90 
proofs of 
their 
muniflcence, 
but 
also within its 
walls those apartments and oiiices for artists, in 
every branch which those great men considered 
requisite to the decoration of their residence. 
And history has immortalised the solicitude with 
which the vast fortune of the family, acquired 
originally in honourable commerce, _and rising 
gloriously to sovereign power, was made con- 
tributory to the nourishing of the arts and 
literature ; of every thing that was intellectual, 
liberal, and great." 
Mr. West 
then 
continued 
to 
enumerate 
the 
honour which the successive illustrious patrons 
of the fine__arts have acquired, deducing from it 
motives of emulation to the young students to 
strive for similar distinction, that their names 
may be 
mingled with those illustrious races and 
families 
superior 
affairs. 
to whom 
eminence 
In doing 
Heaven is pleased to give 
and influence in human 
this he took occasion to 
animadvert on the base 
adulation 
of the 
artists 
Franceuin 
of 
the age of Louis XIV. ; 
or rather 
of the dishonour which the 
monarch has drawn upon 
that 
the 
patronage of 
zhimself; by