With it is
mingled therefore so much of his own individuality, manifested both in this
choice and certain modifications determined by his way of working, that you
have not only a representation of an aspect of nature, as far as that may
be with limited powers and materials, but a revelation of the man's own
mind and nature. Consequently there is a human interest in every true
attempt to reproduce nature, an interest of individuality which does not
belong to nature herself, who is for all and every man. You have just been
saying that you were lying there like a convex mirror reflecting all nature
around you. Every man is such a convex mirror; and his drawing, if he can
make one, is an attempt to show what is in this little mirror of his,
kindled there by the grand world outside. And the human mirrors being all
differently formed, vary infinitely in what they would thus represent of
the same scene. I have been greatly interested in looking alternately over
the shoulders of two artists, both sketching in colour the same, absolutely
the same scene, both trying to represent it with all the truth in their
power. How different, notwithstanding, the two representations came out!"
"I think I understand you, papa.
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