Chapter CLXIX: Section LXII: Sixth side. Justice. Crowned, and with sword
Inscribed in the copy, "REX SUM JUSTICIE."
This idea was afterwards much amplified and adorned in the only good capital of the Renaissance series, under the Judgment angle. Giotto has also given his whole strength to the painting of this virtue, representing her as enthroned under a noble Gothic canopy, holding scales, not by the beam, but one in each hand; a beautiful idea, showing that the equality of the scales of Justice is not owing to natural laws, but to her own immediate weighing the opposed causes in her own hands. In one scale is an executioner beheading a criminal; in the other an angel crowning a man who seems (in Selvatico's plate) to have been working at a desk or table.
Beneath her feet is a small predella, representing various persons riding securely in the woods, and others dancing to the sound of music.
Spenser's Justice, Sir Artegall, is the hero of an entire book, and the betrothed knight of Britomart, or chastity.
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Stones of Venice [introductions]Chapter CLXIX: Section LXII: Sixth side. Justice. Crowned, and with sword
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