On the record
To represent an angel in a picture, you can only draw a beautiful young man winged: but what painting can furnish out anything so grand as the addition of one word, "the angel of the LORD?
Said by
Edmund Burke
Source
gutenberg.orgTo represent an angel in a picture, you can only draw a beautiful young man winged: but what painting can furnish out anything so grand as the addition of one word, "the angel of the LORD?
Burke illustrates the limitations of visual art compared to the expressive power of language in representing divine concepts.
Share
More from Edmund Burke
They will become flatterers instead of legislators,--the instruments, not the guides of the people.
I would not exclude alteration neither; but even when I changed, it should be to preserve.
Let us imitate their caution, if we wish to deserve their fortune or to retain their bequests.
But when the leaders choose to make themselves bidders at an auction of popularity, their talents, in the construction of the state, will be of no service.