If you can get the complete series of Lefèbre's engravings from Titian and Veronese, they will be quite enough to teach you, in their dumb way, everything that is teachable of composition; at all events, try to get the Madonna, with St. Peter and St. George under the two great pillars; the Madonna and Child, with mitred bishop on her left, and St. Andrew on her right; and Veronese's Triumph of Venice. The first of these Plates unites two formative symmetries; that of the two pillars, clasped by the square altar-cloth below and cloud above, catches the eye first; but the main group is the fivefold one rising to the left, crowned by the Madonna. St. Francis and St. Peter form its two wings, and the kneeling portrait figures, its base. It is clasped at the bottom by the key of St. Peter, which points straight at the Madonna's head, and is laid on the steps solely for this purpose; the curved lines, which enclose the group, meet also in her face; and the straight line of light, on the cloak of the nearest senator, points at her also. If you have Turner's Liber Studiorum, turn to the Lauffenburg, and compare the figure group there: a fivefold chain, one standing figure, central; two recumbent, for wings; two half-recumbent, for bases; and a cluster of weeds to clasp. Then turn to Lefèbre's Europa (there are two in the series--I mean the one with the two tree trunks over her head). It is a wonderful ninefold group. Europa central; two stooping figures, each surmounted by a standing one, for wings; a cupid on one side, and dog on the other, for bases; a cupid and trunk of tree, on each side, to terminate above; and a garland for clasp. [Illustration: FIG. 94.] § 13. Fig. 94, page 171, will serve to show the mode in which similar arrangements are carried into the smallest detail. It is magnified four times from a cluster of leaves in the foreground of the "Isis" (Liber Studiorum). Figs. 95 and 96, page 172, show the arrangement of the two groups composing it; the lower is purely symmetrical, with trefoiled centre and broad masses for wings; the uppermost is a sweeping continuous curve, symmetrical, but foreshortened. Both are clasped by arrow-shaped leaves. The two whole groups themselves are, in turn, members of another larger group, composing the entire foreground, and consisting of broad dock-leaves, with minor clusters on the right and left, of which these form the chief portion on the right side. [Illustration: FIG. 95.] [Illustration: FIG. 96.] § 14. Unless every leaf, and every visible point or object, however small, forms a part of some harmony of this kind (these symmetrical conditions being only the most simple and obvious), it has no business in the picture. It is the necessary connection of all the forms and colors, down to the last touch, which constitutes great or inventive work, separated from all common work by an impassable gulf.