Page:Notes and Queries - Series 10 - Volume 11.djvu/226

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NOTES AND QUERIES. [io *. XL MAR. 6, im.

Joshua, as he himself acknowledges, was slighter by far, yet not too slight for him to have formed an opinion on the general merits and defects of his paintings.

One is disappointed to find that almost the only blank margins in the book occur on the pages which treat of Hogarth's theory of beauty. But Coleridge to some extent atones for this omission in his notes on Sir Joshua. A reference to Reynolds's strictures on beauty provokes from him a lengthy comment, and, incidentally, a statement of his own views on the subject. This, however, is not full enough to enable us to detect any material advance upon his standpoint in 1814 (the year of his ' Essays on Criticism ') if, indeed, any such advance has taken place, an assumption which the fragmentary dis- cussions on beauty in ' Table Talk ' would hardly justify. However this may be, Coleridge's opinion of Sir Joshua as a philo- sophical thinker has certainly undergone a change since the days when he praised him in the ' Biographia Literaria.'

Although Coleridge's notes treat chiefly of art and pictures, he is ready to digress upon any topic on which the text invites comment. Thus we find discussion of such extraneous matters as the true cause of Johnson's bearishness, the value of aca- demies, and the relations of men of genius with their patrons. On the last head, by the way, it is interesting to compare Cole- ridge's remarks with his chapter in the ' Biographia Literaria ' ' On the Irritability of Men of Genius.'

Below I give all the marginalia which seem to possess real interest or value. In each case I have indicated the passage in the text to which the note refers ; but have troubled the reader with little or no comment. Coleridge's writing is often trembling and uncertain, and the ink has not stood the test of time ; hence some words have become obscure, others wholly undecipherable. But in no case, I think, is the sense of a whole passage unrecognizable. Obscure words I have denoted by a question mark ; un- readable ones by a blank space. I give first Allan Cunningham's words, followed in each instance by Coleridge's comment.

A. C. Fuseli attacks the allegories of the school of Rubens, as " the supporters of nothing but clumsy forms and clumsier conceits."

S. T. C. This remark requires limitation. Allegory may be painted. A Spenser gallery, Hazlitt observes, would make one of the finest subjects in the world. Dante, ' The Pilgrim's Progress,' the tale of -, all might supply admirable pictures. But allegory should be kept to itself. Any allegorical portrait or history

piece is absurd. But I must take a wider space to explain the difference. These metaphors, such as nuda veritas, green virginity, &c., should not be painted.

A. C. He [Van Dyck] has been surpassed in the fascination of female beauty by Lawrence.

S. T. C. A portrait painter, idealize as he will, can only paint the portraits of people that exist in his own time. Vandyke had not the lovely faces of Lawrence's sitters to imitate, and neither Reynolds nor Lawrence had the hard thinkers and chivalric enterprizers of King Charles's day for models. The race is extinct. We have men of genius not a few men of courage as many as ever ; but poetry is become too feminine,, and war too mechanical, to enlarge the brow and stamp [?] the lineaments with the proportions and of the olden time.

A. C. The Puritans ordered that all such pic- tures there [in York House] as have the repre- sentation of the Virgin Mary upon them should be forthwith burnt.

S. T. C 1. I certainly think the Puritans would have been right, had they condemned such pic- tures only as presumed to give a visible repre- sentation of the Infinite and Invisible. But since the Second Person of the Trinity did con- descend to assume the likeness of man, there appears no just reason why his human lineaments, should not be painted. Far less can I comprehend why the loveliest productions of the art, which portray " the maid and mother undeflled,."' should excite suspicion in any Christian soul.

A. C. Dryden's epitaph on Kneller: Such are thy pictures, Kneller, such thy skill, That nature seems obedient to thy will, Comes out and meets thy pencil in the draught, Lives there, and wants but words to express the- thought.

S. T. C. Dryden's encomium on Kneller is good. If it ascribes to Sir Godfrey what few- painters deserve, it shews a just idea of what the> art is capable.

A. C. The portraits of Holbein.

S. T. C. I never, as far as I know, saw a picture of Holbein's. Vandyke, Lely, and Kneller I must have seen at Windsor, but they made no- impression on me. Their merits may be various, but their fame would certainly be less did they not illustrate the most interesting period of our- history, and give an image to the higher names. Statesmen in their day might be bad things ; now they are mere things or rather nothings.

A. C. Kindness shown to genius at the com- mencement of its career' is seldom forgotten.

S. T. C. Too often, especially if the benefactor, on the strength of his benefaction,, begins to advise, rebuke, or direct, or if he be an unfashion- able old I am far from saying that men

of genius are actually ungrateful ; but they are too frequently vain, proud, testy, suspicious^ Like other men, however, they are better and longer pleased with kindness, sweet words and smiling looks, and a ready welcome, than with' substantial services which they are unable to repay in kind, and begrudge to pay with homage- deference and unremitting attention. Grati- tude is a delightful sentiment, but,. ala3 ; how often is it a grievous duty !