In March 1796, Italy began to fall prey to
the supierior forces of Napoleon's army. Napoleon's army was sweeping across the
country at a rapid rate.
When the army neared Rome people began to panick and felt that only heaven could save them now. Saturday, July 9 a painting of the "Madonna dell' Archetto" (Virgin Mary) changed expression to have a more sorrowful apperance. The portrait then opened and shut it's eyes. Not long afterward 20 other paintings of the Madonna repeated the same movement, all in different communitites. Statues of Saints changed position, and several images of Christ on the crucifix opened their eyes. The citizens of Rome quickly repented and turned their thoughts to God. Father Goani was summoned to watch the Madonna dell'-Archetto. His description follows.: On a sudden, when I least expected it, I perceived a visible and manifest motion in both the eyes. I observed that the ball of the eye moved, that the pupils ascended by degrees, and so far concealed themselves under the upper eyelids, that nothing but the white of the eyes could be seen. I saw moreover, after a very short interval, the same pupils with a slow and uniform motion descend to their prior position....This perpendicular movement I observed two other times successively.... I must not omit some other cirumstances that accompained the ball of the eye began to move, I percieved a very thin shade that rather darkened the white. But this shade was instantly dissipated, for a t the moment of the elevation of the pupils, I observed again the same white just as before. The second circumstance is that the movement was attended with much grace and majesty....The third that at the precise moment I observed the supernatural movement it was attested by the extraordinary cries, prayers and acclamations of all there present.
Father Goani acting as if he was tending to the candles, examined the painting more closely. He found nothing wrong with the painting and nothing to cause disillusion. Two days later he futher scrutinized the painting with the aid of a compass.
While the pupil was almost concealed under the superior eye-lid I applied one point of the compass to its lower extremity, then barely visible, and I fixed the other point to the rim of the lower eye-lid. By this operation I was qualified to take the exact dimensions of the white part or cornea of the eye which appeared, and I found it to be about five lines or half an inch. The pupil of the eye soon re-occupying its former position, no portion of the white was any longer visible, as the pupil touched the inferior eye-lid.
Several other paintings were as closely examined as the Madonna dell' Archetto. In another church the Madonna Addolorta was taken out of its frame to be examined. Nothing was found to be suspicious. The people then requested that they be blessed with the portrait. When the priest was replacing the painting on the altar the eyes moved again causing him to faint.
Later that summer Napolean obtained a favorable treaty from the pope and by the following spring had withdrawn his troops beyond the Alps.
