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ON THE FINE ARTS.

[Continued from col. 629.]

In the succeeding reign of Henry 8th, the art of Painting was properly encouraged. Artists were patronized, and Royal invitation was given to Raphael and Titian to visit the island. Hans Holbein was the ornament of this reign: he was by birth a Swiss; but visited England at an early age, and was patronized by the great Sir Thomas More, who entertained him at his own house, and employed him to paint the portraits of himself and family, which were hung up in a great hall. The monarch having seen them, was so struck with their life, beauty, and similarity, as instantly to become his patron, and ever after to employ and encourage him. His principal occupation was in painting portraits in oil; although he sometimes used both water-colours and distemper. His great attempts in history, were two compositions for the hall of the Steel-Yard Company; but their true designation would be groups of portraits. His works are marked with great force of colouring; and he was equally successful in pourtraying the piercing and intelligent More, or the graceful and lovely Anne Boleyn: he finished his pictures with wonderful neatness, and was so highly esteemed by Zucchero, that he compared his portraits with those of Raphael and Tiziano. The reign of Mary was unpropitious to the arts: that of Elizabeth was marked by the appearance of some very respectable artists; the Queen had no taste for Painting, except when she beheld in a portrait a flattering representation of herself. The fame of Isaac Oliver, who flourished about the end of this reign, as a miniature-painter, is well known. He painted a most beautiful portrait of the unfortunate Queen of Scots; he drew well, and made some admirable copies, after the Italian painters.

James the First entirely disregarded the Arts, but they had now taken such deep root, that even the absence of royal patronage could not expel them from the soil. The duke of Buckingham, who was a collector of pictures, directed the study of prince Charles to paintings, and objects of art in general. Cornelius Jansens, a portrait painter of Amsterdam, resided for some time in England; the great Ru

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bens also visited this country; and Peter Oliver, the son of Isaac, practised miniature painting with deserved success, in a way worthy of the reputation of his father.

Immediately on the accession of Charles, he began to form his collection of paintings, and invited the most celebrated artists to his court. Rubens, Vandyck, Poelemburg, and other foreigners, were duly honoured; but not to the exclusion of native talent. Dobson, who obtained the name of the English Tintoret; George Jamesone, called the Vandyck of Scotland; John Hoskins, and others, were supported and encouraged by royal favour. Of these, Dobson was the most distinguished: he was the father of the English school of portrait-painting; his manner is unequal, but it betrays much of the style of Vandyck, under whom he studied: he resided much at Oxford, where he has left some lovely portraits: he also painted history; the Astronomer and his Family at Blenheim, and the Decollation of St. John, at Wilton, are well known, and justly admired: his premature death, at the early age of 36, robbed the Arts of England of a distinguished ornament, at a time when they stood in need of his continued support.

The collection made by Charles was most valuable; and the dispersion and destruction of it has been, and ever will be, a matter of great regret to all artists and amateurs. The ascendency of the popular party was fatal to the Arts; it was considered part of the religious duty of those in power, to wage war on the Arts, which had been countenanced by the late King. The Parliament resolved, that all pictures, being a representation of our Saviour or the Virgin Mary, should be burned; and the rest of the royal collection they ordered to be sold. The spirit of Republicanism was, at this period, lamentably destructive of the Arts. Fanaticism also lent her willing aid,Painting was deemed idolatrous, Sculpture on monuments became carnal pride,-and a Collegiate Church an abomination, equally offensive to Magna Charta and the Bible.

On the Restoration, the Fine Arts again held up their heads; but his Continental education had given to Charles a licentious and indelicate style; he liked to see the Maids of Honour about his Court painted in a

wanton and Frenchified manner; and, unfortunately, the painters and poets of the day were too ready to succumb to his bad taste. Sir Peter Lely was the best painter of the time: he was originally a landscape-painter, but probably adopted portraits, from the reputation and emolument with which they were attended. He is celebrated for his female portraits, which have all, however, a sameness of character: the air of languishing sweetness which he has infused into all his female forms, has been aptly described as "The sleepy eye, that spoke the melting soul."

Varelst was much distinguished in this reign, as a flower-painter; and he also sometimes painted portraits. Cooper, the pupil of Vandyck, painted heads in a very bold and original style.

The short reign of James the Second afforded no encouragement to the Arts. He was not himself averse to them; but the commotions of contending parties, depressed and kept out of sight all the milder and more peace

ful studies.

William cared nothing for the Arts: he was born in a country where taste never flourished; and it is therefore not surprising, that this monarch was entirely without it. Mary, however, his consort, seems to have had a sort of relish for the Arts; but not enough to extend to them her patronage or protection.

Sir Godfrey Kneller, who was the fashionable artist of the day, was certainly possessed of some genius. His portraits of Dr. Wallis and Lord Crew are in a very good style; the latter was particularly admired by Sir Joshua Reynolds, for the air of nobility and greatness which is infused into it: he managed to paint the portraits of ladies with much more grace than could be expected, when their heads were disfigured with such preposterous dresses: his works are, however, often very negligent and unfinished. This arose from his love of gain, which was so predominant, that it has been said, where he offered one picture to fame, he sacrificed twenty to lucre. Thornhill flourished at this period: his works in fresco on the dome of St. Paul's Cathedral, and the painted hall at Greenwich, are well known and properly admired.

The reign of Anne, so distinguished

for heroes, poets, and philosophers, was not equally distinguished for artists: except Kneller, whom we have mentioned, there was no painter of eminence: he, however, met with great encouragement; he is said to have painted ten crowned heads; viz. four Kings of England and three Queens, the Czar of Muscovy, the Emperor Charles, and Louis XIV. Boil, the enamel painter, must not be forgotten; he has never been surpassed, but by his successor, Zincke.

We have now arrived at a period, when the Arts were almost wholly disregarded. George the First was entirely devoid of taste or judgment on such subjects; and was, when he ascended the throne, at an age too advanced to cultivate or acquire a relish for them. Dalh and Richardson were men of somewhat more than ordinary talent: the colouring of the former was good; the latter was bold in his style, but his men are undignified, and his women without grace. Jervas was the fashionable painter of the day; but his works are deficient in almost every respect: his drawing is bad, and his colour tricksy, crude, and glaring.

Errata.

[To be continued.]

col. 626, line 23, for Teuxis, read Zeuxis.-line 52, for Chautery, read Chantrey.

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"Ir was not until the days of Pope Gregory II. that Church-yards had a beginning. The dead had been usually interred near the highways, according to the Roman laws, and Christian congregations had followed the practice; at least, they had burial places remote from the city. But in Gregory's time, the priests and monks began to offer prayers for the deceased, and received gifts from the relations, for the performance of these services; on which account, these ecclesiastics requested leave of Gregory, that the dead might be interred near the places of the

monks' abode, or in the churches or monasteries; that the relations might have a better opportunity of joining in the funeral devotions. Cuthbert, archbishop of Canterbury, introduced the custom into England, in 750; hence the origin of Church-yards in this island, used as Burial Grounds."-See Newcome's History of the Abbey of St. Alban's, p. 109.

Pardon, not an Acquittal.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE IMPERIAL MAGAZINE.

SIR, HAVING this morning heard a discourse by a respected minister, in which it was repeatedly asserted that justification is " an acquittal from guilt;" it occurred to me that the phrase acquittal, when used in that sense, is highly improper. If all the world is become guilty, I cannot see how the Divine Being can ever pronounce them innocent; and I apprehend the word in question conveys that idea. In order to have an evangelical title to immortal blessedness, it is indeed indispensably necessary to experience a pardon; but I am inclined to think that no human soul, without an uncommon share of arrogance and presumption, can ever hope to be acquitted, either in this world or the world to

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On Public Worship.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE IMPERIAL MAGAZINE.

Staffordshire, 27th Sept. 1819. SIR,-I have the honour to be a native of Downpatrick, in Ireland; and since my arrival in this country, I have observed, with considerable surprise and disgust, that in the congregations of a certain class of people, who are both numerous and respectable, a vast number are in the habit of sitting during the time of public prayer, as though the minister alone had to do with the Divine presence.

The practice is not exclusively confined to those who may be properly denominated irreligious; and it prevails in Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, &c. To a stranger accustomed to stand or kneel before the Lord his maker, and to see others do the same, it appears particularly thoughtless and irreverent. It is a posture that merits severe reprehension, in sinful, dependent creatures; and yet how seldom is it noticed, by those whose peculiar province it is to take cognizance of such infringements of propriety. I once, indeed, heard Dr. Adam Clarke publicly express his abhorrence of this new mode of worshipping the Eternal Self-existent God; but I cannot at present recollect any other instance.

I should be heartily glad to see the evil in question abolished, but it is more than probable that in this respect

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On the Indefinite Article.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE IMPERIAL MAGAZINE.

Liverpool, August 31, 1819. SIR,-In the generality of English Grammars, it is given as an invariable rule, that the article a becomes an before a word which begins with a vowel. This is certainly incorrect; as evidently appears in the following instances, where the article an is placed before some words which begin with the vowel u;-"an unity of affection, an uniformity of conduct, an useful member of society:" these instances, and more of the same kind, are too often to be met with in writers of no mean abilities.

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It it understood, I believe, by all persons who know any thing of English Grammar, that a is changed to an, not because the word which follows it begins with a vowel; but for the sake of making the sound agreeable. It could not be for the sake of this, that, in the above instances, the article is changed;

for by the change the sound is made very disagreeable. Its having been laid down as a rule by grammarians, and want of thought in the writers, were the causes of its being changed.

upon paper of the forementioned
phrases, you will, perhaps, honour
them with a place in your Magazine:
the consequence will be, AN will no
more usurp the place of A.
I am, Sir,

Your's, with respect,

ALPHEUS.

Observations on Participles.

MR. EDITOR,

SIR,-That Lindley Murray's Gram

I never yet met with a book wherein the writer of it had used the article in the shape of an before the word youth; and yet it would be quite as proper to use it thus, as it is to use it before the word “unity.” That this invariable rule has exceptions, the consideration of the word youth affords sufficient proof, for, in its pronunciation, it be-mar has its excellencies, I believe few gins precisely in the same manner as unity; therefore, when the Indefinite Article is used before either youth or unity, the form of it which is proper to be used before one, is proper to be used before both: this being the case, and it being improper to write an youth, it necessarily follows, that it is equally improper to write "an unity."

The exceptions to the useful rule of changing a to an before a word, the first letter of which is a vowel, are confined to certain words which begin with the vowel u, viz. words, of which the u forms of itself the first syllable; as, usurper: and words wherein the first letter (u) has its long sound; as, useful. Sept. 13th, 1819.

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doubt; but that it is in all cases the standard of propriety, is a position which others, as well as A. B. have reason to scruple. I have waited with anxiety for an answer to A. B.'s inquiries, (col. 419,) respecting "the cause of my not receiving it." Two articles have appeared; but it seems to me that Gamma Delta has done nothing towards elucidating the difficulty of the above form of expression; while M. S. having written in haste, has misunderstood A. B. altogether.

As the first note, under the 14th Rule of Syntax, allows a similar construction, viz. "by observing which," and as we have no rule in Murray's Grammar by which we can parse such a construction, it will be necessary to have recourse to other authorities, be

moved :-for, in the first place, we have a preposition (of) which, according to grammarians in general, must govern the objective case; and this preposition evidently points to receiving, which, it would appear, from this consideration, is a noun: but again, receiving retains its action, which falls upon the pronoun it, and causes it to be in the objective case, which case is not governed by nouns.

Since writing the above, respecting the Indefinite Article, I have met with, whilst reading, the following phrases-fore we can have our scruples fully rean European, such an one.' I have found, after an examination of them, that what I remarked concerning the exceptions to the grammatical rule of changing a to an before a vowel being CONFINED to words which begin with the vowel U, is not correct; for it is easy to perceive, that, AN European" sounds much more disagreeable than A European; and that "an one" sounds no better than an warrior, which no person would ever think of putting upon paper, if he meant to write English; therefore, in addition to the exceptions which I mentioned in my last letter, it should be observed, that before all words which begin with a vowel, but are pronounced as though they began with a consonant, the article remains in its original form.

If, Sir, you think that these few remarks are likely, in any degree, to accomplish the end for which they are written, viz. to counteract the want of thought which caused (for I am convinced that want of thought was the chief cause) the erroneous appearance

If, however, we have recourse to the Latin tongue, we shall find the difficulty removed; for in the conjugation of an active verb, we have what are called gerunds: as, from the verb reeipio, to receive, comes recipiendi, of receiving, which, being active, will admit an object after it; hence we may say of receiving it, or, "the cause of my not receiving it." This reasoning appears to me to be legitimate; if so, then the above construction is proper, and this conclusion is agreeable to Dr. Lowth, who says, (see page 103 of his Grammar,) "The participle with a preposition before it, and still retain

It may be objected, that in the English tongue we have no gerunds; but is it not sufficiently evident that we have a form of speech, which is used by all our best writers, for which we have no specific name, and which | exactly corresponds with what is called in Latin the gerund? And what impropriety can there be in giving a name to it illustrative of its meaning? Dr. Johnson defines the gerund to be a verbal noun, which governs cases like | a verb :why then may we not call | participles in such a situation, gerunds, or verbal nouns?

I shall feel gratified if any of your ingenious correspondents will inform me, through the medium of your valuable Miscellany, if the following form | of the possessive pronouns, your's, our's, &c. be correct, or what form | they would have, were the ellipses supplied?

I submit the above remarks and queries to your consideration.-Should you deem them worthy of a place in your justly esteemed Miscellany, their insertion will oblige,

ing its government, answers to what is | man, and Eve of the first woman; or called in Latin the gerund : as, Hap- | that these names are Hebrew; the piness is to be attained by avoiding word Adam, signifying much more evil, &c." than red or ruddy, for which we generally take it, namely, a florid whiteness, and the brightness and lustre proper to pearls and precious stones : Eve, a mother, as the scripture tells us; Issa, which Adam first called his wife, when he saw her; Vira, or a sheman. But this is also very remarkable in the Hebrew names of all living creatures, imposed by Adam, which appear not to be given by chance, or deflected from any other language, as the Greek, Latin, and all others, but to contain therein the na ture of the creature, as the learned and industrious Bochart admirably proves, in his Hierozoicon, where he shews their names were partly taken from something obvious to the senses, as their colour, their hair, their stature, and their external form; partly from their inward properties and dispositions, which he could neither know by use, nor the information of others, but by that original wisdom wherewith he was created, (by the Socinian's leave) and a great part whereof he lost by the fall: for which reason, these names are the most noble monuments of antiquity we have left in the world. Thus, to instance in a few. The Camel, a creature which keeps its name almost in all languages, and which Varro himself grants to be taken from the Syriac language. It is derived from the Hebrew word Gamal, which signifies to retribute, or repay, either good or evil; for which the camel is still noted as the most tenacious of any animal. The Hebrew name of a Horse, is derived from a root which signifies to rule, to guide, to moderate; and it is notorious, this creature is the most docile, and the most easily ruled, considering its vast strength, of any other. The Ass is derived from a word which signifies red, of which colour they generally are in the East, a white ass being, it seems, a rarity; the judges |and great persons, usually, for state, riding upon them, as we see in the song of Deborah: another name of the ass, is taken from its strength, which is undeniably more than any other creatures of the same bulk. The Bull, or Ox, derives its name from a word that signifies firmness, or stability; it is in the Hebrew Sor, for which the Chaldees read Thor, the Arabians

Yours, respectfully,
Bolton-le-Moors,
Oct. 5th, 1819.

I. W.

On the Language spoken in Paradise; and on the Tree of Knowledge.

MR. EDITOR,

In answer to two Queries, contained in
page 576, of the number for August, of
your valuable and instructive Maga-
zine, I beg leave to quote the follow-
ing articles, from a very ancient and
scarce publication, which perhaps your
correspondent of Lytham has never
read. * Your insertion of them, (should
you think them worthy of a place) will
oblige
A SUBSCRIBER.

Belfast, 1819.

1st Query.-What language was spoken by our first parents in Paradise?

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Answer.-I think the Hebrew, or sacred language, stands much fairer for it than any other; for all the names we find mentioned in the history of the beginning of the world, were undoubtedly Hebrew. None, I think, who be- | lieve the Scriptures, can question that Adam was really the name of the first

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