Notes

NOTE A.—Par. 18.

Leonardo da Vinci observes that "a light object relieved on a dark ground appears magnified;" and again, "Objects seen at a distance appear out of proportion; this is because the light parts transmit their rays to the eye more powerfully than the dark. A woman's white head-dress once appeared to me much wider than her shoulders, owing to their being dressed in black." "It is now generally admitted that the excitation produced by light is propagated on the retina a little beyond the outline of the image. Professor Plateau, of Ghent, has devoted a very interesting special memoir to the description and explanation of phenomena of this nature. See his 'Mémoire sur l'Irradiation,' published in the 11th vol. of the Transactions of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Brussels."—S. F.

NOTE B.—Par. 23.

"The duration of ocular spectra produced by strongly exciting the retina, may be conveniently measured by minutes and seconds; but to ascertain the duration of more evanescent phenomena, recourse must be had to other means. The Chevalier d'Arcy (Mém. de l'Acad. des Sc. 1765,) endeavoured to ascertain the duration of the impression produced by a glowing coal in the following manner. He attached it to the circumference of a wheel, the velocity of which was gradually increased until the apparent trace of the object formed a complete circle, and then measured the duration of a revolution, which was obviously that of the impression. To ascertain the duration of a revolution it is sufficient merely to know the number of revolutions described in a given time. Recently more refined experiments of the same kind have been made by Professors Plateau and Wheatstone."—S. F.

NOTE C.—Par. 50.

Every treatise on the harmonious combination of colours contains the diagram of the chromatic circle more or less elaborately constructed. These diagrams, if intended to exhibit the contrasts produced by the action and re-action of the retina, have one common defect. The opposite colours are made equal in intensity; whereas the complemental colour pictured on the retina is always less vivid, and always darker or lighter than the original colour. This variety undoubtedly accords more with harmonious effects in painting.

The opposition of two pure hues of equal intensity, differing only in the abstract quality of colour, would immediately be pronounced crude and inharmonious. It would not, however, be strictly correct to say that such a contrast is too violent; on the contrary, it appears the contrast is not carried far enough, for though differing in colour, the two hues may be exactly similar in purity and intensity. Complete contrast, on the other hand, supposes dissimilarity in all respects.

In addition to the mere difference of hue, the eye, it seems, requires difference in the lightness or darkness of the hue. The spectrum of a colour relieved as a dark on a light ground, is a light colour on a dark ground, and vice versâ. Thus, if we look at a bright red wafer on the whitest surface, the complemental image will be still lighter than the white surface; if the same wafer is placed on a black surface, the complemental image will be still darker. The colour of both these spectra may be called greenish, but it is evident that a colour must be scarcely appreciable as such, if it is lighter than white and darker than black. It is, however, to be remarked, that the white surface round the light greenish image seems tinged with a reddish hue, and the black surface round the dark image becomes slightly illuminated with the same colour, thus in both cases assisting to render the image apparent .

The difficulty or impossibility of describing degrees of colour in words, has also had a tendency to mislead, by conveying the idea of more positive hues than the physiological contrast warrants. Thus, supposing scarlet to be relieved as a dark, the complemental colour is so light in degree and so faint in colour, that it should be called a pearly grey; whereas the theorists, looking at the quality of colour abstractedly, would call it a green-blue, and the diagram would falsely present such a hue equal in intensity to scarlet, or as nearly equal as possible.

Even the difference of mass which good taste requires may be suggested by the physiological phenomena, for unless the complemental image is suffered to fall on a surface precisely as near to the eye as that on which the original colour was displayed, it appears larger or smaller than the original object , and this in a rapidly increasing proportion. Lastly, the shape itself soon becomes changed (26).

That vivid colour demands the comparative absence of colour, either on a lighter or darker scale, as its contrast, may be inferred again from the fact that bright colourless objects produce strongly coloured spectra. In darkness, the spectrum which is first white, or nearly white, is followed by red: in light, the spectrum which is first black, is followed by green (-). All colour, as the author observes , is to be considered as half-light, inasmuch as it is in every case lighter than black and darker than white. Hence no contrast of colour with colour, or even of colour with black or white, can be so great (as regards lightness or darkness) as the contrast of black and white, or light and dark abstractedly. This distinction between the differences of degree and the differences of kind is important, since a just application of contrast in colour may be counteracted by an undue difference in lightness or darkness. The mere contrast of colour is happily employed in some of Guido's lighter pictures, but if intense darks had been opposed to his delicate carnations, their comparative whiteness would have been unpleasantly apparent. On the other hand, the flesh-colour in Giorgione, Sebastian del Piombo (his best imitator), and Titian, was sometimes so extremely glowing that the deepest colours, and black, were indispensable accompaniments. The manner of Titian as distinguished from his imitation of Giorgione, is golden rather than fiery, and his biographers are quite correct in saying that he was fond of opposing red (lake) and blue to his flesh. The correspondence of these contrasts with the physiological phenomena will be immediately apparent, while the occasional practice of Rubens in opposing bright red to a still cooler flesh-colour, will be seen to be equally consistent.

The effect of white drapery (the comparative absence of colour) in enhancing the glow of Titian's flesh-colour, has been frequently pointed out: the shadows of white thus opposed to flesh, often present, again, the physiological contrast, however delicately, according to the hue of the carnation. The lights, on the other hand, are not, and probably never were, quite white, but from the first, partook of the quality of depth, a quality assumed by the colourists to pervade every part of a picture more or less.

It was before observed that the description of colours in words may often convey ideas of too positive a nature, and it may be remarked generally that the colours employed by the great masters are, in their ultimate effect, more or less subdued or broken. The physiological contrasts are, however, still applicable in the most comparatively neutral scale.

Again, the works of the colourists show that these oppositions are not confined to large masses (except perhaps in works to be seen only at a great distance); on the contrary, they are more or less apparent in every part, and when at last the direct and intentional operations of the artist may have been insufficient to produce them in their minuter degrees, the accidental results of glazing and other methods may be said to extend the contrasts to infinity. In such productions, where every smallest portion is an epitome of the whole, the eye still appreciates the fascinating effect of contrast, and the work is pronounced to be true and complete, in the best sense of the words.

The Venetian method of scumbling and glazing exhibits these minuter contrasts within each other, and is thus generally considered more refined than the system of breaking the colours, since it ensures a fuller gradation of hues, and produces another class of contrasts, those, namely, which result from degrees of transparence and opacity. In some of the Flemish and Dutch masters, and sometimes in Reynolds, the two methods are combined in great perfection.

The chromatic diagram does not appear to be older than the last century. It is one of those happy adaptations of exacter principles to the objects of taste which might have been expected from Leonardo da Vinci. That its true principle was duly felt is abundantly evident from the works of the colourists, as well as from the general observations of early writers. The more practical directions occasionally to be met with in the treatises of Leon Battista Alberti, Leonardo da Vinci and others, are conformable to the same system. Some Italian works, not written by painters, which pretend to describe this harmony, are, however, very imperfect. A passage in Lodovico Dolce's Dialogue on Colours is perhaps the only one worth quoting. "He," says that writer, "who wishes to combine colours that are agreeable to the eye, will put grey next dusky orange; yellow-green next rose-colour; blue next orange; dark purple, black, next dark-green; white next black, and white next flesh-colour." The Dialogue on Painting, by the same author, has the reputation of containing some of Titian's precepts: if the above passage may be traced to the same source, it must be confessed that it is almost the only one of the kind in the treatise from which it is taken.

NOTE D.—Par. 66.

In some of these cases there can be no doubt that Goethe attributes the contrast too exclusively to the physiological cause, without making sufficient allowance for the actual difference in the colour of the lights. The purely physical nature of some coloured shadows was pointed out by Pohlmann; and Dr. Eckermann took some pains to convince Goethe of the necessity of making such a distinction. Goethe at first adhered to his extreme view, but some time afterwards confessed to Dr. Eckermann, that in the case of the blue shadows of snow , the reflection of the sky was undoubtedly to be taken into the account. "Both causes may, however, operate together," he observed, "and the contrast which a warm yellow light demands may heighten the effect of the blue." This was all his opponent contended.

With a few such exceptions, the general theory of Goethe with regard to coloured shadows is undoubtedly correct; the experiments with two candles (68), and with coloured glass and fluids (80), as well as the observations on the shadows of snow (75), are conclusive, for in all these cases only one light is actually changed in colour, while the other still assumes the complemental hue. "Coloured shadows," Dr. J. Müller observes, "are usually ascribed to the physiological influence of contrast; the complementary colour presented by the shadow being regarded as the effect of internal causes acting on that part of the retina, and not of the impression of coloured rays from without. This explanation is the one adopted by Rumford, Goethe, Grotthuss, Brandes, Tourtual, Pohlmann, and most authors who have studied the subject."

In the Historical Part the author gives an account of a scarce French work, "Observations sur les Ombres Colorées," Paris, 1782. The writer concludes that "the colour of shadows is as much owing to the light that causes them as to that which (more faintly) illumines them."

NOTE E.—Par. 69.

This opinion of the author is frequently repeated (, , ), and as it seems at first sight to be at variance with a received principle of art, it may be as well at once to examine it.

In order to see the general proposition in its true point of view, it will be necessary to forget the arbitrary distinctions of light and shade, and to consider all such modifications between highest brightness and absolute darkness only as so many lesser degrees of light. The author, indeed, by the word shadow, always understands a lesser light.

The received notion, as stated by Du Fresnoy, is much too positive and unconditional, and is only true when we understand the "displaying" light to comprehend certain degrees of half or reflected light, and the "destroying" shade to mean the intensest degree of obscurity.

There are degrees of brightness which destroy colour as well as degrees of darkness. In general, colour resides in a mitigated light, but a very little observation shows us that different colours require different degrees of light to display them. Leonardo da Vinci frequently inculcates the general principle above alluded to, but he as frequently qualifies it; for he not only remarks that the highest light may be comparative privation of colour, but observes, with great truth, that some hues are best displayed in their fully illumined parts, some in their reflections, and some in their half-lights; and again, that every colour is most beautiful when lit by reflections from its own surface, or from a hue similar to its own.

The Venetians went further than Leonardo in this view and practice; and he seems to allude to them when he criticises certain painters, who, in aiming at clearness and fulness of colour, neglected what, in his eyes, was of superior importance, namely, gradation and force of chiaro-scuro.

That increase of colour supposes increase of darkness, as so often stated by Goethe, may be granted without difficulty. To what extent, on the other hand, increase of darkness, or rather diminution of light, is accompanied by increase of colour, is a question which has been variously answered by various schools. Examples of the total negation of the principle are not wanting, nor are they confined to the infancy of the art. Instances, again, of the opposite tendency are frequent in Venetian and early Flemish pictures resembling the augmenting richness of gems or of stained glass: indeed, it is not impossible that the increase of colour in shade, which is so remarkable in the pictures alluded to, may have been originally suggested by the rich and fascinating effect of stained glass; and the Venetians, in this as in many other respects, may have improved on a hint borrowed from the early German painters, many of whom painted on glass.

At all events, the principle of still increasing in colour in certain hues seems to have been adopted in Flanders and in Venice at an early period; while Giorgione, in carrying the style to the most daring extent, still recommended it by corresponding grandeur of treatment in other respects.

The same general tendency, except that the technical methods are less transparent, is, however, very striking in some of the painters of the school of Umbria, the instructors or early companions of Raphael. The influence of these examples, as well as that of Fra Bartolommeo, in Florence, is distinctly to be traced in the works of the great artist just named, but neither is so marked as the effect of his emulation of a Venetian painter at a later period. The glowing colour, sometimes bordering on exaggeration, which Raphael adopted in Rome, is undoubtedly to be attributed to the rivalry of Sebastian del Piombo. This painter, the best of Giorgione's imitators, arrived in Rome, invited by Agostini Chigi, in 1511, and the most powerful of Raphael's frescoes, the Heliodorus and Mass of Bolsena, as well as some portraits in the same style, were painted in the two following years. In the hands of some of Raphael's scholars, again, this extreme warmth was occasionally carried to excess, particularly by Pierino del Vaga, with whom it often degenerated into redness. The representative of the glowing manner in Florence was Fra Bartolommeo, and, in the same quality, considered abstractedly, some painters of the school of Ferrara were second to none.

In another Note (par. ) some further considerations are offered, which may partly explain the prevalence of this style in the beginning of the sixteenth century; here we merely add, that the conditions under which the appearance itself is most apparent in nature are perhaps more obvious in Venice than elsewhere. The colour of general nature may be observed in all places with almost equal convenience, but with regard to an important quality in living nature, namely, the colour of flesh, perhaps there are no circumstances in which its effects at different distances can be so conveniently compared as when the observer and the observed gradually approach and glide past each other on so smooth an element and in so undisturbed a manner as on the canals and in the gondolas of Venice; the complexions, from the peculiar mellow carnations of the Italian women to the sun-burnt features and limbs of the mariners, presenting at the same time the fullest variety in another sense.

At a certain distance—the colour being always assumed to be unimpaired by interposed atmosphere—the reflections appear kindled to intenser warmth; the fiery glow of Giorgione is strikingly apparent; the colour is seen in its largest relation; the macchia, an expression so emphatically used by Italian writers, appears in all its quantity, and the reflections being the focus of warmth, the hue seems to deepen in shade.

A nearer view gives the detail of cooler tints more perceptibly, and the forms are at the same time more distinct. Hence Lanzi is quite correct when, in distinguishing the style of Titian from that of Giorgione, he says that Titian's was at once more defined and less fiery. In a still nearer observation the eye detects the minute lights which Leonardo da Vinci says are incompatible with effects such as those we have described and which, accordingly, we never find in Giorgione and Titian. This large impression of colour, which seems to require the condition of comparative distance for its full effect, was most fitly employed by the same great artists in works painted in the open air or for large altar-pieces. Their celebrated frescoes on the exterior of the Fondaco de' Tedeschi at Venice, to judge from their faint remains and the descriptions of earlier writers, were remarkable for extreme warmth in the shadows. The old frescoes in the open air throughout Friuli have often the same character, and, owing to the fulness of effect which this treatment ensures, are conspicuous at a very great distance.

In assuming that the Venetian painters may have acquired a taste for this breadth of colour under the circumstances above alluded to, it is moreover to be remembered that the time for this agreeable study was the evening; when the sun had already set behind the hills of Bassano; when the light was glowing but diffused; when shadows were soft—conditions all agreeing with the character of their colouring: above all, when the hour invited the fairer portion of the population to betake themselves in their gondolas to the lagunes. The scene of this "promenade" was to the north of Venice, the quarter in which Titian at one time lived. A letter exists written by Francesco Priscianese, giving an account of his supping with the great painter in company with Jacopo Nardi, Pietro Aretino, the sculptor Sansovino, and others. The writer speaks of the beauty of the garden, where the table was prepared, looking over the lagunes towards Murano, "which part of the sea," he continues, "as soon as the sun was down, was covered with a thousand gondolas, graced with beautiful women, and enlivened by the harmony of voices and instruments, which lasted till midnight, forming a pleasing accompaniment to our cheerful repast."

To return to Goethe: perhaps the foregoing remarks may warrant the conclusion that his idea of colour in shadow is not irreconcileable with the occasional practice of the best painters. The highest examples of the style thus defined are, or were, to be found in the works of Giorgione and Titian, and hence the style itself, though "within that circle" few "dare walk" is to be considered the grandest and most perfect. Its possible defects or abuse are not to be dissembled: in addition to the danger of exaggeration it is seldom united with the plenitude of light and shade, or with roundness; yet, where fine examples of both modes of treatment may be compared, the charm of colour has perhaps the advantage. The difficulty of uniting qualities so different in their nature, is proved by the very rare instances in which it has been accomplished. Tintoret in endeavouring to add chiaro-scuro to Venetian colour, in almost every instance fell short of the glowing richness of Titian.

Giacomo Bassan and his imitators, even in their dark effects, still had the principle of the gem in view: their light, in certain hues, is the minimum of colour, their lower tones are rich, their darks intense, and all is sparkling. Of the great painters who, beginning, on the other hand, with chiaro-scuro, sought to combine with it the full richness of colour, Correggio, in the opinion of many, approached perfection nearest; but we may perhaps conclude with greater justice that the desired excellence was more completely attained by Rembrandt than by any of the Italians.

NOTE F.—Par. 83.

The author, in these instances, seems to be anticipating his subsequent explanations on the effect of semi-transparent mediums. For an explanation of the general view contained in these paragraphs respecting the gradual increase of colour from high light, see the last Note.

The anonymous French work before alluded to, among other interesting examples, contains a chapter on shadows cast by the upper light of the sky and coloured by the setting sun. The effect of this remarkable combination is, that the light on a wall is most coloured immediately under a projecting roof, and becomes comparatively neutralised in proportion to its distance from the edge of the darkest shade.

NOTE G.—Par. 98.

"The simplest case of the phenomenon, which Goethe calls a subjective halo, and one which at once explains its cause, is the following. Regard a red wafer on a sheet of white paper, keeping the eye stedfastly fixed on a point at its center. When the retina is fatigued, withdraw the head a little from the paper, and a green halo will appear to surround the wafer. By this slight increase of distance the image of the wafer itself on the retina becomes smaller, and the ocular spectrum which before coincided with the direct image, being now relatively larger, is seen as a surrounding ring."—S. F. Goethe mentions cases of this kind, but does not class them with subjective halos. See Par. 30.

NOTE H.—Par. 113.

"Cases of this kind are by no means uncommon. Several interesting ones are related in Sir John Herschell's article on Light in the Encyclopædia Metropolitana. Careful investigation has, however, shown that this defect of vision arises in most, if not in all cases, from an inability to perceive the red, not the blue rays. The terms are so confounded by the individuals thus affected, that the comparison of colours in their presence is the only criterion."—S. F.

NOTE I.—Par. 135.

The author more than once admits that this chapter on "Pathological Colours" is very incomplete, and expresses a wish (Par. 734) that some medical physiologists would investigate the subject further. This was afterwards in a great degree accomplished by Dr. Johannes Müller, in his memoir "Über die Phantastischen Gesichtserscheinungen." Coblentz, 1826. Similar phenomena have been also investigated with great labour and success by Purkinje. For a collection of extraordinary facts of the kind recorded by these writers, the reader may consult Scott's Letters on Demonology and Witchcraft. The instances adduced by Müller and others are, however, intended to prove the inherent capacity of the organ of vision to produce light and colours. In some maladies of the eye, the patient, it seems, suffers the constant presence of light without external light. The exciting principle in this case is thus proved to be within, and the conclusion of the physiologists is that external light is only one of the causes which produce luminous and coloured impressions. That this view was anticipated by Newton may be gathered from the concluding "query" in the third book of his Optics.

NOTE K.—Par. 140.

"Catoptrical colours. The colours included under this head are principally those of fibres and grooved surfaces; they can be produced artificially by cutting parallel grooves on a surface of metal from 2000 to 10,000 in the inch. See 'Brewster's Optics,' p. 120. The colours called by Goethe paroptical, correspond with those produced by the diffraction or inflection of light in the received theory.—See Brewster, p. 95. The phenomena included under the title 'Epoptical Colours,' are generally known as the colours of thin plates. They vary with the thickness of the film, and the colour seen by reflection always differs from that seen by transmission. The laws of these phenomena have been thoroughly investigated. See Nobili, and Brewster, p. 100."—S. F.

The colours produced by the transmission of polarised light through chrystalised mediums, were described by Goethe, in his mode, subsequently to the publication of his general theory, under the name of Entoptic Colours. See note to Par. 485.

NOTE L.—Par. 150.

We have in this and the next paragraph the outline of Goethe's system. The examples that follow seem to establish the doctrine here laid down, but there are many cases which it appears cannot be explained on such principles: hence, philosophers generally prefer the theory of absorption, according to which it appears that certain mediums "have the property of absorbing some of the component rays of white light, while they allow the passage of others."

Whether all the facts adduced by Goethe—for instance, that recorded in Par. , are to be explained by this doctrine, we leave to the investigators of nature to determine. Dr. Eckermann, in conversing with Goethe, thus described the two leading phenomena (156, 158) as seen by him in the Alps. "At a distance of eighteen or twenty miles at mid-day in bright sunshine, the snow appeared yellow or even reddish, while the dark parts of the mountain, free from snow, were of the most decided blue. The appearances did not surprise me, for I could have predicted that the mass of the interposed medium would give a deep yellow tone to the white snow, but I was pleased to witness the effect, since it so entirely contradicted the erroneous views of some philosophers, who assert that the air has a blue-tinging quality. The observation, said Goethe, is of importance, and contradicts the error you allude to completely."

The same writer has some observations to the same effect on the colour of the Rhone at Geneva. A circumstance of an amusing nature which he relates in confirmation of Goethe's theory, deserves to be inserted. "Here (at Strasburg), passing by a shop, I saw a little glass bust of Napoleon, which, relieved as it was against the dark interior of the room, exhibited every gradation of blue, from milky light blue to deep violet. I foresaw that the bust seen from within the shop with the light behind it, would present every degree of yellow, and I could not resist walking in and addressing the owner, though perfectly unknown to me. My first glance was directed to the bust, in which, to my great joy, I saw at once the most brilliant colours of the warmer kind, from the palest yellow to dark ruby red. I eagerly asked if I might be allowed to purchase the bust; the owner replied that he had only lately brought it with him from Paris, from a similar attachment to the emperor to that which I appeared to feel, but, as my ardour seemed far to surpass his, I deserved to possess it. So invaluable did this treasure seem in my eyes, that I could not help looking at the good man with wonder as he put the bust into my hands for a few franks. I sent it, together with a curious medal which I had bought in Milan, as a present to Goethe, and when at Frankfort received the following letter from him." The letter, which Dr. Eckermann gives entire, thus concludes—"When you return to Weimar you shall see the bust in bright sunshine, and while the transparent countenance exhibits a quiet blue, the thick mass of the breast and epaulettes glows with every gradation of warmth, from the most powerful ruby-red downwards; and as the granite statue of Memnon uttered harmonious sounds, so the dim glass image displays itself in the pomp of colours. The hero is victorious still in supporting the Farbenlehre."

One effect of Goethe's theory has been to invite the attention of scientific men to facts and appearances which had before been unnoticed or unexplained. To the above cases may be added the very common, but very important, fact in painting, that a light warm colour, passed in a semi-transparent state over a dark one, produces a cold, bluish hue, while the operation reversed, produces extreme warmth. On the judicious application of both these effects, but especially of the latter, the richness and brilliancy of the best-coloured pictures greatly depends. The principle is to be recognised in the productions of schools apparently opposite in their methods. Thus the practice of leaving the ground, through which a light colour is apparent, as a means of ensuring warmth and depth, is very common among the Dutch and Flemish painters. The Italians, again, who preferred a solid under-painting, speak of internal light as the most fascinating quality in colour. When the ground is entirely covered by solid painting, as in the works of some colourists, the warmest tints in shadows and reflections have been found necessary to represent it. This was the practice of Rembrandt frequently, and of Reynolds universally, but the glow of their general colour is still owing to its being repeatedly or ultimately enriched on the above principle. Lastly, the works of those masters who were accustomed to paint on dark grounds are often heavy and opaque; and even where this influence of the ground was overcome, the effects of time must be constantly diminishing the warmth of their colouring as the surface becomes rubbed and the dark ground more apparent through it. The practice of painting on dark grounds was intended by the Carracci to compel the students of their school to aim at the direct imitation of the model, and to acquire the use of the brush; for the dark ground could only be overcome by very solid painting. The result answered their expectations as far as dexterity of pencil was concerned, but the method was fatal to brilliancy of colour. An intelligent writer of the seventeenth century relates that Guido adopted his extremely light style from seeing the rapid change in some works of the Carracci soon after they were done. It is important, however, to remark, that Guido's remedy was external rather than internal brilliancy; and it is evident that so powerless a brightness as white paint can only acquire the splendour of light by great contrast, and, above all, by being seen through external darkness. The secret of Van Eyck and his contemporaries is always assumed to consist in the vehicle (varnish or oils) he employed; but a far more important condition of the splendour of colour in the works of those masters was the careful preservation of internal light by painting thinly, but ultimately with great force, on white grounds. In some of the early Flemish pictures in the Royal Gallery at Munich, it may be observed, that wherever an alteration was made by the painter, so that a light colour is painted over a dark one, the colour is as opaque as in any of the more modern pictures which are generally contrasted with such works. No quality in the vehicle could prevent this opacity under such circumstances; and on the other hand, provided the internal splendour is by any means preserved, the vehicle is comparatively unimportant.

It matters not (say the authorities on these points) whether the effect in question is attained by painting thinly over the ground, in the manner of the early Flemish painters and sometimes of Rubens, or by painting a solid light preparation to be afterwards toned to richness in the manner of the Venetians. Among the mechanical causes of the clearness of colours superposed on a light preparation may be mentioned that of careful grinding. All writers on art who have descended to practical details have insisted on this. From the appearance of some Venetian pictures it may be conjectured that the colours of the solid under-painting were sometimes less perfectly ground than the scumbling colours (the light having to pass through the one and to be reflected from the other). The Flemish painters appear to have used carefully-ground pigments universally. This is very evident in Flemish copies from Raphael, which, though equally impasted with the originals, are to be detected, among other indications, by the finely-ground colours employed.

NOTE M.—Par. 177.

Without entering further into the scientific merits or demerits of this chapter on the "First Class of Dioptrical Colours," it is to be observed that several of the examples correspond with the observations of Leonardo da Vinci, and again with those of a much older authority, namely, Aristotle. Goethe himself admits, and it has been remarked by others, that his theory, in many respects, closely resembles that of Aristotle: indeed he confesses that at one time he had an intention of merely paraphrasing that philosopher's Treatise on Colours.

We have already remarked (Note on par. ) that Goethe's notion with regard to the production of warm colours, by the interposition of dark transparent mediums before a light ground, agrees with the practice of the best schools in colouring; and it is not impossible that the same reasons which may make this part of the doctrine generally acceptable to artists now, may have recommended the very similar theory of Aristotle to the painters of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries: at all events, it appears that the ancient theory was known to those painters.

It is unnecessary to dwell on the fact that the doctrines of Aristotle were enthusiastically embraced and generally inculcated at the period in question; but it has not been observed that the Italian writers who translated, paraphrased, and commented on Aristotle's Treatise on Colours in particular, were in several instances the personal friends of distinguished painters. Celio Calcagnini had the highest admiration for Raphael; Lodovico Dolce was the eulogist of Titian; Portius, whose amicable relations with the Florentine painters may be inferred from various circumstances, lectured at Florence on the Aristotelian doctrines early in the sixteenth century. The Italian translations were later, but still prove that these studies were undertaken with reference to the arts, for one of them is dedicated to the painter Cigoli.

The writers on art, from Leon Battista Alberti to Borghini, without mentioning later authorities, either tacitly coincide with the Aristotelian doctrine, or openly profess to explain it. It is true this is not always done in the clearest manner, and some of these writers might say with Lodovico Dolce, "I speak of colours, not as a painter, for that would be the province of the divine Titian."

Leonardo da Vinci in his writings, as in everything else, appears as an original genius. He now and then alludes generally to opinions of "philosophers," but he quotes no authority ancient or modern. Nevertheless, a passage on the nature of colours, particularly where he speaks of the colours of the elements, appears to be copied from Leon Battista Alberti, and from the mode in which some of Leonardo's propositions are stated, it has been supposed that he had been accustomed at Florence to the form of the Aristotelian philosophy. At all events, some of the most important of his observations respecting light and colours, have a great analogy with those contained in the treatise in question. The following examples will be sufficient to prove this coincidence; the corresponding passages in Goethe are indicated, as usual, by the numbers of the paragraphs; the references to Leonardo's treatise are given at the bottom of the page.

ARISTOTLE.

"A vivid and brilliant red appears when the weak rays of the sun are tempered by subdued and shadowy white,"—154.

LEONARDO

"The air which is between the sun and the earth at sun-rise or sun-set, always invests what is beyond it more than any other (higher) portion of the air: this is because it is whiter."

A bright object loses its whiteness in proportion to its distance from the eye much more when it is illuminated by the sun, for it partakes of the colour of the sun mingled with the colour (tempered by the mass) of the air interposed between the eye and the brightness.

ARISTOTLE.

"If light is overspread with much obscurity, a red colour appears; if the light is brilliant and vivid, this red changes to a flame-colour."—150, 160.

LEONARDO.

"This (the effect of transparent colours on various grounds) is evident in smoke, which is blue when seen against black, but when it is opposed to the (light) blue sky, it appears brownish and reddening."

ARISTOTLE.

"White surfaces as a ground for colours, have the effect of making the pigments appear in greater splendour."—594, 902.

LEONARDO.

"To exhibit colours in their beauty, the whitest ground should be prepared. I speak of colours that are (more or less) transparent."

ARISTOTLE.

"The air near us appears colourless; but when seen in depth, owing to its thinness it appears blue; for where the light is deficient (beyond it), the air is affected by the darkness and appears blue: in a very accumulated state, however, it appears, as is the case with water, quite white."—155, 158.

LEONARDO.

"The blue of the atmosphere is owing to the mass of illuminated air interposed between the darkness above and the earth. The air in itself has no colour, but assumes qualities according to the nature of the objects which are beyond it. The blue of the atmosphere will be the more intense in proportion to the degree of darkness beyond it:" elsewhere—"if the air had not darkness beyond it, it would be white."

ARISTOTLE.

"We see no colour in its pure state, but every hue is variously intermingled with others: even when it is uninfluenced by other colours, the effect of light and shade modifies it in various ways, so that it undergoes alterations and appears unlike itself. Thus, bodies seen in shade or in light, in more pronounced or softer sun-shine, with their surfaces inclined this way or that, with every change exhibit a different colour."

LEONARDO.

"No substance will ever exhibit its own hue unless the light which illumines it is entirely similar in colour. It very rarely happens that the shadows of opaque bodies are really similar (in colour) to the illumined parts. The surface of every substance partakes of as many hues as are reflected from surrounding objects."

Aristotle.

"So, again, with regard to the light of fire, of the moon, or of lamps, each has a different colour, which is variously combined with differently coloured objects."

LEONARDO.

"We can scarcely ever say that the surface of illumined bodies exhibits the real colour of those bodies. Take a white band and place it in the dark, and let it receive light by means of three apertures from the sun, from fire, and from the sky: the white band will be tricoloured."

ARISTOTLE.

"When the light falls on any object and assumes (for example) a red or green tint, it is again reflected on other substances, thus undergoing a new change. But this effect, though it really takes place, is not appreciable by the eye: though the light thus reflected to the eye is composed of a variety of colours, the principal of these only are distinguishable."

LEONARDO.

"No colour reflected on the surface of another colour, tinges that surface with its own colour (merely), but will be mixed with various other reflections impinging on the same surface:" but such effects, he observes elsewhere, "are scarcely, if at all, distinguishable in a very diffused light."

ARISTOTLE.

"Thus, all combinations of colours are owing to three causes: the light, the medium through which the light appears, such as water or air, and lastly the local colour from which the light happens to be reflected."

LEONARDO.

"All illumined objects partake of the colour of the light they receive.

"Every opaque surface partakes of the colour of the intervening transparent medium, according to the density of such medium and the distance between the eye and the object.

"The medium is of two kinds; either it has a surface, like water, &c., or it is without a common surface, like the air."

In the observations on trees and plants more points of resemblance might be quoted; the passages corresponding with Goethe's views are much more numerous.

It is remarkable that Leonardo, in opposition, it seems to some authorities, agrees with Aristotle in reckoning black and white as colours, placing them at the beginning and end of the scale. Like Aristotle, again, he frequently makes use of the term black, for obscurity; he even goes further, for he seems to consider that blue may be produced by the actual mixture of black and white, provided they are pure. The ancient author, however, explains himself on this point as follows—"We must not attempt to make our observations on these effects by mixing colours as painters mix them, but by remarking the appearances as produced by the rays of light mingling with each other."

When we consider that Leonardo's Treatise professes to embrace the subject of imitation in painting, and that Aristotle's briefly examines the physical nature and appearance of colours, it must be admitted that the latter sustains the above comparison with advantage; and it is somewhat extraordinary that observations indicating so refined a knowledge of nature, as regards the picturesque, should not have been taken into the account, for such appears to be the fact, in the various opinions and conjectures that have been expressed from time to time on the painting of the Greeks. The treatise in question must have been written when Apelles painted, or immediately before; and as a proof that Aristotle's remarks on the effect of semi-transparent mediums were not lost on the artists of his time, the following passage from Pliny is subjoined, for, though it is well known, it acquires additional interest from the foregoing extracts.

"He (Apelles) passed a dark colour over his pictures when finished, so thin that it increased the splendour of the tints, while it protected the surface from dust and dirt: it could only be seen on looking into the picture. The effect of this operation, judiciously managed, was to prevent the colours from being too glaring, and to give the spectator the impression of looking through a transparent crystal. At the same time it seemed almost imperceptibly to add a certain dignity of tone to colours that were too florid." "This," says Reynolds, "is a true and artist-like description of glazing or scumbling, such as was practised by Titian and the rest of the Venetian painters."

The account of Pliny has, in this instance, internal evidence of truth, but it is fully confirmed by the following passage in Aristotle:—"Another mode in which the effect of colours is exhibited is when they appear through each other, as painters employ them when they glaze (ἐπαλειφοντες) a (dark) colour over a lighter one; just as the sun, which is in itself white, assumes a red colour when seen through darkness and smoke. This operation also ensures a variety of colours, for there will be a certain ratio between those which are on the surface and those which are in depth."—De Sensu et Sensili.

Aristotle's notion respecting the derivation of colours from white and black may perhaps be illustrated by the following opinion on the very similar theory of Goethe.

"Goethe and Seebeck regard colour as resulting from the mixture of white and black, and ascribe to the different colours a quality of darkness (σκιερὸν), by the different degrees of which they are distinguished, passing from white to black through the gradations of yellow, orange, red, violet, and blue, while green appears to be intermediate again between yellow and blue. This remark, though it has no influence in weakening the theory of colours proposed by Newton, is certainly correct, having been confirmed experimentally by the researches of Herschell, who ascertained the relative intensity of the different coloured rays by illuminating objects under the microscope by their means, &c.

"Another certain proof of the difference in brightness of the different coloured rays is afforded by the phenomena of ocular spectra. If, after gazing at the sun, the eyes are closed so as to exclude the light, the image of the sun appears at first as a luminous or white spectrum upon a dark ground, but it gradually passes through the series of colours to black, that is to say, until it can no longer be distinguished from the dark field of vision; and the colours which it assumes are successively those intermediate between white and black in the order of their illuminating power or brightness, namely, yellow, orange, red, violet, and blue. If, on the other hand, after looking for some time at the sun we turn our eyes towards a white surface, the image of the sun is seen at first as a black spectrum upon the white surface, and gradually passes through the different colours from the darkest to the lightest, and at last becomes white, so that it can no longer be distinguished from the white surface"—See par 40, 44.

It is not impossible that Aristotle's enumeration of the colours may have been derived from, or confirmed by, this very experiment. Speaking of the after-image of colours he says, "The impression not only exists in the sensorium in the act of perceiving, but remains when the organ is at rest. Thus if we look long and intently on any object, when we change the direction of the eyes a responding colour follows. If we look at the sun, or any other very bright object, and afterwards shut our eyes, we shall, as if in ordinary vision, first see a colour of the same kind; this will presently be changed to a red colour, then to purple, and so on till it ends in black and disappears."—De Insomniis.

NOTE N.—Par. 246.

"The appearance of white in the centre, according to the Newtonian theory, arises from each line of rays forming its own spectrum. These spectra, superposing each other on all the middle part, leave uncorrected (unneutralised) colours only at the two edges."—S.F.

NOTE O.—Par. 252.

These experiments with grey objects, which exhibit different colours as they are on dark or light grounds, were suggested, Goethe tells us, by an observation of Antonius Lucas, of Lüttich, one of Newton's opponents, and, in the opinion of the author, one of the few who made any well-founded objections. Lucas remarks, that the sun acts merely as a circumscribed image in the prismatic experiments, and that if the same sun had a lighter background than itself, the colours of the prism would be reversed. Thus in Goethe's experiments, when the grey disk is on a dark ground, it is edged with blue on being magnified; when on a light ground it is edged with yellow. Goethe acknowledges that Lucas had in some measure anticipated his own theory.—Vol. ii. p. 440.

NOTE P.—Par. 284.

The earnestness and pertinacity with which Goethe insisted that the different colours are not subject to different degrees of refrangibility are at least calculated to prove that he was himself convinced on the subject, and, however extraordinary it may seem, his conviction appears to have been the result of infinite experiments and the fullest ocular evidence. He returns to the question in the controversial division of his work, in the historical part, and again in the description of the plates. In the first he endeavours to show that Newton's experiment with the blue and red paper depends entirely on the colours being so contrived as to appear elongated or curtailed by the prismatic borders. "If," he says, "we take a light-blue instead of a dark one, the illusion (in the latter case) is at once evident. According to the Newtonian theory the yellow-red (red) is the least refrangible colour, the violet the most refrangible. Why, then, does Newton place a blue paper instead of a violet next the red? If the fact were as he states it, the difference in the refrangibility of the yellow-red and violet would be greater than in the case of the yellow-red and blue. But here comes in the circumstance that a violet paper conceals the prismatic borders less than a dark-blue paper, as every observer may now easily convince himself," &c.—Polemischer Theil, par. 45. Desaguliers, in repeating the experiment, confessed that if the ground of the colours was not black, the effect did not take place so well. Goethe adds, "not only not so well, but not at all."—Historischer Theil, p. 459. Lucas of Lüttich, one of Newton's first opponents, denied that two differently-coloured silks are different in distinctness when seen in the microscope. Another experiment proposed by him, to show the unsoundness of the doctrine of various refrangibility, was the following:—Let a tin plate painted with the prismatic colours in stripes be placed in an empty cubical vessel, so that from the spectator's point of view the colours may be just hidden by the rim. On pouring water into this vessel, all the colours become visible in the same degree; whereas, it was contended, if the Newtonian doctrine were true, some colours would be apparent before others.—Historischer Theil, p. 434.

Such are the arguments and experiments adduced by Goethe on this subject; they have all probably been answered. In his analysis of Newton's celebrated Experimentum Crucis, he shows again that by reversing the prismatic colours (refracting a dark instead of a light object), the colours that are the most refrangible in Newton's experiment become the least so, and vice versâ.

Without reference to this objection, it is now admitted that "the difference of colour is not a test of difference of refrangibility, and the conclusion deduced by Newton is no longer admissible as a general truth, that to the same degree of refrangibility ever belongs the same colour, and to the same colour ever belongs the same degree of refrangibility."—Brewster's Optics, p. 72.

NOTE Q—Par. 387.

With the exception of two very inconclusive letters to Sulpice Boisserée, and some incidental observations in the conclusion of the historical portion under the head of entoptic colours, Goethe never returned to the rainbow. Among the plates he gave the diagram of Antonius de Dominis. An interesting chapter on halos, parhelia, and paraselenæ, will be found in Brewster's Optics, p. 270.

NOTE R.—Par. 478.

The most complete exhibition of the colouring or mantling of metals was attained by the late Cav. Nobili, professor of physical science in Florence. The general mode in which these colours are produced is thus explained by him:—

"A point of platinum is placed vertically at the distance of about half a line above a lamina of the same metal laid horizontally at the bottom of a vessel of glass or porcelain. Into this vessel a solution of acetate of lead is poured so as to cover not only the lamina of platinum, but two or three lines of the point as well. Lastly, the point is put in communication with the negative pole of a battery, and the lamina with the positive pole. At the moment in which the circuit is completed a series of coloured rings is produced on the lamina under the point similar to those observed by Newton in lenses pressed together."

The scale of colours thus produced corresponds very nearly with that observed by Newton and others in thin plates and films, but it is fuller, for it extends to forty-four tints. The following list, as given by Nobili, is divided by him into four series to agree with those of Newton: the numbers in brackets are those of Newton's scale. The Italian terms are untranslated, because the colours in some cases present very delicate transitions.

First Series.

1. Biondo argentino (4) . 6. Fulvo acceso.

2. Biondo. 7. Rosso di rame (6).

3. Biondo d'oro. 8. Ocria.

4. Biondo acceso (5). 9. Ocria violacea.

5. Fulvo. 10. Rosso violaceo (7).

Second Series.

11. Violetto (8). 20. Giallo acceso.

12. Indaco (10). 21. Giallo-rancio.

13. Blu carico. 22. Rancio (13).

14. Blu. 23. Rancio-rossiccio.

15. Blu chiaro (11) 24. Rancio-rosso.

16. Celeste. 25. Rosso-rancio.

17. Celeste giallognolo. 26. Lacca-rancia (14).

18. Giallo chiarissimo (12). 27. Lacca.

19. Giallo. 28. Lacca accesa (15).

Third Series.

29. Lacca-purpurea (16). 34. Verde-giallo (20).

30. Lacca-turchiniccia (17). 35. Verde-rancio.

31. Porpora-verdognola (18). 36. Rancio-verde (21).

32. Verde (19). 37. Rancio-roseo.

33. Verde giallognolo. 38. Lacca-rosea (22).

Fourth Series.

39. Lacca-violacea (24). 43. Verde-giallo rossiccio (28).

40. Violaceo-verdognolo (25). 44. Lacca-rosea (30).

41. Verde (26).

42. Verde-giallo (27).

"These tints," Professor Nobili observes, "are disposed according to the order of the thin mantlings which occasion them; the colour of the thinnest film is numbered 1; then follow in order those produced by a gradual thickening of the medium. I cannot deceive myself in this arrangement, for the thin films which produce the colours are all applied with the same electro-chemical process. The battery, the solution, the distances, &c., are always the same; the only difference is the time the effect is suffered to last. This is a mere instant for the colour of No. 1, a little longer for No. 2, and so on, increasing for the succeeding numbers. Other criterions, however, are not wanting to ascertain the place to which each tint belongs."

The scale differs from that of Newton, inasmuch as there is no blue in Nobili's first series and no green in the second: green only appears in the third and fourth series. "The first series," says the Professor, "is remarkable for the fire and metallic appearance of its tints, the second for clearness and brilliancy, the third and fourth for force and richness." The fourth, he observes, has the qualities of the third in a somewhat lesser degree, but the two greens are very nearly alike.

It is to be observed, that red and green are the principal ingredients in the third and fourth series, blue and yellow in the second and first.

NOTE S.—Par. 485.

A chapter on entoptic colours, contained in the supplement to Goethe's works, was translated with the intention of inserting it among the notes, but on the whole it was thought most advisable to omit it. Like many other parts of the "Doctrine of Colours" it might have served as a specimen of what may be achieved by accurate observation unassisted by a mathematical foundation. The whole theory of the polarization of light has, however, been so fully investigated since Goethe's time, that the chapter in question would probably have been found to contain very little to interest scientific readers, for whom it seems chiefly to have been intended. One observation occurs in it which indeed has more reference to the arts; in order to make this intelligible, the leading experiment must be first described, and for this purpose the following extracts may serve.

3.

"The experiment, in its simplest form, is to be made as follows:—let a tolerably thick piece of plate-glass be cut into several squares of an inch and a half; let these be heated to a red heat and then suddenly cooled. The squares of glass which do not split in this operation are now fit to produce the entoptic colours.

4.

"In our mode of exhibiting the phenomenon, the observer is, above all, to betake himself, with his apparatus to the open air. All dark rooms, all small apertures (foramina exigua), are again to be given up. A pure, cloudless sky is the source whence we are derive a satisfactory insight into the appearances.

5.

"The atmosphere being clear, let the observer lay the squares above described on a black surface, so placing them that two sides may be parallel with the plane of vision. When the sun is low, let him hold the squares so as to reflect to the eye that portion of the sky opposite to the sun, and he will then perceive four dark points in the four corners of a light space. If, after this, he turn towards the quarters of the sky at right angles with that where his first observation was made, he will see four bright points on a dark ground: between the two regions the figures appear to fluctuate.

6.

"From this simple reflection we now proceed to another, which, but little more complicated, exhibits the appearance much more distinctly. A solid cube of glass, or in its stead a cube composed of several plates, is placed on a black mirror, or held a little inclined above it, at sun-rise or sun-set. The reflection of the sky being now suffered to fall through the cube on the mirror, the appearance above described will appear more distinctly. The reflection of the sky opposite to the sun presents four dark points on a light ground; the two lateral portions of the sky present the contrary appearance, namely, four light points on a dark ground. The space not occupied by the corner points appears in the first case as a white cross, in the other as a black cross, expressions hereafter employed in describing the phenomena. Before sun-rise or after sun-set, in a very subdued light, the white cross appears on the side of the sun also.

"We thus conclude that the direct reflection of the sun produces a light figure, which we call a white cross; the oblique reflection gives a dark figure, which we call a black cross. If we make the experiment all round the sky, we shall find that a fluctuation takes place in the intermediate regions."

We pass over a variety of observations on the modes of exhibiting this phenomenon, the natural transparent substances which exhibit it best, and the detail of the colours seen within them, and proceed to an instance where the author was enabled to distinguish the "direct" from the "oblique" reflection by means of the entoptic apparatus, in a painter's study.

40.

"An excellent artist, unfortunately too soon taken from us, Ferdinand Jagemann, who, with other qualifications, had a fine eye for light and shade, colour and keeping, had built himself a painting-room for large as well as small works. The single high window was to the north, facing the most open sky, and it was thought that all necessary requisites had been sufficiently attended to.

"But after our friend had worked for some time, it appeared to him, in painting portraits, that the faces he copied were not equally well lighted at all hours of the day, and yet his sitters always occupied the same place, and the serenity of the atmosphere was unaltered.

"The variations of the favourable and unfavourable light had their periods during the day. Early in the morning the light appeared most unpleasantly grey and unsatisfactory; it became better, till at last, about an hour before noon, the objects had acquired a totally different appearance. Everything presented itself to the eye of the artist in its greatest perfection, as he would most wish to transfer it to canvas. In the afternoon this beautiful appearance vanished—the light became worse, even in the brightest day, without any change having taken place in the atmosphere.

"As soon as I heard of this circumstance, I at once connected it in my own mind with the phenomena which I had been so long observing, and hastened to prove, by a physical experiment, what a clear-sighted artist had discovered entirely of himself, to his own surprise and astonishment.

"I had the second entoptic apparatus brought to the spot, and the effect on this was what might be conjectured from the above statement. At mid-day, when the artist saw his model best lighted, the north, direct reflection gave the white cross; in the morning and evening, on the other hand, when the unfavourable oblique light was so unpleasant to him, the cube showed the black cross; in the intermediate hours the state of transition was apparent."

The author proceeds to recall to his memory instances where works of art had struck him by the beauty of their appearance owing to the light coming from the quarter opposite the sun, in "direct reflection," and adds, "Since these decided effects are thus traceable to their cause, the friends of art, in looking at and exhibiting pictures, may enhance the enjoyment to themselves and others by attending to a fortunate reflection."

NOTE T.—Par. 496.

"Since Goethe wrote, all the earths have been decomposed, and have been shown to be metallic bases united with oxygen; but this does not invalidate his statement."—S. F.

NOTE U.—Par. 502.

The cold nature of black and its affinity to blue are assumed by the author throughout; if the quality is opaque, and consequently greyish, such an affinity is obvious, but in many fine pictures, intense black seems to be considered as the last effect of heat, and in accompanying crimson and orange may be said rather to present a difference of degree than a difference of kind. In looking at the great picture of the globe, we find this last result produced in climates where the sun has greatest power, as we find it the immediate effect of fire. The light parts of black animals are often of a mellow colour; the spots and stripes on skins and shells are generally surrounded by a warm hue, and are brown before they are absolutely black. In combustion, the blackness which announces the complete ignition, is preceded always by the same mellow, orange colour. The representation of this process was probably intended by the Greeks in the black and subdued orange of their vases: indeed, the very colours may have been first produced in the kiln. But without supposing that they were retained merely from this accident, the fact that the combination itself is extremely harmonious, would be sufficient to account for its adoption. Many of the remarks of Aristotle and Theophrastus on the production of black, are derived from the observation of the action of fire, and on one occasion, the former distinctly alludes to the terracotta kiln. That the above opinion as to the nature of black was prevalent in the sixteenth century, may be inferred from Lomazzo, who observes,—"Quanto all' origine e generazione de' colori, la frigidità è la madre della bianchezza: il calore è padre del nero." The positive coldness of black may be said to begin when it approaches grey. When Leonardo da Vinci says that black is most beautiful in shade, he probably means to define its most intense and transparent state, when it is furthest removed from grey.

NOTE V.—Par. 555.

The nature of vehicles or liquid mediums to combine with the substance of colours, has been frequently discussed by modern writers on art, and may perhaps be said to have received as much attention as it deserves. Reynolds smiles at the notion of our not having materials equal to those of former times, and indeed, although the methods of individuals will always differ, there seems no reason to suppose that any great technical secret has been lost. In these inquiries, however, which relate merely to the mechanical causes of bright and durable colouring, the skill of the painter in the adequate employment of the higher resources of his art is, as if by common consent, left out of the account, and without departing from this mode of considering the question, we would merely repeat a conviction before expressed, viz. that the preservation of internal brightness, a quality compatible with various methods, has had more to do with the splendour and durability of finely coloured pictures than any vehicle. The observations that follow are therefore merely intended to show how far the older written authorities on this subject agree with the results of modern investigation, without at all assuming that the old methods, if known, need be implicitly followed.

On a careful examination of the earlier pictures, it is said that a resinous substance appears to have been mingled with the colours together with the oil; that the fracture of the indurated pigment is shining, and that the surface resists the ordinary solvents. This admixture of resinous solutions or varnishes with the solid is not alluded to, as far as we have seen, by any of the writers on Italian practice, but as the method corresponds with that now prevalent in England, the above hypothesis is not likely to be objected to for the present.

Various local circumstances and relations might seem to warrant the supposition that the Venetian painters used resinous substances. An important branch of commerce between the mountains of Friuli and Venice still consists in the turpentine or fir-resin. Similar substances produced from various trees, and known under the common name of balsams, were imported from the East through Venice, for general use, before the American balsams in some degree superseded them; and a Venetian painter, Marco Boschini, in his description of the Archipelago, does not omit to speak of the abundance of mastic produced in the island of Scio.

The testimonies, direct or indirect, against the employment of any such substances by the Venetian painters, in the solid part of their work, seem, notwithstanding, very conclusive; we begin with the writer just named. In his principal composition, a poem describing the practice and the productions of the Venetian painters, Boschini speaks of certain colours which they shunned, and adds:—"In like manner (they avoided) shining liquids and varnishes, which I should rather call lackers; for the surface of flesh, if natural and unadorned, assuredly does not shine, nature speaks as to this plainly." After alluding to the possible alteration of this natural appearance by means of cosmetics, he continues: "Foreign artists set such great store by these varnishes, that a shining surface seems to them the only desirable quality in art. What trash it is they prize! fir-resin, mastic, and sandarach, and larch-resin (not to say treacle), stuff fit to polish boots. If those great painters of ours had to represent armour, a gold vase, a mirror, or anything of the kind, they made it shine with (simple) colours."

This writer so frequently alludes to the Flemish painters, of whose great reputation he sometimes seems jealous, that the above strong expression of opinion may have been pointed at them. On the other hand it is to be observed that the term forestieri, strangers, does not necessarily mean transalpine foreigners, but includes those Italians who were not of the Venetian state. The directions given by Raphael Borghini, and after him by Armenini, respecting the use and preparation of varnishes made from the very materials in question, may thus have been comprehended in the censure, especially as some of these recipes were copied and republished in Venice by Bisagno, in 1642—that is, only six years before Boschini's poem appeared.

Ridolfi's Lives of the Venetian Painters (1648) may be mentioned with the two last. His only observation respecting the vehicle is, that Giovanni Bellini, after introducing himself by an artifice into the painting-room of Antonello da Messina, saw that painter dip his brush from time to time in linseed oil. This story, related about two hundred years after the supposed event, is certainly not to be adduced as very striking evidence in any way.

Among the next writers, in order of time prior to Bisagno, may be mentioned Canepario (1619). His work, "De Atramentis" contains a variety of recipes for different purposes: one chapter, De atramentis diversicoloribus, has a more direct reference to painting. His observations under this head are by no means confined to the preparation of transparent colours, but he says little on the subject of varnishes. After describing a mode of preserving white of egg, he says, "Others are accustomed to mix colours in liquid varnish and linseed, or nut-oil; for a liquid and oily varnish binds the (different layers of) colours better together, and thus forms a very fit glazing material." On the subject of oils he observes, that linseed oil was in great request among painters; who, however, were of opinion that nut-oil-excelled it "in giving brilliancy to pictures, in preserving them better, and in rendering the colours more vivid."

Lomazzo (a Milanese) says nothing on the subject of vehicles in his principal work, but in his "Idea del Tempio della Pittura," he speaks of grinding the colours "in nut-oil, and spike-oil, and other things," the "and" here evidently means or, and by "other things" we are perhaps to understand other oils, poppy oil, drying oils, &c.

The directions of Raphael Borghini and Vasari cannot certainly be considered conclusive as to the practice of the Venetians, but they are very clear on the subject of varnish. These writers may be considered the earliest Italian authorities who have entered much into practical methods. In the few observations on the subject of vehicles in Leonardo da Vinci's treatise, "there is nothing," as M. Merimée observes, "to show that he was in the habit of mixing varnish with his colours." Cennini says but little on the subject of oil-painting; Leon Battista Alberti is theoretical rather than practical, and the published extracts of Lorenzo Ghiberti's MS. chiefly relate to sculpture.

Borghini and Vasari agree in recommending nut-oil in preference to linseed-oil; both recommend adding varnish to the colours in painting on walls in oil, "because the work does not then require to be varnished afterwards," but in the ordinary modes of painting on panel or cloth, the varnish is omitted. Borghini expressly says, that oil alone (senza più) is to be employed; he also recommends a very sparing use of it.

The treatise of Armenini (1587) was published at Ravenna, and he himself was of Faenza, so that his authority, again, cannot be considered decisive as to the Venetian practice. After all, he recommends the addition of "common varnish" only for the ground or preparation, as a consolidating medium, for the glazing colours, and for those dark pigments which are slow in drying. Many of his directions are copied from the writers last named; the recipes for varnishes, in particular, are to be found in Borghini. Christoforo Sorte (1580) briefly alludes to the subject in question. After speaking of the methods of distemper, he observes that the same colours may be used in oil, except that instead of mixing them with size, they are mixed on the palette with nut-oil, or (if slow in drying) with boiled linseed-oil: he does not mention varnish. The Italian writers next in order are earlier than Vasari, and may therefore be considered original, but they are all very concise.

The treatise of Michael Angelo Biondo (1549), remarkable for its historical mistakes, is not without interest in other respects. The list of colours he gives is, in all probability, a catalogue of those in general use in Venice at the period he wrote. With regard to the vehicle, he merely mentions oil and size as the mediums for the two distinct methods of oil-painting and distemper, and does not speak of varnish. The passages in the Dialogue of Doni (1549), which relate to the subject in question, are to the same effect. "In colouring in oil," he observes, "the most brilliant colours (that we see in pictures) are prepared by merely mixing them with the end of a knife on the palette." Speaking of the perishable nature of works in oil-painting as compared with sculpture, he says, that the plaster of Paris (gesso) and mastic, with other ingredients of which the ground is prepared, are liable to decay, &c.; and elsewhere, in comparing painting in general with mosaic, that in the former the colours "must of necessity be mixed with various things, such as oils, gums, white or yolk of egg, and juice of figs, all which tend to impair the beauty of the tints." This catalogue of vehicles is derived from all kinds of painting to enforce the argument, and is by no means to be understood as belonging to one and the same method.

An interesting little work, still in the form of a dialogue (Fabio and Lauro), appeared a year earlier; the author, Paolo Pino, was a Venetian painter. In speaking of the practical methods Fabio observes, as usual, that oil-painting is of all modes of imitation the most perfect, but his reasons for this opinion seem to have a reference to the Venetian practice of going over the work repeatedly. Lauro asks whether it is not possible to paint in oil on the dry wall, as Sebastian del Piombo did. Fabio answers, "the work cannot last, for the solidity of the plaster is impenetrable, and the colours, whether in oil or distemper, cannot pass the surface." This might seem to warrant the inference that absorbent grounds were prepared for oil-painting, but there are proofs enough that resins as well as oil were used with the gesso to make the preparation compact. See Doni, Armenini, &c. This writer, again, does not speak of varnish. These appear to be the chief Venetian and Italian authorities of the sixteenth and part of the following century; and although Boschini wrote latest, he appears to have had his information from good sources, and more than once distinctly quotes Palma Giovane.

In all these instances it will be seen that there is no allusion to the immixture of varnishes with the solid colours, except in painting on walls in oil, and that the processes of distemper and oil are always considered as separate arts. On the other hand, the prohibition of Boschini cannot be understood to be universal, for it is quite certain that the Venetians varnished their pictures when done. After Titian had finished his whole-length portrait of Pope Paul III. it was placed in the sun to be varnished. Again, in the archives of the church of S. Niccolo at Treviso a sum is noted (Sept. 21, 1521 ), "per far la vernise da invernisar la Pala dell' altar grando," and the same day a second entry appears of a payment to a painter, "per esser venuto a dar la vernise alla Pala," &c. It is to be observed that in both these cases the pictures were varnished as soon as done; the varnish employed was perhaps the thin compound of naphtha (oglio di sasso) and melted turpentine (oglio d'abezzo), described by Borghini, and after him by Armenini: the last-named writer remarks that he had seen this varnish used by the best painters in Lombardy, and had heard that it was preferred by Correggio. The consequence of this immediate varnishing may have been that the warm resinous liquid, whatever it was, became united with the colours, and thus at a future time the pigment may have acquired a consistency capable of resisting the ordinary solvents. Not only was the surface of the picture required to be warm, but the varnish was applied soon after it was taken from the fire.

Many of the treatises above quoted contain directions for making the colours dry: some of these recipes, and many in addition, are to be found in Palomino, who, however defective as an historian, has left very copious practical details, evidently of ancient date. His drying recipes are numerous, and although sugar of lead does not appear, cardenillo (verdigris), which is perhaps as objectionable, is admitted to be the best of all dryers. It may excite some surprise that the Spanish painters should have bestowed so much attention on this subject in a climate like theirs, but the rapidity of their execution must have often required such an assistance.

One circumstance alluded to by Palomino, in his very minute practical directions, deserves to be mentioned. After saying what colours should be preserved in their saucers under water, and what colours should be merely covered with oiled paper because the water injures them, he proceeds to communicate "a curious mode of preserving oil-colours," and of transporting them from place to place. The important secret is to tie them in bladders, the mode of doing which he enters into with great minuteness, as if the invention was recent. It is true, Christoforo Sorte, in describing his practice in water-colour drawing, says he was in the habit of preserving a certain vegetable green with gum-water in a bladder; but as the method was obviously new to Palomino, there seems sufficient reason to believe that oil-colours, when once ground, had, up to his time, been kept in saucers and preserved under water. Among the items of expense in the Treviso document before alluded to, we find "a pan and saucers for the painters." This is in accordance with Cennini's directions, and the same system appears to have been followed till after 1700.

The Flemish accounts of the early practice of oil-painting are all later than Vasari. Van Mander, in correcting the Italian historian in his dates, still follows his narrative in other respects verbatim. If Vasari's story is to be accepted as true, it might be inferred that the Flemish secret consisted in an oil varnish like copal. Vasari says, that Van Eyck boiled the oils with other ingredients; that the colours, when mixed with this kind of oil, had a very firm consistence; that the surface of the pictures so executed had a lustre, so that they needed no varnish when done; and that the colours were in no danger from water.

Certain colours, as is well known, if mixed with oil alone, may be washed off after a considerable time. Leonardo da Vinci remarks, that verdigris may be thus removed. Carmine, Palomino observes, may be washed off after six years. It is on this account the Italian writers recommend the use of varnish with certain colours, and it appears the Venetians, and perhaps the Italians generally, employed it solely in such cases. But it is somewhat extraordinary that Vasari should teach a mode of painting in oil so different in its results (inasmuch as the work thus required varnish at last) from the Flemish method which he so much extols—a method which he says the Italians long endeavoured to find out in vain. If they knew it, it is evident, assuming his account to be correct, that they did not practice it.

NOTE W.—Par. 608.

In the second volume Goethe gives the nomenclature of the Greeks and Romans at some length. The general notions of the ancients with regard to colours are thus described:—"The ancients derive all colours from white and black, from light and darkness. They say, all colours are between white and black, and are mixed out of these. We must not, however, suppose that they understand by this a mere atomic mixture, although they occasionally use the word μίξις; for in the remarkable passages, where they wish to express a kind of reciprocal (dynamic) action of the two contrasting principles, they employ the words κρᾶσις, union, σύγκρισις, combination; thus, again, the mutual influence of light and darkness, and of colours among each other, is described by the word κεράννυστας, an expression of similar import.

"The varieties of colours are differently enumerated; some mention seven, others twelve, but without giving the complete list. From a consideration of the terminology both of the Greeks and Romans, it appears that they sometimes employed general for specific terms, and vice versâ.

"Their denominations of colours are not permanently and precisely defined, but mutable and fluctuating, for they are employed even with regard to similar colours both on the plus and minus side. Their yellow, on the one hand, inclines to red, on the other to blue; the blue is sometimes green, sometimes red; the red is at one time yellow, at another blue. Pure red (purpur) fluctuates between warm red and blue, sometimes inclining to scarlet, sometimes to violet.

"Thus the ancients not only seem to have looked upon colour as a mutable and fleeting quality, but appear to have had a presentiment of the (physical and chemical) effects of augmentation and re-action. In speaking of colours they make use of expressions which indicate this knowledge; they make yellow redden, because its augmentation tends to red; they make red become yellow, for it often returns thus to its origin.

"The hues thus specified undergo new modifications. The colours arrested at a given point are attenuated by a stronger light darkened by a shadow, nay, deepened and condensed in themselves. For the gradations which thus arise the name of the species only is often given, but the more generic terms are also employed. Every colour, of whatever kind, can, according to the same view, be multiplied into itself, condensed, enriched, and will in consequence appear more or less dark. The ancients called colour in this state," &c. Then follow the designations of general states of colour and those of specific hues.

Another essay on the notions of the ancients respecting the origin and nature of colour generally, shows how nearly Goethe himself has followed in the same track. The dilating effect of light objects, the action and reaction of the retina, the coloured after-image, the general law of contrast, the effect of semi-transparent mediums in producing warm or cold colours as they are interposed before a dark or light background—all this is either distinctly expressed or hinted at; "but," continues Goethe, "how a single element divides itself into two, remained a secret for them. They knew the nature of the magnet, in amber, only as attraction; polarity was not yet distinctly evident to them. And in very modern times have we not found that scientific men have still given their almost exclusive attention to attraction, and considered the immediately excited repulsion only as a mere after-action?"

An essay on the Painting of the Ancients was contributed by Heinrich Meyer.

NOTE X.—Par. 670.

This agrees with the general recommendation so often given by high authorities in art, to avoid a tinted look in the colour of flesh. The great example of Rubens, whose practice was sometimes an exception to this, may however show that no rule of art is to be blindly or exclusively adhered to. Reynolds, nevertheless, in the midst of his admiration for this great painter, considered the example dangerous, and more than once expresses himself to this effect, observing on one occasion that Rubens, like Baroccio, is sometimes open to the criticism made on an ancient painter, namely, that his figures looked as if they fed on roses.

Lodovico Dolce, who is supposed to have given the vivâ voce precepts of Titian in his Dialogue, makes Aretino say: "I would generally banish from my pictures those vermilion cheeks with coral lips; for faces thus treated look like masks. Propertius, reproving his Cynthia for using cosmetics, desires that her complexion might exhibit the simplicity and purity of colour which is seen in the works of Apelles."

Those who have written on the practice of painting have always recommended the use of few colours for flesh. Reynolds and others quote even ancient authorities as recorded by Pliny, and Boschini gives several descriptions of the method of the Venetians, and particularly of Titian, to the same effect. "They used," he says, "earths more than any other colour, and at the utmost only added a little vermilion, minium, and lake, abhorring as a pestilence biadetti, gialli santi, smaltini, verdi-azzurri, giallolini." Elsewhere he says, "Earths should be used rather than other colours:" after repeating the above prohibited list he adds, "I speak of the imitation of flesh, for in other things every colour is good;" again, "Our great Titian used to say that he who wishes to be a painter should be acquainted with three colours, white, black, and red." Assuming this account to be a little exaggerated, it is still to be observed that the monotony to which the use of few colours would seem to tend, is prevented by the nature of the Venetian process, which was sufficiently conformable to Goethe's doctrine; the gradations being multiplied, and the effect of the colours heightened by using them as semi-opaque mediums. Immediately after the passage last quoted we read, "He also gave this true precept, that to produce a lively colouring in flesh it is not possible to finish at once." As these particulars may not be known to all, we add some further abridged extracts explaining the order and methods of these different operations.

"The Venetian painters," says this writer, "after having drawn in their subject, got in the masses with very solid colour, without making use of nature or statues. Their great object in this stage of their work was to distinguish the advancing and retiring portions, that the figures might be relieved by means of chiaro-scuro—one of the most important departments of colour and form, and indeed of invention. Having decided on their scheme of effect, when this preparation was dry, they consulted nature and the antique; not servilely, but with the aid of a few lines on paper (quattro segni in carta) they corrected their figures without any other model. Then returning to their brushes, they began to paint smartly on this preparation, producing the colour of flesh." The passage before quoted follows, stating that they used earths chiefly, that they carefully avoided certain colours, "and likewise varnishes and whatever produces a shining surface. When this second painting was dry, they proceeded to scumble over this or that figure with a low tint to make the one next it come forward, giving another, at the same time, an additional light—for example, on a head, a hand, or a foot, thus detaching them, so to speak, from the canvas." (Tintoret's Prigionia di S. Rocco is here quoted.) "By thus still multiplying these well-understood retouchings where required, on the dry surface, (à secco) they reduced the whole to harmony. In this operation they took care not to cover entire figures, but rather went on gemming them (gioielandole) with vigorous touches. In the shadows, too, they infused vigour frequently by glazing with asphaltum, always leaving great masses in middle-tint, with many darks, in addition to the partial glazings, and few lights."

The introduction to the subject of Venetian colouring, in the poem by the same author, is also worth transcribing, but as the style is quaint and very concise, a translation is necessarily a paraphrase.

"The art of colouring has the imitation of qualities for its object; not all qualities, but those secondary ones which are appreciable by the sense of sight. The eye especially sees colours, the imitation of nature in painting is therefore justly called colouring; but the painter arrives at his end by indirect means. He gives the varieties of tone in masses; he smartly impinges lights, he clothes his preparation with more delicate local hues, he unites, he glazes: thus everything depends on the method, on the process. For if we look at colour abstractedly, the most positive may be called the most beautiful, but if we keep the end of imitation in view, this shallow conclusion falls to the ground. The refined Venetian manner is very different from mere direct, sedulous imitation. Every one who has a good eye may arrive at such results, but to attain the manner of Paolo, of Bassan, of Palma, Tintoret, or Titian, is a very different undertaking."

The effects of semi-transparent mediums in some natural productions seem alluded to in the following passage—"Nature sometimes accidentally imitates figures in stones and other substances, and although they are necessarily incomplete in form, yet the principle of effect (depth) resembles the Venetian practice." In a passage that follows there appears to be an allusion to the production of the atmospheric colours by semi-transparent mediums.

NOTE Y.—Par. 672.

The author's conclusion here is unsatisfactory, for the colour of the black races may be considered at least quite as negative as that of Europeans. It would be safer to say that the white skin is more beautiful than the black, because it is more capable of indications of life, and indications of emotion. A degree of light which would fail to exhibit the finer varieties of form on a dark surface, would be sufficient to display them on a light one; and the delicate mantlings of colour, whether the result of action or emotion, are more perceptible for the same reason.

NOTE Z.—Par. 690.

The author appears to mean that a degree of brightness which the organ can bear at all, must of necessity be removed from dazzling, white light. The slightest tinge of colour to this brightness, implies that it is seen through a medium, and thus, in painting, the lightest, whitest surface should partake of the quality of depth. Goethe's view here again accords, it must be admitted, with the practice of the best colourists, and with the precepts of the highest authorities.—See Note C.

NOTE AA.—Par. 732.

Ample details respecting the opinions of Louis Bertrand Castel, a Jesuit, are given in the historical part. The coincidence of some of his views with those of Goethe is often apparent: he objects, for instance, to the arbitrary selection of the Newtonian spectrum; observing that the colours change with every change of distance between the prism and the recipient surface.—Farbenl. vol. ii. p. 527. Jeremias Friedrich Gülich was a dyer in the neighbourhood of Stutgardt: he published an elaborate work on the technical details of his own pursuit.—Farbenl. vol. ii. p. 630.

NOTE BB.—Par. 748.

Goethe, in his account of Castel, suppresses the learned Jesuit's attempt at colorific music (the claveçin oculaire), founded on the Newtonian doctrine. Castel was complimented, perhaps ironically, on having been the first to remark that there were but three principal colours. In asserting his claim to the discovery, he admits that there is nothing new. In fact, the notion of three colours is to be found in Aristotle; for that philosopher enumerates no more in speaking of the rainbow, and Seneca calls them by their right names. Compare with Dante, Parad. c. 33. The relation between colours and sounds is in like manner adverted to by Aristotle; he says—"It is possible that colours may stand in relation to each other in the same manner as concords in music, for the colours which are (to each other) in proportions corresponding with the musical concords, are those which appear to be the most agreeable." In the latter part of the 16th century, Arcimboldo, a Milanese painter, invented a colorific music; an account of his principles and method will be found in a treatise on painting which appeared about the same time. "Ammaestrato dal quai ordine Mauro Cremonese dalla viola, musico dell' Imperadore Ridolfo II. trovò sul gravicembalo tutte quelle consonanze che dall' Arcimboldo erano segnate coi colori sopra una carta."

NOTE CC.—Par. 758.

The moral associations of colours have always been a more favourite subject with poets than with painters. This is to be traced to the materials and means of description as distinguished from those of representation. An image is more distinct for the mind when it is compared with something that resembles it. An object is more distinct for the eye when it is compared with something that differs from it. Association is the auxiliary in the one case, contrast in the other. The poet, of necessity, succeeds best in conveying the impression of external things by the aid of analogous rather than of opposite qualities: so far from losing their effect by this means, the images gain in distinctness. Comparisons that are utterly false and groundless never strike us as such if the great end is accomplished of placing the thing described more vividly before the imagination. In the common language of laudatory description the colour of flesh is like snow mixed with vermilion: these are the words used by Aretino in one of his letters in speaking of a figure of St. John, by Titian. Similar instances without end might be quoted from poets: even a contrast can only be strongly conveyed in description by another contrast that resembles it. On the other hand it would be easy to show that whenever poets have attempted the painter's method of direct contrast, the image has failed to be striking, for the mind's eye cannot see the relation between two colours.

Under the same category of effect produced by association may be classed the moral qualities in which poets have judiciously taken refuge when describing visible forms and colours, to avoid competition with the painters' elements, or rather to attain their end more completely. But a little examination would show that very pleasing moral associations may be connected with colours which would be far from agreeable to the eye. All light, positive colours, light-green, light-purple, white, are pleasing to the mind's eye, and no degree of dazzling splendour is offensive. The moment, however, we have to do with the actual sense of vision, the susceptibility of the eye itself is to be considered, the law of comparison is reversed, colours become striking by being opposed to what they are not, and their moral associations are not owing to the colours themselves, but to the modifications such colours undergo in consequence of what surrounds them. This view, so naturally consequent on the principles the author has himself arrived at, appears to be overlooked in the chapter under consideration, the remarks in which, in other respects, are acute and ingenious.

NOTE DD.—Par. 849.

According to the usual acceptation of the term chiaro-scuro in the artist world, it means not only the mutable effects produced by light and shade, but also the permanent differences in brightness and darkness which are owing to the varieties of local colour.

NOTE EE.—Par. 855.

The mannered treatment of light and shade here alluded to by the author is very seldom to be met with in the works of the colourists; the taste may have first arisen from the use of plaster-casts, and was most prevalent in France and Italy in the early part of the last century. Piazzetta represented it in Venice, Subleyras in Rome. In France "Restout taught his pupils that a globe ought to be represented as a polyhedron. Greuze most implicitly adopted the doctrine, and in practice showed that he considered the round cheeks of a young girl or an infant as bodies cut into facettes."

NOTE FF.—Par. 859.

All this was no doubt suggested by Heinrich Meyer, whose chief occupation in Rome, at one time, was making sepia drawings from sculpture (see Goethe's Italiänische Reise). It is hardly necessary to say that the observation respecting the treatment of the surface in the antique statues is very fanciful.

NOTE GG.—Par. 863.

This observation might have been suggested by the drawings of Claude, which, with the slightest means, exhibit an harmonious balance of warm and cold.

NOTE HH.—Par. 865.

The colouring of Paolo Uccello, according to Vasari's account of him, was occasionally so remarkable that he might perhaps have been fairly included among the instances of defective vision given by the author. His skill in perspective, indicating an eye for gradation, may be also reckoned among the points of resemblance (see Par. 105).

NOTE II.—Par. 902.

The quotation before given from Boschini shows that the method described by the author, and which is true with regard to some of the Florentine painters, was not practised by the Venetians, for their first painting was very solid. It agrees, however, with the manner of Rubens, many of whose works sufficiently corroborate the account of his process given by Descamps. "In the early state of Rubens's pictures," says that writer, "everything appeared like a thin wash; but although he often made use of the ground in producing his tones, the canvas was entirely covered more or less with colour." In this system of leaving the shadows transparent from the first, with the ground shining through them, it would have been obviously destructive of richness to use white mixed with the darks, the brightness, in fact, already existed underneath. Hence the well-known precept of Rubens to avoid white in the shadows, a precept, like many others, belonging to a particular practice, and involving all the conditions of that practice. Scarmiglione, whose Aristotelian treatise on colour was published in Germany when Rubens was three-and-twenty, observes, "Painters, with consummate art, lock up the bright colours with dark ones, and, on the other hand, employ white, the poison of a picture, very sparingly." (Artificiosissimè pictores claros obscuris obsepiant et contra candido picturarum veneno summè parcentes, &c.)

NOTE KK.—Par. 903.

The practice here alluded to is more frequently observable in slight works by Paul Veronese. His ground was often pure white, and in some of his works it is left as such. Titian's white ground was covered with a light warm colour, probably at first, and appears to have been similar to that to which Armenini gives the preference, namely, "quella che tira al color di carne chiarissima con un non so che di fiammeggiante."

NOTE LL.—Par. 919.

The notion which the author has here ventured to express may have been suggested by the remarkable passage in the last canto of Dante's "Paradiso"—

"Nella profonda e chiara sussistenza,
Dell' alto lume parremi tre giri
Di tre colori e d'una continenza," &c.

After the concluding paragraph the author inserts a letter from a landscape-painter, Philipp Otto Runge, which is intended to show that those who imitate nature may arrive at principles analogous to those of the "Farbenlehre."