CHAPTER I.

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Library Edition

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN RUSKIN

POETRY OF ARCHITECTURE

SEVEN LAMPS

MODERN PAINTERS

VOLUME I

NATIONAL LIBRARY ASSOCIATION

NEW YORK CHICAGO

THE COMPLETE WORKS

OF

JOHN RUSKIN

VOLUME II

MODERN PAINTERS

VOLUME I

MODERN PAINTERS.

BY

A GRADUATE OF OXFORD.

VOL. I.

PART I--II.

TO

THE LANDSCAPE ARTISTS OF ENGLAND

This Work

IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED

BY THEIR SINCERE ADMIRER,

_THE AUTHOR_

PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION.

The work now laid before the public originated in indignation at the

shallow and false criticism of the periodicals of the day on the works

of the great living artist to whom it principally refers. It was

intended to be a short pamphlet, reprobating the matter and style of

those critiques, and pointing out their perilous tendency, as guides of

public feeling. But, as point after point presented itself for

demonstration, I found myself compelled to amplify what was at first a

letter to the Editor of a Review, into something very like a treatise on

art, to which I was obliged to give the more consistency and

completeness, because it advocated opinions which, to the ordinary

connoisseur, will sound heretical. I now scarcely know whether I should

announce it is an Essay on Landscape Painting, and apologize for its

frequent reference to the works of a particular master; or, announcing

it as a critique on particular works, apologize for its lengthy

discussion of general principles. But of whatever character the work may

be considered, the motives which led me to undertake it must not be

mistaken. No zeal for the reputation of any individual, no personal

feeling of any kind, has the slightest weight or influence with me. The

reputation of the great artist to whose works I have chiefly referred,

is established on too legitimate grounds among all whose admiration is

honorable, to be in any way affected by the ignorant sarcasms of

pretension and affectation. But when _public_ taste seems plunging

deeper and deeper into degradation day by day, and when the press

universally exerts such power as it possesses to direct the feeling of

the nation more completely to all that is theatrical, affected, and

false in art; while it vents its ribald buffooneries on the most exalted

truth, and the highest ideal of landscape, that this or any other age

has ever witnessed, it becomes the imperative duty of all who have any

perception or knowledge of what is really great in art, and any desire

for its advancement in England, to come fearlessly forward, regardless

of such individual interests as are likely to be injured by the

knowledge of what is good and right, to declare and demonstrate,

wherever they exist, the essence and the authority of the Beautiful and

the True.

Whatever may seem invidious or partial in the execution of my task is

dependent not so much on the tenor of the work, as on its

incompleteness. I have not entered into systematic criticism of all the

painters of the present day; but I have illustrated each particular

excellence and truth of art by the works in which it exists in the

highest degree, resting satisfied that if it be once rightly felt and

enjoyed in these, it will be discovered and appreciated wherever it

exists in others. And although I have never suppressed any conviction of

the superiority of one artist over another, which I believed to be

grounded on truth, and necessary to the understanding of truth, I have

been cautious never to undermine positive rank, while I disputed

relative rank. My uniform desire and aim have been, not that the present

favorite should be admired less, but that the neglected master should be

admired more. And I know that an increased perception and sense of truth

and beauty, though it may interfere with our estimate of the comparative

rank of painters, will invariably tend to increase our admiration of all

who are really great; and he who now places Stanfield and Callcott above

Turner, will admire Stanfield and Callcott more than he does now, when

he has learned to place Turner far above them both.

In three instances only have I spoken in direct depreciation of the

works of living artists, and these are all cases in which the reputation

is so firm and extended, as to suffer little injury from the opinion of

an individual, and where the blame has been warranted and deserved by

the desecration of the highest powers.

Of the old masters I have spoken with far greater freedom; but let it be

remembered that only a portion of the work is now presented to the

public, and it must not be supposed, because in that particular portion,

and with reference to particular excellencies, I have spoken in constant

depreciation, that I have no feeling of other excellencies of which

cognizance can only be taken in future parts of the work. Let me not be

understood to mean more than I have said, nor be made responsible for

conclusions when I have only stated facts. I have said that the old

masters did not give the truth of Nature; if the reader chooses, thence,

to infer that they were not masters at all, it is his conclusion, not

mine.

Whatever I have asserted throughout the work, I have endeavored to

ground altogether on demonstrations which must stand or fall by their

own strength, and which ought to involve no more reference to authority

or character than a demonstration in Euclid. Yet it is proper for the

public to know, that the writer is no mere theorist, but has been

devoted from his youth to the laborious study of practical art.

Whatever has been generally affirmed of the old schools of

landscape-painting is founded on familiar acquaintance with every

important work of art, from Antwerp to Naples. But it would be useless,

where close and immediate comparison with works in our own Academy is

desirable, to refer to the details of pictures at Rome or Munich; and it

would be impossible to speak at once with just feeling, as regarded the

possessor, and just freedom, as regarded the public, of pictures in

private galleries. Whatever particular references have been made for

illustration, have been therefore confined, as far as was in my power,

to works in the National and Dulwich Galleries.

Finally, I have to apologize for the imperfection of a work which I

could have wished not to have executed, but with years of reflection and

revisal. It is owing to my sense of the necessity of such revisal, that

only a portion of the work is now presented to the public; but that

portion is both complete in itself, and is more peculiarly directed

against the crying evil which called for instant remedy. Whether I ever

completely fulfil my intention, will partly depend upon the spirit in

which the present volume is received. If it be attributed to an

invidious spirit, or a desire for the advancement of individual

interests, I could hope to effect little good by farther effort. If, on

the contrary, its real feeling and intention be understood, I shall

shrink from no labor in the execution of a task which may tend, however

feebly, to the advancement of the cause of real art in England, and to

the honor of those great living Masters whom we now neglect or malign,

to pour our flattery into the ear of Death, and exalt, with vain

acclamation, the names of those who neither demand our praise, nor

regard our gratitude.

THE AUTHOR.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

It is allowed by the most able writers on naval and military tactics,

that although the attack by successive divisions absolutely requires in

the attacking party such an inherent superiority in quality of force,

and such consciousness of that superiority, as may enable his front

columns, or his leading ships, to support themselves for a considerable

period against overwhelming numbers; it yet insures, if maintained with

constancy, the most total ruin of the opposing force. Convinced of the

truth, and therefore assured of the ultimate prevalence and victory of

the principles which I have advocated, and equally confident that the

strength of the cause must give weight to the strokes of even the

weakest of its defenders, I permitted myself to yield to a somewhat

hasty and hot-headed desire of being, at whatever risk, in the thick of

the fire, and began the contest with a part, and that the weakest and

least considerable part, of the forces at my disposal. And I now find

the volume thus boldly laid before the public in a position much

resembling that of the Royal Sovereign at Trafalgar, receiving,

unsupported, the broadsides of half the enemy's fleet, while unforeseen

circumstances have hitherto prevented, and must yet for a time prevent,

my heavier ships of the line from taking any part in the action. I

watched the first moments of the struggle with some anxiety for the

solitary vessel,--an anxiety which I have now ceased to feel,--for the

flag of truth waves brightly through the smoke of the battle, and my

antagonists, wholly intent on the destruction of the leading ship, have

lost their position, and exposed themselves in defenceless disorder to

the attack of the following columns.

If, however, I have had no reason to regret my hasty advance, as far as

regards the ultimate issue of the struggle, I have yet found it to

occasion much misconception of the character, and some diminution of

the influence, of the present essay. For though the work has been

received as only in sanguine moments I had ventured to hope, though I

have had the pleasure of knowing that in many instances its principles

have carried with them a strength of conviction amounting to a

demonstration of their truth, and that, even where it has had no other

influence, it has excited interest, suggested inquiry, and prompted to a

just and frank comparison of Art with Nature; yet this effect would have

been greater still, had not the work been supposed, as it seems to have

been by many readers, a completed treatise, containing a systematized

statement of the whole of my views on the subject of modern art.

Considered as such, it surprises me that the book should have received

the slightest attention. For what respect could be due to a writer who

pretended to criticise and classify the works of the great painters of

landscape, without developing, or even alluding to, one single principle

of the beautiful or sublime? So far from being a completed essay, it is

little more than the introduction to the mass of evidence and

illustration which I have yet to bring forward; it treats of nothing but

the initiatory steps of art, states nothing but the elementary rules of

criticism, touches only on merits attainable by accuracy of eye and

fidelity of hand, and leaves for future consideration every one of the

eclectic qualities of pictures, all of good that is prompted by feeling,

and of great that is guided by judgment; and its function and scope

should the less have been mistaken, because I have not only most

carefully arranged the subject in its commencement, but have given

frequent references throughout to the essays by which it is intended to

be succeeded, in which I shall endeavor to point out the signification

and the value of those phenomena of external nature which I have been

hitherto compelled to describe without reference either to their

inherent beauty, or to the lessons which may be derived from them.

Yet, to prevent such misconception in future, I may perhaps be excused

for occupying the reader's time with a fuller statement of the feelings

with which the work was undertaken, of its general plan, and of the

conclusions and positions which I hope to be able finally to deduce and

maintain.

Nothing, perhaps, bears on the face of it more appearance of folly,

ignorance, and impertinence, than any attempt to diminish the honor of

those to whom the assent of many generations has assigned a throne; for

the truly great of later times have, almost without exception, fostered

in others the veneration of departed power which they felt themselves,

satisfied in all humility to take their seat at the feet of those whose

honor is brightened by the hoariness of time, and to wait for the period

when the lustre of many departed days may accumulate on their own heads,

in the radiance which culminates as it recedes. The envious and

incompetent have usually been the leaders of attack, content if, like

the foulness of the earth, they may attract to themselves notice by

their noisomeness, or, like its insects, exalt themselves by virulence

into visibility. While, however, the envy of the vicious, and the

insolence of the ignorant, are occasionally shown in their nakedness by

_futile_ efforts to degrade the dead, it is worthy of consideration

whether they may not more frequently escape detection in _successful_

efforts to degrade the living,--whether the very same malice may not be

gratified, the very same incompetence demonstrated in the unjust

lowering of present greatness, and the unjust exaltation of a perished

power, as, if exerted and manifested in a less safe direction, would

have classed the critic with Nero and Caligula, with Zoilus and

Perrault. Be it remembered, that the spirit of detraction is detected

only when unsuccessful, and receives least punishment where it effects

the greatest injury; and it cannot but be felt that there is as much

danger that the rising of new stars should be concealed by the mists

which are unseen, as that those throned in heaven should be darkened by

the clouds which are visible.

There is, I fear, so much malice in the hearts of most men, that they

are chiefly jealous of that praise which can give the greatest pleasure,

and are then most liberal of eulogium when it can no longer be enjoyed.

They grudge not the whiteness of the sepulchre, because by no honor they

can bestow upon it can the senseless corpse be rendered an object of

envy; but they are niggardly of the reputation which contributes to

happiness, or advances to fortune. They are glad to obtain credit for

generosity and humility by exalting those who are beyond the reach of

praise, and thus to escape the more painful necessity of doing homage to

a living rival. They are rejoiced to set up a standard of imaginary

excellence, which may enable them, by insisting on the inferiority of a

contemporary work to the things that have been, to withdraw the

attention from its superiority to the things that are. The same

undercurrent of jealousy operates in our reception of animadversion. Men

have commonly more pleasure in the criticism which hurts than in that

which is innocuous, and are more tolerant of the severity which breaks

hearts and ruins fortunes, than of that which falls impotently on the

grave.

And thus well says the good and deep-minded Richard Hooker: "To the best

and wisest, while they live, the world is continually a froward

opposite; and a curious observer of their defects and imperfections,

their virtues afterwards it as much admireth. And for this cause, many

times that which deserveth admiration would hardly be able to find

favor, if they which propose it were not content to profess themselves

therein scholars and followers of the ancient. For the world will not

endure to hear that we are wiser than any have been which went

before."--Book v. ch. vii. 3. He therefore who would maintain the cause

of contemporary excellence against that of elder time, must have almost

every class of men arrayed against him. The generous, because they would

not find matter of accusation against established dignities; the

envious, because they like not the sound of a living man's praise; the

wise, because they prefer the opinion of centuries to that of days; and

the foolish, because they are incapable of forming an opinion of their

own. Obloquy so universal is not lightly to be risked, and the few who

make an effort to stem the torrent, as it is made commonly in favor of

their own works, deserve the contempt which is their only reward. Nor is

this to be regretted, in its influence on the progress and preservation

of things technical and communicable. Respect for the ancients is the

salvation of art, though it sometimes blinds us to its _ends_. It

increases the power of the painter, though it diminishes his liberty;

and if it be sometimes an incumbrance to the essays of invention, it is

oftener a protection from the consequences of audacity. The whole system

and discipline of art, the collected results of the experience of ages,

might, but for the fixed authority of antiquity, be swept away by the

rage of fashion, or lost in the glare of novelty; and the knowledge

which it had taken centuries to accumulate, the principles which mighty

minds had arrived at only in dying, might be overthrown by the frenzy of

a faction, and abandoned in the insolence of an hour.

Neither, in its general application, is the persuasion of the

superiority of former works less just than useful. The greater number

of them are, and must be, immeasurably nobler than any of the results of

present effort, because that which is best of the productions of four

thousand years must necessarily be in its accumulation, beyond all

rivalry from the works of any given generation; but it should always be

remembered that it is improbable that many, and impossible that all, of

such works, though the greatest yet produced, should approach abstract

perfection; that there is certainly something left for us to carry

farther, or complete; that any given generation has just the same chance

of producing some individual mind of first-rate calibre, as any of its

predecessors; and that if such a mind _should_ arise, the chances are,

that with the assistance of experience and example, it would, in its

particular and chosen path, do greater things than had been before done.

We must therefore be cautious not to lose sight of the real use of what

has been left us by antiquity, nor to take that for a model of

perfection which is, in many cases, only a guide to it. The picture

which is looked to for an interpretation of nature is invaluable, but

the picture which is taken as a substitute for nature, had better be

burned; and the young artist, while he should shrink with horror from

the iconoclast who would tear from him every landmark and light which

has been bequeathed him by the ancients, and leave him in a liberated

childhood, may be equally certain of being betrayed by those who would

give him the power and the knowledge of past time, and then fetter his

strength from all advance, and bend his eyes backward on a beaten

path--who would thrust canvas between him and the sky, and tradition

between him and God.

And such conventional teaching is the more to be dreaded, because all

that is highest in art, all that is creative and imaginative, is formed

and created by every great master for himself, and cannot be repeated or

imitated by others. We judge of the excellence of a rising writer, not

so much by the resemblance of his works to what has been done before, as

by their difference from it; and while we advise him, in his first

trials of strength, to set certain models before him with respect to

inferior points,--one for versification, another for arrangement,

another for treatment,--we yet admit not his greatness until he has

broken away from all his models, and struck forth versification,

arrangement, and treatment of his own.

Three points, therefore, I would especially insist upon as necessary to

be kept in mind in all criticism of modern art. First, that there are

few, very few of even the best productions of antiquity, which are not

visibly and palpably imperfect in some kind or way, and conceivably

improvable by farther study; that every nation, perhaps every generation,

has in all probability some peculiar gift, some particular character of

mind, enabling it to do something different from, or something in some

sort better than what has been before done; and that therefore, unless

art be a trick, or a manufacture, of which the secrets are lost, the

greatest minds of existing nations, if exerted with the same industry,

passion, and honest aim as those of past time, have a chance in their

particular walk of doing something as great, or, taking the advantage of

former example into account, even greater and better. It is difficult to

conceive by what laws of logic some of the reviewers of the following

Essay have construed its first sentence into a denial of this

principle,--a denial such as their own conventional and shallow criticism

of modern works invariably implies. I have said that "nothing has been

for centuries consecrated by public admiration without possessing in a

_high_ degree _some_ species of sterling excellence." Does it thence

follow that it possesses in the _highest_ degree _every_ species of

sterling excellence? "Yet thus," says the sapient reviewer, "he admits

the fact against which he mainly argues,--namely, the superiority of

these time-honored productions." As if the possession of an abstract

excellence of some kind necessarily implied the possession of an

incomparable excellence of every kind! There are few works of man so

perfect as to admit of no conception of their being excelled,[A]--there

are thousands which have been for centuries, and will be for centuries

more, consecrated by public admiration, which are yet imperfect in many

respects, and have been excelled, and may be excelled again. Do my

opponents mean to assert that nothing good can ever be bettered, and that

what is best of past time is necessarily best of all time? Perugino, I

suppose, possessed some species of sterling excellence, but Perugino was

excelled by Raffaelle; and so Claude possesses some species of sterling

excellence, but it follows not that he may not be excelled by Turner.

The second point on which I would insist is that if a mind _were_ to

arise of such power as to be capable of equalling or excelling some of

the greatest works of past ages, the productions of such a mind would,

in all probability, be totally different in manner and matter from all

former productions; for the more powerful the intellect, the less will

its works resemble those of other men, whether predecessors or

contemporaries. Instead of reasoning, therefore, as we commonly do, in

matters of art, that because such and such a work does not resemble that

which has hitherto been a canon, therefore it _must_ be inferior and

wrong in principle; let us rather admit that there is in its very

dissimilarity an increased chance of its being itself a new, and

perhaps, a higher canon. If any production of modern art can be shown to

have the authority of nature on its side, and to be based on eternal

truths, it is all so much more in its favor, so much farther proof of

its power, that it is totally different from all that have been before

seen.[B]

The third point on which I would insist, is that if such a mind were to

arise, it would necessarily divide the world of criticism into two

factions; the one, necessarily the largest and loudest, composed of men

incapable of judging except by precedent, ignorant of general truth, and

acquainted only with such particular truths as may have been illustrated

or pointed out to them by former works, which class would of course be

violent in vituperation, and increase in animosity as the master

departed farther from their particular and preconceived canons of

right,--thus wounding their vanity by impugning their judgment; the

other, necessarily narrow of number, composed of men of general

knowledge and unbiassed habits of thought, who would recognize in the

work of the daring innovator a record and illustration of facts before

unseized, who would justly and candidly estimate the value of the truths

so rendered, and would increase in fervor of admiration as the master

strode farther and deeper, and more daringly into dominions before

unsearched or unknown; yet diminishing in multitude as they increased in

enthusiasm: for by how much their leader became more impatient in his

step--more impetuous in his success--more exalted in his research, by so

much must the number capable of following him become narrower, until at

last, supposing him never to pause in his advance, he might be left in

the very culminating moment of his consummate achievement, with but a

faithful few by his side, his former disciples fallen away, his former

enemies doubled in numbers and virulence, and the evidence of his

supremacy only to be wrought out by the devotion of men's lives to the

earnest study of the new truths he had discovered and recorded.

Such a mind has arisen in our days. It has gone on from strength to

strength, laying open fields of conquest peculiar to itself. It has

occasioned such schism in the schools of criticism as was beforehand to

be expected, and it is now at the zenith of its power, and,

_consequently_, in the last phase of declining popularity.

This I know, and can prove. No man, says Southey, was ever yet convinced

of any momentous truth without feeling in himself the power, as well as

the desire of communicating it. In asserting and demonstrating the

supremacy of this great master, I shall both do immediate service to the

cause of right art, and shall be able to illustrate many principles of

landscape painting which are of general application, and have hitherto

been unacknowledged.

For anything like immediate effect on the public mind, I do not hope.

"We mistake men's diseases," says Richard Baxter, "when we think there

needeth nothing to cure them of their errors but the evidence of truth.

Alas! there are many distempers of mind to be removed before they

receive that evidence." Nevertheless, when it is fully laid before them,

my duty will be done. Conviction will follow in due time. I do not

consider myself as in any way addressing, or having to do with, the

ordinary critics of the press. Their writings are not the guide, but the

expression, of public opinion. A writer for a newspaper naturally and

necessarily endeavors to meet, as nearly as he can, the feelings of the

majority of his readers; his bread depends on his doing so. Precluded by

the nature of his occupations from gaining any knowledge of art, he is

sure that he can gain credit for it by expressing the opinions of his

readers. He mocks the picture which the public pass, and bespatters with

praise the canvas which a crowd concealed from him.

Writers like the present critic of Blackwood's Magazine[C] deserve more

respect--the respect due to honest, hopeless, helpless imbecility. There

is something exalted in the innocence of their feeblemindedness: one

cannot suspect them of partiality, for it implies feeling; nor of

prejudice, for it implies some previous acquaintance with their subject.

I do not know that even in this age of charlatanry, I could point to a

more barefaced instance of imposture on the simplicity of the public,

than the insertion of these pieces of criticism in a respectable

periodical. We are not insulted with opinions on music from persons

ignorant of its notes; nor with treatises on philology by persons

unacquainted with the alphabet; but here is page after page of

criticism, which one may read from end to end, looking for something

which the writer knows, and finding nothing. Not his own language, for

he has to look in his dictionary, by his own confession, for a word[D]

occurring in one of the most important chapters of his Bible; not the

commonest traditions of the schools, for he does not know why Poussin

was called "learned;"[E] not the most simple canons of art, for he

prefers Lee to Gainsborough;[F] not the most ordinary facts of nature,

for we find him puzzled by the epithet "silver," as applied to the

orange blossom,--evidently never having seen anything silvery about an

orange in his life, except a spoon. Nay, he leaves us not to conjecture

his calibre from internal evidence; he candidly tells us (Oct. 1842)

that he has been studying trees only for the last week, and bases his

critical remarks chiefly on his practical experience of birch. More

disinterested than our friend Sancho, he would disenchant the public

from the magic of Turner by virtue of his own flagellation;

Xanthias-like, he would rob his master of immortality by his own powers

of endurance. What is Christopher North about? Does he receive his

critiques from Eaton or Harrow--based on the experience of a week's

birds'-nesting and its consequences? How low must art and its interests

sink, when the public mind is inadequate to the detection of this

effrontery of incapacity! In all kindness to Maga, we warn her, that,

though the nature of this work precludes us from devoting space to the

exposure, there may come a time when the public shall be themselves able

to distinguish ribaldry from reasoning, and may require some better and

higher qualifications in their critics of art, than the experience of a

school-boy, and the capacities of a buffoon.

It is not, however, merely to vindicate the reputation of those whom

writers like these defame, which would but be to anticipate by a few

years the natural and inevitable reaction of the public mind, that I am

devoting years of labor to the development of the principles on which

the great productions of recent art are based. I have a higher end in

view--one which may, I think, justify me, not only in the sacrifice of

my own time, but in calling on my readers to follow me through an

investigation far more laborious than could be adequately rewarded by

mere insight into the merits of a particular master, or the spirit of a

particular age.

It is a question which, in spite of the claims of Painting to be

called the Sister of Poetry, appears to me to admit of considerable

doubt, whether art has ever, except in its earliest and rudest stages,

possessed anything like efficient moral influence on mankind. Better the

state of Rome when "magnorum artificum frangebat pocula miles, ut

phaleris gauderet equus," than when her walls flashed with the marble

and the gold, "nec cessabat luxuria id agere, ut quam plurimum incendiis

perdat." Better the state of religion in Italy, before Giotto had broken

on one barbarism of the Byzantine schools, than when the painter of the

Last Judgment, and the sculptor of the Perseus, sat revelling side by

side. It appears to me that a rude symbol is oftener more efficient than

a refined one in touching the heart, and that as pictures rise in rank

as works of art, they are regarded with less devotion and more

curiosity.

But, however this may be, and whatever influence we may be disposed to

admit in the great works of sacred art, no doubt can, I think, be

reasonably entertained as to the utter inutility of all that has been

hitherto accomplished by the painters of landscape. No moral end has

been answered, no permanent good effected, by any of their works. They

may have amused the intellect, or exercised the ingenuity, but they

never have spoken to the heart. Landscape art has never taught us one

deep or holy lesson; it has not recorded that which is fleeting, nor

penetrated that which was hidden, nor interpreted that which was

obscure; it has never made us feel the wonder, nor the power, nor the

glory, of the universe; it has not prompted to devotion, nor touched

with awe; its power to move and exalt the heart has been fatally abused,

and perished in the abusing. That which ought to have been a witness to

the omnipotence of God, has become an exhibition of the dexterity of

man, and that which should have lifted our thoughts to the throne of the

Deity, has encumbered them with the inventions of his creatures.

If we stand for a little time before any of the more celebrated works of

landscape, listening to the comments of the passers-by, we shall hear

numberless expressions relating to the skill of the artist, but very few

relating to the perfection of nature. Hundreds will be voluble in

admiration, for one who will be silent in delight. Multitudes will laud

the composition, and depart with the praise of Claude on their

lips,--not one will feel as if it were _no_ composition, and depart

with the praise of God in his heart.

These are the signs of a debased, mistaken, and false school of

painting. The skill of the artist, and the perfection of his art, are

never proved until both are forgotten. The artist has done nothing till

he has concealed himself,--the art is imperfect which is visible,--the

feelings are but feebly touched, if they permit us to reason on the

methods of their excitement. In the reading of a great poem, in the

hearing of a noble oration, it is the subject of the writer, and not his

skill,--his passion, not his power, on which our minds are fixed. We see

as he sees, but we see not him. We become part of him, feel with him,

judge, behold with him; but we think _of_ him as little as of ourselves.

Do we think of Aeschylus while we wait on the silence of Cassandra,[G] or

of Shakspeare, while we listen to the wailing of Lear? Not so. The power

of the masters is shown by their self-annihilation. It is commensurate

with the degree in which they themselves appear not in their work. The

harp of the minstrel is untruly touched, if his own glory is all that it

records. Every great writer may be at once known by his guiding the mind

far from himself, to the beauty which is not of his creation, and the

knowledge which is past his finding out.

And must it ever be otherwise with painting, for otherwise it has ever

been. Her subjects have been regarded as mere themes on which the

artist's power is to be displayed; and that power, be it of imitation,

composition, idealization, or of whatever other kind, is the chief

object of the spectator's observation. It is man and his fancies, man

and his trickeries, man and his inventions,--poor, paltry, weak,

self-sighted man,--which the connoisseur forever seeks and worships.

Among potsherds and dunghills, among drunken boors and withered

beldames, through every scene of debauchery and degradation, we follow

the erring artist, not to receive one wholesome lesson, not to be

touched with pity, nor moved with indignation, but to watch the

dexterity of the pencil, and gloat over the glittering of the hue.

I speak not only of the works of the Flemish School--I wage no war with

their admirers; they may be left in peace to count the spiculae of

haystacks and the hairs of donkeys--it is also of works of real mind

that I speak,--works in which there are evidences of genius and workings

of power,--works which have been held up as containing all of the

beautiful that art can reach or man conceive. And I assert with sorrow,

that all hitherto done in landscape, by those commonly conceived its

masters, has never prompted one holy thought in the minds of nations. It

has begun and ended in exhibiting the dexterities of individuals, and

conventionalities of systems. Filling the world with the honor of Claude

and Salvator, it has never once tended to the honor of God.

Does the reader start in reading these last words, as if they were those

of wild enthusiasm,--as if I were lowering the dignity of religion by

supposing that its cause could be advanced by such means? His surprise

proves my position. It _does_ sound like wild, like absurd enthusiasm,

to expect any definite moral agency in the painters of landscape; but

ought it so to sound? Are the gorgeousness of the visible hue, the glory

of the realized form, instruments in the artist's hand so ineffective,

that they can answer no nobler purpose than the amusement of curiosity,

or the engagement of idleness? Must it not be owing to gross neglect or

misapplication of the means at his command, that while words and tones

(means of representing nature surely less powerful than lines and

colors) can kindle and purify the very inmost souls of men, the painter

can only hope to entertain by his efforts at expression, and must remain

forever brooding over his incommunicable thoughts?

The cause of the evil lies, I believe, deep-seated in the system of

ancient landscape art; it consists, in a word, in the painter's taking

upon him to modify God's works at his pleasure, casting the shadow of

himself on all he sees, constituting himself arbiter where it is honor

to be a disciple, and exhibiting his ingenuity by the attainment of

combinations whose highest praise is that they are impossible. We shall

not pass through a single gallery of old art, without hearing this topic

of praise confidently advanced. The sense of artificialness, the

absence of all appearance of reality, the clumsiness of combination by

which the meddling of man is made evident, and the feebleness of his

hand branded on the inorganization of his monstrous creature, is

advanced as a proof of inventive power, as an evidence of abstracted

conception;--nay, the violation of specific form, the utter abandonment

of all organic and individual character of object, (numberless examples

of which from the works of the old masters are given in the following

pages,) is constantly held up by the unthinking critic as the foundation

of the grand or historical style, and the first step to the attainment

of a pure ideal. Now, there is but one grand style, in the treatment of

all subjects whatsoever, and that style is based on the _perfect_

knowledge, and consists in the simple, unencumbered rendering, of the

specific characters of the given object, be it man, beast, or flower.

Every change, caricature, or abandonment of such specific character, is

as destructive of grandeur as it is of truth, of beauty as of propriety.

Every alteration of the features of nature has its origin either in

powerless indolence or blind audacity, in the folly which forgets, or

the insolence which desecrates, works which it is the pride of angels to

know, and their privilege to love.

We sometimes hear such infringement of universal laws justified on the

plea, that the frequent introduction of mythological abstractions into

ancient landscape requires an imaginary character of form in the

material objects with which they are associated. Something of this kind

is hinted in Reynolds's 14th Discourse; but nothing can be more false

than such reasoning. If there be any truth or beauty in the original

conception of the spiritual being so introduced, there must be a true

and real connection between that abstract idea[H] and the features of

nature as she was and is. The woods and waters which were peopled by the

Greek with typical life were not different from those which now wave and

murmur by the ruins of his shrines. With their visible and actual forms

was his imagination filled, and the beauty of its incarnate creatures

can only be understood among the pure realities which originally

modelled their conception. If divinity be stamped upon the features, or

apparent in the form of the spiritual creature, the mind will not be

shocked by its appearing to ride upon the whirlwind, and trample on the

storm; but if mortality, no violation of the characters of the earth

will forge one single link to bind it to the heaven.

Is there then no such thing as elevated ideal character of landscape?

Undoubtedly; and Sir Joshua, with the great master of this character,

Nicolo Poussin, present to his thoughts, ought to have arrived at more

true conclusions respecting its essence than, as we shall presently see,

are deducible from his works. The true ideal of landscape is precisely

the same as that of the human form; it is the expression of the

specific--not the individual, but the specific--characters of every

object, in their perfection; there is an ideal form of every herb,

flower, and tree: it is that form to which every individual of the

species has a tendency to arrive, freed from the influence of accident

or disease. Every landscape painter should know the specific characters

of every object he has to represent, rock, flower, or cloud; and in his

highest ideal works, all their distinctions will be perfectly expressed,

broadly or delicately, slightly or completely, according to the nature

of the subject, and the degree of attention which is to be drawn to the

particular object by the part it plays in the composition. Where the

sublime is aimed at, such distinctions will be indicated with severe

simplicity, as the muscular markings in a colossal statue; where beauty

is the object, they must be expressed with the utmost refinement of

which the hand is capable.

This may sound like a contradiction of principles advanced by the

highest authorities; but it is only a contradiction of a particular and

most mistaken application of them. Much evil has been done to art by

the remarks of historical painters on landscape. Accustomed themselves

to treat their backgrounds slightly and boldly, and feeling (though, as

I shall presently show, only in consequence of their own deficient

powers) that any approach to completeness of detail therein, injures

their picture by interfering with its principal subject, they naturally

lose sight of the peculiar and intrinsic beauties of things which to

them are injurious, unless subordinate. Hence the frequent advice given

by Reynolds and others, to neglect _specific_ form in landscape, and

treat its materials in large masses, aiming only at general truths,--the

flexibility of foliage, but not its kind; the rigidity of rock, but not

its mineral character. In the passage more especially bearing on this

subject (in the eleventh lecture of Sir J. Reynolds), we are told that

"the landscape painter works not for the virtuoso or the naturalist, but

for the general observer of life and nature." This is true, in precisely

the same sense that the sculptor does not work for the anatomist, but

for the common observer of life and nature. Yet the sculptor is not, for

this reason, permitted to be wanting either in knowledge or expression

of anatomical detail; and the more refined that expression can be

rendered, the more perfect is his work. That which, to the anatomist, is

the end,--is, to the sculptor, the means. The former desires details,

for their own sake; the latter, that by means of them, he may kindle his

work with life, and stamp it with beauty. And so in landscape;--botanical

or geological details are not to be given as matter of curiosity or

subject of search, but as the ultimate elements of every species of

expression and order of loveliness.

In his observations on the foreground of the St. Pietro Martire, Sir

Joshua advances, as matter of praise, that the plants are discriminated

"just as much as was necessary for variety, and no more." Had this

foreground been occupied by a group of animals, we should have been

surprised to be told that the lion, the serpent, and the dove, or

whatever other creatures might have been introduced, were distinguished

from each other just as much as was necessary for variety, and no more.

Yet is it to be supposed that the distinctions of the vegetable world

are less complete, less essential, or less divine in origin, than those

of the animal? If the distinctive forms of animal life are meant for our

reverent observance, is it likely that those of vegetable life are made

merely to be swept away? The latter are indeed less obvious and less

obtrusive; for which very reason there is less excuse for omitting them,

because there is less danger of their disturbing the attention or

engaging the fancy.

But Sir Joshua is as inaccurate in fact, as false in principle. He

himself furnishes a most singular instance of the very error of which he

accuses Vaseni,--the seeing what he expects; or, rather, in the present

case, not seeing what he does not expect. The great masters of Italy,

almost without exception, and Titian perhaps more than any, (for he had

the highest knowledge of landscape,) are in the constant habit of

rendering every detail of their foregrounds with the most laborious

botanical fidelity: witness the "Bacchus and Ariadne," in which the

foreground is occupied by the common blue iris, the aquilegia, and the

wild rose; _every stamen_ of which latter is given, while the blossoms

and leaves of the columbine (a difficult flower to draw) have been

studied with the most exquisite accuracy. The foregrounds of Raffaelle's

two cartoons,--"The Miraculous Draught of Fishes" and "The Charge to

Peter,"--are covered with plants of the common sea colewort, (_crambe

maritima_,) of which the sinuated leaves and clustered blossoms would

have exhausted the patience of any other artist; but have appeared

worthy of prolonged and thoughtful labor to the great mind of Raffaelle.

It appears then, not only from natural principles, but from the highest

of all authority, that thorough knowledge of the lowest details is

necessary and full expression of them right, even in the highest class

of historical painting; that it will not take away from, nor interfere

with, the interest of the figures; but, rightly managed, must add to and

elucidate it; and, if further proof be wanting, I would desire the

reader to compare the background of Sir Joshua's "Holy Family," in the

National Gallery, with that of Nicolo Poussin's "Nursing of Jupiter," in

the Dulwich Gallery. The first, owing to the utter neglect of all

botanical detail, has lost every atom of ideal character, and reminds us

of nothing but an English fashionable flower garden;--the formal

pedestal adding considerably to the effect. Poussin's, in which every

vine leaf is drawn with consummate skill and untiring diligence,

produces not only a tree group of the most perfect grace and beauty, but

one which, in its pure and simple truth, belongs to every age of nature,

and adapts itself to the history of all time. If, then, such entire

rendering of specific character be necessary to the historical painter,

in cases where these lower details are entirely subordinate to his human

subject, how much more must it be necessary in landscape, where they

themselves constitute the subject, and where the undivided attention is

to be drawn to them.

There is a singular sense in which the child may peculiarly be said to

be father of the man. In many arts and attainments, the first and last

stages of progress--the infancy and the consummation--have many features

in common; while the intermediate stages are wholly unlike either, and

are farthest from the right. Thus it is in the progress of a painter's

handling. We see the perfect child,--the absolute beginner, using of

necessity a broken, imperfect, inadequate line, which, as he advances,

becomes gradually firm, severe, and decided. Yet before he becomes a

perfect artist, this severity and decision will again be exchanged for a

light and careless stroke, which in many points will far more resemble

that of his childhood than of his middle age--differing from it only by

the consummate effect wrought out by the apparently inadequate means. So

it is in many matters of opinion. Our first and last coincide, though on

different grounds; it is the middle stage which is farthest from the

truth. Childhood often holds a truth with its feeble fingers, which the

grasp of manhood cannot retain,--which it is the pride of utmost age to

recover.

Perhaps this is in no instance more remarkable than in the opinion we

form upon the subject of detail in works of art. Infants in judgment, we

look for specific character, and complete finish--we delight in the

faithful plumage of the well-known bird--in the finely drawn leafage of

the discriminated flower. As we advance in judgment, we scorn such

detail altogether; we look for impetuosity of execution, and breadth of

effect. But, perfected in judgment, we return in a great measure to our

early feelings, and thank Raffaelle for the shells upon his sacred

beach, and for the delicate stamens of the herbage beside his inspired

St. Catherine.[I]

Of those who take interest in art, nay, even of artists themselves,

there are an hundred in the middle stage of judgment, for one who is in

the last; and this not because they are destitute of the power to

discover, or the sensibility to enjoy the truth, but because the truth

bears so much semblance of error--the last stage of the journey to the

first,--that every feeling which guides to it is checked in its origin.

The rapid and powerful artist necessarily looks with such contempt on

those who seek minutiae of detail _rather_ than grandeur of impression,

that it is almost impossible for him to conceive of the great last step

in art, by which both become compatible. He has so often to dash the

delicacy out of the pupil's work, and to blot the details from his

encumbered canvas; so frequently to lament the loss of breadth and

unity, and so seldom to reprehend the imperfection of minutiae, that he

necessarily looks upon complete _parts_ as the very sign of error,

weakness, and ignorance. Thus, frequently to the latest period of his

life, he separates, like Sir Joshua, as chief enemies, the details and

the whole, which an artist cannot be great unless he reconciles; and

because details alone, and unreferred to a final purpose, are the sign

of a tyro's work, he loses sight of the remoter truth, that details

perfect in unity, and, contributing to a final purpose, are the sign of

the production of a consummate master.

It is not, therefore, detail sought for its own sake,--not the

calculable bricks of the Dutch house-painters, nor the numbered hairs

and mapped wrinkles of Denner, which constitute great art,--they are the

lowest and most contemptible art; but it is detail referred to a great

end,--sought for the sake of the inestimable beauty which exists in the

slightest and least of God's works, and treated in a manly, broad, and

impressive manner. There may be as much greatness of mind, as much

nobility of manner in a master's treatment of the smallest features, as

in his management of the most vast; and this greatness of manner chiefly

consists in seizing the specific character of the object, together with

all the great qualities of beauty which it has in common with higher

orders of existence,[J] while he utterly rejects the meaner beauties

which are accidentally peculiar to the object, and yet not specifically

characteristic of it. I cannot give a better instance than the painting

of the flowers in Titian's picture above mentioned. While every stamen

of the rose is given, because this was necessary to mark the flower, and

while the curves and large characters of the leaves are rendered with

exquisite fidelity, there is no vestige of particular texture, of moss,

bloom, moisture, or any other accident--no dew-drops, nor flies, nor

trickeries of any kind; nothing beyond the simple forms and hues of the

flowers,--even those hues themselves being simplified and broadly

rendered. The varieties of aquilegia have, in reality, a grayish and

uncertain tone of color; and, I believe, never attain the intense purity

of blue with which Titian has gifted his flower. But the master does not

aim at the particular color of individual blossoms; he seizes the type

of all, and gives it with the utmost purity and simplicity of which

color is capable.

These laws being observed, it will not only be in the power, it will be

the duty,--the imperative duty,--of the landscape painter, to descend to

the lowest details with undiminished attention. Every herb and flower of

the field has its specific, distinct, and perfect beauty; it has its

peculiar habitation, expression, and function. The highest art is that

which seizes this specific character, which develops and illustrates it,

which assigns to it its proper position in the landscape, and which, by

means of it, enhances and enforces the great impression which the

picture is intended to convey. Nor is it of herbs and flowers alone that

such scientific representation is required. Every class of rock, every

kind of earth, every form of cloud, must be studied with equal industry,

and rendered with equal precision. And thus we find ourselves

unavoidably led to a conclusion directly opposed to that constantly

enunciated dogma of the parrot-critic, that the features of nature must

be "generalized,"--a dogma whose inherent and broad absurdity would long

ago have been detected, if it had not contained in its convenient

falsehood an apology for indolence, and a disguise for incapacity.

Generalized! As if it were possible to generalize things generically

different. Of such common cant of criticism I extract a characteristic

passage from one of the reviews of this work, that in this year's

Athenaeum for February 10th: "He (the author) would have geological

landscape painters, dendrologic, meteorologic, and doubtless

entomologic, ichthyologic, every kind of physiologic painter united in

the same person; yet, alas, for true poetic art among all these learned

Thebans! No; landscape painting must not be reduced to mere portraiture

of inanimate substances, Denner-like portraiture of the earth's face.

* * * * * Ancient landscapists took a broader, deeper, higher view

of their art; they neglected particular traits, and gave only general

features. Thus they attained mass and force, harmonious union and simple

effect, the elements of grandeur and beauty."

To all such criticism as this (and I notice it only because it expresses

the feelings into which many sensible and thoughtful minds have been

fashioned by infection) the answer is simple and straightforward. It is

just as impossible to generalize granite and slate, as it is to

generalize a man and a cow. An animal must be either one animal or

another animal; it cannot be a general animal, or it is no animal; and

so a rock must be either one rock or another rock; it cannot be a

general rock, or it is no rock. If there were a creature in the

foreground of a picture, of which he could not decide whether it were a

pony or a pig, the Athenaeum critic would perhaps affirm it to be a

generalization of pony and pig, and consequently a high example of

"harmonious union and simple effect." But _I_ should call it simple bad

drawing. And so when there are things in the foreground of Salvator of

which I cannot pronounce whether they be granite or slate, or tufa, I

affirm that there is in them neither harmonious union nor simple effect,

but simple monstrosity. There is no grandeur, no beauty of any sort or

kind; nothing but destruction, disorganization, and ruin, to be obtained

by the violation of natural distinctions. The elements of brutes can

only mix in corruption, the elements of inorganic nature only in

annihilation. We may, if we choose, put together centaur monsters; but

they must still be half man, half horse; they cannot be both man and

horse, nor either man or horse. And so, if landscape painters choose,

they may give us rocks which shall be half granite and half slate; but

they cannot give us rocks which shall be either granite or slate, nor

which shall be both granite and slate. Every attempt to produce that

which shall be _any_ rock, ends in the production of that which is _no_

rock.

It is true that the distinctions of rocks and plants and clouds are less

conspicuous, and less constantly subjects of observation than those of

the animal creation; but the difficulty of observing them proves not

the merit of overlooking them. It only accounts for the singular fact,

that the world has never yet seen anything like a perfect school of

landscape. For just as the highest historical painting is based on

perfect knowledge of the workings of the human form, and human mind, so

must the highest landscape painting be based on perfect cognizance of

the form, functions, and system of every organic or definitely

structured existence which it has to represent. This proposition is

self-evident to every thinking mind; and every principle which appears

to contradict it is either misstated or misunderstood. For instance, the

Athenaeum critic calls the right statement of generic difference

"_Denner_-like portraiture." If he can find anything like Denner in what

I have advanced as the utmost perfection of landscape art--the recent

works of Turner--he is welcome to his discovery and his theory. No;

Denner-like portraiture would be the endeavor to paint the separate

crystals of quartz and felspar in the granite, and the separate flakes

of mica in the mica slate,--an attempt just as far removed from what I

assert to be great art, (the bold rendering of the generic characters of

form in both rocks,) as modern sculpture of lace and button-holes is

from the Elgin marbles. Martin has attempted this Denner-like

portraiture of sea-foam with the assistance of an acre of canvas--with

what success, I believe the critics of his last year's Canute had, for

once, sense enough to decide.

Again, it does not follow that because such accurate knowledge is

_necessary_ to the painter that it should constitute the painter, nor

that such knowledge is valuable in itself, and without reference to high

ends. Every kind of knowledge may be sought from ignoble motives, and

for ignoble ends; and in those who so possess it, it is ignoble

knowledge; while the very same knowledge is in another mind an

attainment of the highest dignity, and conveying the greatest blessing.

This is the difference between the mere botanist's knowledge of plants,

and the great poet's or painter's knowledge of them. The one notes their

distinctions for the sake of swelling his herbarium, the other, that he

may render them vehicles of expression and emotion. The one counts the

stamens, and affixes a name, and is content; the other observes every

character of the plant's color and form; considering each of its

attributes as an element of expression, he seizes on its lines of grace

or energy, rigidity or repose; notes the feebleness or the vigor, the

serenity or tremulousness of its hues; observes its local habits, its

love or fear of peculiar places, its nourishment or destruction by

particular influences; he associates it in his mind with all the

features of the situations it inhabits, and the ministering agencies

necessary to its support. Thenceforward the flower is to him a living

creature, with histories written on its leaves, and passions breathing

in its motion. Its occurrence in his picture is no mere point of color,

no meaningless spark of light. It is a voice rising from the earth,--a

new chord of the mind's music,--a necessary note in the harmony of his

picture, contributing alike to its tenderness and its dignity, nor less

to its loveliness than its truth.

The particularization of flowers by Shakspeare and Shelley affords us

the most frequent examples of the exalted use of these inferior details.

It is true that the painter has not the same power of expressing the

thoughts with which his symbols are connected; he is dependent in some

degree on the knowledge and feeling of the spectator; but, by the

destruction of such details, his foreground is not rendered more

intelligible to the ignorant, although it ceases to have interest for

the informed. It is no excuse for illegible writing that there are

persons who could not have read it had it been plain.

I repeat then, generalization, as the word is commonly understood, is

the act of a vulgar, incapable, and unthinking mind. To see in all

mountains nothing but similar heaps of earth; in all rocks, nothing but

similar concretions of solid matter; in all trees, nothing but similar

accumulations of leaves, is no sign of high feeling or extended thought.

The more we know, and the more we feel, the more we separate; we

separate to obtain a more perfect unity. Stones, in the thoughts of the

peasant, lie as they do on his field, one is like another, and there is

no connection between any of them. The geologist distinguishes, and in

distinguishing connects them. Each becomes different from its fellow,

but in differing from, assumes a relation to its fellow; they are no

more each the repetition of the other,--they are parts of a system, and

each implies and is connected with the existence of the rest. That

generalization then is right, true, and noble, which is based on the

knowledge of the distinctions and observance of the relations of

individual kinds. That generalization is wrong, false, and contemptible,

which is based on ignorance of the one, and disturbance of the other.

It is indeed no generalization, but confusion and chaos; it is the

generalization of a defeated army into indistinguishable impotence--the

generalization of the elements of a dead carcass into dust.

Let us, then, without farther notice of the dogmata of the schools of

art, follow forth those conclusions to which we are led by observance of

the laws of nature.

I have just said that every class of rock, earth and cloud, must be

known by the painter, with geologic and meteorologic accuracy.[K] Nor is

this merely for the sake of obtaining the character of these minor

features themselves, but more especially for the sake of reaching that

simple, earnest, and consistent character which is visible in the

_whole_ effect of every natural landscape. Every geological formation

has features entirely peculiar to itself; definite lines of fracture,

giving rise to fixed resultant forms of rock and earth; peculiar

vegetable products, among which still farther distinctions are wrought

out by variations of climate and elevation. From such modifying

circumstances arise the infinite varieties of the orders of landscape,

of which each one shows perfect harmony among its several features, and

possesses an ideal beauty of its own; a beauty not distinguished merely

by such peculiarities as are wrought on the human form by change of

climate, but by generic differences the most marked and essential; so

that its classes cannot be generalized or amalgamated by any expedients

whatsoever. The level marshes and rich meadows of the tertiary, the

rounded swells and short pastures of the chalk, the square-built cliffs

and cloven dells of the lower limestone, the soaring peaks and ridgy

precipices of the primaries, having nothing in common among

them--nothing which is not distinctive and incommunicable. Their very

atmospheres are different--their clouds are different--their humors of

storm and sunshine are different--their flowers, animals and forests are

different. By each order of landscape--and its orders, I repeat, are

infinite in number, corresponding not only to the several species of

rock, but to the particular circumstances of the rocks' deposition or

after treatment, and to the incalculable varieties of climate, aspect,

and human interference:--by each order of landscape, I say, peculiar

lessons are intended to be taught, and distinct pleasures to be

conveyed; and it is as utterly futile to talk of generalizing their

impressions into an ideal landscape, as to talk of amalgamating all

nourishment into one ideal food, gathering all music into one ideal

movement, or confounding all thought into one ideal idea.

There is, however, such a thing as composition of different orders of

landscape, though there can be no generalization of them. Nature herself

perpetually brings together elements of various expression. Her barren

rocks stoop through wooded promontories to the plain; and the wreaths of

the vine show through their green shadows the wan light of unperishing

snow.

The painter, therefore, has the choice of either working out the

isolated character of some one distinct class of scene, or of bringing

together a multitude of different elements, which may adorn each other

by contrast.

I believe that the simple and uncombined landscape, if wrought out with

due attention to the ideal beauty of the features it includes, will

always be the most powerful in its appeal to the heart. Contrast

increases the splendor of beauty, but it disturbs its influence; it adds

to its attractiveness, but diminishes its power. On this subject I shall

have much to say hereafter; at present I merely wish to suggest the

possibility, that the single-minded painter, who is working out on broad

and simple principles, a piece of unbroken, harmonious landscape

character, may be reaching an end in art quite as high as the more

ambitious student who is always "within five minutes' walk of

everywhere," making the ends of the earth contribute to his pictorial

guazzetto;[L] and the certainty, that unless the composition of the

latter be regulated by severe judgment, and its members connected by

natural links, it must become more contemptible in its motley, than an

honest study of roadside weeds.

Let me, at the risk of tediously repeating what is universally known,

refer to the common principles of historical composition, in order that

I may show their application to that of landscape. The merest tyro in

art knows that every figure which is unnecessary to his picture, is an

encumbrance to it, and that every figure which does not sympathize with

the action, interrupts it. He that gathereth not with me,

scattereth,--is, or ought to be, the ruling principle of his plan: and

the power and grandeur of his result will be exactly proportioned to the

unity of feeling manifested in its several parts, and to the propriety

and simplicity of the relations in which they stand to each other.

All this is equally applicable to the materials of inanimate nature.

Impressiveness is destroyed by a multitude of contradictory facts, and

the accumulation, which is not harmonious, is discordant. He who

endeavors to unite simplicity with magnificence, to guide from solitude

to festivity, and to contrast melancholy with mirth, must end by the

production of confused inanity. There is a peculiar spirit; possessed by

every kind of scene; and although a point of contrast may sometimes

enhance and exhibit this particular feeling more intensely, it must be

only a point, not an equalized opposition. Every introduction of new and

different feeling weakens the force of what has already been impressed,

and the mingling of all emotions must conclude in apathy, as the

mingling of all colors in white.

Let us test by these simple rules one of the "ideal" landscape

compositions of Claude, that known to the Italians as "Il Mulino."

The foreground is a piece of very lovely and perfect forest scenery,

with a dance of peasants by a brookside; quite enough subject to form,

in the hands of a master, an impressive and complete picture. On the

other side of the brook, however, we have a piece of pastoral life, a

man with some bulls and goats tumbling headforemost into the water,

owing to some sudden paralytic affection of all their legs. Even this

group is one too many; the shepherd had no business to drive his flock

so near the dancers, and the dancers will certainly frighten the cattle.

But when we look farther into the picture, our feelings receive a

sudden and violent shock, by the unexpected appearance, amidst things

pastoral and musical, of the military: a number of Roman soldiers riding

in on hobby-horses, with a leader on foot, apparently encouraging them

to make an immediate and decisive charge on the musicians. Beyond the

soldiers is a circular temple, in exceedingly bad repair, and close

beside it, built against its very walls, a neat water-mill in full work.

By the mill flows a large river, with a weir all across it. The weir has

not been made for the mill, (for that receives its water from the hills

by a trough carried over the temple,) but it is particularly ugly and

monotonous in its line of fall, and the water below forms a dead-looking

pond, on which some people are fishing in punts. The banks of this river

resemble in contour the later geological formations around London,

constituted chiefly of broken pots and oyster-shells. At an inconvenient

distance from the water-side stands a city, composed of twenty-five

round towers and a pyramid. Beyond the city is a handsome bridge; beyond

the bridge, part of the Campagna, with fragments of aqueducts; beyond

the Campagna, the chain of the Alps; on the left, the cascades of

Tivoli.

This is, I believe, a fair example of what is commonly called an "ideal

landscape," _i.e._, a group of the artist's studies from nature,

individually spoiled, selected with such opposition of character as may

insure their neutralizing each other's effect, and united with

sufficient unnaturalness and violence of association to insure their

producing a general sensation of the impossible. Let us analyze the

separate subjects a little in this ideal work of Claude's.

Perhaps there is no more impressive scene on earth than the solitary

extent of the Campagna of Rome under evening light. Let the reader

imagine himself for a moment withdrawn from the sounds and motion of the

living world, and sent forth alone into this wild and wasted plain. The

earth yields and crumbles beneath his foot, tread he never so lightly,

for its substance is white, hollow, and carious, like the dusty wreck of

the bones of men.[M] The long knotted grass waves and tosses feebly in

the evening wind, and the shadows of its motion shake feverishly along

the banks of ruin that lift themselves to the sunlight. Hillocks of

mouldering earth heave around him, as if the dead beneath were

struggling in their sleep; scattered blocks of black stone, four-square,

remnants of mighty edifices, not one left upon another, lie upon them to

keep them down. A dull purple, poisonous haze stretches level along the

desert, veiling its spectral wrecks of massy ruins, on whose rents the

red light rests like dying fire on defiled altars. The blue ridge of the

Alban mount lifts itself against a solemn space of green, clear, quiet

sky. Watch-towers of dark clouds stand steadfastly along the

promontories, of the Apennines. From the plain to the mountains, the

shattered aqueducts, pier beyond pier, melt into the darkness, like

shadowy and countless troops of funeral mourners, passing from a

nation's grave.

Let us, with Claude, make a few "ideal" alterations in this landscape.

First, we will reduce the multitudinous precipices of the Apennines to

four sugar-loaves. Secondly, we will remove the Alban mount, and put a

large dust-heap in its stead. Next, we will knock down the greater part

of the aqueducts, and leave only an arch or two, that their infinity of

length may no longer be painful from its monotony. For the purple mist

and declining sun, we will substitute a bright blue sky, with round

white clouds. Finally, we will get rid of the unpleasant ruins in the

foreground; we will plant some handsome trees therein, we will send for

some fiddlers, and get up a dance, and a picnic party.

It will be found, throughout the picture, that the same species of

improvement is made on the materials which Claude had ready to his hand.

The descending slopes of the city of Rome, towards the pyramid of Caius

Cestius, supply not only lines of the most exquisite variety and beauty,

but matter for contemplation and reflection in every fragment of their

buildings. This passage has been idealized by Claude into a set of

similar round towers, respecting which no idea can be formed but that

they are uninhabitable, and to which no interest can be attached, beyond

the difficulty of conjecturing what they could have been built for. The

ruins of the temple are rendered unimpressive by the juxtaposition of

the water-mill, and inexplicable by the introduction of the Roman

soldiers. The glide of the muddy streams of the melancholy Tiber and

Anio through the Campagna, is impressive in itself, but altogether

ceases to be so, when we disturb their stillness of motion by a weir,

adorn their neglected flow with a handsome bridge, and cover their

solitary surface with punts, nets, and fishermen.

It cannot, I think, be expected, that landscapes like this should have

any effect on the human heart, except to harden or to degrade it; to

lead it from the love of what is simple, earnest and pure, to what is as

sophisticated and corrupt in arrangement, as erring and imperfect in

detail. So long as such works are held up for imitation, landscape

painting must be a manufacture, its productions must be toys, and its

patrons must be children.

My purpose then, in the present work, is to demonstrate the utter

falseness both of the facts and principles; the imperfection of

material, and error of arrangement, on which works such as these are

based; and to insist on the necessity, as well as the dignity, of an

earnest, faithful, loving, study of nature as she is, rejecting with

abhorrence all that man has done to alter and modify her. And the praise

which, in this first portion of the work, is given to many English

artists, would be justifiable on this ground only, that although

frequently with little power and desultory effort, they have yet, in an

honest and good heart, received the word of God from clouds, and leaves,

and waves, and kept it,[N] and endeavored in humility to render to the

world that purity of impression which can alone render the result of

art an instrument of good, or its labor deserving of gratitude.

If, however, I shall have frequent occasion to insist on the necessity

of this heartfelt love of, and unqualified submission to, the teaching

of nature, it will be no less incumbent upon me to reprobate the

careless rendering of casual impression, and the mechanical copyism of

unimportant subject, which are too frequently visible in our modern

school.[O] Their lightness and desultoriness of intention, their

meaningless multiplication of unstudied composition, and their want of

definiteness and loftiness of aim, bring discredit on their whole system

of study, and encourage in the critic the unhappy prejudice that the

field and the hill-side are less fit places of study than the gallery

and the garret. Not every casual idea caught from the flight of a shower

or the fall of a sunbeam, not every glowing fragment of harvest light,

nor every flickering dream of copsewood coolness, is to be given to the

world as it came, unconsidered, incomplete, and forgotten by the artist

as soon as it has left his easel. That only should be considered a

picture, in which the spirit, (not the materials, observe,) but the

animating emotion of many such studies is concentrated, and exhibited by

the aid of long-studied, painfully-chosen forms; idealized in the right

sense of the word, not by audacious liberty of that faculty of degrading

God's works which man calls his "imagination," but by perfect assertion

of entire knowledge of every part and character and function of the

object, and in which the details are completed to the last line

compatible with the dignity and simplicity of the whole, wrought out

with that noblest industry which concentrates profusion into point, and

transforms accumulation into structure; neither must this labor be

bestowed on every subject which appears to afford a capability of good,

but on chosen subjects in which nature has prepared to the artist's hand

the purest sources of the impression he would convey. These may be

humble in their order, but they must be perfect of their kind. There is

a perfection of the hedgerow and cottage, as well as of the forest and

the palace, and more ideality in a great artist's selection and

treatment of roadside weeds and brook-worn pebbles, than in all the

struggling caricature of the meaner mind which heaps its foreground with

colossal columns, and heaves impossible mountains into the encumbered

sky. Finally, these chosen subjects must not be in any way repetitions

of one another, but each founded on a new idea, and developing a totally

distinct train of thought; so that the work of the artist's life should

form a consistent series of essays, rising through the scale of creation

from the humblest scenery to the most exalted; each picture being a

necessary link in the chain, based on what preceded, introducing to what

is to follow, and all, in their lovely system, exhibiting and drawing

closer the bonds of nature to the human heart. Since, then, I shall

have to reprobate the absence of study in the moderns nearly as much as

its false direction in the ancients, my task will naturally divide

itself into three portions. In the first, I shall endeavor to

investigate and arrange the facts of nature with scientific accuracy;

showing as I proceed, by what total neglect of the very first base and

groundwork of their art the idealities of some among the old masters are

produced. This foundation once securely laid, I shall proceed, in the

second portion of the work, to analyze and demonstrate the nature of the

emotions of the Beautiful and Sublime; to examine the particular

characters of every kind of scenery, and to bring to light, as far as

may be in my power, that faultless, ceaseless, inconceivable,

inexhaustible loveliness, which God has stamped upon all things, if man

will only receive them as He gives them. Finally, I shall endeavor to

trace the operation of all this on the hearts and minds of men; to

exhibit the moral function and end of art, to prove the share which it

ought to have in the thoughts, and influence on the lives of all of us;

to attach to the artist the responsibility of a preacher, and to kindle

in the general mind that regard which such an office must demand.

It must be evident that the first portion of this task, which is all

that I have yet been enabled to offer to the reader, cannot but be the

least interesting and the most laborious, especially because it is

necessary that it should be executed without reference to any principles

of beauty or influences of emotion. It is the hard, straightforward

classification of material things, not the study of thought or passion;

and therefore let me not be accused of the feelings which I choose to

repress. The consideration of the high qualities of art must not be

interrupted by the work of the hammer and the eudiometer.

Again, I would request that the frequent passages of reference to the

great masters of the Italian school may not be looked upon as mere modes

of conventional expression. I think there is enough in the following

pages to prove that I am not likely to be carried away by the celebrity

of a name; and therefore that the devoted love which I profess for the

works of the great historical and sacred painters is sincere and

well-grounded. And indeed every principle of art which I may advocate, I

shall be able to illustrate by reference to the works of men universally

allowed to be the masters of masters; and the public, so long as my

teaching leads them to higher understanding and love of the works of

Buonaroti, Leonardo, Raffaelle, Titian, and Cagliari, may surely concede

to me without fear, the right of striking such blows as I may deem

necessary to the establishment of my principles, at Gasper Poussin, or

Vandevelde.

Indeed, I believe there is nearly as much occasion, at the present day,

for advocacy of Michael Angelo against the pettiness of the moderns, as

there is for support of Turner against the conventionalities of the

ancients. For, though the names of the fathers of sacred art are on all

our lips, our faith in them is much like that of the great world in its

religion--nominal, but dead. In vain our lecturers sound the name of

Raffaelle in the ears of their pupils, while their own works are visibly

at variance with every principle deducible from his. In vain is the

young student compelled to produce a certain number of school copies of

Michael Angelo, when his bread must depend on the number of gewgaws he

can crowd into his canvas. And I could with as much zeal exert myself

against the modern system of English historical art, as I have in favor

of our school of landscape, but that it is an ungrateful and painful

task to attack the works of living painters, struggling with adverse

circumstances of every kind, and especially with the false taste of a

nation which regards matters of art either with the ticklishness of an

infant, or the stolidity of a Megatherium.

I have been accused, in the execution of this first portion of my work,

of irreverent and scurrile expression towards the works which I have

depreciated. Possibly I may have been in some degree infected by reading

those criticisms of our periodicals, which consist of nothing else; but

I believe in general that my words will be found to have sufficient

truth in them to excuse their familiarity; and that no other weapons

could have been used to pierce the superstitious prejudice with which

the works of certain painters are shielded from the attacks of reason.

My answer is that given long ago to a similar complaint, uttered under

the same circumstances by the foiled sophist:--"[Greek: (Hos d'estin ho

anthropos; hos apaideutos tis, os ouio phaula onomata onomazein tolma en

semno pragmati.) Toioutos tis, o Hippia, ouden allo phrontizon e to

alethes]."

It is with more surprise that I have heard myself accused of thoughtless

severity with respect to the works of contemporary painters, for I fully

believe that whenever I attack them, I give myself far more pain than I

can possibly inflict; and, in many instances, I have withheld

reprobation which I considered necessary to the full understanding of my

work, in the fear of grieving or injuring men of whose feelings and

circumstances I was ignorant. Indeed, the apparently false and

exaggerated bias of the whole book in favor of modern art, is in great

degree dependent on my withholding the animadversions which would have

given it balance, and keeping silence where I cannot praise. But I had

rather be a year or two longer in effecting my purposes, than reach them

by trampling on men's hearts and hearths; and I have permitted myself to

express unfavorable opinions only where the popularity and favor of the

artist are so great as to render the opinion of an individual a matter

of indifference to him.

And now--but one word more. For many a year we have heard nothing with

respect to the works of Turner but accusations of their want of _truth_.

To every observation on their power, sublimity, or beauty, there has

been but one reply: They are not like nature. I therefore took my

opponents on their own ground, and demonstrated, by thorough

investigation of actual facts, that Turner _is_ like nature, and paints

more of nature than any man who ever lived. I expected this proposition

(the foundation of all my future efforts) would have been disputed with

desperate struggles, and that I should have had to fight my way to my

position inch by inch. Not at all. My opponents yield me the field at

once. One (the writer for the Athenaeum) has no other resource than the

assertion, that "he disapproves the natural style in painting. If people

want to see _nature_, let them go and look at herself. Why should they

see her at second-hand on a piece of canvas?" The other, (Blackwood,)

still more utterly discomfited, is reduced to a still more remarkable

line of defence. "It is not," he says, "what things in all respects

really are, but how they are convertible by the mind into what they are

_not_, that we have to consider." (October, 1843, p. 485.) I leave

therefore the reader to choose whether, with Blackwood and his fellows,

he will proceed to consider how things are convertible by the mind into

what they are _not_, or whether, with me, he will undergo the harder,

but perhaps on the whole more useful, labor of ascertaining--What they

are.

FOOTNOTES

[A] One or two fragments of Greek sculpture, the works of Michael

Angelo, considered with reference to their general conception and

power, and the Madonna di St. Sisto, are all that I should myself

put into such a category, not that even these are without defect,

but their defects are such as mortality could never hope to rectify.

[B] This principle is dangerous, but not the less true, and

necessary to be kept in mind. There is scarcely any truth which does

not admit of being wrested to purposes of evil, and we must not deny

the desirableness of originality, because men may err in seeking for

it, or because a pretence to it may be made, by presumption, a cloak

for its incompetence. Nevertheless, originality is never to be

sought for its own sake--otherwise it will be mere aberration--it

should arise naturally out of hard, independent study of nature; and

it should be remembered that in many things technical, it is

impossible to alter without being inferior, for therein, as says

Spencer, "Truth is one, and right is ever one;" but wrongs are

various and multitudinous. "Vice," says Byron, in Marino Faliero,

"must have variety; but Virtue stands like the sun, and all which

rolls around drinks life from her aspect."

[C] It is with regret that, in a work of this nature, I take notice

of criticisms, which, after all, are merely intended to amuse the

careless reader, and be forgotten as soon as read; but I do so in

compliance with wishes expressed to me since the publication of this

work, by persons who have the interests of art deeply at heart, and

who, I find, attach more importance to the matter than I should have

been disposed to do. I have, therefore, marked two or three passages

which _may_ enable the public to judge for themselves of the quality

of these critiques; and this I think a matter of justice to those

who might otherwise have been led astray by them--more than this I

cannot consent to do. I should have but a hound's office if I had to

tear the tabard from every Rouge Sanglier of the arts--with bell and

bauble to back him.

[D] Chrysoprase, (Vide No. for October, 1843, p. 502.)

[E] Every school-boy knows that this epithet was given to Poussin in

allusion to the profound classical knowledge of the painter. The

reviewer, however, (September, 1841,) informs us that the expression

refers to his skill in "Composition."

[F] Critique on Royal Academy, 1842. "He" (Mr. Lee) "often reminds

us of Gainsborough's best manner; but he is _superior_ to him always

in subject, composition, and variety."--Shade of

Gainsborough!--deep-thoughted, solemn Gainsborough,--forgive us for

re-writing this sentence; we do so to gibbet its perpetrator

forever,--and leave him swinging in the winds of the Fool's

Paradise. It is with great pain that I ever speak with severity of

the works of living masters, especially when, like Mr. Lee's, they

are well-intentioned, simple, free from affectation or imitation,

and evidently painted with constant reference to nature. But I

believe that these qualities will always secure him that admiration

which he deserves--that there will be many unsophisticated and

honest minds always ready to follow his guidance, and answer his

efforts with delight; and therefore, that I need not fear to point

out in him the want of those technical qualities which are more

especially the object of an artist's admiration. Gainsborough's

power of color (it is mentioned by Sir Joshua as his peculiar gift)

is capable of taking rank beside that of Rubens; he is the purest

colorist--Sir Joshua himself not excepted--of the whole English

school; with him, in fact, the art of painting did in great part

die, and exists not now in Europe. Evidence enough will be seen in

the following pages of my devoted admiration of Turner; but I

hesitate not to say, that in management and quality of single and

particular tint, in the purely technical part of painting, Turner is

a child of Gainsborough. Now, Mr. Lee never aims at color; he does

not make it his object in the slightest degree--the spring green of

vegetation is all that he desires; and it would be about as rational

to compare his works with studied pieces of coloring, as the

modulation of the Calabrian pipe to the harmony of a full orchestra.

Gainsborough's hand is as light as the sweep of a cloud--as swift as

the flash of a sunbeam; Lee's execution is feeble and spotty.

Gainsborough's masses are as broad as the first division in heaven

of light from darkness; Lee's (perhaps necessarily, considering the

effects of flickering sunlight at which he aims) are as fragmentary

as his leaves, and as numerous. Gainsborough's forms are grand,

simple, and ideal; Lee's are small, confused, and unselected.

Gainsborough never loses sight of his picture as a whole; Lee is but

too apt to be shackled by its parts. In a word, Gainsborough is an

immortal painter; and Lee, though on the right road, is yet in the

early stages of his art; and the man who could imagine any

resemblance or point of comparison between them, is not only a

novice in art, but has not capacity ever to be anything more. He may

be pardoned for not comprehending Turner, for long preparation and

discipline are necessary before the abstract and profound philosophy

of that artist can be met; but Gainsborough's excellence is based on

principles of art long acknowledged, and facts of nature universally

apparent; and I insist more particularly on the reviewer's want of

feeling for his works, because it proves a truth of which the public

ought especially to be assured that those who lavish abuse on the

great men of modern times, are equally incapable of perceiving the

real excellence of established canons, are ignorant of the commonest

and most acknowledged principia of the art, blind to the most

palpable and comprehensible of its beauties, incapable of

distinguishing, if left to themselves, a master's work from the

vilest school copy, and founding their applause of those great works

which they praise, either in pure hypocrisy, or in admiration of

their defects.

[G] There is a fine touch in the Frogs in Aristophanes, alluding

probably to this part of the Agamemnon. "[Greek: Ego d' hechairon te

siope kai me tout' heterpeu ouk hettou e nun hoi lalountes]." The

same remark might be well applied to the seemingly vacant or

incomprehensible portions of Turner's canvas. In their mysterious,

and intense fire, there is much correspondence between the mind of

Aeschylus and that of our great painter. They share at least one

thing in common--unpopularity. [Greek: 'Ho demos aneboa krisin

poiein, XA. o ton panourgon; Ai. ne Di, ouranion g' hoson. XA. met'

Aischylou ho ouk esan heteroi symmachoi; AI. oligon to chreston

estin].

[H] I do not know any passage in ancient literature in which this

connection is more exquisitely illustrated than in the lines,

burlesque though they be, descriptive of the approach of the chorus

in the Clouds of Aristophanes,--a writer, by the way, who, I

believe, knew and felt more of the noble landscape character of his

country than any whose works have come down to us except Homer. The

individuality and distinctness of conception--the visible cloud

character which every word of this particular passage brings out

into more dewy and bright existence, are to me as refreshing as the

real breathing of mountain winds. The line "[Greek: dia ton koilon

kai ton daseon, plagiai]," could have been written by none but an

ardent lover of hill scenery--one who had watched, hour after hour,

the peculiar oblique, sidelong action of descending clouds, as they

form along the hollows and ravines of the hills. There are no

lumpish solidities--no pillowy protuberances here. All is melting,

drifting, evanescent,--full of air, and light, and dew.

[I] Let not this principle be confused with Fuseli's, "love for what

is called deception in painting marks either the infancy or

decrepitude of a nation's taste." Realization to the mind

necessitates not deception of the eye.

[J] I shall show, in a future portion of the work, that there are

principles of universal beauty common to all the creatures of God;

and that it is by the greater or less share of these that one form

becomes nobler or meaner than another.

[K] Is not this--it may be asked--demanding more from him than life

can accomplish? Not one whit. Nothing more than knowledge of

external characteristics is absolutely required; and even if, which

were more desirable, thorough scientific knowledge had to be

attained, the time which our artists spend in multiplying crude

sketches, or finishing their unintelligent embryos of the study,

would render them masters of every science that modern

investigations have organized, and familiar with every form that

Nature manifests. Martin, if the time which he must have spent on

the abortive bubbles of his Canute had been passed in working on the

seashore, might have learned enough to enable him to produce, with a

few strokes, a picture which would have smote like the sound of the

sea, upon men's hearts forever.

[L] "A green field is a sight which makes us pardon

The absence of that more sublime construction

Which mixes up vines, olive, precipices,

Glaciers, volcanoes, oranges, and ices."

_Don Juan._

[M] The vegetable soil of the Campagna is chiefly formed by

decomposed lavas, and under it lies a bed of white pumice, exactly

resembling remnants of bones.

[N] The feelings of Constable with respect to his art might be

almost a model for the young student, were it not that they err a

little on the other side, and are perhaps in need of chastening and

guiding from the works of his fellow-men. We should use pictures not

as authorities, but as comments on nature, just as we use divines,

not as authorities, but as comments on the Bible. Constable, in his

dread of saint-worship, excommunicates himself from all benefit of

the Church, and deprives himself of much instruction from the

Scripture to which he holds, because he will not accept aid in the

reading of it from the learning of other men. Sir George Beaumont,

on the contrary, furnishes, in the anecdotes given of him in

Constable's life, a melancholy instance of the degradation into

which the human mind may fall, when it suffers human works to

interfere between it and its Master. The recommending the color of

an old Cremona fiddle for the prevailing tone of everything, and the

vapid inquiry of the conventionalist, "Where do you put your brown

tree?" show a prostration of intellect so laughable and lamentable,

that they are at once, on all, and to all, students of the gallery,

a satire and a warning. Art so followed is the most servile

indolence in which life can be wasted. There are then two dangerous

extremes to be shunned,--forgetfulness of the Scripture, and scorn

of the divine--slavery on the one hand, free-thinking on the other.

The mean is nearly as difficult to determine or keep in art as in

religion, but the great danger is on the side of superstition. He

who walks humbly with Nature will seldom be in danger of losing

sight of Art. He will commonly find in all that is truly great of

man's works, something of their original, for which he will regard

them with gratitude, and sometimes follow them with respect; while

he who takes Art for his authority may entirely lose sight of all

that it interprets, and sink at once into the sin of an idolater,

and the degradation of a slave.

[O] I should have insisted more on this fault (for it is a fatal

one) in the following Essay, but the cause of it rests rather with

the public than with the artist, and in the necessities of the

public as much as in their will. Such pictures as artists themselves

would wish to paint, could not be executed under very high prices;

and it must always be easier, in the present state of society, to

find ten purchasers of ten-guinea sketches, than one purchaser for a

hundred-guinea picture. Still, I have been often both surprised and

grieved to see that any effort on the part of our artists to rise

above manufacture--any struggle to something like completed

conception--was left by the public to be its own reward. In the

water-color exhibition of last year there was a noble work of David

Cox's, ideal in the right sense--a forest hollow with a few sheep

crushing down through its deep fern, and a solemn opening of evening

sky above its dark masses of distance. It was worth all his little

bits on the walls put together. Yet the public picked up all the

little bits--blots and splashes, ducks, chickweed, ears of corn--all

that was clever and petite; and the real picture--the full

development of the artist's mind--was left on his hands. How can I,

or any one else, with a conscience, advise him after this to aim at

anything more than may be struck out by the cleverness of a quarter

of an hour. Cattermole, I believe, is earthed and shackled in the

same manner. He began his career with finished and studied pictures,

which, I believe, never paid him--he now prostitutes his fine talent

to the superficialness of public taste, and blots his way to

emolument and oblivion. There is commonly, however, fault on both

sides; in the artist for exhibiting his dexterity by mountebank

tricks of the brush, until chaste finish, requiring ten times the

knowledge and labor, appears insipid to the diseased taste which he

has himself formed in his patrons, as the roaring and ranting of a

common actor will oftentimes render apparently vapid the finished

touches of perfect nature; and in the public, for taking less real

pains to become acquainted with, and discriminate, the various

powers of a great artist, than they would to estimate the excellence

of a cook or develop the dexterity of a dancer.

PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.

It is with much regret, and partly against my own judgment, that I

republish the following chapters in their present form. The particular

circumstances (stated in the first preface) under which they were

originally written, have rendered them so unfit for the position they

now hold as introductory to a serious examination of the general

functions of art, that I should have wished first to complete the

succeeding portions of the essay, and then to write another introduction

of more fitting character. But as it may be long before I am able to do

this, and as I believe what I have already written may still be of some

limited and partial service, I have suffered it to reappear, trusting to

the kindness of the reader to look to its intention rather than its

temper, and forgive its inconsideration in its earnestness.

Thinking it of too little substance to bear mending, wherever I have

found a passage which I thought required modification or explanation, I

have cut it out; what I have left, however imperfect, cannot I think be

dangerously misunderstood: something I have added, not under the idea of

rendering the work in any wise systematic or complete, but to supply

gross omissions, answer inevitable objections, and give some substance

to passages of mere declamation.

Whatever inadequacy or error there may be, throughout, in materials or

modes of demonstration, I have no doubt of the truth and necessity of

the main result; and though the reader may, perhaps, find me frequently

hereafter showing other and better grounds for what is here affirmed,

yet the point and bearing of the book, its determined depreciation of

Claude, Salvator, Gaspar, and Canaletto, and its equally determined

support of Turner as the greatest of all landscape painters, and of

Turner's recent works as his finest, are good and right; and if the

prevalence throughout of attack and eulogium be found irksome or

offensive, let it be remembered that my object thus far has not been

either the establishment or the teaching of any principles of art, but

the vindication, most necessary to the prosperity of our present

schools, of the uncomprehended rank of their greatest artist, and the

diminution, equally necessary as I think to the prosperity of our

schools, of the unadvised admiration of the landscape of the seventeenth

century. For I believe it to be almost impossible to state in terms

sufficiently serious and severe the depth and extent of the evil which

has resulted (and that not in art alone, but in all other matters with

which the contemplative faculties are concerned) from the works of those

elder men. On the continent all landscape art has been utterly

annihilated by them, and with it all sense of the power of nature. We in

England have only done better because our artists have had strength of

mind enough to form a school withdrawn from their influence.

These points are somewhat farther developed in the general sketch of

ancient and modern landscape, which I have added to the first section of

the second part. Some important additions have also been made to the

chapters on the painting of sea. Throughout the rest of the text, though

something is withdrawn, little is changed; and the reader may rest

assured that if I were now to bestow on this feeble essay the careful

revision which it much needs, but little deserves, it would not be to

alter its tendencies, or modify its conclusions, but to prevent

indignation from appearing virulence on the one side, and enthusiasm

partisanship on the other.

PREFACE TO NEW EDITION (1873).

I have been lately so often asked by friends on whose judgment I can

rely, to permit the publication of another edition of "Modern Painters"

in its original form, that I have at last yielded, though with some

violence to my own feelings; for many parts of the first and second

volumes are written in a narrow enthusiasm, and the substance of their

metaphysical and religious speculation is only justifiable on the ground

of its absolute honesty. Of the third, fourth, and fifth volumes I

indeed mean eventually to rearrange what I think of permanent interest,

for the complete edition of my works, but with fewer and less elaborate

illustrations: nor have I any serious grounds for refusing to allow the

book once more to appear in the irregular form which it took as it was

written, since of the art-teaching and landscape description it contains

I have little to retrench, and nothing to retract.

This final edition must, however, be limited to a thousand copies, for

some of the more delicate plates are already worn, that of the Mill

Stream in the fifth volume, and of the Loire Side very injuriously;

while that of the Shores of Wharfe had to be retouched by an engraver

after the removal of the mezzotint for reprinting. But Mr. Armytage's,

Mr. Cousen's, and Mr. Cuff's magnificent plates are still in good state,

and my own etchings, though injured, are still good enough to answer

their purpose.

SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS.

PART I.

OF GENERAL PRINCIPLES.

SECTION I.

OF THE NATURE OF THE IDEAS CONVEYABLE BY ART.

CHAPTER I.--Introductory.

PAGE

Sec. 1. Public opinion no criterion of excellence, except after long

periods of time. 1

Sec. 2. And therefore obstinate when once formed. 4

Sec. 3. The author's reasons for opposing it in particular instances. 5

Sec. 4. But only on points capable of demonstration. 5

Sec. 5. The author's partiality to modern works excusable. 6

CHAPTER II.--Definition of Greatness in Art.

Sec. 1. Distinction between the painter's intellectual power and

technical knowledge. 8

Sec. 2. Painting, as such, is nothing more than language. 8

Sec. 3. "Painter," a term corresponding to "versifier." 9

Sec. 4. Example in a painting of E. Landseer's. 9

Sec. 5. Difficulty of fixing an exact limit between language and

thought. 9

Sec. 6. Distinction between decorative and expressive language. 10

Sec. 7. Instance in the Dutch and early Italian schools. 10

Sec. 8. Yet there are certain ideas belonging to language itself. 11

Sec. 9. The definition. 12

CHAPTER III.--Of Ideas of Power.

Sec. 1. What classes of ideas are conveyable by art. 13

Sec. 2. Ideas of power vary much in relative dignity. 13

Sec. 3. But are received from whatever has been the subject of

power. The meaning of the word "excellence." 14

Sec. 4. What is necessary to the distinguishing of excellence. 15

Sec. 5. The pleasure attendant on conquering difficulties is right. 16

CHAPTER IV.--Of Ideas of Imitation.

Sec. 1. False use of the term "imitation" by many writers on art. 17

Sec. 2. Real meaning of the term. 18

Sec. 3. What is requisite to the sense of imitation. 18

Sec. 4. The pleasure resulting from imitation the most contemptible

that can be derived from art. 19

Sec. 5. Imitation is only of contemptible subjects. 19

Sec. 6. Imitation is contemptible because it is easy. 20

Sec. 7. Recapitulation. 20

CHAPTER V.--Of Ideas of Truth.

Sec. 1. Meaning of the word "truth" as applied to art. 21

Sec. 2. First difference between truth and imitation. 21

Sec. 3. Second difference. 21

Sec. 4. Third difference. 22

Sec. 5. No accurate truths necessary to imitation. 22

Sec. 6. Ideas of truth are inconsistent with ideas of imitation. 24

CHAPTER VI.--Of Ideas of Beauty.

Sec. 1. Definition of the term "beautiful." 26

Sec. 2. Definition of the term "taste." 26

Sec. 3. Distinction between taste and judgment. 27

Sec. 4. How far beauty may become intellectual. 27

Sec. 5. The high rank and function of ideas of beauty. 28

Sec. 6. Meaning of the term "ideal beauty." 28

CHAPTER VII.--Of Ideas of Relation.

Sec. 1. General meaning of the term. 29

Sec. 2. What ideas are to be comprehended under it. 29

Sec. 3. The exceeding nobility of these ideas. 30

Sec. 4. Why no subdivision of so extensive a class is necessary. 31

SECTION II.

OF POWER.

CHAPTER I.--General Principles respecting Ideas of Power.

Sec. 1. No necessity for detailed study of ideas of imitation. 32

Sec. 2. Nor for separate study of ideas of power. 32

Sec. 3. Except under one particular form. 33

Sec. 4. There are two modes of receiving ideas of power, commonly

inconsistent. 33

Sec. 5. First reason of the inconsistency. 33

Sec. 6. Second reason for the inconsistency. 34

Sec. 7. The sensation of power ought not to be sought in imperfect art. 34

Sec. 8. Instances in pictures of modern artists. 35

Sec. 9. Connection between ideas of power and modes of execution. 35

CHAPTER II.--Of Ideas of Power, as they are dependent upon Execution.

Sec. 1. Meaning of the term "execution." 36

Sec. 2. The first quality of execution is truth. 36

Sec. 3. The second, simplicity. 36

Sec. 4. The third, mystery. 37

Sec. 5. The fourth, inadequacy; and the fifth, decision. 37

Sec. 6. The sixth, velocity. 37

Sec. 7. Strangeness an illegitimate source of pleasure in execution. 37

Sec. 8. Yet even the legitimate sources of pleasure in execution are

inconsistent with each other. 38

Sec. 9. And fondness for ideas of power leads to the adoption of the

lowest. 39

Sec. 10. Therefore perilous. 40

Sec. 11. Recapitulation. 40

CHAPTER III.--Of the Sublime.

Sec. 1. Sublimity is the effect upon the mind of anything above it. 41

Sec. 2. Burke's theory of the nature of the sublime incorrect, and why. 41

Sec. 3. Danger is sublime, but not the fear of it. 42

Sec. 4. The highest beauty is sublime. 42

Sec. 5. And generally whatever elevates the mind. 42

Sec. 6. The former division of the subject is therefore sufficient. 42

PART II.

OF TRUTH.

SECTION I.

GENERAL PRINCIPLES RESPECTING IDEAS OF TRUTH.

CHAPTER I.--Of Ideas of Truth in their connection with those of

Beauty and Relation.

Sec. 1. The two great ends of landscape painting are the representation

of facts and thoughts. 44

Sec. 2. They induce a different choice of material subjects. 45

Sec. 3. The first mode of selection apt to produce sameness and

repetition. 45

Sec. 4. The second necessitating variety. 45

Sec. 5. Yet the first is delightful to all. 46

Sec. 6. The second only to a few. 46

Sec. 7. The first necessary to the second. 47

Sec. 8. The exceeding importance of truth. 48

Sec. 9. Coldness or want of beauty no sign of truth. 48

Sec. 10. How truth may be considered a just criterion of all art. 48

CHAPTER II.--That the Truth of Nature is not to be discerned by the

Uneducated Senses.

Sec. 1. The common self-deception of men with respect to their

power of discerning truth. 50

Sec. 2. Men usually see little of what is before their eyes. 51

Sec. 3. But more or less in proportion to their natural sensibility to

what is beautiful. 52

Sec. 4. Connected with a perfect state of moral feeling. 52

Sec. 5. And of the intellectual powers. 53

Sec. 6. How sight depends upon previous knowledge. 54

Sec. 7. The difficulty increased by the variety of truths in nature. 55

Sec. 8. We recognize objects by their least important attributes.

Compare Part I. Sect. I. Chap. 4. 55

CHAPTER III.--Of the Relative Importance of Truths:--First, that

Particular Truths are more important than General Ones.

Sec. 1. Necessity of determining the relative importance of truths. 58

Sec. 2. Misapplication of the aphorism: "General truths are more

important than particular ones." 58

Sec. 3. Falseness of this maxim, taken without explanation. 59

Sec. 4. Generality important in the subject, particularity in the

predicate. 59

Sec. 5. The importance of truths of species is not owing to their

generality. 60

Sec. 6. All truths valuable as they are characteristic. 61

Sec. 7. Otherwise truths of species are valuable, because beautiful. 61

Sec. 8. And many truths, valuable if separate, may be objectionable

in connection with others. 62

Sec. 9. Recapitulation. 63

CHAPTER IV.--Of the Relative Importance of Truths:--Secondly, that

Rare Truths are more important than Frequent Ones.

Sec. 1. No accidental violation of nature's principles should be

represented. 64

Sec. 2. But the cases in which those principles have been strikingly

exemplified. 65

Sec. 3. Which are comparatively rare. 65

Sec. 4. All repetition is blamable. 65

Sec. 5. The duty of the painter is the same as that of a preacher. 66

CHAPTER V.--Of the Relative Importance of Truths:--Thirdly, that

Truths of Color are the least important of all Truths.

Sec. 1. Difference between primary and secondary qualities in bodies. 67

Sec. 2. The first are fully characteristic, the second imperfectly so. 67

Sec. 3. Color is a secondary quality, therefore less important than

form. 68

Sec. 4. Color no distinction between objects of the same species. 68

Sec. 5. And different in association from what it is alone. 69

Sec. 6. It is not certain whether any two people see the same colors

in things. 69

Sec. 7. Form, considered as an element of landscape, includes light

and shade. 69

Sec. 8. Importance of light and shade in expressing the character of

bodies, and unimportance of color. 70

Sec. 9. Recapitulation. 71

CHAPTER VI.--Recapitulation.

Sec. 1. The importance of historical truths. 72

Sec. 2. Form, as explained by light and shade, the first of all truths.

Tone, light, and color, are secondary. 72

Sec. 3. And deceptive chiaroscuro the lowest of all. 73

CHAPTER VII.--General Application of the Foregoing Principles.

Sec. 1. The different selection of facts consequent on the several aims

at imitation or at truth. 74

Sec. 2. The old masters, as a body, aim only at imitation. 74

Sec. 3. What truths they gave. 75

Sec. 4. The principles of selection adopted by modern artists. 76

Sec. 5. General feeling of Claude, Salvator, and G. Poussin, contrasted

with the freedom and vastness of nature. 77

Sec. 6. Inadequacy of the landscape of Titian and Tintoret. 78

Sec. 7. Causes of its want of influence on subsequent schools. 79

Sec. 8. The value of inferior works of art, how to be estimated. 80

Sec. 9. Religious landscape of Italy. The admirableness of its

completion. 81

Sec. 10. Finish, and the want of it, how right--and how wrong. 82

Sec. 11. The open skies of the religious schools, how valuable. Mountain

drawing of Masaccio. Landscape of the Bellinis and Giorgione. 84

Sec. 12. Landscape of Titian and Tintoret. 86

Sec. 13. Schools of Florence, Milan, and Bologna. 88

Sec. 14. Claude, Salvator, and the Poussins. 89

Sec. 15. German and Flemish landscape. 90

Sec. 16. The lower Dutch schools. 92

Sec. 17. English school, Wilson and Gainsborough. 93

Sec. 18. Constable, Callcott. 94

Sec. 19. Peculiar tendency of recent landscape. 95

Sec. 20. G. Robson, D. Cox. False use of the term "style." 95

Sec. 21. Copley Fielding. Phenomena of distant color. 97

Sec. 22. Beauty of mountain foreground. 99

Sec. 23. De Wint. 101

Sec. 24. Influence of Engraving. J. D. Harding. 101

Sec. 25. Samuel Prout. Early painting of architecture, how deficient. 103

Sec. 26. Effects of age upon buildings, how far desirable. 104

Sec. 27. Effects of light, how necessary to the understanding of

detail. 106

Sec. 28. Architectural painting of Gentile Bellini and Vittor

Carpaccio. 107

Sec. 29. And of the Venetians generally. 109

Sec. 30. Fresco painting of the Venetian exteriors. Canaletto. 110

Sec. 31. Expression of the effects of age on Architecture by S. Prout. 112

Sec. 32. His excellent composition and color. 114

Sec. 33. Modern architectural painting generally. G. Cattermole. 115

Sec. 34. The evil in an archaeological point of view of misapplied

invention, in architectural subject. 117

Sec. 35. Works of David Roberts: their fidelity and grace. 118

Sec. 36. Clarkson Stanfield. 121

Sec. 37. J. M. W. Turner. Force of national feeling in all great

painters. 123

Sec. 38. Influence of this feeling on the choice of Landscape subject. 125

Sec. 39. Its peculiar manifestation in Turner. 125

Sec. 40. The domestic subjects of the Liber Studiorum. 127

Sec. 41. Turner's painting of French and Swiss landscape. The latter

deficient. 129

Sec. 42. His rendering of Italian character still less successful. His

large compositions how failing 130

Sec. 43. His views of Italy destroyed by brilliancy and redundant

quantity. 133

Sec. 44. Changes introduced by him in the received system of art. 133

Sec. 45. Difficulties of his later manner. Resultant deficiencies. 134

Sec. 46. Reflection of his very recent works. 137

Sec. 47. Difficulty of demonstration in such subjects. 139

SECTION II.

OF GENERAL TRUTHS.

CHAPTER I.--Of Truth of Tone.

Sec. 1. Meanings of the word "tone:"--First, the right relation of

objects in shadow to the principal light. 140

Sec. 2. Secondly, the quality of color by which it is felt to owe part

of its brightness to the hue of light upon it. 140

Sec. 3. Difference between tone in its first sense and aerial

perspective. 141

Sec. 4. The pictures of the old masters perfect in relation of middle

tints to light. 141

Sec. 5. And consequently totally false in relation of middle tints to

darkness. 141

Sec. 6. General falsehood of such a system. 143

Sec. 7. The principle of Turner in this respect. 143

Sec. 8. Comparison of N. Poussin's "Phocion." 144

Sec. 9. With Turner's "Mercury and Argus." 145

Sec. 10. And with the "Datur Hora Quieti." 145

Sec. 11. The second sense of the word "tone." 146

Sec. 12. Remarkable difference in this respect between the paintings

and drawings of Turner. 146

Sec. 13. Not owing to want of power over the material 146

Sec. 14. The two distinct qualities of light to be considered 147

Sec. 15. Falsehoods by which Titian attains the appearance of quality

in light. 148

Sec. 16. Turner will not use such means. 148

Sec. 17. But gains in essential truth by the sacrifice. 148

Sec. 18. The second quality of light. 148

Sec. 19. The perfection of Cuyp in this respect interfered with by

numerous solecisms. 150

Sec. 20. Turner is not so perfect in parts--far more so in the whole. 151

Sec. 21. The power in Turner of uniting a number of tones. 152

Sec. 22. Recapitulation. 153

CHAPTER II.--Of Truth of Color.

Sec. 1. Observations on the color of G. Poussin's La Riccia. 155

Sec. 2. As compared with the actual scene. 155

Sec. 3. Turner himself is inferior in brilliancy to nature. 157

Sec. 4. Impossible colors of Salvator, Titian. 157

Sec. 5. Poussin, and Claude. 158

Sec. 6. Turner's translation of colors. 160

Sec. 7. Notice of effects in which no brilliancy of art can even

approach that of reality. 161

Sec. 8. Reasons for the usual incredulity of the observer with respect

to their representation 162

Sec. 9. Color of the Napoleon. 163

Sec. 10. Necessary discrepancy between the attainable brilliancy of

color and light. 164

Sec. 11. This discrepancy less in Turner than in other colorists. 165

Sec. 12. Its great extent in a landscape attributed to Rubens. 165

Sec. 13. Turner scarcely ever uses pure or vivid color. 166

Sec. 14. The basis of gray, under all his vivid hues. 167

Sec. 15. The variety and fulness even of his most simple tones. 168

Sec. 16. Following the infinite and unapproachable variety of nature. 168

Sec. 17. His dislike of purple, and fondness for the opposition of

yellow and black. The principles of nature in this respect. 169

Sec. 18. His early works are false in color. 170

Sec. 19. His drawings invariably perfect. 171

Sec. 20. The subjection of his system of color to that of chiaroscuro. 171

CHAPTER III.--Of Truth of Chiaroscuro.

Sec. 1. We are not at present to examine particular effects of light. 174

Sec. 2. And therefore the distinctness of shadows is the chief means

of expressing vividness of light. 175

Sec. 3. Total absence of such distinctness in the works of the Italian

school. 175

Sec. 4. And partial absence in the Dutch. 176

Sec. 5. The perfection of Turner's works in this respect. 177

Sec. 6. The effect of his shadows upon the light. 178

Sec. 7. The distinction holds good between almost all the works of the

ancient and modern schools. 179

Sec. 8. Second great principle of chiaroscuro. Both high light and

deep shadow are used in equal quantity, and only in points. 180

Sec. 9. Neglect or contradiction of this principle by writers on art. 180

Sec. 10. And consequent misguiding of the student. 181

Sec. 11. The great value of a simple chiaroscuro. 182

Sec. 12. The sharp separation of nature's lights from her middle tint. 182

Sec. 13. The truth of Turner. 183

CHAPTER IV.--Of Truth of Space:--First, as Dependent on the Focus of

the Eye.

Sec. 1. Space is more clearly indicated by the drawing of objects than

by their hue. 185

Sec. 2. It is impossible to see objects at unequal distances

distinctly at one moment. 186

Sec. 3. Especially such as are both comparatively near. 186

Sec. 4. In painting, therefore, either the foreground or distance must

be partially sacrificed. 187

Sec. 5. Which not being done by the old masters, they could not

express space. 187

Sec. 6. But modern artists have succeeded in fully carrying out this

principle. 188

Sec. 7. Especially of Turner. 189

Sec. 8. Justification of the want of drawing in Turner's figures. 189

CHAPTER V.--Of Truth of Space:--Secondly, as its Appearance is

dependent on the Power of the Eye.

Sec. 1. The peculiar indistinctness dependent on the retirement of

objects from the eye. 191

Sec. 2. Causes confusion, but not annihilation of details. 191

Sec. 3. Instances in various objects. 192

Sec. 4. Two great resultant truths; that nature is never distinct,

and never vacant. 193

Sec. 5. Complete violation of both these principles by the old

masters. They are either distinct or vacant. 193

Sec. 6. Instances from Nicholas Poussin. 194

Sec. 7. From Claude. 194

Sec. 8. And G. Poussin. 195

Sec. 9. The imperative necessity, in landscape painting, of fulness

and finish. 196

Sec. 10. Breadth is not vacancy. 197

Sec. 11. The fulness and mystery of Turner's distances. 198

Sec. 12. Farther illustrations in architectural drawing. 199

Sec. 13. In near objects as well as distances. 199

Sec. 14. Vacancy and falsehood of Canaletto. 200

Sec. 15. Still greater fulness and finish in landscape foregrounds. 200

Sec. 16. Space and size are destroyed alike by distinctness and by

vacancy. 202

Sec. 17. Swift execution best secures perfection of details. 202

Sec. 18. Finish is far more necessary in landscape than in historical

subjects. 202

Sec. 19. Recapitulation of the section. 203

SECTION III.

OF TRUTH OF SKIES.

CHAPTER I.--Of the Open Sky.

Sec. 1. The peculiar adaptation of the sky to the pleasing and

teaching of man. 204

Sec. 2. The carelessness with which its lessons are received. 205

Sec. 3. The most essential of these lessons are the gentlest. 205

Sec. 4. Many of our ideas of sky altogether conventional. 205

Sec. 5. Nature, and essential qualities of the open blue. 206

Sec. 6. Its connection with clouds. 207

Sec. 7. Its exceeding depth. 207

Sec. 8. These qualities are especially given by modern masters. 207

Sec. 9. And by Claude. 208

Sec. 10. Total absence of them in Poussin. Physical errors in his

general treatment of open sky. 208

Sec. 11. Errors of Cuyp in graduation of color. 209

Sec. 12. The exceeding value of the skies of the early Italian and

Dutch schools. Their qualities are unattainable in modern

times. 210

Sec. 13. Phenomena of visible sunbeams. Their nature and cause. 211

Sec. 14. They are only illuminated mist, and cannot appear when the sky

is free from vapor, nor when it is without clouds. 211

Sec. 15. Erroneous tendency in the representation of such phenomena by

the old masters. 212

Sec. 16. The ray which appears in the dazzled eye should not be

represented. 213

Sec. 17. The practice of Turner. His keen perception of the more

delicate phenomena of rays. 213

Sec. 18. The total absence of any evidence of such perception in the

works of the old masters. 213

Sec. 19. Truth of the skies of modern drawings. 214

Sec. 20. Recapitulation. The best skies of the ancients are, in

_quality_, inimitable, but in rendering of various truth,

childish. 215

CHAPTER II.--Of Truth of Clouds:--First, of the Region of the Cirrus.

Sec. 1. Difficulty of ascertaining wherein the truth of clouds

consists. 216

Sec. 2. Variation of their character at different elevations. The

three regions to which they may conveniently be considered

as belonging. 216

Sec. 3. Extent of the upper region. 217

Sec. 4. The symmetrical arrangement of its clouds. 217

Sec. 5. Their exceeding delicacy. 218

Sec. 6. Their number. 218

Sec. 7. Causes of their peculiarly delicate coloring. 219

Sec. 8. Their variety of form. 219

Sec. 9. Total absence of even the slightest effort at their

representation, in ancient landscape. 220

Sec. 10. The intense and constant study of them by Turner. 221

Sec. 11. His vignette, Sunrise on the Sea. 222

Sec. 12. His use of the cirrus in expressing mist. 223

Sec. 13. His consistency in every minor feature. 224

Sec. 14. The color of the upper clouds. 224

Sec. 15. Recapitulation. 225

CHAPTER III.--Of Truth of Clouds:--Secondly, of the Central Cloud

Region.

Sec. 1. Extent and typical character of the central cloud region. 226

Sec. 2. Its characteristic clouds, requiring no attention nor thought

for their representation, are therefore favorite subjects

with the old masters. 226

Sec. 3. The clouds of Salvator and Poussin. 227

Sec. 4. Their essential characters. 227

Sec. 5. Their angular forms and general decision of outline. 228

Sec. 6. The composition of their minor curves. 229

Sec. 7. Their characters, as given by S. Rosa. 230

Sec. 8. Monotony and falsehood of the clouds of the Italian school

generally. 230

Sec. 9. Vast size of congregated masses of cloud. 231

Sec. 10. Demonstrable by comparison with mountain ranges. 231

Sec. 11. And consequent divisions and varieties of feature. 232

Sec. 12. Not lightly to be omitted. 232

Sec. 13. Imperfect conceptions of this size and extent in ancient

landscape. 233

Sec. 14. Total want of transparency and evanescence in the clouds of

ancient landscape. 234

Sec. 15. Farther proof of their deficiency in space. 235

Sec. 16. Instance of perfect truth in the sky of Turner's Babylon. 236

Sec. 17. And in his Pools of Solomon. 237

Sec. 18. Truths of outline and character in his Como. 237

Sec. 19. Association of the cirrostratus with the cumulus. 238

Sec. 20. The deep-based knowledge of the Alps in Turner's Lake of

Geneva. 238

Sec. 21. Farther principles of cloud form exemplified in his Amalfi. 239

Sec. 22. Reasons for insisting on the _infinity_ of Turner's works.

Infinity is almost an unerring test of _all_ truth. 239

Sec. 23. Instances of the total want of it in the works of Salvator. 240

Sec. 24. And of the universal presence of it in those of Turner. The

conclusions which may be arrived at from it. 240

Sec. 25. The multiplication of objects, or increase of their size, will

not give the impression of infinity, but is the resource of

novices. 241

Sec. 26. Farther instances of infinity in the gray skies of Turner. 242

Sec. 27. The excellence of the cloud-drawing of Stanfield. 242

Sec. 28. The average standing of the English school. 243

CHAPTER IV.--Of Truth of Clouds:--Thirdly, of the Region of the

Rain-Cloud.

Sec. 1. The apparent difference in character between the lower and

central clouds is dependent chiefly on proximity. 244

Sec. 2. Their marked differences in color. 244

Sec. 3. And in definiteness of form. 245

Sec. 4. They are subject to precisely the same great laws. 245

Sec. 5. Value, to the painter, of the rain-cloud. 246

Sec. 6. The old masters have not left a single instance of the

painting of the rain-cloud, and very few efforts at it.

Gaspar Poussin's storms. 247

Sec. 7. The great power of the moderns in this respect. 248

Sec. 8. Works of Copley Fielding. 248

Sec. 9. His peculiar truth. 248

Sec. 10. His weakness, and its probable cause. 249

Sec. 11. Impossibility of reasoning on the rain-clouds of Turner from

engravings. 250

Sec. 12. His rendering of Fielding's particular moment in the Jumieges. 250

Sec. 13. Illustration of the nature of clouds in the opposed forms of

smoke and steam. 250

Sec. 14. Moment of retiring rain in the Llanthony. 251

Sec. 15. And of commencing, chosen with peculiar meaning for Loch

Coriskin. 252

Sec. 16. The drawing of transparent vapor in the Land's End. 253

Sec. 17. The individual character of its parts. 253

Sec. 18. Deep-studied form of swift rain-cloud in the Coventry. 254

Sec. 19. Compared with forms given by Salvator. 254

Sec. 20. Entire expression of tempest by minute touches and

circumstances in the Coventry. 255

Sec. 21. Especially by contrast with a passage of extreme repose. 255

Sec. 22. The truth of this particular passage. Perfectly pure blue sky

only seen after rain, and how seen. 256

Sec. 23. Absence of this effect in the works of the old masters. 256

Sec. 24. Success of our water-color artists in its rendering. Use of it

by Turner. 257

Sec. 25. Expression of near rain-cloud in the Gosport, and other works. 257

Sec. 26. Contrasted with Gaspar Poussin's rain-cloud in the Dido and

Aeneas. 258

Sec. 27. Turner's power of rendering mist. 258

Sec. 28. His effects of mist so perfect, that if not at once

understood, they can no more be explained or reasoned on

than nature herself. 259

Sec. 29. Various instances. 259

Sec. 30. Turner's more violent effects of tempest are never rendered

by engravers. 260

Sec. 31. General system of landscape engraving. 260

Sec. 32. The storm in the Stonehenge. 260

Sec. 33. General character of such effects as given by Turner. His

expression of falling rain. 261

Sec. 34. Recapitulation of the section. 261

Sec. 35. Sketch of a few of the skies of nature, taken as a whole,

compared with the works of Turner and of the old masters.

Morning on the plains. 262

Sec. 36. Noon with gathering storms. 263

Sec. 37. Sunset in tempest. Serene midnight. 264

Sec. 38. And sunrise on the Alps. 264

CHAPTER V.--Effects of Light rendered by Modern Art.

Sec. 1. Reasons for merely, at present, naming, without examining the

particular effects of light rendered by Turner. 266

Sec. 2. Hopes of the author for assistance in the future investigation

of them. 266

SECTION IV.

OF TRUTH OF EARTH.

CHAPTER I.--Of General Structure.

Sec. 1. First laws of the organization of the earth, and their

importance in art. 270

Sec. 2. The slight attention ordinarily paid to them. Their careful

study by modern artists. 271

Sec. 3. General structure of the earth. The hills are its action, the

plains its rest. 271

Sec. 4. Mountains come out from underneath the plains, and are their

support. 272

Sec. 5. Structure of the plains themselves. Their perfect level, when

deposited by quiet water. 273

Sec. 6. Illustrated by Turner's Marengo. 273

Sec. 7. General divisions of formation resulting from this

arrangement. Plan of investigation. 274

CHAPTER II.--Of the Central Mountains.

Sec. 1. Similar character of the central peaks in all parts of the

world. 275

Sec. 2. Their arrangements in pyramids or wedges, divided by vertical

fissures. 275

Sec. 3. Causing groups of rock resembling an artichoke or rose. 276

Sec. 4. The faithful statement of these facts by Turner in his Alps

at Daybreak. 276

Sec. 5. Vignette of the Andes and others. 277

Sec. 6. Necessary distance, and consequent aerial effect on all such

mountains. 277

Sec. 7. Total want of any rendering of their phenomena in ancient art. 278

Sec. 8. Character of the representations of Alps in the distances of

Claude. 278

Sec. 9. Their total want of magnitude and aerial distance. 279

Sec. 10. And violation of specific form. 280

Sec. 11. Even in his best works. 280

Sec. 12. Farther illustration of the distant character of mountain

chains. 281

Sec. 13. Their excessive appearance of transparency. 281

Sec. 14. Illustrated from the works of Turner and Stanfield. The

Borromean Islands of the latter. 282

Sec. 15. Turner's Arona. 283

Sec. 16. Extreme distance of large objects always characterized by

very sharp outline. 283

Sec. 17. Want of this decision in Claude. 284

Sec. 18. The perpetual rendering of it by Turner. 285

Sec. 19. Effects of snow, how imperfectly studied. 285

Sec. 20. General principles of its forms on the Alps. 287

Sec. 21. Average paintings of Switzerland. Its real spirit has

scarcely yet been caught. 289

CHAPTER III.--Of the Inferior Mountains.

Sec. 1. The inferior mountains are distinguished from the central, by

being divided into beds. 290

Sec. 2. Farther division of these beds by joints. 290

Sec. 3. And by lines of lamination. 291

Sec. 4. Variety and seeming uncertainty under which these laws are

manifested. 291

Sec. 5. The perfect expression of them in Turner's Loch Coriskin. 292

Sec. 6. Glencoe and other works. 293

Sec. 7. Especially the Mount Lebanon. 293

Sec. 8. Compared with the work of Salvator. 294

Sec. 9. And of Poussin. 295

Sec. 10. Effects of external influence on mountain form. 296

Sec. 11. The gentle convexity caused by aqueous erosion. 297

Sec. 12. And the effect of the action of torrents. 297

Sec. 13. The exceeding simplicity of contour caused by these

influences. 298

Sec. 14. And multiplicity of feature. 299

Sec. 15. Both utterly neglected in ancient art. 299

Sec. 16. The fidelity of treatment in Turner's Daphne and Leucippus. 300

Sec. 17. And in the Avalanche and Inundation. 300

Sec. 18. The rarity among secondary hills of steep slopes or high

precipices. 301

Sec. 19. And consequent expression of horizontal distance in their

ascent. 302

Sec. 20. Full statement of all these facts in various works of

Turner.--Caudebec, etc. 302

Sec. 21. The use of considering geological truths. 303

Sec. 22. Expression of retiring surface by Turner contrasted with the

work of Claude. 304

Sec. 23. The same moderation of slope in the contours of his higher

hills. 304

Sec. 24. The peculiar difficulty of investigating the more essential

truths of hill outline. 305

Sec. 25. Works of other modern artists.--Clarkson Stanfield. 305

Sec. 26. Importance of particular and individual truth in hill drawing. 306

Sec. 27. Works of Copley Fielding. His high feeling. 307

Sec. 28. Works of J. D. Harding and others. 308

CHAPTER IV.--Of the Foreground.

Sec. 1. What rocks were the chief components of ancient landscape

foreground. 309

Sec. 2. Salvator's limestones. The real characters of the rock. Its

fractures, and obtuseness of angles. 309

Sec. 3. Salvator's acute angles caused by the meeting of concave

curves. 310

Sec. 4. Peculiar distinctness of light and shade in the rocks of

nature. 311

Sec. 5. Peculiar confusion of both in the rocks of Salvator. 311

Sec. 6. And total want of any expression of hardness or brittleness. 311

Sec. 7. Instances in particular pictures. 312

Sec. 8. Compared with the works of Stanfield. 312

Sec. 9. Their absolute opposition in every particular. 313

Sec. 10. The rocks of J. D. Harding. 313

Sec. 11. Characters of loose earth and soil. 314

Sec. 12. Its exceeding grace and fulness of feature. 315

Sec. 13. The ground of Teniers. 315

Sec. 14. Importance of these minor parts and points. 316

Sec. 15. The observance of them is the real distinction between the

master and the novice. 316

Sec. 16. Ground of Cuyp. 317

Sec. 17. And of Claude. 317

Sec. 18. The entire weakness and childishness of the latter. 318

Sec. 19. Compared with the work of Turner. 318

Sec. 20. General features of Turner's foreground. 319

Sec. 21. Geological structure of his rocks in the Fall of the Tees. 319

Sec. 22. Their convex surfaces and fractured edges. 319

Sec. 23. And perfect unity. 320

Sec. 24. Various parts whose history is told us by the details of the

drawing. 321

Sec. 25. Beautiful instance of an exception to general rules in the

Llanthony. 321

Sec. 26. Turner's drawing of detached blocks of weathered stone. 322

Sec. 27. And of complicated foreground. 323

Sec. 28. And of loose soil. 323

Sec. 29. The unison of all in the ideal foregrounds of the Academy

pictures. 324

Sec. 30. And the great lesson to be received from all. 324

SECTION V.

OF TRUTH OF WATER.

CHAPTER I.--Of Water, as Painted by the Ancients.

Sec. 1. Sketch of the functions and infinite agency of water. 325

Sec. 2. The ease with which a common representation of it may be

given. The impossibility of a faithful one. 325

Sec. 3. Difficulty of properly dividing the subject. 326

Sec. 4. Inaccuracy of study of water-effect among all painters. 326

Sec. 5. Difficulty of treating this part of the subject. 328

Sec. 6. General laws which regulate the phenomena of water. First, The

imperfection of its reflective surface. 329

Sec. 7. The inherent hue of water modifies dark reflections, and does

not affect right ones. 330

Sec. 8. Water takes no shadow. 331

Sec. 9. Modification of dark reflections by shadow. 332

Sec. 10. Examples on the waters of the Rhone. 333

Sec. 11. Effect of ripple on distant water. 335

Sec. 12. Elongation of reflections by moving water. 335

Sec. 13. Effect of rippled water on horizontal and inclined images. 336

Sec. 14. To what extent reflection is visible from above. 336

Sec. 15. Deflection of images on agitated water. 337

Sec. 16. Necessity of watchfulness as well as of science. Licenses, how

taken by great men. 337

Sec. 17. Various licenses or errors in water painting of Claude, Cuyp,

Vandevelde. 339

Sec. 18. And Canaletto. 341

Sec. 19. Why unpardonable. 342

Sec. 20. The Dutch painters of sea. 343

Sec. 21. Ruysdael, Claude, and Salvator. 344

Sec. 22. Nicolo Poussin. 345

Sec. 23. Venetians and Florentines. Conclusion. 346

CHAPTER II.--Of Water, as Painted by the Moderns.

Sec. 1. General power of the moderns in painting quiet water. The

lakes of Fielding. 348

Sec. 2. The calm rivers of De Wint, J. Holland, &c. 348

Sec. 3. The character of bright and violent falling water. 349

Sec. 4. As given by Nesfield. 349

Sec. 5. The admirable water-drawing of J. D. Harding. 350

Sec. 6. His color; and painting of sea. 350

Sec. 7. The sea of Copley Fielding. Its exceeding grace and rapidity. 351

Sec. 8. Its high aim at character. 351

Sec. 9. But deficiency in the requisite quality of grays. 352

Sec. 10. Variety of the grays of nature. 352

Sec. 11. Works of Stanfield. His perfect knowledge and power. 353

Sec. 12. But want of feeling. General sum of truth presented by modern

art. 353

CHAPTER III.--Of Water, as Painted by Turner.

Sec. 1. The difficulty of giving surface to smooth water. 355

Sec. 2. Is dependent on the structure of the eye, and the focus by

which the reflected rays are perceived. 355

Sec. 3. Morbid clearness occasioned in painting of water by

distinctness of reflections. 356

Sec. 4. How avoided by Turner. 357

Sec. 5. All reflections on distant water are distinct. 357

Sec. 6. The error of Vandevelde. 358

Sec. 7. Difference in arrangement of parts between the reflected

object and its image. 359

Sec. 8. Illustrated from the works of Turner. 359

Sec. 9. The boldness and judgment shown in the observance of it. 360

Sec. 10. The _texture_ of surface in Turner's painting of calm water. 361

Sec. 11. Its united qualities. 361

Sec. 12. Relation of various circumstances of past agitation, &c., by

the most trifling incidents, as in the Cowes. 363

Sec. 13. In scenes on the Loire and Seine. 363

Sec. 14. Expression of contrary waves caused by recoil from shore. 364

Sec. 15. Various other instances. 364

Sec. 16. Turner's painting of distant expanses of water.--Calm,

interrupted by ripple. 365

Sec. 17. And rippled, crossed by sunshine. 365

Sec. 18. His drawing of distant rivers. 366

Sec. 19. And of surface associated with mist. 367

Sec. 20. His drawing of falling water, with peculiar expression of

weight. 367

Sec. 21. The abandonment and plunge of great cataracts. How given by

him. 368

Sec. 22. Difference in the action of water, when continuous and when

interrupted. The interrupted stream fills the hollows of

its bed. 369

Sec. 23. But the continuous stream takes the shape of its bed. 370

Sec. 24. Its exquisite curved lines. 370

Sec. 25. Turner's careful choice of the historical truth. 370

Sec. 26. His exquisite drawing of the continuous torrent in the

Llanthony Abbey. 371

Sec. 27. And of the interrupted torrent in the Mercury and Argus. 372

Sec. 28. Various cases. 372

Sec. 29. Sea painting. Impossibility of truly representing foam. 373

Sec. 30. Character of shore-breakers, also inexpressible. 374

Sec. 31. Their effect how injured when seen from the shore. 375

Sec. 32. Turner's expression of heavy rolling sea. 376

Sec. 33. With peculiar expression of weight. 376

Sec. 34. Peculiar action of recoiling waves. 377

Sec. 35. And of the stroke of a breaker on the shore. 377

Sec. 36. General character of sea on a rocky coast given by Turner in

the Land's End. 378

Sec. 37. Open seas of Turner's earlier time. 379

Sec. 38. Effect of sea after prolonged storm. 380

Sec. 39. Turner's noblest work, the painting of the deep open sea in

the Slave Ship. 382

Sec. 40. Its united excellences and perfection as a whole. 383

SECTION VI.

OF TRUTH OF VEGETATION.--CONCLUSION.

CHAPTER I.--Of Truth of Vegetation.

Sec. 1. Frequent occurrence of foliage in the works of the old

masters. 384

Sec. 2. Laws common to all forest trees. Their branches do not taper,

but only divide. 385

Sec. 3. Appearance of tapering caused by frequent buds. 385

Sec. 4. And care of nature to conceal the parallelism. 386

Sec. 5. The degree of tapering which may be represented as continuous. 386

Sec. 6. The trees of Gaspar Poussin. 386

Sec. 7. And of the Italian school generally, defy this law. 387

Sec. 8. The truth, as it is given by J. D. Harding. 387

Sec. 9. Boughs, in consequence of this law, _must_ diminish where they

divide. Those of the old masters often do not. 388

Sec. 10. Boughs must multiply as they diminish. Those of the old

masters do not. 389

Sec. 11. Bough-drawing of Salvator. 390

Sec. 12. All these errors especially shown in Claude's sketches, and

concentrated in a work of G. Poussin's. 391

Sec. 13. Impossibility of the angles of boughs being taken out of them

by wind. 392

Sec. 14. Bough-drawing of Titian. 392

Sec. 15. Bough-drawing of Turner. 394

Sec. 16. Leafage. Its variety and symmetry. 394

Sec. 17. Perfect regularity of Poussin. 395

Sec. 18. Exceeding intricacy of nature's foliage. 396

Sec. 19. How contradicted by the tree-patterns of G. Poussin. 396

Sec. 20. How followed by Creswick. 397

Sec. 21. Perfect unity in nature's foliage. 398

Sec. 22. Total want of it in Both and Hobbima. 398

Sec. 23. How rendered by Turner. 399

Sec. 24. The near leafage of Claude. His middle distances are good. 399

Sec. 25. Universal termination of trees in symmetrical curves. 400

Sec. 26. Altogether unobserved by the old masters. Always given by

Turner. 401

Sec. 27. Foliage painting on the Continent. 401

Sec. 28. Foliage of J. D. Harding. Its deficiencies. 402

Sec. 29. His brilliancy of execution too manifest. 403

Sec. 30. His bough-drawing, and choice of form. 404

Sec. 31. Local color, how far expressible in black and white, and with

what advantage. 404

Sec. 32. Opposition between great manner and great knowledge. 406

Sec. 33. Foliage of Cox, Fielding, and Cattermole. 406

Sec. 34. Hunt and Creswick. Green, how to be rendered expressive of

light, and offensive if otherwise. 407

Sec. 35. Conclusion. Works of J. Linnel and S. Palmer. 407

CHAPTER II.--General remarks respecting the Truth of Turner.

Sec. 1. No necessity of entering into discussion of architectural

truth. 409

Sec. 2. Extreme difficulty of illustrating or explaining the highest

truth. 410

Sec. 3. The _positive_ rank of Turner is in no degree shown in the

foregoing pages, but only his relative rank. 410

Sec. 4. The exceeding refinement of his truth. 411

Sec. 5. There is nothing in his works which can be enjoyed without

knowledge. 411

Sec. 6. And nothing which knowledge will not enable us to enjoy. 412

Sec. 7. His former rank and progress. 412

Sec. 8. Standing of his present works. Their mystery is the

consequence of their fulness. 413

CHAPTER III.--Conclusion.--Modern Art and Modern Criticism.

Sec. 1. The entire prominence hitherto given to the works of one

artist caused only by our not being able to take

cognizance of _character_. 414

Sec. 2. The feelings of different artists are incapable of full

comparison. 415

Sec. 3. But the fidelity and truth of each are capable of real

comparison. 415

Sec. 4. Especially because they are equally manifested in the

treatment of all subjects. 415

Sec. 5. No man draws one thing well, if he can draw nothing else. 416

Sec. 6. General conclusions to be derived from our past investigation. 417

Sec. 7. Truth, a standard of all excellence. 417

Sec. 8. Modern criticism. Changefulness of public taste. 418

Sec. 9. Yet associated with a certain degree of judgment. 418

Sec. 10. Duty of the press. 418

Sec. 11. Qualifications necessary for discharging it. 418

Sec. 12. General incapability of modern critics. 419

Sec. 13. And inconsistency with themselves. 419

Sec. 14. How the press may really advance the cause of art. 420

Sec. 15. Morbid fondness at the present day for unfinished works. 420

Sec. 16. By which the public defraud themselves. 421

Sec. 17. And in pandering to which, artists ruin themselves. 421

Sec. 18. Necessity of finishing works of art perfectly. 421

Sec. 19. _Sketches_ not sufficiently encouraged. 422

Sec. 20. Brilliancy of execution or efforts at invention not to be

tolerated in young artists. 422

Sec. 21. The duty and after privileges of all students. 423

Sec. 22. Necessity among our greater artists of more singleness of aim. 423

Sec. 23. What should be their general aim. 425

Sec. 24. Duty of the press with respect to the works of Turner. 427

LIST OF PLATES TO VOLUME I.

_Page._

Casa Contarini Fasan, Venice 110

From a drawing by Ruskin.

The Dogana, and Santa Maria della Salute, Venice 136

From a painting by Turner.

Okehampton Castle 258

From a painting by Turner.

Port Ruysdael 376

From a painting by Turner.

MODERN PAINTERS.

PART I

OF GENERAL PRINCIPLES.

SECTION I.

OF THE NATURE OF THE IDEAS CONVEYABLE BY ART.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

Sec. 1. Public opinion no criterion of excellence, except after long

periods of time.

If it be true, and it can scarcely be disputed, that nothing has been

for centuries consecrated by public admiration, without possessing in a

high degree some kind of sterling excellence, it is not because the

average intellect and feeling of the majority of the public are

competent in any way to distinguish what is really excellent, but

because all erroneous opinion is inconsistent, and all ungrounded

opinion transitory; so that while the fancies and feelings which deny

deserved honor and award what is undue have neither root nor strength

sufficient to maintain consistent testimony for a length of time, the

opinions formed on right grounds by those few who are in reality

competent judges, being necessarily stable, communicate themselves

gradually from mind to mind, descending lower as they extend wider,

until they leaven the whole lump, and rule by absolute authority, even

where the grounds and reasons for them cannot be understood. On this

gradual victory of what is consistent over what is vacillating, depends

the reputation of all that is highest in art and literature. For It is

an insult to what is really great in either, to suppose that it in any

way addresses itself to mean or uncultivated faculties. It is a matter

of the simplest demonstration, that no man can be really appreciated but

by his equal or superior. His inferior may over-estimate him in

enthusiasm; or, as is more commonly the case, degrade him, in ignorance;

but he cannot form a grounded and just estimate. Without proving this,

however--which it would take more space to do than I can spare--it is

sufficiently evident that there is no process of amalgamation by which

opinions, wrong individually, can become right merely by their

multitude.[1] If I stand by a picture in the Academy, and hear twenty

persons in succession admiring some paltry piece of mechanism or

imitation in the lining of a cloak, or the satin of a slipper, it is

absurd to tell me that they reprobate collectively what they admire

individually: or, if they pass with apathy by a piece of the most noble

conception or most perfect truth, because it has in it no tricks of the

brush nor grimace of expression, it is absurd to tell me that they

collectively respect what they separately scorn, or that the feelings

and knowledge of such judges, by any length of time or comparison of

ideas, could come to any right conclusion with respect to what is really

high in art. The question is not decided by them, but for them;--decided

at first by few: by fewer in proportion as the merits of the work are of

a higher order. From these few the decision is communicated to the

number next below them in rank of mind, and by these again to a wider

and lower circle; each rank being so far cognizant of the superiority of

that above it, as to receive its decision with respect; until, in

process of time, the right and consistent opinion is communicated to

all, and held by all as a matter of faith, the more positively in

proportion as the grounds of it are less perceived.[2]

Sec. 2. And therefore obstinate when once formed.

Sec. 3. The author's reasons for opposing it in particular instances.

Sec. 4. But only on points capable of demonstration.

But when this process has taken place, and the work has become sanctified

by time in the minds of men, it is impossible that any new work of equal

merit can be impartially compared with it, except by minds not only

educated and generally capable of appreciating merit, but strong enough

to shake off the weight of prejudice and association, which invariably

incline them to the older favorite. It is much easier, says Barry, to

repeat the character recorded of Phidias, than to investigate the merits

of Agasias. And when, as peculiarly in the case of painting, much

knowledge of what is technical and practical is necessary to a right

judgment, so that those alone are competent to pronounce a true verdict

who are themselves the persons to be judged, and who therefore can give

no opinion, centuries may elapse before fair comparison can be made

between two artists of different ages; while the patriarchal excellence

exercises during the interval a tyrannical--perhaps, even a blighting,

influence over the minds, both of the public and of those to whom,

properly understood, it should serve for a guide and example. In no city

of Europe where art is a subject of attention, are its prospects so

hopeless, or its pursuits so resultless, as in Rome; because there, among

all students, the authority of their predecessors in art is supreme and

without appeal, and the mindless copyist studies Raffaelle, but not what

Raffaelle studied. It thus becomes the duty of every one capable of

demonstrating any definite points of superiority in modern art, and who

is in a position in which his doing so will not be ungraceful, to

encounter without hesitation whatever opprobrium may fall upon him from

the necessary prejudice even of the most candid minds, and from the far

more virulent opposition of those who have no hope of maintaining their

own reputation for discernment but in the support of that kind of

consecrated merit which may be applauded without an inconvenient

necessity for reasons. It is my purpose, therefore, believing that there

are certain points of superiority in modern artists, and especially in

one or two of their number, which have not yet been fully understood,

except by those who are scarcely in a position admitting the declaration

of their conviction, to institute a close comparison between the great

works of ancient and modern landscape art, to raise, as far as possible,

the deceptive veil of imaginary light through which we are accustomed to

gaze upon the patriarchal work, and to show the real relations, whether

favorable or otherwise, subsisting between it and our own. I am fully

aware that this is not to be done lightly or rashly; that it is the part

of every one proposing to undertake such a task strictly to examine, with

prolonged doubt and severe trial, every opinion in any way contrary to

the sacred verdict of time, and to advance nothing which does not, at

least in his own conviction, rest on surer ground than mere feeling or

taste. I have accordingly advanced nothing in the following pages but

with accompanying demonstration, which may indeed be true or

false--complete or conditional, but which can only be met on its own

grounds, and can in no way be borne down or affected by mere authority of

great names. Yet even thus I should scarcely have ventured to speak so

decidedly as I have, but for my full conviction that we ought not to

class the historical painters of the fifteenth, and landscape painters of

the seventeenth, centuries, together, under the general title of "old

masters," as if they possessed anything like corresponding rank in their

respective walks of art. I feel assured that the principles on which they

worked are totally opposed, and that the landscape painters have been

honored only because they exhibited in mechanical and technical qualities

some semblance of the manner of the nobler historical painters, whose

principles of conception and composition they entirely reversed. The

course of study which has led me reverently to the feet of Michael Angelo

and Da Vinci, has alienated me gradually from Claude and Gaspar--I cannot

at the same time do homage to power and pettiness--to the truth of

consummate science, and the mannerism of undisciplined imagination. And

let it be understood that whenever hereafter I speak depreciatingly of

the old masters as a body, I refer to none of the historical painters,

for whom I entertain a veneration, which though I hope reasonable in its

grounds, is almost superstitious in degree. Neither, unless he be

particularly mentioned, do I intend to include Nicholas Poussin, whose

landscapes have a separate and elevated character, which renders it

necessary to consider them apart from all others. Speaking generally of

the older masters, I refer only to Claude, Gaspar Poussin, Salvator Rosa,

Cuyp, Berghem, Both, Ruysdael, Hobbima, Teniers, (in his landscapes,) P.

Potter, Canaletti, and the various Van somethings, and Back somethings,

more especially and malignantly those who have libelled the sea.

It will of course be necessary for me in the commencement of the work to

state briefly those principles on which I conceive all right judgment of

art must be founded. These introductory chapters I should wish to be

read carefully, because all criticism must be useless when the terms or

grounds of it are in any degree ambiguous; and the ordinary language of

connoisseurs and critics, granting that they understand it themselves,

is usually mere jargon to others, from their custom of using technical

terms, by which everything is meant, and nothing is expressed.

Sec. 5. The author's partiality to modern works excusable.

And if, in the application of these principles, in spite of my endeavor

to render it impartial, the feeling and fondness which I have for some

works of modern art escape me sometimes where it should not, let it be

pardoned as little more than a fair counterbalance to that peculiar

veneration with which the work of the older master, associated as it has

ever been in our ears with the expression of whatever is great or

perfect, must be usually regarded by the reader. I do not say that this

veneration is wrong, nor that we should be less attentive to the

repeated words of time: but let us not forget, that if honor be for the

dead, gratitude can only be for the living. He who has once stood beside

the grave, to look back upon the companionship which has been forever

closed, feeling how impotent _there_ are the wild love, or the keen

sorrow, to give one instant's pleasure to the pulseless heart, or atone

in the lowest measure to the departed spirit for the hour of unkindness,

will scarcely for the future incur that debt to the heart, which can

only be discharged to the dust. But the lesson which men receive as

individuals, they do not learn as nations. Again and again they have

seen their noblest descend into the grave, and have thought it enough to

garland the tombstone when they had not crowned the brow, and to pay the

honor to the ashes, which they had denied to the spirit. Let it not

displease them that they are bidden, amidst the tumult and the dazzle of

their busy life, to listen for the few voices, and watch for the few

lamps, which God has toned and lighted to charm and to guide them, that

they may not learn their sweetness by their silence, nor their light by

their decay.

FOOTNOTES

[1] The opinion of a majority is right only when it is more probable

with each individual that he should be right than that he should be

wrong, as in the case of a jury. Where it is more probable, with

respect to each individual, that he should be wrong than right, the

opinion of the minority is the true one. Thus it is in art.

[2] There are, however, a thousand modifying circumstances which

render this process sometimes unnecessary,--sometimes rapid and

certain--sometimes impossible. It is unnecessary in rhetoric and the

drama, because the multitude is the only proper judge of those arts

whose end is to move the multitude (though more is necessary to a

fine play than is essentially dramatic, and it is only of the

dramatic part that the multitude are cognizant). It is unnecessary,

when, united with the higher qualities of a work, there are appeals

to universal passion, to all the faculties and feelings which are

general in man as an animal. The popularity is then as sudden as it

is well grounded,--it is hearty and honest in every mind, but it is

based in every mind on a different species of excellence. Such will

often be the case with the noblest works of literature. Take Don

Quixote for example. The lowest mind would find in it perpetual and

brutal amusement in the misfortunes of the knight, and perpetual

pleasure in sympathy with the squire. A mind of average feeling

would perceive the satirical meaning and force of the book, would

appreciate its wit, its elegance, and its truth. But only elevated

and peculiar minds discover, in addition to all this, the full moral

beauty of the love and truth which are the constant associates of

all that is even most weak and erring in the character of its hero,

and pass over the rude adventure and scurrile jest in haste--perhaps

in pain, to penetrate beneath the rusty corselet, and catch from the

wandering glance the evidence and expression of fortitude,

self-devotion, and universal love. So, again, with the works of

Scott and Byron; popularity was as instant as it was deserved,

because there is in them an appeal to those passions which are

universal in all men, as well as an expression of such thoughts as

can be received only by the few. But they are admired by the

majority of their advocates for the weakest parts of their works, as

a popular preacher by the majority of his congregation for the worst

part of his sermon.

The process is rapid and certain, when, though there may be little

to catch the multitude at once, there is much which they can enjoy

when their attention is authoritatively directed to it. So rests the

reputation of Shakspeare. No ordinary mind can comprehend wherein

his undisputed superiority consists, but there is yet quite as much

to amuse, thrill, or excite,--quite as much of what is, in the

strict sense of the word, dramatic, in his works as in any one

else's. They were received, therefore, when first written, with

average approval, as works of common merit: but when the high

decision was made, and the circle spread, the public took up the hue

and cry conscientiously enough. Let them have daggers, ghosts,

clowns, and kings, and with such real and definite sources of

enjoyment, they will take the additional trouble to learn half a

dozen quotations, without understanding them, and admit the

superiority of Shakspeare without further demur. Nothing, perhaps,

can more completely demonstrate the total ignorance of the public of

all that is great or valuable in Shakspeare than their universal

admiration of Maclise's Hamlet.

The process is impossible when there is in the work nothing to

attract and something to disgust the vulgar mind. Neither their

intrinsic excellence, nor the authority of those who can judge of

it, will ever make the poems of Wordsworth or George Herbert

popular, in the sense in which Scott and Byron are popular, because

it is to the vulgar a labor instead of a pleasure to read them; and

there are parts in them which to such judges cannot but be vapid or

ridiculous. Most works of the highest art,--those of Raffaelle, M.

Angelo, or Da Vinci,--stand as Shakspeare does,--that which is

commonplace and feeble in their excellence being taken for its

essence by the uneducated, imagination assisting the impression,

(for we readily fancy that we feel, when feeling is a matter of

pride or conscience,) and affectation and pretension increasing the

noise of the rapture, if not its degree. Giotto, Orgagna, Angelico,

Perugino, stand, like George Herbert, only with the few. Wilkie

becomes popular, like Scott, because he touches passions which all

feel, and expresses truths which all can recognize.