I will mention a few that occur to me of this narrow, confined,

illiberal, unscientific, and servile kind of imitators. Guido was

thus meanly copied by Elizabetta Sirani, and Simone Cantarini;

Poussin, by Verdier and Cheron; Parmigiano, by Jeronimo Mazzuoli;

Paolo Veronese and Iacomo Bassan had for their imitators their

brothers and sons; Pietro de Cortona was followed by Ciro Ferri and

Romanelli; Rubens, by Jacques Jordans and Diepenbeck; Guercino, by

his own family, the Gennari; Carlo Marratti was imitated by

Giuseppe Chiari and Pietro da Pietri; and Rembrandt, by Bramer,

Eckhout, and Flink. All these, to whom may be added a much longer

list of painters, whose works among the ignorant pass for those of

their masters, are justly to be censured for barrenness and

servili ty.

To oppose to this list a few that have adopted a more liberal style

of imitation: Pelegrino Tibaldi, Rosso, and Primaticio did not

coldly imitate, but caught something of the fire that animates the

works of Michael Angelo. The Carraches formed their style from

Pelegrino Tibaldi, Correggio, and the Venetian School.

Domenichino, Guido, Lanfranco, Albano, Guercino, Cavidone,

Schidone, Tiarini, though it is sufficiently apparent that they

came from the School of the Carraches, have yet the appearance of

men who extended their views beyond the model that lay before them,

and have shown that they had opinions of their own, and thought for

themselves, after they had made themselves masters of the general

principles of their schools.

Le Seure's first manner resembles very much that of his master

Vovet: but as he soon excelled him, so he differed from him in

every part of the art. Carlo Marratti succeeded better than those

I have first named, and I think owes his superiority to the

extension of his views; besides his master Andrea Sacchi, he

imitated Raffaelle, Guido, and the Carraches. It is true, there is

nothing very captivating in Carlo Marratti; but this proceeded from