blaze: we must conclude that nature herself dictated to him this method as fuperior to all he could exprefs by features; and that he recognized the fame dictate in Mafaccio, who can no more be fuppofed to have been acquainted with the precedent of Timanthes, than Shakspeare with that of Euripides, when he made Macduff draw his hat over his face." Here we find the face is not covered to conceal the diftortions of grief, nor to preferve propriety, but to give the deepeft pathos to expreffion; the motive, no doubt, that influ enced Timanthes in the choice he made. From this digreffion Mr. Fufeli is at length drawn by the attractive graces of the artifts who formed the ftyle of the third period.-Apelles, Protogenes, Ariftides, Euphranor, Paufias, pupils of Pamphilus and his mafter Eupompus, who eftablished the fchool of Sicyon: and with criticisms that ably mark the various excellencies of these mafters, he clofes his first Lecture. The fecond Lecture treats of the revival of the arts in the fifteenth century, commencing with Ghiberti and Donato in fculpture, and Mafaccio in painting: and Mr. F. proceeds to characterize with his accustomed ingenuity the various masters of the Roman, Tufcan, Venetian, and Lombard, together with the Bolognian and Flemish fchools. He concludes this Lecture with a review of the arts in England from the period of Henry the VIIIth to the establishment of the Royal Academy. With Mr. Fufeli's concluding paragraph, and such obfervations as it fuggefts, we fhall close our remarks on his second Lecture. "From this view of art on the continent, let us caft a glance on its ftate in this country, from the age of Henry VIII. to our own. --From that period to this Britain never ceafed pouring its caravans of noble and wealthy pilgrims over Italy, Greece and Ionia, to pay their devotion at the fhrines of virtù and taste: not content with adoring the obfcure scholo, they have ranfacked their temples, and none returned without some share in the fpoil: in plaifter or in marble, on canvas or in gems, the arts of Greece and Italy were transported to England, and what Petronius faid of Rome, that it was eafier to meet there with a god than a man, might be faid of London. Without enquiring into the permanent and accidental caufes of the inefficacy of thefe efforts with regard to public tafte and fupport of art, it is ob fervable, that, whilft Francis I. was bufied, not to aggregate a mass of painted and chifelled treafures merely to gratify his own vanity, and brood over them with fterile avarice, but to fcatter the feeds of tafte over France, by calling, employing, enriching Andrea del Sarto, Ruftici, Roffo, Primaticcio, Cellini, Niccolo; in England, Holbein and Torregiano under Henry, and Federigo Zucchero under Eliza, beth, were condemned to gothic work and portrait painting. Charles indeed called Rubens and his fcholars to provoke the latent Eng 5 fpark, but the effect was intercepted by his deftiny. His fon, in pof feffion of the cartoons of Raphael, and with the magnificence of Whitehall before his eyes, fuffered Verio to contaminate the walls of his palaces, or degraded Lely to paint the Cymons and Iphigenias of his court; whilft the manner of Kneller fwept completely what yet might be left of tafte, under his fucceffors: fuch was the equally con temptible and deplorable ftate of English art, till the genius of Reynolds firft refcued from the mannered depravation of foreigners his own branch, and foon extending his view to the higher departments of art, joined that felect body of artifs who addreffed the ever open ear, ever attentive mind of our Royal founder, with the firft idea of this establishment. His beneficence foon gave it a place and a name, his auguft patronage, fan&tion, and individual encouragement: the annually increased merits of thirty exhibitions in this place, with the collateral ones contrived by the fpeculations of commerce, have told the furprising effects: a mafs of felf-taught and tutored powers burft upon the general eye, and unequivocally told the world what might be expected from the concurrence of public encouragement-how far this has been or may be granted or withheld, it is not here my pro vince to furmife: the plans lately adopted and now organizing within thefe walls for the dignified propagation and fupport of art, whether foftered by the great, or left to their own energy, muft foon decide what may be produced by the unifon of British genius and talent, and whether the painters' school of that nation which claims the foremost honours of modern poetry, which has produced Reynolds, Hogarth, Gainsborough and Wilfon, fhall fubmit to content themselves with a fubordinate place among the fchools we have enumerated." P.98. How long we muft content ourfelves with this fubordinate place, neither can we determine; but we may prefume, from a general knowledge of human nature, that there will be little ftruggle for eminence in any department of art, which does not promife an adequate reward: as thofe efforts are not likely to be often repeated, that are more commonly followed by duns than patrons. We do not confider the collecting of works of the old matters in hiftory as any proof of love in our countrymen for this branch of art; as the best collections we have to boaft were purchafed by men wholly unacquainted (as far as refpected their own knowledge) with the merits of the various performances. A with to difplay merely what prudence often fhould forbid them to purchafe, creates the firft irritation, which is increafed by the vanity of poffeling what the enormous price fet on it by an unprincipled dealer, places out of the reach of all who have either common fenfe, or a more limited income. The third Lecture treats principally of invention, and the refpective claims of M. Angelo and Raphael to this great faculty of the mind. We regret that our limits will not admit of our entering minutely into the merits of this Lecture, replete with found criticism and acute remark. We shall however felect, felect, for the gratification of our readers, two paffages, the one an animated defcription of the celebrated Cartoon of Pifa, by M. Angelo, the other, in our opinion, a judicious examination of Raphael's Transfiguration: a work which all lovers of art will be happy to fee refcued from the petulant remarks of injudicious criticifm. That celebrated Cartoon, he fays, "Represents an imaginary moment relative to the war carried on by the Florentines against Pifa: and exhibits a numerous group of warriours, roufed from their bathing in the Arno, by the fudden fignal of a war-horn, and rushing to arms. This compofition may without exaggeration be faid to perfonify with unexampled variety that motion, which Agafias and Theon embodied in fingle figures: in imagining this tranfient moment from a ftate of relaxation to a state of energy, the ideas of motion, to ufe the bold figure of Dante, seem to have showered into the artift's mind. From the chief, nearly placed in the centre, who precedes, and whofe war-voice accompanies the trumpet, every age of human agility, every attitude, every feature of alarm, hafte, hurry, exertion, eagerness, burft into fo many rays, like the fparks flying from a red-hot iron. Many have reached, fome boldly fiep, fome have leaped on the rocky fhore; here two arms emerging from the water grapple with the rock, there two hands cry for help, and their companions bend over or rush on to allift them; often imitated, but inimitable is the ardent feature of the grim veteran whofe every finew labours to force over the dripping limbs his cloaths, whilft gnathing he pufhes the foot through the rending garment. He is contrafted by the flender elegance of a half averted youth, who feduloufly eager buckles the armour to his thigh, and methodizes hafte; another íwings the high-raised hauberk on his shoulder, whilst one who seems a leader, mindlefs of drefs, ready for combat, and with brandifhed fpear, overturns a third, who crouched to grafp a weapon one naked himself buckles on the mail of his companion, and he, turned toward the enemy, feems to stamp impatiently the ground.— Experience and rage, old vigour, young velocity, expanded or contracted, vie in exertions of energy. Yet in this fcene of tumult one motive animates the whole, eagerness to engage with fubordination to command; this preferves the dignity of action, and from a ftraggling rabble changes the figures to men whofe legitimate conteft interefts our wishes." P. 121. But a limited fragment of obfervations must not prefume to exhauft what in itfelf is inexhaustible; the features of invention are multiplied before me as my powers decreafe: I thall therefore no longer trefpafs on your patience, than by fixing your attention for a few moments on one of its boldeft flights, the transfiguration of Raphael; a performance equally celebrated and cenfured; in which the moft judicious of inventors, the painter of propriety, is faid to have not only wrestled for extent of information with the hiftorian, but attempted to leap the boundaries, and, with a lefs difcriminating than daring hand, to remove the established limits of the art, to have arbitrarily combined two actions, and confequently two different moments. M BRIT. CRIT. VOL. XXI. FEB. 1803. .. Were "Were this charge founded, I might content myself with obferv ing, that the transfiguration, more than any other of Raphael's oilpictures, was a public performance, deftined by Julio de Medici, afterward Clement VII. for his archiepifcopal church at Narbonne ; that it was painted in conteft with Sebaftian del Piombo, affisted in his rival-picture of Lazarus by Michael Angelo; and thus, confidering it as tramed on the fimple principles of the monumental ftyle, eftablished in my firft difcourfe, on the pictures of Polygnotus at Delphi, I might frame a plaufible excufe for the modern artist; but Raphael is above the affiftance of fubterfuge, and it is fufficient to examine the picture, in order to prove the futility of the charge. Raphael has connected with the transfiguration not the cure of the maniac, but his prefentation for it; if, according to the Gospel record, this happened at the foot of the mountain, whilft the apparition took place at the top, what improbability is there in affigning the fame moment to both? Raphael's defign was to reprefent Jefus as the fon of God, and at the fame time as the reliever of human mifery, by an unequivocal fact. The transfiguration on Tabor, and the miraculous cure which followed the descent of Jefus, united, furnished that fact. The difficulty was how to combine two fucceffive actions in one moment: he overcame it by facrificing the moment of the cure to that of the apparition, by implying the leffer miracle in the greater. In fubordinating the cure to the vifion he obtained fublimity, in placing the crowd and the patient on the foreground, he gained room for the full exertion of his dramatic powers; it was not neceffary that the dæmoniac fhould be reprefented in the moment of recovery, if its certainty could be expreffed by other means: it is implied, it is placed beyond all doubt by the glorious apparition above; it is made nearly intuitive by the uplifted hand and finger of the apostle in the centre, who without hesitation, undifmayed by the obftinacy of the dæmon, unmoved by the clamour of the crowd and the pufillanimous fcepticism of fome of his companions, refers the father of the maniac in an authoritative manner for certain and fpeedy help to his master on the mountain above, whom, though unfeen, his attitude at once connects with all that paffes below, even if it had not been affifted by the parallel gefture of another difciple, referring to the fame fource of affiftance hie feemingly doubting companion; here is the point of contact, here is that union of the two parts of the fact in one moment, which the purblind criticism of Richardfon, and the flimfy petulance of Falconet, could not difcover." Page 148. The various peculiarities, in the ftyle of thefe Lectures, will be moft, and perhaps only, relished by those who admire alfo the eccentricity of the author's pencil; and to thefe we leave the defence of them: but all the honours to which a fuccefsful effort to illuftrate an elegant art can entitle him, in point of principles and judgment, we readily concede. ART. X. A Catalogue and detailed Account of a very valuable and curious Collection of Manufcripts, collected in Hindoftan, by Samuel Guife, Efq. late Head Surgeon to the General Hofpital at Surat: including all thofe that were procured by Monfieur Anquetil Du Perron, relative to the Religion and Hiftory of the Parfis, and many which he could not procure. 4to. J. Nichols. 1800. THIS collection of manuscripts was made, we understand, by Mr. Guife while in India, with very great labour of research, and at a very heavy expence, between the years 1788 and 1795. The volumes are now intended for fale, and, we believe, have been offered with that view to the Directors of the Eaft-India Company. They confift of Arabic, Perfian, and Hindoo MSS. and, among the latter, is a very fine copy of the great work called the MAHABBARAT, of which Mr. Wilkins has prefented the public with an interefting epifode, called BHAGVAT GEETA. The prefatory advertisement informs us that, except thofe in the prefent collection, there are no PELHAVIC manufcripts in England, and not more than four or five in ZEND. These before us treat of the ancient religion and history of the Parfis, or difciples of the great Zoroafter, and many of them were purchased at a high price from the widow of Darab, who was the preceptor of the celebrated M. Anquetil Du Perron, while there are others in it which that induftrious oriental scholar could not procure when in India. We are perfectly aware of the fevere, perhaps too fevere, ftigma caft on thefe writings by Mr. Richardfon, in his Differtation on the Languages and Manners of Eaftern Nations, who brands thefe imputed productions of the Perfian law-giver as grofs forgeries, "the wretched fabrication of a modern Parfee DESTOUR (priest) who lived about three centuries ago;"* as well as his opinion relative to Anquetil Du Perron himself, who, he affirms, was impofed upon, as well as Dr. Hyde, when they were taught to confider the SADDER and the ZEND. AVESTA as authentic originals; yet, while we think it our duty to notice this, we are willing and anxious to do every juftice to Mr. Guife as a diligent collector, and a liberal encourager of eaftern literature, by bringing fo noble a collection over to his native country, and we fincerely with him a proper remuneration. The catalogue contains, on the whole, of Arabic and Perfian MSS. Seventy-feven, many very finely illuminated, Differtation p. 12, oct. edit. Oxford, 1778. and |