Such was the state of the arts at the close of the fif teenth century; in tracing it through that which follow ed, we shall sec it arrive at the highest point of its pro gress, and begin again to turn towards its decay. It is lamentable to think how short-lived perfection seems to prove, or rather, to speak more correctly, our nearest ap proach to it. Much was still wanting in the works of Ghirlandajo, and his predecessors ; labour and constraint was still too obvious not to be irksome to the spectator ; for to charm, a painter must seem to work with creative power, and with the ease of omnipotence. He must even sport with a degree of seeming carelessness, tban which no thing is more fascinating, so that it appears the result of mere playfulness of pencil, and not of negligence. The painters of the fifteenth century were still deficient in fulness of outline, variety of composition, and harmony of colouring. They were chained to the ground by an awkwardness in the manipulation; for a painter at once destroys the charm, if he allows in any thing the impotence of his pencil to appear. The scrupulous exactness, however, of this an cient school, was smoothing the way for the perfection about to follow ; for ease is far more readily engrafted on rigid correctness, than the attainment of correctness where former practice was more loose. It is with paint ing as with every other art—severe precision ought to guide our first steps ; the rudiments admit of no devia-* Lion from strict and measured rule. The superstructure of ease and grace becomes easily raised, if the foundation be solid and good.
Had it not been from a desire not to disconnect the his tory of the Florentine artists, we might, with propriety, have delayed their separation from those who cultivated the arts in other quarters, as hitherto little, if any differ ence existed in the style generally followed. At the close of the fifteenth century, however, the diffusion of the taste for painting had reached that point which gave rise to variety of style, in proportion as the artists of different countries were led to follow the peculiar manner chalked out by their great masters, so as to become marked by features scarcely less distinctive than those of different dialects.
What we have narrated of the state of the arts since the obscurity of the dark ages had begun to pass away, falls so far short of its excellence among the Greeks that it can scarcely be said to have yet revived. It was not till the age of Leonardo da Vinci that painting attained a de gree of dignity sufficient to entitle it to be brought into comparison with the age of Pericles. Leonardo was fol lowed by the transcendent genius of 'Michael Angelo, who stamped the distinctive nature of the Florentine school with the character of grandeur; profound skill in the movements and anatomy of the human body ; austere solemnity, somewhat at the expense of grace ; and uncom mon force and vigour, partaking of the supernatural, but at the same time conveying a noble and majestic concep tion of human nature, that excited sentiments of admira tion more than of pleasure.
Leonardo da Vinci was a native of Florence, born in 14.52. Tiraboschi calls him an illustrious bastard, as he happened to be the natural son of Petro, a notary at Flo lrence. Ho was a man not only of superior knowledge in all the branches of the fine arts, but very learned in the sciences in general. The precocity and universality of his knowledge at a very early age was the marvel of his first instructor, Verrachio, a Florentine painter of that day. The earliest exercise of his talents was in matters
of mechanism, in which he displayed a very surprising reach of inventive genius. While yet a boy, he proposed to underbuild the Church of St. John without injury to the superstructure, an architectural adventure equally new and astonishing to that age. He had the advantage to possess, in addition to all the acquirements of his genius, great beauty and elegance of person, with an amiability of disposition which made him beloved by all. He was in vited to Milan by the Duke, where he charmed the court by his talents in music, which he exhibited on an instru ment of his own invention ; probably a sort of organ gui tar, as it is described to have resembled the skull of a horse in form, and furnished with silver tubes, surpassing, in sweetness of tone, every thing known at the time. He excelled, moreover, in the quality of improvisatore.
Leonardo was particularly attached to the study of ana tomy; and the fertility of his inventive genius made him impatient of the slow process of painting. Ile rather delighted in sketching down his fancies as they arose. There are extant some curious volumes of these jottings, filled with schemes in mechanism, observations, and draw ings of every variety, particularly skirmishes of cavalry. The subjects of his pictures are generally well selected, and seemingly maturely studied.
Leonardo left at Milan many admirable specimens of his talents as an artist, which are still existing in the col lections of that city ; and, above all, that much celebrated and magnificent Neture of the Last Supper. The sub ject is fortunately preserved by Morghen's inimitable en graving, as the original, the remains of which is on the wall of the refectory of the convent of Santa Maria Belle Grazie, is nearly effaced by age, and deplorably injured by negligence and accident ; having been exposed to the license of the soldiery while the hall was occupied as a magazine by the French troops.
There certainly could not be a more admirable subject, in every respect, for the pencil of a great master, than that important scene in the life of our Saviour, which established the mysterious rite, in the observance of which the whole world is destined one day to be united. When we reflect who the actors of this scene were, prepared by mysterious forewarnings that they had assembled for the last time ; the sublime and tender sentiments which must have suffused the minds of the disciples, joined to the be wildering conciousness of inability to reconcile what they saw and heard to the usual course of reasoning, and to the melancholy forebodings of what was about to happen ; the shock of so appalling a declaration of treachery in such a cause, and of such a Master, and by one of their own number,—every circumstance seemed in action to call forth the greatest vivacity and variety of expression, and all directed to one object with that intensity of atten tion, which the remarkable words of our Saviour must have excited. As a contrast to this ferment, we have the sublime tranquillity of Jesus, the least moved of that as sembly, although himself the conscious victim ; contem plating with equal complacency his faithful and devoted followers, as the traitor who was destined to fulfil his dread ful doom.