Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/317

Rh rudeness of the previous uncultivated period had left still clinging to them. But who will venture to affirm that there could yet be found an artist perfect at all points? or one who had arrived at that position, in respect of invention, design, and colour, to which we have attained in the present day? Is there any one who has been able so carefully to manage the shadows of his figures, that the lights remain only on the parts in relief? or who has, in like manner, effected those perforations, and secured those delicate results, in sculpture, which are exhibited by the statues and rilievi of our own day? The credit of having effected this is certainly due to the third period only; respecting which it appears to me that we may safely affirm the arts to have effected all that it is permitted to the imitation of nature to perform, and to have reached such a point, that we have now more cause for apprehension lest they should again sink into depression, than ground for hope that they will ever attain to a higher degree of perfection.

Reflecting attentively within myself on all these things, I conclude that it is the peculiar nature, and distinctive characteristic of these arts, that, rising from mean beginnings, they should proceed to elevate themselves, by gradual effort, and should finally attain to the summit of perfection; and I am confirmed in this opinion by the perception of an almost similar mode of progression in others of the liberal arts. And since there is a close relationship between them all, I am strengthened in the conviction that this, my view, is the just one. With respect to painting and sculpture more especially, their fate, in older times, must have been so exactly alike, that we have only to make a certain change in the names, when the same facts might be related of each. For if the writers who lived near to those times, and who could see and judge of their works, be worthy of credit, the statues of Canacus were stiff, hard, without life or movement of any kind, and therefore very unlike the reality. The same thing has been affirmed respecting the works of Calamis, although they are described as possessing somewhat more of softness than those of the first-named artist. Then came Miron, who, if he did not very closely approach to the successful imitation of nature, did yet impart to his works such an amount of grace, and correct proportion, that