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Rh "Artists," observed Mr. Morland, "are generally an enthusiastic, unworldly race; jealous of praise, as the enthusiastic almost always are; and exaggerating trifles, as the unworldly always do. But society is no school for the artist: the colours of his mind, like those of his pictures, lose their brilliancy by being exposed to the open air. Sir Joshua Reynolds said 'a painter should sew up his mouth'—a rather inconvenient proof of devotion to his art. But it is with painting as with every thing else—first-rate excellence is always a solitary one." "It is curious," replied Lorraine, "to remark the incitement of obstacles. Under what difficulties almost all our great painters and poets have laboured!" "I have," returned Mr. Morland, "a favourite theory of my own, that early encouragement is bad for any of the imaginative pursuits. No—place difficulties before them; let the impediments be many in number. If the true spirit be in the possessor, he will overcome them all. Genius is the Hannibal of the mind. The Alps, which to the common observer seemed insurmountable, served only to immortalise his passage. The imagination is to work with its