THE FAILURE OF THE GREAT PLANS
(1513-1534)
Michelangelo, freed from the Sistine Chapel, returned to sculpture and
to the great project which he had most at heart, the tomb of Julius
II.[29]
Julius II in his will had charged Cardinal d'Agen, Lionardo Grossi della
Rovere and the Prothonotary Lorenzo Pucci (later on Cardinal de Santi
Quatro) to continue the enterprise. He had stipulated that the monument
should not be executed in the colossal proportions which were originally
determined on. But it does not appear that his executors complied with
this request. Michelangelo writes in 1524 "at the death of Pope Julius
and the beginning of Leo's reign Aginensis (Cardinal d'Agen) wished to
enlarge the monument and to make the work more considerable than was my
first design and a contract was made."
The sixth of March, 1513, Michelangelo signed what was in effect a new
contract by which he pledged himself to execute the monument in seven
years and not to undertake any other work of importance till it was
finished. He was to receive sixteen thousand five hundred ducats, from
which were deducted the three thousand five hundred which had been paid
during the life of Julius II.[30] The new plan included thirty-two large
statues, and the monument was to be built against the wall of the
church. "At each of the three sides were two tabernacles, both
containing a group of two figures; in front of each of the pilasters
flanking the tabernacles was to be a statue. Between the tabernacles
were reliefs in bronze, on the platform above was the statue of the pope
supported by four figures and surrounded by six others on pedestals.
Finally from the platform was to rise a little sanctuary thirty-four
palms high[31] and containing five statues larger in size than the
others."[32]
[Illustration: THE LIBYAN SIBYL
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-1512).]
For three years Michelangelo devoted himself almost exclusively to this
work and from that period of vigour and maturity, of relative calm and
satisfying accomplishment, came his most perfect piece of sculpture, the
Moses. This statue, originally intended for one of the six colossal
figures crowning the upper story of the tomb, in the end was itself the
complete expression of the whole monument. The Moses is the older
brother of the Prophets of the Sistine, sprung from the same vehement
and passionate inspiration, but more commanding, more sure and more
master of himself (we shall come upon him again at the completion of the
work thirty years later, for Michelangelo was never tired of returning
to him). The two Slaves[33] now in the Louvre, who were to be placed
against the pilasters of the lower story, immortal symbols of the
weariness of living and of the revolt against life,--the voluptuous hero
with his beautiful body overcome by deadly torpor and the athlete,
vanquished but unsubdued, who writhes in his bonds, "bent like a
spring," gathering himself together and hurling his scorn into the face
of heaven--both belong to this period. Probably the Caryatid of the
Hermitage at St. Petersburg, which was certainly meant for one of the
groups of conquerors in the niches, was made at this time as well as the
models for many statues.
The general subject of the monument according to Condivi and to Vasari
who preserved the sayings of Michelangelo himself, was an allegory cold,
abstruse and courtier-like, as we must admit the subjects of his
undertakings very often were. His nature was timid and lacked
independence, but fortunately the force of his passionate feeling
carried everything before it. Vainly did he bind himself to lifeless and
commonplace programs, vainly attempt to force himself to glorify the
established order and the powers that be. At the very first step he took
all false pretenses fell away and a furious cry of revolt against the
baseness of the world and the bondage of life broke forth. So the
statues of this monument which was to express with stale flattery that
"all the virtues were prisoners of death now that the pope was dead"
became, unconsciously perhaps to their creator, hymns of heroic scorn
and expressions of moral grandeur crushed by force yet rising
unconquered.
But the peculiar quality of these figures compared with the work which
was to follow is that they preserve in all their passionate agony a
balance and a certain melancholy serenity which the artist of the tombs
of the Medici no longer possessed.[34]
In that serene and fruitful period, while the excitement of his work in
the Sistine Chapel quieted little by little, like the calming of a
stormy sea, Michelangelo seems to have accepted only one other
commission, that for the Christ of the Minerva which came from three
Romans, Bernardo Cencio, Mario Scapucci and Metello Varj. Yet beginning
with the summer of 1515 his letters show that he feared and foresaw the
interruption of his work.
"I must make a great effort this summer," he writes on June 16 to his
brother Buonarroto, "to bring my work rapidly to an end, for I think
that I shall soon have to enter the service of the pope."
The new pope, Leo X (Giovanni Medici), at first left Michelangelo
entirely free. He was so anxious to gain the hearts of his former
adversaries that he took very good care not to seem to put any obstacle
in the way of the glorification of his predecessor. He soon found,
however, that the tomb absorbed Michelangelo's energies completely and
he decided to draw him away from it in order to devote him to the
service of his own house. He planned to build the façade of S. Lorenzo,
the church of the Medici in Florence. Several artists, Baccio d'Agnolo,
Antonio da San Gallo, Andrea and Jacopo Sansovino and Raphael himself
brought their plans to him during his stay in Florence in November and
December, 1515. But whether because Raphael was kept in Rome by his post
of superintendent of the construction of St. Peter's in which he had
lately succeeded the old Giuliano da San Gallo in August, 1515, or
whether Leo X wished to attach to himself Michelangelo--whose family
pride he had already flattered by naming his brother Buonarroto _Comes
Palatinus_ and by giving the Buonarroti the right to place in their arms
the "palla" of the Medici with their lilies and the monogram of the
pope--at any rate it was to him that Leo X turned. Michelangelo,
stirred by the growing fame of Raphael, allowed himself to be drawn into
this new task which it was physically impossible for him to accomplish
without neglecting the old one and which was to cause him endless worry
and vexation. His correspondence with Domenico Buoninsegni shows plainly
that he tried to deceive himself into thinking that he could carry on
the two undertakings simultaneously.
[Illustration: THE PROPHET JEREMIAH
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-1512).]
The heirs of Julius II, however, were more clear-sighted and in order to
fight fire with fire they tried to bind him by a third contract on July
8, 1516. By this agreement the monument of the pope was to be diminished
by one-half and the number of the statues reduced from thirty-two to
twenty. They gave Michelangelo nine years more in which to complete the
work, with full liberty to execute it in Florence, Pisa or Carrara. In
return they forced from him the formal agreement that he would not
undertake any other important work "opus saltim magni momenti." That
clause was aimed directly at the plans of Leo X. Michelangelo signed
this in good faith, for he thought that it would not prevent his making
some statues for the façade of S. Lorenzo. His imagination carried him
away. He was more and more attracted by Leo's project and he let himself
go so far as to write that he would undertake the work and he sent a
design for the façade. Then, almost at once, he was seized with
scruples and wanted to rid himself of the greater part of the task by
turning it over to the architect Baccio d'Agnolo and only reserving for
himself the principal statues. The pope agreed to everything, sure of
what would happen, for it was no secret that Michelangelo was incapable
of collaborating with anyone, no matter who he might be. As a matter of
fact Michelangelo was not satisfied with the model of the façade which
Baccio made according to his plan. He made another one, and in the end
grew irritated with Baccio, whom he accused of having an understanding
with his enemies. Little by little his enthusiasm for the work grew.
He wrote restlessly to Domenico Buoninsegni in July, 1517: "I wish to
make of this façade of S. Lorenzo a work which shall be a mirror of
architecture and of sculpture for all Italy. The pope and the
cardinal[35] must make up their minds quickly whether they want me to do
it or not. If they want me to do it they must sign a contract and give
me full powers. I will finish it in six years. Messer Domenico, give me
an exact answer as to the intentions of the pope and the cardinal. That
would afford me the greatest satisfaction."
Here it is Michelangelo himself who begs Leo X to give him this heavy
burden, who trembles for fear of not getting it, and is consumed with
the desire to bind himself to a new servitude! January 19, 1518, he
signed a contract with Leo X by which he agreed to erect the façade of
S. Lorenzo in eight years.
It was to be composed of:
First: An inferior order of eight fluted columns, eleven brasses[36]
high, three portals with four statues five brasses high and seven
bas-reliefs; and around the sides on each lateral face two columns, and
between them a figure in high relief.
Second: A superior order of eight pilasters from six to seven brasses
high; on the façade four seated bronze statues; and on each side two
pilasters and a statue.
Third: The upper cornice carrying an entablature of eight pilasters in
front and two on the side, with four niches in the façade, and one on
each side intended for six marble statues five and a half brasses high.
There were besides on the façade, undoubtedly in the lower story, seven
bas-reliefs of marble with life-size subjects, five squares and two
round plaques. In the centre a pediment with the arms of the Medici.
Michelangelo had the choice of executing the work himself or of having
it done after his models. The heirs of Julius II were obliged to give
way to the order of Leo X and to be satisfied with the permission which
he gave to Michelangelo still to go on with the work on the monument of
Julius in Florence. Even that permission was very soon withdrawn,
according to Michelangelo. "Pope Leo," he writes, "does not want me to
do the monument of Julius." When he began to work on it again in his
atelier in Florence he says: "The Medici, who later on became Pope
Clement and who was then in Florence, saw that I was working at the tomb
and he would no longer permit it. For that reason I was prevented from
doing anything until the Medici became pope."
Michelangelo always sought excuses for not finishing his undertakings.
The real culprit was his eager and changeable genius, uncontrollable and
constantly seized with enthusiasm for some new idea. He no more
succeeded in raising the façade of S. Lorenzo than in finishing the
tomb.
His terrible mania for doing everything himself drove him--instead of
staying and working in Florence--into going to Carrara to oversee the
quarrying of the blocks of marble. There he found himself in all sorts
of difficulties. The Medici wanted to use the quarries of Pietra Santa,
which had been lately bought by Florence, instead of those of Carrara
and Michelangelo, because he took sides with the Carrarese, found
himself suspected by the Cardinal Giulio de' Medici of having been
bought by them; and because he was forced in the end to obey the strict
orders of the pope he was persecuted by the people of Carrara, who made
an arrangement with the Genoese boatmen at Pisa so that he could not
secure any barge to transport his marble. He had to build a road several
miles in length across the mountains with pick and shovel. The ill-will
of the people of Pietra Santa and the stupidity of the workmen who did
not understand their work so upset him that he fell ill at Seravezza
from over-strain and worry. He felt that his vigour, his health and his
ideas were being wasted in this life of an engineer and contractor. He
was dying with impatience to begin the façade, but the blocks of marble
did not reach Florence because the barges were stopped or the Arno was
dry. They arrived at last and the marble was unloaded, but instead of
setting to work Michelangelo returned to Seravezza and Pietra Santa. He
was obstinately determined not to begin until he had gathered in
Florence, just as he had done before in Rome for the tomb of Julius II,
all the material which would be necessary for the entire undertaking, a
veritable mountain of marble. He kept putting off the moment of
beginning. Was it not the truth--though he did not admit it even to
himself--that he was really afraid of the great architectural
undertaking into which he had imprudently plunged and for which he had
so little training? How, indeed, could he have acquired this new art
which he had had no chance of practising? Had he not promised too much
and did he not feel himself in a blind alley with no way out, where he
no longer dared either to advance or retreat?
All his efforts were unsuccessful, even those for the transportation of
the marble. He was cheated by his workmen, and four of the six
monolithic columns sent to Florence were shattered on the way, one of
them at Florence itself. At last the pope and Cardinal de' Medici grew
impatient at this useless loss of so much precious time in the marshes
and quarries of Pietra Santa and on March 10, 1520, an order of the pope
clearly and completely released Michelangelo from the agreement of 1518
concerning the façade of S. Lorenzo and from all obligations in regard
to it. Michelangelo only knew of this through the arrival at Seravezza
of the gangs of workmen sent by Cardinal Giulio to take his place. He
was cruelly hurt.
"I do not begrudge the cardinal," he says, "the three years which I
have lost here. I do not blame him because I am exhausted by this work
for S. Lorenzo. I do not blame him for the great affront of having
ordered me to do this work and then of taking it away from me--I do not
even know for what reason. I do not count against him all that I have
spent, which amounts to this: Pope Leo takes back the quarry with the
blocks already cut; I have left the money that I have in hand--500
ducats--and I am given my liberty."
He could not hold his patrons responsible. The fault was his own, as he
well knew, and that was his worst punishment. Justi has said, not
unreasonably, that he committed the sin against the Holy Ghost in
wasting so many years in such unimportant work. What did he accomplish
from 1515 to 1520 in the fulness of his vigour? Plans which he could
never carry out, plans for the façade of S. Lorenzo, plans for the tomb
of Julius II, plans for the tomb of Dante, whose remains the
Academicians of Florence wanted to bring back from Ravenna to his own
country[37]--for in October, 1519, in the midst of the very worst of his
difficulties he had not hesitated to offer his services to Leo X to
"raise to the divine poet a monument worthy of him."
One single work was realised amidst all these dreams: the Christ of the
Minerva, and it is the coldest and dullest thing he ever did--a work of
Michelangelo (and this is almost unbelievable) which is commonplace and
uninspiring. It can hardly even be called his, for he did not finish it
himself, but gave it over to the neglect of his assistant, Pietro
Urbano, a bungler without talent and incurably lazy, who, when he was
ordered to accompany the statue to Rome and to finish it, ruined it by
his awkwardness and left it there hopelessly marred.[38]
[Illustration: THE ERYTHREAN SIBYL
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-1512).]
Cardinal Giulio de' Medici, when he had extricated Michelangelo from
this hopeless enterprise, determined to turn his genius in a new
direction and one in which he could direct him more closely. He
entrusted him with the construction of the new sacristy of S. Lorenzo
and the tombs of the Medici. In November, 1520, Michelangelo submitted
to him a drawing which met with his approval. This original plan was for
four tombs: those of Lorenzo the Magnificent, Giuliano his brother, his
son Giuliano, Duke of Nemours, and his grandson Lorenzo, Duke of Urbino.
The work was begun before April, 1521, but was not pushed vigorously
until after the nomination on November 19, 1522, of Cardinal Giulio de'
Medici to the pontifical throne under the name of Clement VII.[39]
In May, 1524, Clement VII accepted the idea, suggested to him by the
flattering Salviati, of adding to the four sarcophagi already planned
tombs for Leo X and for himself and of giving them the place of honour.
In June Michelangelo sent him a new plan as well as the drawings for the
Library of S. Lorenzo, the building of which had also been entrusted to
him.
Clement VII wished to monopolise Michelangelo's services, and he
suggested to him in January, 1524, that he should join the order of the
Franciscans so that he might be given a benefice. Michelangelo refused
to do this, but the pope decided, nevertheless, to allow him a monthly
pension of three times the amount for which he had asked[40] and a house
in the neighbourhood of S. Lorenzo. Everything seemed to be going well
and the work on the chapel was progressing when Michelangelo suddenly
left the house which had been given to him and refused to accept Clement
VII's pension. He was going through another crisis of discouragement and
doubt. The heirs of Julius II could not forgive him for having abandoned
the work that he had undertaken. They accused him of unfaithfulness and
threatened him with the law. He was terrified at the idea of a lawsuit,
for his conscience told him that his adversaries were in the right, and
he was tormented by the thought that he had not kept his word. He felt
that he could not accept the money of Clement VII as long as he had not
yet either given back that of Julius II or carried out his promises. But
struggle as he would he lacked strength to free himself from the ties
which bound him to the pope, and necessity forced him to take the
pension which he had refused. He continued to protest while he worked.
By the end of October, 1525, he had only blocked out four figures, the
allegories of the seasons. He was always thinking of the monument of
Julius II and he tried to simplify his plan by changing it to a tomb
built against the wall, like those of Pius II and Pius III at St.
Peter's. He felt that he could finish the figures within a stated time
and then give to Pope Clement all the rest of his powers, "and in truth
they are feeble, for I am old and ought not to have all these worries,
for they affect me greatly. You can not work while your hands are doing
one thing and your head another, especially in sculpture."[41]
Clement VII seemed at times to be touched by Michelangelo's troubles and
expressed an affectionate interest in him and his work. He sent him a
letter on December 23, 1525, in which he said:
"You know that popes do not have long lives and we could not long more
ardently than we do to see the chapel with the tombs of our family and
to know that it is finished and also the Library. We recommend them both
to your zeal. Nevertheless we are trying to possess ourselves in
salutary patience and we pray God that He may inspire you to carry on
all these works at once. Do not fear that you will ever lack either work
or rewards as long as we live. Go on with God and our blessing."
But the incurable frivolity of the Medici regained the upper hand, and
instead of relieving Michelangelo of part of his work he laid new
burdens on him; a Ciborium for S. Lorenzo and a ridiculous Colossus
which it was proposed to put up outside the Medici gardens, the
fantastic plans for which took up much of Michelangelo's time.[42]
It is sad to see this poor great man trying so hard to understand the
absurd whims of his Mæcenas that he ends by almost becoming interested
in them.
"I have thought about the Colossus," he writes to Fattucci in the autumn
of 1525; "I have indeed thought a great deal about it. It seems to me
that it would not be well placed outside the Medici gardens because it
would take up too much room in the street. A better place, I think,
would be where the barber's shop is. There it would not be so much in
the way. As for the expenses of expropriation, I think to reduce them we
could make the figure seated, and as it could be hollow, the shop could
be placed inside so the rent would not be lost. It seems to me a good
idea to put in the hand of the Colossus a horn of abundance, and this
could be hollow and would serve as a chimney. The head could also be
made use of, I should think, for the poultryman, my very good friend who
lives on the square, said to me secretly that it would make a wonderful
dovecote. I have another and still better idea--but in that case the
statue must be made very much larger, which would not be impossible, for
towers are made with stone--and that is that the head should serve as a
bell-tower to S. Lorenzo, which now has none. By placing the bell so
that the sound would come out of the mouth it would seem as if the
giant cried for mercy, especially on holidays when they use the big
bells."
Michelangelo had constant trouble with his workmen, and to these worries
and his pangs of conscience were added domestic difficulties which never
ceased to embitter his life. During the period of the Sistine frescoes
it was his relations with his brothers that gave him most trouble, for
they tried to make use of him and he had to watch them sharply. Then it
was his father whom he adored with almost religious reverence and who
undoubtedly loved him, but who, irritable like himself, and peevish and
suspicious, picked unfair quarrels and spread odious calumnies about
him.
In the midst of all these difficulties the work did not progress at all.
A letter of June, 1526, says that one statue of a captain had been
begun, as well as four allegories and the Madonna, but as a matter of
fact not one of these was ready in 1527. As for the Library and the
Medici Chapel they were hardly begun.
At this moment the revolution broke out in Florence (April, 1527).
[Illustration: JESSE
A Figure in the Series of the "Ancestors of Christ."
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-1512).]
Michelangelo had until then shown in politics the same indecision from
which he had suffered so much in his own affairs and even in his art. He
never succeeded in reconciling his love of liberty with his
obligations to the Medici. It must be admitted that this violent genius
was always timid in action; he never incurred any risk through
struggling against the powers of this world on political or religious
grounds. He was afraid of compromising himself. He was afraid of
everything. He was always afraid. If in spite of his natural timidity he
let himself be drawn into the Florentine Revolution of 1527 he must have
been driven by deep despair and the belief that his life was practically
lost. That extremity of suffering brought to the surface and into action
his fundamental beliefs.
His timid introspective soul was secretly ardently republican. We can
see this in the violent discussions which he had in 1545 with intimate
friends, Luigi del Riccio, Antonio Petreo and Donato Giannotti, who made
note of them in his "Dialogues on Dante's Divine Comedy." In these talks
he defends tyrannicide with enthusiasm.
He found himself in the front ranks of the Florentine revolutionists in
those days of national and republican revival which, in Florence,
followed the news of the taking of Rome by the Imperialists (May 6,
1527) and the driving out of Ippolito and Alessandro de' Medici (May
17th). At first the Republic seems only to have given him artistic
commissions. He was ordered to cut from a block of marble a colossal
group of two figures as a companion-piece to the David. He obeyed, and
began a Hercules and Cacus;[43] then changed his plan and made a sketch
for a Samson slaying the Philistines. But the situation grew tragic and
he was called to more pressing tasks. In October, 1528, at San Miniato
he took part in a council presided over by the Gonfalonier Niccolo
Capponi to discuss the question of the fortification of the town.
Florence had summoned the architect Sebastiano Serlio and the engineer
Pierfrancesco d'Urbino and had sent Francesco da San Gallo and Amadio
d'Alberto to examine the fortifications of Prato, Pistoia, Pisa and
Livorno. Michelangelo was chosen in his turn on January 10, 1529, in the
_Collegium_ of the _Nove di Milizzia_ to direct the works of defense. He
was named on April 6th for one year _Governatore Generale_ and
_Procuratore_ of the fortifications of Florence, and was given a salary
of one golden ducat a day.[44] He realised that the important point of
defense was San Miniato for, "if the enemy gained possession of that
hill they would be master of the city." He determined, therefore, to
strengthen that position with bastions, but he encountered the ill-will
of the Gonfalonier Capponi, who tried to send him away from Florence on
various missions.
In June, 1529, he was ordered to inspect the citadel of Pisa and the
fortifications of Arezzo and Livorno. In July and August he was sent to
Ferrara to examine the celebrated defensive works there and to consult
with the Duke, a great expert in fortifications. The Duke received him
with great honour and took him over the fortifications himself, showed
him his art collection and asked him for one of his works.[45] But
Michelangelo suspected Capponi and the party of the Medici of taking
advantage of his absence to delay the fortification of the town and his
suspicions were confirmed by the neglected condition in which he found
the work on his return. To block these intrigues he installed himself at
San Miniato and would not stir from there again. His restless spirit
felt the least breath of the rumours of treason which, as always,
circulated in a besieged town and which unhappily, as the future showed,
were only too well founded.
Capponi, under suspicion, had been replaced as Gonfalonier by Francesco
Carducci, but the untrustworthy Malatesta Baglioni, who later on was to
give up the town, was named _Condottiere_ and governor-general of the
Florentine troops. Michelangelo foresaw his treason and confided his
suspicions to Carducci. Malatesta did not fail to hear of this
denunciation. He was all-powerful at Florence as Generalissimo, and
since a man of his type would stop at nothing when it was a question of
revenge or of the removal of a dangerous adversary, Michelangelo
believed himself lost. "I had resolved, however, to await without fear
the end of the war," he writes on September 25, 1529, to Battista della
Palla. "But on Tuesday morning the twenty-first of September a certain
man came to me outside of the Porta San Niccolo, where I was on the
bastions, and whispered in my ear that if I wished to save my life I
must not stay any longer in Florence. He went with me to my house,
brought me some horses, and did not leave me again until he had put me
outside of Florence."
Varchi, filling in the details, gives the name of the Councellor Rinaldo
Corsini[46] and adds that Michelangelo had sewed twelve thousand golden
florins into three quilted shirts, and that it was not without
difficulty that he escaped from Florence with Rinaldo and his pupil
Antonio Mini by the gate of Justice, which was the least guarded. That
was on the morning of September 21st. He went through Ferrara without
stopping there and arrived at Venice on September 25th. The Signory at
once sent two gentlemen to do anything for him which he might need (a
proof of the fame which he enjoyed already throughout the whole of
Italy). Michelangelo, however, refused everything and withdrew to the
Giudecca. He thought of going to France and spoke of this intention to
Battista della Palla, the agent of Francis I in Italy for the purchase
of works of art. Lazare de Baïf, the ambassador of France at Venice, was
told of this and wrote immediately to Francis I and to the Constable de
Montmorency, urging them to profit by this chance to secure
Michelangelo. The King at once offered Michelangelo a pension and a
house, but by the time the letter arrived at Venice he had already
returned to Florence.
His flight had caused a great sensation there. The Signory on September
30th decreed that all those who had deserted should be declared rebel
and banished if they did not return by October 7th. On the date fixed
Michelangelo had not returned. A decree declared the fugitives rebels
and their goods confiscated, but the name of Michelangelo did not
figure on the list. They gave him another chance. A few days later the
Florentine envoy at Ferrara, Galeotto Guigni, informed the Signory that
Michelangelo had heard of the decree too late and that he was ready to
return if he would be pardoned. The Signory promised to forgive him and
had a safe conduct sent to him in Venice by the stone-cutter, Bastiano
di Francesco, who brought him at the same time letters from ten of his
friends all beseeching him to return to Florence. He had had time to
reflect on what he had done and was ashamed of his pitiful panic. He
went back to Florence on November 20, 1529, and on the 23rd the decree
of banishment was removed by the Signory, but the Grand Council was
closed to him for three years. According to a letter of Sebastiano del
Piombo, Michelangelo also had to pay to the city a fine of fifteen
hundred ducats.
From that time on he did his duty bravely. He took his place again at
San Miniato, which the enemy had been bombarding for a month. He had the
hill fortified all over again, and it is said that he saved the
campanile by covering it with bales of wool and mattresses hung on
cords. The last record of his activity during the siege is a note of
February 22, 1530, which shows him climbing the dome of the cathedral,
doubtless to watch the movements of the enemy or to examine into the
condition of the dome itself, strained by the bombardment.
[Illustration: DECORATIVE FIGURE
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-1512).]
The misfortune which he had foreseen took place on August 2, 1530, when
Malatesta Baglioni turned traitor. On the 12th Florence capitulated, and
the Emperor turned the town over to the representative of the pope,
Baccio Valori. Then the executions began. During the first few days
nothing checked the vengeance of the conquerors and some of
Michelangelo's best friends were among the victims. Michelangelo hid
himself, it is said, in the tower of S. Niccolò oltr'Arno. He had
especial reason to fear because the report had been spread that he had
wished to tear down the palace of the Medici. "When the wrath of Clement
VII had subsided," says Condivi, "he wrote to Florence that Michelangelo
should be searched for. He added that if he was found and was willing to
go on working at the tombs of the Medici he should be treated with all
the consideration he deserved," Michelangelo came out of his
hiding-place and in September or October, 1530, again undertook his work
for the glory of those against whom he had fought.
It was not the glory of the Medici he wrought, but his own sorrow and
wrath. The same thing happened here as with the tomb of Julius II.
Michelangelo did not have the force to refuse a task unworthy of him:
his genius was heroic, his will not so at all. He accepted the order, he
even outlined a program whose sychophantic affectation arouses a feeling
of sadness and of pity for the humiliation of so great a man, forced to
lie. A note in his own hand at the Casa Buonarroti explains one of the
monuments in the following way.
"Day and Night talk together and say: In our rapid flight we have
brought Duke Giuliano to death. It is therefore just that he should
avenge himself. His vengeance, now that we have killed him, is to snatch
away the light from us; by closing his eyes, he has closed ours, which
will no longer illumine the earth. What would he have done with us if he
had remained alive?"
Is not that insipid interpretation the veil of prudence which he wrapped
about his rebel spirit? How much of this is really left in the work? Who
can find it there? Who thinks only of the Medici before this tragic
expression of a lonely and despairing soul? The burning and mighty
spirit of the Sistine breathes again, and austere forms rise from the
shade. Yet here everything is sadder; a funereal silence reigns. It is
no longer the tragic struggle of the Son of Man. It is the void which
weighs on these giants who groan and complain and on those two sombre,
pondering heroes. The superb imperfection of some of these colossal
figures, from which the sculptor has only torn aside with his chisel
part of the veil of marble that covers them, adds still more to the
impression of mysterious terror expressed by these classic divinities,
half released from chaos and soon to exhaust themselves in a vain
struggle against the forces of destruction. Action, resigned and
powerless, turns his head aside. At his feet Day in fierce contempt for
all things, shows for a moment over his shoulder, his face wrapped in
clouds. He turns his back on life and plunges into passionate isolation.
Night, overcome by leaden sleep and burning with fever, sinks into the
midst of a stifling nightmare, like a stone into a gulf.
Thought, self-divining, bends toward the tomb his austere face bathed in
shadow and considers the succession of his days. Dawn, so beautiful and
pure, wakened against her will, weary of living and exhausted, stirs in
mortal pain; Twilight, with bended brow, bitter and disabused, remembers
the past without regret. The dolorous and resigned Virgin looks on at
this threnody of negation while the child God, famished, gnaws her
breast in anger.[47]
It was in this outburst of despair that Michelangelo drowned his shame
at raising this monument of slavery.[48] He fell ill from
over-excitement and Clement VII attempted in vain to soothe him. He sent
affectionate messages to him by his secretary, Pier Paolo Marzo, urging
him not to overexert himself, to work reasonably and at his leisure, to
take a walk occasionally, and "not to reduce himself to the condition of
a drudge." In the autumn of 1534 his life was in danger. Giovanni
Battista di Paolo Mini wrote on September 29th to Valori, "Michelangelo
is worn and emaciated. I have spoken of it to Bugiardino and Antonio
Mini; we agreed that he had not long to live unless someone looks out
for him."
Clement VII was disturbed and on November 21, 1531, by a special letter
he forbade Michelangelo under pain of excommunication "to work in any
way whatever, except on the tomb of Julius II and the undertaking which
we have entrusted to you (ne aliquo modo laborare debeas nisi in
sepulture et opera nostra quam tibi comisimus) so that you may still
bring glory to Rome, your family and yourself."
He protected Michelangelo against the importunities of those who came to
beg for works of art, and he reprimanded him paternally for accepting
these orders. "When anyone asks you for a painting," he said, "you
should fasten a brush to your foot, make four strokes and say, 'The
picture is done.'" He promised also to arrange Michelangelo's
difficulties with the heirs of Julius II.
On April 29, 1532, by his mediation a fourth contract was agreed upon
between the representative of the heir to Julius II, the Duke of Urbino,
Francesco Maria della Rovere and Michelangelo. Michelangelo promised to
make a new model of the tomb, to deliver the six statues already begun
and still unfinished, as well as everything else that was ready; to
complete it in the course of three years at S. Pietro in Vinculi and to
pay all the expenses as well as two thousand ducats in compensation for
the sums which he had already received. The pope gave him permission to
come for two months every year to Rome for this work. Michelangelo was
agreeing to the ruin of the greatest undertaking of his life and he had
besides to pay so much that he was forced to sell houses and goods.
Like the plans for Julius II, the plans for the Medici collapsed.
Clement VII died on September 28, 1538. Michelangelo was at that time
away from Florence and he never went back there. Duke Alessandro de'
Medici hated him, and only his fear of the pope prevented the tyrant
from assassinating him. Michelangelo therefore left Florence (where his
brother Buonarroto died in January, 1534) just after he had lost his
father, Lodovico, in June of that same year. Nothing bound him any
longer to his own country, and he was never to see it again.
[Illustration: DECORATIVE FIGURE
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (1508-1512).]
That was the end of the chapel of the Medici. It was never
completed.[49] What we know of it to-day is only a very far-away
suggestion of what he had dreamed. Barely the lifeless skeleton of the
architectural decoration is left. Michelangelo had only made (partially)
seven statues--Lorenzo da Urbino, Giuliano de Nemours, the four
allegorical figures and the Madonna--and he had barely begun some of the
others which were planned; he had abandoned to Raffaelo da Montelupo and
Giovanni Montorsoli the figures of S. Cosmo and S. Damien for the tomb
of Lorenzo the Magnificent and to Tribolo the figures for the tomb of
Giuliano the brother of Lorenzo, which were to represent the Earth
crowned with cypress, her head bowed, weeping, and Heaven with lifted
arms, radiant with joy. When these statues were ready to be placed no
one knew where they should go. Vasari inquired in vain of Michelangelo
in 1562 what statues he had intended for the empty niches beside the
captains, above the doors and in the pavilions at the corners and "what
sort of painting he had planned for the walls." Evidently the Medici
Chapel, so bare and cold to-day, was to have had a complete decoration
of painting and sculpture of which it is impossible for us to form any
idea.
Almost the same thing is true of the Laurentian Library. Michelangelo
never took any interest in it except in 1525-1526, when the pope wanted
him to write about it almost every week. When he left Florence he had
only completed the construction of the vestibule and the ceiling of the
chief structure. The staircase had not been begun. When the Grand Duke
Cosmo wished to have it finished by Tribolo in 1558 no model of
Michelangelo's could be found. Vasari begged him to say what his plan
had been and Michelangelo answered that he would tell him willingly if
he could remember it, but he had only a vague idea, as if in a dream, of
a certain staircase, but he did not think it could be the one he had
planned, because it was absurd.[50]
He had so completely given up all these undertakings that he had wiped
them from his memory, or rather his memory had disappeared with them.
"Memory and mind have gone on ahead," he wrote, "to wait for me in the
other world."