DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.73713#0017
RAPHAEL MENGS. 13
appeared in their greatest splendor. Every one
favoured them in Greece. The situation of so
many islands which made nature so various and
beautiful; the temperate climate, and the beauty
of the inhabitants, the customs, the sweet liber-
ty, the greatest esteem which they had for beau-
ty, and the sensasions in those minds so well or-
ganised, and even poverty itself concurred to
to that happy combination. Merit opened the
way to the highest honours, even to apothe-
osis. They considered beauty as a gift of the
gods. Men were more valued for that which
they were, than what they possessed. And the
Stimulus above all to the artists was, to see that
their judges were Philosophers, and that the same
who regulated the republic were of the proper
class of artists themselves, as happened to Phidia,
friend of Pericles, and to Socrates the sculptor,
and first ofthe seven wise men, and the oracle
of all the world. We know well the immense
riches of Phidia, and the great premiums that
were given to the celebrated painters and sculp-
tors. This principally consisted from almost all
the works being executed at the public expence
of some city; in consequence ofwhich, poverty
instead of being a disadvantage was useful, be-
cause these people sought not magnificence in
the value of matter, but in the art of the pro-
fessor which they employed.
Although statuary (undoubtedly the mostanci-
entsof the arts,) was very early known in Greece,
it remained for a long time in a style somewhat
dry, after the manner which we fee in the TuG
appeared in their greatest splendor. Every one
favoured them in Greece. The situation of so
many islands which made nature so various and
beautiful; the temperate climate, and the beauty
of the inhabitants, the customs, the sweet liber-
ty, the greatest esteem which they had for beau-
ty, and the sensasions in those minds so well or-
ganised, and even poverty itself concurred to
to that happy combination. Merit opened the
way to the highest honours, even to apothe-
osis. They considered beauty as a gift of the
gods. Men were more valued for that which
they were, than what they possessed. And the
Stimulus above all to the artists was, to see that
their judges were Philosophers, and that the same
who regulated the republic were of the proper
class of artists themselves, as happened to Phidia,
friend of Pericles, and to Socrates the sculptor,
and first ofthe seven wise men, and the oracle
of all the world. We know well the immense
riches of Phidia, and the great premiums that
were given to the celebrated painters and sculp-
tors. This principally consisted from almost all
the works being executed at the public expence
of some city; in consequence ofwhich, poverty
instead of being a disadvantage was useful, be-
cause these people sought not magnificence in
the value of matter, but in the art of the pro-
fessor which they employed.
Although statuary (undoubtedly the mostanci-
entsof the arts,) was very early known in Greece,
it remained for a long time in a style somewhat
dry, after the manner which we fee in the TuG