THE CARDINAL DE’ MEDICI, who afterwards became Pope Clement VII., had us
recalled to Florence at the entreaty of my father. [1] A certain pupil
of my father’s, moved by his own bad nature, suggested to the Cardinal
that he ought to send me to Bologna, in order to learn to play well from
a great master there. The name of this master was Antonio, and he was in
truth a worthy man in the musician’s art. The Cardinal said to my father
that, if he sent me there he would give me letters of recommendation and
support. My father, dying with joy at such an opportunity, sent me off;
and I being eager to see the world, went with good grace.
When I reached Bologna, I put myself under a certain Maestro Ercole del
Piffero, and began to earn something by my trade. In the meantime I used
to go every day to take my music lesson, and in a few weeks made
considerable progress in that accursed art. However I made still greater
in my trade of goldsmith; for the Cardinal having given me no
assistance, I went to live with a Bolognese illuminator who was called
Scipione Cavalletti (his house was in the street of our Lady del
Baraccan); and while there I devoted myself to drawing and working for
one Graziadio, a Jew, with whom I earned considerably.
At the end of six months I returned to Florence, where that fellow
Pierino, who had been my father’s pupil, was greatly mortified by my
return. To please my father, I went to his house and played the cornet
and the flute with one of his brothers, who was named Girolamo, several
years younger than the said Piero, a very worthy young man, and quite
the contrary of his brother. On one of those days my father came to
Piero’s house to hear us play, and in ecstasy at my performance
exclaimed: “I shall yet make you a marvellous musician against the will
of all or any one who may desire to prevent me.” To this Piero answered,
and spoke the truth: “Your Benvenuto will get much more honour and
profit if he devotes himself to the goldsmiths trade than to this
piping.” These words made my father angry, seeing that I too had the
same opinion as Piero, that he flew into a rage and cried out at him:
“Well did I know that it was you, you who put obstacles in the way of my
cherished wish; you are the man who had me ousted from my place at the
palace, paying me back with that black ingratitude which is the usual
recompense of great benefits. I got you promoted, and you have got me
cashiered; I taught you to play with all the little art you have, and
you are preventing my son from obeying me; but bear in mind these words
of prophecy: not years or months, I say, but only a few weeks will pass
before this dirty ingratitude of yours shall plunge you into ruin.” To
these words answered Pierino and said: “Maestro Giovanni, the majority
of men, when they grow old, go mad at the same time; and this has
happened to you. I am not astonished at it, because most liberally have
you squandered all your property, without reflecting that your children
had need of it. I mind to do just the opposite, and to leave my children
so much that they shall be able to succour yours.” To this my father
answered: “No bad tree ever bore good fruit; quite the contrary; and I
tell you further that you are bad, and that your children will be mad
and paupers, and will cringe for alms to my virtuous and wealthy sons.”
Thereupon we left the house, muttering words of anger on both sides. I
had taken my father’s part; and when we stepped into the street
together, I told him I was quite ready to take vengeance for the insults
heaped on him by that scoundrel, provided he permit me to give myself up
to the art of design. He answered: “My dear son, I too in my time was a
good draughtsman; but for recreation, after such stupendous labours, and
for the love of me who am your father, who begat you and brought you up
and implanted so many honourable talents in you, for the sake of
recreation, I say, will not you promise sometimes to take in hand your
flute and that seductive cornet, and to play upon them to your heart’s
content, inviting the delight of music?” I promised I would do so, and
very willingly for his love’s sake. Then my good father said that such
excellent parts as I possessed would be the greatest vengeance I could
take for the insults of his enemies.
Not a whole month had been completed after this scene before the man
Pierino happened to be building a vault in a house of his, which he had
in the Via dello Studio; and being one day in a ground-floor room above
the vault which he was making, together with much company around him, he
fell to talking about his old master, my father. While repeating the
words which he had said to him concerning his ruin, no sooner had they
escaped his lips than the floor where he was standing (either because
the vault had been badly built, or rather through the sheer mightiness
of God, who does not always pay on Saturday) suddenly gave way. Some of
the stones and bricks of the vault, which fell with him, broke both his
legs. The friends who were with him, remaining on the border of the
broken vault took no harm, but were astounded and full of wonder,
especially because of the prophecy which he had just contemptuously
repeated to them. When my father heard of this, he took his sword, and
went to see the man. There, in the presence of his father, who was
called Niccolaio da Volterra, a trumpeter of the Signory, he said, “O
Piero, my dear pupil, I am sorely grieved at your mischance; but if you
remember it was only a short time ago that I warned you of it; and as
much as I then said will come to happen between your children and mine.”
Shortly afterwards, the ungrateful Piero died of that illness. He left a
wife of bad character and one son, who after the lapse of some years
came to me to beg for alms in Rome. I gave him something, as well
because it is my nature to be charitable, as also because I recalled
with tears the happy state which Pierino held when my father spake those
words of prophecy, namely, that Pierino’s children should live to crave
succour from his own virtuous sons. Of this perhaps enough is now said;
but let none ever laugh at the prognostications of any worthy man whom
he has wrongfully insulted; because it is not he who speaks, nay, but
the very voice of God through him.
Note 1. This Cardinal and Pope was Giulio, a natural son of Giuliano,
Lorenzo de’ Medici’s brother, who had been killed in the Pazzi
conspiracy, year 1478. Giulio lived to become Pope Clement VII., to
suffer the sack of Rome in 1527, and to make the concordat with Charles
V. at Bologna in 1529-30, which settled for three centuries the destiny
of Italy. We shall hear much more of him from Cellini in the course of
this narrative.
X
ALL this while I worked as a goldsmith, and was able to assist my good
father. His other son, my brother Cecchino, had, as I said before, been
instructed in the rudiments of Latin letters. It was our father’s wish
to make me, the elder, a great musician and composer, and him, the
younger, a great and learned jurist. He could not, however, put force
upon the inclinations of our nature, which directed me to the arts of
design, and my brother, who had a fine and graceful person, to the
profession of arms. Cecchino, being still quite a lad, was returning
from his first lesson in the school of the stupendous Giovannino de’
Medici. On the day when he reached home, I happened to be absent; and
he, being in want of proper clothes, sought out our sisters, who,
unknown to my father, gave him a cloak and doublet of mine, both new and
of good quality. I ought to say that, beside the aid I gave my father
and my excellent and honest sisters, I had bought those handsome clothes
out of my own savings. When I found I had been cheated, and my clothes
taken from me, and my brother from whom I should have recovered them was
gone, I asked my father why he suffered so great a wrong to be done me,
seeing that I was always ready to assist him. He replied that I was his
good son, but that the other, whom he thought to have lost, had been
found again; also that it was a duty, nay, a precept from God Himself,
that he who hath should give to him who hath not; and that for his sake
I ought to bear this injustice, for God would increase me in all good
things. I, like a youth without experience, retorted on my poor
afflicted parent; and taking the miserable remnants of my clothes and
money, went toward a gate of the city. As I did not know which gate
would start me on the road to Rome, I arrived at Lucca, and from Lucca
reached Pisa.
When I came to Pisa (I was about sixteen years of age at the time), I
stopped near the middle bridge, by what is called the Fish-stone, at the
shop of a goldsmith, and began attentively to watch what the master was
about. [1] He asked me who I was, and what was my profession. I told him
that I worked a little in the same trade as his own. This worthy man
bade me come into his shop, and at once gave me work to do, and spoke as
follows: “Your good appearance makes me believe you are a decent honest
youth.” Then he told me out gold, silver, and gems; and when the first
day’s work was finished, he took me in the evening to his house, where
he dwelt respectably with his handsome wife and children. Thinking of
the grief which my good father might be feeling for me, I wrote him that
I was sojourning with a very excellent and honest man, called Maestro
Ulivieri della Chiostra, and was working with him at many good things of
beauty and importance. I bade him be of good cheer, for that I was bent
on learning, and hoped by my acquirements to bring him back both profit
and honour before long. My good father answered the letter at once in
words like these: “My son, the love I bear you is so great, that if it
were not for the honour of our family, which above all things I regard,
I should immediately have set off for you; for indeed it seems like
being without the light of my eyes, when I do not see you daily, as I
used to do. I will make it my business to complete the training of my
household up to virtuous honesty; do you make it yours to acquire
excellence in your art; and I only wish you to remember these four
simple words, obey them, and never let them escape your memory:
In whatever house you be,
Steal not, and live honestly.”
Note 1. The Fish-stone, or Pietra del Pesce, was the market on the quay
where the fish brought from the sea up the Arno to Pisa used to be sold.