Legends of the Madonna | Page 4

the duties belonging to
pursuits of imagination which rendered meanness, or servility, or
dishonourable dealing, or license glossed over with some convenient
name, impossible to her.--She was a faithful friend, a devoted relative,
a gracefully-cultivated, and honest literary worker, whose mind was set

on "the best and honourablest things."
* * * * *
Some months since Mrs. Jameson kindly consented to prepare for this
edition of her writings the "Legends of the Madonna," "Sacred and
Legendary Art," and "Legends of the Monastic Orders;" but, dying
before she had time to fulfil her promise, the arrangement has been
intrusted to other hands. The text of this whole series will be an exact
reprint of the last English Edition.
* * * * *
The portrait annexed to this volume is from a photograph taken in
London only a short time before Mrs. Jameson's death.
BOSTON, September, 1860.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE
TO THE FIRST EDITION.
In presenting to my friends and to the public this Series of the Sacred
and Legendary Art, few preparatory words will be required.
If in the former volumes I felt diffident of my own powers to do any
justice to my subject, I have yet been encouraged by the sympathy and
approbation of those who nave kindly accepted of what has been done,
and yet more kindly excused deficiencies, errors, and oversights, which
the wide range of subjects rendered almost unavoidable.
With far more of doubt and diffidence, yet not less trust in the
benevolence and candour of my critics, do I present this volume to the
public. I hope it will be distinctly understood, that the general plan of
the work is merely artistic; that it really aims at nothing more than to
render the various subjects intelligible. For this reason it has been
thought advisable to set aside, in a great measure, individual
preferences, and all predilections for particular schools and particular
periods of Art,--to take, in short, the widest possible range as regards
examples,--and then to leave the reader, when thus guided to the
meaning of what he sees, to select, compare, admire, according to his
own discrimination, taste, and requirements. The great difficulty has
been to keep within reasonable limits. Though the subject has a unity
not found in the other volumes, it is really boundless as regards variety
and complexity. I may have been superficial from mere
superabundance of materials; sometimes mistaken as to facts and dates;

the tastes, the feelings, and the faith of my readers may not always go
along with me; but if attention and interest have been exited--if the
sphere of enjoyment in works of Art have been enlarged and
enlightened, I have done all I ever wished--all I ever hoped, to do.
With regard to a point of infinitely greater importance, I may be
allowed to plead,--that it has been impossible to treat of the
representations of the Blessed Virgin without touching on doctrines
such as constitute the principal differences between the creeds of
Christendom. I have had to ascend most perilous heights, to dive into
terribly obscure depths. Not for worlds would I be guilty of a scoffing
allusion to any belief or any object held sacred by sincere and earnest
hearts; but neither has it been possible for me to write in a tone of
acquiescence, where I altogether differ in feeling and opinion. On this
point I shall need, and feel sure that I shall obtain, the generous
construction of readers of all persuasions.

INTRODUCTION
I. ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE EFFIGIES OF THE
MADONNA.
Through all the most beautiful and precious productions of human
genius and human skill which the middle ages and the renaissance
have bequeathed to us, we trace, more or less developed, more or less
apparent, present in shape before us, or suggested through inevitable
associations, one prevailing idea: it is that of an impersonation in the
feminine character of beneficence, purity, and power, standing between
an offended Deity and poor, sinning, suffering humanity, and clothed in
the visible form of Mary, the Mother of our Lord.
To the Roman Catholics this idea remains an indisputable religious
truth of the highest import. Those of a different creed may think fit to
dispose of the whole subject of the Madonna either as a form of
superstition or a form of Art. But merely as a form of Art, we cannot in
these days confine ourselves to empty conventional criticism. We are
obliged to look further and deeper; and in this department of Legendary
Art, as in the others, we must take the higher ground, perilous though it
be. We must seek to comprehend the dominant idea lying behind and
beyond the mere representation. For, after all, some consideration is
due to facts which we must necessarily accept, whether we deal with

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