at edifices were made almost wholly of spoils, it
was easy for the architects, in making the new, to imitate in great
measure the old, which they had ever before their eyes, and that much
more easily than the sculptors could imitate the good figures of the
ancients, their art having wholly vanished. And that this is true is
manifest, because the Church of the Prince of the Apostles on the
Vatican was not rich save in columns, bases, capitals, architraves,
mouldings, doors, and other incrustations and ornaments, which were all
taken from various places and from the edifices built most magnificently
in earlier times. The same could be said of S. Croce in Gierusalemme,
which Constantine erected at the entreaty of his mother Helena, of S.
Lorenzo without the walls of Rome, and of S. Agnesa, built by him at the
request of Constantia, his daughter. And who does not know that the font
which served for the baptism of both her and her sister was all adorned
with works wrought long before, and in particular with the porphyry
basin carved with most beautiful figures, with certain marble
candlesticks excellently carved with foliage, and with some boys in
low-relief that are truly most beautiful? In short, for these and many
other reasons it is clear how much, in the time of Constantine,
sculpture had already declined, and together with it the other finer
arts. And if anything was wanting to complete this ruin, it was supplied
to them amply by the departure of Constantine from Rome, on his going to
establish the seat of the Empire at Byzantium; for the reason that he
took with him not only all the best sculptors and other craftsmen of
that age, whatsoever manner of men they were, but also an infinite
number of statues and other works of sculpture, all most beautiful.

After the departure of Constantine, the Caesars whom he left in Italy,
building continually both in Rome and elsewhere, exerted themselves to
make their works as fine as they could; but, as may be seen, sculpture,
as well as painting and architecture, went ever from bad to worse, and
this perchance came to pass because, when human affairs begin to
decline, they never cease to go ever lower and lower until such time as
they can grow no worse. So, too, it may be seen that although at the
time of Pope Liberius the architects of that day strove to do something
great in constructing the Church of S. Maria Maggiore, they were yet not
happy in the success of the whole, for the