On my referring to what had been sometimes asserted of the inefficacy of pictures in Protestant churches, Northcote said he might be allowed to observe in favour of his own art, that though they might not strike at first from a difference in our own belief, yet they would gain upon the spectator by the force of habit. The practice of image-worship was probably an after-thought of the Papists themselves, from seeing the effects produced on the minds of the rude and ignorant by visible representations of saints and martyrs. The rulers of the church at first only thought to amuse and attract the people by pictures and statues (as they did by music and rich dresses, from which no inference was to be drawn); but when these representations of sacred subjects were once placed before the senses of an uninstructed but imaginative people, they looked at them with wonder and eagerness, till they began to think they saw them move; and then miracles were worked; and as this became a source of wealth and great resort to the several shrines and churches, every means were used to encourage the superstition and a belief in the supernatural virtues of the objects by the clergy and government. So he thought that if pictures were set up in our churches, they would by degrees inspire the mind with all the feelings of awe or interest that were necessary or proper. It was less difficult to excite enthusiasm than to keep it under due restraint. So in Italy, the higher powers did not much relish those processions of naked figures, taken from scriptural stories (such as Adam and Eve) on particular holidays, for they led to scandal and abuse; but they fell in with the humour of the rabble, and were lucrative to the lower orders of priests and friars, and the Pope could not expressly discountenance them. He said we were in little danger (either from our religion or temperament) of running into those disgraceful and fanciful extremes; but should rather do every thing in our power to avoid the opposite error of a dry and repulsive asceticism. We could not give too much encouragement to the fine arts.
Our talk of to-day concluded by his saying, that he often blamed himself for uttering what might be thought harsh things; and that on mentioning this once to Kemble, and saying it sometimes kept him from sleep after he had been out in company, Kemble had replied, ‘Oh! you need not trouble yourself so much about them: others never think of them afterwards!’
CONVERSATION THE TWELFTH
Northcote was painting from a little girl when I went in. B— was there. Something was said of a portrait of Dunning by Sir Joshua (an unfinished head), and B— observed, ‘Ah! my good friend, if you and I had known at that time what those things would fetch, we might have made our fortunes now. By laying out a few pounds on the loose sketches and sweepings of the lumber-room, we might have made as many hundreds.’ ‘Yes,’ said Northcote, ‘it was thought they would soon be forgot, and they went for nothing on that account: but they are more sought after than ever, because those imperfect hints and studies seem to bring one more in contact with the artist, and explain the process of his mind in the several stages. A finished work is, in a manner, detached from and independent of its author, like a child that can go alone: in the other case, it seems to be still in progress, and to await his hand to finish it; or we supply the absence of well-known excellences out of our own imagination, so that we have a two-fold property in it.’
Northcote read something out of a newspaper about the Suffolk-street Exhibition, in which his own name was mentioned, and M—’s, the landscape-painter. B— said, his pictures were a trick—a streak of red, and then a streak of blue. But, said Northcote, there is some merit in finding out a new trick. I ventured to hint, that the receipt for his was, clouds upon mountains, and mountains upon clouds—that there was number and quantity, but neither form nor colour. He appeared to me an instance of a total want of imagination; he mistook the character of the feelings associated with every thing, and I mentioned as an instance his Adam and Eve, which had been much admired, but which was a panoramic view of the map of Asia, instead of a representation of our first parents in Paradise.
After B— was gone, we spoke of X—. I regretted his want of delicacy towards the public as well as towards his private friends. I did not think he had failed so much from want of capacity, as from attempting to bully the public into a premature or overstrained admiration of him, instead of gaining ground upon them by improving on himself; and he now felt the ill effects of the re-action of this injudicious proceeding. He had no real love of his art, and therefore did not apply or give his whole mind sedulously to it; and was more bent on bespeaking notoriety beforehand by puffs and announcements of his works, than on giving them that degree of perfection which would ensure lasting reputation. No one would ever attain the highest excellence, who had so little nervous sensibility as to take credit for it (either with himself or others) without being at the trouble of producing it. It was securing the reward in the first instance; and afterwards, it would be too much to expect the necessary exertion or sacrifices. Unlimited credit was as dangerous to success in art as in business. ‘And yet he still finds dupes,’ said Northcote; to which I replied, it was impossible to resist him, as long as you kept on terms with him: any difference of opinion or reluctance on your part made no impression on him, and unless you quarrelled with him downright, you must do as he wished you.—‘And how then,’ said Northcote, ‘do you think it possible for a person of this hard unyielding disposition to be a painter, where every thing depends on seizing the nicest inflections of feeling and the most evanescent shades of beauty?
‘No, I’ll tell you why he cannot be a painter. He has not virtue enough. No one can give out to others what he has not in himself, and there is nothing in his mind to delight or captivate the world. I will not deny the mechanical dexterity, but he fails in the mental part. There was Sir Peter Lely: he is full of defects; but he was the fine gentleman of his age, and you see this character stamped on every one of his works;—even his errors prove it; and this is one of those things that the world receive with gratitude. Sir Joshua again was not without his faults: he had not grandeur, but he was a man of a mild, bland, amiable character; and this predominant feeling appears so strongly in his works, that you cannot mistake it; and this is what makes them so delightful to look at, and constitutes their charm to others, even without their being conscious of it. There was such a look of nature too. I remember once going through a suite of rooms where they were shewing me several fine Vandykes; and we came to one where there were some children, by Sir Joshua, seen through a door—it was like looking at the reality, they were so full of life—the branches of the trees waved over their heads, and the fresh air seemed to play on their cheeks—I soon forgot Vandyke!
‘So, in the famous St. Jerome of Correggio, Garrick used to say, that the Saint resembled a Satyr, and that the child was like a monkey; but then there is such a look of life in the last, it dazzles you with spirit and vivacity; you can hardly believe but it will move or fly;—indeed, Sir Joshua took his Puck from it, only a little varied in the attitude.’ I said I had seen it not long ago, and that it had remarkably the look of a spirit or a faery or preternatural being, though neither beautiful nor dignified. I remarked to Northcote, that I had never sufficiently relished Correggio; that I had tried several times to work myself up to the proper degree of admiration, but that I always fell back again into my former state of lukewarmness and scepticism; though I could not help allowing, that what he did, he appeared to me to do with more feeling than any body else; that I could conceive Raphael or even Titian to have represented objects from mere natural capacity (as we see them in a looking-glass) without being absolutely wound up in them, but that I could fancy Correggio’s pencil to thrill with sensibility: he brooded over the idea of grace or beauty in his mind till the sense grew faint with it; and like a lover or a devotee, he carried his enthusiasm to the brink of extravagance and affectation, so enamoured was he of his art! Northcote assented to this as a just criticism, and said, ‘That is why his works must live: but X— is a hardened egotist, devoted to nothing but himself!’ Northcote then asked about —, and if she was handsome? I said she might sit for the portrait of Rebecca in Ivanhoe!
He then turned the conversation to Brambletye-House. He thought the writer had failed in Charles II. and Rochester. Indeed, it was a daring attempt to make bons mots for two such characters. The wit must be sharp and fine indeed, that would do to put into their mouths: even Sir Walter might tremble to undertake it! He had made Milton speak too: this was almost as dangerous an attempt as for Milton to put words into the mouth of the Deity. The great difficulty was to know where to stop, and not to trespass on forbidden ground. Cervantes was one of the boldest and most original inventors; yet he had never ventured beyond his depth. He had in the person of his hero really represented the maxims of benevolence and generosity inculcated by the Christian religion: that was a law to him; and by his fine conception of the subject, he had miraculously succeeded. Shakspeare alone could be said in his grotesque creations to be above all law. Richardson had succeeded admirably in Clarissa, because he had a certain rule to go by or certain things to avoid, for a perfect woman was a negative character; but he had failed in Sir Charles Grandison, and made him a lump of odious affectation, because a perfect man is not a negative, but a positive character; and in aiming at faultlessness, he had produced only the most vapid effeminacy. After all, Brambletye-House was about as good as the Rejected Addresses. There was very little difference between a parody and an imitation. The defects and peculiarities are equally seized upon in either case.
He did not know how Sir Walter would take it. To have imitators seemed at first a compliment, yet no one liked it. You could not put Fuseli in a greater passion than by calling Maria Cosway an imitator of his. Nothing made Sir Joshua so mad, as Miss Reynolds’s portraits, which were an exact imitation of all his defects. Indeed, she was obliged to keep them out of his way. He said, ‘They made every body else laugh, and himself cry.’ It is that which makes every one dread a mimic. Your self-love is alarmed, without being so easily reassured. You know there is a difference, but it is not great enough to make you feel quite at ease. The line of demarcation between the true and the spurious is not sufficiently broad and palpable. The copy you see is vile or indifferent; and the original, you suspect (but for your partiality to yourself) is not perhaps much better.