Raphael Part 6

Not only did she sing, but she played also on all instruments; but she could find none which satisfied her desire to breathe forth the harmony which dwelt within her, and so she invented a new one, the forerunner of the organ, and she consecrated it to the service of G.o.d.

St. Cecilia like St. Catherine was a martyr, but the executioner who was to put her to death was so affected by her innocence that his hand trembled, and the wounds he made did not immediately cause her death.

She lived for three days, and as the story says:--

"She spent (these days) in prayers and exhortations to the converts, distributing to the poor all she possessed; and she called to her St. Urban, and desired that her house, in which she then lay dying, should be converted into a place of wors.h.i.+p for the Christians. Thus, full of faith and charity, and singing with her sweet voice praises and hymns to the last moment, she died at the end of three days."

Very naturally, St. Cecilia was taken as the patron saint of musicians, and is sometimes represented as seated at a modern organ.

In this picture she is shown holding in her hands an instrument of reeds, which may be taken as the beginning of the organ of later days.

Her eyes are raised, and her head is upturned as she listens to the choir of angels shown above in the clouds, their lips parted as they sing from open books. She holds the instrument, but she is so intent on the music she hears that it seems almost slipping from her hands.

Indeed, some of the tubes are already dropping out of their place; and as the eye follows them, it rests upon a number of other musical instruments lying on the ground,--the pipe, the violin, the tambourine, castanets, and others. It is as if we were shown the various instruments which she had set aside as not satisfying to her, and at last were shown her organ itself falling to pieces and dropping from her hands. So faint and imperfect, the painter seems to say, are all these forms of earthly music when compared with the heavenly.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ST. CECILIA _Bologna Gallery_]

St. Cecilia is here in a company of other saints, not indeed of her day and generation, but chosen by Raphael to give expression to various ideas and sentiments. St. Paul, the great apostle to the Gentiles, stands in a thoughtful att.i.tude, one hand carrying a scroll and resting on the hilt of a sword; for in one of his epistles, he speaks of "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of G.o.d." He is listening, and at the same time looks down upon the instruments as if he were thinking how his earthly words, too, were dull beside the voice of the Spirit.

On the opposite side of the picture is Mary Magdalene. She holds the pot of ointment with which she anointed the feet of Christ, and by the movement of her feet she seems just to have come into the scene, and looks out of the picture as if she were bidding us and all other spectators look on the saint and listen to the angels. Perhaps the artist, in choosing her for one of his figures, was mindful of the words of the Lord, who praised her for bringing a precious gift, without thinking of its worth, simply because she loved him, and wished to show her devotion. So St. Cecilia poured out her music, the richest gift she had, not thinking how she could turn it into money and give it to the poor.

Next to St. Paul, behind him and St. Cecilia, stands the evangelist St. John. Painters and scholars alike have always seen in this figure the beloved disciple, the one who leaned on the Lord's breast at the last supper, and they delight to show him as a young man of refined and beautiful countenance. His hand, with the parted fingers, seems to make a gesture bidding one listen, and his face has a look of rapture. It was natural indeed that Raphael should thus have placed in the company one whose gospel is full of feeling, the life of Christ set to music as it were.

Finally, we have St. Augustine, one of the Fathers of the church, standing in his priestly robe and holding a bishop's crook. He is apparently exchanging glances with St. John. Perhaps he is designed to show that the church makes much of music in its service.

If we could see the painting itself with its beautiful color, we should see even more distinctly not only how Raphael thought out his design, making his figures all have a harmonious relation to one another, but how perfectly the composition, in its lines, its light and color, expresses this musical harmony of heaven and earth.

X

THE TRANSFIGURATION

The Transfiguration is a picture divided into two parts. The lower part is filled with more figures than the upper and contains more action. On one side are nine of the disciples of Jesus; on the other is a crowd of people in company with a father who brings his son to be healed. He gives an account of his boy's sickness in these words:--

"He is mine only child. And lo! a spirit taketh him, and he suddenly crieth out; and it teareth him that he foameth again; and, bruising him, hardly departeth from him."[7]

[Footnote 7: Luke, chapter ix., verses 38, 39.]

The father calls upon the disciples, in the absence of Jesus, to heal his son. In the company with him, we can make out two women kneeling by the boy. We think it is the mother who supports him, and looks at the disciples as she points to her son. How quiet and self-possessed she is, in contrast to the poor fellow's violence as shown in his position, and his distorted hands.

She is wholly devoted to him, and the mother shows in her face and bearing. But the other kneeling woman, who may be his sister, carries a different expression as she points to the boy. She looks toward the disciples with a severe and scornful air, as if saying: "What! you profess to heal the sick, and you can do nothing for this poor sufferer!"

The figures in the background are crying aloud and stretching out their arms for aid. One can count the persons, but it looks as if there were a crowd behind that we do not see, all pressing forward.

On the other side of the picture are the disciples, all eager, with heads bent forward, and each gesturing to express his meaning. One, younger than the others, with his hand against his breast, looks at the father with a pitying but helpless expression, as if he would gladly help him if he only could. Another has an open book as though he were trying to find some word of comfort. One is pointing out the boy to his neighbor, and two in the background seem to be lost in perplexity.

But, after all, though most of the disciples are thus intent, the eye quickly notes the action of a figure near the centre, full of fire and energy, who is pointing upward, away from the group, and calling upon the father and the women to look that way. And the line of his arm thrust out is continued by that of another disciple behind him, who also points upward.

For these two have seen the Lord, and they are bidding the troubled parents look the same way for help. There, above all this turmoil and confusion, is a scene of dazzling light, of which they alone seem to be aware.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE TRANSFIGURATION _Vatican Gallery, Rome_]

The upper part of the picture discloses the transfiguration of the Saviour. As the evangelist tells us, he had taken Peter and James and John with him, and had gone up into a mountain to pray.

"And as he prayed, the fas.h.i.+on of his countenance was altered, and his raiment was white and glistering. And, behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and Elias, who appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem. But Peter and they that were with him were heavy with sleep; and when they were awake, they saw his glory, and the two men that stood with him."[8]

[Footnote 8: Luke, chapter ix., verses 29-32.]

The scene shown is at the moment of the awaking of the three disciples, one not daring to look up again, but bowing his head and folding his hands in prayer. They are dazzled with the glory. This glory is a cloud of brightness which envelops the three figures of Christ, Moses, and Elijah, or as the Greeks called him, Elias. The Saviour looks heavenward with rapture in his gaze.

On one side are seen two kneeling figures. They are said to stand for the father and uncle of the Cardinal who ordered the picture from Raphael. It was the fas.h.i.+on of the day thus to introduce a patron into a painting, and Raphael has made them as obscure as he well could.

We must not look at this great picture as if it were a panorama, where a succession of scenes is witnessed, or find fault with it because the Bible says that the transfiguration took place on one day and the scene below took place the next day, when Jesus and his disciples had come down from the mountain. Nor is anything said in the Bible which would lead us to suppose that Jesus and the prophets were raised above the ground.

No; what Raphael intended was to draw a contrast between an earthly scene of suffering and a heavenly scene of peace and serenity; and he took two scenes which lie next each other in the scripture narrative.

That was his thought, and see how wonderfully he has expressed this contrast throughout!

There is the dark confusion and helplessness and grief below; above is a scene of light which is like a vision, and this vision two of the disciples see; and as we have pointed out, a contrast is made evident in various parts of the picture. Indeed, the painting is made up of contrasts; and not the least noticeable is that of the solid ma.s.s below, square shaped, and the light, pyramid-shaped composition above.

The Transfiguration was the last painting to which Raphael set his brush, and it was still unfinished when he was suddenly stricken with fever and died. As his body lay in state, in the hall where he had been working, this great picture was hung at the head, and the people who came in fell to weeping when they saw it.

XI

PARNa.s.sUS

Raphael was but twenty-five years old when he was bidden adorn a room in the Vatican palace, and he made the four walls answer to four divisions in the ceiling, just as afterward in the Heliodorus room.

The four divisions in the ceiling were filled with four figures, representing Theology, Poetry, Philosophy, and Justice. Beneath Poetry was this large, full design of Parna.s.sus.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PARNa.s.sUS _Vatican Palace, Rome_]

Parna.s.sus, in the old Greek myth, was the mountain on which the muses were wont to meet, and here Apollo had his chief seat. Here, in the fancy of the ancients, the poets and historians and dramatists came to draw inspiration. So Raphael has made a great company of G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses, and ancient and modern poets.

By means of the accompanying diagram, all the figures in the composition can be made out.

As it is an imaginary scene, Raphael was free to bring together poets of different ages and countries, grouping them by the natural a.s.sociation of one with another. In this mythic realm time and s.p.a.ce are as nothing, and the poets are united in the higher fellows.h.i.+p of the inspired imagination.

[Ill.u.s.tration: KEY TO PARNa.s.sUS 1. Apollo 2. Calliope 3. Polymnia 4. Clio 5. Erato 6. Terpsich.o.r.e 7. Euterpe 8. Thalia 9. Urania 10. Melpomene 11. Unknown 12. Virgil 13. Homer 14. Dante 15. Scribe 16. Berni 17. Petrarch 18. Corinna 19. Alcaeus 20. Sappho 21. Plautus 22. Terence 23. Ovid 24. Sannazzaro 25. Cornelius Gallus 26. Anacreon 27. Horace 28. Pindar]

It is interesting to note how the painter has brought them together.

Apollo, of course, as the G.o.d of poetry and music, occupies the central position, seated beneath some laurel trees, near the sacred fountain of Hippocrene, with the nine Muses circling about him. Apollo is always spoken of as playing the lyre, but Raphael gives him a violin, because the action in playing that instrument is so graceful.

Some think also he meant to pay a compliment to a famous violinist of that day.

Calliope, the muse of epic poetry, rests for a moment the long trumpet whose epic strains are wont to stir the courage of men. Polymnia, the muse of sacred poetry, leans upon the lyre whose vibrant strings thrill the gentler emotions of faith and love.