e with you. Our
science is almost entirely lost, and without honour or renown in those
kingdoms, and not through the fault of others, but through the fault of
the place and disusage, to such extent that very few esteem it or
understand it unless it be our most serene king, by supporting all virtue
and patronising it; and likewise the most serene infante D. Luiz, his
brother, a very valorous and wise prince, who has a very nice knowledge
and discretion in every liberal art. All the others neither understand nor
esteem painting."

"They do well," said M. Angelo.

But Master Lactancio Tolomei, who had not spoken for some time, proceeded
in this manner:

"We Italians have this very great advantage over all other nations in this
great world, in the knowledge and honour of all the illustrious and most
worthy arts and sciences. But I would have you to know, M. Francisco
d'Ollanda, that whoever does not understand and esteem the most noble art
of painting does so because of his own defects and not because of the art,
which is very noble and clear; and because he is a barbarian and without
judgment, and has no honourable part in being a man. And this is proved by
the example of the most powerful old and modern emperors and kings, and of
the philosophers and wise persons who attained everything, and who so
greatly esteemed and appreciated the knowledge of painting, and spoke of
it with such high praises and examples, and in making use of it and paying
for it so liberally and magnificently and, finally, by the great honour
that the Mother Church does it, with the holy Pontiffs, cardinals, and
great princes and prelates. And so you will find in all the past
centuries, all the past valorous peoples and nations held this art in so
much honour, that they admired nothing more nor considered anything as a
greater wonder. And then we see Alexander the Great, Demetrius, and
Ptolomy, famous kings, together with many other princes, who readily boast
of understanding it; and amongst the Caesars, Augustus the divine Caesar,
Octavian Augustus, M. Agrippa, Claudius, and Caligula and Nero, in this
alone virtuous, likewise Vespasian and Titus, as was shown in the famous
retable of the Temple of Peace, which he built after having vanquished the
Jews and their Jerusalem. What shall I say of the great Emperor Trajan?
What of Helius Adrianus, who with his own hand painted singularly well, as
the Greek Dion writes in his life, and Spartianus? Then t