LADY COCKBURN AND HER CHILDREN
1773. National Gallery, London
resemblance to the mature works of the man. At ten years old he had made some progress in sketching, and at twelve he was a confirmed painter.”
Reynolds’s father was not long, however, in awaking to Joshua’s talents, for the boy was not more than about eight years old when, after perusing a book entitled “The Jesuit’s Perspective,” he made a drawing of Plympton School which effected a complete revolution in the state of the parental mind. “This is what the author of the ‘Perspective’ asserts in his preface,” cried the worthy father, “that by observing the rules laid down in this book a man may do wonders—for this is wonderful!”
After this portentous revelation Joshua was allowed to devote himself more seriously to his favourite pursuit, and his classical studies were sacrificed to the more congenial occupation of drawing likenesses of his relations and friends, and to the perusal of Richardson’s treatise on painting, which gave him his first acquaintance with the beauties of the great Italian Masters.
To the author of this work, Jonathan Richardson the elder, some slight tribute is due in speaking of the formation and development of the English School of Painting, so far at all events as it was influenced by the study of the Italian Masters. Horace Walpole considered him one of the best painters of a head that had appeared in this country. “There is strength, roundness, and boldness in his colouring,” he says, “but his men want dignity and his women grace. The good sense of the nation is characterised in his portraits. You see he lived in an age when neither enthusiasm nor servility were predominant.” The treatise of Richardson in which Reynolds formed his first acquaintance with the Italian Masters was probably the “Essay on the whole Art of Criticism as it relates to Painting,” which was published in 1719, bound up in one volume with “An Argument in behalf of the Science of a Connoisseur.” This was followed, in 1722, by an account of some of the statues, bas-reliefs, drawings, and pictures in Italy, &c., with remarks by Mr. Richardson, Senior and Junior. The son made the journey, and from his notes they both compiled this valuable work. The father formed a large collection of the drawings of Old Masters, many of which were acquired and treasured by Reynolds.
When he was eighteen years old, Reynolds was sent to London to study painting under Thomas Hudson, the most successful portrait painter at that
MISS BOWLES