26S Notices respecting Keiv Books. 



origin, and treat of Chaldean, Indian, Kgyptisn^ Hebrew, 

 Etruscan, Sidonian, Greek, Roman, and modern engraving, 

 in its multifarious forms — as exhibited on sacerdotal orna* 

 roents, signets, hieroglyphics, scarabees, instruments of war, 

 furniture, cenis, coins, and prints ; nor could any .maly^is 

 convey to our readers a correct idea of the instruction and 

 information these lectures are calculated to afford, not only 

 to iho^e who bv their habits and pursuits may be supposed 

 more immediately interested in such inquiries, but to every 

 person possessing a ctiltiv<:tcd mind. The subjoined ex- 

 trac's from the third lecture (p. l-lSand I'd) will serve as 

 a specimen of the author's stvle^ and his manner of treating 

 his subject. 



" Toward the close of my last discourse (on the several 

 Fprcies of modern engraving) I found mvself obliged to an- 

 ticipate that the meanings I annex respectively to the words 

 gevtrnl and particufnr, as applied to works of art, would 

 not be iTiisunderstood : an anticipation of some terms is not 

 easily avoidable, and can be no reason why they should not 

 he subsequcntiv explained. 



** To patticuUirise, is to be attentive to the minutias, 

 severally eon^)d<;red, of ihe object or objects before us. In 

 imitative art, it \i to lepresent those objects in detail. — 

 In cxolaming the ter.Ti generali-iing, as it is lesg well under- 

 stood, I shall be obliged to be more diffuse. 



" 'I'o genernli'sey is not to render vague and indetermin.'ite, 

 but to express with sufficient firmness, what is common to a 

 iMiml er of objec's of tlie same class. A general idea, if the 

 word ilea may be used to signify any other than recalled and 

 pariiculir sensation, is a generic idea ; and a general repre- 

 sentation or descripti'in, in painting or in poetry, is also 

 generic, or such a representation as is coinmon to a number. 

 In moral philosophy, general ideas being comparatively 

 vatiue and indeterminable, have sometimes been denied to 

 exist ; but in art, they may be rendered obvious, may be 

 * returned b.ick to the .'iense from whose-particular impressions 

 thipy are ctnistituted or abstracted :' and thi.», I believe, is 

 pr'icticablv; in all arts, though pei haps not in the same de- 

 {^lec. Tlic statuary, the poet, the painter, the engraver, the 



/ musician. 



