Pliny says there was a doubt in his time, whether some statues
representing the dying children of Niobe (_Niobæ liberos morientes_), in
the Temple of Apollo Sosianus at Rome, were by Scopas or Praxiteles.
The well known group of this subject in the Florentine gallery, is
generally believed to be the identical work mentioned by Pliny. Whether
it be an original production of one of these great artists, or as some
critics have supposed, only a copy, it will ever be considered worthy of
their genius, as one of the sweetest manifestations of that deep and
intense feeling of beauty which the Grecian artists delighted to
preserve in the midst of suffering. The admirable criticism of Schlegel
(Lectures on the Drama, III), developes the internal harmony of the
work. "In the group of Niobe, there is the most perfect expression of
terror and pity. The upturned looks of the mother, and the mouth half
open in supplication, seem to accuse the invisible wrath of Heaven. The
daughter, clinging in the agonies of death to the bosom of her mother,
in her infantile innocence, can have no other fear than for herself; the
innate impulse of self-preservation was never represented in a manner
more tender and affecting. Can there, on the other hand, be exhibited to
the senses, a more beautiful image of self-devoting, heroic magnanimity
than Niobe, as she bends her body forward, that, if possible, she may
alone receive the destructive bolt? Pride and repugnance are melted down
in the most ardent maternal love. The more than earthly dignity of the
features are the less disfigured by pain, as from the quick repetition
of the shocks, she appears, as in the fable, to have become insensible
and motionless. Before this figure, twice transformed into stone, and
yet so inimitably animated--before this line of demarkation of all human
suffering, the most callous beholder is dissolved in tears."