[42] _Modern Painters_, vol. ii. "Of Imagination Penetrative."
Now hath my life across a stormy sea,
Like a frail bark reached that wide port where all
Are bidden, ere the final reckoning fall
Of good and evil for eternity.
Now know I well how that fond phantasy,
Which made my soul the worshipper and thrall
Of earthly art, is vain; how criminal
Is that which all men seek unwillingly.
Those amorous thoughts which were so lightly dressed,
What are they when the double death is nigh?
The one I know for sure, the other dread.
Painting nor sculpture now can lull to rest
My soul that turns to His great Love on high,
Whose arms, to clasp us, on the Cross were spread.
(_Addington Symonds' translation._)
The apse at the east end, or tribuna di San Zenobio, ends in the altar
of the Blessed Sacrament, which is also the shrine of Saint Zenobius.
The reliquary which contains his remains is the work of Lorenzo
Ghiberti, and was finished in 1446; the bronze reliefs set forth his
principal miracles, and there is a most exquisite group of those
flying Angels which Ghiberti realises so wonderfully. Some of the
glass in the windows is also from his design. The seated statues in
the four chapels, representing the four Evangelists, were originally
on the façade; the St. Luke, by Nanni di Banco, in the first chapel on
the right, is the best of the four; then follow St. John, a very early
Donatello, and, on the other side, St. Matthew by Ciuffagni and St.
Mark by Niccolò da Arezzo (slightly earlier than the others). The two
Apostles standing on guard at the entrance of the tribune, St. John
and St. Peter, are by Benedetto da Rovezzano. To right and left are
the southern and northern sacristies. Over the door of the southern
sacristy is a very beautiful bas-relief by Luca della Robbia,
representing the Ascension (1446), like a Fra Angelico in enamelled
terracotta; within the sacristy are two kneeling Angels also by Luca
(1448), practically his only isolated statues, of the greatest beauty
and harmony; and also a rather indifferent St. Michael, a late work of
Lorenzo di Credi. Over the door of the northern sacristy is the
Resurrection by Luca della Robbia (1443), perhaps his earliest extant
work in this enamelled terracotta. The bronze doors of this northern
sacristy are by Michelozzo and Luca della Robbia, assisted by Maso and
Giovanni di Bartolommeo, and were executed between 1446 and 1467. They
are composed of ten reliefs with decorative heads at the corners of
each, as in Lorenzo Ghiberti's work. Above are Madonna and Child with
two Angels; the Baptist with two Angels; in the centre the four
Evangelists, each with two Angels; and below, the four Doctors, each
with two Angels. M. Reymond has shown that the four latter are the
work of Michelozzo. Of Luca's work, the four Evangelists are later
than the two topmost reliefs, and are most beautiful; the Angels are
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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