IN RESPECT OP THE IMITATIVE ARTS. 411 



Paecile and the meridian age of Appelles, who, in the language 

 of Cicero, ronmrnmated this nohle invention lt jam perfecta,'* 

 said h". " sunt omnia." To draw a comparison between these 

 and others of equal celebrity, and the painters of modern times, 

 would be as invidious as foreign to the plan I have prescribed to 

 myself. It is enough to observe, that their excellence has been 

 admitted, to its utmost extent, by Raphael and Poussin ; and we 

 cannot err in applauding them after such antecedent panegyrics. 



Upon the subjects of Grecian statuary and engraving, so nearly 

 connected with painting, I have not space to enter. The perfec. 

 tion of the former art may be fully appreciated from the precious 

 reliques which have descended to our own days ; and that of the 

 latter, from the description of the shields of their heroes as pre. 

 sented to us by their poets. But I ought not to forbear noticing, 

 that amidst many other proofs of their ingenuity, which are totally 

 lost to us, is to be enumerated their mode of encaustic painting as 

 well in wax as on ivory. Of the inventors of these very curious 

 arts we know nothing. The style of painting in wax was in com- 

 mon use at least as early as the age of Anacreon, who, as the 

 friend of Polycrates of Samos, must have flourished upwards of five 

 hundred years anterior to the Christian aera j for he expressly men. 

 tions it in several places, and particularly in Ode xxviii. in which 

 he gives his direction to the painter, who was taking a likeness of 

 his mistress. 



y.p a? njv 



Enough 'tis she her air, her cheek 

 O WAX ! thou soon wilt learn to speak. 



There was also another mode of employing wax in ship. painting, 

 which was obviously invented for the sake of duration, but which 

 is equally lost to us. The little with which we are acquainted of 

 these diiferent methods is preserved by Pliny in the following pas. 

 sage, xi. 41: Encausto pingcndi duo fuisse antiquitus genera 

 constat, cora et in ebore, cestro, id est, verculo ; donee classes 

 pingi cccpere. Hoc tertium adcessit, resolutis igni ceris penioello 

 utendi j quae picttira in navibusnec sole nee sale, ventigque corrum- 

 pitur. " There were formerly two modeb of painting in encaustic, 

 with wax, and on ivory, by the use of a cestrum, or graver, till, at 

 length, ships began to be painted. A third mode was then in. 



