ons exist between the
spirit and the flesh; the will is thwarted by no obstacles. When we think
of Titian, we are irresistibly led to think of music. His "Assumption of
Madonna" (the greatest single oil-painting in the world, if we except
Raphael's "Madonna di San Sisto") can best be described as a symphony--a
symphony of colour, where every hue is brought into harmonious
combination--a symphony of movement, where every line contributes to
melodious rhythm--a symphony of light without a cloud--a symphony of joy
in which the heavens and earth sing Hallelujah. Tintoretto, in the Scuola
di San Rocco, painted an "Assumption of the Virgin" with characteristic
energy and impulsiveness. A group of agitated men around an open tomb, a
rush of air and clash of seraph wings above, a blaze of glory, a woman
borne with sideways-swaying figure from darkness into light;--that is his
picture, all _brio_, excitement, speed. Quickly conceived, hastily
executed, this painting (so far as clumsy restoration suffers us to judge)
bears the impress of its author's impetuous genius. But Titian worked by a
different method. On the earth, among the Apostles, there is action enough
and passion; ardent faces straining upward, impatient men raising impotent
arms and vainly divesting themselves of their mantles, as though they too
might follow her they love. In heaven is radiance, half eclipsing the
archangel who holds the crown, and revealing the father of spirits in an
aureole of golden fire. Between earth and heaven, amid choirs of angelic
children, rises the mighty mother of the faith of Christ, who was Mary and
is now a goddess, ecstatic yet tranquil, not yet accustomed to the skies,
but far above the grossness and the incapacities of earth. Her womanhood
is so complete that those for whom the meaning of her Catholic legend is
lost, may hail in her humanity personified.

The grand manner can reach no further than in this picture--serene,
composed, meditated, enduring, yet full of dramatic force and of profound
feeling. Whatever Titian chose to touch, whether it was classical
mythology or portrait, history or sacred subject, he treated in this large
and healthful style. It is easy to tire of Veronese; it is possible to be
fatigued by Tintoretto. Titian, like nature, waits not for moods or
humours in the spectator. He gives to the mind joy of which it can never
weary, pleasures that cannot satiate, a satisfaction not to be repented
of, a sweetness