Table-Talk | Page 6

I resolved to make mine (as nearly as I could) an exact
facsimile of nature. I did not then, nor do I now believe, with Sir
Joshua, that the perfection of art consists in giving general appearances
without individual details, but in giving general appearances with
individual details. Otherwise, I had done my work the first day. But I
saw something more in nature than general effect, and I thought it
worth my while to give it in the picture. There was a gorgeous effect of
light and shade; but there was a delicacy as well as depth in the
chiaroscuro which I was bound to follow into its dim and scarce

perceptible variety of tone and shadow. Then I had to make the
transition from a strong light to as dark a shade, preserving the masses,
but gradually softening off the intermediate parts. It was so in nature;
the difficulty was to make it so in the copy. I tried, and failed again and
again; I strove harder, and succeeded as I thought. The wrinkles in
Rembrandt were not hard lines, but broken and irregular. I saw the
same appearance in nature, and strained every nerve to give it. If I
could hit off this edgy appearance, and insert the reflected light in the
furrows of old age in half a morning, I did not think I had lost a day.
Beneath the shrivelled yellow parchment look of the skin, there was
here and there a streak of the blood-colour tinging the face; this I made
a point of conveying, and did not cease to compare what I saw with
what I did (with jealous, lynx-eyed watchfulness) till I succeeded to the
best of my ability and judgment. How many revisions were there! How
many attempts to catch an expression which I had seen the day before!
How often did we try to get the old position, and wait for the return of
the same light! There was a puckering up of the lips, a cautious
introversion of the eye under the shadow of the bonnet, indicative of
the feebleness and suspicion of old age, which at last we managed, after
many trials and some quarrels, to a tolerable nicety. The picture was
never finished, and I might have gone on with it to the present hour.[2]
I used to sit it on the ground when my day's work was done, and saw
revealed to me with swimming eyes the birth of new hopes and of a
new world of objects. The painter thus learns to look at Nature with
different eyes. He before saw her 'as in a glass darkly, but now face to
face.' He understands the texture and meaning of the visible universe,
and 'sees into the life of things,' not by the help of mechanical
instruments, but of the improved exercise of his faculties, and an
intimate sympathy with Nature. The meanest thing is not lost upon him,
for he looks at it with an eye to itself, not merely to his own vanity or
interest, or the opinion of the world. Even where there is neither beauty
nor use--if that ever were--still there is truth, and a sufficient source of
gratification in the indulgence of curiosity and activity of mind. The
humblest printer is a true scholar; and the best of scholars--the scholar
of Nature. For myself, and for the real comfort and satisfaction of the
thing, I had rather have been Jan Steen, or Gerard Dow, than the
greatest casuist or philologer that ever lived. The painter does not view

things in clouds or 'mist, the common gloss of theologians,' but applies
the same standard of truth and disinterested spirit of inquiry, that
influence his daily practice, to other subjects. He perceives form, he
distinguishes character. He reads men and books with an intuitive eye.
He is a critic as well as a connoisseur. The conclusions he draws are
clear and convincing, because they are taken from the things
themselves. He is not a fanatic, a dupe, or a slave; for the habit of
seeing for himself also disposes him to judge for himself. The most
sensible men I know (taken as a class) are painters; that is, they are the
most lively observers of what passes in the world about them, and the
closest observers of what passes in their own minds. From their
profession they in general mix more with the world than authors; and if
they have not the same fund of acquired knowledge, are obliged to rely
more on individual sagacity. I might mention the names of Opie, Fuseli,
Northcote, as persons distinguished for striking description and
acquaintance with the subtle traits of character.[3] Painters in ordinary
society, or in obscure situations where their value is not known, and
they are