On this page
-
Text (2)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
reeOrf thousandf old ; tot with all < £ ** $ ^ ££ , ? & 5 & 5 a SfSSKs&fesssss t 0 ^ SSlI S ^ B ^ nchol y walk trough Kensington Gardens bade to L 0 " w ^ at should I do ? I owed my landlord 200 ? . ? . was I to go on ? dlne -to live in feet large ictojust
Wou d he sST * ? ^ r ^ Tto F A p S Tn-in want that day of a dinner . Shall I give up my Solomon , relinquish mv schemes , sell all , retire to obscure lodgings , and do . anything for a living ? It won dT prniseworthy-it would be more . But if I did , I never could reahze enough to Jay my debts . Surely it would be wiser to make another cast-to dijniiss despair . I was in health : I had no family . I knew ^ myself capable of submitting to anything , bufc when once a situation is relinquished it is not possible to regain it again . Besides , the apparent cowardice , after preachmg ^ ucb heroic doc trines to the students . The apparent cowardice was nothing if I could approach nearer ray grand object by it , but I thought I could not by submission do soj-and then the meanness ! How could I submit who had told the students that failure should stimulate and not depress ? Contemptible ! How bear ray own reflections
—how the reflections of others , knowing I deserved them ? Something instantly circulated through me like an essence of fire , and striding with wider steps , I determined to bear all—not to yield one particle of my designs—to go at once for my model—to begin to-morrow , and to make the most of my actual situation . ' Well done , ' said the god within , and instantly I was invincible . I went to the house where I had always dined , intending to dine without paying for that day . I thought the servants did not offer me the same attention . I thought I perceived the company examine me—I thought the meat was worse . My heart sank as I said falteringly , ' I will pay you to-morrow . ' The girl smiled and seemed interested . As I was escaping with a sort of lurking horror , she said , ' Mr . Haydon , Mr . Haydon , my master wishes to see you / 'My God , ' thought I , 'it is to tell me he can't trust ! ' In I walked like a culprit . * Sir , I beg your pardon , but I see by
the papers you have been ill-used . ; I hope you wont be angry— -I mean no offence j but—you wont be offended—I just wish to say , as you have dined here many years and always paid , if it would be a convenienceduring your present work , to dine here till it is done—you know—so that you may not be obliged to spend your money here , when you may want it—I was going to say you need be under no apprehension—hem ! for a dinner / "My heart really filled . - Ltold him I would take his offer . The good man ' s forehead was perspiring , and he seemed quite relieved . Prom that hour the servants , ( who were pretty girls , ) eyed me with a lustrous regret , and redoubled their attentions . The honest wife said , if I was ever ill she would send me broth or any
such little luxury , and the children used to cling round my knees , and ask me to draw a face . 'Now / said I , as I walked home with an elastic step , ' now for my landlord . ' I called up Perkins , and laid my desperate case before him . He was quite affected . I said , ' Perkins , I'll leave you if you wish it , but it will be a pity , will it not , not to finish such a beginning ? ' Perkins looked at the rubbing in , and muttered , ' It ' s a grand thing—how long will it be before it ib done , sir V ' Two years . ' ' What ! two years more , and no rent ? ' ' Not a ' shilling . ' He rubbed his chin , and muttered , ' I should not like ye to go—it ' s hard for both of us ; but what I say is this , you always paid me when you could , and why should you not again when you are able ? ' ' That ' s what I say . ' ' Well , sir , here is my hand , ' ( and a great fat one it was , ) ' I'll give you two years more , and if this does not sell , ' ( affecting to look very severe , ) ' why then , sir , we'll consider what is to be done : so don't fret , but work . ' "
It brings the tears in one's eyes to read such things ! Not only a tender-hearted landlord and tender-hearted restaurant did Haydon find , but— " credat Judceus ! " —a fascinated bailiff ! The man sent to arrest him was so struck with his Xiazarus that he refused to take him ! an incident which is perhaps even more striking than the one recalled by his biographer , —viz ., that of Stradella arresting his murderers by Iris organ-playing . One is anvused by the vehemence of this fiery little man , who cannot paint a hend , but always " dashes it in "—who never sets down to do
anything but " flies at" it " like a tiger , " his very baby when offered the breast " flies at it like a tigress . " When Elmos starts a journal , Haydon tells us , " Ijluvg into it some of my best writing . " This vehemence and Bwagger is visible in his painting : he perpetually mistook largo pictures for grand pictures , as if power wore nothing but size . Swaggering vehemence and self-assertion are ludicrously illustrated in the prayers he perpetually addressed to Heaven with a pertinacity only equalled by that with which he pestered noblemen and ministers . To quote his biographer , —
" I have inserted this and other like utterances of devotion , that my readers may neo what Hnydon ' s prayers wore , how compounded of submission and confidence , and in thoir constant demand for success and personal distinction , how unliko that eimple and general form of petition which Christ has left us as a model of supplication to our Father who is in heaven . Haydon prays an if he would take heuvon by storm , and though he often uhIch for humility , I do not obBorvo that the demands for thiH gift beur any proportion to those for glories and triumphs . His very piety bad something stormy , arrogant , and self-assertive in it . He went on ho praying from hia arrival in London to the very time of his death , and throughout liis prayers nro of the name ionour . " ' " ,
In one of tho prayers given , there is a passage of ludicrous naivStS , wherein ho speaks to Heaven oxactly in tho eamo stylq of self-laudation nri to a patron , lie is painting Xonophon , and exclaims , " Grant , O God , that tho education of my" children , my duties to my love and to society may not bo sacrificed in proceeding with this groat work , ( it will ho my greatest . ) Bless its commencement , its progression , its conclusion , and its effect , for tho sake of the intellectual elevation of my groat and glorious country . " His assuring the Almighty that " it will bo ' his greatest , " ana that n ohanco is thereby offered tho Creator of elevating our country , ftTo vondorrul touches . ¦ R « n ! l m , \ ili 0 lutucr ° u 8 mingled with tho pathetic in these volumes . «! It « 7 * entrv aB tws - — ? $ iumw , \ mi Uop ^ Ufttf nofc wWU My Iwjt j j 4 Umm hm ^
back , and Binns has lost 300 ? . more by it , poor fellow ! My debt was large enough without this . Some days ago , as my previous sketch shows , I settled the composition of Moses and Pharaoh . The background rushed into my head like an irruption . I tingled to the feet , and passed the day in a rapture . " ¦« Perhaps portrait-painting may do me good . I know it may be made subservient to historical purposes , but I , who paint everything , from nature , don't want such a means . Pity , after twenty years * devotion to my art , and having just completed my studies , I should not now have an opportunity to give vent to ^^ Pqrtrait the size of life is better practice than historical pictures in Poussin size , surely ! . . ¦ _ ' . . , . must nillr
" « A wife and four children must be fed , so to work I go , willy . Ah ! my glorious times . I swam through life in a dream of love and glory . Passed ! passed ! passed ! ^ m ' , re " 'I think I felt ; yesterday something like a tinge of pain at my heart , it so , it is the beginning of my family complaint , angina pectorU . '" " « Began my family picture with dear Alfred ' s head , who ia dying , too . J went on painting and crying . There he sat / drooping like a surcharged ^ flower ; as-1 looked at him , I thought what an exquisite subject a dying child would make . There he dozed , beautiful and sickly , his feet , his dear hands , his head , all drooping , and dying . ' " Curious , ^ an a yet how natural , this intervention of tne artist ' s feeling amid those of the father ! ¦ ¦ i
... -.. . . . „ . . , - We are desultory in our extracts from an embarras de , rtchesses , and will close this present notice with two glimpses at the early struggles ot another artist , now a man honoured by all , — -Lough the sculptor . " ' Lough did not , like Chantrey , put off his hour of inspiration till he was independent . Alas , he could not . His genius sat on him night and _ day like an incubus—goaded , haunted , pressed , worried , drove him to exertion . I was a fortnight without meat during Solomon . Lough never ate meat for three , months ; and then Peter Coxe , who deserves to be named , found him : he was tearing up his shirts tt > make wet rags for Us figure to keep the claymoist , and on the point of pulling it down . *" Our readers will rememember a parallel instance in the Life of PaHssv , where that man of genius tore up the planks of his house to feed his furnace with . Here is another glimpse at Lough ' s early trials : —
" « He declared solemnly to me that he had not ate meat for three months , and began the fourth . He said every day at dinner-time he felfc the want , and used to lie down till it passed . He felt weak—at last faint—giddy continually , and latterly began to perceive he thought sillily , and was growing idiotic . He had only one bushel and a half of coals the whole winter , and used to lie down by the side of his clay model of this immortal figure , damp as it was , and shiver for h ours till he fell asleep . He is a most extraordinary being—one of those creatures who come in a thousand years ; and last night when he said he went from my conversation always inspired , the gaunt and lustrous splendour of his dark eyes had a darkened fire , as if a god was shrined within his body , and for a moment forced
his concealment . " Men who can endure thus for the sake of their Art are certain of success . We shall return to these volumes .
Untitled Article
ENGLISH PHILOSOPHY . An Outline of t 7 ie Necessary Laws of Thought ; a Treatise on pure and applied Logic By "William Thomson , M . A . Third Edition , much enlarged . Pickering . An Enquiry into Human Nature . By John G . Macvicar , D . D . Simpkin , Marshall , and Co . Elements of Psychology . Part I . Bj J . D . MorelJ , M . A . Pickering The Philosophical Tendencies of the Age ; being Four Lectures delivered at Edinburgh and Glasgow . By J . D . Morell . People ' s Edition . Eobert Theobald .
[ FIRST AIlTIOIiB . ] Considering the enormous intellectual activity England develops and employs in so many departments , from the highest to the most trivial , we cannot but be struck with the characteristic scarcity of works on Metaphysics . Compare England in this respect with Germany and Franco . Not only are new works of rare publication , but even the old standard classics of speculation cannot find a public . We have no translation of such , works as those which in France find ready acceptance in the cheapest of forms—Descartes , Spinoza , Leibnitz , Malebranche , Gasflnndi -. wo havo no Giordano Bruno , no Camrjanella ; and only to Mr .
Bonn ' s relentless enterprise are we indebted for Plato and Aristotle . This is not a reproach , it is a statement . That English activity should so have neglected Metaphysics , in spite of tho splendid vigour of Englishmen , when perchance they have entered the arena , is in itself a significant fact . To our minds a hopeful fact . Necessary as those great metaphysical battles were in earlier days , and powerfully as thoy assisted tho evolution of Humanity , wo believe thoir day of usefulness to bo passed , their prolongation into our own times an evil . A writer in SlackwooA some years ago well said , that by the time a man reached thirty , he had bettor have cleared his mind of metaphysics altogether , although up to that period they may have been useful to him . What is true of the individual ia true of the race . We have outlived the age when metaphysics can bo of use . ' ,
From old lovo , or from now curiosity , however , many roadcrs will bo glad to hear briefly of what has been done in this department ; and wo , — liaving inklings of an old attachment , unable altogether to forgot tho happy past wlion in the still air of delightful studios an earnest struggle with these problems was rewarded at least by tho negative conviction that tho problems wore insoluble—will act a 3 " taqter" for tho bill of fare presented above . ThoniBon ' fl Outlines of the Necessary Laws of Thought wo must speak of on tho authority of those veraed in this subject , for we cuilnot pretend to have had tho courage to read one single book on Logic , ( oxcopt John Mill ' s work , which is a work on Method , ) no , not even in tho dauntless day ? of youth when Avorroos was not too tiresome , nor Spino ? a too abstruBo for our patience . Tho fault may Jie with «» j at any wite , w »
Untitled Article
THE LEADER . [ Satokpa ^
-
-
Citation
-
Leader (1850-1860), July 16, 1853, page 692, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1995/page/20/
-