_I often hear_, she said,--_but whether it is true, you men
know better than I--that at Olympia the victors are not allowed to
have their statues set up larger than life; the Stewards see to it
that no one transgresses this rule, examining the statues even more
scrupulously than they did the competitor's qualification. Take
care that we do not get convicted of false proportions, and find
our statue thrown down by the Stewards_.

And now I have given you her message. It is for you, Lycinus, to
overhaul your work, and by removing these blemishes avoid the
offence. They shocked and made her nervous as I read; she kept on
addressing the Goddesses in propitiatory words; and such feelings
may surely be permitted to her sex. For that matter, to be quite
frank, I shared them to some extent. At the first hearing I found
no offence; but as soon as she put her finger on the fault, I began
to agree. You know what happens with visible objects; if we look at
them at close quarters, just under our eyes, I mean, we distinguish
nothing clearly; but stepping back to the right distance, we get a
clear conception of what is right and what is wrong about them.
That was my experience here.

After all, to compare a mortal to Hera and Aphrodite is cheapening
the Goddesses, and nothing else. In such comparisons the small is
not so much magnified as the great is diminished and reduced. If a
giant and a dwarf were walking together, and their heights had to
be equalized, no efforts of the dwarf could effect it, however much
he stood on tiptoe; the giant must stoop and make himself out
shorter than he is. So in this sort of portraiture: the human is
not so much exalted by the similitude as the divine is belittled