OF THE PINE ARTS. 



XXI 



never wanting. It must be confessed, however, 

 that their system of architecture had its limits ; to 

 raise a lofty temple, enormous columns were re- 

 quired ; these again demanded enormous blocks 

 of stone for friezes and entablatures, and great 

 wealth, as well as great power, was required to 

 find solid masses of fifty or sixty tons weight, 

 and lift them seventy feet into the air. It may 

 be questioned whether any of the temples of 

 Greece equalled in scientific combination of 

 parts, or in lofty beauty, the cathedrals of St 

 Paul's in London, and St Peter's in Rome ; yet 

 they certainly stood singly and alone in the pre- 

 servation of that elegant and somewhat severe 

 simplicity the mark of every thing Grecian. 



The unity of architecture, painting, and sculp- 

 ture observed by the Egyptians in all their 

 temples was followed for a time by the Greeks, 

 till poetry came to the aid of the two latter and 

 raised them to be principals rather than accessa- 

 ries. In Egypt, the temple surpassed the gods 

 which it sheltered, or the paintings which it 

 protected from the elements : in Greece, the 

 temple soon became little more than an elegant 

 case to contain statues which men worshipped as 

 miracles of beauty, and paintings diviner still. 

 No doubt the three were beautiful when united ; 

 but poetry gave wings to painting and sculpture 

 which lifted them above their more mechanical 

 associate. The great architects of Greece studied 

 durability as well as beauty ; they looked with 

 scrupulous care to the firmness of the founda- 

 tions, to the size and solidity of the stones, and 

 to the nicety with which they were squared and 

 united. They depended less on cements than on 

 the geometrical skill with which one part sustain- 

 ed another ; and there are examples of masonry 

 where the blocks are built without mortar, no 

 doubt from a fear that cement was liable to decay, 

 and would perish sooner than marble. Grecian 

 architecture has been revived in Britain, but it 

 languishes though recommended by high talent, 

 and, more influential still, wealth and rank. 

 The ancient Gothic spirit is strong in our island ; 

 we are lovers of the lofty and the picturesque ; 

 an awe comes upon us while we walk in a Gothic 

 abbey, but we survey the classic creations of 

 Greece with a cold regard ; they are not akin to 

 our emotions, and our heart makes no response. 



art of all other nations, can be proved by all 

 who choose to assert it. We need only point to 

 some half dozen groups and statues, and ask 

 what productions of our latter days can be com- 

 pared to them ? We find more action, indeed, 

 and picturesque display, in some of the marbles 

 of Italy ; but then violent action and extreme 



attitudes were alien to the simplicity in which all 

 of Grecian growth was conceived. A modern 

 warrior fights with ferocity in marble, an ancient 

 warrior fought with grace ; the ladies who live 

 in our later art attract us as much by the nicety 

 of their dress as by the beauty of their persons, 

 the ladies of Attic sculpture charmed by their 

 austere modesty, and by the exquisite symmetry 

 of their forms. Equal decorum was observed in 

 their representations of the gods : they stood 

 with elegance, they moved with dignity ; and 

 when action was necessary, they performed it 

 with a divine ease, which marked the godhead as 

 much as their majesty of look did. Nor did the 

 artists of Greece seem anxious to spread out 

 their conceptions over a large space ; all with 

 them is put into as small compass as possible ; 

 they desired to be compact as well as simple ; 

 they finished all they touched with surprising 

 nicety and care ; the hands, the feet, and heads 

 of their figures seem to have been looked at in 

 every light, and polished to suit all sites and 

 situations. While some modern marbles look 

 hard and sharp in the plaster casts taken from 

 them, the marbles of Greece look soft and round, 

 and lose nothing of their beauty of character 

 by change of material. That the paintings of 

 the Greeks equalled their sculpture; we need 

 have little hesitation in believing. We ought 

 not to see, with some modern critics, the pictures 

 of Athens in the daubings of Herculaneum, any 

 more than behold the excellence of their sculp- 

 ture in the chisellings on the column of Trajan 

 or the arch of Constantine. The Romans 

 inherited little of Greece save the sea and shore ; 

 they were not full heirs of her genius. They 

 carried away multitudes of paintings, and statues 

 by the thousand, and filled Rome with elegant 

 spoil. They carved, too, and they painted, and 

 imagined themselves the rivals as well as con- 

 querors of the people of Attica. In some of 

 their bas-reliefs there is good grouping, and in 

 several of their statues both beauty and simpli- 

 city ; but then the light by which they wrought 

 was artificial and borrowed. Greece was the 

 source of all their efforts, in poetry as well as 

 art ; they were imitators, not true originals. 



Those who make the genius of Greece their 

 study will find that her poetry and sculpture, her 

 painting and architecture, are all akin, and 

 marked with the same distinguishing qualities. 

 The study of the ancient masters " will give the 

 young artist," says Flaxman, " the true princi- 

 ples of composition, with effect and without 

 confusion, to produce the chief interest of his 

 subject by grand lines of figures, without the 

 intrusion of useless, impertinent, or trivial 



