Lavater's Looking-Glass; Or, Essays on the Face of Animated Nature, from Man to Plants (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1800. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... lavater'S looking-glass. essay I. On the Necessity of Studying the Constitution of Living Creatures, and the Imitative Arts. at an exhibition of pictures, the majority of spectators is captivated by lively colours, over-strained forms, and extravagant embellishments. So long as their fenses and foibles are flattered, they gaze with pleasure at a dauber's painting, which will not stand the test of a discerning eye, when it comes to be appreciated by the standard of true taste and judgment. But men endowed with these qualities will find out a master-piece, that has been slighted or unnoticed by vulgar eyes. Their raptures, then, proceed from admiration of just design, true likeness, comely looks, and every trivial appendage that strikes them at once in a picture, where, with one glance, they fee art approach Nature's fairest shape, so far as to renew, on their minds, the impressions made by the real obB 4 jects jects represented. Yet, while the best master-pieces are not valued in France so much as in other countries, the artists have reason to complain of injustice done to them in that respect; because, in so difficult a profession, the qualifications, application, and information required, exceed any idea conceived by people not conversant with arts and sciences. Nature is a stingy mother, and dispenses with a sparing hand the noble talents necessary to imitate her complexion, motions, and expression. She has bestowed on Genius alone that free gift, the divine flame which forms her strong colours and grandest features. An equal degree of perfection cannot be attained merely by dint of labour; yet the heavenly spark, producing such happy effects, is indebted to industry for giving full scope to invention and imitation. Thus an artist would grope in the dark for e...