In English thus:
Virgil and Homer, when they Neptune shew’d,
As he through boist’rous seas his steeds compell’d,
In the mind’s eye alone his figure view’d;
But Vinci saw him, and has both excell’d[1]
.
To these must be added the following: A painting representing two horsemen engaged in fight, and struggling to tear a flag from each other: rage and fury are in this admirably expressed in the countenances of the two combatants; their air appears wild, and the drapery is thrown into an unusual though agreeable disorder. A Medusa’s head, and a picture of the Adoration of the Magi[2]. In this last there are some fine heads, but both this and the Medusa’s head are said by Du Fresne to have been evidently unfinished.
The mind of Leonardo was however too active and capacious to be contented solely with the practical part of his art; nor could it submit to receive as principles, conclusions, though confirmed by experience, without first tracing them to their source, and investigating their causes, and the several circumstances on which they depend
