The National Register.
London, England, 1809-05-07 00:00:00

FINE la.F.

,le. EXIUVITION OF THE ItOYAL ACADEMY, 1809.
Monday last the forty-first National Exhilytion of
ahours of,British Painters, was cipened precisely
e o'clock, and admitted a considerable crowd of vo•
, cognoscenti, and amateurs of that delightful art,
sere previously waiting- beneath the portico of So-
t. House.
first paintiwp: that demands our notice, both by its
CUOUS position and the reputation of its artist
ilard, from ray's Pindaric Ode, by WEST. No.ll 9.
:iem, front which the ideas of the Painter arc bet
Jed to he derived, has been the subject of varto
ism; although, On various accounts, it has attained a
degree of popular reputation, which it was at first
ed. The denunciation with which the Ode corn-
ices does not altogether accord with any image, which
can form of a man uttering it, while ne continues .o
play upon a harp. No position in which we can possibiy
place the Bard, seems suitable to his double character of
musician, and the prophet of impending evil,. aroused by
the sufferings of his country. Mr. West has obviated this
difficulty : his Bard dues not strike ‘. the deep sorrows of
bis Lyre :" Nor does this appear to be a momentary cessa-
sion of his solemn minstrelsy : The heavy harp stands in
such depth of silence by his side, and his figure has so much
snore of the disordered orator than the enraptured bard,
that we cannot but wonder why such au instrument should
be near hint. Scarcely in -my idea does the Painter's mind
seem to have been in unison w.LU the Poets': " the beard
and hoary hair" (however the extravagance of the simile
in Gray may have been ridiculed,) are wholly without the
grandeur and dignity which those venerable adjuncts of old
:age are well adapted to bestow. The countenance is indeed
impressive: the position, though ditibring with the concep-
tion of Gray, is well defined and commanding; the colour-
ing is clear and vigorous, and the surrounding scenery not
only sublime in itself, but sustained by a truly magnificent
gloom of shadowing. Still Use bard of West is in no re-
spect the bard of iiray. It appears to aim at inure dig-
nity and less feeling, it strives to lo,k like something more
than human ; it assumes rather an air of awe, than one of
impassioned sensibility ; it depends more on its prophetic
character, than on its su scept;bility of the common impres-
sions of humanity ; for exciting twr attention, it demands
our respect rather than our emir.: 'ration ;—the bard of
ray, on the other hand; affects us our most exalted at-
tachments, patriotkm and friendship. The warmest
traits of these sentiments, run through the whole ode, and
give it those claims to general estimation, which are every
where acknowledged. The prophetic powers of the Bardol-
though they are the menus of manifesting l!is long continued,
and satisfied vengeance on the posterity ut the destroying
conqueror, and his triumphant gratification in the future glo-
ries of the house of Tudor, yet are they secondary to his love
for country, his grief for the death of his frit% !s, anti
awfull desire of vengeance. This is ever the case in successt..:'
productions : ideas, however magnificent, must be subser-
'tient to sentiment,—to mere human sentiments, or they will
speedily cease to be sublime. But lest we should seem : ►
derogate from the acknowledged abilities of Mr. West, vi •
are willing to admit, that the subject is in no wise adapted
for the pencil : even in poetry, with all its opportunities of
speaking to the hear:, it has almost failed the design is
beyond its execution—and its execution is beyond the
power of human conception—the agent, with all lais subli-
mity, is inadequate to his prophetic task. As far as senti-
meat sustains our commiseration, we experience all his
energies, but we can go ne further: the wmgi of onr sen-
sibility drop off, al we strive to pursue his prophetic flight,
and we fall into the calm stream of history, very much at
our ease ; and by the time that the bard takes his leap into
old Conway's flood, we have almost lost all our terror and
sensibility in our historical recollections and gleanings.
Far less ihe subject therefore adapted to painting than to