he is forced by the exigencies of display, the face for the body, so
also he does not sacrifice happiness for pain. The chief reason why we
all know the "Last Judgment" of Michael Angelo, and not the "Paradise"
of Tintoret, is the same love of sensation which makes us read the
_Inferno_ of Dante, and not his _Paradise_; and the choice, believe me,
is our fault, not his; some farther evil influence is due to the fact
that Michael Angelo has invested all his figures with picturesque and
palpable elements of effect, while Tintoret has only made them lovely in
themselves and has been content that they should deserve, not demand,
your attention.
237. You are accustomed to think the figures of Michael Angelo
sublime--because they are dark, and colossal, and involved, and
mysterious--because in a word, they look sometimes like shadows, and
sometimes like mountains, and sometimes like specters, but never like
human beings. Believe me, yet once more, in what I told you long
since--man can invent nothing nobler than humanity. He cannot raise his
form into anything better than God made it, by giving it either the
flight of birds or strength of beasts, by enveloping it in mist, or
heaping it into multitude. Your pilgrim must look like a pilgrim in a
straw hat, or you will not make him into one with cockle and nimbus; an
angel must look like an angel on the ground, as well as in the air; and
the much-denounced pre-Raphaelite faith that a saint cannot look
saintly unless he has thin legs, is not more absurd than Michael
Angelo's, that a Sybil cannot look Sibylline unless she has thick ones.
238. All that shadowing, storming, and coiling of his, when you look
into it, is mere stage decoration, and that of a vulgar kind. Light is,
in reality, more awful than darkness--modesty more majestic than
strength; and there is truer sublimity in the sweet joy of a child, or
the sweet virtue of a maiden, than in the strength of Antaeus, or
thunder-clouds of AEtna.
Now, though in nearly all his greater pictures, Tintoret is entirely
carried away by his sympathy with Michael Angelo, and conquers him in
his own field;--outflies him in motion, outnumbers him in multitude,
outwits him in fancy, and outflames him in rage,--he can be just as
gentle as he is strong: and that Paradise, though it is the largest
picture in the world, without any question, is also the thoughtfulest,
and most precious.
The Thoughtfulest!--it would be saying but little, as far as Michael
Angelo is concerned.
239. For consider of it yourselves. You have heard, from your youth up
(and all educated persons have heard for three centuries), of this Last
Judgment of his, as the most sublime picture in existence.
The subject of it is one which should certainly be interesting to you,
in one of two ways.
If you never expect to be judged for any of your own doings, and the
tradition of the coming of Christ is to you as an idle tale--still,
think what a wonderful tale it would be, were it well told. You are at
liberty, disbelieving it, to range the fields--Elysian and Tartarean--of
all imagination. You may play with it, since it is false; and what a
play would it not be, well written? Do you think the tragedy, or the
miracle play, or the infinitely Divina Commedia of the Judgment of the
astonished living who were dead;--the undeceiving of the sight of every
human soul, understanding in an instant all the shallow, and depth of
past life and future,--face to face with both,--and with God:--this
apocalypse to all intellect, and completion to all passion, this minute
and individual drama of the perfected history of separate spirits, and
of their finally accomplished affections!--think you, I say, all this
was well told by mere heaps of dark bodies curled and convulsed in
space, and fall as of a crowd from a scaffolding, in writhed concretions
of muscular pain?
But take it the other way. Suppose you believe, be it never so dimly or
feebly, in some kind of Judgment that is to be;--that you admit even the
faint contingency of retribution, and can imagine, with vivacity enough
to fear, that in this life, at all events, if not in another--there may
be for you a Visitation of God, and a questioning--What hast thou done?
The picture, if it is a good one, should have a deeper interest, surely
on _this_ postulate? Thrilling enough, as a mere imagination of what is
never to be--now, as a conjecture of what _is_ to be, held the best that
in eighteen centuries of Christianity has for men's eyes been
made;--Think of it so!
240. And then, tell me, whether you yourselves, or any one you have
known, did ever at any time receive from this picture any, the smallest
vital thought, warning, quickening, or help? It may have appalled, or
impressed you for a time, as a thunder-cloud might: but has it ever
taught you anything--chastised in you anything--confirmed a
purpose--fortified a resistance--purified a passion? I know that, for
you, it has done none of these things; and I know also that, for others,
it has done very different things. In every vain and proud designer who
has since lived, that dark carnality of Michael Angelo's has fostered
insolent science, and fleshly imagination. Daubers and blockheads think
themselves painters, and are received by the public as such, if they
know how to foreshorten bones and decipher entrails; and men with
capacity of art either shrink away (the best of them always do) into
petty felicities and innocencies of genre painting--landscapes, cattle,
family breakfasts, village schoolings, and the like; or else, if they
have the full sensuous art-faculty that would have made true painters
of them, being taught, from their youth up, to look for and learn the
body instead of the spirit, have learned it, and taught it to such
purpose, that at this hour, when I speak to you, the rooms of the Royal
Academy of England, receiving also what of best can be sent there by the
masters of France, contain _not one_ picture honorable to the arts of
their age; and contain many which are shameful in their record of its
manners.
241. Of that, hereafter. I will close to-day giving you some brief
account of the scheme of Tintoret's Paradise, in justification of my
assertion that it is the thoughtfulest as well as mightiest picture in
the world.
In the highest center is Christ, leaning on the globe of the earth,
which is of dark crystal. Christ is crowned with a glory as of the sun,
and all the picture is lighted by that glory, descending through circle
beneath circle of cloud, and of flying or throned spirits.
The Madonna, beneath Christ, and at some interval from Him, kneels to
Him. She is crowned with the Seven stars, and kneels on a cloud of
angels, whose wings change into ruby fire, where they are near her.
The three great Archangels meeting from three sides, fly towards Christ.
Michael delivers up his scales and sword. He is followed by the Thrones
and Principalities of the Earth; so inscribed--Throni--Principatus. The
Spirits of the Thrones bear scales in their hands; and of the
Princedoms, shining globes: beneath the wings of the last of these are
the four great teachers and lawgivers, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St.
Gregory, St. Augustine, and behind St. Augustine stands his mother,
watching him, her chief joy in Paradise.
Under the Thrones, are set the Apostles, St. Paul separated a little
from the rest, and put lowest, yet principal; under St. Paul, is St.
Christopher, bearing a massive globe, with a cross upon it; but to mark
him as the Christ-bearer, since here in Paradise he cannot have the
Child on his shoulders, Tintoret has thrown on the globe a flashing
stellar reflection of the sun the head of Christ.
All this side of the picture is kept in glowing color,--the four Doctors
of the church have golden miters and mantles; except the Cardinal, St.
Jerome, who is in burning scarlet, his naked breast glowing, warm with
noble life,--the darker red of his robe relieved against a white glory.
242. Opposite to Michael, Gabriel flies towards the Madonna, having in
his hand the Annunciation lily, large, and triple-blossomed. Above him,
and above Michael, equally, extends a cloud of white angels, inscribed
"Serafini;" but the group following Gabriel, and corresponding to the
Throni following Michael, is inscribed "Cherubini." Under these are the
great prophets, and singers and foretellers of the happiness or of the
sorrow of time. David, and Solomon, and Isaiah, and Amos of the
herdsmen. David has a colossal golden psaltery laid horizontally across
his knees;--two angels behind him dictate to him as he sings, looking up
towards Christ; but one strong angel sweeps down to Solomon from among
the cherubs, and opens a book, resting it on the head of Solomon, who
looks down earnestly unconscious of it;--to the left of David, separate
from the group of prophets, as Paul from the apostles, is Moses,
dark-robed; in the full light, withdrawn far behind him, Abraham,
embracing Isaac with his left arm, and near him, pale St. Agnes. In
front, nearer, dark and colossal, stands the glorious figure of Santa
Giustina of Padua; then a little subordinate to her, St. Catherine, and,
far on the left, and high, St. Barbara leaning on her tower. In front,
nearer, flies Raphael; and under him is the four-square group of the
Evangelists. Beneath them, on the left, Noah; on the right, Adam and
Eve, both floating unsupported by cloud or angel; Noah buoyed by the
Ark, which he holds above him, and it is _this_ into which Solomon gazes
down, so earnestly. Eve's face is, perhaps, the most beautiful ever
painted by Tintoret--full in light, but dark-eyed. Adam floats beside
her, his figure fading into a winged gloom, edged in the outline of
fig-leaves. Far down, under these, central in the lowest part of the
picture, rises the Angel of the Sea, praying for Venice; for Tintoret
conceives his Paradise as existing now, not as in the future. I at
first mistook this soft Angel of the Sea for the Magdalen, for he is
sustained by other three angels on either side, as the Magdalen is, in
designs of earlier time, because of the verse, "There is joy in the
presence of the angels over one sinner that repenteth." But the Magdalen
is on the right, behind St. Monica; and on the same side, but lowest of
all, Rachel, among the angels of her children, gathered now again to her
forever.
243. I have no hesitation in asserting this picture to be by far the
most precious work of art of any kind whatsoever, now existing in the
world; and it is, I believe, on the eve of final destruction; for it is
said that the angle of the great council-chamber is soon to be rebuilt;
and that process will involve the destruction of the picture by removal,
and, far more, by repainting. I had thought of making some effort to
save it by an appeal in London to persons generally interested in the
arts; but the recent desolation of Paris has familiarized us with
destruction, and I have no doubt the answer to me would be, that Venice
must take care of her own. But remember, at least, that I have borne
witness to you to-day of the treasures that we forget, while we amuse
ourselves with the poor toys, and the petty or vile arts, of our own
time.
The years of that time have perhaps come, when we are to be taught to
look no more to the dreams of painters, either for knowledge of
Judgment, or of Paradise. The anger of Heaven will not longer, I think,
be mocked for our amusement; and perhaps its love may not always be
despised by our pride. Believe me, all the arts, and all the treasures
of men, are fulfilled and preserved to them only, so far as they have
chosen first, with their hearts, not the curse of God, but His blessing.
Our Earth is now incumbered with ruin, our Heaven is clouded by Death.
May we not wisely judge ourselves in some things now, instead of amusing
ourselves with the painting of judgments to come?
FOOTNOTES:
[41] NOTE.--The separate edition of this lecture was prefaced by the
following note:--
"I have printed this Lecture separately, that strangers visiting the
Galleries may be able to use it for reference to the drawings. But they
must observe that its business is only to point out what is to be blamed
in Michael Angelo, and that it assumes the facts of his power to be
generally known. Mr. Tyrwhitt's statement of these, in his 'Lectures on
Christian Art,' will put the reader into possession of all that may
justly be alleged in honor of him.
"_Corpus Christi College, 1st May, 1872._"
[42] If you like to have it with perfect exactitude, recollect that
Bellini died at true ninety,--Tintoret at eighty-two; that Bellini's
death was four years before Raphael's, and that Tintoret was born four
years before Bellini's death.
[43] Julian, rather. _See_ Mr. Tyrwhitt's notice of the lately
discovered error, in his _Lectures on Christian Art_.
[44] From the invaluable series of documents relating to Titian and his
times, extricated by Mr. Rawdon Brown from the archives of Venice, and
arranged and translated by him.
[45] Fondaco de Tedeschi. I saw the last wrecks of Giorgione's frescoes
on the outside of it in 1845.
[46] I beg that this statement may be observed with attention. It is of
great importance, as in opposition to the views usually held respecting
the grave schools of painting.
[47] The upper photograph in S. 50 is, however, not taken from the great
Paradise, which is in too dark a position to be photographed, but from a
study of it existing in a private gallery, and every way inferior. I
have vainly tried to photograph portions of the picture itself.
[48] He had, indeed, other and more solemn thoughts of the Night than
Correggio; and these he tried to express by distorting form, and making
her partly Medusa-like. In this lecture, as above stated, I am only
dwelling on points hitherto unnoticed of dangerous evil in the too much
admired master.
[49] Tintoret dissected, and used clay models, in the true academical
manner, and produced academical results thereby; but all his fine work
is done from life, like that of the Greeks.