of mind.  Observe, it is the fashion to look at such a thing only as a piece of barbarous art; that is the smallest part of its interest.  What I want you to see, is the baseness and falseness of a religious state of enthusiasm, in which such a work could be dwelt upon with pious pleasure.  That a figure, with two small round black beads for eyes; a gilded face, deep cut into horrible wrinkles; an open gash for a mouth, and a distorted skeleton for a body, wrapped about, to make it fine, with striped enamel of blue and gold;—­that such a figure, I say, should ever have been thought helpful towards the conception of a Redeeming Deity, may make you, I think, very doubtful, even of the Divine approval,—­much more of the Divine inspiration,—­of religious reverie in general.  You feel, doubtless, that your own idea of Christ would be something very different from this; but in what does the difference consist?  Not in any more divine authority in your imagination; but in the intellectual work of six intervening centuries; which, simply, by artistic discipline, has refined this crude conception for you, and filled you, partly with an innate sensation, partly with an acquired knowledge, of higher forms,—­which render this Byzantine crucifix as horrible to you, as it was pleasing to its maker.  More is required to excite your fancy; but your fancy is of no more authority than his was:  and a point of national art-skill is quite conceivable, in which the best we can do now will be as offensive to the religious dreamers of the more highly cultivated time, as this Byzantine crucifix is to you.

Mary.  But surely, Angelico will always retain his power over everybody?

L. Yes, I should think, always; as the gentle words of a child will:  but you would be much surprised, Mary, if you thoroughly took the pains to analyze, and had the perfect means of analyzing, that power of Angelico,—­to discover its real sources.  Of course it is natural, at first, to attribute it to the pure religious fervor by which he was inspired; but do you suppose Angelico was really the only monk, in all the Christian world of the middle ages, who labored, in art, with a sincere religious enthusiasm?

Mary.  No, certainly not.

L. Anything more frightful, more destructive of all religious faith whatever, than such a supposition, could not be.  And yet, what other monk ever produced such work?  I have myself examined carefully upwards of two thousand illuminated missals, with especial view to the discovery of any evidence of a similar result upon the art, from the monkish devotion; and utterly in vain.

Mary.  But then, was not Fra Angelico a man of entirely separate and exalted genius?