During four leagues, the road continues to ascend almost imperceptibly, and then climbs the first of those ridges, that are connected with the outposts of the Sierra Guaderrama. From the top of the ridge, about four leagues and a half from Madrid, the Escurial is first seen reposing at the foot of the dark mountain that forms its back ground; and although still fourteen miles distant, it appears in all that colossal magnitude that has helped to earn for it the reputation of being the ninth wonder of the world. Between this point and the village of San Lorenzo, there is nothing to interest, excepting the constant view of the Escurial, increasing in extent, rising in elevation, and growing in magnificence, as the summit of every succeeding ridge discloses a nearer view of it. After a ride of seven hours and a half, I arrived in front of the Escurial a little after mid-day; and dismissing my mule, I immediately presented myself at the gate with my credentials. These were, a letter from the Marquesa de Valleverde, to El muy Rev. Padre Buendia; and another from the Saxon minister, to the Librarian to the Grand Duke of Hesse Darmstadt, M. Feder, who had been for several months resident in the Escurial, employed in collating some classical works. The monks being then at dinner, I declined interrupting the enjoyment of the Father Buendia, and was ushered into a small apartment in one of the angles opposite to the Sierra, where I remained about a quarter of an hour, while the monks continued their repast.
Most persons know that the Escurial was erected by that renowned monarch, Philip II.,—renowned for his vices, his bigotry, and his ambition. The reasons assigned by Philip for the erection of this building are three-fold:—as a token of gratitude to God, on account of the victory gained over the French at St. Quintin; as an act of devotion towards the holy martyr San Lorenzo; and in fulfilment of the wish expressed in the last will of Charles V., that a sepulchre should be erected wherein to deposit the bones of himself and the empress, the parents of Philip II. Another, and less ostensible reason assigned by this religious monarch, was that he might be able to retire at times from the turmoil of the court; and in the seclusion of a royal monastery, profit by the lessons of holy men, and meditate upon the instability of worldly grandeur: and Philip shewed in his practice the apparent sincerity of this motive; for he was wont often to be an inmate of the Escurial; and traits of his devotion and humility are yet related within its walls.
The situation chosen for the Escurial accords well with the gloomy character of its royal founder. There is no town or city nearer to it than Madrid, which is thirty-four miles distant; a wild and deserted country forms its horizon; and the dark defiles and the brown ridges of the Sierra Guaderrama are its cradle. In the building itself, Philip royally acquitted himself of his vows; for a structure so stupendous in its dimensions, or so surpassing in its internal riches, is nowhere to be found. The building was begun in the year 1563, under the direction of Juan Bautista de Toledo, and finished in 1584; Juan de Herrera presiding over the work during several years preceding its completion.
My meditations were interrupted by the welcome entrance of Father Buendia, whom I found an agreeable and rather intelligent man, although a great worshipper of the memory of Philip II. I was first conducted into the church of the monastery, which certainly exceeds in richness and magnificence any thing that I had previously imagined. It is quite impossible to enter into minute descriptions of all that composes this magnificence: the riches of Spain, and her ancient colonies, are exhausted in the materials;—marbles, porphyries, jaspers, of infinite variety, and of the most extraordinary beauty,—gold, silver, and precious stones; and the splendid effect of the whole is not lessened by a nearer inspection; there is no deception, no glitter,—all is real. The whole of the altar-piece in the Capilla Mayor, upwards of ninety feet high and fifty broad, is one mass of jasper, porphyry, marble, and bronze gilded; the eighteen pillars that adorn it, each eighteen feet high, are of deep red and green jasper, and the intervals are of porphyry and marble of the most exquisite polish, and the greatest variety of colour. It is, in fact, impossible to turn the eye in any direction in which it does not rest upon the rarest and richest treasures of nature, or the most excellent works of art; for if it be withdrawn from the magnificence below, by the splendour of the ceiling above, it discovers those admirable frescos of Lucas Jordan, which have earned for him the character of a second Angelo. It would be tedious to enlarge upon the subject of Jordan’s frescos; they are too numerous indeed to be described within the limits of a chapter; but they comprise, it may be said, the whole history of the Christian Religion, beginning from the Promises, and are excelled only by the works of Angelo. The battle of St. Quintin, which ornaments the ceiling of the great stair-case, is considered to be one of the most excellent of Jordan’s frescos.
Lucas Jordan was born at Naples in the year 1632. His father chanced to live near Españaletto, who was then in Italy; and Jordan, from infancy, was constantly in his neighbour’s workshop. At nine years old, he is said to have made great progress; and at fourteen he ran away from his father’s house, and went to Rome, where, it is said, his father following him, found him in the Vatican copying Michael Angelo’s Last Judgment. At Rome he was the disciple of Pietro de Cortona; and he afterwards visited Florence, Bologna, Parma, and Venice, where he improved himself upon the style of Paul Veronese. Subsequently he went to Rome; but unable to forget Veronese, he again returned to Venice, where he remained until called to Florence, in 1657, to paint the cupola of the Capilla Corsini in the church of Carmine. He was afterwards invited to Spain by Charles II., and arrived in Madrid in 1692; and from that time until his death, his genius was employed in enriching the palaces and convents of Spain, particularly the Escurial.
Having satisfied my curiosity with the church, and the frescos, I wished Father Buendia to conduct me to the sacristy, where are to be seen those glorious creations of the pencil, which have added the charm of beauty, to the grandeur and magnificence of the Escurial. But my conductor led me first to the relicary, whose contents were perhaps more valuable in his eyes than those of the sacristy. In this relicary, there were five hundred and fifteen vases before the invasion of the French; but their number is now reduced to four hundred and twenty-two. These vases are of gold, silver, bronze gilded, and valuable wood; many of them thickly studded with precious stones: and upwards of eighty of the richest of these vases still remain. But the French, more covetous of the gold and silver than of the relics, made sad confusion of the latter; for not caring to burden themselves with bones, and wood, and dirty garments, they emptied the little gold and silver vases upon the floor,—irreligiously mingling in one heap, relics of entirely different value. The labels indicating the relics having been upon the vases, the bones, &c. were without any distinguishing mark; so that it was impossible to discriminate between an arm of St. Anthony, and the arm of St. Teresa,—or to know a bit of the true cross, from a piece of only a martyr’s cross,—or a garment of the Virgin Sin Pecada, from one of only the Virgin of Rosalio: and as for the smaller relics,—parings of nails, hair, &c. many were irrecoverably lost. But with all this confusion, and all these losses, the Escurial is still rich in relics. Several pieces of the true cross yet remain; a bit of the rope that bound Christ; two thorns of the crown; a piece of the sponge that was dipped in vinegar; parts of His garments, and a fragment of the manger in which he was laid. Making every allowance for bigotry and excess of ill-directed faith, I cannot comprehend the feeling that attaches holiness to some of these relics: it is impossible to understand what kind of sacredness that is, which belongs to articles that have been the instruments of insult to the Divine Being. Besides these relics of our Saviour, there are several parts of the garments of the Virgin; there are ten entire skeletons of saints and martyrs; the body of one of the innocents, massacred by command of Herod; and upwards of a hundred heads of saints, martyrs, and holy men; besides numerous other bones still distinguishable.
But the peculiar glory of the Escurial, and its most wondrous relic, is the Santa Forma, as it is called; in reality, “the wafer,” in which the Deity has been pleased to manifest himself in three streaks of blood; thus proving the doctrine of transubstantiation. This relic has been deemed worthy of a chapel and an altar to itself. These are of extraordinary beauty and richness; and adorned with the choicest workmanship: jaspers, marble, and silver are the materials; and bas reliefs, in white marble, relate the history of the Santa Forma; which is shortly this. It was originally in the cathedral church of Gorcum in Holland, and certain heretics (Zuinglianos) entering the church, took this consecrated host, threw it on the ground, trod upon it, and cracked it in three places. God, to shew his divine displeasure, and at the same time, as a consolation to the christians, manifested himself in three streaks of blood, which appeared at each of the cracks. One of the heretics, struck with the miracle, and repenting of his crime, lifted the Santa Forma from the ground, and deposited it, along with a record of the miracle, in a neighbouring convent of Franciscans, who kept and venerated it long; the delinquent, who abjured his heresy, and who had taken the habit, being one of their number. From this convent it was translated to Vienna, and then to Prague; and there its peregrinations terminated: for Philip II. being a better Catholic than the Emperor Rodolph, prevailed upon the latter to part with it, and deposited it in the Escurial; where it has ever since remained. It had a narrow escape from being again trodden upon, during the French invasion: upon the approach of the enemy it was hastily snatched from the sacred depositary, and unthinkingly hid in a wine butt, where it is said to have acquired some new, and less miraculous stains: and after the departure of the French, a solemn festival was proclaimed on the 14th of October, 1814; upon which occasion, his present majesty, assisted by all his court, and by half the friars of Castile, rescued the Santa Forma from its inglorious concealment, and deposited it again in the chapel which the piety of Charles II. had erected for it. The Santa Forma is not shewn to heretics; but its history is related: and it was evident, by the manner of the friar who related it to me, that he placed implicit belief in the miraculous stains.
Besides the general relicary and the peculiar chapel for the Santa Forma, there is another smaller relicary, called the Camarin, into which Father Buendia conducted me. Here I was shewn an earthen pitcher, one of those which contained the water that Jesus turned into wine; and affixed to the pitcher, there is a writing, narrating the manner in which the vessel found its way into the Escurial. I was also shewn three caps of Pope Pius V.; and a stone which was taken from his Holiness’ bladder; besides several manuscripts written by the hand of St. Teresa, and St. Augustin; and the ink-horn of the former saint.
I might still have been gratified by the sight of more relics; but I was anxious to visit the sacristy, which contains relics of another kind. The sacristy itself, in its walls, roof, and floor, equals in beauty, any part of the Escurial; but the beauty of jaspers and precious stones, and the excellent workmanship of many rare and beautiful woods, are unheeded, where attractions are to be found so far excelling them. It is in the sacristy of the Escurial, where the choicest works of the most illustrious painters of the great schools are preserved; and of these we may say, what can rarely be said of any collection, that among the forty-two pictures that adorn the sacristy, there is not one that is not a chef d’œuvre. Among these, there are three of Raphael, one of them known all over the world by the name of La Perla; two of Leonardo da Vinci; six of Titian, and many of Tintoretto, Guido, Veronese, and other eminent masters. La Perla represents the Virgin embracing the infant Jesus, with her right arm round his body, while he rests his feet upon her knee; the Virgin’s left hand lies upon the shoulder of Saint Anne, who kneels at her daughter’s side; her elbow resting upon her knee, and her head supported by her hand. The child, St. John, offers fruits to the infant Christ in his little garment of camel-skin; and Jesus accepting them, turns at the same time his smiling face towards his mother, who is looking at St. John. Such is the subject of La Perla, a picture that would have placed Raphael where he now stands among the illustrious dead, even if he had never painted the Transfiguration,—any critique upon a painting of Raphael would be impertinent. While I was occupied with the treasures of the sacristy, a bell rang for prayers; and as it was contrary to the rules of the monastery to leave the door of the sacristy open, I was locked in, while Father Buendia went to his devotions. This was precisely the most agreeable thing that could have happened: a large chair, which looked as old as the days of Philip II., stood below the altar of the Santa Forma; and drawing it into the middle of the sacristy, and sitting down, I spent the next half-hour luxuriously; not as might have been imagined, in admiration of the immortal works around me; but in a waking dream, that carried me away from the Escurial, and back to the days of boyhood, when throwing aside my Horace, I used to seize an old book, which I have never seen since then, called “Swinburne’s Travels,” and devour the descriptions of the Escurial; its immensity, its riches, its monks, its tomb of the kings,—not its pictures, for I was then ignorant of even the name of Raphael,—but this knowledge came later, and all was blended together in this delicious reverie, which was in fact a vision of the Escurial, as imagination had pictured it in bygone days. But the great key, entering the door, annihilated twenty years, and brought me where I was, seated in the great chair in the sacristy of the Escurial; and after another glance at the pictures, I followed Father Buendia to the old church and the cloister; but in passing to these, we entered the Hall of Recreation, or as it is called, La Sala Prioral. Here the monks assemble at certain hours, to converse, and enjoy each other’s society; and for this purpose, they have made choice of the most comfortable room in the monastery. Although in Spain, and only the beginning of September, a stove was lighted; benches, and even some stuffed chairs, were scattered here and there. The windows look over the garden and fish-ponds, from which, on meagre days, the worthy fathers contrive to eke out a repast; and the walls of the hall are adorned by some most choice pictures by Peregrini, Guercino, Titian, Guido; among others, a half-clothed Magdalen, by Titian,—scarcely a suitable study for these holy men; and, “Magdalen at the Feet of Jesus:” ascribed to Correggio, but which, Mengs, in his notices of the life and works of Correggio, supposes to have been left imperfect by that master, and to have been finished by another hand: but it is, at all events, a charming picture.
From the Sala Prioral, we went to the Iglesia Vieja, which is remarkable only on account of its pictures; among which, is one of Raphael: and from the Iglesia Vieja, I was next conducted through the cloisters, also adorned with pictures, to the great Library. This is a magnificent room; the ceilings in fresco, by Peregrini and Carducho, represent the progress of the sciences; the floor is of chequered grey and white marble; and the finest and rarest woods encase the windows, the doors, and the books. The library is more curious than extensive; it does not contain more than 24,000 volumes, but many of these are scarce; and among others, they shew a copy of the Apocalypse of St. John, with a commentary, and illuminated borders, and the devotional exercises of Charles V., &c. The day was almost spent before I reached the library; the light streamed but dimly through the deep windows; and the portraits of Charles, and his son,—the gloomy-minded founder of the monastery,—frowned darkly from the walls. It was too late to examine the Manuscript Library; and making an appointment with Father Buendia for the morning, I left the Escurial for the Posada, where I had ordered a bed, and a late dinner. I was offered both refreshments and a bed, in the monastery; but having a better opinion of the dinner I had ordered than of a supper in the refectory, (for it chanced to be Friday), I forced an excuse upon the reverend father.