part of his IDEA OF A PAINTER,' which cannot be unpleasing, at least to such who are conversant in the philosophy of Plato; and to avoid tediousness I will not translate the whole discourse, but take and leave as I find occasion.

GOD Almighty, in the fabrick of the universe, 'first contemplated himself, and reflected on his own excellencies; from which he drew and con'stituted those first forms which are called ideas ( so that every species which was afterwards ex'pressed, was produced from that first idea, forming that wonderful contexture of all created beings. But the celestial bodies above the moon being incorruptible, and not subject to change, ' remained for ever fair, and in perpetual order. 'On the contrary, all things which are sublunary are subject to change, to deformity, and to decay. And though Nature always intends a consummate beauty in her productions, yet through the inequality of the matter, the forms are altered; and in particular, human beauty ⚫ suffers alteration for the worse, as we see to our 'mortification, in the deformities and disproportions which are in us. For which reason the

In May 1664, Gio. Pietro Bellori read a Discourse in the Academy of St. Luke at Rome, (Carlo Maratti being then President,) entitled-L'Idea del Pittore, dello Scultore, e dell' Architetto, scelta dalle bellezze naturali superiore alla Natura. This Discourse, from which the following extract is taken, was afterwards prefixed to LE VITE DE PITTORE, &c. by the same author, printed at Rome in 4to. 1672.

• artful painter and the sculptor, imitating the Divine Maker, form to themselves, as well as they are able, a model of the superiour beauties; and reflecting on them, endeavour to correct and amend the common nature, and to represent it as it was at first created, without fault, either ' in colour or in lineament.

'This IDEA, which we may call the goddess of painting and of sculpture, descends upon the 'marble and the cloth, and becomes the original ' of those arts; and being measured by the com" pass of the intellect, is itself the measure of the 'performing hand; and being animated by the 'imagination, infuses life into the image. The 'idea of the painter and the sculptor is undoubtedly that perfect and excellent example of the mind, by imitation of which imagined form all things are represented which fall under human sight such is the definition which is made by 'Cicero in his book of the ORATOR to Brutus :'As therefore in forms and figures there is somewhat which is excellent and perfect, to which imagined species all things are referred by imitation, which are the objects of sight, in like manner we behold the species of eloquence in our minds, the effigies or actual image of which we seek in the organs of our hearing. This is likewise confirmed by Proclus in the dialogue of Plato, called TIMEUS. If, says he, you take a man as he is made by nature, and compare him with another, who is the effect of art, the work of nature will always appear the

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'less beautiful, because art is more accurate than 'nature. But Zeuxis, who from the choice which < he made of five virgins drew that wonderful picture of Helena, which Cicero in his ORATOR • beforementioned sets before us as the most per'fect example of beauty, at the same time admo'nishes a painter, to contemplate the ideas of the

most natural forms, and to make a judicious ' choice of several bodies, all of them the most elegant which he can find; by which we may plainly understand, that he thought it impossible 'to find in any one body all those perfections

which he sought for the accomplishment of a • Helena, because Nature in any individual person makes nothing that is perfect in all its parts. For this reason Maximus Tyrius also says, that the image which is taken by a painter from 'several bodies, produces a beauty which it is impossible to find in any single natural body, approaching to the perfection of the fairest statues. • Thus nature on this account is so much inferior 'to art, that those artists who propose to them'selves only the imitation and likeness of such or 'such a particular person, without election of 'those ideas before-mentioned, have often been reproached for that omission. Demetrius was taxed for being too natural; Dionysius was also ⚫ blamed for drawing men like us, and was commonly called agwrógapos, that is, a painter of men. In our times, Michael Angelo da Caravaggio was esteemed too natural. He drew per

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'sons as they were; and Bamboccio, and most of "the Dutch painters, have drawn the worst likeness. ⚫ Lysippus of old, upbraided the common sort of sculptors, for making men such as they were ⚫ found in nature; and boasted of himself, that he 'made them as they ought to be: which is a precept of Aristotle, given as well to poets as to painters. Phidias raised an admiration, even to astonishment, in those who beheld his statues, ' with the forms which he gave to his gods and heroes, by imitating the idea, rather than nature. And Cicero, speaking of him, affirms, that figuring Jupiter and Pallas, he did not contemplate any object from whence he took the likeness, but considered in his own mind a great and • admirable form of beauty; and according to that image in his soul, he directed the operation of his hand. Seneca also seems to wonder that 'Phidias, having never beheld either Jove or Pallas, yet could conceive their divine images in his mind. Apollonius Tyanæus says the same in other words, that the fancy more instructs the painter, than the imitation; for the last makes only the things which it sees, but the first makes ' also the things which it never sees.

Leon Battista Alberti tells us, that we ought not so much to love the likeness as the beauty, and to choose from the fairest bodies severally "the fairest parts. Leonardo da Vinci instructs the painter to form this idea to himself; and Raffaelle, the greatest of all modern masters,

writes thus to Castiglione, concerning his Galatea: "To paint a fair one, it is necessary for me to see many fair ones; but because there is so great a scarcity of lovely women, I am constrained to make use of one certain idea, which I have formed to myself in my own fancy." Guido Reni 'sending to Rome his St. Michael, which he had painted for the church of the Capuchins, at the same time wrote to Monsignor Massano, who ' was Maestro di Casa (or Steward of the House) 'to Pope Urban the Eighth, in this manner: "I ' wish I had the wings of an angel, to have ascended ' into Paradise, and there to have beheld the forms of those beatified spirits, from which I might have copied my archangel. But not being able to mount so high, it was in vain for me to search his resem'blance here below; so that I was forced to make

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an introspection into my own mind, and into that idea of beauty which I have formed in my own imagination. I have likewise created there the contrary idea of deformity and ugliness; but I leave 'the consideration of it, till I paint the devil: and in the mean time shun the very thought of it as much as possibly I can, and am even endeavouring

to blot it wholly out of my remembrance."

'There was not any lady in all antiquity, who was mistress of so much beauty as was to be 'found in the Venus of Gnidus, made by Praxiteles, or the Minerva of Athens, by Phidias; which was therefore called the beautiful form. Neither is there any man of the present age