thy own soul also," becomes the first of the Seven Sorrows.
It is an undecided point whether the Adoration of the Magi took
place thirteen days, or one year and thirteen days after the birth of
Christ. In a series of subjects artistically arranged, the Epiphany
always precedes, in order of time, that scene in the temple which
is sometimes styled the Purification, sometimes the Presentation and
sometimes the _Nunc Dimitis_. They are three distinct incidents; but,
as far as I can judge, neither the painters themselves, nor those who
have named pictures, have been careful to discriminate between them.
On a careful examination of various compositions, some of special
celebrity, which are styled, in a general way, the Presentation in
the Temple, it will appear, I think, that the idea uppermost in the
painter's mind has been to represent the prophecy of Simeon.

No doubt, in later times, the whole scene, as a subject of art, was
considered in reference chiefly to the Virgin, and the intention was
to express the first of her Seven Sorrows. But in ancient art, and
especially in Greek art, the character of Simeon assumed a singular
significance and importance, which so long as modern art was
influenced by the traditional Byzantine types, modified, in some
degree, the arrangement and sentiment of this favourite subject.

It is related that when Ptolemy Philadelphus about 260 years before
Christ, resolved to have the Hebrew Scriptures translated into
Greek, for the purpose of placing them in his far-famed library,
he despatched messengers to Eleazar, the High Priest of the Jews,
requiring him to send scribes and interpreters learned in the Jewish
law to his court at Alexandria. Thereupon Eleazar selected six of
the most learned Rabbis from each of the twelve tribes of Israel,
seventy-two persons in all, and sent them to Egypt, in obedience to
the commands of King Ptolemy, and among these was Simeon, a priest,
and a man full of learning. And it fell to the lot of Simeon to
translate the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when he came to that
verse where it is written, "Behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear
a son," he began to misdoubt, in his own mind, how this could be
possible; and, after long meditation, fearing to give scandal and
offence to the Greeks, he rendered the Hebrew word _Virgin_ by a Greek
word which signifies merely a _young woman_; but when he had written
it down, behold an angel effaced it, and substituted the ri