he has not felt them is
surprising. He has, however, in his second, in many respects admirable
part, manifested such change of opinion, and has shown such a growing
admiration for the old masters, whom in his first volume he treated
with so little respect, nay, with perfect contempt, that I cannot
doubt the operation of his better judgment, when in prosecuting his
subject, he will be led to consider the use of these materials of
nature to poetic art.

I must not, however, forget that I began this paper with questioning
the title of Rubens as a colourist. It has been shown, that I consider
no painter a colourist, who does not unite the two essentials of
colour,--agreeability, and its perfect sympathy with the subject.

I have endeavoured to show in what this agreeability consists. I have
not presumed to lay down any definite rules for the second great
essential; but I have endeavoured by illustration to enforce its
necessity; in this confident that a proper practice will follow, and
be the necessary result of a proper feeling. Now to speak of Rubens;
what are his characteristics as a colourist? Wherein lies his
excellence? I do not stop to repeat any of the extravagant praises
that have been so freely lavished upon him. But I would ask, is there
one _important_ picture by his hand, wherein the colour is of a
sentiment? Is there any one which, if you remove from it to such a
distance as not to see the subject in its particulars, will indicate
by its colouring what sort of narrative is to be told by a nearer
inspection? Try him by those in our National Gallery. I will take
first, his most powerful, and one of a subject most advantageous
perhaps to his manner, because there is no very striking sentiment to
be conveyed by it; for he seems scarcely serious in his treatment of
this passage in the Roman history. I speak of his "Rape of the
Sabines." Inasmuch as it is a picture of glare, and fluster, and
confusion, it may be said to represent the subject; but such ought not
to be the _sentiment_ of it. But inasmuch as it has this glare, and is
entirely deficient in all repose of colour, (for it is not requisite
to representation of violent action, that there should not be _that_
character of repose of colour which the essential agreeability
demands,) the eye cannot rest upon it with satisfaction as a whole.
You must approach it then nearer, to see how the particular objects
are coloured. You will be pleased with the skill with