Four Times of The Day - Reception

Reception

Four Times of the Day was the first series of prints that Hogarth had issued since the success of the Harlot and Rake (and would be the only set he would issue until Marriage à-la-mode in 1745), so it was eagerly anticipated. On hearing of its imminent issue, George Faulkner wrote from Dublin that he would take 50 sets. The series lacks the moral lessons that are found in the earlier series and revisited in Marriage à-la-mode, and its lack of teeth meant it failed to achieve the same success, though it has found an enduring niche as a snapshot of the society of Hogarth's time. At the auction of 1745, the paintings of Four Times of the Day raised more than those of the Rake; and Night, which is generally regarded as the worst of the series, fetched the highest single total. Cunningham commented sarcastically: "Such was the reward then, to which the patrons of genius thought these works entitled". While Horace Walpole praised the accompanying print, Strolling Actresses Dressing in a Barn, as being the finest of Hogarth's works, he had little to say of Four Times of the Day other than that it did not find itself wanting in comparison with Hogarth's other works.

Morning and Night are now in the National Trust Bearsted Collection at Upton House, in Warwickshire. The collection was assembled by Walter Samuel, 2nd Viscount Bearsted and gifted to the Trust, along with the house, in 1948. Noon and Evening remain in the Ancaster Collection at Grimsthorpe Castle, Lincolnshire.