The Life and Writings of Henry Fuseli, Volume 3 (of 3)

What pity that this laboured scale, which has all the air of an astrologic conceit of Vasari, and gives to chance the sanction of predestination, could not be extended to Architecture! As the notion of a writer who dates the subversion of Art from the epoch and style of M. Angelo, it must appear ludicrous even to the most declared votary of that great name on this side of idolatry.

71

The mask of an antique Satyr, and the basso-relievo of the Centaurs, undertaken at the suggestion of Poliziano.

72

One has been preserved, and as a document of the relation in which power at that time stood with art, may interest the reader.

"Julius P.P. II. Dilectis Filiis Prioribus Libertatis, et Vexillifero Justitiae Populi Florentini.

"Dilecti filii, salutem et apostolicam benedictionem. Michael Angelus sculptor, qui a nobis leviter et inconsulte discessit, redire, ut accepimus, ad nos timet, cui nos non succensemus: Novimus hujusmodi hominum ingenia. Ut tamen omnem suspicionem deponat, devotionem vestram hortamur, velit ei nomine nostro promittere, quod si ad nos redierit, illæsus inviolatusque erit, et in ea gratia apostolica nos habiturus, quâ habebatur ante discessum. Datum Romæ, 8 Julii, 1506, Pontificatûs nostri Anno iii."

73

There went a tale that Michael Angelo proposed to demolish the palace of the Medicis, like that of the Bentivogli at Bologna, and to call the site "Piazza de' Muli," the place of Bastards, in allusion to the illegitimacy of Clemente VII. Alessandro, and others of that family. "A feature," says Fiorillo, "if true, as characteristic of his natural ferocity as disgraceful to his heart, after the benefits heaped on him from his infancy by that family. Varchi, however, defends him against this charge."[170 - Stor. Fior. lib. vi. p. 154.] Whether this tale confutes itself or not, may be left to the reader; but on an estimate of his private and public conduct, as man and artist during the long course of his life, it must be owned, that this is the period which offers the most specious opportunity to a sceptic in morals, of fixing some doubts on the integrity of his principles. His earliest actions prove that he drew a severe line between the duty which he owed to his country, and gratitude imposed by private obligations. He left the family of Pier de' Medici on finding his principles incompatible with the laws of a free state; and on the expulsion of the petty tyrants, without lending a hand to the devastation of their property, felt it his duty to act as a free man on the re-establishment of liberty, and to obey the laws of a state whose right to legislate for itself had been acknowledged by all Italy. It will not be said, that it is palliating duplicity to assert, that as a private individual he had a right to accept the behests of Leo X. and Clemente VII. for decorating a sacred edifice; but when he became a leader of the revolution, the trustee of his country's safety, the main defender of the city, did he not more than degrade himself, by forgetting the patriot in the artist, and "secretly" sacrificing time to raise monuments to men whose titles he opposed and whose principles he detested? Thus, whilst his conduct may prove the absurdity of the tale, that he publicly, and with illiberal sarcasms, advised the demolition of palaces belonging to a family whose memory he secretly laboured to perpetuate in monuments inspired by the most amorous phantasy; it certainly does not screen his character from the imputation of a duplicity to which no other period of his life offers a parallel.

74

"Lavorava," says Vasari, "le statue per le sepolture di S. Lorenzo segretamente," – p. 224, ed. B. And again, "Lavorando egli con sollecitudine e con amore grandissimo tali opere, crebbe (che pur troppo gli impedi il fine) lo assedio." – p. 229. Impossible as the secrecy of his labours for the Chapel of S. Lorenzo may appear, the publicity of his situation considered, it must be admitted, to account for the confidence placed in him by the City.

75

Of the Fall of Lucifer and his Host, which was to face the altar-piece of the Last Judgement, no sketch that could give an idea of the whole has yet been discovered; its place over the grand door of the Chapel was reserved for the sacrilegious 'bravura' of the Neapolitan Matteo da Lecca, under the pontificate of Gregorio XIII.: his composition, if impudence of grouping deserve that name, must be supposed to bear infinitely less analogy to the original conception of Michael Angelo, than the tumultuary fresco of the Sicilian; who, says Vasari, having lived many months with Michael Angelo as a servant and colour-grinder, became possessed of some design of his for that subject, and painted it in fresco in a chapel of the Trinità del Monte. Notwithstanding the incompetence of the adventurer to manage such materials, the naked groups showering from Heaven, and the hubbub of transformed fiends grappling below in the abyss, struck the beholder with terror and surprise; – a mass of Dantesque images, and in Dantesque language described by the biographer. – V. di M.A. t. vi. 237.

76

This pompous visit appears to have been made for the purpose of inspecting the Cartoon; to remove the obstacles to its completion which the unfinished state of the Giulian monument still presented; and to convince the artist of the value he set on the exclusive service of his genius. But, besides the obligation of fulfilling his contract with the House of De Rovere, Vasari seems to think that one principal reason of Michael Angelo's tardiness to comply with the wishes of the Pope, was the Pontiff's age, (vedendolo tanto vecchio,) i. e. apprehension, if he lived long enough to prevent the termination of the monument, of his dying too soon for the completion of the fresco, and thus leaving him exposed to the revenge of the Duke of Urbino: a conjecture not countenanced by the Pontiff's age, who, at his accession, was only eight years older than the artist.

77

Bastiano, says Vasari, was a favourite of Michael Angelo, but a disagreement took place between them about the best method of painting the Last Judgement. Frà Bastiano had persuaded the Pontiff to give the preference to oil, but Michael Angelo resolved to execute it only in fresco. On seeing the Frate's preparation adopted, without agreeing to it or opposing it, he remained inactive for several months; till, on being pressed, he finally declared, that he would either do it in fresco or not at all; that oil paint was a woman's art, and the refuge of idlers at their ease like Frà Bastiano. In consequence of which, the Frate's incrustation being dashed to the ground, and the wall duly prepared for fresco, he set about the work, but never forgot the insult he fancied to have received from the friar during life. – Vasari, Vita di F.S.

78

Michael Angelo had finished more than three-fourths of the work, when the Pontiff visited the Chapel, and on inspection, turning to Messer Biagio, of Cesena, then master of ceremonies, in his train, asked him what he thought of the work? The scrupulous prelate replied, that so daring an aggregate of shameless nudities in a sacred place was obscene profanation, and an exhibition fitter for a tavern or a brothel than a papal chapel. Michael Angelo, indignant, and eager to revenge the affront, only waited for his departure, and then, from memory, drew him in the character of Dante's Minos, with a snake encircling his body and gnawing his middle, in the midst of a hillock of fiends. In vain did Messer Biagio supplicate the Pontiff and Michael Angelo to take him out; he remained, and is there still. So far Vasari; but tradition adds, that on Biagio's application, the Pope asked in what part of the picture he was placed, and being answered, in Hell, replied, had you been lodged in Purgatory, you might perhaps have been dismissed, "sed ex Inferno nulla est redemptio." Condivi notices the story not at all.

In the Diary of Paris de' Grassi, Messer Biagio is said to have been appointed master of ceremonies by Leo X. 1518, in the room of Nicola da Viterbo, and, if we believe Ducange, (Table des Auteurs dans le Supplement du Glossaire,) he has written a diary himself. – See Fiorillo, i. p. 389.

79

Blaise de Vigenere, the translator of Philostratus and Callistratus, tells us, in his observations on the latter, page 855, that "he saw M. Angelo, at the age of sixty, strike off more marble from a block in one quarter of an hour, than four stonemasons usually did in three or four hours." If this happened in 1550, as will appear from the following passage, M. Angelo was then in his seventy-sixth year. – "L'entrepris aussi de Michel l'Ange estoit hautaine et fort hardie, sentant bien sa main assurée, le quel commança l'an 1550, que j'estois à Rome, un Crucifiement où il y avoit de dix à douze personnages, non pas moindres que le naturel, le tout d'une seule pièce de marbre, qui était un chapiteau de l'une de ces huict grandes colomnes du temple de la Paix de Vespasian, dont il s'en void encore une toute entière et debout, mais la mort – "

80

Vol. vi. p. 272.

81

Vasari's account of both pictures is sufficiently curious to be communicated in his own words. "Alfonso D'Avalo, Marchese del Guasto, having obtained from Michael Angelo, by means of Frà Nicolo della Magna, a cartoon of Christ appearing to Magdalen in the Garden, made every exertion to have it executed in painting by Puntormo, as he had been told by Michael Angelo that no one could serve him better. Jacopo undertook the work, and succeeded to a degree of excellence, which made Alessandro Vitelli, captain of the Florentine guards, bespeak a second copy of him, which he placed in his house at Cività di Castello."

"Michael Angelo, to oblige his intimate friend Bartolomeo Bettini, made him a Cartoon of Venus naked and Cupid kissing her, to be executed by Puntormo in oil, for the centre piece of an apartment, on the sides of which Bronzino had begun to paint Dante, Petrarca, and Boccaccio, to be followed by the rest of Tuscan love-songsters. The picture of Puntormo was miraculous, but instead of being given to Bettini for the price stipulated, was, by some favour-hunters, his enemies, nearly extorted from Jacopo, and carried off as a present to Duke Alessandro, returning the cartoon to Bettini. A transaction which, when he heard it, irritated Michael Angelo, who loved his friend, and made him dislike Jacopo for it." – Vasari, Vita di Jacopo da, P.V.

82

They had been fellow-scholars in the garden of Lorenzo de' Medici.

83

Lettere della Beata Vergine, S. Caterina da Siena. Venez. 1562., 4to. p. 286, 242. The last was written at the period of Vanni's dignity.

84

1481-1554.

85

1484-1549?

86

Fiorillo, i. 335.

87

1481-1536.

88

Bramante.

89

Lett. Perug. V.

90

"Cervello di porfido."

91

See Vasari on Michael Angelo's observations on Tizian.

92

"Fece li Schizzi e i Cartoni di tutte le Istorie."

    Vita di Pinturicchio.