Page:Van Loon--The Story of Mankind.djvu/276

222 upon the stage of life. They insisted upon giving "expression" to their own individual ideas. If a man happened to be interested in statesmanship like the Florentine historian, Niccolò Macchiavelli, then he "expressed" himself in his books which revealed his own idea of a successful state and an efficient ruler. If on the other hand he had a liking for painting, he "expressed" his love for beautiful lines and lovely colours in the pictures which have made the names of Giotto, Fra Angelico, Rafael and a thousand others household words wherever people have learned to care for those things which express a true and lasting beauty.

THE MANUSCRIPT AND THE PRINTED BOOK

If this love for colour and line happened to be combined with an interest in mechanics and hydraulics, the result was a Leonardo da Vinci, who painted his pictures, experimented with his balloons and flying machines, drained the marshes of the Lombardian plains and "expressed" his joy and interest in all