"The principal cause of the progress of sculpture was the
enlargement which it experienced in the range of its subjects,
and the consequent multiplicity of its productions. As long as
statues were confined to the interior of the temples, and no
more were seen in each sanctuary than the idol of its worship,
there was little room and motive for innovation; and, on the
other hand, there were strong inducements for adhering to the
practice of antiquity. But, insensibly, piety or ostentation
began to fill the temples with groups of gods and heroes, strangers
to the place, and guests of the power who was properly invoked
there. The deep recesses of their pediments were peopled with
colossal forms, exhibiting some legendary scene appropriate to
the place or the occasion of the building. The custom of honoring
the victors at the public games with a statue--an honor afterward
extended to other distinguished persons--contributed, perhaps,
still more to the same effect; for, whatever restraints may have
been imposed on the artists in the representation of sacred subjects,
either by usage or by a religious scruple, these were removed when
the artists were employed in exhibiting the images of mere mortals.
As the field of the art was widened to embrace new objects, the
number of masters increased; they were no longer limited, where
this had before been the case, to families or guilds; their
industry was sharpened by a more active competition and by richer
rewards. As the study of nature became more earnest, the sense
of beauty grew quicker and steadier; and so rapid was the march
of the art, that the last vestiges of the arbitrary forms which
had been hallowed by time or religion had not yet everywhere
disappeared when the final union of truth and beauty, which we
sometimes endeavor to express by the term ideal, was accomplished