ues, as Diodorus tells; that the Egyptians took them from the
Ethiopians, and, from them, the Greeks; for by Homer's time sculpture
and painting are seen to have been perfected, as it is proved, in
discoursing of the shield of Achilles, by that divine poet, who shows it
to us carved and painted, rather than described, with every form of art.
Lactantius Firmianus, by way of fable, attributes it to Prometheus, who,
in the manner of Almighty God, shaped man's image out of mud; and from
him, he declares, the art of statuary came. But according to what Pliny
writes, this came to Egypt from Gyges the Lydian, who, being by the fire
and gazing at his own shadow, suddenly, with some charcoal in his hand,
drew his own outline on the wall. And from that age, for a time,
outlines only were wont to be used, with no body of colour, as the same
Pliny confirms; which method was rediscovered with more labour by
Philocles the Egyptian, and likewise by Cleanthes and Ardices of Corinth
and by Telephanes of Sicyon.

Cleophantes of Corinth was the first among the Greeks who used colours,
and Apollodorus the first who discovered the brush. There followed
Polygnotus of Thasos, Zeuxis, and Timagoras of Chalcis, with Pythias and
Aglaophon, all most celebrated; and after these the most famous Apelles,
so much esteemed and honoured by Alexander the Great for his talent, and
the most ingenious investigator of slander and false favour, as Lucian
shows us; even as almost all the excellent painters and sculptors were
endowed by Heaven, in nearly every case, not only with the adornment of
poetry, as may be read of Pacuvius, but with philosophy besides, as may
be seen in Metrodorus, who, being as well versed in philosophy as in
painting, was sent by the Athenians to Paulus Emilius to adorn his
triumph, and remained with him to read philosophy to his sons.

The art of sculpture, then, was greatly exercised in Greece, and there
appeared many excellent craftsmen, and, among others, Pheidias, an
Athenian, with Praxiteles and Polycletus, all very great masters, while
Lysippus and Pyrgoteles were excellent in sunk reliefs, and Pygmalion in
reliefs in ivory, of whom there is a fable that by his prayers he
obtained breath and spirit for the figure of a virgin that he made.
Painting, likewise, was honoured and rewarded by the ancient Greeks and
Romans, seeing that to those who made it appear marvellous they showed
favour by bestowing on them citizenship and the