Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 12.djvu/207

Rh September here, to tell you the truth, was finer and warmer than August with you. The Apennines in the south have received a warm greeting from me, for I have now had enough of the plain. To-morrow I shall be writing at the foot of them.

Guercino loved his native town: indeed, the Italians almost universally cherish and maintain this sort of local patriotism; and it is to this beautiful feeling that Italy owes so many of its valuable institutions and its multitude of local sanctuaries. Under the management of this master, an academy of painting was formed here. He left behind him many paintings, of which his townsmen are still very proud, and which, indeed, fully justify their pride.

Guercino is here a sacred name, and that, too, in the mouths of children as well as of the old.

Most charmed was I with his picture representing the risen Lord appearing to his mother. Kneeling before him, she looks upon him with indescribable affection. Her left hand is touching his body just under the confounded wound, which mars the whole picture. His hand lies upon her neck; and, in order the better to gaze upon her, his body is slightly bent back. This gives to his figure a somewhat strange, not to say forced, appearance. And yet, for all that, it is infinitely beautiful. The calm and sad look with which he contemplates her is unique, and seems to convey the impression that before his noble soul there still floats a remembrance of his own sufferings and of hers, which the resurrection had not at once dispelled.

Strange has engraved the picture. I wish that my friends could see even his copy of it.

After it a Madonna won my admiration. The child wants the breast: she modestly shrinks from exposing her bosom. Natural, noble, exquisite, and beautiful.

Further, a Mary, who is guiding the arm of the infant Christ, standing before her with his face toward