Soon after the death of Alexander the humiliation of Athens and its old Periclean spirit was complete. If you read the history of Demetrius Poliorcetes, who was even allowed to hold his revels in the most sacred part of the Parthenon--the temple of Minerva--you will see that Athens was enslaved and her people no longer worthy to lead the world in the arts of peace, as they were no longer the brave men who could stand first in war. In their degraded state the Athenians suffered three hundred and sixty statues to be erected to Demetrius Phalereus, and these were destroyed to make way for the golden images of the conquering freebooter Poliorcetes. This last was hailed by the debased people as a god and a saviour. His name and that of his father, Antigonus, were woven into the sacred peplos. At length, under the Diadochi, or successors of Alexander, order was restored, and Antigonus, Ptolemy, Seleucus, and Lysimachus divided the kingdom of Alexander into four Graeco-Oriental monarchies. The dynasty of the Ptolemies in Egypt was the most reputable of these, and gave much encouragement to art and letters. But the sacred fire seems to have died out, or did not burn clearly when transplanted from Athens to Alexandria. The Alexandrines seem to have been mere imitators of what had gone before, and there is nothing to be said of them that is of importance enough for us to linger over it. Very few works remain from this Diadochean period. The Metope of Ilium, which Dr. Schliemann has in his garden in Athens, the Barberini Faun, in the Glyptothek at Munich, and the Nile of the Vatican are the most important remnants of Alexandrine sculpture. Amid all the confusion and strife which followed the death of Alexander the island of Rhodes remained undisturbed, and when the division of the monarchies was made the Rhodians still retained their independence. They were neutral, and so had a commerce with all the monarchies, and thus gained great wealth; and theirs was the only independent State of the old Hellenic world which was able to found and maintain a school of art. Among the great works of the Rhodian artists none is more familiar to us than the group of the Laocoon. In the time of Pliny this work stood in the palace of Titus, and the historian called it "preferable to all other works of pictorial or plastic art." There is a difference of opinion as to the period when it was made, and many date it in the time of Titus, who lived A.D. 40 to 81. But the weight of argument seems to me to rest with those who believe that it was made at Rhodes in the time of the Diadochi.