Page:Poetical Remains.pdf/213

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181



THE SCULPTURED CHILDREN,

On Chantrey's Monument in Lichfield Cathedral.




[The monument by Chantrey in Lichfield Cathedral, to the memory of the two children of Mrs Robinson, is one of the most affecting works of art ever executed. He has given a pathos to marble, which one who trusts to his natural feelings, and admires, and is only touched at their bidding, might have thought from any previous experience that it was out of the power of statuary to attain. The monument is executed with all his beautiful simplicity and truth. The two children, two little girls, are represented as lying in each other's arms, and, at first glance, appear to be sleeping;—

"But something lies,
Too deep and still on those soft-sealed eyes."

It is while lying in the helplessness of innocent sleep, that in fancy and childhood are viewed with the most touching interest; and this and the loveliness of the children, the uncertainty of the expression at first view, the dim shadowing forth of that