their pictures. We see nothing of this kind in Virgil; that which comes the nearest to it is the adventure of the cave, where Dido and Æneas were driven by the storm; yet even there, the poet pretends a marriage before the consummation, and Juno herself was present at it. Neither is there any expression in that story which a Roman matron might not read without a blush. Besides, the poet passes it over as hastily as he can, as if he were afraid of staying in the cave with the two lovers, and of being a witness to their actions. Now I suppose that a painter would not be much commended, who should pick out this cavern from the whole Eneis, when there is not another in the work. He had better leave them in their obscurity, than let in a flash of lightning to clear the natural darkness of the place, by which he must discover himself as much as them. The altarpieces, and holy decorations of painting, show that art may be applied to better uses as well as poetry; and amongst many other instances, the Farnese gallery, painted by Annibale Caracci, is a sufficient witness yet remaining: the whole work being morally instructive, and particularly the Hercules Bivium, which is a perfect triumph of virtue over vice, as it is wonderfully well described by the ingenious Bellori. Hitherto I have only told the reader what ought not to be the subject of a picture or of a poem. What it ought to be on either side our author tells us. It must in general be great and noble; and in this the parallel is exactly true. The subject of a poet, either in tragedy, or in an epic poem, is a great action of some illustrious hero. It is the same in painting; not every action, nor every person, is considerable enough to enter into the cloth. It must be the anger of an Achilles, the piety of an Æneas, the sacrifice of an Iphigenia; for heroines as well as heroes are comprehended in the rule. But the parallel is more complete in tragedy than in an epic poem: for as a tragedy may be made out of many particular episodes of Homer or Virgil ; so may a noble picture be designed out of this or that particular story in either author. History is also fruitful of designs, both for the painter and the tragic poet: Curtius throwing himself into a gulph, and the two Decii sacrificing themselves for the safety of their country, are subjects for tragedy and picture. Such is Scipio restoring the Spanish bride, whom he either loved, or may be supposed to love; by which he gained the hearts of a great nation, to interest themselves for Rome against Carthage these are all but particular pieces in Livy's History, and yet are full, complete subjects for the pen and pencil. Now the reason of this is evident tragedy and picture are more narrowly circumscribed by the mechanic rules of time and place than the epic poem: the time of this last is left indefinite. It is true, Homer took up only the space of eight-and-forty days for his Iliad; : but whether Virgil's action was comprehended in a year or somewhat more, is not determined by Homer made the place of his action Troy, and the Grecian camp besieging it. Virgil introduces his Æneas sometimes in Sicily, sometimes in Carthage, and other times at Cumæ, before he brings him to Laurentum; and even after that, he wanders again to the kingdom of Evander and some parts of Tuscany, before he returns to finish the war by the death of Turnus. But tragedy, according to the practice of the antients, was always confined within the compass of twenty-four hours, and seldom takes up so much time. As for the place of it, it was always one, and that not in a larger sense, as for example, a whole city, or two or three several houses in it, but the market, or some other public place, common to the chorus and all the actors: which established law of theirs, I have not an opportunity to examine in this place, because I cannot do it without digression from my subject, though it seems too strict at the first appearance, because it excludes all secret intrigues, which are the beauties of the modern stage; for nothing can be carried on with privacy, when the chorus is supposed to be always present. But to proceed I must say this to the advantage of painting, even above tragedy, that what this last represents in the space of many hours, the former shows us in one moment. The action, the passion, and the manners of so many persons as are con : tained in a picture, are to be discerned at once in the twinkling of an eye; at least they would be so, if the sight could travel over so many different objects all at once, or the mind could digest them all at the same instant, or point of time. Thus in the famous picture of Poussin, which represents the institution of the blessed Sacrament, you see our Saviour and his twelve Disciples, all concurring in the same action, after different manners, and in different postures; only the manners of Judas are distinguished from the rest. Here is but one indivisible point of time observed; but one action performed by so many persons, in one room, and at the same table; yet the eye cannot comprehend at once the whole object, nor the mind follow it so fast; it is considered at leisure and seen by intervals. Such are the subjects of noble pictures, and such are only to be undertaken by noble hands. There are other parts of nature which are meaner, and yet are the subjects both of painters and of poets. For to proceed in the parallel; as comedy is a representation of human life in inferior persons and low subjects, and by that means creeps into the nature of poetry, and is a kind of juniper, a shrub belonging to the species of cedar; so is the painting of clowns, the representation of a Dutch Kermis, the brutal sport of snick-or-snee, and a thousand other things of this mean invention, a kind of picture which belongs to nature, but of the lowest form. Such is a lazar in comparison to a Venus; both are drawn in human figures; they have faces alike, though not like faces. There is yet a lower sort of poetry and painting which is out of nature; for a farce is that in poetry which grotesque is in a picture: the persons and actions of a farce are all unnatural, and the manners false; that is, inconsistent with the characters of mankind. Grotesque painting is the just resemblance of this; and Horace begins his Art of Poetry, by describing such a figure with a man's head, a horse's neck, the wings of a bird, and a fish's tail, parts of different species jumbled together, according to the mad imagination of the dauber: and the end of all this, as he tells you afterwards, is to cause laughter; a very monster in Bartholomew fair, for the mob to gape at for their twopence. Laughter is indeed the propriety of a man, but just enough to distinguish him from his elder brother with four legs. It is a kind of a bastard pleasure too, taken in at the eyes of the vulgar gazers, and at the ears of the beastly audience. Church-painters use it to divert the honest countryman at public prayers, and keep his eyes open at a heavy sermon; and farce-scribblers make use of the same noble invention to entertain citizens, country gentlemen, and Covent-Garden fops: if they are merry, all goes well on the poet's side. The better sort go thither too, but in despair of sense and the just images of nature, which are the ade |