to gratify a friend whom he very highly respected, ' had presented himself for a sitting to Barry at every leisure moment wl ;ch he could command for near two years. Barry constantly refused or evaded his request, either pretending some indispensible engage ment, or alleging that he could not begin the por trait without at least one day's previous mutilation. In palliation of this ungracious conduct, it has been said, that " a kind of ill humour had at that time possessed Mr Barry, in consequence of the extreme intimacy of the Burkes with Sir J. Reynolds, which led him to suppose that these friends overlooked his merits to aggrandize Sir Joshua's." This intended apology serves only to aggravate offence. For surely if he could permit such a trifling circumstance to counterbalance for a moment his numerous obli gations to the Burkes, he proved himself very un worthy of their kindness. Mr Burke naturally felt. some resentment on the occasion, but conducted him self with a degree of prudence and moderation high ly honourable to his character. After a mutual expla nation, the affair was adjusted ; and Barry, to make some atonement, finished the portrait in a style which proved that he needed only to apply his talents to portrait painting, to attain the highest eminence in that line.
His chief ambition, however, was to be engaged in some great public undertaking ; as if emulous of the Italian masters, whose fame is in a manner identified with the celebrity of their grand national edifices. He therefore entered with eagerness into a proposal made to him, in conjunction with other artists, for decorating with paintings the interior of St Paul's. To his great mortification, the scheme was relin quished for want of the consent of the archbishop of Canterbury and the bishop of London. Another prospect soon opened, equally flattering to his ambi tion ; for a proposal was made to the same artists, for ornamenting with historical and allegorical paint ings the great room of the Society for the encourage ment of arts, manufactures, and commerce in the Adelphi. The proposal was rejected by the artists themselves, and Barry was again disappointed.
During his residence in Rome, he had often been insulted and provoked by hearing the inability of British genius for the higher wol ks of art, asserted and maintained from the authority of Montesquieu, Du Boa, and \Vincleman. He therefore employed the leisure which his disappointments now gave him, in drawing up an " Inquiry into the Real and Ima ginary Obstructions to the Acquisition of the Arts in England," which he published in 1775. In this able work, he very successfully confutes the absurd theories of the above mentioned writers concerning the in fluence of climate ; and proves, from the history of the fine arts in Greece and Italy, that they flourish and decay, not according to the serenity or cloudiness of the sky, but as the moral feelings of the people arc refined or depraved : to account for their slow progress in our own cuuntry, he reminds us, that when the rest of Europe was recovering a taste and feeling fur the beauties of painting and sculpture, Englind wan thrown out of the sphere of their at traction by the destructive fury of the reformers, by political revolutions and civil dissensions, and by the general turn of the public mind to mechanical inven tions, to trade, manufactures, and commerce. He '
presented the treatise to Mr Burke, who, instead of receiving it with cold civility, as an illiberal critic has very injuriously asserted, (see the 32d number of the Edinburgh Review, art. 2.) returned the author a warm and flattering acknowledgment " for his early communication of his most ingenious performance, throughout the whole of which there are•many fine thoughts and observations, very well conceived, and very powerfully and elegantly expressed." As he had pledged himself in this enquiry for the capability of British genius to excel in the fine arts, he was anxious to redeem the pledge by some produc tion of his own. He therefore undertook to execute by himself the paintings for the great room of the So ciety of Arts, on condition that he should not be in terfered with, in the choice and prosecution of his subjects. The history of painting cannot afford an example of nobler and more disinterested ambition. When he made this proposal, his whole property amounted to only sixteen shillings ; and during seven years of intense labour on this grand undertaking, he, was obliged to earn the means of a scanty subsistence, by etching at night designs for the print-sellers, after being fatigued with painting all the day. Of the general design and particular subjects of these paint ings he has published a full explanation, to which we refer our readers. We shall merely mention, that they consisted of a series of six pictures, intended to illus trate the dependence of public and individual happi ness upon the cultivation of the human faculties. Beginning with man in his savage state, full of in convenience, imperfection, and misery, lie carries him through the several gradations of culture and happi ness, which, after our probation here, are finally attend ed with beatitude or misery.' The first picture repre sents the story of Orpheus ; the second a Harvest. Home, or thanksgiving to Ceres and Bacchus ; the third, the Victors at Olympia ; the fourth, Naviga tion, or the triumph of the Thames ; the fifth, the Distribution of Premiums in the Society of Arts, &c. ; and the sixth, Elysium, or the state of final retribu tion. When these paintings were finished, the soci ety expressed their satisfaction by granting him two exhibitions, and voting him at different periods fifty guineas, their gold medal, two hundred guineas more, and a seat among themselves. The clear profits of the exhibitions amounted to upwards of £500, and he received besides several handsome remunerations for portraits which he had copied into some of the pictures. The paintings excited the admiration of all who were qualified to judge of their merits. Jo Bas Hanway, it is said, on quitting the room, de manded his shilling, and left a guinea in its place as a payment more adequate to the pleasure which he had received. And Dr Johnson observed, that there was a grasp of mind displayed in them which could be found no where else.