"The arts of man include not only painting and sculpture but also mosaics, tapestries, stained glass, ceramics, coins, enamels,glass, primitive masks, etchings, book illustrations and illumination. eric Newton, Slade Professor at Fine Art Oxford, has made his choice from all these fields and from all the great periods and cultures. The result is an exciting selection of nearly 200 of the world's greatest masterpieces in all media that is at once personal and far ranging. It includes many works rarely or never previously reproduced as well as familiar ones that one can gaze at again and again. Eric Newton's extremely perceptive text concentrates on the works of art themselves and defines the essence of immortality to be found in the masterpieces illustrated and discussed."
