Chapter VII: Part 7

[63] Hans Holbein, of Basle, died in London, 1544, at the age of 46. Peter Francis Mola, the scholar of Giuseppe d’Arpino and Franc. Albani, was born at the village of Coldre, of the diocese of Balerna, in the bailliage of Mendrisio, in 1621, and died at Rome in 1666.

[64] Eustache le Sueur, bred under Simon Voüet, died at Paris in 1655, at the age of 38. His fellow scholar and overbearing rival Charles le Brun, died in 1690, aged 71.

[65] For the best account of Spanish art, see Lettera di A. R. Mengs a Don Antonio Ponz. Opere di Mengs, vol. ii. Mengs was born at Ausig, in Bohemia, in 1728, and died at Rome in 1779.

[66]

Ὑλῃ και τροποις μιμησεως διαφερουςι.

Πλουταρχ. Π. Αθ. κατα Π. ἠ καθ’ ἐ. ἐνδ.

See Lessings Laokoon. Berlin 1766. 8vo.

[67] All minute detail tends to destroy terrour, as all minute ornament, grandeur. The catalogue of the cauldron’s ingredients in Macbeth, destroys the terrour attendant on the mysterious darkness of preternatural agency; and the seraglio trappings of Rubens, annihilate his heroes.

[68]

Ἐγω δε πλεον ἐλπομαι
Λογον Ὀδυσσεος, ἠ παθεν,
Δια τον ἁδυεπη γενεσθ Ὁμηρον
Ἐπει ψευδεεσσιν ὁι ποτανᾳ γε μαχανᾳ
Σεμνον ἐπεστι τι. σοφια δε
Κλεπτει παραγοισα μυθοις.

Πινδαρ. Νεμ. Ζ.

[69] M. F. Quintilianus, l. xii. 10.—Concipiendis visionibus (quas ΦΑΝΤΑΣΙΑΣ vocant) Theon Samius—est præstantissimus.

At quomodo fiet ut afficiamur? neque enim sunt motus in nostra
potestate. Tentabo etiam de hoc dicere. Quas Φαντασιας græci
vocant, nos sanè visiones appellamus; per quas imagines rerum
absentium ita repræsentantur animo, ut eas cernere oculis
ac præsentes habere videamur: has quisquis bene conceperit,
is erit in affectibus potentissimus. Hunc quidam dicunt
ἐυφαντασιωτον, qui sibi res, voces, actus, secundum verum
optume finget: quod quidem nobis volentibus facile continget.

Nam ut inter otia animorum et spes inanes, et velut somnia
quædam vigilantium, ita nos hæ de quibus loquimur, imagines
persequuntur, ut peregrinari, navigare, præliari, populos
alloqui, divitiarum quas non habemus, usum videamur disponere;
nec cogitare, sed facere: hoc animi vitium ad utilitatem non
transferemus? ut hominem occisum querar, non omnia quæ in
re præsenti accidisse credibile est, in oculis habebo? non
percussor ille subitus erumpet? non expavescet circumventus?
exclamabit, vel rogabit, vel fugiet? non ferientem, non
concidentem videbo? non animo sanguis, et pallor et gemitus,
extremus denique expirantis hiatus insidebit?

Idem, l. vi. c. 11.

Theon numbered with the ‘Proceres’ by Quintilian, by Pliny with less discrimination is placed among the ‘Primis Proximos;’ and in some passage of Plutarch, unaccountably censured for impropriety of subject, ατοπια, in representing the madness of Orestes.

[70] Αιλιανου ποικ. ιστορ. l. ii. c. 44. Θεωνος του Ζωγραφου πολλα μεν και ἀλλα ὁμολογει την χειρουργιαν ἀγαθην οὐσαν, ἀ ταρ οὐν και τοδε το γραμμα.——Και ἐιπες ἀν ἀυτον ἐνθουσιᾶν, ὡσπερ εξ Ἀρεος μανεντα.——Και σφαττειν βλεπων, και ἀπειλῶν δι ὁλου του σχηματος, ὁτι μηδενος φεισεται.

[71] The name of Agasias, the scholar or son of Dositheos, the Ephesian, occurs not in ancient record; and whether he be the Egesias of Quintilian and Pliny, or these the same, cannot be ascertained; though the style of sculpture, and the form of the letters in the inscription are not much at variance with the character which the former gives to the age and style of Calon and Egesias; ‘Signa—duriora et Tuscanicis proxima.’ The impropriety of calling this figure a gladiator has been shewn by Winkelmann, and on his remark, that it probably exhibits the attitude of a soldier, who signalized himself in some moment of danger, Lessing has founded a conjecture, that it is the figure of Chabrias, from the following passage of Corn. Nepos: ‘Elucet maxime inventum ejus in proelio, quod apud Thebas fecit, cum Boetiis subsidio venisset. Namque in eo victoriæ fidente summo duce Agesilao, fugatis jam ab eo conductitiis catervis, reliquam phalangem loco vetuit cedere; obnixoque genu scuto, projectâque hastâ, impetum excipere hostium docuit. Id novum Agesilaus intuens, progredi non est ausus, suosque jam incurrentes tubâ revocavit. Hoc usque eo in Græcia famâ celebratum est, ut illo statu Chabrias sibi statuam fieri voluerit, quæ publicè ei ab Atheniensibus in foro constituta est. Ex quo factum est, ut postea athletæ, _cæterique artifices_ his statibus in statuis ponendis uterentur, in quibus victoriam essent adepti?’

On this passage, simple and unperplexed, if we except the words, ‘cæterique ‘artifices,’ where something is evidently dropped or changed, there can, I trust, be but one opinion—that the manœuvre of Chabrias was defensive, and consisted in giving the phalanx a stationary, and at the same time—impenetrable posture, to check the progress of the enemy; a repulse, not a victory was obtained; the Thebans were content to maintain their ground, and not a word is said by the historian, of a pursuit, when Agesilaus, startled at the contrivance, called off his troops: but the warriour of Agasias rushes forward in an assailing attitude, whilst with his head and shield turned upwards he seems to guard himself from some attack above him. Lessing, aware of this, to make the passage square with his conjecture, is reduced to a change of punctuation, and accordingly transposes the decisive comma after ‘scuto,’ to ‘genu,’ and reads ‘obnixo genu,’ scuto projectâque hastâ,—docuit.’ This alone might warrant us to dismiss his conjecture as less solid than daring and acute.

The statue erected to Chabrias in the Athenian forum was probably of brass, for ‘statua’ and ‘statuarius,’ in Pliny at least, will I believe always be found relative to figures and artists in metal; such were those which at an early period the Athenians dedicated to Harmodios and Aristogiton: from them the custom spread in every direction, and iconic figures in metal, began, says Pliny, to be the ornaments of every municipal forum.

From another passage in Nepos, I was once willing to find in our figure an Alcibiades in Phrygia, rushing from the flames of the cottage fired to destroy him, and guarding himself against the javelins and arrows which the gang of Sysamithres and Bagoas showered on him at a distance. ‘Ille,’ says the historian, ‘sonitu flammæ? excitatus, quod gladius ei erat subductus, familiaris sui subalare telum eripuit—et—flammæ vim transit. Quem, ut Barbari incendium effugisse viderunt, telis eminus missis, interfecerunt. Sic Alcibiades annos circiter quadraginta natus, diem obiit supremum.’

Such is the age of our figure, and it is to be noticed that the right arm and hand, now armed with a lance, are modern; if it be objected, that the figure is iconic, and that the head of Alcibiades, cut off after his death, was carried to Pharnabazus, and his body burned by his mistress; it might be observed in reply, that busts and figures of Alcibiades must have been frequent in Greece, and that the expression found its source in the mind of Agasias. On this conjecture however I shall not insist: let us only observe that the character, forms and attitude, might be turned to better use than what Poussin made of it. It might form an admirable Ulysses bestriding the deck of his ship to defend his companions from the descending fangs of Scylla, or rather, with indignation and anguish, seeing them already snatched up and writhing in the mysterious gripe:

Ἀυταρ ἐγω καταδυς κλυτα τευχεα, και δυο δυoρε
Μακρ’ ἐν χερσιν ἑλων, ἐις ἰκρια νηος ἐβαινον
Πρωρης——ἐκαμον δε μοι ὀσσε
Παντη παπταινοντι προς ἦεροειδεα πετρην
Σκεψαμενος δε——
Ἠδη των ἐνοησα ποδας και χειρας ὑπερθεν
Ὑψος’ ἀειρομενων——

Odyss. M. 328. seq.

[72] Sebbene il divino Michel Agnolo fece la gran Cappella di Papa Julio, dappoi non arrivò a questo segno mai alla metà, la sun virtù non aggiunse mai alla forza di quei primi studi. Vita di Benvenuto Cellini, p. 13.—Vasari, as appears from his own account, never himself saw the cartoon: he talks of an ‘infinity of combatants on horseback,’ of which there neither remains nor ever can have existed a trace, if the picture at Holkham be the work of Bastiano da St. Gallo. This he saw, for it was painted, at his own desire, by that master, from his small cartoon in 1542, and by means of Monsignor Jovio transmitted to Francis I. who highly esteemed it; from his collection it however disappeared, and no mention is made of it by the French writers for near two centuries. It was probably discovered at Paris, bought and carried to England by the late Lord Leicester. That Vasari, on inspecting the copy, should not have corrected the confused account he gives of the cartoon from hearsay, can be wondered at, only by those, who are unacquainted with his character as a writer. One solitary horse and a drummer on the imaginary back-ground of the groups engraved by Agostino Venetiano, are all the cavalry remaining of Vasari’s squadrons, and can as little belong to Michel Agnolo as the spot on which they are placed.

The following are his own words: ‘Si vedeva dalle divine mani di Michelagnolo chi affrettare lo armarsi per dare ajuto a’compagni, altri affibbiarsi la corazza, e molti metter altre armi indosso, ed infiniti combattendo a cavallo cominciare la zuffa.’

Vasari, Vita di M. A. B. p. 183. ed. Bottari.

[73]

Ὁ δε, πως μεγεθυνει τα Δαιμονια;——Την
Ὁρμην ἀντων κοσμικῳ διαστηματι καταμετρει.

Longinus; § 9.

[74] Much has been said of the loss we have suffered in the marginal drawings which Michael Angelo drew in his Dante. Invention may have suffered in being deprived of them; they can, however, have been little more than hints of a size too minute to admit of much discrimination. The true terrours of Dante depend as much upon the medium in which he shews, or gives us a glimpse of his figures, as on their form. The characteristic outlines of his fiends, Michael Angelo personified in the dæmons of the last judgment, and invigourated the undisguised appetite, ferocity or craft of the brute, by traits of human malignity, cruelty, or lust. The Minos of Dante, in Messer Biagio da Cesena, and his Charon, have been recognized by all; but less the shivering wretch held over the barge by a hook, and evidently taken from the following passage in the xxiid of the Inferno:

Et Graffiacan, che gli era più di contra
Gli arroncigliò l’impegolate chiome;
E trasse ’l sù, che mi parve una lontra.

None has noticed as imitations of Dante in the xxivth book, the astonishing groups in the Lunetta of the brazen serpent; none the various hints from the Inferno and Purgatorio scattered over the attitudes and expressions of the figures rising from their graves. In the Lunetta of Haman, we owe the sublime conception of his figure to the subsequent passage in the xviith c. of Purgatory:

Poi piobbe dentro al’ alta phantasia
Un Crucifisso, dispettoso e fiero
Nella sua vista, e lo qual si moria.

The bassorelievo on the border of the second rock, in Purgatory, furnished the idea of the Annunziata, painted by Marcello Venusti from his design, in the sacristy of St. Giov. Lateran, by order of Tommaso de’ Cavalieri, the select friend and favourite of Michael Angelo.

We are told that Michael Angelo represented the Ugolino of Dante, inclosed in the tower of Pisa; if he did, his own work is lost: but if, as some suppose, the bassorelievo of that subject by Pierino da Vinci, be taken from his idea, notwithstanding the greater latitude, which the sculptor might claim, in divesting the figures of drapery and costume; he appears to me, to have erred in the means employed to rouse our sympathy. A sullen but muscular character, with groups of muscular bodies and forms of strength, about him, with the allegoric figure of the Arno at their feet, and that of Famine hovering over their heads, are not the fierce Gothic chief, deprived of revenge, brooding over despair in the stony cage; are not the exhausted agonies of a father, petrified by the helpless groans of an expiring family, offering their own bodies for his food, to prolong his life.

[75]

Dixeris egregiè, notum si callida verbum
Reddiderit junctura novum.——

Q. Horat. Flacci de A. P. v. 47.

[76] Matt. 17. 5. 6. See Fiorillo, geschichte, &c. 104. seq.

[77] The vision on Tabor, as represented here, is the most characteristic produced by modern art. Whether we consider the action of the apostles overpowered by the divine effulgence and divided between adoration and astonishment; or the forms of the prophets ascending like flame, and attracted by the lucid centre, or the majesty of Jesus himself, whose countenance, is the only one we know, expressive of his superhuman nature. That the unison of such powers, should not, for once, have disarmed the burlesque of the French critic, rouses equal surprise and indignation.

[78] The group in the Ludovisi, ever since its discovery, absurdly misnamed Pætus and Arria, notwithstanding some dissonance of taste and execution, may with more plausibility claim the title of Hæmon and Antigone.

[79] The whole of the gallery of Luxemburg by Rubens is but a branch of its magnificence: general as the elements, universal and permanent as the affections of human nature, allegory breaks the fetters of time, it unites with boundless sway, mythologic, feodal, local incongruities, fleeting modes of society and fugitive fashions: thus, in the picture of Rubens, Minerva, who instructs, the Graces that surround the royal maiden at the poetic fount, are not what they are in Homer, the real tutress of Telemachus, the real dressers of Venus, they are the symbols only of the education which the princess received. In that sublime design of Michael Agnolo, where a figure is roused by a descending genius from his repose on a globe, on which he yet reclines, and with surprize discovers the phantoms of the passions which he courted, unmasked in wild confusion flitting round him, M. Agnolo was less ambitious to express the nature of a dream, or to bespeak our attention to its picturesque effect and powerful contrasts, than to impress us with the lesson, that all is vanity and life a farce, unless engaged by virtue and the pursuits of mind.

[80] L’Aurora Sonnacchiosa.

[81] Speaking of the figure of Christ by Raphael in the Madonna del Spasimo, he calls it ‘Una Figura d’un Carattere fra quel di Giove, e quello d’Apollo; quale effettivamente deve esser quello, che corrisponde a Cristo, aggiungendovi soltanto l’espressione accidentale della passione, in cui si rappresenta.’ Opere 11. 83.

[82] It is engraved by Villamena.

[83] The composition, and in some degree the lines, but neither its tone nor effect, may be found among the etchings of Le Fevre.

[84] I cannot quit this picture without observing, that it presents the most incontrovertible evidence of the incongruities arising from the jarring coalition of the grand and ornamental styles. The group of Lazarus may be said to contain the most valuable relic of the classic time of modern, and perhaps the only specimen left of M. Agnolo’s oil-painting: an opinion which will scarcely be disputed by him, who has examined the manner of the Sistine chapel, and in his mind compared it with the group of the Lazarus, and that with the style and treatment of the other parts.

[85] In a picture which he painted at Rome for Bindo Altoviti, it represented ‘Un Cristo quanto il vivo, levato di croce, e posto in terra a’ piedi della Madre; e nell’ aria Febo, che oscura la faccia del sole, e Diana quella della Luna. Nel paese poi, oscurato da queste Tenebre, si veggiono spezzarsi alcuni monti di pietra, mossi dal terremoto, e certi corpi morti di santi risorgendo, uscire de sepolcri in vari modi; il quale quadro, finito che fu, per sua grazia non dispiacque al maggior pittore, scultore, e architetto, che sia stato a’ tempi nostri passati?’ The compliment was not paid to M. Agnolo himself, for the word ‘passati’ tells that he was no more, but it levied a tribute on posterity.

Vita di Giorgio Vasari.

[86] A miracle means an act performed by virtue of an unknown law of Nature.

[87] The form, but not the soul, of Julio’s composition has been borrowed by Rubens, or the master of the well known picture in the gallery of Dulwich college. Few can be unacquainted with the work of Vandyke, spread by the best engravers of that school. The picture of Rembrandt is the chief ornament of the collection in the garden-house of the Schönborn family, in one of the suburbs of Vienna: has been etched on a large scale, and there is a copy of it in the gallery at Cassel. A circumstantial account of it may be found in the Eighth Letter, vol. iii. of Küttner’s Travels.

[88] Nella arte della pittura aggiunse costui alla maniera del colorire ad olio, una certa oscurità; donde banno dato i moderni gran forza e rilievo alle Loro figure. Vasari vita di Lion. da Vinci, p. 559. ed. 1550.

[89] In the greater part of the cartoons, it does not appear that chiaroscuro had more than an ordinary share of attention:

In the Miraculous Draught plain day-light prevails.

In the miracle at the Temple-gate a more forcible and more sublime effect would have been obtained from a cupola-light and pillars darkened on the fore-ground.

In the exceccation of Elymas, composition and expression owe little of their roundness and evidence to chiaroscuro.

Apposition seems to have arranged the Sacrifice at Lystra.

If Dionysius and Damaris, in the cartoon of the Areopagus, had more forcibly refracted by dark colours or shade, the light against the speaker, effect and subject would have gained.

Considered individually or in masses, the chiaroscuro in the cartoon of Ananias appears to be perfect; but the Donation of the Keys owes what impression it makes on us in a great measure to the skilful distribution of its light and shade.

[90] In the following absurd description of the well-known picture in the palace Pitti: ‘It consists of three half-figures, one of which represents Martin Luther in the habit of an Augustin Monk, who plays on a harpsichord; Calvin stands by him in a chorister’s dress, with a violin in his hand: opposite you see a young lively girl in a bonnet with a plume of white feathers; by her Giorgione meant to represent the noted Catharine, Luther’s mistress and wife,’ &c. Fiorillo, vol. ii. p. 63. To expose the ignorant credulity which dictated this passage, it is sufficient to observe, that Giorgione died 1511, and that Calvin was born 1508.

[91] In every edition of the Vite subsequent to his own of 1550. The following passage deserves to be given in his own words: ‘Giorgione di Castel franco; il quale sfumò le sue pitture e dette una terribil’ movenzia a certe cose come è una storia nella scuola di san Marco a Venezia, dove è un tempo turbido che tuona, et trema il dipinto, et le figure si muovono & si spiccano da la tavola per una certa oscurità di ombre bene intese.’ Proemio della terza Parte delle Vite, p. 558.

[92] A La Scuola di S. Marco La Tempesta Sedata dal Santo, ove fra Le altre cose sono tre remiganti ignudi, pregiatissimi pel disegno, e per le attitudini. Lanzi storia, &c. Tomo II. parte prima. Scuola Veneta.

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