Allston was a Christian artist; and the beauty of expression lends uncommon charm to his colors. All that he did shows purity, sensibility, refinement, delicacy, feeling, rather than force. His genius was almost feminine. As he advanced in years, this was more remarked. His pictures became more and more instinct with those sentiments which form the true glory of Art. Early in life he had a partiality for pieces representing _banditti_; but this taste does not appear in his later works. And when asked if he would undertake to fill the vacant panels in the rotunda of the Capitol at Washington, should Congress determine to order such a work, he is reported to have said, in memorable words, "I will paint only one subject, and choose my own: _No battle-piece!_"[177] This incident, so honorable to the Artist, is questioned; but it is certain that on more than one occasion he avowed a disinclination to paint _battle-pieces_. I am not aware if he assigned any reason. Is it too much to suppose that his refined artistic sense, recognizing expression as the highest beauty of Art, unconsciously judged the picture? The ancient Greek epigram, describing the Philoctetes of Parrhasius, an image of hopeless wretchedness and consuming grief, rises to a like sentiment, when it says, with mild rebuke,-- "We blame thee, painter, though thy skill commend; 'Twas time his sufferings with himself should end."[178] [177] Dunlap's History of the Arts of Design, Vol. II. p. 188. Mrs. Jameson's Memoirs and Essays: _Washington Allston_, p. 114. [178] Anthol. Lib. IV. Tit. viii. Ep. 26. In another tone, and with cold indifference to human suffering, Lucretius sings, in often-quoted verse, that it is pleasant, when beyond the reach of danger, to behold the shock of contending armies:-- "Suave etiam belli certamina magna tueri."[179] [179] Lucretius, De Rerum Natura, Lib. II. 6. In like heathen spirit, it may be pleasant to behold a _battle-piece_ in Art. But this is wrong. Admitting the calamitous necessity of war, it can never be with pleasure--it cannot be without sadness unspeakable--that we survey its fiendish encounter. The artist of purest aim, sensitive to these emotions, withdraws naturally from the field of blood, confessing that no scene of battle finds a place in the highest Art,--that man, created in the image of God, can never be pictured degrading, profaning, violating that sacred image.