tion, c. xii. 1.

3, 4. Aaron, as priestly ancestor (because his wand blossomed), and
David, as kingly ancestor of the Virgin.

5, 6. St. Dionysius the Areopagite, who was present at the death of
the Virgin, and St. Bernard, who composed the famous "Salve Regina" in
her honour.

Such is this grand systematic scheme of decoration, which, to those
who regard it cursorily, is merely a sumptuous confusion of colours
and forms, or at best, "a fine example of the Guido school and
Bernino." It is altogether a very complete and magnificent specimen
of the prevalent style of art, and a very comprehensive and suggestive
expression of the prevalent tendency of thought, in the Roman
Catholic Church from the beginning of the seventeenth century. In no
description of this chapel have I ever seen the names and subjects
accurately given: the style of art belongs to the _decadence_, and the
taste being worse than, questionable, the pervading _doctrinal_ idea
has been neglected, or never understood.

III.

Those pictures which represent the Virgin Mary kneeling before the
celestial throne, while the PADRE ETERNO or the MESSIAH extends his
hand or his sceptre towards her, are generally misunderstood. They
do not represent, the Assumption, nor yet the reception of Mary in
Heaven, as is usually supposed; but the election or predestination of
Mary as the immaculate vehicle or tabernacle of human redemption--the
earthly parent of the divine Saviour. I have described such a picture
by Dosso Dossi, and another by Cottignola. A third example may be
cited in a yet more beautiful and celebrated picture by Francia, now
in the Church at San Frediano at Lucca. Above, in the glory of Heaven,
the Virgin kneels before the throne of the Creator; she is clad in
regal attire of purple and crimson and gold; and she bends her fair
crowned head, and folds her hands upon her bosom with an expression
of meek yet dignified resignation--"_Behold the handmaid of the
Lord!_"--accepting, as woman, that highest glory, as mother, that
extremest grief, to which the Divine will, as spoken by the prophets
of old, had called her. Below, on the earth and to the right hand,
stand David and Solomon, as prophets and kingly ancestors: on the left
hand, St. Augustine and St. Anselm in their episcopal robes. (I have
mentioned, with regard to the office in honour of the Immaculate
Conception, that the idea is said to have originated in England. I
should also have added,