These

inflames nor irritates, his heart seems to dilate with happiness, he is disposed to every act of kindness and benevolence, to love and cherish all around him. are the sensations which beauty considered generally, and without any regard to the sex or to the nature of the object in which it resides, does, and ought to excite. A mind in such a state may be compared to the surface of a pure and tranquil lake, into which if the smallest pebble be cast, the waters, like the affections, seem gently to expand themselves on every side: but when the mind is carried on by any eager pursuit, the still voice of the milder affections is as little heard, and its effect as short lived, as the sound or effect of a pebble, when thrown into a rapid and rocky stream.

Repose is always used in a good sense; as a state, if not of positive pleasure, at least as one of freedom from all pain and uneasiness: irritation, almost always in an opposite sense, and yet, contradictory as it may appear, we must ac knowledge it to be the source of our most

active and lively pleasures: it's nature, however, is eager and hurrying, and such are the pleasures which spring from it. Let those who have been used to observe the works of nature, reflect on their sensations when viewing the smooth and tranquil scene of a beautiful lake, or the wild abrupt and noisy one of a picturesque river: I think they will own them to have been as different as the scenes themselves, and that nothing but the poverty of language makes us call two sensations so distinct from each other, by the common name of pleasure.

All that has been said in this chapter with respect to the effects of roughness and smoothness, of light and shadow, in producing either irritation or repose, will receive much additional illustration from that art, by means of which the most striking characters of visible objects have been pointed out to our notice, and impressed on our minds. I now therefore shall take a view of the practice and principles of some of the most eminent painters, and

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shall endeavour to strengthen the posi tions which I have ventured to advance, by their examples and authority.

1

The genius of Rubens was strongly turned to the picturesque disposition of his figures, so as often to sacrifice every other consideration to the intricacy, contrast, and striking variations of their forms and groups. Such a disposition of objects, seems to call for something similar in the management of the light and shade; and accordingly we owe some of the most striking examples of both, to his fertile invention. In point of brilliancy, of extreme splendour of light* no pictures can stand in competition with those of Rubens: sometimes those lights are almost unmixed with shade; at other times they burst from dark shadows, they glance on

* I speak of those pictures (and they are very numerous) in which he aimed at great brilliancy. As no painter possessed more entirely all the principles of his art, the solemn breadth of his light and shade is, on some occasions, no less striking than its force and splendour on others.

the different parts of the picture, and produce that flicker (as it sometimes is called) so captivating to the eye under his management, but so apt to offend it when attempted by inferior artists, or by those who are less thoroughly masters of the principles of harmony than that great painter. All these dazzling effects are heightened by the spirited management of his pencil, by those sharp, animated touches, which give life and energy to every object.

Correggio's principal attention in point of form, was directed to flow of outline, and gradual variation: of this he never entirely lost sight, even in his most capricious fore-shortenings; and the style of his light and shadow is so congenial, that the one seems the natural consequence of the other. His pictures are always cited as the most perfect models of those soft and insensible transitions, of that union of effect, which above every thing else, impresses the general idea of beauty. The manner of his pencilling is exactly of a piece

with the rest; all seems melted together, but with so nice a judgment, as to avoid, by means of certain free, yet delicate touches, that laboured hardness and insipidity, which arise from what is called high finishing. Correggio's pictures are indeed as far removed from monotony, as from glare; he seems to have felt beyond all others, the exact degree of brilliancy which accords with the softness of beauty, and to have been with regard to figures, what Claude was in landscape.

The pictures of Claude are brilliant in a high degree; but that brilliancy is so diffused over the whole of them, so happily balanced, so mellowed and subdued by the almost visible atmosphere which pervades every part, and unites all together, that nothing in particular catches the eye; the whole is splendour, the whole is repose; every thing lighted up, every thing in sweetest harmony. Rubens differs as strongly from Claude, as he does from Correggio; his landscapes are full of the peculiarities, and picturesque