owever, who has the Ambition to be a real master, the solid satisfaction
which proceeds from a consciousness of his advancement (of which seeing
his own faults is the first step) will very abundantly compensate for the
mortification of present disappointment. There is, besides, this
alleviating circumstance. Every discovery he makes, every acquisition of
knowledge he attains, seems to proceed from his own sagacity; and thus he
acquires a confidence in himself sufficient to keep up the resolution of
perseverance.

We all must have experienced how lazily, and consequently how
ineffectually, instruction is received when forced upon the mind by
others. Few have been taught to any purpose who have not been their own
teachers. We prefer those instructions which we have given ourselves,
from our affection to the instructor; and they are more effectual, from
being received into the mind at the very time when it is most open and
eager to receive them.

With respect to the pictures that you are to choose for your models, I
could wish that you would take the world's opinion rather than your own.
In other words, I would have you choose those of established reputation
rather than follow your own fancy. If you should not admire them at
first, you will, by endeavouring to imitate them, find that the world has
not been mistaken.

It is not an easy task to point out those various excellences for your
imitation which he distributed amongst the various schools. An endeavour
to do this may perhaps be the subject of some future discourse. I will,
therefore, at present only recommend a model for style in painting, which
is a branch of the art more immediately necessary to the young student.
Style in painting is the same as in writing, a power over materials,
whether words or colours, by which conceptions or sentiments are
conveyed. And in this Lodovico Carrache (I mean in his best works)
appears to me to approach the nearest to perfection. His unaffected
breadth of light and shadow, the simplicity of colouring, which holding
its proper rank, does not draw aside the least part of the attention from
the subject, and the solemn effect of that twilight which seems diffused
over his pictures, appear to me to correspond with grave and dignified
subjects, better than the more artificial brilliancy of sunshine which
enlightens the pictures of Titian. Though Tintoret thought that Titian's
colouring was the model of perfection, and would c