66 



or a St. Jerome, was as much admired for 

 its spirited and characteristic roughness, as 

 for its equality and smoothness in his an- 

 gels and madonnas, — what must be the 

 case with men who have been tethered all 

 their lives in a clump or a belt? 



There is another instance of contrast be- 

 tween two eminent painters, Albano and 

 Mola, which I cannot forbear mentioning, 

 as it confirms the alliance between rough- 

 ness and picturesqueness, and between 

 smoothness and beauty; and as it shews, in 

 the latter case, the consequent danger of 

 sameness. Of all the painters who have left 

 behind them a high reputation, none per- 

 haps, was more uniformly smooth than 

 Albano, or less often deviated into abrupt- 

 ness of any kind: none also have greater 

 monotony of character; but, from the ex- 

 treme beauty and delicacy of his forms 

 and his tints, and his exquisite finishing, 

 few pictures are more generally captivating. 

 Mola, the scholar of Albano, (and that 

 circumstance makes it more singular) is as 

 'remarkable for many of those opposite 



