Self Help by Samuel Smiles (desktop ebook reader txt) 📖

mother’s means were too limited to permit him to

devote himself exclusively to study. She had sold the few jewels

she possessed, and refused herself every indulgence, in order to

forward the instruction of her other children. Under such

circumstances, it was natural that Ary should wish to help her; and

by the time he was eighteen years of age he began to paint small

pictures of simple subjects, which met with a ready sale at

moderate prices. He also practised portrait painting, at the same

time gathering experience and earning honest money. He gradually

improved in drawing, colouring, and composition. The ‘Baptism’

marked a new epoch in his career, and from that point he went on

advancing, until his fame culminated in his pictures illustrative

of ‘Faust,’ his ‘Francisca de Rimini,’ ‘Christ the Consoler,’ the

‘Holy Women,’ ‘St. Monica and St. Augustin,’ and many other noble

works.

 

“The amount of labour, thought, and attention,” says Mrs. Grote,

“which Scheffer brought to the production of the ‘Francisca,’ must

have been enormous. In truth, his technical education having been

so imperfect, he was forced to climb the steep of art by drawing

upon his own resources, and thus, whilst his hand was at work, his

mind was engaged in meditation. He had to try various processes of

handling, and experiments in colouring; to paint and repaint, with

tedious and unremitting assiduity. But Nature had endowed him with

that which proved in some sort an equivalent for shortcomings of a

professional kind. His own elevation of character, and his

profound sensibility, aided him in acting upon the feelings of

others through the medium of the pencil.” {21}

 

One of the artists whom Scheffer most admired was Flaxman; and he

once said to a friend, “If I have unconsciously borrowed from any

one in the design of the ‘Francisca,’ it must have been from

something I had seen among Flaxman’s drawings.” John Flaxman was

the son of a humble seller of plaster casts in New Street, Covent

Garden. When a child, he was such an invalid that it was his

custom to sit behind his father’s shop counter propped by pillows,

amusing himself with drawing and reading. A benevolent clergyman,

the Rev. Mr. Matthews, calling at the shop one day, saw the boy

trying to read a book, and on inquiring what it was, found it to be

a Cornelius Nepos, which his father had picked up for a few pence

at a bookstall. The gentleman, after some conversation with the

boy, said that was not the proper book for him to read, but that he

would bring him one. The next day he called with translations of

Homer and ‘Don Quixote,’ which the boy proceeded to read with great

avidity. His mind was soon filled with the heroism which breathed

through the pages of the former, and, with the stucco Ajaxes and

Achilleses about him, ranged along the shop shelves, the ambition

took possession of him, that he too would design and embody in

poetic forms those majestic heroes.

 

Like all youthful efforts, his first designs were crude. The proud

father one day showed some of them to Roubilliac the sculptor, who

turned from them with a contemptuous “pshaw!” But the boy had the

right stuff in him; he had industry and patience; and he continued

to labour incessantly at his books and drawings. He then tried his

young powers in modelling figures in plaster of Paris, wax, and

clay. Some of these early works are still preserved, not because

of their merit, but because they are curious as the first healthy

efforts of patient genius. It was long before the boy could walk,

and he only learnt to do so by hobbling along upon crutches. At

length he became strong enough to walk without them.

 

The kind Mr. Matthews invited him to his house, where his wife

explained Homer and Milton to him. They helped him also in his

self-culture—giving him lessons in Greek and Latin, the study of

which he prosecuted at home. By dint of patience and perseverance,

his drawing improved so much that he obtained a commission from a

lady, to execute six original drawings in black chalk of subjects

in Homer. His first commission! What an event in the artist’s

life! A surgeon’s first fee, a lawyer’s first retainer, a

legislator’s first speech, a singer’s first appearance behind the

foot-lights, an author’s first book, are not any of them more full

of interest to the aspirant for fame than the artist’s first

commission. The boy at once proceeded to execute the order, and he

was both well praised and well paid for his work.

 

At fifteen Flaxman entered a pupil at the Royal Academy.

Notwithstanding his retiring disposition, he soon became known

among the students, and great things were expected of him. Nor

were their expectations disappointed: in his fifteenth year he

gained the silver prize, and next year he became a candidate for

the gold one. Everybody prophesied that he would carry off the

medal, for there was none who surpassed him in ability and

industry. Yet he lost it, and the gold medal was adjudged to a

pupil who was not afterwards heard of. This failure on the part of

the youth was really of service to him; for defeats do not long

cast down the resolute-hearted, but only serve to call forth their

real powers. “Give me time,” said he to his father, “and I will

yet produce works that the Academy will be proud to recognise.” He

redoubled his efforts, spared no pains, designed and modelled

incessantly, and made steady if not rapid progress. But meanwhile

poverty threatened his father’s household; the plaster-cast trade

yielded a very bare living; and young Flaxman, with resolute self-denial, curtailed his hours of study, and devoted himself to

helping his father in the humble details of his business. He laid

aside his Homer to take up the plaster-trowel. He was willing to

work in the humblest department of the trade so that his father’s

family might be supported, and the wolf kept from the door. To

this drudgery of his art he served a long apprenticeship; but it

did him good. It familiarised him with steady work, and cultivated

in him the spirit of patience. The discipline may have been hard,

but it was wholesome.

 

Happily, young Flaxman’s skill in design had reached the knowledge

of Josiah Wedgwood, who sought him out for the purpose of employing

him to design improved patterns of china and earthenware. It may

seem a humble department of art for such a genius as Flaxman to

work in; but it really was not so. An artist may be labouring

truly in his vocation while designing a common teapot or water-jug.

Articles in daily use amongst the people, which are before their

eyes at every meal, may be made the vehicles of education to all,

and minister to their highest culture. The most ambitious artist

way thus confer a greater practical benefit on his countrymen than

by executing an elaborate work which he may sell for thousands of

pounds to be placed in some wealthy man’s gallery where it is

hidden away from public sight. Before Wedgwood’s time the designs

which figured upon our china and stoneware were hideous both in

drawing and execution, and he determined to improve both. Flaxman

did his best to carry out the manufacturer’s views. He supplied

him from time to time with models and designs of various pieces of

earthenware, the subjects of which were principally from ancient

verse and history. Many of them are still in existence, and some

are equal in beauty and simplicity to his after designs for marble.

The celebrated Etruscan vases, specimens of which were to be found

in public museums and in the cabinets of the curious, furnished him

with the best examples of form, and these he embellished with his

own elegant devices. Stuart’s ‘Athens,’ then recently published,

furnished him with specimens of the purest-shaped Greek utensils;

of these he adopted the best, and worked them into new shapes of

elegance and beauty. Flaxman then saw that he was labouring in a

great work—no less than the promotion of popular education; and he

was proud, in after life, to allude to his early labours in this

walk, by which he was enabled at the same time to cultivate his

love of the beautiful, to diffuse a taste for art among the people,

and to replenish his own purse, while he promoted the prosperity of

his friend and benefactor.

 

At length, in the year 1782, when twenty-seven years of age, he

quitted his father’s roof and rented a small house and studio in

Wardour Street, Soho; and what was more, he married—Ann Denman was

the name of his wife—and a cheerful, bright-souled, noble woman

she was. He believed that in marrying her he should be able to

work with an intenser spirit; for, like him, she had a taste for

poetry and art; and besides was an enthusiastic admirer of her

husband’s genius. Yet when Sir Joshua Reynolds—himself a

bachelor—met Flaxman shortly after his marriage, he said to him,

“So, Flaxman, I am told you are married; if so, sir, I tell you you

are ruined for an artist.” Flaxman went straight home, sat down

beside his wife, took her hand in his, and said, “Ann, I am ruined

for an artist.” “How so, John? How has it happened? and who has

done it?” “It happened,” he replied, “in the church, and Ann

Denman has done it.” He then told her of Sir Joshua’s remark—

whose opinion was well known, and had often been expressed, that if

students would excel they must bring the whole powers of their mind

to bear upon their art, from the moment they rose until they went

to bed; and also, that no man could be a GREAT artist unless he

studied the grand works of Raffaelle, Michael Angelo, and others,

at Rome and Florence. “And I,” said Flaxman, drawing up his little

figure to its full height, “I would be a great artist.” “And a

great artist you shall be,” said his wife, “and visit Rome too, if

that be really necessary to make you great.” “But how?” asked

Flaxman. “WORK AND ECONOMISE,” rejoined the brave wife; “I will

never have it said that Ann Denman ruined John Flaxman for an

artist.” And so it was determined by the pair that the journey to

Rome was to be made when their means would admit. “I will go to

Rome,” said Flaxman, “and show the President that wedlock is for a

man’s good rather than his harm; and you, Ann, shall accompany me.”

 

Patiently and happily the affectionate couple plodded on during

five years in their humble little home in Wardour Street, always

with the long journey to Rome before them. It was never lost sight

of for a moment, and not a penny was uselessly spent that could be

saved towards the necessary expenses. They said no word to any one

about their project; solicited no aid from the Academy; but trusted

only to their own patient labour and love to pursue and achieve

their object. During this time Flaxman exhibited very few works.

He could not afford marble to experiment in original designs; but

he obtained frequent commissions for monuments, by the profits of

which he maintained himself. He still worked for Wedgwood, who was

a prompt paymaster; and, on the whole, he was thriving, happy, and

hopeful. His local respectability was even such as to bring local

honours and local work upon him; for he was elected by the

ratepayers to collect the watch-rate for the Parish of St. Anne,

when he might be seen going about with an ink-bottle suspended from

his button-hole, collecting the money.

 

At length Flaxman and his wife having accumulated a sufficient

store of savings, set out for