My opinions being then confused and unsettled, I was in danger of being borne down by this plausible reasoning, though I remember I then had a dawning suspicion that it was not sound doctrine; and at the same time I was unwilling obstinately to refuse assent to what I was unable to confute." False and low views of art are now so commonly taken both in and out of the profession, that we have not hesitated to quote the above passage; the danger Sir Joshua confesses he was in, is common, and demands the warning. To make it more direct we should add, "Read his Discourses." Again, without intending to fetter the student's mind to a particular method of study, he urges the necessity and wisdom of previously obtaining the appropriated instruments of art, in a first correct design, and a plain manly colouring, before any thing more is attempted. He does not think it, however, of very great importance whether or not the student aim first at grace and grandeur before he has learned correctness, and adduces the example of Parmegiano, whose first public work was done when a boy, the "St Eustachius" in the Church of St Petronius, in Bologna--one of his last is the "Moses breaking the Tables," in Parma. The former has grandeur and incorrectness, but "discovers the dawnings of future greatness." In mature age he had corrected his defects, and the drawing of his Moses was equally admirable with the grandeur of the conception--an excellent plate is given of this figure by Mr Burnet. The fact is, the impulse of the mind is not to be too much restrained--it is better to give it its due and first play, than check it until it has acquired correctness--good sense first or last, and a love of the art, will generally insure correctness in the end; the impulses often checked, come with weakened power, and ultimately refuse to come at all; and each time that they depart unsatisfied, unemployed, take away with them as they retire a portion of the fire of genius. Parmegiano formed himself upon Michael Angelo: Michael Angelo brought the art to a "sudden maturity," as Homer and Shakspeare did theirs. "Subordinate parts of our art, and perhaps of other arts, expand themselves by a slow and progressive growth; but those which depend on a native vigour of imagination, generally burst forth at once in fulness of beauty." Correctness of drawing and imagination, the one of mechanical genius the other of poetic, undoubtedly work together for perfection--"a confidence in the mechanic produces a boldness in the poetic." He expresses his surprise that the race of painters, before Michael Angelo, never thought of transferring to painting the grandeur they admired in ancient sculpture. "Raffaelle himself seemed to be going on very contentedly in the dry manner of Pietro Perugino; and if Michael Angelo had never appeared, the art might still have continued in the same style." "On this foundation the Caracci built the truly great academical Bolognian