Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/36

22 overcome and annihilated the ancient creeds of the pagan world, by the frequency of miracles exhibited, and by the earnest sincerity of the means adopted ; and ardently devoted, with all diligence, to the extirpation of error, nay, to the removal of even the slightest temptation to heresy, it not only destroyed all the wondrous statues, paintings, sculptures, mosaics, and other ornaments of the false pagan deities, but at the same time extinguished the very memory, in casting down the honours, of numberless excellent ancients, to whom statues and other monuments had been erected, in public places, for their virtues, by the most virtuous times of antiquity. Nay, more than this, to build the churches of the Christian faith, this zeal not only destroyed the most renowned temples of the heathens, but, for the richer ornament of St. Peter’s, and in addition to the many spoils previously bestowed on that building, the tomb of Adrian, now called the castle of St. Angelo, was deprived of its marble columns, to employ them for this church, many other buildings being in like manner despoiled, and which we now see wholly devastated. And although the Christian religion did not effect this from hatred to these works of art, but solely for the purpose of abasing and bringing into contempt the gods of the Gentiles, yet the result of this too ardent zeal did not fail to bring such total ruin over the noble arts, that their very form and existence was lost. Next, and that nothing might be wanting to the completion of these misfortunes, the rage of Totila was aroused against Rome, and having first destroyed her walls, he devastated her most noble and beautiful edifices, giving the whole city to fire and the sword, after having driven forth all the inhabitants, so that, during eighteen days, no living soul was to be found within the city ; paintings, statues, mosaics, and all other embellishments, were so entirely wasted and destroyed by these means, that all were deprived, I do not say of their beauty and majesty only, but of their very form and being. The lower rooms of palaces and other edifices being adorned with pictures, statues, and various ornaments, all these were submerged in the fall of the buildings above them, and thence it is that, in our day, so many admirable works have been recovered : for