imited range of mind which is different from, and
in its way better than, anything presented to us by the more grasping
intellect. We all know that the nightingale sings more nobly than the
lark; but who, therefore, would wish the lark not to sing, or would deny
that it had a character of its own, which bore a part among the melodies
of creation no less essential than that of the more richly-gifted bird?
And thus we shall find and feel that whatever difference may exist
between the intellectual powers of one artist and another, yet wherever
there is any true genius, there will be some peculiar lesson which even
the humblest will teach us more sweetly and perfectly than those far
above them in prouder attributes of mind; and we should be as mistaken
as we should be unjust and invidious, if we refused to receive this
their peculiar message with gratitude and veneration, merely because it
was a sentence and not a volume. But the case is different when we
examine their relative fidelity to given facts. That fidelity depends on
no peculiar modes of thought or habits of character; it is the result of
keen sensibility, combined with high powers of memory and association.
These qualities, as such, are the same in all men; character or feeling
may direct their choice to this or that object, but the fidelity with
which they treat either the one or the other, is dependent on those
simple powers of sense and intellect which are like and comparable in
all, and of which we can always say that they are greater in this man,
or less in that without reference to the character of the individual.
Those feelings which direct Cox to the painting of wild, weedy banks,
and cool, melting skies, and those which directed Barret to the painting
of glowing foliage and melancholy twilight, are both just and beautiful
in their way, and are both worthy of high praise and gratitude, without
necessity, nay, without _proper_ possibility of comparing one with the
other. But the degree of fidelity with which the leaves of the one and
the light of the other are rendered, depends upon faculties of sight,
sense, and memory common to both, and perfectly comparable; and we may
say fearlessly, and without injustice, that one or the other, as the
case may be, is more faithful in that which they have chosen to
represent. It is also to be remembered that these faculties of sense and
memory are not partial in their effect; they will not induce fidelity in
the renderin