l length
portrait of _Wordsworth_, in a modern painting of 'Christ riding into
Jerusalem;' it was amongst a group of Jews, and next to a likeness
of _Voltaire_. I believe the painter intended to contrast the
countenances of the Christian and infidel poets, and thus pay a
handsome compliment to the former; but the taste that placed the
ancients and moderns together, remind me of a fine old painting of the
Flemish school; a 'David with Goliah's head,' in the fore-ground of
which were a number of fat _Dutchmen_, dressed in _blue coats and
leather breeches_, with _pipes_ in their mouths."--"Raphael," says a
little French work on painting, in my possession, speaking of _unity_
of time, "_A peche contre cette regle, dans son tableau d'Heliodore,
ou il fait intervenir le Pape Jules 2 dans le Temple de Jerusalem
porte sur les epaules, des Gonfalonniers_." The same work notices a
breach of the _unity of design_ in Paul Veronese, "_qui dans la partie
droite d'un de ses tableaux, a represente Jesus Christ benissant
l'eau, dont il va etre baptise par St. Jean Baptiste; et dans la
partie gauche notre Seigneur tente par le diable_."--Upon the
celebrated "Transfiguration" of Raphael, I heard an artist remark,
"undoubtedly it is the first picture in the world, yet the painter has
erred in these respects:--the upper portion of the picture is occupied
by the subject, but the lower and fore-ground by the _Healing of
the Demoniac_. Now that event did not happen until after the
transfiguration, and we infringe upon our Saviour's _ubiquity_ by
supposing it to occur (contrary to the sacred story) at the same time.
_He_ may, indeed, as _God_ be _omnipresent_, but as _man_, the
New Testament no where asserts that the Incarnate Presence was in
different places at the same moment." Instances of erroneous judgment
are frequent in those who illustrate holy writ. Some have attempted to
embody _Him_, "whom no man hath seen at any time." Some have filled
their skies with beings as little aerial as possible, or apotheoses of
the Virgin and sundry saints. Angels, as some represent them, even in
whole lengths, are by _anatomists_ regarded as _monsters_; but what
then are the chubby winged heads _without bodies_, with which some
artists etherealize their works. Some err by mingling on the same
canvass the sacred and profane; scripture characters and the
non-descripts of heathen mythology. Nor is poetry free from the latter
error, as is exemplified in the