"We have examples of this in two of the most beautiful works of antiquity, one of which is the image of the fear of certain death, the other of suffering exceeding anguish. "Niobe and her daughters, against whom Diana shot her fatal arrows, are represented as seized with terror and horror, in that state of indescribable anguish, when the sight of instant and inevitable death deprives the mind of the power of thought. Of this state of stupor and insensibility, the fable gives us an idea in the metamorphosis of Niobe into a stone; and hence Æschylus introduces her in his tragedy as stunned and speechless. In such a moment, when all thought and feeling ceases, in a state bordering upon insensibility, the appearance is not altered nor any feature of the face disturbed, and the mighty artist could here depict the most sublime beauty, and has indeed done so. Niobe and her daughters are, and ever will be, the most perfect models of beauty. "Laocoon is the image of the most acute grief, that puts the nerves, the muscles, and the veins, in action. His blood is in a state of extreme agitation from the venomous bite of the serpents; every part of his body evinces pain and suffering; and the artist has put in motion, so to speak, all the springs of nature, and thus made known the extent of his art and the depth of his knowledge. In the representation, however, of this excessive torment, we can still recognise the conduct of a brave man struggling against his misfortunes, stifling the emotions of his anguish, and striving to repress them." "The ancient artists have preserved this air of composure even in their dancing figures, except the Bacchanals; and thus an opinion obtained that the action of their figures should be modelled on the manners adopted in their ancient dances, and therefore, in their later dances, the ancient figures served as a model to the performers to prevent their overstepping the bounds of a modest deportment: Molli diducunt candida gestu Brachia. _Propert._ "No immoderate or violent passions are ever found expressed in the public works of the ancients. "The knowledge of the ancients cannot be better known than by comparing their performances with the majority of those of the moderns, in which a little is expressed by much, instead of much by a little. This is what the Greeks call [Greek: parenthyrsos]; a word that aptly expresses the defect produced by too much expression in modern artists. Their figures resemble in action the comedians of the ancient theatre, who, to render themselves visible even to the most distant portion of the audience, were compelled to exceed the limits of nature and truth; and the faces of modern figures are like the ancient masks, which for the same reason, the increase of expression, became hideous.