DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.19571#0013
THE ARTIST's ASSISTANT. 9
A clofe and ferviie imitation, however, is not
what we would wifh to recommend; a man may
find his account in attending to the manner, and
ftoring up the obfervations of a well-bred and in-
telligent acquaintance, without ridiculoufly afreft-
ing his gait, or copying his phrafeology.
There are not wanting fome who attribute the
decline of painting to a dearth of genius, whereas
it feems to fpring from a very different caufe ; the
truth is, few parents are judges of the real bent of
their children's inclination, (another word for ge-
nius) and fewer ft ill give themfelves the trouble of
feekin? for it, confidermg what line of life accords
mofh with their own wifhes, or convenience, But
of thofe few who really difcover in what fcience
nature intended their little ones to excel, how rarely
do we meet with one who takes the right method
to infure fuccefs, by directing their ftudies in the
proper channel !
For though one fhould be apt to fmile at the ab-
furdity of thofe parents, cr guardians, who, find-
ing a boy poffeffed of a genius for painting, fhould,
by way of initiating him in that delightful art, grave-
ly recommend to him the ftudy of the daffies ;
nnce it feems full as reafonable to expect him to
become a poet, from contemplating the works of
Guido, Titian, and Raphael, as to become a painter
from turning over the leaves of Homer, Horace,
and Ovid. Yet can any thing be more common than
to fee a lad condemned to undergo a courfe of Latin
and Greek, let the profeffion for which he is de-
figned be whatever it may ? But life, methinks, is
too fhort to admit of fix or feven years (and thofe
the moft important ones) being trifled away in
learning what, perhaps, will prove of very little
fervice to him in the fituation which he is to be
hereafter
A clofe and ferviie imitation, however, is not
what we would wifh to recommend; a man may
find his account in attending to the manner, and
ftoring up the obfervations of a well-bred and in-
telligent acquaintance, without ridiculoufly afreft-
ing his gait, or copying his phrafeology.
There are not wanting fome who attribute the
decline of painting to a dearth of genius, whereas
it feems to fpring from a very different caufe ; the
truth is, few parents are judges of the real bent of
their children's inclination, (another word for ge-
nius) and fewer ft ill give themfelves the trouble of
feekin? for it, confidermg what line of life accords
mofh with their own wifhes, or convenience, But
of thofe few who really difcover in what fcience
nature intended their little ones to excel, how rarely
do we meet with one who takes the right method
to infure fuccefs, by directing their ftudies in the
proper channel !
For though one fhould be apt to fmile at the ab-
furdity of thofe parents, cr guardians, who, find-
ing a boy poffeffed of a genius for painting, fhould,
by way of initiating him in that delightful art, grave-
ly recommend to him the ftudy of the daffies ;
nnce it feems full as reafonable to expect him to
become a poet, from contemplating the works of
Guido, Titian, and Raphael, as to become a painter
from turning over the leaves of Homer, Horace,
and Ovid. Yet can any thing be more common than
to fee a lad condemned to undergo a courfe of Latin
and Greek, let the profeffion for which he is de-
figned be whatever it may ? But life, methinks, is
too fhort to admit of fix or feven years (and thofe
the moft important ones) being trifled away in
learning what, perhaps, will prove of very little
fervice to him in the fituation which he is to be
hereafter