ABSTRACT
Great treat at Sir G. Beaumonts, the holy Family of M. Angelo 1 more striking in its unfinished state than if entirely completed. the parts of greatest beauty & interest are brought out & wrought with the very soul of love & genius. the inferior are left but sketched or scarcely discernible or in the native rock. the subject seems growing from the marble & emerging into life. it assumes by degrees its shape, features form and unformed mass. as it were you trace & watch its birth from the sculptor's mind as you would an animal in its birth, the chicken breaking thro' its shell. I have seen nothing but this that conveys the idea in the Greek epigram of a sculptor who says I have no merit but discovering the form which lies within the marble. one feels in beholding it to desire still to go on discovering, still to disclose more. It would be a curious metaphysical question to trace the pleasure which derives from an unfinished sketch & which is confessed by all the world – doubtless M.A. knew this well & calculated on the value of his works as not lessened by it. admiration mixed with regret – if 'he had finished it what a fine thing it would have been – was he disgusted with its failure, did he cut too deep or make mistake, did he die prematurely in the progress of the work, was he idle', he knew the mind would trace the progress of the sculptor's mind with more interest... [if he entered] into the pursuit with the artist. he sees the unformed rock beside the half finished work, he feels & confesses the difficulty of the art. the contrast convinces him of it, the contrast too gives additional effect to the work. Seta spectator before a finished work, he compares it with its prototype, nature –he finds it inferior – but show him first a wet or plain canvas, let him watch the artist who out of the blank creates a living groupe [sicl & animates a vacancy –he will confess there is merit & his mind enters into the contest or pursuit. 2
