applies no less to the intellect than to the affections. When applied
to genius, it may be called the social inspiration, the simple
statement of which seems to us of itself a solution of the
oft-repeated question, "Why is it that genius always appears in
clusters?" To Nature, indeed, we must all at last recur, as to the
only true and permanent foundation of real excellence. But Nature is
open to all men alike, in her beauty, her majesty, her grandeur, and
her sublimity. Yet who will assert that all men see, or, if they see,
are impressed by these her attributes alike? Nay, so great is the
difference, that one might almost suppose them inhabitants of
different worlds. Of Claude, for instance, it is hardly a metaphor to
say that he lived in two worlds during his natural life; for Claude
the pastry-cook could never have seen the same world that was made
visible to Claude the painter. It was human sympathy, acting through
human works, that gave birth to his intellect at the age of forty.
There is something, perhaps, ludicrous in the thought of an infant of
forty. Yet the fact is a solemn one, that thousands die whose minds
have never been born.

We could not, perhaps, instance a stronger confutation of the vulgar
error which opposes learning to genius, than the simple history of
this remarkable man. In all that respects the mind, he was literally a
child, till accident or necessity carried him to Rome; for, when the
office of color-grinder, added to that of cook, by awakening his
curiosity, first excited a love for the Art, his progress through its
rudiments seems to have been scarcely less slow and painful than that
of a child through the horrors of the alphabet. It was the struggle of
one who was learning to think; but, the rudiments being mastered, he
found himself suddenly possessed, not as yet of thought, but of new
forms of language; then came thoughts, pouring from his mind, and