1. He is ordained by Sixtus II. (with the features of Nicholas V.).
2. Sixtus II. delivers the treasures of the Church to him for distribution among the poor.
3. He Distributes them in Alms.
4. He is carried before Decius the Prefect.
5. He suffers Martyrdom A.D. 253.
Introduced in the side arches, are the figures of St. Jerome, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Gregory, St. John Chrysostom, St. Athanasius, St. Leo—as the protector of Rome, and St. Thomas Aquinas—as painted by the Dominican Angelico, and for a Dominican pope Nicholas V.
"The Consecration of St. Stephen, the Distribution of Alms, and, above all, his Preaching, are three pictures as perfect of their kind as any that have been produced by the greatest masters, and it would be difficult to imagine a group more happily conceived as to arrangement, or more graceful in form and attitude, than that of the seated females listening to the holy preacher; and if the furious fanaticism of the executioners, who stone him to death, is not expressed with all the energy we could desire, this may be attributed to a glorious incapacity in this angelic imagination, too exclusively occupied with love and ecstasy to be ever able to familiarise itself with those dramatic scenes in which hateful and violent passions were to be represented."—Rio. Poetry of Christian Art.
"The soul of Angelico lives in perpetual peace. Not seclusion from the world. No shutting out of the world is needful for him. There is nothing to shut out. Envy, lust, contention, discourtesy, are to him as though they were not; and the cloister walls of Fiesole no penitential solitude, barred from the stir and joy of life, but a possessed land of tender blessing, guarded from the entrance of all but holiest sorrow. The little cell was as one of the houses of heaven prepared for him by his Master. What need had it to be elsewhere? Was not the Val d'Arno, with its olive woods in white blossom, paradise enough for a poor monk? Or could Christ be indeed in heaven more than here? Was He not always with him? Could he breathe or see, but that Christ breathed beside him, or looked into his eyes? Under every cypress avenue the angels walked; he had seen their white robes,—whiter than the dawn,—at his bedside, as he woke in early summer. They had sung with him, one on each side, when his voice failed for joy at sweet vesper and matin time; his eyes were blinded by their wings in the sunset, when it sank behind the hills of Luni."—Ruskin's Modern Painters.
The same staircase which is usually ascended to reach the Stanze (that on the left of the fountain in the Cortile S. Damaso) will also lead, by turning to the left in the loggia of the third floor, to:
The Gallery of Pictures, founded by Pius VII., who acted on the advice of Cardinal Gonsalvi and of Canova, and formed the present collection from the pictures which had been carried off by the French from the Roman churches, upon their restoration. The pictures have, to a great extent, been recently rearranged and are not all numbered. Each picture is worthy of separate examination. They are contained in four rooms, and according to their present position are:
1st Room.—
Entrance Wall:
1. St. Jerome: Leonardo da Vinci, painted in bistre.
16. St. John Baptist: Guercino.
4. The Annunciation, Adoration of the Magi, and Presentation in the Temple: Raphael;—formerly a predella to the Coronation of the Virgin in the third room.
5. The dead Christ and Mary Magdalen: Andrea Mantegna,—from the Aldrovandi gallery at Bologna.
7. Madonna with the Child and St. John: Fr. Francia.
Right Wall:
The Story of St. Nicolo of Bari: Fra Angelico da Fiesole,—two out of the three predella pictures once in the sacristy of S. Domenico at Florence, whence they were carried off to Paris, where the third remains.
(Above,) The Adoration of the Shepherds: Murillo.
The Virgin surrounded by Angels: Fra Angelico.
3. The Story of St. Hyacinth: Benozzo Gozzoli.
(Above,) The Marriage of St. Catherine: Murillo.
2. "I Tre Santi:" Perugino.