Waagen visited the major collections on visits to England, and commented:
The collections which were formed by the end of the eighteenth century are of a very different character from those of the time of Charles I. They betray a far less pure and elevated taste, and in many parts show a less profound knowledge of art. We indeed often find the names of Raphael, Corregio, and Andrea del Sarto, but very seldom their works. The Venetian school is better represented so that there are often fine pictures by Titian, Paul Veronese, Tintoretto, and the Bassanos. Still more frequent are the pictures of the Carracci and their school, of Domenichino, Guido, Guercino (1591-1666), Albano, but there are among them but few works of the first rank. Unhappily the masters of the period of the decline of art in Italy are particularly numerous; for instance, Castiglione, Pietro Francesco Mola, Filippo Lauri, Carlo Cignani, Andrea Sacchi, Pietro da Cortona, Carlo Maratti, Luca Giordano. At this time also a predilection for the work of certain masters appears. Among these are of the Italian school, Carlo Dolce, Sasso Ferrato, Salvator Rosa, Claude Lorraine and Gaspar Poussin, pictures of the two last being frequently the brightest gems in these galleries. ( Waagen, Treasures of Art in Great Britain, I. p. 16)