When one has seen the outward appearance of a man, one knows his character, his spirit, and his genius. Ingres' portrait of himself contains the analysis of his art. He was quite a small man, of a swarthy complexion, with features sharp and as if cast in bronze. His thick black hair stood up stubbornly on end, so that he had to grease it carefully every day. Under hair of this kind there is almost always an obstinate brain. The jaws projected, as is the case with men endowed with a strong will. The eyes were large and piercing, with that bold eagle-glance which fills parents with fond hopes, but does not touch the hearts of young women. When he appeared to be excited, it was only the excitement of work expressing itself in him. This little man, in his large cloak, seemed to say when he stood at his easel, pencil in hand: "I shall be a great painter, for I am determined to be one." He kept his word. Strength of will, hard work, study, obstinacy, patience--these are the elements of which Ingres' talent is compounded. "_Vouloir, c'est pouvoir_," was his motto. One would think Buffon had had him in mind in that passage in which he defines genius as patience. The trinity-in-unity of his qualities consisted of correctness, balance, exactness; qualities which go to make rather a great architect or mathematician than an interesting painter. Ingres' range of subjects was unusually wide. Pictures on themes taken from antiquity ("Oedipus and the Sphinx" and "Virgil reading the Æneid"); costume pictures ("Henry IV and his Children" and the "Entry of Charles V into Paris"); religious paintings (Madonnas, "Christ giving the Keys to St. Peter," and "St. Symphorian"); nude female figures (the "Odalisque," the "Liberation of Angelica," and "The Source"); allegories ("The Apotheosis of Homer" and "The Apotheosis of Napoleon"); pictures of public functions ("Bonaparte as First Consul" and "Napoleon on the Throne"); and even a painting taken from the life ("Pius VII in the Sistine Chapel"), are included in the list. Yet, notwithstanding his astonishing diversity of themes, there is hardly an artist more one-sided in his principles. Ingres thought exclusively of purely plastic art: beauty of form and harmony of line alone attracted him; he was insensible to the charm of colour. His standpoint was the Institute of Rome; the Italian Cinquecento the exclusive object of his worship. He carried this study as far as plagiarism, and as director of the Roman Academy made free with the intellectual property of the Cinquecento masters, as if they had lived only on his account.