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96
HEADERTEXT.
96

96 On Affectation colours; whilst the confused grouping and contracted limbs of Puget's Alexander and Diogenes at Versailles betray the favorite pupil of Pietro di Cortona, and might be called a picture in marble. This sacrifice of sculpture to painting appears to be one of the principal causes of the fault in question. It has brought with it the struggle for the ex- pression of passion, and the substitution of this for form and dignity, arising from the peculiar fitness of painting for it, and from the tendency of mankind to push a thing too far, when it has already succeeded up to a certain point. The contrast between the progress of the two arts has often been remarked. Painting, being associated with the Christian wor- ship, and eminently calculated to portray the sentiments of the heart in the face, attained^ while the art of drawing the figure was yet rude, to a perfection in expression which has never been surpassed, and which has not existed in union with the same simplicity and serene beauty since the days of Raphael. Sculpture, when she had (3nce individualized the gods of epic poetry, without attempting to express feel- ings^, proceeded to clothe them in those glorious forms which led Aristotle to say, eirel tovto ye (pavepov^ m el ToaovTov yevoLVTo ciacbopoL to aco/ua jjlovov baov ai twv Oecov €LKov€£y T0V9 VTroXeiTTo^ei^ou^ iravTe^ (pdlev av a^iovs elvai tov- T0L9 covXeveii/. Pol. I. 5. Expression indeed is used for two very different things; and the ambiguity is worth dwelling on for a moment, as it is in constant use, and has probably caused much mischief in art. It is obvious that we may employ the term for the expression either of character or passion % of those emotions which agitate the human frame and distort the features, or models in sculpture for the pediment of the Madeleine ; of these not above two or three had avoided the fault of having more than One plan. Compare Sir Joshua Reynolds, Discourse x. 5 A. Thiersch Epochen der Griech. Kunst. « Unterschied in Ansehung der Schonheit des Ausdrucks zwischen transitorischem und permanentem. Jener ist gewaltsam und folglich nie schon ; dieser ist die Folge von der oftem Wiederholung des Erstern, vertragt sich nicht allein mit der Schonheit, sondem bringt auch mehr Vershiedenheit in die Schonheit selbst. Lessing Fragmente zum 2ten Th. des Laokoon, Werke x. 7- Compare Meyer's notes on Winkelmann's Werke. iv. p. 363.