Giovanni da Bologna, or John of Douay, as he is also called, was a sculptor of even greater natural talent than Cellini. He was equipped with almost every gift that a sculptor can desire. It has been well said of him that he had “the power of seeing a definite idea incorporated in a form which is the distillation of all the related sensations which go to make up the idea.” This is the Hellenic gift—the essential characteristic of a man who has to express himself by means of marble and bronze. With it went, in the case of Giovanni Bologna, a wonderful feeling for the beauty of line. Technically, his finest endowment was, perhaps, his unique power of expressing swift movement—the best known example of which is the well-known “Mercury” now in the Bargello. Giovanni images the Messenger of the gods as borne on a light zephyr through space. The figure is the very embodiment of energetic action. Yet the harmony which is essential to sculptural beauty is never sacrificed. [Illustration: BERNINI APOLLO AND DAPHNE Borghese Gallery, Rome] [Illustration: BERNINI SAINT THERESA S. Maria della Vittoria, Rome] But Giovanni Bologna, like Cellini, worked at a time when the force of the humanistic revival had spent itself. He lacked two things, either of which might have placed him among the immortals. One was the perfection of taste which kept Praxiteles in the straight way. The other was the philosophic depth which saved Michael Angelo from overstepping the bounds that separate noble from ignoble art. As it was, Giovanni Bologna’s craftsmanship continually led him astray. He preferred to master a technical difficulty rather than to find the one design which would vitalize an idea or emotion _of real worth_. The consequence was such a work as the well-known “Rape of the Sabine Women.” Primarily this group is a study in the contrast between the strength and vigour of the male form and the shrinking softness of the female. The knotty muscles of the man are sharply contrasted with the soft flesh of the woman whom he bears off. The work is full of beauties, whether we regard it as a design or a piece of modelling. It was the precursor of a long line of similar statues, particularly in France, where the influence of Giovanni Bologna was considerable. “The Rape of Proserpine” by Girardon at Versailles is a good example. But Giovanni Bologna’s “Rape of the Sabines,” considered as an incident in the history of sculpture, is superfluous. The world is surfeited with examples of the magnificent conquest of technical difficulties. Looking at it critically, we are struck with the qualities it lacks rather than with the qualities it possesses. In a sentence, it witnesses to the characteristics of the age for which Giovanni Bologna worked—its material outlook, and its utter neglect of that side of human experience which, for want of a better word, we call spiritual or divine.