The works of Raphael’s third period, and those executed by his pupils in a spirit and with a touch which leave them sometimes hardly distinguishable from the master’s, show a profounder penetration of life, and at the same time a firmer, more reasonable apprehension of the divinity which lies inclosed in the subject. Mary is now something more than a young man’s dream of virginal purity and maternal tenderness,—she is also the blessed among women; the infant Christ is not only the innocent, playful child, but the prophetic soul, conscious of his divinity and his destiny. These characteristics pervade both the treatment which regards them as historic personages and that which invests them with adorable attributes as having their throne in heaven. The Holy Family is interpreted in a large, serious, and dignified manner, and in the exalted, worshipped Madonna there is a like vision of things eternal seen through the human form. To illustrate this an example may be taken of each class. The Madonna del Passegio, in the Bridgewater gallery, is a well-known composition, which represents the Madonna and child walking through a field; Joseph is in advance, and has turned to look for the others. They have been stopped by the infant S. John Baptist, clad in a rough skin, who presses eagerly forward to kiss Jesus. The mother places a restraining hand upon the shoulders of S. John, and half withdraws the child Jesus from his embrace. A classic grace marks Jesus, who looks steadfastly into the eyes of the impassioned John. The three figures in the principal group are conceived in a noble manner: S. John, prophesying in his face the discovery of the Lamb of God; Mary, looking down with a sweet gravity which marks the holy children, and would separate Jesus as something more than human from too close fellowship with John; Jesus himself, a picture of glorious childhood, with a far-reaching look in his eye, as he gently thrusts back the mother with one hand, and with the other lays hold of the cross which John bears.