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temples or of the modern palace might be 

 diminished., without diminution of their 

 grandeur, may be a question ; but I believe 

 it is very clear, that after a certain point, as 

 they gained more in lightness, they would 

 become less majestic, and, beyond that 

 again, less beautiful. 



The same principle seems to have guided 

 the highest painters in respect to the human 

 figure. The Prophets and Sybils of M. An- 

 gelo, Raphael, and Fra. Bartolomeo are all 

 of a character and proportion, which in 

 buildings would be called massive : Tibaldi, 

 and after him the Caracci and their disci- 

 ples, formed their style upon those famous 

 models ; and they had a peculiar word 

 (sagoma) to express that fulness and mas- 

 siveness of form, as opposed to the meagre- 

 ness of Mantegna, Pietro Perugino, and al- 

 most all the earlier painters. Particular ex- 

 perpendicular direction: — no weight, they said, would break 

 it. A person who was sitting at some distance from the Duke 

 of Marlborough, called out to him, " My Lord Duke ! it 

 u they were to put Blenheim upon it, egod I believe it would 

 u crush the egg." 



