In the Periclean age, art was held as a glory, not as a luxury. Private life was frugal and modest, while the public monuments were soaring in proudest display. Socrates, the cotemporary of Pericles, according to his own testimony preserved by Xenophon, occupied a house which, with all it contained, was valued at five minæ, or about ninety dollars. The dwellings of Miltiades, Aristides, Themistocles, and Cimon were contracted and devoid of all decoration. Alcibiades was the first who introduced painting as an ornament to his living apartments. But a passion for art actuated all classes, and was most prominent in the highest. Thus the beautiful Elpinice, sister of Cimon, took a pride in being a model to Polygnotus, at the same time her potent brother, at the head of the republic, triumphed over the mighty king. With kindred zeal, the populace of Croton gathered all the fairest damsels before Zeuxis, in order that from them he might select the best features with which to execute their commission to paint Helen. The astonishing progress made at that period in sculpture and painting was seen in the contrast which existed between an Indian idol, or Egyptian Isis, and the Jupiter of Phidias; between the infantile fancies of a Chinese designer, and the ineffable charms of a picture by Apelles. While Socrates employed the language of Homer as the medium of moral discourse, and Plato thence derived images and reasoning to convey the theologies of Orpheus and Pythagoras, Agatharcus invented dramatic painting, and drew for Æschylus the first scene that ever agreed with the rules of linear perspective. A picture of the battle of Marathon, representing Miltiades erect in the foreground, was solemnly guarded by the public, and deemed an adequate reward by that great captain. A pendant to this is said to have been one representing Aristides watching at night over the bloody field, in sight of the blue sea, no longer crowded by the barbarian fleet, and the white columns of the temple of Hercules, near which the Athenians had pitched their tents.