The first inquiry which runs through Sir Joshua Reynolds's Discourses
is whether the student ought to look at nature with his own eyes or
with the eyes of others, and on the whole, he apparently inclines to
the latter. The second question is what is to be understood by
nature; whether it is a general and abstract idea, or an aggregate of
particulars; and he strenuously maintains the former of these positions.
Yet it is not easy always to determine how far or with what precise
limitations he does so.
The first germ of his speculations on this subject is to be found in two
papers in the _Idler._ In the last paragraph of the second of these, he
says:
'If it has been proved that the painter, by attending to the invariable
and general ideas of nature, produces beauty, he must, by regarding
minute particularities and accidental discrimination, deviate from the
universal rule, and pollute his canvas with deformity.'
In answer to this, I would say that deformity is not the being varied in
the particulars, in which all things differ (for on this principle all
nature, which is made up of individuals, would be a heap of deformity),
but in violating general rules, in which they all or almost all agree.
Thus there are no two noses in the world exactly alike, or without a
great variety of subordinate parts, which may still be handsome, but a
face without any nose at all, or a nose (like that of a mask) without
any particularity in the details, would be a great deformity in art
or nature. Sir Joshua seems to have been led into his notions on this
subject either by an ambiguity of terms, or by taking only one view of
nature. He supposes grandeur, or the general effect of the whole, to
consist in leaving out the particular details, because these details
are sometimes found without any grandeur of effect, and he therefore
conceives the two things to be irreconcilable and the alternatives of
each other. This is very imperfect reasoning. If the mere leaving out
the detail constituted grandeur, any one could do this: the greatest
dauber would at that rate be the greatest artist. A house or sign
painter might instantly enter the lists with Michael Angelo, and might
look down on the little, dry, hard manner of Raphael. But grandeur
depends on a distinct principle of its own, not on a negation of the
parts; and as it does not arise from their omission, so neither is it
incompatible with their insertion or the highest finishing. In fact, an
artist may give the minute particulars of any object one by one and with
the utmost care, and totally neglect the proportions, arrangement,
and general masses, on which the effect of the whole more immediately
depends; or he may give the latter, viz. the proportions and arrangement
of the larger parts and the general masses of light and shade, and leave
all the minuter parts of which those parts are composed a mere blotch,
one general smear, like the first crude and hasty getting in of the
groundwork of a picture: he may do either of these, or he may combine
both, that is, finish the parts, but put them in their right places, and
keep them in due subordination to the general effect and massing of the
whole. If the exclusion of the parts were necessary to the grandeur of
the whole composition, if the more entire this exclusion, if the
more like a _tabula rasa,_ a vague, undefined, shadowy and abstracted
representation the picture was, the greater the grandeur, there could be
no danger of pushing this principle too far, and going the full length
of Sir Joshua's theory without any restrictions or mental reservations.
But neither of these suppositions is true. The greatest grandeur may
coexist with the most perfect, nay with a microscopic accuracy of
detail, as we see it does often in nature: the greatest looseness and
slovenliness of execution may be displayed without any grandeur at
all either in the outline or distribution of the masses of colour. To
explain more particularly what I mean. I have seen and copied portraits
by Titian, in which the eyebrows were marked with a number of small
strokes, like hairlines (indeed, the hairs of which they were composed
were in a great measure given)--but did this destroy the grandeur of
expression, the truth of outline, arising from the arrangement of these
hair-lines in a given form? The grandeur, the character, the expression
remained, for the general form or arched and expanded outline remained,
just as much as if it had been daubed in with a blacking-brush: the
introduction of the internal parts and texture only added delicacy and
truth to the general and striking effect of the whole. Surely a number
of small dots or lines may be arranged into the form of a square or
a circle indiscriminately; the square or circle, that is, the larger
figure, remains the same, whether the line of which it consists is
broken or continuous; as we may see in prints where the outlines,
features, and masses remain the same in all the varieties of mezzotinto,
dotted and lined engraving. If Titian in marking the appearance of the
hairs had deranged the general shape and contour of the eyebrows, he
would have destroyed the look of nature; but as he did not, but kept
both in view, he proportionably improved his copy of it. So, in what
regards the masses of light and shade, the variety, the delicate
transparency and broken transitions of the tints is not inconsistent
with the greatest breadth or boldest contrasts. If the light, for
instance, is thrown strongly on one side of a face, and the other
is cast into deep shade, let the individual and various parts of the
surface be finished with the most scrupulous exactness both in the
drawing and in the colours, provided nature is not exceeded, this will
not nor cannot destroy the force and harmony of the composition. One
side of the face will still have that great and leading distinction of
being seen in shadow, and the other of being seen in the light, let the
subordinate differences be as many and as precise as they will. Suppose
a panther is painted in the sun: will it be necessary to leave out the
spots to produce breadth and the great style, or will not this be done
more effectually by painting the spots of one side of his shaggy coat as
they are seen in the light, and those of the other as they really appear
in natural shadow? The two masses are thus preserved completely, and
no offence is done to truth and nature. Otherwise we resolve the
distribution of light and shade into _local colouring._ The masses, the
grandeur exist equally in external nature with the local differences of
different colours. Yet Sir Joshua seems to argue that the grandeur, the
effect of the whole object, is confined to the general idea in the mind,
and that all the littleness and individuality is in nature. This is
an essentially false view of the subject. This grandeur, this general
effect, is indeed always combined with the details, or what our
theoretical reasoner would designate as _littleness_ in nature: and so
it ought to be in art, as far as art can follow nature with prudence and
profit. What is the fault of Denner's style?--It is, that he does _not_
give this combination of properties: that he gives only one view of
nature; that he abstracts the details, the finishing, the curiosities of
natural appearances from the general result, truth, and character of the
whole, and in finishing every part with elaborate care, totally loses
sight of the more important and striking appearance of the object as it
presents itself to us in nature. He gives every part of a face; but the
shape, the expression, the light and shade of the whole is wrong, and
as far as can be from what is natural. He gives an infinite variety
of tints of the human face, nor are they subjected to any principle of
light and shade. He is different from Rembrandt or Titian. The English
schools, formed on Sir Joshua's theory, give neither the finishing of
the parts nor the effect of the whole, but an inexplicable dumb mass
without distinction or meaning. They do not do as Denner did, and think
that not to do as he did is to do as Titian and Rembrandt did; I do
not know whether they would take it as a compliment to be supposed
to imitate nature. Some few artists, it must be said, have 'of
late reformed this indifferently among us! Oh! let them reform it
altogether!' I have no doubt they would if they could; but I have
some doubts whether they can or not.--Before I proceed to consider the
question of beauty and grandeur as it relates to the selection of form,
I will quote a few passages from Sir Joshua with reference to what has
been said on the imitation of particular objects. In the Third Discourse
he observes: 'I will now add that nature herself is not to be too
closely copied.... A mere copier of nature _can never produce anything
great; can never raise and enlarge the conceptions, or warm the heart of
the spectator._ The wish of the genuine painter must be more extensive:
instead of endeavouring to amuse mankind with the minute neatness of
his imitations, he must endeavour to improve them by the grandeur of his
ideas; instead of seeking praise by deceiving the superficial sense of
the spectator, he must strive for fame by captivating the imagination.'
From this passage it would surely seem that there was nothing in nature
but minute neatness and superficial effect: nothing great in _her_
style, for an imitator of it can produce nothing great; nothing 'to
enlarge the conceptions or warm the heart of the spectator.'
What word hath passed thy lips, Adam severe!
All that is truly grand or excellent is a figment of the imagination, a
vapid creation out of nothing, a pure effect of overlooking and scorning
the minute neatness of natural objects. This will not do. Again, Sir
Joshua lays it down without any qualification that--
'The whole beauty and grandeur of the art consists in being able to get
above all singular forms, local customs, peculiarities, and _details_ of
every kind.'
Yet we find him acknowledging a different opinion.
'I am very ready to allow' (he says, in speaking of history-painting)
'that _some_ circumstances of minuteness and particularity _frequently_
tend to give an air of truth to a piece, and _to interest the spectator
in an extraordinary manner._ Such circumstances therefore cannot wholly
be rejected; but if there be anything in the Art which requires
peculiar nicety of discernment, it is the disposition of these minute,
circumstantial parts, which, according to the judgment employed in the
choice, become so useful to truth or so injurious to grandeur.'
That's true; but the sweeping clause against 'all particularities and
details of every kind' is clearly got rid of. The undecided state of
Sir Joshua's feelings on this subject of the incompatibility between
the whole and the details is strikingly manifested in two short passages
which follow each other in the space of two pages. Speaking of some
pictures of Paul Veronese and Rubens as distinguished by the dexterity
and the unity of style displayed in them, he adds:
'It is by this, and this alone, that the mechanical power is ennobled,
and raised much above its natural rank. And it appears to me that with
propriety it acquires this character, as an instance of that superiority
with which mind predominates over matter, by contracting into one whole
what nature has made multifarious.'
This would imply that the principle of unity and integrity is only
in the mind, and that nature is a heap of disjointed, disconnected
particulars, a chaos of points and atoms. In the very next page the
following sentence occurs:
'As painting is an art, they' (the ignorant) 'think they ought to be
pleased in proportion as they see that art ostentatiously displayed;
they will from this supposition prefer neatness, high finishing, and
gaudy corlouring, to the truth, simplicity, and unity of nature.'
Before, neatness and high finishing were supposed to belong exclusively
to the littleness of nature, but here truth, simplicity, and unity are
her characteristics. Soon after, Sir Joshua says: 'I should be sorry
if what has been said should be understood to have any tendency to
encourage that carelessness which leaves work in an unfinished state. I
commend nothing for the want of exactness; I mean to point out that
kind of exactness which is the best, and which is alone truly to be so
esteemed.' This Sir Joshua has already told us consists in getting above
'all particularities and details of every kind.' Once more we find it
stated that--
'It is in vain to attend to the variation of tints, if in that attention
the general hue of flesh is lost; or to finish ever so minutely the
parts, if the masses are not observed, or the whole not well put
together.'
Nothing can be truer; but why always suppose the two things at variance
with each other?
'Titian's manner was then new to the world, but that unshaken truth on
which it is founded has fixed it as a model to all succeeding painters;
and those who will examine into the artifice will find it to consist in
the power of generalising, and in the shortness and simplicity of the
means employed.'
Titian's real excellence consisted in the power of generalising and of
_individualising_ at the same time: if it wore merely the former, it
would be difficult to account for the error immediately after pointed
out by Sir Joshua. He says in the very next paragraph:
'Many artists, as Vasari likewise observes, have ignorantly imagined
they are imitating the manner of Titian when they leave their colours
rough and neglect the detail; but not possessing the principles on which
he wrought, they have produced what he calls _goffe pitture_--absurd,
foolish pictures.'
Many artists have also imagined they were following the directions of
Sir Joshua when they did the same thing, that is, neglected the detail,
and produced the same results--vapid generalities, absurd, foolish
pictures.
I will only give two short passages more, and have done with this
part of the subject. I am anxious to confront Sir Joshua with his own
authority:
'The advantage of this method of considering objects (as a whole) is
what I wish now more particularly to enforce. At the same time I do
not forget that a painter must have the power of contracting as well as
dilating his sight; because he that does not at all express particulars
expresses nothing; yet it is certain that a nice discrimination of
minute circumstances and a punctilious delineation of them, whatever
excellence it may have (and I do not mean to detract from it), never did
confer on the artist the character of Genius.'
At page 53 we find the following words:
'Whether it is the human figure, an animal, or even inanimate objects,
there is nothing, however unpromising in appearance, but may be raised
into dignity, convey sentiment, and produce emotion, in the hands of a
Painter of genius. What was said of Virgil, that he threw even the
dung about the ground with an air of dignity, may be applied to Titian;
whatever he touched, however naturally mean, and habitually familiar, by
a kind of magic he invested with grandeur and importance.'--No, not by
magic, but by seeking and finding in individual nature, and combined
with details of every kind, that grace and grandeur and unity of effect
which Sir Joshua supposes to be a mere creation of the artist's brain!
Titian's practice was, I conceive, to give general appearances with
individual forms and circumstances: Sir Joshua's theory goes too often,
and in its prevailing bias, to separate the two things as inconsistent
with each other, and thereby to destroy or bring into question that
union of striking effect with accuracy of resemblance in which the
essence of sound art (as far as relates to imitation) consists.
Farther, as Sir Joshua is inclined to merge the details of individual
objects in general effect, so he is resolved to reduce all beauty or
grandeur in natural objects to a central form or abstract idea of a
certain class, so as to exclude all peculiarities or deviations from
this ideal standard as unfit subjects for the artist's pencil, and as
polluting his canvas with deformity. As the former principle went to
destroy all exactness and solidity in particular things, this goes to
confound all variety, distinctness, and characteristic force in the
broader scale of nature. There is a principle of conformity in nature
or of something in common between a number of individuals of the same
class, but there is also a principle of contrast, of discrimination and
identity, which is equally essential in the system of the universe and
in the structure of our ideas both of art and nature. Sir Joshua would
hardly neutralise the tints of the rainbow to produce a dingy grey, as a
medium or central colour; why, then, should he neutralise all features,
forms, etc., to produce an insipid monotony? He does not indeed consider
his theory of beauty as applicable to colour, which he well understood,
but insists upon and literally enforces it as to form and ideal
conceptions, of which he knew comparatively little, and where his
authority is more questionable. I will not in this place undertake to
show that his theory of a middle form (as the standard of taste and
beauty) is not true of the outline of the human face and figure or other
organic bodies, though I think that even there it is only one principle
or condition of beauty; but I do say that it has little or nothing to
do with those other capital parts of painting, colour, character,
expression, and grandeur of conception. Sir Joshua himself contends that
'beauty in creatures of the same species is the medium or centre of
all its various forms'; and he maintains that grandeur is the same
abstraction of the species in the individual. Therefore beauty and
grandeur must be the same thing, which they are not; so that this
definition must be faulty. Grandeur I should suppose to imply something
that elevates and expands the mind, which is chiefly power or magnitude.
Beauty is that which soothes and melts it; and its source, I apprehend,
is a certain harmony, softness, and gradation of form, within the limits
of our customary associations, no doubt, or of what we expect of certain
species, but not independent of every other consideration. Our critic
himself confesses of Michael Angelo, whom he regards as the pattern of
the great or sublime style, that 'his people are a superior order of
beings: there is nothing about them, nothing in the air of their actions
or their attitudes, or the style or cast of their limbs or features,
that reminds us of their belonging to our own species. Raffaelle's
imagination is not so elevated; his figures are not so much disjoined
from our own diminutive race of beings, though his ideas are chaste,
noble, and of great conformity to their subjects. Michael Angelo's works
have a strong, peculiar, and marked character: they seem to proceed from
his own mind entirely, and that mind so rich and abundant that he
never needed, or seemed to disdain to look abroad for foreign help.
Raffaelle's materials are generally borrowed, though the noble structure
is his own.(1) How does all this accord with the same writer's
favourite theory that all beauty, all grandeur, and all excellence
consist in an approximation to that central form or habitual idea
of mediocrity, from which every deviation is so much deformity and
littleness? Michael Angelo's figures are raised above our diminutive
race of beings, yet they are confessedly the standard of sublimity in
what regards the human form. Grandeur, then, admits of an exaggeration
of our habitual impressions; and 'the strong, marked, and peculiar
character which Michael Angelo has at the same time given to his works'
does not take away from it. This is fact against argument. I would
take Sir Joshua's word for the goodness of a picture, and for its
distinguishing properties, sooner than I would for an abstract
metaphysical theory. Our artist also speaks continually of high and low
subjects. There can be no distinction of this kind upon his principle,
that the standard of taste is the adhering to the central form of each
species, and that every species is in itself equally beautiful. The
painter of flowers, of shells, or of anything else, is equally elevated
with Raphael or Michael, if he adheres to the generic or established
form of what he paints: the rest, according to this definition, is a
matter of indifference. There must therefore be something besides the
central or customary form to account for the difference of dignity, for
the high and low style in nature or in art. Michael Angelo's figures, we
are told, are more than ordinarily grand; why, by the same rule, may
not Raphael's be more than ordinarily beautiful, have more than ordinary
softness, symmetry, and grace?--Character and expression are still less
included in the present theory. All character is a departure from the
common-place form; and Sir Joshua makes no scruple to declare that
expression destroys beauty. Thus he says:
'If you mean to preserve the most perfect beauty _in its most perfect
state,_ you cannot express the passions, all of which produce distortion
and deformity, more or less, in the most beautiful faces.'
He goes on: 'Guido, from want of choice in adapting his subject to his
ideas and his powers, or from attempting to preserve beauty where it
could not be preserved, has in this respect succeeded very ill. His
figures are often engaged in subjects that required great expression;
yet his Judith and Holofernes, the daughter of Herodias with the
Baptist's head, the Andromeda, and some even of the Mothers of the
Innocents, have little more expression than his Venus attired by the
Graces.'
What a censure is this passed upon Guido, and what a condemnation of
his own theory, which would reduce and level all that is truly great
and praiseworthy in art to this insipid, tasteless standard, by setting
aside as illegitimate all that does not come within the middle,
central form! Yet Sir Joshua judges of Hogarth as he deviates from this
standard, not as he excels in individual character, which he says is
only good or tolerable as it partakes of general nature; and he might
accuse Michael Angelo and Raphael, the one for his grandeur of style,
the other for his expression; for neither are what he sets up as the
goal of perfection--I will just stop to remark here that Sir Joshua
has committed himself very strangely in speaking of the character and
expression to be found in the Greek statues. He says in one place:
'I cannot quit the Apollo without making one observation on the
character of this figure. He is supposed to have just discharged his
arrow at the Python; and by the head retreating a little towards the
right shoulder, he appears attentive to its effect. What I would remark
is the difference of this attention from that of the Discobolus, who
is engaged in the same purpose, watching the effect of his Discus. The
graceful, negligent, though animated air of the one, and the vulgar
eagerness of the other, furnish an instance of the judgment of the
ancient Sculptors _in their nice discrimination of character._ They
are both equally true to nature, and equally admirable.' After a few
observations on the limited means of the art of sculpture, and the
inattention of the ancients to almost everything but form, we meet with
the following passage:--
'Those who think Sculpture can express more than we have allowed may
ask, by what means we discover, at the first glance, the character that
is represented in a Bust, a Cameo, or Intaglio? I suspect it will be
found, on close examination, by him who is resolved not to see more
than he really does see, that the figures are distinguished by their
_insignia_ more than by any variety of form or beauty. Take from Apollo
his Lyre, from Bacchus his Thyrsus and Vine-leaves, and Meleager the
Boar's Head, and there will remain little or no difference in their
characters. In a Juno, Minerva, or Flora, the idea of the artist seems
to have gone no further than representing perfect beauty, and afterwards
adding the proper attributes, with a total indifference to which they
gave them.'
(What, then, becomes of that 'nice discrimination of character' for
which our author has just before celebrated them?)
'Thus John De Bologna, after he had finished a group of a young man
holding up a young woman in his arms, with an old man at his feet,
called his friends together, to tell him what name he should give it,
and it was agreed to call it The Rape of the Sabines; and this is the
celebrated group which now stands before the old Palace at Florence. The
figures have the same general expression which is to be found in most of
the antique Sculpture; and yet it would be no wonder if future critics
should find out delicacy of expression which was never intended, and go
so far as to see, in the old man's countenance, the exact relation which
he bore to the woman who appears to be taken from him.'
So it is that Sir Joshua's theory seems to rest on an inclined plane,
and is always glad of an excuse to slide, from the severity of truth
and nature, into the milder and more equable regions of insipidity and
inanity; I am sorry to say so, but so it appears to me.
I confess, it strikes me as a self-evident truth that variety or
contrast is as essential a principle in art and nature as uniformity,
and as necessary to make up the harmony of the universe and the
contentment of the mind. Who would destroy the shifting effects of light
and shade, the sharp, lively opposition of colours in the same or in
different objects, the streaks in a flower, the stains in a piece of
marble, to reduce all to the same neutral, dead colouring, the same
middle tint? Yet it is on this principle that Sir Joshua would get rid
of all variety, character, expression, and picturesque effect in forms,
or at least measure the worth or the spuriousness of all these according
to their reference to or departure from a given or average standard.
Surely, nature is more liberal, art is wider than Sir Joshua's theory.
Allow (for the sake of argument) that all forms are in themselves
indifferent, and that beauty or the sense of pleasure in forms can
therefore only arise from customary association, or from that middle
impression to which they all tend: yet this cannot by the same rule
apply to other things. Suppose there is no capacity in form to affect
the mind except from its corresponding to previous expectation, the same
thing cannot be said of the idea of power or grandeur. No one can say
that the idea of power does not affect the mind with the sense of awe
and sublimity. That is, power and weakness, grandeur and littleness,
are not indifferent things, the perfection of which consists in a medium
between both. Again, expression is not a thing indifferent in itself,
which derives its value or its interest solely from its conformity to
a neutral standard. Who would neutralise the expression of pleasure
and pain? or say that the passions of the human mind--pity, love, joy,
sorrow, etc.--are only interesting to the imagination and worth the
attention of the artist, as he can reduce them to an equivocal state
which is neither pleasant nor painful, neither one thing nor the other?
Or who would stop short of the utmost refinement, precision, and force
in the delineation of each? Ideal expression is not neutral expression,
but extreme expression. Again, character is a thing of peculiarity,
of striking contrast, of distinction, and not of uniformity. It is
necessarily opposed to Sir Joshua's exclusive theory, and yet it is
surely a curious and interesting field of speculation for the human
mind. Lively, spirited discrimination of character is one source of
gratification to the lover of nature and art, which it could not be if
all truth and excellence consisted in rejecting individual traits.
Ideal character is not common-place, but consistent character marked
throughout, which may take place in history or portrait. Historical
truth in a picture is the putting the different features of the face or
muscles of the body into consistent action. The picturesque altogether
depends on particular points or qualities of an object, projecting as
it were beyond the middle line of beauty, and catching the eye of the
spectator. It was less, however, my intention to hazard any speculations
of my own than to confirm the common-sense feelings on the subject by
Sir Joshua's own admissions in different places. In the Tenth Discourse,
speaking of some objections to the Apollo, he has these remarkable
words:--
'In regard to the last objection (viz. that the lower half of the figure
is longer than just proportion allows) it must be remembered that
Apollo is here in the exertion of _one of his peculiar powers,_ which
is swiftness; he has therefore that proportion which is best adapted to
that character. This is no more incorrectness than when there is given
to a Hercules an extraordinary swelling and strength of muscles.'
Strength and activity then do not depend on the middle form; and the
middle form is to be sacrificed to the representation of these positive
qualities. Character is thus allowed not only to be an integrant part of
the antique and classical style of art, but even to take precedence of
and set aside the abstract idea of beauty. Little more would be required
to justify Hogarth in his Gothic resolution, that if he were to make
a figure of Charon, he would give him bandy legs, because watermen are
generally bandy-legged. It is very well to talk of the abstract idea
of a man or of a God, but if you come to anything like an intelligible
proposition, you must either individualise and define, or destroy
the very idea you contemplate. Sir Joshua goes into this question at
considerable length in the Third Discourse:
'To the principle I have laid down, that the idea of beauty in each
species of beings is an invariable one, it may be objected,' he says,
'that in every particular species there are various central forms,
which are separate and distinct from each other, and yet are undeniably
beautiful; that in the human figure, for instance the beauty of
Hercules is one, of the Gladiator another, of the Apollo another, which
makes so many different ideas of beauty. It is true, indeed, that these
figures are each perfect in their kind, though of different characters
and proportions; but still none of them is the representation of an
individual, but of a class. And as there is one general form, which,
as I have said, belongs to the human kind at large, so in each of these
classes there is one common idea which is the abstract of the various
individual forms belonging to that class. Thus, though the forms
of childhood and age differ exceedingly, there is a common form in
childhood, and a common form in age, which is the more perfect as it is
remote from all peculiarities. But I must add further, that though the
most perfect forms of each of the general divisions of the human figure
are ideal, and superior to any individual form of that class, yet the
highest perfection of the human figure is not to be found in any of
them. It is not in the Hercules, nor in the Gladiator, nor in the
Apollo; but in that form which is taken from all, and which partakes
equally of the activity of the Gladiator, of the delicacy of the Apollo,
and of the muscular strength of the Hercules. For perfect beauty in
any species must combine all the characters which are beautiful in that
species. It cannot consist in any one to the exclusion of the rest: no
one, therefore, must be predominant, that no one may be deficient.'
Sir Joshua here supposes the distinctions of classes and character to
be necessarily combined with the general leading idea of a middle form.
This middle form is not to confound age, sex, circumstance, under one
sweeping abstraction; but we must limit the general ideas by certain
specific differences and characteristic marks, belonging to the several
subordinate divisions and ramifications of each class. This is enough
to show that there is a principle of individuality as well as of
abstraction inseparable from works of art as well as nature. We are to
keep the human form distinct from that of other living beings, that of
men from that of women; we are to distinguish between age and infancy,
between thoughtfulness and gaiety, between strength and softness. Where
is this to stop? But Sir Joshua turns round upon himself in this very
passage, and says: 'No: we are to unite the strength of the Hercules
with the delicacy of the Apollo; for perfect beauty in any species must
combine all the characters which are beautiful in that species.' Now
if these different characters are beautiful in themselves, why not give
them for their own sakes and in their most striking appearances, instead
of qualifying and softening them down in a neutral form; which must
produce a compromise, not a union of different excellences. If all
excess of beauty, if all character is deformity, then we must try to
lose it as fast as possible in other qualities. But if strength is an
excellence, if activity is an excellence, if delicacy is an excellence,
then the perfection, i.e. the highest degree of each of these qualities,
cannot be attained but by remaining satisfied with a less degree of the
rest. But let us hear what Sir Joshua himself advances on this subject
in another part of the _Discourses:_
'Some excellences bear to be united, and are improved by union: others
are of a discordant nature, and the attempt to unite them only produces
a harsh jarring of incongruent principles. The attempt to unite contrary
excellences (of form, for instance(2)) in a single figure can never
escape degenerating into the monstrous but by sinking into the insipid;
by taking away its marked character, and weakening its expression.
'Obvious as these remarks appear, there are many writers on our art who,
not being of the profession and consequently not knowing what can
or cannot be done, have been very liberal of absurd praises in their
description of favourite works. They always find in them what they
are resolved to find. They praise excellences that can hardly exist
together; and, above all things, are fond of describing with great
exactness the expression of a mixed passion, which more particularly
appears to me out of the reach of our art.(3)
'Such are many disquisitions which I have read on some of the Cartoons
and other pictures of Raffaelle, where the critics have described their
own imaginations; or indeed where the excellent master himself may have
attempted this expression of passions above the powers of the art, and
has, therefore, by an indistinct and imperfect marking, left room for
every imagination with equal probability to find a passion of his
own. What has been, and what can be done in the art, is sufficiently
difficult: we need not be mortified or discouraged at not being able
to execute the conceptions of a romantic imagination. Art has its
boundaries, though imagination has none. We can easily, like the
ancients, suppose a Jupiter to be possessed of all those powers and
perfections which the subordinate Deities were endowed with separately.
Yet when they employed their art to represent him, they confined his
character to majesty alone. Pliny, therefore, though we are under great
obligations to him for the information he has given us in relation
to the works of the ancient artists, is very frequently wrong when he
speaks of them, which he does very often, in the style of many of
our modern connoisseurs. He observes that in a statue of Paris,
by Euphranor, you might discover at the same time three different
characters: the dignity of a Judge of the Goddesses, the Lover of Helen,
and the Conqueror of Achilles. A statue in which you endeavour to
unite stately dignity, youthful elegance, and stern valour, must surely
possess none of these to any eminent degree.
'From hence it appears that there is much difficulty as well as danger
in an endeavour to concentrate in a single subject those various
powers which, rising from various points, naturally move in different
directions.'
What real clue to the art or sound principles of judging the student
can derive from these contradictory statements, or in what manner it is
possible to reconcile them one to the other, I confess I am at a loss
to discover. As it appears to me, all the varieties of nature in the
infinite number of its qualities, combinations, characters, expressions,
incidents, etc., rise from distinct points or centres and must move
in distinct directions, as the forms of different species are to be
referred to a separate standard. It is the object of art to bring them
out in all their force, clearness, and precision, and not to blend them
into a vague, vapid, nondescript _ideal_ conception, which pretends to
unite, but in reality destroys. Sir Joshua's theory limits nature and
paralyses art. According to him, the middle form or the average of
our various impressions is the source from which all beauty, pleasure,
interest, imagination springs. I contend, on the contrary, that this
very variety is good in itself, nor do I agree with him that the whole
of nature as it exists in fact is stark naught, and that there is
nothing worthy of the contemplation of a wise man but that _ideal
perfection_ which never existed in the world nor even on canvas. There
is something fastidious and sickly in Sir Joshua's system. His code
of taste consists too much of negations, and not enough of positive,
prominent qualities. It accounts for nothing but the beauty of the
common Antique, and hardly for that. The merit of Hogarth, I grant, is
different from that of the Greek statues; but I deny that Hogarth is
to be measured by this standard or by Sir Joshua's middle forms: he
has powers of instruction and amusement that, 'rising from a different
point, naturally move in a different direction,' and completely attain
their end. It would be just as reasonable to condemn a comedy for not
having the pathos of a tragedy or the stateliness of an epic poem. If
Sir Joshua Reynolds's theory were true, Dr. Johnson's _Irene_ would be a
better tragedy than any of Shakespear's.
The reasoning of the _Discourses_ is, I think, then, deficient in the
following particulars:
1. It seems to imply that general effect in a picture is produced by
leaving out the details, whereas the largest masses and the grandest
outline are consistent with the utmost delicacy of finishing in the
parts.
2. It makes no distinction between beauty and grandeur, but refers both
to an _ideal_ or middle form, as the centre of the various forms of
the species, and yet inconsistently attributes the grandeur of Michael
Angelo's style to the superhuman appearance of his prophets and
apostles.
3. It does not at any time make mention of power or magnitude in an
object as a distinct source of the sublime (though this is acknowledged
unintentionally in the case of Michael Angelo, etc.), nor of softness
or symmetry of form as a distinct source of beauty, independently of,
though still in connection with another source arising from what we are
accustomed to expect from each individual species.
4. Sir Joshua's theory does not leave room for character, but rejects it
as an anomaly.
5. It does not point out the source of expression, but considers it
as hostile to beauty; and yet, lastly, he allows that the middle form,
carried to the utmost theoretical extent, neither defined by character,
nor impregnated by passion, would produce nothing but vague, insipid,
unmeaning generality.
In a word, I cannot think that the theory here laid down is clear and
satisfactory, that it is consistent with itself, that it accounts for
the various excellences of art from a few simple principles, or that the
method which Sir Joshua has pursued in treating the subject is, as he
himself expresses it, 'a plain and honest method.' It is, I fear, more
calculated to baffle and perplex the student in his progress than to
give him clear lights as to the object he should have in view, or to
furnish him with strong motives of emulation to attain it.