On the Fine Arts. 89 
and sculptors are required to know the principles of their 
respective arts. But as that knowledge of grammar which 
constitutes the merit of a grammarian will never make a 
poet, so that knowledge uf perspective and anatomy which 
constitutes the merit of a connoisseur will never make a 
painter or a sculptor. Painting and sculpture are repre- 
sentative arts.. Their province 1s confined to forms that 
can be exhibited, and surely excellence cannot be attained 
in them but by studying such forms as naturally exist. 
In groups the sculptor may bring together figures that 
might never have met, as the landscape- painter may com- 
bine into one picture objects selected Irom different views, 
and thereby prodace an effect that, while perfectly natural, 
shall be more pleasing and impressive than any particular 
view in nature. But the scuiptor must not attempt to 
create forms, nor the painter to draw mountains or trees 
from his own fancy, or they will assuredly never fail to 
offend, if they do not always disgust. The two grand alle- 
gorical landscapes of Claude, descriptive of the rise and 
tall of the Roman empire, furnish an admirable illustration 
of the maxim which | would inculcate. There is no part 
of Jtaly, various and beautiful as the scenery of that coun- 
try is, which exhibits such magnificient scenes as these 
paintings ; but still the moment that we see them we at 
once recognise all the features of the Italian landscape. 
In the pictnre descriptive of the rise of the Roman nation, 
we are informed at the first glance of the moral which the 
artist intends to convey. The skv indicates the morning. 
On more close examination we find, by the general ap- 
pearance of the woods and other objects, that it is. the 
spring of the year, and the allegory is still more distinctly 
tuld by the introduction of husbandmen employed in pre- 
paring the soil; and the rudeness of society 1s ingeniously 
expressed by a number of little incidents that nevertheless 
harmonize with the general tone of the composition, while 
the style of the buildings and the features of the landscape 
show that it is a probable view of Italy in the simple and 
manly ages of the Roman republic. {In delineating the 
decline of the empire the painter bas been no less happy. 
The circumstances are chosen with equal skill, and com- 
bined with equal judgement. The sun is serting; it is the 
close of the vintage. The temples are in ruins, which em- 
phatically inform us how much the reverence for the gods 
has declined. The peasants are discovered in a state of in- 
foxication, and the painter has contrived to represent this 
without any ludicrous circumstance, He wished to con- 
vey 
