ABSTRACT
Manual labour is distinguished from manual gymnastics by the fact that the object of the latter is to exercise the hand, and the former, to accomplish a determinate work, being, or simulating, a socially useful object. The archaeological, historical, and artistic importance of the vase is very great, and may be compared with the numismatic art. In fact the first object of which humanity felt the need was the vase, which came into being with the utilisation of fire, and before the discovery of the production of fire. People who have progressed in civilisation show their feeling for art and their aesthetic feeling also in vases which are multiplied in almost infinite form, as we see in Egyptian, Etruscan, and Greek art. The vase then comes into being, attains perfection, and is multiplied in its uses and its forms, in the course of human civilisation; and the history of the vase follows the history of humanity itself.
