechanically following the Antique, but rather from erecting into

a model the exaggerated _shadow_ of his own practice; from

repeating lines and masses that might have impressed us with grandeur

but for the utter absence of the informing soul. And that such is the

character--or rather want of character--of many of the figures in his

Last Judgment cannot be gainsaid by his warmest admirers,--among whom

there is no one more sincere than the present writer. But the failures

of great men are our most profitable lessons,--provided only, that we

have hearts and heads to respond to their success.

In conclusion. We have now arrived at what appears to us the

turning-point, that, by a natural reflux, must carry us back to our

original Position; in other words, it seems to us clear, that the

result of the argument is that which was anticipated in our main

Proposition; namely, that no given number of Standard Forms can with

certainty apply to the Human Being; that all Rules therefore, thence

derived, can only be considered as _Expedient Fictions_, and

consequently subject to be _overruled_ by the Artist,--in whose

mind alone is the ultimate Rule; and, finally, that without an

intimate acquaintance with Nature, in all its varieties of the moral,

intellectual, and physical, the highest powers are wanting in their

necessary condition of action, and are therefore incapable of

supplying the Rule.

Composition.

The term Composition, in its general sense, signifies the union of

things that were originally separate: in the art of Painting it

implies, in addition to this, such an arrangement and reciprocal

relation of these materials, as shall constitute them so many

essential parts of a whole.

In a true Composition of Art will be found the following

characteristics:--First, Unity of Purpose, as expressing the general

sentiment or intention of the Artist. Secondly, Variety of Parts, as

expressed in the diversity of shape, quantity, and line. Thirdly,

Continuity, as expressed by the connection of parts with each other,

and their relation to the whole. Fourthly, Harmony of Parts.

As these characteristics, like every thing which the mind can

recognize as true, all have their origin in its natural desires, they

may also be termed Principles; and as such we shall consider them. In

order, however, to satisfy ourselves that they are truly such, and not

arbitrary assumptions, or the traditional dogmas of Practice, it may

be well to inquire whence is their authority; for, though the ultimate

cause of pleasure and pain may ever remain to us a mystery, yet it is

not so with their intermediate causes, or the steps that lead to them.

With respect to Unity of Purpose, it is sufficient to observe, that,

where the attention is at the same time claimed by two objects, having

each a different end, they must of necessity break in upon that free

state required of the mind in order to receive a full impression from

either. It is needless to add, that such conflicting claims cannot,

under any circumstances, be rendered agreeable. And yet this most

obvious requirement of the mind has sometimes been violated by great

Artists,--though not of authority in this particular, as we shall

endeavour to show in another place.

We proceed, meanwhile, to the second principle, namely, Variety; by

which is to be understood _difference_, yet with _relation_

to a _common end_.

Of a ruling Principle, or Law, we can only get a notion by observing the

effects of certain things in relation to the mind; the uniformity of

which leads us to infer something which is unchangeable and permanent.

It is in this way that, either directly or indirectly, we learn the

existence of certain laws that invariably control us. Thus, indirectly,

from our disgust at monotony, we infer the necessity of variety. But

variety, when carried to excess, results in weariness. Some limitation,

therefore, seems no less needed. It is, however, obvious, that all

attempts to fix the limit to Variety, that shall apply as a universal

rule, must be nugatory, inasmuch as the _degree_ must depend on the

_kind_, and the kind on the subject treated. For instance, if the

subject be of a gay and light character, and the emotions intended to be

excited of a similar nature, the variety may be carried to a far greater

extent than in one of a graver character. In the celebrated Marriage at

Cana, by Paul Veronese, we see it carried, perhaps, to its utmost

limits; and to such an extent, that an hour's travel will hardly conduct

us through all its parts; yet we feel no weariness throughout this

journey, nay, we are quite unconscious of the time it has taken. It is

no disparagement of this remarkable picture, if we consider the subject,

not according to the title it bears, but as what the Artist has actually

made it,--that is, as a Venetian entertainment; and also the effect

intended, which was to delight by the exhibition of a gorgeous

_pageant_. And in this he has succeeded to a degree unexampled; for

literally the eye may be said to _dance_ through the picture, scarcely

lighting on one part before it is drawn to another, and another, and

another, as by a kind of witchery; while the subtile interlocking of

each successive novelty leaves it no choice, but, seducing it onward,

still keeps it in motion, till the giddy sense seems to call on the

imagination to join in the revel; and every poetic temperament answers

to the call, bringing visions of its own, that mingle with the painted

crowd, exchanging forms, and giving them voice, like the creatures of a

dream.

To those who have never seen this picture, our account of its effect

may perhaps appear incredible when they are told, that it not only

has no story, but not a single expression to which you can attach a

sentiment. It is nevertheless for this very reason that we here cite

it, as a triumphant verification of those immutable laws of the mind

to which the principles of Composition are supposed to appeal; where

the simple technic exhibition, or illustration of _Principles_,

without story, or thought, or a single definite expression, has

still the power to possess and to fill us with a thousand delightful

emotions.

And here we cannot refrain from a passing remark on certain

criticisms, which have obtained, as we think, an undeserved currency.

To assert that such a work is solely addressed to the senses (meaning

thereby that its only end is in mere pleasurable sensation) is to give

the lie to our convictions; inasmuch as we find it appealing to one

of the mightiest ministers of the Imagination,--the great Law of

Harmony,--which cannot be _touched_ without awakening by its

vibrations, so to speak, the untold myriads of sleeping forms that lie

within its circle, that start up in tribes, and each in accordance

with the congenial instrument that summons them to action. He who

can thus, as it were, embody an abstraction is no mere pander to the

senses. And who that has a modicum of the imaginative would assert

of one of Haydn's Sonatas, that its effect on him was no other than

sensuous? Or who would ask for the _story_ in one of our gorgeous

autumnal sunsets?

In subjects of a grave or elevated kind, the Variety will be found to

diminish in the same degree in which they approach the Sublime. In the

raising of Lazarus, by Lievens, we have an example of the smallest

possible number of parts which the nature of such a subject would

admit. And, though a different conception might authorize a much

greater number, yet we do not feel in this any deficiency; indeed, it

may be doubted if the addition of even one more part would not be felt

as obtrusive.

By the term _parts_ we are not to be understood as including the

minutiae of dress or ornament, or even the several members of a group,

which come more properly under the head of detail; we apply the term

only to those prominent divisions which constitute the essential

features of a composition. Of these the Sublime admits the fewest. Nor

is the limitation arbitrary. By whatever causes the stronger passions

or higher faculties of the mind become pleasurably excited, if they be

pushed as it were beyond their supposed limits, till a sense of the

indefinite seems almost to partake of the infinite, to these causes we

affix the epithet _Sublime._ It is needless to inquire if such

an effect can be produced by any thing short of the vast and

overpowering, much less by the gradual approach or successive

accumulation of any number of separate forces. Every one can answer

from his own experience. We may also add, that the pleasure which

belongs to the deeper emotions always trenches on pain; and the sense

of pain leads to reaction; so that, singly roused, they will rise

but to fall, like men at a breach,--leaving a conquest, not over the

living, but the dead. The effect of the Sublime must therefore be

sudden, and to be sudden, simple, scarce seen till felt; coming like

a blast, bending and levelling every thing before it, till it passes

into space. So comes this marvellous emotion; and so vanishes,--to

where no straining of our mortal faculties will ever carry them.

To prevent misapprehension, we may here observe, that, though the

parts be few, it does not necessarily follow that they should always

consist of simple or single objects. This narrow inference has often

led to the error of mistaking mere space for grandeur, especially

with those who have wrought rather from theory than from the true

possession of their subjects. Hence, by the mechanical arrangement

of certain large and sweeping masses of light and shadow, we are

sometimes surprised into a momentary expectation of a sublime

impression, when a nearer approach gives us only the notion of a vast

blank. And the error lies in the misconception of a mass. For a mass

is not a _thing_, but the condition of _things_; into which,

should the subject require it, a legion, a host, may be compressed,

an army with banners,--yet so that they break not the unity of their

Part, that technic form to which they are subordinate.

The difference between a Part and a Mass is, that a Mass may include,

_per se_, many Parts, yet, in relation to a Whole, is no more

than a single component. Perhaps the same distinction may be more

simply expressed, if we define it as only a larger division, including

several _parts_, which may be said to be analogous to what is

termed the detail of a _Part_. Look at the ocean in a storm,--at

that single wave. How it grows before us, building up its waters as

with conscious life, till its huge head overlooks the mast! A million

of lines intersect its surface, a myriad of bubbles fleck it with

light; yet its terrible unity remains unbroken. Not a bubble or a line

gives a thought of minuteness; they flash and flit, ere the eye can

count them, leaving only their aggregate, in the indefinite sense

of multitudinous motion: take them away, and you take from the

_mass_ the very sign of its power, that fearful impetus which

makes it what it is,--a moving mountain of water.

We have thus endeavoured, in the opposite characters of the Sublime

and the Gay or Magnificent, to exhibit the two extremes of Variety; of

the intermediate degrees it is unnecessary to speak, since in these

two is included all that is applicable to the rest.

Though it is of vital importance to every composition that there be

variety of Lines, little can be said on the subject in addition to

what has been advanced in relation to parts, that is, to shape and

quantity; both having a common origin. By a line in Composition is

meant something very different from the geometrical definition.

Originally, it was no doubt used as a metaphor; but the needs of

Art have long since converted this, and many other words of like

application, (as _tone_, &c.,) into technical terms. _Line_

thus signifies the course or medium through which the eye is led from

one part of the picture to another. The indication of this course is

various and multiform, appertaining equally to shape, to color, and to

light and dark; in a word, to whatever attracts and keeps the eye in

motion. For the regulation of these lines there is no rule absolute,

except that they vary and unite; nor is the last strictly necessary,

it being sufficient if they so terminate that the transition from one

to another is made naturally, and without effort, by the imagination.

Nor can any laws be laid down as to their peculiar character: this

must depend on the nature of the subject.

In the wild and stormy scenes of Salvator Rosa, they break upon us

as with the angular flash of lightning; the eye is dashed up one

precipice only to be dashed down another; then, suddenly hurried to

the sky, it shoots up, almost in a direct line, to some sharp-edged

rock; whence pitched, as it were, into a sea of clouds, bellying with

circles, it partakes their motion, and seems to reel, to roll, and to

plunge with them into the depths of air.

If we pass from Salvator to Claude, we shall find a system of lines

totally different. Our first impression from Claude is that of perfect

_unity_, and this we have even before we are conscious of a

single image; as if, circumscribing his scenes by a magic circle, he

had imposed his own mood on all who entered it. The _spell_ then

opens ere it seems to have begun, acting upon us with a vague sense of

limitless expanse, yet so continuous, so gentle, so imperceptible in

its remotest gradations, as scarcely to be felt, till, combining

with unity, we find the feeling embodied in the complete image of

intellectual repose,--fulness and rest. The mind thus disposed, the

charmed eye glides into the scene: a soft, undulating light leads it

on, from bank to bank, from shrub to shrub; now leaping and sparkling

over pebbly brooks and sunny sands; now fainter and fainter, dying

away down shady slopes, then seemingly quenched in some secluded dell;

yet only for a moment,--for a dimmer ray again carries it onward,

gently winding among the boles of trees and rambling vines, that,

skirting the ascent, seem to hem in the twilight; then emerging

into day, it flashes in sheets over towers and towns, and woods and

streams, when it finally dips into an ocean, so far off, so twin-like

with the sky, that the doubtful horizon, unmarked by a line, leaves no

point of rest: and now, as in a flickering arch, the fascinated eye

seems to sail upward like a bird, wheeling its flight through a

mottled labyrinth of clouds, on to the zenith; whence, gently

inflected by some shadowy mass, it slants again downward to a mass

still deeper, and still to another, and another, until it falls into

the darkness of some massive tree,--focused like midnight in the

brightest noon: there stops the eye, instinctively closing, and giving

place to the Soul, there to repose and to dream her dreams of romance

and love.

From these two examples of their general effect, some notion may be

gathered of the different systems of the two Artists; and though

no mention has been made of the particular lines employed, their

distinctive character may readily be inferred from the kind of motion

given to the eye in the descriptions we have attempted. In the

rapid, abrupt, contrasted, whirling movement in the one, we have an

exposition of an irregular combination of curves and angles; while the

simple combination of the parabola and the serpentine will account for

all the imperceptible transitions in the other.

It would be easy to accumulate examples from other Artists who differ

in the economy of line not only from these but from each other; as

Raffaelle, Michael Angelo, Correggio, Titian, Poussin,--in a word,

every painter deserving the name of master: for lines here may be

called the tracks of thought, in which we follow the author's mind

through his imaginary creations. They hold, indeed, the same relation

to Painting that versification does to Poetry, an element of style;

for what is meant by a line in Painting is analogous to that which

in the sister art distinguishes the abrupt gait of Crabbe from the

sauntering walk of Cowley, and the "long, majestic march" of Dryden

from the surging sweep of Milton.

Of Continuity little needs be said, since its uses are implied in the

explanation of Line; indeed, all that can be added will be expressed

in its essential relation to a _whole_, in which alone it differs

from a mere line. For, though a line (as just explained) supposes a

continuous course, yet a line, _per se_, does not necessarily

imply any relation to other lines. It will still be a line, though

standing alone; but the principle of continuity may be called

the unifying spirit of every line. It is therefore that we have

distinguished it as a separate principle.

In fact, if we judge from feeling, the only true test, it is no

paradox to say that the excess of variety must inevitably end in

monotony; for, as soon as the sense of fatigue begins, every new

variety but adds to the pain, till the succeeding impressions are at

last resolved into continuous pain. But, supposing a limit to variety,

where the mind may be pleasurably excited, the very sense of pleasure,

when it reaches the extreme point, will create the desire of renewing

it, and naturally carry it back to the point of starting; thus

superinducing, with the renewed enjoyment, the fulness of pleasure, in

the sense of a whole.

It is by this summing up, as it were, of the memory, through

recurrence, not that we perceive,--which is instantaneous,--but that

we enjoy any thing as a whole. If we have not observed it in others,

some of us, perhaps, may remember it in ourselves, when we have stood

before some fine picture, though with a sense of pleasure, yet for

many minutes in a manner abstracted,--silently passing through all its

harmonious transitions without the movement of a muscle, and hardly

conscious of action, till we have suddenly found ourselves returning

on our steps. Then it was,--as if we had no eyes till then,--that

the magic Whole poured in upon us, and vouched for its truth in an

outbreak of rapture.

The fourth and last division of our subject is the Harmony of Parts;

or the essential agreement of one part with another, and of each with

the whole. In addition to our first general definition, we may further

observe, that by a Whole in Painting is signified the complete

expression, by means of form, color, light, and shadow, of one

thought, or series of thoughts, having for their end some

particular truth, or sentiment, or action, or mood of mind. We say

_thought_, because no images, however put together, can ever

be separated by the mind from other and extraneous images, so as to

comprise a positive whole, unless they be limited by some intellectual

boundary. A picture wanting this may have fine parts, but is not a

Composition, which implies parts united to each other, and also suited

to some specific purpose, otherwise they cannot be known as united.

Since Harmony, therefore, cannot be conceived of without reference to

a whole, so neither can a whole be imagined without fitness of parts.

To give this fitness, then, is the ultimate task and test of genius:

it is, in fact, calling form and life out of what before was but a

chaos of materials, and making them the subject and exponents of the

will. As the master-principle, also, it is the disposer, regulator,

and modifier of shape, line, and quantity, adding, diminishing,

changing, shaping, till it becomes clear and intelligible, and it

finally manifests itself in pleasurable identity with the harmony

within us.

To reduce the operation of this principle to precise rules is,

perhaps, without the province of human power: we might else expect to

see poets and painters made by recipe. As in many other operations of

the mind, we must here be content to note a few of the more tangible

facts, if we may be allowed the phrase, which have occasionally been

gathered by observation during the process. The first fact presented

is, that equal quantities, when coming together, produce monotony,

and, if at all admissible, are only so when absolutely needed, at

a proper distance, to echo back or recall the theme, which would

otherwise be lost in the excess of variety. We speak of quantity here

as of a mass, not of the minutiae; for _the essential components_

of a part may often be _equal quantities_, (as in a piece of

architecture, of armour, &c.,) which are analogous to poetic feet, for

instance, a spondee. The same effect we find from parallel lines and

repetition of shapes. Hence we obtain the law of a limited variety.

The next is, that the quantities must be so disposed as to balance

each other; otherwise, if all or too many of the larger be on one

side, they will endanger the imaginary circle, or other figure, by

which every composition is supposed to be bounded, making it appear

"lop-sided," or to be falling either in upon the smaller quantities,

or out of the picture: from which we infer the necessity of balance.

If, without others to counteract and restrain them, the parts

converge, the eye, being forced to the centre, becomes stationary; in

like manner, if all diverge, it is forced to fly off in tangents:

as if the great laws of Attraction and Repulsion were here also

essential, and illustrated in miniature. If we add to these Breadth, I

believe we shall have enumerated all the leading phenomena of

Harmony, which experience has enabled us to establish as rules. By

_breadth_ is meant such a massing of the quantities, whether

by color, light, or shadow, as shall enable the eye to pass without

obstruction, and by easy transitions, from one to another, so that it

shall appear to take in the whole at a glance. This may be likened to

both the exordium and peroration of a discourse, including as well

the last as the first general idea. It is, in other words, a simple,

connected, and concise exposition and summary of what the artist

intends.

We have thus endeavoured to arrange and to give a logical permanency

to the several principles of Composition. It is not to be supposed,

however, that in these we have every principle that might be named;

but they are all, as we conceive, that are of universal application.

Of other minor, or rather personal ones, since they pertain to the

individual, the number can only be limited by the variety of the

human intellect, to which these may be considered as so many simple

elementary guides; not to create genius, but to enable it to

understand itself, and by a distinct knowledge of its own operations

to correct its mistakes,--in a word, to establish the landmarks

between the flats of commonplace and the barrens of extravagance. And,

though the personal or individual principles referred to may not with

propriety be cited as examples in a general treatise like the present,

they are not only not to be overlooked, but are to be regarded by the

student as legitimate objects of study. To the truism, that we can

only judge of other minds by a knowledge of our own, we may add

its converse as especially true. In that mysterious tract of the

intellect, which we call the Imagination, there would seem to lie

hid thousands of unknown forms, of which we are often for years

unconscious, until they start up awakened by the footsteps of a

stranger. Hence it is that the greatest geniuses, as presenting a

wider field for excitement, are generally found to be the widest

likers; not so much from affinity, or because they possess the

precise kinds of excellence which they admire, but often from the

_differences_ which these very excellences in others, as the

exciting cause, awaken in themselves. Such men may be said to be

endowed with a double vision, an inward and an outward; the inward

seeing not unfrequently the reverse of what is seen by the outward.

It was this which caused Annibal Caracci to remark, on seeing for the

first time a picture by Caravaggio, that he thought a style totally

opposite might be made very captivating; and the hint, it is said,

sunk deep into and was not lost on Guido, who soon after realized what

his master had thus imagined. Perhaps no one ever caught more from

others than Raffaelle. I do not allude to his "borrowing," so

ingeniously, not soundly, defended by Sir Joshua, but rather to his

excitability, (if I may here apply a modern term,)--that inflammable

temperament, which took fire, as it were, from the very friction

of the atmosphere. For there was scarce an excellence, within his

knowledge, of his predecessors or contemporaries, which did not in a

greater or less degree contribute to the developement of his powers;

not as presenting models of imitation, but as shedding new light on

his own mind, and opening to view its hidden treasures. Such to him

were the forms of the Antique, of Leonardo da Vinci, and of Michael

Angelo, and the breadth and color of Fra Bartolomeo,--lights that

first made him acquainted with himself, not lights that he followed;

for he was a follower of none. To how many others he was indebted for

his impulses cannot now be known; but the new impetus he was known to

have received from every new excellence has led many to believe, that,

had he lived to see the works of Titian, he would have added to his

grace, character, and form, and with equal originality, the splendor

of color. "The design of Michael Angelo and the color of Titian," was

the inscription of Tintoretto over the door of his painting-room.

Whether he intended to designate these two artists as his future

models matters not; but that he did not follow them is evidenced in

his works. Nor, indeed, could he: the temptation to _follow_,

which his youthful admiration had excited, was met by an interdiction

not easily withstood,--the decree of his own genius. And yet the

decree had probably never been heard but for these very masters. Their

presence stirred him; and, when he thought of serving, his teeming

mind poured out its abundance, making _him_ a master to future

generations. To the forms of Michael Angelo he was certainly indebted

for the elevation of his own; there, however, the inspiration ended.

With Titian he was nearly allied in genius; yet he thought rather with

than after him,--at times even beyond him. Titian, indeed, may be said

to have first opened his eyes to the mysteries of nature; but they

were no sooner opened, than he rushed into them with a rapidity and

daring unwont to the more cautious spirit of his master; and, though

irregular, eccentric, and often inferior, yet sometimes he made his

way to poetical regions, of whose celestial hues even Titian himself

had never dreamt.

We might go on thus with every great name in Art. But these examples

are enough to show how much even the most original minds, not only

may, but _must_, owe to others; for the social law of our nature

applies no less to the intellect than to the affections. When applied

to genius, it may be called the social inspiration, the simple

statement of which seems to us of itself a solution of the

oft-repeated question, "Why is it that genius always appears in

clusters?" To Nature, indeed, we must all at last recur, as to the

only true and permanent foundation of real excellence. But Nature is

open to all men alike, in her beauty, her majesty, her grandeur, and

her sublimity. Yet who will assert that all men see, or, if they see,

are impressed by these her attributes alike? Nay, so great is the

difference, that one might almost suppose them inhabitants of

different worlds. Of Claude, for instance, it is hardly a metaphor to

say that he lived in two worlds during his natural life; for Claude

the pastry-cook could never have seen the same world that was made

visible to Claude the painter. It was human sympathy, acting through

human works, that gave birth to his intellect at the age of forty.

There is something, perhaps, ludicrous in the thought of an infant of

forty. Yet the fact is a solemn one, that thousands die whose minds

have never been born.

We could not, perhaps, instance a stronger confutation of the vulgar

error which opposes learning to genius, than the simple history of

this remarkable man. In all that respects the mind, he was literally a

child, till accident or necessity carried him to Rome; for, when the

office of color-grinder, added to that of cook, by awakening his

curiosity, first excited a love for the Art, his progress through its

rudiments seems to have been scarcely less slow and painful than that

of a child through the horrors of the alphabet. It was the struggle of

one who was learning to think; but, the rudiments being mastered, he

found himself suddenly possessed, not as yet of thought, but of new

forms of language; then came thoughts, pouring from his mind, and

filling them as moulds, without which they had never, perhaps, had

either shape or consciousness.

Now what was this new language but the product of other minds,--of

successive minds, amending, enlarging, elaborating, through successive

ages, till, fitted to all its wants, it became true to the Ideal, and

the vernacular tongue of genius through all time? The first inventor

of verse was but the prophetic herald of Homer, Shakspeare, and

Milton. And what was Rome then but the great University of Art, where

all this accumulated learning was treasured?

Much has been said of self-taught geniuses, as opposed to those who

have been instructed by others: but the distinction, it appears to

us, is without a difference; for it matters not whether we learn in a

school or by ourselves,--we cannot learn any thing without in some way

recurring to other minds. Let us imagine a poet who had never read,

never heard, never conversed with another. Now if he will not be

taught in any thing by another, he must strictly preserve this

independent negation. Truly the verses of such a poet would be a

miracle. Of similar self-taught painters we have abundant examples in

our aborigines,--but nowhere else.

But, while we maintain, as a positive law of our nature, the necessity

of mental intercourse with our fellow-creatures, in order to the full

developement of the _individual_, we are far from implying that

any thing which is actually taken from others can by any process

become our own, that is, original. We may reverse, transpose,

diminish, or add to it, and so skilfully that no scam or mutilation

shall be detected; and yet we shall not make it appear original,--in

other words, _true_, the offspring of _one_ mind. A borrowed

thought will always be borrowed; as it will be felt as such in its

_effect_, even while we are ourselves unconscious of the fact:

for it will want that _effect of life_, which only the first mind

can give it[3].

Of the multifarious retailers of the second-hand in style, the class

is so numerous as to make a selection difficult: they meet us at every

step in the history of the Art. One instance, however, may suffice,

and we select Vernet, as uniting in himself a singular and striking

example of the _false_ and the _true_; and also as the least

invidious instance, inasmuch as we may prove our position by opposing

him to himself.

In the landscapes of Vernet, (when not mere views,) we see the

imitator of Salvator, or rather copyist of his lines; and these we

have in all their angular nakedness, where rocks, trees, and mountains

are so jagged, contorted, and tumbled about, that nothing but an

explosion could account for their assemblage. They have not the

relation which we sometimes find even in a random collocation, as in

the accidental pictures of a discolored wall; for the careful hand

of the contriver is traced through all this disorder; nay, the very

execution, the conventional dash of pencil, betrays what a lawyer

would call the _malice prepense_ of the Artist in their strange

disfigurement. To many this may appear like hypercriticism; but we

sincerely believe that no one, even among his admirers, has ever been

deceived into a real sympathy with such technical flourishes: they

are felt as factitious; as mere diagrams of composition deduced from

pictures.

Now let us look at one of his Storms at Sea, when he wrought from his

own mind. A dark leaden atmosphere prepares us for something fearful:

suddenly a scene of tumult, fierce, wild, disastrous, bursts upon us;

and we feel the shock drive, as it were, every other thought from the

mind: the terrible vision now seizes the imagination, filling it with

sound and motion: we see the clouds fly, the furious waves one upon

another dashing in conflict, and rolling, as if in wrath, towards the

devoted ship: the wind blows from the canvas; we hear it roar through

her shrouds; her masts bend like twigs, and her last forlorn hope,

the close-reefed foresail, streams like a tattered flag: a terrible

fascination still constrains us to look, and a dim, rocky shore looms

on her lee: then comes the dreadful cry of "Breakers ahead!" the crew

stand appalled, and the master's trumpet is soundless at his lips.

This is the uproar of nature, and we _feel_ it to be _true_;

for here every line, every touch, has a meaning. The ragged clouds,

the huddled waves, the prostrate ship, though forced by contrast

into the sharpest angles, all agree, opposed as they seem,--evolving

harmony out of apparent discord. And this is Genius, which no

criticism can ever disprove.

But all great names, it is said, must have their shadows. In our Art

they have many shadows, or rather I should say, reflections; which

are more or less distinct according to their proximity to the living

originals, and, like the images in opposite mirrors, becoming

themselves reflected and re-reflected with a kind of battledoor

alternation, grow dimmer and dimmer till they vanish from mere

distance.

Thus have the great schools of Italy, Flanders, and Holland lived and

walked after death, till even their ghosts have become familiar to us.

We would not, however, be understood as asserting that we receive

pleasure only from original works: this would be contradicting

the general experience. We admit, on the contrary, that there are

hundreds, nay, thousands, of pictures having no pretensions to

originality of any kind, which still afford pleasure; as, indeed,

do many things out of the Art, which we know to be second-hand, or

imperfect, and even trifling. Thus grace of manner, for instance,

though wholly unaided by a single definite quality, will often delight

us, and a ready elocution, with scarce a particle of sense, make

commonplace agreeable; and it seems to be, that the pain of mental

inertness renders action so desirable, that the mind instinctively

surrounds itself with myriads of objects, having little to recommend

them but the property of keeping it from stagnating. And we are

far from denying a certain value to any of these, provided they

be innocent: there are times when even the wisest man will find

commonplace wholesome. All we have attempted to show is, that the

effect of an original work, as opposed to an imitation, is marked by

a difference, not of degree merely, but of kind; and that this

difference cannot fail to be felt, not, indeed, by every one, but by

any competent judge, that is, any one in whom is developed, by

natural exercise, that internal sense by which the spirit of life is

discerned.

* * * * *

Every original work becomes such from the infusion, so to speak, of

the mind of the Author; and of this the fresh materials of nature

alone seem susceptible. The imitated works of man cannot be endued

with a second life, that is, with a second mind: they are to the

imitator as air already breathed.

* * * * *

What has been said in relation to Form--that the works of our

predecessors, so far as they are recognized as true, are to be

considered as an extension of Nature, and therefore proper objects

of study--is equally applicable to Composition. But it is not to be

understood that this extended Nature (if we may so term it) is in any

instance to be imitated as a _whole_, which would be bringing our

minds into bondage to another; since, as already shown in the second

Discourse, every original work is of necessity impressed with the mind

of its author. If it be asked, then, what is the advantage of such

study, we shall endeavour to show, that it is not merely, as some have

supposed, in enriching the mind with materials, but rather in widening

our view of excellence, and, by consequent excitement, expanding our

own powers of observation, reflection, and performance. By increasing

the power of performance, we mean enlarging our knowledge of the

technical process, or the medium through which thought is expressed;

a most important species of knowledge, which, if to be otherwise

attained, is at least most readily learned from those who have left us

the result of their experience. This technical process, which has been

well called the language of the Art, includes, of course, all that

pertains to Composition, which, as the general medium, also contains

most of the elements of this peculiar tongue.

From the gradual progress of the various arts of civilization, it

would seem that only under the action of some great _social_ law

can man arrive at the full developement of his powers. In our

Art especially is this true; for the experience of one man must

necessarily be limited, particularly if compared with the endless

varieties of form and effect which diversify the face of Nature; and

the finest of these, too, in their very nature transient, or of rare

occurrence, and only known to occur to those who are prepared to seize

them in their rapid transit; so that in one short life, and with but

one set of senses, the greatest genius can learn but little. The

Artist, therefore, must needs owe much to the living, and more to the

dead, who are virtually his companions, inasmuch as through their

works they still live to our sympathies. Besides, in our great

predecessors we may be said to possess a multiplied life, if life

be measured by the number of acts,--which, in this case, we may all

appropriate to ourselves, as it were by a glance. For the dead in Art

may well be likened to the hardy pioneers of our own country, who have

successively cleared before us the swamps and forests that would have

obstructed our progress, and opened to us lands which the efforts of

no individual, however persevering, would enable him to reach.

Aphorisms.

Sentences Written by Mr. Allston on the Walls of His Studio.

1. "No genuine work of Art ever was, or ever can be, produced but for

its own sake; if the painter does not conceive to please himself, he

will not finish to please the world."--FUSELI.

2. If an Artist love his Art for its own sake, he will delight in

excellence wherever he meets it, as well in the work of another as in

his own. This is the test of a true love.

3. Nor is this genuine love compatible with a craving for distinction;

where the latter predominates, it is sure to betray itself before

contemporary excellence, either by silence, or (as a bribe to the

conscience) by a modicum of praise.

The enthusiasm of a mind so influenced is confined to itself.