oyment of them shall be
greatest. For instance, in the matter we have at present in hand,
temperance in color does not mean imperfect or dull enjoyment of color;
but it means that government of color which shall bring the utmost
possible enjoyment out of all hues. A bad colorist does not _love_
beautiful color better than the best colorist does, nor half so much.
But he indulges in it to excess; he uses it in large masses, and
unsubdued; and then it is a law of Nature, a law as universal as that of
gravitation, that he shall not be able to enjoy it so much as if he had
used it in less quantity. His eye is jaded and satiated, and the blue
and red have life in them no more. He tries to paint them bluer and
redder, in vain: all the blue has become grey, and gets greyer the more
he adds to it; all his crimson has become brown, and gets more sere and
autumnal the more he deepens it. But the great painter is sternly
temperate in his work; he loves the vivid color with all his heart; but
for a long time he does not allow himself anything like it, nothing but
sober browns and dull greys, and colors that have no conceivable beauty
in them; but these by his government become lovely: and after bringing
out of them all the life and power they possess, and enjoying them to
the uttermost,--cautiously, and as the crown of the work, and the
consummation of its music, he permits the momentary crimson and azure,
and the whole canvas is in a flame.

Sec. VIII. Again, in curvature, which is the cause of loveliness in all
form; the bad designer does not enjoy it more than the great designer,
but he indulges in it till his eye is satiated, and he cannot obtain
enough of it to touch his jaded feeling for grace. But the great and
temperate designer does not allow himself any violent curves; he works
much with lines in which the curvature, though always existing, is long
before it is perceived. He dwells on all these subdued curvatures to the
uttermost, and opposes them with still severer lines to bring them out
in fuller sweetness; and, at last, he allows himself a momentary curve
of energy, and all the work is, in an instant, full of life and grace.

The curves drawn in Plate VII. of the first volume, were chosen entirely
to show this character of dignity and restraint, as it appears in the
lines of nature, together with the perpetual changefulness of the
degrees of curvature in one and the same line; but although the purpose
of that plate w