\ v\\l 



FUSE AND PROGRESS 



the mantle of poetry over the ordinary 

 of war, and product-d notliing but 

 mystery and extraragaiu<>. r.an.n, \\ ith a mind 

 of a more literal cast, suited the public taste, 

 and mad* both fame and fortune. The former 

 Lin, however, Buffered something of an eclipse, 

 though hit statues of Johnson and Howard are 

 noble works. Nollekens, notwithstanding- the 

 praise of Wordsworth, was essentially a bust 

 sculptor. His mind was mechanical ; he had no 

 imagination ; he was plodding and laborious, and 

 produced many works but they were works 

 without feeling or passion. Flaxman had the 

 loftiest genius of all our British sculptors ; he 

 was alike simple and sublime ; he grappled with 

 the most poetic subjects, and reached their gran- 

 deur, as well as their beauty. His designs for 

 the Greek poets have so much of the Greek spirit 

 that they might pass for the sketches of Phidias, 

 while his designs from Scripture reach the height 

 of the great argument of the gospel, and form 

 the only commentary we ever saw in perfect 

 harmony with the original. This is high praise. 

 We must add, by way of abatement, that his 

 execution was not equal to his conception, and 

 that, while in true poetic works he fairly rivalled 

 the works of antiquity, in literal transcripts of 

 life and the times he lived in, he was excelled 

 by sculptors who had not a tithe of his talent. 

 He could show the kernel of things, but he failed 

 in exhibiting the husk. The living sculptors are 

 numerous, and some are of high talent. Chan- 

 trey is natural, graceful, and manly : Baily 

 always elegant and sometimes poetic. Westma- 

 cott carves now and then a classic group. The 

 sculpture of Britain has not yet reached, and 

 likely never will reach, the excellence of that of 

 antiquity. With us, it is more a matter of neces- 

 sity than of genius and feeling; a sculptor is 

 considered as a sort of manufacturer ; he has to 

 work according to dying bequests, and to fill a 

 certain space with marble, commemorating parti- 

 cular virtues ; he has no liberty in selection of 

 subjects ; a soldier perishes in battle, and has a 

 statue ; a statesman dies, and has his statue also, 

 and materials are furnished, to ensure a good 

 resemblance, both as respects aspect and costume. 

 This sort of act-of-parliament commission can 

 hardly call a true work of art into existence. It 

 is true, that such men as Egremont, and Devon- 

 shire, and Bedford desire to have sculptures of a 

 poetic nature. We speak not of individual cases, 

 but of a general feeling ; we have no national 

 taste in such matters. The very mobs of Italy 

 and France respect the presence of works of art ; 

 they look on them with admiration and awe, 

 while the crowds of old England scratch, and 



crush, and break sculpture without remorse. 

 The first emotion felt on beholding a national 

 statue set up in a public place is, to pull it 

 down, or throw stones at it. 



The British school of painting occupies a 

 place between the schools of Italy and Holland. 

 It wants the sublime loftiness of the former, 

 neither is it so low or so literal as the latter ; it 

 partakes of the qualities of both, while the spirit 

 of the land shines visibly through it, and estab- 

 lishes its claim to originality. It has great 

 variety, great force, vivid colour, and expression. 

 In lofty emotion, historic dignity, and poetic 

 passion, it is less powerful than in human char- 

 acter, domestic incident, natural elegance, and 

 deep pathos, sharp satire, and a humour rich and 

 deep. Painting has taken few successful flights 

 into the regions of the imaginative, though it has 

 made many attempts ; neither has it treated with 

 much dignity and vigour the deeds of daring 

 wrought by Britons, by either sea or land. We 

 have no Shakspeares, Spensers, Miltons, or 

 Scotts in art. The academy, it is true, opens 

 its doors to all, and sets an example by models, 

 and gives advice in lectures, concerning the 

 sublime and the historic. It exports, too, to 

 Rome at stated intervals, certain of the most 

 gifted of its students to feel, with Reynolds, the 

 unreachable elevation of Michael Angelo, or 

 confirm their own notions of what is excellent, 

 by gazing on Raphael, Correggio, and other 

 great masters. Yet, nevertheless, the grand 

 historic style is anything but prosperous. Artists 

 dream of the Vatican, and waken to paint a cow 

 grazing in a meadow, two dogs quarrelling for a 

 bone, a windmill after nature, or a lady patched, 

 plumed, and padded, ready to burst upon some 

 astonished coterie, and fan them into envy with 

 her nodding plumes. 



The first great painter of the island is still the 

 most vigorous, most characteristic, and original- 

 we mean Hogarth. Some of his brethren, indeed, 

 deny him the title of painter ; though they allow 

 he is a great something, they hesitate* to say 

 what. But this is mere pedantry. He is held to 

 be a true painter by all who know what art is ; 

 for it is by form, by colour, and by force of 

 expression that he accomplishes all. In fact, he 

 has carried art farther than any other man has 

 done. He is not only a painter, but he is more ; 

 he is a great dramatist, second only to Shak- 

 speare. Crabbe has been called the Hogarth of 

 poets. There is a little resemblance between 

 them ; the song of the poet was of humble vice, 

 and villany, and corruption in rags ; the satire 

 of the painter dropped like aquafortis on the 

 profligacy of the high, on those who, froou station 



