This may not be considered a fair comparison, but rather the antithesis of the two schools. What then shall we take as the highest effort of Dutch genius? The Bull of Paul Potter![1] As well might we compare a wax figure of Tecumseh with the Apollo Belvidere, or the Sleeping Beauty with the Venus de Medicis. But, if indeed, it be the highest effort of genius to produce an _exact representation_ of things, the modeller in wax, is superior to the sculptor in marble, and the Bull at the Hague, to the Transfiguration in the Vatican. As no one of any pretension to taste will ever assent to this conclusion, I must again insist, that art aspires to a higher attainment than the mere portraiture of nature, and claims poetic honors; it is the poetry of form and color: it selects the agreeable from the discordant parts of the great prototype--combines and disposes them--and without changing the features, elevates and ennobles them; it seizes upon incidental effects to cast a shadow over the asperities of objects, and throws a broad and brilliant light on the more beautiful parts. When Dominichino was asked what obscured a part of his picture, "_una neblia si passa_," was his reply; and by thus imagining a passing cloud, he was enabled to preserve that breadth of light and shade so remarkable in the English school at present. The Italians however, did not often seek after _effect_; they did not address themselves so much to the eye, as to the judgment; and their distinguishing excellence is _correctness_ of _design_ and _dignity of character_. It was this that acquired for them the praise of a "grand gusto," or sublimity of style, superior to all other artists. [Footnote 1: This is esteemed the greatest of the Dutch school.] G. C. For the Southern Literary Messenger. ETYMOLOGY. ----The inventor of a new word must never flatter himself that he has secured the public adoption, for he must lie in the grave before he can enter the Dictionary.--_D'Israeli_.