Self-Portrait (1788)
At Kenwood House on Hampstead Heath is Joshua Reynolds’ 1788 Self-Portrait. Unusually for the time, he shows himself wearing a clumsy-looking pair of glasses. I know people even today who remove their spectacles for the sake of a photograph. He may have worn his glasses as an honest token of his declining sight, or because he wished to truly depict the man gazing back at him in the mirror.
We often employ powerful lenses when considering the faults of others, all the while turning blind eyes to our own. Let us behold others’ shortcomings through squinting, imperfect eyes, but let us apply the microscope to our own hearts.
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