Page:The age of Justinian and Theodora (Volume 1).djvu/252

 b. On the other hand, statuary almost threatened to become a lost art. The devotion to athletic contests, which prevailed among the Greeks, caused them to lay great stress on physical culture; and at the public games, as well as in the preparatory gymnasia, they were constantly familiarized with the aspect of the human figure undraped in every phase of action and repose. The eye of the artist thus acquired a precision which enabled him to execute works in marble with a perfection unapproached in any later age. To the anthropomorphic spirit of polytheism it was necessary that the images of the gods should be multiplied in temples and even in public places; and the Greeks essayed to express the ideal beauty of their divinities under those corporeal forms which appeared most exquisite to the human senses. Received as being of both sexes and as fulfilling the conception of faultless excellence in a variety of spheres, a boundless field lay open before the artist in which to represent them according to their diverse attributes of sovereignty, of intellect, or of grace. But the traditions of Hebrew