It has been remarked that the luminous and
transparent character of the flesh is enhanced, as in several of
Vandyke's portraits, by bringing it in contact with an earthy, dull
tint. Vandyke, indeed, when his ground would not permit him, introduced
over the shoulders of his females a scarf of this colour. Rembrandt
often plunges from the dark shadows of his head into his ground, and
thus gives both a breadth and unity. This practice, where the shadows of
the face are produced by the same colour as the contiguous background,
is certainly the foundation of simplicity.

I think the money value of Rembrandt's portraits may be taken as a
criterion of their intrinsic worth as works of art; other masters'
decline in producing high prices, Rembrandt's increase--witness
the portrait sold the other day at the Duke of Buckingham's, at
Stowe;--though the half-length of a burgomaster whom few people ever
heard of, it realized seven hundred guineas and upwards. No nameless
portrait by Reynolds, under the same disadvantages, would produce an
equivalent sum. Sir Joshua's portraits are either branches of our
aristocracy, or celebrated public characters. As a knowledge of art
advances, works fall naturally into their proper stations. When
Reynolds's sister asked Sir Joshua the reason that we never see any of
the portraits by Jervas now, he replied, "Because, my dear, they are all
up in the garret." Yet this man drove his chariot and four, and received
the praises of Pope in verse. Sir Godfrey Kneller would sometimes
receive a sum of money and a couple of portraits by Vandyke as payment;
but now, a single portrait of the great founder of the Dutch school
would outweigh in true value a large number of Kneller's collected
talent: yet Rembrandt died insolvent, and Sir Godfrey accumulated
a large fortune. And such will be the fate of those who paint for
posterity, "and look beyond the ignorant present." The true statement
of this change, which of necessity takes place, is, that the man of
genius paints according to the high impulse that has been given him, as
paramount to every other consideration; the other panders to the caprice
and ignorance of those who employ him. This it was that made Reynolds's
master, Hudson, exclaim, after Sir Joshua's return from Italy, "Why,
Joshua, you don't paint so well as you did before you went abroad!" When
men of genius and high talent fall upon favourable times, the result
is the reverse, and the fine arts