But if this is the most extraordinary part of Wilkie’s pictures, and the part most likely to attract vulgar attention and curiosity, it is far from being the most valuable and characteristic. If it were, I should not regard him as the really great artist which I now do. The mere overcoming of difficulty, for the sake of overcoming it, and without producing any other ulterior effect, would be a mere idle waste of time and skill, and quite unworthy either of praise or attention. It is in these particular instances which I have noticed above, as in numerous others in different lines of art, a mere sleight of hand, exceedingly curious, as exhibiting the possible extent of human skill, but no more.
In Wilkie’s pictures, this exhibition of mere manual skill is used very sparingly, and is almost always kept in subjection to, or brought in aid of, other infinitely more valuable ends. With the single exception of the “Cut Finger,” which is a mere gratuitous effort of this manual dexterity, all his pictures are moral tales, more or less interesting, from their perfectly true delineation of habits and manners, or impressive, from their development of character, passion, and sentiment. The “Opening of the Will” is as fine in this way, as any of Sir Walter Scott’s novels; and the “Rent Day” includes a whole series of national tales of English pastoral life in the nineteenth century.
It is a great mistake to consider Wilkie as a comic painter, in which light he is generally regarded by the public on both sides of the Atlantic. When they are standing before his pictures, they seem to feel themselves bound to be moved to laughter by them, as they would by a comedy or a farce; and without this, they do not show their taste; whereas laughter seems to me to be the very last sensation these works are adapted to call forth.
Speaking of the best and most characteristic of them, I would say, that scarcely any compositions of the art, in whatever class, are calculated to excite a greater variety of deep and serious feelings; feelings, it is true, so uniformly tempered and modified by a calm and delightful satisfaction, that they can scarcely be considered without calling up a smile to the countenance. But the smile arising from inward delight is as different from the laughter excited by strangeness and drollery as any one thing can be from another. It is, in fact, the very essence of Wilkie’s pictures, that there is literally nothing strange, and consequently nothing droll and laughter-moving about them.
From the works of no one English artist have I received so much pure and unmixed pleasure and instruction as I have from those of Sir David Wilkie. He differs from all the great old masters, inasmuch as I think he possesses more vigor of pencil, and more natural and characteristic truth of expression than any of them. His style cannot, indeed, be said to possess the airy and enchanting graces of Claude, or the classic power and beauty of the Poussins, or the delicious sweetness of Paul Potter, or the sunny brightness of Wynants, or the elegant warmth of Both, or the delightfully rural and country-fied air of Hobbima. In fact, he has no peculiar or distinguishing style of his own; and this is his great and characteristic beauty. There is nothing in his pictures but what belongs positively and exclusively to the scene they profess to represent. When any of the above qualities are required in his pictures, they are sure to be found there; not because they are part of his style, but because they are part of Nature’s, in the circumstances under which he is representing her. The artist never obtrudes himself to share with nature the admiration of the spectator. And this is a very rare and admirable quality to possess in these days of pretence and affectation; when subject is usually but a secondary consideration, and is kept in submission to the display of style, manner, and what is called effect.
TO AMIE—UNKNOWN.
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BY L. J. CIST.
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