The Palace and Park by Phillips, Forbes, Latham, Owen, Scharf, and Shenton

[Born at York, 1755. Died 1826. Aged 71.] Beyond all compare the greatest artist England has produced, and in all respects one of her worthiest sons. His life constitutes one of the landmarks set up in a nation for the guidance of the ambitious, and the encouragement of the desponding. His father was a moulder of plaster casts: in whose humble shop the boy received his earliest inspiration. Feeble, and crippled, and thrown upon himself, he read such books as he could obtain, and made drawings from the classic models that surrounded him. This was his education, for there was no money at home to purchase a better. At ten, the self-taught boy could read Latin, and had picked up much varied information. A shop filled with plaster casts will be visited occasionally by men of taste and feeling. One such man saw, and was struck by the genius of John Flaxman. His name was Mathew, and by him the child, who could read Latin, was made acquainted with the beauties of the Iliad and Odyssey. At fifteen, admitted a student of the Royal Academy, and competed successfully for the silver medal. What was to be done next?--the father without means, and the youth old enough to earn his own bread! The young sculptor entered the service of the Messrs. Wedgwood, and devoted some dozen years of his life to the improvement of their porcelain manufacture. His genius stamped upon the products of the potteries a character of beauty and classic elegance rivalling the productions of any country. The forms were admired in his own day; they are now more highly esteemed than ever. At the age of twenty-seven Flaxman married Anne Denman. His marriage, his friends declared, would ruin him as an artist. Friends are apt to look upon the shadowy side of one’s happiness. In this case they were mistaken. Anne Denman had the finest qualities of heart; she possessed also exquisite taste, and a cultivated mind. She appreciated the genius of her husband, and was an enthusiast for his works. She accompanied him to Italy, where he nourished his talents by the study of the masterpieces of antiquity. At Rome he executed his illustrations of Homer, Hesiod, Æschylus, and Dante. For the first-named he received fifteen shillings for each drawing, and was satisfied. He was elected member of the Academies of Florence and Carrara, and after seven years’ absence came back to England. His reputation bad preceded him, and he soon justified his fame by his noble monument of Lord Mansfield, in Westminster Abbey. The works of Flaxman, whether of the pencil or the chisel, may take rank with the productions of any age or country. They are distinguished by simplicity, dignity, sublimity, grace, and true poetic feeling. If any modern sculptor may take rank with the ancients, Flaxman’s place will be second to none. His productions are scattered over the globe; we meet them in India, the two Americas, and in Italy, as well as nearer home. He is better appreciated everywhere than in England. But we are beginning to know his value. His worth as a man was equal to his greatness as an artist. All who knew him speak of his modesty, his gentleness, his single-heartedness. After the death of his wife in 1820, whom he tenderly loved, he lived in comparative retirement. [By E. H. Baily, R.A. From the marble executed for Sir Thomas Lawrence, 1824.]