Ashtabula telegraph. (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1874-1880, 1874-05-23

generations before he was born;
whereas the marble bust actually re-
sembles the original, because it was
taken from a cast of his face when
living. and cut from the block of
marble under his own inspection and
criticism; or, if the statue be copy
of the original, there is the same
chance that it still resembles the sub
iect, Just as the busts of Washing
ton and Franklin, which are copies,
reproduce faithfully their originals.
A picture, at best, is only cOlored
shadow of substance; but the stat
ne is a counterfeit of the thing itself.
1t is something corporal, which one
can not only see, but touch. How
ever, all this is but matter of taste
and notion. Many persons care little
for statuary, but are carried away
with happiness before fine picture.
AGE ADDS TO THE VALUE
of a work of art. 1t lends an addi-
tionaI interest to a statue to know
that it was executed in the ages of
antiquity. There are pieces of stat
nary in the Vatican galleries which
date back before the time of Socra-
tes and Demosthenes; and others in
the Egyptian collection which are
contemporaneous with the periods of
David, Sampson and Moses; and
some obelisks and sarcophagi that
were already ancient in the days of
Abraham OF the seige of Troy. In
the Vatican are scores OF full-length
statues and groups which are either
the works of Phidias and Praxiteles;
or copies therefrom by their disciples.
One can look at the buSts of Homer,
feeling that it is a correct likeness
of the prince of poets, with as much
confidence as that the bust of Shaks-
peare resembles the Bard of Avon.
One of the most interesting col
lections of statuary for the student is
found in the
MUSEUM ON CAPIToT HILL.
One large room is filled with the
busts of the Emperors and their
wives, extending over a period of
500 years; and the adjoining room
contains nearly a hundred busts of
the most illustrious men of Greek
and Roman history, other than the
Roman Emperors. In the hall con-
tanning the latter are. arranged in
chronological order, with scarcely a
break, eighty-three Emperors and
Expresses, beginning with Julius
Caesar. B. C. 63, whose murderer,
Brutus, sits in the adjoining room,
and ending with Justin, in the time
of Belisarius, A. D. 527.
Here the visitor has looking him
in the face, from out of marble eyes,
the rulers of Rome from the date of
it's zenith to the date of its fall.
They embody the history of that
wonderful power from the time the
Republic was changed into the EN-
pire until it was dismembered and
reduced to a ghastly ruin. In con
templating each of these marble i'm
ages, one sees before him the form
and features, the contour and expires
sion-in short, the fac-simile-of a
monarch whose will was law to 15O,-
600, 900 of human beings of Europe,
Asia and Africa.
There, at the head of the process
sion of rulers, sits the counterfeit of
the head of the
MIGHTY DICTATOR,
Julius Caesar, whose frown awed the
world. 1t was brought into,its pres
ent shape in his own presence, and
received its finishing touches under
his own criticism. Next to it sits
the bust of his adopted son, the wise
and magnificent Augustus, who was
the Solomon among the Roman EN-
perors, as Julius Cesar was the Da-
vid, as a warrior and stern ruler;
and then come young Marcellus and
TIberius, in whose reign lived Christ;
Drusus and Antonia, his wife, the
mother of Germanicus and Claudius;
Caligula, the bloody monster, with
round head, thick neck and low
brows; and near him the still blood
ier monster, Nero, the execrated of
Christendom. Not far along the
line are Vespasian and Titus, the de-
stroyers of Jerusalem; and close to
them is the sanguinary wretch, Dom
titan; and near him are Traian and
Hadrian, two of the ablest of the
Roman Emperors. And then comr
the benevolent statesman Antonine
Plus, and
THE REMARKABLE PHILOSOPHER,
Marcus Auelius, of whom it is said,
'Their united reign of forty-two
years are the only periods of Roman
history in which the happiness of a
great people was the sole object OF
Government" One of the two great
columns still standing in Rome is
that to the memory of Marcus Azure.
lius-the other being the Trajan col
umn. But Pope Sixtus V. pulled
down his bronze statue from its sum
init, and placed in its stead fancifu.
representation of St. Paul; and he
also removed The statue of TrajaI
from the top of his column and re
placed it with an ideal bronze of St
Peter.
From the marble bust of Marcus
| Aurelius we pass to those of Com
modus, Pertinax and Septimus Sew
erus-the first named being noted TO
cruelty, and lascivious profigacy
and dissoluteness of life; his bus
exhibits a lecherous mounth and al
evileye. The energetic and abl
Severus sits beside his wife, Julii
Pia, who wears wig. Next to he
is the cruel and dissolute, curly
haired Caracalla, who constructet
the enormous Baths whose ruins still
fill the visitor with astonishment
One or two removes from him is FL
agabalus, whose superstition ant
profigacy were suddenly terminate
by his disgusted soldiery, who ha
imposed him on the people. He wa
succeeded by Alexander Severus, a
able and fair-minded man, with
pleasing face and light moustach'
l.