SETTIGNANO
741
SEVEN
1890. He outlived by ten years his wife Sarah Red-
wood Parrish, a Philadelphian convert from the
Society of Friends. Their only child William died in
infancy. He did much charitable work, especially
in obtaining employment for the poor. He is buried
with the Setons at Mt. St. Mary's, Emmitsburg,
Maryland.
Seton, An Old Family (New York, 1889), 3.59-61; Living Catholic Men of Science in Catholic World, LXVI (New York, 1898); Lamb's Encycl. of American Biography; Appletons' Cycl. of American Biography. 3_ RANDOLPH.
Settignano, Desiderio da, b. at Settignano, Tus- cany, 1428; d. at Florence, 1463. He is said to have been the son of a stone-cutter and was admitted to the association of "Maestri di Pietra" (stone - workers) in 1453. He studied under Donatello, from whom no doubt he acquired the characteristics of fineness, joy- fulness, elegance, and distinction which cause his work to be often confused with his miister's. In spite of his brief life his name ranks among those of the great artists of his day. His chief produc- t i o n s are : th(; architectural tomb covered with fine sculp- ture of Carlo Marsuppini, sec- retary of the re- l)ublic, in the C h u r c h of Sta Croce; a marble tal)(>rnacle at San Lorenzo with a charming stand- ing figure of the Child Jesus ; a \'ery interesting bust of Marietta Strozzi in the
Bust or a.\ Unknown Girl
Desiderio da Settignano, Museo Naz-
ionaie, Florence
Strozzi Palace; a graceful relief of the Madonna and
Infant on the corner of the Palazzo Panciatichi;
portrait bust of a young girl in the Bargello; the
wooden statue of the Magdalen over her altar in the
Church of Sta Trinity (finished by Benedetto da Ma-
jano) ; and a bust in the Palazzo Pubblico at Forli.
Besides these, mention should be made of a number of
works attribut(Ml to Desiderio by some authorities
and by others to Donatello or his school — a Pieta in
San Lorenzo, Florence; a Beatrice d'Este in the
Louvre; a Virgin and Child in the South Kensington
Museum, London; a portrait bust of a young woman
in the Mu.seum, Berhn; the "Child Laughing" in the
Benda Collection, Vienna; and the well-known relief
of Sta Cecilia in the collection of Lord ^^■emyss, Lon-
don.
Perkins, Tuscan Sculptors (London, 1886); Cicognara, Sloria detla scultura (Venice, 1853) ; Bode, Denkmdler der Renaisaance- Sculplur Toscanan (Munich, 1905).
M. L. Handley.
Seven- Branch Candlestick, one of the three chief furnishings of the Holy of the Tabernacle and the Temple (Ex., xxv, 31-40; xxxvii, 17-24). In reality it was an elaborate lampst and, set on the south side of t lie Holy Place so as to fa('(> \hv loaves of proposit ion. It was beaten out of finest gold. A central shaft, to- p:o(lier with three i)airs of bra.nches curving upward frf)in out the shaft , all exquisitely ornamented and sur- mounted with stands, held in a line the seven golden
lamps that gave light to the sanctuary. The priests
dressed the lamps in the morning and set them on the
lampstand in the evening (Ex., xxx, 7, 8). All night
long the seven lamps were kept burning (Ex., xxvii,
20, 21; Lev. .xxiv, 3; I Kings, iii, 3). As for the day,
Josephus (Antiq. Jud., Ill, viii, 3) tells us that three
lamps were lighted. Levites of the family of Caath
cared for the golden lampstand on the march (Num.,
iii, 31). It was among the spoils brought by Vespa-
sian and Titus to grace their triumph at Rome, and
may be seen sculptured upon the Arch of Titus.
Walter Drum.
See Felicitas, Saint; Sym-
Seven Brothers.
phrosa. Saint.
Seven Churches, The. See Rome.
Seven Churches of Asia. See Apocalypse.
Seven Deacons, the seven men elected by the whole company of the original Christian community at Jerusalem and ordained by the Apostles, their office being chiefly to look after the poor and the common agape. The number of believers at Jeru- salem had grown very rapidly, and complaints had been made that the poor widows of Hellenistic Jews were neglected. The Apostles, not desiring to be drawn away from preaching and the higher spiritual ministry to care for material things, proposed to the believers to transfer such duties to suitable men, and following this suggestion the "Seven" were appointed (Acts, vi, 1-6). This was the first separation of an ecclesiastical, hierarchical office from the Apostolate in which up to then the ecclesiastico-religious power had been concentrated. The "seven men" were "full of the Holy Ghost" and therefore able partially to r(>present the Apostles in more important matters referring to the spiritual life, as is seen in the case of St. Stephen (q. v.) at Jerusalem, of St. Philip in Samaria, and elsewhere. Nothing further is known of several of the seven deacons, namely Nicanor, Timon, and Parmenas. Philiy), who is called the "Evangelist", preached with much success in Sam- aria (Acts, viii, 5 sq.), so that the two Apostles Peter and John went there later to bestow the Holy Ghost on those whom he had bai)tized. He also baptized the eunuch of the (^ueen of the Ethiopians (Acts, viii, 2() sqq.). According to the further testimony of the Book of the Acts (xxi, S sqq.) he lived later with his prophetically gifted daughters at Cajsarea. His feast is observed on 6 June, by the Greek Church on 11 Oct()b(ir. In later narratives Prochorus is said to be one of the seventy disciples chosen by Christ; it is related that he went to Asia Minor as a missionary and became Bishop of Ni(;omedia. The apocryphal Acts of John were wrongly ascribed to him [cf. Lip- sius, "Apokryphc Apostelgeschichten und Apostellc- genden", I (Brunswick, 1883), 355 sqq.]
In the second half of the second century a curious tradit ion appeared respecting Nicholas. Irenajus and the ant i-her(>ti(^al writers of the early Church who fol- low him r<>fer the name of the Nicolaitans — a dissolute, immoral sect that are opposed, as early as the Apoc- alypse of John, to that of Nicholas and trace the sect back to him (Irena;us, "Adv. hajr.", I, xxvi, 3; III, xi, 1). Clement relates as a popular report (Stro- mat., II, xx) that Nicholas was reproved by the Apostles on account of his jealousy of his beautiful wife. On this he set her free and left it open for any one to marry her, saying that the flesh should be mal- treated. His followers took this to mean that it was necessary to yield to the lusts of the flesh (cf. the Philosophumena, VII, 36). This narrative points to a similar tradition, such as is found in Irena^us respecting the Nicolaitans. How far the tradition is historical cannot now ho determined, perhaps the Nicolaitans themselves falsely ascribed their origin to t he Deacon Nicholas [cf . Wohlenberg, "Nikolas von
