latter pictures, he has avoided this fault, and produced as elegant and delicate figures as any painter whatever. His skill and judgment ought to be rated by his best productions, and if so, perhaps upon the whole, when all his talents are taken into the account, he may, at least, be said to be one of the greatest painters whose works remain.

Page 23. Mr. Webb says, "I should not be so particular in tracing the origin of sculpture, and, consequently, of painting, to this æra, were it not that Pliny confidently affirms, that the latter did not exist in those times," &c. which is very probable.

Page 51, 52. "There is no one excellence of design," &c. What follows, to the end of this paragraph, is very judicious, particularly where the author remarks, "that careless decency, and unaffected grace, which ever attend the motions and gestures of men unconscious of observation."

Page 86. "Can paint express a quickening perspiration? The mellowest tints of the Venetian school furnish no such ideas."-No-but the spectator furnishes them to himself. How often have we heard a man of a warm imagination, though of sense and genius, pretend to see excellencies in ptures which the painter never intended? Nothing is more common than for such to find all the delicacies of expression which they conceive should be attempted, and impute to an artist (especially if otherwise celebrated) not only the utmost perfection, but often what is not within the compass of the art. Many reflections of this kind may be made in reading Pliny, who, at other times also, discovers great ignorance in the observations that escape him, particularly where he remarks of a certain painter that he was the first who, in a portrait, drew the eyes with so peculiar a skill, that they seemed to follow the spectator as he changed his place, and still to look at him; whereas this effect is constant, and impossible to be otherwise. The most ignorant painter does the same thing without intention; and the most skilful can never represent the eyes looking at the spectator, standing in any one place, but they will also appear to have the same direction to him standing in any other. The cause of this effect it is plain he did not know. It is, that the direction of the eyes towards the spectator, remains the same in whatsoever place he stands; for that direction, or turn of the pupil, bears still the same relation to the position of each feature, and to all the parts of the face, which being on a plane, suffer no apparent change; and it is on this relation that the whole depends; whereas, in a living

face, or statue, that relation is continually changing with every change of place of the spectator.

Page 94. "Rubens has painted in imitation of the rainbow; all the colours co-operate; the effect is good, but accidental; but in Titian and Corregio this arrangement is the result of science; it is a harmony which springs from a judicious and happy union of consenting colours."-It seems very unjust, when the effect is allowed to be produced, to call in question the judgment that produced it. Why must that be pronounced accidental in Rubens, which is esteemed the result of science in Titian and Corregio? As no distinction is made, no reason given, none can be surmised but the prejudice of connoisseurship, since the author seems determined to depreciate Rubens and the Flemish school, in order to exalt Corregio, Titian, and other Italians*-Can any good thing come out of Gallilee?

Page 151. Speaking of Raphael, Mr. Webb says, "The most unpicturesque action composed by him, seems to have been destined for paint," &c. Here, and elsewhere, such lavish encomiums seem without reason or truth. How contradictory to the above observation are several representations of this painter; particularly that in which Joseph is relating his dreams to his brethren! This picture would exhibit nothing more than a youth speaking to a number of auditors, the subject remaining utterly unknown, had he not, to explain it, drawn two circles in the sky, in one of which eleven sheaves are bowing to a twelfth in the midst; and in the other circle, the sun and moon making obeisance, &c. Without this expedient, which is surely very unpicturesque, the story could not have been told. Surely the author will not say, that this action seems to have been destined for paint. These are subjects not fit for the pencil, and which only can be related, particularly where there is a succession of circumstances. On the contrary, where the principal incidents are crowded into a moment, and are, as it were, instantaneous, there is room for the display of the painter's

skill.

Such, for instance, as Alexander taking the potion from the hand of his suspected physician Philip, who knows not that he is suspected; Alexander giving to Philip the letter of accusation at the same time that he is swallowing the

This remark is by a Lady,

draught; the astonishment and indignation of Philip at reading it; his admiration of the generosity and confidence of Alexander; and the amazement of the attendants, &c. All these circumstances subsist in the same moment.

The choice of subject is of as much consequence in painting, as the choice of fable in an Epic poem. Such a story is better and more emphatically told in picture than in words, because the circumstances that happen at the same time, must, in narration, be successive.

Page 158. Of the Laocoon, he says admirably, "We trace in it the labour of years, we feel from it the impression of a minute." His whole description is judicious, striking, and expressive, and he had one of the finest productions of antiquity to describe. But he adds, p. 159, "It is not probable that men of taste and letters, while they were eye-witnesses, &c. should celebrate those very qualities in the works of their painters, were they not eminently possessed of them." Here, however, is great room for distinction. Statuary is a much more obvious art than painting, and rose much earlier to perfection, though if it be allowed that the painters drew as correctly, and expressed the passions as justly as the sculptors, by lines only, (which, it is supposed, was the practice for a long time before the effects of light and shadow were known) this will be but a small advance in the art of painting. The famous story of Apelles and Protogenes, as related by Pliny, gives no very advantageous idea of the progress they had made; the most that can be drawn from it is, that Apelles excelled in the correctness or in the beauty of the outline, and by that Protogenes is said to have discovered him. Now every step beyond this, in the infancy of an art so complicated, must surprise; and the encomiums bestowed on those who introduced shadowing and colouring, especially with any degree of roundness or projection, may be admitted as just for the time; but to produce all the effects of colouring, as described under the article of Rubens, required the experience of more than an age. Rubens, it is true, had all the materials before him, besides the works of his predecessors, without which the progress he made would have been impossible, even with his genius.

And, indeed, it appears from Pliny, that many of those circumstances related as wonderful effects of this art, must have been then new to the beholders (by their admiration) though they are generally very trifling, and such as modern artists easily execute. But this is said not to depreciate the genius or skill of the ancient artists, (who might,

notwithstanding, be equal or superior to any moderns) but merely to shew the small advance this slow-paced art then made.

It is not at all improbable that among the most unlettered and barbarous people, attempts may have been made in statuary, either by cutting in wood, or forming in clay, or wax, or otherwise, where, perhaps, it has never entered their heads to attempt raising the image of any object, on a flat superficies, by means of light, and shade, and colour, The one presents itself readily to the imagination, while the other is never thought of, or thought impracticable.

But if, besides the knowledge of the effects of light in all possible directions, of shadows, and reflections, of both light and shadow, in the several degrees of distance (which may be called the aerial perspective) of preserving the same tints of colouring in all these degrees of light, shade, and reflection; if to these be added the true linear perspective, all which are essentials of the art, and with which statuary has nothing to do; if these things are considered, it will not be thought strange that painting should require much more time, study, and experience to arrive at perfection, than so simple and uncomplicated an art as statuary; and that a small progress in the one, should excite an equal ad miration and praise with the greatest in the other (especially if at the same time the outline of the picture be as correct as that of the statue) and though these circumstances superadded in painting, be but in a moderate degree of perfec tion, they might, at that time, seem to be all that art was capable of producing, to those who had never yet seen more produced. And thus we may, in some measure, account for the testimonies transmitted down to us of the works of the ancient painters, who might notwithstanding, be far inferior to many modern artists, though with equal, or perhaps superior natural talents.

As a case in point, we see what painting the Chinese produce, though esteemed a learned and polite people, and who have long cultivated this and other arts; at the same time that they are no bad statuaries, at least in portraits, several of which we have seen that were modelled from the life, as like as could be done by any European statuary; which is an ocular proof how much more easy one is than the other.

Page 180. The author's encomium on Raphael, in rela tion to the cripple healed by Paul and Barnabas, is very judicious. He says truly, "That the wit of man could not devise means more certain of the end proposed; such a

chain of circumstances is equal to a narration; and that he cannot but think that the whole would have been an example of invention and conduct even in the happiest age of antiquity." This whole paragraph is admirable.

The well-known story of the contest between Zeuxis and Parrhasius, furnishes another argument of the moderate progress of this art, at that time. It is recorded, that the birds were deceived by the painted grapes of the one, and that the competitor was himself deceived by the painted curtain of the other. Now that the birds were deceived (if they really were) must be owing to the perfection of the represented grapes; but it is no difficult matter to represent fruit or flowers so perfectly as to deceive even men.

It is a thousand times more difficult to represent truly the human figure: and we find, by the same story, that these grapes were in the hand of a boy, whom, if the painter had represented as well as he had the fruit, the birds would scarcely have ventured to peck at it. And the curtain of the other painter being in a place where a curtain might probably hang, if it were not very perfectly represented, (though such representation is by no means difficult) might easily deceive a person who expected no such thing, and therefore did not scrupulously examine it. And, indeed, very indifferent representations, even of human figures, do sometimes deceive, in places where the originals might probably be; as centinels, and other figures in gardens, painted in wood, and cut out at all the extremities; and figures painted in sham windows. These, and such like, have often deceived the spectators, though not well executed, because, as was said, originals might probably be in these places. But the best portrait that ever Titian drew, if hung up in a frame, on the side of a room, would not deceive; that is, would not be taken for the person represented, which, however, it infallibly would, if placed where that person might be expected. And on the contrary, were a living face to appear through a canvass, inclosed in a frame, and mounted up as high as pictures are generally hung, it would very probably be taken for a picture; an instance of which is recounted of the famous Marshal Luxembourg, who, having had his picture drawn by one of the best painters in Paris, carried his mistress to see it, in hopes of prevailing on her to sit for her own. She immediately condemned it, asserting at the same time, that she never saw any picture like a human face. He, knowing that this was mere prejudice, persuaded the lady to call once more at the painter's house, after the last sitting, and assured