The Press. — London, England, 1854-05-06 00:00:00

exhibit the most exquisite feeling for beauty of lines and effect of lighting : at the same time he has the power of making them express the most varied moods of nature— * lofty grandeur, a deep and gloomy melancholy, a sunny cheerfulness and peace, or an uproar of all the elements. Buildings he also treats with peculiar felicity ; while the sea, in its most varied aspect, is equally subservient to his magic brush. His views of certain cities and localities inspire the spectator with poetic feelings such as no other painter ever excited in the same degree, and which is chiefly attributable to the exceeding picturesqueness of the paint of view chosen, and to the beauty of the lighting. Finally, he treats the most common little subjects, such as a group of trees, a meadow, a shaded stream, with inch art as to impart to them the most picturesque charm. We inspected lately the landscape of Turner hung between the precious Claudes in the National Gallery, and cannot help think ing that in poetic feeling, and even in some of the higher technicalities of art, it surpasses them, though falling far short of their finish. How exquisitely beautiful the sentiment and grand the effect, yet on inspection how easy and careless seem the touches of his brush! The character of Landseer's genius does not satisfy us, nor does Dr. Waagen seem to com prehend the versatility of this first of our living artists, or do justice to the force and variety of his invention, or to that profound and sympathising sentiment which invests each one of his pictures with an eloquence of its own, appealing to thoughts and feelings lying deep in the breast of universal hu manity. We have thus far glanced at some of the principal results of Dr. Waagen's labours , as they show his great diligence. But it is to be lamented that his criticisms are too often so hasty as to he of little value. His visits to this country were of limited duration, and in his rapid run through galleries he was often only able to make insignificant and superficial notes. A. more serious fault is the want of arrange ment and the clumsy manner in which por tions of Dr. Waagen's former work are incorporated with the present. Fugitive notes from his diary are out of place here. After an account of the Museum and National Gallery, which nearly fills a volume, and must have taken months to pen, we do not expect to meet with " yesterday," and " a few days since." All personal details might have been omitted with advantage. We have no doubt that Sir Robert Peel did tell the author that his first book was the best on art in England, but it does not show good taste to print it. Dr. Waagen rarely appears to advantage when he quits pictures. His attempt to connect the progress of art in England with that of literature (1. 300) is sadly deficient in know ledge. We cannot agree that Shakspeare has been reinstated in the national feeling by the influence of Tieck and Schlegel, nor that Lord Byron was the first in modern day to renew the taste for genuine poetry. His compari son'of painters with musicians 144), apropos of a concert at Lord Lansdowne's, is too laboured to please. There may be some analogy between the genius of masters in various lines of art and science, but to rcgu larly pair off artists and musicians, Michael Angelo and Bach, Haydn and Correggio, Mozart and Raffaelle, Giulio Romano and Beethoven, is mere pedantry. The same turn of mind prompts him to use terms of art where they are anything but appropriate. English cookery is not to be compared with that of the French in " the lighter arabesque " style." The " invention of our fancy is neither " rich nor happy " in culinary matters. Roast beef brings to his mind Homer, the son of Telemon, and Agamemnon ; and such geologi cal terms as " petrified fluid mass," and "conglomerate of the mountains," are dragged in to describe a plum-pudding. In the mere notes of a German tourist such oddities might be amusing, but they ought to have been ex punged from a work of so much importance as this. We must complain, too, of the general arrangement. A classification of schools and artists would have been every way more con venient than catalogues of collections. The spacegiven to illuminated MSS. ifs quite dis proportioned to their worth, and, if published at all, might advantageously have been thrown into a distinct work. The press of Albemarle street is, in general, so attentiVe to details, and we are accustomed to see Works issued from it l THE PRESS. in so perfect a shape, that we are surprised these obvious faults should have escaped the Argus who watches over it. As Dr. Waagen (with rare exceptions) was received with great courtesy by the fortunate possessors of the works he describes, it is not surprising that he should endeavour to make a suitable return, but it is hardly to be sup posed that the mero possession of pictures can in every case confer such attainments and talents as the doctor would have us believe. When he admires the courtesy of the Duke of Devonshire, and the pure benevolence and personal kindness of the Duchess of Suther land, and when he acknowledges how greatly he was " indebted to the Earl of Malmesbury " for great assistance during his researches in " England, which he promoted in the kindest " way," every one can appreciate the justice of the tribute, but we are a little doubtful whether he could really have met with quite so much superiority of intellect, perfect taste, andlnoble character, as commbnly figure in the prefatory remarks to every art collection. In spite of these drawbacks, the book, from the extent of its information, the soundness of its knowledge, and the accuracy of its general views, is extremely valuable. It stands alone in its design. It is the only account approaching to completeness of the art trea sures we possess. Though, doubtless, it will, for these merits, meet with a cordial reception, and find a place on the shelves of wealthy collectors, yet Mr. Murray would do a great service to the public should he, by-and bye, extract the really valuable portion of its con tents, give it a convenient arrangement, and issue it as one of his admirable handbooks. Remains of the late Edward Coplestofte, Bishop of Llandaff. By Richard Whately, D.D., Archbishop of Dublin. London : J. W. Parker and Son. Genie twice over the same ground where there is nothing strikingly original, or permanently attractive in the prospect, is proverbially dis agreeable. Here we have additional remi niscences of Bishop Coplestone from the active pen of the Archbishop of Dublin ; but, after laying down the volume, a reader will wonder with ourselves why its matter was not either incorporated with the previously-pub lished " Memoirs," or why it was not reserved for a future edition of the late prelate's works, if any such be contemplated. The remi niscences by the editor are very few ; the notes from Bishop Coplestone's common place book are not important ; and, though the sermons are frequently marked by ability, they will scarcely add to the preacher's fame. More remarkable tbr his didactic merits than for any faculties as an original thinker, Bishop Coplestone must always be honourably mentioned amongst the school divines of the Church of England. Differing in many fea tures, there was a considerable resemblance between the systems of thought adopted by the late Bishop of Llandaff and the present Archbishop of Dublin. Both of those eminent persons won reputation in the ratiocinative school of divinity, and some of their critics and polemical opponents have hinted that they exaggerated the value of the mere forms of thought, and that their teaching tended to confound the anatomy of a subject with its vitalising principle, as if wo were to be in structed that the index to a history was of more importance than the narrative, or the plot of a drama more to be regarded than in vention in the characters or poetry in the language. Extravagantly admired by their immediate friends and followers, they were also unjustly disparaged by persons moo' prompt to see defects than to acknowledge merits. Space is not at our command to enable us to say as fully as we could desire what, in common with others, we have long felt about the teaching of theology at Oxford ; but on a future occasion we may discuss the value of what is known as the exclusively " logical" system of divinity. Whatever may be the worth of the ex elusively-reasoning school of divinity, it is plain, we thick, that neither Romanism or Puse% ism at one side, Socinianism and Infi delity at the other, are to be crushed by mere iATURDAY, " logic." Detection of fallacies, ease in un ravelling a coil of sophistry, and adroitness in shifting middle terms, will not form living minds or draw forth the various faculties with which Eternal Beneficence has endowed human nature. We have a strong sense of the importance of logic, but we have observed that, amongst some of its most clamorous admirers, there is not due appreciation given to other branches of knowledge ; that they are apt to be coldly indifferent to the moving powers of eloquence ; and we have hoard some of them affect to sneer at " mere erudition." We could heartily desire that a more fervid spirit was infused into our current theology than can be imparted by teachers of the school to which Bishop Coplestone belonged. A broader and profounder synthesis, more ge• Mal sympathy with the emotional elements in religion, ought to be manifested by those who aspire to mould the ecclesiastical minds that are to defend Protestantism against the Jesuit, with his speckled and tinselled Popery, and the Neologist with his German pedlar's pack of poison. On reading through these sermons of Bishop Coplestone we observe their neatness of ar rangement and absence of literary blemishes; we admire their occasional profundity and the constant presence in them of an acute intel lect; but there is a characteristic want in them of that evangelising energy, that mind awakening power which, under God's blessing, is potent, not only in bringing hearers to righteousness, but also in scattering far and wide the seeds of germinating thoughts amongst readers. Theology, to our appre hension, is the very noblest of the sciences, but it is only so when it addresses the whole mind, and when, kindling with thek grandeur of their subject, its teachers deliver their con victions with the moral fervour that inspirits and instructs. The great divines who have won permanent renown soared to far sublimer heights and breathed a more invigorating atmosphere than can be found iii those lowly regions where mere schoolmen browse. But it is always more agreeable to us to record merits than to register defects. Past and passing schools of theology have had faults peculiar, not so much to their expositors as to the times; and in making these remarks we remember how much there was of what was truly Meritorious in the late Bishop of Llan daff. For one thing his name will be for a long time memorable in literary annals. Rarely has a single pen in controversy done such effec tive service as in the case of Bishop Coplestone's defence of Oxford against the Edinburgh Re view. Opposed to him were the professors of the north and the pamphleteers of the south, aided by the voice of Opposition in Parlia ment, and "the cry" of the Radicals through. out the land. Calmly measuring the literary strength of his adversaries, he fixed his eye on the vulnerable part of their system of at tack, and resolved to confront and conquer them. His " Reply to the Calumnies against Oxford " was a very different sort of paper ammunition from that intended to have been discharged by Mr. Thomas Moore at the head of the heroic Jeffrey. The violence of Lord Byron's railing in " English Bards and Scotch Reviewers " detracted from the satirical force of the poetical assault on the organ of the sages of the north; but the calm tone of Bishop Coplestone—the judicial air blended with po lemical skill—the sarcastic vigour and cutting coolness of retort—were sorely felt by those whose haste in aspersion was only surpassed by their rapidity in retreat. It is only just to say that the lesson was not entirely lost. The reviewers became less venturesome, though they remained equally venomous. They stood before the literary world signally defeated, and convicted of double cowardice. Compelled to retire, they had not the candour to retract. Since that time the power of the great Whig organ has, from a variety of causes, sensibly diminished. Its feelings on religion are revo lutionised to the extent that it might be said that " Broad Church " has taken the place of "No Church " in its pages, a circumstance which we only remark on because, on referring some time since to Bishop Coplestone's con troversy with it, we felt that the interest of the discussion was diminished. But thus it is with the memory of those contests that are