Britton, John [Hrsg.]: The fine arts of the English school: illustrated by a series of engravings from paintings, sculpture, and architecture, of eminent English artists ; with ample biographical, critical, and descriptive essays (London, 1812) [Cicognara, 14]

REMARKS ON THE PICTURE

OF

GARRICK BETWEEN TRAGEDY AND COMEDY:

PAINTED BY

SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS.

The painting, from which the annexed print is engraved, is one of those rare,
and successful works of art, that must please almost every class of persons. The
professed painter, the learned connoisseur, and the common observer, will each
be delighted with it: but the first will derive the most complete pleasure,
because he alone can justly appreciate its worth and merit. To him it unfolds
the most irresistible and undescribable traits of excellence ; for it manifests an
enlightened mind and a refined taste in the painter. As a work of art it may
be said to approximate perfection ; its merits are many, its defects few: indeed,
it would require the full exertion of fastidious criticism to point out any
essential fault. In design, composition, colouring, expression, and, above all,
identity of personal features, and felicitous adaptation of character and senti-
ment, it is a performance that amply justifies those elegant lines of Shee's
" Rhymes on Art, " which apply to Reynolds ;

" --------whose Genius rais'd his country's name,

Refin'd her taste, and led her Arts to fame ;
Whose powers unrival'd, Envy's self disarm'd ;
Whose pen instructed, and whose pencil charm'd.
Hail, Star of Art! by whose instinctive ray
Our boreal lights were kindled into day."

Such is Reynolds' general character; and we shall find it exemplified in the
picture now before us. This may be called a poetical portrait, or an historical