Third Discourse

Delivered to the Students of the Royal Academy on the Distribution
of the Prizes, December, 14, 1770, by the President

Gentlemen,--It is not easy to speak with propriety to so many
students of different ages and different degrees of advancement.
The mind requires nourishment adapted to its growth; and what may
have promoted our earlier efforts, might, retard us in our nearer
approaches to perfection.

The first endeavours of a young painter, as I have remarked in a
former discourse, must be employed in the attainment of mechanical
dexterity, and confined to the mere imitation of the object before
him. Those who have advanced beyond the rudiments, may, perhaps,
find advantage in reflecting on the advice which I have likewise
given them, when I recommended the diligent study of the works of
our great predecessors; but I at the same time endeavoured to guard
them against an implicit submission to the authority of any one
master, however excellent; or by a strict imitation of his manner,
to preclude ourselves from the abundance and variety of nature. I
will now add that nature herself is not to be too closely copied.
There are excellences in the art of painting, beyond what is
commonly called the imitation of nature: and these excellences I
wish to point out. The students who, having passed through the
initiatory exercises, are more advanced in the art, and who, sure
of their hand, have leisure to exert their understanding, must now
be told that a mere copier of nature can never produce anything
great; can never raise and enlarge the conceptions, or warm the
heart of the spectator.

The wish of the genuine painter must be more extensive: instead of
endeavouring to amuse mankind with the minute neatness of his
imitations, he must endeavour to improve them by the grandeur of
his ideas; instead of seeking praise, by deceiving the superficial
sense of the spectator, he must strive for fame, by captivating the
imagination.

The principle now laid down, that the perfection of this art does
not consist in mere imitation, is far from being new or singular.
It is, indeed, supported by the general opinion of the enlightened
part of mankind. The poets, orators, and rhetoricians of
antiquity, are continually enforcing this position, that all the
arts receive their perfection from an ideal beauty, superior to
what is to be found in individual nature. They are ever referring
to the practice of the painters and sculptors of their times,
particularly Phidias (the favourite artist of antiquity), to
illustrate their assertions. As if they could not sufficiently
express their admiration of his genius by what they knew, they have
recourse to poetical enthusiasm. They call it inspiration; a gift
from heaven. The artist is supposed to have ascended the celestial
regions, to furnish his mind with this perfect idea of beauty.
" He," says Proclus, "who takes for his model such forms as nature
produces, and confines himself to an exact imitation of them, will
never attain to what is perfectly beautiful. For the works of
nature are full of disproportion, and fall very short of the true
standard of beauty. So that Phidias, when he formed his Jupiter,
did not copy any object ever presents to his sight; but
contemplated only that image which he had conceived in his mind
from Homer's description." And thus Cicero, speaking of the same
Phidias: "Neither did this artist," says he, "when he carved the
image of Jupiter or Minerva, set before him any one human figure as
a pattern, which he was to copy; but having a more perfect idea of
beauty fixed in his mind, this he steadily contemplated, and to the
imitation of this all his skill and labour were directed.

The moderns are not less convinced than the ancients of this
superior power existing in the art; nor less conscious of its
effects. Every language has adopted terms expressive of this
excellence. The Gusto grande of the Italians; the Beau ideal of
the French and the GREAT STYLE, GENIUS, and TASTE among the
English, are but different appellations of the same thing. It is
this intellectual dignity, they say, that ennobles the painter's
art; that lays the line between him and the mere mechanic; and
produces those great effects in an instant, which eloquence and
poetry, by slow and repeated efforts, are scarcely able to attain.

Such is the warmth with which both the ancients and moderns speak
of this divine principle of the art; but, as I have formerly
observed, enthusiastic admiration seldom promotes knowledge.
Though a student by such praise may have his attention roused, and
a desire excited, of running in this great career, yet it is
possible that what has been said to excite, may only serve to deter
him. He examines his own mind, and perceives there nothing of that
divine inspiration with which he is told so many others have been
favoured. He never travelled to heaven to gather new ideas; and he
finds himself possessed of no other qualifications than what mere
common observation and a plain understanding can confer. Thus he
becomes gloomy amidst the splendour of figurative declamation, and
thinks it hopeless to pursue an object which he supposes out of the
reach of human industry.

But on this, as upon many other occasions, we ought to distinguish
how much is to be given to enthusiasm, and how much to reason. We
ought to allow for, and we ought to commend, that strength of vivid
expression which is necessary to convey, in its full force, the
highest sense of the most complete effect of art; taking care at
the same time not to lose in terms of vague admiration that
solidity and truth of principle upon which alone we can reason, and
may be enabled to practise.

It is not easy to define in what this great style consists; nor to
describe, by words, the proper means of acquiring it, if the mind
of the student should be at all capable of such an acquisition.
Could we teach taste or genius by rules, they would be no longer
taste and genius. But though there neither are, nor can be, any
precise invariable rules for the exercise or the acquisition of
those great qualities, yet we may as truly say that they always
operate in proportion to our attention in observing the works of
nature, to our skill in selecting, and to our care in digesting,
methodising, and comparing our observations. There are many
beauties in our art, that seem, at first, to lie without the reach
of precept, and yet may easily be reduced to practical principles.
Experience is all in all; but it is not every one who profits by
experience; and most people err, not so much from want of capacity
to find their object, as from not knowing what object to pursue.
This great ideal perfection and beauty are not to be sought in the
heavens, but upon the earth. They are about us, and upon every
side of us. But the power of discovering what is deformed in
nature, or in other words, what is particular and uncommon, can be
acquired only by experience; and the whole beauty and grandeur of
the art consists, in my opinion, in being able to get above all
singular forms, local customs, particularities, and details of
every kind.

All the objects which are exhibited to our view by nature, upon
close examination will be found to have their blemishes and
defects. The most beautiful forms have something about them like
weakness, minuteness, or imperfection. But it is not every eye
that perceives these blemishes. It must be an eye long used to the
contemplation and comparison of these forms; and which, by a long
habit of observing what any set of objects of the same kind have in
common, that alone can acquire the power of discerning what each
wants in particular. This long laborious comparison should be the
first study of the painter who aims at the greatest style. By this
means, he acquires a just idea of beautiful forms; he corrects
nature by herself, her imperfect state by her more perfect. His
eye being enabled to distinguish the accidental deficiencies,
excrescences, and deformities of things from their general figures,
he makes out an abstract idea of their forms more perfect than any
one original; and what may seem a paradox, he learns to design
naturally by drawing his figures unlike to any one object. This
idea of the perfect state of nature, which the artist calls the
ideal beauty, is the great leading principle by which works of
genius are conducted. By this Phidias acquired his fame. He
wrought upon a sober principle what has so much excited the
enthusiasm of the world; and by this method you, who have courage
to tread the same path, may acquire equal reputation.

This is the idea which has acquired, and which seems to have a
right to the epithet of Divine; as it may be said to preside, like
a supreme judge, over all the productions of nature; appearing to
be possessed of the will and intention of the Creator, as far as
they regard the external form of living beings.

When a man once possesses this idea in its perfection, there is no
danger but that he will he sufficiently warmed by it himself, and
be able to warm and ravish every one else.

Thus it is from a reiterated experience, and a close comparison of
the objects in nature, that an artist becomes possessed of the idea
of that central form, if I may so express it, from which every
deviation is deformity. But the investigation of this form I grant
is painful, and I know but of one method of shortening the road;
this is, by a careful study of the works of the ancient sculptors;
who, being indefatigable in the school of nature, have left models
of that perfect form behind them, which an artist would prefer as
supremely beautiful, who had spent his whole life in that single
contemplation. But if industry carried them thus far, may not you
also hope for the same reward from the same labour? We have the
same school opened to us that was opened to them; for nature denies
her instructions to none who desire to become her pupils.

To the principle I have laid down, that the idea of beauty in each
species of beings is invariably one, it may be objected that in
every particular species there are various central forms, which are
separate and distinct from each other, and yet are undeniably
beautiful; that in the human figure, for instance, the beauty of
the Hercules is one, of the gladiator another, of the Apollo
another, which makes so many different ideas of beauty.

It is true, indeed, that these figures are each perfect in their
kind, though of different characters and proportions; but still
none of them is the representation of an individual, but of a
class. And as there is one general form, which, as I have said,
belongs to the human kind at large, so in each of these classes
there is one common idea and central form, which is the abstract of
the various individual forms belonging to that class. Thus, though
the forms of childhood and age differ exceedingly, there is a
common form in childhood, and a common form in age,--which is the
more perfect, as it is more remote from all peculiarities. But I
must add further, that though the most perfect forms of each of the
general divisions of the human figure are ideal, and superior to
any individual form of that class, yet the highest perfection of
the human figure is not to be found in any one of them. It is not
in the Hercules, nor in the gladiator, nor in the Apollo; but in
that form which is taken from them all, and which partakes equally
of the activity of the gladiator, of the delicacy of the Apollo,
and of the muscular strength of the Hercules. For perfect beauty
in any species must combine all the characters which are beautiful
in that species. It cannot consist in any one to the exclusion of
the rest: no one, therefore, must be predominant, that no one may
be deficient.

The knowledge of these different characters, and the power of
separating and distinguishing them, is undoubtedly necessary to the
painter, who is to vary his compositions with figures of various
forms and proportions, though he is never to lose sight of the
general idea of perfection in each kind.

There is, likewise, a kind of symmetry or proportion, which may
properly be said to belong to deformity. A figure lean or
corpulent, tall or short, though deviating from beauty, may still
have a certain union of the various parts, which may contribute to
make them, on the whole, not unpleasing. When the artist has by
diligent attention acquired a clear and distinct idea of beauty and
symmetry; when he has reduced the variety of nature to the abstract
idea; his next task will be to become acquainted with the genuine
habits of nature, as distinguished from those of fashion. For in
the same manner, and on the same principles, as he has acquired the
knowledge of the real forms of nature, distinct from accidental
deformity, he must endeavour to separate simple chaste nature from
those adventitious, those affected and forced airs or actions, with
which she is loaded by modern education.

Perhaps I cannot better explain what I mean than by reminding you
of what was taught us by the Professor of Anatomy, in respect to
the natural position and movement of the feet. He observed that
the fashion of turning, them outwards was contrary to the intent of
nature, as might be seen from the structure of the bones, and from
the weakness that proceeded from that manner of standing. To this
we may add the erect position of the head, the projection of the
chest, the walking with straight knees, and many such actions,
which are merely the result of fashion, and what nature never
warranted, as we are sure that we have been taught them when
children.

I have mentioned but a few of those instances, in which vanity or
caprice have contrived to distort and disfigure the human form;
your own recollection will add to these a thousand more of ill-
understood methods, that have been practised to disguise nature,
among our dancing-masters, hair-dressers, and tailors, in their
various schools of deformity.

However the mechanic and ornamental arts may sacrifice to fashion,
she must be entirely excluded from the art of painting; the painter
must never mistake this capricious changeling for the genuine
offspring of nature; he must divest himself of all prejudices in
favour of his age or country; he must disregard all local and
temporary ornaments, and look only on those general habits that are
everywhere and always the same. He addresses his works to the
people of every country and every age; he calls upon posterity to
be his spectators, and says with Zeuxis, In aeternitatem pingo.

The neglect of separating modern fashions from the habits of
nature, leads to that ridiculous style which has been practised by
some painters who have given to Grecian heroes the airs and graces
practised in the court of Louis XIV.; an absurdity almost as great
as it would have been to have dressed them after the fashion of
that court.

To avoid this error, however, and to retain the true simplicity of
nature, is a task more difficult than at first sight it may appear.
The prejudices in favour of the fashions and customs that we have
been used to, and which are justly called a second nature, make it
too often difficult to distinguish that which is natural from that
which is the result of education; they frequently even give a
predilection in favour of the artificial mode; and almost every one
is apt to be guided by those local prejudices who has not chastised
his mind, and regulated the instability of his affections, by the
eternal invariable idea of nature.

Here, then, as before, we must have recourse to the ancients as
instructors. It is from a careful study of their works that you
will be enabled to attain to the real simplicity of nature; they
will suggest many observations, which would probably escape you, if
your study were confined to nature alone. And, indeed, I cannot
help suspecting, that in this instance the ancients had an easier
task than the moderns. They had, probably, little or nothing to
unlearn, as their manners were nearly approaching to this desirable
simplicity; while the modern artist, before he can see the truth of
things, is obliged to remove a veil, with which the fashion of the
times has thought proper to cover her.

Having gone thus far in our investigation of the great style in
painting; if we now should suppose that the artist has formed the
true idea of beauty, which enables him to give his works a correct
and perfect design; if we should suppose also that he has acquired
a knowledge of the unadulterated habits of nature, which gives him
simplicity; the rest of his talk is, perhaps, less than is
generally imagined. Beauty and simplicity have so great a share in
the composition of a great style, that he who has acquired them has
little else to learn. It must not, indeed, be forgot that there is
a nobleness of conception, which goes beyond anything in the mere
exhibition, even of perfect form; there is an art of animating and
dignifying the figures with intellectual grandeur, of impressing
the appearance of philosophic wisdom or heroic virtue. This can
only be acquired by him that enlarges the sphere of his
understanding by a variety of knowledge, and warms his imagination
with the best productions of ancient and modern poetry.

A hand thus exercised, and a mind thus instructed, will bring the
art to a higher degree of excellence than, perhaps, it has hitherto
attained in this country. Such a student will disdain the humbler
walks of painting, which, however profitable, can never assure him
a permanent reputation. He will leave the meaner artist servilely
to suppose that those are the best pictures which are most likely
to deceive the spectator. He will permit the lower painter, like
the florist or collector of shells, to exhibit the minute
discriminations which distinguish one object of the same species
from another; while he, like the philosopher, will consider nature
in the abstract, and represent in every one of his figures the
character of its species.

If deceiving the eye were the only business of the art, there is no
doubt, indeed, but the minute painter would be more apt to succeed:
but it is not the eye, it is the mind, which the painter of genius
desires to address; nor will he waste a moment upon these smaller
objects, which only serve to catch the sense, to divide the
attention, and to counteract his great design of speaking to the
heart.

This is the ambition I could wish to excite in your minds; and the
object I have had in my view, throughout this discourse, is that
one great idea which gives to painting its true dignity, that
entitles it to the name of a Liberal Art, and ranks it as a sister
of poetry.

It may possibly have happened to many young students whose
application was sufficient to overcome all difficulties, and whose
minds were capable of embracing the most extensive views, that they
have, by a wrong direction originally given, spent their lives in
the meaner walks of painting, without ever knowing there was a
nobler to pursue. "Albert Durer," as Vasari has justly remarked,
" would probably have been one of the first painters of his age (and
he lived in an era of great artists) had he been initiated into
those great principles of the art which were so well understood and
practised by his contemporaries in Italy. But unluckily, having
never seen or heard of any other manner, he considered his own,
without doubt, as perfect."

As for the various departments of painting, which do not presume to
make such high pretensions, they are many. None of them are
without their merit, though none enter into competition with this
great universal presiding idea of the art. The painters who have
applied themselves more particularly to low and vulgar characters,
and who express with precision the various shades of passion, as
they are exhibited by vulgar minds (such as we see in the works of
Hogarth) deserve great praise; but as their genius has been
employed on low and confined subjects, the praise that we give must
be as limited as its object. The merrymaking or quarrelling of the
Boors of Teniers; the same sort of productions of Brouwer, or
Ostade, are excellent in their kind; and the excellence and its
praise will be in proportion, as, in those limited subjects and
peculiar forms, they introduce more or less of the expression of
those passions, as they appear in general and more enlarged nature.
This principle may be applied to the battle pieces of Bourgognone,
the French gallantries of Watteau, and even beyond the exhibition
of animal life, to the landscapes of Claude Lorraine, and the sea-
views of Vandervelde. All these painters have, in general, the
same right, in different degrees, to the name of a painter, which a
satirist, an epigrammatist, a sonnetteer, a writer of pastorals, or
descriptive poetry, has to that of a poet.

In the same rank, and, perhaps, of not so great merit, is the cold
painter of portraits. But his correct and just imitation of his
object has its merit. Even the painter of still life, whose
highest ambition is to give a minute representation of every part
of those low objects, which he sets before him, deserves praise in
proportion to his attainment; because no part of this excellent
art, so much the ornament of polished life, is destitute of value
and use. These, however, are by no means the views to which the
mind of the student ought to be PRIMARILY directed. By aiming at
better things, if from particular inclination, or from the taste of
the time and place he lives in, or from necessity, or from failure
in the highest attempts, he is obliged to descend lower; he will
bring into the lower sphere of art a grandeur of composition and
character that will raise and ennoble his works far above their
natural rank.

A man is not weak, though he may not be able to wield the club of
Hercules; nor does a man always practise that which he esteems the
beat; but does that which he can best do. In moderate attempts,
there are many walks open to the artist. But as the idea of beauty
is of necessity but one, so there can be but one great mode of
painting; the leading principle of which I have endeavoured to
explain.

I should be sorry if what is here recommended should be at all
understood to countenance a careless or indetermined manner of
painting. For though the painter is to overlook the accidental
discriminations of nature, he is to pronounce distinctly, and with
precision, the general forms of things. A firm and determined
outline is one of the characteristics of the great style in
painting; and, let me add, that he who possesses the knowledge of
the exact form, that every part of nature ought to have, will be
fond of expressing that knowledge with correctness and precision in
all his works.

To conclude: I have endeavoured to reduce the idea of beauty to
general principles. And I had the pleasure to observe that the
professor of painting proceeded in the same method, when he showed
you that the artifice of contrast was founded but on one principle.
And I am convinced that this is the only means of advancing
science, of clearing the mind from a confused heap of contradictory
observations, that do but perplex and puzzle the student when he
compares them, or misguide him if he gives himself up to their
authority; but bringing them under one general head can alone give
rest and satisfaction to an inquisitive mind.