the whole world;
he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out
with him."

The Book of Revelation is full of strange imagery; and ever since it
was written, men learned and unlearned have tried to turn its
impassioned verses into real historical scenes, past or to come. Above
all, this figure of a dragon, a monster part man, part brute, puzzled
people, and they have all sorts of explanations to make of it.

In our fairy tales we often hear of hobgoblins and dragons and like
fearful beings, and we think of them as make-believe creatures, and
sometimes are afraid of them, even though if we are questioned we say
we know they do not really exist. But in Raphael's day, dragons were
by no means unreal things to people. Some thought they had seen them,
and there were a great many persons who if they had not seen them
themselves were sure others had seen them.

In Raphael's day there were large tracts of the world, dark woods,
inaccessible mountains, which had hardly been explored at all, and
people fancied them haunted by strange men and stranger animals. As
more and more light is let into the world, these dark places
disappear, and we have come to know just what kinds of animals and men
there are everywhere. Yet still, we are not quite sure there may not
be singular beasts lurking out of sight, like the sea serpent for
example.

Now, the dragon in early days stood for what was ugly and terrible and
a hater of good. The Greeks believed there were dragons, and they had
many tales of how Hercules or this or that hero slew a dragon. To the
Christian of the Middle Ages the dragon stood at one end of the scale,
an archangel at the other; for as the dragon was all darkness and
hideousness, the archangel was all light and beauty and gloriousness.
It thrilled every one to think of the angel of light fighting with and
overcoming the beast of darkness; for every one knew that sort of
struggle was going on in the world, even in himself.

[Illustration: ST. MICHAEL SLAYING THE DRAGON
_The Louvre, Paris_]

Raphael's picture gives a fine contrast between the beautiful, strong,
young archangel and his ugly foe. St. Michael hovers in mid air as
light and graceful as a bird, while Satan squirms beneath his feet, a
loathsome creature scorched by the flames and sulphurous fumes, which
pour from the clefts of the rock.

In the artist's imagination both are spirits, and so both are winged;
for wings, which carry on