Note 81 — HOGARTH. (continued 2)

"They abound," says an excellent judge, "in true humour; and satire, which is generally well-directed: they are admirable moral lessons, and afford a fund of entertainment suited to every taste: a circumstance, which shews them to be just copies of nature." We may consider them too as valuable repositories of the manners, customs, and dresses of the present age. What amusement would a collection of this kind afford, drawn from every period of the history of Britain!—How far the works of Hogarth will bear a critical examination, may be the subject of a little more enquiry. In design Hogarth was seldom at a loss. His invention was fertile, and his judgement accurate. An improper incident is rarely introduced; a proper one rarely omitted. No one could tell a story better; or make it, in all its circumstances, more intelligible. His genius, however, it must be owned, was suited only to low, or familiar subjects. It never soared above common life: to subjects naturally sublime, or which from antiquity, or other accidents, borrowed dignity, he could not rise. In composition we see little in him to admire. In many of his prints, the deficiency is so great, as plainly to imply a want of all principle; which makes us ready to believe, that when we do meet with a beautiful group, it is the effect of chance. In one of his minor works, the Idle Prentice, we seldom see a crowd more beautifully managed, than in the last print. If the sheriff's officers had not been placed in a line, and had been brought a little lower in the picture, so as to have formed a pyramid with the cart, the composition had been unexceptionable: and yet the first print of this work is so striking an instance of disagreeable composition, that it is amazing, how an artist, who had any idea of beautiful forms, could suffer so unmasterly a performance to leave his hands. Of the distribution of light Hogarth had as little knowledge as of composition. In some of his pieces we see a good effect; as in the execution just mentioned; in which, if the figures at the right and left corners had been kept down a little, the light would have been beautifully distributed on the fore-ground, and a little fine secondary light spread over part of the crowd: but at the same time there is so obvious a deficiency in point of effect, in most of his prints, that it is very evident he had no principles. Neither was Hogarth a master in drawing. Of the muscles and anatomy of the head and hands he had perfect knowledge; but his trunks are often badly moulded, and his limbs ill set on. I tax him with plain bad drawing; I speak not of the niceties of anatomy, and elegance of outline: of these indeed he knew nothing; nor were they of use in that mode of design which he cultivated: and yet his figures, upon the whole, are inspired with so much life and meaning, that the eye is kept in good humour, in spite of its inclination to find fault. The author of the Analysis of Beauty, it might be supposed, would have given us more instances of grace, than we find in the works of Hogarth; which shews strongly that theory and practice are not always united. Many opportunities his subjects naturally afford of introducing graceful attitudes; and yet we have very few examples of them. With instances of picturesque grace his works abound. Of his expression, in which the force of his genius lay, we cannot speak in terms too high. In every mode of it he was truly excellent. The passions he thoroughly understood, and all the effects which they produce in every part of the human frame: he had the happy art also of conveying his ideas with the same precision with which he conceived them.—He was excellent too in expressing any humorous oddity, which we often see stamped upon the human face. All his heads are cast in the very mould of nature. Hence that endless variety, which is displayed through his works: and hence it is, that the difference arises between his heads, and the affected caricaturas of those masters, who have sometimes amused themselves with patching together an assemblage of features from their own ideas. Such are Spagniolet's; which, though admirably executed, appear plainly to have no archetypes in nature. Hogarth's, on the other hand, are collections of natural curiosities. The Oxford-heads, the physicians-arms, and some of his other pieces, are expressly of this humorous kind. They are truly comic; though ill-natured effusions of mirth: more entertaining than Spagniolet's, as they are pure nature; but less innocent, as they contain ill-directed ridicule.—But the species of expression, in which this master perhaps most excels, is that happy art of catching those peculiarities of air, and gesture, which the ridiculous part of every profession contract; and which, for that reason, become characteristics of the whole. His counsellors, his undertakers, his lawyers, his usurers, are all conspicuous at sight. In a word, almost every profession may see, in his works, that particular species of affectation which they should most endeavour to avoid. The execution of this master is well-suited to his subjects, and manner of treating them. He etches with great spirit; and never gives one unnecessary stroke. For myself, I greatly more value the works of his own needle, than those high-finished prints on which he employed other engravers. For as the production of an effect is not his talent; and as this is the chief excellence of high finishing; his own rough manner is certainly preferable; in which we have most of the force and spirit of his expression. The manner in none of his works pleases me so well as in a small print of a corner of a play-house. There is more spirit in a work of this kind, struck off at once, warm from the imagination, than in all the cold correctness of an elaborate engraving. If all his works had been executed in this style, with a few improvements in the compositions, and the management of light, they would certainly have been a much more valuable collection of prints than they are. The Rake's Progress, and some of his other works, are both etched and engraved by himself: they are well done; but it is plain he meant them as furniture. As works designed for a critick's eye, they would certainly have been better without the engraving, except a few touches in a very few places. The want of effect too would have been less conspicuous, which in his highest-finished prints is disagreeably striking." Gilpin, Essay on Prints, p. 165.