ational Gallery, or in the curved
portico of No. 30; but still these are not points to be taken into
consideration as having anything to do with artistical rank, just as,
though we should say it was disgraceful if a great poet could not spell,
we should not consider such a defect as in any way taking from his
poetical rank. Neither is there anything particularly belonging to
architecture, as such, which it is any credit to an artist to observe or
represent; it is only a simple and clear field for the manifestation of
his knowledge of general laws. Any surveyor or engineer could have drawn
the steps and balustrade in the Hero and Leander, as well as Turner has;
but there is no man living but himself who could have thrown the
accidental shadows upon them. I may, however, refer for general
illustration of Turner's power as an architectural draughtsman, to the
front of Rouen Cathedral, engraved in the Rivers of France, and to the
Ely in the England. I know nothing in art which can be set beside the
former of these for overwhelming grandeur and simplicity of effect, and
inexhaustible intricacy of parts. I have then only a few remarks farther
to offer respecting the general character of all those truths which we
have been hitherto endeavoring to explain and illustrate.

Sec. 2. Extreme difficulty of illustrating or explaining the highest truth.

Sec. 3. The _positive_ rank of Turner is in no degree shown in the
foregoing pages, but only his relative rank.

Sec. 4. The exceeding refinement of his truth.

Sec. 5. There is nothing in his works which can be enjoyed without
knowledge.

Sec. 6. And nothing which knowledge will not enable us to enjoy.

The difference in the accuracy of the lines of the Torso of the Vatican,
(the Maestro of M. Angelo,) from those in one of M. Angelo's finest
works, could perhaps scarcely be appreciated by any eye or feeling
undisciplined by the most perfect and practical anatomical knowledge. It
rests on points of such traceless and refined delicacy, that though we
feel them in the result, we cannot follow them in the details. Yet they
are such and so great as to place the Torso alone in art, solitary and
supreme; while the finest of M. Angelo's works, considered with respect
to truth alone, are said to be only on a level with antiques of the
second class, under the Apollo and Venus, that is, two classes or grades
below the Torso. But suppose the best sculptor in the world, posse