ght have been given to the honour of Reynolds,
he is "unconscious of having omitted any enquiry likely to lead him
aright."--P. 320. He may have made the enquiry without using the
information--a practice not inconsistent in such a biographer. For
instance, when he assumes, that in the portrait of Beattie, the figures
of Scepticism, Sophistry, and Infidelity, represent Hume, Voltaire, and
Gibbon; remarking, that they have survived the "insult of Reynolds." An
enquiry from Northcote ought to have led him to conclude otherwise, for
Northcote, who had the best means of knowing, says, "Because one of
those figures was a lean figure, (alluding to the subordinate ones
introduced,) and the other a fat one, people of lively imaginations
pleased themselves with finding in them the portraits of Voltaire and
Hume. But Sir Joshua, I have reason to believe, had no such thought when
he painted those figures." We have done with this disgusting Life. We
would preserve to art and the virtue-loving part of mankind the great
_integrity_ of the character of Sir Joshua Reynolds. Documents and
testimonies are sufficient to establish as much entire worth as falls to
the lot and adornment of the best; and to bring this conviction, that,
for the justice, candour, liberality, kindness, and generosity, which he
showed in his dealings with all, even his professional rivals, if he had
not had the extraordinary merit of being the greatest British painter,
he deserved, and will deserve, the respect of mankind; and to have had
his many and great virtues recorded in a far other manner than in that
among the "Lives of the British Painters." His pictures may have faded,
and may decay; but his precepts will still live, and tend to the
establishment and continuance of art built upon the soundest principles;
and the virtues of the man will ever give a grace to the profession
which he adorned, and, for the benefit of art, contribute mainly to his
own fame.

"Nihil enim est opere aut manu factum, quod aliquando non conficiat et
consumat Vetustas; at vero haec tua justitia et lenitas animi florescet
quotidie magis, ita ut quantum operibus tuis dinturnitas detrahet,
tantum afferet laudibus."

"He had," says Burke, "from the beginning of his malady, a distinct view
of his dissolution; and he contemplated it with that entire composure,
which nothing but the innocence, integrity, and usefulness of his life,
and an unaffected submission to the will of Providence, c