Page 59

59
of a faculty or power, is not dependent on the will of monarchs, or the
smiles of nobles.   True art is a plant which will flourish in any clime;
it
will bear the frosts of winter, as well as the scorching heats of summer;
it
chooses its own shelter from the winds it most fears, and flourishes best
in
the quiet and repose of nature, but often dies unadmired and unknown.
   From the time of Augustus and his immediate successors, the arts fell
in
public estimation, and not even a succession of virtuous princes, and appa-
rently favourable circumstances, could arrest their decline.   In the year
537
of the Christian era, the Goths attacked Rome.      They have the unenviable
character of barbarous destroyers of the very relics of art; but if they
extin-
guished the flame of knowledge and art, it was burning so dimly, that the
attentive observer would have been before unconscious of its light. It is
true
that these northern warriors could find nothing worthy of respect, much less
of imitation, in a nation they had conquered; yet they were not altogether
insensible to the advantages and pleasures derived from some of the arts,
for in the erection, and decoration of a palace for the Gothic monarch,
architects and sculptors were employed, though we have no knowledge of the
engagement of painters.
   The iconoclasts, mad with religious bigotry, and in the indulgence of
all
those evil propensities which spring from it, were active in the destruction
of
ancient works of art; but in after ages, the progress of architecture, sculpture,
and painting, was aided by a similar zeal in the same cause, differently
directed. Not long after, the ecclesiastics vied with each other in the decora-
tion of the churches with which they were connected, and before the com-
mencement of the ninth century, the desire for novelty and splendour had
introduced the stained glass window.