ation of leaves and plants, "even to excite the
admiration of a botanist."--Sir Joshua said they were not there. Mr
Burnet examined the picture at Paris, and found, indeed, the detail, but
adds, that "they are made out with the same hue as the general tint of
the ground, which is a dull brown," an exemplification of the rule, "Ars
est celare artem." Mr Burnet remarks, that there is the same minute
detail in Titian's "Bacchus and Ariadne."--He is right--we have noticed
it, and suspected that it had lost the glazing which had subdued it. As
it is, however, it is not important. Mr Burnet is fearful lest the
authority of Sir Joshua should induce a habit of generalizing too much.
He expresses this fear in another note. He says, "the great eagerness to
acquire what the poet calls

'That voluntary style,
Which careless plays, and seems to mock at toil,'

and which Reynolds describes as so captivating, has led many a student
to commence his career at the wrong end. They ought to remember, that
even Rubens founded this excellence upon years of laborious and careful
study. His picture of himself and his first wife, though the size of
life, exhibits all the detail and finish of Holbein." Sir Joshua nowhere
recommends _careless_ style; on the contrary, he every where urges the
student to laborious toil, in order that he may acquire that facility
which Sir Joshua so justly calls captivating, and which afterwards
Rubens himself did acquire, by studying it in the works of Titian and
Paul Veronese; and singularly, in contradiction to his fears and all he
would imply, Mr Burnet terminates his passage thus:--"Nor did he
(Rubens) quit the dry manner of Otho Venius, till a contemplation of the
works of Titian and Paul Veronese enabled him to display with rapidity
those materials which industry had collected." It is strange to argue
upon the abuse of a precept, by taking it at the wrong end.

* * * * *

The TWELFTH DISCOURSE recurs likewise to much that had been before laid
down. It treats of methods of study, upon which he had been consulted by
artists about to visit Italy. Particular methods of study he considers
of little consequence; study must not be shackled by too much method. If
the painter loves his art, he will not require prescribed tasks;--to go
about which sluggishly, which he will do if he have another impulse, can
be of little advantage. Hence would follow, as he admirably express