-British-Museum.jpg) |
| Roman Empire Bottle 5th century AD blown glass, excavated in Syria British Museum |
 |
| Antonio Rossellino Virgin and Child ca. 1460-70 marble relief Bode Museum, Berlin |
-British-Museum.jpg) |
| attributed to Giovanni Maria Obizzo Goblet ca. 1475-1500 enameled glass, made on the island of Murano British Museum |
 |
| attributed to Hans Peisser Putto ca. 1550 lindenwood Art Institute of Chicago |
-British-Museum.jpg) |
| Melchior Reichle Compass and Sundial in Crucifix Form 1569 gilt brass (sliding rulers convert common hours to Italian hours) British Museum |
 |
| Artus Quellinus Omphale with Lion Skin & Club of Hercules before 1668 boxwood British Museum |
-Staatliche-Kunstsammlungen-Dresden.jpg) |
| Hans Petzolt Lidded Vessel with Neptune ca. 1670-80 ivory Staatliche Kunstsammlungen, Dresden |
 |
| Giacomo Antonio Ponsonelli Bust of Mars ca. 1695-1700 marble Liechtenstein Museum, Vienna |
-British-Museum.jpg) |
| Jean-Baptiste Pigalle Louis XV as Roman Warrior ca. 1770-73 porcelain (modeled by Pigalle, produced by Sèvres) British Museum |
 |
| David Roentgen Desk ca. 1785-90 oak, cherry and walnut, veneered with birch burlwood, and with fittings in gilt bronze Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich |
 |
| James Pradier Funerary Urn 1840 marble Musées d'Art et d'Histoire, Genève |
 |
| Hiram Powers The Greek Slave (bust version) 1855-56 marble Reynolda House Museum of American Art Winston-Salem, North Carolina |
 |
| Theodore Roszak Bi-Polar in Red 1940 metal, plastic and wood Whitney Museum of American Art, New York |
 |
| Frank Patania Floral Spray Bracelet ca. 1950 turquoise and silver Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC |
 |
| Leslie Ernest Pinches Portrait of Princess Margaret 1953 electrotype for medallion British Museum |
 |
| Bronwyn Oliver Siren 1985 painted fiberglass National Gallery of Australia, Canberra |
 |
| Gabriel Orozco Inner Circles of the Wall 1999 plaster and graphite Dallas Museum of Art |
But is this life so great a good that the loss of it should be so dear unto man? If it be, the meanest creatures of nature thus be happy, for they live no less than he. If it be so great a felicity, how is it esteemed of man himself at so small a rate that for so poor gains, nay, one disgraceful word, he will not stand to lose it? What excellency is there in it, for the which he should desire it perpetual and repine to be at rest and return to his old Grandmother Dust? Of what moment are the labours and actions of it, that the interruption and leaving-off of them should be to him so distasteful and with such grudging lamentations received?
Is not the entering into life weakness? The continuing sorrow? In the one he is exposed to all the injuries of the elements and like a condemned trespasser (as if it were a fault to come to light) no sooner born than fast manacled and bound; in the other he is restless, like a ball, tossed in the tennis-court of this world; when he is in the brightest meridian of his glory there needeth nothing to destroy him but to let him fall his own height; a reflex of the sun, a blast of wind, nay, the glance of an eye is sufficient to undo him. How can that be any great matter, of which so small instruments and slender actions are masters?
– William Drummond of Hawthornden, from A Cypress Grove (London: Hawthornden Press, 1919, reprinting the original edition of 1623)