Anecdotes of William Hogarth, by William Hogarth  

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Anecdotes of William Hogarth, by William Hogarth is a book written by William Hogarth

PREFACE.

THE productions of the satirical and humorous pencil of Hogarth, will ever continue to be studied and admired : they are for all time. It was well observed by M. Bartsch : " Hogarth, who may, in more than one respect, be compared to Aristophanes, introduced genuine Comedy into Painting, and delineated the manners of his countrymen in a true, attractive, and instructive manner, and not unfrequently with considerable pathos. One considers him as a great sa- tiric author, who described the follies and vices of his age with the pencil and the burin." And our ingenious coun- tryman, Mr. Lamb, thus places him in the first rank of AUTHORS : "I was pleased with the reply of a gentleman, who, being asked which book he esteemed most in his library, answered Shakspeare* : being asked which he esteemed next best, replied < Hogarth.' His graphic repre- sentations are indeed BOOKS : they have the teeming, fruit- ful, suggestive meaning of words. Other pictures we look at his prints we read."

Mr. George Steevens, one of the earliest and ablest com- mentators on Hogarth, judiciously remarks : " Of all his fraternity, whether ancient or modern, Hogarth bent the keenest eye on the follies and vices of mankind, and ex-

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iv PREFACE.

pressed them with a degree of variety and force, which it would be vain to seek among the satiric compositions of any other painter. In short, what is observed by Hamlet con- cerning a player's office, may, with some few exceptions, be applied to the designs of Hogarth ' Their end, both at ' first and now, was, and is, to hold as 'twere the mirror up ' to Nature j to shew Virtue her own feature, Scorn her ' own image, and the very age and body of the time his

• form and pressure.' "

The works of Hogarth are, indeed, generally allowed to have a moral tendency, by painting Vice in those true and disgusting colours which, by leading the mind to reflection, will induce it to embrace with zeal the cause of Virtue. Anecdotes of his life and character, the object and the consequence of his performances, become, therefore, proper and indispensable subjects of animadversion and critical at- tention ; and these have accordingly exercised the pens of several eminent individuals.

The first commentator was Dr. Trusler, who was assisted by Mrs. Hogarth. The Doctor's object was to present the reader with concise and comprehensive explanations of the moral tendency of Hogarth's works ; and to excite in young persons a just dread of the rocks and quicksands of life. This volume having become rare and valuable, a highly im- proved edition has lately been published by Mr. Major. This edition has the advantage of a new set of plates, which, when the diminutive size is considered, will be found to have preserved, in an uncommon degree, the original spirit and manner of Hogarth. It is also enriched with many va- luable additional notes.

PREFACE. v

But the labours of Dr. Trusler being confined to a moral commentary on about fifty only of the principal works of Hogarth (the Doctor professing no intimate acquaintance with the arts), and being deficient in Biographical Anec- dotes of the inimitable artist, the Editor of the present Volume considered that an interesting selection might be formed from the works of Walpole, Gilpin, Steevens, John Ireland, Lamb, Phillips, and other eminent biographers and critics.

The first article that forcibly struck the attention of the Editor, was Hogarth's sketch of his own life, comprehend- ing his studies, correspondence, political quarrels, &c. This interesting relic was compiled by Mr. John Ireland from Hogarth's very rough memoranda, and first published in the Third Volume of " Illustrations of Hogarth."

The refined taste and elegant diction of Mr. Walpole, ex- ercised on the works of Hogarth, deserve every commenda- tion. Selections, therefore, from his judicious remarks are included in this volume : which are followed by some perti- nent and ingenious observations from Mr. Gilpin's ' Essay on Prints."

The spirited eulogium and defence of Hogarth, by Mr. Charles Lamb, was too interesting an article not to be given entire ; and some remarks, by the late Mr. Hazlitt, on the " Marriage a la Mode," and other paintings by Hogarth, exhibited in 1814, were so masterly, that I could not resist transplanting them into this work.

A very luminous memoir of Hogarth, by Thomas Phil- lips, Esq. R.A. appeared in the last edition of Dr. Rees's

vi PREFACE.

Cyclopaedia. This eminent living artist very properly founded his memoir on Hogarth's Sketch of his own Life. Several passages from Mr. Phillips's memoir have been en- grafted into this volume ; as well as valuable criticisms from other sources.

By these various dissertations the reader cannot fail to be both delighted and instructed.

But a fuller Biographical Essay appearing to be still de- sirable, the Editor was gratified to be allowed, by Messrs. Baldwin and Cradock, to reprint, in this volume, one which was written for the edition of the " Genuine Works of Ho- garth," published under the superintendance of Messrs. Nichols and Heath. The writer of this elegant " Biogra- phical Essay" has evidently studied his subject with the strictest attention and impartiality, and gleaned many in- teresting remarks from various sources, particularly from G. C. Lichtenberg, an intelligent German commentator on Ho- garth, and a writer not sufficiently known in this country.

The Catalogue of Hogarth's Prints is much more full than any preceding list. Mr. Steevens long ago remarked, " The Collector who contents himself with the later impres- sions of Hogarth's Works, will not consult our artist's repu- tation. Those who wish to be acquainted with the whole extent of his powers, should assemble the Jirst copies, toge- ther with all the varieties of his capital works."

The Editor has, therefore, minutely noticed all the princi- pal Variations to be found in Hogarth's Plates, and has also given accounts of the various copies of his works. This labour was originally performed many years ago by examin-

PREFACE. vii

ing the collection of the late WILLIAM PACKER, Esq. since deposited in the British Museum, and in this task he was assisted by J. T. Smith, Esq. Keeper of the Prints in that national establishment. The Editor has lately had the ad- vantage of a critical examination of the collection made by the late GEORGE BARKER, Esq. of Birmingham, which was since purchased by that munificent Patron of the Arts, GEORGE THE FOURTH, and now forming the Royal Col- lection ; as also the extensive collections of HENRY PE- TER STAMDLY, Esq. of Paxton Place, near St. Neot's ; JOHN SHEEPSHANKS, Esq. of New Bond Street ; and H. R. WILLETT,* Esq. of Shooter's Hill. As opportunities of in- specting these Collections did not occur till the greater part of his volume was printed, the Editor has been compelled

• In addition to those Paintings noticed in this work as belonging to Mr.

WILLETT, he is also possessed of the following Pictures. Hudibras van- quished by Trulla, similar in design to Plate V. of " Hudibras." Happy Marriage, Plate I. engraved in S. Ireland's " Graphic Illustrations," as noticed p. 357. A very pleasing sketch, representing Florizel and Perdita, in Act IV. Sc. iii. of the *' Winter's Tale." This painting is erroneously described in p. 366, as the story of "Chrysostom and the Shepherdess Marcella." Both the pictures of Rosamond's Pond, noticed in p. 367. George the Second and Family, p. 372. A repetition of the Portrait of Lord Boyne, p. 384. Portrait of Miss Woodley, p. 886. The Portrait of Dr. Pellett is not in his possession, p. 386. The Portrait of Bullock the Co- median, p. 387, was presented by Mr. Willett to Charles Mathews, Esq. the celebrated comedian, who also possesses the portrait of Quin, p. 337. Mr. Willett has also the Drawing of Paul before Felix, noticed in p. 397.

In a sale by auction, by Mr. W. Richardson, June 30, 18J3, occurs a picture representing a Musical Party, in which were " introduced the Por- traits of the Duke of Bnlton, Miss Fenton, &c., the same subject as Mar- riage- a-la-Mode, PI. IV., but differently treated."

viii PREFACE.

to give his remarks as " Additions" to the Catalogue. The Editor hopes his labours will be found useful to the Collec- tor, although he fears they may be considered too minute for the general reader.

At the end of the volume, the Editor has given an account of such Paintings and Drawings by Hogarth, as have come to his knowledge ; but whilst he fears that some subjects are herein described which Hogarth never saw, he doubts not very many genuine productions of his pencil are buried in private collections, and remain yet to be described.

In selecting the Embellishments, the Editor has scrupu- lously avoided all those given in Mr. Major's Edition of Dr. Trusler's " Hogarth Moralized ;" and as this volume is printed in an uniform manner, he hopes it may be considered as a necessary Supplement to that popular work.

J. B. NICHOLS.

March 1, 1833.

CONTENTS.

ANECDOTES OF WILLIAM HOGARTH, WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.

Page

CHAP. I. Hogarth's own account of his birth and early edu- cation ; reasons for his being apprenticed to a silver-plate engraver ; with which employment being disgusted, he com- mences an engraver on copper ; his method of study ; the fate of the first print he published ..... 1

CHAP. II. Marries : paints small conversations, which sub- jects he quits for familiar prints ; attempts history ; but find- ing it not encouraged in England, returns to engraving from his own designs. Occasionally takes portraits as large as life, for which he incurs much abuse. To prove his powers and vindicate his fame, paints the admirable portrait of Cap- tain Coram, and presents it to the Foundling Hospital . 8

CHAP. III. Of Academies ; Hogarth's opinion of that now denominated Royal ; and of the Society for the Encourage- ment of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, giving pre- miums for pictures and drawings . . . . .24

CHAP. IV. The motives by which Hogarth was induced to publish his Analysis of Beauty ; the abuse it drew upon him, and his vindication of himself and his work . . .43 b

x CONTENTS.

Page

CHAP. V. Hogarth's inducement to paint the picture of Si- gismunda. His correspondence with Lord Grosvenor on the subject ; contrasted by two letters from Lord Charlemont, for whom he had previously painted an interesting scene. Origin of the quarrel with Wilkes and Churchill, which gave rise to the print of the Bear, &c . . . . .51

Remarks by Hogarth, on various Prints . . . .60

Criticisms on Hogarth :

1. By Hon. Horace Walpole 68

fi. By Rev. W. Gilpin 74

3. By John Ireland, Esq. 77

4. By James Christie, Esq 80

5. By Thomas Phillips, Esq. R. A. . . . . .81

6. By Richard Payne Knight, Esq 85

7. By John Britton, Esq. F.S.A 86

8. By Allan Cunningham, Esq. 87

9. By Win. Hazlitt, Esq. *87

Essay on the Genius and Character of Hogarth. By Charles Lamb, Esq. ........ 91

Biographical Essay on the Genius and Works of Hogarth . 118 A Chronological Catalogue of Hogarth's Prints. With an

Account of the Variations and Principal Copies . 159 305 A Catalogue of Prints ascribed to Hogarth . . . 306

Additions to, with remarks on, the preceding Catalogue of

Hogarth's Prints 317

List of Prints published to ridicule Hogarth's Works . 346

Account of Paintings by Hogarth . . . . .349

Account of Drawings by Hogarth 390

Collectors of Hogarth's Works 407

Index to the Catalogue of Hogarth's Prints . . .410 Index to the Account of Paintings . . . . .414 Index to the Account of Drawings . . . . / . 416

LIST OF PLATES.

Page

1. Rape of the Lock . 160

2. The Dance, from De la Mortraye's Travels . . 161

3. Farinelli, Cuzzoni, and Senesino .... 165

4. Frontispiece to Terrse Filius 166

5. Large Masquerade Ticket 170

6. The Man of Taste 176

7- Portrait of Sarah Malcolm 1JT8

8. The Matchmaker and Old Maid , 193

9. The Parson's Head . . . . . . .194

10. Woman swearing a Child to a grave Citizen . . 195

11. Don Quixote, Plate 1 203

12. - Plate II 204

13. - - Plate III ift.

14. - - Plate IV ib..

15. - - Plate V 205

16. - - Plate VI. ...... ib.

17. - Plate VII 206

18. - - Plate VIII ib.

19. Sancho's Feast, Plate IX .207

20. The Foundlings .208

21. Portrait of Captain Coram 232

22. Characters and Caricaturas . . . . .214

23. Battle of the Pictures 218

24. Portrait of Lord Lovat 219

25. Mr. Garrick, in the character of Richard the Third . 220

xii LIST OF PLATES.

PagO

26. Profiles of Garrick and Hogarth (Frontispiece) . . 230

27. First Stage of Cruelty 234

28. Second Stage of Cruelty 235

29. Cruelty in Perfection 236

30. Reward of Cruelty 237

31. Paul before Felix burlesqued . . . . . 239

32. Paul before Felix 240

33. The same with fewer figures 241

34. Moses brought to Pharoah's Daughter . . . 242

35. The Bench 250

36. Frontispiece to Brook Taylor's " Perspective of Archi-

tecture" ........ 252

37. Frontispiece to the Artist's Catalogue . . . 253

38. Tail-piece to ditto 254

39. Time smoking a Picture 255

40. The five Orders of Periwigs 257

41. Enthusiasm delineated 259

42. Credulity, Superstition, and Fanaticism, a Medley . 262

43. The Times, Plate I. 265

44. - - Plate II. 267

45. Portrait of Henry Fielding 269

46. The Sepulchre . 276

47. Sigismunda, by Hogarth . . . . 379

48. - - byCorreggio . . - . . .281

ANECDOTES

OF

WILLIAM HOGARTH,

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF.

CHAPTER I.

Hogarth's own account of his birth and early education ; reasons for his being apprenticed to a silver-plate engraver ; with which employment becoming disgusted, he commences an engraver on copper ; his method of study ; the fate of the first print he published.

I WAS born in the City of London, on the 10th day of November 1697, and baptized the 28th of the same month. My father's pen, like that of many other authors, did not enable him to do more than put me in a way of shifting for myself. As I had naturally a good eye, and a fondness for drawing, shows of all sorts gave me uncommon pleasure when an infant; and mimickry, common to all children, was remarkable in me. An early access to a neighbouring painter, drew my attention from play; and I was, at every possible opportunity, employed in making drawings. I picked up an acquaintance of the same turn, and soon learnt to draw the alphabet with great correctness. My exercises when at school were more remarkable for the or-

B

2 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

naments which adorned them, than for the exercise itself. In the former I soon found that blockheads with better memories could much surpass me ; but for the latter, I was particularly distinguished.

Besides the natural turn I had for drawing rather than learning languages, I had before my eyes the precarious situation of men of classical education. I saw the difficulties under which my father laboured, and the many inconve- niences he endured, from his dependance being chiefly on his pen, and the cruel treatment he met with from book- sellers and printers, particularly in the affair of a Latin Dic- tionary,* the compiling of which had been a work of some years. It was deposited, in confidence, in the hands of a certain printer, and, during the time it was left, letters of approbation were received from the greatest scholars in England, Scotland, and Ireland. But these flattering tes- timonies from his acquaintance (who, as appears from their letters, which I have still by me, were of the first class, ) produced no profit to the author. It was therefore very conformable to my own wishes that I was taken from school, and served a long apprenticeship to a silver-plate engraver.

I soon found this business in every respect too limited. The paintings of St. Paul's Cathedral and Greenwich hos- pital, which were at that time going on, ran in my head ; and I determined that silver-plate engraving should be fol-

• [The Dictionary here alluded to, Mrs. Lewis, of Chiswick,

presented to me. It is a thick quarto, containing an early edition of Littleton's Dictionary, and also Robertson's Phrases ; with nu- merous corrections to each, and about 400 pages of manuscript close written. On the marginal leaf is inscribed, in Hogarth's hand-writing : " The manuscript part of this Dictionary was the work of Mr. Richard Hogarth." J. IRELAND.]

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. $

lowed no longer than necessity obliged me to it. Engrav- ing on copper was, at twenty years of age, my utmost ambi- tion. To attain this it was necessary that I should learn to draw objects something like nature, instead of the monsters of heraldry, and the common methods of study were much too tedious for one who loved his pleasure, and came so late to it j for the time necessary to learn in the usual mode, would leave me none to spare for the ordinary enjoyments of life. This led me to considering whether a shorter road than that usually travelled was not to be found. The early part of my life had been employed in a business rather detrimental than advantageous to those branches of the art which I wished to pursue, and have since professed. I had learned, by practice, to copy with tolerable exactness in the usual way ; but it occurred to me that there were many disadvantages attending this method of study, as having faulty originals, &c. and even when the pictures or prints to be imitated were by the best masters, it was little more than pouring water out of one vessel into another. Drawing in an academy, though it should be after the life, will not make the student an artist j for as the eye is often taken from the original, to draw a bit at a time, it is possible he may know no more of what he has been copying, when his work is finished, than he did before it was begun.

There may be, and I believe are, some who, like the en- grossers of deeds, copy every line without remembering a word ; and if the deed should be in law Latin, or old French, probably without understanding a word of their original. Happy is it for them ; for to retain would be in- deed dreadful.

A dull transcriber, who in copying Milton's " Paradise Lost" hath not omitted a line, has almost as much right to be

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4 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

compared to Milton, as an exact copier of a fine picture by Rubens hath to be compared to Rubens. In both cases the hand is employed about minute parts, but the mind scarcely ever embraces the whole. Besides this, there is an essential difference between the man who transcribes the deed, and he who copies the figure ; for though what i s written may be line for line the same with the original, it is not probable that this will often be the case with the copied figure j frequently far from it. Yet the performer will be much more likely to retain a recollection of his own imperfect work than of the original from which he took it.

More reasons, not necessary to enumerate, struck me as strong objections to this practice, and led me to wish that I could find the shorter path, fix forms and characters in my mind, and, instead of copying the lines, try to read the lan- guage, and if possible find the grammar of the art, by bringing into one focus the various observations I had made, and then trying by my power on the canvas, how far my plan enabled me to combine and apply them to practice.

For this purpose, I considered what various ways, and to what different purposes, the memory might be applied ; and fell upon one which I found most suitable to my situation and idle disposition.

Laying it down first as an axiom, that he who could by any means acquire and retain in his memory, perfect ideas of the subjects he meant to draw, would have as clear a knowledge of the figure, as a man who can write freely hath of the twenty -four letters of the alphabet, and their infinite combinations (each of these being composed of lines), and would consequently be an accurate designer.

This I thought my only chance for eminence, as I found that the beauty and delicacy of the stroke in engraving was

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 5

not to be learnt without much practice, and demanded a larger portion of patience than I felt myself disposed to ex- ercise. Added to this, I saw little probability of acquiring the full command of the graver, in a sufficient degree to distinguish myself in that walk ; nor was I, at twenty years of age, much disposed to enter on so barren and unprofitable a study, as that of merely making fine lines. I thought it still more unlikely, that by pursuing the common method, and copying old drawings, I could ever attain the power of making netv designs, which was my first and greatest am- bition. I therefore endeavoured to habituate myself to the exercise of a sort of technical memory ; and by repeating in my own mind, the parts of which objects were composed, I could by degrees combine and put them down with my pencil. Thus, with all the drawbacks which resulted from the circumstances I have mentioned, I had one material ad- vantage over my competitors, viz. the early habit I thus acquired of retaining in my mind's eye, without coldly copy- ing it on the spot, whatever I intended to imitate.* Some- times, but too seldom, I took the life, for correcting the parts I had not perfectly enough remembered, and then I transferred them to my compositions.

My pleasures and my studies thus going hand in hand,

• [Though averse, as he himself expresses it, to coldly copying

on the spot any objects that struck him, it was usual with him when he saw a singular character, either in the street or else- where, to pencil the leading features, and prominent markings upon his nail, and when he came home, to copy the sketch on paper, and afterwards introduce it in a print. Several of these sketches I have seen, and in them may be traced the first thoughts for many of the characters which he afterwards introduced in his works. J. IRELAND.]

6 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

the most striking objects that presented themselves, either comic or tragic, made the strongest impression on my mind; but had I not sedulously practised what I had thus acquired, I should very soon have lost the power of performing it.

Instead of burthening the memory with musty rules, or tiring the eyes with copying dry and damaged pictures, I have ever found studying from nature the shortest and safest way of attaining knowledge in my art.* By adopt- ing this method, I found a redundancy of matter continually occurring. A choice of composition was the next thing to be considered, and my constitutional idleness naturally led me to the use of such materials as I had previously col- lected ; and to this I was further induced by thinking, that if properly combined, they might be made the most useful to society in painting, although similar subjects had often failed in writing and preaching.

To return to my narrative, the instant I became master of my own time, I determined to qualify myself for engrav- ing on copper. In this I readily got employment; and fron- tispieces to books, such as prints to Hudibras, in twelves, &c. soon brought me into the way. But the tribe of book- sellers remained as my father had left them, when he died about five years before this time,f which was of an illness

• As this was the doctrine I preached as well as practised, an

arch brother of the pencil once gave it this turn ; that the only way to draw well, was not to draw at all; and on the same principle, he supposed, that if I wrote an essay on the art of swimming, I should prohibit my pupil from going into the water, until he had learnt.

f [Hudibras was published in 1726, so that his father probably died about the year 1721, leaving two daughters, Mary and Anne, besides his son William, who, on the leaf of an old memorandum

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 7

occasioned partly by the treatment he met with from this set of people, and partly by disappointment from great men's promises; so that I doubly felt this usage, which put me upon publishing on my own account. But here again I had to encounter a monopoly of printsellers, equally mean, and destructive to the ingenious j for the first plate I published, called The Taste of the Toivn* in which the reigning follies were lashed, had no sooner begun to take a run, than I found copies of it in the print-shops, vending at half-price, while the original prints were returned to me again $ and I was thus obliged to sell the plate for whatever these pirates pleased to give me, as there was no place of sale but at their

Owing to this and other circumstances, by engraving, until I was near thirty, I could do little more than maintain myself; but even then I was a punctual paymaster.

book in my possession, after mentioning the time of his own birth and baptism, thus continues,

" Mary Hogarth was born November Wth, 1699.

" Ann Hogarth, two years after in the same month.

" Taken from the Register at Great St. Bartholomew's."

J. IRELAND.]

[His sister Anne Hogarth survived till August 13, 1771. I have Hogarth's portraits of his two sisters, which have not been engraved. N.]

• [The print alluded to is The Small Masquerade Ticket, or

Burlington Gate. J. IRELAND.]

ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

CHAPTER II.

Marries : paints small Conversations, which subjects he quits for familiar prints; attempts History ; but finding it not encouraged in England, returns to engraving from his own designs. Occa- sionally takes portraits large as life, for which he incurs much abuse. To prove his powers and vindicate his fame, paints the admirable portrait of Captain Coram, and presents it to the Foundling Hospital.

I THEN married, and commenced painter of small Conver- sation pieces, from twelve to fifteen inches high. This having novelty, succeeded for a few years. But though it gave somewhat more scope to the fancy, was still but a less kind of drudgery j and as I could not bring myself to act like some of my brethren, and make it a sort of a manu- factory, to be carried on by the help of back-ground and drapery painters, it was not sufficiently profitable to pay the expenses my family required. I therefore turned my thoughts to a still more novel mode, viz. painting and en- graving modern moral subjects, a field not broken up in any country or any age.

The reasons which induced me to adopt this mode of designing were, that I thought both writers and painters had, in the historical style, totally overlooked that intermediate species of subjects, which may be placed between the sub- lime and grotesque ; I therefore wished to compose pictures on canvas, similar to representations on the stage ; and further hope that they will be tried by the same^est, and

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 9

criticised by the same criterion. Let it be observed, that I mean to speak only of those scenes where the human spe- cies are actors, and these I think have not often been de- lineated in a way of which they are worthy and capable.

In these compositions, those subjects that will both en- tertain and improve the mind, bid fair to be of the greatest public utility, and must therefore be entitled to rank in the highest class. If the execution is difficult (though that is but a secondary merit), the author has claim to a higher degree of praise. If this be admitted, comedy, in painting as well as writing, ought to be allotted the first place, as most capable of all these perfections, though the sublime, as it is called, has been opposed to it. Ocular demonstra- tion will carry more conviction to the mind of a sensible man, than all he would find in a thousand volumes ; and this has been attempted in the prints I have composed. Let the decision be left to every unprejudiced eye ; let the figures in either pictures or prints be considered as players dressed either for the sublime, for genteel comedy,* or farce, for high or low life. I have endeavoured to treat my sub- jects as a dramatic writer : my picture is my stage, and men and women my players, who by means of certain actions and gestures, are to exhibit a dumb shota.

Before I had done any thing of much consequence in this walk, I entertained some hopes of succeeding in what the puffers in books call the great style of History painting ; so that without having had a stroke of this grand business before, I quitted small portraits and familiar conversations,

• [It has been truly observed that comedy exhibits the character

of a species,; farce of an individual. Of the class in which Hogarth has a right to be placed, there can be little doubt ; Ae wrote comedies with a pencil. J. IRELAND.]

10 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

and, with a smile at my own temerity, commenced history painter, and on a great staircase at St. Bartholomew's Hos- pital, painted two Scripture stories, the Pool of Bethesda and the Good Samaritan, with figures seven feet high. These I presented to the Charity,* and thought they might serve as a specimen to $hew that, were there an inclination in England for encouraging historical pictures, such a first essay might prove the painting them more easily attainable than is generally imagined. But as religion, the great pro- moter of this style in other countries, rejected it in Eng-

• [For these pictures he was elected a governor of the Hospital.

On the top of the staircase beneath the cornice, is the follow- ing inscription. ' The historical paintings of this staircase were painted and given by Mr. William Hogarth, and the ornamental paint- ings at his expense, A. D. 1736.'

" Of the character of these paintings much need not be said ; it is evident that Hogarth himself never considered them as the fair- est fruits of his fancy, and others have treated them with still less respect. For historical and poetical subjects he seems to have possessed strong powers ; but he wanted discipline of hand, and that patient laboriousness of study, without which works of a high order are seldom achieved. He had a keen sense of character, eminent skill in grouping, and facility perhaps unrivalled in giving to his numerous figures one combined, clear, and consistent employ- ment : but of the art of elevating and ennobling he seems to have known little, and to have had no desire of learning more. The grandeur of a Macbeth or a Hamlet was not included in the the- ory which he was resolved to follow ; it took in Thersites, but left out Agamemnon. He could hold the mirror up to folly, show vice her visage till she writhed with anguish, and paint lasci- viousness as disgusting as one of Swift's Yahoos ; but the serene beauty of innocence, and the dignity of Tragic emotion, were things beyond his power, or at least beyond his ambition." CUN- NINGHAM.]

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 11

land, I was unwilling to sink into a portrait manufacturer ; and, still ambitious of being singular, dropped all expec- tations of advantage from that source, and returned to the pursuit of my former dealings with the public at large. This I found was most likely to answer my purpose, pro- vided I could strike the passions, and by small sums from many, by the sale of prints, which I could engrave from my own pictures, thus secure my property to myself.

In pursuing my studies, I made all possible use of the technical memory which I have before described, by ob- serving and endeavouring to retain in my mind lineally, such objects as best suited my purpose ; so that be where I would, while my eyes were open, I was at my studies, and acquiring something useful to my profession. By this means, whatever I saw, whether a remarkable incident, or a trifling subject, became more truly a picture than one that was drawn by a camera obscura. And thus the most striking objects, whether of beauty or deformity, were by habit the most easily im- pressed and retained in my imagination. A redundancy of matter being by this means acquired, it is natural to suppose I introduced it into my works on every occasion that I could.

By this idle way of proceeding I grew so profane as to admire nature beyond the first productions of art, and ac- knowledged I saw, or fancied, delicacies in the life, so far surpassing the utmost efforts of imitation, that when I drew the comparison in my mind, I could not help uttering blas- phemous expressions against the divinity even of Raphael Urbino, Corregio, and Michael Angelo. For this, though my brethren have most unmercifully abused me, 1 hope to be forgiven. I confess to have frequently said, that I thought the style of painting which I had adopted, ad-

V2 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

mitting that my powers were not equal to doing it justice, might one time or other come into better hands, and be made more entertaining and more useful than the eternal blazonry, and tedious repetition of hackneyed, beaten subjects, either from the Scriptures, or the old ridiculous stories of heathen gods ; as neither the religion of one or the other requires promoting among protestants, as it for- merly did in Greece, and at a later period in Rome.

For these and other heretical opinions, as I have before observed, I was deemed vain, and accused of enviously at- tempting what I was unable to execute.

The chief things that have brought much obloquy on me, are first, the attempting portrait painting ; secondly, writing the Analysis of Beauty ; thirdly, painting the picture of Sigismunda ; and fourthly, publishing the first print of the Times.

In the ensuing pages it shall be my endeavour to vindicate myself from these aspersions, and each of the subjects taken in the order they occurred, shall be occasionally interspersed with some thoughts by the way, on the state of the arts, institution of a Royal Academy, Society of Arts, &c. as being remotely, if not immediately connected with my own pursuits.

Though small whole-lengths, and prints of familiar con- versations, were my principal pursuit, yet by those who were partial to me I was sometimes employed to paint por- traits as large as life, and for this I was most barbarously abused. My opponents acknowledged, that in the particular branches to which I had devoted my attention, I had some little merit ; but as neither history nor portrait were my province, nothing but what they were pleased to term ex- treme vanity, could induce me to attempt either one or the

7

WRITTEN BVT HIMSELF. 13

other ; for it would be interfering in that branch of which I had no knowledge, and in which I had therefore no concern.

At this I was rather piqued, and as well as I could, de- fended my conduct, and explained my motives. Some part of this defence it will be necessary to repeat, and it will also be proper to recollect, that after having had my plates pirated in almost all sizes, I in 1735 applied to Parliament for redress ; and obtained it in so liberal a manner, as hath not only answered my own purpose, but made prints a considerable article in the commerce of this country ; there being now more business of this kind done here, than in Paris, or any where else, and as well.

The dealers in pictures and prints found their craft in danger, by what they called a new fangled innovation. Their trade of living and getting fortunes by the ingenuity of the industrious, has, I know, suffered much by my in- terference"; and, if the detection of this band of public cheats, and oppressors of the rising artists, be a crime, I confess myself most guilty.

To put this matter in a fair point of view, it will be necessary to state the situation of the arts and artists at this period. In doing which I shall probably differ from every other author, as I think the books hitherto written on the subject, have had a tendency to confirm prejudice and error, rather than diffuse information and truth. My notions of painting differ, not only from those who have formed their opinions from books, but from those who have taken them upon trust.

I am therefore under the necessity of submitting to the public what may possibly be deemed peculiar opinions -, but without the least hope of bringing over either men whose interests are concerned, or who implicitly rely upon the

1* ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

authority of a tribe of picture dealers, and puny judges, that delight in the marvellous, and determine to admire what they do not understand ; but I have hope of succeeding a little with such as dare to think for themselves, and can believe their own eyes.

As introductory to the subject, let us begin with consider- ing that branch of the art which is termed still life ; a species of painting which ought to be held in the lowest estimation.

Whatever is, or can be perfectly fixed, from the plainest to the most complicated object, from a bottle and glass, to a statue of the human figure, may be denominated still lifer Ship and landscape painting ought unquestionably to come into the same class ; for, if copied exactly as they chance to appear, the painters have no occasion of judgment ; yet, with those who do not consider the few talents necessary, even this tribe sometimes pass for very capital artists.

Well painted, and finely pencilled ! are phrases perpetually repeated by coach and sign painters. Merely well painted or pencilled, is chiefly the effect of much practice ; and we frequently see that those who are in these particulars very excellent, cannot advance a step further.

As to portrait painting, the chief branch of the art by which a painter can procure himself a tolerable livelihood, and the only one by which a lover of money can get a for- tune ; a man of very moderate talents may have great suc- cess in it, as the artifice and address of a mercer is infinitely more useful than the abilities of a painter. By the manner in which the present race of professors in England conduct it, that also becomes still life, as much as any of the pre- ceding. Admitting that the artist has no further view than merely copying the figure, this must be admitted to its full extent ; for the sitter ought to be still as a statue, and no

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 15

one will dispute a statue being as much still life as fruit, flowers, a gallipot, or a broken earthen pan. It must, indeed, be acknowledged, they do not seem ashamed of the title, for their figures are frequently so executed as to be as still as a post. Posture and drapery, as it is called, is usually sup- plied by a journeyman, who puts a coat, &c. on a wooden figure, like a jointed doll, which they call a layman, and copies it in every fold as it chances to come ; and all this is done at so easy a rate, as enables the principal to get more money in a week than a man of the first professional talents can in three months. If they have a sufficient quantity of silks, satins, and velvets to dress their laymen, they may thus carry on a very profitable manufactory, without a ray of genius. There is a living instance, well known to the con- noisseurs in this town, of one of the best copiers of pictures, particularly those by Rubens, who is almost an idiot.* Mere correctness, therefore, if in still life, from an apple or a rose, to the face, nay, even the whole figure, if you take it merely as it presents itself, requires only an exact eye and an adroit hand. Their pattern is before them, and much practice, with little study, is usually sufficient to bring them into high vogue. By perpetual attention to this branch only, one should imagine they would attain a certain stroke ; quite the reverse, for, though the whole business lies in an oval of four inches long, which they have before them, they

• [Hogarth may possibly allude to Ranelagh Barret, who, I

learn from Mr. Walpole, was thus employed ; and, being counte- nanced by Sir Robert Walpole, copied several of his collection, and others for the Duke of Devonshire and Dr. Mead. He was inde- fatigable, executed a vast number of works, succeeded greatly in copying Rubens, and died in 1768 : his pictures were sold by auction in the December of that year. J. IRELAND.]

16 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

are obliged to repeat and alter the eyes, mouth, and nose, three or four times, before they can make it what they think right. The little praise due to their productions ought, in most cases, to be given to the drapery man, whose pay is only one part in ten, while the other nine, as well as all the reputation, is engrossed by the master phiz -monger, for a proportion which he may complete in five or six hours ; and even this, little as it is, gives him so much importance in his own eyes, that he assumes a consequential air, sets his arms a-kimbo, and, strutting among the historical artists, cries, <( How we apples swim ! "

For men who drudge in this mechanical part, merely for gain, to commence dealers in pictures is natural. In this also, great advantage may accrue from the labour and ingenuity of others. They stand in the catalogue of paint- ers, and having little to study in their own way, become great connoisseurs ; not in the points where real perfection lies, for there they must be deficient, as their ideas have been confined to the oval j but their great inquiry is, how the old masters stand in the public estimation, that they may regu- late their prices accordingly, both in buying and selling. You may know these painter-dealers by their constant at- tendance at auctions. They collect under pretence of a love for the arts j but sell, knowing the reputation they have stamped on the commodity they have once purchased, in the opinion of the ignorant admirer of pictures, drawings, and prints j which thus warranted, almost invariably produce them treble their original purchase-money, and treble their real worth. Unsanctioned by their authority,* and unascer-

• [In part of this violent philippic, Hogarth may possibly

glance at Sir Joshua Reynolds, whom it has been said, but 1

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 17

tained by tradition, the best preserved and highest finished picture (though it should have been painted by Raphael), will not, at a public auction, produce five shillings ; while a despicable, damaged, and repaired old canvas, sanctioned by their praise, shall be purchased at any price, and find a place in the noblest collections. All this is very well understood by the dealers, who, on every occasion where their own in- terest is concerned, are wondrously loquacious in adoring the mysterious beauties ! spirited touches ! brilliant colours ! and the Lord knows what, of these ancient worn-out won- ders ; but whoever should dare to hint that (admitting them to be originally painted by Raphael) there is little left to admire in them, would be instantly stigmatized as vilifying the great masters ; and to invalidate his judgment, accused of envy and self-conceit. By these misrepre- sentations, if he has an independent fortune, he only suffers the odium ; but if a young man, without any other property than his talents, presumes boldly to give an opinion, he may be undone by his temerity j for the whole herd will unite, and try to hunt him down.

Such is the situation of the arts and artists at this time. Credulity an implicit confidence in the opinions of others and not daring to think for themselves, leads the whole town into error, and thus they become the prey of ignorant and designing knaves.

With respect to portrait painting, whatever talents a pro- fessor may have, if he is not in fashion, and cannot afford to

think unjustly, he envied. In Sir Joshua's very early pictures there is not much to envy ; they gave little promise of the taste and talents which blaze in his later works. J. IRELAND,]

c

18 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

hire a drapery-man, he will not do ; but if he is in vogue, and can employ a journeyman, and place a layman in the garret of his manufactory, his fortune is made ; and as his two coadjutors are kept in the back-ground, his own fame is established.

If a painter comes from abroad, his being an exotic will be much in his favour j and if he has address enough to per- suade the public that he had brought a new discovered mode of colouring, and paints his faces all red, all blue, or all pur- pie, he has nothing to do but to hire one of these painted tailors as an assistant, for without him the manufactory can- not go on, and my life for his success.

Vanloo, a French portrait painter, being told that the English were to be cajoled by any one who had a sufficient portion of assurance, came to this country,* set his trum- peters to work, and by the assistance of puffing, monopolized all the people of fashion in the kingdom. Down went at once *, *, *, *, *, &c. &c. &c. painters who, before his arrival, were highly fashionable and eminent ; but by this foreign interloper were driven into the greatest distress and poverty.

By this inundation of folly and fuss, I must confess, I was much disgusted, and determined to try if by any means I could stem the torrent, and by opposing end it. I laughed at the pretensions of these quacks in colouring, ridiculed their productions as feeble and contemptible, and asserted that it required neither taste nor talents to excel their most popular performances. This interference excited much en- mity, because, as my opponents told me, my studies were in another way, You talk, added they, with ineffable con-

• [Vanloo came to England, with his son, in 1/37. WALPOLE'S

ANECDOTES.]

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 19

tempt of portrait painting ; if it is so easy a task, why do not you convince the world by painting a portrait yourself. Provoked at this language, I one day, at the Academy in St. Martin's-lane, put the following question : Supposing any man at this time were to paint a portrait as well as Vandyke, would it be seen or acknowledged, and could the artist en- joy the benefit, or acquire the reputation, due to his per- formance ?

They asked me, in reply, if I could paint one as well ? and I frankly answered, " I believed I could." My query as to the credit I should obtain if I did, was replied to by Mr. Ram- say, and confirmed by the president and about twenty mem- bers present : " Our opinions must be consulted, and we will never allow it." Piqued at this cavalier treatment, I resolved to try my own powers, and if I did what I at- tempted, determined to affirm that I had done it. In this decided manner I had a habit of speaking, and if I only did myself justice, to have adopted half words would have been affectation. Vanity, as I understand it, consists in affirm- ing you have done that which you have not done, not in frankly asserting what you are convinced is truth.

A watchmaker may say, " The watch which I have made for you, is as good as Quare, or Tompion, or any other man could have made." If it really is so, he is neither called vain, nor branded with infamy, but deemed an honest and fair man, for being as good as his word. Why should not the same privilege be allowed to a painter ? The modern artist, though he will not warrant his works as the watch- maker, has the impudence to demand twice as much money for painting them, as was charged by those whom he ac- knowledges his superiors in the art.

Of the mighty talents said to be requisite for portrait c2

20 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

painting, I had not the most exalted opinion, and thought that, if I chose to practice in this branch, I could at least equal my contemporaries, for whose glittering productions I really had not much reverence. In answer to this, there are who will say with Peachum in the play, " all professions berogue one another" but let it be taken into the account, that men with the same pursuits are naturally rivals, and when put in competition with each other, must necessarily be so : what racer ever wished that his opponent might outrun him ? what boxer ever chose to be beat in pure com- plaisance to his antagonist ? The artist who pretends to be pleased and gratified when he sees himself excelled by his competitor, must have lost all reverence for truth, or be totally dead to that spirit which I believe to be one great source of excellence in all human attempts j and if he is so polite and civil, as to confess superiority in one he knows to be his inferior, he must be either a fool or an hypocrite ; perhaps both. If he has temper enough to be silent, it is surely sufficient j but this I have seldom seen, even amongst the most complaisant and liberal of the faculty.

Those who will honestly speak their feelings must confess that all this is natural to man ; one of the highest gratifica- tions of superiority, arises from the pleasure which attends instructing men who do not know so much as ourselves j but when they verge on being rivals, the pleasure in a de- gree ceases. Hence the story of Rubens advising Vandyke to paint horses and faces, to prevent, as it is said, his being put in competition with himself in history painting. Had either of these great artists lived in England at this time, they would have found men of very moderate parts mere face painters, who, if they chanced to be in vogue, might with ease get a thousand a year ; when they, with all their talents, would scarcely have found employment.^

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 27

To return to my dispute with Mr. Ramsay, on the abili- ties necessary for portrait painting ; as I found the per- formances of professors in this branch of the art were held in such estimation, I determined to have a brush at it. I had occasionally painted portraits, but as they required constant practice to take a likeness with facility, and the life must not be rigidly followed, my portraitures met with a fate somewhat similar to those of Rembrandt. By some they were said to be nature itself, by others declared most execrable ; so that time only can decide whether I was the best or the worst face painter of my day ; for a medium was never so much as suggested.

The portrait which I painted with most pleasure, and in which I particularly wished to excel, was that of Captain Coram, for the Foundling Hospital ; and if I am so wretched an artist as my enemies assert, it is somewhat strange that this, which was one of the first I painted the size of life, should stand the test of twenty years competition, and be generally thought the best portrait in the place, notwith- standing the first painters in the kingdom exerted all their talents to vie with it.* To this I refer Mr. Rams- eye, f and his quick-sighted and impartial coadjutors.

• [The rival portraits here alluded to, are, George the Second,

patron of the foundation, by Shackleton ; Lord Dartmouth, one of the vice-presidents, by Mr. Reynolds (afterwards Sir Joshua) ; Taylor White, treasurer of the hospital, in crayons, by Coates ; Mr. Milner and Mr. Jackson, by Hudson ; Dr. Mead, by Ram- say ; Mr. Emmerson, by Highmore ; and Francis Fauquier, Esq, by Wilson. To say that it is superior to these, is but slight praise ; independent of this relative superiority, it will not be easy to point out a better painted portrait. The head, which is marked with uncommon benevolence, was, in 1739, engraved in mezzo- tinto, by M'Ardell. J. IRELAND.]

t [Thus does Hogarth pun upon the name of Mr. Ramsay, who

22 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

For the portrait of Mr. Garrick in Richard III. I was paid two hundred pounds (which was more than any Eng- lish artist ever received for a single portrait), and that too by the sanction of several painters who had been previously consulted about the price, which was not given without mature consideration.

Notwithstanding all this, the current remark was, that portraits were not my province; and I was tempted to abandon the only lucrative branch of my art, for the prac- tice brought the whole nest of phizmongers on my back, where they buzzed like so many hornets. All these people have their friends, whom they incessantly teach to call my women harlots, my Essay on Beauty borrowed, and my composition and engraving contemptible.

This so much disgusted me, that I sometimes declared I would never paint another portrait, and frequently refused when applied to ; for I found by mortifying experience, that whoever would succeed in this branch, must adopt the mode recommended in one of Gay's fables, and make divinities of all who sit to him.* Whether or not this childish affecta-

he seems to think peered too closely into his prints ; though he acknowledges, that in a book entitled the Investigator, Ramsay has treated him with more candour than any of his other oppo- nents. J. IRELAND.]

• [The fable here alluded to, is entitled, a Painter who pleased

every body and nobody.

" So very like a painter drew,

That every eye the picture knew. His honest pencil touch'd with truth, And mark'd the date of age and youth ;" But see the consequence,

" In dusty piles his pictures lay, For no one sent the second pay/'

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 23

lion will ever be done away, is a doubtful question ; none of those who have attempted to reform it have yet suc- ceeded j nor, unless portrait painters in general become more honest, and their customers less vain, is there much reason to expect they ever will.

Finding the result of truth so unpropitious to his fame and for- tune, he changed his practice ;

" Two bustos fraught with every grace, A Venus, and Apollo's, face, He placed in view ; resolv'd to please, Whoever sat, he drew from these." This succeeded to a tittle,

" Through all the town his art they prais'd, His custom grew, his price was rais'd." J .IRELAND.}

24 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

CHAPTER III.

Of Academies ; Hogarth's opinion of that now denominated Royal ; and of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, giving premiums for pictures and drawings.

JVlUCH has been said about the immense benefit likely to result from the establishment of an Academy in this country, but as I do not see it in the same light with many of my contemporaries, I shall take the freedom of making my ob- jections to the plan on which they propose forming it j and as a sort of preliminary to the subject, state some slight particulars concerning the fate of former attempts at similar establishments.

The first place of this sort was in Queen-street, about sixty years ago ; it was begun by some gentlemen-painters of the first rank, who in their general forms imitated the plan of that in France, but conducted their business with far less fuss and solemnity j yet the little that there was, in a very short time became the object of ridicule. Jea- lousies arose, parties were formed, and the president and all his adherents found themselves comically represented, as marching in ridiculous procession round the walls of the room. The first proprietors soon put a padlock on the door ; the rest, by their right as subscribers, did the same, and thus ended this academy.

Sir James Thornhill, at the head of one of these parties, then set up another in a room he built at the back of his

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 25

own house, now next the playhouse, and furnished tickets gratis to all that required admission j but so few would lay themselves under such an obligation, that this also soon sunk into insignificance. Mr. Vanderbank headed the re- bellious party, and converted an old Presbyterian meeting- house into an academy, with the addition of a woman figure, to make it the more inviting to subscribers. This lasted a few years ; but the treasurer sinking the subscription money, the lamp, stove, &c. were seized for rent j and that also dropped.

Sir James dying, I became possessed of his neglected ap* paratus ; and thinking that an Academy conducted on pro- per and moderate principles had some use, proposed that a number of artists should enter into a subscription for the hire of a place large enough to admit thirty or forty people to draw after a naked figure. This was soon agreed to, and a room taken in St. Martin's Lane. To serve the society, I lent them the furniture which had belonged to Sir James Thornhill's academy and as I attributed the failure of that and Mr. Vanderbank's to the leading members assuming a su- periority which their fellow-students could not brook, I pro- posed that every member should contribute an equal sum to the establishment, and have an equal right to vote in every question relative to the society. As to electing presidents, directors, professors, &c. I considered it as a ridiculous imi- tation of the foolish parade of the French Academy, by the establishment of which Louis XIV. got a large portion o>f fame and flattery on very easy terms. But I could never learn that the arts were benefited, or that members acquired any other advantages than what arose to a few leaders from their paltry salaries, not more I am told than fifty pounds a yearj which, as must always be the case, were engrossed

26 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

by those who had most influence, without any regard to their relative merit. As a proof of the little benefit the arts derived from this Royal Academy, Voltaire asserts that, after its establishment, no one work of genius appeared in the country ; the whole band, adds the same lively and sen- sible writer, became mannerists and imitators.* It may be said in answer to this, that all painting is but imitation : granted ; but if we go no further than copying what has been done before, without entering into the spirit, causes, and effects, what are we doing ? If we vary from our ori- ginal, we fall off from it, and it ceases to be a copy ; and if we strictly adhere to it, we can have no hopes of getting beyond it j for if two men ride on a horse, one of them must be behind.

To return to our own Academy j by the regulations I have mentioned of a general equality, &c., it has now subsisted near thirty years ; and is, to every useful purpose, equal to that in France, or any other j but this does not satisfy. The members finding his present Majesty's partiality to the arts, met at the Turk's Head in Gerrard-street, Soho ; laid out the public money in advertisements, to call all sorts of artists together ; and have resolved to draw up and present a ridiculous address to King, Lords, and Commons, to do for them, what they have (as well as it can be) done for them- selves. Thus to pester the three great estates of the em- pire, about twenty or thirty students drawing after a man or a horse, appears, as it must be acknowledged, foolish enough ; but the real motive is, that a few bustling cha-

• [Louis XIV. founded an academy for the French at Rome ;

but Poussin and Le Sueur, painters who have done the most credit to France, were prior to the establishment. J. IRELAND.]

7

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 27

raeters, who have access to people of rank, think they can thus get a superiority over their brethren, be appointed to places, and have salaries as in France, for telling a lad when an arm or a leg is too long or too short.

Not approving of this plan, I opposed it; and having re- fused to assign to the society the property which I had be- fore lent them, I am accused of acrimony, ill nature, and spleen, and held forth as an enemy to the arts and artists. How far their mighty project will succeed, I neither know nor care ; certain I am it deserves to be laughed at, and laughed at it has been. The business rests in the breast of Majesty, and the simple question now is, whether he will do, what Sir James Thornhill did before him, i. e. establish an Academy, with the little addition of a royal name, and salaries for those professors who can make most interest and obtain the greatest patronage. As his Majesty's beneficence to the arts will unquestionably induce him to do that which he thinks most likely to promote them, would it not be more useful, if he were to furnish his own gallery with one pic- ture by each of the most eminent painters among his own subjects ? This might possibly set an example to a few of the opulent nobility ; but, even then, it is to be feared that there never can be a market in this country for the great number of works which, by encouraging parents to place their children in this line, it would probably cause to be painted. The world is already glutted with these commodi- ties, which do not perish fast enough to want such a supply.

In answer to this, and other objections which I have sometimes made to those who display so much zeal for in- creasing learners, and crowding the profession, I am asked, if I consider what the arts were in Greece ? what immense benefits accrued to the city of Rome from the possession of

28 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

their works ? and what advantages the people of France derive from the encouragement given by their Royal Aca- demy ? it is added, why cannot we have one on the same principles? That we may not be led away by sounds without meaning, let us take a cursory view of these things separately, and in the same order that they occurred.

The height to which the arts were carried in Greece, was owing to a variety of causes, concerning some of which we can now only form conjectures. They made a part of their system of government, and were connected with their modes of worship. Their temples were crowded with deities of their own manufacture, and in places of public resort were depicted such actions of their fellow-citizens, as deserved commemoration, which being displayed in a language legi- ble to all, incited the spectator to emulate the virtues they represented. The artists who Could perform such wonders, were held in an estimation of which we can hardly form an idea ; and could we ascertain the rewards they received, I think it would be found that they were most liberally paid for their works, and might therefore devote much more time than we can afford, to rendering them perfect.

With air this, even there, the arts had but a slow rise; and when they had attained their highest state of perfection, the Romans (having previously plundered and butchered their own neighbours) attacked and conquered the Greeks, and robbed them also of their portable treasures, parti- cularly their statues and pictures.* To sculpture and

• Of the estimation in which they were held, and the taste with

which they were contemplated by the Romans, we may form some judgment, by a general assuring a soldier, to whom he gave in charge a statue, which was the work of Praxiteles, that if he broke it, he should get another as good made in its place.

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 29

painting, war is a most destructive enemy the rage of con- quest, civil broils, and intestine quarrels, necessarily put a stop to the exercise of the imitative arts, which lay in a dormant state until they were revived by the introduction of a new religion ; this, in the magnificent style it was there brought forward, called upon sculpture and painting for their auxiliary aid. The admirable specimens that, during the perturbed period above alluded to, had been hidden in the earth, were now restored to light, eagerly sought for, and in some cases appropriated to purposes diametrically opposite to their pagan origin. Even those that were mu- tilated, were held in the most enthusiastic admiration. The Torso, and many other inimitable specimens, prove that their admiration was just. The contemplation of such works would naturally produce imitators, who in time rivalled, but never could equal, their originals. These remains of ancient grandeur being thus added to their new productions, and both interwoven, forming a sort of ornamental fringe to their gaudy religion, Rome became a kind of puppet-show to the rest of Europe ; and, whatever it might be to their visitors, was certainly very advantageous to themselves. The arts are much indebted to Popery, and that religion owes much of its universality to the arts.

France, ever aping the magnificence of other nations, has in its turn assumed a foppish kind of splendour sufficient to dazzle the eyes of the neighbouring states, and draw vast sums of money from this country. We cannot vie with these Italian and Gallic theatres of art, and to enter into competition with them is ridiculous ; we are a commercial people, and can purchase their curiosities ready made, as in fact we do, and thereby prevent their thriving in our native

30 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

clime. If I may be permitted to compare great things with small, this nation labours under similar disadvantage to the playhouse in Goodman's Fields, which, though it might in- jure, could never rival, the two established theatres, so much more properly situated, in any degree material to itself.

In Holland, selfishness is the ruling passion in England, vanity is united with it. Portrait painting therefore ever has, and ever will succeed better in this Country than in any other ; the demand will be as constant as new faces arise j and with this we must be contented, for it will be in vain to attempt to force what can never be accomplished ; or at least can never be accomplished by such institutions as Royal Academies on the system now in agitation. Upon the whole, it must be acknowledged that the artists and the age are fitted for each other. If hereafter the times alter, the arts, like water, will find their level.

Among other causes that militate against either painting or sculpture succeeding in this nation, we must place our religion ; which, inculcating unadorned simplicity, doth not require, nay absolutely forbids, images for worship, or pic- tures to excite enthusiasm. Paintings are considered as pieces of furniture, and Europe is already overstocked with the works of other ages. These, with copies, countless as the sands on the sea shore, are bartered to and fro, and are quite sufficient for the demands of the curious ; who natu- rally prefer scarce, expensive, and far- fetched productions, to those which they might have on low terms at home. Who can be expected to give forty guineas for a modern landscape, though in ever so superior a style, when he can purchase one, which, for little more than double the sum, shall be sanctioned by a sounding name, and warranted ori-

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 31

ginal by a solemn-faced connoisseur ? This considered, can it excite wonder that the arts have not taken such deep root in this soil as in places where the people cultivate them from a kind of religious necessity, and where proficients have so much more profit in the pursuit ? Whether it is to our honour or disgrace, I will not presume to say, but the fact is indisputable, that the public encourage trade and mechanics, rather than painting and sculpture. Is it then reasonable to think, that the artist, who, to attain essential excellence in his profession, should have the talents of a Shakspeare, a Milton, or a Swift, will follow this tedious and laborious study merely for fame, when his next door neighbour, perhaps a porter-brewer, or an haberdasher of small wares, can with- out any genius accumulate an enormous fortune in a few years, become a Lord Mayor, or a Member of Parliament, and purchase a title for his heir ? Surely no ; for, as very few painters get even moderately rich, it is not reasonable to expect, that they should waste their lives in cultivating the higher branch of the art, until their country becomes more alive to its importance, and better disposed to reward their labours,

These are the true causes that have retarded our pro- gress; and for this, shall a nation which has, in all ages, abounded in men of sound understanding, and the brightest parts, be branded with incapacity, by a set of pedantic dreamers, who seem to imagine that the degrees of genius are to be measured like the degrees on a globe, determine a man's powers from the latitude in which he was born, and think that a painter, like certain tender plants, can only thrive in a hot-house? Gross as are these absurdities, there will always be a band of profound blockheads ready to adopt and circulate them ; if it were only upon the authority of the great names by which they are sanctioned,

32 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

To return to our Royal Academy, I am told that one of their leading objects will be, sending young men abroad to study the antique statues, &c. Such kind of studies may sometimes improve an exalted genius, but they will not create it ; and whatever has been the cause, this same travelling to Italy has, in several instances that I have seen, seduced the student from nature, and led him to paint mar- ble figures, in which he has availed himself of the great works of antiquity, as a coward does when he puts on the armour of an Alexander ; for, with similar pretensions, and similar vanity, the painter supposes he shall be adored as a second Raphael Urbino.

The fact is, that every thing necessary for the student, in sculpture or painting, may at this time be procured in Lon- don. Of the Venus, and the Gladiator, we have small casts ; and even the Torso, by which Michael Angelo asserted he learned all he knew of the art, has been copied in a reduced size j and the cast, by which the principle may be clearly seen, is sold for a few shillings. These small casts, if quite correct, are full as useful to the student as the originals ; the parts are easier comprehended j they are more portable to place in different lights ; and of an even colour : while the old Parian marbles are apt to shine, dazzle, and con- found the eye. If this be doubted, let a plaster figure be smoked and oiled, and the true dimensions of the muscles can be no more distinguished than those of a sooty chimney- sweeper.

After all, though the best statues are unquestionably, in parts, superlatively fine, and superior to nature, yet they have invariably a something that is inferior.

As to pictures, there are enough in England to seduce us from studying nature, which every man ought to do, if he

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 33

aims at any higher rank than being an imitator of the works of others ; and to such servile spirits I will offer no advice.

In one word, I think that young men by studying in Italy have seldom learnt much more than the names of the paint- ers; though sometimes they have attained the amazing power of distinguishing styles,* and knowing by the hue of the picture the hard name of the artist, a power which, highly as they pride themselves upon it, is little more than knowing one hand-writing from another. For this they gain great credit, and are supposed vast proficients, because they have travelled. They are gravely attended to by people of rank, with whom they claim acquaintance, and talk of the antique in a cant phraseology, made up of half or whole Italian, to the great surprise of their hearers, who become gulls, in order to pass for connoisseurs, wonder with a foolish face of praise and bestow unqualified admiration on the marvellous bad copies of marvellous bad originals, which they have brought home as trophies, and triumphantly display, to prove their discernment and taste.

Neither England nor Italy ever produced a more con- temptible dauber than the late Mr. Kent, and yet he gained the prize at Rome, in England had the first peo- ple for his patrons, and, to crown the whole, was appointed painter to the king. But in this country such men meet with the greatest encouragement, and soonest work their way into noblemen's houses and palaces.

To conclude, I think that this ostentatious establishment can answer no one valuable purpose to the arts, nor be of the

• Their mode of judging, subjects them to continual imposition ;

for what is called manner, is easily copied by the lowest per- former ; he only fails in beauty, delicacy, and spirit J

D

34 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

least use to any individual, except those who are to be elected professors, and receive salaries, for the kind superin- tendence they will exercise over such of their brethren as have not so much interest as themselves.

Many of the objections which I have to the institution of this Royal Academy, apply with equal force to the project of the Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, for distributing premiums for drawings and pictures ; subjects of which they are totally ignorant, and in which they can do no possible service to the community.

It is extremely natural for noblemen, or young people of fortune, who have travelled, and seen fine pictures and statues, to be planet-struck with a desire of being celebrated in books, like those great men of whom they have read in the lives of the painters, &c. j for it must be recollected that the popes, princes, and cardinals, who patronized these painters, have been celebrated as creators of the men who created those great works :

" Shar'd all their honours, and partook their fame."

The Dilettanti had all this in prospect, when they offered to establish a drawing school, &c. at their own expense ; for here they expected to be paramount. But when those painters, who projected the scheme, presumed to bear a part in the direction of the school, the Dilettanti kept their money, and rejected them with scorn, the whole castle fell to the ground, and has been no more heard of.

This society of castle-builders have a similar idea. They wish first to persuade the world, that no genius can deserve notice without being first cultivated under their direction ; and will ultimately neither foster nor encourage any artist that has not been brought up by themselves.

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 35

The sounding title of a Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, with two or three people of rank at their head, attracted a multitude of subscribers. Men, when repeatedly applied to, were unwilling to refuse two guineas a year ; people of leisure, tired of public amuse- ments, found themselves entertained with formal speeches, from men who had still more pleasure in displaying their talents for oratory. Artificers of all descriptions were invited, and those who were not bidden, strained every nerve to become members, and appear upon the printed list, as promoters of the fine arts. By this means, they were con- sulted in their several professions, and happy was he who could assume courage enough to speak, though ever so little to the purpose.

The intention of this great Society is unquestionably laudable, their success in subscriptions astonishing. How far their performances have been equal to their promises, it is not my business to inquire ; but as, while I had the honour of being a member, my opinion was frequently asked on some points relating to my own profession, I venture to lay it before the reader, with the same frankness that I then gave it.

When the Society was in its infancy, they gave premiums for children's drawings, and for this let children lisp their praise. It was asserted that we should thus improve our own manufactures, and gravely asked by these professed encouragers of the commerce of their country, if the French children, being instructed in drawing, did not enable that people to give a better air to all the articles they fabricated. I answered positively, no ; and added, that thus trumpeting their praise, was a degradation of our own country, and giving to our rivals a character which they had no right to.

D2

36 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

Were this point debated, French superiority would be sup- ported by fashionable ladies, travelled gentlemen, and pic- ture dealers. In opposition to them, would be those who are capable of judging for themselves, the few that are not led away by popular prejudices, and the first artists in the kingdom. These, I am conscious, would be a minority ; but composed of men that ought to have weight, and whose opinion and advice should have been taken before the plan was put in execution.

Of the immense improvement that is to take place in our manufactures, from boys of almost every profession being taught to draw, I form no very sanguine expectations.

To attain the power of imitating the forms of letters with freedom and precision in all their due proportions and various elegant turns, as Snell has given them, requires as much skill as to copy different forms of columns and cor- nices in architecture, and might with some show of propriety be said to demand a knowledge of design ; yet common sense and experience convince us, that the proper place for acquir- ing a fine hand is a writing-school. As measuring is but measuring, I do not think that a tailor would make a suit of clothes fit better, from having been employed twice seven years in taking the dimensions of all the bits of antiquity that remain in Greece.* How absurd would it be to see perriwig-makers' and shoemakers' boys learning the art of drawing, that they might give grace to a peruke or a slipper. If the study of Claude's landscapes would benefit the carver of a picture frame, or the contemplation of a finely painted

• Swift's Laputa tailor made all his clothes by mathematical

rules, and there was no objection to them, except that they never fitted thosejbr whom they were made.

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 37

saucepan by Teniers, or Basson, would be an improvement to a tinman, it would be highly proper for this Society to encourage them in the practice of the arts. But as this is not the case, giving lads of all ranks a little knowledge of every thing, is almost as absurd as it would be to instruct shopkeepers in oratory, that they may be thus enabled to talk people into buying their goods, because oratory is necessary at the bar and in the pulpit. As to giving pre- miums to those that design flowers, &c. for silks and linens, let it be recollected that these artisans copy the objects they introduce from nature ; a much surer guide than all the childish and ridiculous absurdities of temples, dragons, pa- godas, and other fantastic fripperies, which have been im- ported from China.

As from all these causes (and many more might be added), it appears that a smattering in the arts can be of little use, except to those who make painting their sole pursuit, why- should we tempt such multitudes to embark in a profession by which they never can be supported ? For historical pic- tures there never can be a demand : our churches reject them ; the nobility prefer foreign productions ; and the generality of our apartments are too small to contain them. A certain number of portrait painters, if they can get patronized by people of rank, may find employment j but the majority, even of these, must either shift how they can amongst their acquaintance, or live by travelling from town to town like gipsies. Yet, as many will be allured by flat- tering appearances, and form vague hopes of success, some of the candidates must be unsuccessful ; and men will be rendered miserable, who might have lived comfortably enough by almost any manufactory, and will wish that they had been taught to make a shoe, rather than thus devoted to

38 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

the polite arts. When I once stated something like this to the Society, a member humanely remarked, that the poorer we kept the artists, the cheaper we might purchase their works.*

[In ridicule of the preference given to old pictures, Ho- garth exercised not only his pencil but his pen. His Adver- tisement for the sale of the paintings of Marriage -a-la-mode, inserted in a Daily Advertiser of 1750, thus concludes:]

As according to the standard so righteously and laudably established by picture-dealers, picture-cleaners, picture- frame-makers, (and other connoisseurs,) the works of a painter are to be esteemed more or less valuable, as they are more or less scarce, and as the living painter is most of all affected by the inferences resulting from this and other considerations equally candid and edifying, Mr. Hogarth by way of precaution, not puff, begs leave to urge, that probably this will be the last sale of pictures he may ever exhibit, because of the difficulty of vending such a number at once to any tolerable advantage: and that the whole number he has already exhibited of the historical or humourous kind does not exceed fifty ; of which the three sets called the Harlot's Progress, the Rake's Progress, and that now to be sold, make twenty ; so that whoever has a taste of his own to rely on, and is not soo squeamish, and has courage enough to own it, by daring to give them a place in a collection till Time, (the supposed finisher, but real destroyer of paint- ings,) has rendered them fit for those more sacred reposi- tories where schools, names, heads, masters, &c. attain their

• [How far Hogarth's prediction has been fulfilled, by the repent-

ance of some painters, who may have been thus dragged into the temple of taste, those painters only can determine. J . IRELAN D.]

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 39

last stage of preferment, may from hence be convinced, that multiplicity at least, of his, Mr. Hogarth's, pieces, will be no diminution of their value."

[The annexed letter Mr. John Ireland was informed was written by Hogarth ; add to this authority, of which he had no doubt, it carries internal evidence of his mind. It is printed in the London Magazine for 1737, and thus prefaced :]

" The following piece, published in the St. James's Even- ing Post of June 7th, is by the first painter in England, perhaps in the world in his way.

" Every good-natured man and well-wisher to the Arts in England, must feel a kind of resentment at a very indecent paragraph, in the Daily Post of Thursday last, relating to the death of M. de Morine, first painter to the French king ; in which very unjust, as well as cruel reflections, are cast on the noblest performance (in its way) that England has to boast of ; I mean the work of the late Sir James Thornhill in Greenwich Hall. It has ever been the business of nar- row, little geniuses, who by a tedious application to minute parts, have (as they fancy) attained to a great insight into the correct drawing of a figure, and have acquired just knowledge enough in the art to tell accurately when a toe is too short, or a finger too thick, to endeavour, by detracting from the merits of great men, to build themselves a kind of reputation. These peddling demi-critics, on the painful discovery of some little inaccuracy (which proceeds mostly from the freedom of the pencil), without any regard to the more noble parts of a performance (which they are totally ignorant of), with great satisfaction condemn the whole as a bad and incorrect piece.

The meanest artist in the Emelian square, Can imitate in brass the nails or hair ;

40 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

Expert at trifles, and a cunning fool,

Able to express the parts, but not the whole.

There is another set of gentry, more noxious to the art than these, and those are your picture jobbers from abroad, who are always ready to raise a great cry in the prints, whenever they think their craft is in danger ; and indeed it is their interest to depreciate every English work as hurtful to their trade of continually importing ship-loads of dead Christs, Holy Families, Madonas, and other dismal dark sub- jects, neither entertaining nor ornamental, on which they scrawl the terrible cramp names of some Italian masters, and fix on us poor Englishmen the character of universal dupes. If a man, naturally a judge of painting, not bigotted to those empyrics, should cast his eye on one of their sham virtuoso pieces, he would be very apt to say, * Mr. Bubbleman, that grand Venus, as you are pleased to call it, has not beauty enough for the character of an English cook-maid.' Upon which the quack answers, with a confident air, * Sir, I find that you are no connoisseur ; the picture, I assure you, is in Alesso Baldminetto's second and best manner, boldly painted, and truly sublime : the contour gracious ; the air of the head in the high Greek taste ; and a most divine idea it is.* Then spitting in an obscure place, and rubbing it with a dirty handkerchief, takes a skip to t'other end of the room, and screams out in raptures, ' There's an amazing touch ! A man should have this picture a twelvemonth in his col- lection before he can discover half its beauties !' The gen- tleman (though naturally a judge of what is beautiful, yet. ashamed to be out of the fashion, by judging for himself) with this cant is struck dumb ; gives a vast sum for4he pic- ture, very modestly confesses he is indeed quite ignorant of painting, and bestows a frame worth fifty pounds on a fright-

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 41

ful thing, which, without the hard name, is not worth so many farthings. Such impudence as is now continually practised in the picture trade must meet with its proper treatment, would gentlemen but venture to see with their own eyes. Let but the comparison of pictures with nature be their only guide, and let them judge as freely of painting as they do of poetry, they would then take it for granted, that when a piece gives pleasure to none but these connois- seurs, or their adherents, if the purchase be a thousand pounds, 'tis nine hundred and ninety-nine too dear j and were all our grand collections stripped of such sort of trum- pery, then, and not till then, it would be worth an English- man's while to try the strength of his genius to supply their place ; which now it were next to madness to attempt, since there is nothing that has not travelled a thousand miles, or has not been done a hundred years, but is looked upon as mean and ungenteel furniture. What Mr. Pope in his last work says of poems, may with much more propriety be applied to pictures :

' Authors, like coins, grow dear as they grow old ; It is the rust we value, not the gold/

Sir James Thornhill, in a too modest compliance with the connoisseurs of his time, called in the assistance of Mr. Andr, a foreigner, famous for the fullness of his outline, to paint the royal family at the upper end of Greenwich Hall to the beauties or faults of which I have nothing to say ; but with regard to the ceiling, which is entirely of his own hand, I am certain all unprejudiced persons, with (or without) much insight into the mechanic parts of painting, are at the first view struck with the most agreeable harmony and play of colours that ever delighted the eye of a spectator. The

42 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

composition is altogether extremely grand, the groups finely disposed, the light and shade so contrived as to throw the eye with pleasure on the principal figures, which are drawn with great fire and judgment; the colouring of the flesh delicious, the drapery great, and well folded, and upon examination, the allegory is found clear, well invented, and full of learning : in short, all that is necessary to constitute a complete ceiling-piece, is apparent in that magnificent work. Thus much is in justice to that great English artist.

BRITOPHIL.

N. B. If the reputation of this work were destroyed, it would put a stop to the receipt of daily sums of money from spectators, which is applied to the use of sixty charity-chil- dren."

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 43

CHAPTER IV.

The motives by which Hogarth was induced to publish his^ Ana- lysis of Beauty; the abuse it drew upon him, and his vindica- of himself and his work.

" What ! a book, and by Hogarth ! then twenty to ten, All he 's gained by the pencil he '11 lose by the pen." " Perhaps it may be so howe'er, miss or hit, He will publish here goes it 's double or quit."

Epigram by HOGARTH.

[HOGARTH finding his prints were become sufficiently nu- merous to form a handsome volume, in the year 1745,* en- graved his own portrait as a frontispiece. In one corner of the plate he introduced a painter's palette, on which was a waving line inscribed The line of Beauty. This created much speculation, and as he himself expresses it,]

The bait soon took, and no Egyptian hieroglyphic ever amused more than it did for a time ; painters and sculptors came to me to know the meaning of it, being as much puz- zled with it as other people, till it came to have some ex- planation j then, indeed, but not till then, some found it out

• [Such is the date, both in his MS. and the preface to the

Analysis ; though under the print, he has engraven, Se ipse pinxit et sculpsit, 1749. It is probable that in the first instance, he spoke of the painting it was taken from, now in the National Gallery. J. IRELAND.]

44 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

to be an old acquaintance of theirs,* though the account they could give of its properties was very near as satisfac- tory as that which a day-labourer, who constantly uses the lever, could give of that machine as a mechanical power. They knew it, as FalstafF did Prince Henry by instinct !

[This crooked line drew upon him a numerous band of opponents, and involved him in so many disputes, that he at length determined to write a book, explain his system., and silence his adversaries.]

My preface and introduction to the Analysis contain a general explanation of the circumstances which led me to commence author j but this has not deterred my opponents from loading me with much gross, and I think unmerited obloquy ; it therefore becomes necessary that I should try to defend myself from their aspersions.

Among many other high crimes and misdemeanours, of which I am accused, it is asserted that I have abused the great masters. This is so far from being just, that when the truth is fairly stated, it may possibly appear, that the professional reputation of these luminaries of the arts, is more injured by the wild and enthusiastic admiration of those who denominate themselves their fast friends, than by men who are falsely classed their enemies.

Let us put a case : suppose a brilliant landscape had been so finely painted by a first-rate artist, that the trees, water, sky, &c. were boldly, though tenderly relieved from each other, and the eye of the spectator might, as it were, travel into the scenery ; and suppose this landscape, by the heat

• [To this he evidently alludes, in giving the well-known story

of Columbus breaking the egg, as a subscription receipt to his Analysis of Beauty. J. IRELAND.]

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 45

of the sun, the ravages of time, or the still more fatal ravages of picture-cleaners, was shorn of its beams, and deprived of all its original brightness j let me ask, whether the man who will affirm that this almost obliterated, unharmonious, spotty patchwork piece of antiquity is in the state that it first came out of the artist's hands, does not abuse the painter ? and whether he who asserts, that though it might once have been bright and clear, it is now faded, does not thus place the defects to the proper account -, and consequently de- fend him ?

So far from attempting to lower the ancients, I have always thought, and it is universally admitted, that they knew some fundamental principles in nature, which enabled them to produce works that have been the admiration of succeeding ages ; but I have not allowed this merit to those leaden-headed imitators, who, having no consciousness of either symmetry or propriety, have attempted to mend na- ture, and, in their truly ideal figures, gave similar propor- tions to a Mercury and a Hercules.

This, and many other opinions which I have ventured to advance, has roused a nest of hornets, from whose stings 1 would wish to guard myself, as I am conscious that they will try to condemn all my works by my own rules. To disappoint these insects, I have, in my explanatory prints, done the Antinous, Venus, &c. in a slighter style than the other figures, to show that they are introduced as mere re- ferences to the originals ; and I will not now attempt to paint my Goddess of Beauty. Who can tell how long the artist was employed in giving such exquisite grace to the Grecian Venus ? he might, perhaps, think that a single su- per-excellent statue would confer immortality, and was suf- ficient for a whole life. Can any one expect to see equal

46 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

perfection, in that which is done in little, and in a short space of time ?

With respect to beauty, though men felt its effects, yet both artists and others appeared to me to be totally ignorant of its principles ; and contented themselves with bestowing undistinguishing praise, and giving us cold and servile copies of the fine models of antiquity, without making any inquiry into the system by which they were produced. The few who wished to learn the principles, found themselves so be- wildered and confounded by the vague and contradictory opinions which they had heard and read concerning beauty and grace, that they began to suspect the whole to be an illu- sion, and that neither one nor the other existed except in fancy and imagination. This should excite less surprise, from its having sometimes happened in a matter of an infinitely higher and more important nature j and were it politically right, it is possible that a small octavo might be written, which would start as many folios of theological controversy as would fill Westminster Hall ; though the whole put to- gether might be mere lumber, and of no more use than waste paper. But this by the bye. To return into my own path, and resume the reasons that induced me to tread it in a new character. In doing this, it will be proper to give a succinct statement of the strange way in which this subject has been treated by preceding writers.

The first attempts that were made to fix true ideas of taste upon a surer basis, were by natural philosophers, who, in their amplified contemplations on the universal beauty displayed in the harmony and order of nature, very soon lost themselves ; an event that, from the way in wliich they set out, was inevitable ; for, if I may be permitted to adopt an allegorical figure, it necessarily led them into the wide

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 4-7

road of order and regularity, which they unexpectedly found crossed and intersected by many other paths, that led into the labyrinths of variety ; where, not having passed through the province of painting, they became confused, and could never find their way. To explaining the order and usefulness of nature they might be equal ; but of her sportiveness and fancy, they were totally ignorant. To ex- tricate themselves from these difficulties, they ascended the mound of moral beauty, contiguous to the open Jield of divinity, where rambling and ranging at large, they lost all remembrance of their former pursuit.

These gentlemen having failed, it was next suggested, that the ^eepjy-read and travelled man, was the only person fully qualified to undertake the task of analysing beauty. But here let it be observed, that a few things well seen, and thoroughly understood, are more likely to^ furnish proper materials for this purpose, than the cursory view of all that can be met with in a hasty journey through Europe.

Nature is simple, plain, and true, in all her works, and those who strictly adhere to her laws, and closely attend to her appearances in their infinite varieties, are guarded against any prejudiced bias from truth; while those who have seen many things that they cannot well understand, and read many books which they do not fully comprehend, notwithstanding all their pompous parade of knowledge, are apt to wander about it and about it, perpetually perplexing themselves and their readers with the various opinions of other men.

The knowledge necessary for writing a work on the arts, differs as much from that acquired by the simple traveller, as the art of simpling doth from the science of botany. Taking the grand tour, to see and pick up curiosities, which the tra-

48 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

vellers are taught nicely to distinguish from each other, by certain cramp marks and hard names, may with no great impropriety be termed going a simpling ; but with this spe- cial difference, that your field simpler never picks up a nettle for a marsh-mallow ; a mistake which your tour simpler is very liable to.

As to those painters who have written treatises on painting, they were, in general, too much taken up with giving rules for the operative part of the art, to enter into physiolo- gical disquisitions on the nature of the objects. With respect to myself, I thought I was sufficiently grounded in the principles of my profession, to throw some new lights on the subject ; and though the pen was to me a new instrument, yet, as the mechanic at his loom may possibly give as satis- factory an account of the materials and composition of the rich brocade he weaves, as the smooth-tongued mercer, sur- rounded with all his parade of showy silks, I trusted that I might make myself tolerably understood, by those who would take the trouble of examining my book and prints together ; for, as one who makes use of signs and gestures to convey his meaning in a language of which he has little knowledge, I have occasionally had recourse to my pencil. For this I have been assailed by every profligate scribbler in town, and told that, though words are man's province, they are not my province j and that, though I have put my name to the Analysis of Beauty, yet (as I acknowledge having received some assistance from two or three friends) I am only the supposed author. By those of my own profession I am treated with still more severity. Pestered with carica- ture drawings, and hung up in effigy in prints ; accused of vanity, ignorance, and envy ; called a mean and con-

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 49

temptible dauber ; represented in the strangest employments, and pictured in the strangest shapes ; sometimes under the hieroglyphical semblance of a satyr, and at others under the still more ingenious one of an ass.

Not satisfied with this, finding that they could not over- turn my system, they endeavoured to wound the peace of my family. This was a cruelty hardly to be forgiven : to say that such malicious attacks and caricatures did not discom- pose me would be untrue, for to be held up to public ridi- cule would discompose any man ; but I must at the same time add, that they did not much distress me. I knew that those who venture to oppose received opinions, must in re- turn have public abuse ; so that, feeling I had no right to exemption from the common tribute, and conscious that my book had been generally well received, I consoled myself with the trite observation, that every success or advantage in this world must be attended by some sort of a reverse ; and that, though the worst writers and worst painters have tra- duced me, by the best I have had more than justice done me. The partiality with which the world has received my works, and the patronage and friendship with which some of the best characters in it have honoured the author, ought to excite my warmest gratitude, and demand my best thanks. They enable me to despise this cloud of insects; for happily, though their buzzing may teaze, their stings are not mortal.

[On the 6th of June 1757, Hogarth was appointed " Ser- jeant Painter of all his Majesty's works, as well belonging to his Royal Palaces or houses, as to his great Wardrobe or otherwise." He thus notices the interest by which he ob- tained the places and its annual profits.]

Just after my brother's death, I obtained, by means

50 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

of my friend Mr. Manning and the Duke of Devonshire, the office of Serjeant Painter, which might not have exceeded one hundred a year to me for trouble and attendance ; but by two portraits, at more than eighty pounds each, the last occasioned by his present Majesty's accession, and some other things, it has, for these last five years, been one way or other worth two hundred pounds per annum.

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 51

CHAPTER V.

Hogarth's inducement to paint the picture of Sigismunda; his correspondence with Lord Grosvenor on the subject, contrasted by two letters from Lord Charlemont, for whom he had pre- viously painted an interesting scene; Origin of the Quarrel with Wilkes and Churchill, which gave rise to the Print of the Bear, &c.

JjEING thus driven out of the only profitable branch of my profession, I at first thought of attaching myself to history painting j but in this there was no employment ; for in forty years I had only two orders of any consequence for historical pictures. This was rather mortifying; and being, by the profits of my former productions, and the office of Serjeant painter, tolerably easy in my circum- stances, and thoroughly sick of the idle quackery of criticism, I determined to quit the pencil for the graver. In this humble walk I had one advantage : the perpetual fluctuations in the manners of the times enabled me to introduce new characters, which being drawn from the pass- ing day, had a chance of more originality, and less insipidity, than those which are repeated again and again, and again, from old stories. Added to this, the prints which I had previously engraved were now become a voluminous work, and circulated not only through England but over Europe. These being secured to me by an Act which I had previously

E2

52 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

got passed, were a kind of an estate ; and as they wore, I could repair and re-touch tlienij so that in some particulars they became better than when first engraved.*

While I was making arrangements to confine myself entirely to my graver, an amiable nobleman (Lord Charle- mont) requested that before I bade a final adieu to the pencil, I would paint him one picture. The subject to be my own choice, and the reward, whatever I demanded. The story I pitched upon, was a young and virtuous mar- ried lady, who, by playing at cards with an officer, loses her money, watch, and jewels ; the moment when he offers them back in return for her honour, and she is wavering at his suit, was my point of time.

The picture was highly approved of, and the payment was noble ; but the manner in which it was made, by a note inclosed in one of the following letters, was, to me, infinitely more gratifying than treble the sum.

From Lord Charlemont to Mr. Hogarth. "Dear Sir, Mount-street, 19 Aug. 1759.

" I have been so excessively busied with ten thousand troublesome affairs, that I have not been able to wait upon you according to my promise, nor even to find time to sit for my picture ; as I am obliged to set out for Ireland to- morrow, we must defer that till my return, which will be in

• [Hogarth might conceive that by rendering the habits of his

early figures more conformable to the fashion of the times when they were altered, he improved them. Collectors are of a different opinion ; though it must be acknowledged, that in Plate IV. of the Rake's Progress, the humour is much heightened by introducing a group of vulgar minor gamblers, in the place of the shoeblack. J. IRELAND.}

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 53

the latter end of January, or in the beginning of February at farthest. I am still your debtor, more so indeed than I ever shall be able to pay ; and did intend to have sent you before my departure what trifling recompence my abilities permit me to make you. But the truth is, having wrong calculated my expenses, I find myself unable for the present even to attempt paying you However, if you be in any present need of money, let me know it, and as soon as I get to Ireland I will send you, not the price of your picture, for that is inestimable, but as much as I can afford to give for it. Sir, I am, with the most sincere wishes for your health and happiness,

" Your most obedient humble servant,

" CHARLEMONT."

To Mr. Hogarth.

" Dear Sir, Dublin, 29 January, 1/60.

" Inclosed I send you a note upon Nesbitt for one hun- dred pounds ; and considering the name of the author, and the surprising merit of your performance, I am really much ashamed to offer such a trifle in recompence for the pains you have taken, and the pleasure your picture has afforded me. I beg you would think that I by no means attempt to pay you according to your merit, but according to my own abilities. Were I to pay your deserts, I fear I should leave myself poor indeed. Imagine that you have made me a pre- sent of the picture, for literally as such I take it, and that I have begged your acceptance of the inclosed trifle. As this is really the case, with how much reason do I subscribe myself,

" Your most obliged humble servant,

" CHARLEMONT."

54 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

This elevating circumstance had its contrast, and brought on a train of most dissatisfactory circumstances, which by happening at a time when I thought myself, as it were, landed, and secure from tugging any longer at the oar, were rendered doubly distressing.

A gentleman (now a nobleman), seeing this picture, pressed me with much vehemence to paint another for him, upon the same terms. To this I reluctantly assented ; and as I had been frequently flattered for my power of giving expression, I thought the figure of Sigismunda weeping over the heart of her lover, would enable me to~3isplay it. Im- pressed with this idea, I fixed upon this very difficult sub- ject. My object was dramatic, and my aim to draw tears from the spectator ; an effect I have often witnessed at a tragedy ; and it therefore struck me that it was worth trying, if a painter could not produce the same effect, and touch the heart through the eye, as the player does through the ear. Thus far I have been gratified ; I have more than once seen the tear of sympathy trickle down the cheek of a female, while she has been contemplating the picture.

As four hundred pounds had a short time before been bid for a picture of Sigismunda, painted by a French master, but falsely ascribed to Corregio, four hundred pounds was the price at which I rated this.

By any other of my pursuits I could have got twice the sum in the time I devoted to it ; nor was it more than half what a fashionable face-painter would have gained in the same period. Upon these grounds I put it at this sum -, see the letter, and see the answer. It ended in my keeping the picture in my painting-room, and his Lordship keeping his money in his pocket. Had it been Charlemont !

[This transaction having given rise to many ridiculous false-

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 55

hoods, the following unvarnished tale will set the whole in its true light. (January, 1764?.)

The picture of Sigismunda was painted at the earnest re- quest of Sir Richard Grosvenor, now Lord Grosvenor, in the year 1759, at a time when Mr. Hogarth had fully deter- mined to leave off painting ; partly on account of ease and re- tirement, but more particularly because he had found by thirty years' experience, that his pictures, except in an instance or two, mentioned in the note,* had not produced him one quarter of the profit that arose from his engravings. How- ever, the flattering compliments, as well as generous offers made him by the above gentleman (who was immensely rich), prevailed upon the unwary artist to undertake this difficult subject (which being seen, and fully approved of by his Lordship, whilst in hand), was, after much time and the utmost efforts finished, BUT HOW! the painter's death (as usual), can only positively determine. The price required for it was therefore not on account of its value as a pic- ture, but proportioned to the value of the time it took in painting.

This nobleman, in the interim, fell into the clutches of the dealers in old pictures ; the treatment a man who painted new ones was to expect where these gentry once get a foot- ing, so much alarmed the artist, that he thought it best to set his Lordship at full liberty to take or reject the picture, by writing the following letter, and putting him in mind of the agreement which was made when the work was under- taken.

[* The Altar-piece in St. Mary Redcliffe's, Bristol, for which he received j500 ; and the Paul before Felix, painted for Lincoln's Inn Hall. J. IRELAND.]

56 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

Mr. Hogarth's Letter to Sir Richard Grosvenor.

Sir,

u I have done all I can to the picture of Sigismunda ; you may remember you was pleased to say you would give me what price I should think fit to set upon any subject I would paint for you, and at the time you made this generous offer, I in return made it my request, that you would use no ceremony in refusing the picture when done, if you should not be thoroughly satisfied with it. This you promised should be as I pleased, which I now entreat you to comply with, without the least hesitation, if you think four hundred too much money for it.* One more favour I have to beg, which is, that you will determine on this matter as soon as you can conveniently, that I may resolve whether I shall go about another picture, for Mr. Hoare the banker, on the same conditions, or stop here.

" I am, &c." June 13, 1757.

Sir Richard Grosvenor to Mr. Hogarth.

Sir,

"I should sooner have answered yours of the 13th instant, but have been mostly out of town. I understand by it that you have a commission from Mr. Hoare for a picture. If he should have taken a fancy to the Sigismunda, I have no sort of objection to your letting him have it ; for I really think the performance so striking and inimitable, that the con-

• N. B. At Sir Luke Schaub's sale, Sir Richard Grosvenor bid

j400 for a less picture, said to be a Corregio, but realty painted by an obscure French artist.

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 57

stantly having it before one's eyes, would be too often occasioning melancholy ideas to arise in one's mind, which a curtain's being drawn before it would not diminish in the least.

tf I am, Sir, your most obedient servant,

" RICHARD GROSVENOR."

Grosvenor- square, Sunday morning, June 17th.

Mr. Hogarth's Reply.

" Sir Richard,

" As your obliging answer to my letter in regard to the picture of Sigismunda did not seem to be quite positive, I beg leave to conclude you intend to comply with my request, if I do not hear from you within a week.

I am, &c. W. H."

His Lordship not thinking fit to take any farther notice of the affair, here it must have ended ; but things having been represented in favour of his Lordship, and much to Mi*. Hogarth's dishonour, the foregoing plain tale is therefore submitted to such as may at any time think it worth while to see the whole truth, in what has been so publicly talked of.]

As the most violent and virulent abuse thrown on Sigis- munda was from a set of miscreants, with whom I am proud of having been ever at war, I mean the expounders of the mysteries of old pictures, I have been sometimes told they were beneath my notice. This is true of them individually, but as they have access to people of rank, who seem as happy in being cheated as these merchants are in cheating them, they have a power of doing much mischief to a modern

58 ANECDOTES OF HOGARTH,

artist. However mean the vender of poisons, the mineral is destructive : to me its operation was troublesome enough. Ill-nature spread so fast, that now was the time for every little dog in the profession to bark, and revive the old spleen which appeared at the time of the Analysis. The anxiety that attends endeavouring to recollect ideas long dormant, and the misfortunes which clung to this transaction, coming at a time when nature demands quiet, and something besides exercise to cheer it, added to my long sedentary life, brought on an illness which continued twelve months. But when I got well enough to ride on horseback, I soon re- covered. This being a period when war abroad and conten- tion at home engrossed every one's mind, prints were thrown into the back-ground ; and the stagnation rendered it necessary that I should do some timed thing, to recover my lost time, and stop a gap in my income. This drew forth my print of the Times, a subject which tended to the re- storation of peace and unanimity, and put the opposers of these humane objects in a light, which gave great offence to those who were trying to foment disaffection in the minds of the populace. One of the most notorious among them, till now rather my friend and flatterer, attacked me in a North Briton, in so infamous and malign a style, that he himself, when pushed even by his best friends, was driven to so poor an excuse as to say, he was drunk when he wrote it. Being at that time very weak, and in a kind of slow fever, it could not but seize on a feeling mind. My philosophical friends advise me to laugh at the nonsense of party-writing who would mind it ? but I cannot rest myself

" Who steals my gold, steals trash ; 'tis something ; nothing ; Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands :

WRITTEN BY HIMSELF. 59

But he that filches from me my good name,

Robs me of that which not enriches him,

And makes me poor indeed/'

Such being my feelings, my great object was to return the compliment, and turn it to some advantage.

This renowned patriot's portrait drawn, like as I could as to features, and marked with some indications of his mind, fully answered my purpose. The ridiculous was apparent to every eye. A Brutus ! a saviour of his country, with such an aspect ! was so arrant a farce, that though it gave rise to much laughter in the lookers-on, galled both him and his adherents to the bone. This was proved by the papers being every day crammed with invectives against the artist, till the town grew absolutely sick of thus seeing me always at full length.

Churchill, Wilkes's toad-eater, put the North Briton into verse, in an epistle to Hogarth ; but as the abuse was pre- cisely the same, except a little poetical heightening, which goes for nothing, it made no impression, but perhaps in some measure effaced or weakened the black strokes of the N. B. However, having an old plate by me, with some parts ready, such as the back-ground and a dog, I began to consider how I could turn so much work laid aside to some account, so patched up a print of Master Churchill in the character of a Bear. The pleasure, and pecuniary advantage, which I derived from these two engravings, together with occasion- ally riding on horseback, restored me to as much health as can be expected at my time of life.

Thus have I gone through the principal circumstances of a life which, till lately, past pretty much to my own satis- faction, and, I hope, in no respect injurious to any other man. This I can safely assert, I have invariably endeavoured

60 REMARKS BY HOGARTH,

to make those about me tolerably happy, and my greatest enemy cannot say I ever did an intentional injury ; though, without ostentation, I could produce many instances of men that have been essentially benefited by me. What may fol- low, God knows.

FINIS,

REMARKS ON VARIOUS PRINTS,

WRITTEN BY HOGARTH.*

I. CHARACTERS AND CARICATURAS.

BEING perpetually plagued, from the mistakes made among the illiterate, by the similitude in the sound of the words character and caricatura, 1 ten years ago endea- voured to explain the distinction by the above print; and as I was then publishing Marriage A-la-mode, wherein were characters of high life, I introduced the great number of faces there delineated, (none of which are exaggerated) varied at random, to prevent if possible personal applica- tion, when the prints should come out :

" We neither this nor that Sir Fopling call,

He 's knight o* th' shire, and represents you all."

• [First printed by John Ireland, in vol. iii. of " Hogarth Illus-

trated," 1798, from Hogarth's MSS. then in his possession.]

ON VARIOUS PRINTS. 61

This, however did not prevent a likeness being found for each head, for a general character will always bear some resemblance to a particular one.

II. MARRIAGE A-LA-MODE.

[A description was found among the papers of the late Mr. Lane, of Hillingdon ; and his family believed it to be Hogarth's explanation, either copied from his own hand- writing, or given verbally to Mr. Lane at the time he pur- chased the pictures. It will be found in John Ireland's ' Hogarth Illustrated," vol. ii. pp. 8 15. It differs not materially from Dr. Trusler's description, who seems to have made what use he thought proper of it.]

III. INDUSTRY AND IDLENESS.

Industry and Idleness, exemplified in the conduct of two fellow-prentices ; where the one, by taking good courses, and pursuing those points for which he was put apprentice, becomes a valuable man, and an ornament to his country ; whilst the other, giving way to idleness, naturally falls into poverty, and most commonly ends fatally, as is expressed in the last print. As these prints were intended more for use than ornament, they were done in a way that might bring them within the purchase of those whom they might most concern ; and, lest any part should be mistaken, a de- scription of each print is engraved thereon. Yet, notwith- standing the inaccuracy of the engraving, what was thought conducive and necessary for the purpose for which they were intended, such as action and expression, &c. are as carefully attended to, as the most delicate strokes of the

62 REMARKS BY HOGARTH,

graver would have given, sometimes more ; for often ex- pression, the first quality in pictures, suffers in this point, for fear the beauty of the stroke should be spoiled j while the rude and hasty touch, when the fancy is warm, gives a spirit not to be equalled by high finishing.

These twelve prints were calculated for the instruction of young people, and every thing addressed to them is fully described in words as well as figures ; yet to foreigners a translation of the mottoes, the intention of the story, and some little description of each print, may be necessary. To this may be added, a slight account of our customs, as boys being usually bound for seven years, &c. Suppose the whole story was made into a kind of tale, describing in episode the nature of a night-cellar, a marrow-bone concert, a Lord Mayor's show, &c. These prints I have found sell much more rapidly at Christmas than at any other season.

IV. THE GATE OF CALAIS.

After the March to Finchley, the next print that I en- graved, was the Roast Beef of Old England;* which took its rise from a visit I paid to France the preceding year. The first time an Englishman goes from Dover to Calais, he must be struck with the different face of things at so little a distance, A farcical pomp of war, pompous parade of religion, and much bustle with very little business. To sum up all, po- verty, slavery, and innate insolence, covered with an affec-

• [So does he express himself in the MS. though the Roast Beef

was published March 6, 1/49 ; and the March, Dec. 3Cl750. J. IRELAND.]

ON VARIOUS PRINTS. 63

tation of politeness, give you even here a true picture of the manners of the whole nation ; nor are the priests less oppo- site to those of Dover, than the two shores. The friars are dirty, sleek, and solemn ; the soldiery are lean, ragged, and tawdry ; and as to the fishwomen their faces are ab- solute leather.

As I was sauntering about, and observing them near the Gate, which it seems was built by the English, when the place was in our possession, I remarked some appearance of the arms of England on the front. By this, and idle cu- riosity, I was prompted to make a sketch of it, which being observed, I was taken into custody ; but not attempting to cancel any of my sketches or memorandums, which were found to be merely those of a painter for his private use, without any relation to fortification, it was not thought ne- cessary to send me back to Paris.* I was only closely con- fined to my own lodgings, till the wind changed for Eng- land j where I no sooner arrived, than I set about the pic- ture, made the gate my back-ground, and in one corner introduced my own portrait,-}- which has generally been thought a correct likeness, with the soldier's hand upon my shoulder. By the fat friar, who stops the lean cook, that is sinking under the weight of a vast sirloin of beef, and two of the military bearing off a great kettle of soup maigre, I meant to display toiy own countrymen the striking differ- ence between the food, priests, soldiers, &c. of two nations so contiguous, that in a clear day one coast may be seen from the other. The melancholy and miserable Highlander,

• [It has been said that Hogarth never went farther into France

than Calais ; this proves he had reached Paris. J. IRELAND.] t [This was afterwards copied for a watch-paper. J. IRELAND.}

64 REMARKS BY HOGARTH,

browzing on his scanty fare, consisting of a bit of bread and an onion, is intended for one of the many that fled from this country after the rebellion in 1745.

V. BEER STREET AND GIN LANE.

When these two prints were designed and engraved, the dreadful consequences of gin-drinking appeared in every street. In Gin Lane, every circumstance of its horrid ef- fects is brought to view in terrorem. Idleness, poverty, misery, and distress, which drives even to madness and death, are the only objects that are to be seen ; and not a house in tolerable condition but the pawnbroker's and Gin-shop.

Beer Street, its companion, was given as a contrast, where that invigorating liquor is recommended, in order to drive the other out of vogue. Here all is joyous and thriving. Industry and jollity go hand in hand. In this happy place, the pawnbroker's is the only house going to ruin ; and even the small quantity of porter that he can procure is taken in t the wicket, for fear of further distress.

VI. FOUR STAGES OF CRUELTY.

The leading points in these, as well as the two preceding prints, were made as obvious as possible, in the hope that their tendency might be seen by men of the lowest rank. Neither minute accuracy of design, nor fine engraving, were deemed necessary, as the latter would render them too expensive for the persons to whom they were intended to^>e useful. And the fact is, that the passions may be more forcibly ex- pressed by a strong bold stroke, than by the most delicate en-

ON VARIOUS PRINTS. 65

graving. To expressing them as I felt them, I have paid the utmost attention, and as they were addressed to hard hearts, have rather preferred leaving them hard, and giving the effect, by a quick touch, to rendering them languid and feeble by fine strokes and soft engraving ; which require more care and practice than can often be attained, except by a man of a very quiet turn of mind. Mason, who gave two strokes to every particular hair that he engraved, me- rited great admiration ; but at such admiration I never as- pired, neither was I capable of obtaining it if I had.

The prints were engraved with the hope of, in some de- gree, correcting that barbarous treatment of animals, the very sight of which renders the streets of our metropolis so distressing to every feeling mind. If they have had this ef- fect, and checked the progress of cruelty, I am more proud of having been the author, than I should be of having painted Raphael's Cartoons.

The French, among their other mistakes respecting our tragedies, &c. &c. assert, that such scenes could not be re- presented except by a barbarous people. Whatever may be our national character, I trust that our national conduct will be an unanswerable refutation.*

VII. ELECTION ENTERTAINMENT. 1755. These two patriots,! who,- let what party will prevail, can

• [Humanity and tenderness of mind were the leading charac-

teristics of my most valued and most regretted friend Mortimer ; he would not have trod on a worm ; yet, in painting subjects from which the common eye would revolt, he had the greatest delight. J. IRELAND.] f [The Butcher with^ro patrid in

his cap, and his wounded companion. N.]

66 REMARKS BY HOGARTH,

be no gainers, yet spend their time, which is their fortune, for what they suppose right, and for a glass of gin lose their blood, and sometimes their lives, in support of the cause, are, as far as I can see, entitled to an equal portion of fame with many of the emblazoned heroes of ancient Rome ; but such is the effect, of prejudice, that though the picture of an antique wrestler is admired as a grand character, we ne- cessarily annex an idea of vulgarity to the portrait of a mo- dern boxer. An old blacksmith in his tattered garb is a coarse and low being; strip him naked, tie his leathern apron round his loins, chisel out his figure in free-stone or marble, precisely as it appears, he becomes elevated, and may pass for a philosopher, or a Deity.

VIII. THE BENCH.

I have ever considered the knowledge of character, either high or low, to be the most sublime part of the art of paint- ing or sculpture ; and caricatura as the lowest : indeed as much so as the wild attempts of children, when they first try to draw : yet so it is, that the two words, from being similar in sound, are often confounded. When I was once at the house of a foreign face-painter, and looking over a legion of his portraits, Monsieur, with a low bow, told me that he infinitely admired my caricatures ! I returned his conge, and assured him, that I equally admired his.

I have often thought that much of this confusion might be done away, by recurring to the three branches of the drama, and considering the difference between Comedy, Tra- gedy, and Farce. Dramatic dialogue, which represents na- ture as it really is, though neither in the most elevated nor yet the most familiar style, may fairly be denominated Co-

ON VARIOUS PRINTS. 67

medy : for every incident introduced might have thus hap- pened, every syllable have been thus spoken, and so acted in common life. Tragedy is made up of more extraordinary events. The language is in a degree inflated, and the ac- tion and emphasis heightened. The performer swells his voice, and assumes a consequence in his gait ; even his habit is full and ample, to keep it on a par with his deportment. Every feature of his character is so much above common nature, that, were people off the stage to act, speak, and dress in a similar style, they would be thought fit for Bed- lam. Yet with all this, if the player does not o'erstep the proper bounds, and, by attempting too much, become swoln, it is not caricatura, but elevated character. I will go fur- ther, and admit that with the drama of Shakspeare, and ac- tion of Garrick, it may be a nobler species of entertainment than comedy.

As to Farce, where it is exaggerated, and outrtf, I have no objection to its being called caricatura, for such is the proper title.

IX. THE FIVE ORDERS OF PERRIWIGS.

There is no great difficulty in measuring the length, breadth, or height of any figures, where the parts are made up of plain lines. It requires no more skill to take the di- mensions of a pillar or cornice, than to measure a square box, and yet the man who does the latter is neglected, and he who accomplishes the former, is considered as a miracle of genius ; but I suppose he receives his honours for the distance he has travelled to do his business.*

• [This is a pointed ridicule in Stuart's " Antiquities of Athens,"

in which the measurements of all the members of the Greek archi- tecture are given with minute accuracy. J. IRELAND.

F 2

CHARACTERS OF HOGARTH;

CRITICISMS ON HIS WORKS.

I. BY THE HON. HORACE WALPOLE.*

HAVING dispatched the herd of our painters in oil, I re- served to a class by himself that great and original genius* Hogarth ; considering him rather as a writer of comedy with a pencil, than as a painter. If catching the manners and follies of an age living as they rise, if general satire on vices and ridicules, familiarized by strokes of nature, and heigh- tened by wit, and the whole animated by proper and just expressions of the passions, be comedy, Hogarth composed comedies as much as Moliere : in his Marriage A-la-mode there is even an intrigue carried on throughout the piece. He is more true to character than Congreve j each person- age is distinct from the rest, acts in his sphere, and cannot

• " Since the first edition of this work, a much ampler account of

Hogarth and his works has been given by Mr. Nichols, which is not only more accurate, but much more satisfactory than mine ; omitting nothing that a collector would wish to knowv-fither with regard to the history of the painter himself, or to the circumstances, different editions, and variations of his prints. H. WALPOLE."

BY HORACE WALPOLE. 69

be confounded with any other of the Dramatis Persons. - The alderman's footboy, in the last print of the set I have mentioned, is an ignorant rustic ; and if wit is struck out from the characters in which it is not expected, it is from their acting conformably to their situation and from the mode of their passions, not from their having the wit of fine gentlemen. Thus there is wit in the figure of the alderman, who when his daughter is expiring in the agonies of poison, wears a face of solicitude, but it is to save her gold ring, which he is drawing gently from her finger. The thought is parallel to Moliere's, where the miser puts out one of the candles as he is talking. Moliere, inimitable as he has proved, brought a rude theatre to perfection. Hogarth had no model to follow and improve upon. JHe created his art > and used colours instead of language. His place is between the Italians, whom we may consider as epic poets and tragedians, and the Flemish painters, who are as writers of farce and editors of burlesque nature. They are the Tom Browns of the mob. Hogarth resembles Butler, but his sub- jects are more universal, and amidst all his pleasantry he observes the true end of comedy, reformation ; there is always a moral to his pictures. Sometimes he rose to tragedy, not in the catastrophe of kings and heroes, but in marking how vice conducts insensibly and incidentally to misery and shame. He warns against encouraging cruelty and idleness in young minds, and discerns how the different vices of the great and the vulgar lead by various paths to the same unhappiness. The fine lady in Marriage A-la-mode, and Tom Nero in the Four Stages of Cruelty, terminate their story in blood she occasions the murder of her hus- band, he assassinates his mistress. How delicate and supe- rior too is his satire, when he intimates in the College of

70 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

Physicians and Surgeons that preside at a dissection, how the legal habitude of viewing shocking scenes hardens the human mind, and renders it unfeeling. The president main- tains the dignity of insensibility over an executed corpse, and considers it but as the object of a lecture. In the print of the Sleeping Judges, this habitual indifference only ex- cites our laughter.

It is to Hogarth's honour that in so many scenes of satire or ridicule, H is obvious that ill-nature did not guide his pencil. His end is always reformation, and his reproofs general.

It is seldom that his figures do not express the character he intended to give them. When they wanted an illustration that colours could not bestow, collateral circumstances, full of wit, supply notes. The nobleman in Marriage A -la-mode has a great air the coronet on his crutches, and his pedigree issuing out of the bowels of William the Conqueror, add his character. In the breakfast the old steward reflects for the spectator. Sometimes a short label is an epigram, and is never introduced without improving the subject. Unfortu- nately some circumstances, that were temporary, will be lost to posterity, the fate of all comic authors j and if ever an author wanted a commentary that none of his beauties might be lost, it is Hogarth not from being ob- scure, (for he never was that but in two or three of his first prints, where transient national follies, as Lotteries, Free- masonry, and the South-Sea were his topics) but for the use of foreigners, and from a multiplicity of little incidents, not essential to, but always heightening the principal action. Such is the spider's web extended over the poofV.box in a parish-church ; the blunders in architecture in the noble- nian's seat seen through the window, in the first print of

BY HORACE WALPOLE. 71

Marriage A-la-mod ; and a thousand in the Strollers dressing in a barn, which for wit and imagination, without any other end, I think the best of all his works j as for useful and deep satire, that on the Methodists is the most sublime. The scenes of Bedlam and the Gaming house, are inimitable representations of our serious follies or unavoidable woes 5 and the concern shown by the Lord- Mayor when the com- panion of his childhood is brought before him as a criminal, is a touching picture, and big with humane admonition and reflection.

Another instance of this author's genius is his not con- descending to explain his moral lessons by the trite poverty of allegory. If he had an emblematic thought, he expressed it with wit, rather than by a symbol. Such is that of the whore setting fire to the world in the Rake's Progress. Once indeed he descended to use an allegoric personage, and was not happy in it : in one of his Election prints Britannia's chariot breaks down, while the coachman and footman are playing at cards on the box. Sometimes too, to please his vulgar customers, he stooped to low images and national satire, as in the two prints of France and England, and that of the Gate of Calais. The last indeed has great merit, though the caricatura is carried to excess. In all these the painter's purpose was to make his countrymen observe the ease and affluence of a free government, opposed to the wants and woes of slaves. In Beer-Street the English butcher tossing a Frenchman in the air with one hand, is absolutely hyperbole ; and what is worse, was an after- thought, not being in the first edition.* The Gin-alley is much superior, horridly fine, but disgusting.

• [Mr. Walpole is mistaken. The butcher is a blacksmith. In

T2 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

His Bartholomew-fair* is full of humour ; the March to Finchley, of nature : the Enraged Musician tends to farce. The Four Parts of the Day, except the last, are inferior to few of his works. The Sleeping Congregation, the Lecture on the Vacuum, the Laughing Audience, the Consultation of Physicians as a coat of arms, and the Cockpit, are perfect in their several kinds. The prints of Industry and Idleness have more merit in the intention than execution.

It may appear singular, that of an author whom I call comic, and who is so celebrated for his humour, I should speak in general in so serious a style -, but it would be sup- pressing the merits of his heart to consider him only as a promoter of laughter. I think I have shown that his views were more generous and extensive. Mirth coloured his pic- tures, but benevolence designed them. He smiled like Socrates, that men might not be offended at his lectures, and might learn to laugh at their own follies. When his topics were harmless, all his touches were marked with pleasantry and fun, He never laughed like Rabelais at nonsense that he imposed for wit ; but like Swift combined incidents that divert one from their unexpected encounter, and illustrate the tale he means to tell. Such are the hens roosting on the upright waves in the scene of the Strollers, and the devils drinking porter on the altar. The manners or costume are more than observed in every one of his works. The very furniture of his rooms describes the characters of the persons to whom they belong ; a lesson that might be of use to comic authors. It was reserved to Hogarth to write a scene of

furniture. The rake's levee-room, the nobleman's dining-

~^

the first state of the plate the blacksmith is lifting a Frenchman ; in the second state the Frenchman is properly discarded. N.]

• [Southwark Fair. N.]

BY HORACE WALPOLE. 73

room, the apartments of the husband and wife in Marriage A-la-mode, the alderman's parlour, the poet's bedchamber, and many others, are the history of the manners of the age.

Before his apprenticeship was expired, he felt the impulse of genius, and felt it directed him to painting, though little apprized at that time of the mode nature had intended he should pursue. His apprenticeship was no sooner expired, than he entered into the Academy in St. Martin's-lane, and studied drawing from the life, in which he never attained to great excellence. It was character, the passions, the soul, that his genius was given him to copy.

His Midnight Modern Conversation was the first work that showed his command of character : but it was the Har- lot's Progress that established his fame. The pictures were scarce finished and no sooner exhibited to the public, and the subscription opened, than above twelve hundred names were entered on his book. The familiarity of the subject, and the propriety of the execution, made it tasted by all ranks of people. Every engraver set himself to copy it, and thousands of imitations were dispersed all over the kingdom. jt was made into a pantomime, and performed on the stage. The Rake's Progress, perhaps superior, had not so much suc- cess, from want of novelty ; nor indeed is the print of the Arrest equal in merit to the others.

The curtain was now drawn aside, and his genius stood displayed in its full lustre. From time to time he continued to give those works that should be immortal, if the nature of his art will allow it. Even the receipts for his subscriptions had wit in them. Many of his plates he engraved himself, and often expunged faces etched by his assistants when they had not done justice to his ideas.

74 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

II. BY THE REV. WILLIAM GILPIN, M.A.

The works of Hogarth abound in true humour ; and sa- tire, 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 pre- sent 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 examina- tion, may be the subject of a little more enquiry.

In design Hogarth was seldom at a loss : his invention was fertile, and his judgment 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 lotv or familiar subjects. It never soared abave 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 Apprentice," 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 tfi picture, so as to have formed a pyramid with the cart, the composi- tion had been unexceptionable ; and yet the first print of

BY THE REV. WM. GILPIN. 75

this work is so striking an instance of disagreeable composi- tion, 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 know- ledge 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 doivn a little, the light would have been beautifully distributed on the foreground : 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 principle.

Neither was Hogarth a master of drawing. Of the mus- cles and anatomy of the head and hands he had perfect knowledge ; but his trunks are 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 he knows nothing ; nor were they of use in that mode of de- sign which he cultivated : and yet his figures, on the whole, are infused 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 sup- posed, would have given us more instances of grace than we find in the works of Hogarth ; which shews 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 in- stances 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

76 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

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 caricatures of those masters, who have sometimes amused themselves with patching together an assemblage of features from their own ideas. Such are Spaniolet's $ which, though admirably executed, appear plainly to have no arche- types in nature. Hogarth's, on the other hand, are collec- tions of natural curiosities. The " Oxford-heads*," the " Physicians' Armsf," and some of his other pieces, are ex- pressly of this kind. They are truly comic ; though ill-na- tured effusions of rnirth : more entertaining than Spaniolet'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 catch- ing those peculiarities of air and gesture, which the ridicu- lous part of every profession contract ; and which, for that reason, became characteristic of the whole. His counsel- lors, his undertakers, his lawyers, his usurers, are all con- spicuous at sight. In a word, almost every profession may see in his works, that peculiar 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 un- necessary stroke. For myself, I greatly more value the works of his own needle, than those high -finished prints, on

• [The Lecture. N.] f [Undertakers' Arms. N.]

BY THE REV. WM. GILPIN. 77

which he employed other engravers. For, as the produc- tion of an effect is not his talent, and this is the chief excel- lence 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 cor- rectness of an elaborate engraving. If all his works had been executed in this style, with a few improvements in the composition and the management of light, they would cer- tainly have been a 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 critic's eye, they would have been better without the engraving; except a. few touches in a very Jeiu places. The want of effect too would have been less conspicuous, which, in his highly finished prints, is disagree- ably striking.

III. BY JOHN IRELAND, ESQ.

Were the character of Hogarth considered by a connois- seur, he would probably assert, that this man could not be a painter, for he had never travelled to Rome ; could not be a judge of art, for he spoke irreverently of the ancients ; gave his figures neither dignity nor grace ; was erro- neous in his distribution of light and shade, and inattentive to the painter's balance ; that his grouping was inartificial, and his engraving coarse.

To traverse continents in search of antique paintings, ex-

• The Pleased Audience at a Play. N.]

78 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

plore caverns for mutilated sculpture, and measure the pro- portions of a statue with mathematical precision, was not the boast of William Hogarth. The Temple of Nature was hisl academy, and his topography the map of the human mindj Disdaining to copy or translate, he left the superior class of beings that people the canvas of Poussin and Michael Angelo to their admirers, selected his images from his own country, and gave them with a truth, energy, and variety of cha- racter, ever appropriate, and invariably original. Consi- dering his peculiar powers, it is fortunate for his fame that he was a native of Britain. In Switzerland, the scenery is romantic, the rocks are stupendous ; in Italy, the models of art are elevated and majestic, the ruins of ancient Greece still continue a school of architecture and proportion ; but in England, and in England alone, we have every variety of character that separates man from man. To these he re- sorted, and rarely attempted to heighten nature, either by ideal or elevated beauty ;. for though he had the eye, he had not the wing of an eagle ; when he attempted to soar, par- ticles of his native clay clung to his pinions, and retarded his flight.

His engravings, though coarse, are forcible, in a degree scarcely to be paralleled. Every figure is drawn from the quarry of nature ; and, though seldom polished, is always animated.

He has been accused of grossness in some of his single figures : but the general vein of his wit is better calculated to make the man of humour smile, than the humourist laugh ; has the air of Cervantes, rather than Rabelais, of Field- ing, rather than Smollett.

I do not know in what class to place his pictured stories. They are too much crowded with little incidents, for the

BY JOHN IRELAND. 79

dignity of history ; for tragedy, are too comic; yet have a termination which forbids us to call them comedies. Being selected from life, they present to us the absurdities, crimes, punishments, and vicissitudes of man : to-day, basking in the bright beams of prosperity ; to-morrow, sunk in the gloom of comfortless despair. Be it recorded to his honour, that their invariable tendency is the promotion of virtue ; and the dif- fusion of such a spirit as tends to make men industrious, hu- mane, and happy. If some of the incidents are thought too ludicrous, and a few of the scenes rather border on the li- centious, let it be remembered, that since they were en- graved, the standard of delicacy has been somewhat altered : that species of wit which this sentimental and double-refined age deems too much debased for common currency, was then, with a still larger portion of alloy, the sterling coin of the kingdom.

On canvass he was not so successful as on copper. Scrip- ture history, which was one of his first attempts, did not add a leaf to his laurel. In small portraits of conversations, &c. he was somewhat more successful ; but in a few years the novelty wore off, and the public grew tired. Though he had great facility, and general success, in his resemblances, his eye was too correct, and his hand too faithful, for those who wished to be flattered. The fantastic fluttering robes, given by contemporary painters, were too absurd for him to imitate ; and he painted all his figures in the exact habits they wore. Compared with the dignified dresses of Van- dyke, the Germanic garb, which then prevailed, gave a mean and unpicturesque formality to his portraits.

With respect to his person, though hardly to be classed as a little man, Hogarth was rather below the middle size ; he had an eye peculiarly bright and piercing, and an air of spirit

80 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

and vivacity. From an accident in his youth, he had a deep scar on his forehead : the mark remained ! and he frequently wore his hat so as to display it. His conversation was lively and cheerful, mixed with a quickness of retort that did not gain him friends. Severe in his satire on those who were present, but of the absent he was usually the advocate ; and has sometimes boasted that he never uttered a sentence concerning any man living, that he would not repeat to his face. In the relations of husband, brother, friend, and mas- ter, he was kind, generous, sincere, and indulgent. In diet abstemious ; but in his hospitalities, though devoid of osten- tation, liberal and free-hearted. Not parsimonious, yet fru- gal ;-r-but so comparatively small were the rewards then paid to artists, that, after the labour of a long life, he left a very inconsiderable sum to his widow, with whom he must have received a large portion of what was bequeathed to her.

IV. BY JAMES CHRISTIE, ESQ.

Hogarth may be justly deemed the Teniers of the English school. These masters equally entered into the scenes of domestic and familiar life j they equally represented them according to nature and truth. The latter may perhaps have excelled in sweetness of colouring, yet Hogarth sur- passed him in originality of character, with the additional advantage of an historical talent, and a morality of de- sign, which Teniers did not possess. We might even pro- ceed still farther with the parallel. As humour was ex- posed in the works of each master $ so, to give it every va- riety offeree, subjects were introduced by each, from which the eyes of prudish delicacy might sometimes turn aside. But in this point of view, the beam evidently inclines in fa-

BY JOHN IRELAND. 81

vour of the English artist. This apparent objection emi- nently ennobled his work. He pleaded the cause of virtue it was vice that he painted in disgusting colours; and though the judicious spectator may occasionally discover grossness in the production of this great Artist, yet they were such as scenes from nature produced, and such as the great Moralist always contrasted, by displaying virtue at the same time in the loveliest attire, and giving her the most attrac- tive expression.

V. BY THOMAS PHILLIPS, ESQ. R. A.

William Hogarth was one of those few original and extra- ordinary characters with whom it has pleased Providence occasionally to bless the world ; to enlighten mankind, and to carry the arts and sciences necessary for their comfort, pleasure, and improvement, nearer to perfection. It cannot, indeed, be truly said of Hogarth, that he improved the practice of the arts of Painting and Engraving, which he professed but he merited the praise of having more power- fully exhibited their moral utility than any of his prede- cessors ; and that in a new, and, till then, unthought-of mode, adapted to the feelings and understandings of all orders of men ; as it arose from a close observance of the actions and expressions common to all under the influence of the passions. Moved by the impulse of genius rather than the tuition of man, he travelled in a path unexplored by any before him, and which yet remains closed to suc- ceeding artists. Possessing, by early practice, the knowledge of the art of engraving, he was happily enabled to disseminate, by its means, the ingenious inventions of his mind, in a man- ner more perfect than those of other painters have been

G

82 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

presented to the world ; 'or than probably ever again will be done, till another painter shall be his own engraver.

Hogarth was accused of vanity, and of enviously endea- vouring to under-rate what he was unable to execute. And certainly with much justice the remarks appear to have been made ; for, previously to his adopting the line of conduct in Painting which was so suitable to his peculiar genius, he at- tempted several pictures in the grand historical style, and in all failed most woefully. It is apparent that he at no time of his life understood the object or character of that species of art, and was, therefore, ill qualified to judge of its value. But probably he was urged to the strong declarations in which he indulged, by seeing the success of infamous dealers in bad copies ; and continually hearing bad originals exalted beyond all rational bounds, because they are supposed, by presuming connoisseurs, to be the productions of this or that man of genius ; while in fact, they may be the inferior labours of some mongrel imitator. What, however, but the extreme of vanity, could induce a man, so ill trained in art, to think of contending with Poussin and Corregio in histo- rical painting, and with Vandyke in portraiture ? He assert- ed himself equal to either in their way, and in both proved himself grossly defective. In his own original manner, and in that alone, distinct from every one, he was super-excel- lent ; conceiving his subjects with most consummate intelli- gence, and executing them with appropriate character and style.

In 1759 he made another unsuccessful attempt at serious historical painting, and that under circumstances particularly unfavourable to him ; the failure in which, or rather the pub- lic circumstances connected with it, was thought by many to have hastened his end. He was induced by vanity to en-

BY T. PHILLIPS, ESQ. R.A. 83

deavour at rivalry with a picture,, said to be by Corregio, of " Sigismunda weeping over the Heart of her Lover." The consequence was, what might justly have been expected, disappointment, with the world at least, however he might himself appreciate it. He set the same value upon it as its prototype had brought at sale by public auction, viz. ^400. The nobleman for whom it was painted excused himself from taking it, and it remained with Hogarth to his death. It is at present in the possession of J. H. Anderdon, Esq.

It is lamentable, that a man so highly useful and honour- able to his country and the arts he professed, should, by singularity, and by an impolitic although upright mode of conduct, bring enemies upon himself as he advanced in years ; who, unequal to cope with him for the bright rewards of genius, yet had influence enough in the world to sting him, and that remorselessly, by petty, paltry efforts. These, though they could never seriously wound his fame, yet dis- turbed his repose, and prevented the enjoyment of those well-earned encomiums the wise and virtuous were inclined to bestow upon his meritorious efforts. Such, unhappily, was the fate of Hogarth. Strong in mind, original in re- flection, and deeply reflective, but narrowed by want of education, he lavished abroad opinions peculiar to himself; opposing old and well-founded reasonings, because he saw more of their abuse than of their utility. He appears to have been a humourist, but of the best class. He spoke his mind freely, heedless of the result. Its effect upon him proves to others who may be inclined to follow the same course, that it is not always to be pursued with impunity.

In a state thus irritable, goaded by the malignity and envy of others, and resting for support entirely upon his own con- scious rectitude, and the consolation of a few friends who G 2

845 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

knew how to estimate his talents and his genuine worth, he continued to employ himself on minor labours ; till, in 1762, he unfortunately elicited a flame of enmity in the breasts of two powerful antagonists, under whose united efforts he sunk. These were Wilkes and Churchill, whose great inge- nuity and keen satire he drew upon himself, by exhibiting them in his print of " The Times," as incendiaries ; fomenters of public disturbances.*

To revenge himself, he published a likeness of Wilkes, which doubtless he thought was the greatest satire upon his pretension to political honesty and heroic character that he could produce. This drew upon him Churchill the Poet, who severely treated him in an epistle, fraught with the grossest abuse and the utmost malignity, and even falsehood, though in some parts justly complimentary. All that the bitterness of resentment could dictate, or the malevolence of the keenest satire inspire, is poured forth in it upon the de- voted Hogarth, who could only retort by a print of a Bear with a pot of porter and a ragged staff, on the knots of which was written Lies, Lies, Lies !

This unhappy event Hogarth did not long survive. It is said that he did not suffer in mind by the coarse attack of Churchill, so much as by the previous one by Wilkes ; he says of it himself, that " it made no impression, but perhaps in some measure effaced or weakened the black strokes of the North Briton." And he concludes his own memoir by say- ing, Thus have I gone through the principal circumstances of a life which, till lately, passed pretty much to my own satisfaction, and I hope in no respect injurious to any other man. This I can safely assert, I have invariably endeavoured

• His own account of this circumstance has been before given ;

see p. 58.

BY T. PHILLIPS, ESQ. R.A. 85

to make those about me tolerably happy : and my greatest enemy cannot say I ever did an intentional injury ; though, without ostentation, I could produce many instances of men that have been essentially benefited by me. What may fol- low God knows ! Finis /"

Such is the candid appeal, which, in the consciousness of sound principle and rectitude of heart, this excellent artist and well-intentioned man made to his contemporaries, and to posterity. Let the human weakness he exhibited in com- mon with his fellow men, teach them, like his works (which necessarily lead to moral reflection), that strict government of the heart and mind, and kind indulgence to the infirmities of others, are the best guides to happiness, here as well as hereafter.

His last original production he termed " Finis, the Bathos, or the Art of sinking in Sublime Painting." This print was published in March 1764 -, and in the October following death put a.Jinis to the labours of this extraordinary man, and de- prived society of one of its most useful members ; who con- tributed alike to its amusement and its improvement, and has left a perpetual fund of both for the benefit of future ages.*

VI. BY RICHARD PAYNE KNIGHT, ESQ.

Hogarth adopted a new line of art, purely English ; his merits are known to the public, more from his prints than from his paintings : both deserve our attention. His pictures often display beautiful colouring, as well as accurate draw- ing : his subjects generally convey useful lessons of morality, and are calculated to improve the man, as well as the artist : and he teaches with effect, because he delights while he in-

• Rees's Cyclopedia.

86 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

structs. It has been said of him, that in his pictures he com- posed comedies ; his humour never fails to excite mirth, and it is directed against the fit objects of ridicule or con- tempt. The powers of his pencil were not perverted to the purposes of personal attack the application of his satire was general, and the end at which he aimed was the reformation of folly or of vice.*

VII. BY JOHN BRITTON, ESQ. F.S.A.

It is incompatible with the constitution of man and the qualifications of genius, to excel in the different branches of art, or to acquire positive pre-eminence in two distinct de- partments of science. The productions of Hogarth, among those of several other justly-famed artists, serve to illustrate this maxim. In pictures of comic character, rich humour, and moral satire, and particularly in displaying the human figure and countenance in its common and popular forms, he certainly excelled all other painters. Many of his pic- tures were also executed in a masterly style of colouring, grouping, and effect. Like the generality of artists, he was occasionally required to paint subjects from ancient and sa- cred history - } but he then wandered out of his element, and at once betrayed a want of judgment and of taste. In the three pictures in Redcliffe Church, this is exemplified. As specimens of colouring, however, they possess much merit, and may be viewed with advantage by the young artist but in the forms and expression of the figures, and in their attitudes and grouping, we seek in vain for propriety, dig- nity, or elegance. Hogarth was certainly an artist of pecu- liar and distinguished talents. He stood alone in art, and

• Exhibition Catalogue of the British Gallery, 1814.

BY J. BRITTON, ESQ. 87

formed a school of his own. He was at once the Pictorial Satirist, Moralist, and Historian of the age in which he lived. I use the latter term, from the conviction that his pictures will always be referred to with pleasure and advantage, as recording the features, costume, and corporeal character- istics of many eminent and illustrious persons, and of many public and private events of his time.*

VIII. BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM, ESQ.

William Hogarth was rather below the middle size ; his eye was peculiarly bright and piercing 5 his look shrewd, sarcastic, and intelligent; the forehead high and round. He was active in person, bustling in manner, and fond of af- fecting a little state and importance : of a temper cheerful, joyous, and companionable ; fond of mirth and good fellow- ship ; desirous of saying strong and pointed things j ardent in friendship and in resentment. His lively conversation his knowledge of character his readiness of speech and quickness of retort, made many covet his company, who were sometimes the objects of his satire ; but he employed his wit on those who were present, and spared or defended the absent. His personal spirit was equal to his satiric talents ; he provoked, with his pencil, the temper of those whom it was not prudent to offend ; with him no vice nor folly found shelter behind wealth, or rank, or power. As to the license of his tongue, he himself often said that he never uttered that sentence about a living man which he would not repeat gladly to his face : as to his works, he always felt conscious of their merit, and predicted with equal openness that his name would descend with no de-

• Account of St, Mary Redcliffe Church.

88 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

crease of honour to posterity. He loved state in his dress, good order in his household, and the success of his works enabled him to indulge in the luxuries of a good table and pleasant guests.

The character of William Hogarth as a man is to be sought for in his conduct, and in the opinions of his more dispassionate contemporaries ; his character as an artist is to be gathered from numerous works, at once original and unrivalled. His fame has flown far and wide ; his skill as an engraver spread his reputation as a painter ; and all who love the dramatic representation of actual life all who have hearts to be gladdened by humour all who are pleased with judicious and well-directed satire all who are charmed with the ludicrous looks of popular folly and all who can be moved with the pathos of human suffering are admirers of Hogarth. That his works are unlike those of other men, is his merit, not his fault. He belonged to no school of art ; he was the produce of no academy ; no man living or dead had any share in forming his mind, or in rendering his hand skilful. He was the spontaneous offspring of the gra- phic spirit of his country, as native to the heart of England as independence is, and he may be fairly called, in his own walk, the first-born of her spirit.

He painted life as he saw it. He gives no visions of by- gone things no splendid images of ancient manners ; he regards neither the historian's page nor the poet's song. He was contented with the occurrences of the passing day with the folly or the sin of the hour ; to the garb and fashion of the moment, however, he adds story and sentiment for all time.

The morality of Hogarth has been questioned ; and in- deed the like has befallen Crabbe. We may smile as we look at his works, and we may laugh all this is true ; the

BY ALLAN CUNNINGHAM, ESQ. 89

victims whom Hogarth conducts pass through many varied scenes of folly, and commit many absurdities ; but the spec- tacle saddens as we move along, and if we commence in mirth, we are overwhelmed with sorrow at last. His object was to insinuate the excellence of virtue by proving the hideousness of vice j and, if he has failed, who has suc- ceeded? As to other charges, preferred by the malice of his contemporaries, time and fame have united in disproving them. He has been accused of want of knowledge in the human form, and of grace and serenity of expression. There is some truth in this perhaps ; but the peculiar cha- racter of his pictures required mental vigour, rather than external beauty, and the serene Madonna-like loveliness could not find a place among the follies and frivolities of the passing scene. He saw a way of his own to fame, and fol- lowed it; he scorned all, imitation, and by word and works recommended nature for an example and a monitress in art. His grammatical accuracy and skill in spelling have been doubted by men who are seldom satisfied with any thing short of perfection, and they have added the accusation that he was gross and unpolished. Must men of genius be ex- amples of both bodily and mental perfection ? Look at the varied works of Hogarth, and say, could a man, overflowing with such knowledge of men and manners, be called illi- terate or ignorant. He was of no college but not there- fore unlearned ; he was of no academy yet who will que&- tion his excellence in art ? He acquired learning by his study of human nature in his intercourse with the world in his musing on the changes of seasons and on the vary- ing looks of the nation and the aspect of the universe. He drank at the great fountain of information, and went by the ancient road ; and till it is shown that his works are with- out knowledge, I shall look on him as a well-informed man.

90 CHARACTER OF HOGARTH.

" As a painter" says Walpole, " Hogarth has slender merit." What is the merit of a painter ? If it be to re- present life to give us an image of man to exhibit the workings of his heart to record the good and evil of his nature to set in motion before us the very beings with whom earth is peopled to shake us with mirth to sadden us with woeful reflection to please us with natural group- ing, vivid action, and vigorous colouring Hogarth has done all this and if he that has done so be not a painter, who will show us one ? I claim a signification as wide for the word painter as for the word poet. But there seems a dis- position to limit the former to those who have been formed under some peculiar course of study and produced works in the fashion of such and such great masters, This I take to be mere pedantry ; and that as well might all men be excluded from the rank of poets, who have not composed epics, dramas, odes, or elegies, according to the rules of the Greeks.

Hogarth's style of engraving is indeed rough ; but it is vigorous and free. He accomplishes his aim by one or two fortunate and happy strokes not by a multitude of small and timid touches which diminish the natural freedom of the original.*

• Mr. Strutt, in his Dictionary of Engravers, observes,

" The engravings which Hogarth has finished with his own hands, though not so neat and excellent with respect to the mechanical part of them, as those executed by professed engravers, convey, however, more of the original genius, and fire, if I may so express myself, of the artist, than can be found in the best copies from his designs, and for this reason I should prefer the prints engraved by himself to any of the rest. They are easily distinguished.

87*

IX. BY WILLIAM HAZLITT, ESQ.* (FROM THE ROUND TABLE.)

It has been observed, that Hogarth's pictures are exceed- ingly unlike any other representations of the same kind of subjects that they form a class, and have a character pe- culiar to themselves. It may be worth while to consider in what this general distinction consists.

In the first place they are, in the strictest sense, Histo- rical pictures j and if what Fielding says be true, that his novel of Tom Jones ought to be regarded as an epic prose- poem, because it contained a regular developement of fable, manners, character, and passion, the compositions of Ho- garth will in like manner be found to have a higher claim to the title of Epic Pictures, than many which have of late arrogated that denomination to themselves. When I say that Hogarth treated his subjects historically, I mean that his works represent the manners and humours of mankind in action, and their characters by individual expression. Every thing in his pictures has life and motion in it. Not only does the business of the scene never stand still, but

• This elegant piece of criticism first appeared in the Examiner

in 1814, as a critique on the Exhibition then on view at the British Gallery, and has been reprinted in the " Round Table." But it contains so just an estimate of the immortal painter, as regards his conception of character, his power in delineation, independently of his wit, satire, and buffoonery, and finally of his skill in the mechanical department of the art, that I cannot resist the plea- sure of laying the whole before the reader. N,

G 6

88* CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

every feature and muscle is put into full play ; the exact feeling of the moment is brought out, and carried to its utmost height, and then instantly seized and stamped on the canvass for ever. The expression is always taken en passant, in a state of progress or change, and, as it were, at the salient point. Besides the excellence of each indi- vidual face, the reflection of the expression from face to face, the contrast and struggle of particular motives and feelings in the different actors in the scene, as of anger, contempt, laughter, compassion, are conveyed in the hap- piest and most lively manner. His figures are not like the back ground on which they are painted ; even the pictures on the wall have a peculiar look of their own. Again, with all the rapidity, variety, and scope of history, Ho- garth's heads have all the reality and correctness of por- traits. He gives the extremes of character and expression, but he gives them with perfect truth and accuracy. This is in fact what distinguishes his compositions from all others of the same kind, that they are equally remote from cari- cature, and from mere still life. It of course happens in subjects from common life, that the painter can procure real models, and he can get them to sit as long as he pleases. Hence, in general, those attitudes and expressions have been chosen which could be assumed the longest ; and in imitating which the Artist, by taking pains and time, might produce almost as complete fac-similes as he could of a flower or a flower-pot, of a damask-curtain, or a china vase. The copy is as perfect and as uninteresting in the one case as in the other. On the contrary, subjects of drol- lery and ridicule affording frequent examples of strange de- formity and peculiarity of features, these have been eagerly seized by another class of Artists, who, without subjecting

BY W. HAZLITT, ESQ. 89*

themselves to the laborious drudgery of the Dutch School and their imitators, have produced our popular caricatures, by rudely copying or exaggerating the casual irregularities of the human countenance. Hogarth has equally avoided the faults of both these styles, the insipid lameness of the one, and the gross vulgarity of the other, so as to give to the productions of his pencil equal solidity and effect. For his faces go to the very verge of caricature, and yet never (we believe in any single instance) go beyond it ; they take the very widest latitude, and yet we always see the links which bind them to nature j they bear all the marks and carry all the conviction of reality with them, as if we had seen the actual faces for the first time, from the precision, consistency, and good sense, with which the whole and every part is made out. They exhibit the most uncommon features wiih the most uncommon expressions, but which are yet as familiar and intelligible as possible, because with all the force they have all the truth of Nature. Hogarth has left behind him as many of these memorable faces, in their memorable moments, as perhaps most of us remember in the course of our lives, and has thus doubled the quan- tity of our observation.

The superiority of the pictures of Hogarth, in the pre- sent collection at the British Institution, to the common prints, is confined chiefly to the MARRIAGE-A-LA-MODE. We shall attempt to illustrate a few of their most striking excellencies, more particularly with reference to the ex- pression of character. Their merits are indeed so promi- nent, and have been so often discussed, that it may be thought difficult to point out any new beauties ; but, in fact, they contain so much truth of nature, they present the ob- jects to the eye under so many aspects and bearings, admit

G 7

90* CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

of so many constructions, and are so pregnant with mean- ing, that the subject is in a manner inexhaustible.

Boccaccio, the most refined and sentimental of all the novel-writers, has been stigmatised as a mere inventor of licentious tales, because readers in general have only seized on those things in his works which were suited to their own taste, and have reflected their own grossness back upon the writer. So it has happened that the majority of critics, having been most struck with the strong and decided ex- pression in Hogarth, the extreme delicacy, and subtle gra- dations of character in his pictures have almost entirely escaped them. In the first picture of the MARRIAGE A- LA-MODE, the three figures of the young Nobleman, his intended Bride, and her inamorato, the Lawyer, show how much Hogarth excelled in the power of giving soft and effeminate expression. They have however been less no- ticed than the other figures, which tell a plainer story, and convey a more palpable moral. Nothing can be more finely managed than the differences of character in these delicate personages. The Beau sits smiling at the looking-glass, with a reflected simper of self-admiration, and a languish- ing inclination of the head, while the rest of his body is perked up on his high heels with a certain air of tip-toe elevation. He is the Narcissus of the reign of George II. whose powdered peruke, ruffles, gold lace, and patches, divide his self-love unequally with his own person, the true Sir Plume of his day :

" Of amber snuff-box justly vain, And the nice conduct of a clouded cane."

There is the same felicity in the figure and attitude of the Bride, courted by the Lawyer. There is the utmost flexi- bility, and yielding softness in her whole person, a listless

BY W. HAZLITT, ESQ. 91*

languor and tremulous suspense in the expression of her face. It is the precise look and air which Pope has given to his favourite Belinda, just at the moment of the Rape of the Lock. The heightened glow, the forward intelligence, and loosened soul of love in the same face, in the Assigna- tion scene before the masquerade, form a fine and instructive contrast to the delicacy, timidity, and coy reluctance ex- pressed in the first. The Lawyer in both pictures is much the same perhaps too much so though even this unmoved unaltered appearance may be designed as characteristic. In both cases he has " a person, and a smooth dispose, framed to make women false." He is full of that easy good- humour, and easy good opinion of himself, with which the sex are delighted. There is not a sharp angle in his face to obstruct his success, or give a hint of doubt or difficulty. His whole aspect is round and rosy, lively and unmeaning, happy without the least expence of thought, careless and inviting j and conveys a perfect idea of the uninterrupted glide and pleasing murmur of the soft periods that flow from his tongue.

The expression of the Bride in the MORNING SCENE, is the most highly seasoned, and at the same time the most vulgar in the series. The figure, face, and attitude of the Husband, are inimitable. Hogarth has with great skill contrasted the pale countenance of the Husband with the yellow whitish colour of the marble chimney-piece behind him, in such a manner as to preserve the fleshy tone of the former. The airy splendour of the view of the inner room in this picture is probably not exceeded by any of the pro- ductions of the Flemish School.

The Young Girl in the third picture, who is represented as the victim of fashionable profligacy, is unquestionably

08

92* CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

one of the Artist's chef-d'ceuvres. The exquisite delicacy of the painting is only surpassed by the felicity and sub- tlety of the conception. Nothing can be more striking than the contrast between the extreme softness of her person, and the hardened indifference of her character. The va- cant stillness, the docility to vice, the premature suppres- sion of youthful sensibility, the doll-like mechanism of the whole figure, which seems to have no other feeling but a sickly sense of pain show the deepest insight into human nature, and into the effects of those refinements in depra- vity, by which it has been good-naturedly asserted, that " vice loses half its evil in losing all its grossness." The story of this picture is in some parts very obscure and enig- matical. It is certain that the Nobleman is not looking straightforward to the Quack, whom he seems to have been threatening with his cane, but that his eyes are turned up with an ironical leer of triumph to the Procuress. The commanding attitude and size of this woman, the swelling circumference of her dress, spread out like a turkey-cock's feathers, the fierce, ungovernable, inveterate malignity of her countenance, which hardly needs the comment of the clasp-knife to explain her purpose, are all admirable in themselves, and still more so, as they are opposed to the mute insensibility, the elegant negligence of the dress, and the childish figure of the Girl, who is supposed to be her protegee. As for the Quack, there can be no doubt enter- tained about him. His face seems as if it were composed of salve, and his features exhibit all the chaos and confusion of the most gross, ignorant, and impudent empiricism.

The gradations of ridiculous affectation in the Music SCENE, are finely imagined and preserved. The preposte- rous, overstrained admiration of the Lady of Quality, the sentimental, insipid, patient delight of the Man with his

BY W. HAZLITT, ESQ. 93*

hair in papers, and sipping his tea, the pert, smirking, conceited, half-distorted approbation of the figure next to him, the transition to the total insensibility of the round face in profile, and then to the wonder of the Negro-boy at the rapture of his Mistress, form a perfect whole. The sanguine complexion and flame-coloured hair of the female Virtuoso, throw an additional light on the character. This is lost in the Print. The continuing the red colour of the hair into the back of the chair has been pointed out as one of those instances of alliteration in colouring, of which these pictures are every where full. The gross bloated ap- pearance of the Italian Singer is well relieved by the hard features of the instrumental performer behind him, which might be carved of wood. The Negro-boy, holding the chocolate, both in expression, colour, and execution, is a master-piece. The gay, lively derision of the other Negro- boy, playing with the Acteon, is an ingenious contrast to the profound amazement of the first. Some allusion has already been made to the two lovers in this picture. It is curious to observe the infinite activity of mind which this Artist displays on every occasion. An instance occurs in the present picture. He has so contrived the papers in the hair of the Bride, as to make them look almost like a wreath of half-blown flowers, while those which he has placed on the head of the musical amateur very much re- semble a cheveux-de-fris of horns, which adorn and fortify the lack-lustre expression and mild resignation of the face beneath.

The NIGHT SCENE is inferior to the rest of the series. The attitude of the Husband, who is just killed, is one in which it would be impossible for him to stand or even to fall. It exactly resembles the loose pasteboard figures they make for children. The characters in the last Pic-

94* CHARACTER OF HOGARTH,

ture, in which the Wife dies, are all masterly. We would particularly refer to the captious petulant self-sufficiency of* the Apothecary, whose face and figure are constructed on the same physiognomical principles ; and to the fine example of passive obedience and non-resistance in the Servant, whom he is taking to task, and whose coat of green and yellow livery is as long and melancholy as his face. The disconsolate look, the haggard eyes, the open mouth, the comb sticking in the hair, the broken, gapped teeth, which as it were hitch in an answer, every thing denotes the ut- most perplexity and dismay. The harmony and gradations of colour in this picture are uniformly preserved with the greatest nicety, and are well worthy the attention of the Artist.

We have thus attempted to point out the fund of ob- servation, physical and moral, contained in one set of these pictures, the MARRIAGE A-LA-MODE. The rest would furnish as many topics to descant upon, were the patience of the reader as inexhaustible as the Painter's in- vention. But as this is not the case, we shall content our- selves with barely referring to some of those figures in the other pictures which appear the most striking, and which we see not only while we are looking at them, but which we have before us at all other times. For instance, who having seen, can easily forget that exquisite frost-piece of religion and morality, the antiquated Prude in the MORNING SCENE ; or that striking commentary on the good old times, the little wretched appendage of a Foot-boy, who crawls half famished and half frozen behind her ? The French Man and Woman in the NOON are the perfection ^of flighty affectation and studied grimace ; the amiable fraternization of the two Old Women saluting each other is not enough to be admired ; and in the little Master, in the same na-

BY W. HAZL1TT, ESQ. 95*

tional groupe, we see the early promise and personification of that eternal principle of wonderous self-complacency, proof against all circumstances, and which makes the French the only people who are vain even of being cuck- olded and being conquered! Or shall we prefer to this the outrageous distress and unmitigated terrors of the Boy, who has dropped his dish of meat, and who seems red all over with shame and vexation, and bursting with the noise he makes ? Or what can be better than the good house- wifery of the Girl underneath, who is devouring the lucky fragments, or than the plump, ripe, florid, luscious look of the Servant-wench embraced by a greasy rascal of an Othello, with her pye-dish tottering like her virtue, and with the most precious part of its contents running over ? Just no, not quite as good is the joke of the Woman over head, who having quarrelled with her husband, is throwing their Sunday's dinner out of the window, to com- plete this chapter of accidents of baked-dishes. The Hus- band, in the EVENING SCENE, is certainly as meek as any recorded in history ; but we cannot say that we admire this picture, or the NIGHT SCENE after it. But then, in the TASTE IN HIGH LIFE, there is that inimitable pair, differ- ing only in sex, congratulating and delighting one another by " all the mutually reflected charities" of folly and af- fectation, with the young Lady coloured like a rose, dan- dling her little, black, pug-faced, white teethed, chuckling favourite, and with the portrait of Mons. Des-Noyers in the back-ground, dancing in a grand ballet, surrounded by but- terflies. And again, in the ELECTION DINNER, is the im- mortal Cobler surrounded by his Peers, who " frequent and full"

" In loud recess and brawling conclave sit ;"

96* CHARACTER BY HAZLITT.

the Jew in the second picture, a very Jew in grain innu- merable fine sketches of heads in the POLLING FOR VOTES, of which the Nobleman overlooking the caricaturist is the best; and then the irresistible tumultuous display of broad humour in the CHAIRING THE MEMBER, which is perhaps, of all Hogarth's pictures, the most full of laughable inci- dents and situations the yellow, rusty-faced Thresher, with his swinging flail, breaking the head of one of the Chairmen, and his redoubted antagonist the Sailor, with his oak-stick, and stumping wooden leg, a supplemental cudgel the persevering extacy of the hobbling Blind Fid- ler, who, in the fray, appears to have been trod upon by the artificial excrescence of the honest tar Monsieur, the Monkey, with piteous aspect, speculating the impending disaster of the triumphant candidate, and his brother Bruin, appropriating the paunch the precipitous flight of the pigs, souse over head into the water the fine Lady fainting, with vermilion lips and the two Chimney-Sweepers, satirical young rogues ! We had almost forgot the POLITICIAN, who is burning a hole through his hat with a candle in reading the newspaper and the chickens, in the MARCH TO FINCHLEY, wandering in search of their lost dam, who is found in the pocket of the Serjeant. Of the pictures in the RAKE'S PROGRESS in this collection we shall not here say any thing, because we think them on the whole such inferior to the Prints, and because they have already been criticised by a writer, to whom we could add nothing, in a paper which ought to be read by every lover of Hogarth and of English genius.* W. H.

• See the following Essay by Mr. Lamb. N,

91

ESSAY

ON THE

GENIUS AND CHARACTER

OF

HOGARTH,

BY CHARLES LAMB, ESQ.*

ONE of the earliest and noblest enjoyments I had when a boy was in the contemplation of those capital prints by Hogarth, the Harlot's and Rakes Progresses, which, along with some others, hung upon the walls of a great hall in an old-fashioned house in shire, and seemed the solitary

• This ingenious essay was originally printed in " The Reflec-

tor, No. III. 1811 ;" and was copied by permission of Mr. Leigh Hunt, the principal proprietor of that publication, into the third Volume of Nichols's edition of Hogarth's Works. In this Essay Mr. Lamb has successfully combated, that this great and truly Eng- lish Painter necessarily belongs to a class inferior to the Historical, He has opened to us the hidden soul of beauty, and made us feel how independent the imagination is of extreme pomp and circum- stance for its most genuine and excellent productions.

92 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

tenants (with myself) of that antiquated and life-deserted apartment.

Recollection of the manner in which those prints used to affect me, has often made me wonder, when I have heard Hogarth described as a mere comic painter, as one whose chief ambition was to raise a laugh. To deny that there are throughout the prints which I have mentioned circumstances introduced of a laughable tendency, would be to run counter to the common notions of mankind ; but to suppose that in their ruling character they appeal chiefly to the risible fa- culty, and not first and foremost to the very heart of man, its best and most serious feelings, would be to mistake no less grossly their aim and purpose. A set of severer satires (for which they are not so much comedies, which they have been likened to, as they are strong and masculine satires), less mingled with any thing of mere fun, were never written upon paper, or graven upon copper. They resemble Juve- nal, or the satiric touches in " Timon of Athens."

I was pleased with the reply of a gentleman, who, being asked which book he esteemed most in his library, answered, " Shakspeare :" being asked which he esteemed next best, replied, " Hogarth." His graphic representations are in- deed books : they have the teeming, fruitful, suggestive meaning of words. Other pictures we look at his prints we read.

In pursuance of this parallel, I have sometimes entertained myself with comparing the Timon of Athens of Shakspeare (which I have just mentioned) and Hogarth's Rake's Pro- gress together. The story, the moral, in both is nearly the same. The wild course of riot and extravagance, ending in the one with driving the Prodigal from the society of men into the solitude of the deserts, and in the other with con-

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 93

ducting the Rake through his several stages of dissipation into the still more complete desolations of the mad-house, in the play and in the picture are described with almost equal force and nature. The levee of the Rake, which forms the subject of the second plate in the series, is almost a trans- cript of Timon's levee in the opening scene of that play. We find a dedicating poet, and other similar characters, in both.

The concluding scene in the Rake's Progress is, perhaps, superior to the last scenes of Timon. If we seek for some- thing of kindred excellence in poetry, it must be in the scenes of Lear's beginning madness, where the King and the Fool and the Tom-o'-Bedlam conspire to produce such a medley of mirth checked by misery, and misery rebuked by mirth j where the society of those "strange bed-fellows" which mis- fortunes have brought Lear acquainted with, so finely sets forth the destitute state of the monarch, while the lu- natic bans of the one, and the disjointed sayings and wild but pregnant allusions of the other, so wonderfully sympa- thize with that confusion, which they seem to assist in the production of, in the senses of that " child-changed father."

In the scene in Bedlam, which terminates the Rake's Pro- gress, we find the same assortment of the ludicrous with the terrible. Here is desperate madness, the overturning of ori- ginally strong thinking faculties, at which we shudder, as we contemplate the duration and pressure of affliction which it must have asked to destroy such a building ; and here is their gradual hurtless lapse into idiotcy, of faculties, which at the best of times never having been strong, we look upon the consummation of their decay with no more of pity than is consistent with a smile. The mad tailor, the poor driveller that has gone out of his wits (and truly he appears to have

9* MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

had no great journey to go to get past their confines) for the love of Charming Betty Careless, these half-laughable, scarce-pitiable objects take off from the horror which the principal figure would of itself raise, at the same time that they assist the feeling of the scene by contributing to the general notion of its subject :

" Madness, thou chaos of the brain, What art, that pleasure giv'st, and pain ? Tyranny of Fancy's reign ! Mechanic Fancy, that can build Vast labyrinths and mazes wild, With rule disjointed, shapeless measure, Fiird with horror, fill'd with pleasure ! Shapes of horror, that would even Cast doubts of mercy upon Heaven. Shapes of pleasure, that, but seen, Would split the shaking sides of spleen.*"

Is it carrying the spirit of comparison to excess to remark, that in the poor, kneeling, weeping female, who accompanies her seducer in his sad decay, there is something analogous to Kent, or Caius, as he delights rather to be called, in Lear, the noblest pattern of virtue which even Shakspeare has con- ceived, who follows his Royal Master in banishment, that had pronounced his banishment, and forgetful at once of his wrongs and dignities, taking on himself the disguise of a me- nial, retains his fidelity to the figure, his loyalty to the car- cass, the shadow, the shell and empty husk of Lear ?

In the perusal of a book, or of a picture, much of the impression which we receive depends upon the habit of mind which we bring with us to such perusal. The same^circum-

• Lines inscribed under the plate.

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 95

stance may make one person laugh, which shall render ano- ther very serious ; or in the same person the first impression may be corrected by after-thought. The misemployed incon- gruous characters at the Harlot's Funeral, on a superficial inspection, provoke to laughter ; but when we have sacrificed the first emotion to levity, a very different frame of mind succeeds, or the Painter has lost half his purpose. I never look at that wonderful assemblage of depraved beings, who, without a grain of reverence or pity in their perverted minds, are performing the sacred exteriors of duty to the relics of their departed partner in folly, but I am as much moved to sympathy from the very want of it in them, as I should be by the finest representation of a virtuous death- bed, surrounded by real mourners, pious children, weeping friends, perhaps more by the very contrast. What reflect- tions does it not awake, of the dreadful heartless state in which the creature (a female too) must have lived, who in death wants the accompaniment of one genuine tear! That wretch who is removing the lid of the coffin to gaze upon the corpse with a face which indicates a perfect nega- tion of all goodness or womanhood the hypocrite Parson and his demure partner all the fiendish group to a thought- ful mind present a moral emblem more affecting than if the poor friendless carcass had been depicted as thrown out to the woods, where wolves had assisted at its obsequies, itself furnishing forth its own funeral banquet.

It is easy to laugh at such mcongrjiitigs as are met together in this picture, incongruous objects being of the very essence of laughter, but surely the laugh is far different in its kind from that thoughtless species to which we are moved by mere farce and grotesque. We laugh when Ferdinand

96 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

Count Fathom, at the first sight of the white cliffs of Bri- tain, feels his heart yearn with filial fondness towards the land of his progenitors, which he is coming to fleece and plunder, we smile at the exquisite irony of the passage ; but, if we are not led on by such passages to some more salutary feeling than laughter, we are very negligent peru- sers of them in book or picture.

It is the fashion with those who cry up the great Histo- rical School in this country, at the head of which Sir Joshua Reynolds is placed, to exclude Hogarth from that school, as an artist of an inferior and vulgar class. Those persons seem to me to confound the painting of subjects in common or vulgar life with the being a vulgar artist. The quantity of thought which Hogarth crowds into every picture, would alone unvulgarize every subject which he might choose. Let us take the lowest of his subjects, the Print called Gin Lane. Here is plenty of poverty and low stuff to disgust upon a superficial view ; and accordingly, a cold spectator feels himself immediately disgusted and repelled. I have seen many turn away from it, not being able to bear it. The same persons would, perhaps, have looked with great complacency upon Poussin's celebrated picture of the Plague at Athens.* Disease and Death, and bewildering Terror, in Athenian garments, are endurable, and come, as the delicate critics express it, " within the limits of pleasur- able sensation." But the scenes of their own St. Giles's, delineated by their own countryman, are too shocking to think of. Yet if we could abstract our minds from the fascinating colours of the Picture, and forget the coarse

• At the late Mr. Hope's in Cavendish Square.

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 97

execution (in some respects) of the Print, intended as it was to be a cheap plate, accessible to the poorer sort of people, for whose instruction it was done, I think we could have no hesitation in conferring the palm of superior genius upon Hogarth, comparing this work of his with Poussin's picture. There is more of imagination in it that power which draws all things to one, which makes things animate and inanimate, beings with their attributes, subjects and their accessaries, take one colour, and serve to one effect. Every thing in the print, to use a vulgar expression, tells. Every part is full of ft strange images of death." It is per- fectly amazing and astounding to look at. Not only the two prominent figures, the woman and the half-dead man, which are as terrible as any thing which Michael Angelo ever drew, but every thing else in the print contributes to bewilder and stupefy ; the very houses, as I heard a friend of mine express it, tumbling all about in various directions, seem drunk seem absolutely reeling from the effect of that diabolical spirit of phrenzy which goes forth over the whole composition. To shew the poetical and almost prophetical conception of the Artist, one little circumstance may serve. Not content with the dying and dead figures, which he has strewed in profusion over the proper scene of the action, he shews you what (of a kindred nature) is passing beyond it. Close by the shell, in which, by direction of the parish beadle, a man is depositing his wife, is an old wall, which, partaking of the universal decay around it, is tumbling to pieces. Through a gap in this wall are seen three figures, which appear to make a part in some funeral procession which is passing by on the other side of the wall, out of the sphere of the composition. This extending of the interest beyond the bounds of the subject could only have been con- ceived by a great genius.

H

98 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

Shakspeare, in his description of the painting of the Trojan War, in his Tarquin and Lucrece, has introduced a similar device, where the painter made a part stand for the whole :

" For much imaginary work was there, Conceit deceitful, so compact, so kind, That for Achilles' image stood his spear, Grip'd in an armed hand j himself behind Was left unseen, save to the eye of mind : A hand, a foot, a face, a leg, a head, Stood for the whole to be imagined."

This he well calls imaginary work, where the spectator must meet the artist in his conceptions half way ; and it is peculiar to the confidence of high genius alone to trust so much to spectators or readers. Lesser Artists shew every thing distinct and full, as they require an object to be made out to themselves before they can comprehend it.

When I think of the power displayed in this (I will not hesitate to say) sublime Print, it seems to me the extreme narrowness of system alone, and of that rage for classification, by which, in matters of taste at least, we are perpetually perplexing instead of arranging our ideas, that would make us concede to the work of Poussin above-mentioned, and deny to this of Hogarth, the name of a grand, serious com- position.

We are for ever deceiving ourselves with names and theories. We call one man a great historical painter, be- cause he has taken for his subjects kings or great men, or transactions over which time has thrown a grandeur. We term another the painter of common life, and set him down in our minds for an Artist of an inferior class, without reflect-

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 99

ing whether the quantity of thought shewn by the latter may not much more than level the distinction which their mere choice of subjects may seem to place between them j or whether, in fact, from that very common life a great artist may not extract as deep an interest as another man from that which we are pleased to call history.

I entertain the highest respect for the talents and virtues of Reynolds ; but I do not like that his reputation should over- shadow and stifle the merits of such a man as Hogarth, nor that to mere names and classifications we should be content to sacrifice one of the greatest ornaments of England.

I would ask the most enthusiastic admirer of Reynolds, whether in the countenances of his Staring and Grinning Despair, which he has given us for the faces of Ugolino and dying Beaufort, there be any thing comparable to the expression which Hogarth has put into the face of his broken- down Rake in the last Plate but one of the Rake's Progress,* where a letter from the Manager is brought to him to say that his Play " will not do ? " Here all is easy, natural, undistorted ; but withal what a mass of woe is here accumu- lated ! the long history of a misspent life is compressed into the countenance as plainly as the series of Plates before had told it ; here is no attempt at Gorgonian looks which are to freeze the beholder, no grinning at the antique bed- posts, no face-making, or consciousness of the presence of

• The first face, perhaps, in all Hogarth, for serious expression.

That which comes next to it, I think, is the jaded morning counte- nance of the Debauchee in the Second Plate of the Marriage A-la- mode, which lectures on the vanity of pleasure as audibly as any thing in Ecclesiastes.

H 2

100 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

spectators in or out of the picture ; but grief kept to a man's self, a face retiring from notice with the shame which great anguish sometimes brings with it, a final leave taken of hope, the coming-on of vacancy and stupefaction, a beginning alienation of mind, looking like tranquillity. Here is matter for the mind of the beholder to feed on for the hour together, matter to feed and fertilize the mind. It is too real to admit one thought about the power of the Artist who did it. When we compare the expression in subjects which so fairly admit of comparison, and find the superiority so clearly to remain with Hogarth j shall the mere contemptible difference of the scene of it being laid in the one case in our Fleet or King's Bench Prison, and in the other in the State Prison of Pisa, or the bedroom of a Cardinal, or that the subject of the one has never been authenticated, and the other is mat- ter of history, so weigh down the real points of the com- parison, as to induce us to rank the Artist who has chosen the one scene or subject (though confessedly inferior in that which constitutes the soul of his art) in a class from which we exclude the better genius (who has happened to make choice of the other) with something like disgrace.

The Boys under Demoniacal Possession of Raphael and Domenichino, by what law of classification are we bound to assign them to belong to the great style in painting, and to degrade into an inferior class the Rake of Hogarth, when he is the Madman in the Bedlam scene ? I am sure he is far more impressive than either. It is a face which no one that has seen can easily forget. There is the stretch of human suffering to the utmost endurance, severe bodily pain brought on by strong mental agony, the frightful obstinate laugh of madness, yet all so unforced and natural, that those who sver were witness to madness in real life, think they see

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 101

nothing but what is familiar to them in this face. Here are no tricks of distortion, nothing but the natural face of agony. This | is high tragic painting ; and we might as well deny to Shaks- \ peare the honours of a great Tragedian, because he has interwoven scenes of mirth with the serious business of his Plays, as refuse to Hogarth the same praise for the two con-' eluding scenes of the Rakes Progress, because of the Comic Lunatics* which he has thrown into the one, or the Alche- mist that he has introduced in the other, who is paddling in the coals of his furnace, keeping alive the flames of vain hope within the very walls of the prison to which the vanity has conducted him, which have taught the darker lesson of extin- guished hope to the desponding figure who is the principal person of the scene.

It is the force of these kindly admixtures, which assimi- lates the scenes of Hogarth and of Shakspeare to the drama of real life, where no such thing as pure tragedy is to be found ; but merriment and infelicity, ponderous crime and feather-light vanity, like twi-formed births, disagreeing com- plexions of one intexture, perpetually unite to shew forth motley spectacles to the world. Then it is that the poet or painter shows his art, when in the selection of these comic

• " There are of madmen, as there are of tame,

All humour'd, not alike. We have here some So apish and fantastic, play with a feather ; And though 't would grieve a soul to see God's image So blemish'd and defac'd, yet do they act Such antic and such pretty lunacies, That, spite of sorrow, they will make you smile. Others again we have, like angry lions, Fierce as wild bulls, untameable as flies."

HONEST WHORE,

102 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

adjuncts he chooses such circumstances as shall relieve, contrast with, or fall into, without forming a violent oppo- sition to, his principal object. Who sees not the Grave- digger in Hamlet, the Fool in Lear, have a kind of corres- pondency to, and fall in with, the subjects which they seem to interrupt ; while the comic stuff in Venice Preserved, and the doggrel nonsense of the Cook and his poisoning asso- ciates in the Rollo of Beaumont and Fletcher, are pure, irrele- vant, impertinent discords, as bad as the quarrelling dog and cat under the table of the Lord and the Disciples at Emmaus of Titian ?

Not to tire the reader with perpetual reference to prints which he may not be fortunate enough to possess, it may be sufficient to remark, that the same tragic cast of expres- sion and incident, blended in some instances with a greater alloy of comedy, characterizes his other great work, the Marriage A-la-mode, as well as those less elaborate exer- tions of his genius, the prints called Industry and Idle- ness, The Distrest Poet, &c. ; forming, with the Harlot's and Rake's Progresses, the most considerable, if not the largest class of his productions j enough surely to rescue Hogarth from the imputation of being a mere buffoon, or one whose general aim was only to shake the sides.

There remains a very numerous class of his performances, the object of which must be confessed to be principally comic. But in all of them will be found something to dis- tinguish them from the droll productions of Bunbury and others. They have this difference, that we do not merely laugh at, we are led into long trains of reflection by them. In this respect they resemble characters of Chaucer's Pil- grims, which have strokes of humour in them enough to de- signate them for the most part as comic : but our strongest

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 103

feeling still is, wonder at the comprehensiveness of genius which could crowd, as poet and painter have done, into one small canvass so many diverse yet co-operating materials.

The faces of Hogarth have not a mere momentary in- terest, as in caricatures, or those grotesque physiognomies which we sometimes catch a glance of in the street, and, struck with their whimsicality, wish for a pencil and the power to sketch them down ; and forget them again as ra- pidly : but they are permanent, abiding ideas. Not the sports of nature, but her necessary eternal classes. We feel that we cannot part with any of them, lest a link should be broken.

It is worthy of observation, that he has seldom drawn a mean or insignificant countenance.* Hogarth's mind was eminently reflective ; and, as it has been well observed of Shakspeare, that he has transfused his own poetical charac- ter into the persons of his drama (they are all more or less poets), Hogarth has impressed a thinking character upon the persons of his canvass. This remark must not be taken universally. The exquisite idiotism of the little gentleman in the bag and sword beating his drum in the print of the Enraged Musician, would of itself rise up against so sweep- ing an assertion. But I think it will be found to be true of the generality of his countenances. The knife-grinder and Jew flute-player, in the plate just mentioned, may serve as

• If there are any of that description, they are in his Strolling

Players, a print which has been cried up by Lord Orford as the richest of his productions ; and it may be, for what I know, in the mere lumber, the properties, and dead furniture of the scene ; but in living character and expression it is (for Hogarth) lamentably poor and wanting ; it is, perhaps, the only one of his performances at which we have a right to feel disgusted.

104 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

instances instead of a thousand. They have intense think- ing faces, though the purpose to which they are subservient by no means required it ; but indeed it seems as if it was painful to Hogarth to contemplate mere vacancy or in- significance.

This reflection of the Artist's own intellect from the faces of his characters, is one reason why the works of Hogarth, so much more than those of any other artist, are objects of meditation. Our intellectual natures love the mirror which gives them back their own likenesses. The mental eye will not bend long with delight upon vacancy.

Another line of eternal separation between Hogarth and the common painters of droll or burlesque subjects, with whom he is often confounded, is the sense of beauty, which in the most unpromising subjects seems never wholly to have deserted him. " Hogarth himself," says Mr. Cole- ridge,* from whom I have borrowed this observation, speak- of a scene which took place at Ratzeburg, " never drew a more ludicrous distortion, both of attitude and physiognomy, than this effect ocasioned : nor was there wanting beside it one of those beautiful female faces which the same Hogarth, in luhom the Satirist never extinguished that love of beauty which belonged to him as a Poet, so often and so gladly in- troduces as the central figure in a crowd of humourous de- formities ; which figure (such is the power of true genius) neither acts, nor is meant to act, as a contrast ; but diffuses through all, and over each of the group, a spirit of reconcilia- tion and human kindness ; and, even when the attention is no longer consciously directed to the cause of this feeling, still blends its tenderness with our laughter : and thus/ prevents

• The Friend, No. XVI.

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 105

the instructive merriment at the tuhims of nature, or the Jbibles or humours of our fellow-men, from degenerating into the heart-poison of contempt or hatred" To the beau- tiful females in Hogarth, which Mr. Coleridge has pointed out, might be added, the frequent introduction of children (which Hogarth seems to have taken a particular delight in) into his pieces. They have a singular effect, in giving tranquillity and a portion of their own innocence to the sub- ject. The baby riding in its mother's lap in the March to Finchley (its careless innocent face placed directly behind the intriguing time-furrowed countenance of the treason- plotting French priest) perfectly sobers the whole of that tumultuous scene. The Boy Mourner winding up his top with so much unpretending insensibility in the plate of the Harlot's Funeral (the only thing in that assembly that is not a hypocrite) quiets and sooths the mind that has been disturbed at the sight of so much depraved man and woman- kind.

I had written thus far, when I met with a passage in the writings of the late Mr. Barry, which, as it falls in with the vulgar notion respecting Hogarth, which this Essay has been employed in combating, I shall take the liberty to transcribe, with such remarks as may suggest themselves to me in the transcription 5 referring the reader for a fuller answer to that which has gone before.

" Notwithstanding Hogarth's merit does undoubtedly entitle him to an honourable place among the artists, and that his little compositions, considered as so many dramatic representations, abounding with humour, character, and extensive observations on the various incidents of low, faulty, and vicious life, are very in- geniously brought together, and frequently tell their own story with more facility than is often found in many of the elevated and

106 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

more noble inventions of Rafaelle, and other great men ; yet it must be honestly confessed, that in what is called knowledge of the figure, foreigners have justly observed, that Hogarth is often so raw and unformed, as hardly to deserve the name of an artist. But this capital defect is not often perceivable, as examples of the naked and of elevated nature but rarely occur in his subjects, which are for the most part filled with characters, that in their nature tend to deformity ; besides, his figures are small, and the jonctures, and other difficulties of drawing that might occur in their limbs, are artfully concealed with their cloaths, rags, &c. But what would atone for all his defects, even if they were twice told, is his admirable fund of invention, ever inexhaustible in its resources ; and his satire, which is always sharp and perti- nent, and often highly moral, was (except in a few instances, where he weakly and meanly suffered his integrity to give way to his envy) seldom or never employed in a dishonest or unmanly way.

" Hogarth has been often imitated in his satirical vein, some- times in his humourous ; but very few have attempted to rival him in his moral walk. The line of art pursued by my very ingenious predecessor and brother academician, Mr. Penny, is quite distinct from that of Hogarth, and is of a much more delicate and supe- rior relish ; he attempts the heart, and reaches it, whilst Ho- garth's general aim is only to shade the sides : in other respects no comparison can be thought of, as Mr. Penny has all that know- ledge of the figure and academical skill which the other wanted. As to Mr. Bunbury, who had so happily succeeded in the vein of humour and caricatura, he has for some time past altogether re- linquished it, for the more amiable pursuit of beautiful nature : this, indeed, is not to be wondered at, when we recollect that he has, in Mrs. Bunbury, so admirable an exemplar of the most finished grace and beauty continually at his elbow. But (to say all that occurs to me on this subject) perhaps it may be reasonably doubted, whether the being much conversant with Hogarth's method of exposing meanness, deformity, and vice, in many of his

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 107

works, is not rather a dangerous, or at least, a worthless pursuit j which if it does not find a false relish, and a love of and search after satire and buffoonery in the spectator, is at least not unlikely to give him one. Life is short ; and the little leisure of it is much better laid out upon that species of art which is employed about the amiable and the admirable, as it is more likely to be attended with better and nobler consequences to ourselves. These two pur- suits in art may be compared with two sets of people with whom we might associate : if we give ourselves up to the Footes, the Kenricks, &c. we shall be continually busied and paddling in whatever is ridiculous, faulty, and vicious in life ; whereas there are those to be found with whom we should be in the constant pursuit and study of all that gives a value and a dignity to human nature."*

" it must be honestly confessed, that in what is called

knowledge of the figure, foreigners have justly observed, &c." BARRY, see p. 106.

It is a secret well known to the professors of the art and mystery of criticism, to insist upon what they do not find in a man's works, and to pass over in silence what they do. That Hogarth did not draw the naked figure as well as Michael Angelo, might be allowed; especially as " examples of the naked," as Mr. Barry acknowledges, " rarely (he might almost have said never) occur in his subjects ;" and that his figures, under their draperies, do not discover all the fine graces of an Antinous or an Apollo, may be con- ceded likewise. Perhaps it was more suitable to his pur- pose to represent the average forms of mankind in the me- diocrity (as Mr. Burke expresses it) of the age in which he

• Account of a Series of Pictures in the Great Room of the Society

of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, at the Adelphi, by James Barry, R. A. Professor of t Painting to the Royal Academy ; re- printed in the last quarto edition of his works.

108 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

lived : but that his figures in general, and in his best sub- jects, are so glaringly incorrect as is here insinuated, I dare trust my own eye so far as positively to deny the fact. And there is one part of the figure in which Hogarth is allowed to have excelled, which these foreigners seem to have over- looked, or perhaps calculating from its proportion to the whole (a seventh or an eighth, I forget which) deemed it of trifling importance ; I mean, the human face j a small part, reckoning by geographical inches, in the map of man's body ; but here it is that the painter of expression must con- dense the wonders of his skill, even at the expense of neg- lecting the " jonctures and other difficulties of drawing in the limbs," which it must be a cold eye that in the interest so strongly demanded by Hogarth's countenances has leisure to survey and censure.

" The line of art pursued by my very ingenious predecessor and brother academician, Mr. Penny." BARRY, see p. 106.

The first impression caused in me by reading this passage, was an eager desire to know who this Mr. Penny was. This great surpasser of Hogarth in the " delicacy of his relish," and the " line which he pursued," where is he, what are his works, what has he to show ? In vain I tried to recollect, till, by happily putting the question to a friend, who is more conversant in the works of the illustrious obscure than myself, I learnt that he was the painter of a Death of Wolfe, which missed the prize the year that the celebrated picture of West on the same subject obtained it; that he also made a picture of the Marquis of Granby relieving a Sick Soldier ; moreover, that he was the inventor of two pictures of Suspended and Restored Animation) which I now

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 109

remember to have seen in the Exhibition some years since, and the prints from which are still extant in good men's houses. This then, I suppose, is the line of subjects in which Mr. Penny was so much superior to Hogarth, I confess I am not of that opinion. The relieving of poverty by the purse, and the restoring a young man to his parents, by using the methods prescribed by the Royal Humane So- ciety, are doubtless very amiable subjects, pretty things to teach the first rudiments of humanity ; they amount to about as much instruction as the stories of good boys that give away their custards to poor beggar-boys in Children's books, or the tale of Carlo the dog. But, good God ! is this milk for babes to be set up in opposition to Hogarth's moral scenes, his strong meat for men ? As well might we prefer the fulsome verses upon their own goodness, to which the gentlemen of the Literary Fund annually sit still with such shameless patience to listen, to the Satires of Juvenal and Persius ; because the former are full of tender images

• of Worth relieved by Charity, and Chanty stretching out

her hand to rescue sinking Genius; and the theme of the latter is men's crimes and follies, with their black conse- quences forgetful, meanwhile, of those strains of moral pathos, those sublime heart-touches, which these poets (in them chiefly showing themselves poets) are perpetually dart- ing across the otherwise appalling gloom of their subject consolatory remembrancers, when their pictures of guilty mankind have made us even to despair for our species, that there is such a thing as virtue and moral dignity in the world, that her unquenchable spark is not utterly out re- freshing admonitions, to which we turn for shelter from the too great heat and asperity of the general satire.

And is there nothing analogous to this in Hogarth?

110 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

nothing which " attempts and reaches the heart" ? no aim beyond that of " shaking the sides"? If the kneeling ministering female in the last scene of the Rakes Progress, the Bedlam scene, of which I have spoken before, and have dared almost to parallel it with the most absolute idea of Virtue which Shakspeare has left us, be not enough to dis- prove the assertion 5 if the sad endings of the Harlot and the Rake, the passionate heart-bleeding entreaties for forgiveness which the adulterous wife is pouring forth to her assassinated and dying lord in the last scene but one of the Marriage A-la~mode, if these be not things to touch the heart, and dispose the mind to a meditative tenderness ; is there nothing sweetly conciliatory in the mild patient face and gesture with which the wife seems to allay and ventilate the feverish irritated feelings of her poor poverty-distracted mate (the true copy of the genus irritabile) in the print of the Distrest Poet ? Or, if an image of maternal love be required, where shall we find a sublimer view of it than in that aged woman in Industry and Idleness (plate V.), who is clinging with the fondness of hope not quite extinguished to her brutal vice- hardened child, whom she is accompanying to the ship which is to bear him away from his native soil, of which he has been adjudged unworthy : in whose shocking face every trace of the human countenance seems obliterated, and a brute beast's to be left instead, shocking and repulsive to all but her who watched over it in its cradle before it was so sadly altered, and feels it must belong to her while a pulse by the vindictive laws of his country shall be suffered to continue to beat in it. Compared with such things, what is Mr. Penny's " knowledge of the figure and academical skill which Hogarth ^wanted" ? With respect to what follows concerning another gentle- man, with the congratulations to him on his escape out of

AND CHARACTERS OF HOGARTH. Ill

the regions of " humour and caricatura," in which it appears he was in danger of travelling side by side with Hogarth ; I can only congratulate my country, that Mrs. Hogarth knew her province better than by disturbing her husband at his pallet, to divert him from that universality of subject which has stamped him, perhaps, next to Shakspeare, the most inventive genius which this Island has produced, into the " amiable pursuit of beautiful nature," i. e. copying ad infi- nitum the individual charms and graces of Mrs. Hogarth.

" Hogarth's method of exposing meanness, deformity, and vice." " Paddling in whatever is ridiculous, faulty, and vicious."

BARRY, pp. 106, 107.

A person unacquainted with the works thus stigmatized, would be apt to imagine, that in Hogarth there was nothing else to be found but subjects of the coarsest and most repul- sive nature. That his imagination was naturally unsweet, and that he delighted in raking into every species of moral filth. That he preyed upon sore places only, and took a pleasure in exposing the unsound and rotten parts of human nature ; whereas, with the exception of some of the plates of the Harlot's Progress, which are harder in their character than any of the rest of his productions (the Stages of Cruelty I omit, as mere worthless caricaturas, foreign to his general habits, the offspring of his fancy in some wayward humour); there is scarce one of his pieces where vice is most strongly satirized, in which some figure is not introduced upon which the moral eye may rest satisfied ; a face that indicates good- ness, or perhaps mere good-humouredness and carelessness of mind (negation of evil) only ; yet enough to give a relax-

112 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

ation to the frowning brow of satire, and keep the general air from tainting. Take the mild supplicating posture of patient poverty in the poor woman that is persuading the pawnbroker to accept her clothes in pledge, in the plate of Gin Lane, for instance. A little does it, a little of the good nature overpowers a world of bad. One cordial honest laugh of Tom Jones absolutely clears the atmosphere that was reeking with the black putrefying breathings of a hypocrite Blitil. One homely expostulating shrug from Strap, warms the whole air which the suggestions of a gentlemanly in- gratitude from his friend Random had begun to freeze. One " Lord bless us" of Parson Adams upon the wicked- ness of the times, exorcises and purges oft* the mass of in- iquity which the world-knowledge of even a Fielding could cull out and rake together. But of the severer class of Ho- garth's performances, enough, I trust, has been said, to show that they do not merely shock and repulse ; that there is in them the " scorn of vice" and the " pity'* too ; some- thing to touch the heart, and keep alive the sense of moral beauty ; the " lacrymce rerum," and the sorrowing by which the heart is made better. If they be bad things, then is satire and tragedy a bad thing let us proclaim at once an age of gold, and sink the existence of vice and misery in our speculations ; let us

wink, and shut our apprehensions up

From common sense of what men were and are ;

let us make believe, with the children, that every body is good and happy 5 and, with Dr. Swift, write panegyricks upon the world.

But that larger half of Hogarth's Works which were painted more for entertainment than instruction (though

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 113

such was the suggestiveness of his mind, that there is always something to be learnt from them), his humourous scenes, are they such as merely to disgust and set us against our species ?

The confident assertions of such a man as I consider the late Mr. Barry to have been, have that weight of authority in them which staggers, at first hearing, even a long precon- ceived opinion. When I read his pathetic admonition con- cerning the shortness of life, and how much better the little leisure of it were laid out upon that species of art which is employed about the amiable and the admirable ;" and Hogarth's " method " proscribed as a ( * dangerous or worth- less pursuit j" I began to think there was something in it j that I might have been indulging all my life a passion for the works of this artist, to the utter prejudice of my taste and moral sense : but my first convictions gradually returned ; a world of good-natured English faces came up one by one to my recollection ; and a glance at the matchless Election Entertainment, which 1 have the happiness to have hanging up in my parlour, subverted Mr. Barry's \* hole theory in an instant.

In that inimitable print (which in my judgment as far exceeds the more known and celebrated March to Finchley as the best comedy exceeds the best farce that ever was written) let a person look till he be saturated ; and when he has done wondering at the inventiveness of genius which could bring so many characters (more than thirty distinct classes of face) into a room, and set them down at table together, or otherwise dispose them about, in so natural a manner, engage them in so many easy sets and occupations, yet all partaking of the spirit of the occasion which brought them together, so that we feel that nothing but an Election-

I

114 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

time could have assembled them j having no central figure or principal group (for the Hero of the piece, the Candidate, is properly set aside in the levelling indistinction of the day, one must look for him to find him) ; nothing to detain the eye from passing from part to part, where every part is alike instinct with life for here are no furniture-faces, no figures brought in to fill up the scene like stage choruses, but all Dramatis Personce : when he shall have done won- dering at all these faces so strongly charactered, yet finished with the accuracy of the finest miniature; when he shall have done admiring the numberless appendages of the scene, those gratuitous doles which rich genius flings into the heap when it has already done enough, the over-measure which it delights in giving, as if it felt its stores were exhaustless ; the dumb rhetoric of the scenery for tables, and chairs, and joint stools, in Hogarth, are living and significant things; the witticisms that are expressed by words (all artists but Hogarth have failed when they have endeavoured to combine two mediums of expression, and have introduced words into their pictures), and the unwritten numberless little allusive pleasantries that are scattered about; the work that is going on in the scene, and beyond it, as is made visible to the "eye of mind," by the mob which choaks up the door-way, and the sword that has forced an entrance before its master : when he shall have sufficiently admired this wealth of genius, let -him fairly say what is the result left on his mind. Is it an impression of the vileness and worthlessness of his species? or is it not the general feeling which remains, after the indi- vidual faces have ceased to act sensibly upon his mind, a kindly one in favour of his species ? was not the general air of the scene wholesome ? did it do the heart hurt to be among it ? Something of a riotous spirit, to be sure, is there, some

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 115

worldly-mindedness in some of the faces, a Dodingtonian smoothness which does not promise any superfluous degree of sincerity in the fine gentleman who has been the occasion of calling so much good company together : but is not the general cast of expression in the faces, of the good sort ? do they not seem cut out of the good old rock, substantial English honesty ? would one fear treachery among charac*- ters of their expression ? or shall we call their honest mirth and seldom -returning relaxation by the hard names of vice and profligacy ? That poor country fellow that is grasping his staff (which, from that difficulty of feeling themselves at home which poor men experience at a feast, he has never parted with since he came into the room), and is enjoying with a relish that seems to fill all the capacities of his soul, the slender joke which that facetious wag his neighbour is practising upon the gouty gentleman, whose eyes the effort to suppress pain has made as round as rings does it shock the "dignity of human nature" to look at that man, and to sympathize with him in the seldom-heard joke which has unbent his care-worn hard-working visage, and drawn iron smiles from it ? or with that full-hearted cobbler, who is ho- nouring with the grasp of an honest fist the unused palm of that annoyed patrician, whom the license of the time has seated next him ?

I can see nothing " dangerous" in the contemplation of such scenes as this, or the Enraged Musician, or the South- wark Fair, or twenty other pleasant prints which come crowd- ing in upon my recollection, in which the restless activities, the diversified bents and humours, the blameless peculiarities of men, as they deserve to be called, rather than their " vices and follies," are held up in a laughable point of view. All laughter is not of a dangerous or soul-hardening

i 2

116 MR. LAMB ON THE GENIUS

tendency. There is the petrifying sneer of a demon, which excludes and kills love j and there is the cordial laughter of a man, which implies and cherishes it. What heart was ever made the worse by joining in a hearty laugh at the simpli- cities of Sir Hugh Evans, or Parson Adams, where a sense of the ridiculous mutually kindles, and is kindled, by a percep- tion of the amiable ? That tumultuous harmony of singers that are roaring out the words, " The world shall bow to the Assyrian throne," from the opera of Judith, in the third plate of the series called the Four Groups of Heads, which the quick eye of Hogarth must have struck off in the very infancy of the rage for sacred oratorios in this country, while " Music yet was young ;" when we have done smiling at the deafening distortions which these tearers of devotion to rags and tatters, these takers of Heaven by storm, in their bois- terous mimicry of the occupation of angels, are making ; what unkindly impression is left behind, or what more of harsh or contemptuous feeling, than when we quietly leave Uncle Toby and Mr. Shandy riding their hobby-horses about the room ? The conceited, long-backed sign-painter, that with all the self-applause of a Raphael or Corregio (the twist of body which his conceit has thrown him into has something of the Corregiesque in it), is contemplating the picture of a bottle, which he is drawing from an actual bottle that hangs beside him, in the print of Beer Street ; while we smile at the enormity of the self-delusion, can we help loving the good humour and self-complacency of the fellow ? would we willingly wake him from his dream ?

I say not that all the ridiculous subjects of Hogarth have necessarily something in them to make us like them j some are indifferent to us, some in their natures repulsive, and only made interesting by the wonderful skill and truth to

AND CHARACTER OF HOGARTH. 117

nature in the Painter but I contend that there is in most of them that sprinkling of the better nature, which, like holy- water, chases away and disperses the contagion of the bad. They have this in them besides, that they bring us ac- quainted with the every-day human face, they give us skill to detect those gradations of sense and virtue (which escape the careless or fastidious observer) in the countenances of the world about us ; and prevent that disgust at common life, that tcedium quotidianarum jbrmarum, which an unre- stricted passion for ideal forms and beauties is in danger of producing. In this, as in many other things, they are ana logous to the best novels of Smollett and Fielding.

118

BIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY

ON THE

GENIUS AND WORKS

OF

WILLIAM HOGARTH.

SO much lias already been written respecting the illus- trious Artist who is the subject of the present memoir, that, were it not intended as a necessary accompaniment to this edition of his works,* a sketch of his life might seem to re- quire some apology. It is not here professed to bring for- ward additional facts, but rather to examine generally his peculiar merits as an artist, and to exhibit, within a mode-

• This elegant " Essay on the Genius and Works of Hogarth"

is here reprinted by the permission of Messrs. Baldwin and Cra- dock, the Proprietors of the original plates of Hogarth. It was written expressly for the large edition of the " Genuine Works of Hogarth," after the plates had been repaired by James Heath, Esq. Associate Engraver, R. A. Without those plates^ now hap- pily to be obtained at a moderate price, no library can be said to be complete ; and who would be content with copies, however ex- cellent, when the originals can be so easily procured ?

ESSAY ON HOGARTH. 119

rate compass, the opinions of his various commentators j con- necting this criticism with such a brief outline of his life as may serve to give a biographical form to the whole.

England is justly proud of having given birth to two men of kindred excellence, and of unrivalled genius, of each of whom it may be said, that he neither found a predecessor, nor left a successor, in the track which he pursued. Each was eminently gifted with the talent of pourtraying humour, passion, and feeling, in all their varying shades, with a feli- city that seems to mock competition : it is hardly necessary to add the names of Shakspeare and Hogarth.

Hogarth, like Shakspeare, has been a fertile theme to biographers, critics, commentators, and illustrators. As there is hardly a syllable in the works of the one that has not been the subject of a remark, or a note, so there is scarcely an incident or a figure in the productions of the other that has not been explained or noticed. Even this external evidence of their superior merit, alone, carries con- viction ; for, however fashion, prejudice, admiration of no- velty, or some other circumstance, may for a while cause even extended reputation, it .cannot be permanently secured through successive generations, unless founded upon qualities productive of lasting interest. The bulk of productions, whether in literature or in art, must necessarily be brief in their existence. Among these scintillations that gleam and disappear, it is only the few and mighty master-minds that are stars shining in that firmament where they have been fixed by the apotheosis of their own genius.

In discussing the merits of men like Hogarth, criticism naturally assumes the tone of eulogium : they who should preside as judges at a tribunal, prostrate themselves as wor- shippers before a shrine. Enthusiasm must not, however,

120 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

be permitted to usurp the place of discrimination; nor is it necessary to claim for one who possesses so many excel- lencies, those to which his pretensions appear somewhat dis- putable. Although a very perfect master of expression, and well able to depict that majesty of the passions which arises from their vividness and energy, he could not, like our great Poet, array them with equal success either in a humble or dignified garb. His powers were less universal ; for, though they were great, their range was more limited. In histori- cal composition he did not even attain to a respectable me- diocrity ; yet this is no disparagement of his merits, nor is it half so surprising as that the Author of " Tom Jones," who was gifted with such extraordinary talent for comic writing, should have uniformly failed when he attempted comedy. And it is well for the fame of our Artist, that, instead of proving a successful follower in a beaten track, he boldly struck into one that was new and unexplored. Avia Pieridum peragrat loca, nullius ante Trita solo : juvat integros accedere fontes.

Had he succeeded in the first case, he would have been merely one among the many : at present he is not only the first in that branch of art which he created, but stands there without a subsequent competitor of eminence.

To assert, however, that his productions possess the poeti- cal beauties, and sublime expressions, that are to be found in the great Italian masters, would be as imprudent as to claim for him that exquisite beauty and truth of execution which are characteristic of the Flemish school ; and as ab- surd, as to deny him those peculiar merits which constitute his excellence, and have secured his fame. Elegance of composition and picturesque effect were but secondary con- siderations with one whose principal object was not so much

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 121

to flatter the eye with forms of majesty and beauty, or the splendour of colouring, the magic of chiaro-scuro and de- ceptive imitation, as to inform the mind ; to pourtray hu- man nature, rather ethically than poetically, exhibiting man, the creature not only of nature but of society, with all his vices and his follies, his errors and his weaknesses. This being his aim, he regarded forms themselves less than the meaning which they are capable of conveying -, so that as one of his most zealous admirers has observed, " other pictures we look at Hogarth's prints we read"

WILLIAM HOGARTH was born in London, Nov. 10, 1697. His early prospects were far from promising ; for his father, who kept a school in the parish of St. Martin, Ludgate, was not able to do more toward his future provision in life, than to put him in the way of shifting for himself. Having a spon- taneous turn for drawing, he chose the profession of an en- graver of cyphers and coats of arms- on plate. As soon as his apprenticeship was expired, he entered into the Aca- demy in St. Martin's Lane, where he studied from the living figure. He supported himself at this period of his life by en- graving arms and shop-bills, and it was some time before he emerged from obscurity, or was at all noticed as an artist. From 1723 to 1730, he was employed upon designs and plates for a variety of publications, among which were thirteen folio prints in Aubrey de la Motraye's Travels; seven small ones for Apuleius in 1724; five frontispieces for Cassandra j seventeen cuts for a duodecimo edition of Hu>- dibras in 1726, and a variety of others. None of these per- formances are at all superior to the common book embellish- ments of that period, which is certainly not saying much in their favour : but though the sun of his genius arose ob- scured, its meridian and setting beams were fervid and bril-

122 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

liant. Even the set of plates which he executed for Hudi- bras, although the best of these works, exhibit no very strong traits of humour ; yet it might be supposed that such a poem would, at a more mature age and in easier circumstances, have been illustrated by him with congenial talent.

About the year 1728 he commenced the profession of Painter : his subjects were small groups of family portraits, or conversation pieces. One of these, painted for Earl Tyl- ney, and containing portraits of that nobleman and his family, is well known under the denomination of the " Wanstead As- sembly." This composition, which is said to have been his first performance in this line that attracted public notice, is very mach in the style of Watteau ; as is likewise his " View of the Mall in St. James's Park." Yet, although he painted several portraits and groups, he was not destined to succeed in a branch of his profession requiring address, delicacy, and flattery. The pencil of Hogarth was too uncourtly to at- tempt to embellish the traits which nature had given ; it de- lighted rather in heightening than subduing character, how- ever unfavourable that character might be.

An anecdote is recorded of him which sufficiently proves this. A nobleman, not remarkable either for the regularity of his features or the gracefulness of his person, felt ag- grieved at the verity with which the artist had depicted him, and refused to take the picture ; nor would he have done so had it not been for a threat that, unless the money was sent in the course of three days, the portrait should be exhibited in a manner most wounding to the self-love of the original.

When he first began to publish his plates on his own ac- count, they were pirated by the dealers, who combined for that purpose, and, by vending their copies at a lower price,

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 123

prevented him from reaping the reward due to his labours : so that he was glad to dispose of his plates for whatever they chose to give him, there being no law to protect the copy- right of engravings. At a subsequent period, therefore, he himself, in conjunction with Venue, Pine, and some other artists, successfully petitioned Parliament for an Act to se- cure their property, and to prevent copies being made with- out the consent of the Artist, for the term of fourteen years. The year 1730 was marked by an important event in the domestic history of our artist ; this was his marriage with Jane, the only daughter of Sir James Thornhill, the histori- cal painter, with whom he became acquainted by attending her father's academy opened at his house in Covent Garden. This union was made without the previous knowledge of the lady's parents ; and at first the knight was little pleased at a match which he considered derogatory to his family, and by no means adequate to his daughter's prospects ; nor was he for some time disposed to forgive them. A reconciliation was, however, afterwards effected through the mediation of Lady Thornhill, who advised her daughter to place in her fa- ther's way some of the scenes of the " Harlot's Progress,'* which Hogarth was then painting. Struck with the merit of these performances, Sir James expressed his approbation, but in such a manner as shewed that his satisfaction arose from the consideration that the talents of his son-in-law would enable him to support his wife : afterwards, however, he re- lented, and behaved with generosity towards his daughter and her husband. At the period of his marriage Hogarth had lodgings at South Lambeth, and being intimate with Mr. Tyers, the proprietor of Vauxhall, he advised him to embellish his Garden with paintings. This was accordingly done, and some of the designs were furnished by Hogarth himself.

124 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

Not long afterwards appeared his print called " The Man of Taste," intended as a satire upon Kent, Lord Burlington, that artist's patron, and Pope. The two former of these had before fallen under his lash, in his plate of Burlington Gate; and the cause assigned of his dislike towards them was, his Lordship's preference of Kent to Thornhill, and his procur- ing the former to be employed in painting the Palace at Kensington. Whether he had any pique against the Poet is not known ; perhaps he made use of him merely as a vehicle for his satire, and as being a distinguished character. Cer- tain it is, that however ill the Bard might relish this per- formance, or might feel the poignancy of its wit, he was too discreet to manifest any resentment, or to attempt a retort, well aware that his person was not of a description to with- stand the ridicule that might be cast upon it by the pencil, or to enter into a contest, of which the result would inevi- tably prove an exposure of his bodily deformity. That Pope, however, really bore him no good-will, in conse- quence of his attacks, is rendered highly probable by his abstaining from any allusion to, or mention of, one who was a keen satirist of the follies and vices of the age ; and be- tween whom and himself there might be supposed to exist much congeniality of talent and disposition. But at this period Hogarth had not put forth all his powers, nor pro- duced any of those great works which have secured for him immortal fame, and reflected on his minor compositions a reputation which they would not otherwise have obtained.

In the spring of the year 1732 Hogarth made an excursion to Rochester and Sheerness, with four friends, Thornhill, his brother-in-law, Scott*, the landscape-painter, TPbthall,*

• See notices of Scott and Tothall in Nichols's " Biographical

Anecdotes of Hogarth/' vol. I. p. 522.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 125

and Forrest.* The latter of these undertook to be the his- torian of their adventures, and drew up a humorous narrative of this impromptu tour, intended as a satire upon the unin- teresting and impertinent details committed to paper by tra- vellers ; while Hogarth and Scott were the draftsmen on this expedition. This literary and graphic curiosity has been given to the public by Mr. Nichols, in the third or supple- mentary volume of the " Biographical Anecdotes," as has likewise a poetical version of the same narrative, written by the Rev. W. Gostling, at the end of the first volume.

In the following year appeared the first of those three admirable graphic Dramas which created a new epoch in the Art to which they belong, and conferred upon their author the pre-eminent appellation of a great Ethic Painter, namely " The Harlot's Progress," (t The Rake's Progress," and " Marriage-a-la-mode." In the former of these he has presented an awful lesson, inculcated in the history of an unfortunate female j who, passing through a career chec- quered by pleasure, splendour, profligacy, misery, and dis- ease, terminates her life prematurely, if indeed she can be justly said to expire prematurely who has long survived the wreck of her peace and her hopes ; whose existence is re- garded as a nuisance by society ; and whose death excites neither regret nor remorse in the companions of her shame and her guilt. It has been observed, that this drama does not possess that completeness which might have been given to it, the transitions from one scene to another being too sudden, and without those intermediate events being pre- sented to our notice which are necessary to connect them. There is, it must be allowed, a striking contrast between the first and second plates : in the one we behold an inno-

• Nichols's "Biographical Anecdotes of Hogarth/' vol. III.

p. 130.

126 ESSAY OF THE GENIUS

cent country girl, in the next we see her transformed into a wily courtesan, a finished adept in all the arts of intrigue. It may, however, be observed, that it perhaps would have been difficult to select such scenes as would not have been offensive in the representation ; and that it is impossible for the pencil, like the pen, to produce an uninterrupted nar- rative, or a complete concatenation of events. It is not in- tended here to particularize the individual subjects, or to enter into a detailed comment upon them. A few remarks, however, may be expected : the Artist has not been emi- nently successful in imparting to his heroine any very con- considerable attractions of feature, or of person. Hogarth was the Analyser, not the Painter, of Beauty. This circum- stance need not, however, occasion any very serious regret, since never was there an artist who more completely atones for his deficiency in this respect, or causes it to be less felt. In the second plate, the expression of the lady's countenance does not accord exactly with her threatening gesture ; this ought not, however, to be imputed to the Artist as a defect, but rather be mentioned as a proof of his judgment, her an- ger being merely assumed, and her violence employed for no other purpose than to favour the retreat of her gallant. Another proof of his attention to probability is shewn in the third plate, where the cat is introduced, by no means at random ; since, were it not for the appearance of this animal with whom the heroine is amusing herself, there would be no motive for her holding up the watch and without this the spectator would be ignorant of the immediate cause of her being apprehended by the executors of the Law. I3ut it is, perhaps, after all, not so much in the conduct of the princi- pal action, as in the episodical parts of his compositions, and his hors-d'ceuvres, that Hogarth's forte and principal merit

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 127

consist. In some of these incidental strokes of wit there is more point and significancy than decency ; for instance, in the coat of arms displayed in the funeral scene, and the manner in which the wretch in the garb of a clergyman is holding his glass. The rod, too, which is suspended at the head of the bed, in the third plate, has drawn forth certain remarks from Hogarth's German commentator, Lichtenberg, which expose this apparently innocent and insignificant ob- ject to suspicions of a no very decorous nature.

About two years after the appearance of " The Harlot's Progress," our artist produced another series of plates, called " The Rake's Progress." As in the former he had depicted the shame and ruin attendant upon a life of pros- titution, so in the latter he conveyed a moral lesson equally useful, by delineating the fatal consequences of profligacy and debauchery in the other sex ; and showed how they may conduct to an end still more horrible than that of the friendless, deserted, and abhorred prostitute ; and the first plate is as severe a satire upon the folly of avarice, as the succeeding ones are on that of heedless dissipation and pro. fusion. In these engravings there is a still greater abund* ance of wit than in those of the preceding series. The painter comes here more immediately into contact with the fashionable vices of high life, not, however, so completely as in his " Marriage-a-la-mode." It might be supposed that so much wit would in some degree destroy the principal effect ; but this is by no means the case, for the humour is kept down so as not to predominate in an offensive manner, or border on caricature. No artist in fact is more distant from mere unmeaning buffoonery and grimace than Ho- garth, who though eminently gifted with a sense of the ridi culous, yet at the same time possessed as powerful a feeling

128 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

for nature in all its varying expressions. The fe quicquid agunt Homines" may be applied with great propriety to his works, since they present an epitome of humanity in all its shapes.

After an interval of nine years appeared the third of Hogarth's admirable graphic dramas, the Marriage-a-la- raode." As in the two preceding ones he had exhibited the fatal effects of abandoned habits and profligacy in the unmarried of either sex, so did he here pourtray, in a man- ner equally forcible, the calamities which result from vicious indulgences and depraved conduct in connubial life. And, as if to point out that happiness or misery, virtue or guilt, is increased by participation with others, and incurs a double reward or penalty, he has brought both the guilty hero and his equally criminal partner, to a tragic end : nor must it be forgotten that her ladyship's paramour meets a fate more ignominious than that of either.

Not one of these three admirable works can be classed as belonging decidedly either to comedy or tragedy ; and this circumstance is doubtless a great fault in the estimation of those who prefer the rules and theories of criticism to those of nature. But neither Shakspeare nor Hogarth com- posed for systematic critics, or had any idea of working ac- cording to their compass and rule. Rules are for meaner artists : they are mere mechanical aids and succedanea, for which Genius has no more occasion than grown-up persons for leading-strings ; or those who enjoy the use of their limbs for crutches. Nay, such theories and rules may as frequently be compared to the latter as to the former, for they as often denote the imbecility arising from decay as that which precedes matured vigour. Independently of the excellence of these productions in other respects, they pos-

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 129

sess strong interest, arising from the valuable information they supply respecting the manners and fashions of the age to which they belong, and which they so faithfully pourtray. They transport the beholder to the period whose manners have been so incomparably delineated by Fielding and Smol- lett ; and we may almost fancy that we here meet with many of their characters. The former of these eminent writers has borne ample testimony to the merits of Hogarth, in his preface to " Joseph Andrews."

If there be any thing in the " Marriage-a-la-mode" to which criticism may justly object, it is undoubtedly the ob- scurity of the subject of the third plate, and its want of sufficient connection with the principal action of the piece : unless it be intended by way of companion to the succeed- ing plate, and to point out the congeniality of pursuits be- tween this modish couple. No language can better de- scribe the wretched langour that succeeds to dissipation, or how much it degrades the faculties, than the characteristic figures of the husband and wife in the second scene. In short, this drama depicts the fashionable extravagances of that day with great fidelity and humour.

Soon after the publication of the " Marriage-a-la-mode," a poem appeared in Hudibrastic verse, in six Cantos, each Canto being explanatory of one of the plates. It has been said that the admirable comedy of the " Clandestine Mar- riage" is founded upon these engravings j yet the resem- blance between the pictorial and the written drama is too slight to warrant such a supposition. The latter would doubtless have been produced, had the former never ex- isted, since the only point of similitude between the two, is the circumstance of a matrimonial alliance, wherein the parties barter gold and nobility.

K

130 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

Between this and the preceding series (which have been noticed together, as belonging, more expressly than his other productions, to the same class,) Hogarth published in the year 1738 his excellent plates, " Morning, Noon, Evening, and Night ; " besides one, to which Mr. Walpole assigns the palm of superiority over all his other works, " for wit and imagination, without any other end." This was his " Strolling Actresses j" a print which certainly pos- sesses an infinitude of whimsical combinations, and smart satire. So far, however, is Mr. Lamb from concurring with the opinion of that celebrated critic, that he affirms it to be "lamentably poor in living character and expression, and perhaps the only one of Hogarth's performances at which we have a right to feel disgusted." And yet it must be ac- knowledged, that it affords a rich banquet for those who enjoy facetiousness, and that species of humour which is produced by odd contrasts, and the hieroglyphical lan- guage of symbol.

At the period of the publication of the " Marriage-a- mode," the reputation of our artist may be considered as having attained its zenith. His works were popular beyond any precedent, for their subjects could be enjoyed by all : while their pleasantry and general humour were intelligible to the meanest capacities; and interesting because taken from common life, they at the same time possessed wit ca- pable of delighting the most fastidious, and a knowledge of human nature deserving to be studied by the most intelli- gent and reflective.

Their popularity of course attracted the cupidity of print- dealers; and in order to secure the property of himself and others against their nefarious practices, Hogarth, as has

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 131

been before stated*, applied to Parliament in the year 1735. He thus secured to himself the emoluments arising from his sale of the plates, which were eagerly purchased by the public ; yet finding it not so easy to dispose of his Pictures, he determined, in 1745, to offer them by auction, or sale, according to a particular scheme which he devised. The paintings were the entire series of both the " Harlot's" and the " Rake's Progress," the four subjects, ' Morning, Noon, Evening, and Night," and the " Strolling Actresses dress- ing in a Barn," which altogether produced no more than e427. 7s. By way of Ticket of admission to the sale, he engraved the " Battle of the Pictures," of which not only the idea is ingenious, and characteristic of the Artist's con- tempt for the prejudice in favour of the Old Masters, or rather spurious imitations of them ; but the manner in which he executed it, although so trifling a subject, discovers ex- quisite pleasantry in the way in which he has opposed the various combatants to each other : of this there is a sufficient proof in the assault made by a St. Francis upon the Old Maid in the picture of " Morning," and in the resemblance, or rather the contrast, which Hogarth thus suggests, be- tween the Catholic Saint and his own sanctified Prude.

About this period, and after the completion of the " Mar- riage-a-la-mode," he projected, as a companion to that series, another, which was to represent the happiness of connubial life when founded on mutual affection and esteem. Hogarth made a coloured sketch of the first scene of his " Happy Marriage," but never completed the design. Yet, although a mind like his would have elicited humour from the tamest and most barren subjects, it must be confessed

• See pp. 13, 123.

K2

132 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

that this was little calculated to exhibit his peculiar forte. Pictures of tranquillity, harmony, and propriety, presented little to a pencil that more delighted to exhibit the failings or the imperfect virtues of mankind, than either scenes or actions divested of all absurdity and ridicule.

Domestic tranquillity has always been considered as a rather insipid subject, whether on the canvass or on the stage. There was, however, some scope for his peculiar talent in the first scene, which represented the new-married couple and their friends partaking of refreshments after their return from church ; and the painter indulged more particularly in an episodical part of the composition : this was a groupe consisting of a cook, and a portly divine in his canonicals, who was giving directions as to the culinary operations of the day ; and here he evidently laboured more con amore than on the foremost and principal characters. It was in allusion to our Artist's propensity to delineate the low, rather than the gaiety of comic subjects, that Churchill observed, with more energy than delicacy, that Hogarth painted only the backside of Nature.

In 1746, he executed a plate, the subject of which was so popular, that although the rolling-press was employed un- interruptedly for the first week, it could not supply the im- pressions sufficiently fast to satisfy the eager demand of the public: yet the interest of this production arose merely from incidental and political circumstances, it being no other than the portrait of the Rebel Laird, Lord Lovat.

His next work of importance, and the most extended, though the least elaborate of his dramatic series, '^Industry and Idleness," was published about two years afterwards. In these designs, the principal aim of the Artist was to pro- duce a popular work, that should be as efficacious in instruct- ing and reforming the numerous class of persons to whom it

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 133

was more immediately addressed, as his other masterly pro- ductions had been in holding up to ridicule and reprobation the follies and dissipation of those of a higher rank. " The Harlot's Progress" was a forcible moral lesson to the young and indiscreet of the female sex, pointing out the wretched consequences of a deviation from virtue, and the misery that sooner or later inevitably overtakes the victims of pros- titution, after a brief course not of happiness, but of wild pleasure and riot. The purpose of the present set of plates was to inculcate salutary admonitions upon the youth of the other sex, moving in a less elevated sphere than the prodi- gal whose history formed more immediately a counterpart to that of the unfortunate harlot. The plan of this series is more complex, and was therefore of necessity more ex- tended, since in this double history one part is the complete antithesis of the other. These subjects, are, however, un- deniably less impregnated with either that playful or that caustic humour, and that happy wit, which are so predomi- nant in his preceding works 5 and the traits of genius and expression are not only fewer but less vigorous.

In the opinion, however, of Mr. Lamb, even here are to be discovered marks of superior powers. " If," says he, " an image of natural love be required, where shall we find a sub - limer view of it than in that aged woman in Industry and Idleness, who is clinging with the fondness of hope, not quite extinguished, to her brutal, vice-hardened child, in whose shocking face every trace of the human countenance seems obliterated, and a brute beast's to be left instead, shocking and repulsive to all but her who watched over it in its cradle before it was so sadly altered, and feels it must belong to her while a pulse shall be suffered by the vindictive laws of his country to continue to beat in it ? " This is,

134 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

indeed, a warm and feeling eulogium, one that confers honour both on the Artist who calls it forth, and the Critic who utters it ; yet, it must not be concealed, that the im- passioned description of the latter, has considerably height- ened the effect produced in the original by the burin of the former.

The next production of importance by which Hogarth distinguished himself was, the " Roast Beef of Old England," which perhaps acquired as much popularity from its falling in with national prejudices, as from its own intrinsic merit. The circumstance which gave rise to this piece of satire was the apprehension of the Artist as a spy, while he was making a drawing of the Gate of Calais, on his visit to France, shortly after the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle. Hogarth undoubtedly had strong prejudices, which may in a great measure be im- puted to the want of a more liberal education : among these was his rancorous and indiscriminate dislike of every thing in the shape of connoisseurship, and an attempt to disparage those higher walks of the art that is, higher in regard to grandeur and dignity of subject in which he himself had failed, and failed too most egregiously. " It is apparent," says an elegant Biographer,* whose competence to judge will be conceded by all who know his own excellence in the art, " that he at no time of his life understood the object or character of that species of art, and was therefore ill-qualified to judge of its merit." In like manner, his Antigallican antipathies were excited by every thing he beheld in France, of which country he expressed himself in terms more ener- getic than courtly. That their taste in cookery incurred his strong reprobation, is evident, from the ridicule which, on every opportunity, he casts upon their frogs and squp-rnaigre,

/

• T. Phillips, Esq. R. A.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 135

and upon the carrion-like figures which he has bestowed upon the natives of that country. Indeed, from more than one circumstance, we might suppose, that tenuity and obesity were, to Hogarth's imagination, one of the seven deadly sins and one of the cardinal virtues, so forcibly would he impress us with the conviction that the former is as certain a sign of rascality as the latter of honesty.

About this period Hogarth purchased a small house at Chiswick, which now became his chief place of abode, although he still retained his residence in Leicester Fields* and in 1750 he published his celebrated " March to Finch- ley ;" the original painting of which he disposed of by Lot- tery. This production is replete with bustle and with inci- dents of the most lively and ludicrous description ; nor is it deficient in several of those keen strokes of satire which were peculiarly our Artist's forte. It is, indeed, abundant in invention, nor can we sufficiently admire the skill with which so much interest is imparted to such a variety of groupes ; each sufficiently important to form a separate subject. This was the only production with which Hogarth favoured the admirers of his genius in 1750; in the following year, how- ever, he was more prolific, for he then published *' Beer Street" and " Gin Lane," the " Four Stages of Cruelty/' and the burlesque print of "Paul before Felix." The merits on " Gin Lane " have been so fully pointed out and expatiated upon by Mr. Lamb,* who has dwelt upon its beauties with enthusiasm, that any subsequent eulogium must appear cold by comparison with the glowing terms of commendation which he applies to this performance. For expression, and for the poetry of imagination, he assigns to it the very fore- most class, and even prefers it to Poussin's celebrated Plague

• See p. 96.

136 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

at Athens. This conglomeration of horrors may be considered as a continued allegorical representation, and as embodying to the eye all the shapes of misery arising from the perni- cious habit it was intended to correct, and than which none can be more destructive, either to the bodily powers or the mental faculties.

Whether Hogarth was equally happy in enforcing the ex- cellence of Beer, may be doubted, although it cannot cer- tainly be denied, that there is an air of joyousness in the subject, that renders it an exhilarating contrast to its com- panion, and all due honour is paid to his favourite jollity and rotundity of person. With respect to the " Stages of Cruelty," the excellent Critic who has been just mentioned condemns them as very inferior performances, terming them mere worthless caricatures, foreign to Hogarth's general habit, the offspring of his fancy in some wayward humour." There is in them too much of unmixed horror, and the gratification they are capable of affording partakes too nearly of that derived from witnessing an execution j the spectator in some degree reproaches himself for enduring to behold human nature so degraded. It may morever be questioned, whether such representations do not tend as much to fami- liarize with the contemplation of suffering, and to stimulate in some a depraved curiosity, as to impress a due abhorrence of such cruelties. But we now to turn to the Artist in a happier mood.

In the preceding year Hogarth had painted, for the Hall of Lincoln's Inn, his picture of " Paul before Felix," for which he obtained a commission, through the interest of his friend Lord Mansfield, who, when ^200 were bequeathed by Lord Wyndham for the purpose of ornamenting the Hall, proposed that Hogarth should be employed fpr that purpose. This painting, and that of " Moses before Pha-

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 137

roah's Daughter," at the Foundling Hospital, were engraved by him ; and by way of receipt for the subscriptions of the two plates, he produced his " Burlesque Print" of the former subject, probably intended to set off the dignity of the ori- ginal composition, by contrasting it with the absurdly ludi- crous ones of the Dutch Masters. The drollery of the cari- cature, however, was more Hogarthian, and better relished by the public than the original, which certainly does not possess sufficient merit to prevent us from regretting that the painter was impelled by his ambition to deviate into a walk so little congenial with his habits, and so little favour- able to the display of his peculiar talent.

It was on this occasion that Dr. Warton, in the first edi- tion of his " Essay on Pope," in a note on the line,

" One science only will one genius fit,"

quoted Hogarth himself as an example of the truth of this maxim, and indulged in some reflections on his incapacity for serious and dignified subjects, thereby exciting the Artist's indignation. The latter retaliated in kind, by exhibiting in one of his prints a publication of the Doctor's in no very honourable situation. Through the interference, however, of Mr. Garrick and Dr. John Hoadly, a reconciliation was effected : and in a subsequent edition Warton not only qua- lified his observation, but added to it a most handsome compliment on the Artist's genius.

At the latter end of 1752 appeared his print of " Colum- bus breaking the Egg," as a subscription ticket to his " Ana- lysis of Beauty." This was also intended to illustrate the extreme simplicity of the theory laid down in that treatise, notwithstanding which no one had before detected it. The Analysis itself appeared in the following year : the object of this work is to endeavour to lay down some fixed principle of beauty, and this Hogarth thought could be invariably

138 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

referred to a waving or serpentine line, which he therefore denominated the Line of Beauty. On the whole this must be allowed to be tolerably satisfactory ; curved lines being in general more beautiful than either straight or angular ones ; yet the theory must be accepted with some limitation, since it accounts for merely one, not the sole cause of what is termed Beauty, which may be defined to be that quality in objects by means of which they excite pleasing emotions. Hogarth's doctrine, therefore, is correct and satisfactory as far as it goes, but it does not advance far enough : it is too contracted and partial ; for while it explains much, it also leaves much unexplained. The sources of Beauty are in- deed so various and complicated, that every attempt to re- duce them to any single principle, except that of association, has proved nugatory, and has foiled the ability of the most ingenious.

Being ill-qualified by his education for any literary per- formance, Hogarth submitted his manuscript to the correc- tions of his friend Dr. Morell ; and, after his decease, to those of the Rev. Mr. Townley, the head-master of Mer- chant Taylors' School. The plates to the work present some ludicrous contrasts between the stiff and preposterous dresses then in fashion, and the easy elegance of the antique. Such a Roman costume as that in which Quin is here exhi- bited, is almost incredible : the fashions of that period were certainly absurd, not because so opposite to those of the present day, but because so contradictory to those principles of sound taste which teach us that dress is intended to cover and to decorate, not to disguise the human form, or destroy its proportions. It was, however, easier for Hogarth to hold absurdity up to ridicule than to pourtray gracefulness and elegance ; accordingly in the dancing scene, in tne second plate, he has not been eminently successful in the couple

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 139

who are intended as specimens of grace, and as contrasts to the other groupes. The lady, too, possesses as litlle of na- tural beauty as of acquired elegance. To paint beauty was not the Artist's forte : this even his warmest admirers must allow ; and they may do so the more readily, conscious that they will thereby no more detract from the genuine merits of Hogarth than they do from the masterly eloquence of Cicero by refusing to admire his wretched attempts at poetry.

His " Analysis of Beauty" drew upon him much persecu- tion at the time of its appearance; and involved him in squabbles productive of vexation and irritation. A German translation of this work by Mylius, who executed it under the author's inspection, was published in London ; and an improved edition afterwards appeared at Berlin in 1754, by Fr. Vok, accompanied with an explanation of Hogarth's satirical prints from the French. An Italian translation, also, was published at Leghorn in 1761.

About this period, in consequence of the public attention bestowed upon the painting presented to the Foundling Hospital by Hogarth, the Academy in St. Martin's Lane began to form themselves into a more important body, and to teach the Arts under regular professors. But, extraor- dinary as it may appear, this scheme was so far from being welcomed by Hogarth as indicative of a brighter sera in the Fine Arts, that he absolutely discouraged it, as tending to allure many young men into a profession in which they would not be able to support themselves, and at the same time to degrade what ought to be a liberal profession into a merely mechanical one.*

• See p. 37.

140 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

In the interval between the " Analysis" and the " Election Prints," which (with the exception of the fourth, not com- pleted till 1758) appeared in 1755, our Artist produced nothing of importance, his only works being the " Frontis- piece to Kirby's Perspective," and a plate entitled " Crowns, Mitres, Maces," &c. The Frontispiece is a whimsical col- lection of the most absurd solecisms against the rules of perspective, such as no one could possibly commit. The other plate, which was originally intended as a compliment to Parliament for the protection afforded by them to the copyright of engravings, was altered so as to serve as a sub- scription ticket to the series of Election Prints.

The first of this excellent set of plates, the " Election Entertainment," is dated Feb. 24, 1755. Of this subject Mr. Lamb speaks in rapturous terms of commendation. For the whole of this elegant criticism the reader must be refer- red to the Essay itself*, from the perusal of which he will rise with an entire conviction that Hogarth was a genuine painter of Human Nature in all its modifications, and as capable of exciting generous sentiments, as of entertaining by his humour and his wit. This series was published at different intervals, the second plate not appearing until two years after the first, and the third and fourth at the begin- ning of the year 1758. Other works, however, were pro- duced in the interim ; in 1756 his " France" and " England," two prints etched by himself: in these Hogarth appears to have indulged in his spleen, or his patriotism, against the French nation. Nothing can be imagined more antithetical than these two companion prints, as to the subjects exhi- bited, although they certainly accord admirably as to their

• Seep. 113.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. ui

object, namely, to turn the Grand Monarque and his armies into ridicule. The puny and haggard forms of the French are strongly contrasted with the ample persons of the Eng- lish j nor are their respective signs, " Soup Meagre," and " Roast and Boiled every Day," less speakingly opposed to each other. In all that concerned national feelings Hogarth was a staunch John Bull. Walpole, indeed, says, that these were two of the instances in which he stooped to low images and national satire, to please his vulgar customers.

In the same year he painted the three pictures that de- corate the Altar-piece at St. Mary's RedclifFe, at Bristol, viz. 1. " The Ascension ;" 2. " The High-priest and Ser- vants sealing the Tomb 3" 3. " The Three Marys at the Sepulchre*."

Shortly after this period (in 1757) Hogarth obtained both honorary titles and substantial emolument. The former were conferred upon him by the Imperial Academy at Augs- burg, which elected him a Counsellor, and an Honorary Member of their Institution ; the latter he obtained from his appointment of Serjeant Painter to the King, an office from which he derived ^200. per annum. This had been ori- ginally held by his father-in-law, Sir James Thornhill, by whom it was given up to his son, John Thornhill, Esq. and at his death Hogarth was appointed/)*

Our Artist may now be considered as having produced all the more vigorous offspring of his genius ; for from this pe- riod, with one or two exceptions, his engravings consist of small and unimportant works. He published, however, in 1758, a portrait of himself, in which he is represented paint-

• Some judicious observations on these three pictures by John

Britton, Esq. F.S.A. have already been inserted in p. 86. t See p. 49.

14-2 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

ing a figure of the Comic Muse ; also another print, entitled

• • Character, or the Bench," containing four portraits of

Judges of the Common Pleas, which plate he afterwards altered, and worked upon even the day preceding his death. As one of the exceptions to the above remark must be no- ticed his " Cockpit," which exhibits great diversity of cha- racter in individuals actuated by the same passions. In the decrepid Old Man, who is holding a trumpet up to his ear, the Artist has shewn how strong the attachment to such disgraceful and inhuman pursuits continues, in spite of the infirmities of age, when they appear doubly criminal and in- excusable. The figure seated on the left of the President, and looking up, is strikingly natural, and one of those which every one recognizes, without being able to identify it with any particular individual.

In 1759, the same year in which this print made its ap- pearance, Hogarth produced his celebrated picture of " Si- gismunda," to which performance he was, in evil hour, in- stigated by his ambition to enter into competition with Cor- reggio. This was indeed a desperate and imprudent attempt, undertaken without duly considering his own talents. Ho- garth, like Boccacio, could be alternately comic or serious, but he did not possess the instinctive delicacy of pathos and the simplicity of the Italian, nor could he do justice to such a subject as Count Guiscardo's Widow. This failure occa- sioned him much vexation, although the self-love of the Artist preponderated over public neglect and disappro- bation.

From this period till 1762, when his satirical prints of " The Medley," and " The Times" appeared, he was em- ployed upon a few subjects of minor importance, viz. The Frontispieces to two volumes of Tristram Shandy antl Brook Taylor's Perspective, " Time smoking a Picture," and the

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 143

" Five Orders of Periwigs." The print of Time was in- tended as a subscription ticket for his " Sigtsmunda," like- wise to ridicule the affectation of connoisseurs for old pic- tures, and the artifices of picture-dealers and vampers-up of undoubted originals. For the latter he always professed a strong aversion, taking not the least pains to conceal it. Speaking of'" Sigismunda," he says, "the most virulent and violent abuse thrown on it was from a set of miscreants with whom I am proud of having been ever at war. I mean the expounders of the mysteries of old pictures*." Against the quackery of connoisseurship, too, he always expressed him- self with particular asperity.

" The Five Orders of Periwigsf" was intended, it is said, as an oblique satire upon Stuart's Athens, and the minute accuracy with which the different measurements and pro- portions are given in that work. This, if may judge from a fragment preserved by Mr. John Ireland, was, in Hogarth's opinion, supreme trifling ; indeed, to such a mind as his, whatever partook of that scrupulous investigation necessary to the study of antiquities must have appeared pedantic and mechanical. Could he, however, have foreseen that the study of the Grecian Orders would have superseded the school of Burlington and Kent, he would probably rather have been eager to promote, than have attempted to ridi- cule it.

The first idea of " The Medley; or, Credulity, Supersti- tion, and Fanaticism," was entitled " Enthusiasm Deli- neated 5" but in this state of the copper only two impres- sions were taken. It was afterwards altered so completely as to be rendered altogether a different subject. Originally it was intended to ridicule the gross and palpable absurdities

• See p. 57- t See p. 6/.

144 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

of the Romish Church, but was altered so as to apply to the prevailing superstitions of the day in general, and to Me- thodism in particular. The foolish and profane presumption of attempting to represent under a visible form that which can never be an object of the senses, and the monstrous ab- surdities which arise from it, are well exemplified in the grotesque Cherubim. Such hieroglyphical forms are but one degree removed from the profane Anthropomorphism of the Catholic painters, who represent the First Person of the Trinity under the appearance of an Old Man ; as if de- crepitude and age were the attributes of the Deity. Speak- ing of this print, Mr. Walpole says, that it is, " for deep and useful satire, the most sublime of all his works."

This year was marked by an event that contributed in no small degree to embitter the declining days of Hogarth, and even, perhaps, to abridge them. In evil hour he turned aside from subjects of universal and permanent interest, to become a political caricaturist, and to embroil himself in all the asperities of party contention, attacking his former friends, Wilkes and Churchill. The plate of " The Times" was published in September 1762, and immediately pro- duced a very severe paper upon the artist, written by Wilkes, in the 17th number of the North Briton. Ho- garth retorted by publishing a caricature portrait of the writer. This, however, so far from terminating the contest, served only to call an ally into the field. Churchill, eager to chastise the painter for this personal attack upon his friend, produced his " Epistle to William Hogarth." But although this keen invective is said to have been felt by him less than the North Briton was, he was not at all disposed to let it pass with impunity ; therefore, as he had before exhibited Wilkes, by merely heightening the natural obli-

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 145

quity of his countenance, he now exposed the poet in the shape of a bear, affixing the following title to the print, ' The Bruiser, C. Churchill (once the Revd) in the Charac- ter of a Russian Hercules/' &c.

These contentions, which were carried on with so little credit or honour to any party, produced much irritation to Hogarth ; his health visibly declined, and toward the end of 1762 he was affected with some internal disorder that brought on a general decay. He continued, however, to employ himself, and made a curious design (" The Weigh* ing House") to illustrate a pamphlet by Mr. Clubbe, enti- tled " Physiognomy." During the last year of his life he re-touched many of his plates, in which he was assisted by several engravers ; and, but a few months previous to his death, as if conscious of the approach of that event, and desirous of terminating his labours with an appropriate sub- ject, he executed his " Finis," or an allegorical representa- tion of the end of all things. On the 25th of October 1764 he was removed from his villa at Chiswick to his house in Leicester Square, and on the same night expired in the arms of his wife. His remains were interred in Chiswick church-yard, where a monument is erected to his memory.

[On the first side is engraved,

HERE LIETH THE BODY

OF WILLIAM HOGARTH, ESQ.

WHO DIED OCTOBER 26, 1/64,

AGED 67 YEARS.

MRS. JANE HOGARTH, WIFE OF WILLIAM HOGARTH, ESQ. OBIIT 13 NOVEMBER,

80 YEARS. L

146 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

On the second

HERE LIETH THE BODY OF DAME JUDITH THORNHILL,

RELICT OF SIR JAMES THORNHILL, KNIGHT,

OF THORNHILL, IN THE COUNTY OF DORSET ;

SHE DIED NOV. 12, 1757,

AGED 84 YEARS.

On a third

HERE LIETH THE BODY OF MRS. ANNE HOGARTH,

SISTER TO WILLIAM HOGARTH, ESQ.

SHE DIED AUGUST 13, 1771,

AGED 70 YEARS.

On the front, in basso-relievo, is the comic mask, laurel wreath, rest-stick, palette, pencils, a book inscribed, Ana- lysis of Beauty, and the following admirable lines, by his friend Mr. Garrick :

Farewell, great Painter of mankind,

Who reach'd the noblest point of art ; Whose pictur'd morals charm the mind,

And through the eye correct the heart. If genius fire thee, reader, stay ;

If Nature touch thee, drop a tear : If neither move thee, turn away,

For Hogarth's honour'd dust lies here.*

• The verses as first written by Mr. Garrick were as follow :

If thou hast genius, reader, stay ;

If thou hast feeling, drop the tear ; If thou hast neither, hence, away,

For Hogarth's dear remains lie here. His matchless works, of fame secure,

Shall live our country's pride and boast, As long as Nature shall endure,

And only in her wreck be lost.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 147

Dr, Johnson also wrote an epitaph on Hogarth, which fortunately Mrs. Piozzi has preserved :

The hand of him here torpid lies,

That drew the essential Form of Grace ;

Here closed in Death the attentive eyes That saw the manners in the face !

The Rev. James Townley, in the Public Ledger of No- vember 19, 1764-, paid the following tribute to the talents and virtues of his deceased Friend:

To the Memory of

WILLIAM HOGARTH ;

who was such an accurate observer of mankind,

that no character escaped him ; and so happy in expressing his conceptions,

by the strength of his pencil,

that, as his own times never produced a rival,

posterity will scarce ever see an equal to him.

His thoughts were so constantly employed

in the cause of Truth and Virtue,

that he may be justly ranked amongst the best moral Authors* Whilst he faithfully followed Nature through all her varieties,

and exposed, with inimitable skill,

the infinite follies and vices of the world,

he was himself an example of many virtues :

and when, with universal admiration and applause,

he had reproved, instructed, and delighted

the age wherein he lived,

he resigned the uncommon gifts which he possessed,

and paid the great debt he owed to Nature,

Oct. 26, 1764.]

L2

J4 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

From what is recorded of his personal character, Hogarth appears to have been by no means remarkable for amiable manners or liberal sentiments, but to have retained through his whole life all the narrow prejudices arising from his want of education. He is said to have been jealous of his contemporaries ; and, not content with being pre-eminent and without a rival in his own branch of the art, was always disposed to depreciate the serious, historical, and poetical styles. On the other hand, it must be acknowledged, that he was a man of strict integrity, liberal, and hospitable ; so that, notwithstanding the affluence which he secured to himself by his works, he did not leave, with the exception of his plates, any considerable property to his widow. These were secured to her by his will, dated August 12, 1764, chargeable with an annuity of s80 to his sister Anne. His widow survived him five and twenty years, for -she did not die till November 13, 1789 ; after which event the plates were sold by Mrs. Lewis to Alderman Boydell.

Few men of genius have been the subject of more nu- merous writings than Hogarth, nor have many been so for- tunate in their commentators. His three great critics, Walpole, Larnb, and Lichtenberg, appear to have studied his works profoundly, but variously j each discovering in his remarks the peculiar bent of his own temper. Lord Or- ford is lively and shrewd, and his observations* are worthy of the pen that wrote the " Reminiscences." Lamb has penetrated further into the genius of Hogarth ; he has ana- lysed in the most masterly manner his powers of imagina- tion and invention, and has brought to his subject a mind that completely grasped it. From him we learn, that

• See p. 6873.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 149

Hogarth was a truly philosophical artist, not a mere putter- together of figures to compose amusing pictures ; for he has shown that his works are replete with profound study and vigorous intellect, and that for the quality of thought they will bear a comparison with those of the greatest masters. Lichtenberg, who, although a German, is the very antipode of a High-Dutch Commentator, looked at him completely through the medium of wit : he fully entered into his spirit, as far as relates to whimsicalness, oddity, and a keen relish for the ridiculous and the humourous for all the combina- tions of graphic wit. When we read this author, we feel that it may be as truly predicated of Hogarth as of Falstaff, that he was not only witty himself, but the cause of wit in other men. It must be allowed,, however, that both he and Mr. Lamb are occasionally apt to see in Hogarth more than he probably intended.

Like other commentators, Mr. Lamb exhibits an extreme, not to say undue, partiality for his author ; yet he has cha- racterised his productions with real feeling, and has deeply analysed that finer spirit which is less perceptible to common beholders. He has exhibited Hogarth's powers in a point of view very different from that in which he had been consider- ed by preceding writers. According to him, Hogarth pos- sesses even more severity than comic humour more of the causticity of Juvenal, or of Shakspeare in his Timon and Jaques, than of the playful wit of the latter in his Falstaff.* By some, however, by the admirers of what is called the grand style of painting, or by those who regard the pro- duction of beautiful forms as the primary object of art, rather than the intellectual value of a composition, he will

• See p. 92.

150 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

be thought to estimate his favourite too highly. With great excellencies, Hogarth has at the same time his defects : it is the province, therefore, of criticism to discriminate between the latter and the former, since genius does not excite our approbation in consequence, but in spite, of the blemishes which accompany it.

Many of Hogarth's defects belong not so much to him as to the subjects which he selected, and consequently he could not have avoided them without committing greater errors. Of this description is the preposterous and tasteless cos- tume of that period, both in dress and furniture, which, from our not being accustomed to it in real life, gives to his figures a grotesque and antiquated air, that to some persons will render them less natural than the characters in Wilkie's pictures, since, by some, Nature and the Tailor are consi- dered as nearly equal co-partners in the fabrication of that compound being Man. Yet from this very circumstance, his plates acquire a value and interest which they could not have for contemporaries, namely that of recording more perfectly and vividly than any description, however elabo- rate, the fashions and manners of our ancestors. It would, however, certainly be imprudent to claim for our artist every species of merit : he had but little grace or elegance, nor was he always pre-eminently successful in picturesque effect : what he chiefly valued was, strokes of satire, character, expression, thought ; and, provided he secured these, he did not scruple to sacrifice graphic elegance to moral strength, and to sentiment whether humorous or pathetic. Thus much may be safely conceded on either side ; but it hardly shews much judgment to insist upon his possessing beauties at which he did not aim, or, if he did, not with any^striking xccess.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 151

On the merits of the " Biographical Anecdotes of Ho- garth," first published in 1781, in a thin octavo volume, it would (for obvious reasons) be improper here to enlarge ; but it may not be too much to say that, assisted as the Work was by the powerful talents of George Steevens, Esq. it soon passed through a third, greatly enlarged edition, and, at a distance of thirty years, was again published in two handsome quartos, to which a third volume was added in 1817, which contains, like the preceding, very many interesting particu- lars respecting the personal history of our great Artist, and his early graphic productions.

Among the other writers upon Hogarth may be mentioned the two Irelands, whose works are rather historical and explanatory than critical ; and Mr. Gilpin, who, in his " Essay on Prints," has several able remarks * on their tech- nical merits, and their value as ethical compositions.

As to Dr. Trusler's " Hogarth Moralized," the observa- tions it contains are too trite and common-place to be worthy the productions they profess to elucidate : indeed, the author was much better qualified to descant on the morality of Mr. Penny's f pictures, than to set up for the hierophant of Ho- garth's Genius. Yet little valuable as this performance is in itself, it has the merit of originality, and of giving rise, pro- bably, to an idea that has subsequently been so much im- proved upon : unless, indeed, Rouquet's descriptive work be considered as the prototype of all subsequent ones.

The " Clavis Hogarthiana"J is merely a piece of pleasant-

• See p. 74.

f See Mr. Lamb's Essay, p. 109. If we believe Barry, this gentle- man, whose works by the bye are now utterly forgotten, pursued a line of art " of a much more delicate and superior relish I"

} Written by the Rev. E. Ferrers.

152 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

ry, the merit of which is, that it amuses by the happy appli- cations it produces from classical writers.

The late M. Bartsch* in his " Anleitung zur Kupferstich- kunde," speaking of Hogarth, says, " This artist, who may in more than one respect be compared to Aristophanes, intro- duced genuine Comedy into Painting, and delineated the manners of his countrymen in a true, attractive, and in- structive manner, and not unfrequently with considerable pathos. One considers him as a great satiric author, who described the follies and vices of his age with the pencil and the burin. His great merit consists in invention, and in the expression which he gives to the passions. His efforts are constantly directed at catching the soul of his art, in doing which he comparatively disregarded its body mechanical skill ; his productions, therefore, are more valued for their vigorous and racy conceptions, than for the excellence of their execution. It is the Satirist, not the Artist, that we admire in Hogarth."

It will, perhaps, be inquired, how far Hogarth deserves the appellation of a Moral Painter ; or, whether he has not, on more than one occasion, exhibited scenes rather likely to corrupt by their profligacy, than reform by the lesson they purpose to inculcate. The latter objection attaches itself more or less to every production that exposes to reproof what is censurable in manners and conduct ; and there are minds so unhappily constituted, that they are apt to fasten with a perverted appetite upon what is held up to scorn and reprehension. Of Hogarth, however, it may be safely asserted, that he has less gratuitous indecency than certain of his subjects would lead us to expect.

• This celebrated Connoisseur, the Author of " Le Peirttre Gra-

veur," died August 21, 1821.

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 153

With respect to his two plates, " Before and After," they can hardly be said to belong to his works. These were painted at the suggestion of another; but this circumstance rather aggravates than extenuates the offence : for he who condescends to administer to the prurient and depraved taste of others, is uniformly regarded as more criminal and more contemptible than he who seeks only his own vicious in- dulgences. Yet, gross as is the idea of these subjects, there is in the manner of their execution but little to seduce, for they certainly partake much more of the ridiculous than of the voluptuous.

With regard to indelicacies, it is not so easy to exculpate our Artist ; but, as it is not purposed here to apologise for them, so neither is it intended to enumerate them : they may be regarded as belonging to the manners of the age, which were not altogether so pure, so innocent, and so unsophisticated, as the declaimers against modern times and habits would have us believe. It may, however, be ob- served, by way of general remark, that he is in this respect, as M. Bartsch has felicitously characterized him, the Aris- tophanes of painters : if he occasionally indulges in equal licence, and in similar transgressions against decorum, he at the same time displays the same protervity of fancy, the same caprice of imagination equal mordacity, and equal humour.

Turning from the consideration of his merits as an ethical Painter, it is now time to examine Hogarth as a Caricaturist. A great portion of the humour of Caricature, or rather those whimsical, satirical compositions, and capricci, so denomi- nated, consists in translating closely on the copper or canvas the metaphors of language. This is, in fact, the essence of this branch of the graphic art, which must, therefore, be

154. ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

judged accordingly. These extravagances are " chartered Libertines," and are therefore not amenable to any other than their own bye-laws. " Tous les genres sont bons," says Voltaire, " hors le genre ennuyeux ;" they may, therefore, be tolerated as the relaxations or the frolics of genius, for it would be as absurd to quarrel with such impossibilities, as to cavil at the talking and reasoning animals in JEsop's Fables. To this class of productions, partaking somewhat of the nature of hieroglyphic writing, may be referred, " The Just View of the British Stage j" " Royalty, Episcopacy, and Law j" " The Times," &c. In these his satire was some- times sufficiently caustic, at others not perfectly intelligible. It has not been remarked before, but it may be supposed that the Teapot, which serves to form the head of the Lady in the second of the above-mentioned subjects, was intended to denote, that the Fair Sex of that age had more vapours (at that time the fashionable phrase for what is now understood by ennui) in their heads than brains $ particularly ladies of quality, for tea was not then so common a bever- age as it is now. This print may, indeed, be termed a com- bination of visible puns, and graphic metaphors ; we may, therefore, safely presume, that in forming his emblematic representations of Courtiers, the Artist not only designed to hint that they borrow their hue of prejudice and passion from their superiors, just as a mirror reflects the surrounding objects, but also intended a pun by exhibiting them in the form of Peer-glasses. Hogarth appears to have delighted in these enigmatical amusements, just as Swift did in conun- drums and riddles, for he has given us another specimen of them in his " Large Masquerade Ticket." Yet, after all, the pleasure afforded by such ingenious obscurities ter- minates with the labour of decyphering them ; although it

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 155

must at the same time be allowed that there is some latitude in this respect, since they admit of so many various interpre- tations, more perhaps than the Artist himself had any idea of, each person explaining them his own way.

Independently of the principal interest and satire of his plates, Hogarth abounds in sly, and apparently unintended traits of humour j there is such a prodigality of wit in his compositions, that they afford a varied and inexhaustible fund of interest. As instances of this bye-play this redun- dancy of his spirit may be mentioned, Crebillon's novel of the " Sopha," significantly thrown upon the piece of furniture of that name in the Countess's Dressing- room in Marriage-a-la-mode the picture of St. Luke in the 5th plate of the same series the Goose flying over the Member's Head, in the Chairing scene the Halfpenny nailed up in Bedlam the Prelate killing Time at a Mas- querade and, the Strolling Actresses, passim. Not even a piece of paper, however apparently insignificant, was suffered to be idle, but such little scraps were made to con- tribute some stroke of satire or of wit thus, such inscrip- tions as " Freeman's Best," and " Kirton's Best," with many other similar instances, will be found on examination to possess a significancy that bestows on them a value and importance.

Even a motto in Hogarth is replete with as much drollery and humour, as an entire page in many an author, to whom, nevertheless, dulness is not to be imputed. What, for ex- ample, can be happier than that which he has selected for the " Undertakers' Arms " " Et Plurima Mortis Imago? " Independently, too, of their own positive merits, his prints would possess no inconsiderable value, were it only for

156 ESSAY ON THE GENIUS

recording so faithfully the manners and the fashions of the age to which they belong ; and for preserving the likenesses of many contemporary characters, that too more expres- sively than would have been done by mere portraits. If he sometimes exceeds the limits of propriety, it is where he introduces too many accessaries and details to be either con- sistent with probability, or advantageous to the general effect, the composition being thereby crowded, and frittered away. In this respect, some of his pieces require a certain degree of conventional concession on the part of the spectator, that he will overlook this species of improbability, and rather regard such subjects as generalities, and as delinea- tions of classes of events, than as the representations of individual incidents. Examples of this occur in the " Stages of Cruelty," " Gin Lane," &c. where circumstances are crowded together in the most improbable manner.

With regard to the mechanical execution of his Engra- vings, it is by no means of a superior description, for Hogarth seems to have been less solicitous to captivate the eye, than to inform the mind, and to depict in a forcible and energetic manner the follies which he exposed to deri- sion the vices which he held forth to abhorrence. But in estimating his merits and his deficiencies in this respect, it behoves us to take into account the wretched state of the Arts at the time when he flourished, and the extraordinary pro- gress which those of Engraving and Design have since made. There is now a certain general air of elegance displayed in the most common-place prints, and in the productions of very moderate Artists, that forms a striking contrast with those of sixty or seventy years ago. Such book- embellish- ments as those designed by Hogarth for Milton and Don

AND WORKS OF HOGARTH. 157

Quixote, would not now be tolerated. It is, indeed, some- what remarkable that his subjects from Hudibras, Don Quixote, and Tristram Shandy works which we might suppose would have been illustrated by him in the happiest manner, as productions most consonant to his own particu- lar bent of genius, dissappoint us when compared with his original compositions ; they have, in short, nothing of that raciness and generous flavour which springs from imme- diate inspiration. It is not so extraordinary that he should have completely failed in embodying the sublime concep- tions of Milton, as that he should have attempted what was so diametrically opposite to his talent, and what must baffle the utmost powers of Painting.

Before concluding, it may not be improper briefly to ad- vert to our Artist's predilection for Alterations. In some of his plates these are considerable, and of an important na- ture ; for, like all men of genius, the fertility of his mind continually created new ideas. Such discrepancies, there- fore, in many instances between the early and later impres- sions from the same copper, should not induce any one to suppose that the altered engravings are spurious copies, since the variations were made by Hogarth himself, who frequently, after a very few impressions had been taken from a plate, effaced some parts, and substituted others. Of course the scarce impressions taken from the plate in its first state, are highly prized by curious collectors, not for any greater intrinsic merit they possess, but in consequence of the incidental and adventitious value conferred upon them by their rarity.

That the Works of such a man as William Hogarth should have obtained universal approbation, and be held in venera-

158 GENIUS AND WORKS OF HOGARTH.

tion by his countrymen, as reflecting honour on his native land, is most natural ; yet, in some instances, admiration and zeal seem to have overstepped their due bounds. To affect to discern something valuable in all his minor produc- tions is somewhat indiscreet; for, like other men of genius, he occasionally produced what would never have been worth either preserving or, recording, had it not been for the association of his name ; and what is considered to be as the dross, not the sterling metal of his genius. Much, however, is pardonable to that curiosity respecting an emi- nent individual, which induces us to examine every thing connected with him, although even certain of not meeting with any thing to increase our admiration.

Hogarth was one of those Great Men, whose works are destined to survive all the changes of taste, and all the ca- prices of fashion : for valuable and interesting as they would be, did they do no more than preserve a faithful picture of contemporary manners, they are to be still more highly esti- mated, for containing those strokes of Nature, and of genuine Wit, that are intelligible in every country, and in every age. In dignity of subject, in grandeur of compo- sition, in the technical beauties of execution, in design, in chiaro-scuro, in exactness of imitation, in elegance, and in gracefulness, Hogarth has been excelled by several ; but no Artist has ever yet produced works that rival, in expression and in character, those of the great Ethic Painter, of whom England is so justly proud : works that will always con- tinue to be admired in proportion to the care with which they are studied.

159

CHRONOLOGICAL CATALOGUE

OF

HOGARTH'S PRINTS;

WITH AN ACCOUNT OF THE

VARIATIONS AND PRINCIPAL COPIES,

• The articles marked with the initial [B.] are included in Bald-

win's Edition of " The Genuine Works of Hogarth," folio, 1822 ; of those marked with [N.] there are reduced copies in Nichols's " Works of Hogarth," in 3 vols. 4to. ; of those marked with [M,] there are reduced copies in Major's Edition of " Trusler's Hogarth Moralized ;" and of those marked with [s.i.] there are copies in Samuel Ireland's " Graphic Illustrations of Hogarth.' 9

About 1717. [s.i.] The Rape of the Lock."

" Sir Plume, of amber snuff-box justly vain, And the nice conduct of a clouded cane, With earnest eyes and round unthinking face, He first the snuff-box open'd, then the case, And thus broke out ' My Lord ! why, what the devil ? ' Z ds ! d n the Lock ! 'fore Gad, you must be civil ! Plague on't ! 'tis past a jest nay, prithee, pox ! Give her the hair ;' he spoke and rapp'd his box." POPE.

160 CATALOGUE OF

" Though slight, and not intended to be impressed on paper, the air of the figures is easy, and the faces, especially of Sir Plume and the heroine of the story, extremely characteristic. It is said to have been engraven on the lid of a snuff-box, for some gentle- man characterized in Pope's admirable mock-heroic poem ; pro- bably Lord Petre, who is here represented as holding the lock of hair in his hand. Sir Plume, the round-faced and insignificant Sir Plume,

' Of amber snuff-box justly vain,

And the nice conduct of a clouded cane,'

for Sir George Brown, who was the only one of the party who took the thing serious. He was angry that the Poet should make him talk nothing but nonsense ; and in truth (as Mr. Warburton adds) one could not well blame him. As this little story was in- tended to be viewed on gold, the figures in the copy are not re- versed, but left as they were originally engraven on the box ; from which, I believe there are only three impressions extant ; one of which was sold by Greenwood, at Mr. Gulston's sale, on the 7th of February, 1786, for thirty-three pounds." J. IRELAND.

There is a copy of the Rape of the Lock, engraved by Riepenhausen.

1720.

[N. M.] "Wm. Hogarth, engraver, April ye 29th, 1720 ;" with two Figures, and two Cupids.

" An impression of it has been sold for 25." S. IRELAND. Of this there is a modern copy.

1721.

[N.] An emblematic print on the South Sea. tf W. Ho- garth inv. et sc."

VARIATIONS. " First state. ' Sold by Mrs. Chilcot, in West- minster Hall, and B. Caldwell, printseller, in Newgate -street.' Se-

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 161

cond state. With "John Bowles. Price 1 shilling." Third state. Without any publisher's name, or price.

[B.] A copy of the same, by T. Cook.

[N.] " The Lottery." W. Hogarth inv. and sculp.

VARIATIONS. First state. Sold by Chilcot and Caldwell, price Is. Second state. Printed by Chilcot. Third state, for Sympson. In a Fourth state, for Bowles, " price Is." is erased. Fifth state. Without any publisher's name, or price. The first state has the fringe of the Curtain, on the right or blank side of the Lottery, cross-hatched, which was afterwards altered.

[B.] A copy .of the same, by T. Cook. 1723.

Eighteen Plates to Aubry de la Mottraye's Travels. Hogarth's name in fourteen of them. As these prints have such references as are hardly intelligible, the following list is given on the authority of Mr. John Ireland, with a slight hint of the subject of each.

1. TOM. 1. NO. V. " Vas mirabile ex integro Smaragdo, Genoae," etc. The Vase only, without the ornaments, with " W. Hogarth sc." is in the British Museum.

2. TOM. 1. No. IX. " Tiara Patriarchalis Graeca."

3. TOM. 1. NO. X. A Lady and Black in a Bath. No name legible.

4. TOM. 1. NO. XI. A Dance of elegant female figures. \_Copiedin the accompanying plate. ~\

"In p. 159, De la Mottraye tells us, in some very ill-arranged sentences, that the Greek women in the isle of Scio, where the scene is laid, have a striking pre-eminence over those of any other island in the Archipelago for beauty as well as gaiety, and some say likewise for complaisance. They verify the proverb, " merry

M

162 CATALOGUE OF

as a Greek/' dance every Sunday or holiday, in the open air, and in ring, as represented in the print ; and on such occasions wine is not spared. He describes fig. 1. as a chief woman of Smyrna, and fig. 7' as her daughter ; fig. 4. as a Greek woman of Constanti- nople, and fig. 3. as a country girl of Scio, in a habit peculiar to that place. From these slender materials the artist made his de- sign in a style which proves (notwithstanding the total deficiency of taste alleged by his biographers) that at this early period of his life he had the power of delineating figures with some portion of grace." J. IRELAND.

5. TOM. 1. No. XV. A Procession.

6. TOM. 1. NO. XVII. A group of figures in turbans.

7. TOM. 1. No. XVIII. A Scene in the Seraglio.

8. TOM. 2. No. III. Park of the Artillary.

9. TOM. 2. No. V. BENDER." Portrait of Charles XII.

10. TOM. 2. No. VIII. Head of Charles XII. &c.

11. TOM. 2. No. IX. PI. I. "Fodina Argentaea Sahlensis."

12. TOM. 2. No. IX. PI. ditto.

13. TOM. 2. No. XI. Fodina Terrea Donmorensis."

14. TOM. 2. No. XIV. A Lapland Hut, with Rein Deer, &c.

To this catalogue may perhaps be added, among other minor plates, NO. XIII. TOM. I. and NO. XVI. TOM. 1. as well as the figures at the corners of TOM. 2. NO. XXVI. A. and those in TOM. 2. C. of which there is a modern copy, under the name of

[N.] " The Five Muscovites."

1724.

Seven small prints to the new Metamorphosis of " Lu- cius Apuleius of Medaura;" printed for Samuel firiscoe,

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 163

12mo. 2 vols. one of the plates without Hogarth's name. The hints for these figures are taken from the prints in a translation, 2 vols. 8vo. 1708.

VARIATIONS. The plate of Apuleius, re-engraved by Mr. Thorn- ton, and given in Nichols's Hogarth, vol. iii. p. 106, is probably from a first or rejected design by Hogarth. It differs materially from the fourth plate used in the work. The disposition of the room is nearly the same in both. The materials in the room vary. In thejirst design there are a flat candlestick and various articles on the chimney-piece. The fire-place, which is half hid by a blanket or cloth, is without fire. There are a stool and bottle be- hind the witch ; also a stool in the front, on which a hat and coat are lying, with a pair of shoes on the floor. In the centre is another stool, on which a dog is resting his paws. The woman is without a stick. The two male figures grouping with her, are both of the same height and age. Above these figures are two, a male and female, peeping in at the window. In the right corner are a broom, a dish, and a bundle of faggots. In the design used, on the chimney-piece are only a jug and a something like a book. No stool and bottle behind the witch. A bundle of faggots is substituted for the stool in front. Instead of the stool with the dog, is a trunk, out of which a man is taking a boy. The witch has a stick ; and the figures peeping in at the window are omitted. In the right hand corner are a broom, a dish, and a stool.

[N.] " Masquerades and Operas : Burlington Gate. W. Hogarth inv. et sculp." This is the first plate Hogarth pub- lished. f3. 13*. 6<" in Baker's sale.

CHARACTERS REPRESENTED. The kneeling figure at the feet of Cuzzoni, the Italian singer, is the Earl of Peterbo- rough. Heidegger is at the window, with the letter H. un- der him. Of the three figures in the centre, the middle is Lord Burlington, on one side Campbell the architect, the other unknown. On the top of Burlington Gate, Kent the architect.

M2

164 CATALOGUE OF

VARIATIONS. The first impressions have Pasquin No. 11, on a label on a book, where in the second impressions is Ben Jonson. Eight lines on a separate piece of copper are sometimes found un- der the first impression.

" Could now dumb Faustus, to reform the age/' &c. To the second impression :

" Oh, how refin'd, how elegant we 're grown ! " &c.

To a copy of this print there are also eight lines, beginning,

" Long has the stage productive been/' &c.

[B.] A copy of the same by T. Cook.

[N.] t( Royalty, Episcopacy, and Law," with this in- scription : '< Some of the principal Inhabitants of ye Moon, as they were perfectly discovered by a Telescope brought to ye Greatest Perfection since ye last Eclipse ; Exactly Engraved from the objects, whereby y e Curious may Guess at their Religion, Manners, &c. Price Six Pence."

This print was first published 2 Dec. 1724. It is very rare : not more than two or three known. One was pur- chased by the British Museum for ^Pll. 11s.

[B.] A copy of thje same by T. Cook.

[N. & s. i.] " Frontispiece to the Happy Ascetick ;" en- graved by Hogarth for a sixth edition of that work, by An- thony Horneck, D.D. This is sometimes called, " The Master of the Vineyard." "sgZ. 2s."

1725.

Five small prints, for the Translation of Cassandra, 5 vols. 12mo. " W. Hogarth inv. et sculp."

[N. & s. i.] Fifteen head-pieces for ' The Roman, Military Punishments," by John Beaver, Esq. Engraved in the style of Callot.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 165

[N. & s. i.] A little figure of a Roman General in the title- page of the above work, may possibly be by Hogarth, though his name is not to it.

[N.] A Burlesque on Kent's Altar-piece at St. Cle- ment's.

A copy on the same size.

VARIATIONS. The original plate, which is usually on blue pa- per, may be known by the antiquated form of the writing, the double letters not being joined, and the last word wings has a long f. The last line of the writing in the original is close to the foot of the copper : the copy, also on blue paper, has a quarter of an inch of copper to spare.

[B.] A copy of the same, by T. Cook.

" Farinelli, Cuzzoni, and Senesino." A scene performed in Handel's Opera of Ptolomeo.

" This dignified heroine, and the two heroes of a class ' By their smooth chins, and simple simper known,'

are here the representatives of the majesty of Egypt, a morsel for a monarch, and the foremost man of all this world ; * they were the three principal performers in Handel's opera of Ptolomeo, per- formed in the year 1/28. There have been some suspicions of its not being Hogarth's design, and from the characters more than bordering on caricature, etc. I once inclined to that opinion ; but from the general spirit of the satire, and the same figures being introduced in nearly the same attitudes in the first print Hogarth ever published, there is little doubt of its being his production." J. IRELAND.

[N.] " A Just View of the British Stage ; or Three Heads

are better than one." Scene Newgate, by M. D. V to.

Booth, Wilks, and Gibber, contriving a Pantomime.

• See Shakspeare's Julius Csesar, and Antony and Cleopatra.

166 CATALOGUE OF

Mr. Devoto was 1 scene-painter at Drury Lane or Lincoln's Inn Fields Theatre, and also to Goodman's Fields. There is a portrait of him by Faber 1736.

[B.] A copy of the above, by T. Cook.

1726.

[N.] Frontispiece to " Terra? Filius."

" The work to which this is a frontispiece was written by Ni- cholas Amhurst, author of the Craftsman, and published in 1726. The leading object of the writer is to satirize the Tory principles of the University of Oxford. To the figures introduced in this print the original artist has given a spirit worthy of Cal- lot ; and the copy hereto annexed has been thought correct and animated." J. IRELAND.

[N.] Twenty-six figures, on two large sheets engraved for "A Compendium of Military Discipline," by J. Blackwell. The book, with the plates, was sold at Yates's sale in 1827 for =2. 12s. 6d.

[N.] Twelve Prints for Hudibras; the large set. " W. Hogarth pinx. et sculp." The original plates are in the pos- session of Mr. Laurie.

VARIATIONS. PLATE I. "Frontispiece. The first state has the name of P. Overton as publisher, instead of Sayer. The in- scription is at the bottom of the plate. PLATE II. " Hudibras

sallying forth." The first impressions are without " Hogarth inven. et sculp." The dog has two small spots on his rump. The light parts of the table are without lines. The keg over the man's shoulder is white in its light parts. The tail of Sidrophel's horse is lighter in its dark parts. The upper part of the rump is with- out lines. The shadows on the ground from Hudibras's- horse's legs are much lighter. The chest and neck of the horse are with- out lines upon the light parts. The holster in its light parts is without lines. The saddle is without cross-hatchings. The

fE'RRJE, FILIUS.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 167

lower part of the road, over which the dog is jumping, is without

cross-hatchings. PLATE III. " Hudibras's First Adventures."

In the first impressions, the butcher's waistcoat is without stripes. The handkerchief on his head is not chequered. The stocking and shoe on the right leg are white in the light parts. The fiddler's hat is perfectly white in the light parts, as are his shoulder and sleeve. The skirts of his jacket are not crossed. The lights on his stump and on his wooden leg are perfectly white, as are those on his other knee. Hudibras's belt is without lines near the buckle. The upper parts of his boot are perfectly white in the light parts, as are the holster, and the right fore-leg of the horse. The bear-keeper's light parts are perfectly white, as are his hat, his shoulders, and thigh. The bear's light parts, as well as the fore-ground under the bear, are before the cross-hatchings. The hat of the man, with the club above the bear, is white in its light

parts ; as is the club. PLATE IV. " Hudibras catechized." In

the first impressions there are no shadows in the ornaments above the press. The sole of the shoe of the man in the mask like a pig, is before the lines were made stronger. The shadows of Hudibras

are much lighter ; as is the ground under his body. PLATE V.

" Hudibras vanquished by Trulla." In the first impressions the bosom and arms of Trulla are lighter. The stays do not conform to the shape of the bosom. The sign, and cross-timber on which it hangs, are lighter. The sword in the man's hand with Sidro-

phel is before the cross-hatchings. PLATE VI. " Hudibras in

Tribulation." The first impression is without "Wm. Hogarth inven. et sculp." The bottom of Hudibras's beard is lighter. The shadows of the boots are not so strong. The leg of the stool under the jug is lighter. The bottom of the foreground at

both corners is not cross-hatched. PLATE VII. "Hudibras

and the Lawyer." The first impression differs not from the

later ones, except that the Plate is not numbered. PLATE

VIII. " Hudibras, Sidrophel, and his man Whacum." The first impression is without " Hogarth inven. et sculp." All the sha- dows are lighter, particularly in the cat, in which the spots are

168 CATALOGUE OF

much less strong ; in the book on the table, the shadows have been

forcibly re-entered. PLATE IX. "The Committee." The first

impression is without "Wm. Hogarth inven. et sculp." and has

the name of P. Overton as publisher. PLATE X. " Hudibras

triumphant." The first impression is without "Wm. Hogarth inven. et sculp/' The bosom of the lady is lighter, and the lace is less decided as to pattern. The hat of the man addressing her is before the cross-hatchings. The hatchings in the Squire's legs

are considerably less strong.i PLATE XI. "Burning the Rumps

at Temple Bar." The earliest impressions want " Down with the Rumps," on the scroll. Both the boots of Hudibras are much lighter, the dark parts of the right boot having been afterwards re- entered. The palm of the glove is before the lines. The man be- hind the effigy is white in the light parts of the sleeve, and breeches on the right knee ; his apron is before the cross-hatchings. The front man's breeches are not striped, and his jacket is whiter. The butcher's jacket is not striped. The white parts of the dra- pery of the man trundling the barrel are perfectly white, as are the light parts of the barrel inside and out. The figure hanging from the sign of Henry VIII. is before the cross-hatchings on his right

side. PLATE XII. " Hudibras encounters the Skimmington."

The first impression has the light part of the holster of Hudibras quite white ; the guard of the sword has not the cross-hatchings. The light parts of the breeches and stockings of the man blowing the horn are quite white. The shoulder of the left arm and the right side of his waistcoat are not so much worked upon. The bag- piper's hat is white in its light parts. His left arm not so worked upon. The distaff in the hands of the man behind the Skim- mington is white in the light parts. The light parts of the Skim- mington's leg are not crossed. The neck and chest of the horse on which they ride, are before the cross-hatchings ; and there is no girth to his saddle. The drapery over the knees and leg of the man with the kettle, is white in the light parts ; his kettle consi- derably lighter in the dark parts. The spots of the dog, .which the man is about to throw, are lighter and smaller. The timber on which the sign of the Shears hangs, is not cross-hatched.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 169

A fine lot of the large plates of Hudibras, with " Down with the Rumps," sold at Yates's sale 1827, for s3.

[B.] Copies of the same, by T. Cook.

Seventeen small Prints for Hudibras, with Butler's head. This portrait is evidently copied from White's mezzotinto of " John Baptist Monnoyer."

The same designs were engraved on a larger scale, and with some slight variations, by J. Mynde, for Gray's edition of "Hudibras," 1744.

Copies are inserted in Townley's translation of "Hudi- bras" into French, published in 1757.

Many of them were copied, with violent alterations, by Ross, for Dr. Nash's edition of " Hudibras," 1795.

A print representing Hudibras and Sidrophel, and ta- ken off in colours, was in 1782 engraved by T. Gaugain. This print Mr. John Ireland did not consider to be genuine.

" Cunicularii ; or the Wise Man of Godliman in Con- sultation." A burlesque on the believers of Mary Tofts, the Rabbit Woman.

1727.

[N.] " Musick introduc'd to Apollo by Minerva." Ho- garth fecit. Frontispiece to some piece ofmusick, or ticket for a concert. Said to be a copy from a more antient book of music. " alO." Baker.

[B. & N.] Large " Masquerade Ticket." Very rare. In Yates's sale, 1827, <!, ISs.

" We have here the interior of the room crowded with a count- less multitude of grotesque characters, celebrating the orgies of the place ; which, in the following references engraved under the ori-

170 CATALOGUE OF

ginal print, are thus described : ' A. a sacrifice to Priapus. B. a pair of Lecherometers, shewing y e company's inclinations as they approach 'em. Invented for the use of ladys and gentlemen

by y e ingenious Mr. H r.' (Heidegger.) This titular divinity

of the gardens being thus considered as the god of their idolatry, his Term is entitled to the first notice ; the arched niche in which it is placed, is terminated by a -goat's head, ornamented with a pair of branching antlers, and decorated with festooned curtains. Beneath is an altar, the base of which is relieved with rams' heads and flowers ; and three pair of stags' horns are fixed to the top. As a companion to it, the united statues of a Venus and Cupid, both of them masked, are placed on the opposite side of the print. Cupid, who is a very well drawn and spirited little figure, has bent his bow to shoot at random ; and Venus seems contemplating the rise and fall of the mercury, in one of those instruments which the reference informs us is to shew the inclinations of all that ap- proach it. The niche in which these divinities are placed, is not only decorated with curtains, but crowned with cooing doves. An altar beneath has on it three or four bleeding hearts, which, being close to the blaze, are in the way of being broiled. On the base are queue^wigs," bag-wigs, &c. This may suffice, for the presiding deities of the diversion; the head of their high-priest, the renowned Heidegger, the master of the mysteries and mana- ger in chief, is placed on the front of a large dial, fixed lozenge- fashion at the top of the print, and I believe intended to vibrate with the pendulum ; the ball of which hangs beneath, and is label- led " Nonsense." On the minute finger is written " Impertinence," and on the hour-hand, " Wit :" which seems to intimate nonsense every second ; impertinence every minute ; and wit once an hour ! The time is half past one the witching hour of night : 1727, the date of the year this print was published, is on the corners of the clock. Recumbent on the upper line of this print, and resting against the sides of the dial, the artist has placed our British lion and unicorn renverse (such I think is the term in heraldry), ^Jy ing on their backs, and each of them playing with its own tail. The

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 171

lion sinister, and the unicorn dexter. The supporters of our regal arms being thus ludicrously introduced, may perhaps allude to the encouragement George the Second gave to Heidegger, who at that period might be said to

' Teach kings to fiddle, and make senates dance ;'

and who, by thus kindly superintending the pleasures of our nobles, gained an income of 5,000 a year, and, as he frequently boasted, laid out the whole in this country. Beneath, is a framed picture of a Bacchanalian scene ; and, on each side, shelves with pyramids of jellies, sweetmeats, &c. inscribed ' Provocatives :' on two labels placed before them is written ' Supper below/ A pair of instruments, somewhat similar to the mental thermometer in the Medley, are fixed on each side : on that next to Venus and Cu- pid, is written ' Cool, warm, dry, changeable, hot, moist, fixt ; ' on the other, ' Expectation, hope, hot desire, extreme hot, moist, sudden cold.' The motley crew who make up the crowd, it is not easy to describe ; for every one present assumes a false character. Here are priests of all persuasions bramins, friars, drones, monks ; and monkies not a few. A figure of ' Time' with his scythe, eagerly pressing towards the altar with rams' heads, is arrested in his course by a sort of slaughterman, with a mask, shaven crown, and short apron ; who violently grasps his wing with one hand, and with the other lifts up a hatchet, which with fatal force he aims at his head. For sanctuary, this feeble figure lays hold of one of the horns of the altar, but is frustrated in his attempt to reach the steps, by a bishop, who with his sacrificing knife coolly stabs him to the heart ; while a monkey, in the habit of a chorister, holds a bason to catch the blood, the fumes from which he snuffs up with ineffable delight. This I apprehend to be a metaphorical view of a Prelate killing Time at a masquerade. Next to this group is a Mother Shipton, hooking on the arms of a clown ; and near them a Harlequin endeavouring to draw the attention of a graceful Co- lumbine from a turban ed Turk, who attempts to seduce her from her party-coloured gallant. A female, with the mask of a mon- key's head, salutes a nun in a black veil ; and while an old Capu-

172 CATALOGUE OF

chin, with the face of an ape, whispers soft things to a young girl, a fellow somewhat like Tiddy-doll, draws up her head-dress to a point like a fool's cap. A man in the right hand-corner, soli- citous to give a glass of wine to one of the sisterhood, lifts up her veil for the purpose of her drinking it." J. IRELAND.

VARIATION. First state. Provocatives spelt with a u. Second state, altered to v.

[N. & s. i.] Frontispiece to " Leveridge's Songs." VARIATION. The title runs, " A Collection of Songs, with the Musick, by Mr. Leveridge. In two Volumes." Then the follow- ing lines with the music : "To sing my songs will free your lungs, from all oppression, spleen will dye, and vapours fly. London, Engraved and Printed for the Author, in Tavistock Street, Covent Garden. . 1727." In either side of the engraved border are the initials R. and S. This plate, with the sky partly omitted, or an imitation of the design, was used for "A Ticket for the Benefit of Signora Laschi, at the King's Theatre in the Haymarket, on Tuesday, March 27. Pitt." A copy of it was sold in Mr. Alex- ander's sale, Nov. 1816.

The ornaments round the title-page seem likewise to be Hogarth's.

1727 or 1728.

" The Punishment inflicted on Lemuel Gulliver, by ap- plying a Luliputian fire-engine to his posteriors, for his criminal profanation of the Royal Pallace of Mildendo j" which was intended as a frontispiece to his first volume, but omitted. Hogarth sculp.

The title of the plate was afterwards altered to " The Political Clyster. Nahtanoi Tfiws. [Jonathan Swift.] Dr O'Gearth sculp."

1728.

[s. i.] " Head of Hesiod 5" from the bust at Wilton, for Cook's translation.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 173

[B. & N.] " Rich's Glory ; or his Triumphant Entry into Covent Garden. W. H. inv. et sculp. Price sixpence." Mr. Steevens says, " The style of composition, manner of engraving, &c. &c. would have sufficiently proved it to be the work of Hogarth, if the initials of his name had been wanting ;" but Mr. John Ireland considered it not genuine, and called it " contemptible !" Rich is riding in a chariot, drawn by Harlequin ; Pope is in the corner of the Piazza, the letter P over his head.

[N.] " The Beggars' Opera" burlesqued ; the title in let- ters disproportionably large.

VARIATIONS. There are two different Copper-plates of this subject, with writing engraved under them in a different manner. One of them is found in two states. First, " Sold at the Print- shop in the Strand, near Catherine-street." Second, " Printed for John Bowles, at the Black Horse in Cornhill."

[B.] A copy of the same, by T. Cook.

The same ; the lines engraved under it in a different manner.

A copy of the same; with " The Opera House, or the Italian Eunuch's Glory," &c.

1729.

[N.] " King Henry the Eighth and Anna Bullen ;" with lines by Allan Ramsay,

" Here struts old pious Harry," &c.

A proof sold for s13. 2s. 6d. in Baker's sale. The original picture was painted for the Portico at Vauxhall. The por- traits were said to be Frederick Prince of Wales and Lady Vane.

174 CATALOGUE OF

VARIATIONS. In the first impressions the verses are divided into three compartments, six verses in the first, and four in th e two others. To fill up the blank space, a large unmeaning flourish is introduced. The later impressions, without the verses, are thus inscribed : " King Henry the Eighth and Anna Bullen. De- signed and Engraved by Wm. Hogarth. Printed for John Bowles, at the Black Horse in Cornhill, &c. Price 3s." In more recent impressions altered to 5s. " Printed for Robert Wilkinson, Corn- hill, Carrington Bowles, in St. Paul's Church Yard, and R. Sayer, in Fleet Street."

The Plate has been recently thoroughly repaired, and re- published.

[B.] A copy of the same, by T. Cook. The same, an 8vo plate. " Benning sculp." There is a coarse copy, I think engraved on pewter. The design is engraved under a folio portrait of Henry Vlll.by R.Sheppard.

[N.] Frontispiece to the " Humours of Oxford," a co- medy by James Millar. " W. Hogarth inv. ; G. Vander- gucht sculp."

[B.&N.] "Examination ofBambridge, in a Committee of the House of Commons." Painted about 1729. Engraved by T. Cook from a print in the possession of Robert Ray, Esq. in 1803.

[B. & N.] " The Beggars' Opera." Engraved by Blake 1790.

An Etching of the Plate is in the British Museum, " paint- ed by W. Hogarth 1729 ; etched by W. Blake 1788 ; pub- lished, Oct. 29, 1788, by Alderman Boydell and Co. Cheap- side."

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 175

Key Plate to ditto.

PERFORMERS. Macheath, Mr. Walker ; Lockitt, Mr. Hall; Peachum, Mr. Hippisley; Lucy, Mrs. Egleton j Polly, Miss Fenton, afterwards Duchess of Bolton.

AUDIENCE. Duke of Bolton; Major Paunceford; Sir Robert Fagg ; Mr. Rich, the manager -, Mr. Cock, the auc- tioneer : Mr. Gay j Lady Jane Cook ; Anthony Henley, Esq. -, Lord Gage ; Sir Conyers D'Arcy ; Sir Thos, Ro- binson,

1730.

[N.] Frontispiece to " Perseus and Andromeda." Per- seus, and Medusa dead, and Pegasus. W. Hogarth fee. [N.] Another print of the same, " Perseus descending."

[N.] " Gulliver presented to the Queen of Babilary. W. Hogarth inv. ; Ger. Vandergucht sculp." Frontispiece to Lockman's translation from the French of John Gulliver's

Travels.

1731.

A Frontispiece to " Moliere's L'Avare." A copy of the original drawing of the Miser appeared in Sam. Ireland's " Graphic Illustrations," vol. II. p. 76.

Frontispiece to his " Le Coed Imaginaire." These two Plates were parts of the embellishments to the Plays of Moliere, in French and English, 8 vols.

Frontispiece to Fielding's " Tom Thumb." * ' W. Hogarth inv. ; Ger. Vandergucht sculp."

" Grotesque and good." J. IRELAND.

Frontispiece to Joseph Mitchell's opera of " The High- land Fair, or the Union of the Clans." " W. Hogarth inv. ; Ger. Vandergucht sculp."

176 CATALOGUE OF

[B.] " The Indian Emperor ; or the Conquest of Mexico." Painted in 1731. Engraved by Dodd in 1792, from the ori- ginal picture in the collection of Lord Holland.

The Key Plate to the above, 1732.

PERFORMERS. Cortez, Lord Lempster ; Cydaria, Lady Caroline Lenox ; Almeria, Lady Sophia Fermor; Alibech, Miss Conduit, afterwards Lady Lymington.

AUDIENCE. Duke of Cumberland, Princess Mary, Prin- cess Louisa, Lady Deloraine, her daughters, Duchess of Richmond, Duke of Richmond, Earl of Pomfret, Duke of Montague,, Tom Hill (or, it has been said, Captain Poyntz), Dr. Desaguliers, bust of Sir Isaac Newton.

1732.

[B.&N.] " The Man of Taste." The Gate of Burlington House. Pope with a tie wig on.

t This design presents a view of Burlington-gate. On the front, as a crooked compliment to the noble proprietor, Hogarth has in- scribed the word TASTE, and as a standing proof of the Projector being entitled to the appellation, placed a statue of his grand fa- vourite William Kent, triumphantly brandishing his palette and pencils on the summit, with, two reclining figures, representing Raphael and Michael Angelo, for his supporters. Standing on a scaffold board beneath them, Mr. Pope, in the character of a plas- terer, is white-washing the front, and whirling his brush, with a spirit that produces a shower of liquid pearl, which, dismays and defiles the passengers beneath ; the principal of these, intended for the Duke of Chandos, holds his hat over his bead to shelter himself in his retreat. The torrent is not confined to his Grace's person, but lavishly scattered over his carriage and attendants, among whom is a Blackamoor in the way of being whitewashed. The clergyman, whom I believe intended for the Duke's chaplain,

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 177

is escaping round the carriage. An old military character, who as well as the chaplain is got out of the poet's vortex, is rubbing off the stains which he has previously contracted. Climbing a ladder reared against the scaffold, we have Lord Burlington, doing the office of a labourer, and arrayed in a tie-wig, with a pair of compasses suspended to the riband of his order, and carrying to his little active workman a hand-hawk, on which is a portion of what I am told the bricklayers call fine stuff, to mix up more whitening for beautifying the front of his own gate, and defiling the garments of every passenger. This it must be acknowledged our poetical plasterer performs with distinguished dexterity : he at the same time covers the corrosions on the front, dashes a plen- teous shower on those that come near it, and so kicks the bottom of a pail which hangs to his short ladder, that a copious stream flows on the head of a gentleman beneath. This double distribu- tion of flattery and satire is amply exemplified in the epistle to Lord Burlington ; where the poet, by contrasting the feeble and imperfect efforts of those he abuses, with the superior and super- lative genius of the peer, elevates the powers of his own patron, and sinks those of all his competitors." J. IRELAND.

The same, Pope in a cap. Prefixed to " A Miscellany of Taste, by Mr. Pope," c.

The same, still smaller size, coarsely engraved.

[B. &N.] " Sarah Malcolm ;" executed March 7, 1732-3. " W. Hogarth (ad Vivum) pinxit et sculpsit."

An engraved copy. <{ W. Hogarth ad vivum pinxit."

The same, mezzotinto.

Another, part graven and part mezzotinto.

Another copy, by T. Cook.

Another copy, with the addition of a clergyman hold-

178 CATALOGUE OF

ing a ring. This was designed as a Frontispiece to a Pam- phlet advertised in ' The Weekly Miscellany," Aug. 25, 1733.

A wooden cut in the Gentleman's Magazine for March 1733.

A copy from a small whole-length, formerly in the pos- session of Alderman Boydell.

" Sarah Malcolm was executed opposite Mitre-court, Fleet- street, on the 7th of March 1733, for the murder "of Mrs. Lydia Buncombe, Elizabeth Harrison, and Anne Price. The portrait of this sanguinary wretch Mr. Hogarth painted in Newgate ; and to Sir James Thornhill, who accompanied him, he made the- following observation, ' I see by this woman's features, that she is' capable of any wickedness.' Of his skill in physiognomy I entertain a very high opinion ; but as Sarah sat for her picture after condemnation, 1 suspect his observation to resemble those prophecies which were made after the completion of events they professed to foretel. She has a locked-up mouth, wide nostrils, and a penetrating eye, with a general- air that indicates close observation and masculine cou- rage ; but I do not discover either depravity or cruelty ; though her conduct in this, as well as some other horrible transactions, evinced an uncommon portion of both, and proved her a Lady Macbeth in low life. The portrait from which this print was en- graved is well painted. It was probably copied from that which was painted in Newgate, which was in the collection of Mr. Horace Walpole, at Strawberry Hill. It will not appear extra- ordinary, that Hogarth should have delineated her twice, when we consider, that from the print he published there were four copies, besides one in wood, which was engraved for the Gentle- man's Magazine. Thus eager were the public to possess the por- trait of this most atrocious woman. All these delineations were what the painters call half-lengths ; her whole figure was never engraved, except in the opposite plate." J. IRELAND.

SARAH MALCOLM..

-I by Nictwls i:Scm,Z>tx;.i.i834.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 179

1733.

[B. & N.] " The Laughing Audience," originally called " A pleased Audience at a Play. Subscription Ticket to the Rake's Progress and Southwark Fair, which were originally delivered to the subscribers at a guinea and a half.

VARIATIONS. The first State has the receipt for the Rake's Progress and Southwark Fair. In the later impressions the writ- ing at the foot of the plate has been cut off, but parts of the first line are still discernible on the plate.

Of this print there is a coarse copy.

A copy by Riepenhausen, 11 in. by 6.

A copy of the same size, by T. Cook.

[M ] A beautiful small copy, by G. Cruikshank.

[B., N., & M.] " Southwark Fair. Invented, painted, and engraved by W. Hogarth."

" Strolling players, fire-eaters, jugglers

' Katterfelto, with his hair on end,

At his own wonders wondering for his bread ' simple-faced countrymen, nimble pickpockets, and ladies with roguish eyes, are the actors who fill his stage. One of the most successful characters is that of the strutting Amazon in a hat and feather, the sole heroine in a gang of hedge comedians beating up for an audience. On this patched, painted, and buskined beauty, two clowns are staring their senses away in gaping extacy of en- joyment." CUNNINGHAM.

CHARACTERS REPRESENTED. The figure vaulting, Signor Violante. The man descending on a rope, Cadman, killed afterwards at Shrewsbury. Paris, Walker, afterwards the fa- mous Macheath. On a blind horse, Figg, the prize-fighter. The tall man, Miller, a native of Saxony, 8 feet high. Two

180 CATALOGUE OF

jugglers in senatorial wigs, Fawkes and Neve. Man with head hound with laurel, old Gibber. Tall thin figure, Mr. Highmore. The show-cloth is from an etching of John La- guerre. The paint-pot and brushes, added to the figure with a cudgel, said to allude to John Ellis, the painter, but as probably to Jack Laguerre.

A copy of this print, in the finest state, at Yates's sale, 1827, s2. 12*.6rf.

In Mr. Packer's collection, now in the British Museum, is a very large copy of " Southwark Fair, done from ye original of Mr. Wm. Hogarth," 34 in. wide, by 22 in. high, " printed and sold by H. Overton and J. Hoole, at ye White Horse without Newgate, London." Underneath are forty- seven lines of poetry.*

This large print is a very close copy of the original, ex- cept that it is reversed, or rather properly engraved the same way as the original painting. On each side the plate an addition is made ; on the right side to introduce more of the House, on the left the whole of the Horse.

There is a copy of this print, intituled, (l The Humours and divertions of Southwark Fair. Les Plaisirs et Divertise- ments de Foire de Southwark. Printed for Carington Bowles, at No. 69, in St Paul's Church Yard ; and John Bowles, at No. 13, in Cornhill, London. Wm. Hogarth inven. et pinxt. R. Parr sculp." This is a well-executed imitation of the original, and of the same size ; but the de- sign is reversed on the plate.

There is also a smaller copy of the print, 14- in by 9J, intituled, " The Humours and Diversions of Southwark Fair.

• Printed in Nichols's Hogarth, iii. 217.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 181

Les Bizarreries et Les Plaisirs de la Foire de Southwark." This likewise is tolerably engraved.

A copy by Riepenhausen, 1 1 in. by 6.

" Judith and Holofernes." Engraved by Vandergucht. Frontispiece to the Oratorio of Judith, by William Hug- gins, Esq.

[B. & N.] " Boys peeping at Nature." Subscription Tic- ket to the Harlot's Progress.

VARIATIONS. In the first state, a Satyr is examining the mys- teries of Nature. The following Receipt was afterwards neatly engraved under it :

" Received 1 737, half a guinea, being the first pay-

ment for 5 large prints ; one representing the Strolling Company of Actresses dressing themselves in a Barn, and the other 4, Morning, Noon, Evening, and Night ; which I promise to deliver on Lady day next on receiving half a guinea more." " They will be twenty-five shillings after the subscription is over." In the second state, an unmeaning portrait takes the place of the Satyr. In this state Hogarth intended it as a Receipt for Moses brought before Pha- raoh's Daughter, and St. Paul before Felix ; but afterwards sub- stituted the Burlesque Paul.

A copy of the^r^ state, in aquatint, by Rd. Livesay, 1782.

1733 and 1734. [B., N., & M.] " The Harlot's Progress," in six plates.

" The Harlot's Progress is no burlesque production nor jesting matter it exhibits, in the midst of humour and satire, a moral pathos which saddens the heart." CUNNINGHAM.

CHARACTERS REPRESENTED IN THIS SERIES. PI. I. The debauchee, Col. Chartres. Behind him John Gover, a pimp in his employ ; or Anthony Henley. The procuress, Mother

182 CATALOGUE OF

Needham. PI. II. The sign, Pontac's Head, alludes to a ce- lebrated purveyor of that name. Pictures, Dr. Clarke and Henry Fox, Uzziah and the Ark. PI. III. The justice, Sir John Gonson. The hat-box is James Dalton's, a no- torious street-robber. Hackabout was the name of a woman of the town, committed to Bridewell in 1730. Her brother was hung at Tyburn. The pictures, Dr. Sacheverell and Capt. Mackheath. PI. V. The lean Doctor is Misaubin, a foreign quack. His fat opponent, Dr. Rock, or Dr. Ward. PI. VI. The Parson is the chaplain of the Fleet. The principal female, Eliz. Adams, executed for robbery in 1737. The bawd, Mother Bentley.

VARIATIONS. The first state of this series of prints has not the cross in the centre at the bottom, which marks the second state of the

plates. PLATE I. In the second state, the uppermost pan much

worked upon. The hair of the girls in the waggon darkened, and better made out ; the shadow of the bawd's arm on the girl's shoul- der and bosom, much darkened. The hat and cap of the girl are worked upon. The rose in her bosom surrounded by darker leaves. Her apron in broad shadow, proceeding from the figure of the bawd. The cloak under her right arm much darkened. Feet are added to the bawd. The basket containing the goose much darkened. The sign-board of the Bell has a border, by the internal part being made darker. Shadow thrown by one house upon another. " London" added to the letter the parson is read- ing. PLATE II. In the second state, the lower parts of the lady's

drapery are in many places cross-hatched. The shade on the ground under her foot is so enlarged as to unite from the shadow of the black boy to the shadow of the table. The forward leg of

the table brighter in its light parts. PLATE III. In the second

state, the locks of hair in the harlot's head-dress are extended over the right side of her bosom. The shadow of the waist is consi- derably enlarged, so as to relieve the watch. The bed-clothes and

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 183

the lower part of her dress darkened, to relieve the white cat. The shadow of the stool is extended under the cat to the leg of the chair. The sleeve of the right arm of the maid is considerably added to. Her handkerchief is entirely covered with lines, and her neck is cross-hatched. The shadow on the ground is extended from the pipe and pot in the corner to the stool or tea-table ; the ground is also shaded above. The extreme bed-curtain is darkened diagonally. The shadow under the chair is even with the foot of the Plate. The outside of the bason is considerably darkened. There are also cross -hatchings in the side of the window. The shadow from the harlot's hat is made rounder. A ' sugar-dish* near the punch-bowl, in \hefirst state, is in the second changed to a ' bottle/ PLATE IV. In the second state, the holes in the tiles of the roof are all filled up. The wall on which the gentleman's hat hangs is considerably widened in its return : indeed the per- spective or return of the wall is completely altered. There is also a diagonal shadow from the hoop on the same wall to the gentle- man's head who is beating hemp. The stones in the corner above the stocks are darkened. The upper part of the lappet on the right shoulder of the harlot is darkened, as is also her left shoulder ; her petticoat is darkened on the right hip, and a broad shadow, proceeding from the block on which she is beating hemp, falls on the front of her petticoat. The hemp she is beating is covered with lines ; and the block is partially darkened from the blows it has before received. The cap of the overseer is considerably darkened, and the lower part of his cravat is in shadow. The shadow from his left leg is increased, and comes more towards his right foot. The shadow is considerably increased from the block towards his left foot : indeed the whole of the foreground of this print has been crossed. The cap of the intermediate figure has been lowered. All the lights of the gentleman are covered, to throw the figure further back. The lights on the jacket of the woman gartering her stocking have been lowered, and the front of the block on which her foot rests has been considerably widened in its shadow. The dog and his collar are made darker. ^PLATE V. In the second

184 CATALOGUE OF

state, the roof is considerably darkened between the rafters, as is also the wall over the fire-place. The opening between the cur- tains has been considerably lightened. The lines on which the cloaths hang, have been considerably darkened. The bottom of the harlot's drapery has been cross-hatched, and a strong light on the arm of the chair has been introduced. The gown of the wo- man supporting the harlot is considerably darker, and her cap low- ered ; and the breeches of the boy turning the meat have been re- touched, as has also the joint at the fire. The centre of the drip- ping-pan has been crossed, as likewise the front of the bellows. The lower part of the cravat of the seated Doctor has been dark- ened ; the whole of Ms wig has been cross-hatched, and made generally larger ; and a shadow is also thrown from the Doctor against the door. The waistcoat of the Doctor in a rage has also been cross-hatched. His left leg is considerably darkened. The cane part of the back of the chair has been darkened. The whole of the top of the stool on which the Doctors had been writing their prescriptions, has received a diagonal line. The name of " Dr. Rock" has been added to the paper. The drapery of the woman on her knees, rummaging the box, has been made darker ; and the upper lights of the cloths he has thrown out have been crossed over. The bricks behind the woman have all been darkened, as has the shadow from the cloth that stops up a hole in the wall under the candles. The dark shadow in the corner, where the coals are, has

been softened off. PLATE VI. In the second state, the wig of the

clergyman is darkened by cross-hatching. The shadow from his hand holding the glass is considerably enlarged on the handker- chief; and the shadow from the woman's arm holding the hat has been interlined : and many parts of the lower folds of her petticoat have been altered in their forms, and strengthened in their sha- dows. The undertaker's forehead has received a shade from the female's head. The mask on the bottle has a most ludicrous ap- pearance. The cloth near the cheek and under the chin of the old bawd, as well as the shadowed part of her cheek, and the ruffle on her right arm, have been cross-hatched ; and a shadow is thrown o ver her apron, proceeding from the bottle of Nantz.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 185

" Harlot's Progress," in first state, at Yates's sale 1827, e4>. In second state, ggl.Zs.

Mr. T. Cook has given, in his " Hogarth Restored/' good copies of this set of Plates in their^r^ state.

Mr. Wilkinson possessed the Copper-plates of the earliest and best of the pirated copies of the Harlot's Progress, with verses underneath.* They are engraved in the same size as the originals; but the designs in the first five plates are re- versed.

The more material variations are as follow : PLATE I. On the

top of the plate, " The progress of a Harlot, engraved from y De- signs of Mr. Hogarth." Under the sign of the Bell, " Parsons' en- tire Butt Beer." On the waggon, "B. R. York Waggon." In

the original, the syllable "Wag" is omitted. PLATE II. Instead

of the paintings of Jonah and David, two pictures, each containing

a Shepherd and Shepherdess, are introduced. PLATE III. Instead

of the picture of Abraham offering up Isaac, a Shepherd and Shep. herdess. Instead of " Dr. Sacheverell, S. T. P." " Henry Sache- verell, D. D." The word "these" added to the direction of the letter in the drawer of the table. No inscription on the porter- pot in the corner of the room. The word "to" omitted after

" Pastoral Letter." PLATE IV. Several holes in the roof, as in

thefirst state of the original. PLATE V. Dr. Rock's name omit- ted, as in the^r^ state of the original. No " M. H." on the roof.

The lean Doctor has no sword. PLATE VI. Over the Clergyman

is a letter "A." referring to this note at the bottom: "A. The famous Couple-beggar in the Fleet, a wretch who there screens himself from the Justice due to his Villanies, and daily repeats them." On the coffin-plate the date of the harlot's death altered from the "2d" to the "3d". This is the only plate of the set that is not reversed.

Copies of these six plates were engraved in mezzotinto

• Printed in "Nichols's Hogarth," 4to, vol. IT. pp. 104 109.

186 CATALOGUE OF

by E. Kirkall, 15 in. by 11|, with verses underneath. They are thus entitled : 1. The Harlot's Progress. Her arrival in London. 2. In High-keeping, by a Jew. 3. Sets up for herself. 4. In the House of Correction. 5. In a high Salivation. 6. Her Funeral. Each plate has 16 lines of poetry. A set of these plates, printed with green ink, is in the British Museum.

A small set of the Harlot's Progress, engraved by G. King, 9J in. by 7f , is in the British Museum. In PI. I. the de- bauchee's name is thus designated : " Col. C s." In

PI III. the Justice's name thus, " Sir Jno. G n." Un- derneath is a description of each plate.

A copy of the Six Plates, by Riepenhausen, 11 in. by 6.

[B., N., &M.] "Rehersal of the Oratorio of Judith."

The little figure in the left corner is Mr. Tothall, a wool- len draper in Tavistock Court.

There is a mezzotinto copy of this Plate. " The Musical Group. Price 6c?." On the music-books, " Cecilian Sis- ters, Tuneful Nine." On the top book, " An Ode for New Year's Day."

Copy by Riepenhausen, 11 in. by 6.

[B., N., & M.] "A Midnight Modern Conversation." " Sir John Hawkins says this divine is Henley the orator, the victim of Pope ; but according to Mrs. Piozzi he is no other person than Parson Ford, a near relative of Dr. Johnson, and famous in his day for profligacy. * His intellects and

power of swallow survive amidst the general wreck of his com- panions : with a pipe in one hand and a cork-screw in the other, which he uses as a tobacco- stopper, he still presides with suitable

gravity,

' And to mere mortals, seems a priest in drink.' "

CUNNINGHAM.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 187

OTHER CHARACTERS REPRESENTED. The figure lean- ing over the Parson, John Harrison, a tobacconist in Bell Yard. The lawyer, Kettleby, a vociferous barrister. The man in a night-cap, old Chandler, a book-binder, in Shire Lane.

VARIATIONS. In the second state the folds of the Parson's gown are darker. The shadows of the wig of the man burning his ruffle are considerably stronger, and the shade on the ground, extending from the chair to the heel of his shoe, darker ; the contents of the vessel in the corner, as well as the vessel itself, are cross-hatched. The shadow from it is much strengthened. The chair fallen on the ground is considerably darker ; as is the whole of the dress of the fallen member. The wig of the figure in front, leaning on the back of the chair, is considerably strengthened in its shadows. The wig of the smoker behind the gentleman in the white cap is much darkened. From the paper on which " Freeman's best" is writ- ten, a shadow falls on the table-cloth. The inside of the lemon near the chair, has been considerably darkened.

In the British Museum is an impression of this plate in its Jirst state, printed with red ink.

A copy in the Jirst state, in Yates'ssale 1827, sl. 10s.

Mr. T. Cook has copied the First state of this Plate in his " Hogarth Restored."

The late Mr. Wilkinson possessed the copper of a copy of this Plate in its Jirst state, which might be mistaken for the original, being only a quarter of an inch less wide, but the writing (for which there is greater space at the foot of the Plate) is in different-shaped letters. " Hogarth Pinxt, Pair sculp." and " Sold by Carington Bowles, in St. Pau. Church Yard ; and John Bowles, at the Black Horse Cornhill."

188 CATALOGUE OF

Mr. Wilkinson had also a mezzotinto copy of this Plate, by Kirkall.

A copy by Riepenhausen.

There are in the British Museum two good copies of this Plate. The drawing is properly reversed. " Geo. Bick- ham, Jun. sculp." and *' R. Cooper sculp."

There is likewise a very large copy, 2 ft. 11 in. wide, by 22^ in. high, intituled, " A Midnight Modern Conversation. W. Hogarth inven. et pinxit. Printed and sold by John Bowles, at the Black Horse in Cornhill." On each side of this title, are numerous verses, copied by Nichols, vol. III. p. 224 ; being an abridgement, with alterations, of those printed by him in vol. II. pp.112 114. A copy of this Print was sold by auction, by Mr. Evans, Dec. 9, 1816, in the collection of the late Duke of Norfolk, and bought by Mr. Molteno.

The eleven heads in the " Midnight Conversation" were engraved in two small Plates, under the title of " Societe Nocturne nomme'e communement Cotterie de Dbauche en Ponche, par Hogarth," by M. Riepenhausen, and published in " Manuel contenant diverses Connoissances curieuses et utile pour 1'annee 1786; a Gottingen, chez Jean Chretien Dietrich," p. 14-8. They were accompanied by a French description ; a translation of which is given in Nichols's Ho- garth, vol. III. p. 228.

There is in the British Museum a well-executed French copy of the " Midnight Conversation," engraved by Creite, 16 in. wide by 10 high.

VARIATIONS. It is ornamented on each side with a border of

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 189

grapes and vine leaves, and at bottom has the following verses in very large print :

Chaque Peuple a son gout, tout Pais a sa mode,

Chacun se rejouit ou pleure a sa fa9on ;

Mais, fut-on plus severe et serieux que Caton, II faut qu'au train public un chacun s'accommode.

Si, pour faire eclater sa joye, un Francois chante, Si les Italiens se plaisent aux Concerts, Si 1'Allemand cherit la Table et les Desserts,

L'Anglois s'en tient au Ponch, et la Pipe 1'enchante.

The figures are accurate resemblances of the original; but the minor parts of the Print vary. The table is of larger dimensions. The fallen candlestick is much further removed from the bottle the man is holding in his hand. " Freeman's Best" is omitted on the paper on the table ; as are " London Journal" and " Craftsman" on the newspapers in the Politician's pocket. The top row of flasks over the chimney consists of six instead of four. The pan- nel of the room near the clock is much wider.

1735.

[B.,N., & M.] " The Rake's Progress," in eight plates.

" The woman discarded in the first print rescues Rakewell in the fourth, is present at his marriage, follows him into the gaol, and watches over him in Bedlam." GILPIN.*

CHARACTERS. PI. I. Picture : Miser weighing gold.

PI. II. The Fencing master, Dubois ; the prize-fighter, Figg ; teacher of musick, Handel ; the dancing-master, Essex ; the French-horn player, Bridgeman. Pictures : Fighting Cocks,

Judgment of Paris. PI. III. The fellow with a pewter

dish, Leathercoat, many years porter at the Rose Tavern.

• An elaborate criticism on the eight Plates of the Rake's Pro-

gress may be seen in Gilpin's " Essay on Prints."

190 CATALOGUE OF

The Caesars thus arranged : Julius on the floor, Pontac the cook in his stead ; Augustus without a head ; Nero, entire - t

Titus, Otho, Vitellius, Vespasian, all decapitated. PI. IV.

The usurer with pen in hand, Old Manners, brother to John

Duke of Rutland. PI. VIII. The tailor, Lord L r, who

had a passion for that business; the maniac chained to the floor, is a copy of one of Cibber's figures over the gate of Bedlam ; the Rake himself is the companion figure ; ihe man sitting by the figure inscribed, < Charming Betty Care- less," is Win. Ellis : this maniac lost his reason through love for his Betty ; see a portrait of him by Sutton Nicholls, aet. 45, 1709.

VARIATIONS. PLATE I. In the second state, the girl's face is altered for the worse, from the appearance of a child of sixteen to a woman of thirty. A shadow is thrown on her apron from th e chair. The woollen -draper's shop-bill, on the roll of black cloth, is omitted. The back part of the cap of the old woman is reduced. The head of the Rake is also lessened, and his face made thinner and older. The breeches on the right side are cross-hatched. The flap of the tailor's coat is strengthened, as is also the stocking of the left leg. The book of memorandums is removed from the left corner of the print, and placed on the ground below the tailor's foot. The shirt of the steward stealing the money, is cross-hatched ; and the middle of the parchment thrown over the table, is considerably darkened. The sole of a shoe is introduced, formed from the cover of the Holy Bible. It lies by the Bible itself, with its mutilated cover. These are in place of the memorandum-book in the first state. The light parts of the wigs and other articles within the closet, are all lowered by cross-hatchings. The dress of the old woman with the sticks, and different parts of the stove, are cross- hatched. The sleeve before the closet-door is cross-hatched. The spots on the cat's side and shoulder are much darkened.-^ PLATE II. In the second state, the folds in the left skirt of the dancing-

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 191

master are interlined. The ground under the dancing-master is considerably darkened. " The word Horlots, as it appears in the

first state, is altered to Harlots." PLATE III. In the second state,

the bosom of the woman pulling up her shoe is increased in its length of shade. Her neck is lengthened, and a portion of hair is removed from the left side. The hat of the Rake has an additional corner, and his face has received a shadow from another hat placed on the head of the lady he embraces, instead of the cap in the first state, which is wholly taken away. The hand of the woman taking the watch is in a different position, receiving it in her hand and not taking it with her fingers. The head-dress of this woman is altered, to show a larger feather. The cap of the lady polite enough to squirt in the face of another is much reduced at the top, to a flatter shape. The cap of the lady receiving the contents of her antagonist's mouth is also lowered. The cap of the female embracing the young man is likewise reduced. The picture near the looking-glass representing a Caesar without a head, is altered to a portrait with the name of Pontac. June y e 24th, 1735, as in the

first state, altered to June 25. PLATE IV. In the first state, a

shoe-black steals the Rake's cane. In the second state, his place is supplied by a group of boys gambling ; near them a stone in- scribed BLACK'S, a contrast to White's gaming-house, against which a flash of lightning is pointed. The curtain of the window of the sedan-chair is thrown back. The leak in Taffy's hat is smaller and lighter. The pavement is cross-hatched. The lights on the horse in the sign are cross-hatched. The lights in the sleeves of the Rake are reduced. His glove on the left hand is entirely covered with lines. The coat of the chairman in front

is cross-hatched, as is also his left hand. PLATE V. In the

second state, " the right foot of the Bridegroom is omitted." The lace at the bottom of the Bride's dress is cross-hatched. " The Maid- servant's face altered." The hair of the man in the gallery is made black. The front of the pew is considerably darkened. The head of the woman with the child, near the Pew -opener, is considerably darker in all its shadows. The stones under the boy

192 CATALOGUE OF

with the hassock are alternately blackened. PLATE VI. The

whole countenance of Lord Cogg is considerably altered. The strokes on the gaming-table are interlined. The front of the wig of a gentleman scrambling for the money is considerably darkened ; as is the gentleman receiving the money. The right knee of the enraged Rake is cross-hatched. The shadow on the ground, from his knee to the back of the chair, is enlarged ; so is the shadow on the ground under the wig. The fire alludes to an accident which happened April 28, 1733, when White's Chocolate-house and two adjoining houses were consumed. A fine collection of paintings, belonging to Sir Andrew Fountaine, valued at 3000 at least, was entirely destroyed. His Majesty and the Prince of Wales were present above an hour, and encouraged the firemen and others to work at the engines, by distributing money amongst

them. , See Gent. Mag. vol. III. p. 214. PLATE VII. " In the

very earliest impressions, Plate VII. is not inscribed in the mar- gin." In the second state, the wings over the tester are consider- ably darker ; as is the whole of the drapery of the fainting female, particularly the stays. The ribband on the cap of the woman slapping her hand, the bow on the cap of the child, the shoes of the Rake, and the shoulder of his wife, are all darkened. The face of the Pot-boy is much strengthened. The whole of the fore- ground of this plate is darkened. There is a considerable varia- tion in the folds of the drapery in front of the stool. PLATE

VIII. In the second state, the face of the woman with the fan is altered ; she has now a cap on, and is turned away from the mad monarch as if speaking to the other woman. " A half-penny, with the figure of Britannia 1763, is fixed against the wall, to inti- mate what Hogarth thought of the Nation." The sky, as seen through the grating above the monarch, is darkened. His crown, instead of being light, is also darkened. The whole of the shadows of the Rake are considerably strengthened ; and in many instances cross-hatched. The head of the girl weeping is a totally new one; and the hair of the man putting her away from the Rake, instead of white, is dark. A band is also introduced under this man's

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 193

chin. The two figures behind the iron-gates are rendered less visible. " Retouched by the Author, 1763."

Mr. T. Cook has given, in his " Hogarth Restored," good copies of this set of plates in thehv/rs state.

Copies of the Eight Plates, the subjects reversed, with verses under each, 12 in. by 9, were published with the con- sent of Mrs. Hogarth, by Henry Parker, 82, Cornhill, March 25, 1765.

Copies of the eight Phtes by Riepenhausen.

A set, infrst state, sold at Gulston's sale, 1786, for ^3. 3*.

An Etching of the last plate, the interior of Bedlam, was bought at Gulston's sale for j5. 7s. 6d. by Mr. Baker ; and at his sale was bought by Mr. Smedley, for Mr. Stand- ley, for sll. Os. 6d.

' First Design for the Rake's Progress." " Jane I[reland] sc." Published by S. Ireland, in vol. II. of " Graphic Il- lustrations." Painted about 1736.

[N.] "The Matchmaker and Old Maid." " Livesay fecit." Figures from the above subject. Two Plates.

The same in one Plate. " I. Mills sculp."

" The two agreeable persons here introduced formed part of a group in an unfinished picture painted by Hogarth. They were some years since engraved on two copper-plates, but as I thought that was placing still farther apart the hands of those twain, whom the holy service of matrimony was soon to unite, I have here brought them into one ; and in this we are presented with the bride, and that useful agent of Hymen, denominated a Match- maker. By the beauty-spots on her face, she wishes to conceal the ravages of time, and from her laced lappets, cuffs, robings,

o

194- CATALOGUE OF

and brocaded silk, we may suppose that the antiquated virgin is rich." J. IRELAND.

[N.] " The Parson's Head." " Livesay fecit." This por- trait was intended to have been introduced into a series of plates of " The Happy Marriage."

" This animated countenance was copied by Mr. Livesay from a picture which appeared to have been intended for one of the series of " The Happy Marriage*," of which no part was legible but the head ; and in the back-ground, at some distance, the procession of the Bride and Bridegroom, &c. coming from church. No con- jecture can be formed how this figure was to be employed, nor of any other part of the picture, it being entirely obliterated." NICHOLS.

" The Happy Marriage." In Mr. S. Ireland's second volume of tf Graphic Illustrations" appeared four designs for this series. " T. Ryder, sculp."

[N.] " Woman swearing a Child to a grave Citizen." W. Hogarth pinxit, J. Sympson, jun. fecit.

" This title sufficiently explains to us the plot of the comedy. The stern formality of the magistrate is well contrasted by the in- fant in the chair, who is punishing the poor animal by teaching him to stand on his hind legs. The child and the quadruped are evidently intended as a parody upon the justice and the culprit. The rage of the old lady, at the discovery of the infidelity of her husband, the horror of the old miser at the perjury of the girl, and his hearing the dire decree of the " tremendous justice Midas," that he must maintain the bantling, are well expressed. In the library of the magistrate, we find just over his head the two books generally referred to, viz. " The Art of Spelling," and " The

• Described by Mr. Steevens in Nichols's Hogarth, 4to. vol. i.

p. 124.

1PAH. S O^ 9 HE AID

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 195

Complete Justice." On the table is seen " The Law of Bastardy," a book which has been recently consulted. In the disposition of the figures it is said to have a more than accidental resemblance to a picture by Heemskirk, which was in the possession of Mr. Watson, Surgeon, llathbone Place, where all the male figures are monkies ; all the females cats." J. IRELAND.

[B.] A copy by T. Cook.

A large copy of this print, 35 in. wide and 21 1 high, was published by John Bowles, under the title of " The Substi- tute Father, or Perjured Whore swearing her Bastard Child upon a rich old Miser." Underneath are 61 not over deli- cate verses, probably taken from Banks's Works. See Ni- chols's Hogarth, vol. ii. p. 199.

1736. " Before and After." Two prints.

Copies of these Prints, in different states, are in the British Museum.

Copies of the two Plates hy Riepenhausen. [B., N., &M.] " The Sleeping Congregation."

" The Sleeping Congregation, in which a heavy parson is pro- moting, with all the alacrity of dulness, the slumber of a respect- able, but singular auditory, is very clever. Similar scenes must arise on the fancy of all who look on this work. Sleep seems to have come over the whole like a cloud. The last who yields is the clerk, a portly man with a shining face. One of his eyes is closed, and the other is only kept open by a very fine young woman, who is sleeping very earnestly at his left hand. He is conscious of the temptation ; his efforts to keep awake are very ludicrous but it is easy to see that sleep is to be the conqueror." CUNNINGHAM.

196 CATALOGUE OF

The divine is the Rev. Dr. Desaguliers, the celebrated lec- turer on experimental philosophy. He died Feb. 29, 1744.

VARIATIONS. In the first state, " Dieu et mon droit is wanted under the King's Arms ; the Angel has a pipe in his mouth. Se- cond state. The motto added, pipe effaced, and the lines of the triangle doubled." The whole of the sky is crossed ; the cup on the communion-table is considerably darkened; and the wig of one of the sleepers made black. The hands of the Clerk are much darker. His face is entirely crossed, and so are the face and wig of the Parson. The circle on the pulpit is strengthened. Third state. " Retouched and Improved, April 21, 1762, by the Author."

Mr. T. Cook has copied the Jirst state of this plate, in his " Hogarth Restored."

There is a copy of this print, of the same size as the ori- ginal, but the design is reversed ; no writing on the Parson's book, nor on the pulpit j no Engraver's name, nor any in- scription underneath.

[B., N., & M.] The Distressed Poet."

VARIATIONS. " First state. Pope thrashing Curll, and four lines from the Dunciad inscribed under the Print. Second state. In the place of Pope and Curll, a view of the gold mines of Peru ; and the four lines of the Dunciad erased. This has been conjec- tured by Mr. Steevens to be a portrait of Theobald.

Two copies, in various states, sold in Gulston's sale, 1768, for *2. 4*.

Sold with " Enraged Musician," both jirst states, in Ba- ker's sale, 1825, for ^9. 9s.

Sold in Yates's sale, 1827, for s2. 195.

Mr. Cook, in " Hogarth Restored," has copied the Jirst state of this plate.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 197

There is a copy in the second t>tate, 13 in. by 9, engraved by M. Rennoldson. The design is reversed. A copy by Riepenhausen, 1 1 in. by 6.

In 1794, a copy of the head,* with Theobald's name an- nexed to it, was published for Richardson ; and the plate is now in the possession of Mr. Jeffery, bookseller, Pall Mall.

" Right Hon. Frances Lady Byron." " W. Hogarth pinx. J. Faber fecit."

VARIATIONS. First state. Whole length, by Faber. " Beat impressions are usually in brown ink." Second state. Plate cut down to a three-quarters size.

Two copies, in the various states, sold in Gulston's sale for jl.4s.

[B.,&N.] "Arms of the Undertakers' Company j' r or, " Consultation of Physicians."

CHARACTERS. The Three figures at top are Dr. Ward, Chevalier Taylor, the oculist, and Mrs. Mapp, the bone- setter. Others are, Dr. Pierce Dodd and Dr. Bamber.

VARIATIONS. First state. " One compleat Docter," &c. Se- cond. Spelling corrected.

A copy by Riepenhausen, 11 in. by 6.

[M.] The same, in small, etched by G. Cruikshank.

tf Frontispiece to the Lawyer's Fortune, or Love in a Hollow Tree ; " a Comedy by Lord Viscount Grimston, has been ascribed to Hogarth. The Elephant dancing on the ropes, in the printed title-page, might also have been of Hogarth's invention.

• It was accompanied by an essay by Mr. Steevens, for which

see " Nichols's Illustrations of Literary History/' vol. ii. p. 745.

198 CATALOGUE OF

1737.

[B. & N.] " Scholars at a Lecture."

The Lecturer was the Rev. Mr. Fisher, registrar of the University of Oxford.

VARIATIONS. First state. " Datur Vacuum" omitted. Ho- garth sometimes added the words with a pen and ink. " Pub- lished Jan. 20, 1736-7. Price 6d." Second state. " Datur Va- cuum" engraved on the Plate. Date altered to " March 3, 1736."

A copy by Riepenhausen, 1 1 in. by 6.

[M.] A copy in small, etched by G. Cruikshahk.

" jEneas in a Storm." Doubtful if by Hogarth. In Baker's sale, 1825, j^5. 7*. 6d. In Yates's sale, 1827, ^2. 12s. 6cl.

1738. [B., N., & M.] " The Four Parts of the Day."

MORNING. The scene is Covent Garden. Hogarth treads London streets, and finds materials in its follies. The door of King's Coffee-house is filled with drunken compan- ions. Dr. Rock is expatiating to a marvelling audience.

VARIATIONS. In the second state, the bunch of carrots has been considerably darkened, particularly in the upper parts ; and the whole of the fore-ground cross-hatched.

NOON. The scene is laid at the French Chapel, Hog Lane, (now Castle-street,) Seven Dials, a part of the town at that time mostly inhabited by French emigrants.

VARIATIONS. In the second state, the coat of the boy with the sword by his side is considerably darkened. The embroidery of his cuff is also better made out. A light part of the front of the dress of the Lady above the Boy has been strengthened in its lines.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 199

The leg and shoe of the Beau are darker, particularly the latter ; and his left cuff is made black. The waistcoat and breeches of the Boy with a broken pie are cross-hatched, and made much darker.

EVENING. The scene is laid on the banks of the New River, near Sadler's Wells.

VARIATIONS. " In the first impressions, the man's hands are printed in blue/' to denote a Dyer, " and the woman's face and neck in red;" but in later impressions are sometimes washed over with vermillion, to pass for a first impression ; in the later im- pressions, " the rail-post is crossed with intersecting lines, and the clearness of the water is much injured." In the second! state of the plate, the whole of the foliage on the left corner of the print is considerably darkened. The ground immediately under the Man and his Wife, and also under the Boy, is strengthened by a cross- line. The bow on the Wife's bosom is made entirely black. The sleeve of her gown, and also a great portion of her petticoat, are cross-hatched. The Husband's hair under his wig is considerably increased and darkened. The coat of the Boy has been consider- ably strengthened in its folds.

A proof of " Evening," before the Artists' names, or any inscription, and prior to the introduction of the Girl, (only three known, ) was bought by Baker, at Gulston's sale, 1786, for sgbO. Ss. 6d. ; and at his sale, 1825, by Mr. Smedley, for Mr. Standley, for ^50.

NIGHT. The scene is near Charing-Cross, and the time the annual rejoicing on the night of the 29th of May. The wounded freemason is Sir Thomas de Veil.

VARIATIONS. In the second state, the knee of the Boy blowing the link has received additional lines. The ground on which the watchman and freemason stand, has been cross-hatched.

A set of the Four Plates in their first state, at Baker's sale, 1825, s6. 12s. 6d. ; in Yates's sale, 1827, s@6. 5s.

200 CATALOGUE OF

Copies of the Four Plates, by Riepenhausen.

Mezzotinto copies of these four plates were engraved by Spooner, 13 in. by 10. The design of Morning is properly reversed.

" The half-starved Boy." The figure of the shivering Boy was in 1739 (1730, by mistake, on the print) copied by F. Sykes.

[B., N., & M.] " Strolling Actresses dressing in a Barn." " This is one of the most imaginative and amusing of all the works of Hogarth. In a huge barn, fitted up like a theatre, the invention of the artist has assembled such a company of performers as never before or since met to dress, rehearse, and prepare them- selves for the amusement of mankind. The Devil to Pay in Heaven is the play they are preparing to exhibit. The wit, the humour, and amusing absurdities of this performance are without end. Into the darkest nook the artist has put meaning, and there is instruction or sarcasm in all that he has introduced. There is such a display of the tinsel wealth and the symbols of vulgar en- joyment of the strolling community such a ludicrous intermix- ture of heaven with things of the earth earthy, and such a contrast of situations and characters, that the eye is never wearied, for the mind is ever employed." CUNNINGHAM.

The following ludicrous enumeration of Dramatis Personee, &c. is copied from the Rev. E. Ferrars's " Clavis Hogarthi- ana."

The Play-bill vide the Print. Play-bill continued. Dramatis Persona. 1. Feeder.* 5. Siren.

• The first figure is at the left hand of the spectator.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 201

2. Child. 15. Juno.

3. Player. 12, 13, Flora, Tisiphone, 8. Jupiter. &c. or three Cats ; One 6. Cupid. of them with teeth and 10, 11, Heathen Deities, four legs.

or Demons. 9. Diana.

14. Juno's Woman, or

4. Serena, or Aurora, or Night.

The Morning Star. 7- Lady candling her hair.

Rustic Thatcher, Thresher,

&c. &c. &c.

With Crowns, and Pap -spoons, Bed for Desdemona, Nel, &c. &c. Breeches and other paraphernalia.

Gridirons. Candles with sticks of iron and clay ;

Lyres,

Cups and balls, Wigs and Mirrors, Mitre and Cushion,

dark-lanthorn for Guy Vaux and other murderers ;

Helmets and other urinals ;

Gins and other poisons,

Hampers, with Jewels of all kinds.

Roman Temples, Fasces, Eagles, Cars, Standards,

Drums, Trumpets, and Brooms,

Flails, Frailties, and Blankets,

Bow, Quiver, Arrows, and Ladder for Cupid ;

Stockings for Jupiter ; Caps, Ruffles, and a Shift for the Ladies ;

Shield for the Gorgon.

Pipes and Porter for the young Princes.

Altars, Violoncello, Pallets, Basil, Painting-brushes,

and Blood-bowls of all sorts.

Dredger, Comb, Candle, and hoop-petticoat for Flora.

Thunderbolt, trunk, wheelbarrow, salt-box, rouge, and

rolling-pin, for Juno.

202 CATALOGUE OF

Needle, and Plainwork for Night.

Together with flowers, waves, clouds, ropes, dragons, monkey, chickens, kittens, fleas, and other attendants upon Ladies and Gen- tlemen.

Containing, in the whole, above seventy articles or samples of articles ; exclusive of various particulars too minute to identify, too numerous to particularize, or too curious to mention.

VARIATIONS. Mr. Steevens remarks, " In the two earliest states, the Actress personating Flora is greasing her hair with a tallow-candle, and preparing to powder herself after her cap and feathers are put on." This solecism in the regular course of dress is altered in the third state, the cap and ornament being omitted. In the first state, we could read in the Play- bill, from the truckle- bed, that the part of Jupiter was to be performed by Mr. Bilk-vil- lage ; in the present state, an additional shade renders this part of the inscription illegible. Several holes in the thatch of the barn have been filled up ; and the whole plate has lost somewhat of its clearness. The painter's pot near the pallet and pencils is made considerably darker. The upper part of the wood-work upon which the car is placed is also darkened. The lady weeping has had a considerable portion of her skull taken away. The gin-bottle in the hands of the Mermaid is made quite black. The shadows from the nearest foot of the bedstead extending to the crown are consi- derably increased and darkened. Diana has received greater strength in many parts of her dress ; and the hoop on which she stands has been-cross-hatched. The cap of the woman holding the cat has been considerably lessened ; and the complexion of the Female mending the stocking of the Queen has been rendered so dark as to make her a Moor. The shoe of the Queen, which was a white satin one in the first state, has been changed to a black leather one. The lights on the box upon which Jove's thunder is placed are much darkened. There is also in the later impressions a shadow thrown on the ground from the drapery next the cat playing with the mound.

In Baker's sale, 1825, a print, in First state, sold for

DON" C^TTIXOTE, PLATE I. futlu-Jisa f>v 2fiw'jls kS

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 203

. 85 ; and a Proof, extra fine, for zg6. 105. In Yates's sale, 1827, the print in itsjirst state sold for e3. 5s.

Mr. T. Cook has given, in his " Hogarth Restored," a good copy of this plate in hsjlrst state.

A copy by Riepenhausen.

In Mr. Packer's collection, now in the British Museum, is an early copy of this plate, which might easily be mis- taken for the original impression by the uninformed Col- lector, who merely judges by the cap and the holes in the roof j but it differs very much, particularly in its size, want- ing nearly J of an inch in depth.

[B.] " Don Quixote." Eight plates for Jarvis's quarto translation. Six of these plates were inserted in Baldwin's edition of Hogarth's Works."

A set of the six Plates sold in Baker's sale, 1825, for 18s. ; and another set of the eight Plates, proofs before the letters, for *8.

Copies of the above, in Svo. by I. Mills.

" PLATE I. The first Sally in quest of Adventures. The original from which this plate is copied is in Jarvis's quarto translation, without either painter's or engraver's name, but the style of the etching and air of the figures indisputably determine the artist. It represents our heroic candidate for fame, before he had received the honour of knighthood, at the door of an inn, which he con- sidered as a castle ; the host holding his horse's bridle, and two young female travellers looking with astonishment at his figure. In the distance is a swine-herd blowing his horn, which our ad- venturer mistakes for a trumpet sounded by a dwarf on the battle- ments, to announce his approaching the portico of the castle.

(Fide Shelton, p. 3.) PLATE II. The Inn-Keeper. The original

of this print is in my [Mr. John Ireland's] possession, and was de-

204 CATALOGUE OF

signed to represent the inn-keeper conferring the order of knight- hood on Don Quixote, but for some cause, not now known, never finished. The artist probably intended that it should form a part of the series begun for Lord Carteret, but the other six being discarded, never completed his design ; though a slight outline of the Don kneeling to receive his new honours, is discernible in the corner of the print. Mine host, though a large man, is a less portly personage than the author describes. The style leaves little doubt of the artist. In the plate from Vanderbank, in Jarvis's quarto, representing the whole scene, the innkeeper has a more than accidental re- semblance to this figure. PLATE III. The funeral of Chrysos-

tom. The stern attention which our Don gives to the Shepherdess Marcella, who is vindicating herself to those that surround the corpse, well expresses his determination to defend her cause, and protect her from insult. The shepherd in a similar attitude to the soldier in Vandyke's Belisarius, and Sancho blubbering with his finger in his eye, are well imagined, but the figure of Marcella is affected and stiff, and the shepherd on her right hand has more city pertness than rural simplicity. Vanderbank has taken this scene for one of the prints in Jarvis's translation, and by placing Marcella where she ought to be, on the summit of the rock, ren- dered his design more picturesque than Hogarth's. (Fide Shelton, p. 10.) PLATE IV. The Innkeeper's Wife and Daughter admi- nistering chirurgical assistance to the poor Knight of La Mancha. Don Quixote's adventure with the Yanguessian carriers having terminated in his being most bountifully beaten, he is here re- presented in the hay-loft of a very sorry inn, attended by the hostess and her daughter, Maritornes, and his faithful squire, the two former administering comfort to his sufferings, the third holding a candle ; and the last, with a most rueful countenance, bewailing his own unfortunate participation in the buffetings of his lord and master. The picture which Cervantes draws of Maritornes, Ho- garth has well transferred to the copper. Thus is she portrayed : " From head to heel she was not seven palms* high ; and burthened

• " Jarvis oddly enough translates it seven feet."

DON QUIXOTE, PLATE n.

by Nic7ioL?$c Son,. Fci>. 1.183 L.

DON QUIXOTE, PLATE m, d by Nichols 8c Son, Feb. 1.1832.

DON QUIXOTE, PLATE IV. by ATic/wls & Son.F&d. 1.1632.

DON QUIXOTE, PLATE V. NicTwl? ScSo7i,Marc/i 2,28 g a .

DON QUIXOTE. PLATE VI.

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 205

with shoulders that forced her to look down more than she wished. Added to this, she was broad faced, flat pated, saddle nosed, blind of one eye, and could scarcely see out of the other." The hostess could not have been better marked by the pencil of Teniers ; the owl perched over her head should not be overlooked. That, as well as the rope hung to a beam, cracked walls, &c. &c. added to the miserable figure of the knight reclined on his hard pallet, display variety of wretchedness. I do not recollect to have seen a print in which the light is more judiciously distributed ; in this and every other particular, I think it much superior to the same scene de- signed by Vanderbank, in Jarvis's quarto translation. (Vide Shel-

ton, p. 29.) PLATE V. Don Quixote seizes the Barber's Bason

for Mambrino's Helmet. In this print the face and figure of the fierce knight are spirited ; the terror and astonishment of the dis- comfited barber well expressed, and the triumphant shout of Sancho, in the distance, admirably characteristic. Notwithstanding this, I think, that Vanderbank's design for Jarvis, where the squire is brought into the fore-ground, contemplating the glittering prize, is a better chosen point of time. To Sancho he has given a mix- ture of cunning and simplicity which I have seldom seen so happily displayed ; and taken as a whole, it is perhaps a superior

plate to Hogarth's. (Vide Shelton, p. 42 J PLATE VI. Don

Quixote releases the Galley Slaves. The moment taken in this busy scene, is when our valorous knight, after having unhorsed one of the guards, is engaged with the other, while Sancho, willing to bear his part in the adventure, helps to extricate Gines de Passamonte from his bonds. In this, as in some other of Hogarth's designs, the artist not having taken the trouble of reversing his drawing, the figures are left handed. The character of Sancho, and two or three of the slaves, is admirable. I think the whole design much superior to Vanderbank's in Jarvis's translation, where the scene is chosen after the discomfiture of the guards ; for to two or three of the thieves Van. has given the countenances of apostles. His whole print is tame, feeble, and spiritless. (Vid e Shelton, p. 47.J PLATE VII. The first Interview of the va-

206 CATALOGUE OF

lourous Knight of La Mancha with the unfortunate Kniyht of the Rock. This interview, which took place in the mountains of Sierra Morena, Cervantes thus describes : " Cardenio approached with a grave pace, and in a hoarse voice saluted them, with great courtesy- Don Quixote returned his greeting with no less complaisance, and pressed him strongly in his arms, as if they had been long ac- quainted. The knight of the rock, after he had been thus embraced* retreated a few steps, and laying his hand on the Don's shoulder, perused his face with such earnestness, as though he were desirous of recollecting if he had ever seen him before, and no less admired Don Quixote's strange figure, than himself was admired by our heroic knight errant." This is the point of time which Hogarth has chosen ; and the wild eye of Cardenio, the placid benevolence of Don Quixote, and the shrewdness of the goatherd, are well opposed. From the air, attitude, and action of Sancho, I should have ima- gined the period to be after he had been mauled by the madman, did not the two knights so strongly determine it to be before. In Vanderbank's design of the same subject, vide Jarvis's quarto, the figure of Sancho is tolerable, but the Don is vapid and ill drawn, and Cardenio's head, like that of Medusa, looks as if it were en- circled with snakes. (Vide Shelton, p. 51 J PLATE VIII*

The Curate and Barber disyuisiny themselves to convey Don Quixote home. Don Quixote's old neighbours, the curate and barber, being desirous of checking his wandering disposition, are here disguising themselves for an interview, in which they hoped to bring him home, where they trusted he might again live as an old Christian ought to do. In pursuance of this plan, the barber procured an ample beard, made from the tail of a pied ox ; and the curate as- sumed the habit of a distressed virgin, and framed a tale of having been wronged by a naughty knight, to punish whom the Don was to be entreated to follow, wherever this afflicted fair one should lead. The dressing-room for this masquerade, is the kitchen of an inn ; out of the door, astride on a bench, inhaling copious draughts from a leathern bottle, Sancho gives some life to a little landscape in the distauce. (Vide Shelton, p. 60 J PLATE IX. Sancho's

DON QUIXOTE. PLATE VIE.

DON QUIXOTE, PLATE vm.

jf ficSiolf k Son,, Mareh 2,1832 .

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 207

Feast. Though Don Quixote is the ostensible hero of this admirable listory, 1 have sometimes thought that Sancho was the author's iavourite character. He is here represented as governor of Bara-

aria, and seated in the spacious hall of a sumptuous palace, sur-

rounded with all the pompous parade of high rank, and encircled >y numerous attendants. A band of musicians in an adjoining gallery strike up a symphony to gratify his ear ; and a table is spread with every dainty, to feast his eye and fret his soul ; for lowever magnificent the appendages of this mock-monarch, the in- stant he attempts to taste the solid comforts of government, the loaves and fishes evade his grasp, are touched by the black rod, ind vanish !

In plenty starving, tantaliz'd in state,

tie curses the gaudy unsubstantial pageant, vows vengeance on the ioctor, and swears, that he will offer up both him and every phy- sical impostor in the island, as a sacrifice to his injured and in- sulted appetite. Hogarth has here caught the true spirit of the author, and given to this scene the genuine humour of Cervantes. Hie rising choler of our governor, is admirably contrasted by the assumed gravity of Doctor Pedro Rezio. The starch and serious solemnity of a straight-haired student, who officiates as chaplain, is well opposed by the broad grin of a curl-pated blackamoor. Ihe suppressed laughter of a man who holds a napkin to his mouth, forms a good antithesis to the open chuckle of a fat cook. Sancho's two pages bear a strong resemblance to the little punch- maker in the Election Feast, and though well conceived, might have had more variety ; they present a front and back view of the same figure. To two females on the viceroy's right hand, there may be a similar objection. The original print was designed and 2ngraved at a very early period of Hogarth's life. As it was finished with more neatness than any of the eight which he after- wards etched for the same work, the copy is attempted in a similar style. In the drawing, Sancho was originally pourtrayed with a full face : but Hogarth judiciously thinking a profile would be pre-

203 CATALOGUE OF

ferable, fixed a bit of paper over his first thought, and altered it to the state in which it is here engraved. The design that Van- derbank made of the same scene, is cold and uninteresting ; in ano- ther, by Hayman, prefixed to Smollett's coarse translation, San- cho is fat enough for Falstaff, and the doctor looks like a fellow dressed up to play the part of a conjuror in a puppet-show. Fide Shelton, p. 221." J. IRELAND.

" Sancht) at the Feast starved by his Physician." " W. Hogarth, inv. et sculp." " Printed for H. Overton and J. Hoole."

Sancho's Feast, two impressions, one with inscription cut off, sold for ^5. 15s. 6d. in Baker's sale.

A copy of " Sancho's Feast," from the original drawing by Hogarth, with variations from the common print, has lately been engraved in aquatinta, and it is said only six im- pressions are to be taken from this plate.

1739. [N.] The Foundlings."

Hogarth, by presenting some of his works to the Foundling Hospital, was, in fact, an early benefactor to the Charity; he made the annexed design for the use of this Institution ; it was engraved by F. Morrellon la Cave, as the head-piece to a power of an attor- ney from the trustees of the Charity to those gentlemen who were appointed to receive subscriptions towards the building, &c. The artist has made his old friend Captain Coram a principal figure, and as this excellent and venerable man was, in fact, the founder of the Charity, it is with great propriety he is introduced. Before him the Beadle of the Hospital carries an infant, whose mother, having dropped a dagger, with which she might have been momen- tarily tempted to destroy her child, kneels at his feet, while he, with that benevolence with which his countenance was so emi-

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HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 209

nently marked, bids her to be comforted, for her babe will be nursed and protected. On the dexter side of the print is a new-born infant, left close to a stream of water, which runs under the arch of a bridge. Near a gate, on a little eminence in the path-way, above, a woman leaves another child to the casual care of the next person who passes by. In the distance is a village with a church. In the other corner are three boys, coming out of a door, with the king's arms over it : as emblems^ of their future employments, one of them poizes a plummet, a second holds a trowel, and a third, whose mother is fondly pressing him to her bosom, has in his hand a card for combing wool. The next group, headed by a lad elevating a mathematical instrument, are in sailors' jacket and trowsers ; those on their right hand, one of whom has a rake, are in the uniform of the school. The attributes of the three little girls in the foreground, a spinning wheel, sampler, and broom, indicate female industry and ingenuity. It must be ad- mitted, that the scene here represented is a painter's anticipation, for the charter was not granted until October 1/39, and this de- sign was made only three years afterwards ; but the manner in which the Charity has been since conducted has realized the scene." J. IRELAND.

The same design was engraved from the original drawing in possession of Robert Wilkinson, by 1. Stow, and pub- lished in 1826.

1741.

[B.,N.,&M.] "The Enraged Musician." This has been sup- posed to be intended for Corvetto, well known by the name of Nosee ; but according to others, Dr. Arne. Mr. John Ireland says, " Mr. John Foster is the hero of the Print." He was eminent on the German flute and hautboy. Mr. Dallaway says, Signior Castrucci was intended.

"Of vocal performers, we have the dustman, shouting 'Dust ho ! dust ho !' the wandering fishmonger, calling ' Flounders ;' a

210 CATALOGUE OF

milkmaid, crying ' Milk above ! milk below ;' a female ballad- singer, chaunting the doleful story of the ' Lady's FalF her child and a neighbouring parrot screaming the chorus ; a little French drummer beats ' rub-a-rub, rub-a-rub' without remorse, singing all the time ; two cats squall and puff in the gutter tiles ; a dog is howling in dismay ; while, like a young demon overlooking and inspiring all, a sweep-boy, with nothing un-black about him save his teeth and the whites of his eyes, proclaims that his work is done from the top of a chimney-pot. Of instrumental accom- paniments there is good store. A postman with his horn, a strol- ler with his hautboy, a dustman with his bell, a pavior with his rammer, a cutler grinding a butcher's cleaver ; and ' John Long, Pewterer/ over a door, adds the clink of twenty hammers striking on metal to the medley of out-of-door sounds. * It

seems impossible to increase his annoyance by the addition of any other din, save the braying of an ass, which Cowper says is the only unmusical sound in nature." CUNNINGHAM.

VARIATIONS. Mr. Cricket had an impression, taken before the man blowing a horn, cats, steeple, play-bill, or dog, were intro- duced. In this, it is believed, unique print, the dustman is with- out a nose, the chimney-sweeper has a Grenadier's cap on, and a doll is placed under a trap, composed of bricks, &c. In the early impressions, the horse's head is white ; in its present state, black. In the later impressions, the dog, hatchet, &c. are considerably darker than when first engraved. The whole of the play-bill be- hind the lamp is entirely crossed. The shoulder of the ballad- woman is cross-hatched, and the lights upon her apron are dark- ened. The cap of the sow-gelder is lightened. The whole of the jacket of the dustman is crossed. The slate attached to the girdle of the boy, and many parts of the fore-ground, are darkened.

Two copies of " The Enraged Musician" sold in Gulston's sale, 1786, in various states, for =1. 4-s. A copy of " The Enraged Musician," with " Distressed Poeti" both Jirst states, in Baker's sale, 1825, for ^9. 9s. And another

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 211

print of fe Enraged Musician," in first state, at Yates's sale, 1827, for *2. 14s.

Mr. T. Cook has well copied thejlrst finished state of this Plate, in his " Hogarth Restored."

There is a copy of this Plate, in its second state, 13 in. by 9, engraved by J. June.

A copy by Riepenhausen, 11 in. by 6.

A print, copied from what is stated to be original design, is given in S. Ireland's " Graphic Illustrations," vol. II. p. 117.

1742.

[N.] " Martin Folkes, Esq. W. Hogarth pinxit et sculpsit."

A proof before the writing is in the British Museum, and also another before the engraver's name is added.

The same in mezzotinto, engraved by Faber. " W. Ho- garth pinxt. 1741. J. Faber fecit 1742."

Three Prints of Folkes, engraved and mezzotinto, one a proof, sold in Gulston's sale, 1786, for ^1. 10s.

[B.] The same engraved by T. Cook.

" The Charmers of the Age." A sketch ; no name ; in- tended to ridicule Monsieur Desnoyer and Signora Bar- berini.

[N.] Of this there is a spirited modern copy.

[-B. &M.] Taste in High Life."

The male connoisseur is Lord Portmore.

VARIATIONS. First state. " Painted by Mr. Hogarth. Sold by M. Jarvis." Second state. " Invented and Painted by Wm. Ho- garth."

p 2

212 CATALOGUE OF

A copy by Riepenhausen, 11 in. by 6.

[B.] A copy by Samuel Phillips, was published in 1798.

VARIATIONS. First state. The only proof taken off before the inscription was inserted, was sold at Baker's sale, 1825, together with the original Print, for 4. 4s. Second state. Date, " May 1, 1798." Third state. Date altered to " March 1, 1808."

[N.] "The Mystery of Masonry brought to light by the Gormagons."

This Print, and " Tartuff s Banquet," sold at Baker's sale for s2. 15s.

1743.

[N.] " Dr. Benjamin Hoadley, Lord Bishop of Winches- ter ;" engraved by Baron.

[B.] The same, engraved by T. Cook.

A small oval from the same picture, was in 1759 engraved by Sherlock.

" Captain Thomas Coram ;" a three-quarters mezzotinto, admirably engraved by McArdell. The copy in the British Museum has the date 174*9.

" Captain Thomas Coram was born in the year 1668, bred to the sea, and passed the first part of his life as master of a vessel trading to the colonies. While he resided in the vicinity of Ro- therhithe, as his avocations obliged him to go early into the city and return late, he frequently saw deserted infants exposed to the in- clemencies of the seasons, and through the indigence or cruelty of their parents left to casual relief, or untimely death. This natu- rally excited his compassion, and led him to project the establish- ment of an hospital for the reception of exposed and deserted young children : in which humane design he laboured more than seventeen years, and at last, by his unwearied application, obtained

CAPTAIN THOMAS CORAM,

From the or -tore in the Foundling Hospital

HOGARTH'S PRINTS. 213

the royal charter, bearing date the 17th of October, 1739, for its incorporation. He was highly instrumental in promoting another good design, viz. the procuring a bounty upon naval stores im- ported from the Colonies to Georgia and Nova Scotia. But the charitable plan which he lived to make some progress in, though not to complete, was a scheme for uniting the Indians in North America more closely with the British Government, by an estab- lishment for the education of Indian girls. Indeed, he spent a great part of his life in serving the public, and with so total a dis- regard to his private interest, that in his old age he was himself supported by a pension of somewhat more than a hundred pounds a year,* raised for him at the solicitation of Sir Sampson Gideon and Dr. Brocklesby, by the voluntary subscriptions of public- spirited persons, at the head of whom was the late Frederick Prince of Wales. On application being made to this venerable and good old man, to know whether a subscription being opened for his benefit would not offend him ; he gave this noble answer,