BENJAMIN WEST,
An American Quaker by birth, was the youngest of a family of ten children, and was nurtured with great tenderness and care; a prophecy uttered by a preacher of the sect having impressed his parents with the belief that their child would, one day, become a great man. In what way the prophecy was to be realised they had formed to themselves no definite idea; but an incident, which occurred in young West’s sixth year, led his father to ponder deeply as to whether its fulfilment were not begun. Benjamin, being left to watch the infant child of one of his relatives while it was left asleep in the cradle, had drawn its smiling portrait, in red and black ink, there being paper and pens on the table in the room. This spontaneous and earliest essay of his genius was so strikingly truthful that it was instantly and rapturously recognised by the family. During the next year he drew flowers and birds with pen and ink; but a party of Indians, coming on a visit to the neighbourhood, taught him to prepare and use red and yellow ochre and indigo. Soon after, he heard of camel-hair pencils, and the thought seized him that he could make use of a substitute, so he plucked hairs from the tail of a black cat that was kept in the house, fashioned his new instrument, and began to lay on colours, much to his boyish satisfaction. In the course of another year a visitant friend, having seen his pictures, sent him a box of colours, oils, and pencils, with some pieces of prepared canvas and a few engravings. Benjamin’s fascination was now indescribable. The seductions presented by his new means of creation were irresistible, and he played truant from school for some days, stealing up into a garret, and devoting the time, with all the throbbing wildness of delight, to painting. The schoolmaster called, the truant was sought, and found in the garret by his mother. She beheld what he had done; and instead of reprehending him fell on his neck and kissed him, with tears of ecstatic fondness. How different from the training experienced by the poor, persecuted and tormented “Salvatoriello!” What wonder, that the fiery-natured Italian afterwards drew human nature with a severe hand; and how greatly might his vehement disposition have been softened, had his nurture resembled that of the child of these gentle Quakers!
The friend who had presented him with the box of colours some time after took him to Philadelphia, where he was introduced to a painter, saw his pictures, the first he had ever seen except his own, and wept with emotion at the sight of them. Some books on Art increased his attachment to it; and some presents enabled him to purchase materials for further exercises. Up to his eighteenth year, strange as the facts seem, he received no instruction in painting, had to carve out his entire course himself, and yet advanced so far as to create his first historical picture, “The Death of Socrates,” and to execute portraits for several persons of taste. His father, however, had never yet assisted him; for, with all his ponderings on the preacher’s prophecy, he could not shake off some doubts respecting the lawfulness of the profession of a painter, to which no one of the conscientious sect had ever yet devoted himself. A counsel of “Friends” was therefore called together, and the perplexed father stated his difficulty and besought their advice. After deep consideration, their decision was unanimous that the youth should be permitted to pursue the objects to which he was now both by nature and habit attached; and young Benjamin was called in, and solemnly set apart by the primitive brethren for his chosen profession. The circumstances of this consecration were so remarkable, that, coupled with the early prophecy already mentioned, they made an impression on West’s mind that served to strengthen greatly his resolution for advancement in Art, and for devotion to it as his supreme object through life.
On the death of his affectionate mother he finally left his father’s house, and, not being yet nineteen, set up in Philadelphia as a portrait-painter, and soon found plenty of employment. For the three or four succeeding years he worked unremittingly, making his second essay at historic painting within that term, but labouring at portraits, chiefly with the view of winning the means to enable himself to visit Italy. His desire was at length accomplished, a merchant of New York generously presenting him with fifty guineas as an additional outfit, and thus assisting him to reach Rome without the uneasiness that would have arisen from straitness of means in a strange land.
The appearance of a Quaker artist of course caused great excitement in the metropolis of Art; crowds of wonderers were formed around him; but, when in the presence of the great relics of Grecian genius, he was the wildest wonderer of all. “How like a young Mohawk!” he exclaimed, on first seeing the “Apollo Belvidere,” its life-like perfection bringing before his mind, instantaneously, the free forms of the desert children of Nature in his native America. The excitement of little more than one month in Rome threw him into a dangerous illness, from which it was some time before he recovered. He visited the other great cities of Italy, and also painted and exhibited two great historical pictures, which were successful, ere the three years were completed which he stayed in that country. He would have returned to Philadelphia; but a letter from his father recommended him first to visit England.
West’s success in London was speedily so decided, that he gave up all thoughts of returning to America. For thirty years of his life he was chiefly employed in executing, for King George the Third, the great historical and scriptural pictures which now adorn Windsor Palace and the Royal Chapel. After the abrupt termination of the commission given him by the King, he continued still to be a laborious painter. His pictures in oil amount to about four hundred, and many of them are of very large dimensions and contain a great number of figures. Among these may be mentioned, for its wide celebrity, the representation of “Christ healing the Sick,” familiar to every visitor of the National Gallery. If polished taste be more highly charmed with other treasures there, the heart irresistibly owns the excellence of this great realisation by the child of the American Quaker. He received three thousand guineas for this picture, and his rewards were of the most substantial kind ever after his settlement in England. He was also appointed President of the Royal Academy, on the death of Sir Joshua Reynolds, and held the office at his own death, in the eighty-second year of his age.
Though exposed to no opposition from envy or jealousy at any time of his career, and though encouraged in his childish bent, and helped by all who knew him and had the power to help him, without Perseverance of the most energetic character Benjamin West would not have continued without pattern or instruction to labour on to excellence, nor would he have sustained his prosperity so firmly, or increased its productiveness so wondrously.
