Section III. Of Truth of Skies

Chapter I.—Of the Open Sky.

§ 1. The peculiar adaptation of the sky to the pleasing and teaching of man.

§ 2. The carelessness with which its lessons are received.

§ 3. The most essential of these lessons are the gentlest.

§ 4. Many of our ideas of sky altogether conventional.

§ 5. Nature, and essential qualities of the open blue.

§ 6. Its connection with clouds.

§ 7. Its exceeding depth.

§ 8. These qualities are especially given by modern masters.

§ 9. And by Claude.

§ 10. Total absence of them in Poussin. Physical errors in his general treatment of open sky.

§ 11. Errors of Cuyp in graduation of color.

§ 12. The exceeding value of the skies of the early Italian and Dutch schools. Their qualities are unattainable in modern times.

§ 13. Phenomena of visible sunbeams. Their nature and cause.

§ 14. They are only illuminated mist, and cannot appear when the sky is free from vapor, nor when it is without clouds.

§ 15. Erroneous tendency in the representation of such phenomena by the old masters.

§ 16. The ray which appears in the dazzled eye should not be represented.

§ 17. The practice of Turner. His keen perception of the more delicate phenomena of rays.

§ 18. The total absence of any evidence of such perception in the works of the old masters.

§ 19. Truth of the skies of modern drawings.

§ 20. Recapitulation. The best skies of the ancients are, in quality, inimitable, but in rendering of various truth, childish.

Chapter II.—Of Truth of Clouds:—First, of the Region of the Cirrus.

§ 1. Difficulty of ascertaining wherein the truth of clouds consists.

§ 2. Variation of their character at different elevations. The three regions to which they may conveniently be considered as belonging.

§ 3. Extent of the upper region.

§ 4. The symmetrical arrangement of its clouds.

§ 5. Their exceeding delicacy.

§ 6. Their number.

§ 7. Causes of their peculiarly delicate coloring.

§ 8. Their variety of form.

§ 9. Total absence of even the slightest effort at their representation, in ancient landscape.

§ 10. The intense and constant study of them by Turner.

§ 11. His vignette, Sunrise on the Sea.

§ 12. His use of the cirrus in expressing mist.

§ 13. His consistency in every minor feature.

§ 14. The color of the upper clouds.

§ 15. Recapitulation.

Chapter III.—Of Truth of Clouds:—Secondly, of the Central Cloud Region.

§ 1. Extent and typical character of the central cloud region.

§ 2. Its characteristic clouds, requiring no attention nor thought for their representation, are therefore favorite subjects with the old masters.

§ 3. The clouds of Salvator and Poussin.

§ 4. Their essential characters.

§ 5. Their angular forms and general decision of outline.

§ 6. The composition of their minor curves.

§ 7. Their characters, as given by S. Rosa.

§ 8. Monotony and falsehood of the clouds of the Italian school generally.

§ 9. Vast size of congregated masses of cloud.

§ 10. Demonstrable by comparison with mountain ranges.

§ 11. And consequent divisions and varieties of feature.

§ 12. Not lightly to be omitted.

§ 13. Imperfect conceptions of this size and extent in ancient landscape.

§ 14. Total want of transparency and evanescence in the clouds of ancient landscape.

§ 15. Farther proof of their deficiency in space.

§ 16. Instance of perfect truth in the sky of Turner's Babylon.

§ 17. And in his Pools of Solomon.

§ 18. Truths of outline and character in his Como.

§ 19. Association of the cirrostratus with the cumulus.

§ 20. The deep-based knowledge of the Alps in Turner's Lake of Geneva.

§ 21. Farther principles of cloud form exemplified in his Amalfi.

§ 22. Reasons for insisting on the infinity of Turner's works. Infinity is almost an unerring test of all truth

§ 23. Instances of the total want of it in the works of Salvator.

§ 24. And of the universal presence of it in those of Turner. The conclusions which may be arrived at from it.

§ 25. The multiplication of objects, or increase of their size, will not give the impression of infinity, but is the resource of novices.

§ 26. Farther instances of infinity in the gray skies of Turner.

§ 27. The excellence of the cloud-drawing of Stanfield.

§ 28. The average standing of the English school.

Chapter IV.—Of Truth of Clouds:—Thirdly, of the Region of the Rain-Cloud.

§ 1. The apparent difference in character between the lower and central clouds is dependent chiefly on proximity.

§ 2. Their marked differences in color.

§ 3. And in definiteness of form.

§ 4. They are subject to precisely the same great laws.

§ 5. Value, to the painter, of the rain-cloud.

§ 6. The old masters have not left a single instance of the painting of the rain-cloud, and very few efforts at it. Gaspar Poussin's storms.

§ 7. The great power of the moderns in this respect.

§ 8. Works of Copley Fielding.

§ 9. His peculiar truth.

§ 10. His weakness, and its probable cause.

§ 11. Impossibility of reasoning on the rain-clouds of Turner from engravings.

§ 12. His rendering of Fielding's particular moment in the Jumieges.

§ 13. Illustration of the nature of clouds in the opposed forms of smoke and steam.

§ 14. Moment of retiring rain in the Llanthony.

§ 15. And of commencing, chosen with peculiar meaning for Loch Coriskin.

§ 16. The drawing of transparent vapor in the Land's End.

§ 17. The individual character of its parts.

§ 18. Deep-studied form of swift rain-cloud in the Coventry.

§ 19. Compared with forms given by Salvator.

§ 20. Entire expression of tempest by minute touches and circumstances in the Coventry.

§ 21. Especially by contrast with a passage of extreme repose.

§ 22. The truth of this particular passage. Perfectly pure blue sky only seen after rain, and how seen.

§ 23. Absence of this effect in the works of the old masters.

§ 24. Success of our water-color artists in its rendering. Use of it by Turner.

§ 25. Expression of near rain-cloud in the Gosport, and other works.

§ 26. Contrasted with Gaspar Poussin's rain-cloud in the Dido and Æneas.

§ 27. Turner's power of rendering mist.

§ 28. His effects of mist so perfect, that if not at once understood, they can no more be explained or reasoned on than nature herself.

§ 29. Various instances.

§ 30. Turner's more violent effects of tempest are never rendered by engravers.

§ 31. General system of landscape engraving.

§ 32. The storm in the Stonehenge.

§ 33. General character of such effects as given by Turner. His expression of falling rain.

§ 34. Recapitulation of the section.

§ 35. Sketch of a few of the skies of nature, taken as a whole, compared with the works of Turner and of the old masters. Morning on the plains.

§ 36. Noon with gathering storms.

§ 37. Sunset in tempest. Serene midnight.

§ 38. And sunrise on the Alps.

Chapter V.—Effects of Light rendered by Modern Art.

§ 1. Reasons for merely, at present, naming, without examining the particular effects of light rendered by Turner.

§ 2. Hopes of the author for assistance in the future investigation of them.