clouds, they appear to get
bewildered, forget that they are dealing with forms regulated by
precisely the same simple laws of light and shade as more substantial
matter, overcharge their color, confuse their shadows and dark sides,
and end in mere ragged confusion. I believe the evil arises from their
never attempting to render clouds except with the brush; other objects,
at some period of study, they take up with the chalk or lead, and so
learn something of their form; but they appear to consider clouds as
altogether dependent on cobalt and camel's hair, and so never understand
anything of their real anatomy. But whatever the cause, I cannot point
to any central clouds of the moderns, except those of Turner and
Stanfield, as really showing much knowledge of, or feeling for, nature,
though _all_ are superior to the conventional and narrow conceptions of
the ancients. We are all right as far as we go, our work may be
incomplete, but it is not false; and it is far better, far less
injurious to the mind, that we should be little attracted to the sky,
and taught to be satisfied with a light suggestion of truthful form,
than that we should be drawn to it by violently pronounced outline and
intense color, to find in its finished falsehood everything to displease
or to mislead--to hurt our feelings, if we have foundation for them, and
corrupt them, if we have none.

FOOTNOTES

[32] Here I include even the great ones--even Titian and
Veronese,--excepting only Tintoret and the religious schools.

[33] Engraved in Findel's Bible Illustrations.

CHAPTER IV.

OF TRUTH OF CLOUDS: THIRDLY, OF THE REGION OF THE RAIN-CLOUD.

Sec. 1. The apparent difference in character between the lower and central
clouds is dependent chiefly on proximity.

The clouds which I wish to consider as characteristic of the lower, or
rainy region, differ not so much in their real nature from those of the
central and uppermost regions, as in appearance, owing to their greater
nearness. For the central clouds, and perhaps even the high cirri,
deposit moisture, if not distinctly rain, as is sufficiently proved by
the existence of snow on the highest peaks of the Himaleh; and when, on
any such mountains, we are brought into close contact with the central
clouds,[34] we find them little differing from the ordinary rain-cloud
of the plains, except by being slightly less dense and dark. But th