In the present undertaking, two methods of arrangement are obviously presented: either to treat the arts simultaneously; or, considering each in succession, to commence with that one which seemed best adapted to illustrate the history and common principles of all. With this view we have, in the commencement, followed the fortunes of Sculpture at some length, because here we find an uninterrupted series of monuments; here the elements of imitative art are discoverable in their purest and least compounded character; and also because in Sculpture the labours, being enduring, of greater magnitude, and more generally employed for national purposes than those of Painting, seem more clearly to illustrate the connexion which will ever be found to subsist between the refinement of taste and the progress of moral and political intelligence, as affects nations, or the human race universally. This is the truly dignified object in the history of the fine arts. In this respect our inquiries have been most satisfactorily resolved. We have found the state of sculpture an index of the moral and political condition of the people; owing its best cultivation to national and popular causes. We have seen it languish or revive according to the energy and the freedom of national institutions. The epochs of painting were nearly or altogether the same, as were also those of architecture. The conclusions, then, are universal. Little, therefore, remains to be explained in painting, save its own peculiarities as an individual art.

Painting, which depends upon illusion for some of its most striking effects, and employs principles abstractly unreal, is, in the application of these principles, and in the full accomplishment of their effects, an art of greater difficulty than Sculpture. Hence, a priori, it might be inferred, that the former would more slowly attain to the perfection which it reached among the nations of the ancient world. But perhaps it would hardly have been predicted, that, in the age of Phidias, when sculpture had already been raised to an elevation yet unapproached, the sister art should still be little advanced. At the same time, there can be no doubt that the elements of both arts have in all countries sprung up together. Nature has sown the seed, but circumstances nourish the plants.

Among the ancient inhabitants of Asia, painting and writing appear to have been the same art, or rather, the former supplied the place of the latter. From the same source the art arose in Egypt, where are still to be found its oldest remains. In this branch the mental and political despotism already explained, bound down every aspiration. Whether we regard the art as picture writing, or in its more determinate and independent efforts at representation, we discover no change—no progressive improvement, and no superiority which has not evidently arisen from a greater or less degree of care and personal skill in the performer. Egyptian painting seldom, if ever, attempts more than an outline of the object, as seen in profile, such as would be obtained by its shadow. To this rude but always well-proportioned draught, colors are applied, simply and without mixture or blending, or the slightest indication of light and shade. The process appears to have been, first, the preparation of the ground in white; next, the outline was firmly traced in black; and, lastly, the flat colors were applied. The Egyptian artists employed six pigments, mixed up with a gummy liquid, namely, white, black, red, blue, yellow, and green: the three first always earthy, the remaining vegetable, or at least frequently transparent. The specimens from which we derive these facts, are the painted shrouds and cases of the mummies, and the still more perfect examples on the walls of the tombs. It can furnish no evidence of extraordinary experience or practice, that these paintings still retain their hues clear and fresh. The circumstance merely shows the aridity of the climate, and that the coloring matters were prepared and applied pure and without admixture.

Over no part of ancient intellectual history hangs there so great uncertainty, respecting at least the means and progressive steps, as in the instance of Painting in Greece. We can judge here only from inference, while the facts upon which our conclusions must rest, are in some degree contradictory. No production of the Grecian pencil remains to us, as in sculpture, whence to form our own judgment apart from the opinions of ancient critics; while there is internal evidence, that the historical annals handed down to us, imperfect as these now are, have been compiled, not from authentic materials early collected, but from recollection of names to whom discoveries are by the later historian casually attributed. The whole account of early painting is too regular, too systematic, the progressive advances follow each other in an order too artificial to represent faithfully the alternate failure and success, the devious course, the rapid and almost inexplicable advance of genius. The young eagle tempts not the liquid way in steady flight, commensurate only with his strength—he flutters and falls—wavers in broken and ungraceful curves, before he can launch into full career, or circle slowly and majestically in his pride of place.

We do not doubt, then, that the names of the earliest painters handed down to us in the Greek and Roman writers, are correct; but the system of gradual and regular advance which they have connected with these names, seems inconsistent with the nature of human things. In this case, the only safe method that can be adopted, consistently with the intention of giving every useful information, is to select a few leading and well ascertained dates, between which it is proved that certain discoveries did take place; the interval will thus be sufficiently filled up without entering into minute discussion. Anticipating this arrangement, we have been full in our account of the early schools of sculpture, whence the deficiency here may be supplied; for in both arts, the locality is always, and the masters frequently, the same.

The first painting on record is the battle of Magnete, by Bularchus, and purchased by Candaules, king of Lydia, for its weight in gold, or as some say, a quantity of gold coins equal to the extent of its surface. This establishes the first era, 718 B. C. During five centuries, however, the art had previously flourished in the cities and islands, and especially at Corinth, whose situation, commanding the two seas that wash the shores, and connecting by land the grand divisions, of Greece, early rendered that city, with the commercial states already noticed, the seat of wealth and refinement. Practised by numerous masters,—as Eucherus, Hygenon, Dymas, Charamides, Philocles, Cleanthes, Cleophantes,—painting, in this interval, is reported to have passed through various gradations; as, simple skiagraphy, or shadow painting; the monographic style, consisting of a simple outline; monochromatic compositions, in which one color only was employed; and polychromatic, where a variety of hue, but without shading, was used. During the same time, there appear accounts of minor improvements, with their authors assigned, all of which we reject, as already stated. In what manner the work of Bularchus was executed, does not appear; but there is every reason to believe that it was merely a monogram, and, from the contemporaneous state of sculpture, very highly finished, in a style hard, dry, and ineffective. The price paid is by no means the criterion of absolute excellence;—the work might be fully prized as the master-piece of its own remote age, while the laborious minuteness of its details might render the sum not more than a compensation for the time bestowed.

To select a second era sufficiently marked by addition or revolution of principle, is difficult. To the age of Phidias, the art continued certainly to improve, but very slowly, being left far in the rear by Sculpture. The genius of this consummate master, who indeed had originally commenced his career as a painter, extended to all the arts; and, under such an instructer, his brother PenÆnus, very highly distinguished himself, though vanquished in a contest for the public prize, then instituted at Delphos and Corinth. From the middle of the fifth century, then, a decided movement commences in the history of painting,—a preparation for something still greater. The influence extended among the able contemporaries of the great sculptor. Polygnotus of Thasos then first succeeded, to borrow a phrase, 'in the expression of undescribed being,' and whose pictures Pliny admired six hundred years afterwards. Improvement was carried forward for half a century by Mycon, famous in horses; Pauson, his rival; Dionysius of Colophon, praised by Ælian for minute accuracy; Aglaophon, bold and energetic; Colotes, sculptor and painter; Evenor, father of Parrhasius; and finally, greatest of all, Apollodorus the Athenian, who invented or perfected the knowledge of light and shade. With this artist, the precursor and contemporary of Zeuxis, and whose discovery may be placed about the commencement of the fourth century B. C., may be terminated the second era. The propriety of this division will more obviously appear, when it is considered that to this period, not only was the art deficient in the most powerful of its means, the magic of chiar' oscura, but also in its instruments. The ancient paintings, as late as the age of Phidias, were executed with the cestrum, a species of pliant stylus, similar to that used in writing. This is the diagraphic, or linear method, and seems to have resembled our chalk and crayon, or perhaps more closely our pen and reed drawing. The process, however, can be explained only by conjecture. The tablet, primed in white, was laid over with a varnish of resin mixed with wax, and usually incorporated with a dark-reddish coloring matter. Upon this the subject was traced, and the lights worked in with the cestrum of various fineness. At what precise period this imperfect instrument was superseded by the pencil, or if the effects of the two were combined, is unknown. But the invention must have been made after the death of Polygnotus, and prior to the ninetythird Olympiad, a period of twenty or thirty years, when Apollodorus is known to have handled the pencil with great effect. It is not unlikely, therefore, that this artist either was the inventor or the improver of this tool, whose mastery so decidedly ministered to his reputation.

The third period commences with Zeuxis, marking an era distinct at once in principle and in excellence. Preceding masters had crowded their tablets with numerous figures. He introduced simplicity of composition, and relied upon the perfection frequently of a single figure to concentrate interest. He was equally simple in his coloring, never using more than four, often only two pigments. Parrhasius equalled the former in expression, and seems to have surpassed him in coloring. Euphranor was equally celebrated in painting as in statuary. Both were surpassed by Timanthes, who, in veiling the head of a father compelled to attend the sacrifice of his daughter, appealed to the heart not in vain, when the powers of genius had failed. Eupompus, by the splendour of his style, gave rise to a new distinction of schools into the Athenian and Sicyonian, in addition to the Asiatic, the Rhodian, and the Corinthian. Theon of Samos obtained high praise for the eager haste of his young warrior to join the fight. Aristides of Thebes, in his picture of the wounded mother, solicitous, in the pangs of death, lest her child should suck blood, appears to have reached the utmost range of expression in art. And lastly, Pamphilus the Macedonian, eminent for the natural feeling and truth of his style, was the master of Apelles. This era, embracing about the first half of the fourth century, coincides with the commencement of the Phidian age in painting. Whatever might have been the merits of preceding masters, Zeuxis was certainly the first from whose works we derive explicit statements of the ideal in Grecian painting. This ideal, as in their sculpture, was immediately derived from reality; it was no farther the creation of fancy, than as taste and imagination were employed in selecting and combining what was good in particular, towards an approach to the best, in general nature. 'Behold,' said Eupompus to Lysippus, when consulted by the young sculptor on the subject of imitation, pointing to the passing multitude, 'Behold my models: from nature, not from art, must he study, who aspires to the true excellence of art.' Zeuxis, then, first discovered or practised the grand principle in the heroic style of painting,—to render each figure the perfect representative of the class to which it belongs. There is reason to believe, also, that he taught the true method of grouping; at least, from the manner of description adopted by Pausanias, it would evidently seem that in all pictures anterior to this age, the figures were ranged in lines, without any principal group on which the interest of the event was concentrated. Even so late as the works of PanÆnus, the brother of Phidias, the different distances were represented by the very inartificial and ungracious means of placing the figures in rows one above the other. In all his improvements, Zeuxis was more than followed by his able contemporaries. It is a singular and an amusing fact, that at no time do we find more real talent in art, combined with so much ridiculous coxcombry in the personal character of artists.

The fourth and last epoch of painting in Greece commences with Apelles, about the conclusion of the fourth century B. C. This age witnessed both the glory and the fall of ancient art. Apelles united, in his own style, the scattered excellences which had separately adorned the performances of his predecessors. It was this power and equability of combination, arranged and animated by an elegance and refinement of taste peculiarly his own, which constituted the just eminence of this master. From the descriptions of ancient writers, the character of his style must have closely resembled that of Raphael, while their choice of subjects appears to have been nearly similar. The Venus of Apelles, long afterwards purchased by Augustus for one hundred talents, or £20,000 sterling, was esteemed the most faultless creation of the Grecian pencil, the most perfect example of that simple yet unapproachable grace of conception, of symmetry of form, and exquisite finish, in which may be summed up the distinctive beauties of his genius. He alone appears to have practised portrait painting in the full majesty of that art; this, indeed, does not appear to have been a branch the most cultivated among the Greeks, who preferred busts. Hence, while Pausanias enumerates eightyeight masterpieces of history, he mentions only half the number of portraits, which he had seen in his travels through Greece, during the second century.

The contemporaries of Apelles were Protogenes, an excellent artist, whose merits his generous rival first pointed out. He was blamed for finishing too highly; yet, to obtain possession of one of his pictures, was the chief cause of the siege of Rhodes. Nicias, who is reported to have touched up the statues of Praxiteles—in what manner is not known, nor was Canova successful in his researches on this subject. Somewhat later lived Nichomachus, Pausius, Ætion, the Albano of antiquity, and others, with whom the art began to lapse. The causes and progress of this decline have already been traced in the history of sculpture. The remarks there are applicable to both arts, but peculiar circumstances rendered the progress of decay more rapid in painting. Even in the later contemporaries of the great ornament of the art, we discover a falling off from the great style, to one exactly resembling that of the modern Dutch school. Although the best pictures, from their greater rarity, were more highly valued in pecuniary estimation than statues, yet the art was never so completely national as Sculpture. The ambition was not cherished, nor the talents of painters directed, by the nationality of their performances; the general taste was not fixed by public and venerated monuments, consequently the wholesome restraints of public opinion operated but slightly, and were speedily withdrawn. Be it also remembered, that the standard here was formed after the severe purity of ancient taste, and morals had suffered sad relaxation. Hence painting was sooner abandoned to the caprice of private patronage and judgment; but the whole framework of her institutions, moral and political, was to be dissolved before sculpture,—which honored the forms of her religion; whose labours were publicly dedicated to the renown of her good, her learned, and her brave,—could cease to be regarded with national sympathy in Greece. Pausanias mentions the names of one hundred and sixtynine sculptors, and only fifteen painters; while, after three centuries of spoliation, he found in Greece three thousand statues, not one of them a copy, while he describes only one hundred and thirtyone paintings. The empire, then, of ancient painting, appears to have been of brief continuance, for, beyond the age now under review, no memorials of its greatness remain. The Romans prized this, as they have been shown to value every accomplishment in the fine arts, as ministering to luxury, and as a worthy employment for their slaves. In the early portion of their iron reign, Etruscan captives decorated their houses—subsequently itinerant Greeks; and though we find a few names of Roman painters, we never find it carried among them beyond mere embellishment. The moral dignity of the art never revived.

One difficulty regarding the history of ancient painting still remains to be stated—satisfactorily cleared it never can be—namely, the perfection to which the art actually attained. It has been said, and the remark is just, that there exists a wide disparity between the means and instruments of the art, as described by writers of antiquity, and the excellence of the effects produced, as these have reached us through the same channel. We have, it is replied, the criticisms of the same writers upon other subjects of taste, with the originals likewise in our hands, and finding here their opinions correct—not only so, but exquisitely correct—we are constrained to admit, that in painting their judgment was equally refined as in poetry, oratory, sculpture, or architecture. This reasoning may prove relative, but not absolute excellence; for taste being necessarily formed upon the very models on which it passes sentence, cannot be admitted as evidence beyond its experience. Our own conviction is, that, unless in this view of merely relative beauty, the praises bestowed by the Greek and Roman writers upon their paintings are overcharged; and that these were much inferior to their sculptures. This opinion is founded not upon any alleged inferiority of means, for, besides the difficulty of exactly comprehending certain passages on this subject, we do find, that the ancient artists were armed with all the powers of fresco-painting, in which the grandest conceptions of modern talent are embodied. But these very descriptions, in many of which are accounts of very complicated expression, show that the writers, and especially Pliny, the most circumstantial, either did not truly feel the nature and object of beauty in painting; or they evince, that if such effects were attempted, the art was devoid of that simplicity and natural expression which constitute the primeval source, the all-pervading principle, of beauty and of grandeur, of truth and excellence, in antique sculpture. But again, if, from the few and very imperfect remains of ancient painting, any conclusion be allowed in reference to its higher state, we discover in these all the principles, especially those of form, common to sculpture, always well, often admirably understood, while those peculiar to painting are inartificially expressed, without firmness or decision.

These remains consist, first, of the delineations upon vases, improperly called Etruscan, where the pictorial representations are monochromatic shadows and outline, or monograms, executed with the cestrum, or style, in black, upon a red or yellow ground, or sometimes the order of the colors is reversed. Even these support the views just stated; for, vigorous as are the lines, the representation, on the whole, is inferior to the abstract perception of the beautiful in form, as exhibited in the vases themselves. The second division of remains are the frescos, or stucco paintings of Herculaneum, Pompeii, Stabia near Naples, and those in the baths of Titus at Rome. The former were doubtless executed by itinerant Greek painters, who are known to have been very numerous under the empire. The latter were most probably the performance of the best artists that could be procured; yet we do not discover an intrinsic difference of style which can bear against our general conclusion, or rather the similarity proves the fact, while in Herculaneum every sculptured ornament is infinitely more elegant than the paintings found in the same spot. To these might be added some very imperfect sepulchral remains, found near Tarquinia, which merely prove that the ancient Etruscans were far from ignorant of painting. In the pictures at Naples and Rome, is greater variety of coloring than, from some passages in their writings, has been allowed to the ancients. And, indeed, unless Pliny be supposed to point out a distinction in this respect between the practice of the earlier and later painters, he contradicts himself; for in all, he enumerates no less than five different whites, three yellows, nine reds or purples, two blues, one of which is indigo, two greens, and one black, which also appears to be a generic expression, including bitumen, charcoal, ivory, or lamp-black, mentioned with probably others.

Occasional allusion has been made to the mechanical modes of operation employed in ancient painting. On comparing the different passages allusive to these, two things certainly appear: that a permanency was given to its productions unknown even in modern art; and that oil-painting, properly so termed, formed no part of its practice. Laying aside, then, all conflicting opinions, we are disposed to infer that there were three principal methods; first, Distemper employed on stuccoed walls, and for pictures not moveable; second, Glazing, when the picture, after being furnished in water-colours, crayons, or distemper, was covered with a coat of hard and transparent varnish, of which several kinds are described; and thirdly, Encaustic, when the coloring matters actually incorporated with wax, or preparations of wax, were thus applied in a liquid state, and when finished, allowed to dry, and most likely afterwards varnished also. In these two latter methods were executed the most excellent pictures of the great masters, and which were portable. The last has given rise to much needless discussion, as if resembling enamel, the colors being burnt in. We apprehend, however, the Greek and Latin verb here used, merely denotes that the tints were laid on hot, which, from their nature, must have been absolutely necessary, while it is evident, from scattered hints, that the material painted upon was destructible by fire.