gather in public places. This intense social life develops the emotional side of individuals. It awakens in them desire for pleasure, for excitement, and for variety. The mind is more alert and impressionable and the whole intellectual life is much more responsive to the expression of artistic feeling. In cold countries the indoor life favors isolation of individuals or small groups, who become less dependent upon the pursuit of pleasure but who can apply themselves more continuously to mental labor. The emotional life of the common people is less well developed, but at the same time it is not so well controlled, so that emotional excesses are not uncommon. In cold countries family life is better developed, and conditions are somewhat more favorable for the pursuit of science.

Aside from these direct influences of the environment upon the intellectual and the emotional life, indirect or secondary influences have helped to make warm countries the natural centers of the arts and especially of sculpture. The physical environment and the human body are among the chief sources of inspiration for the production of art, and in warm countries these sources are much more stimulating. In cold countries man protects himself from the environment, while in warm countries he is in much closer contact with it. Where the body has to be well clothed people are less accustomed to the nude and artists less frequently study it and reproduce it. Contemplation and appreciation of the beauty of nature are also more common under favorable climatic conditions.

An interesting minor effect of the physical environment is its influence in determining the type of art produced. Sculpture and painting are strongly influenced by atmospheric conditions. Sculpture has reached its highest development in dry climates, such as Egypt, Asia Minor, Greece, and Central Italy, where the atmosphere is clear and objects have distinct outlines. In the Netherlands, on the other hand, the climate is exceptionally moist, and the humidity of the atmosphere renders outlines indistinct and causes objects to merge into one another. As Taine observes, "in Holland the spot is the noticeable thing, while in Greece the line is prominent.' Thus the very atmospheric 1 H. Taine, Lectures on Art, Second Series, p. 225.

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conditions of Greece were favorable to the development of sculpture, and even the Greek and Pompeiian paintings showed clearcut figures against simple backgrounds, possibly representative of the clear atmospheric effects. Atmospheric conditions in Holland, while not conducive to clearness of form, do produce constantly changing color schemes. The greenness of nature, the varying density of the mists, and the lights and shades, all combine to give prominence to the earth instead of to the sky, and to produce a delicacy of color unknown in drier regions. Climatic conditions in the Netherlands therefore, and in Venice also, have been strong influences in making these places the homes of the greatest colorist schools in the history of art. Music and literature, on the contrary, have been less strongly influenced by physical conditions. Painting and sculpture express those emotions having their origins in the external world, while music expresses the more subjective emotions. Music in its highest form is the product of a contemplative, philosophical people. Literature is a much more complicated and varied art. It expresses the experiences, the desires, and the aspirations of a people. And while its forms may vary in different environments, literature of one kind or another is to be found wherever peoples are sufficiently advanced for self-expression. It is as likely to mature with a thoughtful as with an emotional people. It is interesting to note that in Germany, the home of science and philosophy, of literature and of music, its great painter Dürer is considered one of the most intellectual painters of any school.

Influence of the Social Environment. Although physical influences upon art are powerful and varied, they have not been strong enough to make the South the exclusive home of art, for not all warm countries have produced great art and no country has produced it at all stages of its development. Therefore other influences connected with the social environment must be more potent than the physical environment in determining the production of art. An analysis of the periods most notable for the greatness of their art, - such as those of Italy during the Renaissance, of the Netherlands during the 15th and 17th centuries, of England during the 16th and of France during the 17th centuries, -all show that art is perfected always in an advanced stage of social life. The economic life of a society must have reached such a point in the accumulation of wealth that a leisure class has been evolved with time and means to devote to cultural activities. Art will then receive the patronage essential to its healthy growth; and history has demonstrated that this growth will continue until pursuit of immediate pleasure becomes so exclusively the object of society, or moral corruption becomes so general, that the morale is undermined and strong emotions are no longer possible. Then art rapidly degenerates. The decline of art is usually discussed from the purely artistic standpoint, and is attributed to servile imitation of the great masters, to an abandonment of nature as a source of inspiration, or to a failure to appreciate and express the national ideals. These are doubtless correct analyses of the course of events; but behind all these factors lies the general truth that, if the social conditions had continued favorable, there would have been a process of selection among artists, eliminating imitators, and popular demand would have brought to the front great artists who could continue to express social ideals. The fact that, in a period of decline, artists select trivial or sensual subjects, or that they pervert their talents by servility to patrons, shows that the social ideals have themselves degenerated to a plane unworthy of artistic representation.

The development of art then requires wealth and leisure, but they must be accompanied by virility and idealism. Wealth in a degenerate or disintegrating society will be powerless to produce a high type of art. Art, however, does not seem to be dependent upon intellectual development nor even upon moral attainment, though the character of art may be of a higher type if accompanied by superior moral and intellectual qualities. Greece at her best reached a superior stage of development in all three of these spheres. But the period of the Renaissance in Italy, though active in intellectual and artistic lines, lacked the moral element. It was a period of violence, licentiousness, and corruption; but nevertheless the corruption was not the kind which showed lack of force and virility. In the earlier period of the Middle Ages Europe generally lacked the intellectual factor, though art flourished and moral ideals revealed lofty sentiments and self-sacrificing devotion. It appears therefore that art, although influenced in its direction by moral and intellectual conditions, is able to develop independently of them.

In every historical period, however, art seems to have reached its zenith at a time of economic prosperity. In Italy the intellectual and artistic revival came at a period when the cities were accumulating wealth from the Mediterranean trade and were the banking centers of Europe. The wealth acquired was spent in luxurious display, social intercourse was refined, and the arts were cultivated.

Similar conditions existed in the Netherlands during the 15th and 17th centuries. Their cities held the trade of the North and were beginning to rival the Italian cities as banking centers. And, although prosperity and artistic development were interrupted by the religious wars of the 16th century, recovery was rapid and the production of art continued through the 17th century. The inhabitants of the Netherlands differed greatly in character and temperament from the Italians, and their wealth was more evenly distributed; but, for northern countries, luxury and extravagence prevailed and the people as a whole were ardent supporters of the fine arts. It is reported that a banker paid 600 florins for a single figure by Vandemeer of Delft.

In England and France also the period of greatest artistic development coincided with that of economic prosperity and of luxurious expenditure. During the time of the Renaissance in Italy both of these countries were too wasted by war to show any great intellectual development. And the people as a whole possessed a lower degree of culture than the Italians. In England, however, after the destructive Wars of the Roses, the reign of the Tudors brought sufficient peace and prosperity to permit a considerable accumulation of wealth, which was shared by the middle classes as well as by the nobility. During the Elizabethan epoch the favorable social forces culminated in an exceptional period of scientific and literary activity.

France did not reach her stage of intellectual development until the 17th century, when the administrations of Richelieu and Mazarin prepared the way for the glories of the early years of the reign of Louis XIV. This period produced a literary and

scientific activity comparable to the Elizabethan epoch in England; and it included also notable building, painting, and sculpture. The luxury of this period did not proceed from a very firm economic foundation, being based rather upon oppression and an unjust system of taxation; but nevertheless it served for the time being to produce an artificial class prosperity sufficient to stimulate the arts. In fact art would have attained an even higher stage of development had it not been for the fact that Louis attempted to impress it so strongly with his own personality. This period furnishes an example of the repression which art may suffer from too great interference from its chief patron.

Spain, at first glance, appears to be an exception to the rule of the coincidence of art and prosperity; at least it seems anomalous that Velasquez should have been painting at the court of Philip IV. It should be remembered, however, that Philip's reign marks the end rather than the beginning of the great period of Spanish art, and the height of prosperity was reached in the reign of Philip II. Furthermore, with the exception of Ribera, the Spanish School was almost entirely a product of Seville. Now Seville, on account of its location as the natural center for both foreign and domestic trade, was a comparatively prosperous city in a destitute country. Although it suffered severely from the emigration of the Moors after the Christian conquest of 1248, it recovered wonderfully after the discovery of America, as it had the monopoly of its rich trade. Certainly it is significant that so many Spanish artists were natives of Seville. Moreover, Philip IV was a generous patron of the fine arts, and in an absolute monarchy the advantages of royal patronage are signal. The Spanish School, though brilliant, was small; but the few great masters indicate what Spain might have produced had she been wisely and economically governed from the time of Charles I.

In ancient Greece conditions were different, for economic life rested upon slavery rather than upon the activity of free citizens. And attainment of leisure was not so much a consequence of wealth as it was of the modesty of personal desires and the ease with which they could be satisfied. The food, clothing, and household equipment, considered essential, were of the simplest;