_Christ Is Dead_, - Dead To Your Eye As He Was To The Eye Of Mary
And Of John.
Death absolute, hopeless, is written in the faded majesty
of that face, peaceful and weary; death in every relaxed muscle.
And,
surely, in painting this form, some sentiment of reverence and
devotion softened into awestruck tenderness that hand commonly so
vigorous; for, instead of the almost coarse vitality which usually
pervades his manly figures, there is shed over this a spiritualized
refinement, not less, but more than human, as if some heavenly voice
whispered, "This is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world!"
The figures of the disciples are real and individual in expression.
The sorrow is homely, earnest, unpicturesque, and grievously heart
broken. The cheek of the kneeling Mary at his feet is wet with tears.
You cannot ask yourself whether she is beautiful or not. You only see
and sympathize with her sorrow. But the apostle John, who receives
into his arms the descending form, is the most wonderful of all.
Painters that I have seen represent him too effeminately. They forget
the ardent soul whom Jesus rebuked for wishing to bring down fire from
heaven on his enemies; they forget that it was John who was called the
son of thunder, and that his emblem in the early church was the eagle.
From the spiritualized softness of his writings we have formed another
picture, forgetting that these are the writings of an aged man, in
whom the ardor of existence has been softened by long experience of
suffering, and habits of friendship with a suffering Lord.
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