§ 5. And different in association

from what it is alone.

§ 6. It is not certain

whether any two people see the same colours in things.

§ 7. Form, considered as

landscape,

only the chief characteristic of species, but the only characteristic of individuals of a species.

Again, a colour, in association with other colours, is different from the same colour seen by itself. It has a distinct and peculiar power upon the retina dependent on its association. Consequently, the colour of any object is not more dependent upon the nature of the object itself, and the eye beholding it, than on the colour of the objects near it; in this respect also, therefore, it is no characteristic.

And so great is the uncertainty with respect to those qualities or powers which depend as much on the nature of the object suffering as of the object acting, that it is totally impossible to prove that one man sees in the same thing the same colour that another does, though he may use the same name for it. One man may see yellow where another sees blue, but as the effect is constant, they agree in the term to be used for it, and both call it blue, or both yellow, having yet totally different ideas attached to the term. And yet neither can be said to see falsely, because the colour is not in the thing, but in the thing and them together. But if they see forms differently, one must see falsely, because the form is positive in the object. My friend may see boars blue for anything I know, but it is impossible he should see them with paws instead of hoofs, unless his eyes or brain be diseased. (Compare Locke, book ii. chap. xxxii. § 15.) But I do not speak of this uncertainty as capable of having any effect on art, because, though perhaps Landseer sees dogs of the colour which I should call blue, yet the colour he puts on the canvass, being in the same way blue to him, will still be brown or dog-colour to me; and so we may argue on points of colour just as if all men saw alike, as indeed in all probability they do; but I merely mention this uncertainty to show farther the vagueness and unimportance of colour as a characteristic of bodies.

Before going farther, however, I must explain the sense in which an element of I have used the word "form," because painters have a most inaccurate and careless habit of confining this term to the outline of bodies, whereas it necessarily implies light and shade. It is true that the outline and the chiaroscuro must be separate subjects of

includes light and shade.

investigation with the student; but no form whatsoever can be
known to the eye in the slightest degree without its chiaroscuro;
and, therefore, in speaking of form generally as an element of land-
scape, I mean that perfect and harmonious unity of outline with
light and shade, by which all the parts and projections and propor-
tions of a body are fully explained to the eye; being nevertheless
perfectly independent of sight or power in other objects, the pre-
sence of light upon a body being a positive existence, whether we
are aware of it or not, and in no degree dependent upon our
senses. This being understood, the most convincing proof of the
unimportance of colour lies in the accurate observation of the way
in which any material object impresses itself on the mind. If we
look at nature carefully, we shall find that her colours are in a
state of perpetual confusion and indistinctness, while her forms, as
told by light and shade, are invariably clear, distinct, and speaking.
The stones and gravel of the bank catch green reflections from
the boughs above; the bushes receive greys and yellows from the
ground; every hair's breadth of polished surface gives a little bit
of the blue of the sky, or the gold of the sun, like a star upon the
local colour; this local colour, changeful and uncertain in itself, is
again disguised and modified by the hue of the light, or quenched
in the grey of the shadow; and the confusion and blending of tint
are altogether so great, that were we left to find out what objects.
were by their colours only, we could scarcely in places distinguish
the boughs of a tree from the air beyond them, or the ground
beneath them. I know that people unpractised in art will not
believe this at first; but if they have accurate powers of observa-
tion, they may soon ascertain it for themselves; they will find that,
while they can scarcely ever determine the exact hue of anything,
except when it occurs in large masses, as in a green
field or the blue
sky, the form, as told by light and shade, is always decided and
evident, and the source of the chief character of every object.
Light and shade indeed so completely conquer the distinctions of
local colour, that the difference in hue between the illumined
parts of a white and of a black object is not so great as the differ-
ence (in sunshine) between the illumined and dark side of either
separately.

§ 9. Recapitu lation.

We shall see hereafter, in considering ideas of beauty, that colour, even as a source of pleasure, is feeble compared with form: but this we cannot insist upon at present; we have only to do with simple truth, and the observations we have made are sufficient to prove that the artist who sacrifices or forgets a truth of form in the pursuit of a truth of colour, sacrifices what is definite to what is uncertain, and what is essential to what is accidental.

CHAPTER VI.

RECAPITULATION.

portance of

historical

truths.

Ir ought farther to be observed respecting truths in general, that § 1. The imthose are always most valuable which are most historical; that is, which tell us most about the past and future states of the object to which they belong. In a tree, for instance, it is more important to give the appearance of energy and elasticity in the limbs which is indicative of growth and life, than any particular character of leaf or texture of bough. It is more important that we should feel that the uppermost sprays are creeping higher and higher into the sky, and be impressed with the current of life and motion which is animating every fibre, than that we should know the exact pitch of relief with which those fibres are thrown out against the sky. For the first truths tell us tales about the tree, about what it has been, and will be, while the last are characteristic of it only in its present state, and are in no way talkative about themselves. Talkative facts are always more interesting and more important than silent ones. So again the lines in a crag which mark its stratification, and how it has been washed and rounded by water, or twisted and drawn out in fire, are more important, because they tell more than the stains of the lichens which change year by year, and the accidental fissures of frost or decomposition; not but that both of these are historical, but historical in a less distinct manner, and for shorter periods.

light and shade, the first

Hence in general the truths of specific form are the first and § 2. Form, as most important of all; and next to them, those truths of chiaroscuro explained by which are necessary to make us understand every quality and part of forms, and the relative distances of objects among each other, and in consequence their relative bulks. Altogether lower than

of

all truths. Tone, light, secondary.

and colour, are

§ 3. And deceptive chiaroscuro the lowest of all.

these, as truths, though often most important as beauties, stand all effects of chiaroscuro which are productive merely of imitations of light and tone, and all effects of colour. To make us understand the space of the sky, is an end worthy of the artist's highest powers; to hit its particular blue or gold is an end to be thought of when we have accomplished the first, and not till then.

Finally, far below all these come those particular accuracies or tricks of chiaroscuro which cause objects to look projecting from the canvass, not worthy of the name of truths, because they require for their attainment the sacrifice of all others; for not having at our disposal the same intensity of light by which nature illustrates her objects, we are obliged, if we would have perfect deception in one, to destroy its relation to the rest. (Compare Sect. II. Chap. V.) And thus he who throws one object out of his picture, never lets the spectator into it. Michael Angelo bids you follow his phantoms into the abyss of heaven, but a modern French painter drops his hero out of the picture frame.

This solidity or projection, then, is the very lowest truth that art can give; it is the painting of mere matter, giving that as food for the eye which is properly only the subject of touch; it can neither instruct nor exalt; nor can it please, except as jugglery; it addresses no sense of beauty nor of power; and wherever it characterizes the general aim of a picture, it is the sign and the evidence of the vilest and lowest mechanism which art can be insulted by giving name to.