American painter & poet (1779-1843)
I have no ambition to shine beyond my abilities.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
letter to Henry Collins Flagg, Jun. 23, 1800
Reverence is an ennobling sentiment; it is felt to be degrading only by the vulgar mind, which would escape the sense of its own littleness by elevating itself into an antagonist of what is above it. He that has no pleasure in looking up is not fit so much as to look down. Of such minds are mannerists in Art; in the world, tyrants of all sorts.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
Lectures on Art and Poems
To you sir, this may appear strange; it may appear impertinent; it may appear astonishing; but to me, sir, who am as uncorrupted, us unprotected by power, it is a duty which every honest man out of office should observe towards every rogue in.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
letter to John Knapp, Oct. 23, 1800
I am inclined to think from my own experience that the difficulty to eminence lies not in the road, but in the timidity of the traveler.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
letter to his mother, Aug. 12, 1800
Titian, Tintoretto, and Paul Veronese absolutely enchanted me, for they took away all sense of subject.... It was the poetry of color which I felt, procreative in its nature, giving birth to a thousand things which the eye cannot see, and distinct from their cause.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
Graham's American Monthly Magazine of Literature, Art, and Fashion, Jul. 1855
I have not been three days at Rome. How charming are the Italian women! Nature seems here to have concentrated all her beauties. In other countries she has bestow'd only one feature; but in Rome the countenance is perfect. There she has given souls without bodies; here they both exist in the same being.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
letter from Rome, Oct. 1800
If the whole world should agree to speak nothing but truth, what an abridgment it would make of speech! And what an unraveling there would be of the invisible webs which men, like so many spiders, now weave about each other!
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
Lectures on Art and Poems
In the same degree that we overrate ourselves, we shall underrate others.
WASHINGTON ALLSTON
Lectures on Art and Poems