197. Another important means of expressing unity is to mark some kind of
sympathy among the different objects, and perhaps the pleasantest,
because most surprising, kind of sympathy, is when one group imitates or
repeats another; not in the way of balance or symmetry, but
subordinately, like a far-away and broken echo of it. Prout has insisted
much on this law in all his writings on composition; and I think it is
even more authoritatively present in the minds of most great composers
than the law of principality.[54] It is quite curious to see the pains
that Turner sometimes takes to echo an important passage of color; in
the Pembroke Castle for instance, there are two fishing-boats, one with
a red, and another with a white sail. In a line with them, on the beach,
are two fish in precisely the same relative positions; one red and one
white. It is observable that he uses the artifice chiefly in pictures
where he wishes to obtain an expression of repose: in my notice of the
plate of Scarborough, in the series of the Harbors of England, I have
already had occasion to dwell on this point; and I extract in the
note[55] one or two sentences which explain the principle. In the
composition I have chosen for our illustration, this reduplication is
employed to a singular extent. The tower, or leading feature, is first
repeated by the low echo of it to the left; put your finger over this
lower tower, and see how the picture is spoiled. Then the spires of
Coblentz are all arranged in couples (how they are arranged in reality
does not matter; when we are composing a great picture, we must play the
towers about till they come right, as fearlessly as if they were
chessmen instead of cathedrals). The dual arrangement of these towers
would have been too easily seen, were it not for the little one which
pretends to make a triad of the last group on the right, but is so faint
as hardly to be discernible: it just takes off the attention from the
artifice, helped in doing so by the mast at the head of the boat, which,
however, has instantly its own duplicate put at the stern.[56] Then
there is the large boat near, and its echo beyond it. That echo is
divided into two again, and each of those two smaller boats has two
figures in it; while two figures are also sitting together on the great
rudder that lies half in the water, and half aground. Then, finally, the
great mass of Ehrenbreitstein, which appears at first to have no
answering form, has almost its _facsimile_ in the bank on which the girl
is sitting; this bank is as absolutely essential to the completion of
the picture as any object in the whole series. All this is done to
deepen the effect of repose.
198. Symmetry, or the balance of parts or masses in nearly equal
opposition, is one of the conditions of treatment under the law of
Repetition. For the opposition, in a symmetrical object, is of like
things reflecting each other: it is not the balance of contrary natures
(like that of day and night), but of like natures or like forms; one
side of a leaf being set like the reflection of the other in water.
Symmetry in Nature is, however, never formal nor accurate. She takes the
greatest care to secure some difference between the corresponding things
or parts of things; and an approximation to accurate symmetry is only
permitted in animals, because their motions secure perpetual difference
between the balancing parts. Stand before a mirror; hold your arms in
precisely the same position at each side, your head upright, your body
straight; divide your hair exactly in the middle and get it as nearly as
you can into exactly the same shape over each ear; and you will see the
effect of accurate symmetry: you will see, no less, how all grace and
power in the human form result from the interference of motion and life
with symmetry, and from the reconciliation of its balance with its
changefulness. Your position, as seen in the mirror, is the highest type
of symmetry as understood by modern architects.
199. In many sacred compositions, living symmetry, the balance of
harmonious opposites, is one of the profoundest sources of their power:
almost any works of the early painters, Angelico, Perugino, Giotto,
etc., will furnish you with notable instances of it. The Madonna of
Perugino in the National Gallery, with the angel Michael on one side and
Raphael on the other, is as beautiful an example as you can have.
In landscape, the principle of balance is more or less carried out, in
proportion to the wish of the painter to express disciplined calmness.
In bad compositions, as in bad architecture, it is formal, a tree on one
side answering a tree on the other; but in good compositions, as in
graceful statues, it is always easy and sometimes hardly traceable. In
the Coblentz, however, you cannot have much difficulty in seeing how the
boats on one side of the tower and the figures on the other are set in
nearly equal balance; the tower, as a central mass, uniting both.