Painting, sculpture, any form of art, if it is not directed towards a higher ideal must go downward; it cannot rise because there is no ladder. It is the ideal which helps everything to go upward, and without the ideal everything goes downward. One can see the reason why people become more materialistic: beauty naturally belongs to heaven; on the earth it is only reflected; and when the connection with heaven is broken, when the back is turned towards heaven, then the eyes become focused on the earth and slowly and gradually beauty begins to disappear. Thus in a way the divergence between the Renaissance and our time has been caused by materialism, by commercialism, and by the lack of heavenly inspiration.