HAND-BOOK FOR YOUNG PAINTERS BY C. R. LESLIE, R.A. 'To admire on principle, is the only way to imitate without loss of SECOND EDITION, WITH ILLUSTRATIONS LONDON JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET 1870 IF, from all that has been written on Painting, the truth could be brought out and presented clear from every ambiguity of language, the student of the present day would stand in little need of further guidance to its true principles. It is not from the want of sound dicta, or because enough has not been given to the world in the way of theory and criticism, that something still remains to be said; but it is because far too much has been written; and because it is the nature of error to be more prolific than truth; and because those points on which the best writers may be mistaken, or what has more frequently happened, those points on which they have been mistaken by inferior minds, have generally become starting-places from which plausible, but unsound, criticism has spread itself out through all the avenues of the popular literature of the day. The Fine Arts are often selected as themes affording opportunities for the display of eloquence and learning; and in apparently profound dissertations accompanied often with much valuable information, theories are not unfrequently advanced utterly adverse to the right 7 progress of Art,-theories the more dangerous for the talents with which they are advocated; and from the peculiar fashions at present dominant in criticism, I have no hesitation in expressing my conviction that the thing, just now, most in danger of being neglected by painters is the Art of Painting; and that want of patronage is far less to be dreaded than the want of that which patronage should foster. The road to Art is proverbially a long one; and it is often made longer than it need be, not only by the causes I have mentioned, but by our own mistakes. If, therefore, anything I can say should tend to shorten it to younger artists, it will be in a great measure owing to discoveries of some of my own errors,-which, though made too late to be of much benefit to myself, may possibly be of use to those whose habits are not so formed but that they may be abandoned, if wrong. Painting and Poetry, as Sister Arts, have a family likeness; but it is the business of each to do what the other cannot; and words can no more become substitutes for pictures than lines and colours can supply the place of Poetry. Hence the difficulty of writing or speaking of Painting; indeed the impossibility of describing those things belonging to it that are most impressive. Yet Language may do something for Art. It may direct the student in all that is mechanical and scientific, and principles of Nature, as far as they are known, may be explained; and, as we may believe Ben Jonson, when he tells us, that |