_Technical Points_.--These two figures have suffered from
restoration more than any others, but the right hand of Rhetoric is
still entirely genuine, and the left, except the ends of the fingers.
The ear, and hair just above it, are quite safe, the head well set on
its original line, but the crown of leaves rudely retouched, and then
faded. All the lower part of the figure of Cicero has been not only
repainted but changed; the face is genuine--I believe retouched, but so
cautiously and skilfully, that it is probably now more beautiful than
at first.
III. LOGIC. The science of reasoning, or more accurately Reason
herself, or pure intelligence.
Science to be gained after that of Expression, says Simon Memmi; so,
young people, it appears, that though you must not speak before you
have been taught how to speak, you may yet properly speak before you
have been taught how to think.
For indeed, it is only by frank speaking that you _can_ learn how
to think. And it is no matter how wrong the first thoughts you have may
be, provided you express them clearly;--and are willing to have them
put right.
Fortunately, nearly all of this beautiful figure is practically safe,
the outlines pure everywhere, and the face perfect: the
_prettiest_, as far as I know, which exists in Italian art of this
early date. It is subtle to the extreme in gradations of colour: the
eyebrows drawn, not with a sweep of the brush, but with separate cross
touches in the line of their growth--exquisitely pure in arch; the nose
straight and fine; the lips--playful slightly, proud, unerringly cut;
the hair flowing in sequent waves, ordered as if in musical time; head
perfectly upright on the shoulders; the height of the brow completed by
a crimson frontlet set with pearls, surmounted by a _fleur-de-lys_.
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