pieces
of landscape character as might bear upon them the impression of solemn,
earnest, and pervading thought, definitely directed, and aided by every
accessory of detail, color, and idealized form, which the disciplined
feeling, accumulated knowledge, and unspared labor of the painter could
supply. I have alluded, in the second preface, to the deficiency of our
modern artists in these great points of earnestness and completeness; and
I revert to it, in conclusion, as their paramount failing, and one fatal
in many ways to the interests of art. Our landscapes are all descriptive,
not reflective, agreeable and conversational, but not impressive nor
didactic. They have no other foundation than

"That vivacious versatility,
Which many people take for want of heart.
They err; 'tis merely what is called "mobility;"
A thing of temperament, and _not of art,
Though seeming so from its supposed facility_.

* * * * *

This makes your actors, _artists_, and romancers;
Little that's great--but much of what is clever."

Only it is to be observed that--in painters--this vivacity is _not_
always versatile. It is to be wished that it were, but it is no such
easy matter to be versatile in painting. Shallowness of thought insures
not its variety, nor rapidity of production its originality. Whatever
may be the case in literature, facility is in art inconsistent with
invention. The artist who covers most canvas always shows, even in the
sum of his works, the least expenditure of thought.[79] I have never
seen more than four works of John Lewis on the walls of the Water-Color
Exhibition; I have counted forty from other hands; but have found in the
end that the forty were a multiplication of one, and the four a
concentration of forty. And therefore I would earnestly plead with all
our artists, that they should make it a law _never_ to repeat
themselves; for he who never repeats himself will not produce an
inordinate number of pictures, and he who limits himself in number gives
himself at least the opportunity of completion. Besides, all repetition
is degradation of the art; it reduces it from headwork to handwork; and
indicates something like a persuasion on the part of the artist that
nature is exhaustible or art perfectible; perhaps, even, by him
exhausted and perfected. All copyists are contemptible, but the