ry
detail. Here, you have a woman; there, a statue; here again, a dead
body. Your creation is incomplete. You have breathed only a part of your
soul into the well-beloved work. The torch of Prometheus went out in
your hands over and over again; there are several parts of your painting
on which the celestial flame never shone."

"But why is it so, my dear master?" said Porbus humbly, while the young
man could hardly restrain a strong desire to strike the critic.

"Ah! that is the question," said the little old man. "You are floating
between two systems,--between drawing and color, between the patient
phlegm and honest stiffness of the old Dutch masters and the dazzling
warmth and abounding joy of the Italians. You have tried to follow, at
one and the same time, Hans Holbein and Titian; Albrecht Durier and
Paul Veronese. Well, well! it was a glorious ambition, but what is
the result? You have neither the stern attraction of severity nor the
deceptive magic of the chiaroscuro. See! at this place the rich, clear
color of Titian has forced out the skeleton outline of Albrecht Durier,
as molten bronze might burst and overflow a slender mould. Here and
there the outline has resisted the flood, and holds back the magnificent
torrent of Venetian color. Your figure is neither perfectly well
painted nor perfectly well drawn; it bears throughout the signs of this
unfortunate indecision. If you did not feel that the fire of your genius
was hot enough to weld into one the rival methods, you ought to have
chosen honestly the one or the other, and thus attained the unity which
conveys one aspect, at least, of life. As it is, you are true only
on your middle plane. Your outlines are false; they do not round upon
themselves; they suggest nothing behind them. There is truth here," said
the old man, pointing to the bosom of the saint; "and here," showing the
spot where the shoulder ended against the background; "but there," he
added, returning to the throat, "it is all false. Do not inquire into
the why and wherefore. I should fill you with despair."

The old man sat down on a stool and held his head in his hands for some
minutes in silence.

"Master," said Porbus at length, "I studied that throat from the nude;
but, to our sorrow, there are effects in nature which become false or
impossible when placed on canvas."

"The mission of art is not to copy nature, but to represent it. You
are not an abject copyist, but a poet," cried the ol