The Life, Studies, and Works of Benjamin West, Esq. Composed from Materials Furnished by Himself by Galt, John, 1779-1839

_Transfiguration by Raphael._

The title of this picture is a misnomer. The picture itself tells you it is _the Ascension_. The Transfiguration is another incident, which happened long before the Ascension, and is recited in the ninth chapter of St. Luke:--"When the countenance of Jesus was changed, and he became [Greek: etethon] and his clothing was _white_, and lightened." The robe of the ascending Christ is BLUE.

The painter brings different incidents together to constitute one plot. The picture consists of three separate groupes, combined and united in one scheme or action.

I. Jesus ascending perpendicularly into the air, clothed in blue raiment, and attended by two other figures.

II. Some of his disciples on the Mount, who see the ascent, and lie dazzled and confounded by the sight.

III. A number of persons at the bottom of the Mount, who appear to look intently on a young man possessed by a devil, and convulsed. None of them see the Ascension but the young man, or rather the devil, who was in him, does see it. On all similar occasions, those fallen angels know the Christ, and acknowledge him. The other figures are agitated with astonishment and terror, variously and distinctly expressed in every one of them, at sight of the effect which they see is made upon him by some object which _they_ do not see.

This is the sublime imagination, by which the lower part of the picture is connected with the upper.

P. FRANCIS.

_13th July, 1816._

But although it must be confessed that this comment is exceedingly ingenious, in so far as it explains the painter's design in representing the demoniac boy, as the connecting link between the action on the Mount, and the groupe at the foot of it; yet, upon an examination of the picture, it will be found that it does not exhibit the Ascension, but the Transfiguration; and I beg leave to refer to a letter, from my friend Mr. M'Gillivray, in the Appendix which seems to me as perfectly satisfactory on the subject as any thing of the kind I ever met with. Mr. West was of the same opinion as Mr. M'Gillivray; but in conversing with him on the subject, he did not enter into so distinct an explanation of his reasons for dissenting from the speculation of Sir Philip Francis. In criticism, however, whether the matter in question be works of art, or of literature, the best opinion is exactly that which is the most reasonable; and the point at issue here, is not one in which an artist's judgment can be allowed greater weight than that of any other man.

Chap. VII.