life are those into which I threw most
trouble and labour, and I confess I should not grieve were half my works
to go to the bottom of the Atlantic--if I might choose the half to go.
Sometimes as I paint I may find my work becoming laborious; but as soon
as I detect any evidence of that labour I paint the whole thing out
without more ado.

_Millais._

[Illustration: _Millais_ LOVE _By permission of F. Warne & Co._]

XCVI

I think that a work of art should not only be careful and sincere, but
that the care and sincerity should also be evident. No ugly smears
should be allowed to do duty for the swiftness which comes from long
practice, or to find excuse in the necessity which the accomplished
artist feels to speak distinctly. That necessity must never receive
impulse from a desire to produce an effect on the walls of a gallery:
there is much danger of this working _un_consciously in the accomplished
artist, _consciously_ in the student.

_Watts._

XCVII

Real effect is making out the parts. Why are we to be told that masters,
who could think, had not the judgment to perform the inferior parts of
art? (as Reynolds artfully calls them); that we are to learn to _think_
from great masters, and to perform from underlings--to learn to design
from Raphael, and to execute from Rubens?

_Blake._

XCVIII

If I knew that my portrait was still at Antwerp, I would have it kept
back for the case to be opened, so that one could see that it had not
been hurt by so long a time spent in a case without being exposed to the
air, and that, as often happens to colours freshly put on, it has not
turned rather yellow, thereby losing all its first effect. The remedy,
if this has happened, is to expose it repeatedly to the sun, the rays of
which absorb the superfluity of oil which causes this change; and if at
any time it still turns brown, it must be exposed afresh to the sun.
Warmth is the only remedy for this serious mischief.

_Rubens._

EFFECTS OF TIME ON PAINTING

XCIX

The only way to judge of the treasures the Old Masters of whatever age
have left us--whether in architecture, sculpture, or painting--with any
hope of sound deduction, is to look at the work and ask oneself--"What
was that like when it was new?" The Elgin Marbles are allowed by common
consent to be the perfection of art. But how much of our feeling of
reverence is inspired by time? Imagine the Parthenon as it must have
looked with the frie