incipal head.

Botticelli has first the long line of the horizon echoed in the ground
at the right-hand lower corner. And then he has made a determined stand
against the flow of lines carrying you out of the picture on the right,
by putting straight, upright trees and insisting upon their
straightness.

[Illustration: Diagram XVI.

ILLUSTRATING SOME OF THE MAIN LINES ON WHICH THE RHYTHMIC UNITY OF THIS
PICTURE DEPENDS.]

[Illustration: Plate XXXVIII.

THE RAPE OF EUROPA. BY PAOLO VERONESE (VENICE)

A composition of rich full forms and rich full colour. (See the diagram
on opposite page for analysis of line rhythm.)

_Photo Anderson_]

Another rhythmic form the lines at the basis of a composition may take
is a flame-like flow of lines; curved lines meeting and parting and
meeting again, or even crossing in one continual movement onwards. A
striking instance of the use of this quality is the work of the
remarkable Spanish painter usually called El Greco, two of whose works
are here shown (page 172 [Transcribers Note: Plate XL]). Whatever may
be said by the academically minded as to the incorrectness of his
drawing, there can be no two opinions as to the remarkable rhythmic
vitality of his work. The upward flow of his lines and the flame-like
flicker of his light masses thrills one in much the same way as watching
a flaring fire. There is something exalting and stimulating in it,
although, used to excess as he sometimes uses it, it is apt to suffer
from lack of repose. Two examples of his pictures are reproduced here,
and illustrate his use of this form of movement in the lines and masses
of his compositions. Nowhere does he let the eye rest, but keeps the
same flickering movement going throughout all his masses and edges. The
extraordinary thing about this remarkable painter is that while this
restless, unrestrained form of composition makes his work akin to the
rococo work of a later period, there is a fiery earnestness and
sincerity in all he does, only to be matched among the primitive
painters of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and very different
from the false sentiment of the later school.

Blake was also fond of this flame line, but usually used it in
combination with more straight lines than the energetic Spaniard allowed
himself. Plates III and V in the Job series are good examples of his use
of this form. In both cases it will be seen that he uses it in
combination with the steadying influenc