Excerpts from Books and Wikipedia
" . . . Julius had chosen the theme of celestial and earthly wisdom, and it is the latter that Raphael depicts in The School of Athens, a masterpiece of fresco painting that connects the pagan philosophers of antiquity with the Neoplatonism of Renaissance thought." [1001 Days] Pope Julius II (1503--1513) also convened the Council of the Lateran (1512), took control of the Papal States for the first time, commissioned the painting of the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and proposed rebuilding St. Peter's Basilica. [Wikipedia]