Note 234 — 1100. A SCENE IN A PLAY. (continued 2)

Mr. Monkhouse suggests alternative explanations. Who is the figure on the throne? "Is he meant for some intellectual Dives, learning too late that happiness exists not in luxury or knowledge? Is he the poet, musing in sadness and mental solitude on the mysteries of life, who cannot taste of its fruit or listen to its music, unconscious of the brute forces symbolised by the panther, and the vanity of human pride imaged by the peacock on the dead branch; or is he a philosopher imparting wisdom to the young? What matter, the picture charms like nature, because we cannot fathom it" (In the National Gallery, p. 234). In the case of Giorgione's frescoes at Venice, Vasari frankly "gave it up": "I, for my part, have never been able to understand what they mean, nor, with all the inquiries that I have made, could I ever find any one who did understand, or could explain them to me." But the theory that the subject in Renaissance pictures meant nothing—that details were treated from a purely pictorial point of view—is, as Dr. Richter has well observed, more convenient than correct. The clue to many of these unknown subjects is to be found in classical or Italian literature. Bellini's allegorical compositions have recently been thus interpreted. Titian's so-called "Sacred and Profane Love" has been identified by Herr Franz Wickhoff as an illustration of the story of Medea as told in the seventh book of the Argonautica of Valerius Flaccus, and the same author has also found the key to several works ascribed to Giorgione.