fields, unapproachable but by
the reverent and loving souls, in some sort already among the Dead.

They interpret to those of us who can read them, so far as they already
see and know, the things that are forever. "Charity never faileth; but
whether there be prophecies, they shall fail--tongues, they shall
cease--knowledge, it shall vanish."

And the one message they bear to us is the commandment of the Eternal
Charity. "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with _all_ thine heart, and
thy neighbor as thyself." As thyself--no more, even the dearest of
neighbors.

"Therefore let every man see that he love his wife even as himself."

No more--else she has become an idol, not a fellow-servant; a creature
between us and our Master.

And they teach us that what higher creatures exist between Him and us,
we are also bound to know, and to love in their place and state, as
they ascend and descend on the stairs of their watch and ward.

The principal masters of this faithful religious school in painting,
known to me, are Giotto, Angelico, Sandro Botticelli, Filippo Lippi,
Luini, and Carpaccio; but for a central illustration of their mind, I
take that piece of work by the sculptor of Quercia,[48] of which some
shadow of representation, true to an available degree, is within reach
of my reader.

249. This sculpture is central in every respect; being the last
Florentine work in which the proper form of the Etruscan tomb is
preserved, and the first in which all right Christian sentiment
respecting death is embodied. It is perfectly severe in classical
tradition, and perfectly frank in concession to the passions of existing
life. It submits to all the laws of the past, and expresses all the
hopes of the future.

Now every work of the great Christian schools expresses primarily,
conquest over death; conquest not grievous, but absolute and serene;
rising with the greatest of them, into rapture.

But this, as a _central_ work, has all the peace of the Christian
Eternity, but only in part its gladness. Young children wreathe round
the tomb a garland of abundant flowers, but she herself, Ilaria, yet
sleeps; the time is not yet come for her to be awakened out of sleep.

Her image is a simple portrait of her--how much less beautiful than she
was in life, we cannot know--but as beautiful as marble can be.

And through and in the marble we may see that the damsel is not dead,
but sleepeth: yet as visibly a sleep that shall know no en