| INTRODUCTORY AND CRITICAL
ignoble roughening of impasto into arbitrary representations of earth
or wall, the sketching with the edge of the thumb-nail in wet color, the
trowelling with a spatula, and other tricky juggles, more worthy of the
wood-grainer than the artist—he would respect less than he does some
of the most wonderful pieces of illusion in the galleries. He would
see, at least, that a certain class of tempers, and those not the meanest,
will always scorn to be carried away one inch from controlled con-
struction and drawing by a device for texture, however brilliant; that
the rapturous enjoyment of chiaroscuro and harmonious values is a
distinctly sensual pleasure, while that of noble composition and lucid
statement is an intellectual one, that Michael Angelo will never bring
himself to sacrifice his modelling of Moses pudic cheek for a device to
scramble with the hair upon it; that the grand style, in fact, is a style
of selections and of reticences, and that they are blessed who have
chosen the better part.
EDWARD STRAHAN
19 LAFAYETTE PLACE, 1881.
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