The Lord and His disciples are
gathered round the last sacred meal of the Old Covenant, the first of
the New. On the left, a long table stretches from the spectator into the
depths of the picture; the disciples are ranged along one side of it;
and on the other sits Judas, solitary and accursed. The young Christ has
risen; He holds the bread in His lifted hands and is about to give it to
the beloved disciple, while Peter beyond, rising from his seat in his
eagerness, presses forward to claim his own part in the Lord's body.
The action of the Christ has in it a very ecstasy of giving; the bending
form, indeed, is love itself, yearning and triumphant. This is further
expressed in the light which streams from the head of the Lord, playing
upon the long line of faces, illuminating the vehement gesture of Peter,
the adoring and radiant silence of St. John--and striking even to the
farthest corners of the room, upon a woman, a child, a playing dog.
Meanwhile, from the hanging lamps above the supper-party there glows
another and more earthly light, mingled with fumes of smoke which darken
the upper air. But such is the power of the divine figure that from this
very darkness breaks adoration.
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