The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2,
December, 1857, by Various

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Title: The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857

Author: Various

Release Date: November 19, 2003 [eBook #10138]
[Date last updated: April 30, 2005]

Language: English

Chatacter set encoding: US-ASCII

***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 1,
ISSUE 2, DECEMBER, 1857***

E-text prepared by Joshua Hutchinson, Bob Blair, and Project Gutenberg
Distributed Proofreaders

THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY.

A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS.

VOL. I.--DECEMBER, 1857.--NO. II.

FLORENTINE MOSAICS.

[Concluded.]

VI.

THE CARMINE.

The only part of this ancient church which escaped destruction by fire
in 1771 was, most fortunately, the famous Brancacci chapel. Here are
the frescos by Masolino da Panicale, who died in the early part of the
fifteenth century,--the Preaching of Saint Peter, and the Healing of
the Sick. His scholar, Masaccio, (1402-1443,) continued the series,
the completion of which was entrusted to Filippino Lippi, son of Fra
Filippo.

No one can doubt that the hearty determination evinced by Masolino and
Masaccio to deal with actual life, to grapple to their souls the
visible forms of humanity, and to reproduce the types afterwards in
new, vivid, breathing combinations of dignity and intelligent action,
must have had an immense effect upon the course of Art. To judge by
the few and somewhat injured specimens of these masters which are
accessible, it is obvious that they had much more to do in forming the
great schools of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, than a painter
of such delicate, but limited genius as that of Fra Angelico could
possibly have. Certainly, the courage and accuracy exhibited in the
nude forms of Adam and Eve expelled from paradise, and the expressive
grace in the group of Saint Paul conversing with Saint Peter in
prison, where so much knowledge and power of action are combined with
so much beauty, all show an immense advance over the best works of the
preceding three quarters of a century.

Besides the great intrinsic merits of these paintings, t