The Sun.
London, England, 1825-10-07 00:00:00

EMORNING CHRONICLE.]

It has often been-said' that the congregating
men together in large cities is equally injurious
to their minds-and bodies; and• hence many per-
sons look on the growth of our sea-ports and our
manufacturing towns with -great apprehension.—
" Manufactures and commerce (says the Poet
Wordsworth) have, by unnaturally clustering
the people together, enfeebled their bodies, in-
flamed-their passions •by intemperance, vitiated
from childhood their moral affections, and de,
stroyed their imaginations." That great cities are,
upon the whole, bad schools 'for youth, and that it
requires much care on the part of parents and guar-
dians to secure children both from the influence of
corrupting associations, and front a certain pert-
ness and self-sufficiency of manner, must, we fear,
be admitted. The evil has, however, been greatly
exaggerated, while the disadvantages attendant
on an education in the country are not taken into
account. If those who have been brought up in
towns are wore pert in manner, those who have
been brought up in the country are -often much
conceited in reality ; if the- affections of the
latter are stronger, they are also more -vindictive
and malicious ;• and cunning and hypocrisy are
much more frequent in villages than in towns. But
however this may be—as we cannot arrest the
progress of society, which. is continually swelling
the size of our towns, instead of idly declaring-
against that which cannot be prevented, we ought
to endeavour to-counteract- as far as possible the
tendencies to evil which great cities naturally
generate. Hence, the importance of those insti-
tutions, which snatch the infants of necessi-
tous parents from that worst
.of all schools,
the streets of a great tenon. ,A few years
of infancy 'well spent, 'the influence of the
good impressions then received often deter-
mines the character of the whole of the future
life. We are sorry to see • the High Church
Clergy every Where endeavouring to thwart the
benevolent individuals engaged in this truly
charitable work, by an attempt to make the
teaching the Church Catechism a ,sine qua non
in the infant schools, thus fettering them with
a condition
.which would limit them to a par-
ticular class, and preferring a miserable Sectarian
triumph, to the good of • their fellow creatures.
Fortunately in great cities, where these schools
are most wanted, the mischievous attempts of the
Clergy are least likely to be successful. In the
Birmingham Journal of Oct. 1, it is stated that
" neither of the Rectors of the Parish Churches
in this town, nor any of the Clergy officiating at
these Churches, were invited to form a part of
the Provisional Committee, or to take any share'
in the deliberations as to the propriety and
expediency of establishing the Infant School."—
The' plain English, of this,' we suppose, is, that
the sentiments of the individuals in question had
been too unequivocally expressed on. the subject
of these schools to allow of any hope of
obtaining their •co-operation. In Exeter, how-
' ever, where -the churchmen _muster stronger
its prosperity toah
hs otriti e of
27 coupe
pdte.
than in a manufacturing _ town which owes
dissenters,h
them
main was attempted • by
Finding :that 'the establishment of an infant
school in that city could not he prevented,: and
that the promoters of the design were averse to
any 'conditions which should be an obstacle to
its universality, a meeting was held in the Guild-
hall on the above day, the Bishop of. Exeter -in
the Chair—not, however, a public meeting, for it
had never been publicly called by advertisement
or any other means, and not above one hundred
persons were present, when regulations of an ex-
clusive character were produced, and alt discus-
sion on the subject of them interdicted.

FOR THE SUN.
.wwWlfileggliere•
ANTIQUITY OF PAINTING.

Mit. EDITan-Man is essentially an imitative
animal, this faculty, from which result some of
the most rational of his enjoyments, is one of the
first which-is developed in him from his earliest
infancy; we find the child making repeated at-
tempts to imitate the sot•nd, and the gestures of
those around him. At a period of life rather
more advanced, we see him endeavouring to imi-
tate the form of the different bodies raich meet
his eye; to this rational bias, we are indebted
for the origin of the fine arts, whose object
is the representation of the forms, or of the
sounds which nature every where presents to our
senses. But, however perfect these may be in
their nature, the sensations they awaken are
not equally pleasing. '!'he eye naturally dwells
upon some forms with more pleasure than on
others, and" tiiP ear is delighted with some tones
and sounds, whilst others produce an effect pre-
cisely the reverse. As pleasure is the object
man incessantly pursues, he was soon struck with
this remarkable difference, and directing the
whole of his attention upon what gratified his
mind, he proceeded gradually from a rude
imitation of the objects around him; to a
more perfect representation of them ; and en-
couraged by his success at the same time, that
his genius was called forth by the praises he fail-
ed not to receive from adrniring nations, he pass-
ed on from this correct representation of nature
to the creation of the beau ideal, or the embody-
ing in one subject the perfections which nature
rarely bestows upon even the most favoured of
her individual productions. Such has been the
rise and progress of Painting, upon the antiquity
of which I intend, more especially, to make a few
observations in the present letter.

Tradition and historical documents both tes-
tify the great antiquity of the Art of Painting.
Though necessarily rude in its first attempts, it
had reached no inconsiderable degree of perfec-
tion so early as the time of Homer. What this
eminent Poet relates of the embroidery worked
by Helen and Penelope, leave no doubt that
design, and even colouring,had been long known
to the Greeks. Virgil must have considered
Painting as having attained no mean degree of
perfection at this early period, since his hero
immediately recognizes his own features in the
Paintings which decorated the walls of the
Temple of Juno at Carthage. Pass we on from
the Poets to the historian, we shall have further
proof of the antiquity of Painting. Diodorus
Siculus informs us, that the celebrated walls of
Babylon, erected by the no less celebrated Se-
miramis, were made of coloured bricks, disposed
so as to offer• the representation of different ani-
mals. Nay, more ; we are further informed, that
in the palace of this Queen were seen pictures
representing ,battles, and the amusement of the
chace..

The• Egyptians were undoubtedly one of t e
most ancient , people upon- the face Of the earth.
Without admitting to its full extent their
ridi-
culous Psistensions upon this head, that they were
among the first men who assembled in a society,
and .Whopracticed.the arts and sciences, which
such a mode of existence renders indispensable,
is a fact which it is impossible to deny. Anxious
to represent themselves as highly civilized at a
period when the rest-of rorankind were still sunk
in a most deplorable state • of ignorance and of
barbarity, they have not failed to claim the in-
vention of painting,- and have boldly assert.
ed that - they practised this art above. • six
thousand years before it was known -in Greece.
What-gives force to this assertion, is the sym-
bolical method 'they employed to represent
ideas. The very elstence• of hieroglyphics,
proves the existence of drawings, since per-
sons and object were-represented by figures of
men, of animals, of fruit, of flowers, and of other
natural productions, and though undoubtedly a
laborious, i# is certainly the most simple method
of conveying ideas to the mind : but as it can re-
present only objects- that exist externally, it is
necessarily united in its operations.
Much as we had heard from ancient authors,
respecting the perfection to which the Egyptians
had attained in painting, we might have consi-
dered the whole as grossly exaggerated, had not
the discovery of. paintings hidden from public
view during several centuries, and now brought
to light by the labours 'of Deport, and the perse-
verance of Belzoni, convinced us that such was
indeed the case. It appeared so extraordi-
nary, that paintings should resist- the attacks
of time, and those,. much more destructive, of
ignorance and. of rapaciousness, that When the
first European who -visited the ruins of Upper
Egypt, among whom was Paul Lucas, publish-.
ed an account of- what they had seen, the truth
of their narration was not generally credited.
This arose, however, less from the incredulity of
the readers, than from the excessive credulity of
the traveller, who lending a ready ear to the
tales he heard abroad, or needlessly yielding to
the suggestions of an exuberant imagieatiops filled
his narrative
with such improbable fads, that
they threw a, shade.of suspicion over the whole.
performance. But, now, when many temples
have been carefully, explored, now that the bold
and indefatigable Belzoni has brought to light
the paintings which adorn the tombs of the Kings
of Thebes, :the.proficiency of the Egyptains
paintings, at a very
ear)); period, cannot be rea-
sonably disputed; T hat they never departed from
the stiff and
graceless style they had once adopt-
ed, and consequently left the arts of painting and
statuary•%sholly without improvement, does not,
in the least, militate against this opinion.
Much as I may be disposed to admire the
ancient institutions of the Egyptians I must still
confess that I think they tended only to make
horses, • what we find them,- mere automatons ;
capable of doing well that which they had been
'trained up to do, but ever obliged to move with.
in o.e limits of the same circle, and, therefore,
wholly incapable of improvement. Of this we
have another remarkable instance, in a nation
which may boast likewise of the highest antiquity.
Like the Egyptians, the Chinese were early ad-
dictsd to the arts. zuld sciences; but among them

'likewise) these arts and sciences bale ever re-
mained stationary.
more espy
oiAmong the ancient Bactrians, but
chilly among the ancient Persians, the
with stud lthat
painting was practised, and kept pace
''
scru '
d by
of literature. This had been commas
Zoroaster ; and his disciples polou, at.
tended to his precepts. -Painting was
sIY
tect
..
praciZna
among the most ancient nations of Asia' roved
the travels of Mr. Bullock in Mexico, bavel:6,,o.
that this art was not unknown to the anciel',,le,
habitants of that country. Most of the Pr°7"eir
tions of art were carefully destroyed II
pre-
Spanish conquerors ; but enough has bee", %cy
served. to give us some notion of their proficiel',.:t
These relics are valuable on this account, t"...
they are not less so on account of the very
but more es
.P
ing resemblance their design, 0,
dully the sculptures, bears to that of the - t
cient Egyptians. This resemblance is s° great,g
:
that the visitor, at first, fancies himself am ° is
productions of the Egyptian chisel' This id
a remarkable coincidence. Wherefore shou
we meet with heads and statues with an g5„Pt:
tian style of countenance, with pyramids Lieth
ins some resemblance to those of Egypt/
Ell
deities similar to those whose gigantic forfus
the temples of Ilindoostan, among an itoulatear
people dwelling on the shores of a portion or oro
globe, which had remained for thousands of Yea
unknown to the rest of mankind ? To the learn:
in such lore I leave the explanation of this sing;
bar coincidence between the Asiatic monumelli
such as they may see at Bullocks, with those w(
Egypt, now exhibiting by the amiable wid°,vl.o,
the unfortunate Belzoni, and with those of 11.1,1
doostan, such as they are delineated in vorio'
works upon the latter country.

A• Y•