Page:Thoughts on art and life.djvu/150

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

his own work; and if thou art not conscious of this in thyself, study it in others and thou wilt profit by their faults. Therefore be desirous to bear with patience the opinions of others, and consider and reflect well whether he who blames has good ground or not to blame thee, and if thou thinkest that he has, amend thy work; and if not, act as though thou hadst not heard him, and if he should be a man thou esteemest show him by reasoning where his mistake lies.

66.

There is a certain generation of painters who, owing to the scantiness of their studies, must needs live up to the beauty of gold and azure, and with supreme folly declare that they will not give good work for poor payment, and that they could do as well as others if they were well paid. Now consider, foolish people! Cannot such men reserve some good work and say, "This is costly; this is moderate, and this is cheap work," and show that they have work at every price?

67.

When thou wishest to see whether thy picture who corresponds entirely with the objects thou hast drawn from nature, take a mirror and let the living reality be reflected in it, and compare the reflection with thy picture, and consider well

114

This article is issued from Wikisource. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.