found in Dr.
Farnell's _Cults of the Greek States_, and some selected types are
discussed with the greatest subtlety and understanding in Brunn's
_Griechische Gotterideale_. In the present volume only a few examples
are mentioned as characteristic of the various periods. It may thus, I
trust, serve as an introduction to a more complete study of the subject;
and may, at the same time, offer to those who have not the leisure or
inclination for such further study, at least a summary of what we may
learn from Greece as to the relations of religion and art under the most
favourable conditions. It is easy, as Aristotle says, to fill in the
details if only the outlines are rightly drawn--[Greek: doxeie d' an
pantos einai proagagein kai diorthosai ta kalos echonta te perigraphe.]

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGE

I. IDOLATRY AND IMAGINATION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

II. ASPECTS OF RELIGION--POPULAR, OFFICIAL, POETICAL,
PHILOSOPHICAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

III. THE CONDITIONS OF RELIGIOUS ART IN GREECE . . . . . . . . . 48

IV. ANTHROPOMORPHISM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

V. IDEALISM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

VI. INDIVIDUALISM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

VII. PERSONIFICATION, CONVENTION, AND SYMBOLISM . . . . . . . . . 108

RELIGION AND ART IN ANCIENT GREECE

CHAPTER I

INTRODUCTION--IDOLATRY AND IMAGINATION

The relation of religion to art has varied greatly among different
peoples and at different periods. At the one extreme is the
uncompromising puritan spirit, which refuses to admit any devices of
human skill into the direct relations between God and man, whether it be
in the beauty of church or temple, in the ritual of their service, or in
the images which they enshrine. Other religions, such as those of the
Jews or of Islam, relegate art to a subordinate position; and while they
accept its services to decorate the buildings and apparatus connected
with divine worship, forbid any attempt to make a visible representation
of the deity. Modern Christianity, while it does not, as a rule, repeat
this prohibition, has varied greatly from time to time and from country
to country as to the extent to which it allows such representations.
Probably the better educated or more thoughtful individuals would in
ever