tendency to lead them, and which have rendered abortive the hopes of so
many successions of promising young men in all parts of Europe.

I wish, also, to intercept and suppress those prejudices which
particularly prevail when the mechanism of painting is come to its
perfection, and which when they do prevail are certain to prevail to the
utter destruction of the higher and more valuable parts of this literate
and liberal profession.

These two have been my principal purposes; they are still as much my
concern as ever; and if I repeat my own ideas on the subject, you who
know how fast mistake and prejudice, when neglected, gain ground upon
truth and reason, will easily excuse me. I only attempt to set the same
thing in the greatest variety of lights.

The subject of this discourse will be imitation, as far as a painter is
concerned in it. By imitation I do not mean imitation in its largest
sense, but simply the following of other masters, and the advantage to be
drawn from the study of their works.

Those who have undertaken to write on our art, and have represented it as
a kind of inspiration, as a gift bestowed upon peculiar favourites at
their birth, seem to ensure a much more favourable disposition from their
readers, and have a much more captivating and liberal air, than he who
goes about to examine, coldly, whether there are any means by which this
art may be acquired; how our mind may be strengthened and expanded, and
what guides will show the way to eminence.

It is very natural for those who are unacquainted with the cause of
anything extraordinary to be astonished at the effect, and to consider it