to do it.

After these things he executed a very great work in Rome for the
Neapolitan Cardinal, Olivieri Caraffa, at the request of the elder
Lorenzo de' Medici, who was a friend of that Cardinal. While going
thither for that purpose, he passed through Spoleto at the wish of
Lorenzo, in order to give directions for the making of a marble tomb
for his father Fra Filippo at the expense of Lorenzo, who had not
been able to obtain his body from the people of Spoleto for removal
to Florence. Filippo, therefore, made a beautiful design for the
said tomb, and Lorenzo had it erected after that design (as has
been told in another place), sumptuous and beautiful. Afterwards,
having arrived in Rome, Filippo painted a chapel in the Church of
the Minerva for the said Cardinal Caraffa, depicting therein scenes
from the life of S. Thomas Aquinas, and certain most beautiful
poetical compositions ingeniously imagined by himself, for he had a
nature ever inclined to this. In the scene, then, wherein Faith has
taken Infidelity captive, there are all the heretics and infidels.
Hope has likewise overcome Despair, and so, too, there are many
other Virtues that have subjugated the Vice that is their opposite.
In a disputation is S. Thomas defending the Church "ex cathedra"
against a school of heretics, and holding vanquished beneath him
Sabellius, Arius, Averroes, and others, all clothed in graceful
garments; of which scene we have in our book of drawings the
original design by Filippo's own hand, with certain others by the
same man, wrought with such mastery that they could not be bettered.
There, too, is the scene when, as S. Thomas is praying, the Crucifix
says to him, "Bene scripsisti de me, Thoma"; while a companion of
the Saint, hearing that Crucifix thus speaking, is standing amazed
and almost beside himself. In the panel is the Virgin receiving the
Annunciation from Gabriel; and on the main wall there is her
Assumption into Heaven, with the twelve Apostles round the
sepulchre. The whole of this work was held, as it still is, to be
very excellent and wrought perfectly for a work in fresco. It
contains a portrait from life of the said Cardinal Olivieri Caraffa,
Bishop of Ostia, who was buried in this chapel in the year 1511, and
afterwards removed to the Piscopio in Naples.

[Illustration: THE LIBERATION OF S. PETER

(_After the fresco by =Filippo Lippi (Filippino)=. Florence: S.
Maria del Carmine_)

_Anderson_]

Having returne