"SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS," says Burke, was the first Englishman who added the praise of the elegant arts to the other glories of his country." Without staying to inquire how far the literal truth of this assertion may be affected by the priority in date of Wilson and Hogarth, not to mention their less illustrious predecessors, it may safely be affirmed, not only that Reynolds was the founder of the English school, but that the most valuable qualities in the art of painting were almost lost sight of throughout Europe when he began his career. In Holland, the rich manner of Rembrandt, feebly sustained by his imitators, had been succeeded by no less opposite a style than that of Vanderwerf; the still more laboured

finish of Denner, a native of Hamburgh, followed; while the minute perfection which was in vogue found a more legitimate application in the flower-pieces of Van Huysum. Reynolds was twenty-four years old at the decease of Denner, who had twice visited London, and had been much employed there. The French school about the middle of the last century took its tone from Boucher, a name now almost forgotten, and, if remembered, synonymous with the extreme of affectation; he was principal painter to Louis XV. The native country of Claude and Poussin was indeed more illustrious during this time in the department of landscape, as Vernet produced his views of sea-ports about the period alluded to; but this example, however respectable, was itself indicative of a declining taste, and the style of viewpainting in the hands of the foreign artists who practised it in Italy, with the Prussian Hackert at their head, had the effect of extinguishing for a time all invention in landscape. The academy at Berlin was under the direction of a Frenchman; Oeser was the greatest name at Leipzic and Dresden; and the south of Germany still imported imitations of the latest Italian styles in fashion. The state of the arts in Spain may be judged of by the fact, that when, in 1761, Mengs, who was himself a native of Germany, repaired to Madrid in the service of Charles III., the chief painters established there were a Venetian and a Neapolitan, Tiepolo and Corrado Giaquinto. The Venetian school, sometimes entirely losing its original character, seemed at least to maintain a consistent degeneracy in the styles of Sebastian Ricci and the above-named Giambattista Tiepolo, both weak and mannered imitators of Paul Veronese, but still preserving, at least the latter, some brilliancy of colour and pleasing execution. With Tiepolo the characteristic merits of the school seem however to have

ceased altogether: towards the latter part of the century, the chief employment of the Venetian painters was the restoration of old pictures.* A particular school was established in 1778 for this purpose, and a description of the extraordinary labours of the artists is preserved in the thirty-eighth volume of Goethe's works. In Rome, the talents of Maratta and Sacchi, and "the great but abused powers of Pietro da Cortona" had been succeeded by feebler efforts, descending or fluctuating through the styles of Cignani, Trevisani, and others, till the time of Sebastian Conca, and Pompeo Battoni. The last-named was approaching the zenith of his short-lived reputation, and almost without a rival (for Mengs was as yet young, and Conca already aged), when Reynolds visited Rome.

Laborious detail on the one hand, and empty facility on the other, formed the distinguishing characteristics of these different schools; but however opposite in execution, mind was alike wanting in both. Denner may be considered the representative of the microscopic style-a style, if it deserves the name, which he applied even to heads the size of life; and as mere finish never was, and probably never will be carried to a more absurd length, his name, though comparatively obscure, marks an epoch in the art. The same scrupulous minuteness obtained about the same time in landscape; among the view-painters, Hendrick Van Lint, surnamed Studio, may be named as the most remarkable of his class. Reynolds alludes to him in one of his discourses, as noted, when he knew him in Rome, for copying every leaf of a tree. The opposite style, which aimed at quantity and rapidity, was derived from the expert painters of galleries and ceilings, called "Machinisti," and more immediately from Luca Giordano.

*It is worthy of remark, that about the same time the sculptors in Rome were as exclusively employed in restoring antique statues.

Facility and dispatch, at the expense of every solid quality of art, were the characteristics of the school which was represented in the earlier part of Reynolds's career, principally by Sebastian Conca in Italy, and by Corrado Giaquinto in Spain.

The changes which took place in this state of things, towards the latter part of the century, may be traced partly to the renewed appreciation of the antique statues (a taste which, however beneficial to sculpture, had an unfortunate influence on the sister art), and subsequently to political circumstances. The fluctuations of taste, however deliberately estimated by retrospective criticism, are indeed generally the result of accident, and depend on causes but seldom derived from a just definition of the nature and object of art. It appears, however, that Reynolds, alone as he was, the founder rather than the follower of a school, enjoyed the rare privilege of making the taste of his time instead of being made by it; and although it would be absurd to suppose that he could be independent of the accidents with which he was brought in contact, it will not appear, upon a candid inquiry, that this great artist was in any respect directly influenced by the practice of his age.

Joshua Reynolds was born at Plympton, near Plymouth, in Devonshire, July 16, 1723; he was the son of the Rev. Samuel Reynolds, who taught the grammar school of Plympton. The young artist's fondness for drawing manifested itself early, and at eight years of age he had become so well acquainted with the "Jesuits' Perspective," as to apply its principles with some effect in a drawing of his father's school, a building elevated on stone pillars. Among other books connected with art to which he had access, Richardson's Treatise on Painting' had a powerful effect in exciting his ambition. The earliest known picture he attempted is a portrait of the Rev.

Thomas Smart, who was the vicar of Maker, the parish in which Mount Edgecumbe is situated. Reynolds, then a school-boy about twelve years of age, sketched the portrait of the vicar at church, and afterwards copied it on canvass. This picture is now in the possession of John Boger, Esq., of East Stonehouse, near Plymouth. The taste of the young painter becoming every day more decided, his father, urged by the advice of some friends, placed him at the age of seventeen as a pupil with Hudson, who had at that time the chief business in portrait painting, although a very indifferent artist. In 1743 Reynolds returned to Devonshire, in consequence of a disagreement with his master, and set up as a portrait painter in the town of Plymouth Dock, since called Devonport. He here painted various portraits, chiefly of naval officers. One of these works, containing the portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Eliot and family, is in the possession of the Earl of St. Germains. The composition of this picture-the artist's first attempt at a group-approaches the pyramidal form; and Reynolds, after contemplating it when finished, observed, "I see I must have read something about a pyramid, for there it is." Six other pictures of the artist are preserved in the same collection, at Port Eliot in Cornwall. An admirable picture of a boy reading by a reflected light was also executed about this time. Many interesting works of Reynolds, some of them belonging to his earlier practice, are preserved in the immediate neighbourhood of Plymouth, in the collections of the Earl of Morley, Mr. Pole Carew of Antony, Mr. Rosdew of Beechwood, Mr. Lane of Coffleet, and others. The artist's early works, although sometimes carelessly drawn, are distinguished by breadth of colour, by freedom of handling, and not unfrequently by great truth of expression: in short, he seems to have contracted none of the defects