bout 1159 to 1175),
preserved in the Library at Strasburg.]

* * * * *

In the centre group of Michael Angelo's "Last Judgment," we have the
same leading _motif_, but treated in a very different feeling. Christ
stands before us in figure and mien like a half-naked athlete; his
left hand rejects, his right hand threatens, and his whole attitude
is as utterly devoid of dignity as of grace. I have often wondered
as I have looked at this grand and celebrated work, what could be
Michael Angelo's idea of Christ. He who was so good, so religious,
so pure-minded, and so high-minded, was deficient in humility and
sympathy; if his morals escaped, his imagination was corrupted by the
profane and pagan influences of his time. His conception of Christ is
here most unchristian, and his conception of the Virgin is not much
better. She is grand in form, but the expression is too passive.
She looks down and seems to shrink; but the significance of the
attitude,--the hand pressed to the maternal bosom,--given to her by
the old painters, is lost.

In a "Last Judgment" by Rubens, painted for the Jesuits of Brussels
(Brussels; Musee), the Virgin extends her robe over the world, as if
to shield mankind from the wrath of her Son; pointing, at the same
time, significantly to her bosom, whence He derived his earthly life.
The daring bad taste, and the dramatic power of this representation,
are characteristic alike of the painter, the time, and the community
for which the picture was painted.

* * * * *

More beautiful and more acceptable to our feelings are those graceful
representations of the Virgin as dispenser of mercy on earth; as
protectress and patroness either of all Christendom, or of some
particular locality, country, or community. In such pictures she
stands with outstretched arms, crowned with a diadem, or in some
instances simply veiled, her ample robe, extended on each side, is
held up by angels, while under its protecting folds are gathered
worshippers and votaries of all ranks and ages--men, women,
children,--kings, nobles, ecclesiastics,--the poor, the lame, the
sick. Or if the picture be less universal in its significance,
dedicated perhaps by some religious order or charitable brotherhood,
we see beneath her robe an assemblage of monks and nuns, or a troop of
young orphans or redeemed prisoners. Such a representation is styled a
_Misericordia_.

In a pictu