CHAPTER VII.
VENETIAN PAINTING Painting bloomed late in Venice--Conditions offered by Venice to Art--Shelley and Pietro Aretino--Political Circumstances of Venice--Comparison with Florence--The Ducal Palace--Art regarded as an adjunct to State Pageantry--Myth of Venezia--Heroic Deeds of Venice--Tintoretto's Paradise and Guardi's Picture of a Ball--Early Venetian Masters of Murano--Gian Bellini--Carpaccio's Little Angels--The Madonna of S.Zaccaria--Giorgione--Allegory, Idyll, Expression of Emotion--The Monk at the Clavichord--Titian, Tintoret, and Veronese--Tintoretto's Attempt to dramatise Venetian Art--Veronese's Mundane Splendour--Titian's Sophoclean Harmony--Their Schools--Further Characteristics of Veronese--of Tintoretto--His Imaginative Energy--Predominant Poetry--Titian's Perfection of Balance--Assumption of Madonna--Spirit common to the great Venetians..