aised?

No, for this Coronation of the Virgin is a masterpiece, and superior to
all that enthusiasm can say about it; indeed, it outstrips painting and
soars through realms which the mystics of the brush had never
penetrated.

Here we have not a mere manual effort, however admirable; this is not
merely a spiritual and truly religious picture such as Roger van der
Weyden and Quentin Matsys could create; it is quite another thing. With
Angelico an unknown being appears on the scene, the soul of a mystic
that has entered on the contemplative life, and breathes it on the
canvas as on a perfect mirror. It is the soul of a marvellous monk that
we see, of a saint, embodied on this coloured mirror, exhaled in a
painted creation. And we can measure how far that soul had advanced on
the path of perfection from the work that reflects it.

He carries his angels and his saints up to the Unifying Life, the
supreme height of Mysticism. There the weariness of their dolorous
ascent is no more; there is the plenitude of tranquil joy, the peace of
man made one with God. Angelico is the painter of the soul immersed in
God, the painter of his own spirit.

None but a monk could attempt such paintings. Matsys, Memling, Dierck
Bouts, Roger van der Weyden were no doubt sincere and pious worthies.
They gave their work a reflection of Heaven; they too reflected their
own soul in the faces they depicted; but though they gave them a
wonderful stamp of art, they could only infuse into them the semblance
of the soul beginning the practice of Christian asceticism; they could
only represent men still detained, like themselves, in the outer
chambers of those Castles of the Soul of which Saint Theresa speaks, and
not in the Hall where, in the centre, Christ sits and sheds His glory.

They were, in my opinion, greater and keener observers, more learned and
more skilful, even better painters than Angelico; but their heart was in
their craft, they lived in the world, they often could not resist giving
their Virgins fine-lady airs, they were hampered by earthly
reminiscences, they could not rise in their work above the trammels of
daily life; in short, they were and remained men. They were admirable;
they gave utterance to the promptings of ardent faith; but they had not
had the specific culture which is practised only in the silence and
peace of the cloister. Hence they could not cross the threshold of the
seraphic realm where roamed the guileless bein