When David, the painter, was commissioned to paint his picture
of Napoleon crossing the Alps, he asked the First Consul to
name a day when he would sit. “Sit!” said Bonaparte; “to what
good? Do you suppose the great men of antiquity sat for their
portraits?” “But I paint you for your own times, for men who
have known and seen you; they expect a good likeness.” “A good
likeness! It is not the exactitude of the features, the little
wart on the nose, that makes a likeness. What ought to be
painted is the character of the physiognomy. No one inquires if
the portraits of great men are alike; it is quite enough if they
manifest their genius.”--_Magazine of Art._
(1205)