Note 21 — Chapter II

It is worth notice, that Ratti, persuaded of Coreggio's residence at Rome, has availed himself of the argument of certain figures being borrowed by him from the Judgment, before Michel Angiolo had painted it. Equally valid is his conjecture, founded upon several figures of Raffaello's, which he detected in Coreggio, as if these two artists had never studied from the same book of nature. Such an opinion is asserted also by Padre della Valle, cited in our second volume, p. 121. But writers will always be liable to these mistakes, as long as they pretend to make discoveries and throw light upon ancient facts, without adhering to historical dates, and in their conjectures rather consult novelty and their own vanity than truth. But this fault, brought into vogue about the middle of the eighteenth century, has produced no little evil, both in letters and religion, and surely cannot continue to receive encouragement at this enlightened period. Let us rather trust, that the love of truth, never altogether extinguished, will resume its former influence in the investigation of historical points, and that one of its leading objects will be to free both sacred and profane history from those foolish sophisms that so much obscure it.