Turner’s notes commenced here continue on folio 73 verso of the sketchbook (
D07217; Turner Bequest CVI 70a); for convenience they are transcribed in full here:
Sir Joshua’s 1st discourse consists of seven pages.
29 lines of 29 letters only |
15
145
29
435 2 Discourse. 13 Pages. Leaves
29
3915
970
13,615 lines
The history of errors [properly managed inserted] shortens the road | to truth. 2 Discourse. | The a Student from the stock of Ideas | collects and not by ... following | any favourite beyond where that mas|ter excells. Yet not blindly to any | authority however great, but not to | rely but be afraid of trusting his | own judgement [& of deviating into any track inserted without deleted] which he | cannot find the Footsteps of some famous | master | A great part of every composition is | commonplace – 2 dis. – therefore G Copying | delusive | By comparison with originals deficiencies | are ... more sensibly than by precepts. | The true principles of Ptg. will mingle with | your thoughts. Ideas fixed by sensible objects [continued on folio 73 verso] will be certain and defective and sinking | deeper in the mind will not only be just | but more lasting than those presented to you | by precepts only, wh. will always be fleeting | variable and undetermined. 2 dis. | Not to have any dependence upon [yr own inserted] Genius. | If you have any great talents industry will | improve them, if you have but moderate abilities | industry will improve them. Nothing denied to | well directed labours. Assiduity unabated by | difficulty. A disposition eagerly directed to | its pursuits will produce effects similar to those | wh. some call the result of natural powers. | 2 discourse
Finberg, confirming that Turner’s source was the second of Sir Joshua Reynolds’s Royal Academy Discourses, quotes some of the original text; as is often the case, Turner has summarised the original text and altered some words, so that, for example, ‘ideas [thus] fixed by sensible objects’ become ‘defective’ instead of ‘definitive’. Discourse 2 was first given by Reynolds in 1769. It was devoted to ‘The Course and Order of Study’.
David Blayney Brown
July 2010
