(179) On the throne are the Virgin and her mother, St. Anne, who offers the infant Christ a peach, symbolical, as the fruit thus offered in these pictures originally was, of "the fruits of the spirit--joy, peace, and love." At the foot of the throne stands the little St. John (the Baptist), "one of the purest creations of Christian art," holding in his arms the cross of reeds and the scroll inscribed "Ecce Agnus Dei" ("Behold the Lamb of God"). The discovery of Benedetto Buonvisi's will has shown why the various saints were selected--St. Anne, because the Buonvisi chapel was dedicated to her; St. Lawrence as the patron of the founder's father; St. Paul as the patron of the founder's brother and heir; St. Sebastian as the saint invoked in plagues (from which calamity Lucca suffered in 1510); and St. Benedict as the patron of the founder (G. C. Williamson's _Francia_, p. 111). (180) This picture, which was the "lunette," or arch, forming the top of the altar-piece, is a "pietà," _i.e._ the Virgin and two angels weeping over the dead body of Christ. The artist has filled his picture with that solemn reverential pity, harmonised by love, which befits his subject. The body of Christ--utterly dead, yet not distorted nor defaced by death--is that of a tired man whose great soul would not let him rest while there was still His father's work to do on earth. In the face of the angel at His head there is a look of quiet joy, as of one who knows that "death is but a covered way that leads into the light"; in the attitude and expression of the angel at the feet there is prayerful sympathy for the sorrowing mother. The face of the mother herself, which before was pure and calm, is now tear-stained and sad, because her son has met so cruel a death-- What else in life seems piteous any more After such pity? Yet it bears a look of content because the world has known him. She rests His body tenderly on her knee as she did when he was a little child--thus are "the hues of the morning and the solemnity of eve, the gladness in accomplished promise, and sorrow of the sword-pierced heart, gathered into one human Lamp of ineffable love" (_Modern Painters_, vol. ii. pt. iii. sec. ii. ch. v. § 21). 181. THE VIRGIN AND CHILD WITH ST. JOHN. _Perugino_ (_Umbrian_: 1446-1523). _See 288._