Where, dread expanfe! fierce-driving tempefts blow,
And only genius fhuns the gulf below:
Where fools half fluttering and half floating ftill,
Who flounder on against Apollo's will,
Become the general jeft, the vulgar game,
And fink at last beneath a weight of shame.
"Who boldly then the common track depart,
Toil after fame, and take the paths of art;
Ye finer fouls! in Fancy's eye who fee
What'er young hopes, and fanguine hearts decree;
While yet unfpell'd, unplighted y u remain,
Paufe, ere you join the art-enamour'd train;
Confult your powers, the fancied paffion prove,
Nor tranfient liking take, for lafting love;
The nymph once wedded, you repent too late,
To change your fortune or to check
your fate;
When time fhall tinge her beauties in your fight,
And all feem labour which was once delight;
From hope's fond dreams unwillingly awake,
When flow conviction whifpers your mistake;
Then, fhall you wifh fome lefs advent'rous aim
Had fix'd you fafe below the cares of fame ;
To fome obfcure mechanic toil had fway'd,
Or left you humbly diligent in trade;
While foil'd ambition weeps his wafted prime,
And difappointment drags the load of time." P. 27.
The picture of a true painter is then drawn with great vigour and truth.
"To gain th' immortal wreath of art requires,
Whate'er of worth, or Mufe, or Grace infpires;
Whatever man, of heav'n, or earth, obtains,
Through mental toil or mere mechanic pains;
A conftant heart, by Nature's charms imprefs'd,
An ardour, ever burning in the breaft;
A zeal for truth, a pow'r of thought intense;
A fancy, flowering on the ftems of fenfe;
A mem'ry, as the grave retentive, vaft;
That holds to rife again, th' imprison'd paft;
A feeling, ftrong, inftinctive, active, chafte ;.
The thrilling electricity of tafte;
That marks the muse on each refplendent part;
The feal of nature, on the acts of art;
An eye, to bards alone and painters given,
A frenzied orb, reflecting earth and heaven;
Commanding all creation at a glance,
And ranging Poffibility's expanfe;
A hand, with more than magic fkill endow'd,
To trace Invention's vifions as they crowd;
Embody thoughts beyond the poet's skill,
And pour the eloquence of art at will;
'Bove all, a dauntlefs foul to perfevere,
Though mountains rife, though Alps on Alps appear;
Though Poverty prefent her meagre form,
Though patrons fail, and Fortune frown a storm.
"O! rare affemblage! rich amount of mind!
Collective light of intellect refin'd!
Scarce once an age from Nature's niggard hands
Beftow'd on man, yet fuch the Mufe demands;
Such, where'er found, let grateful ftates hold dear,
Reward them wisdom, wealth and rank revere." P. 28.
The poet afterwards points briefly at the obftacles raifed' by envy and prejudice, and concludes the firft part with a view of the best times of Italy, and an earnest hope for the future pre-eminence of Britain in the fame arts. He protests, however, very nobly, against purchasing art at the price of freedom, as in the cafe of Florence.
In the fecond part, the poet appears more in the character of a fatirift than of a didactic writer, and he is a fatirift of great vigour. He lafhes not only the pretended critics in painting, but the philofophic fpirit, fo far as it is hoftile to works of genius; and ftill more the fashionable rage for a fmattering in various fciences, ufelefs to thofe who fo imperfectly acquire them. The modern metaphyfical philo fopher has not often been better attacked.
"Ungrac'd, ungracious, dull, demure, and vain, A cav'ling, cold, pert, difputatious train;
The nation's obloquy, the time's offence,
Infeft philofophy, and torture sense;
Pervert all truth, profcribe each finer art,
Fire the weak head, and freeze the feeling heart;
Adrift in Paffion's tempeft turn the mind,
And cut the moral cables of mankind.
In patchwork of exploded follies wrought,
Clofe quilted in good housewifery of thought,
Their heads with ftraws from Rouffeau's ftubble crown'd,
Our metaphyfic madmen rave around:
With kings and priefts, they wage eternal war,
And laws, as life's ftrait waiftcoats they abhor,
As crafty means to check the mind's career,
And put infpir'd philofophers in fear;
To cramp the energies of foul and fenfe,
And conftitute enjoyment an offence.
What food for ridicule ! what room for wrath!
When study works up folly to a froth!
When dullness bubbling o'er ambition's fire,
In cloud, and finoke, and vapour will afpire;
Through each foul funnel of the prefs will rife,
And fill with fog the intellectual skies!" P. 50.
In this paffage alfo,
"Profeffors there in pride of power elate,
Would fry experiments on every ftate,
Re-organize the globe on Reafon's plan,
New-temper Nature, and new-model man.
No more her ancient fettled fyftem priz'd,
Lo! Europe like a compound analyz'd!
Her laws, modes, morals, melted down, to try
What forms the fighting elements fupply;
What shapes of focial order rife refin'd,
From Speculation's crucible combin'd;
While cool ftate chymifts watch the boiling brim,
And life's low dregs upon the surface swim.
What! though 'midft Paffion's fiery tumults tofs'd,
A generation's in the procefs loft,
Regardless of his raw material, man,
The calm philofopher purfues his plan;
Looks on the ruin of a race with fcorn,
And works the weal of ages yet unborn." P: 60.
He is ftill more animated when he attacks, with equal juftice, the pretended critics, whofe ignorant affectation condemns, in the grofs, all modern art.
"Painting dejected views a vulgat band, From every haunt of dullness in the land, In heathen homage to her fhrine repair,
And immolate all living merit there;
From each cold clime of pride that glimmering lies,
Brain-bound and bleak, 'neath Affectation's skies,
In critic crowds new Vandal nations come,
And worse than Goths--again disfigure Rome;
With rebel zeal each graphic realm invade,
And crush their country's arts by foreign aid.
Dolts from the ranks of useful fervice chas'd,
Pafs mufter in the lumber troop of Tafte;
Soon learn to load with critic fhot, and play
Their pop-guns on the genius of the day.
"No awkward heir that o'er Capania's plain,
Has fcamper'd like a monkey in his chain;
BRIT. CRIT, VOL. XXVI. SEPT. 1895.
No ambuth'd afs that, hid in learning's maze,
Kicks at defert, and crops wit's budding bays;.
No baby grown that ftill his coral keeps,.
And fucks the thumb of Science till he fleeps;
No mawkifh fon of fentiment who strains
Soft fonnet drops from barley-water brains;
No pointer of a paragraph, no peer,
That hangs a picture-pander at his ear;
No fmatterer of the ciceroni crew,
No pauper of the parish of Virtu;
But ftarts an Ariftarchus on the town,
To hunt full cry dejected Merit down;
With fapient thrug affumes the critic's part,
And loud deplores the fad decline of art." P. 70.
The importation of original pictures he contends, with truth, is not fufficient, without the encouragement of modern genius.
"Say, what avails it, from Italia's plains,
Her ranfack'd palaces, and plunder'd fanes,
That fraud or folly draw delufive ftores,
And empty Europe's refufe on our shores?
That pedigree'd on proud patrician walls,
In cloifter'd cabinets, and coftly halls,
The time-touch'd wonders of meridian tafte,
In clofe-kept folitudes of ftate are plac'd?
If cold, and kindlefs to our country's arts,
We shut our eyes, our houses, and our hearts;
With foreign blooms long faded fill our bowers,
Yet find no fragrance in our native flowers;
If that high impulfe, which the bounding foul
Of genius urges to its utmost goal,
The great refufe, nor grant one favouring fmile,
To gild the hope, or glad the heart of toil." P. 79,
After the well merited fatire against thofe who repress our native arts, Mr. S. introduces a very pleafing panegyric upon the few who have lately encouraged them among whom the late Duke of Bridgewater receives a juft encomium; both for his patriotic improvements, and for that love of painting which he indulged at a later period of life.
"When love of painting (late a paffion) came,
With kindling zeal he caught the novel flame,
To joys unfelt before with rapture fprung,
Forgot his age and found he still was young.
Though late he fell, had fate deferr'd the blow,
And left him yet a few short years below;
His country's genius fure, had found a friend,
Pleas'd to reward, and pow'rful to defend.
The fons of Tafte had fhed the grateful tear,
And Painting wept the patron, in the peer." P. 92.
As a proof of this, it is rightly mentioned in a note, that
Though poffeffed of the finest examples of the old masters, he was not one of thofe affected admirers of art, who regard the productions of their own time with indifference or contempt; nor did he conceive it an impeachment of his tafte, to place as an ornament in his collection, a work of ability from the pencil of a living artift (Mr. Turner), though felected at a price, which even the merit of Wilfon could never extort from the parfimonious patronage of his day." P. 91.
As the author has given the picture of a genius .for. painting, fo alfo he introduces that of a true critic in the art.
"Give me the critic bred in Nature's fchool,
Who neither talks by rote, nor thinks by rule;
Who feeling's honeft dictates ftill obeys,
And dares, without a precedent, to praife;"
Whofe hardy tafte the bigot crowd disclaims,
That chorus catalogues, and worship names;
Unbiafs'd ftill to merit fondly turns,
Regardless where the flame of genius burns,
Whether through Time's long gloom transmitted bright,
Or pour'd a later luftre on the fight;
From Rome's proud dome it dart a beam divine,
Or burft fpontaneous from a Cornish mine." P. 93.
We have dwelt on this poem with fingulár pleafure, notonly for its merit, but for the fake of the fubject, which is, in our opinion, truly important. We are fill obliged, as we forefaw, to omit feveral paffages which well deferve citation. Among which we must particularly mention the view of nature as furveyed by the poet, which extends from page 98 to the end of the poem. The note on the Royal Academy (p. 4.) is of great importance; as are also the author's obfervations on the propriety of having a public gallery of painting, to which ftudents could have unlimited admiffion; and on the opportunity unfortunately neglected by Sir Jofhua Reynolds, of forming, by bequeft from his own collection, a nucleus or beginning for fuch an inflitution at the Royal Academy. (p. 65.) On thefe, and other matters, the neceffity of concluding the prefent article forbids us to expatiate, or to give citations. We rejoice to find, that whether from the impulfe given by this work, or from the 'pontaneous reflections of individuals,
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