Such soft expressions, such over-diluted countenances, which, ever since Mengs gave them as people are wont to think typical of ideality, would be entirely pulverized by such decision of colour. In recent times and among us Germans, weak faces which have essentially nothing to say[293], carefully posed in ways that imagine themselves to possess grace, simplicity, and imposing character, are all the fashion. This lack of distinction, on the side of spiritual characterization, has its counterpart in and indeed produces a similar lack of definition in colour and tone, so that all colours are run together in one confusion, and forceless condition of mutilation and evaporization, and no real emphasis is laid on any. You cannot say that one suppresses another exactly, but then none adds contrast to another. It is no doubt a colour harmony of a kind, and frequently it impresses with its excessive sweetness and flattering endearment, but the note of distinction is absent. In this connection Goethe thus expresses himself in his observations added to the translation of Diderot's essay on painting: "Critics do not by any means admit that it is easier to make weak colour harmonious than a strong scheme: but it stands to reason when colour is strong, when colours are placed before us vividly, in that case the eye will experience their harmony or discord with greater vividness. If, however, we weaken our colours, employ some with brilliance, others in fusion, others in obscure squalour, then it is obvious no one will be able to say whether the picture he looks at is harmonious or not. One thing in any case we can say of it, it lacks distinction." With harmony of colour, however, we have not by any means attained the goal of the art of colouring. To reach this consummate effect, in the _third_ place, several other aspects must not be neglected. In this respect I will restrict my observations to three points, first, the so-called _atmospheric perspective_, secondly, _flesh-colour_, and in conclusion, the magic of _colour brilliancy._[294]