THE ART OF DRAWING. 161 
historical development of ideas must fill his breast, to enable him to repre- 
sent them. 
3. Lanpscare Pamtryc. Among the arts of design that of landscape 
painting holds an important rank. The beholder of a good landscape pic- 
ture whose mind is capable of penetrating the depths of nature in a 
scientific spirit, looks upon that picture as a moment of the everlasting life 
of nature, fixed by the painter. The delight which nearly all men take in 
the beauties of nature proves the intimate connexion that exists between it 
and the human mind. Rarely does the faculty of taste receive such perfect 
gratification from any source as that which it derives from the contempla- 
tion of open nature. The endless variety and the intimate harmony of its 
colors charm the eye almost whithersoever it turns. Whatever can be 
imagined of delightful, great, or wonderful in form and shape is there met 
with ; and yet in each landscape all the various and endlessly commingled 
forms constitute a harmonious whole, and all is so combined together that 
notwithstanding the indescribable multiplicity of images, none contradicts 
the other, while each breathes a spirit of its own. Painting accordingly is 
provided in nature with an inexhaustible fund of materials for operating 
advantageously on the mind of man; and the landscape painter, if 
acquainted with the higher powers of his art, and if he connects moral and 
pathetic subjects with the scenes of nature, can in many ways usefully and 
delightfully entertain the beholder. By means of a well chosen scene of 
social life, and by a proper combination of living figures, he can give to his 
landscape a value that places it upon a par with the best historical painting ; 
nay, a landscape becomes itself a historical painting, when it represents 
grand actions of the forces of nature or their visible results. 
To work up a landscape to the highest degree of perfection exhausts all 
the resources of natural science, of the finest taste, and of the profoundest 
art. A great landscape painter must unite in himself almost all the talents 
of every other class of painters. Before all things the painter, when he has 
found a landscape proper for representation, should remove from it every- 
thing foreign and superfluous, but retain to the most minute peculiarity 
everything typical, in order that its appropriate character may not be dis- 
turbed. In order to give unity to the piece, it is necessary that in every land- 
scape there be asingle spot to serve as a central point of interest to the whole, 
while nothing at the edge of the picture must be made so prominent as to 
divert the attention. Landscapes, such as exist even by good masters, which 
represent a broad tract of country where everything is beautiful and inter- 
esting, so that they might be cut up into several small pieces, each of which 
would form a pretty landscape, can never produce a grand effect. In a 
good landscape the light and shade must consist of principal masses which 
offer no particularly prominent points, but which approach to a roundish 
appearance when viewed from a distance. A number of the landscapes of 
Wouvermann, few of the older, but a majority of the works of the best modern 
landscape painters, Achenbach, Lessing, Turner, and others, can stand this 
test. If from a distance we see light and dark patches scattered about a 
picture, it will not produce a powerful effect when viewed near at hand. Here 
ICONOGRAPHIC ENCYCLOPADIA.—VOL. IV. 35 545 
