pleasing and powerfu'. The portraits of Sir Joshua Reynolds, who presented not only the form, and the features, but the mind, on his magically-breathing canvas, will live with those of Vandyke. and Rubens; while the productions of Gainsborough, Loutherbourg, De Cort, Turner, Sir George Beaumont, and many other artists, may, without peril by comparison, embellish the same gallery with those of Claude, Rubens, and Raphael.

A public exhibition is one of the most fostering spheres for the expansion of genius. But in the world of painting as well as of letters, prejudice and paruality should be divested of their poisons, lest they, in time, contaminate and blast the very root of genius. We have seen pictures of peculiar excellence placed in so unfavourable a light, that they have not only lost their effect, but have even been precluded from obser vation; while the coarse daubings of more powerful artists have glared through their day of exposure like the broad sign posts of arrogance and folly. Yet among the ornaments of the art we have to boast of a West, a Barry, an Opie, a Northcote, a Lawrence, a. Westall, a Beechey, a Fuseli, and many a rising candidate for fame.

The travels of Mr. Flaxman have cultivated a pure and elegant taste. His casts, after the antique, are executed with an effect, and precision which will embellish our public buildings and our private galleries for Genturies to come. This majestic art, though hiherto little encouraged in Britain, has certainly been more cherished of late. It is an undoubted fact, that it flourishes more during a state of warfare, from the circumstance of those of our heroes who lose their lives in the service of a grateful country, claiming the assistance of this art to embalm the memories of her brave citizens with all the honours of sculpture.. Statues, busts, and vases, which almost universally embellish the public edifices, and the private habitations of the nobility, and even of the middling classes, in

Italy, are, however, seldom seen in the halls or galle rics of English houses. There are, indeed, collections of the very first order in the possession of individuals in this country. Wilton, the seat of the Earl of Pembroke; Stourhead, the princely palace of Sir Richard Hoare; and the collection of the late Mr. Townley, which has been removed to the British Museum, have many exquisite and valuable antique specimens of the sculptor's art but (whether from the fastidious deli cacy of false taste, or the force of habit, is yet to be de. cided) we seldom see this power of giving the human form with all its grace and symmetry encouraged, or even approved, by the mass of civilized society. Why should not the British sculptor exercise that divine spirit of emulation which immortalized the Grecian art ? Flaxman has been thought by some to have disputed the wreath of fame with the sculptors of antiquity? To his labours and taste the public will long continue to be indebted; his exertions promise to awaken that gust for the art in which he excels, which has not only been dormant, but has scarcely ever been cherished into vigour, in this country. Neither is the name of Flaxman, though highly deserving of praise, selected as the only one whose labours merit that distinction, but as a type for many excellent rivals.

The best public specimens of modern sculpture are those which embellish the gothic ailes of Westminsterabbey, and those already erected in St. Paul's Cathe dral, but in the former they are so crowded together, so mingled with awkward, uncouth, and heavy designs, il executed and ill arranged, that more than half their beauty is lost in the chaos of inconsistency; and it is a disgrace to the sculptor's art, as well as to the finest monument of gothic architecture, that West❤ minster-abbey exhibits, even in these enlightened days, a wax-work puppet-shew of kings and queens, which would disgrace the booth of an itinerant mountebank.

Sculpture will be exhibited to the greatest advan tage in the sublime temple of St. Paul; which, though

of more diminutive construction than the far-famed St. Peter's at Rome, is infinitely more beautiful in the minutiæ of its external decorations. This splendid building will display monumental trophies with considerable effect, and from the specimens already placed there, this magnificent church promises to become the recep tacle of the works of the most eminent English sculp tors. Our squares exhibit statues, but they are not of the first order. We shall, however, describe them in a subsequent part of this work: but these deficiencies are beautifully contrasted by the plantations of Grosvenor, Portman, Fitzroy, Leicester, Finsbury, Soho, and Lincoln's-inn squares; and it is to be hoped that every open space of ground in London will, in the course of a few years, afford its inhabitants this species of summeer promenade.

Three foreigners of distinguished names in polite criticism, Montesquien, the Abbé du Bos, and the Abbé Winkelman, have been pleased to represent the English as aliens (chiefly from the nature of their climate) to that taste, without which the fine arts have no existence, and morals lose half their worth. The usual discernment and accuracy of the former, and the charac ter for laborious research in the two latter, converted this injurious phantasy into a current opinion, In a treatise, of peculiar strength, expressly written on the subject, our countryman, Mr. Barry, has shewn that the origin of taste is to be found in the accidents of a nation's history, and has vindicated England in the illustrious examples of her poets. With the same breath, however, he acknowledges, that moral causes have existed to obstruct the progress of the fine arts in England. Without following Mr. Barry in his happy developement of those causes, we are compelled to own, that while Sir Christopher Wren, and Inigo Jones, Wilson, and Sir Joshua Reynolds, with several of our living artists, have placed the name of England for the fine arts on the same roll with Italy, and even Greece; yet, the actual general character of England,

in this respect, is unworthy of her genius. A stranger who rambles through London, will be dissatisfied with the general style of the public buildings, and chilled with the poverty of thought and invention, that leaves the noblest situations unadorned with monuments of the arts, or disfigured with poor and frigid examples of them. If the outside of the cathedral of St. Paul, the inside of St. Stephen's church, Walbrook, the portico of St. Martin's near the Strand, and the fragment of the palace of Whitehall, be excepted, there is scarcely a building of eminent grandeur or exquisite beauty in this metropolis. In statues, the public places are still more barren; there are none but those of Charles I. at Charing-cross, and James II. in the court behind Whitehall, that can be viewed with emotion, which is the genuine effect of a natural and lively imitation of nature. The only fine paintings that are in any manner open to the public, are the ceiling of the chapel at Whitehall, by Rubens, and the pictures by Barry, in the great room of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, in the Adelphi.

These examples of architecture, sculpture, and painting, are indeed worthy, in their respective classes, of a great city and nation; but the largest and most wealthy city in Europe should present a multitude, a crowd of such pure and excellent objects of delightful sensations. Commerce, wealth, and luxury, are just sources of jealousy to all who would rather see a people happy than splendid, even when they are attended with the fine arts, which are among their compensa. tions; but a large capital, which ranks with the former, and is unblest with the latter, has nothing equivocal in its character, and is a monster of moral and political deformity. London is not to be reproached with that hateful character. Although it fails in exterior decoration, it may honourably and proudly boast of many grand collections of pictures and statues, and of the passion for the fine arts of their meritorious owners the annual exhibition of the Royal Academy at Somer.

set House, commencing in May, and continuing open six weeks, furnishes a fund of entertainment, to which no person of taste fails to pay several visits.

Commerce.

The influence which government is supposed to have over London, and the result which the learned professions, as they are cultivated in the metropolis, have upon it, have already been noticed.

But though London is really distinguished for the general propriety of its appearance, which arises out of the general excellence of its morals and manners, it must be acknowledged that the feature which above all others marks this great capital, is the magnitude of its commerce. Situation, a long continued current of successful accidents, with the genius for gain, elevated above and directing the whole to its own purpose, ale though not to the exclusion, yet to the subjugation, of all other objects, have in London reared up an emporium that the merchant of other nations, with all his knowledge of the power of commerce, surveys with inexpressible wonder. It is not possible in this work to give the simplest outline of the commerce of the me. tropolis; but one or two points of the outward form may afford an idea of the stupendous mass.

The commerce of London has three principal points: 1st. The port of London, with the foreign trade, and domestic wholesale business; 2d. The manufactures; and, lastly, the retail trade.

The Port of London.

The present annual value of the exports and imports of London may be stated at sixty millions and a half sterling, and the annual amount of the customs, at more than six millions. These exports and imports employ about 3,500 ships, British and foreign; while the cargoes that annually enter the port are not less than 13,400. On an average, there are 1,100 ships in the river; together with 3,419 barges, and other