Elements of a Contract Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Elements of a Contract - Assignment Example Ball parks are not included in an offer. It does not request for proposals of a letter of intent. Indicating general intent to launch into a contract and inviting persons, to give their offers is what constitutes an invitation to treat. An offer goes beyond mere display of intent. For instance, displaying cars in a motor vehicle shop together with their prices does not constitute an offer waiting for interested customers to walk in and accept the offer. Rather, it becomes an offer when a customer comes and selects the car of the price they want and goes to pay for it. The motor vehicle seller will then decide to, either accept the offer, or not. A contract that has a high value has a longer time of offer (Blum, 2007). Acceptance Acceptance is an expression by the person who receives the offer that they have accepted it. Acceptance needs to be an absolute and unconditional agreement that a person will abide by the terms spelt out in the offer(Drake, 2007). The person who gave the offe r needs to see to it that the person receiving it has understood it well. It ought to come before the expiry of the period of offer. Otherwise, acceptance can only be valid after the given time of offer has lapsed if the one giving the offer renews that period. Where the time of the offer has been stated as ‘reasonable’, usually, the circumstances of such a case will define what is reasonable. If there are conditions attached to the acceptance or the terms of the offer changes, the involved parties are negotiating. Legal consideration Consideration is needed in order to make the contract valid. Parties exchange promises or make an act as to the agreement. Consideration is what makes such an arrangement binding. Consideration denotes some form of benefit to the one who is making the offer and a corresponding cost to the one accepting the offer. It could be monetary, some form of right or interest. The parties agree on how much consideration is adequate. This consideratio n needs to be something valuable. Such an agreement is subject to the courts deciding whether to enforce it, especially with regard to the adequacy of the consideration(Helewitz, 2007). A past promise cannot be a consideration. It is must either a new promise or benefit in exchange of the offer. Capacity A valid contract is between competent parties. Legal capacity is defined by several factors. There are people who are not free to enter into a valid contract, and their consent is treated specially. People who have mental impairment may not understand the terms of a contract. Legal capacity of mentally impaired people will largely depend on whether there is a genuine consent. Since consent depends on an individual’s understanding of a contract, the complexity or simplicity of a contract matters(Burton, 2009). Courts may have to come in if it is established that the individual who was making the offer knew of the disability of the contracted person and was out to take advantag e of them. The contract can also be suspended if the benefit that the second party received has not been sold to another that was not involved in the contract. If it had been sold, the third party is informed of the possible outcomes so as not to be bound by the contract. There are some people with mental impairments who are assisted by administrators that are legally appointed for them. Such people cannot enter contracts freely

Economics for the global manager Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Economics for the global manager - Essay Example All benefits have a corresponding cost. The air we breathe, kept clean through laws costing millions of dollars to enforce, is not free. If your friend treats you for lunch, it is not free for you either, because the time you spent with your friend has an opportunity cost that may probably be more than the price of the lunch. 3. Why might the government want to influence transactions The government wants to influence transactions for many reasons. First, as in nations with free market economies, the government wants to make sure the market's rules are fair as part of its mandate to keep the people happy. One danger of a free market economy is explained by what is called asymmetric information: sellers may hide vital information from buyers that does not allow a fair price to be paid for a good (think second-hand car dealers). Otherwise, people cheated all the time will be aggravated and may move to change the government. Second, the government wants to control the supply and flow of money in the economy, because if they do not, there will be trouble in the form of inflation that can lead to social unrest (Solomon 1972 cited in Samuelson 1992, p. 712). Third, the government wants to influence transactions, like the Fed setting interest rates, Congress cutting budget deficits, or the Commerce Department ne gotiating trade agreements, because of the add-on effects that these actions (all are forms of market intervention) have on the nation's macroeconomic conditions. And fourth, government wants to ensure the country's patrimony is safe, for example to prevent some scam artist from selling the Statue of Liberty to foreigners. 4. What does the spillover or externality principle measure Use examples. This principle measures the costs or benefits of externalities, activities that affect others, without meaning to, either positively in the form of benefits not paid for or negatively in the form of inconvenience or costs for which they are not compensated. An example of the first (called external economies) is having a wife who is a doctor (you can consult her for "free" or, at least, you don't have to pay someone else to prescribe the right medicine). An example of the second (called external diseconomies) is driving recklessly on the freeway, which makes many other drivers nervous and increases their consumption of tranquilizers. 5. Currently our demand for gasoline is rising as our economy is expanding. However, we expect OPEC to keep the supply stable. Use a graph to show what your prediction is for the price of gasoline. USE A GRAPH INDICATING WHEN THE DEMAND INCREASES. I predict the price will increase, because as shown in the graph on Figure 1, with the supply constant and the demand increasing, the demand curve shifts to the right, moving the equilibrium point to the right, with the effect of increasing the equilibrium price, or the point at which the current supply curve intersects the increased demand curve, from p to p'. At price p, the gasoline market is in equilibrium, that is, supply equals demand. OPEC's move holds the supply curve steady, but an expanding/growing economy needs more fuel,

Effects of the Fur Trade on Native Societies Essay Example for Free

Effects of the Fur Trade on Native Societies Essay Between the fifteenth and the nineteenth century the fur trade and slave trade connected the global commerce, and played a significant role in world history. Each of them transformed the destiny of North American and African society. Politically, economically and culturally, North Americans were dying slowly in seemingly more peaceful fur trade, and Africans were immediately hit by the wreaked havoc of slave trade. North America’s ostensible peace with the outside world could not avoid civil wars, as African people’s self-protection could not avoid European gory violent human plunder. In Africa, people were still live in a village community system with introverted self-governments. When colonists came, big kingdoms fragmented because the increasing of trade and arms. In this way, there was not a large-scale revolt or uprising in native Africa. As a result, small societies suffered from frequent slave raiding. As long as their own village was safe, they passively watched as people in other villages were raided and sold. Benin was a developed state in West Africa. In the 16th century the oba banned slave trade and relatively avoided slave traders. They bought arms from Europeans to protect themselves, but never helped others. In consequence, the power of oba declined in the 18th century and they could not stop the slave trade any more (456-457). When armed aggressors burst in small villages, they could not even protect themselves like Benin, but just be pillaged in desperation. Native Americans maintained cooperative relationships with Europeans under the fur trade. It protected them from extinction and slavery like those in Africa. However native people noticed the benefit of the fur trade, and then the profit of trade intensified the competition among tribes. They began to demand guns to deal with other tribes – and Europeans had gun. Therefore a circulation of furs and guns was fo rmed, and the increasing of arms imports aggravated the political conflicts of native people. In other words, more trade, more warfare. Fur trade brought North America both modern civilization and prolonged damage, yet the African economy was directly attacked by slave trade. North Americans traded furs with Europeans and received foreign goods and benefits such as pots, guns and metals. Europeans finished products gave them modern technology and tools, and caused the self-sufficiency system to transform to agricultural villages. Hurons lived in North America â€Å"in the early seventeenth century†. They traded many beavers and â€Å"received copper pots, metal axes, knives, cloth, firearms, and alcohol† (447). It was a big step for North America, to become a modern and developed society. Nevertheless, it was also the start of a long-term decline. â€Å"By the 1760s, hunters in southern British colonies took about 500,000 deer every year† (446). Hunters largely killed industrious animals, the amount of them sharply decreased. The fur trade absorbed labor supply, and restricted other developments. In reality, North America had been lagged behind chronically under the simple and dependent economic system caused by fur trade. Unlike North America, Africa had been steadily developing for a while in sixteenth century. The slave trade, was unprecedented havoc for native people and society. Just demographically, Africa lost millions of population in the fifteenth through nineteenth century. The productivity was greatly broken. The economy stagnated, or even retrogressed without technology. Both native North American and African people lost part of their ethos and native culture. North America was changed more by profit motive; however Africa was forced by demographical transformation and authorities’ avarice. Before European’s arrival, North Americans led a primitive lifestyle as a part of nature. They had laggard tools and technology but mastered natural environment. Their moral quality could be confirmed by the origin of Thanksgiving holiday: Native Indian helped European settlers tide over the hard time. Although they were economically backward, their spiritual civilization was wealthy. But after they began to trade with Europeans, they killed animals in quantity, overly reclaimed land, and broke their belief of nature. The benefits of furs led people to trade for guns and fight other tribes. Many of them became alcoholics, spent a lot of money to buy rum and brandy. They used foreign products all the time, and forgot their traditional crafts. In Africa, Europeans raided and drove away people in different cultures, and exterminated many ancient civilizations. The Europeans trading living human without caring whether they lived or died, was a bloody humiliation in the history. The hard truth is that many native authorities joined slave trading for their own interest. Dahomey was a highly authoritarian state in eighteenth century. They fully participated in slave trade and helped Europeans capture a lot of native people (456-457). It was a miserable shame of African culture and entire human history, that the chiefs of states helped invaders do human trafficking. Both trades certainly destroyed a part of native civilization, and changed a part of people. The politics, culture and economy of the native North Americans were gradually negatively affected while trading with Europeans and Africans were rapidly devastated by large human raid. Once, struggling in the wheel of history, they grew and died.

Poems By Ann Bradstreet And Edward Taylor

Poems By Ann Bradstreet And Edward Taylor Ann Dudley Bradley was an American writer who was born in the year 1612 and lived for 60 years and died in 1672. Among her many works that she wrote included the poem titled The Prologue. She is best remembered as the first American poet to be published during colonisation of America. Edward Taylor was born in Sketchley, Leicestershire, England in 1642 and he lived for 87 years till in 1729. He too was an American poet during the colonisation of America. A Pastor and a Physician, one of his poems published was titled Prologue. The prologue by Ann has eight stanzas and each stanza has six lines, the stanzas of the poem have been arranged in a simple and clear manner; while in comparison with the prologue by Edward, written in 1939 from Preparatory Meditation has five stanzas and six lines. The first and the third line of every stanza have been indented left. Ann Bradley in her poem in the first stanza seems to despise the tendency to praise and adore war, captains and the kings and th eir cities and wealth that are as a resultant of war. She seems not to be able to compel herself into taking her pen and paper and praise them. (For my mean pen are too superior things). To her, it is the duty of poets and historians to set the facts straight. In her poem there is a thin line between the facts of history and the illusions of the kings and captains plus their wealth: and there worth will not be deemed by her writing. The perception of Ann and the emotions of her heart seem to look down about the colonisers good way of life (great bartas sugared lines) and she feels saddened about the state of her fellow Americans in the middle of plenty. In the Prologue by Edward Taylor, the poet seems to ask God a rhetoric question, that its very obvious like a clear sky that the dust that is on the earth (men) can not outweigh the totality of the grand mountains (superiority of God) on the earth caused its not their design nor show that can befit the grandeur of the divinity. To hi m he is self-agreeing that being handed a moistures pen (pen that is ready to be written with) will guide him in giving a wonderful praise to the lord. In the second stanza, he glorifies a pen that has been expectedly made for writing using a super refined ink that can even write on the most unlikely surface (in crystal leaves) where it can write ferociously till the writer stops. Both writers seem to praise the art of writing in bringing out their perception and in glorifying heavenly and in seeking self worth. (2nd stanza for Edward and the fifth and the sixth line of the first stanza for Ann.) In the fourth to the sixth stanzas, Ann Bradley states that they do not expect, any expressive language (rhetoric) from the school boys nor music (sweet consort) from old musical equipments (broken strings) nor a beauty that dance to their tune and so her thoughts also sings out but all this is in vain as whatever the issue at hand, it is not reversible as cause nature made it so. These has made her to dislike the Greek who through art discovered that there desires can be partly fulfilled by art to a certain extent , but at the end of the day an injured brain does not accept therapy.( the fifth stanza). The poet is intolerable to every nagging tongue that prejudices her hand that writes and scorns at her work just because of the superiority of her works and because sh e is female. This brings about the theme of gender bias and inequality through her works (Who says my hand a needle better fits.)and its her duty to prove them wrong through her works ( a poets pen all scorn) even though proving them wrong through her works will lead them to stating that her works and intelligence are not original but its plagiarized( last two sentence of the sixth stanza) Edward Taylor, in the third to the fifth and the last stanza refers himself to be the crump of dust that is so low in the society and its only through his pen that he can bring himself to the level of the praise and high life like the mountains and these he is to do through praising of the Lord through written poems written in the most refined if inks (Â  And Write in Liquid Gold upon Thy Name; My Letters till Thy glory forth doth flame.) He continues by stating that no one should attempt to neither break down his endeavours nor laugh at his works. He applies to the lord to inspire his works and may glory be given to the lord who may have mercy to all those that are looking down at his works of praise (Nor laugh Thou them to scorn but pardon give). For if glory is given then it will last (Thy dust shall live.) And that the people should be careful not to scorn at the short coming of his works as they are still part of his works. (They being Slips slipped from Thy Crumb of Dust.) Edw ard as the crump of dust seeks God( the mountain) to guide him so that he can show case his prowess and give praise and glory to the almighty god (the last stanza)In the last three stanza for Ann Bradley, she looks back at the ancient Greeks who were mild in there treatment of there women but they are still pretenders (Else of our sex why feigned they those Nine). To her Greeks are Greeks and that men should stop waging wars to prove to the women as they have an advantage and they will always excel, all that women are seeking from the men is some respect and acknowledgement for all that they do( Yet grant some small acknowledgement of ours) For even the birds that fly the skies fly high but catch their prey and that men can stop looking down the women achievements then women achievement including her works is bound to bring more wealth to the men by simply acknowledging them.( last stanza) . To conclude both writers are looking at the art of writing as a means of fulfilling there de sires. For Ann Acknowledgement from men and for Edward praise to the lord.

ESP Abilities :: essays research papers

Ability and talent A person's psychic, ESP, or telepathic abilities can't be judged by a single or a group of exercises. This ability develops through time and practice. So, if you don't do well the first time, don't feel bad, the exercises need to be practiced over and over. Be patient and you can expect to see an improvement in all your latent abilities over a period of time, not just in a few tries of guessing cards. Attitude The mind set and attitude at the time of the test are critical. It is important to maintain enthusiasm and interest when testing yourself because it has been found to make a difference. When a person begins to get bored, their score often times goes down. Meditation This helps to train your mind to focus. It’s very helpful to meditate before you start ESP exercises. The object of the process is two-fold; to relax the body and to subdue the thoughts that continuously traverse our mind. One never stops the mind completely, but one can achieve states of relatively long periods where the mind is silent. It is during these moments, no matter how brief they are, that we enter a state of the void, the null or nothingness. Start the counting from around 20 and imagine seeing the shape of each number as you count down. At one point you may disappear from the counting process and not be aware that you've done so. It’s OK, don't be concerned, its part of meditation. You can also say to yourself â€Å"deeper† and imagine your body drowning into deep state if counting requires too much effort. ESP Exercises 1. Using the ESP symbols, make your own card preferably 25, 5 for each symbol. Try to guess what the card is without looking. It’s always good idea to record your results to see if you’re making progress. If it helps, make the card distinct as possible and practice with fewer symbols until you feel comfortable. Also playing with different colors may help you differentiate better. 2. Get 3 cups and fill each cup with water, orange juice and milk. Either blindfold your eye or set up some kind of barrier where you can’t see the content of the cup, place hand directly over the cup and guess the content of each. Focus and try to feel the energy each liquid is exerting.

Biblical Allusions and Imagery in Steinbecks The Grapes of Wrath :: Grapes Wrath essays

Biblical Allusions and Imagery in Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath John Steinbeck always makes it a point to know about his subjects first hand. His stories always have some factual basis behind them. Otherwise, he does not believe that they will be of any value beyond artistic impression. Therefore, most of his novels take place in California, the site of his birth and young life. In preparation for writing his novels, Steinbeck would often travel with people about whom he was going to write. The Grapes of Wrath was no exception to his other works. To prepare for it, he joined migrants in Oklahoma and rode with them to California. When he got to California, he lived with them, joining them in their quest for work. By publishing these experiences and trials of the migrants he achieved an effect that won him the Nobel Prize for literature in 1962. The writing of The Grapes of Wrath coincided with the Great Depression. This time of hardship and struggle for the rest of America gave Steinbeck inspiration for his work. Other peoples' stories of everyday life became issues for Steinbeck. His writings spoke out against those who kept the oppressed in poverty and therefore was branded as a Communist because of his "voice." Although, it did become a bestseller and receive countless awards, his book was banned in many schools and libraries. However, critics never attacked The Grapes of Wrath on the artistic level and they still consider it a beautifully mastered work of art. More than any other American novel, it successfully embodies a contemporary social problem of national scope in an artistically viable expression.1 In The Grapes of Wrath, Steinbeck utilizes Biblical imagery and allusions to illustrate the struggle of the Joad family as a direct parallel with that of the Hebrew people. Steinbeck bolsters the strength of structure and character development in the book through Biblical allusions and imagery. Peter Lisca has noted that the novel reflects the three-part division of the Old Testament exodus account which includes captivity, journey, and the promised land.2 The Joads' story is a direct parallel with that of the Hebrews. Just as the Hebrews were captives of the Pharaoh, the Joads' are captives of their farm. Both make long and arduous journeys until they reach their promised land. Israel is the final destination for the Hebrews and California plays the same role for the Joads. Hunter mentions several of the parallels in the novel. When the Joads embark on their journey, there are twelve members which corresponds to the twelve tribes of Israel who are leaving the old order behind.

Discobolus by Myron (Ancient Greek Art)

In any history, and above all in the history of art, there are two main aspects, from which the subject may be considered. The subject may be either studied from the point of view of general tendencies, the development of types and ideas, their national character, and the circumstances that surrounded and fostered their growth; or attention may be given to the achievements of individuals, their personality, and the contributions that they respectively made to the general progress.It is true that in any comprehensive study the two must be blended, must supplement and confirm each other. Whichever principle is followed to guide the selection and arrangement of the facts, the study cannot follow it to the entire exclusion of the other. Yet the artist is no less dependent upon external circumstances for the occasion and the material of his works.Had not the predecessors worked through generations of experiment and observation to improve the familiar types, to attain mastery over the stub born substance of marble and bronze, and to acquire and perfect a skilled technique in the treatment of the nude and of drapery, no sculptor of the fifth century could have conceived or executed the bold yet symmetrical contortions of the Discobolus. Had Myron been born a century earlier, he could no more have produced these works than if he had lived at the present day.Before the study approaches the work of this individual master, it may be advisable to take a more general survey of the character of Greek sculpture, as contrasted with earlier and later styles. No art, and especially that of sculpture, can make true progress unless it is constantly kept in touch with nature by observation. Here again the social surroundings of the Greek artist gave him an immense advantage over all others. The daily exercises in the palaestra or gymnasium and the frequently recurring athletic festivals gave him constant opportunities for observing the human form both in rest and in action.This perf ection of condition and of all-round muscular development with the help of a well-trained memory is one of the chief attainments of Myron. For the observation of drapery, too, he had constant opportunities in the figures that surrounded him in daily life. There he could see a variety and grace of texture and of folds such as no draping of a model in unfamiliar garments and materials could ever have suggested. It is true that the same opportunities for varied observation did not exist in the case of the nude female figure.It is perhaps for this very reason that Greek statues of this type, however beautiful in form, rarely if ever impress us with the same breadth and nobility of conception as the corresponding male figures, whether of gods or men. The feeling of the Greeks themselves about the matter is well illustrated by the story of Zeuxis at Croton , how the people of that town, when they commissioned him to paint a picture of Helen, and wished to give him every opportunity for ex celling himself in such a subject, allowed him to see a selection of the most beautiful of their maidens just as freely as he could see their brothers exercising in the palaestra.This is evidently the meaning of the story, though it is misinterpreted by some later authorities in accordance with the eclectic spirit of their own age. Myron was a Greek sculptor. He is supposed to have been a pupil of Ageladas of Argos, but he worked largely in Athens. Sculpting in bronze, he was noted for his animals (of which no examples have survived) and for his athletes in action. His works are known through descriptions by ancient writers, such as Pliny and Pausanias, and two of them by copies, the Discobolus (Gr. discus thrower), the best copy of which is the Lancelotti Discobolus in Rome (Terme Museum), and Athena and Marsyas, of which there are also Roman copies . We know but little about Myron’s life. He was a native of Eleutherae, a town on the frontier of Attica and Boeotia. To judge from the list of his works and the places where they were set up, he must have enjoyed a reputation throughout Hellenic lands. The statues of athletic victors from his hand could be seen at Olympia and at Delphi. However, several of his most famous works were in Athens, and it is probable that his artistic career was mainly associated with that city.He is recorded, however, to have been a pupil of the Argive sculptor Ageladas, who was for a long time the acknowledged leader of the Peloponnesian School of athletic sculpture; and it is said that his fellow-pupils were Phidias and Polyclitus. The dates of Myron’s artistic career can be fixed with certainty by the Olympiads of the victors whose statues he made; Lycinus won in 448 B. C. , and Timanthes in 456; Ladas probably in 476; but so famous an athlete may have had a statue set up in his honor some years after the event.The traditional date given by Pliny, which makes Myron a contemporary of Polyclitus, is evidently wrong. Hi s son Lycius was employed on an important public commission, the statues set up by the knights of Athens at the entrance to the Acropolis, about 446 B. C. We must, therefore, assign the artistic activity of Myron himself to the first half of the fifth century. His early manhood must have coincided with the period of the Persian wars. Of the great men of this period, our knowledge, after all, is most unsatisfactory.Only one of the transitional sculptors who are mentioned by ancient writers, Myron, has a definite personality. He was clearly an artist of decidedly individual tendencies, who can hardly be called typical of any school. Though all of Myron’s works have perished, we have copies of at least two of them, from which we can gain a fairly clear idea of this ancient master. This is the first time that we have had to deal with copies, and it may be worthwhile, therefore, to digress for a moment and consider the nature of the copies on which much of our knowledge of ancient sculpture depends.In the later days of antiquity, especially after the Roman conquest of Greece, there was evidently an enormous demand for reproductions of the famous works of Greek sculpture, and numerous artists devoted themselves to supplying this demand. Some seem to reproduce their originals with considerable exactness; others are obviously far inferior to them. Often one copy was made from another, and sometimes the copyists did not hesitate to alter the originals in details, so that many of their productions are reflections rather than copies, in any exact sense.One very common alteration was the addition of a support in the form of a tree-stump or some other object. This was almost always employed when the copyist, as frequently happened, was working out a marble copy of a bronze original. Moreover, mutilated ancient statues, when they were dug out of the ground, were commonly handed over to a marble-worker for â€Å"restoration†, that is, for the addition of legs o r heads or noses, whatever, in fact, was necessary to make the statue complete.Thus, we have constantly to keep in mind that in dealing with copies, the problem often is to determine, from several widely divergent and differently restored copies, the general appearance and the details of an ancient statue. This method of procedure is excellently illustrated by the most famous of Myron’s works, the Discobolus, or Discus-thrower. The copies of this, which have been found, vary greatly in details. All are marred by the supporting tree-stump, though this was differently treated by different copyists.Only one has a head, which has never been broken off and which shows the original position, as it is described by Lucian. One fragmentary copy was completely misunderstood by the sculptor to whom it was handed over and restored as a fleeing Niobid! The Discobolus is justly famous for its splendid suggestion of vigorous manhood, its bold pose, and its perfect balance. If it were not fo r the formal locks of hair, the rather expressionless face, and some ancient evidence, which fixes the career of Myron in the first half of the fifth century, the statue might well be regarded as a work of the great age of Greek sculpture.As it is, we must probably assign the original to the years just before 450, and regard the unusual freedom with which it is conceived as proof of the originality of Myron rather than as evidence of a general adoption of such active poses by the men of the transitional time. Such an inference is borne out by some other works of the master, such as his group of Athena and Marsyas, and especially his Ladas, a statue of a runner poised on tiptoe just as he reached the goal, a work of which only literary accounts are preserved.Moreover, down to the time of Alexander the Great such violent action as is suggested by these works was rarely represented by the Greek sculptors. These particular innovations, therefore, were little imitated by Myron’s i mmediate successors, but there can be little doubt that much of the progress made during the transitional period was due to his initiative. In compensation for this cooling of ancient enthusiasm, we may perhaps extenuate the one weakness noted by the ancients. He was accounted a master of anatomy and action, but weak in the rendering of the face.Conceding that the faces are not very expressive, it may be doubted whether this is altogether a weakness. It is questionable whether the athletes whom he represents were very expressive of countenance, and it is altogether certain that their faces were not the subject of chief attention. In still further subordinating facial expression, Myron is but following the great law of concentration, which is recognized in all great art. Probably he could not in any case have been a master of psychic analysis, but it is more than doubtful if his themes would have gained by such mastery.Other masters of the same theme long betray the same tendency. My ron was the earliest of the great masters of Greek sculpture. That is to say, he was the earliest sculptor whose works appeared, even to critics who were familiar with the whole range of later art, to be admirable alike for the boldness and originality of their design and the skill of their execution, and who was spoken of in the same breath with Polyclitus and Lysippus, with Phidias and Praxiteles. Quintilian himself declares that to find fault with the Discobolus argues a lack of appreciation of art.The Dorian sculptor Myron specialized in athletes. A marble copy found in Rome demonstrates the way a sculptor may at the same time hold to conventions and reach out toward new forms. The Discus Thrower is really designed to be seen only from the front. Anyone who moves around to the side of this piece can see that it is all on a flat plane. The general line of the figure, which starts with the left foot and runs up through the arms, ending in the discus, suggests somewhat the tension of an opened spring, which will snap shut and propel the wheel into space.The muscles appear about as natural as those in the contemporary Olympian pediment sculpture, and yet this is a single figure. Up to that time, single figures had always some religious significance and therefore remained columnar or geometric. This one is frankly realistic and may have been made pretty much for its own sake. It was no new departure in art for Myron to represent an athlete practicing the exercise in which he excelled. His great attainment, as exemplified by the Discobolus, was the choice of a subject and a moment that was suitable to representation in sculpture.He appears to have been the first to realize the principle, never afterwards violated in Greek sculpture of the best period, that a statue or a sculptural group must be complete in itself, must possess a certain unity and concentration, so as to attract and contain the interest of the spectator within the work itself, and not to direct i t to other extraneous objects, nor even to allow it to wander away. In the Discobolus, the self-contained completeness in the action finds its expression and counterpart in the lines of the composition itself.It may be, as Quintilian says, labored and contorted, but the result is not, as might have been expected, restless in effect or tiring to the eye, because every part is in harmony with the whole, and the eye is carried on by an easy and pleasing succession of outlines round the whole contour of the figure . Beside this excellence of artistic composition, the clever choice of the right moment for representation and of an athletic exercise in which such a moment occurs must also be allowed their merit.The disc or quoit was not aimed at any mark, but merely hurled as far as possible in a given direction, as in the modern competitions of putting the weight or throwing the hammer. Therefore, there was no need for the eye of the competitor to be turned towards a distant goal, but the head could follow the motion of the arm that swung the quoit, the position of the feet sufficing to define the direction of the throw.A false restoration, which makes the thrower turn his head toward this direction, not only produces a painful and even impossible attitude, but also destroys the harmony of the composition, by breaking in upon the system of concentric curves in which every member of the body follows the swing of the extended arm. Athleticism, however, gave one important thing to the Greeks. It was from the models in the palaestra and the stadium that the sculptors of Greece drew their inspiration.It was of course an immense benefit to that art to be able to see the stripped body at exercise in the sunlight, and that, coupled with the natural Greek sense of form, is the secret of the unchallenged supremacy of Greek sculpture. Perfect anatomy of the body was achieved even before the face could be properly rendered. The nude male figure was the favorite theme of fifth-c entury art, and extraordinary perfection was reached by Myron. Myron’s Discobolus is, of course, one of the best known of ancient statues. There are few statues of the fifth century, which thus select an instant out of a series of movements.In the Discobolus, the clear lines of demarcation are not inconsistent with a correct and skilful modeling of the surface. The effect is perhaps somewhat dry, and suggests the appearance of a man in hard training, and even the tension of muscles that would not be exerted at the moment of action is portrayed. However, what convention is left is so thoroughly harmonized with the results of fresh observation as to give the impression of a living body, and to justify the criticism applied to Myron by ancient critics, that he â€Å"almost captured the souls of men and animals in his bronzes† .