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audience, very slightly informed in such matters. These allusions, however, together with Fuseli's other peculiarities of style, rendered his lectures quite unintelligible to the younger part of his auditors, until they had heard them several times: but when once comprehended, they became deservedly popular.

R. N. W.

March 7. 1848.

THE

LECTURES OF JAMES BARRY.

LECTURE I.

ON THE HISTORY AND PROGRESS OF THE ART.

GENTLEMEN,

So much has been written on the subject of painting, that it will now be difficult to say any thing in the way of general theory, which has not been already either observed upon, or hinted at by some one or other of the ingenious and learned writers of those countries of Europe, where this art has had the advantage of being early cultivated and more encouraged. Therefore, without being at all solicitous to avoid or to follow the tracks of others, I shall proceed to discharge the duty I have been honoured with, by laying before you such a series of observations as appear to me best calculated to lead your attention into that track of study, which conducted our predecessors to the excellence that has rendered them so illustrious, and which must enable us (if any thing can) to sustain and to perpetuate this excellence, and to proceed to the further attainment of whatever other desiderata may yet remain for the completing and perfecting of art.

Of all the creatures within the sphere of our inspection man alone appears to be endowed with powers for contemplating many of the great designations, the extensive and various uses, dependencies, and relations, in the creation that surrounds him: hence he is impressed with that just sense of beauty, of wisdom, order, and goodness, which not

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only form the foundation of religion and virtue, but of all his intellectual satisfaction and happiness.

With these powers for contemplation, the passion for imitation is also congenial to his mind, and exhibits one of the most peculiar, and most glorious characteristics of the exalted nature of this substitute of Providence upon earth as the governing animal.

The powers of imitation are in nothing more evident than in poetry, which employs words or arbitrary signs, and in the arts of design, where the images of the objects themselves are exhibited to the senses in all their realities of form and colour.

I shall hereafter have occasion to dwell more particularly upon these modes of imitation, as compared with each other; but at present our remarks will be confined to the imitation effected by the arts of design, particularly that of painting, which comprehends all the others.

The rude beginnings of the arts of design are traceable amongst the most savage people; the growth and progress of them are co-extended with the general improvement of the human faculties; and the greatest and wisest nations of the world have ever considered these arts, particularly painting, when taken in its full and comprehensive sense, as one of the most accomplished ornaments of polished society. Though it will be foreign to our purpose to dwell long upon the little which happens to be preserved of the memorial and accounts of ancient art, yet a short survey of this matter may not be wholly without use.

But little is known of the Assyrians, who appear to have been the most ancient nation; and yet, scanty as our information is, we find them to have been familiar with the arts, which they practised to no inconsiderable extent.

It is recorded of Semiramis* (who flourished about a century before the calling of Abraham) that on a wall round one of her palaces, different animals were raised in basrelief, and painted from the life; and it is worth remarking, that these figures were relieved and painted on the faces of the bricks before they were burned, and consequently must have been vitrified or enamelled.

The period of Semiramis is uncertain, and it is even doubtful whether there was ever such a person.-W.

There was also painted on another wall the several manners of hunting all kinds of beasts. Here Semiramis herself was represented on horseback, striking a leopard through with a dart, and her husband Ninus, with his javelin, wounding a lion.

We find mention also of colossal statues of their idols, and also of Ninus and Semiramis, some in gold, others in brass; and that these works of sculpture in Assyria were not confined to temples and public places, we may be reasonably assured from the mention of the little images which Rachel stole away from her father's house. That the career

of the arts in Assyria was also a very long one, we may learn from the golden statue, sixty cubits high, of Nebuchadnezzar, set up fourteen hundred years after the stealing of Laban's images."

As I shall have occasion, in another part of these lectures, to establish some weighty consequences on this recorded as well as remarkable fact, respecting those coloured, basso-rilievo, historical representations, which were vitrified, or enamelled on the brick walls of Babylon, at so early a period as the time of Semiramis, it is with great concern I feel myself obliged here to take notice of a very mistaken and ill-advised passage respecting this matter in one of the most deservedly celebrated works of our time. Dr. Lowth, in his new translation of the prophecy of Isaiah, ch. ix. v. 10,-"the bricks are fallen, but we build with hewn stones," has the following note on that passage, p. 77. "The eastern bricks,' (says Sir John Chardin, see Harmer's obs. p. 176.), are only clay well moistened with water, and mixed with straw and dried in the sun;' so that their walls are commonly no better than our mud walls: see Maundrel, p. 124. That straw was a necessary part in the composition of this sort of bricks, to make the parts of the clay adhere together, appears from Exodus, ch. v. These bricks are properly opposed to hewn stone, so greatly superior in beauty and durableness." And, page 95, the bishop has the following note on ch, xiii. 19: — "We are astonished at the accounts which ancient historians, of the best credit, give of the immense extent, height, and thickness of the walls of Nineveh and Babylon; nor are we less astonished, when we are assured by the concurrent testimony of moderns, that no remains, not the least traces of these prodigious works, are now to be found. Our wonder will, I think, be moderated in both respects, if we consider the fabric of these celebrated walls, and the nature of the materials of which they consisted. Buildings in the East have always been, and are to this day, made of earth or clay mixed or beat up with straw to make the parts cohere, and dried only in the sun. This is their method of making bricks; see note on ch. ix. v. 9. The walls of the city were built of earth digged out on the spot, and dried upon the place; by which means both the ditch and the wall were at

On Egyptian art I shall proceed to speak with more pleasure, as we have sufficient monuments yet remaining to

once formed; the former furnishing materials for the latter. That the walls of Babylon were of this kind is well known, and Berosus expressly says, apud Joseph. Antiq. X. 2., that Nebuchadnezzar added three new walls both to the old and new city, partly of brick and bitumen, and partly of brick alone. A wall of this sort must have a great thickness in proportion to its height, otherwise it cannot stand. The thickness of the walls of Babylon is said to have been one fourth of their height, which seems to have been no more than was absolutely necessary. Maundrel, speaking of the garden walls of Damascus, they are,' says he, of a very singular structure. They are built of great pieces of earth, made in the fashion of brick, and hardened in the sun. In their dimensions they are two yards long each, and somewhat more than one broad, and half a yard thick;' and afterwards, speaking of the walls of houses, from this dirty way of building they have this, among other inconveniences, that upon any violent rain the whole city becomes by the washing of the houses as it were a quagmire.' (p. 124.) When a wall of this sort comes to be out of repair, and is neglected, it is easy to conceive the necessary consequences; namely, that in no long course of ages, it must totally be destroyed by the heavy rains, and at length washed away, and reduced to its original earth." And on ch. xxx. 13. the bishop has the following note. "It has been observed before, that the buildings in Asia generally consist of little better than what we call mud walls.' All the houses in Ispahan,' says Thevenot (vol. ii. p. 159.) ‘are built of bricks made of clay and straw, and dried in the sun; and covered with a plaster made of a fine white stone. In other places in Persia, the houses are built with nothing else but such bricks, made with tempered clay and chopped straw, well mingled together and dried in the sun and then used; but the least rain dissolves them. Sir John Chardin's MS. remarks on this passage of Isaiah are very apposite: Murs en Asie etant faits de terre fendent ainsi par milieu et de haut en bas.' This shows clearly how obvious and expressive the image is." (P. 158.)

By this citation from Exodus, and those passages from so many travellers and learned men of high credit, it would appear that Bishop Lowth was persuaded himself, and meant to persuade his readers, that the walls of Babylon were only built of mud and straw, dried in the sun; and from his mention of the ancient historians of the best credit, who speak of those walls, without noting any circumstance of difference between the ancient and the modern accounts or surmises, another proof is afforded of the truth and general extension of an observation, which I have long since had occasion to insist upon, namely, that the bulk of men seldom see any thing either in the great spectacle of nature, or of arts, that they are not by previous studies taught to look for. Men must be taught to see, and to distinguish, and however paradoxical this may seem, yet nothing is more true: but let us turn our attention to the Abbé Terrasson, a knowing and judicious French academician, habituated to the conversation and workshops of artists, and consequently to that

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