Dolci was eminently a sentimentalist; he had no redeeming vices; a little of the devilry of a Benvenuto Cellini would have been invaluable to him and to his art. But it is futile to complain of a man for being as Nature made him, and if we will turn to Carlo Dolci's pictures for pretty, agreeable, and highly finished interpretations of moral ideas in terms of paint, we shall find no small amount of momentary satisfaction.
We must not forget that the world at large had suffered not a little when Carlo Dolci came upon the scene from the excessive daring and superb initiative of the Renaissance. Its eyes were a little dimmed by the splendour of the great men who had gone before, and had travelled to heights beyond the ken of the average citizen. Carlo Dolci helped to bring his greatly dazzled fellow-countrymen back to earth, pleasantly and in fashion that flattered their vanity. In the eyes of hundreds of his contemporaries the devout, God-fearing, conscientious Florentine must have been regarded as the greatest artist Italy had ever seen, and if such a thought pleases some of the unsophisticated among their descendants, who should desire to complain? Let us rather put to Dolci's credit the facts that he did not pose as a heaven-born genius, that he was not greedy or grasping, that he did not seek to found a school. The portrait he painted of himself suggests that he was not altogether deficient in humour; perhaps there were hours when he laughed with himself at those who praised him for the gifts he lacked. If we could but be sure that he laughed now and again at himself and his pictures, recognising the limitations that are so patent to us to-day, the most superior critic could refuse no longer to have some regard for Carlo Dolci.
The plates are printed by Bemrose Dalziel, Ltd., Watford
The text at the Ballantyne Press, Edinburgh