The particular application of these principles to the an cient style, and to such parts of modern country residences as are laid out with a view to the beauties of design and uti lity, will be made in the course of treating of the different materials and subjects of gardening.
The chief object of all the imitative arts is the produc tion of natural or unit ersal beauty. Music, poetry, and panning, are the principal imitati ve arts ; to these has been lately added lag Escape gardening, an art Si hich has for its object the production of landscapes by combinations of the actual nriterials of nature, as landscape painting has for its object their imitation by combinations of colours. Land scape gardening h, 5 been said "to realize whatever the fancy of the painter has iniaginetp (Girardin); and " to rr,:ate a scenery more pure, more harmonious, and more expressive, than any that is to be found in nature herself," (Alison.) Such are Mr. Alison's ideas of the powers of this al t ; and such appear, in some degree, to have been those of Mr. Wheatley and M. Girardin. A more correct idea of its capacities, in our opinion, is suggested by the re mark of Lord Walpole, when he represents it as " proud of no other art than that of softening nature's harshnesses, and copying her graceful touch." It has also been said, that it is to poetry and painting, what the reality is to the re presentation," (Girardin.) But experience proves, that the former (the reality) is always exceeded by the latter, both in respect to natural and picturesque beauty ; and this re ality is supposed to exceed any representation, if it is a scene of gardening, that is, if it is any given variety of ground, rocks, and distance, as the basis to be furnished with wood, water, and buildings ; the rocks shewn, or con cealed, as the gardener may wish, or as the genius of the place may require, and every other purpose effected, which is in the power of gardening to perform : When all this is done, it will be a scene greatly inferior in beauty, not only to the imitative creation of a painter from the same ground work and materials, but to a similar scene produced by na ture. To put this matter in a clear light, let there be a natural landscape, either of medir---ity or of any given beauty, with every circumstance so'irranged, as to be alike suitable for both arts ; and let a painter and a gardener, each attempt to copy it according to their art, with or with out permission to improve its beauties. Which of the two
imitations would be most beautiful, considered in the ab stract, and without reference to any selfish or arbitrary as sociation ? Decidedly, in our opinion, the production of the painter.
The great source of the beauty of every verdant land scape is wood ; and so much of the beauty of all woods de pends on accidental circumstances, in their progress from the time of planting till they attain a considerable age, and which circumstances cannot be said practically to be tinder the controul of the gardener, that however high our.aim, however we may study the natural effects of time, and however correctly we may imitate them, at the end of all our labours, any wood of art will always be far inferior to a wood of nature under the same circumstances. For fur ther illustrations we have only to appeal to such painters as have made landscape their particular study, and who cer tainly must be considered in this case as the best judges.
To what kind or degree of beauty, then, can landscape gardening aspire ? To this we answer, that, abstracted from all relations of utility and design, it can seldom succeed in producing any thing higher than picturesque beauty,* or such a harmonious mixture of forms, colours, lights, and shades, as will be grateful to the sight of men in general ; and to such, mole particularly, as have made this beauty in some degree their study. This harmonious assemblage of objects may be grateful and agreeable, without being ac companied by any, or at all events by much general expres sion; for example, of gaiety, melancholy, grandeur, sim plicity, or elegance ; but it may also combine one or more of these poetic or general beauties in a high degree, and this, too, with or without being picturesque. It may recal many other pleasurable emotions, if we admit the consi derations of fitness, novelty, or its contrast to surrounding scenery and utility, or its adaptation to man.