s every where; we have not a town
where the houses are not "turned out of windows," and all the
furniture of every kind piled up in the streets; and as if to
show a pretty general bankruptcy, together with the artist's
own poverty, you would imagine an auction going on in every
other house, by the Turkey carpets and odds and ends hanging
from the windows. We have even seen a "Rag Fair" in a turnpike
road.

Novelty, Variety, and Contrast are required in Art, because they are the
natural springs that move the mind to attention from its indolent
quiescence; but having moved, their duty is performed--the mind of
itself will do the rest; they must not act prominent parts. In every
work there must be a simplicity which binds the whole together, as a
whole; and whatever comes not within that girdle of the graces, is worse
than superfluous--it draws off and distracts the attention which should
be concentrated. Besides that simplicity which we have spoken of--and we
have used the word in its technical sense, as that which keeps together
and makes one thing of many parts--there is a simplicity which is best
known by its opposite, affectation; upon this Sir Joshua enlarges.
"Simplicity, being a negative virtue, cannot be described or defined."
But it is possible, even in avoiding affectation, to convert simplicity
into the very thing we strive to avoid. N. Poussin--whom, with regard to
this virtue, he contrasts with others of the French school--Sir Joshua
considers, in his abhorrence of the affectation of his countrymen,
somewhat to approach it, by "what in writing would be called pedantry."
Du Piles is justly censured for his recipe of grace and dignity. "If,"
says he, "you draw persons of high character and dignity, they ought to
be drawn in such an attitude that the portraits must seem to speak to
us of themselves, and as it were to say to us, 'Stop, take notice of
me--I am the invincible king, surrounded by majesty.' 'I am the valiant
commander who struck terror every where,' 'I am that great minister, who
knew all the springs of politics.' 'I am that magistrate of consummate
wisdom and probity.'" This is indeed affectation, and a very vulgar
notion of greatness. We are reminded of Partridge, and his admiration of
the overacting king. All the characters in thus seeming to say, would be
little indeed. Not so Raffaelle and Titian understood grace and dignity.
Simplicity he holds to be "our barr