

RISE AND PROGRESS 



The gtfury of Greece was at ii !,. i-!it both in 

 arts ami in anus during the days of Phidias : the 

 !. land \nw tilled with the trophic of war 

 mi with the statues of heroes and of gods : the 

 eye, wherever it turned, was charmed with the 

 loveliest or the noblest forms which the mind of 

 man could conceive or his hand execute. The 

 rudest hinds of Greece looked with reverence on 

 those works, and serf and peasant wandered 

 among groves of statues without injuring; or even 

 touching them. How different is the feeling for 

 such works in England : iron rails and paid 

 guards cannot protect the statues of our island 

 from the barbarous hands of the people : they 

 have no taste for the poetic or the grand : they 

 confer a smile of approbation upon coarse repre- 

 sentations of vulgar life and throw stones at 

 whatever is beautiful or majestic. The Venus 

 Aphrodite, by Alcamenes, or the Venus of 

 Cnidos, by Praxiteles, would have fared ill 

 among the rustics of Britain ; in Greece and her 

 isles they found only admirers. Praxiteles ex- 

 celled in creations of youth and beauty. Many 

 sailed to Cnidos to gaze at his Venus ; of that 

 goddess he formed two statues, one naked, the 

 the other draped ; the Coons preferred to pur- 

 chase the latter on account of its severe modesty ; 

 the citizens of Cnidos bought the other, and ad- 

 mired it so much as to reject the offer of king 

 Niomedes to forgive them a large debt to have 

 the honour of possessing such a miracle of genius. 

 From his naked Venus it is generally surmised 

 that the Venus de Medicis is derived. 



Of the works of the succeeding great sculptors 

 of Greece, some of high merit have descended to 

 us without suffering much injury from accident or 

 time. The gold and ivory creations of Phidias 

 carried such temptations about them as the bar- 

 barian conquerors of Greece could not resist ; 

 the wooden figures of Dasdalus and his succes- 

 sors, perished by fire ; the brass or silver statues 

 of Praxiteles or Polycletus were broken in 

 pieces, melted and reproduced in current coin 

 or capacious drinking cups ; such is the fate of 

 all works of art executed in too attractive ma- 

 terials. The Waterloo cannon, in the statue of 

 Valour, may at some future day return to their 

 original shape and use. The Discobolus of 

 Nausides, admired for its firm and fine balance, 

 has reached us ; the dying hero of Ctesias, the 

 admiration of antiquity has been discovered, too 

 ingeniously we fear, in the Dying Gladiator. 

 The graceful and delicate Hermaphrodite of 

 Polycles has been diffused over Europe in casts. 

 Scholars have perceived the Nine Muses of 

 Philisciis of Rhodes, or those brought to Rome 

 by Fulvius Nobilior, in the Muses of the pope's 



collection, of which comedy is eminent for grace, 

 and tragf dy for grandeur. That the marbles of 

 the exterior of the Parthenon are the work as well 

 as the invention of Phidias, has been asserted by 

 antiquaries in our own day : the colossal statues 

 on Monte Cavallo, in Rome, bear the names of 

 Phidias and Praxiteles, on their pedestals ; the 

 animated character of the group, as well as the 

 style of execution, seem of the best days of 

 Grecian art. 



Other works of equal or superior beauty to 

 these have been preserved, viz., the Fighting 

 Gladiator, by Agasias, pronounced by Albata 

 Fea to be Ajax son of Oileus ; the touching 

 group of Laocoon and his sons, the work of 

 Apollodorus Athenodorus and Agesander of 

 Rhodes ; the Niobe and her youngest daughter, 

 by Leopas ; the Apollo of Belvidere, believed 

 to be the Apollo of Calamis ; the Venus de 

 Medicis, found in the forum of Octavia, descend- 

 ed without diminution of beauty, it is believed, 

 from the Venus of Cnidos. Of these the Apollo 

 is the most godlike. " Admirable and sublime," 

 says Flaxman, " as its beauty is, there is a reason 

 which perhaps might render it less popular with 

 the ancients than the moderns. Maximus Tyrius 

 describes a statue by Phidias, very similar to 

 this, but more in motion, discharging an arrow, 

 or preparing to do so. There are traces of this 

 statue in some ancient basso-relievos, and it is 

 possible the stronger expression of Phidias'a 

 work, together with the authority of his name, 

 might have diminished the public attention to 

 Calamis in a comparative production." Nor 

 should those noble reliques, the Elgin marbles, 

 be forgotten ; few of them indeed are perfect ; 

 heads, and hands, and feet have been miserably 

 despoiled by time, nay, in some of them the sur- 

 face is entirely gone : yet in the most tune-worn 

 and broken, such simple grandeur of conception, 

 exquisite ease and nature of detail, and delicate 

 skill of workmanship is visible, as justifies the 

 admiration as well as money lavished upon them 

 by the nation. 



The architecture of the Greeks all but rivalled 

 their statues and pictures ; they found it rude and 

 cumbrous, and they gave it beauty and grace ; 

 they added columns to the temple, and raised 

 the ornamented roof, which caught the eye in the 

 distance, shielded the worshippers -alike from 

 sun and rain, and preserved the walls from frosts 

 and damps, and from the pressure of heavy 

 snows. They divided it into orders, and assigned 

 to each a proper duty ; all their inventions had .1 

 meaning ; their commonest ornaments spoke his- 

 ;ory, real or fabulous, to the beholder ; they did 

 nothing for the sake of effect only, yet effect was 



