to have been determined by
the _disposition of the people_ to whom it was addressed, and the
object of its composition to have varied with the purpose it was called
on to fulfil.--The Grecian statues were designed to excite the devotion
of a cultivated people; to embody their conceptions of divine
perfection; to realise the expression of that character of mind which
they imputed to the deities whose temples they were to adorn: It was
grace, or strength, or majesty, or the benignity of divine power, which
they were to represent by the figures of Venus, of Hercules, of Jupiter,
or of Apollo. Their artists accordingly were led to aim at the
expression of _general character_; to exclude passion, or emotion, or
suffering, from their design, and represent the figures in that state of
repose where the permanent expression of mind ought to be displayed. It
is perhaps in this circumstance that we are to discern the cause both of
the peculiarity and the excellence of the Grecian statuary.

The Italian painters were early required to effect a different object.
Their pictures were destined to represent the sufferings of nature; to
display the persecution or death of our Saviour, the anguish of the Holy
Family, the heroism of martyrs, the resignation of devotion. In the
infancy of the arts, accordingly, they were led to study the expression
of passion, of suffering, and of temporary emotion; to aim at rousing
the pity, or exciting the sympathy, of the spectators; and to endeavour
to characterise their works by the representation of temporary passion,
not the expression of permanent character. Those beautiful pictures in
which a different object seems to have been followed--in which the
expression is that of permanent emotion, not transient passion, while
they captivate our admiration, seem to be exceptions from the general
design, and to have been suggested by the peculiar nature of the subject
represented, or a particular firmness of mind in the artist. In these
causes we may perhaps discern the origin of the peculiar character of
the Italian school.

In the French school, the character and manners of the people seem to
have carried this peculiarity to a still greater length. Their character
led them to seek in every thing for stage effect; to admire the most
extravagant and violent representations, and to value the efforts of
art, not in proportion to their imitation of the expressions of nature,
but in proportion to their resemb