CHAP. III. Of Judg ment. priety of arrangement in the parts, resulting from accurate intelligence guided by just feeling. By having their attention at once directed to common or individual nature, and to nature elevated and improved by the genius of poetry, they raised the style of imitation above that of its archetypes, without any of that deviation into manner, which has been so fatal to taste in modern times: for, though the revivers of the art in Italy, particularly Michel Angelo and his followers, have abundantly succeeded in departing from the individual peculiarities of their models, they have not been so successful in keeping clear of their own. Their figures, it is true, are not those of any one particular age or country, or of any one particular class of individuals; but, what is worse, they are those of one particular artist; and such as have never been seen but in his works. 45. We are naturally so much disposed to admire things, which appear difficult and surprising, that I do not wonder at the admiration, with which the works of Michel Angelo have been viewed, though I was never able to participate in it. Ease in design seems to me to be quite as requisite to the perfection of art, as ease in execution: for, whether the mind, or the hand of the artist display symptoms of constrained labour, the effect upon the imagination will be the same; the "ut sibi quivis speret idem" being the infallible and indispensable characteristic of high excellence in both. "If I had seen a ghost," says Partridge on seeing Garrick in Hamlet, "I should have looked exactly as that little man did*;" and this simple observation contains the justest and most exalted praise, that can be bestowed. But it is of a kind, which no one, even of his most enthusiastic admirers, ever thought of bestowing upon any composition of Michel Angelo. We sympathize with the struggles of Laocoon and his sons entangled in the folds of the serpents, because we feel that they are such as we ourselves should make in a similar situation: but the postures, into which the figures are thrown, in Michel Angelo's picture of the Plague of Serpents, are such as no human figures ever did put themselves into, except in a drawing academy, or painter's study. 46. It is not only with relation to themselves, but with relation to others, that the evil which men do, lives after them, while the good is often buried in their graves. The good, which this great artist did to imitative art, by co-operating with Lionardo da Vinci, and Fra. Bartolomeo di San Marco in breaking through the dry meagre style derived from the Byzantine painters, ended with that style; and, of course, ceased with his first great exertions: but the See Fielding's History of a Foundling. CHAP. 111. Of Judg ment, СНАР. III. Of Judg ment. evil which he did, in making extravagance and distortion pass for grandeur and vigour of character and expression, still spreads with increasing virulence of contagion; and, while it is supported by such brilliant theories as those of the Inquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful, there can be but faint hopes of its ceasing or subsiding. If the power of exciting surprise and astonishment be the genuine principle of sublimity, the compositions of the Sistine chapel and the tombs of the Medici are certainly the most sublime works in art; except, perhaps, some later productions of this school; for this is a style, in which imitators generally surpass their archetypes. 47. Invention, in every art, becomes more easy, the further it departs from the modesty and simplicity of nature: whence this style is flattering both to vanity and indolence; men being naturally pleased to find that they can produce, without much exertion of thought or science, works, which are more original and surprising, and therefore, according to this new system, more sublime than those, which are the slow result of deep research, long study, and accurate observation. The peculiarities of trick and eccentricities of manner are thus exalted into the characteristics of heaven-born genius and native talent; and if the public do not receive these gigantic efforts with the favour which the artist expects, he comforts himself that his works are above vulgar capacities; the taste for the true sublime having been always confined to the chosen few. 48. The great artists of antiquity, though they exalt the characters of their gods and heroes above those of ordinary nature; yet, when exhibited in action, they put their limbs and bodies into such postures, as such actions would spontaneously produce in common life. Jupiter wields his thunderbolt, Neptune his trident, and Minerva her spear, exactly as we should: but, in the figures of Michel Angelo, all is directly reversed. The characters, though remote from ordinary or individual nature, are oftener below than above it, in dignity of expression; but then their attitudes and gestures are such, as ordinary nature never does display, under any circumstances; except such as influence it in a painter's or sculptor's study, or academy. Even in representing sleep, he could not employ a natural or easy posture; but has put Adam into one, in which, all the narcotic powers of opium could scarcely have enabled him to rest. 49. It was not however to conceal any want of industry or science that Michel Angelo ran into this error; but from an eager and injudicious desire to display knowledge, where he should have consulted feeling, and expressed X CHAP. III. Of Judg ment. CHAP. Of Judg ment. sentiment. Though not to be compared even with a third rate artist of ancient Greece in knowledge of the structure and pathology of the human body, he appears to have known more than any of his contemporaries; and when he made his knowledge subservient to his art, and not his art to his knowledge, he produced some compositions of real excellence. Such are almost all those, which he designed for others to execute; such as the Raising of Lazarus, the Descent from the Cross, and the Entombing of Christ; in which he lowered the tone of his invention to meet the capacities of the colourists, Sebastian del Piombo, and Daniel di Volterra; and thus, through mere condescension, became natural, easy, and truly sublime. Where he puts forth all his might, and sacrifices just expression to what is called grandeur of form and outline, he seems to me to counteract his own ends: for form, con* sidered in the abstract, is neither grand nor mean; but owes all its power of exciting sentiments, either of the one kind, or the other, to the association of ideas. We have learned, by habitual observation, that certain forms of the limbs and body are adapted to great exertions; and certain forms of the features, to great expression, or the expression of great character, and lofty sentiment; whence such forms excite grand and elevated ideas of the objects, in |