H TJ L E S 
 
 FOR THE REGULATION OF 
 
 THE Bmm immm, 
 
 OF THE 
 
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 1. At the Annual Meeting of said Parish there shall bo elected a Committee 
 on the Library, whose duty it shall be to provide a place for the keeping of the 
 Library, to employ a Librarian, to select the books that may from time to time be 
 purchased, to accept sui;h donations of books as they may deem suitable and 
 proper, to enforce the rules and regulations adopted for the management of the 
 Library, to make a Report at every Annual Meeting of the Parish, on the state 
 of the Library, proposing therein such measures in relation to the same, as may 
 be thought expedient. 
 
 2. The Librarian shall keep the l)ooks of the Library in a case, when not taken 
 out, shall have them covered with thick and strong paper, shall enter in a book 
 to be kept for that purpose the name of the person who takes the same ftx>m the 
 Library, the book taken, the time when taken out and returned, and shall collect 
 ail fines for the detention of the books, as herein provided. 
 
 3. Any person habitually attending public worship in said Parish, above the 
 age of 11} years, may take a volume from the Library, on application to the Li- 
 brarian immediately after the morning service every Sunday, and shall return 
 the same to the Library on or before the expiration of a fortnight. 
 
 4. No person shall have from the Library more than one volume at a time. 
 
 5. Books shall be returnable on Sunday of each week at the time aforesaid, 
 and at no other time. 
 
 0. The person who borrows a book from the Library shall be responsible for it?, 
 return in as good condition as wlien taken, ordinary wear excepted ; and if such 
 book be injured or lost, he shall pay to the Librarian the value thereof, or shall 
 replace the same and the other volumes of the work, if such there be, by an 
 edition equally as good, as may be determined by the Committee. 
 
 7. Any person who keeps more than a fortnight a book taken out, shall pay a 
 fine of twelve and a half cents per week for the time it is so detained beyond a 
 fortnight. 
 
 8. The books shall be returned to the Lil)rary annually, for inspection by the 
 Committee, on the first Sunday in April. 
 
 9. A copy of the Rules for the regulation of the Library shall be pasted within 
 the cover of each volume belonging to the same, and the name of the donor of 
 any volumes shall also be therein inserted. 
 
7V 
 
at 
 
Digitized by 
 
 the Internet Archive 
 
 
 
 in 2013 
 
 
 
 http://archive.org/details/memorialofhorati01tuck 
 
0f 
 
 CONSISTING OF A MEMOIR SELECTIONS PROM HIS WRITINGS 
 AND TRIBUTES TO HIS GENIUS 
 
 HENRY T TUCKERMAN 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 G. P. PUTNAM & CO., 10 PARK PLACE. 
 
 1853. 
 
.1 
 
 Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S5-3, 
 BY G. P. PUTNAM & CO., 
 In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern 
 District of New York. 
 
 R. Craighead, Printer, 
 53 Vesev Street. 
 
PiGE 
 
 Memoir 9 
 
 Catalogue of Wo5iks, 54 
 
 ESSAYS. 
 
 P 
 
 ^Esthetics at Y/ashington, 61 
 
 (f Social Theories 95 
 
 S American Aet, 105 
 
 American Architecture, IIT 
 
 J- Kelative and Independent Beauty, ISl 
 
 The Trumbull Gallery 146 
 
 Burke on The Beautiful, . , . . . . , 151 
 
 Criticism in Search of Beauty, 15Y 
 
 Structure and Organization, 1*70 
 
 The Cooper Monument, 184 
 
 Fashion, 188 
 
 j An Artist's Creed, 192 
 
 Fragments, 199 
 
CONTEKTS. 
 
 TRIBUTES. 
 
 Pi.GR 
 
 Essay on the Statue of "Washington, by A. H. Everett, . 215 
 A Visit to Greenough's Studio, from " Scenes and Thoughts 
 
 IN Europe," 226 
 
 Meeting of Artists at Rome, 232 
 
 To THE Group of The Angel and Child, by Washington 
 
 Allston, 238 
 
 To the Same, 239 
 
 To THE Statue of Medoba, by Richard H. Dana, . . . 240 
 
 To THE Statue of Washington, by H. T. Tuckerman, . . 241 
 
 To the Chanting Cherubs, by Richard H. Dana, . , . 243 
 Monody on the Death of Horatio Greexough, by George 
 
 H. Calvert, 244 
 
MEMOIR. 
 
 Although tlie creations of the artist are his best monument, 
 when the spirit in which he works transcends the limits of a 
 special vocation, and associates him with the progress of society, 
 and the happiness of his friends, a catalogue raisonne of what 
 he has left in marble or colors, we feel to be an incomplete 
 record of his life. The recent death of our earliest sculptor has 
 caused so wide and sincere a grief that it becomes not less a 
 sacred duty than a melancholy pleasure to trace his career, 
 gather up the tributes to his genius, and endeavor to delineate 
 the features of his character ; and it is at the request of those 
 more dear to hira, as well as from a vivid sentiment of affection 
 and regret, that I have prepared this inadequate memorial of 
 
 A life that all the muses decked 
 
 With gifts of grace that might express 
 All-comprehensive tenderness, 
 
 All subtilizing intellect : 
 2 
 
10 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 Heart-affluence in discursive talk 
 
 From houseliold fountains never dry; 
 
 The critic clearness of an eye, 
 That saw through all the Muses' walk : 
 
 No longer caring to embalm 
 
 In dying songs or dead regret, 
 
 But like a statue solid-set, 
 And moulded in colossal calm.* 
 
 Horatio Greenough was born in Boston, Massachusetts, 
 September 6, 1805. His father belonged to that respected 
 class of merchants whose integrity, enterprise, and intelligence, 
 half a century ago, justly gave them a degree of consideration 
 which is almost unknown at the present day. Comparatively 
 few in number, and active in the political and social life of the 
 town, they almost created public opinion, and were remarkable 
 for individuality of character not less than a tone of mind above 
 and beyond the mere spirit of trade. This was evinced in the 
 careful manner in which their children were brought up, and the 
 intellectual privileges afforded them, the sacred interest attached 
 to home, and the superiority of the local schools. The mother 
 of Greenough is a native of Massachusetts, endowed with the 
 conscientious affection and vigorous intellect that are so honor- 
 able a distinction of the genuine New England matron. He 
 was one of several children, and shared with them the educa- 
 
 * Tennyson's In Memoriam. 
 
Memoir. 11 
 
 tion both of public and private seminaries, and of the domestic 
 circle. 
 
 The instinct of genius discovers amid circumstances appa- 
 rently inauspicious, the means and incentives for its develop- 
 ment. In the community where Greenough was born and 
 passed his early years, there existed a prevalent taste and more 
 than one noble example to encourage the votary of letters ; 
 Stuart's masterpieces, family portraits by Copley, a few choice 
 originals and many fine copies from the old masters, as well as 
 the presence of native artists of more or less skill and fame, 
 offered a stimulus to the cultivation of drawing and painting; 
 the system of popular education, and the intellectual tone of 
 society, were also highly favorable to individual culture in its 
 general relations ; but the art of modelling in clay was rarely if 
 ever practised, the specimens of sculpture were few, and only 
 a strong natural bias could have so early directed Greenough's 
 aspirations towards the art. Having a decided sense of form, 
 a love of imitating it, and a mechanical aptitude which kept 
 his knife, pencil, and scissors continually active, he employed 
 hours in carving, drawing, and moulding toys, faces, and wea- 
 pons, by way of amusing himself and his comrades. I have 
 seen a head evidently taken from an old Roman coin, executed 
 upon a bit of compact plaster about the size of a penny, admi- 
 rably cut by Greenough with a penknife and common nail, 
 while a schoolboy, seated upon the door-step of one of his 
 neighbors. The lady who observed this achievement, pre- 
 served the little medal with rehgious care ; and was the first to 
 
12 Memoir. 
 
 give the young sculptor a commission. It was for her that he 
 executed the beautiful ideal bust of the Genius of Love. This 
 propensity soon took a higher range. It was encouraged 
 by the mechanics and professional men around him, whose 
 good-will his agreeable manners and obvious genius propi- 
 tiated. One kind artisan taught him the use of fine tools; a 
 stone-cutter, of more than ordinary taste, instructed him to 
 wield a chisel ; benevolent librarians allowed him the use of 
 plates, casts, and manuals; a physician gave him access to 
 anatomical designs and illustrations; and Binon, a French 
 artist, known by his bust of John Adams in Faneuil Hall, Bos- 
 ton, encouraged him to model at his side. Thus, as a mere ♦ 
 schoolboy, did Greenough glean the rudiments of an artistic 
 education without formal initiation. With eclectic wisdom he 
 sought and found the aid he required, while exploring the 
 streets of his native town ; one day he might be seen 
 poring over a folio, or contemplating a plaster copy of a 
 famous statue; and, on another, exercising his mechanical 
 ingenuity at the office of Solomon Willard, whose family name 
 yet stamps, with traditional value, many an old dial-plate in 
 New England ; now he eagerly watches Alpheus Gary as he 
 puts the finishing touch to a cherub's head on a tombstone ; 
 and, again, he stands a respectful devotee before Shaw or 
 Coggswell, waiting for some treasured volume on the process 
 or the results of his favorite art, from the shelves of Harvard 
 and the Athenaeum. Some of his juvenile triumphs are still 
 remembered by his playmates — especially a pistol ornamented 
 
Memoir. 13 
 
 ■with relievo flowers in lead, a series of carriages moulded in 
 bee's-wax, scores of wooden daggers tastefully carved, a lion 
 coucliant, modelled with a spoon from a pound of butter, to 
 astonish his mother's guests at tea, elaborate card-paper plans 
 for. estates, and, as a climax to these childish yet graceful expe- 
 riments, a little figure of Penn cut in chalk from an engraving 
 of his statue in the Port-Folio. 
 
 There is no truth more sustained by the facts of conscious- 
 ness, than that the mind assimilates only its legitimate nutriment. 
 The artist, the hero, and the lover seem hardly conscious of 
 any element of Hfe, save that which ministers to their idiosyn- 
 crasy ; and it is in these laws of character, and not in any external 
 appliances, that we must seek. a true philosophy of life. The 
 real-estate broker, as he passed the home of the young sculptor, 
 saw but a certain number of feet of ground, and perchance 
 speculated on its value; but the ardent gaze of the boy was 
 only conscious of a statue of Phocion that stood in the garden. 
 The mystery of that figure, the process of its creation, the 
 law of its design, were the great problems of his dawning intel- 
 ligence ; he was sensible of a relation to the sphere of human 
 activity represented by that image. It was more to him than 
 the animated forms in the street, more than the printed charac- 
 ters of his hornbook, more than an academic degree. It was 
 a nucleus for his reveries, a hint to his ingenuity, a prophecy 
 of his hfe. It kept bright and palpable to his young imagina- 
 tion the idea of being a sculptor, and though the language of 
 State St. Long Wharf, and even the old South Church gave no 
 
14 Memoir. 
 
 confirmation to the oracle, — to him its silent eloquence was 
 none the less impressive, for his nature had an element of the 
 Greek as well as the Puritan, which asserted itself in spite of 
 time and place. 
 
 This strong tendency for art did not, however, alone charac- 
 terize his mind. The graces of scholarship were equally 
 native. At school and college he excelled in the classics, and 
 exhibited a command of language and perception of the 
 beauties of expression, such as usually indicate the future orator 
 and poet It is recorded that no classmate excelled him in 
 verbal memory ; and when quite a boy, he used to recite a 
 thousand lines of English verse, at a time, without error or 
 hesitation. Fortunately, too, his physical development kept 
 pace with his mental activity. He was a proficient in all 
 manly exercises. Indeed, that peculiar zest of action which 
 belongs to organizations at once nervous and muscular, never 
 ceased to inspire him. A good horseman, swimmer, pedestrian 
 — he seemed to enjoy his sensitive and athletic, not less than 
 his mental being; and when, at the age of sixteen, he entered 
 Harvard University, in appearance and intellectual promise, he 
 was the ideal of a gifted youth. It is remarkable that while 
 his family had given no direct encouragement to his artistic 
 plans, and made it a condition of their future realization, that 
 he should pass through the usual academic training, he found 
 at Cambridge, the highest and most valuable inspiration as a 
 votary of art, yet experienced. There, at the house of Mr. 
 Dana, he became acquainted with Washington Allston, who 
 
Memoir. 15 
 
 soon, and, as it were, by the law of nature, became his master ; 
 not that there was any recognised connexion of the kind be- 
 tween them, but an affinity of genius, a mutual worship of the 
 beautiful, and an earnest purpose quite apart from and above 
 those around them, — bound together in the highest sympathy, 
 the mature, religious artist, and the enthusiastic youth. 
 Long afterwards when applied to for some biographical data, 
 he answered ; " A note to AUston's life might tell all of me that 
 is essential." In one of his letters from Italy, at a later period, 
 he declares — " Allston was to me a father in what concerned my 
 progress of every kind. He taught me first how to discrimi- 
 nate, how to think, how to feel. Before I knew him I felt 
 strongly but blindly, and if I should never pass mediocrity, I 
 should attribute it to my absence from him, so adapted did he 
 seem to kindle and enlighten me, making me no longer myself, 
 but, as it were, an emanation from his own soul ;" and on his last 
 return to America, he said with great emotion to a friend, that 
 the only thought which cast a shadow over his heart, was that 
 Allston was no more. 
 
 A classmate, with whom he was intimate, intended to become 
 a physician, and, while an undergraduate, began his medical 
 inquiries. The two young men, one for a professional, and the 
 other for an artistic object, engaged with zeal in anatomical 
 ■ investigations. The sister of this college friend of Greenough, 
 remembers the ardor and mutual interest with which they 
 carried on this pursuit, — often bringing anatomical preparations 
 to the house, and always impatient to return to Cambridge 
 
16 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 before the evening of their weekly holiday, in order to hear 
 Allston's conversation. It was a habit with him to visit his 
 friend Edmund Dana on Saturdays ; the two students occupied 
 rooms in the house of the latter gentleman, whom they always 
 called " the master," on account of his serene wisdom and fine 
 perception in art and letters ; and to hear the two men, whom 
 they most deeply reverenced, talk, was to them at once inspira- 
 tion and knowledge beyond the teachings of the University^ 
 the invaluable episode of their academic life. 
 
 It was rare in those early days and in that latitude to find a 
 genuine lover of art ; as a career the practical and commercial 
 spirit of the people repudiated it ; and among the educated, pro- 
 fessional life combined with the honors of literature and states- 
 manship, yielded almost the only prizes of ambition. Artists were 
 therefore comparatively isolated ; and we can readily imagine the 
 pleasure with which a painter at once so benign and highly en- 
 dowed as Allston would welcome to his own sphere another with 
 a mind so finely tempered and prophetic of excellence as Green- 
 ough. Accordingly the best hours of the latter's college-life 
 were those passed with Allston ; from him he caught the most 
 elevated ideal of art, a sense of its dignity, a courage to face 
 its inevitable discipline, and a faith in its great rewards. This 
 intercourse gave consistency to Greenough's aims and new 
 vigor to his resolution ; it was also a source of the highest im- 
 mediate enjoyment. A few perhaps of the friends of either 
 yet recall the scene presented, on a moonlight evening of sum- 
 mer, when they were the central figures of a charmed gro up 
 
Memoir. 17 
 
 on the piazza, — aroimd them the glimmering foliage, dark sward, 
 and bright firmament ; — the spiritual countenance and long sil- 
 very hair of Allston, wearing the semblance of a bard or prophet, 
 and the tall agile figure and radiant face of his young disciple, 
 both intent upon a genial theme. Those hours were memora- 
 ble to the casual auditors ; and to Greenough they were 
 fraught with destiny. His nature was essentially sympathetic ; 
 example and personal communion taught him infinitely more 
 than books. He required heat as well as light to inform and 
 mould his mind, and the friendship and conversation of such 
 an artist as our great painter, at this most susceptible epoch 
 of his life, could not but give a new impetus and a sanction to 
 his genius. 
 
 There was an exuberance and variety in his youthful mind 
 that charmed elder companions, and awoke in them a pro- 
 phetic interest. The routine of college life w^as, indeed, subor- 
 dinate, in his estimation, to the practice of art and the enjoy- 
 ment of gifted society ; and yet, by virtue of a natural aptitude 
 and an honorable spirit, he fulfilled the allotted tasks with 
 eminent fidelity, and excelled in all branches save mathema- 
 tics, for which he had an instinctive dislike. In the intervals 
 of these studies he cultivated his private tastes with an assi- 
 duity that surprised his most intimate associates. One of 
 these, now a venerable man, has told me, with a glow of aftec- 
 tionate pride, of a landscape that Greenough painted while 
 an under-graduate, of some beautiful sonnets he then com- 
 posed, and of an excellent fac-simile he wrought of a bust of 
 
 2* 
 
18 Memoir. 
 
 Napoleon. While such evidences of genius won for him the 
 high regard of his own, a handsome person, animated conversa- 
 tion, and graceful manners, rendered him a favorite with the 
 other sex; yet amid the calls upon his time, and the constant 
 exercise of his powers, incident to such a position, the primary 
 direction of his mind never wavered. Sculpture was the art to 
 "which he had long since resolved to dedicate his life ; and to 
 this were given the hours not absorbed by his college duties 
 and his friends. He modelled, at this period, a bust of Wash- 
 ington, from Stuart's portrait, and others of his own contempora- 
 ries, from life. A proposal for designs for the monument on 
 Bunker Hill having been issued, Greenough constructed a model 
 in wood which was at once selected by the committee, although 
 the prize they oflfered the successful competitor was never 
 bestowed upon him who was fully entitled to it. The interior 
 arrangement of the work was planned by another, but the form, 
 proportions, and style of the monument were adopted from 
 Greenough's model ; and the simple, majestic, and noble struc- 
 ture that designates the early battle field of the American 
 Revolution, is thus indissolubly associated with his name. His 
 preference for the obelisk seems to have been confirmed by 
 subsequent observation ; and the reasons he assigns for this 
 choice, in one of his papers on art, are certainly not less forcible 
 than just. In anticipation of his residence abroad, he also 
 began, while at college, the study of the Italian language, and 
 could speak it with considerable fluency months before he 
 embarked for Europe. Another instance of this facility in 
 
Memoir. 19 
 
 acquiring a foreign tongue occurred many years later, when, on 
 the occasion of a visit to Graefenburiif for the health of his 
 family, he became an excellent German scholar. Italian, how- 
 ever, continued to be his favorite language, and during the last 
 few days of his hfe, only its soft vowels escaped his fevered lips. 
 
 From diffidence he wished to avoid the delivery of his part, 
 which had not only been awarded but written ; and towards 
 the close of his senior year, with the approbation of the college 
 government, he availed himself of a favorable opportunity and 
 embarked for Marseilles. Thence he proceeded to Rome. It 
 was at that period uncommon for an American student of art 
 to take up his residence there ; and Greenough was the pio- 
 neer of his country's sculptors. He engaged with zeal in the 
 usual course of observation and practice, drawing and model- 
 ling from life at the Academy and from the antique at the 
 Vatican. His habits of self-denial and simple tastes were con- 
 firmed by this systematic discipline. " I began to study art in 
 Rome," he observes ; " until then I had rather amused myself 
 with clay and marble than studied. When I say that those 
 materials were familiar to my touch, I say all that I profited 
 by my boyish efforts. It was not until I had run through all 
 the galleries and studios of Rome, and had under ray eye the 
 genial forms of Italy, that I began to feel Nature's value. I 
 had before adored her, but as a Persian does the sun, with my 
 face to the ground." Here he enjoyed the friendship of Thor- 
 waldsen, and his companion at this time was R. W. Weir, the 
 painter ; they occupied rooms in the house known as Claude's, 
 
20 Memoir. 
 
 on the Pincian Hill. After long and severe application, 
 a severe illness induced by the malaria, so prostrated Green- 
 ough as to induce his return home ; and his faithful brother 
 artist not only watched over him abroad, but accompanied him 
 to the United States. The voyage completely restored his 
 health, and a visit of several months among his friends was not 
 unprofitably occupied in executing several busts of his distin- 
 guished countrymen. At Paris, also, he remained awhile to 
 execute a bust of Lafayette. " The bust of David," says 
 Cooper, in allusion to this work, " is like, it cannot be mis- 
 taken, but it is in his ordinary manner — heroic or poetical ; on 
 the other hand, the bust of Greenough is the very man, and 
 should be dear to us in proportion as it is faithful. As Lafayette 
 himself expressed it, ' one is a French bust, the other an Ame- 
 rican.' " On his return to Italy, Greenough passed many 
 weeks at the quarries of Carrara, a fine school for the practical 
 details of statuary ; and then proceeded to Florence, where he 
 took up his abode. It was here, in the autumn of 1833, that I 
 first met him, and I quote from impressions soon after recorded : 
 " On one of the last afternoons preceding my embarkation, I 
 had sat a long hour opposite a striking, though by no means 
 faithful portrait of Greenough, while one of the fairest of his 
 kindred spoke fondly of him, and charged me with many a 
 message of love for the gifted absentee. On a table beneath 
 the picture stood one of the earliest products of his chisel. I 
 glanced from the countenance of the young sculptor, to the 
 evidence of his dawning genius ; I listened to the story of his 
 
Memoir. 21 
 
 exile ; and thenceforth he was enshrined high and brightly 
 among the ideals of my memory. With rapid steps, therefore, 
 the morning after my arrival in Florence, I threaded the narrow 
 thoroughfare, passed the gigantic cathedral, nor turned aside 
 until, from the end of a long and quiet street, I discerned the 
 archway which led to the domicile of my countryman. Asso- 
 ciations arose within me, such as the time-hallowed and novel 
 objects around failed to inspire. There was a peculiar charm in 
 the idea of visiting the foreign studio of a countryman devoted 
 to the art of sculpture, to one who was fresh from the stirring 
 atmosphere of his native metropolis. Traversing the court and 
 stairway, I could but scan the huge fragments of marble that 
 lined them, ere entering a side door, I found myself in the pre- 
 sence of the artist. He was seated beside a platform, contem- 
 plating an unfinished model, which bore the impress of recent 
 moulding. In an adjoining apartment was the group of the 
 Guardian Angel and Child — the countenances already radiant 
 with distinctive and touching loveliness, and the limbs exhibit- 
 ing their perfect contour, although the more graceful and deli- 
 cate lines were as yet undeveloped. One by one I recognised 
 the various plaster casts about the room — mementos of his 
 former labors. My eye fell on a bust which awakened sea and 
 forest pictures — the spars of an elegant craft, the lofty figure of 
 a hunter, the dignified bearing of a mysterious pilot. It was 
 the physiognomy of Cooper. And yon original, arch-looking 
 gentleman ? Ah ! that can be no other than Francis Alexan- 
 der. Surely those Adonis-like ringlets, so daintily carved. 
 
22 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 belong to one whom it is most pleasing to remember as the 
 writer of some exqui>ite verses under the signature of Roy. 
 No one can mistake the benevolent features of Lafayette, or 
 the expressive image of the noble pilgrim-bard ; or fail to linger 
 in the corridor, over the embodiment of one of his fairest crea- 
 tions — the figure of the dead Medora. In other studios of the 
 land I beheld a more numerous and imposing array ; but in 
 none could I discover more of that individuality of design and 
 execution which characterizes native intellectual results. 
 
 "Coleridge's favorite prescription for youthful atheism was 
 love ; on the same principle would we commend to the admi- 
 ration of the scoffer at a spiritual philosophy, the unwavering 
 and martyr-like progress of genius towards its legitimate end. 
 In this characteristic, the course of all gifted beings agrees. 
 They have a mission to fulfil ; and lured betimes, as they may 
 be, by the fiowers of the wayside, and baffled awhile, as is the 
 destiny of man, by vicissitude — from first to last the native 
 impulse, the true direction, is everywhere discernible. In the 
 case of Greenough, this definiteness of aim, this solemnity of 
 determination, if we may so call it, is remarkably evident. 
 Often did he incur the penalty of tardiness, by lingering to 
 gaze at a wooden eagle which surmounted the gateway of an 
 old edifice he daily passed — thinking, as he told me, how beau- 
 tiful it must be to carve such a one. 
 
 " When he arrived in Genoa he was yet in his minority. 
 He entered a church. A statue, more perfect than he had ever 
 beheld, met his eye. With wonder he saw hundreds pass it 
 
Memoir. 23 
 
 by, without bestowing even a glance. He gazed in admiration 
 on the work of art, and marked the careless crowd, till a new 
 and painful train of thoughts was suggested. ' What !' he 
 soliloquized, * are the multitude so accustomed to beautiful sta- 
 tues that even this fails to excite their passing notice ? How 
 presumptuous, then, in me, to hope to accomplish anything 
 worthy of the art !' He was deeply moved, as the distance 
 between himself and the goal he had fondly hoped to reach, 
 widened to his view; and concealing himself among the rub- 
 bish of a palace-yard, the young and ardent exile sought relief 
 in tears. * genius !' I mused, going forth with this anecdote 
 fresh from his lips, ' how mysterious thou art ! And yet how 
 identical are the characteristics of thy children ! Susceptible 
 and self-distrusting, and yet vividly conscious of high endow- 
 ments — slow to execute and quick to feel — pressing on amid 
 the winning voices of human allurements, or the wailing cry of 
 human weakness and want — as pilgrims bent on an errand of 
 more than earthly import, through a night of dimness and 
 trial, and yet ever beholding the star, hearing the angel-choir, 
 and hastening on to worship !' 
 
 " On one of the most beautiful evenings of my visit, I accom- 
 panied Greenough to the studio where he proposed to erect his 
 statue of Washington. It was a neat edifice ; which had for- 
 merly been used as a chapel ; and from its commodious size 
 and retired situation, seemed admirably adapted to his purpose. 
 The softened effulgence of an Italian twilight glimmered 
 through the high windows, and the quiet of the place was 
 
24 Memoir. 
 
 invaded only by distant rural sounds and the murmur of the 
 nearest foliage in the evening breeze. There was that in the 
 scene and its suggestions, which gratified my imagination. I 
 thought of the long and soothing days of approaching summer, 
 which my companion would devote, in this solitary and plea- 
 sant retreat, to his noble enterprise. I silently rejoiced that the 
 blessed ministry of nature would be around him, to solace, 
 cheer, and inspire, when his energies were bending to their 
 glorious task : — that when w^eariness fell upon his spirit, he 
 could step at once into the luxurious air, and look up to the 
 deep green cypresses of Fiesole, or bare his brow to the moun- 
 tain wind, and find refreshment ; — that when doubt and per- 
 plexity bafiied his zeal, he might turn his gaze towards the 
 palace roofs and church domes of Florence, and recall the tro- 
 phies of art wrought out by travail, misgivings, and care, that 
 are garnered beneath them; that when his hope of success 
 should grow faint, he might suspend the chisel's movement, 
 raise his eye to the western horizon, and remember the land 
 for which he toiled."* 
 
 Greenough then occupied the wing of a somewhat dreary 
 palazzo near the Porto Pinti; the window of his studio, how- 
 ever, commanded views of an extensive garden ; and one of the 
 rooms was fitted up in the American style. Here, beside a 
 wood fire, on winter evenings, it was his delight to greet two 
 or three friends around the tea-table, speculate on the news 
 
 * ItaUan Sketch Book. 
 
Memoir. 25 
 
 from home, criticise works of art, and tell stories. I recall, 
 with melancholy pleasure, many of these occasions. He would 
 often occupy himself with pen or crayon while thus enjoying a 
 social hour ; sometimes covering a sheet of paper with the 
 remembered faces of the absent and the loved ; and, at others, 
 making elaborate and carefully wrought designs for a basso- 
 relievo or statue. He had studies enough for twenty years' 
 use, partially sketched at the time of his death. A fine speci- 
 men of his facility and precision as a draughtsman is before 
 me as I write — his parting gift when I left Florence. It 
 represents Orestes tormented by the Furies ; the clear, fine out- 
 line and statuesque efi'ect, as well as the relief of the figures, 
 are given with the finish of an excellent engraving. Not less 
 pleasant in the retrospect, are the walks we used to take, some 
 years later, during a remarkably fine autumn. He beguiled 
 the way with humorous anecdotes, descriptions of men and 
 places, and remarks on art and letters. There was a vivacious, 
 liberal, and often brilliant tone in those by-way conversations 
 that indicated a mental affluence in the highest degree win- 
 some and satisfactory. We were usually accompanied by a 
 remarkably fine English greyhound, a great pet of Green- 
 ough's, called Arno, whose intelligent gambols always amused 
 him ; this favorite dog lived to a green old age, and his marble 
 eflBgy, in an attitude peculiar to him, from the chisel of his 
 master, now ornaments the library of the Hon. Edward 
 Everett. 
 
 Comparatively isolated however in the pursuit of his art, at 
 
26 Memoir. 
 
 a distance from home, and destitute of that encouragement 
 which the natives of Europe bestow upon their artistic country- 
 men, Grcenough's first years in Florence were passed with 
 httle but dreams of hope, and the consciousness of improve- 
 ment to sustain him. There were periods, at this time, when 
 the young sculptor was depressed and nervous; — as month 
 after month flitted by and brought him no commissions. The 
 Americans who visited Italy, delighted in his society and 
 respected his self-devotion ; but few had the means, and very 
 few the taste and liberality to give him substantial aid. He 
 occupied himself upon busts, designs, and studies ; and reahzed 
 that in art, as in life, "they also serve who only stand in wait." 
 
 It was about this period, however, that his heart was cheered 
 by the reception of anonymous pecuniary aid. He never dis- 
 covered the source of this kindly benefaction ; but circum- 
 stances justified him in the conviction, that it was sent from 
 his native city. To evidence his gratitude he had recourse to 
 an artistic device worthy of his genius. He sent to a friend in 
 Boston a basso-relievo in marble, representing a student intent 
 upon his book; a lamp burns before him, and a hand mysteri- 
 ously thrust from the cloud above, is feeding it with oil. The 
 design is well executed ; and the unknown benefactor must 
 have thrilled with pleasure at so graceful an acknowledgment. 
 He always referred with grateful emotion, also, to the gleam 
 of sunshine which encouraged him, at this crisis, in the friendship 
 of our late renowned novelist — Cooper. The American sym- 
 pathies of this distinguished man, as well as his personal afi"ec- 
 
Memoir. 27 
 
 tion, were excited by Greenough. One day they paused in one 
 of the saloons of the Pitti palace, before a capo cfopera of 
 Raphael, and the artist pointed out to his companion the fine 
 drawing exhibited in two Httle angelic figures in the foreground, 
 in the act of holding an open book, and singing. Cooper inquir- 
 ed if a subject like this was not well adapted to sculpture ; 
 afterwards one of his daughters copied the figures ; and the 
 result of their mutual interest in the design, was an order from 
 Cooper for a group, which in a few months Greenough execut- 
 ed in marble. It was afterwards exhibited in America, under 
 the name of the " Chanting Cherubs and not only proved a 
 most acceptable immediate encouragement, but served to in- 
 troduce the artist to his countrymen. In allusion to this sub- 
 ject, the artist observes in a letter written some years after ; 
 " Fenimore Cooper saved me from despair after my return to 
 Italy. He employed me as I wished to be employed ; and 
 up to this moment has been as a father to me." 
 
 This was the first group in marble executed by an American. 
 The scope of the work is obviously limited. It consists merely 
 of two nude cherubs. Yet a careful scrutiny will reveal those 
 niceties of execution which proclaim the true artist. One of 
 the figures is planted on its little feet, and its position is up- 
 right ; his bosom heaves with a gentle exultation as if inspired 
 by the song ; his companion, quite as beautiful, is slightly awed ; 
 one has ringlets that suggest more strength than the smooth 
 flowing hair of his brother, whose face is also longer and more 
 spiritual and subdued ; he is more up-looking, less self-sustain- 
 
28 Memoir. 
 
 ed. A most true and delicate principle of contrast is thus un- 
 folded in the two forms and faces. The celestial and the child- 
 like are blended ; we realize, as we gaze, the holiness of infant 
 beauty ; a peaceful, blessed charm seems wafted from the 
 infantile forms, whose contour and expression are alive with 
 innocent, sacred, and, as it were, magnetic joy. Here we 
 have the poetry of childhood, as in the Medora the poetry of 
 Death. 
 
 The grace, truth to nature, and infantile beauty of the Che- 
 rubs w^ere at once and warmly recognised. It was an inciden- 
 tal result of this labor of love that Greenough obtained the 
 government order to execute his statue of Washington. The 
 pledge he had thus given of ability, and the earnest represen- 
 tations of Allston, Cooper, and Everett, were the means of this 
 important enterprise. To the sculptor's honor these timely 
 services were never forgotten. His last work was a bust of his 
 illustrious friend, the American novelist, which he proposed to 
 cast in bronze, at his own expense, and' place in the field 
 where stands the old mill in Newport — one of the scenes of 
 his novel of the " Red Rover." He also took frequent counsel 
 with the friends of the departed author in regard to erecting a 
 suitable monument to his name, and among his papers is an 
 elaborate design for the work. The example of recognition 
 thus commenced was soon followed, and numerous orders 
 reached the now prosperous exile. Among the beautiful ideal 
 works he executed within the few succeeding years was 
 Medora — illustrative of Byron's memorable description of the 
 
Memoir. 
 
 29 
 
 Corsair's bride after death ; of which the greatest praise is to 
 say that the marble embodies the verse : 
 
 In life itself she was so still and fair, 
 
 That death with gentler aspect withered there ; 
 
 And the cold flowers her colder hand contained, j 
 
 In that last grasp as tenderly were strained 
 
 As if she scarcely felt but feigned a sleep, . 
 
 And made it almost mockery yet to weep ; 
 
 The long dark lashes fringed her lids of snow, 
 
 And veiled — thought shrinks from all that lurked below ; 
 
 Oh ! on the eye death most exerts his might. 
 
 And hurls the spirit from her throne of light ! 
 
 Sinks those blue orbs in that long lost eclipse, 
 
 But spares, as yet, the charm around the lips — 
 
 Yet, yet they seemed as they forbore to smile, 
 
 And wished repose — but only for a while ; j 
 
 But the white shroud and each extended tress, 
 
 Long, fair — but spread in utter lifelessness, 
 
 Which, late the sport of every summer wind, ' 
 
 Escaped the baffled wreath that strove to bind : 
 
 These — and the pale pure cheek, became the bier — 
 
 But she is nothing — wherefore is he here?* 
 
 There is a mingled pathos and delicacy in the shape and 
 attitude of this figure which touches the heart and awes the 
 imagination. The lines of the face have that inflexible repose 
 which indicates the sleep of death ; the neck and bosom are 
 
 * The Corsair. Canto iii. 
 
80 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 eloquent of feminine grace; the peculiar grasp of the hand 
 which still retains the flowers, and the manner in which the 
 drapery folds over the limbs, are in exquisite harmony with the 
 subject. A chaste beauty, entire proportion, and affecting inte- 
 rest characterize the Medora. The " Angel and Child" is another 
 favorite work. Its conception is singularly beautiful, and it is 
 realized to the life. The artist's idea was to represent a child 
 received and guided by its angel companion into the mysterious 
 glories of heaven. The difference between the human and the 
 spiritual is exhibited in the baby outline of the child, rounded, 
 natural, and real — and the mature celestial grace of the angel — 
 his look of holy courage and his attitude of cheer, while the reve- 
 rence and timidity of his newly-arrived brother are equally obvi- 
 ous. In these subjects the high imagination and native senti- 
 ment of the sculptor are evident. His taste for English poetry 
 caused him to select with discrimination and indicate with faci- 
 lity the most apt illustrations both with pen and chisel. With 
 the latter he imaged the most vague yet effective of Pope's 
 female portraits — Heloise : 
 
 " Dear, fatal name ! rest ever unrevealed, 
 Nor pass these lips in holy silence sealed ; 
 Hide it, my heart, within that close disguise 
 Where, joined with God's, his loved idea lies." 
 
 In the portraits of children, whether from actual life or his 
 own fancy, Greenough excelled. Two boys playing with a 
 squirrel, and two others engaged in a game of battledore, we 
 
Memoir. 31 
 
 recall as remarkable specimens both of spirited portraiture and 
 felicitous action. His earliest ideal work was a statue of 
 Abel, modelled during his first visit to Rome — and his last, 
 " the Rescue." It was executed at Florence for the govern- 
 ment, designed in 183Y, and completed in 1851. It represents 
 the conflict between the Anglo-Saxon and aboriginal races. 
 The chief figure is an American settler, an athletic man, in a 
 hunting shirt and cap, rescuing a female and her infant from a 
 savage who has just raised his tomahawk to murder them ; the 
 effect is wonderfully fine and noble. The hunter has ap- 
 proached his enemy unexpectedly from behind, and grasped 
 both his arms, holding them back, and in such a manner that he 
 has no command of his muscles, even for the purpose of freeing 
 himself. It is nearly two years since this admirable work was 
 completed. The government ordered that one of the vessels of 
 our squadron in the Mediterranean, when on its return to the 
 United States, should take it on board. Greenough came to 
 this country with the view of superintending its erection. 
 After long delay, a vessel was sent to Leghorn, but on account 
 of the hatchway being too small to admit the group, it was left 
 behind ; but is now understood to be on its way in a merchant 
 vessel. 
 
 In the meantime his statue of Washington had been 
 finished. Of the merits of this work the criticisms of two of 
 its most intelligent admirers, reprinted in this volume, afford 
 the best evidence. It was undertaken with a painful sense of 
 responsibility, designed with great study, and after long delibe- 
 
32 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 ration ; it occupied tlie best part of eigbt years, and was erected 
 under circumstances unfavorable to its immediate appreciation. 
 The just complaints of the artist, in one of the selected papers, 
 as to its present condition, should meet with respectful notice 
 from those in authority. 
 
 *' Among the most charming creations of Mr. Greenougb's 
 chisel," says Edward Everett, in a letter from Italy in 1841, 
 " is the statue of a child of three years old, the daughter of 
 Count Revicksky, the Austrian Minister at Florence. The little 
 girl is represented as seated on a bank of flowers contemplating 
 a butterfly, which has just lighted on her raised forearm. The 
 intentness with which she regards the symbol of the immortal 
 soul, happily indicates the awakening of an infant understand- 
 in o-. So entirely absorbed is she in contemplation of the object 
 which has attracted her attention, and so complete is her 
 repose, that a lizard creeps fearlessly from his hole in the bank 
 of flowers. The gaze of the child is full of that mixture of 
 simplicity and thought, with which children sometimes give us 
 such startling assurance of the unfathomed mystery of our 
 being." In the same letter he adds, " I regard Mr. Greenough's 
 Washington as one of the greatest works of sculpture of 
 modern times. I do not know the work which can justly 
 be preferred to it, whether we consider the purity of the taste, 
 the loftiness of the conception, the truth of the character, or, 
 what we must own we feel less able to judge of, accuracy of 
 anatomical study and mechanical skill." The rationale of this 
 work is admii-ably set forth in the artist's letter to the govern- 
 
Memoir. 33 
 
 ment explaining the principles of the design. Another work 
 that amply fulfils all the requirements of a severe taste, and is 
 yet crowned with an ideal beauty, is a head of Our Saviour. It 
 is just enough larger than life to derive from the contour and 
 features a sublimity of effect. The expression is profoundly 
 calm, but the serenity is that of conscious power tempered with 
 a touching benignity. Its characteristic point is an infinitely 
 suggestive charm, at once holy, pure, and majestic. The bust 
 is fixed upon a coiled serpent whose head is bowed in front ; 
 and the whole conception is eloquent with the highest moral 
 significance. It invites contemplation, and is instinct with de- 
 vout sentiment. The beautiful simplicity of the idea is only 
 equalled by the chaste and noble execution. Greenough enter- 
 tained, indeed, the highest view of the function of religious art, 
 but, at the same time, recognised its true use. In a letter 
 referring to this work he says, " I am not aware that any Ame- 
 rican has, until now, risked the placing before his countrymen 
 a representation of Our Saviour. The strong prejudice, or 
 rather conviction of the Protestant mind has, perhaps, deterred 
 many. Not behind the most jealous in deprecating the abuse 
 of images in places of public worship, I think, nevertheless, 
 that the person and face of Our Saviour is a legitimate subject 
 of art, because, although our conception must fall short of 
 what the heart of the Christian looks for, yet you will allow 
 that we may offer to many an imperfect instead of a mean or 
 grovelling idea which they have drawn from other sources. 
 The prayers and hymns of the most pious are as far unworthy 
 
 3 
 
34 Memoir. 
 
 tlie perfection to which they are addressed, as the h'ghts and 
 shadows of the artist ; yet both may be accepted as fervent 
 aspirations after the good and beautiful. It is a mistake to 
 suppose that the artist, because he stops working, thinks his 
 task perfect ; he says only — behold the subject proposed to me 
 as the art which is in me can give it." 
 
 My next meeting with Greenough was in the autumn of 
 1837. On a bright cool day in October, the Cascine of Flo- 
 rence was thronged. Lines of open carriages extended along 
 the park ; under the chestnuts groups of pedestrians sauntered ; 
 the dead leaves flew along the turf; the Arno gleamed in the 
 sun. The scene was at once rural and festive. In every 
 barouche were gaily-dressed ladies, and the cheerful hum of 
 conversation was suddenly quieted as all hastened to the 
 inclosed open space between the trees, to witness a race. This 
 was a rare entertainment originated by the Enghsh residents of 
 Florence. The bright tints of the jockeys' costumes, the^sleels^ 
 elegant, and spirited horses, and the hilarity of the company, 
 accorded with the bracing air and cheerful sunshine. In the 
 midst of the crowd I met Greenough. It was a few days after 
 his marriage with Miss Louisa Gore of Boston. In a subse- 
 quent conversation we referred to the prosperous termination 
 of those days of suspense and anxiety which, on my first visit, 
 had shadowed his career. In the brief interval he had received 
 many commissions, achieved a reputation, and was now settled 
 happily in a congenial home. The auspicious change in my 
 friend's prospects identified itself with the gay scene in which 
 
Memoir. 
 
 35 
 
 our intercourse was resumed ; and it struck my fancy as sym- 
 bolic of tlie happiness that crowned his life. 
 
 Florence continued to be his residence until his final return 
 to this country. In the meantime he frequently visited Ger- 
 many, Paris, and other parts of Europe, and came home to 
 superintend the erection of his statue of Washington. His 
 house at Florence soon became the favorite resort of Ameri- 
 cans; and all who enjoyed the hospitality of the Palazzo 
 JBaciocchij now recall the delightful hours spent there with grate- 
 ful yet melancholy interest. The habitues^ indeed, must feel 
 with one of his neighbors who, in a recent letter, alluding to 
 Greenough's death, says, "He was a true, high-spirited, and 
 independent man, and I feel, in losing him, that something is 
 permanently deducted from my hfe." 
 
 Here were passed the happiest years of his life ; and any one 
 who shared, even for a time, his existence in the Tuscan capi- 
 tal, soon realized how just was his partiality for that adopted 
 home. If less rich in the trophies of art than Rome, there is 
 more unity of effect in the architecture, galleries, and scenery. 
 In his daily walks for many years, Greenough here became 
 familiar with the noble relics of the middle ages, sombre but 
 massive ; the grand simplicity of the Strozzi and Pitti palaces, 
 the beautiful cornice of the Ricardi, Bruneleschi's gigantic 
 dome and airy tower, the graceful bridged that span the Arno, 
 and the lovely gates of San Lorenzo ; objects ever fresh and 
 charming to an artist's eye. The memorials of individual 
 genius, too, always suggestive to his cultivated mind, of epochs 
 
36 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 in the history of art, of long and patient study, and of the lof- 
 tiest aspirations, were constant themes to him of encom-aging 
 meditation and eloquent discourse. In Florence are gathered the 
 most characteristic legacies of Angelo and Cellini, and the city 
 and its environs are intimately associated with Dante, Galileo, 
 Boccacio, Vespucci, Macchiavelli, and Milton. A promenade 
 along the river in view of the unrivalled sunsets that bathe the 
 distant Apennine range with gold and purple, an hour's gossip at 
 the visits to the galleries and studios, and an occasional 
 evening at the opera, are constant and available recreations. 
 
 A few years since a new square was laid out in Florence, on 
 the Fiesole side of the Arno, between the Porta San Gallo and 
 the Porta al Prato. It is called the Piazza Maria Antonia, in 
 honor of the present Grand Duchess. The corner lot was pur- 
 chased by Greenough, and upon it he erected a studio which is 
 a model of its kind, and unsurpassed in Europe. All the rooms 
 are on one floor, built with great strength and a fine ornamental 
 stone work on the exterior, having in the centre the cypher G. 
 Attached to the structure is a beautiful garden; within is a 
 spacious and admirably lighted exhibition-room — near by the 
 sculptor's private studio, a large apartment for the workmen, a 
 gallery of plaster casts, a vestibule hung with pictures, a noble 
 rotunda, leading by a short flight of steps to the garden, and a 
 charming library. This studio is a monument of Greenough's 
 intelligent taste and aesthetic culture ; and it is deeply to be 
 regretted that it cannot be preserved as an artistic temple to 
 his memory. 
 
Memoir. 
 
 In the Autumn of 1851 Greenough returned to the United 
 States with his family. He came ostensibly to erect his group 
 of " The Rescue," now completed and packed for exportation ; 
 but his departure from Florence was hastened by the political 
 state of Europe ; the myrmidons of Austria thronged the streets 
 of that beautiful capital ; the press was under strict censorship, 
 and a system of espionage interfered with all freedom of speech, 
 domestic privacy, and social activity — a contrast, at once sad 
 and humiliating to the hopeful era which had so recently 
 closed. Upon returning to his residence one day, Greenough 
 found several cavalry soldiers quartered on his premises. He 
 instantly wrote to the American Consul at Leghorn, and 
 obtained a diplomatic office of sufficient consideration to relieve 
 him of this annoyance; but so many instances of despotic 
 injustice daily came under his notice, that they, in a measure, 
 destroyed the charms of a hitherto genial home, and he longed 
 once more to breathe the free air, and hold communion with 
 the free minds of his native country. He believed also that he 
 could now be more useful at home, and that circumstances 
 there "vv^fere more favorable to the artist. 
 
 There are certain peculiarities noticeable on returning to 
 this country after a long absence, by all observant minds, which 
 Greenough not only opposed in conversation but practically 
 repudiated. He wondered at the extreme deference to public 
 opinion, at the absurd extravagance in living, and the prevalent 
 want of moral courage. The true artist's simplicity in the 
 externals of life was visible in him always ; his individuality 
 
88 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 was not set aside in conformity to fashion ; he manifested reve- 
 rence for age ; he was impatient of the substitutes for comfort, 
 fellowship, and truth invented by what is called society ; he 
 contemned that habitual view of general questions and human 
 welfare through the contracting lens of self-interest which per- 
 vades a mercantile community; and it was the essential in 
 character, experience, and social economy, and not the tempo- 
 rary and artificial, which he recognised. 
 
 I was agreeably surprised to perceive the confidence with 
 which he unfolded his plans, and the generous zeal that led 
 him, at once and earnestly, to advocate so many projects of 
 taste and utility. It was remarkable to what an extent his 
 personal influence acted even upon our most utilitarian and 
 busy citizens. He took me aside one morning in Broadway, 
 and whispered the result of his visit among the leading com- 
 mercial men of New York, in behalf of a statue of Washington 
 designed to ornament Union Square. The sum of twenty-five 
 thousand dollars was subscribed in sums of five hundred. It 
 may be safely asserted that no other man but Greenough could, 
 in so brief a space, have won the sympathy and " material aid" 
 of so many stern votaries of commerce. 
 
 I was interested also in the change produced in him by 
 domestic ties. As he had once talked of art he now talked of 
 life. His affections had led him to reflect upon human des- 
 tiny ; and I found him as eloquent and as ingenious in the 
 discussion of the religious sentiment and educational theories 
 as he was wont to be when intent upon the vocation of the 
 
Memoir. 89 
 
 artist. However imaginative in some of these speculations, he 
 was remarkably in earnest and reverent of nature as the true 
 mother, whose laws were to be devoutly studied and implicitly 
 obeyed ; in her statutes as well as handiwork he beheld the 
 finger of God ; and justly ascribed no small degree of existent 
 evil to the system of intervention by which this divine light 
 is obscured or perverted. 
 
 His intimate acquaintance with the state of parties, and the 
 course of governments abroad, as well as his decided liberal 
 sentiments, constantly impelled him, at this time, to political 
 discussion ; and whoever engaged with him in these colloquies, 
 whether convinced by his arguments or not, was informed by 
 the array of facts he cited, and charmed by his graphic powers 
 of description and brilliant analysis. He was inspired also by 
 that spirit of enterprise which marks even the speculative 
 opinions and social life of our country. Looking around him 
 with the eye of an artist and the heart of a patriot, he was 
 conscious of a new scope and motive, both for his genius and 
 sympathies. He had matured a system of architecture founded 
 on the idea of the appropriate, and adapted to the climate and 
 exigencies of the country. He was prepared to suggest and 
 illustate the adornment of our cities with national statuary. In 
 many of the details of social economy he was the advocate of 
 wise and practical reforms ; and had much to say that was 
 fresh and noble, if not available, upon education, hygiene, 
 society, art, literature, and manners. There was a remarkable 
 communicative instinct in Greenough ; and the results of his 
 
40 Memoir. 
 
 studies and experience were the property of his friends. A dis- 
 interested mental activity was the distinctive and invaluable trait 
 of his character. There is no doubt that if his life had been 
 preserved, he would have proved a most attractive and useful 
 teacher through the rostrum and the press, in departments of 
 thought and action comparatively neglected among us. The 
 principles of art he could unfold with the highest intelligence ; 
 and, without an harmonious and complete system, he had 
 attained to many just conceptions of the philosophy of life. 
 
 Greenough's temperament was both sanguine and nervous — 
 a combination more favorable to a receptive and sympathetic, 
 than a self-possessed and tranquil character. Accordingly he 
 was of an excitable nature, and required for the healthful ex- 
 ercise of his mind and wise enjoyment of life, at once a genial, 
 free, and harmonious sphere. Artist-life in Italy, so calm, 
 absorbing, and undisturbed, was fitted to his nature. The 
 amenities of a domestic circle, the pleasant stimulus of in- 
 tellectual companionship, the wholesome occupation of body 
 and mind, were to him a peculiar necessity. The restless, 
 bustling, ever changeful existence that infects the very atmo- 
 sphere of this country were sometimes oppressive and irritating. 
 He felt the absence of that equability and routine, that keeps 
 brain and heart so well balanced in the old cities of Europe. 
 He missed the gi*adations by which the temperature seems to 
 adapt itself to the sensitive frame. In the climate, the society, 
 the mode of life, he found it almost impossible to escape the 
 hurried, alternating, fitful spirit of the land. It seemed as if 
 
Memoir. 41 
 
 the genius of enterprise around had infected his mind with a 
 tendency to action at once impulsive and uncertain. He con- 
 stantly broached new plans ; and sought to attach others to 
 his own aims. The transition from a serene to an excitable 
 social atmosphere, from a conservative to a progressive country, 
 was too abrupt for a nature both sensitive and aspiring. He 
 caught the spirit of the times, and was eager to throw his 
 energies into the stream of popular activity. There was soon 
 obvious not so much an inconsistency of thought as a want of 
 correspondence between his avowed sentiments and pur- 
 poses and his actions. It was evident that his mind had be- 
 come unduly excited, as is so often the case with the novice 
 in American life. But in this instance the physical re- 
 sult was unusual and inexpressibly sad. A brain fever ter- 
 minated, after a few days' illness, the life of Greenough. It may 
 be regarded as a fortunate circumstance, that the attack occur- 
 red at his house in Newport, and while he was surrounded by 
 those most near and dear to him. He was subsequently re- 
 moved to the vicinity of .Boston for the benefit of medical 
 treatment. While the life-struggle was going on, we can ima- 
 gine the agony of suspense that brooded over his household 
 at Newport, where severe illness kept his dearest companion. 
 The fatal issue was anticipated by the Italian servants — two 
 Tuscan women who had accompanied the family on their 
 return. "With that passionate grief characteristic of the race, 
 they burst forth one wintry afternoon with the declaration, 
 that the Padrone would surely die, because a large owl had 
 
 3* 
 
42 Memoir. 
 
 descended the chimney and was found in the parlor; the 
 incident awakened their latent superstition, and the bird of 
 ill-omen was deemed the certain precursor of death. A few 
 hours afterwards came the sad tidings, but they were mitigat- 
 ed, as far as such desolation can be, by the fact that his suffer- 
 ings were inconsiderable, and the delusions incident to his 
 malady, of a gay rather than a despairing nature. His 
 strength gradually yielded to the cerebral excitement, and he 
 expired on Saturday morning, the 18th of December, 1852. 
 
 He had been naturally impatient, on his return to America, to 
 settle himself in an agreeable locality with his studio arranged 
 to his taste, a fine subject in the process of execution, and his 
 family and household gods around him. But owing to the 
 unjustifiable delay of the government in sending for his group 
 at Leghorn, to the uncertainty which obtained in regard to 
 the two or three important works he proposed to execute, and 
 his unavoidable indecision as to a permanent residence, — the 
 year which intervened between his arrival in the United States, 
 and his death, was passed in various places and occupations, 
 and attended with much care and discomfort. He enjoyed, 
 however, by this very state of things, many opportunities of 
 social intercourse ; and the intervals spent with his family at 
 Newport, during the last summer, were periods of unalloyed 
 enjoyment. 
 
 It was at this time and, as it were, with a prophetic sentiment 
 that he wrote : — " I am arrived at that ' mezzo del camming 
 that half-way house, where a man sees, or thinks he sees, both 
 
Memoir. 43 
 
 ways. If my head is not ripe it is whitening — I begin to love 
 to sit alone — to look upon the skies, the water and the soft 
 green — the face of the mighty mother ! I feel that she thus 
 sweetly smiles on me, more sweetly than formerly, because she 
 means to call me home to her own bosom. I would not pass 
 away and not leave a sign that I, for one, born by the grace 
 of God in this land, found life a cheerful thing, and not that 
 sad and dreadful task with whose prospect they scared my 
 youth." 
 
 It was here, on the beautiful sea-shore, that I once more 
 renewed an association commenced so many years ago in Italy ; 
 and never, since the hour of our first acquaintance, did Green- 
 ough appear more full of noble aims, more kindled by the 
 inspiration of nature and society, and more abounding in intel- 
 lectual sympathy. It is difficult to realize that the agile and 
 well-developed form that sported with such grace amid the bil- 
 lows, is now lifeless ; that the nervous frame so delicately 
 strung no more responds to vital influences ; and that the voice 
 attuned to a key so sympathetic, and freighted with such 
 wealth of mind, is hushed for ever ! By a singular coincidence 
 the last time I saw Greenough, he took me home to pass a 
 rainy evening, and as he sat at work upon a crayon head, we 
 revived together the memories of those happy days in Italy. 
 It was early in autumn. The gay visitors at Newport had 
 nearly all returned to the cities, and the ties of friendship were 
 drawn closer from the more frequent and uninterrupted oppor- 
 tunities of association. Imperceptibly the hours flitted away ; 
 
44 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 and I was surprised to find it near midnight when I rose to 
 depart. I remember, during my homeward walk, to have 
 mused of Greenough's versatility and prolific ideas during that 
 interview, — which I so little imagined would be the last. He 
 had, in those few hours, run through every phase of conversa- 
 tion. With the skill of a consummate im-jprovvisatore he had 
 told a story in the dramatic and artistic way peculiar to him, 
 painting the scene to the eye, giving the very sensation of the 
 experience ; he had analysed, with tact and discrimination, 
 several characters of our mutual acquaintance; he had ably 
 discussed a question of public concern, and he had evolved 
 several bon-mots. In a word, his talk was argumentative, pic- 
 turesque, anecdotical, earnest, philosophic, and humorous ; and 
 this without the least effort or formality, but through the natu- 
 ral suggestions of the moment. He made me realize anew his 
 varied knowledge and his independent mind. I felt that he 
 was capable of the greatest social and artistic usefulness. I 
 recalled the consistency of his friendship, his kind leave-taking, 
 and cheerful anticipation of " another such evening soon ;" and 
 these vivid recollections deepened the sorrow with which, a few 
 weeks later and in a foreign land, I was startled with the news 
 of his death. 
 
 The outline I have given of Greenough's career as an artist, 
 afibrds but an inadequate idea of his genius and character. It 
 is the distinction of the latter, where they possess originality 
 and power, always to suggest more than they actualize. As a 
 sculptor his executive ability fell short of his conceptions ; and 
 
Memoir. 45 
 
 as a man his influence was quite as individual and extensive as 
 his artistic fame. Indeed he was endeared to his friends and 
 useful to the world by virtue of larger gifts than belong exclu- 
 sively to the practical artist. In respect to personal eflSciency 
 — that charm and gift that diffuses itself by the magnetism of 
 association and the attrition of mind, Greenough held a memo- 
 rable place in the estimation not only of a vast number but of 
 widely different minds. He combined public spirit with the 
 qualities that insure good fellowship, and the facility of the 
 man of the world with the attainments of a liberal scholar, to 
 a degree and in a manner altogether rare even in this age of 
 generalization. His original endowments and his wide expe- 
 rience equally contributed to this result. He went forth in 
 early manhood 'from a cultivated but formal society, where he 
 had received an excellent domestic and intellectual training, 
 urged by a natural love of art in a special form ; but, by virtue 
 of his broad intelligence and generous sympathies, while mainly 
 devoted to his profession, he became an intellectual cosmo- 
 polite. 
 
 The classical education he had received, and his early advan- 
 tages, made him familiar with the historical relations of his art. 
 He could fully realize its indirect value and its characteristic 
 development. As a national language he understood its sig- 
 nificance — grand and inscrutable in Egypt, unrivalled in Gre- 
 cian beauty, primitive in Central America. The fables of 
 mythology, the monumental glor}^, the poetry and the truth 
 which sculpture embodied in different eras and countries, he 
 
46 Memoir. 
 
 knew as a scholar and appreciated as an artist. Contrary to 
 the usual eflfect of extensive knowledge, this acquaintance with 
 the facts and meaning of sculpture did not make him a devotee 
 of any school ; he thoroughly enjoyed the masterpieces of the 
 chisel, and expatiated, with earnest intelligence, upon each sepa- 
 rate trophy of the sculptor, however different in kind. I have 
 heard him aHke eloquent over the radiant Apollo of the Vati- 
 can and the brooding Lorenzo of the Medici chapel, the Lions 
 of Canova and the Perseus of Cellini, a Bacchante by Barto- 
 lini, a group of Gibson's, one of Flaxman's linear wonders, an 
 apostle of Thorwaldsen, and a bust of Powers. It was in the 
 variety of his comparisons and the richness of his illustrations 
 that he evinced the extent of his culture. The majority of our 
 artists have been self-taught men, chiefly dependent upon a 
 special talent. Greenough's general knowledge proved a valu- 
 able and attractive facility in his expositions of art. The 
 remarkable absence of extravagance in all his artistic produc- 
 tions was another result of his disciplined taste. The simpli- 
 city that belongs to true superiority had become with him a 
 principle both of judgment and action. During his early stu- 
 dies in Italy, Homer was frequently in his hands. In literature, 
 art, and Hfe, his taste was singularly just ; not a trace of affec- 
 tation or fantasy is visible in any of his designs or statues. 
 The classical standard he thoroughly appreciated, while, at the 
 same time, the details of expression in nature were his constant 
 study. 
 
 He was also a student of art in general as well as a proficient 
 
Memoir. 47 
 
 • 
 
 in sculpture. He had enjoyed a very wide range of observa- 
 tion and a large acquaintance with artists. There was no sub- 
 ject upon which he had thought more earnestly or could dis- 
 course with more zest and eloquence than the philosophy of 
 art. The principles of architecture, modes of living, arrange- 
 ments of society — in a word, the wise organization of the means 
 provided by nature for the ends desirable for man, was to him 
 a theme of the deepest significance. With a truly fraternal 
 sympathy for his race, instead of regarding his pursuit as exclu- 
 sive and chiefly intended to gratify individual taste, he advo- 
 cated art as an element of humanity, a universal benefit, and a 
 source both of high social utility and poetic faith. Accord- 
 ingly, with his pen and his speech, he urged the claims of art 
 upon his countrymen, not as a professor but as a brother, 
 striving always to make apparent the essential interest and the 
 national dignity of the subject, and this course he pursued with 
 the intelligent mechanic not less than the fashionable circle. 
 
 Few authors by profession are better equipped for literary 
 art than was Greenough ; had not sculpture been his chosen 
 pursuit, he would have doubtless adventured in the field of let- 
 ters. By education, verbal memory, and remarkable power of 
 expression, he was admirably fitted to excel as a writer. In 
 Europe, he had acquired entire facility in the use of the 
 modern languages. He had a natural love and discriminating 
 taste for poetry ; and, as has been truly said by one of his 
 friends, was an artist in the telling of a story. Occasionally he 
 contributed to the journals of the day, usually in order to dis- 
 
48 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 sent from some popular but unphilosophical criticism on art, or 
 to invoke public attention in favor of a neglected work of 
 genius ; it was thus usually an impulse of generosity or a dic- 
 tate of justice that led him to take up the pen. His friends, 
 however, were desirous to see it wielded with a more elaborate 
 and definite purpose by a hand so skilful ; and during the last 
 year of his life he was frequently occupied in writing. His 
 thoughts were not cast in a formal shape, but jotted down as 
 occasion and mood suggested. Many of these desultory efforts 
 he submitted to his literary acquaintances, and they united in* 
 admiration of their freshness, beauty, and acumen. They were 
 subsequently in part arranged in a book form, but in conse- 
 quence of the various suggestions he received and the modifica- 
 tions he intended, the plan was never wholly completed. It is 
 chiefly from these fragments of a work that I have gleaned the 
 specimens contained in this volume. They are mainly essays 
 which indicate an unfinished achievement ; but they are none 
 the less precious and interesting as a record of his opinions and 
 sentiments, and illustrations of his style. 
 
 The strictures upon art as it actually exists in, and is essen- 
 tially related to our republic, are bold, honest, and wise ; they 
 have a practical value, and are often expressed with earnestness 
 and grace. A busy yet cheerful spirit of utility, a genuine 
 patriotism and love of beauty characterize them ; and the 
 lectures and correspondence should be now gathered up not 
 only as appropriate memorials but as the endeared legacy of 
 their author. " His conversation," observes an experienced and 
 
Memoir. 49 
 
 gifted author, in a recent letter, " was both brilliant and deep ; 
 and his writing so remarkable for its realism and its occasional 
 splendor, that I conceived the highest hope of what he should 
 do, and cause others to do, by his speech and pen as well as by 
 his chisel." 
 
 Greenough was a consistent republican. His alternate resi- 
 dence in Europe and America, only confirmed his sympathy 
 with the people and his faith in their claims. His steadfast, 
 ardent loyalty to the principles of his own country, is the 
 more remarkable in a man whose tastes were refined, and whose 
 associations fully exposed him to the blandishments of rank 
 and fortune. A spectator of, and to some extent, a participa 
 tor in the remarkable events of 1848, his trust and hope were 
 never subdued by the subsequent re-action. His " faith was 
 large in time." A witness of the siege of Vienna, and an 
 actor in the popular demonstration that celebrated the advent 
 of liberty in Florence, he was entirely cognizant both of the 
 condition of the masses, and the power of the conservative 
 party ; but he also had the discrimination and the love of his 
 race which induces a calm and earnest trust in the ultimate 
 triumph of freedom. To hear an American defend the encroach- 
 ments of European rulers upon popular rights, or discredit the 
 national impulse, — excited in Greenough w^arm indignation. 
 He used to startle, and perhaps offend the complacent mem- 
 bers of what he called the " Tory party" in his own country, 
 by the vigor of his animadversion or the sting of his wit. 
 And yet no advocate of republican sentiment was ever more 
 
60 Memoir. 
 
 free from prejudice. It was on tlie wide ground of humanity 
 that he took his position ; and an aristocratic table was often 
 the scene of bis most eloquent protest. 
 
 Another rare and precious trait was his nobility of mind. 
 The most attractive phase of genius is its coincidence with 
 magnanimity. So genuine was his love of art that it made 
 him self-oblivious. When a brother artist, his superior in ex- 
 ecutive ability for the most profitable department of sculpture, 
 became his neighbor, he not only gave him a fraternal wel- 
 come, but cheerfully yielded his best workmen, and choicest 
 marble, as well as his advice and encouragement, to facilitate 
 and cheer the stranger. When he planned a monumental 
 trophy, it was almost invariably based on the idea of a division 
 of labor that included the services of others. To discover and 
 proclaim merit was his delight ; the glowing terms in which 
 he advocated the claims of unappreciated or modest talent, 
 seldom failed to kindle sympathy; from the rank of our 
 native artists no one could have been less spared in this re- 
 gard. His recognition was not limited to achievement, but 
 extended to latent powers. He was one of that invaluable 
 minority whose perception goes beneath the surface of charac- 
 ter and the accidents of expression ; and perhaps of all his 
 friends he valued chiefly " the poet who never wrote." 
 
 The partiality of artists and men of letters for Greenough's 
 society was a natural result of his fine social qualities. He 
 came at once into relation with those who aspired to high cul- 
 ture or lived for intellectual ends. The frank hospitality with 
 
Memoir. 61 
 
 which hie received another's thought, and expressed his own, 
 rendered companionship with him easy and genial. It was not 
 requisite to accept his theory or coincide in his opinions in 
 order either to enjoy or profit by his society. Like Montaigne 
 he seemed rather to prefer a brisk encounter to an assimilation 
 of minds ; and among those most warmly attached to him 
 there was the greatest diversity of character and sentiment. It 
 was enough for him that an individual possessed courteous, 
 brave, intelligent, or generous qualities, to awaken respect or 
 sympathy. With the independent thinker, the lover of beauty, 
 the student of art, he was always at home, and oblivious of 
 those considerations of nationality, creed, or party that limit 
 and chill the associations of less Catholic minds. He entered 
 with the same relish into the by-way vagaries of Cole, Morse, 
 or any of his brother artists as they roamed over the Roman 
 campagna or the valley of the Arno, as he discussed a literary 
 question with the classic Landor in his Villa garden, sympa- 
 thized with Nicollini in his deep patriotic regrets, contributed 
 to the table-talk of the Marquis Capponi, hstened to memorable 
 reminiscences as he moulded the benign features of Lafayette, 
 discussed American character with Dr. Francis, or social reform 
 with Emerson. 
 
 Among his friends were a Hungarian nobleman, a Francis- 
 can friar, an American Presbyterian divine, and an Italian poet. 
 His genius was eminently social. As we retrace the path of 
 his life, it appears crowded with endeared and venerated forms ; 
 and we feel that the highest privilege won by his talents and 
 
52 
 
 Memoir. 
 
 character, was that of free intercourse with superior minds. 
 
 These select intelligences quickened without interfering with his 
 nature. He was keenly appreciative, and quick to detect the pro- 
 mise as well as the fruition of excellence. I remember accom- 
 panying him on a visit to a sculptor who had just completed 
 an equestrian statue, and desired his frank opinion. The faults 
 of the work were so apparent and predominant that as he cri- 
 tically surveyed it, I began to wonder what single encouraging 
 trait he could, without violence to truth, recognise. His first 
 words were — " ce molto vita,^^ and the vitality and spirit of the 
 conception alone redeemed it. The zeal with which he wel- 
 comed and befriended Powers on his first arrival in Italy was 
 delightful to contemplate; and few of his countrymen who 
 have gone abroad to follow art as a vocation, have failed to 
 experience his cheerful sympathy. Perhaps this readiness to 
 acknowledge and foster talent, the spontaneous interest which 
 a marked character or a gift of intellect excited in Greenough, 
 was the secret of his power to elicit and refresh the thought of 
 his companion. 
 
 By this contact with leading minds in various countries, by 
 habitual observation of nature and art, and especially through 
 the exercise of genuine mental independence, he disciplined and 
 enriched his intellect in every sphere. True to his American 
 principles, he recognised no aristocracy but that of nature; 
 broad in his views of life, he rose superior to all jealousy or 
 narrowness; bold and free in opinion, he uttered his honest 
 sentiments with candor and enthusiasm ; and thus, in the cha- 
 
Memoir . 
 
 53 
 
 racter of an artist, lie brought an ever fresh accession of infor- 
 mation, wit, and geniahty to the social circle, and shed abroad 
 the light and glow of a noble, kindly, and intelligent man. It 
 is in this view that we feel the void occasioned by his death, 
 and realize the loss his country has sustained ; for art, though 
 a grand and beautiful, is not a universal language, and when 
 her gifted votaries are also priests at the altar of humanity, 
 they are doubly mourned and honored. 
 
CATALOGUE OF GREENOUGH'S WORKS. 
 
 1. A statue of Abel, modelled in Rome, in 1826, but never 
 executed in marble. 
 
 2. Statue of Byron's Medora. For R. Gilmore, of Balti- 
 more. 
 
 3. Group. The Chanting Cherubs. For J. Fenimore 
 Cooper. 
 
 4. The Ascension of the Infant Spirit. A group of an Infant 
 and Cherub. 
 
 5. Group. Portraits of two Children of David Sears, play- 
 ing with a squirrel. 
 
 6. Statuette. The Genius of America. For J. Hoyt, of 
 New York. 
 
 1. Portrait statue of Miss Grinnell. 
 
 8. Portrait Statues of two Youths, sons of J. Thompson, of 
 New York. 
 
 9. Monument to Mr. and Mrs. Gibbs. For Miss Gibbs of 
 Newport. 
 
 10. Statue of Washington, by order of Congress, for the 
 Capitol. 
 
Catalogue of "Works. 65 
 
 The sum, twenty thousand dollars, voted by Congress, was 
 intended to be an honest compensation for this work. The 
 amount was the same as that paid by Massachusetts to Chantry 
 for his statue of Washington, the size of life. Greenough, 
 determined to spare neither time nor expense to make his 
 work worthy of the country and himself, made it colossal 
 (twice the size of life), involving an expense threefold beyond 
 what it would have cost of the natural size. 
 
 The embellishments of the chair have a significance which 
 often escape observation. The statuettes of Columbus, and an 
 Indian Chief, supporting the arms of the chair, and the trident, 
 have found favor as being obviously illustrative of our country's 
 history. But the bas-reliefs of the Rising Sun on Apollo's cha- 
 riot on the one side, and the infant Hercules strangling a ser- 
 pent on the other, are, by many, looked upon as mere " clas- 
 sical" embellishments, independent of the subject. Were they 
 no more than this, they would be disfigurements instead of 
 adornments. The artist originally designed to have inscribed 
 two lines from an ode of Virgil ; — under the Apollo, Nunc 
 nascitur lucidus ordo ; and under the Hercules, Incipe^ parve 
 puer, cui non risere parentes. These verses would have inter- 
 preted the bas-reliefs. Greenough finally omitted them, be- 
 cause sculpture should speak its own language so distinctly as 
 to need no aid from letters. 
 
 11. Child seated on a bank, intently gazing at a butterfly 
 that has just lighted on the back of its hand. For a Hunga- 
 rian nobleman, 
 
56 Catalogue of Works. 
 
 12. Statuette of Venus Victrix. For John Lowell, and pre- 
 sented by him to the Boston Athenaeum. 
 
 13. Colossal Group, for the Capitol, by order of Congress. 
 This work, which was finished in July, 1851, occupied the 
 
 artist eight years, besides a delay of four years occasioned by 
 his not being able in all that time to obtain a block of Serra- 
 vezza marble suitable to his purpose. It consists of four figures, 
 a mother and child, an American Indian and the father. This 
 group illustrates a phasis in the progress of American civiliza- 
 tion, viz., the unavoidable conflict between the Anglo-Saxon 
 and aboriginal savage races. The figures of the mother and 
 child were entirely remodelled in the years 1846 and '4*7. 
 
 14. Statue of the Angel Abdiel retiring from the assemblage 
 of rebellious Angels ; from Milton's Paradise Lost. 
 
 15. Monument to his friend Giusti, the Itahan poet; erected 
 at Pescia, Tuscany. 
 
 16. Bas-relief, representing an artist whoso labors are sus- 
 pended by the failure of the^'light by which he is working. 
 He is seated in an attitude of pensive dejection, while a hand 
 from a cloud supplies oil to the lamp. 
 
 17. Bas-rehef of Castor and Pollux. 
 
 18. Venus, contending for the golden apple. It is of 
 heroic size, that of the Venus of Milo. This statue was 
 much admired in Florence, and Browning, the English 
 poet, urged Greenough to send it to the World's Fair, 
 in London. 
 
 It was modelled entirely in plaster of Paris (as was also the 
 
Catalogue of Works. 57 
 
 second group of tlie mother and child) by a new process. 
 " The merit of this invention seems to be shared between 
 Greenough and Powers. They commenced about the same 
 time to make trials in this material, and by interchange of 
 experiences and views the method was perfected. The gain to 
 artists by this invention is two-fold ; plaster of Paris does not 
 expand like clay, and there is no need of the precarious and 
 expensive j^rocess of casting." 
 
 19. Ideal Bust. Our Saviour crucified. 
 
 20. Two Ideal Busts of Heloise. 
 
 21. Ideal Bust of Lucifer. 
 
 22. Ideal Bust of the Graces. 
 
 23. Ideal Bust. The Genius of Love. 
 
 Besides the above enumerated statues and bas-relief, he exe- 
 cuted a large number of busts ; among these were portraits of 
 John Adams and of John Q. Adams, Henry Clay, Mrs. R. 
 Gilmor, Josiah Quincy, Sen., S. Appleton, Jonathan Mason, 
 Thos. Cole, the late celebrated landscape-painter, N. P. Willis, 
 the Marquess Gino Capponi, for many years a personal friend 
 of Greenough, and latterly Prime Minister of Tuscany, John 
 Jacob Astor, Cooper, and others. 
 
 4 
 
ESSAYS 
 
 BY 
 
 HORATIO GREENOUGH. 
 
[Greenough commenced a series of Lectures on Art during the 
 last months of his life ; two of these had been written and delivered, 
 and copious notes for others were found among his papers; while 
 abroad he also wrote several essays on this and kindred subjects ; 
 and man}^ of his letters are valuable and interesting ; these it is pro- 
 posed to collect in a subsequent volume. The selections now 
 published will indicate the scope of his inquiries, and the originality 
 of his views, and serve as a foretaste of more elaborate specimens.] 
 
i:STHETICS A'T WASHINGTON. 
 
 An American citizen, who has gone abroad to study a 
 refined art, presents himself before his fellow-countrymen at 
 disadvantage. To the uninitiated, his very departure from 
 these shores is an accusation of the fatherland. If he sail away 
 to strike the whale on the Pacific, or load his hold with the 
 precious teeth, and gums, and sands of Africa, it is well ; but 
 to live for years among Italians, Frenchmen, and Germans, for 
 the sake of breathing the air of high art. ancient and modern, 
 this is shrewdly thought by many to show a lack of genius, 
 whose boast it is to create, and we are often asked triumphantly 
 if nature is not to be found here on this continent. They who 
 thus reason and thus feel, are not aware of the peculiar position 
 of the aspirant to artistic activity in these States. They see 
 that lawyers and statesmen, divines, physicians, mechanics, all 
 are here developed, are said to be home grown, nay, often also 
 self-made. They forget that all the elements of our civilization 
 have been imported. They forget that our schools and col- 
 leges, our libraries and churches, are filled with the most mate- 
 
62 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 rial proof, that Greek and Roman thought is even now modi- 
 fying and guiding our intellectual development. A moment's 
 attention will enable them to perceive that the American stu- 
 dent of art only seeks to effect for his own department of 
 knowledge a like transfer of rudimental science, and at this late 
 day, make the form of our culture harmonious with its essential 
 and distinctive character. 
 
 We are still imbued, deeply imbued, with the stern disregard 
 of everything not materially indispensable, which was gene- 
 rated by ages of colonial, and border, and semi-savage life. 
 We have imported writings on art in abundance, and there is 
 scarcely a scholar in the land who cannot wield the terms of 
 dilettantism as glibly as a European professor; but unfortu- 
 nately for us, the appreciation of an sesthetical theory without 
 substantial art, is as difficult as to follow a geometric demon- 
 stration without a diagram. It is sterile and impotent, as is all 
 faith without works. 
 
 If the arts of design could have simply remained in a nega- 
 tive state, like seeds buried in autumn, to await the action of a 
 more genial season, we should be justified in postponing, even 
 now, their cultivation. But like the Bourgeois gentilhomme, 
 who talked prose from his boyhood without being aware of it, 
 we have been compelled both to design and to adorn, and our 
 efforts, from their nature, must remain monuments of chaotic 
 disorder in all that relates to ^Esthetics. In a word, we have 
 negative quantities to deal with, before we can rise to zero. I 
 do not mean to say that the beautiful has not been sought and 
 
^Esthetics at Washington. 63 
 
 found amongst us. I wish, and I hope to show, that we have 
 done more, in a right direction, than has been appreciated ; 
 much in a wrong direction, that must be examined and repu- 
 diated. 
 
 I am sensible of the disadvantage under which I labor, in 
 speaking of matters to which I have devoted my attention for 
 many years. I regret that I have no such right to sympathy 
 and to support as that set forth by the author of a recent work 
 when he says, " I have no qualifications for a critic in art, and 
 make no pretensions to the character. I write only for the 
 great multitude, as ill instructed in this sphere as I cheerfully 
 admit myself." When the writer of that profession shall |^ave 
 learned what the main qualifications for a critic on art really 
 are, I cannot believe that he will cheerfully renounce them ; 
 and far as I am from a personal acquaintance with the great 
 multitude, I cannot believe that one " as ill instructed as them- 
 selves" is the exact person whom they would depute to deal 
 with matters which, to] say the least of them, require some 
 training. 
 
 It is the great multitude that has decided the rank of the 
 statesmen, the poets, and the artists of the world. It is the 
 great multitude for whom all really great things are done, and 
 said, and suffered. The great multitude desires the best of 
 everything, and in the long run is the best judge of it. I have 
 said this much in relation to the sesthetical observations of this 
 writer, because, though I generally sympathize with his views, 
 and often admire the expression of them, I look upon the 
 
64 
 
 ^Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 ground he here takes, as one too often taken — in itself untena- 
 ble, and apt to mislead by an exaggerated expression of 
 modesty. Substantially, it is analogous to the conduct of one 
 who should commence by declaring that all men are free and 
 equal, and go on to give orders to the right and left as to valets. 
 Fain would I also lay claim to the title of self-made man ; 
 indeed, I graduated at Harvard, in 182-, which they who knew 
 the school will allow was near enough self-making to satisfy 
 any reasonable ambition. But since then I have been indebted 
 to very many for light as for assistance. 
 
 If there were in our character or in our institutions, aught 
 that-is at war with art in the abstract, I for one would be silent, 
 preferring the humblest labor, if any labor deserve the name of 
 humble, to the development of an influence adverse to Ameri- 
 can freedom. I speak of art now, because I think I see that it 
 is a want — a want widely felt, deeply felt — an intellectual want, 
 a social want, an economical want — and that to a degree which 
 few seem to suspect. I believe that these states need art as a 
 visible exponent of their civilization.'^ They call for it as a sal- 
 
 * In the speech of Mr. Smith, of Alabama, in explanation of a resolu- 
 tion offered by him in relation to Kossuth, I find the following passage : 
 "I will make another observation, and that is in reference to the idea 
 of establishing republican governments in*Europe. New governments 
 there are constantly rising and falling, and they have been trying to 
 establish republican goA^ernments for the last thousand years; have 
 they ever succeeded ? and why not ? Because of their antiquities and 
 their monuments, breathing, smacking, and smelling of nobility and roy- 
 alty, and because half of the people are magnates." 
 
 I take note of this remark, because I believe there is good, solid truth 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 65 
 
 vation from merely material luxury and sensual enjoyment, they 
 require it as the guide and ornament of inevitable structure and 
 manufacture. 
 
 Joyfully have the governing men of England, France, and 
 Germany beheld in the United States that policy which has 
 denied all national education, except for the purpose of war and 
 trade. Joyfully have they seen the individual States equally 
 blind to the swift coming requirements of this people ; and they 
 have' founded and perfected schools of design, of w^hich the 
 abler pupils are employed in illustrating the national history ; 
 the lower talents fill the factory, the foundry, and the atelier^ 
 to fashion fabrics for ourselves. From Boston to New Orleans 
 no house, no tavern, no bar-room, I had almost said, that does 
 not give proof, by the tawdry spawn of European manufacture, 
 of our tribute to their savoir faire, and their appreciation of our 
 
 in it. " Quoi si je poiirrai fripponner quelqiie chose pour etayer roon 
 pauvre petit livre!" I should have placed the magnates first in the 
 list of obstacles to republican progress, but I will not quarrel about pre- 
 cedence. The statesmen may be allowed to settle this matter. 
 
 I rejoice to find that American legislators have found out the value 
 and significance of monuments, and of antiquities in their political influ- 
 ence. May we not expect that our civilization and our institutions will 
 obtain this support from Congress ? I hope, in a subsequent paper, to 
 urge this matter more fully. I will now merely state that there stands 
 in the studio of Mr. Powers, at Florence, a statue of America, which is 
 not only ^ beautiful work of art, but which " breathes, smacks, and 
 smells" of Republicanism and Union. If placed conspicuously, by Mr. 
 Walter, in one of the new wings of the Capitol, it would be a monu- 
 ment of Union. The sooner it is done, the sooner it will become an 
 " antiquity." 
 
 4*^ 
 
66 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 taste. But what, it will be asked, has the development of art 
 to do with manufactures ? High art stands in relation to manu- 
 factures and all the so-called lower trades, where high literature 
 stands in relation to social and to civil life. Ask how much of 
 the fruit of high culture and mental training reaches the public 
 through the forum, the pulpit, and the diurnal press, and you will 
 have the measure of the influence of pure art on structure and 
 manufacture in all their branches. AVho in England urged this 
 matter upon the attention of Parliament, until the best models 
 of Greece and Italy were placed within reach of every manu- 
 facturing population ? The Board of Trade. That body caused 
 to be translated from foreign languages, and illustrated by ela- 
 borate drawings, the most approved works of Munich, Berlin, 
 and Paris. They have ransacked, at great cost, the mediaeval 
 magnificence of Italy, to find new forms, and add a grace to the 
 products of their looms, their potteries, and their foundries. 
 Does any statesman fancy that these governments have been 
 invaded by a sudden love of the sublime and beautiful? I 
 believe that they who watch our markets and our remittances, 
 will agree with me, that their object is to keep the national 
 mints of America at work for themselves ; and that the beau- 
 tiful must, to some extent, be cultivated here, if we would avoid 
 a chronic and sometimes an acute tightness of the money 
 market. The statistics of our annual importation ' of wares, 
 which owe their preference solely to design, will throw a light 
 on this question that will command the attention of the most 
 thrifty and parsimonious of our legislators. 
 
.Esthetics at Washington. 6Y 
 
 In founding a school of art, we have an obstacle to sur- 
 mount, viz. a puritanical intolerance thereof. The first work 
 of sculpture by an American hand exhibited in this country, 
 executed for the illustrious Cooper, was a group of children. 
 The artist was rebuked and mortified by loud complaints of 
 their nudity. Those infantine forms roused an outcry of cen- 
 sure, which seemed to have exhausted the source w^hence it 
 sprang, since all the harlot dancers who have found an El 
 Dorado in thiese Atlantic cities, have failed to reawaken it. I 
 say seemed to have exhausted it — but only seemed — for the 
 same purblind squeamishness which gazed without alarm at the 
 lascivious Fandango, awoke with a roar at the colossal naked- 
 ness of Washington's manly breast. This fact will show how 
 easy it is to condemn what is intrinsically pure and innocent, 
 to say the least ; how difficult to repress what is clearly bad and 
 vicious. They who speculate upon the corrupt tastes of a pub- 
 lic, when they have learned that genteel comedy is neglected, 
 that tragedy is unattractive, that galleries of painting and sta- 
 tuary are unknown in a large and wealthy community, such 
 speculators take their Bayaderes thither as to a sure market. 
 They know that a certain duration of abstinence, voluntary or 
 forced, makes garbage tolerable, and ditch water a luxury. I 
 do not venture to hope that even high art will abolish " cakes 
 and ale," but I trust before many years are elapsed no usee 
 Terpsichore of Paris or Vienna will be able to show half a mil- 
 lion as a measure of our appetite for the meretricious. 
 
 I wish not to be misunderstood for a moment as recommend- 
 
68 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 ing a Smithsonian school, with a hierarchy of dignitaries in art. 
 I have elsewhere stated my conviction that such a system is 
 hostile to artistic progress. I desire to see working Normal 
 schools of structure and ornament, organized simply but effect- 
 ively, and constantly occupied in designing for the manufac- 
 turers, and for all mechanics who need festhetical guidance in 
 their operations — schools where emulation shall be kindled by 
 well considered stimuli, and where all that is vitally important 
 in building or ornament shall be thoroughly taught and con- 
 stantly practised. I know not how far the limit of congres- 
 sional action may admit the founding of such schools by the 
 central government. Should it be impossible to interest Con- 
 gress in the matter, I am not without hope that some, at least, 
 of the State legislatures may effect it; and, failing this 
 resource, I hope that associated individuals will combine for this 
 object. I cannot but believe that a report, called for by Con- 
 gress, on the amount of goods imported, which owe the favor 
 they find here, to design, would show the importance of such 
 schools in an economical point of view. I believe that such a 
 report would show that the schools which we refuse to support 
 here, we support abroad, and that we are heavily taxed for 
 them. 
 
 It surely cannot be asking too much that the seat of Govern- 
 ment, where the national structures rise, and are yearly in- 
 creasing in number and importance, should present a specimen 
 of what the country can afford in material and workmanship, 
 in design and ornament. If this were resolved on, a stimulus 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 69 
 
 would be given to exertion, while tlie constant experience here 
 acquired would soon perfect a school of architectural design. 
 
 The defects of the stone of which the Capitol was built, 
 could have been no secret to Mr. Bulfinch. Had there existed 
 a board, or a school, or any other responsible depository of 
 architectural experience, we should not have witnessed the 
 deplorable recurrence to the same quarries for the construction 
 of the Patent Office and the Treasury buildings. The outlay 
 in paint alone, to which recourse has been had in order to 
 sheathe this friable material, would have maintained a school 
 which would have saved us from the blunder, not to mention 
 the great advantage we should have derived from its designs 
 and its pupils. Had the amount expended in white lead been 
 invested, a fund would have now accumulated sufficient to 
 reface them all with marble. I am convinced that true 
 economy would at this moment order the Potomac stone, 
 wherever it has been used, to be immediately replaced by a 
 better material. 
 
 Setting aside, however, the question of economy, and look- 
 ing at the question of propriety, can anything be more absurd 
 than to expend millions upon noble pieces of masonry, and 
 then to smear them with lead — thereby reducing them to a 
 level with the meanest shingle palace ? Stone among build- 
 ing materials, standing where gold stands among metals, to • 
 paint stone is like covering gold with tin-foil. So far has this 
 been carried, that even in the Rotunda, where no conceivable 
 motive could exist for the vandalism, the entire masonry has 
 
70 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 been painted, and that too of various tints, so that I will ven- 
 ture to affirm that many carry away the idea, that the whole 
 is but a piece of carpenter's work. The treatment of the 
 Treasury buildings, where the granite basement has been 
 painted of one color, the columns of a second, and the wall 
 behind them of a third, where even the lamp-posts have been 
 daubed with divers tints, like a barber's pole, is noticed with 
 priceless naivete in an important public document as a neat 
 piece of work. What shall we say of the balustrades, where 
 massive iron bars have been driven bodily into the columns, 
 as though a column in a first class building might be treated 
 like a blind wall in the basest structure, and that, too, with- 
 out a shadow of need ? What shall we say of the iron railings 
 that obtrude upon the eye about the blockings of the Patent 
 Office, and veil, with their inharmonious blackness, the organ- 
 ization of that building ? What of the one slender chimney 
 of red brick, which peers over the broken profile of the marble 
 Post Office ? Will any adept in the science of construction 
 explain why the gas light which is seen at the eastern 
 entrance of the Capitol, was made to hang with so many feet 
 of tiny pipe, and then secured by shabby wires driven into the 
 columns \ Would any person conversant with the proprieties 
 of building tolerate such a slovenly arrangement in a private 
 house, or in a private stable, if columns formed a feature of 
 that stable ? Do not such absurd and ignorant malpractices 
 look as if a barbarous race had undertaken to enjoy the mag- 
 nificence of a conquered people, and not known how to set 
 
Esthetics at AVashington. 71 
 
 about it ? Does any one fancy that the uninstructed multitude 
 does not feel these incongruities ? It is not so. As well may 
 you hope to sin against grammar in your speeches, and 
 against decency and self-respect in your dress or deportment, 
 and expect that it will pass unobserved. 
 
 The effect produced by the grounds and shrubbery in the 
 neighborhood of the Capitol deserve a moment's attention. 
 There is somewhat in flower beds and fancy gardening, with 
 corbeilles of ephemeral plants, so out of all keeping with the 
 character and functions of this edifice, as to give the spectator 
 a painful sense that the idea of the adaptation of grounds to 
 buildings has never recurred to those whose duty it was to 
 look after these matters. Trees and verdure are beautiful, 
 and flowers still more so, but they are impertinent adjuncts 
 to the Capitol of the United States, and where they veil and 
 obstruct the view of the facade, as at the Post Office, are insuf- 
 ferable. The creeping vines that have been led over the arches 
 which support the platform in rear of the Naval monument, 
 are a grosser instance of misguided search after the picturesque. 
 If these arches are properly constructed, the vines are imperti- 
 nent, for they hide their articulation. Whether well or ill 
 built, the proximity of these vines is a destructive element, use- 
 lessly added to the inevitable wear of the weather. Further, if 
 the principle which guided their introduction here be a sound 
 one, logical sequence and harmony call for their appearance in 
 other like situations. 
 
 The recent appointment of a gentleman of approved taste to 
 
'12 -(^ISTHETICS AT WASHINGTON. 
 
 superintend the arrangement of the public grounds, gives well 
 founded reasons to hope that these, and the like unsightly 
 anomalies, will disappear; and that all, at least within his 
 department, will be made in harmony with the character and 
 purposes of the chief edifice of the country. 
 
 The position of the group of Columbus and the Indian girl 
 is anomalous and absurd ; anomalous, because it invades the 
 front view of the portico, chokes the facade, and hides another 
 statue by the same artist ; absurd, because it treats the building 
 as somewhat on which to mount into conspicuous view, not as 
 a noble and important vase which it is called humbly to adorn 
 and illustrate. The statue of Washington is surrounded by 
 dwarf cypress and clumps of rose bush. These are impertinent 
 and ridiculous — impertinent because they hide the pedestal and 
 obstruct the view of the inscription, thus overlaying the inten- 
 tion of the monument, and that for the mere display of ephe- 
 meral vegetation, a phenomenon, however attractive, not here 
 in place — ridiculous, because they seem as if intended in some 
 way to help and eke out the sculpture ; which, when a statue 
 of this class requires it, must be done by replacing it with 
 something worthy to stand alone. The grass within the rail- 
 ing, if cut close, destroys the monumental effect, by the exhi- 
 bition of frequent care ; if neglected, offends by its rank growth 
 and decay. The railings which have been placed about the 
 statues of the Capitol accuse a want of respect for the public 
 property. They accuse it without remedying it ; for in spite 
 of their protection, perhaps because of it, the statues of Colum- 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 73 
 
 bus and of Washington have received more injury in the few 
 years that they have been so guarded, than many figures 
 wrought before the birth of Christ have suffered in coming to 
 us through the so-called dark ages. I have several times seen 
 boys at play on the portico of the Capitol ; which, if right, 
 makes it wrong there to place costly sculptures. If I protest 
 against iron railings around statuary, it is because I believe they 
 avail not for their object. I trust to the intelligence of the 
 many to do justice to the artistic efforts made for their sake. 
 In the end, I believe the people will be the best guardians of 
 public works here, as they have proved themselves elsewhere. 
 Four lamps have been placed around the statue of Washing- 
 ton ; by night they light only the feet of the figure, by day 
 they exactly obstruct two of the principal views of it. I doubt 
 not that the person who so placed these lights meant to do the 
 statue a service. He probably never heard of "the eight 
 views" of a statue. These ever-jarring principles of magnifi- 
 cence and economy — laying out millions for dignity, and deny- 
 ing the thousands necessary to insure care, intelligence, and 
 taste, in their conservation and exposition — produce a certain 
 compound of pretension and meanness of eftect, highly to be 
 deprecated in great public works. I say highly to be depre- 
 cated, for, however they who have given no attention to art 
 and its influences may be surprised at the assertion — such a 
 chaos cannot be daily seen with impunity. What at first 
 shocked soon becomes familiar, and the susceptibility to healthy 
 impressions from the display of order, harmony, logical depend- 
 
74 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 ence, and adaptation, are weakened, if not destroyed in the 
 observer. 
 
 I have mentioned some flagrant instances of the want of care 
 or of knowledge on the part of those to whom the national 
 buildings have been intrusted. This strain of remark might be 
 continued until we had passed in review almost every detail of 
 the structure and ornaments of the public works. It is an 
 ungrateful task. Enough has been said to show that the evi- 
 dent intention of Congress to render these buildings and 
 grounds worthy of the nation, both in their construction and 
 maintenance, has thus far been very imperfectly effected. I 
 will now state what I beheve to be the reason why so much 
 outlay has produced so unsatisfactory a result. First : I believe 
 that the absence of any clear and distinct ideas of what is 
 becoming, dignified, and proper in the premises, lies at the root 
 of the evil. For this no one is to blame. The wants of this 
 people have called — imperatively called — the active and able 
 men of the country to pursuits far removed from an investiga- 
 tion of the beautiful, either in theory or in practice. These 
 minds have been engaged in laying the foundations, broad and 
 deep, of a mighty empire. They have reared the walls — they 
 have distributed the blessed light and blessing air throughout 
 the vast structure. They have tamed the forest, subdued the 
 wilderness, and spread the benign influence of the gospel and 
 of education from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean. They have 
 left to later days and men of other mould the task of throwing 
 around the pillai-s of the State the garlands of a fine artistic 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 75 
 
 culture. Had they been men intent upon the questions that 
 occupy u^ now, they had been as unfit for the task imposed on 
 them, as the land was unprepared for their labors. But untu- 
 tored as they were in the mysteries of art, an instinct, great, 
 noble, and unerring, guided their decision in respect to the 
 visible attributes of this Metropolis. The selection of this site, 
 the ground plan of this city, show the outline of a master ; and 
 years must elapse ere any school which we can found will be 
 capable of worthily filling it. Secondly : I believe that the 
 heterogeneous and chaotic character of these buildings and 
 grounds arises from an ill-judged interference with technical 
 design and arrangement on the part of men in authority, whe- 
 ther in the legislative or executive branches of government. 
 Since our institutions carry with them, as a necessary conse- 
 quence, a frequent change in the personnel of government, it is 
 clear that if each succeeding wave of deputed authority is to 
 leave the impress of its taste and its will upon the public struc- 
 tures, these must, ere long, be but a patchwork of as many 
 whims, fancies, and artistic dogmas, as have found favor in the 
 eyes of the temporary occupants of place, unless some standard 
 can be established which all will recognise — a consummation 
 not now to be hoped for. I believe that this country is alone 
 in referring matters of art to legislative committees. In Eng- 
 land committees supervise and report, and Parliament criticises 
 and condemns, but the artist is not interfered with, in his own 
 province. The law maxim is held good in that case. I have 
 been told that the invention of the alto relievo upon the tym- 
 
76 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 panum, was due to Mr. Adams. If so, it was an unhappy- 
 exertion of his great powers. Sculpture, when it adorps build- 
 ings, is subordinate to them ; and when the sculptor invades 
 the tympanum, he must fill it, or he produces a meagre and 
 mean effect. Mr. Adams knew all of art that books and much 
 observation could teach him, but he could not, of course, be 
 aware of the many proprieties violated in that invention. The 
 work has another defect as sculpture. It is the translation of 
 rhetoric into stone — a feat often fatal to the rhetoric, always 
 fatal to the stone. 
 
 As a most honorable contrast to ever conflicting claims of 
 private taste and whim to obtain utterance in the public works, 
 I feel pleasure and pride in observing the course adopted by 
 the architect who has been honored with the task of adding 
 the wings of the Capitol. That architect, trained in the sever- 
 est school of ancient art, had he been called on for a new 
 building, would surely have attempted something very different 
 from the actual Capitol. Called to enlarge it, he has sought 
 to divest himself of every prepossession that would interfere 
 with its harmony as a whole. He has approached his task 
 with reverence. He has sought to keep company with his pre- 
 decessor. This is not only honorable and just as regards La- 
 trobe, but can take nothing from his own well earned reputa- 
 tion. Speaking now and in view of the mere model, I doubt if 
 it be even in his power so widely to extend the facade, without 
 painfully isolating the cupola, and leaving the present edifice 
 too low, too wanting in mass and weight, to characterize a 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 77 
 
 centre. Avoiding this defect, he will triumph over a great 
 obstacle. What the architect has here decided in reference to 
 the original design of the Capitol, seems worthy of all emula- 
 tion on the part of such as, by the vicissitudes of office, may 
 have charge of the national buildings. 
 
 In all remarks upon important public edifices, there is a two- 
 fold subject under contemplation. First : The organic structure 
 of the works. Second : Their monumental character. To 
 plant a building firmly on the ground — to give it t^re light that 
 may, the air that must, be needed — to apportion the spaces for 
 convenience — decide their size — and model their shapes for 
 their functions — these acts organize a building. No college of 
 architects is a quorum to judge this part of the task. The 
 occupants alone can say if they have been well served ; time 
 alone can stamp any building as solid. The monumental cha- 
 racter of a building has reference to its site — to its adaptation 
 in size and form to that site. It has reference also to the 
 external expression of the inward functions of the building — to 
 adaptation of its features and their gradation to its dignity and 
 importance, and it relates, moreover, to that just distinction 
 which taste always requires between external breadth and inte- 
 rior detail. 
 
 To ascertain what the organic requirements of a building 
 like the Capitol are, is, in itself, a most laborious task. To 
 meet them requires all the science we possess. Have we not 
 seen the House of Lords, in spite of all the experience and the 
 knowledge brought to bear upon the vast outlay that reared it, 
 
'IS -Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 pronounced a gewgaw by the men who were obliged to work 
 therein ? Discomfort and annoyance soon find utterance. De- 
 coration and magnificence in such cases, like the velvet and 
 gilding of a ship's cabin, seen with sea-sick eyes, aggravate our 
 discontent. Nor is a defective arrangement merely uncom- 
 fortable ; it may prove costly beyond all belief. I have been 
 assured by one of the chief oflScers of a department, that one- 
 half of the employes of his section of the administration, were 
 required o^y by the blundering and ignorant arrangement of 
 the edifice. To say that such oversights are inevitable, is an 
 unjust accusation of the art. When those who are called to 
 the task of lodging one of the departments of the Government, 
 shall make organization the basis of their design, instead of a 
 predetermined front, which often deserves to have the inverted 
 commas of quotation affixed to it, we shall hear no such com- 
 plaints as I have above related. 
 
 The men who have reduced locomotion to its simplest ele- 
 ments, in the trotting wagon and the yacht America, are nearer 
 to Athens at this moment than they who would bend the Greek 
 temple to every use. I contend for Greek principles, not Greek 
 things. If a flat sail goes nearest wind, a bellying sail, though 
 picturesque, must be given up. The slender harness and tall 
 gaunt wheels are not only effective, they are beautiful — for they 
 respect the beauty of a horse, and do not uselessly task him. 
 The English span is a good one, but they lug along more pre- 
 tension than beauty ; they are stopped in their way to claim 
 respect for wealth and station ; they are stopped for this, and, 
 
JESTHETICS AT WASHINGTON. '79 
 
 tlierefore, easily passed by tbose who care not to seem, but are. 
 To prefer housings to horseflesh, and trappings to men, is ahke 
 worthy of a savage. 
 
 THE WASHINGTON MONUMENT. 
 
 A national monument to Washington has been designed, 
 and is in process of construction. A lithographic print of this 
 design is before the public. It represents an obelisk, rising out 
 of a low, circular building, whose exterior presents a Greek 
 colonnade of the Doric order. A fac-simile of the endorsement 
 of some of our most distinguished citizens recommends this 
 design to their fellow countrymen. I propose to examine the 
 invention. 
 
 The prominent peculiarity of the design before us is the inter- 
 marriage of an Egyptian monument — whether astronomical, as 
 I believe, or Phallic, as contended by a Boston critic, matters 
 not very much — with a Greek structure, or one of Greek ele- 
 ments. I do not think it is in the power of art to effect such 
 an amalgamation, without corrupting and destroying the spe- 
 cial beauties and characters of the two elements. The one, 
 simple even to monotony, may be defined a gigantic expression 
 of unity. The other a combination of organized parts, assem- 
 bled for a common object. The very perfection of their forms, 
 as exponents of so distinct characters, makes them protest 
 against juxtaposition. 
 
t 
 
 80 ^Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 If the union of Egyptian mass and weight with Greek com- 
 bination and harmony be heterodox, the order in which they 
 are here displayed is even more strikingly a violation of pro- 
 priety. The complex, subdivided, comparatively light Greek 
 structure, is placed as a basis, a foundation. The Egyptian 
 mass of stone rises above it. When this arrangement is stated, 
 I must think that its palpable absurdity is demonstrated. It 
 may be urged that those weaker and more slender columns veil 
 a massive foundation within them. We had guessed this 
 already, because a miracle alone could otherwise sustain the 
 weight. The pillars hide the strength of the structure, hence 
 their impertinence, as an architectural feature. It is incum- 
 bent upon edifices, first to be strong; secondly, to look 
 STRONG. We have read of a colossus of brass, with feet of 
 clay, and the image is striking. To an architect, Egyptian 
 weight sustained, in appearance, by Greek pillars, is not less so. 
 That buildings, in rising from the earth, be broad and simple 
 at their bases, that they grow lighter not only in fact but in 
 expression, as they ascend, is a principle established. The laws 
 of gravitation are at the root of this axiom. The spire obeys 
 it. The obelisk is its simplest expression. 
 
 Waiving the impropriety of a Doric colonnade as a basis for 
 an obelisk, I object to that order for a circular structure. The 
 Doric capital, in its upper member, echoes and parallels the 
 entablature. In a circular structure, this is impossible, without 
 maiming the order. Your capital protests against its entabla- 
 ture. For circular structures, in the temple of Vesta, and that 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 81 
 
 beautiful ruin at Tivoli for instance, the Corinthian capital has 
 been adopted ; but the Corinthian is too manifestly absurd a 
 basis for a plain shaft of stone. 
 
 This obelisk is made to differ essentially from the most 
 admired specimens of that kind of monument. The differences 
 are, first, in the relative diameters at the summit and base; 
 second, in the relative height of the pyramidion which forms 
 the apex. In Cleopatra's needle, the base is a full diagonal of 
 the summit of the prism. In this the base is less than that 
 diagonal. By this departure from example, topheaviness has 
 been obtained. The altitude of the pyramidion, in Cleopatra's 
 needle, is equal to the width of the base, and is, of course, a 
 very acute angle, terminating gradually the lofty shaft. In 
 this, the pyramidion forms an obtuse angle, its altitude is so 
 small that a little distance will obliterate it altogether, and the 
 obelisk must assume a truncated, and of course unfinished 
 appearance. 
 
 When Michael Angelo was wending his way from Florence 
 
 to Rome, to assume the charge of finishing St. Peter's Church, 
 
 his ser^^ant related that, on reaching the summit of the Apen- 
 
 nine, near Poggibonsi, he turned his horse and sat gazing long 
 
 and intently upon the dome of Bruneleschi, the giant cupola of 
 
 the Florentine cathedral. After some time he was heard to 
 
 growl, " Better than thee, I cannot ; like thee, I will not." The 
 
 result was the dome of St. Peter's. Michael Angelo "took the 
 
 responsibility," as such men always will. He did it at his 
 
 peril, as all men must. Implicit conformity to precedent obli- 
 
 5 
 
82 
 
 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 terates and annihilates the individual ; violation of it, not jus- 
 tified by theory, or by practical result, sets the individual on no 
 enviable pedestal. A throne may become a pillory. 
 
 The obelisk has to my eye a singular aptitude, in its form 
 and character, to call attention to a spot memorable in history. 
 It says but one word, but it speaks loud. If I understand its 
 voice, it says. Here ! It says no more. For this reason it was 
 that I designed an obelisk for Bunker Hill, and urged argu- 
 ments that appeared to me unanswerable against a column 
 standing alone.* If this be the expression of the obelisk, I 
 object to the site of the proposed monument. 
 
 * The column used as a form of monument has two advantages. 
 First, it is a beautiful object — confessedly so. Secondly, it requires no 
 study or thought ; the formula being ready made to our hands. 
 
 I object, as regards the first of these advantages, that the beauty of a 
 column, perfect as it is, is a relative beauty, and arises from its adapta- 
 tion to the foundation on which it rests, and to the entablature which 
 it is organized to sustain. The spread of the upper member of the 
 capital calls for the entablature, cries aloud for it. The absence of that 
 burden is expressive either of incompleteness, if the object be fresh and 
 new, or of ruin if it bear the marks of age. The column is, therefore, 
 essentially fractional — a capital defect in a monument, which should 
 always be independent. I object to the second advantage as being one 
 only to the ignorant and incapable. I hold the chief value of a monu- 
 ment to be this, that it affords opportunity for feeling, thought, and 
 study, and that it not only occasions these in the architect, but also in 
 the beholder. 
 
 I have urged these arguments in conversation, and have sometimes 
 been met by the declaration that my hearer did not feel their force as 
 against what he liked in itself. I may state here that such a feeling 
 places him in the same category with those to whom it is indifferent 
 
Esthetics at Washington. ♦ 
 
 83 
 
 I protest also against the enormous dimensions of this struc- 
 ture. It is another example of the arithmetical sublime — an 
 attempt to realize in art the physical truth that many little 
 things united form one great one ; which in art is not true, 
 A monolithe, a single shaft of granite, has a value like that of 
 the diamond — a value which increases in a geometric ratio 
 with its weight. "Why? Because its extraction from the 
 quarry, its elaboration and safe erection show not only wealth, 
 but science. The temple of Minerva, at Athens — the marvel of 
 ancient as of modern critics — was scarce larger than one of our 
 schoolhouses. It was great, but not large. It was a jewel, 
 both of design and structure. It was an embodiment of 
 thought. 
 
 To be impressive, a monument must contain thought 'and 
 feeling. Flendum est primum ipsi tibi ! Your five hundred 
 
 whether a book be held with the right or with the wrong side up. It 
 accuses want of vision or want of instruction. 
 
 But ancient Rome possessed two of these monuments, London has 
 two, and Paris has two. To this I will only answer that London and 
 Paris have confessedly followed Rome in this matter, and Rome was 
 more eager to seize upon and appropriate the Greek magnificence than 
 capable of digesting and assimilating it But the attempting now to 
 argue against columns, so universally admired as monuments, is pre- 
 sumptuous. I object to this objection that it is not American. 
 
 The column used as an integral monument, however its fractional 
 character may be disguised by urns, statues, or other objects placed 
 upon it, belongs to the numerous and respectable family of makeshifts 
 — taking a form or object designed for one purpose, and applying it to 
 another — which is a violation of the first sublime law of creation. 
 Creation supposes that neither material nor power is wanting. 
 
84 ^ Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 feet of granite built as chimneys are, stone upon stone, is a 
 failure. It shows how much you are willing to spend to have 
 done with it. " // faut payer de sa peau /" 
 
 A structure which rises five hundred feet from the ground 
 and bears the name of Washington, must form a unique fea- 
 ture in this metropolis. It must command the attention of 
 every one, be he American or foreigner, who sees its lofty shaft 
 towering into the blue, and holding the sunshine after twilight 
 is grey below. What will be its effect artistically speaking ? 
 Kneading into incongruous contact elements hitherto only 
 jumbled by conquest and ruin — truncated— bare — without gra- 
 dation and without finale — standing upon crumbling detail — 
 heavy above and light below — it will be a symbol of huge 
 aspiration and chaotic impotence. 
 
 Monuments to really great men are opportunities on which 
 to hang the proofs of the development of art. The great need 
 them not. We need them. The tombs of the Medici embody 
 the theory of Buonarotti. The statue of Frederic is the apo- 
 theosis of Prussian sculpture. 
 
 The obelisk which stands at the entrance of the Champs 
 Elysees is typical of African conquest. Like the captive ele- 
 phants led in a Roman show, its exotic form gives significance 
 to the triumph that placed it there. The monolithes that tower 
 before the Roman Basilicas have also a certain propriety in the 
 residence of an absolute temporal prince, who is at the same 
 time assumed to be the vicar of Christ. All forms may be 
 collected without, as all tongues are spoken within. 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 85 
 
 I am aware that there is scarce an architect in the country 
 that could not have demonstrated the absurdity of the monu- 
 ment I have examined, and have thus prevented its consumma- 
 tion. Why were they all silent ? 
 
 THE EMBARKATION OF THE PILGRIMS. 
 
 The general aspect of this picture is striking. The idea of 
 representing these heroes of our history, engaged in prayer on 
 the deck of the good ship that was to waft them to these 
 shores, was an ingenious and a happy one. The composition 
 of lines is worthy of Mr. Weir, and shows a profound study of 
 that very difficult branch of his art. There is no clap-trap or 
 vulgar effect in the arrangement — all are in their places, and a 
 pleasing variety has been created without any theatrical make- 
 shift. The subject has been treated with due reverence — con- 
 scientiously. It is a work of good omen. 
 
 The arrangement of the chiaro-scuro is a puzzle to my under- 
 standing. I see a circle of light inclosing a broad mass of half 
 shadow. In this half shadow lies the pith and marrow of the 
 subject matter of this composition. He who prays — he who 
 holds the sacred volume — the mother with her ailing child — 
 all these are in twilight, while the evidence and flash of day are 
 reserved for figures half averted — piebald silks, and gleaming 
 armor, with other objects essentially accessory. 
 
86 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 If any deep-laid train be here to rouse the attention and 
 chTiin it to the important features of this page, it has missed its 
 object with me. I long to haul a sail aside, if sail it be that 
 makes this mischief, and let in a shaft of light upon that pray- 
 erful face. I am out of humor with that dress, so real, which 
 mocks my desire to see men. The armor is true Milan steel. 
 The men are foggy. The sail is real — the maker would 
 swear to his stitches. The hobnailed shoes are so new and 
 actual that I smell leather as I stand there. To balance the 
 execution, the hair should be less conventional — the flesh, too, 
 more transparent and life-like. I see no gleam from any eye 
 in all that company ; but the iron ring in yonder foot of the 
 sail twinkles ambitiously. This inversion of the true law of 
 emphasis is unaccountable to me in this master. Had I any 
 hope of influencing him, I would beg of him, while yet it is 
 day, to modify the eflfect of this work. If I despaired of bring- 
 ing the heads and hands up to the still-life, I would put the 
 latter down, not only in light but in elaboration and illusion, 
 until it kept its place. 
 
 Light in a composition is like sound and emphasis in deli- 
 very. You may make a figure or a group tell darkly amid a 
 glare for certain purposes ; not when the nuances of physi- 
 ognomy and emotion are essential. Awfully have I seen in a 
 broad, illuminated group, a cloud darken Judas as he gave the 
 traitor kiss to our Lord. The masters of Venice have more 
 than once succeeded in giving to figures in shadow all the 
 roundness, glow, and reality, admitted in the highest light ; 
 
Esthetics at Waspiington. 87 
 
 where that power of pencil is, who could deny the right quid- 
 Ubet audendi ? To my sense, here are figures more important 
 than these on the foreground, which are flat, and cold, 
 and dim. 
 
 Who can doubt that Mr. "Weir, had he lived in an age and 
 country where art was prized, would have wrought many 
 great, instead of this one very respectable picture ? I mean for 
 the government. 
 
 As I have ventured to complain of the Flemish illusion and 
 microscopic finish of the accessories in this picture, contrasted 
 as they are by an execution rather dim and vague in the chief 
 figures, I will further explain my meaning by a contrary exam- 
 ple in a master-piece of ancient art. In the group of Laocoou 
 we never weary of admiring the palpitating agony of the 
 father, the helpless struggles of the sons. The serpents, which 
 are the causes of this pain and despair, are scarce noticed ; 
 why ? because the artist wished to chain our attention upon 
 the human portion of the spectacle. He had no means of veil- 
 ing the snakes in shadow ; but he has veiled them in the mode 
 of treatment. There is more imitation, undercutting, illusion, 
 in one of the grey locks of the old man, than in the serpents' 
 whole form. Even their heads, as they strike, are made vague 
 and indistinct. Do we suppose that the sculptor who made 
 those limbs throb, and that marble mouth hot with pain, was 
 blind to the beauty of the bossed hide and abdominal rings of 
 a snake ? This is impossible. He gave only enough of the 
 snakes to tell tlie story, because the snakes were not the sub- 
 
88 ^Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 jects of his cliisel, but the men. This is art; nay, this is 
 pure art. 
 
 The same rule, or a rule analogous to this, decides the treat- 
 ment of drapery in the higher works of Greece. In decorative 
 statuary, the Greek showed his feeling for all the minutest 
 graces, and the most accidental effects of varied stuffs ; and his 
 hand echoed his eye, and mirrored the whole in stone. But in 
 his great works, the stuff is one, and all the folds are wrought 
 broad and simple. He avoids small facts, that he may fasten 
 your eye upon great truth. To be true to fact, the figure of 
 Laocoon should be clothed in a priest's dress — clothe him thus, 
 and the subject is for a painter. The first postulate of sculp- 
 ture in its essence is, that the veil of convention be rent. Dress 
 the fighting gladiator, and you might as well sculpture a house, 
 and tell me that a fighting hero is inside thereof; or say, as 
 Michael Angelo playfully said, that perfection lies in every rock 
 that rolls from a quarry. True it is, that perfect beauty is in 
 every rock ; the art lies in stripping therefrom the dress of chips 
 that disguise it. 
 
 There is one law of painting, as of sculpture, which he alone 
 can fully understand and obey who is conversant with both 
 arts. This law commands, to lay the stress of study there 
 where the art is strong, and avoid, as far as may be, the occa- 
 sion of showing its impotence. For instance, when in the 
 fifteenth century they attempted perspective in bas-relief, they 
 blundered ; because the success is partial, and unable to keep 
 company with painted perspective, where it is perfect. The 
 
Esthetics at Washington. 89 
 
 flying hair and waving draperies of Bernini, are similar proofs 
 of ill-judged toil. They are a conquest of mechanical diflSculty, 
 and so is the Chinese ivory ball within ball — both belong to the 
 same family, characterized by Reynolds as laborious effects of 
 idleness ; both are curious and amusing, and so is a juggler — 
 but not in the Senate. 
 
 THE SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION. 
 
 I was wandering, the evening of my arrival in Washington, 
 after a nine years' absence ; musing as I walked, I found myself 
 on the banks of the Potomac. I was reflecting upon the sin- 
 gular contrast between the non-committal, negative nomencla- 
 ture of these avenues and streets, and the sagacious policy 
 which, in Europe, makes every name a monument, every 
 square enforce the creed, every bridge echo an historical fact, 
 or record a triumph of principle. Nature, in the moral world, 
 still abhors a vacuum, and I felt that A, B, C street were tem- 
 porary names — squatters, waiting till the rightful lords of the 
 domain shall appear. 
 
 I pondered in my mind the structure of a monument which 
 should record the labors, sufferings, and triumph of the cham- 
 pions of freedom ; — of free thought and behef, of free speech 
 and free action. The moon was rising, half veiled by long 
 straight bars of heavy cloud. She rose out of them, and her 
 light fell broad and bright on the distant Capitol, with triple 
 
 5* 
 
90 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 dome and stately columns. My eagerness to rear the pile I 
 had been dreaming of was hushed. I thought I saw it there 
 before me ! Those pillars were no more mere shafts of stone ; 
 Luther and Melancthon, Russell, Hampden, Galileo, Savona- 
 rola, Sarpi, and a host besides, united in spectral majesty with 
 the worthies of our own land to uphold the roof! The whole 
 was cemented with the blood of martyrs. No man that had 
 cast fear behind him, and done battle for the right, but had 
 given his grain to form that temple. It stirred me, for I am 
 not used to the sight. A few weeks earlier I had been seated 
 beside a pale Dominican friar in the cell where Savonarola 
 dwelt, and where hung a picture of the Puritan of the Arno, 
 burning on the great square, and steadied amid the flames, by 
 masked monks, as he reeled amid the choking heat ; I 
 thought how different is the fire that here burns. As a mere 
 unit of humanity I felt consoled. Suddenly, as I walked, the 
 dark form of the Smithsonian palace rose between me and the 
 white Capitol, and I stopped. Tower and battlement, and all 
 that mediaeval confusion, stamped itself on the halls of Con- 
 gress, as ink on paper ! Dark on that whiteness- — complication 
 on that simplicity ! It scared me. Was it a spectre, or was 
 not I another Rip Van Winkle who had slept too long ? It 
 seemed to threaten. It seemed to say, I bide my time ! Oh, 
 it was indeed monastic at that hour ! 
 
 I never was of those who hold that there is a covered way 
 from the Vatican to Avernus, on the one hand, corresponding 
 to that which leads to the Fort of St. Angelo, on the other. I 
 
^Esthetics at Wasiiingtok. 91 
 
 have seen the Italian clergy nearly — sometimes intimately — 
 from the prelate to the begging friar ; I have admired their 
 scholars, and have loved their men. I revere the bridge over 
 which our faith has been borne to us. I am not so ignorant 
 of history as to repudiate the sagacious preservers of the old 
 Latin civilization. Still, I have brought from that land a fear 
 of their doctrine, and a hatred of their politics. I fear their 
 doctrine, because it seems to lull and to benumb the general, 
 the average mind, while it rouses and spurs the few. I fear it 
 the more because others do not fear it. I hate their politics 
 because they are hostile to ours. 
 
 This it was that made me shudder at that dark pile — that 
 castle of authority — that outwork of prescription. On walk- 
 ing round to the south, I was much relieved ; I could see 
 ♦through and through the building. This was a departure 
 from all that I had seen in the real, old turreted fortresses 
 of theology. It was of good omen. 
 
 I am not about to criticize the edifice. I have not quite 
 recovered from my alarm. There is still a certain mystery 
 about those towers and steep belfries that makes me uneasy. 
 This is a practical land. They must be for something. 
 Is no cowp d'etat lurking there ? Can they be merely orna- 
 ments, like the tassels to a University cap ? Perhaps they 
 are an allopathic dose adminstered to that parsimony which 
 so long denied to science wbere to lay her head — contraria 
 contrariis curantur ! They must have cost much money. 
 "Bosom'd high in tufted trees," the Smithsonian College 
 
92 ^Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 must, in itself, be hereafter a most picturesque object — the 
 models, whence it has been imitated, are both "rich and rare" 
 — the connoisseurs may well " wonder how the devil it got 
 there:' 
 
 I propose to examine the building hereafter, with reference 
 to its organization for a distinct purpose. 
 
 THE DESECRATION OF THE FLAG. 
 
 An American citizen, standing here upon the pavement of 
 the principal avenue of the Metropolis, sees five ensigns of the 
 United States flying within sight of each other. Two of these 
 flags float over the halls of Congress, and announce a session 
 of both branches of the legislature ; a third adorns the roof of 
 an omnibus as a gala decoration; a fourth appears on the 
 roof-tree of a new hotel as a sign, or perhaps pufl' extraordinary ; 
 a fifth marks the site of an engine-house. I cannot but think 
 that several of these flags are misplaced. Their use at the 
 Capitol has always struck my eye as appropriate and beautiful. 
 The other instances of their appearance which I have mention- 
 ed seem an abuse, a desecration of the national symbol of 
 Union. 
 
 There is always a tendency in every community to seize 
 upon and make use of that which is public, or of general influ- 
 ence and widely recognised significance. The same holy 
 symbol which surmounts the cupola of all Roman Catholic 
 
JEsTUETICS AT WASHINGTON. 93 
 
 cathedrals, is made in Italy to answer the end which in Eng- 
 land is effected by a bit of board, bearing the words " commit 
 no nuisance." When the position which it is desired to protect 
 is particularly exposed, the cross is repeated ten, twenty, fifty 
 times, and is even reinforced by verses in honor of saints, 
 martyrs, and the Holy Virgin. A foreigner is much shocked 
 by such a practice. The natives smile at his squeamishness — 
 they are used to it ; yet they all quote " nec Beus intersit^ etc.^'' 
 readily enough upon other occasions. 
 
 It is very clear that the national flag, however some persons 
 may smile at the assertion, has a deep and noble significance, 
 one which we should hold sacred and do nothing to impair. 
 Were it a mere " bit of bunting," as the British Foreign Secre- 
 tary thoughtlessly or artfully styled it, why should we see it 
 universally paraded? 
 
 I believe no one will deny that the colors of the Union 
 hoisted at the dockyards and arsenals assert the national pos- 
 session — that they proclaim the nationality of our merchant 
 ships in foreign parts, and sanction the display of our naval 
 power. These and the like occasions call for them, and their 
 appearance has a value and expression of a peculiar kind. Is 
 it doubtful that the dragging them through the streets by who- 
 soever chooses so to do, the parading them upon taverns, and 
 raree-shows, and other like trivial occasions, tends to degrade 
 and weaken their special meaning and value ? I may be told 
 that the abuse, if such it be, is rather within the region of taste 
 than of legal observance. I regret that it is so, because the 
 
94 Esthetics at Washington. 
 
 whole matter lias assumed its present aspect, because it is 
 " nobody's business" to interfere. It is merely as a question of 
 taste that I speak of it, and as such, I believe that a little reflec- 
 tion will show, that accustomed as we are to see the flag hung 
 out " d-propos de hottes,^'' and sometimes hanging downwards 
 too, so as almost to touch the heads of the horses as they pass, 
 our indiff'erence to the desecration is merely a measure of use, 
 and wont, and analogous, though not equal to the obtuseness 
 of the Catholic, who uses the cross of the Redeemer in lieu of a 
 by-law or police regulation. 
 
 I have heard the right of each citizen to use the national flag 
 stoutly maintained. I cannot see why the consular seal, or the 
 gardens of the White House, are not equally at his mercy. 
 There is another argument which may be called the argumen- 
 tum ad Buncombe, and which might easily be resorted to to 
 defend this and the hke abuses, viz., That it is peculiarly 
 American and democratic. The English long asserted a right . 
 to be coarse and uncourteous as a proof of sincerity and frank- 
 ness. John Bull, they contended, was too honest to be civil. 
 There is much nonsense of this sort in the old books. Exces- 
 sive beer-drinking and other gluttonies were upheld as having 
 some mysterious virtue in them. Sailors used to swear and 
 blaspheme in a similar way. It was expected of them, and 
 required no apology. When such notions yielded, as they 
 must, to reflection and cultivation, it was seen at once that they 
 had been only abuses or barbarisms ingeniously hitched on to 
 other qualities, and identified with self-love. 
 
SOCIAL THEORIES. 
 
 The plant of civilization, like otlier plants, springs from God's 
 ground ; it has its roots in the business and bosoms of men, 
 throws into the sunshine and the air the stem and branches of 
 its toil and its culture, blossoms in poetry, and heroism, and 
 bears at length the fruit of science, which is a forbidden fruit 
 only in its pulp and rind — its seeds are wisdom — not all wis- 
 dom, for of the seed itself the germ is small part, since there, 
 too, is a rind and a pulp, even the divine embryo of future 
 improvement therein wrapped and conserved cannot quicken 
 unless it die, for this is not a world for Eureka ! and exultation, 
 but for courage, toil, and brotherly love. 
 
 Herein do I find the mischiefs of the older world that they 
 have sought to establish, check, and stop the rolling ball that 
 circles round the sun ; and truly they were giants, for though 
 they could not stop they have shaken it, which is enough, 
 when you consider who made it and set it going. 
 
 The higher development of each civilization is a self-criti- 
 cism, and along with the condemnation of the past, neatly 
 packed in silken integument, lies a promise of better things. 
 But this divine verdict, towering at the top of the plant, can 
 only wither by staying there ; it must be blown, or shaken, or 
 
96 Social Theories. 
 
 plucked thence, and consigned to that earth which -we all despise 
 so truly — the hearts and heads of common men. There must it 
 find the soil and moisture, blood and tears, which burst its rind 
 and evolve the godhead within. 
 
 The philosophy of Aristotle, the method of Bacon, the poli- 
 tics of Machiavelli, the social contract of Rousseau, the Tiran- 
 nide of Alfieri, and the philanthropy of "Wilberforce, have by 
 turns entered into the brains and arms of men who knew not 
 how to write, else had they been mere figments of the brain. 
 
 The rhetorical beauty and elaborate putting out of hand of 
 these gentlemen's performances mark their position in the 
 career of culture ; not roots, but lordly seed cups are they. 
 They have no filaments that pierce the solid earth with a dia- 
 meter of a spider's web, yet absorb. Not cushioned in cool 
 halls, sacred to stillness and fragrant with Russia binding, do 
 men found dynasties. The sign-manual of the Grand Turk 
 hath a blood relationship with these cunning fruits of the 
 human mind, these theories incarnate in rhetoric. It also is 
 symmetrical, elaborate, pleasing to the eye, but if you will 
 mark well its contour and features, you shall yet see the bloody 
 hand laid down on the sheepskin — which was its prototype. 
 
 Study thou thy botanies ; it is well ; but still shalt thou 
 make the good Scotch gardener smile at thy shortcomings ; 
 study thou thy anatomies ; it is well ; still shall a Silesian pea- 
 sant cure, while thy utmost book only sufiiceth to kill ; study 
 thou thy electricities and chemistry in thy institute and Royal 
 College, yet shall one American painter alone report thee to 
 
S o c I A L Theories. 97 
 
 the antipodes, another row thee thither; study thou thy 
 mechanics, and forces, and mathematics, build thy practical 
 navies and thy yachts made by scientific norma to outstrip the 
 world ; yet shall the shrewd eye and rule of thumb suffice to 
 leave thee seven miles to leeward, while thy queen sees the 
 discomfiture through her tears. 
 
 The voyage of discovery and improvement hath been made 
 with a captain who came in through the cabin windows, but 
 there were good dumb boatswains on board, who managed to 
 say yes and no. 
 
 AVe who cut stone, temper our tools and choose our blocks 
 by rules 'hat are not in the Encyclopiedia or Conversations- 
 Lexicon. We are jealous of these knowledges, many of them 
 are vague, dim guess-work to appearance. When the book- 
 maker doth cross-question us to extract the kernel of our toil, 
 Ave hang the lip and look silly ; under the garb of inarticulate 
 stupidity lies a grim determination that the idler enter not into 
 our rest. 
 
 AVhen the great monolith e was erected, by Fontana. if I 
 remember, in the square of St. Peter's, it was determined to 
 make that job an incarnation of the means and knowledge of 
 Rome. This was noble and truly human. They arranged 
 their tackle, spotted their hands, and a papal edict promised 
 death to any man who should utter a word, until the engineer 
 gave the signal that all risk was past. The square was full of 
 admiring eyes and beating hearts; slowly that huge crystalliza- 
 tion of Egyptian sweat rose on its basis — five degrees, ten, 
 
98 
 
 Social Theories. 
 
 fifteen, twenty, alas ! There be signs of faltering ; no matter ! 
 twenty-five, thirty, forty, forty-three — thei-e is trouble ! Lo ! 
 the hempen cables that, like faithful servants, have thus far 
 obeyed the mathematician, have suddenly lugged out an order 
 from God not to hold that base steady any longer on those 
 terras. The engineer, who knew the hand-writing, trembled ; 
 the obedient masons and fachini looked down, then eyed the 
 threatening mass. The question was, which way it would fall. 
 Among the crowd, silence! The sun poured down on the 
 stillness and the despair. Suddenly from out that breathless 
 mass of men there came a voice, clear as the archangel's trum- 
 pet, Wet the ropes ! The crowd turned. Tiptoe on a post stood 
 a fellow in a jacket of humble homespun, his eye full of fire, 
 and his hair rising ^Yith the sense of his responsibility ; from 
 engineer to humblest facliino that order had instant obe- 
 dience ; the cables, which only wanted the water cure, bit fiercely 
 into the granite ; the windlasses were manned once more, the 
 obelisk rose to its post and took its stand for centuries. It is 
 well that there is order and discipline and even the pain of 
 death for their sake, because the divine man is not stopped by 
 the latter, in that he bears eternal life, and the sense thereof in 
 his own bosom. 
 
 Thou whose " Lectures and Miscellanies" do fill my mind 
 with a certain sense of roundness, finish, and courtly present- 
 ableness, I pray thee, in the fervor of thy faith, to read them in 
 a German beerhouse, and amid throngs of low^-browed and big- 
 jawed Hibernians, stepping here on shore with vast appetite, a 
 
Social Theories. 99 
 
 faith that removes mountains, and imperfect, insuflBcient know- 
 ledge of Paley and Chesterfield. There, in the eye that lights 
 all that bone and muscle, shalt thou see, as in a glass, darkly, 
 no dearth of hard knocks and bloody noses, standing in dread 
 array between thy silk stocking theory and any 2:)ractical, bear- 
 able system of living together based thereon. I do not mean 
 to deny that thou hast found a sibylline leaf and deciphered it 
 well, but there were other sibylline leaves, which were burned 
 before pride took the alarm, and the secret of making men 
 learn lovingly — was in those that were burned ! 
 
 Humbly do I recognise in thy hand the divine hammer that 
 fashions me, as with resolute grip thou boldest me upon the 
 anvil ; but the anvil below strikes as hard as thou above, and is 
 steadier, for it stands on that which talk cannot reach, l^ot 
 from Pliny's Page or BufFon's elaborations did man learn the 
 mystery of tiger's tooth or fangs of deadly rattlesnake. The 
 nightshade "never told her love" to the eye; 'twas in the 
 w^ritbing stomach of experiment that she talked the true, Catho- 
 lic tongue, English to Englishmen, French to Frenchmen, and 
 they who saw believed. 
 
 Well do I know that God's truth is a two-edged sword, even 
 such of it as man may wield ; but it is a sword whose handle 
 burns as fiercely as its edge doth cut, and knowing men pass it 
 more quickly than the bottle. 
 
 Let us make, then, a grand experiment, let us unite as one 
 man from Maine to Georgia, we who have read and have seen, 
 and let us seek to change the Anglo-Saxon hat, or wrench one 
 
100 Social Theories. 
 
 button from the empire of Brummagem fashion and trans- 
 atlantic dictation, let us see " quid valeant quid recusent humeri" 
 let us test our influence with the masses, by a garb made 
 according to the demonstrable requirement of climate and con- 
 venience. Yerily, I say to thee, that Wall street will greet us 
 with a guffaw, the maids will titter at us through the blinds, 
 the rowdies w^ill hustle us in the thoroughfare, and even the 
 good quiet man will see these things through the plate glass of 
 his chariot, and say debaxo de su manto. — " Served them right." 
 While thou warmest in the promise of order, quiet, content, 
 and cheerful toil, lo I the Catholic priest hath already occupied 
 their hearts with the "promise to pay," whose Biddle has yet 
 to find his Andrew, and whose god-like defenders and consti- 
 tutional expounders mean to fight for it at last, and not " obso- 
 lete" it. Not by rushing madly at the differential calculus, or 
 wielding algebraic signs or logarithmic compend, is the traffic 
 of the world done, because then there would be too hard a pres- 
 sure of Sir Isaac Newtons, and Lacroix would lose his balance ; 
 Cocker alone will carry you to millions, and then you may 
 maintain those that teach the higher law of calculation — and 
 make trouble therewith. 
 
 Let us seek rather the kingdom of God and his righteous- 
 ness, and all these things shall be added unto us ; let us throw 
 off our coats, and leaving the question of the Trinity an open 
 one, teach the poor and the lowly that cleanliness is next to 
 godliness ; let us try to save and cleanse what of womanhood 
 is left in " poor and common," and seek out little wrongs 
 
Social Theories. 101 
 
 as a hidden treasure, that we may put a little right in their 
 places; let us frown down waste, for God has only made 
 enough of each thing ; let us honor toil, for toil is the sun- 
 shine's brother ; let us seek the heart of man, for there is eter- 
 nal life, and not ask too much of his head, for that fruit is not 
 yet ripe. 
 
 I cannot as yet adopt thy broad humanity — I will put up 
 with less breadth, much less — only give me more depth there- 
 with. I love the concrete, my brother, and I can look Sir 
 Isaac Newton in the eye without flinching ; I kneel to William 
 Shakspeare, who guessed to a drop how much oil goes to a 
 Lombard's salad. 
 
 Give me the man who, seated in that fog bank betwixt the 
 North Sea and the Irish Channel, held horses at the play-house 
 and found it in his head to teach kings how to wear a crown ! 
 the man who, living amid theatre wenches and pot-house degra- 
 dation, found it in his heart to paint the purple dawn of virgin 
 womanhood in the far away south, and made a Moor to burn 
 with more than Afric's passion. That's the mind that I will 
 follow, not only because he is genial, warm, and real, not only 
 because he is substantial, hath avoirdupois, a perfume, and a 
 taste, but because he is multiform, elastic, not procrustean, not 
 monomaniacal. I hate thy straight lines, and thy arrangements 
 for the elbows, and thy lid that fits over all, with the screws 
 ready in thy hand. I will none of it. If thou insist, fun shall 
 come of it, but it shall be of that fun which all men make who 
 forget that it takes two to conclude a bargain. 
 
102 Social Theories. 
 
 The measure which thou hast scientifically taken of me is 
 ray measure now, perhaps! but now I am young, dormant, not 
 come to my full height or my adult strength. I feel that I 
 am destined to outgrow thy feet and inches hereafter ; whole 
 degrees of latitude shall I require for my morning walk — what 
 do I say ? I will spurn the great glohe itself, and the solar 
 system shall hold me in base " circumscription and confine." 
 The utmost measure of thy extended arms, my brother, is thy 
 own measure, not mine, still less that of collective manhood. If 
 thou be truly gi-eat, then shalt thou add one grain of sand to 
 the ant-hill, and that shall suffice thee, as it hath sufficed thy 
 brother insect however great, until now ! 
 
 Remember how Mahomet learned that he was sent of God, 
 even by making two or three dunderheads take him at that 
 rate. This is the mountain that the fate of all prophets must 
 begin by removing. Ever so little a spark of this, even as a 
 grain of mustard seed, will answer for a beginning, and then 
 comes by degrees a flame that covers a large portion of Asia, 
 Africa, and Europe, with turbans, circumcision, and slaughter. 
 
 I object to these transcendental theories of life, because of 
 their genesis. I object to them, because of the experience of 
 them that hath been made. I object to them, more than all, 
 because they threaten to pare down and clip the tendrils by 
 which I cling to the concrete. 
 
 They are, one and all, the offspring of negative propositions, 
 and are imaginary eliminations of existing evils, and what 
 men regard as such. Fourier's disgust at French corruption, 
 
Social Theories. 103 
 
 passion, and discord, was a good motive for his going to Eng- 
 land, or Switzerland, or America. He might have found his 
 quietus in the concrete. This disgust was no generative power 
 to create a new civilization, because generation is not effected 
 through disgust, never was, and never will be. It is the 
 crystalHzation of love and worship in the average mind that 
 foundeth new systems, dissatisfaction operates with the torch, 
 the mine, and the guillotine, it ploughs, harrows and prepares 
 the ground, love seeds it. Love^ and Hope, and Faith. 
 
 Dost thou speak to me of the large promise of these people, 
 of quiet, and joy, and universal satisfaction, and offer this as a 
 proof of love ? I cannot accept it as such. They offer it to 
 man on the condition of his being no more what he hath ever 
 been — a beUigerent. They ask him to lay down his fangs and 
 claws, and taking him into the high mountain of their theory, 
 promise him the kingdom of the world. Retro Satanas ! 
 
 I shall not enter into any contract to wash my Ethiopian 
 skin or eradicate my leopard's spots. I shall seek to be clean 
 and to make my neighbor clean, but if he will not be clean, 
 
 let him be filthy still." 
 
 The experience that hath been made of ultra doctrines does 
 not charm my mind. I like not to contemplate the rites of 
 Buddha, or the Thebaid, or the monomania of La Trappe. 
 Even Quakerism leaves a burning spot of my heart un watered ; 
 this, thou of the Society of Friends, this thou sayest is a proof 
 of my corrupt nature. Let us pray ! 
 
 We are all convinced of our own unworthiness, monsters of 
 
104 
 
 Social Theories. 
 
 guilt are we, but yet liave we a clear perception of the right, 
 we think. Did God, then, make our conscience, and the de\dl 
 make our wills ? If so, we are held by a double ownership, 
 and must abide the consequence. 
 
 We are conscious that there is an up and a down in space, 
 but if we analyse this idea we shall find that " down" is but 
 another name for that which is in the direction of gravitation ; 
 " up," that which is against gravitation. To the Infinite Mind 
 in infinite space can there be neither up nor down, I think. 
 In the moral world self is the centre of gravitation, what tends 
 uniquely thither we call selfish — down ; what tends against 
 that — generous — up. Now the highest flight of eagle vitality 
 must tire, for the gravitation is perennial, the vitality limited, 
 brief, feeble. We build our church up into the sky against the 
 gravitation, but 'tis only the downward tendency that holds it 
 fast. This is true materially, and it is true morally, for there 
 are not two Gods, but one God, I believe ! Therefore do civili- 
 zations begin with heroism, self-sacrifice, and love ! These, like 
 the fusee of the rocket, conquer the suction of earth, and the 
 stick soars. The fusee lessens by combustion, the stick remains 
 ever of the original avoirdupois. The stick goes up with so 
 many ounces of unwillingness, and by degrees there comes a 
 balance of power — momentary ; for the downward will gets the 
 better of the fire, and the stick comes home. The first Chris- 
 tians were crucified with their heads downwards; the later 
 Christians hold largely in the funds, and seek Rothschild's 
 countenance. This suction self-ward is so inherent and inevi- 
 
Social Theories. 105 
 
 table, that the sacrifice of self hatli ever, until now, been bought 
 — for a consideration — which, to my mind, seems not unlike 
 going in at the same hole at which we came out — sailing 
 •westward until we find ourselves in the orient. 
 
 For these reasons do I mistrust the theorist. Nine times in 
 ten hath he no wholesome, working, organic relation with 
 God's ground or with his fellow-men. Nine times in ten is his 
 position in life exceptional and not normal. Nine times in ten 
 doth he sit perched upon an income which is a dead branch of 
 the living tree of industry, and with his belly distended by the 
 east wind, and his heart sour with the ambition that hath struck 
 inward, doth he spout generalities more or less outside of the 
 real needs of to-day. He hath said in his heart, that God's 
 world, till now, hath been but rough draft on slate, and saitli 
 that he hath a sponge. Not so, brother! This is a fight; 
 come down, and take thy side, and do battle for the most right 
 of the two combatants. Thy " virtue" is an elevation on 
 paper ; to build it on the ground, we must have " cakes 
 and ale." 
 
 Lock up thy head, which would fain teach us that one man 
 is more than all men ; open thy heart, where there be treasures 
 yet untold ; let thy hand do with its might whatever it findetli 
 to do, not because of perfection, which is out of reach, but 
 because idleness is the root of much evil. 
 
 When, in the plenitude of thy ingenuity, thou canst fashion 
 a stick with only one end, a solid body with only one side, a 
 
 6 
 
106 Social Theories. 
 
 magnet with only one pole, a light not dogged by sha- 
 dow, a liariuony with only one part, a marriage with only 
 a bridegroom, then wilt thou bo prepared to begin thy 
 Millennium. 
 
AMERICAN ART. 
 
 TfiE susceptibility, the tastes, and the genius which enable a 
 people to enjoy the Fine Arts, and to excel in them, have been 
 denied to the Anglo-Americans, not only by European talkers, 
 but by European thinkers. The assertion of our obtuseness and 
 inefficiency in this respect, has been ignorantly and presumptu- 
 ously set forth by some persons, merely to fill up the measure 
 of our condemnation. Others have arrived at the same con- 
 clusion, after examining our political and social character, after 
 investigating our exploits, and testing our capacities. They 
 admit that \v^e trade with enterprise and skill ; that we build 
 ships cunningly, and sail them well ; that we have a quick and 
 far-sighted apprehension of the value of a territory ; that we 
 make wholesome homespun laws for its government, and that 
 we fight hard when molested in any of these homely exercises 
 of our ability ; but they assert that there is a stubborn, anti- 
 poetical tendency in all that we do, or say, or think ; they 
 attribute our very excellence, in the ordinary business of life, to 
 causes which must prevent our development as artists. 
 
 Enjoying the accumulated result of the thought and labor of 
 centuries, Europe has witnessed our struggles with the hard- 
 
108 American Art. 
 
 ships of an untamed continent, and tlie disadvantages of colo- 
 nial relations, with but a partial appreciation of what we aim 
 at, with but an imperfect knowledge of what we have done. 
 Seeing us intently occupied, during several generations, in felling 
 forests, in building towns, and constructing roads, she thence 
 formed a theory that we are good for nothing except these pio- 
 neer efforts. She taunted us, because there were no statues or 
 frescoes in our log-cabins ; she pronounced us unmusical, 
 because we did not sit down in the swamp, with an Indian on 
 one side and a rattlesnake on the other, to play the violin. 
 That she should triumph over the deficiencies of a people who 
 had set the example of revolt and republicanism, was natural ; 
 but the reason which she assigned for those deficiencies was not 
 the true reason. She argued with the depth and the sagacity 
 of a philosopher who should conclude, from seeing an infant 
 imbibe with eagerness its first aliment, that its whole life would 
 be occupied in similar absorption. 
 
 Sir Walter Scott, rank tory as he was, showed more good 
 sense, when, in recommending an American book to Miss Edge- 
 worth, he accounted for such a phenomenon, by saying, "that 
 people once possessed of a three-legged stool, soon contrive to 
 make an easy-chair." Humble as the phrase is, we here per- 
 ceive an expectation on his part, that the energies now exer- 
 cised in laying the foundations of a mighty empire, would, in 
 due time, rear the stately columns of civilization, and crown the 
 edifice with the entablature of letters and of arts. Remember- 
 ing that one leg of the American stool was planted in Maine, a 
 
American Art. 
 
 109 
 
 second in Florida, and the third at the base of the Rocky 
 Mountains, he could scarce expect that the chair would become 
 an easy one in a half-century. 
 
 It is true, that before the Declaration of Independence, 
 Copley had in Boston formed a style of portrait which filled Sir 
 Joshua Reynolds with astonishment ; and that West, breaking 
 through the bar of Quaker prohibition, and conquering the pre- 
 judice against a provincial aspirant, had taken a high rank in 
 the highest walk of art in London. Stuart, Trumbull, AUston, 
 Morse, Leslie, and Newton, followed in quick succession, while 
 Vanderlyn won golden opinions at Rome, and bore away high 
 honors at Paris. So far were the citizens of the Republic from 
 showing a want of capacity for art, that we may safely affirm 
 the bent of their genius was rather peculiarly in that direc- 
 tion, since the first burins of Europe were employed in the ser- 
 vice of the American pencil, before Irving had written, and 
 while Cooper was yet a child. That England, with these facts 
 before her, should have accused us of obtuseness in regard to 
 art, and that we should have pleaded guilty to the charge, fur- 
 nishes the strongest proof of her disposition to underrate our 
 intellectual powers, and of our own ultra docility and want of 
 self-reliance. 
 
 Not many years since, one of the illustrious and good men 
 of America exclaimed, in addressing the nation : 
 
 "Excudent alii molhus spirantia £era, 
 Credo eauidern ; vivos ducent de marmore vultns!" 
 
110 American Art. 
 
 Since that period, art has received a new impulse among iis. 
 Artists have arisen in numbers ; the public gives its attention 
 to their productions ; their labors are liberally rewarded. It 
 seems now admitted that wealth and cultivation are destined to 
 yield, in America, the same fruits that they have given in Italy, 
 in Spain, in France, Germany, and England. It seems now 
 admitted that there is no anomalous defect in our mental 
 endowments ; that the same powers displayed in clearing the 
 forest, and tilling the farm, will trim the garden. It seems clear 
 that we are destined to have a school of art. It becomes a 
 matter of importance to decide how the youth who devote 
 themselves to these studies are to acquire the rudiments of imi- 
 tation, and what influences are to be made to act upon them. 
 This question seemed, at one time, to have been decided. The 
 friends of art in America looked to Europe for an example ; and 
 with the natural assumption that experience had made the old 
 world wise, in what relates to the fine arts, determined upon 
 forming Academies, as the more refined nations of the continent 
 have ended by doing. We might as well have proposed a 
 national chu/ch establishment. That the youth must be taught 
 is clear — but in framing an institution for that object, if we look 
 to countries grown old in European systems, it must be for 
 warning rather than for example. We speak from long experi- 
 ence and much observation of European Academies. We enter- 
 tain the highest respect for the professional ability and for the 
 personal character of the gentlemen who preside over those 
 institutions. Nay, it is our conviction of their capacity and of 
 
American Art. Ill 
 
 their individual willingness to impart knowledge, which forces 
 upon us the opinion of the rottenness of the systems of which 
 they are the instruments. 
 
 De Tocqueville remarks upon the British aristocracy, that, 
 notwithstanding their sagacity as a body, and their integrity 
 and high-toned character as individuals, they have gradually 
 absorbed everything, and left the people nothing; while he 
 declares the American employes, though they are sometimes 
 defaulters and dishonest, yet, after all, get little beyond their 
 dues, and are obliged to sacrifice both reputation and self- 
 respect in order to obtain that little. Those who direct the 
 Academies of Fine Arts in Europe, are prone to take an advan- 
 tage of their position analogous to that enjoyed by the afore- 
 said aristocracy. As the latter come to regard the mass as a 
 flock to be fed, and defended, and cherished, for the sake of 
 their wool and mutton, so the former are not slow to make a 
 band of edueandi the basis of a hierarchy. Systems and 
 manner soon usurp the place of sound precept. Faith is 
 insisted on rather than works. The pupils are required to be 
 not only docile but submissive. They are not free. 
 
 To minds once opened to the light of knowledge, an adept 
 may speak in masses, and the seed will fall on good ground ; 
 bnt to awaken a dormant soul, to impart first principles, to 
 watch the budding of the germ of rare talent, requires a contact 
 and relations such as no professor can have with a class, such 
 as few men can have with any boy. If Europe must furnish a 
 model of artistical tuition, let us go at once to the records of 
 
112 American Art. 
 
 the great age of art in Italy, and we shall there learn that 
 Michael Angelo and Raphael, and their teachers also, were 
 formed without any of the cumbrous machinery and mill-horse 
 discipline of a modern Academy. They were instructed, it is 
 true ; they were apprenticed to painters. Instead of passively 
 listening to an experienced proficient merely, they discussed 
 with their fellow students the merits of different works, the 
 advantages of rival methods, the choice between contradictory 
 authorities. They formed one another. Sympathy warmed 
 them, opposition strengthened, and emulation spurred them on. 
 In these latter days, classes of boys toil through the rudiments 
 under the eye of men who are themselves aspirants for the 
 public favor, and who, deriving no benefit, as masters from 
 their apprentices, from the proficiency of the lads, look upon 
 every clever graduate as a stumbhng-block in their own way. 
 Hence their system of stupefying discipline, their tying down 
 the pupil to mere manual execution, their silence in regard to 
 principles, their cold reception of all attempts to invent. To 
 chill in others the efibrt to acquire, is in them the instinctive 
 action of a wish to retain. Well do we remember the expres- 
 sion of face and the tone of voice with which one of these 
 bashaws of an European Academy once received our praise of 
 the labors of a man grown grey in the practice of his art, but 
 who, though his works were known and admired at Naples and 
 St. Petersburgh, at London and Vienra, had not yet won from 
 the powers that were his exequatur — " Yes, sir, yes ! clever 
 boy, sir ! promises well /" 
 
American Art. 113 
 
 The president and the professors of an Academy are regarded 
 by the public as, of course, at the head of their respective pro- 
 fessions. Their works are models, their opinions give the law. 
 The youth are awed and dazzled by their titles and their fame ; 
 the man of genius finds them arrayed in soHd phalanx to com- 
 bat his claim. In those countries where a court bestows all 
 encouragement, it is found easy to keep from those in power 
 all knowledge of a dangerous upstart talent. How far this 
 mischievous influence can be carried, may be gathered from the 
 position in which Sir Joshua Reynolds and his court managed 
 to keep men like Wilson and Gainsborough. He who sees the 
 productions of these men in company with those of their con- 
 temporaries, and who remembers the impression which Sir 
 Joshna's writings had conveyed of their standing as artists, will 
 perceive with surprise that they were not the victims of any 
 overt act of misrepresentation, but that they were quietly and 
 gently praised out of the rank due to them into an inferior one, 
 by a union of real talent, constituted influence, and a sly, cool, 
 consistent management. 
 
 Many of the ablest painters and sculptors of Europe have 
 expressed to us, directly and frankly, the opinion that Academies, 
 furnished though they be with all the means to form the eye, 
 the hand, and the mind of the pupil, are positively hindrances 
 instead of helps to art. 
 
 The great element of execution, whether in painting or in 
 sculpture, is imitation. This is the language of art. Almost 
 all clever boys can learn this to a degree far beyond what is 
 6* 
 
114 American Art. 
 
 supposed. That objects should be placed before them calculated 
 to attract their attention, and teach them the rules of propor- 
 tion, while they educate the eye to form and color, no one will 
 dispute ; but the insisting upon a routine, the depriving them 
 of all choice or volition, the giving a false preference to readi- 
 ness of hand over power of thought, all these are great evils, 
 and we fully believe that they fall with a withering force on 
 those minds especially whose nourishment and guidance they 
 were intended to secure — we mean on those minds which are 
 filled with a strong yearning after excellence, warm sympa- 
 thies, quick, delicate, and nice perceptions, strong will, and a 
 proud consciousness of creative power of mind, joined to diflS- 
 dence of their capacity to bring into action the energies they 
 feel within them. The paltry prizes offered for the best per- 
 formances seldom rouse men of this order ; they may create in 
 such souls an unamiable contempt for their unsuccessful com- 
 petitors ; they may give to successful mediocrity, inflated hopes, 
 and a false estimate of its own powers. As a substantial help 
 they are worthless even to the tyro who wins them. 
 
 Leonardo da Vinci coiled a rope in his studio, and drew from 
 it, with the subtlest outline, and the most elaborate study of 
 light and shade. " Behold !" said he, " my academy !" He 
 meant to show that the elements of art can be learned without 
 the pompous array of the antique school, or the lectures of the 
 professor. Few will be tempted to follow his example; but 
 even that were far better than a routine of instruction which, 
 after years of drudgery and labor, sends forth the genius and 
 
American Art. 116 m 
 
 the blockhead so nearly on a level with each other, the one 
 manacled with precepts, the other armed with them at all 
 points. 
 
 The above reflections have been drawn from us by the oft- 
 repeated expression of regret which we have listened to, " that 
 from the constitution of our society, and the nature of our 
 institutions, no influences can be brought to bear upon art with 
 the vivifying power of court patronage." We fully and firmly 
 believe that these institutions are more favorable to a natural, 
 healthful growth of art than any hot-bed culture whatever. 
 We cannot — (as did Napoleon) — make, by a few imperial 
 edicts, an army of battle painters, a hierarchy of drum-and-fife 
 glorifiers. Nor can we, in the life-time of an individual, so 
 stimulate this branch of culture, so unduly and disproportion- 
 ately endow it, as to make a W^alhalla start from a republican 
 soil. The monuments, the pictures, the statues of the repubHc 
 will represent what the people love and wish for, — not what 
 they can be made to accept, not how much taxation they will 
 bear. We hope, by such slow growth, to avoid the reaction 
 resulting from a morbid development; a reaction like that 
 which attended the building of St. Peter's ] a reaction like that 
 consequent upon the outlay which gave birth to the royal 
 mushroom at Versailles ; a reaction like that which we antici- 
 pate in Bavaria, unless the people of that country are consti- 
 tuted differently from the rest of mankind. 
 
 If there be any youth toiling through the rudiments of art, 
 at the forms of the simple and efficient school at New York 
 
116 American Art. 
 
 (whose title is the only pompous thing about it), with a chilling 
 belief that, elsewhere, the difficulties he struggles with are 
 removed or modified, we call upon him to be of good cheer, 
 and to believe — what from our hearts we are convinced of — 
 that there is at present no country where the development and 
 growth of an artist is more free, healthful, and happy than it is 
 in these United States. It is not until the tyro becomes a pro- 
 ficient — nay, an adept — that his fortitude and his temper are 
 put to tests more severe than elsewhere — tests of which we pro- 
 pose to speak more at large on a future occasion. 
 
AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE. 
 
 We have heard the learned in matters relating to art, ex- 
 press the opinion that these United States are destined to form 
 a new style of architecture. Remembering that a vast popu- 
 lation, rich in material and guided by the experience, the pre- 
 cepts, and the models of the old -world, was about to erect 
 durable structures for every function of civilized life, we also 
 cherished the hope that such a combination would speedily be 
 formed. 
 
 We forgot that though the country was young, yet the 
 people were old, that as Americans we have no childhood, no 
 half-fabulous, legendary wealth, no misty, cloud-enveloped 
 back-ground. We forgot that we had not unity of religious 
 belief, nor unity of origin ; that our territory, extending from 
 the white bear to the alligator, made our occupations dissimi- 
 lar, our character and tastes various. We forgot that the Re- 
 public had leaped full-grown and armed to the teeth from the 
 brain of her parent, and that a hammer had been the instru- 
 ment of delivery. We forgot that reason had been the dry 
 nurse of the giant offspring, and had fed her from the begin- 
 ning with the strong bread and meat of fact ; that every wry 
 
118 American Architecture. 
 
 * 
 
 face the bantling ever made had been daguerreotyped, and all 
 her words and deeds printed and labelled away in the pigeon- 
 lioles of official bureaux. 
 
 Reason can dissect, but cannot originate; she can adopt, 
 but cannot create ; she can modify, but cannot find. Give her 
 but a cock-boat, and she will elaborate a line-of-battle ship ; 
 give her but a beam, with its wooden tooth, and she turns 
 out the patent plough. She is not young ; and when her friends 
 insist upon the phenomena of youth, then is she least attractive. 
 She can imitate the flush of the young cheek, but where is the 
 flash of the young eye ? She buys the teeth — alas ! she 
 cannot buy the breath of childhood. The puny cathedral 
 of Broadway, like an elephant dwindled to the size of a dog, 
 measures her yearning for Gothic sublimity, while the roar of 
 the Astor-house, and the mammoth vase of the great reservoir, 
 show how she works when she feels at home, and is in earnest. 
 
 The mind of this country has never been seriously applied 
 to the subject of building. Intently engaged in matters of 
 more pressing importance, we have been content to receive 
 our notions of architecture as we have received the fashion of 
 our garments, and the form of our entertainments, from 
 Europe. In our eagerness to appropriate, we have neglected 
 to adapt, to distinguish, — nay, to understand. We have 
 built small Gothic temples of wood, and have omitted all 
 ornaments for economy, unmindful that size, material, and 
 ornament are the elements of effect in that style of building. 
 Captivated by the classic symmetry of the Athenian models 
 
American Architecture. 119 
 
 we have souglit to bring the Parthenon into our streets, to 
 make the temple of Theseus work in our towns. We have 
 shorn them of their lateral colonnades, let them down from 
 their dignified platform, pierced their walls for light, and, in- 
 stead of the storied relief and the eloquent statue which 
 enriched the frieze, and graced the pediment, we have made 
 our chimney tops to peer over the broken profile, and tell, by 
 their rising smoke, of the traffic and desecration of the in- 
 terior. Still the model may be recognised, some of the 
 architectural features are entire ; like the captive king, stripped 
 alike of arms and purple, and drudging amid the Helots of a 
 capital, the Greek temple, as seen among us, claims pity for 
 its degraded majesty, and attests the barbarian force which 
 has abused its nature, and been blind to its qualities. 
 
 If we trace Architecture from its perfection, in the days of 
 Pericles, to its manifest decay in the reign of Constantine, we 
 ■shall find that one of the surest symptoms of decline was the 
 adoption of admired forms and models for purposes not con- 
 templated in their invention. The forum became a temple ; 
 the tribunal became a temple ; the theatre was turned into a 
 church ; nay, the column, that organized member, that sub- 
 ordinate part, set up for itself, usurped unity, and was a 
 monument ! The great principles of Architecture being once 
 abandoned, correctness gave way to novelty, economy and 
 vain-glory associated produced meanness and pretension. 
 Sculpture, too, had waned. The degenerate workmen could 
 no longer match the fragments they sought to mingle, nor 
 
120 American Architecture. 
 
 copy the originals they only lioped to repeat. The mouldering 
 remains of better days frowned contempt upon such impotent 
 efforts, till, in the gradual coming of darkness, ignorance be- 
 came contempt, and insensibility ceased to compare. 
 
 We say that the mind of this country has never been 
 seriously applied to architecture. True it is, that the com- 
 monwealth, with that desire of public magnificence which has 
 ever been a leading feature of democracy, has called from the 
 vasty deep of the past the spirits of the Greek, the Roman, 
 and the Gothic styles ; but they would not come when she 
 did call to them ! The vast cathedral, with its ever open por- 
 tals, towering high above the courts of kings, inviting all men 
 to its cool and fragrant twilight, where the voice of the organ 
 stirs the blood, and the dim-seen visions of saints and martyrs 
 bleed and die upon the canvas amid the echoes of hymning 
 voices and the clouds of frankincense, this architectural embo- 
 dying of the divine and blessed words, " Come to me, ye who 
 labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest !" demands 
 a sacrifice of what we hold dearest. Its corner-stone must be 
 laid upon the right, to judge the claims of the church. The 
 style of Greek architecture, as seen in the Greek temple, 
 demands the aid of sculpture, insists upon every feature of its 
 original organization, loses its harmony if a note be dropped in 
 the execution, and when so modified as to serve for a custom- 
 house or a bank, departs from its original beauty and propriety 
 as widely as the crippled gelding of a hackney coach dilOfers 
 from the bounding and neighing wild horse of the desert. 
 
American Architecture. 121 
 
 Even where, in the fervor of our faith in shapes, we have 
 sternly adhered to the dictum of another age, and have actu- 
 ally succeeded in securing the entire exterior which echoes the 
 forms of Athens, the pile stands a stranger among us, and 
 receives a respect akin to what we should feel for a fellow-citi- 
 zen in the garb of Greece. It is a make-believe. It is not the 
 real thing. We see the marble capitals ; we trace the acanthus 
 leaves of a celebrated model — incredulous; it is not a temple. 
 
 The number and variety of our experiments in building show 
 the dissatisfaction of the public taste with what has been 
 hitherto achieved ; the expense at which they have been made 
 proves how strong is the yearning after excellence ; the talents 
 and acquirements of the artists whose services have been 
 engaged in them are such as to convince us that the fault lies 
 in the system, not in the men. Is it possible that out of this 
 chaos order can arise ? — that of these conflicting dialects and 
 jargons a language pan be born ? When shall we have done 
 with experiments ? AVhat refuge is there from the absurdities 
 that have successively usurped the name and functions of archi- 
 tecture ? Is it not better to go on with consistency and uni- 
 formity, in imitation of an admired model, than incur the dis- 
 grace of other failures ? In answering these questions let us 
 remember with humility that all salutary changes are the work 
 of many and of time ; but let us encourage experiment at 
 the risk of license, rather than submit to an iron rule that 
 begins by sacrificing reason, dignity, and comfort. Let us con- 
 sult nature, and, in the assurance that she will disclose a mine. 
 
122 American Architecture. 
 
 richer than was ever dreamed of by the Greeks, in art as well 
 as in philosophy. Let us regard as ingratitude to the author 
 of nature the despondent idleness that sits down while one want 
 is unprovided for, one worthy object un attained. 
 
 If, as the first step in our search after the great principles of 
 construction, we but observe the skeletons and skins of animals, 
 through all the varieties of beast and bird, of fish and insect, are 
 we not as forcibly struck by their variety as by their beauty ? 
 There is no arbitrary law of proportion, no unbending model of 
 form. There is scarce a part of the animal organization which 
 we do not find elongated or shortened, increased, diminished, 
 or suppressed, as the wants of the genus or species dictate, as 
 their exposure or their work may require. The neck of the 
 swan and that of the eagle, however different in character and 
 proportion, equally charm the eye and satisfy the reason. We 
 approve the length of the same member in grazing animals, its 
 shortness in beasts of prey. The horse's shanks are thin, and 
 we admire them ; the greyhound's chest is deep, and we cry, 
 beautiful ! It is neither the presence nor the absence of this or 
 that part, or shape, or color, that wins our eye in natural 
 objects ; it is the consistency and harmony of the parts juxta- 
 posed, the stibordination of details to masses, and of masses to 
 the whole. 
 
 The law of adaptation is the fundamental law of nature in 
 all structure. So imflinchingly does she modify a type in 
 accordance with a new position, that some philosophers have 
 declared a variety of appearance to be the object aimed at; so 
 
American Architecture. 
 
 123 
 
 entirely does she limit the modification to the demands of 
 necessity, that adherence to one original plan seems, to limited 
 intelligence, to be carried to the very verge of caprice. The 
 domination of arbitrary rules of taste has produced the very 
 counterpart of the wisdom thus displayed in every object 
 around us; we tie up the cameleopard to the rack; we shave 
 the lion, and call him a dog ; we strive to bind the unicorn 
 with his band in the furrow, and to make him harrow the val- 
 leys after us ! 
 
 When the savage of the South Sea islands shapes his war 
 club, his first thought is of its use. His first eftbrts pare the 
 long shaft, and mould the convenient handle ; then the heavier 
 end takes gradually the edge that cuts, while it retains the 
 weight that stuns. His idler hour divides its surface by lines 
 and curves, or embosses it with figures that have pleased his 
 eye, or are linked with his superstition. We admire its effect- 
 ive shape, its Etruscan-like quaintness, its graceful form and 
 subtle outline, yet we neglect the lesson it might teach. If we 
 compare the form of a newly invented machine with the per- 
 fected type of the same instrument, we observe, as we trace it 
 through the phases of improvement, how weight is shaken off 
 where strength is less needed, how functions are made to 
 approach without impeding each other, how the straight 
 becomes curved, and the curve is straightened, till the strag- 
 gling and cumbersome machine becomes the compact, effective, 
 and beautiful engine. 
 
 vSo instinctive is the perception of organic beauty in the 
 
124 American Architecture. 
 
 human eye, that we cannot withhold our admiration even from 
 the organs of destruction. There is majesty in the royal paw 
 of the lion, music in the motion of the brindled tiger ; we accord 
 our praise to the sword and the dagger, and shudder our appro- 
 val of the frightful aptitude of the ghastly guillotine. 
 
 Conceiving destruction to be a normal element of the system 
 of nature equally with production, we have used the word 
 beauty in connexion with it. We have no objection to ex- 
 change it for the word character, as indicating the mere adapt- 
 ation of forms to functions, and would gladly substitute the 
 actual pretensions of our architecture to the former, could we 
 hope to secure the latter. 
 
 Let us now turn to a structure of our own, one which, from 
 its nature and uses, commands us to reject authority, and we 
 shall find the result of the manly use of plain good sense, so 
 like that of taste and genius too, as scarce to require a distinct- 
 ive title. Observe a ship at sea ! Mark the majestic form of 
 her hull as she rushes through the water, observe the graceful 
 bend of her body, the gentle transition from round to flat, the 
 grasp of her keel, the leap of her bows, the symmetry and rich 
 tracery of her spars and rigging, and those grand wind mus- 
 cles, her sails. Behold an organization second only to that of 
 an animal, obedient as the horse, swift as the stag, and bearing 
 the burden of a thousand camels from pole to pole ! What 
 Academy of Design, what research of connoisseurship, what 
 imitation of the Greeks produced this marvel of construction ? 
 Here is the result of the study of man upon the great deep, 
 
.American Architecture. 125 
 
 where Nature spake of the laws of building, not in the feather 
 and in the flower, but in winds and waves, and he bent all his 
 mind to hear and to obey. Could we carry into our civil 
 architecture the responsibilities that weigh upon our ship-build- 
 ing, we should ere long have edifices as superior to the Parthe- 
 non, for the purposes that we require, as the Constitution or the 
 Pennsylvania is to the galley of the Argonauts. Could our 
 blunders on terra firma be put to the same dread test that those 
 of shipbuilders are, little would be now left to say on this 
 subject. 
 
 Instead of forcing the functions of every sort of building into 
 one general form, adopting an outward shape for the sake of 
 the eye or of association, without reference to the inner distri- 
 bution, let us begin from the heart as a nucleus, and work out- 
 wards. The most convenient size and arrangement of the rooms 
 that are to constitute the building being fixed, the access of the 
 light that may, of the air that must be wanted, being provided 
 for, we have the skeleton of our building. Nay, we have all 
 excepting the dress. The connexion and order of parts, juxta- 
 posed for convenience, cannot fail to speak of their relation and 
 uses. As a group of idlers on the quay, if they grasp a rope to 
 haul a vessel to the pier, are united in harmonious action by the 
 cord they seize, as the slowly yielding mass forms a thorough- 
 bass to their livelier movement, so the unflinching adaptation 
 of a building to its position and use gives, as a sure product of 
 that adaptation, character and expression. 
 
 What a field of study would be opened by the adoption in 
 
12G American Architecture. 
 
 civil architecture of those laws of apportionment, distribution, 
 and connexion, which we have thus hinted at? No longer 
 could the mere tyro huddle together a crowd of ill-arranged, 
 ill-lighted, and stifled rooms, and masking the chaos with the 
 sneaking copy of a Greek facade, usurp the name of architect. 
 If this anatomic connexion and proportion has been attained in 
 ships, in machines, and, in spite of false principles, in such 
 buildings as make a departure from it fatal, as in bridges and 
 in scaffolding, why should we fear its immediate use in all con- 
 struction ? As its first result, the bank would have the physi- 
 ognomy of a bank, the church would be recognised as such, 
 nor would the billiaixl-room and the chapel wear the same uni- 
 form of columns and pediment. The African king, standing in 
 mock majesty with his legs and feet bare, and his body clothed 
 in a cast coat of the Prince Regent, is an object ^vhose ridicu- 
 *lous effect defies all power of face. Is not the Greek temple 
 jammed in between the brick shops of Wall street or Cornhill, 
 covered with lettered signs, and occupied by groups of money- 
 changers and apple women, a parallel even for his African 
 majesty ? 
 
 We have before us a letter in which Mr. Jeff"erson recom- 
 mends the model of the Maisoii Carree for the State House at 
 Richmond. Was he aware that the Maison Carrie is but a 
 fragment, and that too, of a Roman temple? He was; it is 
 beautiful — is the answer. An English society erected in Hyde 
 Park a cast in bronze of the colossal Achilles of the Quirinal, 
 and, changing the head, transformed it into a monument to 
 
American Architecture. 127 
 
 Wellington. But where is the distinction between the personal 
 prowess, the invulnerable body, the heaven-shielded safety of 
 the hero of the Iliad, and the complex of qualities which makes 
 the modern general ? The statue is beautiful, — is the answer. 
 If such reasoning is to hold, why not translate one of Pindar's 
 odes in memory of Washington, or set up in Carolina a colossal 
 Osiris in honor of General Greene ? 
 
 The monuments of Egypt and of Greece are sublime as 
 expressions of their power and their feeling. The modern 
 nation that appropriates them displays only wealth in so doing. 
 The possession of means, not accompanied by the sense of pro- 
 priety or feeling for the true, can do no more for a nation than 
 it can do for an individual. The want of an illustrious ancestry 
 may be compensated, fully compensated ; but the purloining of 
 the coat-of-arms of a defunct family is intolerable. That such 
 a monument as we have described should have been erected in 
 London while Chantry flourished, when Flaxman's fame was 
 cherished by the few, and Bailey and Behnes were already 
 known, is an instructive fact. That the illustrator of the Greek 
 poets, and of the Lord's Prayer, should, in the meanwhile, have 
 been preparing designs for George the Fourth's silversmiths, is 
 not less so. 
 
 The edifices, in whose construction the principles of architec- 
 ture are developed, may be classed as organic, formed to meet 
 the wants of their occupants, or monumental, addressed to the 
 sympathies, the faith, or the taste of a people. These two 
 great classes of buildings, embracing almost every variety of 
 
12S American Architecture. 
 
 structure, though occasionally joined and mixed in the same 
 edifice, have their separate rules, as they have a distinct 
 abstract nature. In the former class, the laws of structure 
 and apportionment, depending on definite wants, obey a 
 demonstrable rule. They may be called machines, each indi- 
 vidual of which must be formed with reference to the abstract 
 type of its species. The individuals of the latter class, bound 
 by no other laws than those of the sentiment which inspires 
 them, and the sympathies to which they are addressed, occupy 
 the positions and assume the forms best calculated to render 
 their parent feeling. No limits can be put to their variety ; 
 their size and richness have always been proportioned to the 
 means of the people who have erected them. 
 
 If, from what has been thus far said, it shall have appeared 
 that we regard the Greek masters as aught less than the true 
 apostles of correct taste in building, we have been misunder- 
 stood. We believe firmly and fully that they can teach us ; 
 but let us learn principles, not copy shapes ; let us imitate 
 them like men, and not ape them like monkeys. Remember- 
 ing what a school of art it was that perfected their system of 
 ornament, let us rather adhere to that system in enriching 
 what we invent than substitute novelty for propriety. After 
 observing the innovations of the ancient Romans, and of the 
 modern Italian masters in this department, we cannot but 
 recur to the Horatian precept — 
 
 *' exemplaria Grreca 
 Nocturna versate mann, versate diurna !" 
 
American Architecture. 129 
 
 To conclude : The fundamental laws of building, found at 
 the basis of every style of architecture, must be the basis of 
 ours. The adaptation of the forms and magnitude of structures 
 to the climate they are exposed to, and ^the offices for which 
 they are intended, teaches us to study our own varied wants 
 in these respects. The harmony of their ornaments with the 
 nature that they embellished, and the institutions from which 
 they sprang, calls on us to do the like justice to our country, 
 our government, and our faith. As a Christian preacher may 
 give weight to truth, and add persuasion to proof, by studying 
 the models of pagan writers, so the American builder, by a 
 truly philosophic investigation of ancient art, will learn of the 
 Greeks to be American. 
 
 The system of building we have hinted at cannot be formed 
 in a day. It requires all the science of any country to ascer- 
 tain and fix the proportions and arrangements of the members 
 of a great building, to plant it safely on the soil, to defend it 
 from the elements, to add the grace and poetry of ornament to 
 its frame. Each of these requisites to a good building requires 
 a special study and a life-time. Whether we are destined soon 
 to see so noble a fruit, may be doubted ; but we can, at least, 
 break the ground and throw in the seed. 
 
 We are fully aware that many regard all matters of taste 
 as matters of pure caprice and fashion. We are aware that 
 many think our architecture already perfect; but we have 
 chosen, during this sultry weather, to exercise a truly Ameri- 
 can light — the right of talking. This privilege, thank God, 
 
 7 
 
130 American Architecture. 
 
 is unquestioned, — from Miller, -who, robbing Beranger, trans- 
 lates into fanatical prose, " Finissons en ! le monde est assez 
 vieux!" to Brisbane, who declares that the same world has yet 
 to begin, and waits a subscription of two hundred thousand 
 dollars in order to start. Each man is free to present his 
 notions on any subject. We have also talked, firm in the 
 belief that the development of a nation's taste in art depends 
 on a thousand deep-seated influences, beyond the ken of the 
 ignorant present ; firm in the belief that freedom and know- 
 ledge will bear the fruit of refinement and beauty, we have 
 yet dared to utter a few words of discontent, a few crude 
 thoughts of what might be, and we feel the better for it. 
 We promised ourselves nothing more than that satisfaction 
 which Major Downing attributes to every man " who has had 
 his say, and then cleared out," and we already have a pleasant 
 consciousness of what he meant by it. 
 
RELATIVE AND INDEPENDENT BEAUTY. 
 
 There are threads of relation which lead me from my specialty 
 to the specialties of other men. Following this commune quod- 
 dam vinculum^ I lay my artistic dogma at the feet of science ; 
 I test it by the traditional lore of handicraft ; I seek a confir- 
 mation of these my inductions, or a contradiction and refuta- 
 tion of them ; I utter these inductions as they occur to myself; 
 I illustrate them by what they spontaneously suggest; I let 
 them lead me as a child. 
 
 Persons whose light I have sought, have been worried and 
 fretted at the form, the body of my utterance. Since this soul, 
 if soul it be, took the form of this body, I have received it as it 
 came. If I seek another form, another dress than that with 
 which my thought was born, shall I not disjoin that which is 
 one? Shall I not disguise what I seek to decorate? I have 
 seen that there is in the body and the dress an indication of 
 the quantum and quality of the mind, and therefore doth it 
 seem honest that I seek no other dress than mine own. I also 
 know by heart some lines and proportions of the work of able 
 penmen. The lucidus ordo of another mind is not displayed 
 
132 
 
 Relative and 
 
 before me as pearls before swine. I love to bear in my bosom 
 a nosegay plucked in classic ground : it sweetens me to myself. 
 I respect too much the glory of Scliiller and Winkelraan, of 
 Goethe and Hegel, to dare purloin their vesture for my crudi- 
 ties. The partial development of my mind makes the dress 
 and garb of imperfection proper for me. My notion of art is 
 not a somewhat set forth for sale, that I should show it to 
 advantage, or a soldier in uniform, anxious to pass muster, but 
 rather a poor babe, whom I strip before the faculty, that they 
 may council and advise — peradventure bid me despair. 
 
 Bodies are so varied by climate, and so changed by work, 
 that it is rash to condemn them until impotence is demon- 
 strated. The camelopard was long declared a monster, born 
 of fancy, a nightmare of traveller's brain ; but when the giraffe 
 stood browsing in the tree-tops before iis, we felt that we had 
 been hasty. God's law is as far away from our taste as his 
 ways are beyond our ways. I know full well that, without 
 dress and ornament, there are places whence one is expelled. 
 I am too proud to seek admittance in disguise. I had rather 
 remain in the street, than get in by virtue of a borrowed coat. 
 That which is partial and fractional may yet be sound and 
 good as far as it goes. 
 
 In the hope that some persons, studious of art, may be curi- 
 ous to see how I develope the formula I have set up, I proceed. 
 When I define Beauty as the promise of Function ; Action as 
 the presence of Function ; Character as the record of Function, 
 I arbitrarily divide that which is essentially one. I consider 
 
Independent Beauty. 
 
 133 
 
 the phases through which organized intention passes to com- 
 pleteness, as if they were distinct entities. Beauty being the 
 promise of function, must be mainly present before the phase 
 of action ; but so long as there is yet a .promise of function there 
 is beauty, proportioned to its relation with action or with cha- 
 racter. There is somewhat of character at the close of the first 
 epoch of the organic life, as there is somewhat of beauty at the 
 commencement of the last, but they are less apparent, and 
 present rather to the reason than to sensuous tests. 
 
 If the normal development of organized life be from beauty 
 to action, from action to character, the progress is a progress 
 upwards as well as forwards ; and action will be higher than 
 beauty, even as the summer is higher than the spring ; and 
 character will be higher than action, even as autumn is the 
 resume and result of spring and summer. If this be true, the 
 attempt to prolong the phase of beauty into the epoch of action 
 can only be made through non-performance ; and false beauty 
 or embellishment must be the result. 
 
 Why is the promise of function made sensuously pleasing ? 
 Because the inchoate organic life needs a care and protection 
 beyond its present means of payment. In order that we may 
 respect instinctive action, which is divine, are our eyes charmed 
 by the aspect of infancy, and our hearts obedient to the com- 
 mand of a visible yet impotent volition. 
 
 The sensuous charm of promise is so great that the unripe 
 reason seeks to make life a perennial promise; but promise, in 
 
134 
 
 Relattvk and 
 
 the phase of action, receives a new name — that of non- 
 performance, and is visited with contempt. 
 
 The dignity of character is so great that the unripe reason 
 seeks to mark the phase of action with the sensuous livery of 
 character. The ivy is trained up the green wall, and while the 
 promise is still fresh on every line of the building, its function 
 is invaded by the ambition to seem to have lived. 
 
 Not to promise for ever, or to boast at the outset, not to 
 shine and to seem, but to be and to act, is the glory of any 
 coordination of parts for an object. 
 
 I have spoken of embellishment as false beauty. I will 
 briefly develope this view of embellishment. Man is an ideal 
 being; standing, himself inchoate and incomplete, amid the 
 concrete manifestations of Nature, his first observation recog- 
 nises defect ; his first action is an effort to complete his being. 
 Not gifted, as the brutes, with an instinctive sense of complete- 
 ness, he stands alone as capable of conative action. He studies 
 himself; he disciplines himself. Now, his best efforts at orga- 
 nization falling short of the need that is in his heart, and there- 
 fore infinite, he has sought to compensate for the defect in his 
 plan by a charm of execution. Tasting sensuously the effect of 
 a rhythm and harmony in God's world, beyond any adaptation 
 of means to ends that his reason could measure and approve, 
 he has sought to perfect his own approximation to the essential 
 by crowning it with a wreath of measured and musical, yet non- 
 demonstrable, adjunct. Now, I afiirm that, from the ground 
 
Independent Beauty. 135 
 
 whereon I stand and whence I think I see him operate, he 
 thus mirrors, but darkly, God's world. By the sense of incom- 
 pleteness in his plan, he shows the divine yearning that is in 
 him ; by the effort to compensate for defect in plan by any 
 make-shift whatever, he forbids, or at least checks, further 
 effort. I understand, therefore, by embellishment, the in- 
 stinctive EFFORT OF INFANT CIVILIZATION TO DISGUISE ITS 
 INCOMPLETENESS, EVEN AS God's COMPLETENESS IS TO INFANT 
 
 SCIENCE DISGUISED. The mauy-sidcd and full and rich har- 
 mony of nature is a many-sided response to the call for many 
 functions ; not an sesthetical utterance of the Godhead. In the 
 tree and in the bird, in the shell and in the insect, we see the 
 utterance of him who sayeth yea, yea, and nay, nay ; and, 
 therefore, whatever is assume^ as neutral ground, or margin 
 around the essential, will be found to come of evil, or, in other 
 words, to be incomplete. 
 
 I base my opinion of embellishment upon the hypothesis 
 that there is not one truth in religion, another in the mathe- 
 matics, and a third in physics and in art ; but that there is one 
 truth, even as one God, and that organization is his utterance. 
 Now, organization obeys his law. It obeys his law by an 
 approximation to the essential, and then there is what we term 
 life ; or it obeys his law by falling short of the essential, and 
 then there is disorganization. I have not seen the inorganic 
 attached to the organized but as a symptom of imperfect plan, 
 or of impeded function, or of extinct action. 
 
 The normal development of beauty is through action to 
 
136 Relative and 
 
 completeness. The invariable development of embellishment 
 and decoration is more embellishment and more decoration. 
 The reductio ad ahsurdum is palpable enough at last; but 
 where "was the first downward step ? I maintain that the first 
 downward step was the introduction of the first inorganic^ non- 
 functional element, whether of shape or color. If I be told that 
 such a system as mine would produce nakedness, I accept the 
 omen. In nakedness I behold the majesty of the essential, 
 instead of the trappings of pretension. The agendum is not 
 diminished ; it is infinitely extended. We shall have grasped 
 with tiny hands the standard of Christ, and borne it into the 
 academy, when we shall call upon the architect, and sculptor, 
 and painter to seek to be perfect even as our father is perfect. 
 The assertion that the human body is other than a fit exponent 
 and symbol of the human, being, is a falsehood, I believe. I 
 believe it to be false on account of the numerous palpable 
 falsehoods which have been necessary in order to clinch it. 
 
 Beauty is the promise of Function. Solomon, in all his 
 glory, is, therefore, not arrayed as the lily of the field. Solo- 
 mon's array is the resuit of the instinctive efi'ort of incomplete- 
 ness to pass itself for complete. It is pretension. When 
 Solomon shall have appreciated nature and himself, he will 
 reduce his household, and adapt his harness, not for pretension, 
 but for performance. The lily is arrayed in heavenly beauty, 
 because it is organized both in shape and color, to dose the 
 germ of future lilies with atmospheric and solar influence. 
 
 We now approach the grand conservative trap, the basis 
 
Independent Beauty. 13Y 
 
 of independent beauty. Finding in God's world a sensuous 
 beauty, not organically demonstrated to us, the hierarchies 
 call on us to shut our eyes, and kneel to an sesthetical utterance 
 of the divinity. I refuse. Finding here an apparent embel- 
 lishment, I consider the appearance of embellishment an 
 accusatioji of ignorance and incompleteness in my science. I 
 confirm my refusal after recalling the fact that science has, 
 thus far, done nothing else than resolve the lovely on the one 
 hand, the hateful on the other, into utterances of the Godhead 
 — the former being yea, the latter nay. As the good citizen 
 obeys the good law because it is good, and the bad law 
 that its incompleteness be manifest, so does every wrong result 
 from divine elements, accuse the organization, and by pain 
 and woe represent X, or the desired solution. To assert that 
 this or that form or color is beautiful per se, is to formulate 
 prematurely ; it is to arrogate godship ; and once that false 
 step is taken, human-godship or tyranny is inevitable without 
 a change of creed. 
 
 The first lispings of science declared that nature abhors a 
 vacuum ; there we see humanity expressing its ignorance, by 
 transferring a dark passion to the Godhead which is light and 
 love. This formula could not outlive experiment, which has 
 demonstrated that God's care upholds us with so many pounds 
 to the square inch of pressure on every side, and that the 
 support is variable. 
 
 The ancients knew somewhat of steam. They formulated 
 steam as a devil. The vessels at Pompeii all speak one language 
 
138 Relative and 
 
 — look out for steam ! The moderns have looked into steam, 
 and, by wrestling with him, have forced him to own himself an 
 angel — an utterance of love and care. 
 
 We are told that we shall know trees by their fruits : even 
 because of the fruits of refusing to kneel, and of worshipping 
 with the eyes open, do I proceed to seek that I may find. 
 
 Mr. Garbett, in his learned and able treatise on the 
 principles of Design in Architecture, has dissected the English 
 house, and found with the light of two words, fallen from Mr. 
 Emerson, the secret of the inherent ugliness of that structure. 
 It is the cruelty and selfishness of a London house, he says 
 (and I think he proves it, too), which affects us so disagree- 
 ably as we look upon it. Now, these qualities in a house, like 
 the blear-eyed stolidity of an habitual sot, are symptoms, not 
 diseases. Mr. Garbett should see herein the marvellous expres- 
 sion of which bricks and mortar can be made the vehicles. 
 In vain will he attempt to get by embellishment a denial of 
 selfishness, so long as selfishness reigns. To medicate symp- 
 toms, will never, at best, do more than eff'ect a metastasis — 
 suppress an eruption; let us believe, rather, that the English- 
 man's love of home has expelled the selfishness from the 
 boudoir, the kitchen, and the parlor, nobler organs, and 
 thrown it out on the skin, the exterior, where it less threatens 
 life, and stands only for X, or a desired solution. If I have 
 been clear in what I have said, it will be apparent that the 
 intention, the soul of an organization, wnll get utterance in the 
 organization in proportion to the means at its disposal : in 
 
Independent Beauty. 139 
 
 vain shall you drill the most supple body of hiin that hates 
 me, into a manifestation of love for me ; while my blind and 
 deaf cousin will soon make me feel, and pleasingly feel, that I 
 was the man in all tha world that he wished to meet. 
 
 In seeking, through artistic analysis, a confirmation of my 
 belief in one God, I offend such hierarchies as maintain that 
 there be two Gods : the one good and all powerful, the other 
 evil, and somewhat powerful. It is only necessary, in order to 
 demolish the entire structure I have raised, that some advocate 
 of independent beauty and believer in the devil — for they go 
 and come together — demonstrate embellishment for the sake 
 of beauty in a work of the divine hand. Let me be under- 
 stood ; I cannot accept as a demonstration of embellishment a 
 sensuous beauty not yet organically explained. I throw the 
 onus proba7idi on him who commands me to kneel. I learned 
 this trick in Italy, where the disappointed picture-dealer often 
 defied me, denying his daub to be a Raphael, to say, then, 
 what it was. No, my friend, I care not whose it is ; when I say 
 certainly not a Raphael, I merely mean that I will none of it. 
 
 If there be in religion any truth, in morals any beauty, in 
 art any charm, but through fruits, then let them be demon- 
 strated ; and the demonstration, in regard to morals and faith, 
 will work backward and enlighten art. 
 
 I have diligently sought, with scalpel and pencil, an embel- 
 lishment for the sake of beauty, a sacrifice of function to other 
 than destruction. I have not found it. IVhen I, therefore, 
 
140 
 
 Relative and 
 
 defy the believer in the devil to show me such an embellish- 
 ment, I do so humbly. I want help. 
 
 It seems to me that a word of caution is necessary before 
 seeking independent beauty. Beauty may be present, yet not 
 be recognised as such. If we lack the sense of the promise of 
 function, beauty for us will not exist. The inhabitants of cer- 
 tain Swiss valleys regard a goitre as ornamental. It is a some- 
 what superadded to the essential, and they see it under the 
 charm of association. The courtiers of Louis XIV. admired the 
 talon rouge^ and the evioxmow^ pcrruque. They were somewhat 
 superadded to the essential, and they saw them under the 
 charm of association ; but the educated anatomist in Switzer- 
 land sees the goitre as we see it. The educated artist of Louis 
 XIV .'s time saw the maiming pretension of his dress as we 
 see it. 
 
 The aim of the artist, therefore, should be first to seek the 
 essential ; when the essential hath been found, then, if ever, will 
 be the time to commence embellishment. I will venture to 
 predict that the essential, when found, will be complete. I will 
 venture to predict that completeness will instantly throw off all 
 that is not itself, and will thus command, " Thou shalt have no 
 other Gods beside me." In a word, completeness is the abso- 
 lute utterance of the Godhead ; not the completeness of the 
 Catholic bigot, or of the Quaker, Avhich is a pretended one, 
 obtained by negation of God-given tendencies ; but the com- 
 pleteness of the sea, which hath a smile as unspeakable as the 
 
Independent Beauty. 
 
 141 
 
 darkness of its wrath ; the completeness of earth, whose every 
 atom is a microcosm ; the completeness of the human body, 
 where all relations are resumed at once and dominated. As 
 the monarch rises out of savage manhood a plumed Czar, 
 embellishing his short-comings with the sensuous livery of pro- 
 mise, yet, entering the phase of developed thought and con- 
 scious vigor, stands the eagle-eyed and grey-coated Bonaparte, 
 so will every development of real humanity pass through the 
 phase of non-demonstrable embellishment, which is a false 
 completeness, to the multiform organization which responds to 
 every call. 
 
 I hold the human body, therefore, to be a multiform com- 
 mand. Its capacities are the law and gauge of manhood as 
 connected with earth. T hold the blessings attendant upon 
 obedience to this command, to be the yea, yea ; the woe con- 
 sequent upon disobedience, the nay, nay, of the Godhead. 
 These God daily speaketh to him whose eyes and ears are open. 
 Other than these I have not heard. When, therefore, the life 
 of man shall have been made to respond to the command which 
 is in his being, giving the catholic result of a sound collective 
 mind in a sound aggregate body, he will organize his human 
 instrument or art for its human purpose, even as he shall have 
 adapted his human life to the divine instrument which was 
 given him. I wish to be clear ; the instrument or body being 
 of divine origin, we formulate rashly when we forego it, before 
 thoroughly responding to its requirement. That it is in itself 
 
142 Relative and 
 
 no final or complete entity is herein manifest, that it changes. 
 The significance of yesterday, to-day, and to-morrow, is this, 
 that we are in a state of development. Now, the idea of deve- 
 lopment necessarily supposes incompleteness ; now, complete- 
 ness can know no change. The instrument of body is no hap- 
 hazard datum, given as an approximation, whose short-comings 
 we are to correct by convention, arbitrium, and whim, but an 
 absolute requirement, and only then responding to the divine 
 intention when its higher nature shall be unfolded by high 
 function, even as the completeness of the brute responds to the 
 requirement of his lower nature. 
 
 Internecine war is the law of brute existence. "War ! The 
 lion lives not by food alone. Behold, how he pines and dwin- 
 dles as he growls over his butcher's meat ! It is in the stealthy 
 march, the ferocious bound, and deadly grapple, tearing palpi- 
 tating flesh from writhing bone — a halo of red rain around his 
 head — that he finds the completion of his being, in obedience 
 to a word that proceeded out of the mouth of God. Now, the 
 law of brute life is the law of human life, in so far as the brute 
 man is undeveloped in his higher tendencies. They, therefore, 
 who, having formulated a credo for infant intelligence, and find- 
 ing domination thereby secured, proceed to organize a ^><?mz- 
 nial infancy, that they may enjoy an eternal dominion, will 
 sooner or later see their sheep transformed to tigers ; for the 
 law of development being a divine law, can only be withstood 
 by perishing. If what I have said be true, collective manhood 
 
Independent Beauty. 143 
 
 will never allow exceptional development to slumber at the 
 helm or to abuse the whip. Collective manhood calls for deve- 
 lopment. If exceptional development answer — Lo ! ye are but 
 wolves, manhood will reply, — Then, have at you 1 He who 
 cannot guide, must come down. We feel that we cannot 
 remain where we are. 
 
 I have followed this train of remark whither it led me. Let 
 us resume. Organization being the passage of intention 
 through function to completeness, the expressions of its phases 
 are symptoms only. The same philosophy which has cloaked, 
 and crippled, and smothered the human body as rebelling 
 against its Creator, yet always in vain, because the human 
 body, like the Greek hero, says. Strike ! but learn, that philo- 
 sophy has set up a theory of beauty by authority, of beauty 
 independent of other things than its own mysterious harmony 
 with the human soul. Thus, we remark that the human soul, 
 so inclined to evil in the moral world, according to the same 
 philosophy, is sovereign arbiter of beauty in the aesthetical 
 world. The Creator, who formed man's soul with a thirst for 
 sin, and his body as a temple of shame, has, therefore, made 
 his taste infallible! Let us seek through the whole history of 
 arbitrary embellishment to find a resting-place. We shall look 
 in vain ; for the introduction of the inorganic into the organized 
 is destruction ; its development has ever been a reductio ad 
 ahsurduin. 
 
 There is no conceivable function which does not obey an 
 
144 
 
 Relative and 
 
 absolute law. The approximation to that law in material, in 
 parts, in their form, color, and relations, is the measure of free- 
 dom or obedience to God, in life. The attempt to stamp the 
 green fruit, the dawning science, the inchoate life, as final, by 
 such exceptional minds and social achievements as have pro- 
 duced a wish to remain here, and a call for a tabernacle, these 
 are attempts to divide manhood, which is one ; they are 
 attempts to swim away from brute man, sinking in the sea of 
 fate. They will ever be put to shame ; for the ignorance of 
 the ignorant confounds the wise; for the filth of the filthy 
 befouls the clean ; for the poverty of the poor poisons the quiet 
 of the possessor. The brute man clings to the higher man ; he 
 loves him even as himself; he cannot be shaken oft'; he must 
 be assimilated and absorbed. 
 
 I call, therefore, upon science, in all its branches, to arrest the 
 tide of sensuous and arbitrary embellishment, so far as it can 
 do it, not negatively by criticism thereof alone, but positively, 
 by making the instrument a many-sided response to the multi- 
 form demands of life. The craving for completeness will then 
 obtain its normal food in results, not the opiate and deadening 
 stimulus of decoration. Then will structure and its dependent 
 sister arts emerge from the stand-still of ij^se dixit, and, like the 
 ship, the team, the steam-engine, proceed through phases of 
 development towards a response to need. 
 
 Th^ truth of such doctrine, if truth be in it, must share the 
 fate of other truth, and off'end him whose creed is identified 
 
Independent Beauty. 146 
 
 with the false ; it must meet the indifference of the many who 
 believe that a new truth is born every week for him who can 
 afford to advertise. But it must earn a place in the heart of 
 him who has sought partial truths with success ; for truths are 
 all related. 
 
THE TRUBIBULL GALLERY- 
 
 Ix passing tlirougli jS"ew Haven, a few days since, I visited 
 the Trumbull gallery, and was sincerely gratified to find the 
 works of my venerable friend collected, cared for, and in the 
 keeping of a dignified and permanent corporation. 
 
 I remarked with regret that the building, where these works 
 of Col. Trumbull are kept, was in part of combustible material, 
 and warmed in a manner which must always be injurious to 
 pictures. I am not aware of the wants which placed the gallery 
 on the second story, with a wooden floor and a wooden stair- 
 case so near the pictures. Whatever ends may have been 
 gained by this arrangement, much has been sacrificed to them. 
 Had this gallery been located on a ground floor, in a building 
 of one story, lighted as at present, with a stone or painted brick 
 floor resting upon ventilated cobble stones, I must believe that 
 the expense would have been no greater, and the security 
 perfect. 
 
 I noted a most interesting object in this gallery, a sketch of 
 .Major Andre made by himself on the day of his execution. 
 This sketch, which is made with a pen, is not of artistic value 
 
The Trumbull Gallery. 147 
 
 beyond what may be looked for in similar efforts of any edu- 
 cated engineer ; but it has a historic and personal interest of a 
 high order, and I would venture to hint that it is not properly 
 framed considering its value, nor safely kept, if any one con- 
 sider its high interest elsewhere. It should form an inseparable 
 part of some larger fixture. This suggestion would be both 
 uncalled for and ungracious, but for the fact that much larger 
 wDi-ks have in Europe been abstracted from places of public 
 resort, and that, too, in spite of a jealous supervision of the 
 authorities interested in their preservation. 
 
 It was truly interesting to observe in this collection the small 
 studies of Col. Trumbull's pictures for the Rotunda ; and since 
 I have mentioned these, I cannot refrain from saying a few 
 words in relation to the Declaration of Independence, which I 
 regard as by far the ablest of these pictures, a work selected by 
 John Randolph as the butt of his unscrupulous sarcasm, stig- 
 matized by him as the Shin Piece, and almost universally known, 
 even now, and mentioned by that ludicrous cognomen. 
 
 I believe I shall be speaking the sense of the artistical body, 
 and of cognoscenti in the United States, when I say that the 
 " Declaration of Independence " has earned the respect of all, 
 the warm interest of such as watch the development of Ameri- 
 can Art, and the admiration of those who have tried their own 
 hand in wielding a weighty and difficult subject. 
 
 I admire in this composition the skill with which Trumbull 
 has collected so many portraits in formal session, without the- 
 atrical effort, in order to enliven it, and without falling into bald 
 
148 The Trumbull Gallery. 
 
 insipidity by adherence to trivial fact. These men are earnest, 
 yet fall of dignity ; they are firm yet cheerful ; they are gentle- 
 men ; and you see at a glance that they meant something very 
 serious in pledging their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred 
 honors. 
 
 The left hand of the figure of Adams is awkwardly pushed 
 forwards. The left arm of Mr. Jeff'erson is singularly incorrect 
 for so careful a draughtsman as Col. Trumbull. One could 
 wish that the lower limbs of Hancock had been made more 
 distinct ; perhaps a slight enlargement and extension of the light 
 upon his chair, uniting with the mass of light, would have 
 effected this object. Would not the chair itself, in such case, 
 be less a spot than it now is in the composition ? 
 
 Those who have seen only the sortie of Gibraltar and the 
 battle of Bunker Hill, would scarcely believe that these larger 
 works of the Capitol are of the same hand, from their inferiority 
 in color and eff"ect. They have a chalky distemper-like tone, 
 which is very unpleasing. 
 
 In calling this picture the Shin Piece, Mr. Randolph accused 
 a defect of composition. If I understand the gibe, it meant 
 that there was an undue prominence and exhibition of legs in 
 the work. Now, in point of fact, this is the last charge which 
 be should have made ; nay, if Mr. Randolph had any special 
 aversion for legs, he owed a tribute of praise to the artist for 
 sparing him in that regard, since, of more than forty persons 
 who are there assembled, ten only show their legs. The gibe, 
 however, took with the house, because the house was, by its 
 
The Trumbull Gallery. 149 
 
 tedium, prepared for a laugh, and not prepared to do justice to 
 the painter. 
 
 The veteran artist, whose feelings were thus wounded, was 
 but a few feet distant from the shameless orator. He after- 
 wards assured me, with tears in his eyes, that up to that 
 moment he had always believed Randolph his personal friend. 
 If those who echoed and still echo that paltry jest, will look 
 carefully at the Declaration of Independence, they will see that 
 the fact of those legs appearing in small-clothes, no longer 
 familiar to the eye, calls attention to them in an undue manner, 
 and they will rather pity the spirit and the intelligence which 
 overlooked this diflSculty, than blame the painter for an inevita- 
 ble consequence of the change of fashion. 
 
BURKE ON THE BEAUTIFUL- 
 
 Burke lias developed, at length, the negative examination of 
 beauty. He arrives at no result by this course, because nega- 
 tive analysis can only attain its object by exhausting negation ; 
 which is not possible in this vast field of inquiry. 
 
 When, at last, he affirms, he says roundly that Beauty is a 
 positive entity, cognizable by the sense. He proceeds to enu- 
 merate the qualities which, he thinks, constitute beauty in visi- 
 ble objects. He states these as follows : Smallness, Smooth- 
 ness, Gradual Variation, Delicacy, Color. 
 
 Smallness. — One may well be startled at the list of positive 
 entities which commences with size, for which, even in trade, 
 we have only an approximative standard. The pendulum 
 which beats seconds in a given latitude must share the imper- 
 fection of the measure of time ; it must feel, more or less, the 
 variation of temperature in its dimension. The bare element 
 of size explains to me the grandeur of the Alp and the Ele- 
 phant, the endearing dependence of the babe, and the attraction 
 of the humming-bird; but the significance of dimension in all 
 these cases, and in every case that I conceive, is a relative sig- 
 
Burke on the Beautiful. 151 
 
 nificance. When Burke found the sense of the sublime to 
 result alike from the contemplation of the orbs that roll in 
 space, and the idea of beings that elude the test of the micro- 
 scope, I must think that he should have concluded that the 
 sublime is no quality in things, having a positive existence, but 
 a mental perception of relation. 
 
 Smoothness. — This, again, is a relative quality. The smooth- 
 ness of the teeth, and of a marble or porphyry table, is one ; 
 the smoothness of the eye-ball, the brow, the cheek is an- 
 other. If any one doubt the organic significance of smoothness, 
 let him imagine the smoothness of the teeth transferred to the 
 lip, that of the eye-ball to the eye- lid, that of the varnished bud 
 of April to the petal of the rose in June, that of the billiard- 
 ball to the hand of the maiden. Smoothness is mere negation, 
 The smoothness of the eye-ball is on the one hand a bail and 
 socket smoothness, like that of the head of the femur and the 
 acetabulum, a lubricated smoothness. It is on the other hand 
 a crystalline smoothness, related to the function of transmit- 
 ting light and color. The smoothness of cutlery, as it comes 
 from the hand of the artisan, is an organic smoothness. The 
 perfection of the polish proclaims the entireness of the promise. 
 It begins to lose that polish as soon as its action commences, 
 and at last retains mainly the beauty of form. If any one 
 doubt that the perception of smoothness is a relative percep- 
 tion, let him, for one minute, rub the palms of his hands upon 
 sandstone, and then rub them together. 
 
 Gradual Variation. — Variation is characteristic of organic 
 
152 Burke on the Beautiful. 
 
 rhythm, whether in the works of nature or those of man ; but 
 the perception of gradation is the perception of relation, whether 
 the gradation be one of size, or of form, or of tint. To prove 
 gradation a positive element of beauty, it would be necessary 
 to show that the greater the gradation, or the greater the vari- 
 ety of gradation, the greater would be the beauty, an assertion 
 to be easily estimated after a glance at the human eye. 
 
 Delicaaj. — By delicacy, as an element of beauty. Burke is 
 careful to tell us that he does not mean weakness, or any modi- 
 fication in the direction of weakness, but only the absence of 
 roughness and excessive robustness. Now, it is not apparent 
 that he means anything more, by this quality, than a normal 
 and healthy apportionment of means to ends ; if he does, then 
 has he foisted into the academy the taste of the boudoir and 
 the drawing-room, which can only earn respect there as a pupil. 
 His delicacy in such case must share the fate of Hogarth's 
 grandeur oi the perm ig,''^ and be the creature of convention- 
 ridiculous, except in the time, place, and circumstances that 
 gave its value. 
 
 If you can establish the opinion that ladies should hobble 
 about with difiiculty, the crippled foot would please our eyes, 
 as it is said to charm those of the Mandarin. If you can prove 
 that the human hand was intended as a proclamation of idle- 
 ness and effeminacy, the nauseous claws seen in the east, and 
 sometimes cultivated by persons in civilized countries, will have 
 a suggestive charm. 
 
 Color. — That the modifications of light have an organic 
 
Burke on the Beautiful. 153 
 
 significance and are not positive elements of beauty, results to 
 my mind from the fact that there is a degree of light which sur- 
 feits, a want of it which starves the visual organ. The absence 
 of color in the teeth is as beautiful as its presence in the lips. 
 The contrast of the two heightens each, and exemplifies a 
 charm where gradual variation has no place. Now its absence 
 in the one case and the presence in the other has an organic 
 and functional import and meaning. The dark polish of ice 
 and the pure white of snow are alike mechanical defences of 
 the permanence of these forms of water. 
 
 I think it of the higliest importance that we continue the 
 investigation of the functional significance of color, rather than 
 close the school with an anodyne formula, because whether the 
 eye be adapted to objects in nature, or these to the eye, true it 
 is that the relation is a vital one. I will be rash enough to 
 confess, that I have an instinctive belief, that the eye is, under 
 God, the creature of the sun ; for I find it made in his own 
 image, and I seek it in vain in such fishes, for instance, as 
 know him not. 
 
 In order to prove that beauty consists of positive elements, 
 cognizable by the sense, I think it must be shown, that the 
 beauty is in ]jroportion to the presence of the elements, and that 
 where these elements are diminished or suppressed for the sake 
 of function, beauty shall be diminished in proportion to their 
 absence. Now this may be done to the satisfaction of the milli- 
 ner or the "pe^iVe maitresse,^'' but never to the satisfaction of the 
 philosopher or the artist. 
 
 8 
 
154 Burke on the Beautiful. 
 
 Burke was bold when be invited tbe world to a feast of 
 beauty, witb so meagre a bill of fare. With the exception of 
 delicacy, by which I know not what he means, in philosophy, I 
 believe that all the other elements he has mentioned can be 
 exemplified and even combined into the most sickening mani- 
 festation of morbid action. Skin disease and imposthume will 
 display them all, and force the student to go farther for the 
 secret of beauty, even at the risk of faring worse. 
 
 It is natm-al to suppose that the soul of any civilization will 
 find utterance in its statement of what its love is and should be. 
 Have not theories of beauty been invented to fit " spoon 
 fashion " certain systems of politics and morals ? Is it not from 
 an unconscious desire to constitute and limit the good that we 
 seek the good with such starveling formulas ? I believe the 
 Beautiful to be the promise and announcement of the good ; to 
 seek the semblance thereof, rather than the true, has been, is, 
 and must be the occupation of such as seek the beautiful only 
 in pursuit of the good. 
 
 He who seeks the beautiful in the stupendous system of 
 nature, will seek in vain for a positive entity, whose elements, 
 cognizable by sense, can be set down like the ingredients of a 
 dish, or the inventory of a portmanteau. I doubt if he ever 
 find anything more tangible than the human soul ; if he does 
 I will venture to predict that it will be somewhat more than 
 small, smooth, gradually varied, delicate, and of pleasing color. 
 
 To the generality of men the sight of a skull, whether of 
 man or beast, is rather painful. They view it in relation to 
 
Burke on the Beautiful. 166 
 
 disorganization, of which we all have an instinctive horror. 
 Why, then, to the anatomist and the artist is the skull a beau- 
 tiful, a sublime object ? Because they have minutely investi- 
 gated its relation to life. All its forms, surfaces, and dimen- 
 sions speak of its former contents, vesture, and capacities. That 
 pale spheroidal dome is a model of the globe, those lack-lustre 
 eyeless holes beneath, speak of the heavens ; they echo the dis- 
 tant sun. 
 
 Why, in the crowded thoroughfare, do we pass nine men in 
 ten without emotion, and as if they were not ? Why are we 
 so patiently incurious respecting the myriads of human beings 
 who have laid the basis of our actual being ? Why in the 
 first sight of a foreign city, whose language is as unknown to 
 us as its streets, does the heart shrink back on itself? Why, 
 in such position, does the coin in our pockets assume an im- 
 portance unfelt before? In all cases because of relation. This 
 it is that makes the Austrian prince* spurn, as less than man, 
 all beneath the barons. This it is which melts the divine 
 Saviour into tenderness at the sight of sin and sorrow. The 
 positive sound of cannon is not much ; it is relation that makes 
 the growl of the morning gun at Gibraltar the voice of the 
 British lion, and, therefore, does the responsive thunder of, 
 Ceuta sound a good morrow from the African shore. When, 
 in the breathless court, the word "guilty" drops from the lips 
 of the foreman, why does it ring satisfaction to the ear of the 
 
 * Der Mensch fsengt mit dem Baron an. — Dictum of Windiscligratz. 
 
156 Burke on the Beautiful. 
 
 stern attorney, and for the prisoner at the bar strike the larum 
 of despair ? It is the relative import of things that character- 
 izes their perception, and that with which we have no relation, 
 for us is not. 
 
 With what positive result do we, then, close this review of 
 Mr. Burke's position ? "With a conviction which, if it be well 
 grounded, is not only of artistic but of general importance. In a 
 world of dependence and of relation to a being like man, whose 
 isolated mind collapses to idiocy, whose isolated body is the 
 slave of its lower want, that which is fitted to one relation is 
 therefore unfitted for another and different relation. That which 
 is beautiful in one connexion is therefore deformed in another 
 and different connexion. To deal with relative elements, as if 
 they were positive, is to insure discord and disorganization — for 
 as the charm of rhyme resides not in " dove" or " love," but in 
 the perception of the dependence of sound, — as the charm of 
 verse lies not in its positive structure, but in the relation it bears 
 to the thought, and the breath that makes it heard, so has all 
 that sways the mind, the heart, the sense of man, only a rela- 
 tive and dependent being. 
 
 The entire gamut of visual qualities in objects, is, therefore, 
 a language, a tongue, whose vocabulary must be learned, word 
 by word, and which has already been mastered to an extent 
 that justifies the surmise, that its elements have force from their 
 relation, and not from positive existence; since God alone 
 truly is. 
 
CRITICISM IN SEARCH OF BEAUTY, 
 
 To many minds the definition of Beauty as the promise of 
 function, must appear an excessive generalization. To many 
 minds such expanse dilutes all substance, and leaves but their 
 air as a result. Yet is this generalization but an effort to 
 grasp a wider collection of phenomena, and, if developed, it is 
 not certain that it will prove other than a step to a wider and 
 a higher generalization. 
 
 Hogarth's ingenious plea for his line of beauty, holds good 
 with regard to the spinal column and the necks of long necked 
 birds and beasts. It is the line of moving water, of flowing 
 draperies, and of many pleasing vegetable forms, but if we 
 drop from the flank of the horse where we find it, to the shank 
 which is thin, straight, and hard, we get a new sense of 
 beauty, and not a sacrifice thereof. With Hogarth's formula in 
 hand we must accept the vagaries of Bernini, and condemn the 
 Greek peristyle and pediment. This famed line is truly in- 
 dicative of motion, of the double element of inertia or resist- 
 ance on the one hand, and of a moving power on the other. 
 From its inevitable significance and uniformity of expression, it 
 
158 Criticism in Search of Beauty. 
 
 becomes monotonous by repetition, incongruous and imperti- 
 nent wherever such double action is out of place. Transfer the 
 waving line of a horse's flank to his metatarsal bone, and you 
 have a cripple. Transfer the double curve of a swan's neck to 
 his bill, and you have an impotent and therefore ridiculous 
 arrangement. 
 
 The right line is perhaps susceptible of more various signi- 
 ficance than any other line whatever. The right line vertical, 
 as seen in the pendent chain, is indicative of utter flexibility ; in 
 the staff whose base is buried, of stark rigidity. Horizontal, it 
 proclaims equal support throughout its length, whether from 
 its own consistence or from extraneous prop. Inclined, it de- 
 clares a double thrust in opposite directions. Observe the 
 folds of linen that drop, like organ pipes, from the girdle of 
 Pallas; transfer your eye to yonder spear on which Adonis 
 leans ; remark how nearly identical are the forms, how directly 
 reversed is the expression of these cylindrical shapes ! Such 
 forms have therefore a force and a speech analogous to the 
 virtues of the vocabulary. Their significance is relative and 
 dependent. They may not be safely used as positive entities. 
 
 Let us dwell, for a moment, upon one of the chief means of 
 embellishment, the adoption of the sequence and rhythm of 
 organization, as an sesthetical element of positive import, apart 
 from all requirement, save the craving of the eye. The leaf, 
 the flower, the chain — the contorted spiial of the cable, the 
 alternations of the woven withe of the basket, have, among 
 other similar functional arrangements, been pressed into the 
 
Criticism in Search of Beauty. 159 
 
 service of the decorator, to fill that vacuum which the heart 
 of man abhors. The eye responds inevitably to the sensuous 
 charm, and the associated expression of these forms ; but, if 
 we reflect deeply on the source of this gratification, we shall 
 detect their real character. Thus enjoyed, this rhythm is never 
 truly generative ; — for, if the organizations they were intended 
 to complete, had no requirement of their own^ whose spaces 
 and means have been usiuyd by their quotations, then I affirm 
 that these extraneous and irrelevant forms invade that silence 
 which alone is worthy of man, when there is nothing to be 
 said. To my sense, therefore, these forms only accuse a vacuum. 
 They accuse it credibly, and the eye assents to them ; but 
 though they accuse they do not fill it, since the more we get 
 of them the more we ask, until performance reels and slavery dies, 
 under the requirement. Such is the result of dealing with 
 the relative and finite, as if it were a positive, a divine being. 
 
 What is the real meaning of that vast aggregation of mar- 
 ble and gilding — of silks and jewels, of glass and metal, of 
 carved and painted embellishment which is called St. Peter's 
 church ? Throwing and holding aloft the gilded symbol of 
 self-sacrifice and love to man, whose glimmer flashes on the 
 one hand to the gulf of Geneva, on the other to the waves of 
 the Adriatic, is it not a giant's attempt to scale the heavens? 
 — the afinrmation of the positive in the relative — a mechanical 
 assertion of spirit — an attempt at arithmetical demonstration 
 that Christ's kingdom is of this world ? When, amid the 
 gorgeous retinue of bedizened prelates, the triple crowned 
 
160 Criticism in Search of Beauty. 
 
 Pontiff, crippled by weight of frippery, is borne on subject 
 shoulders to that balcony, when the peacocks' tails are waved 
 about his head, and he utters his presumptuous blessing, 
 " Urbi et Orbi," — while kneeling troops clash their weapons as 
 they go down, and trumpets laugh and cannons thunder from 
 the fortress of the Holy Angel ; — when the sense and the 
 imagination is thus appealed to in base assertion, what is the 
 practical result ? What are the fruits^ by which alone this 
 tree must at last be judged ? The perfumed sweetness of that 
 vast pile hath cured no yellow and swollen victim of Pontine 
 miasma. The weight of that expenditure hath crushed to 
 earth the denizens of the patrimony of St. Peter ; since Mary 
 must bring daily the precious ointment for a Christ who is 
 always with us ; and whose worldly pomp outvies the arro- 
 gance of kings. For each effeminate warbling of soprano 
 Latin praise to God in the temple, there go up a thousand 
 curses of tyrants, in the vernacular, from the thoroughfare, 
 the hovel, and the dungeon. When was the absolute other 
 than the paramour of the expedient ? Would the papal cross 
 at this moment stand but for the piled dollars of the Israelite 
 where it has been pawned ? 
 
 To what, at length, is the size of St. Peter's church related ? 
 Is it a lodging for prayer ? Christ has recommended a closet. 
 Is it to receive the laity of the earth ? All earth is a temple to 
 liim who looks upward, and naught less will suffice for man. 
 The size of St. Peter's church is, therefore, a pretension. It 
 affirms of the tree its i its soil, and its branches ; and 
 
Criticism in Search op Beauty. 161 
 
 these it measures. As a result of nearly two thousand years, 
 preaching of the doctrine of self sacrifice and the laying up of 
 treasure in Heaven, it is a reductio ad ahsurdum. 
 
 Criticism has shaped another theory of Beauty. The 
 beautiful has been defined as a result of the combination of 
 Uniformity with Variety. This combination is indeed uni- 
 versally found in organization, whether in the works of nature 
 or of man ; but the theory asserts too much, since, if true, 
 beauty can be produced by mere mechanical means, and 
 England would make it with steam power, and flood the globe 
 therewith. This theory is sustained in the hope of divorcing 
 the beautiful and the good. It is sustained in the hope of 
 giving the former and receiving the latter. The sensuous 
 adjunct of intention, when divorced from that intention, loses 
 at once its virtue, and retains its charm only so long as its 
 emptiness is unsuspected. The smile of benevolence may be 
 assumed also, and may pass currently with the world, but if too 
 many practise this beautiful art, frowns will at last come to be 
 in fashion. 
 
 When Homer would give us the idea of womanly charm in 
 Helen, he seeks no positive ingredients to wake our enthusiasm. 
 He makes the princess to pass through a crowd of aged men, 
 who are reviling her as the cause of their woe, and at her aspect 
 they are hushed in mute admiration. When she has passed 
 away, they swear with one accord that such a vision is worth 
 the ten years' war, and the burning of the ships and the slaugh- 
 ter of the men. Achilles, who remains in every scholar's mind 
 
 8* 
 
162 Criticism in Search of Beauty. 
 
 the type of manly beauty, is painted as swift of foot, and tlie 
 most beautiful of all the Greeks who went to Troy. These 
 beauties, then, have been created by relation in our own minds, 
 and we have done the work with the bard ; and it is because 
 that work is a delight that we love him. If criticism had other 
 than a negative power we might reproduce the phenomena of 
 a Shakspeare or a Dante. It is because the speech of these 
 men is inalienably theirs, related more to themselves than to 
 the positive, that we may hope to approach the latter rather 
 than to repeat them. 
 
 The creation of beauty in art, as in other forms of poetry, is 
 a welling up from the depths of the soul, not a scientific syn- 
 thesis. There has been in England, since 1815, more discussion 
 of sesthetical doctrine, more analysis, experiment, and dogged 
 determination to effect somewhat in art, than attended the 
 birth of the Florentine school ; but always in the main impo- 
 tent, because the governing intellect of England has held art to 
 be a thing, a plant growing by human knowledge with gold 
 for its nutriment. Art is not a thing, but a form, a develop- 
 ment of man — " La vostra Arte quasi di Dio e nipote.''^ The 
 artistic power, whatever it be, has no positive existence. Like 
 the organ in our churches, on week-days, it stands dumb and 
 dead till the constituency drive through its pipes the health of 
 life, and minister to its requirement. 
 
 I will seek to make clearer what I have said by a rapid 
 glance at the career of pictorial art. In the great works of the 
 Roman and Florentine schools we behold the highest develop- 
 
Criticism in Search of Beauty. 163 
 
 ment of thought and feeling in the pictorial form. These great 
 masters always based their creations upon tangible, palpable, 
 every-day truth. The mother bears her babe, the Saviour 
 embraces his cross. The heavens, as they open, reflect earth, 
 and worship the Deity with words of human speech. Titian, 
 in his color, is not less true to the concrete. As art declined, 
 we find the process to be one of separating the sensuously 
 pleasing from its organic relation ; till, in Luca Giordano and 
 Boucher, we find a chaos of bombast, falsehood, and clogging 
 sensuality. This farrago corrupted still further the appetite 
 that demanded it, and Boucher had for a successor a worse than 
 Boucher, till utter impotence gave at length silence and repose. 
 
 There is a sensation analogous to the sense of beauty, which 
 is effected somewhat independent of function, nay running 
 oftentimes counter to the requirement of function. This is the 
 offspring of the fashion, the mode, omnipotent for an hour, 
 contemptible wdien that hour is passed. I have yet to see any 
 solid reason for receiving nine-tenths of the architectural fea- 
 tures of our actual structures as other than a servile obeisance 
 to this despotic requirement from abroad. He whose eye is 
 tickled by the play of light and shadow, and the merely pictur- 
 esque projections of the present fashion, will be inclined to 
 flout me when I hint that these are a jargon and no tongue. 
 Their features, which seem of such significance, will, however, 
 inevitably turn out, at last, like the cant phrases of the rabble, 
 to mean whatever you please, merely because they mean 
 nothing. Once adopt the principles by which alone they can 
 
164 Criticism in Search of Beauty. 
 
 be defended, and there is no bar between you and the prolific 
 silliness of Borromini, excepting the want of funds. These 
 feats have effected what I once believed impossible ; they have 
 made the sober and the true enamored of the old, bald, neutral- 
 toned, Yankee farm house which seems to belong to the ground 
 whereon it stands, as the caterpillar to the leaf that feeds him. 
 
 The expression of life, which is what we all crave, can only 
 be obtained by living. I have seen a clergyman of the esta- 
 blished church, who long appeared to me an overgrown auto- 
 maton, in which the digestive apparatus was exaggerated. He 
 was an incarnation of vicarious being. He seemed to have 
 been taken into the world and done for. Inoffensive was he — 
 well-begotten and respectable ; for he had been educated among 
 scholars — dressed by a tailor, and dressed well — shaved by a 
 barber, and well shorn — insured by a solvent company here 
 below — saved by his Saviour in the world to come, so that one 
 saw no obstacle to his translation to another sphere except his 
 weight. Yet was all this only apparent, for no sooner was a 
 trout stream mentioned than the kaleidoscope revolved, the fog 
 rolled from before his eyes, and he became animated and alert. 
 There was after all an agendum. Now it is clear that this man 
 was a crushed individuality, born out of time or place. Like 
 the potato which has sprouted in the crypt, this poor soul had 
 sent its pale elongated shoot through darkness and prohibition, 
 ^ till it found the light and air of freedom at a cranny, when it 
 instantly assumed its color, threw out its leaves and was — a 
 human otter. 
 
Criticism in Search of Beauty.' 165 
 
 If it were true that the sense of beauty in nature and in art 
 finds its nourishment in the pleasing, independent of other than 
 its own relation to the innate craving of man ; if it were true 
 that beauty is a iertium quid thrown into ingredients in them- 
 selves indifferent, to fill a psychological vacuum, — as salt and 
 sugar are added to compounds which offend through acid or 
 pall by insipidity, then should we behold professors of beauty, 
 who would translate into the vulgar tongue what Mahomet 
 meant by his houris, what the Northmen meant by drinking 
 beer in skulls, what the Indian meant by his happy hunting 
 grounds, what the Christian preacher means by that which 
 " eye hath not seen nor ear heard ?" The man possessed of 
 this catholicon would be able to adorn and sanctify the hum- 
 blest, the most repulsive details of life. These details are, in 
 fact, adorned and sanctified to man — not by any combination 
 of uniformity with variety, or waving line, or other like futile 
 mechanical grasp at the unspeakable, but by their relation to 
 " things hoped for.'''' 
 
 The men who, in Greece and Italy, earned a remembrance as 
 creators of the beautiful, were most untiring students of organi- 
 zation, of the relations of antecedence and consequence. More 
 has been said about the art of pleasing by ingenious English- 
 men and Frenchmen than can be found in all the disquisitions 
 of Leonardo, or Leon Batista, Alberti, or Raffaello. How does 
 he of Urbino, who has held the world captive, define the beau- 
 tiful which was his magic sceptre ? He says, in plain words. 
 
166 Criticism in Search of Beauty. 
 
 that it was a " certa idea che ho nella inente," a certain idea 
 that I have in ray mind. 
 
 The skilfid analysis of the relations of color and sound in 
 their modifications, to the rhythm of organization, tending 
 without doubt to assist our conception of all related things, is 
 but the servant and never the master of creative mind. Deal- 
 ing with such elements only as the reason has incarnated in 
 propositions, they have in that incarnation dropped all divinity 
 which is unspeakable, and have taken their humble place among 
 things. Such results are but the record of a mental, as the foot- 
 print of man is the record of a physical function, proclaiming, 
 it is true, the beauty of the related parts which achieved the 
 step, but impotent as a creative . power. As well may you hope 
 to beget eloquence of pure grammar, as music of science, or 
 beauty of things. 
 
 Organization and dissolution ; these are the two poles of the 
 divine magnet, and to the pure intelligence the one is as har- 
 monious a speech as the other, since it is its correlative. That 
 the sense revolts at the phenomena of disorganization proves 
 only the relation of the body to things ; but that relation being 
 a divine datum, the marriage of the sensuous phenomena of life 
 to the action of decay, cannot be other than poisonous and 
 suicidal. 
 
 Is the display which has lantern-led princes and people 
 other than a rhythm of disorganization sensuously enjoyed 
 because its functional significance was not apparent? If the 
 moral and political phenomena attendant upon vigorous 
 
Criticism in Search of Beauty. 16*1 
 
 attempts after beauty, independent of function, had not been 
 constant and unvarying, I should doubt any mental induction 
 that accused such import in adornment. Luxury and decay 
 have not been separated, and the only terms on which both can 
 be long kept up, is to regard the crucified homo as a symbol 
 of collective man made the grovelling basis of exceptional 
 development and well-being. 
 
 Whence is derived the attraction of the play-house and the 
 opera ? I believe that these fruits of civilization are pleasing, 
 but, to the mass, sensuous special pleadings against the dogma 
 which, condemning the body, commands us to perish. Feeling 
 a void in our hearts, amid the negative requirements of the law- 
 giver and the priest, we ask the spectacle at least of untram- 
 melled life, and hire the dancing girl to give a vicarious grace 
 and joy, driven from among us by a sour and one-sided dogma. 
 Now, it will be apparent to reflection and to the heart, that the 
 dancing girl is degraded by representing a fraction of huma- 
 nity. The greater her beauty, the more perfect the response of 
 her limbs and the vivacity of her foot to the joyous notes of 
 the composer, the greater the degradation. That divine instru- 
 ment before us is the representative of womanhood, and is 
 degraded by aught less than true woman's life. Not with 
 impunity, therefore, shall we gaze upon her in that monstrous 
 relation, for, though we may forget it, yet is she nevertheless our 
 sister. There is here a sin, and a grievous sin — not in the light 
 of that eye that flashes, not in the music of that frame that 
 takes captive the sense, not in the panting of that, perhaps, 
 
168 Criticism in Search of Beauty. 
 
 virgin bosom, but in the hireling divorce of these phenomena 
 from their normal and organic sequence in human life. There 
 lies the prostitution — there the selfishness and the vice, and 
 therefore the destruction. 
 
 The East Indian bigot who seeks to please God by main- 
 taining one posture till the articulations have stiffened him to a 
 monument of monomania and the paid exponent of youthful 
 joy and desire — these are extreme expressions of a prohibition 
 to live. As the one kills by checking function, so the other 
 destroys by the inculcation of vicarious life. I will close this 
 statement by an aflSrmation which formerly could not have 
 been spoken without perishing in the flames ; and which, even 
 now, cannot perhaps be spoken with impunity. That which 
 the human being was made to bear, the human being was not 
 made to bear the want of. 
 
 To follow blindly the dictates of sense and instinctive crav- 
 ing — that is, to be a brute and not a man ; to deny the prompt- 
 ings of sense and instinctive craving, that is to perish. Behold 
 the absolute. Between these lies human life — an existence for 
 which no revelation will ever afford a mechanical rule or abso- 
 lute dogma, without its immediate translation from time to 
 eternity; for to seek the true — this is truly to live in time 
 which only is through succession of phenomena to find it — 
 this will be to repose in the bosom of omniscience, for where 
 all is absolutely right nothing can change. Since truth is not 
 a series of approximations, but an arrival and a result. 
 
 Therefore do I feel that this American people is the advanced 
 
Criticism in Search of Beauty. 169 
 
 guard of humanity. Because it is one vast interrogation. 
 Never aflSrming but when there is need of action ; in its affirm- 
 ation conceding that the minority represents a sacred human 
 want not yet articulate to the aggregate ear ; it gives peace 
 and good will in proportion to the universality of the wants to 
 which it ministers. If the passion displayed in the alternation 
 of hope and fear fright the timid and skeptical, the lull of the 
 storm, when the sovereignty has spoken, is full of hope for a 
 distant futurity, for it proves that our political constitution, like 
 the human frame, is not less wonderfully than fearfully made. 
 
STRUCTURE AND ORGANIZATION. 
 
 It is useless to regret that discussions of principle involve, to a 
 certain extent, persons also. If this were not, on the whole, a 
 good arrangement, principles would have been furnished with 
 a better lodging. I take it, that passions and interests are the 
 great movers and steadiers of the social world, and that prin- 
 ciples, like the bread on Sir John Falstaft'^s score, are an uncon- 
 scionably small item. 
 
 The working forces and restraints are, like the furnaces and 
 engines, the lock up and lock out of the mint at Philadelphia, 
 all very effective for their objects. A showy front masks all 
 these things, and adorns Chesnut street by the maimed quota- 
 tion of a passage of Greek eloquence, relating to something 
 else. A huge brick chimney rising in the rear, talks English, 
 and warns you that the facade is to be taken with some grains 
 of allowance. 
 
 The domain of Taste is eminently one of free discussion. In 
 most civilized countries, the individual is restrained by the 
 magistracy from offending the public eye, by unsightly or ill- 
 timed exhibitions of any very peculiar dogra* of his own. 
 
Structure and Organization. 171 
 
 because it is thought that the harm thus done to the public is 
 not compensated by the gratification of the unit. Still, he is 
 allowed to maintain his theory by any means short of an inva- 
 sion of the public sense of propriety. 
 
 One unaccustomed to trace the influence of associated ideas, 
 of example, and of authority, would naturally suppose that 
 each climate, each creed and form of Government, would stamp 
 its character readily and indelibly upon the structures of a 
 thinking population. It is not so. It is only by degrees that 
 leisure and wealth find means to adapt forms, elsewhere invented, 
 to new situations and new wants. 
 
 "When civilization gradually developes an indigenous type, 
 the complex result still carries the visible germ whence it 
 sprang. The harmony of the Chinese structures indicates a 
 oneness of orimn and modification. The si on-manual of the 
 Sultan is but the old mark pompously flourished. There is a 
 blood-relationship between the pipe of the North American 
 savage and the temples of Central America. 
 
 In the architecture of Greece, of Italy, and of the more recent 
 civilizations on the other hand, we remark a struggle between 
 an indigenous type, born of the soil and of the earlier wants of 
 a people, and an imported theory which, standing upon a 
 higher artistic ground, captivates the eye and wins the approval 
 of dawning taste. If my limits permitted, it were not amiss to 
 trace this conquest of refinement, and to follow it out also, in 
 relation to literature, and to dress, and amusements. The least 
 eff*ort of memory will suggest numerous invasions of artistic 
 
1*72 Structure and Organization. 
 
 theory upon primitive expedients, conflicts between the home- 
 grown habit which has possession, and exotic theory which 
 seeks it. 
 
 There is one feature in all the great developments of archi- 
 tecture which is worthy to occupy us for a moment. They are 
 all fruits of a dominating creed. If we consider how vast was 
 the outlay they required, we shall not wonder that religion 
 alone has thus far been able to unite, in a manner to wield 
 them, the motives and the means for grand and consistent 
 systems of structure. The magnificence of the Romans, the 
 splendor of Venice and Genoa, like the ambitious efiforts of 
 France, England, and Germany in more recent days, had a cer- 
 tain taint of dilettantism in their origin, which, aiming to com- 
 bine inconsistent qualities, and that for a comparatively low 
 motive, carried through all their happiest combinations the 
 original sin of impotence, and gave as a result, bombast instead 
 of eloquence, fritter instead of richness, boldness for simplicity, 
 carving in lieu of sculpture. The laws of expression are such 
 that the various combinations which have sought to lodge 
 modern functions in buildings composed of ancient elements, 
 developed and perfected for other objects, betray, in spite of all 
 the skill that has been brought to bear upon them, their bastard 
 origin. In literature, the same struggle between the ancient 
 form so dear to scholars, and the modern thought which was 
 out-growing it, was long and obstinate. In literature the battle 
 has been won by the modern thought. The models of Greece 
 are not less prized for this. We seek them diligently, we 
 
Structure and Organization. 173 
 
 ponder them with delight and instruction. We assimilate all 
 of their principles that is true and beautiful, and we learn of 
 them to belong to our day and to our nation, as they to theirs. 
 
 In all structure that from its nature is purely scientific, in 
 fortifications, in bridges, in ship-building, we have been eman- 
 cipated from authority by the stern organic requirements of the 
 works. The modern wants spurned the traditional formula in 
 these structures, as the modern life outgrew the literary moulds 
 of Athens. In all these structures, character has taken the 
 place of dilettantism, and if we have yet to fight for sound 
 doctrine in all structure, it is only because a doctrine which has 
 possession must be expelled, inch by inch, however unsound its 
 foundation. 
 
 The developments of structure, in the animal kingdom, are 
 worthy of all our attention, if we would arrive at sound prin- 
 ciples in building. The most striking feature in the higher 
 animal organizations is, the adherence to one abstract type. 
 The forms of the fish and the lizard, the shape of the horse, 
 and the lion, and the camelopard, are so nearly framed after 
 one type, that the adherence thereto seems carried to the verge 
 of risk. The next most striking feature is the modification of 
 the parts, which, if contemplated independently of the exposure 
 and the functions whose demands are thus met, seems carried 
 to the verge of caprice. I believe few persons not conversant 
 with natural history, ever looked through a collection of birds, 
 or fish, or insects, without feeling that they were the result of 
 Omnipotence at play, for mere variety's sake. 
 
1*74 Structure and Organization. 
 
 If tliere be any principle of structure more plainly inculcated 
 in the works of the Creator than all others, it is the principle of 
 unflinching adaptation of forms to functions. I believe that 
 colors also, so far as we have discovered their chemical causes 
 and aflSnities, are not less organic in relation to the forms they 
 invest than are those forms themselves. 
 
 If I find the length of the vertebrae of the neck in grazing 
 quadrupeds increased, so as to bring the incisors to the grass; 
 if I find the vertebrje shortened in beasts of prey, in order to 
 enable the brute to bear away his victim ; if I find the wading 
 birds on stilts, the strictly aquatic birds with paddles ; if, in 
 pushing still further the investigation, I find color arrayed 
 either for disguise or aggression, I feel justified in taking the 
 ground that organization is the primal law of structure, and I 
 suppose it, even where my imperfect light cannot trace it, unless 
 embellishment can be demonstrated. Since the tints as well 
 as the forms of plants and flowers, are shown to have an orga- 
 nic significance and value, I take it for granted that tints have 
 a like character in the mysteriously clouded and pearly shell, 
 where they mock my ken. I cannot believe that the myriads 
 are furnished at the depths of the ocean, with the complicated 
 glands and absorbents, to nourish those dyes, in order that the 
 hundreds may charm my idle eye as they are tossed in disor- 
 ganized ruin upon the beach. 
 
 Let us dwell for a moment upon the forms of several of the 
 higher types of animal structure. Behold the eagle, as he sits 
 on the lonely cliff", towering high in the air ; carry in your mind 
 
Structure and Organization. 175 
 
 the proportions and lines of the clove, and mark how the finger 
 of God has, by the mere variation of diameters, converted the 
 type of meekness into the most expressive symbol of majesty. 
 His eye, instead of rushing as it were out of his head, to see 
 the danger behind him, looks steadfastly forward from its deep 
 cavern, knowing no danger but that which it pilots. The struc- 
 ture of his brow allows him to fly upwards with his eyes in shade. 
 In his beak and his talons we see at once the belligerent, in the 
 vast expanse of his sailing pinions the patent of his prerogative. 
 Dei Gratia Raptor ! Whence the beauty and majesty of the 
 bird? It is the oneness of his function that gives him his 
 grandeur, it is transcendental mechanism alone that begets his 
 beauty. Observe the lion as he stands ! Mark the ponderous 
 predominance of his anterior extremities — his lithe loins, the 
 lever of his hock — the awful breadth of his jaws, and the depth 
 of his chest. His mane is a cuirass, and when the thunder of his 
 voice is added to the glitter of his snarling jaws, man alone 
 with all his means of defence stands self-possessed before him. 
 In this structure again are beheld, as in that of the eagle, the 
 most terrible expression of power and dominion, and we find 
 that it is here also the result of transcendental mechanism. 
 The form of the hare might well be the type of swiftness for 
 him who never saw the greyhound. The greyhound overtakes 
 him, and it is not possible in organization that this result 
 should obtain, without the promise and announcement of it, in 
 the lengths and diameters of this breed of dogs. 
 
 Let us now turn to the human frame — the most beautiful 
 
1*76 Structure and Organization. 
 
 organization of earth, the exponent and minister of the highest 
 being we immediately know. This stupendous form, towering 
 as a light-house, commanding by its posture a wide horizon, 
 standing in relation to the brutes where the spire stands in rela- 
 tion to the lowly colonnades of Greece and Egypt, touching earth 
 with only one half the soles of its feet — it tells of majesty and 
 dominion by that upreared spine, of duty by those unencum- 
 bered hands. Where is the ornament of this frame ? It is all 
 beauty, its motion is grace, no combination of harmony ever 
 equalled, for expression and variety, its poised and stately gait ; 
 its voice is music, no cunning mixture of wood and metal ever 
 did more than feebly imitate its tone of command or its warble 
 of love. The savage who envies or admires the special attri- 
 butes of beasts, maims unconsciously his own perfection, to 
 assume their tints, their feathers, or their claws ; we turn from 
 him with horror, and gaze with joy on the naked Apollo. 
 
 I have dwelt a moment on these examples of expression and 
 of beauty, that I "may draw from them a principle in Art, a 
 principle which, if it has been often illustrated by brilliant 
 results, v/e constantly see neglected, overlooked, forgotten — a 
 principle which I hope the examples I have given have pre- 
 pared you to accept at once, and unhesitatingly. It is this — 
 in Art, as in nature, the soul, the purpose of a work will never 
 fail to be proclaimed in that work in proportion to the subor- 
 dination of the parts to the Avhole, of the whole to the function. 
 If you will trace the ship through its various stages of improve- 
 ment, from the dug-out canoe and the old galley, to the latest 
 
Structure and Organization. 1*77 
 
 type of the sloop-of-war, you will remark that every advance in 
 performance has been an advance in expression, in grace, in 
 beauty, or grandeur, according to the functions of the craft. 
 This artistic gain, effected by pure science in some respects, in 
 others by mere empirical watching of functions where the ele- 
 ments of the structure were put to severe tests, calls loudly 
 upon the artist to keenly watch traditional dogmas, and to see 
 how far analogous rules may guide his own operations. You 
 will remark, also, that after mechanical power had triumphed 
 over the earlier obstacles, embellishment began to encumber 
 and hamper ships, and that their actual approximation to 
 beauty has been effected first, by strict adaptation of forms to 
 functions ; second, by the gradual elimination of all that is irre- 
 levant and impertinent. The old chairs were formidable by 
 their weight, puzzled you by their carving, and often contained 
 too mu'oh else to contain convenience and comfort. The most 
 beautiful chairs invite you by a promise of ease, and they keep 
 that promise ; they bear neither flowers nor dragons, nor idle 
 displays of the turner's caprice. By keeping within their pro- 
 vince they are able to fill it well. Organization has a language 
 of its own, and so expressive is that language, that a make-shift 
 or make-believe can scarce fail of detection. The swan, the 
 goose, the duck, when they walk towards the water are awk- 
 ward, when they hasten towards it are ludicrous. Their feet 
 are paddles, and their legs are organized mainly to move those 
 paddles in the water ; they, therefore, paddle on land, or as we 
 say, waddle. It is only when their breasts are launched into 
 
178 Structure and Organization. 
 
 the pond that their necks assume the expression of ease and 
 grace. A serpent, upon a smooth hard road, has a similar 
 awkward expression of impotence ; the grass, or pebbles, or 
 water, as he meets either, aflbrd him his sine qua no7i, and he 
 is instantly confident, alert, effective. 
 
 K I err not, we should learn from these and the like exam- 
 ples, which will meet iis wherever we look for them, that God's 
 world has a distinct formula for every function, and that we 
 shall seek in vain to borrow shapes ; we must make the shapes, 
 and can only effect this by mastering the principles. 
 
 It is a confirmation of the doctrine of strict adaptation that 
 I find in the purer Doric temple. The sculptures which adorned 
 certain spaces in those temples had an organic relation to the 
 functions of the edifice ; they took possession of the worshipper 
 as he approached, lifted him out of e very-day life, and prepared 
 him for the presence of the divinity within. The world has 
 never seen plastic art developed so highly as by the men who 
 translated into marble in the tympanum and the metope, the 
 theogony and the exploits of the heroes. Why, then, those 
 columns uncarved ? Why, then, those lines of cornice un- 
 broken by foliages, unadorned by flowers ? Why, that match- 
 less symmetry of every member, that music of gradation, with- 
 out the tracery of the gothic detail, without the endless caprices 
 of arabesque ? Because those sculptures spake, and speech 
 asks a groundwork of silence and not of babble, though it were 
 of green fields. 
 
 I am not about to deny the special beauties and value of any 
 
Structure and Organization. 179 
 
 of tlie great types of building. Each has its meaniDg and 
 expression. I am desirous now of analysing that majestic and 
 eloquent simplicity of the Greek temple, because, though I 
 truly believe that it is hopeless to transplant its forms with any 
 other result than an expression of impotent dilettantism, still I 
 believe that its principles will be found to be those of all struc- 
 tures of the highest order. 
 
 When I gaze upon the stately and beautiful Parthenon, I do 
 not wonder at the greediness of the moderns to appropriate it. 
 I do wonder at the obtuseness which allowed them to persevere 
 in trying to make it work in the towns. It seems like the en- 
 thusiasm of him who should squander much money to transfer 
 an Arabian stallion from his desert home, that, as a blindfolded 
 gelding, he might turn his mill. The lines in which Byron paints 
 the fate of the butterfly that has fallen into the clutches of its 
 childish admirer, would apply not inaptly to the Greek temple, 
 at the mercy of a sensible building committee, wisely deter- 
 mined to have their money's worth. 
 
 "When high art declined, carving and embellishment invaded 
 the simple organization. As the South Sea Islanders have 
 added a variety to the human form by tattooing, so the cunning 
 artisans of Greece undertook to go beyond perfection. Many 
 rhetoricians and skilled grammarians refined upon the elements 
 of the language of structure. They all spake : and demigods, 
 and heroes, and the gods themselves, went away and were 
 silent. 
 
 If we compare the simpler form of the Greek temple with the 
 
180 Structure and Organization. 
 
 ornate and carved specimens which followed it, we shall be con- 
 vinced, whatever the subtlety, however exquisite the taste that 
 long presided over those refinements, that they were the begin- 
 ning of the end, and that the turning point was the first introduc- 
 tion of a fanciful, not demonstrable, embellishment, and for 
 this simple reason, that embellishment being arbitrary, there is 
 no check upon it; you begin with acanthus leaves, but the 
 appetite for sauces, or rather the need of them, increases as the 
 palate gets jaded. You want jasper, and porphyry, and ser- 
 pentine, and giallo antico, at last. Nay, you are tired of Aris- 
 tides the Just, and of straight columns ; they must be spiral, 
 and by degrees you find yourself in the midst of a barbaric 
 pomp, whose means must be slavery, nothing less will supply 
 its waste, whose enjoyment is satiety, whose result is corrup- 
 tion. 
 
 It was a day of danger for the development of taste in this 
 land, the day when Englishmen perceived that France was lay- 
 ing them under contribution by her artistic skill in manufac- 
 ture. They organized reprisals upon ourselves, and, in lieu of 
 truly artistic combinations, they have overwhelmed us with 
 embellishment, arbitrary, capricious, setting at defiance all 
 principle, meretricious dyes and tints, catch-penny novelties of 
 form, steam-woven fineries and plastic ornaments, struck with 
 the die or pressed into moulds. In even an' ordinary house we 
 look around in vain for a quiet and sober resting-place for the 
 eye; we see naught but flowers, flourishes — the renaissance 
 of Louis Quatorze gingerbread embellishment. We seek 
 
Structure and Organization. 181 
 
 in vain for aught else. Our own manufacturers have caught 
 the furor, and our foundries pour forth a mass of ill-digested 
 and crowded embellishment, which one would suppose addres- 
 sed to the sympathies of savages or of the colored population, 
 if the utter absence of all else in the market were not too 
 striking to allow such a conclusion. 
 
 I do not suppose it is possible to check such a tide as that 
 which sets all this corruption towards our shores. I am aware 
 of the economical sagacity of the English, and how fully they 
 understand the market; but I hope that we are not so through- 
 ly asphyxiated by the atmosphere they have created, as to fol- 
 low their lead in our own creation of a higher order. I remark 
 with joy, that almost all the more important efforts of this land 
 tend, with an instinct and a vigor born of the institutions, to- 
 wards simple and effective organization ; and they never fail 
 whenever they toss overboard the English dictum, and work from 
 their own inspirations, to surpass the British, and there, too, 
 where the world thought them safe from competition. 
 
 I would fain beg any architect who allows fashion to invade 
 the domain of principles, to compare the American vehicles 
 and ships with those of England, and he will see that the 
 mechanics of the United States have already outstripped the 
 artists, and have, by the results of their bold and unflinching 
 adaptation, entered the true track, and hold up the light for all 
 who operate for American wants, be they what they will. 
 
 In the American trotting waggon I see the old-fashioned and 
 
182 Structure and Organization. 
 
 pompous coach dealt with as the old-fashioned palatial display 
 must yet be dealt with in this land. In vain shall we en- 
 deavor to hug the associations connected with the old form. 
 The redundant must be pared down, the superfluous dropped, 
 the necessary itself reduced to its simplest expression, and then 
 we shall find, whatever the organization may be, that beauty 
 was waiting for us, though perhaps veiled, until our task was 
 fully accomplished. 
 
 Far be it from me to pretend that the style pointed out by 
 our mechanics is what is sometimes miscalled an economical, 
 a cheap style. No ! It is the dearest of all styles ! It costs 
 the thought of men, much, very much thought, untiring 
 investigation, ceaseless experiment. Its simplicity is not the 
 simplicity of emptiness or of poverty, its simplicity is that of just- 
 ness, I had almost said, of justice. Your steam artisan would fill 
 your town with crude plagiarisms, calquts upon the thefts from 
 Pompeii or modern Venice, while the true student is determining 
 the form and proportions of one article. 
 
 Far be it froin me to promise any man that when he has 
 perfected the type of any artistic product, he shall reap the 
 fruit of his labor in fame or money. He must not hope it. 
 Fame and money are to be had in plenty ; not in going against 
 the current, but in going with it. It is not diflScult to conceive 
 that the same state of the popular taste which makes the cor- 
 rupted style please, will render the reformed style tasteless. It 
 is not possible to put artistic products to a test analogous to 
 
Structure and Organization. 183 
 
 that wliicli tries the ship and the carriage, but by a lapse of time. 
 True it is, that society always reserves a certain number of minds 
 and of eyes unpoisoned by the vogue of the hour, and in the 
 sympathy of these must the artist often find his chief reward 
 in life. 
 
THE COOPER MONUMENT. 
 
 It is with great reluctance, nay, with grief, that I liave under- 
 taken to speak of this monument to Cooper. Accustomed to 
 express my conception in the language of form, and address- 
 ing the mind and the imagination of the constituency by 
 means of substantial art, I feel painfully the impotence of my 
 language to express my feeling as well as my meaning. * * * 
 I propose for this monument a parallelogram of twenty-four 
 by forty-eight feet, inclosing a room of about twenty feet high, 
 equally lighted throughout from above. I propose to raise this 
 building upon three high steps which wnll quite surround it. 
 At the corners of these steps I propose to erect, on pedestals, 
 four figures illustrating four of Cooper's most striking creations 
 of character. The external frieze I propose to decorate with 
 designs embodying national traits described by the poet, and, 
 in the interior, I propose to call upon four of the ablest painters 
 of the country to make visible a certain number of his most 
 effective descriptions. The colossal bronze portrait of Cooper 
 will ornament the extremity of this room opposite the entrance. 
 I propose that, in form, this building shall be an example of 
 symmetry and effective mnsonry, and that all its parts shall be 
 
The Cooper Monument. 185 
 
 specimens of what can be afforded by the country now. I pro- 
 pose to exclude from the entire work all ornament, except the 
 graceful modification of the necessary elements, and the picto- 
 rial and sculptural illustrations I have enumerated. 
 
 I count upon the soul of this building to impress itself on the 
 body, and if, as I believe, its purpose is great and noble, let no 
 man fear that greatness and nobility will not get utterance 
 through the hands of those who rear and illustrate it, even as 
 the leaden types arrange themselves now at the command of 
 the long buried Shakspeare. 
 
 I propose that a large and thoroughly digested model of the 
 entire work be prepared before anything farther be attempted. 
 
 I do not deny that, for the sum of money which this work 
 will absorb, a vast pile of Gothic fritter or other European 
 clap-trap could be erected, which would fill all the papers of 
 the land with hyperbolical eulogium and self-gratulation. 
 
 I do not deny that, when all is efiected that I propose to 
 attempt, the spectator must bring to the view of the work a 
 warm love of the first American Novelist, a keen relish for the 
 simple, the fervid, the true, or he will go away as they go, who, 
 enticed by the hope of a feast, only get a sermon. 
 
 I believe, notwithstanding, that this work would have several 
 
 desirable results. It could scarce fail to develope and improve 
 
 highly the artists employed on it, who, unless this or other 
 
 similar works be commanded, mu§t continue the expectants of 
 
 private patronage or caprice ; and, as such, too often accept 
 
 tasks calculated rather to belittle than to expand and develope 
 
 9* 
 
186 The Cooper Monument. 
 
 their faculties. In art, swimming is only learned in the 
 water. 
 
 I believe that, as a type of structure, this work could scarce 
 fail to influence, in the most wholesome manner, the structures 
 of the country, by showing in practice what a few sound and 
 pure maxims will do for any building. 
 
 I feel confident that, as a homage to a man who has been a 
 great national benefactor and a literary hero, it would command 
 the respect of all beholders. By degrees the public would 
 learn to understand its language, and when that has been 
 accomplished a great step will have been taken in this branch 
 of culture. 
 
 I have stated my views in regard to this monument in a 
 general manner ; to go farther into detail it would be necessary 
 to have elaborated the design, and to have performed all but 
 the material execution thereof : a labor of many months, and 
 requiring somewhat of expense in experiment. 
 
 I cannot close without expressing my regret that a building 
 has not already been prepared, and does not already preserve 
 a public testimonial to other illustrious sons of New York, to 
 which this monument of Cooper would have been a noble 
 addition. I believe that, since the fire which destroyed the old 
 Exchange and annihilated the statue of Hamilton, nothing wor- 
 thy of the State or the man remains to record visibly his fame. 
 Fulton's statue, or even bust, if it exist, has not been seen by 
 me. The fate of the statue of Hamilton, that of Washington's 
 statue at Raleigh, the destruction of the library at Washington 
 
The Cooper Monument. 187 
 
 of the Academy of Fine Arts of Philadelphia, of the antiquities 
 of Central America at New York, and the burning of the Pano- 
 rama of Athens at Cambridge, are all examples of our habitual 
 reliance upon combustible material, against all principles of true 
 and wise economy, and warnings not to be slighted in the face 
 of the statistics of conflagration, and the new, saddening ele- 
 ment of voluntary and malicious incendiarism now beginning 
 to be developed in these States. 
 
 I am fully aware that the great calls made upon the means 
 of citizens by amusements of an expensive character, by feasts 
 and dances that vie with the royal follies of the old world, and 
 embellishments, domestic and personal, which, like the triumphs 
 of Rome, represent the achievements and the whims of the 
 known world, leave but scanty resources available for purposes 
 like that I propose ; but I have still thought it best to speak of 
 what might be, believing that such an object would be a deco- 
 ration of the city, a stimulus to youth, a subject of pleasing study 
 and instruction for the leisure of the citizens, and as permanent 
 and connected with the national glory, a commencement of that 
 fund of artistic wealth by which we measure the minds of 
 nations whose conquests are passed, and whose policy has 
 suffered the fate of all things here below. 
 
FASHION- 
 
 Fashion has lived too long, and exercised an influence too 
 potent for us either to deny or to escape it. I wish to analyse 
 it briefly. The fact that it runs counter to functional require- 
 ment oft-times ; that it is imperative for its hour, and that it 
 loses all claim even to respect or gratitude after that hour is 
 passed, brings it into the same category with ceitain British 
 Sovereigns, who are stamped as the first gentlemen and ladies 
 of Christendom, as long as they sit upon the throne, and who 
 are found, by subsequent analysis, to require a new definition 
 of decency or propriety to bring them within the class of 
 reputable men. 
 
 I regard the Fashion as the instinctive eftbrt of the stationary 
 to pass itself ofi" for progress : its embellishment exhibits the 
 rhythm of organization, without the capacity for action ; so 
 the fashion boasts the sensuous phenomena of progress with- 
 out any real advance. The one and the other are, I believe, 
 opiates, intended to quell and lull the wholesome demands of 
 nature, and of the author of nature. I believe both are better 
 than nothing ; for a false homage to the good has more of 
 hope in it than a conscious and hearty adherence to wrong. 
 
Fashion. 189 
 
 Wherever the student of modern life turns his eye, he sees, 
 among other api^arently more substantial and serious obstacles 
 to advancement and reform, a phantom-like opponent who, 
 though no man may say whence he comes, or who is his sire, 
 assumes the purple, and rules with a rod of iron. I mean the 
 Fashion. I mean the essential mode ! I do not mean to re- 
 flect upon the victims and subjects of this despot. I believe 
 we all bow the neck to him, more or less ; nor do I mean to 
 assert that he has no right of any sort to our regard, for he 
 has might, and might always means something very serious. 
 I wish to put him to the test of analysis, and find an intelligible 
 definition of him, that I may know at least where and how far 
 we may lazily submit, when and how we may rebel with a 
 chance of freedom. 
 
 The Fashion is not coeval with the race — he was not a 
 younger brother of the sun and stars, a second-born of Heaven. 
 The great civilizations of antiquity never saw him, till the 
 epoch of their decline. The Iliad and the Greek tragedies 
 liave no trace of him. Even the modern man, in his hour of 
 travail and of woe, wots not of him ; he is a flutterer in the 
 sunshine of superfluity. He is protean, elusive, he is here and 
 gone; and when we had believed him dead, is here again in 
 the twinkling of an eye ! We had hoped that his change was 
 a search after the good, until we felt that he gloried in the no 
 logic of his shifting. We had hoped that he was seeking a 
 wise folly, and that when the circle of folly was run, he 
 
190 Fashion. 
 
 would turn to wisdom in despair. But again and again he 
 flies to the old folly, and gilds with his sanction the exploded 
 siUiness of a few years since. 
 
 The Fashion is no respecter of persons. He has apparently 
 no preferences of a distinct and reliable nature. He gives no 
 premonitory symptoms of his approach. He expires in full 
 vigor, and like Tadur, reappears in the form of some other 
 impotent, dumb, and voiceless form. 
 
 His essential characteristic is change ; he is a dodger, an 
 ever new countersign, a Bramah lock, which, when Mr. Hobbs 
 has made his key, instantly becomes a common padlock, and 
 so puts him to shame. 
 
 I understand by the Fashion the instinctive effort of preten- 
 sion to give by mere change, the sensuous semblance of pro- 
 gress. I look upon it as a pis aller of the stationary to pass 
 itself oflf for locomotion. I regard it as a uniform, with which 
 thinking humanity cripples its gait, in the vain hope that the 
 unthinking may keep up with itself. It is a result of the 
 desperate effort to make a distinction out of nothing, and is 
 only driven from change to change, because nothing is a fruit 
 that grows within the reach of all. 
 
 Still, Fashion denotes a hope of better things. It betrays a 
 lurking want not clearly expressed, and it gives stones and 
 serpents to stop our craving, only because it has neither bread 
 nor fishes to bestow. Fashion is no positive evil, and has been 
 often a relative good. As etiquette, though a poor make-shift. 
 
Fashion. 
 
 191 
 
 still confesses the existence of propriety, its superstition, with 
 all its darkness, would prove a twilight to the godless ; so 
 Fashion may be allowed to protest against finality, and be the 
 symbol of yearning yet impotent aspiration. 
 
AN ARTIST'S CREED, 
 
 Sir Joshua Reynolds, in his very able and scholar-like Dis- 
 courses on the Art of Painting, adhered to " sound believing," 
 and though in his work-room he was chiefly occupied with 
 lords and ladies, at two, three, and five hundred pounds a head, 
 yet in his doctrine was he a firm maintainer of the gusto grande^ 
 and its concomitant short-commons. He thus served the god 
 of art and the mammon of society alternately — led Barrys and 
 Haydons into the temptation of " entusimusy," and kept his 
 royal siege and extensive custom safe alike from rivalry and 
 neglect. 
 
 He has recorded the boast that his were no "unfledged 
 opinions," he had gained them all from the Italian eagles' moun- 
 tain home, after they had left the parent nest. Was he not in 
 error here ? Were they not chiefly eggs which he distributed 
 at Somerset house ? Were not most of the male eggs addled ? 
 
 The master-pieces that I saw in London last summer, were 
 dogs, with an epigraph more or less witty or far-fetched, the 
 Houses of Parliament, a sort of parvenu nightmare, caused by 
 the middle ages not being yet thoroughly digested by the British 
 
An Artist's Creed. 193 
 
 stomach, and an unsightly cohimn, with an unsightly statue on 
 its summit, wliich made me feel that one man, at least, had 
 failed " to do his duty." 
 
 I doubt if the world can accept these spolia opima as any 
 fair remuneration for so many years of successful sway by sea 
 and land. 
 
 I wish to give forth an artist's creed which I have prepared 
 for my own child. I have followed Winkelman through the 
 labyrinth of his dogma, and it has seemed to me that he hath 
 rather imposed his own feeling and taste than struck and laid 
 bare the foundations of truth. I have followed Schiller and 
 Goethe to the top of their high mountain, and found the air 
 thin and cold, and often so foggy that I could see no trace of 
 the kingdoms of the world they told me were at my feet. 
 
 I dare not deny the mastery of these men of the ideas they 
 handled. I must, however, make shift to get along without 
 understanding them at present. I have not the antecedent 
 training necessary to follow them, and find my way back to 
 practice. I remark, likewise, that the light of their sun hath 
 not prevented many princes and peoples from running into pal- 
 pable artistical absurdity, and this is my only safe reason for 
 doubting them. An isolated spider throws out a web and pulls 
 upon it to see if its other end hath caught somewhat ; if it be 
 floating in space he withdraws it, and throws out, another much 
 longer : if he have no better success than before, he waits a long- 
 time after withdrawing this second web, and then throwing out 
 a thread of incredible fineness and length, he runs upon it, not 
 
194 An Artist's Creed. 
 
 caring whether it have any hold at the other end, and trusting 
 to its hold upon the air, to take him at all events out of that. 
 I believe the symmetrical and brilliant theories which are not 
 incarnate in practical result, have a certain analogy with this 
 third web of the isolated spider ; for though it require an ex- 
 ceptional brain to demonstrate a new truth, your average man 
 can generally adapt it, and work it into theresylt with heat and 
 vigor and even new application* not foreseen by the original 
 discerner thereof. 
 
 I sat in the fresh morning within my garden ; the sun was 
 rising, and the sea and sky responded to his eternal smile. A 
 gentle wind crept over me, and wrapped me in a paradise of new- 
 mown hay and wild flowers. The sweetbrier that canopied 
 my head poured forth her breath of praise till the sense ached 
 at her. I was still and cheerful. Suddenly my own blue-eyed 
 boy stood by me ; he leaned his elbows on my knees, looked 
 wistfully up to my face, and, with bewildered smile asked, " Papa, 
 what is God ? Since " the boy's the father of the man," I com- 
 manded my voice and my smile ; 1 bade him call his mother 
 
 * Some of the ablest Daguerrian operators are, without doubt, the very 
 men who would have laughed Daguerre to scorn had they seen him trying 
 to fix the image upon his silver retina. You may know the practicians 
 by this sign, they are great laughers. They stand in relation to the 
 inventors where the fist stands in relation to the brain, and are as 
 necessary to it as it to them. 
 
An Artist's Creed. 195 
 
 that we might speak together of this ; he bounded away. 
 My breast was shaken, and I wept. That question, thus asked 
 then and tliere, was too much for me. It was as if the new- 
 born Htter had lifted their mewling muzzles from the teat, and 
 yelped for the day that was burning on their closed lids. 
 
 Ere long I heard his laughing voice ; he was at play ; I went 
 to him. " Papa. God is my father which is in heaven !" " Ay, my 
 child !' hallowed be his name!' "I say it every night — Thy 
 kingdom come ! thy will be done !" and, leaning on his Lilli- 
 putian rake, he recited the divine petition. Is it right thus to 
 make the infant brain a romha of words that come, at last, to be 
 associated only with bed-time ? I know not there be honest 
 men that were thus tutored. Because of my fear that my 
 child may come at last not to taste the quality of the Lord's 
 prayer, until he can compare it with the prayers of the hier- 
 archies, do I now seek to prepare for him an artist's creed, that 
 he may learn somewhat of man made in God's image, and 
 thence climb from nature to nature's author and finisher. 
 
 Three things, my child, have I seen in man worthy of thy 
 love and thought. Three proofs do I find in man that he was 
 made only a little lower than the angels — Beauty — Action — 
 Character. 
 
 By beauty I mean the promise of function. 
 By action I mean the presence of function. 
 By character I mean the record of function. 
 
196 An Artist's Creed. 
 
 The glory of beauty is the faith of future action. 
 
 The honor of action is the hope of future character. 
 
 The divinity of character is the charity that giveth itself to 
 God, in sacrificing self to humanity. 
 
 These three do I find, and the greatest of these is charity. 
 Go thou, my child, into the thoroughfare, test these my words, 
 and if they be clever statements of a lie, say to them retro, 
 Satane ! But if they be feeble lines of truth, come to me 
 once more, and we will pull these threads and seek to know 
 where their other end is fastened. 
 
 The April leaf bursts its integument at the call of the coming 
 sun. Its stem is feeble, but its pulp is also tender, obedient to 
 the breeze, coy of the rain, it shines and thinks not of August, 
 still less of November. The eye of man sees here the beauty 
 of the leaf, the promise of midsummer function ; not that func- 
 tion hath not begun — it began ere the sharded husk fell to 
 earth. But it is light, easy gentle work. He hangs upon the 
 breast of the young year, and answers the flow of her milk 
 with the light of his eye, and his heavenly, toothless laugh. 
 The eye of man foresees the dog-days and hears afar the hail- 
 storm and the thunder. Xot for ever will that mother watch — 
 she only prepares thee I 
 
 In July we visit once more the leaf, and we find him a lit- 
 tle dusty generally, his stem tougher, he sways where he once 
 fluttered, and his gloss is gone ; he takes his dose of sun and 
 rain when he can get it, but not with the froHc of May ; his 
 outline hath been somewhat shrivelled by the heat, his integrity 
 
An Artist's Creed. 19*7 
 
 a little damaged by grub, or moth. In the long drought we 
 think we hear him cry, How long ! Oh Lord, how long ?" He 
 is now in full action, and though he seem less buoyant, this is 
 his life of life. There is still beauty in him, for there is still a 
 promise of function, but there is chiefly action, performance, 
 which is more than promise. Character is now developing, 
 the record of his function is now seen, he is beginning to get a 
 receipt in full from the Maker of all things. 
 
 The eye of man now sees, in the expanded and towering 
 trunk, the treasure, that these little busy ones have laid up of 
 solid wood. 
 
 In November we seek the leaf once more — it hangs by a 
 filament ; beauty is there yet, for yet is there a promise of func- 
 tion ; but how small ! The thready fibre that sustains the 
 shrivelled lung still promises, the filament still acts, character 
 is here ; and at last, with sudden puff of north-wester, comes the 
 receipt in full, and the rustling fall is answered with greeting 
 rustle by such as fell before. 
 
 The ear of man hears audibly the words " Well done ! good 
 and faithful servant." 
 
 The heathen saw in spring one deity, in the summer another, 
 in the fall another ; and when the winter came they sorrowed 
 as without hope. The eye of man now sees one God, the God 
 of spring, of summer, of fall and of winter, and in whom, 
 through all these aspects, is there no shadow of turning. 
 
 Thou who dost not grope as I, but seest ; who art not dumb 
 as I, who have dabbled in jargons till I have lost my vernacu- 
 
198 
 
 An Artist's Creed. 
 
 lar and gained no tongue, — but speakest; say of man, say of 
 nations, say of creeds, say of every juxtaposition of parts for 
 an end what I have tried to say of the leaf, what thou feelest 
 that I struggle after, even as the drowning man clutches, vain- 
 ly ; and if it be not true, there must be more Gods than one. 
 
FRAGMENTS. 
 
 The man of genius is pre-eminently the servant of a God whose 
 service is perfect freedom. The so called terror — the delirium 
 tremens of responsibility belongs, I believe, rather to what is 
 called talent, especially when conjoined with a fierce desire to 
 parvenir, as the French say, — to succeed. 
 
 Your man of genius goes about looking for responsibility ; 
 and when he finds it, he takes it joyfully, often telling you, 
 somewhat frankly, that he is the man for it, and forgetting, in 
 the fervor of his volition, that modesty which the copy-books 
 have conjoined inseparably with merit. He not only promises 
 largely, magnificently, but he tells you that his performance is 
 not to be despised — Exegi moniimentum cere perennius ! Rega- 
 lique situ pyramidum altius. That's the way he talks when 
 he is communicative and in good humor with himself. 
 
 I believe it is Ovid who shows his conviction of the immor- 
 tality of the soul, by loudly defying old " tempus edax rerum'''' 
 to strike one leaf from his laurelled brow\ 
 
 Dante says, that he writes from a harmony that is suona dentro 
 
200 Fragments. 
 
 — inside of him. He accuses no terrible pressure from without, 
 except political tyranny and want of bread. Valtrui pane — 
 eating the crust of charity — that is his complaint. Shak- 
 speare's " eye in a fine frenzy roUing," rolled from the fulness 
 of the God within, not from fear of outward lash or black 
 mark. 
 
 I am afraid that some of our critics, with their stern claims 
 and terrible law, have swallowed more of the east wind than 
 is good for the liver. They may do harm with this reign of 
 terror. Boys of genius are sprouting in every direction, by all 
 accounts. Why scare them in this way ? 
 
 Look at Robert Burns ! When he brought forward his little 
 specimens of the utterance of genius, the dominant intellect of 
 Britain said, "It is naught!" So they set him to gauge whis- 
 key ; yet, when he had gone his way, " straightway they 
 rejoiced," built him a huge monument, and bemoaned him. 
 So far from making any stern claim upon this mind, now 
 known as the very jewel of Scotland, the dunderheads never 
 found out what he was good for until he was gone. Burns 
 hankered and cankered — he confessed it — but it was not for 
 fear of not getting utterance: it was, he says, "to see their 
 cursed pride." They made stern claims of some kind or other, 
 and he protested against them. There is little doubt that the 
 man saw in the distance the big marble monument that was 
 to shelter his image. He would gladly have exchanged some 
 tithe of its future outlay and splendor, and have received there- 
 
Fragments. 201 
 
 for a cottage for his wife and bread for his bairns. What ter- 
 ror inspired his song? If I mistake not, he says, roundly, " I 
 rhyme for fun." 
 
 I believe it is now settled, that to interlard one's talk or 
 written language with French phrases and scraps of Latin or 
 other foreign tongues, is essentially vulgar and affected — still 
 I have not tried to break myself of it, partly because I am one 
 of those men who do not easily learn new habits, and partly to 
 repel — shake off — and trip up the self-made critics, who are my 
 especial aversion. When I say self-made, I do not mean such 
 men as having perceived that there were " more things in heaven 
 than on earth," &c., have seriously set themselves to supply 
 the deficiency. I mean the truly self-made man, who is not 
 only ignorant, but is cheerfully so, who has kept constantly 
 within that narrow circle where the accident of birth placed 
 him, and where strong lungs and an iron stomach have made 
 him the cock of the walk. I have generally found that this 
 sort of man, in making himself, never forgets the important 
 item of self-appreciation — nay, it is often the only part of the 
 god-like task that does not seem to me to have been hurried, 
 botched, and made a mess of. I had hoped to have increased 
 these citations in number and value, with assistance of the Con- 
 gressional library, but that, alas ! is gone, having been quite 
 burned up, in consequence of the economy that filled its halls 
 
 with some forty or fifty cords of painted pine, and that too, in 
 
 10 
 
202 Fragments. 
 
 a building where the soda-water merchants and applewomen 
 have royal vaults, over head and under foot, and where even 
 the crypts and outhouses are worthy of Genoa, Venice, or 
 RoEQe. 
 
 Stopping here and there, among men of different races, 
 creeds, and forms of civilization, I have become inoculated, to 
 some extent, with the various ways of thinking of those about 
 me, always retaining nearly the same proportion of original 
 Yankee conviction to after-thought, that you will find of matrix 
 to pebbles in the pudding-stone of Roxbury, Massachusetts. 
 
 The habit of working in stone has spoiled me for debate. I 
 never can discuss with a vigorous and resolute antagonist. 
 When I work a bit of clay it will, to a certain extent, stay put, 
 as the saying is. Stone also is, after all, a soft material. If I 
 strike off a bit with my chisel, it stays off through all time ; 
 but when I answer an objection in politics or morals, the rogues 
 state it over again in another shape and grow personal — ^just 
 as the wolf, when he tried the lamb at the brook-side assizes, 
 kept making new indictments and drawing nearer to him all 
 the while. 
 
 This impossibility of getting the better of a disputant is the 
 real secret, I take it, of the ultima ratio of fire, sword, and tor- 
 ture. Hercules cut off the Hydra's heads, but he was obliged 
 to burn the stumps to prevent their sprouting, and all opinion 
 
Fragments. 203 
 
 is a Hydra's head. Uniformity of creed is only to be realized 
 by mechanical means. If you would have men's faith as relia- 
 ble as stone you must petrify them. But when thev be of 
 stone, other men may throw them at you (see the history of 
 the French Revolution). Perhaps it is wiser to agree to differ, 
 and to set up our men in society as the shipwrights do their 
 masts, with somewhat of space and play, lest they snap and 
 come down about our ears if put to too strong a test Shrouds 
 and stays are good, but neither sun nor rain respects them. 
 What is all right and tight to-day will be rickety to morrow ! 
 
 Serpens nisi Setyentem comedit non Jit Draco. — The brutes 
 in their war, as in their truce, obey a divine law. Men also 
 obey a divine law in their war with brutes, as in their truce. 
 Now the hierarchies and higher law men declare that another 
 God is necessary to explain the battle between man and man. 
 To this I would answer, that men do not fight about arithmeti- 
 cal questions ; they do not fight about that which both under- 
 stand. When meli fight, therefore, one of the belligerents at 
 least is brutal, perhaps both ; in either case there is a brutal 
 belligerent. I see no necessity for inventing a new God to pre- 
 side over brutal men ; for, though man may manage to be 
 thierischer als jedes ikeir, he can scarce surpass them all. 
 Let us then paraphrase the Horatian precept and proclaim, — 
 " N'ec Diaholus interdt^ nisi dignus vindice nodus inciderit.'''' 
 
204 Fragments. 
 
 English writers, even of a high class, speak complacently of 
 the bull-dog courage of their masses. They parade it in terro- 
 rem. Now, bull-dogs are terrible to curs and mastiffs, but 
 when they see men they see their lord. 
 
 John Bull, in his Quarterly Review, after bellowing trium- 
 phantly over the ten carcases of Frenchmen he once " knocked 
 over" (Sic) with old fashioned smooth-bore, and saying pithy 
 things of the capability of the rifle and bayonet, squeals about 
 the C7'uel invention of a French officer for throwinof into his 
 ships a flame inevitable and inextinguishable. Doth he 
 think it diabolical ? Let him pray ! Perhaps the Frenchman 
 thought his bull-dogs diabolical, and has prayed first. 
 
 At Vienna, I heard an Austrian say, boastingly, that in the 
 next war with France, the imperial troops would be found to be 
 a wall of granite. A Yankee who stood there, said, quietly, 
 " The imperial troops, sir, w^ere always such a wall ; it will 
 never be an impassable barrier to Frenchmen, unless you 
 garnish it with — men." 
 
 Perhaps the old symbol of the serpent with his tail in his 
 mouth, means man seeking self-knowledge after having subju- 
 gated sea and land ; if so, perhaps a better type of eternity 
 could not have been invented. I thank the prophetic seers of 
 
Fragments. 205 
 
 Egypt that tliey made the circle by putting the tail between 
 the teeth ; by this arrangement, the brain overlooks tlie fun 
 from two eyes. The circle is sometimes sought by giving the 
 tail a double turn round the neck ; thanks to God ! the tail 
 loses its power when the brain is isolated by the hug. 
 
 When Jove made the anaconda's head, he saw the eyes 
 fixed upon a bullock, and asked, " Dost thou wish a tail ?" 
 " Yea, papa, a big one." " Dost thou wish a fine pair of legs ?" 
 " No, papa, they would only be in my way ; why askest thou ?" 
 " Merely to test thy head, my boy. Behold, thou art 
 finished !" " Alas, I am small." " But unencumbered." " I 
 am very hungry." "Go ahead !" 
 
 Jove humored the ambition of the hog, and made him a 
 monumental elephant. The hypercritical quadruped surveyed 
 himself in a pool, and came back shaking his ears in much dis- 
 gust. "How now, thou ponderous one?" "Pater andronte 
 theonte ! Did I not ask for dignity, that I might stand a 
 monument of thy own greatness and wisdom ? Behold, thou 
 hast given me two tails instead of one, and I am a laughing- 
 stock !" " My child," said the pitying God, " this is no common 
 tail, but a marvellous proboscis ! Why let it hang thus pendu- 
 lous and forlorn ? Throw it aloft ! Hold it vertical and rigid ! 
 Blow ! Behold, thou liast a spire and belfry all in one !" 
 
206 Fragments. 
 
 " Truly thou art great, my father ; I will sing thy praises ever- 
 more." The elephant now repaired to the hill-top, took his 
 stand, and tossing his snout into the sky, commenced his hymn 
 to Jove. He was the glory and wonder of all hogdom. When 
 hunger came, between strophe and antistrophe, he managed to 
 trumpet for dinner. "My child," said Jove with laughter, "I 
 cannot afford so much one-sided magnificence. Thy nose must 
 come down and attend upon thy belly. Behold, thou standest 
 in thine own ordure ! Such a monument as thou requires two 
 tails ; the one to strike the flies from thy flank, the other to 
 purvey for thy maw. Thou shalt find ,it supple as a snake ; 
 prehensile as monkey's hand. Fall not, my son, into mono- 
 mania. So much grandeur and immobility can only exist by a 
 mobile, flexible, sensitive jack-of-all-trades adjunct. Know that 
 thy snout is my master-piece. The rest of thee I made to 
 please thy foolish self; but for this snout thy dignity would 
 soon starve." 
 
 The Egyptian immortality lost in flavor and color what it 
 gained in duration. Their architecture was as expressive of 
 impotent aspiration as their mummy. They exempHfy with 
 their conserved carcases and perennial clumsiness, that fear of 
 death which, mistrusting God or believing in more than one, is 
 all its lifetime subject to bondage. 
 
 The Egyptians sought immortality by passing their lives in 
 
Fragments. 207 
 
 hewing stone cases for their carcases, not altogether in vain, 
 for after three thousand years, the faithful granite yields us the 
 eternal grin. The Greeks put their bodies in the fire ; and 
 their lives upon papyrus or marble, where it still breathes and 
 glows. 
 
 There be dilettanti who think that art can utter no more, 
 because they have not heard aright one word of all that art 
 hath uttered. If any man studying books at night, conclude 
 that the day of poetry is past, let him rise before the sun and 
 see the day born, and he will feel with joy that God still 
 liveth. 
 
 Having lived all my life in lands where people looked over 
 their shoulders before asking what's o'clock, for fear that they 
 might wake the suspicion of a spy, and having, from time to 
 time, read books published here at home, in which it seemed 
 to me that speech took a high, wide, and deep range, going 
 indeed so far as to call in question the constitution of these 
 States, and the creed of a majority of our fellow-citizens, I pro- 
 mised myself the satisfaction of blowing off the steam accumu- 
 lated by years of malcontent silence, without let or hindrance. 
 I felt all the safer in this my proposed talk, because I am a sin- 
 cere and hearty adherent to the distinctive political opinions of 
 my country ; and though I cannot, of course, think on matters 
 
208 F n A G M E >- T s . 
 
 of faith like eveiybod v, 1 allow that in all snch matters " much 
 may he said on both sides.*' 
 
 The real, hidden, not outspoken meaning of these checks 
 upon the freedom of speech, would seem to be a regret that he 
 who uses it, hath ever been bom, or, being born and developed, 
 that he doth not make sufficient haste to die. 
 
 Whoever will compare the remarks made upon Feniraore 
 Cooper, during his life and after his demise, both at home and 
 abroad, will scarce escape the conclusion that when laid in his 
 coffin and screwed down, he was just where many wished to 
 have him. Had he followed the prudential advice of some 
 well-wishers, his admirers would have been merely less grieved, 
 his foes less gratifieti, when he at length put on that extreme 
 quiemess of manner which the English preach, and whose 
 glory is ih-M from it there is nobbing to hope or to fear. To 
 assume this quietness in life, would for him have been suicide 
 — for "quiet to quick bosoms is a hell.'* 
 
 I understand by this continual order to keep one's feet close 
 together, one's elbows close to the side, and one's voice below 
 the breath, simply a denial of the ri^t to live. Surely, there is 
 vet room enough on this continent for an individual to walk 
 and talk, and even to shout and run, without breaking any 
 one's rest or endangering public rights. 
 
 The main advantage of intercourse and society has always 
 appeared to me to consist herein, that by uttering one's thought, 
 feeling, whim if you will, one could show his hand, and obtain 
 perhaps sympathy, perhaps instruction, or peradventure the 
 
Fragments. 209 
 
 knowledge that neither was to be hoped for. In Europe we talk 
 much about the opera, the fashion, the weather, and the deli- 
 cacies of the season. We talk of topics which unite as many as 
 possible of a mixed company, and which expose no one to the 
 attention of the police. In such societies, to broach political sub- 
 jects, to speak of creeds, or to mention Washington, would be 
 a breach of manners ; because these are not safe topics. Some 
 of the best bred and most refined circles in Europe use all this 
 caution. Let no one fancy, however, that he can win his entree 
 into such company by tattle about music, and gastronomy. 
 He gets no entrance there without having been tested and 
 stamped elsewhere. 
 
 I regard it as no more than common honesty in an individual 
 who enters any society, that he speak his thought and feeling, 
 lest he be called to join a procession to glorify a cause he 
 despises, or to eat abolition bread and salt, with a secret south- 
 ern leaning. 
 
 The great charm of a hospitable entertainment and friendly 
 greeting lies herein, that they be extended to ourselves, by 
 which I mean, because of our special ism, or in spite of it. If 
 I keep back my opinion, and get invited to dine thereby, is it 
 not a trick that I play upon Abraham ? Besides, how can I 
 be sure that the warmth and friction of talk will not rouse the 
 voice of Jacob, and so give the lie to the hide of Esau ? Now, the 
 meanest attitude conceivable by me, is that of one who stands 
 convicted of the desire to cheat, and of the impotence to deceive. 
 
 10* 
 
210 
 
 Fragments. 
 
 I write my opinions more willingly than I speak tliem ; 
 because, being many of them not strictly demonstrable, they 
 tend to rouse the individual feeling of him who uttereth them. 
 Mathematical and physical truths are proven, explained, and 
 developed by a tide of talk which, like a placid sea, rolls its 
 deep waters gently but irresistibly shorewards. Moral, political, 
 and economical truths are defended by language which, like 
 the roller of the beach, meeting resistance from below, gets up 
 with sudden vivacity, and combs and breaks with foam and 
 roar. A man is never so well prepared to do justice to Euclid 
 as in the morning, and with empty stomach ; he talks politics 
 and religion with vigor, when the ladies are withdrawn and 
 the cloth is removed. 
 
 It is often necessary to try one's opinions on several hearers, 
 in order to see what sort of interests and aspirations are 
 offended by them. I should be ashamed to utter twice what 
 were once condemned by good men and true of opposite poli- 
 tics and different creeds ; but a one-sided condemnation hath 
 no terrors for me. 
 
 There is a form of speech which aspires, by breadth of sym- 
 pathy, to live peaceably with all men. In certain states of 
 society, this temper is ornamental and useful ; but if perse- 
 vered in through thick and thin, it is apt to incur the charge 
 of a fondness for the " mess," and an aversion for the " watch." 
 
 I have always heard Thorwaldsen, Eastlake, Gerard, De la 
 
Fragments. 211 
 
 Roche, Gibson, Rauch, Teneranni, Bienaime, speak with a cer- 
 tain reserve and caution of a new work by an able hand. 
 They seem to have an instinctive sense that new works, though 
 they be works of a Dante or a Shakspeare, do not always find 
 their level with the " ignorant present they get it often when, 
 as Lord Bacon says, " some time be passed away." Even when 
 sure that a " miss" has been made, they beget a softness that 
 doth give a smoothness to their sorrow. When Dante speaks 
 of Homer as the poet, " che sovra ogni altro come aquila vola^'' 
 one would suppose that he had no room for other idols, yet in 
 the presence of Virgil's moonlight beauty doth he kneel out- 
 right, call him his " master," and say that from his golden 
 page came the fair style that shed honor on his own Tuscan 
 town. Lo ! he hath found another eagle ! This is not exactly 
 Shylock justice, or New England logic perhaps, but it is true 
 to the heart of man nevertheless. 
 
 Fra Beato Angelico was unknown and unappreciated by 
 whole schools of able modern painters. Read all that Eng- 
 lishmen have written on art, up to Flaxman's time, and you 
 will find no trace of his deathless fame. Read all that French 
 criticism has uttered (and French criticism is not to be 
 despised), and you will see that Fra Beato's paradise is to them 
 a terra incognita. Read the shallow babble about the hard- 
 ness of Perugino in the old English works. It is wrong to be 
 so fast in our verdicts. 
 
1^ 
 
 212 Fragments. 
 
 Genius would seem to make immense efforts almost uncon- 
 sciously, and to keep a large reserve out of tlie figbt altogether. 
 Shakspeare went into the country and remained still. He has 
 told us that he knew his name would have a life where life is 
 most active, " even in the mouths of men." Lord Bacon, too, 
 pointed out his future station in the world's opinion, adding, 
 mournfully, that it must be withheld " until some time be 
 passed away." This disposition on the part of mediocrity to 
 harry, and scourge, and flout men of creative power, looks more 
 like the result of a terrible law than anything else in the annals 
 of genius. Still, it is too general not to be an ordinance of 
 God. Like loves like, and it requires the collective heart of 
 man to make a quorum to judge the broad, the deep, the 
 genial soul. The man of vast power of mind is like the for- 
 tress full of armed hosts, with spears glittering over the turret, 
 with pointed artillery and burning match. We sit down to 
 sketch it and glorify it more cordially, when the portcullis 
 chain is broken, the guns are spiked, and the ivy and the owl 
 have possession of its towers. 
 
TRIBUTES. 
 
0- 
 
GREENOUGH'S 
 STATUE OF WASHINGTON. 
 
 BY THE LATE HON. ALEXANDER H. EVERETT. 
 
 Greenough's great work has surpassed my expectations, high 
 as they were. It is truly sublime. The statue is of colossal 
 grandeur ; about twice the size of life. The hero is represented 
 in a sitting posture. A loose drapery covers the lower part of 
 the figure, and is carried up over the right arm, which is 
 extended, with the elbow bent, and the forefinger of the hand 
 pointed upwards. The left arm is stretched out a little above 
 the thigh ; and the hand holds a Roman sword reversed. The 
 design of the artist was, of course, to indicate the ascendency 
 of the civic and humane over the military virtues, which dis- 
 tinguished the whole career of Washington, and which form 
 the great glory of his character. It was not intended to bring 
 before the eye the precise circumstance under which he resigned 
 his commission as commander-in-chief. This would have 
 required a standing posture and a modern military costume ; 
 and, without an accompanying gi-oup of members of Congress, 
 would have been an incomplete work. The sword reversed, 
 
216 Statue of Washington. 
 
 and the finger pointed upwards, indicate the moral sentiment, 
 of which the resignation of his commission, as commander-in- 
 chief, was the strongest evidence, without the details, which 
 were inconsistent with the general plan. The face is that of 
 Stuart's portraits modified so as to exhibit the highest point of 
 manly vigor and maturity. Though not corresponding exactly 
 with any of the existing portraits, it is one of the aspects which 
 the countenance of Washington must necessarily have worn in 
 the course of his progress through life, and is obviously the 
 proper one for the purpose. In expression, the countenance is 
 admirably adjusted to the character of the subject and the 
 intention of the work. It is stamped with dignity, and radiant 
 with benevolence and moral beauty. The execution is finished 
 to the extreme point of perfection, as well in the accessories as 
 in the statue itself. The seat is a massy arm-chair, of antique 
 form and large dimensions, the sides of which are covered with 
 exquisitely wrought bas-reliefs. The subject of one is the infant 
 Hercules strangling the serpent in his cradle; that of the 
 other, Apollo guiding the four steeds that draw the chariot of 
 the sun. The back of the chair is of open work. At the left 
 corner is placed a small statue of Columbus, holding in his 
 hand a sphere, which he is examining with fixed attention : at 
 the right corner is a similar small statue of an Indian chief. 
 The effect of these comparatively diminutive images is to 
 heighten by contrast the impression of grandeur, which is made 
 by the principal figure. The work stands upon a square block 
 of granite, which bears upon its front and two sides, as an 
 
Statue or Washington. 217 
 
 inscription, tlie well known language of the resolution, adopted 
 in Congress upon the receipt of the intelligence of Washing- 
 ton's death : " First in war : first in peace : first in the hearts 
 of his countrymen." On the back of the statue, just above the 
 top of the chair, is placed another inscription in Latin, which is 
 as follows : 
 
 Simulacrum istud 
 Ad magnum Libertatis exemplum 
 Koc sine ipsa duraturum 
 Horatius Greenough 
 Faclebat. 
 
 This inscription is not very felicitous. Independently of the 
 objections that have been made to the grammar of the faciehat, 
 wdiich, though defended on classical authority, does not strike 
 me as the natural form, the ideas are hardly expressed with 
 sufficient distinctness, and, so fixr as they can be gathered, are 
 not particularly appropriate. It is not easy to see in what pre- 
 cise or correct understandino; of the terms Washino-ton can be 
 called an " example of liberty ;" and admitting that, by a rather 
 latitudinous construction, this phrase may be supposed to mean 
 that his conduct is a proper example for the imitation of the 
 friends of liberty, it is still more difficult to imagine why a • 
 statue of Washington may not be preserved though liberty 
 should perish. Two thousand years have elapsed since the fall 
 of Grecian and Roman liberty, but Demosthenes and Cicero 
 still survive in their "all but living busts," as well as in their 
 "thoughts that breathe and words that burn." The precise 
 
218 Statue of Washington. 
 
 object of this description would, perhaps, have been suflBciently 
 provided for by a simple indication of the name of the sculptor 
 and of the circumstances under which the work was ordered 
 and executed. The statue was originally placed in the Rotunda 
 of the Capitol ; but the light being found unfavorable, it was 
 removed to a temporary building in the garden, where it now 
 stands. The light is better than before, but the meanness of 
 the building forms an unpleasant contrast with the grandeur of 
 the work, and it is much to be desired that a more suitable 
 place of deposit may soon be found for a monument so worthy 
 of the great subject, and so honorable to the artist and the 
 country. 
 
 This magnificent product of genius does not seem to be 
 appreciated at its full value in this metropolis of " the freest 
 and most enlightened people on the globe." I have met with 
 few persons here who have spoken of it in terms of strong or 
 even moderate satisfaction. Every one has some fault to point 
 out, that appears to withdraw his attention entirely from the 
 grandeur and beauty of the whole, which, when they are 
 pressed upon him, lie is compelled to acknowledge. One is 
 dissatisfied that the figure is colossal ; another that the face is 
 not an exact copy of Stuart's portrait ; a third, that the posture 
 is sitting and not standing ; a fourth, that there is a want of 
 repose in the general expression ; a fifth, that one of the ankles 
 is incorrectly modelled ; and so of the rest. Most of these 
 objections proceed, as I have heard them stated, from persons 
 who would think themselves wronged if their sensibility to the 
 
Statue of Washington. 219 
 
 grand and beautiful in nature and art were called in question. 
 But how feeble must this quality be in one who can see nothing 
 in so splendid a monument but some trifling real or imaginary 
 fault! I should not blame any one for indicating and insisting 
 on what he might consider as blemishes, if he were also to 
 exhibit a proper feeling for the acknowledged merits of the 
 woi-k : but I almost lose patience when I hear a person, not 
 without some pretensions to good taste, after a visit of an hour 
 to the statue, making no other remark than that one of the 
 ankles is incorrectly modelled; an error which, after a careful 
 examination for the express purpose, I have been wholly unable 
 to discover. This remark is nearly a repetition of the one made 
 by the Athenian cobbler, upon the first exhibition of one of the 
 celebrated Venuses of antiquity — that there was a wrong stitch 
 in one of her sandals. It aftbrds a curious, though not very 
 agreeable proof, how exactly human nature repeats itself under 
 similar circumstances, even to the slightest and apparently most 
 accidental particulars. 
 
 The most satisfactory expression of feeling that I have met 
 with here, in regard to the statue, was prompted by the finer 
 and truer sensibility inherent in the heart of woman. It pro- 
 ceeded from a company of ladies whom I happened to encoun- 
 ter on my first visit to the building that contains this great 
 national monument. They were strangers to me, and had not 
 the air of persons belonging to the fashionable coteries of our 
 large cities ; but they evidently possessed — what is much more 
 important — cultivated minds, and a keen susceptibility to the 
 
220 Statue of Washington. 
 
 influence of natural and moral beauty. They appeared to have 
 been travelling extensively, and one of them had under her 
 arm a large sketch-book. They expressed in various forms the 
 highest admiration of the statue, and one of them finally 
 remarked, as a sort of summary of the whole, that it produced 
 upon her mind a stronger impression of sublimity and grandeur 
 than she had received from the cataract of Niagara. 
 
 The objections above mentioned to the size, attitude, and 
 costume of the statue, and to the character of the features, pro- 
 ceed upon the supposition, that it was the interest of the artist 
 to make the nearest possible approach to the person and coun- 
 tenance of Washington, as represented in the most authentic 
 portraits and statues ; and in costume, to the dress that he actu- 
 ally wore. This supposition is obviously an erroneous one. 
 These are matters which liave their importance as points of 
 historical information — especially in connexion with a character 
 of so much interest. But the object of the artist, in a Avork of 
 this kind, is much older than that of satisfying curiosity upon 
 these particulars. It was, as it should have been, his purpose 
 to call forth, in the highest possible degree, the sentiment of 
 the moral sublime, which the contemplation of the character of 
 Washington is fitted to excite. This purpose required such a 
 representation of his person, for instance, as, consistently with 
 truth to nature, would tend most strongly to produce this 
 result. A servile adherence to the existing portraits is not 
 essential to the accomplishment of such a purpose, and might 
 even be directly opposed to it ; as, for example, if these had 
 
Statue of Washington. 221 
 
 been executed in the early youth or extreme old age of the 
 subject. Still less would it be necessary to preserve the cos- 
 tume of the period, which is already out of fashion, and for 
 every subject, except the satisfaction of antiquarian curiosity, 
 entirely unsuitable for effect in sculpture. The colossal size — 
 the antique costume — the more youthful air of the face — are 
 circumstances which, without materially impairing the truth to 
 nature, increase very much the moral impression, and, instead 
 of furnishing grounds for objection, are positive merits of high 
 importance. 
 
 The question betwen a sitting and a standing posture is sub- 
 stantially the same as whether the subject was to be presented 
 under a civil or a military aspect. In the latter case, a stand- 
 ing posture would undoubtedly have been preferable. But if the 
 ascendency, given by Washington through his whole career to 
 the virtues of the patriot citizen over the talents of the military 
 chieftain, was the noblest trait in his character, and if it was the 
 duty of the artist to exhibit him, on this occasion, under the 
 circumstances in which he appeared, in real life, to the greatest 
 advantage, then the civil aspect of the subject, and with it the 
 sitting posture, like the other particulars that have been men- 
 tioned, instead of being a ground of objection, is a high posi- 
 tive merit. 
 
 It has been mentioned in private, as an objection made by a 
 person whose judgment in some respects would be considered 
 as entitled to respect, that there is a want of repose in the atti- 
 tude. The arms are extended in a way in which they could 
 
222 Statue of Washington. 
 
 not be placed for any length of time without producing fatigue ; 
 and we feel, it is said, the same sort of uneasiness on witnessing 
 this attitude in a statue that we should if it were maintained 
 permanently by a living person in our presence. 
 
 It is rather difficult to comprehend the precise meaning of 
 this objection as applied to the statue of Washington. When 
 it is the intention of the artist to express repose, the indications 
 of activity, of any kind, are, of course, out of place. Where it 
 is intended to express activity, the indications of repose would, 
 for the same reason, be incongruous with the subject. It is no 
 more an objection to the statue of Washington that the arms 
 are placed in an attitude which, after a short time, would 
 become fatiguing to a living person, than it is an objection to 
 the antique group of Laocoon that the muscles of a living man 
 could not remain more than a few minutes in the state of 
 extreme tension, indicated in that celebrated work, without 
 convulsions, or to the Apollo Belvidere, that he stands, with foot 
 drawn back and arm extended, in the position of an archer 
 who has just discharged an arrow from his bow. In the 
 famous equestrian statue of Peter the Great, at St. Petersburg, 
 the horse is rearing on his hinder legs, while the fore legs 
 remain suspended in the air at some distance from the ground. 
 This is an attitude which could not be maintained by a living 
 horse for more than two or three seconds; but, far from being 
 made a ground of objection to the work, it has been regarded 
 as its greatest merit, and as the precise quality which has given 
 it the character of being the finest equestrian statue in Europe. 
 
Statue of Washington. 223 
 
 It was not the design of the artist to represent his subject in 
 a state of repose. On the contrary, the obvious intention is to 
 exhibit the noblest trait in his intellectual and moral character. 
 I mean his habitual control over all the irregular propensities 
 of his nature, at the point of time when it reached its fullest 
 active development. In his practical career, this point was 
 indicated by the resignation of his commission, as commander- 
 in-chief, into the hands of the President of Congress. But that 
 was a scene which comes within the province of painting rather 
 than sculpture. A group so vast is beyond the reach of the 
 chisel. It was the difficult duty of the artist to embody the 
 sentiment which governed the conduct of Washington on that 
 occasion, in a single figure. His success in conquering this 
 difficulty, and producing, by a single figure, a moral emotion, 
 superior, probably, to any that could be called forth by the 
 finest "painting of the scene before Congress, is one of the 
 noblest triumphs of his noble art. To say that the work 
 indicates activity and not repose, is only saying, in other words, 
 that it was executed in conformity to the leading point in a 
 plan, which was suggested, or rather imperiously dictated, by 
 the nature of the subject. 
 
 It is rather unpleasant to be compelled, in commenting on 
 this splendid effort of genius, to meet such objections as these, 
 instead of joining in the general expression of mingled admira- 
 tion and delight which it ought to elicit from the whole public. 
 I make no pretensions to connoisseurship in the art of sculp- 
 ture, and judge of the merit of the work merely by the irapres- 
 
224 Statue of Washington. 
 
 sion which it makes upon my own mind; but I can say for 
 myself, that after seeing the most celebrated specimens o 
 ancient and modern sculpture to be found in Europe, including 
 the Laocoon and the Apollo Belvidere, with the finest produc- 
 tions of Canova, Thorwaldsen, Sergell, and Chantry, 1 consider 
 the Washington of Greenough as superior to any of them, and 
 as the master-piece of the art. The hint seems to have been 
 taken from the Olympian Jupiter of Phidias, who said himself 
 that he had caught the inspiration under which he conceived 
 the plan of that great glory of ancient sculpture, from a passage 
 in the Iliad. In this way the noble work of Greenough con- 
 nects itself, by the legitimate filiation of kindred genius, trans- 
 mitting its magnetic impulses through the long hues of inter- 
 vening centuries, with the poetry of Homer. The vast dimen- 
 sions of the Jupiter of Phidias may have made it to the eye a 
 more imposing and majestic monument ; but if the voluntary 
 submission of transcendent power to the moral law of duty be, 
 as it certainly is, a more sublime spectacle than any positive 
 exercise of the same power over inferior natures, then the sub- 
 ject of the American sculptor is more truly divine than that of 
 his illustrious prototype in Greece. When Jupiter shakes 
 Olympus with his nod, the imagination is affected by a grand 
 display of energy, but the heart remains untouched. When 
 Washington, with an empire in his grasp, resigns his sword to 
 the President of Congress, admiration of his great intellectual 
 power is mingled with the deepest emotions of delightful sym- 
 pathy, and we involuntarily exclaim with one of the characters 
 
Statue of Washington. 225 
 
 in a scene of much less importance, as depicted by an elegant 
 female writer : " There spoke the true thing ; now my own 
 heart is satisfied." 
 
 The present location of the statue is, of course, merely provi- 
 sional. It is much to be regretted that the light in the 
 Rotunda was found to be unfavorable, as there is no other hall 
 in any of the buildings belonging to the Union sufficiently lofty 
 and extensive to become a suitable, permanent place of deposit 
 for this naonument. How, when, and where, such a one shall 
 be provided is a problem of rather difficult solution. If, as has 
 sometimes been suggested, the patrimonial estate of Washing- 
 ton, at Mount Vernon, should ever be purchased by the coun- 
 try, and a public building erected there to serve as a sort of 
 National Mausoleum, or Western Westminster Abbey, the 
 statue would become, of course, its principal ornament. But 
 the execution of this plan, should it ever be realized, is proba- 
 bly reserved for the good taste and liberality of some future 
 generation. In the meanwhile, the noblest achievement of the 
 art of sculpture, dedicated to the memory of the greatest man 
 that ever lived in the tide of time, will be permitted by a coun- 
 try which received from his hands gifts no less precious than 
 Independence and Liberty, to take up its abode in a paltry 
 barrack. 
 
 11 
 
A VISIT TO GREENOUGH'S STUDIO. 
 
 [from " scenes and thoughts in EUROPE."] 
 
 Among the studios of living Artists, tlie most attractive natu- 
 rally to an American, are those of his fellow countrymen. Nor 
 do they need national partiality to make them attractive. The 
 first American who gained a reputation in the severest of 
 the Fine Arts was Greenough. For some years he was the 
 only sculptor we had, and worthily did he lead the van in a 
 field where triumphs awaited us. I happened, five or six 
 years ago, to travel from Boston southward with him and 
 Powers, and heard Greenough then warmly second Powers' 
 inclination, and urge him to hasten to Italy. Powers was 
 soon followed by Clevenger, who, in turn, received from him 
 encouraging words. The three are now working here harmo- 
 ifiously together. 
 
 Artists of merit have seldom much to show at their rooms ; 
 for their works are either made to order, and sent to their des- 
 tinations as fast as finished, or they are sold almost as soon 
 as seen. Sculptors have an advantage over painters, inas- 
 much as they retain the plaster casts after which each work is 
 chiselled in marble. As Greenough does not always fini^h 
 
A Visit to Greenougii's Studio. 227 
 
 the clay model up to the full design in his mind, but leaves the 
 final touches to the chisel itself, he is not forward to exhibit 
 his casts taken from the clay, the prototypes of the forms that 
 have been distributed to different quarters of the world. He 
 has just now in his studio, recently finished in marble for a 
 Hungarian nobleman, an exquisite figure of a child, seated on 
 a bank gazing at a butterfly, that has just lighted on the back 
 of its upraised hand. In the conception there is that union of 
 simplicity and significance, so requisite to make a work of 
 plastic Art, especially of sculpture, efi'ectivej and which denotes 
 the genial Artist. The attitude of the figure has the pliable 
 grace of unconscious childhood ; the limbs are nicely wrought ; 
 and the intelligence, curiosity, delight, implied and expressed, 
 in its gaze at the beautiful little winged wonder before it, 
 impart vividly to the work the moral element ; wanting the 
 which, a production, otherwise commendable, is not lifted up 
 to one of the high platforms of Art. The mind of the specta- 
 tor is drawn into that of the beautiful child, whose inmost 
 faculties are visibly budding in the effort to take in the phe- 
 nomenon before it. The perfect bodily stillness of the little 
 flexible figure, under the control of its mental intentness, is 
 denoted by the coming forth of a lizard from the side of the 
 bank. This is one of those delicate touches whereby the artist 
 knows how to beautify and heighten the chief effect. 
 
 Another work of high character, which Greenough is just 
 about to finish in marble, is a head of Lucifer, of colossal 
 size. The countenance has the beauty of an archangel, with the 
 
228 A Visit to Greenough's Studio. 
 
 hard, uncertain look of an archangel fallen. Here is a noble 
 mould not filled up with the expression commensurate to it. 
 There is no exaggeration to impress the beholder at once with 
 the malevolence of the original which the sculptor had in his 
 imagination. The sinister nature lies concealed, as it were, in 
 the features, and comes out gradually, after they have been 
 some time contemplated. The beauty of the countenance is 
 not yet blasted by the deformity of the mind. 
 
 Greenough's Washington had left Italy before my arrival in 
 Florence. By those best qualified to judge, it was here 
 esteemed a fine work. Let me say a few words about the 
 nudity of this statue, for which it has been much censured in 
 America. 
 
 Washington exemplifies the might of principle. He was a 
 great man without ambition, and the absence of ambition was 
 a chief source of his greatness. The grandeur of his character 
 is infinitely amplified by its abstract quality ; that is, by its 
 cleanness from all personality. Patriotism, resting on inte- 
 grity of soul and broad massive intellect, is in him uniquely 
 embodied. The purity and elevation of his nature were the 
 basis of his success. Had his rare military and civil genius 
 been united to the selfishness of a Cromwell, they would have 
 lost much of their effectiveness upon a generation warring for 
 the rights of man. Not these, but the unexampled union of 
 these with uprightness, with stainless disinterestedness, made 
 him Washington. If the Artist clothes him with the toga of 
 civil authority, he represents the great statesman ; if with uni- 
 
A Visit to Greenough's Studio. 229 
 
 form and spurs, the great General. Representing him in 
 either of these characters, he gives preference to the one over 
 the other, and his image of Washington is incomplete, for he 
 was both. But he was more than either or both ; he was a 
 truly great man, in whom statesmanship and generalship were 
 subordinate to supreme nobleness of mind and moral power. 
 The majesty of his nature, the immortality of his name, as of 
 one combining the morally sublime with commanding practical 
 genius, demand the purest form of artistic representation, — the 
 nude. To invest the colossal marble image of so towering, so 
 everlasting a man, with the insignia of temporary office, is to 
 fail in presenting a complete image of him. Washington, to 
 be best seen, ought to be beheld, not as he came from the 
 hand of the tailor, but as he came from the hand of God. 
 Thus, the image of him will be at once real and ideal. 
 
 That Greenough's fellow-countrymen, by whose order this 
 statue was made, would have preferred it draped, ought to be 
 of no weight, even if such a wish had accompanied the order. 
 To the true Artist, the laws of Art are supreme against all 
 wishes or commands. He is the servant of Art only. If, 
 bending to the uninformed will of his employers, he executes 
 commissions in a way that is counter to the requirements of 
 Art, he sinks from the Artist into the artisan. Nor can he, by 
 stooping to uncultivated tastes, popularize Art ; he deadens it, 
 and so makes it ineffective. But by presenting it to the gene- 
 ral gaze in its severe simplicity, and thus, through grandeur 
 and beauty of form, lifting the beholder up into the ideal 
 
230 A Visit to Gree rough's Studio. 
 
 region of Art. — l>y this means be can popularize it. He gra- 
 dually awakens and creates a love for it, and thus he gains a 
 wide substantial support to. Art in tbe sympatby for it engen- 
 dered, the which is the only true furtherance from without that 
 tbe Artist can receive. 
 
 A statue, wbieb is a genuine work of Art, cannot be appre- 
 ciated, — nay, cannot be seen without thought. Tbe imagina- 
 tion must be active in the beholder, must work with the per- 
 ception. Otherwise, what he looks at. is to him only a super- 
 ficial piece of handicraft. The form before him should breed 
 in him conjecture of ils inward nature and capacity, and by its 
 beauty or stamp of intellect and soul, lead him up into the 
 domain of human possibilities. The majestic head and figure 
 of Washington will reveal and confirm the greatness of his 
 character, for the body is the physiognomy of the mind. Tbat 
 broad mould of limbs, that stern calmness, that dignity of brow, 
 will carry the mind beyond the scenes of the revolution, and 
 swell the heart with thoughts and hopes of the nobleness and 
 destiny of man. Let the beholder contemplate this great 
 statue calmly and thoughtfully ; let him, by dint of contem- 
 plation, raise himself up to the point of view of the artist, and 
 it will have on him something of this high eff"ect. He will 
 forget that Washington ever wore a coat, and will turn away 
 from this noble colossal form in a mood that will be whole- 
 some to his mental state. 
 
 This attempt to justify Greenough's work by no means 
 implies a condemnation of other conceptions for a statue of 
 
A Visit to Greenougii's Studio. 231 
 
 AVashington. A colossal figure, — but partially draped, — 
 seated, the posture of repose and authority, — Greenough's con- 
 ception, seems to me the most elevated and appropriate. 
 Artists have still scope for a figure, entirely draped in military 
 or civil costume, on horseback or standing. Only this repre- 
 sentation of Washington will not be so high and complete as 
 the other. 
 
MEEThXG OF ARTISTS AT ROME. 
 
 On the reception in Rome of the intelligence of the death of 
 Horatio Greenough, Esq., a meeting of the American artists 
 and of his personal friends, was held on Saturday, January 
 15th, 1853, at the residence of our eminent sculptor, Thomas 
 Crawford. 
 
 The American artists, without exception, were present, and 
 the distinguished English sculptor, John Gibson, R. A., also 
 attended, as well as many other friends of the deceased. 
 
 The meeting was called to order by the Hon. Lewis Cass, Jr., 
 Charge d' Affaires of the United States, at Rome, — who, after 
 stating its object, made a few just and appropriate remarks on 
 the eminent qualities of Mr. Greenough. Mr. Crawford having 
 been elected President, Mr. Chapman Vice-President, and Mr. 
 Freeman, Secretary ; 
 
 On taking the Chair, Mr. Crawford addressed the meeting as 
 follows : — 
 
 Gentlemen : I shall not detain you longer upon this melan- 
 choly occasion, than is requisite to place before you the 
 object of our meeting, and to pass a few resolutions in connex- 
 ion with it. You are all, I presume, aware of the recent in- 
 
Meeting of Artists at Rome. 233 
 
 telligence we have received in Rome, of the death of our emi- 
 nent sculptor, Horatio Greenough, the announcement of which 
 has been so unexpected, and so mournful, that I, who knew him 
 well, have become, if I may use the words, quite overpowered. 
 
 Never in the course of my life have I been influenced by a 
 greater desire to express in language appropriate to this solemn 
 event, my own feelings. My inability to do this at present, 
 gives me much pain. Therefore, I shall only say that by the 
 death of our brother artist, we have lost not only a man in whom 
 all the virtues which make life a glorious preparation for the 
 future, were so truly evident ; but we have also lost a friend whose 
 devotion to his profession united with respect and affection for 
 the artists of all countries, were combined in a manner so strik- 
 ing as to call forth, upon many occasions, our ajDplause and our 
 enduring admiration. 
 
 Gentlemen, Horatio Greenough arrived in Rome twenty-seven 
 years ago, at a time when, with us at home, sculpture may be said 
 to have been truly in its infancy. He came here prompted by 
 a most enthusiastic desire to become an artist. He brought 
 with him rare learning, ardent ambition, and a determination 
 to succeed in a profession the diflSculties of which are almost 
 insurmountable. We can all of us appreciate his attachment 
 to our noble art, because we know how many sacrifices are re- 
 quired, how many home-ties are broken, and how much neglect 
 often falls to the lot of those who are determined to accomplish 
 a course of study, so far removed from home. More I need 
 
 11* 
 
234 Meeting of Artists at Rome. 
 
 not say regarding this. Your sympathies do not require to be 
 roused by referring to the incidents of artist-life. Those inci- 
 dents most frequently come and go, leaving behind them more 
 shadow than sunshine, It is sufficient to say that a truer, a 
 more noble, or a more affectionate heart never existed, than 
 the one now so silent, in the grave of Horatio Greenough. It 
 is a sad duty for us to be here this night, and know. Gentle- 
 men, that the honor he attained not only belongs to the 
 history of our country, but also to us ; and we can fully 
 appreciate the importance of the heritage, and are determined to 
 cherish it. 
 
 It is for this purpose you have been called together. The 
 willingness you have shown to be present proves that your 
 respect for the deceased is of the most earnest character. 
 Therefore, in conclusion, allow me to express a hope that by 
 the resolutions we shall pass this evening, we may perhaps 
 cause one ray of light to fall, with its mild and cheering influ- 
 ence, upon the mournful affliction of the widow and children of 
 our lamented brother artist, who in the vigor of life, with a 
 long vista of years, and works, and honors before him, has 
 been called suddenly away to that far off" land, where the 
 aspirations of his soul will find, in the presence of its God, the 
 full and beatific realization of its devotion while on earth to the 
 purity of goodness and the beauty of art. 
 
 Mr. Wm. W. Story then addressed the meeting, eloquently 
 alluding to the rank Mr. Greenough held among living artists, 
 
Meeting of Artists at Rome. 235 
 
 and to his noble qualities as a man. Mr Story then proposed the 
 following resolutions, which were unanimously adopted : 
 
 Resolved, That we have heard with deep regret of the death 
 of our fellow countryman and brother artist, Horatio Greenough, 
 Esq. 
 
 Resolved, That by his early and ardent devotion to sculpture, 
 at a period when this department of art was scarcely known or 
 practised in our country, he is fairly entitled to be considered 
 as the Pioneer of American Sculpture. By careful culture, he 
 trained and developed original powers of a high order, and 
 attained a public fame of which we, in common with all 
 Americans, are justly proud. His works are marked by purity 
 of conception, correctness of taste, graceful design, and rare 
 delicacy of sentiment. He brought to his profession the 
 accomplishments of scholarship, and he pursued it with liberal- 
 ity of spirit and elevation of purpose ; he lived and shone not 
 merely for success, but to elevate Art, and no personal spirit of 
 rivalry or jealousy dwarfed the loftiness of his aim. He w^as 
 eminently a gentleman in whom refinement of feeling ever 
 prompted courtesy of manner. He also won the friendship and 
 regard of all who knew him. We feel, therefore, that in him 
 we have lost not only an able and educated artist, but an honor- 
 able and high-minded man. 
 
 Resolved, That in manifestation of our regard for the memory 
 of the deceased, we will wear crape on the left arm for the 
 space of thirty days. 
 
 Resolved, That we sincerely sympathize with the wife and 
 
236 Meeting of Artists at Rome. 
 
 family of the deceased, in the bereavement which they have 
 sustained ; and that a copy of these resolutions be forwarded to 
 them, as a tribute of our unfeigned respect for his genius, 
 character, and works. 
 
 The meeting then adjourned. 
 
THE 
 
 THE GROUP OP 
 ANGEL AND CHILD, 
 
 BY WASHINGTON ALLST9N, 
 
 I STOOD alone ; nor word nor other sound, 
 Broke the mute solitude that closed me round ; 
 As when the air doth take her midnight sleep, 
 Leaving the -v^^ntry stars her Watch to keep, 
 So slept she now at noon. But not alone 
 My spirit then : a hght witliin me shone 
 
 That was not mine ; and feelings undefined. 
 And thoughts flowed in upon me not my own, 
 'Twas that deep mystery — for aye unknoAvn — > 
 
 The hving presence of another's mind. 
 
 Another mmd was there — the gift of few — 
 That by its own strong will can all that's true 
 In its ovvTi nature unto others give, 
 And mingling life vdih. life, seem there to live- 
 1 felt it now in mine ; and oh ! how fair, 
 How beautiful the thoughts that met me there- 
 Visions of Love, and Purity, and Tnith ! 
 Though form distinct had each, they seemed, as 'twere, 
 Embodied all of one celestial air — 
 To beam for ever in coequal youth. 
 
238 
 
 The Group of the 
 
 And thus I learned — as in the mmd they moved — 
 These stranger Thoughts the one the other loved ; 
 That Purity loved Truth, because 'twas true, 
 And Truth, because 'twas pure, the first did woo ; 
 While Love, as pure and true, did love the twain ; 
 Then Love was loved of them, for that sweet chain 
 
 That bound them all. Thus sure, as passionless, 
 Their love did grow, till one harmonious strain 
 Of melting sounds they seemed ; then, changed again, 
 
 One angel form they took— Self-Happiness. 
 
 This angel form the gifted Artist saw, 
 That held me in his spell. 'Twas his to draw 
 The veil of sense, and see the immortal race, 
 The Forms spiritual, that know not place. 
 He saw it in the quarry, deep in earth. 
 And stayed it by his will, and gave it birth 
 
 E'en to the world of sense ; bidding its cell, 
 The cold, hard marble, thus in plastic girth 
 The shape ethereal fix, and body forth 
 
 A being of the skies — with man to dwell. 
 
 And then another form beside it stood ; 
 
 'Twas one of this our earth — though the warm blood 
 
 Had from it passed exhaled as in a breath. 
 
 Drawn from its lips by the cold kiss of Death. 
 
 Its little " dream of human life " had fled ; 
 
 And yet it seoKied not numbered with the dead, 
 
 But one emerging to a life so bright 
 That, as the wondi-ous nature o'er it spread. 
 Its very consciousness did seem to shed 
 
 Rays from ^vithin, and clothe it all in light. 
 
Angel and Child. 
 
 239 
 
 Now touched the Angel Form its little hand, 
 
 Turning upon it with a look so bland, 
 
 And yet so full of majesty, as loss 
 
 Than holy nature never may impress — 
 
 And more than proudest guilt unmoved may brook. 
 
 The Creature of the Earth now felt that look. 
 
 And stood in blissful awe — as one above 
 Who saw his name in the Eternal Book, 
 And Him that opened it ; e'en Him that took 
 
 The Little Child, and blessed it in his love. 
 
 TO THE SAME. 
 
 My little ones, welcome ! in memory's dream 
 
 I've fondly beheld you full long,] 
 Your bright snowy forms as dear messengers seem, 
 
 From the radiant land of song. 
 
 How could you depart from that balmy clime, 
 
 Where your glorious kindred are ? 
 The sculptured childi-en of olden time, 
 
 Your elder brothers are there ! 
 
 Sweet Babe ! wouldst thou speak of that gem of earth, 
 
 With your gaze of wondering fear ? 
 And you, fair cherub, of him who gave birth 
 
 To your smile of holy cheer 1 
 
 Oh, we feel how eloquent silence may be. 
 When before us — all breathing of love — 
 
 Is the embodied spirit of infancy. 
 And its angel guide above ! 
 
THE 
 
 CHANTING CHERUBS. 
 
 BY RICHARD H. DANA. 
 
 Whence come ye, Cherubs ? from the moon 1 
 
 Or from a shming star 1 
 Ye, sure, are sent a blessed boon, 
 
 From kinder worlds afar ; 
 For while I look, my heart is all delight : 
 Earth has no creatures half so pure and bright. 
 
 From moon nor star we hither flew ; 
 
 The moon doth wane away, — 
 The stars, they pale at morning dew ; 
 
 We're children of the day ; 
 Nor change, nor night, was ever ours to bear ; 
 Eternal light, and love, and joy we share. 
 
 Then sons of light, from Heaven above, 
 
 Some blessed news ye bring. 
 Come ye to chant eternal love, 
 
 And tell how angels sing. 
 And in your breathing, conscious forms to show, 
 How purer forms above live, breathe, and glow ? 
 
 Our parent is a human mind ; 
 
 His winged thoughts are we ; 
 To sun nor stars are we confined : 
 
 We pierce the deepest sea. 
 Moved by a brother's call, our Father bade 
 Us light on earth : and here our flight is stayed. 
 
THE 
 
 STATUE OF MEDORA. 
 
 BY RICHARD H. DANA. 
 
 Medora, wake ! — nay do not wake ! 
 I would not stir that placid brow, 
 Nor lift those lids, though light should break 
 Warm from the twin blue heavens that lie below. 
 
 Sleep falls on thee, as on the streams 
 The summer moon. Touched by its might, 
 The soul comes out in loving dreams. 
 And wraps thy delicate form in living light. 
 
 Thou art not dead ! — These flowers say 
 That thou, though more thou heed'st them not, 
 Didst rear them once for him away, 
 Then loose them in thy hold like things forgot. 
 
 And lay thee here where thou might'st weep,— - 
 That Death but hushed thee to repose, 
 As mothers tend their infants' sleep. 
 And watch their eyelids falter, open, close, — 
 
 That here thy heart hath found release, 
 Thy sorrows all are gone away, 
 Or touched by something almost peace. 
 Like night's last shadows by the gleaming day. 
 
 When he who gave thee form is gone, 
 And I within the earth shall lie, 
 Thou still shalt slumber softly on, 
 Too fair to live, too beautiful to die. 
 
THE STATUE OF WASHIXGTO^^ 
 
 BY H. T. TUCKERMAN. 
 
 The quarry whence thy form majestic sprung-, 
 
 Has peopled earth with givace, 
 Heroes and Gods that elder bards have sung — 
 
 A bright and peerless race ; 
 
 But from its sleeping veins ne'er rose before 
 
 A shape of loftier name 
 Than his who Glory's wreath with meekness wore,— 
 
 The noblest son of Fame ! 
 
 Sheathed is the sword that passion never stained : 
 
 His gaze around is cast, 
 As if the joys of Freedom, newly-gained, 
 
 Before his vision passed ; — 
 
 As if a nation's shout of love and pride 
 
 With music filled the air. 
 And his calm soul was lifted on the tide 
 
 Of deep and grateful prayer ; — 
 
 As if the crystal mirror of his life 
 
 To fancy sweetly came, 
 With scenes of patient toil and noble strife, 
 
 Undimmed by doubt or shame ; — 
 
The Statue of Washington. 
 
 243 
 
 As if the lofty purpose of his soul 
 
 Expression would betray — 
 The high resolve ambition to control, 
 
 And thrust her crown away ! 
 
 Oh, it was well in marble firm and white, 
 
 To carve our hero's form, 
 Whose angel guidance was our strength in fight, 
 
 Our star amid the storm ! 
 
 Whose matchless truth has made his name divine, 
 
 And hiunan freedom sure, — 
 His country great, his tomb earth's dearest shrine, 
 
 While man and time endure ! 
 
 And it is well to place his image there 
 
 Upon the soil he blest ; 
 Let meaner spirits who its counsels share, 
 
 Revere that silent guest ! 
 
 Let us go up with high and sacred love 
 
 To look on Ills pure brow ; 
 And, as with solemn grace, he points above, 
 
 Renew the patriot's vow ! 
 
MONODY ON THE 
 
 DEATH OF HORATIO GREENOUGH. 
 
 BY GEORGE H. CALVERT. 
 
 The generous hopes of youth 
 Are firsthngs of our procreant being ; 
 Born while the heart is newly seeing 
 
 Great visions of the truth. 
 
 Life's morning glows with fires, 
 Reddening the soul with lusty flashes, 
 That, ere its noon, are silent ashes 
 
 Of dead dreams and desires. 
 
 He is the highest man. 
 Whose dreams die not ; — in whom the ideal, 
 Surging for ever, makes life real. 
 
 Ending where it began, 
 
 In visionary deeds ; — • 
 By plastic will deserted never. 
 His life-long joy and sweet endeavor 
 
 To prosper Beauty's seeds. 
 
 'Tis he helps Nature's might. 
 Echoing her soul, whether it erieth. 
 Or silent speaks ; and when he dieth, 
 
 On Earth there is less light. 
 
Monody, 
 
 Then mourn, my country ! Shed 
 Deep tears from thy ^-eat lids, and borrow 
 Night's gorgeous gloom to deck thy sorrow ; 
 
 Greenough, thy son, is dead. 
 
 A crowned son of Art 
 And thee ; lifted by love and duty 
 To his high work of marble beauty, 
 
 Coining thereon his heart. 
 
 Quick is gi'ief's shadow sped 
 Across the seas to Tuscan mountains, 
 Darkening the depths of living fountains 
 
 By Art and Friendship fed. 
 
 That peopled solitude. 
 The Studio, where, amid his creatures, 
 Broodeth the God, his busy features 
 
 Irradiant with his mood. 
 
 Is orphaned now ; and pale. 
 Each sculptured child seems sadly listening 
 For the warm look, that came in glistening 
 
 With a fresh morning hail. 
 
 These are his inmost heirs ; 
 In them still pulse his heart's best beatings. 
 Of soul and thought deep nuptial greetings 
 
 What most was his, is theks. 
 
 And they are ours. Our sight 
 Grows strong, as, compassing this gifted 
 Enmarbled life, we are uplifted : — 
 
 On Earth there is more light. 
 
NEW WORKS BY H. T. TUCKERMAN, 
 
 Reccnily Published hj G. P. Putnam S Co. 
 I. 
 
 The Optimist : a Series of Essays. 
 
 BY WmX T. TUCKERMAN. 
 
 Second Edition. 12mo. Cloth, 75 cents. 
 
 "There is a tone of quiet refinement about each, whether the pen is at work upon 
 the margin of a metaphysical mystery, or upon a description of an inauguration at 
 Vfa,sh.\xigion."—Philadelpliia Bulletin. 
 
 "Mr. Tuckerman touches no subject without throwing around it the charms of a fine 
 style, the fruit of a full, cultivated mind. He is, in our opinion, the best of the American 
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 trated."— ^^<gi/;rtrA; Advertiser. 
 
 "To such of our readers as would enjoy an intellectual treat, we cannot too highly 
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 Lit. Messenger. 
 
 "As a finished, graceful, thoughtful essayist, we reckon him a possession of grea 
 worth to this heedless, pressing, staring age. Amid the confused clamor and bruit of 
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 "As a writer, Mr. Tuckerman has the graceful earnestness and simplicity of that 
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 with a freshness of ideas and an adaptation to the present time, that show, beyond 
 cavil, that if he is to some extent an imitator, he is not a copyist of those distinguished 
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 our characteristics as a portion of the American people, our habits of thought and opin- 
 ion, and especially our terrific energy for thiift, which allows no rest, and almost con- 
 demns him as a lunatic who dares to be unemployed. The volume is full of good 
 thoughts, well \xii&i-Q6..— Worcester Palladium. 
 
 IT. 
 
 Sicily. A Pilgrimag^e. 
 
 1 '2mo. cloth, 40 cents. 
 
 "A clever description of a country less frequented by travellers than many other 
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WORKS ON THE FIXE ARTS, 
 
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 Manual of the Fine Arts, Critical and Historical. 
 
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 "The most practical and useful manual of the fine arts, which has yet been pub- 
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 " The object of the author was, to diffuse a taste for the study of the arts by gather- 
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 Hand-Book of Literature and the Fine Arts. 
 
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