THE PIOUS POISONERS
The Italian princes were no more influenced by the moral austerity of
Dante than the Roman ruling class had been by Virgil. Medieval Italy
traveled the same road as imperial Rome, and two centuries after Dante
we find the vicars of God on earth reproducing the worst crimes of the
Neros and Caligulas. Alexander VI, the Borgia pope, purchased his high
office, and then set to work to plunder the cities of Italy and harry
the whole peninsula with war. Among his children by his numerous
mistresses was Cesare Borgia, who became the commander of the papal
armies, and slaughtered and poisoned all who stood in his way, including
his own brother. Returning from his wars, he would amuse himself by
using his prisoners of war as targets for archery practice in the
courtyard of the Vatican. In the end Cesare died of wounds, Alexander
died by poison, and his daughter Lucrezia poisoned her own son and then
herself.
Here was an ideal environment for the development of leisure-class art.
These popes and princes built themselves magnificent palaces, and as a
measure of soul-insurance they built cathedrals and churches. They were
willing to spend fortunes upon famous artists; and the artists, needless
to say, were willing to take the money. Browning has a poem, “The Bishop
Orders His Tomb at St. Praxed’s Church,” a vivid picture of the attitude
of mind of these pious poisoners and artistic assassins. The bishop lies
upon his couch dying, and his sons, politely known as “nephews,” gather
about him to hear his vision of a tomb which is to preserve his memory
and bring peace to his soul. He describes the treasures of beauty which
are to go upon the tomb--
One block, pure green as a pistachio-nut,
There’s plenty jasper somewhere in the world--
And have I not St. Praxed’s ear to pray
Horses for ye, and brown Greek manuscripts,
And mistresses with great smooth marbly limbs?
The pious soul goes on to specify his epitaph; it must be “choice Latin,
picked phrase,” from Cicero. Having got this--
And then how I shall lie through centuries,
And hear the blessed mutter of the mass,
And see God made and eaten all day long,
And feel the steady candle-flame, and taste
Good strong thick stupefying incense-smoke!
The true “art for art’s sake” attitude, you perceive; and under the
patronage of such esthetic prelates, the poets and musicians, the
painters and sculptors flourished in sixteenth century Italy. Among
those who were employed by the poisoner pope, Alexander VI, was a
youthful painter of extraordinary ability, Raphael Sanzio by name. This
pope was succeeded by two others, who conquered many cities for the
glory of God, and spent millions of their plunder upon religious art. So
this young painter of genius was floated through life upon a flood of
gold ducats, and with his magic brushes he turned the blood and sweat
and tears of the peasantry of Italy into beautiful images of serenely
smiling madonnas, and enraptured saints, and ineffably gracious Jesuses.
Raphael is ranked by many as the greatest painter in history; we stand,
therefore, within the very holy of holies, before the shrine of “pure”
beauty, and it will repay us to dig into the roots of his life, and see
from what soil this precious flower grows.
He was the son of a court painter, and his life was one of ease, swift
achievement, and applause. He was gifted with all the graces of body,
also a genial and winning nature. He studied the work of one painter
after another, and acquired all the powers of each. He became so famous
that his life was “not that of a painter, but of a prince.” Ambassadors
from the wealthy and powerful besieged his doors, and waited for months
in hope of an interview. He went about accompanied by a band of more
than fifty youths, pupils and adorers of his art.
He had one weakness, which was for the ladies. The popes and princes
who cherished him sought to put loving restraint upon him, and planned
wealthy marriages for him, but he could not bring himself to stoop to
matrimony. At this time he was decorating the palace of a Sienese
millionaire, Chigi, owner of ships and of salt and alum mines throughout
Italy; this gentleman, discovering that Raphael was so wrapped up in his
mistress that he was neglecting the palace decorations, solved the
problem by a brilliant move--bringing the mistress to live in the
palace! In the end this darling of fortune died at the age of
thirty-seven, of a fever brought on by self-indulgence. His adoring
biographer, Vasari, tells us that when he knew his last hour had come,
he sent away his mistress from his home, “as a good Christian should,”
and so passed on to decorate the palaces of heaven.
What was the secret of Raphael’s fortune? The answer is, he painted the
ruling class of Italy, in their physical beauty and their material
luxury and splendor. In order to flatter their vanity, he painted them
as all the saints and demigods of the Catholic mythology. Every trace of
asceticism is now gone out of church art; the Christian gentlemen and
mistresses and virgins and gods and saints of Raphael and his
contemporaries are full-throated and full-bosomed and ruddy-cheeked
pictures of prosperity; their ecstasies have never been permitted to
interfere with their digestions. The angel comes to the Virgin Mary to
bring to her the sacred tidings of her divine pregnancy, and finds her
seated, not in a carpenter’s hut, but in a palace. Even when Jesus is
crucified and borne to the sepulchre, the mourning ladies have not
forgotten the proper arrangement of their hair and the proper costumes
for the historic occasion. Says Vasari: “Our Lady is seen to be
insensible, and the heads of all the weeping figures are exceedingly
graceful.”
Needless to say, Raphael painted portraits of all the Old Men and the
Witch Doctors of his time, and he made them magnificent and thrilling.
Of the portrait of Pope Julius II, valiant war-maker, Vasari writes:
“The picture impresses on all beholders a sense of awe, as if it were
indeed the living object.” Later on came another pope, Leo X, who in
order to get the millions necessary for his family monuments, and for
the art glories of St. Peter’s, started a sale of indulgences, which
brought about the church revolt known to us as the Reformation. His
portrait by Raphael shows a Tammany politician of the bar-room type; and
Vasari tells us--
The velvet softness of the skin is rendered with the utmost
fidelity; the vestments in which the Pope is clothed are also most
faithfully depicted, the damask shines with a glossy luster; the
furs which form the linings of his robes are soft and natural,
while the gold and silk are copied in such a manner that they do
not seem to be painted, but really appear to be silk and gold.
There is also a book in parchment decorated with miniatures, a most
vivid imitation of the object represented, with a silver bell,
finely chased, of which it would not be possible adequately to
describe the beauty. Among other accessories, there is, moreover, a
ball of burnished gold on the seat of the Pope, and in this--such
is its clearness--the divisions of the opposite window, the
shoulders of the Pope, and the walls of the room, are faithfully
reflected; all these things are executed with so much care, that I
fully believe no master ever has done, or ever can do anything
better.
A man who can perform such miracles for the rich and powerful can
command his own price, and is master of everything except his own
passions. Raphael’s old uncle wrote, begging him to return to his home
town and take himself a respectable wife. The young painter’s reply has
come down to us. “If I had done as you wished,” he says, “I should not
be where I am now.” And he goes on to tell where he is--
At the present time I have property in Rome worth three thousand
gold ducats, and an income of fifty gold crowns, as his Holiness
gives me a salary of three hundred gold ducats for superintending
the fabric of St. Peter, which will continue as long as I live; and
I am sure to earn more from other sources and am paid whatever I
choose to ask for my work. And I have begun to paint another room
for his Holiness which will bring me one thousand two hundred gold
ducats, so that you see, my dearest uncle, that I do honor to you
and to all my family and to my country.... What city in the world
can compare with Rome, what enterprise is more worthy than this of
Peter, which is the first temple in the world? And these are the
grandest works which have ever been seen, and will cost more than a
million in gold, and the Pope has decided to spend sixty thousand
ducats a year on the fabric and can think of nothing else.
While Raphael was thus flourishing and proud of his world, a German monk
by the name of Martin Luther was nailing his condemnation of the papacy
upon the door of the church at Wittenberg. But our painter-prince was so
busy, he had so many commissions to portray new popes and cardinals,
new annunciations and transfigurations and illuminations and immaculate
conceptions, that he probably never even heard of the barbarian rebel in
the far North. He remained to the end the perfect exemplar of
leisure-class art, and is today the darling of pious peasant-wives, and
sentimental school-marms doing culture-pilgrimages: in short, of all who
wish to develop their emotions at the expense of their brains, and to
shut their eyes to the grim realities of life, out of which alone true
and vital beauty can grow.