This is contrary to the opinion which has till recently been entertained. Lord Lindsay asserts of the paintings of the Catacombs that, “considered as works of art, they are but poor productions--the meagreness of invention only equalled by the feebleness of execution--inferior, generally speaking, to the worst specimens of contemporary heathen art.”[330] But this characterization was the result of imperfect acquaintance with the subject. Indeed, he speaks of the Catacombs as “for the most part closed up and inaccessible, and the frescoes obliterated by time and destroyed.” But recent discoveries have brought to light many important examples which completely disprove his depreciatory estimate. In many of the newly opened crypts the colours are as fresh as if applied yesterday; and, as regards style and execution, the frescoes of the Catacombs “approach,” says the eminent art critic, Kugler, “very near to the wall paintings of the best period of the empire.”[331] No one can look through the magnificent volumes of Perret without being struck with the grace, vigour, and classic beauty of many of the paintings there reproduced. It is admitted that the French artists have “touched up” the faded colours, and some of the pictures may be better termed 208 restorations than accurate copies; but they are nowhere accused of being false to the general character and spirit of the originals. The antiquity of these better specimens of Christian art is still further confirmed by their being found in the oldest crypts of the Catacombs; and, like the architectural character of these more ancient chambers, they indicate the publicity of their construction and their legal protection. In the later excavations, on the contrary, the paintings are few in number, and inferior in type and execution--an evidence of the persecution and impoverishment of the Christians as well as of the decline of art. The more celebrated shrines, it is true, were repeatedly decorated at successive periods down to the ninth century;[332] but the times of these decorations may be approximately estimated by internal evidence, as the presence of the Constantinian monogram, of the nimbus,[333] and other characteristic signs testify. [Illustration: ☧]