uch appearance of reason,
why I think it necessary to devote a separate portion of the work to the
showing of what is truthful in art. "Cannot we," say the public, "see
what nature is with our own eyes, and find out for ourselves what is
like her?" It will be as well to determine this question before we go
farther, because if this were possible, there would be little need of
criticism or teaching with respect to art.

Now I have just said that it is possible for all men, by care and
attention, to form a just judgment of the fidelity of artists to nature.
To do this, no peculiar powers of mind are required, no sympathy with
particular feelings, nothing which every man of ordinary intellect does
not in some degree possess,--powers, namely, of observation and
intelligence, which by cultivation may be brought to a high degree of
perfection and acuteness. But until this cultivation has been bestowed,
and until the instrument thereby perfected has been employed in a
consistent series of careful observation, it is as absurd as it is
audacious to pretend to form any judgment whatsoever respecting the
truth of art: and my first business, before going a step farther, must
be to combat the nearly universal error of belief among the thoughtless
and unreflecting, that they know either what nature is, or what is like
her, that they can discover truth by instinct, and that their minds are
such pure Venice glass as to be shocked by all treachery. I have to
prove to them that there are more things in heaven and earth than are
dreamed of in their philosophy, and that the truth of nature is a part
of the truth of God; to him who does not search it out, darkness, as it
is to him who does, infinity.

Sec. 2. Men usually see little of what is before their eyes.

The first great mistake that people make in the matter, is the
supposition that they must _see_ a thing if it be before their eyes.
They forget the great truth told them by Locke, Book ii. chap. 9, Sec.
3:--"This is certain, that whatever alterations are made in the body, if
they reach not the mind, whatever impressions are made on the outward
parts, if they are not taken notice of within, there is no perception.
Fire may burn our bodies, with no other effect than it does a billet,
unless the motion be continued to the brain, and there the sense of heat
or idea of pain be produced in the mind, wherein consists actual
perception. How often may a man observe in himself, that while