"Having passed from the antique school, to that in which you draw after the living figure, still adhere to that scrupulous exactness of drawing with which you first set out; marking with precision the divisions of the figure. After you have made yourselves acquainted with the drawing of the living figure, you must then begin to enlarge your lines, and to give softness and breadth, to direct your attention to what constitutes style and character, and to discriminate these from what constitutes manner. "To assist you in this nice discrimination, consult the prints and works of Michael Angelo, Raphael, and Hannibal Carracci. In them you will find the strongest and purest evidence of style and character, yet all differing from each other, and all equally brought out of nature. I do not recommend them with a view that you should adopt the style and character of any of them; but to show from those great examples, that style and character, although ever founded in nature, are as various as the individual genius of every artist; that they are as free to you as they were to those masters; that if you will consult your own mind, you will draw forth a style and character of your own, and therefore no man can ever be excused for sinking into a mannerist. "And I cannot omit to observe here, that in the order of your studies, your mental powers should be cherished and brought into action by reading and reflection, but not until you have acquired practical facility in your art. Too often it happens, and I have seen it with concern, that the presumption of youth, or the errors of instruction, have reversed this order, and have carried many to attempt essays of research and learning, before they were well grounded in the principles of professional practice. What other consequences can follow from such a course, but that the student will turn in discontent from his own productions, because they fall short of the ideas in his mind; and induce him, perhaps, to abandon, with disgust, a profession in which he might have shone with distinction, had he taken a right method of cultivating his own powers!