Chapter V: Part 5

In those churches of Christendom which have not been defaced by a blind destructive zeal, this image meets us at every turn: it salutes us in the porch as we enter, or it shines upon us in gorgeous colours from the window, or it is wreathed into the capitals of columns, or it stands in its holy heroic beauty over the altar. It is so common and so in harmony with our inmost being, that we rather feel its presence than observe it. It is the visible, palpable reflection of that great truth stamped into our very souls, and shadowed forth in every form of ancient belief,—the final triumph of the spiritual over the animal and earthly part of our nature. This is the secret of its perpetual repetition, and this the secret of the untired complacency with which we regard it; for even in the most inefficient attempts at expression, we have always the leading _motif_ distinct and true, the winged virtue is always victorious above, and the bestial vice is always prostrate below: and if to this primal moral significance be added all the charm of poetry, grace, animated movement, which human genius has lavished on this ever blessed, ever welcome symbol, then, as we look up at it, we are ‘not only touched, but wakened and inspired,’ and the whole delighted imagination glows with faith and hope, and grateful triumphant sympathy,—so at least I have felt, and I must believe that others have felt it too.

In the earliest representations of this subject, we see the simplest form of the allegory, literally rendering the words of Scripture, ‘The dragon shalt thou trample under foot’ (Ps. xci. 13). Here there is no risk of a divided interest or a misdirected sympathy. The demon, grovelling under the feet of the victorious spirit, is not the star-bright apostate who drew after him the third part of heaven; it is the bestial malignant reptile:—not the emblem of resistance, but the emblem of sin; not of the sin that aspires, which, in fact, is a contradiction in terms;—no sin aspires;—but of the sin which degrades and brutifies, as all sin does. In the later representations, where the demon takes the half-human shape, however hideous and deformed, the allegory may so be brought nearer to us, and rendered more terrible even by a horrid sympathy with that human face, grinning in despite and agony; but much of the beauty of the scriptural metaphor is lost.[66]

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The representations of St. Michael and the dragon are so multifarious that I can only select a few among them as examples of the different styles of treatment.

The symbol, as such, is supposed to have originated with the Gnostics and Arians, and the earliest examples are to be found in the ancient churches on the western coast of Italy, and the old Lombard churches. I have never seen it in the old mosaics of the sixth century, but in the contemporary sculpture frequently. It would be difficult to point to the most ancient example, such is the confusion of dates as regards dedications, restorations, alterations; but I remember a carving in white marble on the porch of the Cathedral of Cortona (about the seventh century), which may be regarded as an example of this primitive style of treatment: the illustration, from a slight sketch made on the spot, will be better than any description (35).

Another instance will be remembered by the traveller in Italy, the strange antique bas-relief on the façade of that extraordinary old church the San Michele at Pavia; not the figure in the porch, which is modern, but that which is above. In the Menologium Grecum is a St. Michael standing with a long sceptre, a majestic colossal figure, while kneeling angels adore him, and the demons crouch under his feet.[67]

By Martin Schoen: St. Michael, attired in a long loose robe and floating mantle, tramples on the demon; he has thrown down the shield, and with his lance in both hands, but without effort, and even with a calm angelic dignity, prepares to transfix his adversary. The figure is singularly elegant. The demon has not here the usual form of a dragon, but is a horrible nondescript reptile, with multitudinous flexile claws, like those of a crab, stretched out to seize and entangle the unwary;—for an emblematical figure, very significant (36). In an old fresco by Guariente di Padova[68] the angel is draped as in Martin Schoen’s figure, but the attitude is far less elegant.

Sometimes the dragon has a small head at the end of his tail, instead of the forked sting. I recollect an instance of St. Michael transfixing the large head, while a smaller angel, also armed, transfixes the other head.[69] This is an attempt to render literally the description in the Apocalypse: ‘For their power is in their mouth, and in their tails: for their tails were like unto serpents, and had heads, and with them they do hurt.’ (Rev. ix. 19.) In a most elegant figure of St. Michael, from the choir of the San Giovanni, at Malta, I found the demon thus characterised, with a tail ending in the serpent head.

In an old Siena picture[70] St. Michael is seated on a throne: in one hand a sword, in the other the orb of sovereignty; under his feet lies the dragon mangled and bleeding: a bad picture, but curious for the singular treatment.

In the sixteenth century these figures of St. Michael become less ideal and angelic, and more and more chivalrous and picturesque. In a beautiful altar-piece by Andrea del Sarto, now in the Florence Academy, there is a fine martial figure of the Archangel, which, but for the wings, might be mistaken for a St. George; and in the predella underneath, on a small scale, he is conqueror of the demon. The peculiarity here is, that the demon, though vanquished, makes a vain struggle, and has seized hold of the belt of the angel, who, with uplifted sword, and an action of infinite grace and dignity, looks superior down, as one assured of victory.

Raphael has given us three figures of St. Michael, all different, and one of them taking rank with his masterpieces.

The first is an early production, painted when he was a youth of nineteen or twenty, and now in the Louvre. St. Michael, armed with a shield on which is a red cross, his sword raised to strike, stands with one foot on a monster; other horrible little monsters, like figures in a dream, are around him: in the background are seen the hypocrites and thieves as described by Dante; the first, in melancholy procession, weighed down with leaden cowls; the others, tormented by snakes: and, in the distance, the flaming dolorous city. St. Michael is here the vanquisher of the Vices. It is a curious and fantastic, rather than poetical, little picture.

The second picture, also in the Louvre, was painted by Raphael, in the maturity of his talent, for Francis I.: the king had left to him the choice of the subject, and he selected St. Michael, the military patron of France, and of that knightly Order of which the king was grand master.

St. Michael—not standing, but hovering on his poised wings, and grasping his lance in both hands—sets one foot lightly on the shoulder of the demon, who, prostrate, writhes up, as it were, and tries to lift his head and turn it on his conqueror with one last gaze of malignant rage and despair. The archangel looks down upon him with a brow calm and serious; in his beautiful face is neither vengeance nor disdain—in his attitude no effort; his form, a model of youthful grace and majesty, is clothed in a brilliant panoply of gold and silver; an azure scarf floats on his shoulders; his wide-spread wings are of purple, blue, and gold; his light hair is raised, and floats outward on each side of his head, as if from the swiftness of his downward motion. The earth emits flames, and seems opening to swallow up the adversary. The form of the demon is human, but vulgar in its proportions, and of a swarthy red, as if fire-scathed; he has the horns and the serpent-tail; but, from the attitude into which he is thrown, the monstrous form is so fore-shortened that it does not disgust, and the majestic figure of the archangel fills up nearly the whole space—fills the eye—fills the soul—with its victorious beauty.

That Milton had seen this picture, and that when his sight was quenched the ‘winged saint’ revisited him in his darkness, who can doubt?—

Over his lucid arms
A military vest of purple flowed
Livelier than Melibœan, or the grain
Of Sarra worn by kings and heroes old
In time of truce.
By his side,
As in a glittering zodiac, hung the sword,
Satan’s dire dread, and in his hand the spear.

A third St. Michael, designed by Raphael, exists only as an engraving.[71] The angel here wears a helmet, and is classically draped; he stands in an attitude of repose, his foot on the neck of the demon; one hand rests on the pummel of his sword, the other holds the lance.

It seems agreed that, as a work of art, there is only the St. Michael of Guido (in the Capuccini at Rome) which can be compared with that of Raphael; the moment chosen is the same; the treatment nearly the same; the sentiment quite different.

Here the angel, standing, yet scarcely touching the ground, poised on his outspread wings, sets his left foot on the head of his adversary; in one hand he brandishes a sword, in the other he holds the end of a chain, with which he is about to bind down the demon in the bottomless pit. The attitude has been criticised, and justly; the grace is somewhat mannered, verging on the theatrical; but Forsyth is too severe when he talks of the ‘air of a dancing-master:’ one thing, however, is certain, we do not think about attitude when we look at Raphael’s St. Michael; in Guido’s, it is the first thing that strikes us; but when we look farther, the head redeems all; it is singularly beautiful, and in the blending of the masculine and feminine graces, in the serene purity of the brow, and the flow of the golden hair, there is something divine: a slight, very slight expression of scorn is in the air of the head. The fiend is the worst part of the picture; it is not a fiend, but a degraded prosaic human ruffian; we laugh with incredulous contempt at the idea of an angel called down from heaven to overcome such a wretch. In Raphael the fiend is human, but the head has the god-like ugliness and malignity of a satyr; Guido’s fiend is only stupid and base. It appears to me that there is just the same difference—the same _kind_ of difference—between the angel of Raphael and the angel of Guido, as between the description in Tasso and the description in Milton; let any one compare them. In Tasso we are struck by the picturesque elegance of the description as a piece of art, the melody of the verse, the admirable choice of the expressions, as in Guido by the finished but somewhat artificial and studied grace. In Raphael and Milton we see only the vision of a ‘shape divine.’

One of the most beautiful figures of St. Michael I ever saw, occurs in a coronation of the Virgin by Moretto, and is touched by his peculiar sentiment of serious tenderness.[72]

In devotional pictures such figures of St. Michael are sometimes grouped poetically with other personages, as in a most beautiful picture by Innocenza da Imola,[73] where the archangel tramples on the demon; St. Paul standing on one side, and St. Benedict on the other, both of whom had striven with the fiend and had overcome him: the Madonna and Child are seen in a glory above.

And again in a picture by Mabuse,[74] where St. Michael, as patron, sets his foot on the black grinning fiend, and looks down on a kneeling votary, while the votary, with his head turned away, appears to be worshipping, not the protecting angel, but the Madonna, to whom St. Michael presents him (38). Such votive pictures are not uncommon, and have a peculiar grace and significance. Here the archangel bears the victorious banner of the cross;—he has conquered. In some instances he holds in his hand the head of the Dragon, and in _all_ instances it is, or ought to be, the head of the Dragon which is transfixed:—‘Thou shalt bruise his head.’

Those representations in which St. Michael is not conqueror, but combatant, in which the moment is one of transition, are less frequent; it is then an _action_, not an _emblem_, and the composition is historical rather than symbolical. It is the strife with Lucifer; ‘when Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon fought and his angels, and the great dragon was cast out.’ (Rev. xii. 7.) In churches and chapels dedicated to St. Michael, or to ‘the Holy Angels,’ this appropriate subject often occurs; as in a famous fresco by Spinello d’Arezzo, at Arezzo.[75] In the middle of the composition, Michael, armed with sword and shield, is seen combating the dragon with seven heads, as described in the Apocalypse. Above and around are many angels also armed. At the top of the picture is seen an empty throne, the throne which Lucifer had ‘set in the north;’ below is seen Lucifer, falling with his angels over the parapet of heaven. (Isaiah xiv. 13.) The painter tasked his skill to render the transformation of the spirits of light into spirits of darkness as fearful and as hideous as possible; and, being a man of a nervous temperament, the continual dwelling on these horrors began at length to trouble his brain. He fancied that Lucifer appeared to him in a dream, demanding by what authority he had portrayed him under an aspect so revolting?—the painter awoke in horror, was seized with delirious fever, and so died.

In his combat with the dragon, Michael is sometimes represented alone, and sometimes as assisted by the two other archangels, Gabriel and Raphael: as in the fresco by Signorelli, at Orvieto, where one of the angels, whom we may suppose to be Raphael, looks down on the falling demons with an air of melancholy, almost of pity.

In a picture by Marco Oggione,[76] Michael has precipitated the demon into the gulf, and hovers above, while Raphael and Gabriel stand below on each side, looking on; all are clothed in voluminous loose white draperies, more like priests than warriors; but it is a fine picture.

In the large Rubens-room at Munich, there are two pictures of Michael subduing the revolted angels. The large one, in which Michael is the principal figure, is not agreeable. Rubens could not lift himself sufficiently above the earth to conceive and embody the spiritual, and heroic, and beautiful in one divine form; his St. Michael is vulgar. The smaller composition, where the fallen, or rather falling, angels fill the whole space, is a most wonderful effort of artistic invention. At the summit of the picture stands St. Michael, the shield in one hand, in the other the forked lightnings of divine wrath; and from above the rebel host tumble headlong ‘in hideous ruin and combustion hurled,’ and with such affright and amazement in every face, such a downward movement in every limb, that we recoil in dizzy horror while we look upon it. It is curious that Rubens should have introduced female reprobate spirits: if he intended his picture as an allegory, merely the conquest of the spiritual over the sensual, he is excusable; but if he meant to figure the vision in the Apocalypse, it is a deviation from the proper scriptural treatment, which is inexcusable. This picture remains, however, as a whole, a perfect miracle of art: the fault is, that we feel inclined to applaud as we do at some astonishing _tour de force_; such at least was my own feeling, and this is not the feeling appropriate to the subject. Though this famous picture is entitled the Fall of the Angels, I have some doubts as to whether this was the intention of the painter; whether he did not mean to express the fall of sinners, flung by the Angel of judgment into the abyss of wrath and perdition?

In those devotional pictures which exhibit St. Michael as Lord of souls, he is winged and unarmed, and holds the balance. In each scale sits a little naked figure, representing a human soul; one of these is usually represented with hands joined as in thankfulness—he is the _beato_, the elected; the other is in an attitude of horror—he is the rejected, the reprobate; and often, but not necessarily, the idea is completed by the introduction of a demon, who is grasping at the descending scale, either with his talons, or with the long two-pronged hook, such as is given to Pluto in the antique sculpture.

Sometimes St. Michael is thus represented singly; sometimes very beautifully in Madonna pictures, as in a picture by Leonardo da Vinci (A.D. 1498), where St. Michael, a graceful angelic figure, with light flowing hair, kneels before the Madonna, and presents the balance to the Infant, who seems to welcome the pious little soul who sits in the uppermost scale.

I have seen this idea varied. St. Michael stands majestic with the balance poised in his hands: instead of a human figure in either scale, there are weights; on one side is seen a company of five or six little naked shivering souls, as if waiting for their doom; on the other several demons, one of whom with his hook is pulling down the ascending scale.[77] With or without the balance, St. Michael figures as Lord of souls when introduced into pictures of the Assumption or the Glorification of the Virgin. To understand the whole beauty and propriety of such representations, we must remember, that according to one of the legends of the death of the Virgin her spirit was consigned to the care of St. Michael until it was permitted to reanimate the spotless form, and with it ascend to heaven.

In one or two instances only, I have seen St. Michael without wings. In general, an armed figure, unwinged and standing on a dragon, we may presume to be a St. George; but where the balance is introduced, it leaves no doubt of the personality—it is a St. Michael. Occasionally the two characters—the protecting Angel of light and the Angel of judgment—are united, and we see St. Michael, with the dragon under his feet and the balance in his hand. This was a favourite and appropriate subject on tombs and chapels dedicated to the dead; such is the beautiful bas-relief on the tomb of Henry VII. in Westminster Abbey.

In some representations of the last judgment, St. Michael, instead of the banner and cross, bears the scales; as in the very curious bas-relief on the façade of the church of St. Trophime at Arles. St. Michael here has a balance so large that it is almost as high as himself; it is not a mere emblem, but a fact; a soul sits in each scale, and a third is rising up; the angel holds out one hand to assist him. In another part of the same bas-relief St. Michael is seen carrying a human soul (represented as a little naked figure) and bringing it to St. Peter and St. Paul. In a celebrated Last Judgment, attributed by some authors to John Van Eyck, by others to Justus of Ghent, St. Michael is grandly introduced.[78] High up, in the centre, sits the Saviour, with the severe expression of the judge. Above him hover four angels with the instruments of the Passion, and below him three others sounding trumpets (_v._ p. 54),—I suppose the seven pre-eminent angels: the Virgin and St. John the Baptist on each side, and then the Apostles ranged in the usual manner. ‘In the lower half of the picture stands St. Michael, clad in golden armour, so bright as to reflect in the most complete manner all the surrounding objects. His figure is slender and elegant, but colossal as compared to the rest. He seems to be bending earnestly forward, a splendid purple mantle falls from his shoulders to the ground, and his large wings are composed of glittering peacock’s feathers. He holds the balance; the scale with the good rests on earth, but that with the souls which are found wanting mounts into air. A demon stands ready to receive them, and towards this scale St. Michael points with the end of a black staff which he holds in his right hand.’ This picture, which is a chef-d’œuvre of the early German school, is now in the church of St. Mary at Dantzig.

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The historical subjects in which St. Michael is introduced exhibit him as prince of the Hebrew nation, and belong properly to the Old Testament.[79] ‘After the confusion of tongues, and the scattering of the people, which occurred on the building of the Tower of Babel, every separate nation had an angel to direct it. To Michael was given in charge the people of the Lord. The Hebrews being carried away captive into the land of Assyria, Daniel prayed that they might be permitted to return when the seventy years of captivity were over: but the Angel of Persia opposed himself on this occasion to the angels Michael and Gabriel. He wished to retain the Jews in captivity, because he was glad to have, within the bounds of his jurisdiction, a people who served the true God, and because he hoped that in time the captive Jews would convert to the truth the Assyrians and Persians committed to his care.’ This curious passage from one of the early Christian fathers, representing the good angels as opposed to each other, and one of them as disputing the commands of God, is an instance of the confused ideas on the subject of angels which prevailed in the ancient Church, and which prevail, I imagine, in the minds of many even at this day.

In the story of Hagar in the wilderness, it is Michael who descends to her aid. In the sacrifice of Isaac, it is Michael who stays the arm of Abraham. It is Michael who brings the plagues on Egypt, and he it is who leads the Israelites through the wilderness. It was the belief of the Jews, and of some of the early Christian fathers, that through his angel (not in person) God spoke to Moses from the burning bush, and delivered to him the law on Mount Sinai; and that the angel so delegated was Michael.

It is Michael who combats with Lucifer for the body of Moses. (Jude v. 9.) According to one interpretation of this curious passage of Scripture, the demon wished to enter and to possess the form of Moses, in order to deceive the Jews by personating their leader; but others say, that Michael contended for the body, that he might bury it in an unknown place, lest the Jews should fall into the sin of paying divine honours to their legislator. This is a fine picturesque subject; the rocky desert, the body of Moses dead on the earth, the contest of the good and evil angel confronting each other,—these are grand materials! It must have been rarely treated, for I remember but one instance—the fresco by L. Signorelli, in the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican.

It is Michael who intercepts Balaam[80] when on his way to curse the people of Israel, and puts blessings into his mouth instead of curses: a subject often treated, but as a fact rather than a vision.

It is Michael who stands before Joshua in the plain by Jericho:—‘And Joshua said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries? And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant? And the captain of the Lord’s host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy.’ (Joshua v. 13-15.) This subject is very uncommon. In the Greek MS. already alluded to, I met with a magnificent example—magnificent in point of sentiment, though half ruined and effaced; the God-like bearing of the armed angel, looking down on the prostrate Joshua, is here as fine as possible.

It is Michael who appears to Gideon.[81] It is Michael who chastises David.[82] It is Michael who exterminates the army of Sennacherib; a subject magnificently painted by Rubens. (Some suppose that on this occasion God made use of the ministry of an evil angel.[83])

It is Michael who descends to deliver the Three Children from the burning fiery furnace. The Three Children in the furnace is a subject which appears very early in the catacombs and on the sarcophagi as a symbol of the Redemption;—so early, that it is described by Tertullian;[84] but in almost all the examples given there are three figures only: where there is a fourth, it is, of course, the protecting angel, but he is without wings.[85]

Michael seizes the prophet Habakkuk by the hair of the head, and carries him to Babylon, to the den of lions, that he may feed Daniel.[86] This apocryphal subject occurs on several sarcophagi.[87] I have seen it also in illuminated MSS., but cannot at this moment refer to it. It occurs in a series of late Flemish prints after Hemskirk,—of which there are good impressions in the British Museum.

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The Archangel Michael is not named in the Gospels; but in the legends of the Madonna, as we shall see hereafter, he plays a very important part, being deputed by Christ to announce to his mother her approaching end, and to receive her soul. For the present I will only remark, that when, in accordance with this very ancient legend, an angel is represented kneeling before the Madonna, and holding in his hand a palm surmounted by stars, or a lighted taper, this angel is not Gabriel, announcing the conception of Christ, as is usually supposed, but Michael, as the angel of death.[88]

The legend of Monte Galgano I saw in a large fresco, in the Santa Croce at Florence, by a painter of the Giotto school; but in so bad a state, that I could only make out a bull on the top of a mountain, and a man shooting with a bow and arrow. On the opposite wall is the combat of Michael with the dragon—very spirited, and in much better preservation. To distinguish the apparition of St. Michael on Monte Galgano from the apparition on Mont St. Michel, in both of which a bull and a bishop are principal figures, it is necessary to observe, that, in the last-named subject, the sea is always introduced at the base of the picture, and that the former is most common in Italian, and the latter in French, works of art. In the French stained glass of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, St. Michael is a very popular subject, either with the dragon, or the scales, or both.

Lately, in removing the whitewash from the east wall of the nave of Preston Church, near Brighton, was discovered the outline of a group of figures representing St. Michael, fully draped, and with large wings, bearing the balance; in each scale a human soul. The scale containing the _beato_ is assisted by a figure fully draped, but so ruined that it is not possible to say whether it represents the Virgin, or the guardian saint of the person who caused the fresco to be painted. I am told that in the old churches of Cornwall, and of the towns on the south coast, which had frequent intercourse with France, effigies of St. Michael occur frequently, both in painting and sculpture. On the old English coin, thence called an _angel_, we have the figure of St. Michael, who was one of the patron saints of our Norman kings.

I must now trust to the reader to contemplate the figures of St. Michael, so frequent and so varied in Art, with reference to these suggestions; and leaving for the present this radiant Spirit, this bright similitude of a primal and universal faith, we turn to his angelic companions.

ST. GABRIEL.

_Lat._ Sanctus Gabriel. _Ital._ San Gabriello, San Gabriele, L’Angelo Annunziatore. _Fr._ St. Gabriel.

‘I am GABRIEL, that stand in the presence of God.’—_Luke_ i. 19.

In those passages of Scripture where the Angel Gabriel is mentioned by name, he is brought before us in the character of a Messenger only, and always on important occasions. In the Old Testament he is sent to Daniel to announce the return of the Jews from captivity, and to explain the vision which prefigures the destinies of mighty empires. His contest with the Angel of the kingdom of Persia, when St. Michael comes to his assistance, would be a splendid subject in fit hands; I do not know that it has ever been painted. In the New Testament the mission of Gabriel is yet more sublime: he first appears to the high priest Zacharias, and foretells the birth of John the Baptist,—a subject which belongs especially to the life of that saint. Six months later, Gabriel is sent to announce the appearance of the Redeemer of mankind.[89]

In the Jewish tradition, Gabriel is the guardian of the celestial treasury. Hence, I presume, Milton has made him chief guardian of Paradise:—

Betwixt these rocky pillars Gabriel sat,
Chief of the angelic guards, awaiting night.

As the Angel who announced the birth of Christ, he has been venerated as the Angel who presides over childbirth. He foretells the birth of Samson, and, in the apocryphal legends, he foretells to Joachim the birth of the Virgin. In the East, he is of great importance. Mahomet selected him as his immediate teacher and inspirer, and he became the great protecting angel of Islamism: hence between Michael, the protector of the Jews and Christians, and Gabriel, the protector of the Moslem, there is supposed to exist no friendly feeling—rather the reverse.

In the New Testament, Gabriel is a much more important personage than Michael; yet I have never met with any picture in which he figures singly as an object of worship. In devotional pictures he figures as the second of the three Archangels—‘Secondo fra i primi,’ as Tasso styles him; or in his peculiar character as the divine messenger of grace, ‘_l’Angelo annunziatore_.’ He then usually bears in one hand a lily or a sceptre; in the other a scroll on which is inscribed, ‘AVE MARIA, GRATIA PLENA!’[90]

The subject called the ANNUNCIATION is one of the most frequent and most important, as it is one of the most beautiful, in the whole range of Christian Art. It belongs, however, to the history of the Virgin, where I shall have occasion to treat it at length; yet as the Angel Gabriel here assumes, by direct scriptural testimony, a distinct name and personality, and as the dignity and significance proper to a subject so often unworthily and perversely treated depend very much on the character and deportment given to the celestial messenger, I shall make a few observations in this place with respect to the treatment of the angel, only reserving the theme in its general bearing for future consideration.

In the early representations of the Annunciation it is treated as a religious mystery, and with a solemn simplicity and purity of feeling, which is very striking and graceful in itself, as well as in harmony with the peculiar manner of the divine revelation. The scene is generally a porch or portico of a temple-like building; the Virgin stands (she is very seldom seated, and then on a kind of raised throne); the angel stands before her, at some distance: very often, she is within the portico; he is without. Gabriel is a majestic being, generally robed in white, wearing the tunic and pallium _à l’antique_, his flowing hair bound by a jewelled tiara, with large many-coloured wings, and bearing the sceptre of sovereignty in the left hand, while the right is extended in the act of benediction as well as salutation: ‘Hail! thou that art highly favoured! Blessed art thou among women!’ He is the principal figure: the attitude of the Virgin, with her drapery drawn over her head, her eyes drooping, and her hands folded on her bosom, is always expressive of the utmost submission and humility. So Dante introduces the image of the lowly Virgin receiving the angel as an illustration of the virtue of Humility:—

Ed avea in atto impressa esta favella
‘Ecce ancilla Dei!’—

and Flaxman has admirably embodied this idea, both in the lofty angel with outspread arms, and the kneeling Virgin. Sometimes the angel floats in, with his arms crossed over his bosom, but still with the air of a superior being, as in this beautiful figure after Lorenzo Monaco, from a picture in the Florence Gallery.

The two figures are not always in the same picture; it was a very general custom to place the Virgin and the Angel, the ‘Annunziata’ and the ‘Angelo annunziatore,’ one on each side of the altar, the place of the Virgin being usually to the right of the spectator; sometimes the figures are half-length: sometimes, when placed in the same picture, they are in two separate compartments, a pillar, or some other ornament, running up the picture between them; as in many old altar-pieces, where the two figures are placed above or on each side of the Nativity, or the Baptism, or the Marriage at Cana, or some other scene from the life and miracles of our Saviour. This subject does not appear on the sarcophagi; the earliest instance I have met with is in the mosaic series over the arch in front of the choir in the church of Santa Maria Maggiore, at Rome, executed in the fifth century. Here we have two successive moments represented together. In the first the angel is sent on his mission, and appears flying down from heaven; the earliest instance I have seen of an angel in the act of flight. In the second group the Virgin appears seated on a throne; two angels stand behind her, supposed to represent her guardian angels, and the angel Gabriel stands in front with one hand extended. The dresses are classical, and there is not a trace of the mediæval feeling, or style, in the whole composition.

In the Greek pictures, the Angel and the Virgin both stand; and in the Annunciation of Cimabue the Greek formula is strictly adhered to. I have seen pictures of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, in which Gabriel enters as a princely ambassador, with three little angels bearing up his mantle behind: in a picture in the collection of Prince Wallerstein, one meek and beautiful angel bears up the rich robes of the majestic archangel, like a page in the train of a sovereign prince. But from the beginning of the fourteenth century we perceive a change of feeling, as well as a change of style: the veneration paid to the Virgin demanded another treatment. She becomes not merely the principal person, but the superior being; she is the ‘Regina angelorum,’ and the angel bows to her, or kneels before her as to a queen.[91] Thus in the famous altar-piece at Cologne, the angel kneels; he bears a sceptre, and also a sealed roll, as if he were a celestial ambassador delivering his credentials: about the same period we sometimes see the angel merely with his hands folded over his breast, and his head inclined, delivering his message as if to a superior being.

I cannot decide at what period the lily first replaced the sceptre in the hand of the angel, not merely as the emblem of purity, but as the symbol of the Virgin from the verse in the Canticles usually applied to her: ‘I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valley.’ A lily is often placed in a vase near the Virgin, or in the foreground of the picture: of all the attributes placed in the hand of the angel, the lily is the most usual and the most expressive.

The painters of Siena, who often displayed a new and original sentiment in the treatment of a subject, have represented the angel Gabriel as the announcer of ‘peace on earth;’ he kneels before the Virgin, crowned with olive, and bearing a branch of olive in his hand, as in a picture by Taddeo Bartoli. There is also a beautiful St. Gabriel by Martin Schoen, standing, and crowned with olive. So Dante—

L’ angel che venne in terra col decreto
Della molt’ anni lagrimata pace.

Another passage in Dante which the painters seem to have had before them shows us the Madonna as queen, and the angel as adoring:—

‘Qual è quel angel che con tanto giuoco
Guarda negli occhi la nostra regina
Innamorato sì che par di fuoco?’
Ed egli a me,—‘Baldezza e leggiadria
Quanta esser puote in angelo ed in alma
Tutta è in lui, e si volem che sia!’

It is in seeking this _baldezza e leggiadria_ in a mistaken sense that the later painters have forgotten all the spiritual dignity of the Angel Messenger.

Where the angel bears a lighted taper, which the Virgin extends her hand to take from him; or, kneeling, bears in his hand a palm-branch, surmounted by seven or twelve stars (44), the subject represented is not the announcement of the birth of the Saviour, but the death of the Virgin, a part of her legendary history which is rarely treated and easily mistaken; then the announcing angel is not Gabriel, but Michael.[92]

In old German Art, the angel in the Annunciation is habited in priestly garments richly embroidered (42). The scene is often the bedroom of the Virgin; and while the announcing angel enters and kneels at the threshold of the door, the Holy Ghost enters at the window. I have seen examples in which Gabriel, entering at a door behind the Virgin, unfolds his official ‘Ave Maria.’ He has no lily, or sceptre, and she is apparently conscious of his presence without seeing him.[93]

But in the representations of the sixteenth century we find neither the solemnity of the early Italian nor the naïveté of the early German school; and this divine subject becomes more and more materialised and familiarised, until, losing its spiritual character, it strikes us as shockingly prosaic. One cannot say that the angel is invariably deficient in dignity, or the Virgin in grace. In the Venetian school and the Bologna school we find occasionally very beautiful Annunciations; but in general the half-draped fluttering angels and the girlish-looking Virgins are nothing less than offensive; and in the attempt to vary the sentiment, the _naturalisti_ have here run the risk of being much _too_ natural.

In the Cathedral at Orvieto, the Annunciation is represented in front of the choir by two colossal statues by Francesco Mochi: to the right is the angel Gabriel, poised on a marble cloud, in an attitude so fantastic that he looks as if he were going to dance; on the other side stands the Virgin, conceived in a spirit how different!—yet not less mistaken; she has started from her throne; with one hand she grasps it, with the other she seems to guard her person against the intruder: majesty at once, and fear, a look of insulted dignity, are in the air and attitude,—‘_par che minacci e tema nel tempo istesso_’—but I thought of Mrs. Siddons while I looked, not of the Virgin Mary.

This fault of sentiment I saw reversed, but equally in the extreme, in another example—a beautiful miniature.[94] The Virgin, seated on the side of her bed, sinks back alarmed, almost fainting; the angel in a robe of crimson, with a white tunic, stands before her, half turning away and grasping his sceptre in his hand, with a proud commanding air, like a magnificent surly god—a Jupiter who had received a repulse.

I pass over other instances conceived in a taste even more blamable—Gabriels like smirking, winged lord chamberlains; and Virgins, half prim, half voluptuous—the sanctity and high solemnity of the event utterly lost. Let this suffice for the present: I may now leave the reader to his own feeling and discrimination.

ST. RAPHAEL.

_Lat._ Sanctus Raphael. _Ital._ San Raffaello. _Fr._ Saint Raphael.
_Ger._ Der Heilige Rafael.

‘I am RAPHAEL, one of the Seven Holy Angels which present the prayers
of the Saints, and which go in and out before the glory of the HOLY
ONE.’—_Tobit_ xii. 15.

I have already alluded to the established belief, that every individual man, nay, every created being, hath a guardian angel deputed to watch over him:—‘Woe unto us, if, by our negligence or our self-will, we offend him on whose vigilance we depend for help and salvation! But the prince of guardian spirits, the guardian angel of all humanity, is Raphael; and in this character, according to the early Christians, he appeared to the shepherds by night ‘with good tidings of great joy, which shall be for all people.’ It is, however, from the beautiful Hebrew romance of Tobit that his attributes are gathered: he is the protector of the young and innocent, and he watches over the pilgrim and the wayfarer. The character imputed to him in the Jewish traditions has been retained and amplified by Milton: Raphael is the angel sent by God to warn Adam:—

. . . . . The affable archangel
Raphael; the sociable spirit that deign’d
To travel with Tobias, and secured
His marriage with the seven times wedded maid.

And the character of the angel is preserved throughout: his sympathy with the human race, his benignity, his eloquence, his mild and social converse. So when Adam blesses him:—

. . . . Since to part,
Go, heavenly guest, ethereal messenger,
Sent from whose sovereign goodness I adore!
Gentle to me and affable hath been
Thy condescension, and shall be honour’d ever
With grateful memory. Thou to mankind
Be good and friendly still, and oft return!

This character of benignity is stamped on all the best representations of Raphael, which, however, are not common: they occur principally in the chapels dedicated to the holy guardian angels; but there are also churches and chapels dedicated to him singly.

The devotional figures of Raphael exhibit him in the dress of a pilgrim or traveller, ‘his habit fit for speed succinct,’ sandals on his feet, his hair bound with a fillet or diadem, the staff in his hand, and sometimes a bottle of water or a wallet (_panetière_) slung to his belt. In this figure by Murillo (46), from one of the most beautiful pictures in the Leuchtenberg Gallery, Raphael is the guardian and guide of the votary who appears below—a bishop who probably bore the same name.[95]

Sometimes, as guardian spirit, he has a sword: the most beautiful example I could cite of this treatment is the figure in the Breviary of Anne of Bretagne (A.D. 1500); he wears a pale-green tunic bordered with gold, and wings of a deep rose-colour; he has a casket or wallet slung over his shoulder by a golden belt; in one hand he holds a sword, and the other is raised with a warning gesture; his countenance, beautiful and benign as possible, yet says, ‘Take heed.’ More commonly, however, he carries a small casket, box, or vase, supposed to contain the ‘fishy charm’ against the evil spirits. (Tobit vi. 6, 7.)

Raphael, in his character of guardian angel, is generally represented as leading the youthful Tobias. When, in order to mark the difference between the celestial and the mortal being, Tobit is figured so small as to look like a child, and when the angel wears his spirit-wings, and is not disguised, the whole subject becomes idealised: it is no longer an historical action, but a devotional allegory; and Tobias with his fish represents the Christian, the believer, guarded and guided through his life-pilgrimage by the angelic monitor and minister of divine mercy.

There is a small side chapel in the church of Saint Euphemia, at Verona, dedicated to St. Raphael. The walls are painted with frescoes from the story of Tobit; and over the altar is that masterpiece of Carotto, representing the three archangels as three graceful spirit-like figures without wings. The altar being dedicated to Raphael, he is here the principal figure; he alone has the glory encircling his head, and takes precedence of the others; he stands in the centre leading Tobias, and looking down on him with an air of such saintly and benign protection, that one feels inclined to say or sing, in the words of the litany, ‘Sancte Raphaël, adolescentium pudicitiæ defensor, ora pro nobis!’ Even more divine is the St. Michael who stands on the right, with one hand gathering up the folds of his crimson robe, the other leaning on his great two-handed sword; but such a head, such a countenance looking out upon us—so earnest, powerful, and serious!—we recognise the Lord of Souls, the Angel of Judgment. To the left of Raphael stands Gabriel, the Angel of Redemption; he holds the lily, and looks up to heaven adoring: this is the least expressive of the three heads, but still beautiful; and, on the whole, the picture left a stronger impression on my mind than any I had seen at Venice, the glorious Assumption excepted. The colouring in its glowing depth is like that of Giorgione. Vasari tells us, that this picture, painted when Carotto was young (about A.D. 1495), was criticised because the limbs of the angels were too slender; to which Carotto, famous for his repartees, replied, ‘Then they will fly the better!’ The drawing, however, it must be conceded, is not the best part of the picture.

The earliest picture of Titian which remains to us is a St. Raphael leading Tobias;[96] beautiful, but not equal, certainly, to that of Carotto. Raphael, as we might naturally suppose, painted his guardian angel and patron saint _con amore_:[97] we have by him two St. Raphaels; the first, a little figure executed when he was a boy in the studio of his master Perugino, is now on one side of an altar-piece in the Certosa at Pavia. Later in life, and in one of his finest works, he has introduced his patron saint with infinite beauty of feeling: in the Madonna della Pesce,[98] the Virgin sits upon her throne, with the Infant Christ in her arms; the angel Raphael presents Tobias, who is not here a youth but a child; while the Infant Christ turns away from the wise bearded old doctor, who is intently studying his great book, to welcome the angel and his charge. The head of the angel, looking up in the face of the Madonna, is in truth sublime: it would be impossible to determine whether it belongs to a masculine or a feminine being; but none could doubt that it is a _divine_ being, filled with fervent, enthusiastic, adoring love. The fish in the hand of Tobias has given its name to the picture; and I may as well observe that in the devotional pictures, where the fish is merely an attribute, expressing Christian baptism, it is usually very small: in the story it is a sort of monster, which sprang out of the river and would have devoured him.

All the subjects in which the Archangel Raphael is an actor belong to the history of Tobit. The scenes of this beautiful scriptural _legend_—I must call it so—have been popular subjects of Art, particularly in the later schools, and have been admirably treated by some of the best Dutch and Flemish painters: the combination of the picturesque and poetical with the homely and domestic recommended it particularly to Rembrandt and his school. Tobias dragging the fish ashore, while the angel stands by, is a fine picturesque landscape subject which has been often repeated. The spirited little sketch by Salvator,[99] in which the figure of the guardian angel is admirable for power and animated grace; the twilight effect by Rembrandt;[100] another by Domenichino; three by Claude; may be cited as examples.

In such pictures, as it has been rightly observed, the angel ought not to have wings: he is disguised as the friendly traveller. The dog, which ought to be omitted in the devotional pictures, is here a part of the story, and figures with great propriety.

Rembrandt painted the parting of Tobias and his parents four times; Tobias led by the angel, four times; Tobias healing his father, once; the departure of the angel, twice. Of this last subject, the picture in the Louvre may be pronounced one of his finest;—miraculous for true and spirited expression, and for the action of the soaring angel, who parts the clouds and strikes through the air like a strong swimmer through the waves of the sea (47).

The story of Tobit, as a series of subjects, has been very frequently represented, always in the _genre_ and picturesque style of the later schools. I shall have to return to it hereafter; here I have merely alluded to the devotional treatment, in order to direct attention to the proper character of the Archangel Raphael.

And thus we have shown

... how Holy Church
Doth represent with human countenance
Gabriel and Michaël, and him who made
Tobias whole.—DANTE, _Par._ c. iv.

ADDITIONAL NOTES ON ANGELS.

1. In a picture by Gentile da Fabriano (_Berlin Gallery_, 1130), the Virgin and Child are enthroned, and on each side of the throne is a tree, on the branches of which are little red Seraphim winged and perched like birds, singing and making music. I remember also a little Dutch print of a Riposo (_v._ ‘Legends of the Madonna,’ p. 256), in which five little angels are perched on the trees above, singing and playing for the solace of the divine Infant. Thus we have Dante’s idea of the _Uccelli di Dio_, reproduced in a more familiar form.

2. In the Convent of Sant-Angelo at Bologna, Camillo Procaccino painted the ‘Acts of the Holy Angels’ in the following order:—1. The Fall of the Dragon. 2. The Angels drive Adam and Eve from Paradise. 3. The three Angels visit Abraham. 4. The Angel stays the arm of Abraham. 5. The Angel wrestles with Jacob. 6. The Angels visit Jacob in a Dream. 7. The Angel delivers the three Children in the burning fiery Furnace. 8. The Angel slays the Host of Sennacherib. 9. The Angel protects Tobit. 10. The Punishment of Heliodorus. 11. The Annunciation to Mary. It will be remarked that all these subjects are strictly scriptural.

The Four Evangelists.

‘Matthew wrote for the Hebrews; Mark, for the Italians; Luke, for the
Greeks; for ALL, the great herald John.’—_Gregory Nazianzen._

Since on the Four Evangelists, as the witnesses and interpreters of a revealed religion, the whole Christian Church may be said to rest as upon four majestic pillars, we cannot be surprised that representations of them should abound, and that their effigies should have been introduced into Christian places of worship, from very early times. Generally, we find them represented together, grouped, or in a series; sometimes in their collective character, as the _Four Witnesses_; sometimes in their individual character, each as an inspired teacher, or beneficent patron. As no authentic resemblances of these sacred personages have ever been known or even supposed to exist, such representations have always been either _symbolical_ or _ideal_. In the symbol, the aim was to embody, under some emblematical image, the spiritual mission; in the ideal portrait, the artist, left to his own conception, borrowed from Scripture some leading trait (when Scripture afforded any authority for such), and adding, with what success his skill could attain, all that his imagination could conceive, as expressive of dignity and persuasive eloquence—the look ‘commercing with the skies,’ the commanding form, the reverend face, the ample draperies—he put the book or the pen into his hand, and thus the writer and the teacher of the truth was placed before us.

The earliest type under which the Four Evangelists are figured is an emblem of the simplest kind: four scrolls placed in the four angles of a Greek cross, or four books (the Gospels), represented allegorically those who wrote or promulgated them. The second type chosen was more poetical—the four rivers which had their source in Paradise: representations of this kind, in which the Saviour, figured as a lamb holding the cross, or in his human form, with a lamb near him, stands on an eminence, from which gush four rivers or fountains, are to be met with in the catacombs, on ancient sarcophagi preserved among the Christian relics in the Vatican, and in several old churches constructed between the second and the fifth century.