he patron saint of
musicians, and is sometimes represented as seated at a modern organ.
In this picture she is shown holding in her hands an instrument of
reeds, which may be taken as the beginning of the organ of later days.

Her eyes are raised, and her head is upturned as she listens to the
choir of angels shown above in the clouds, their lips parted as they
sing from open books. She holds the instrument, but she is so intent
on the music she hears that it seems almost slipping from her hands.

Indeed, some of the tubes are already dropping out of their place; and
as the eye follows them, it rests upon a number of other musical
instruments lying on the ground,--the pipe, the violin, the
tambourine, castanets, and others. It is as if we were shown the
various instruments which she had set aside as not satisfying to her,
and at last were shown her organ itself falling to pieces and dropping
from her hands. So faint and imperfect, the painter seems to say, are
all these forms of earthly music when compared with the heavenly.

[Illustration: ST. CECILIA
_Bologna Gallery_]

St. Cecilia is here in a company of other saints, not indeed of her
day and generation, but chosen by Raphael to give expression to
various ideas and sentiments. St. Paul, the great apostle to the
Gentiles, stands in a thoughtful attitude, one hand carrying a scroll
and resting on the hilt of a sword; for in one of his epistles, he
speaks of "the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." He is
listening, and at the same time looks down upon the instruments as if
he were thinking how his earthly words, too, were dull beside the
voice of the Spirit.

On the opposite side of the picture is Mary Magdalene. She holds the
pot of ointment with which she anointed the feet of Christ, and by the
movement of her feet she seems just to have come into the scene, and
looks out of the picture as if she were bidding us and all other
spectators look on the saint and listen to the angels. Perhaps the
artist, in choosing her for one of his figures, was mindful of the
words of the Lord, who praised her for bringing a precious gift,
without thinking of its worth, simply because she loved him, and
wished to show her devotion. So St. Cecilia poured out her music, the
richest gift she had, not thinking how she could turn it into money
and give it to the poor.

Next to St. Paul, behind him and St. Cecilia, stands the evangelist
St. John. Painters and scholars ali