in the valley beneath, from a villa on one of the surrounding heights.
The startling bell-tower Giotto raised more than startles him.
(For an explanation of this, see note under Stanza 2.)
Although the poem presents a general survey of the old
Florentine masters, the THEME of the poem is really Giotto,
who received the affectionate homage of the Florentines,
in his own day, and for whom the speaker has a special love.
The poem leads up to the prophesied restoration of Freedom to Florence,
the return of Art, that departed with her, and the completion
of the Campanile, which will vindicate Giotto and Florence together,
and crown the restoration of freedom to the city, and its liberation
from the hated Austrian rule.

Mrs. Browning's `Casa Guidi Windows' should be read in connection with
this monologue. The strong sympathy which is expressed
in the last few stanzas of the monologue, with Italian liberty,
is expressed in `Casa Guidi Windows' at a white heat.

"We find," says Professor Dowden, "a full confession
of Mr. Browning's creed with respect to art in the poem entitled
`Old Pictures in Florence'. He sees the ghosts of the early
Christian masters, whose work has never been duly appreciated,
standing sadly by each mouldering Italian Fresco; and when
an imagined interlocutor inquires what is admirable in such work
as this, the poet answers that the glory of Christian art lies
in its rejecting a limited perfection, such as that of the art
of ancient Greece, the subject of which was finite, and the lesson
taught by which was submission, and in its daring to be incomplete,
and faulty, faulty because its subject was great with infinite fears
and hopes, and because it must needs teach man not to submit
but to aspire."

Pictor Ignotus.

{Florence, 15--.}

An unknown painter reflects, but without envy, upon the praise which
has been bestowed on a youthful artist,--what that praise involves.
He himself was conscious of all the power, and more,
which the youth has shown; no bar stayed, nor fate forbid,
to exercise it, nor would flesh have shrunk from seconding his soul.
All he saw he could have put upon canvas;

"Each face obedient to its passion's law,
Each passion clear proclaimed without a tongue."

And when he thought how sweet would be the earthly fame which his work
would bring him, "the thought grew frightful, 'twas so wildly dear!"
But a vision flashed before him and changed that thought. A