Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. Excerpt from book: Section 3THE MEN OF THE DAY; AND WHAT THEY WERE DOING A HUNDRED YEARS AGO. CHAP. X. Let us now glance at the intellectual giants who lived on the earth a hundred years ago. Like the arbutus which bears at the same time buds, blossoms, green, mature, and over-ripe fruit, the age was distinguished by its nascent, its brilliant, its fading illustrations. A few words must be devoted to each class, rather as notes of reference than as aiming at description. It was in 1755 that Volney was born. Having acquired a reputation in excess of his real merits, he is now estimated below his intrinsic value. The boldness and originality of his scepticism, at a time when it was possible for scepticism to be both boldand original, invested his
Ruins of Empires
with a light mistaken by his contemporary admirers for the halo of the immortals, but which posterity has already pronounced an evanescent though brilliant coruscation. That same year was more bountiful to the arts. The city of York was enabled to boast of being the birthplace of Flaxman, to whom the present generation is mainly indebted for its appreciation of pure classical beauty in sculpture. Of humbler, but genuine merit, was Henry Bone, a native of Truro, who achieved a high celebrity as a painter in enamel. His most celebrated performance was his
Bacchus and Ariadne, by Titian, for which he received 2200 guineas from that magnificent Maecenas, Mr. Gr. Bowles. And bright was the smile of the Muse of Tragedy, when, in the dull Cambrian town of Brecknock, a strolling actor became the father of a female child. In the fulness of time this infant was destined to be a household word in the mouths of her countrymen to all generations. So long as Shakespeare is remembered, the name of Siddons can never be forgotten. In the following year Godwin first brea…