DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.61252#0026
Xxii GENERAL INTRODUCTION.
example of any private individual indulging this costly,
magnificent taste, previous to that of the Earl of Arundel.
He appears to have been, not only the first Englishman,
but the first subject in Europe, who, out of his own
private fortune, and inspired by a genuine feeling of their
beauty and value, collected round him ancient and modern
works of art, as statues, busts, ancient inscribed marbles,
gems, drawings, pictures, chased work in gold and silver,
everything, in short, which the Italians class under the
general name of virtu. Lord Arundel was, in fact, the
first virtuoso not only of his own country but his own
time. I never look at his portrait by Van Dyck, in
the Sutherland Gallery, with its thoughtful, melancholy,
refined expression of countenance, without a deep interest;
and those works of art which he obtained have, through
association with his name and fate, a value, to my fancy,
beyond their own. The Laughing Boy, by Lionardo da
Vinci, now, I believe, in the possession*of Mr. Beckford;
Raphael’s Little St. George, now at Petersburg ; the
Pomfret marbles, at Oxford; the antique statues and busts,
at Wilton; the Marlborough gems, famed throughout the
world — formed only a part of the Arundel collection.
The Duke of Buckingham followed Lord Arundel—but it
is almost an injustice to name them together! What
was taste and enthusiasm in Arundel, was sheer vanity and
ostentation in Buckingham. What a proof we have of the
spirit which actuated Buckingham, in one anecdote of him!
Arundel had employed William Petty, uncle to that Sir
William Petty, who was the ancestoi* of the present Mar-
quess of Lansdowne, to collect antiques for him in Greece
and Syria. Buckingham, then all-powerful, gave a similar
commission to Sir Thomas Roe, English ambassador at
Constantinople, and instructed him, at the same time, to
throw every possible obstacle in the way of Petty! Dalia-
example of any private individual indulging this costly,
magnificent taste, previous to that of the Earl of Arundel.
He appears to have been, not only the first Englishman,
but the first subject in Europe, who, out of his own
private fortune, and inspired by a genuine feeling of their
beauty and value, collected round him ancient and modern
works of art, as statues, busts, ancient inscribed marbles,
gems, drawings, pictures, chased work in gold and silver,
everything, in short, which the Italians class under the
general name of virtu. Lord Arundel was, in fact, the
first virtuoso not only of his own country but his own
time. I never look at his portrait by Van Dyck, in
the Sutherland Gallery, with its thoughtful, melancholy,
refined expression of countenance, without a deep interest;
and those works of art which he obtained have, through
association with his name and fate, a value, to my fancy,
beyond their own. The Laughing Boy, by Lionardo da
Vinci, now, I believe, in the possession*of Mr. Beckford;
Raphael’s Little St. George, now at Petersburg ; the
Pomfret marbles, at Oxford; the antique statues and busts,
at Wilton; the Marlborough gems, famed throughout the
world — formed only a part of the Arundel collection.
The Duke of Buckingham followed Lord Arundel—but it
is almost an injustice to name them together! What
was taste and enthusiasm in Arundel, was sheer vanity and
ostentation in Buckingham. What a proof we have of the
spirit which actuated Buckingham, in one anecdote of him!
Arundel had employed William Petty, uncle to that Sir
William Petty, who was the ancestoi* of the present Mar-
quess of Lansdowne, to collect antiques for him in Greece
and Syria. Buckingham, then all-powerful, gave a similar
commission to Sir Thomas Roe, English ambassador at
Constantinople, and instructed him, at the same time, to
throw every possible obstacle in the way of Petty! Dalia-