y. The officers wore light armor, and in their helmets a waving
plume.... The old cardinals entered in their magnificent scarlet velvet
cloaks, with their white ermine capes, and seated themselves side by
side in a great half-circle within the barrier, while the priests who
had carried their trains seated themselves at their feet. By the little
side door of the altar the holy father now entered, in his scarlet
mantle and silver tiara. He ascended his throne. Bishops swung the
vessels of incense around him, while young priests, in scarlet
vestments, knelt, with lighted torches in their hands, before him and
the high altar.

The reading of the lessons began. But it was impossible to keep the
eyes fixed on the lifeless letters of the Missal--they raised
themselves, with the thoughts, to the vast universe which Michael Angelo
has breathed forth in colors upon the ceiling and the walls. I
contemplated his mighty sibyls and wondrously glorious prophets,--every
one of them a subject for a painting. My eyes drank in the magnificent
processions, the beautiful groups of angels; they were not, to me,
painted pictures;--all stood living before me. The rich tree of
knowledge, from which Eve gave the fruit to Adam; the Almighty God, who
floated over the waters,--not borne up by angels, as the older masters
had represented him--no, the company of angels rested upon him and his
fluttering garments. It is true, I had seen these pictures before, but
never as now had they seized upon me. My excited state of mind, the
crowd of people, perhaps even the lyric of my thoughts, made me
wonderfully alive to poetical impressions; and many a poet's heart has
felt as mine did!

The bold foreshortenings, the determinate force with which every figure
steps forward, is amazing, and carries one quite away! It is a spiritual
Sermon on the Mount, in color and form. Like Raphael, we stand in
astonishment before the power of Michael Angelo. Every prophet is a
Moses, like that which he formed in marble. What giant forms are those
which seize upon our eye and our thoughts as we enter! But when
intoxicated with this view, let us turn our eyes to the background of
the chapel, whose whole wall is a high altar of art and thought. The
great chaotic picture, from the floor to the roof, shows itself there
like a jewel, of which all the rest is only the setting. We see there
the Last Judgment.

Christ stands in judgment upon the clouds, and his Mother and the
Ap