THE RISE AND. PROGRESS 



OF 



THE FINE ARTS. 



PART II. 



CHRISTIAN. 



WHEN Christianity rose, the heathen arts fell ; 

 not, indeed, at once, as Dagon did, but slowly 

 and surely. Their spirit was touched, oracles 

 became dumb, divine voices were no longer 

 heard on Olympus, and Jupiter and Minerva gra- 

 dually grew into figures of speech. But the fine 

 arts would have sunk, had the star of Bethlehem 

 never risen. It is true, that Christianity forbade 

 bowing to gods of stone, and wood, and brass, 

 and desired man to raise his eyes towards that 

 Divine Being, the Unknown God of the heathen, 

 who created and directed all. This would have 

 purified art, rather than crushed it ; painting and 

 sculpture, taking a new direction, and inspired 

 with a truer inspiration, would have wrought 

 miracles worthy of the days of Phidias and 

 Apelles : but time was not afforded for the 

 change. Before the coming of Christ the 

 northern nations of the earth, an unsummed and 

 unknown race, had given intimations of their 

 resolution to march towards the sun, and contend 

 with those who called them barbarians for the 

 vineyards and cornfields of Italy and Greece. 

 In the days of the apostles this terrible march 

 was begun ; and though the warlike spirit of the 

 early emperors, and the discipline of the legions, 

 retarded or repulsed the Gothic nations for a 

 time, they burst the decaying barriers of the 

 empire at last, and science and letters were all 

 but extinguished on the earth. They were 

 neither softened by the harmony of verse, nor 

 gladdened by the loveliness of sculpture or 

 painting. Temples, statues, pictures, books, all 

 were trodden relentlessly underfoot, in their 

 tremendous march. 



The spirit the divine spirit of Christianity, 

 enabled it to survive this sad devastation ; and 



with it the hopes of science and letters remained. 

 The fierce conquerors of all that was civilized or 

 elegant rested themselves among the ruins of 

 temples and cities ; and with the wine-cup in 

 one hand and the sword in the other, gave a sort 

 of surly audience to the dauntless successors of 

 the apostles, who came to tempt them with the 

 joys of heaven, or alarm them with the horrors of 

 hell. By some it has been reckoned miraculous 

 that those rude and fierce chiefs who ruled the 

 Gothic tribes, seated with one foot, perhaps, on 

 the body of a mangled Roman, and the other on 

 a broken statue Apollo or Venus should have 

 listened, and that with emotion, to the first 

 preachers of the word of God. But be it borne in 

 mind, that the latter came neither as suppliants, 

 nor rivals, nor enemies ; they desired no share 

 in their conquests, nor in their carousals ; the 

 kingdom which they revealed to them was not of 

 this world ; and thus opening up fresh sources of 

 glory, the Gothic princes listened, and perhaps 

 postponed the destruction of a temple or the 

 burning of a city for a day. There was some- 

 thing in the glory or the woe of a future state 

 which suited the imaginations, and, in some 

 measure, accorded with the natural belief of the 

 Goths, and fitted their minds for receiving the 

 sublime truths of the gospel. 



Painting and sculpture aided largely in this 

 beneficial conversion. The first missionaries, 

 speaking the classic languages of Greece or 

 Rome, were not understood by their northern 

 audiences till they called in the works of the 

 pencil and chisel as auxiliaries. A Christ on 

 the Cross, a Virgin Mother, a Saint John in the 

 Wilderness, the Raising of Lazarus, the Ascen- 

 sion, together with reliques of the early saints, 

 all helped to relate the history and the hopes of 

 Christianity, and impress it on their rude under- 

 standings. Nor were the barbarians reluctant hear- 



