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THE RENAISSANCE ORNAMENT. 
in the j4th century the Order of Knighthood had already outlived its time,
people consequently saw that the impossible conditions associated with Feudalism
required to be completely changed in order to suit the new ideas of Religion,
Art, and Science which now began to become prevalent. 
From an Italian Manuscript 
 (Dolmetsch). Humanity broke the fetters with which 
  Feudalism had bound it, and in all branches 
of human activity men appeared to lay the foundations of a new Social, Religious,
Artistic, and Scientific life. A universal re-birth, called by the Italians
Rinascimento, by the French Renaissance, took place. The Gothic, which had
never really become part of the Italian nature, could no longer satisfy the
new ideas, consequently Classic Art was had recourse to, it was the nearest
to hand, and its creations were those which the Italian artists had always
pictured before their eyes. It is impossible to think that the ruins of the
imposing monuments of Classic Art in Italy could have had no influence on
Italian Art. Such influences are, as a matter of fact, to be seen in the
more or less prominent reminiscences of Classic Art seen in the Byzantine,
Roman, and even in the Gothic Style in Italy. Italy became at that time,
in Poetry, Architecture, Plastic, and Plainting, the leader of the entire
Christian world. Characteristic of this Epoch is the complete dissociation
from all ideas then prevalent in the Middle Ages, from the intimate corporate
connections then customary, and from the influence of the Church, and the
change of the individual to a freer independent, purely 
22*