And among all these characters, good or evil, I see that
some, remaining to us from old or transitional periods, do not
properly belong to us, and will soon fade away, and others, though not
yet distinctly developed, are yet properly our own, and likely to grow
forward into greater strength.
For instance: our reprobation of bright colour is, I think, for the
most part, mere affectation, and must soon be done away with.
Vulgarity, dulness, or impiety, will indeed always express themselves
through art in brown and grey, as in Rembrandt, Caravaggio, and
Salvator; but we are not wholly vulgar, dull, or impious; nor, as
moderns, are we necessarily obliged to continue so in any wise. Our
greatest men, whether sad or gay, still delight, like the great men of
all ages, in brilliant hues. The colouring of Scott and Byron is full
and pure; that of Keats and Tennyson rich even to excess. Our
practical failures in colouring are merely the necessary consequences
of our prolonged want of practice during the periods of Renaissance
affectation and ignorance; and the only durable difference between old
and modern colouring, is the acceptance of certain hues, by the
modern, which please him by expressing that melancholy peculiar to his
more reflective or sentimental character, and the greater variety of
them necessary to express his greater science.
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