But to return to Sir Joshua. He conferred upon
his profession not more benefit by his writings and paintings, than by
his manners and conduct. To say that they were irreproachable would be
to say little--they were such as to render him an object of love and
respect. He adorned a society at that time remarkable for men of wit and
wisdom. He knew that refinement was necessary for his profession, and he
studiously cultivated it--so studiously, that he brought a portion of
his own into that society from which he had gathered much. He abhorred
what was low in thought, in manners, and in art. And thus he tutored his
genius, which was great rather from the cultivation of his judgment, by
incessantly exercising his good sense upon the task before him, than
from any innate very vigorous power. He thought prudence the best guide
of life, and his mind was not of an eccentric daring, to rush heedlessly
beyond the bounds of discretion. And this was no small proof of his good
sense; when the prejudice of the age in which he lived was prone to
consider eccentricity as a mark of genius; and genius itself,
inconsistently with the very term of a silly admiration, an
_inspiration_, that necessarily brought with it carelessness and
profligacy. By his polished manners, his manly virtues, and his
prudential views, which mainly formed his taste, and enabled him to
disseminate taste, Sir Joshua rescued art from this degrading prejudice,
which, while it flattered vanity and excused vice, made the objects of
the flattery contemptible and inexcusable. If genius be a gift, it is
one that passes through the mind, and takes its colour; the love of all
that is pure, and good, and great, can alone invest genius with that
habit of thought which, applied to practice, makes the perfect painter.
Castiglione considered painting the proper acquirement of the perfect
gentleman--Sir Joshua Reynolds thought that to be in mind and manners
the "gentlemen," was as necessary to perfect the painter. The friend of
Johnson and Burke, and of all persons of that brilliant age,
distinguished by abilities and worth, was no common man. In raising
himself, he was ever mindful to raise the art to which he had devoted
himself, in general estimation.

We have noticed a charge against the writer of the Discourses, that he
did not pursue that great style which he so earnestly recommended.
Besides that this is not quite true--for he unquestionably did adopt so
much of the great