Meissonier, his life and his art . hat of Venice, for instance. He could never tolerate anybelittlement of the French School. He worshipped Claude. Butit was on individual works that he loved best to dwell, regardlessof schools. He was fond of explaining how he had come to appreciatesome sooner than others, classifying them according to what theyhad taught him, the enthusiasm they had inspired in him. Hereagain, of course, we mustnot ask more from theConvcrsalions than theypretend to give; touchesrapid and fugitive, butvivid and happy to adegree! One hears andsees the speaker! andcan fully app
Meissonier, his life and his art . hat of Venice, for instance. He could never tolerate anybelittlement of the French School. He worshipped Claude. Butit was on individual works that he loved best to dwell, regardlessof schools. He was fond of explaining how he had come to appreciatesome sooner than others, classifying them according to what theyhad taught him, the enthusiasm they had inspired in him. Hereagain, of course, we mustnot ask more from theConvcrsalions than theypretend to give; touchesrapid and fugitive, butvivid and happy to adegree! One hears andsees the speaker! andcan fully appreciate whathe would have been asa teacher. I will quotebut a few typical utter-ances. All the world knowshow Ingres worshippedRaphael. Raphael to himwas not only the greatestof painters ; he was beau-tiful, he was good, he waseverything. If, contraryto the usual fate of artists,he was happy too, it wasbecause he was inviolable by nature. No less profound, Meissoniersworship was less exclusive. He would have framed the Psyche in I. Tlll£ (M. Cliauchards collection.) S8 MEISSONIER diamonds; the drawing in the Ambrosiana made him dnmk withpure beauty. But he reasons out his enthusiasm, even whilegiving himself up to its intoxication. Raphael was heir to thegenius of all the masters before him. b^om each he took the best,like a bee making a divine honey. His is a supreme harmonymade up of familiar chords. He is not original in the strictsense. Hence he never stirs our emotions to the same degree asGiotto. He was a lover of CorregfSfio. At first he did not altosfetherunderstand him. But one night when Louis Philippe gave a feteat the Louvre, in the Salon Carre and the Rubens Gallery, where hesaw the Antiopc, he was enraptured. This gallery was his road toDamascus. No other painter of flesh, he said, makes one longto pass the hand over his surfaces as does Correggio with his meltingcarnations. His admiration for Titian was less expansive. Thepomp of that regal brush
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