in their rich stuffs.

But the thing is very different with a pupil of the greater schools.
Annibale Caracci thought twelve figures sufficient for any story: he
conceived that more would contribute to no end but to fill space; that
they would, be but cold spectators of the general action, or, to use his
own expression, that they would be figures to be let. Besides, it is
impossible for a picture composed of so many parts to have that effect,
so indispensably necessary to grandeur, of one complete whole. However
contradictory it may be in geometry, it is true in taste, that many
little things will not make a great one. The sublime impresses the mind
at once with one great idea; it is a single blow: the elegant indeed may
be produced by a repetition, by an accumulation of many minute
circumstances.

However great the difference is between the composition of the Venetian
and the rest of the Italian schools, there is full as great a disparity
in the effect of their pictures as produced by colours. And though in
this respect the Venetians must be allowed extraordinary skill, yet even
that skill, as they have employed it, will but ill correspond with the
great style. Their colouring is not only too brilliant, but, I will
venture to say, too harmonious to produce that solidity, steadiness, and
simplicity of effect which heroic subjects require, and which simple or
grave colours only can give to a work. That they are to be cautiously
studied by those who are ambitious of treading the great walk of history
is confirmed, if it wants confirmation, by the greatest of all
authorities, Michael Angelo. This wonderful man, after having seen a
picture by Titian, told Vasari, who accompanied him, "that he liked much
his colouring and manner; but then he added, that it was a pity the
Venetian painters did not learn to draw correctly in their early youth,