verse was intended to relate to men, and how far can such verse, if
existent, be taken to imply that he had no separate way of feeling
for women? The opinions of Mr. Symonds have already been cited
(see note to No. 6 [XX]). In noticing Michelangelo’s use of the
idiomatic Tuscan word _signore_, lord, as applied in the sonnets to
female persons as well as male (the English _liege_ may similarly be
used), he says, “But that Michelangelo by the _signore_ always or
frequently meant a woman can be disproved in many ways. I will only
adduce the fragment of one sonnet” (No. LXXXIII). It is a pity that
Mr. Symonds did not enter into detail; I am quite at a loss for any
circumstances that can be held to warrant his declaration. For the
word, the sonnets only afford information. No. XVI, containing the
words _signior mie car_, is a variant of No. XV, expressly addressed
to a lady. In No. XXII, no one will doubt that the reference is to
a woman. In No. XXXV the sex is shown by the epithet _leggiadre_,
fair, applied to the arms (Mr. Symonds renders “fragile”). No. XXXVII
qualifies _signor_ by _donna_. No. LV treats of the shyness of a
lady in presence of her lover. In No. XL, instead of _signior_,
the variant gives _donna_. No. XLVII seems obviously addressed to
Vittoria Colonna. In No. XXXVI, the feminine application appears
to be indicated by the description of the sovereign person as
reigning _nella casa d’amore_. Thus in not a single instance can the
suggestion of Mr. Symonds be accepted.
There remains the fragment mentioned, No. LXXXIII, a beautiful and
interesting piece, unhappily imperfect. “Yonder it was that Love
(_amor_; variant, _signior_), his mercy, took my heart, rather my
life; here with beauteous eyes he promised me aid, and with the
same took it away. Yonder he bound me, here he loosed me; here for
myself I wept, and with infinite grief saw issue from this stone
him who took me from myself, and of me would none.” It will be seen
that the masculine pronoun is rendered necessary by the reference to
personified Love, and that the allusion is clearly to sexual passion.
Mr. Symonds has not entirely comprehended the scope of the fragment.
The mystical description of Love as issuing from a stone (_sasso_)
may probably be an application of the familiar sculpturesque metaphor.
As, in the instances considered, the opinion of Mr. Symonds appears
void of foundation, so it is counter to the tenor of the poetry. If
No. XXXI really was written for Cavalieri, the reference probably
consisted of no more than the introduction, into the ordinary phrases
of a love poem, of a complimentary play on words. As for the metaphor
by which a lady is compared to an armed enemy, that was already
commonplace in the day of Dante.
14 [XXXII] From pieces dealing with ideal affection we pass to one
obviously biographic in its inspiration. The poem is written below a
letter of 1532, addressed to the sculptor when in Rome. The artist
seems to refer to his own impetuous nature, too liable to quarrel
with friends. Analogous is the sonnet addressed to Luigi del Riccio.
(See madrigal No. 3 [IV] note.) But this composition evidently
relates to a lady, as is shown by the mention of the _dorato strale_,
gilded dart of Love.
15 [XXXIII] As with all lyric poetry, so in the compositions of
Michelangelo, it is not to be assumed that every expression of
emotion of necessity corresponds to some particular experience. Yet
the tenderness, melancholy, and gentle regret which inspire the verse
evidently reflect the character and habitual manner of feeling of the
author. Related in sentiment are the following sonnets:--
[XXVI]
NON MEN GRAN GRAZIA, DONNA, CHE GRAN DOGLIA
_By happiness as deep as agony
Below the scaffold is the caitiff slain,
When lost to hope, and ice in every vein,
His pardon comes, his sudden liberty;
So when, beyond thy wonted charity,
My heaven overcast with many a pain
Thy sovereign pity doth make clear again,
More deep than anguish, pierceth ecstasy.
Sweet news and cruel in so far agree,
As either in a moment may destroy
The heart by grief, or sunder it through joy;
If thou desirest that I live for thee,
The rapture mete, for many a creature frail
Hath died of grace too free for its avail._
[XXXV]
SENTO D’UN FOCO UN FREDDO ASPETTO ACCESO
_I See a face that in itself is cold,
Yet lit with fire that burneth me afar;
Two arms, that quiet and unmoving are,
Whereby all else is moved and controlled;
The vision of a beauty I behold,
Immortal, yet pursuing me to death;
A power that free, my own envelopeth;
Another’s balm, that may my hurt enfold.
How can befall, that a fair countenance
Hath power to cause effect so contrary,
Creating what it doth now own? Perchance,
The life that taketh my felicity,
Yet doth itself deny, is like the sun,
That yieldeth the world heat, yet heat hath none._
[XXXVIII]
RENDETE A GLI OCCHI MIEI, O FONTE O FIUME
_Ah give me back, or river thou or source,
The turbid waters that enlarge thee so,
That thy augmented current doth o’erflow,
And hasten on an unaccustomed course;
O laden air, whose gathered mists allay
And temper heaven’s shining to these eyes,
Return my weary heart her many sighs,
And cloudless leave the countenance of day.
Earth, render to my feet their steps again,
Along the track they trod let grass grow green;
Restore, deaf Echo, my petitions vain;
And ye, alas! unmovèd eyes serene!
Give mine their wasted looks, that they may see
Some kinder loveliness, disdained by thee!_
With these sonnets of ideal love may be compared one later in date,
apparently more biographic in sentiment, and doubtless inspired by
Vittoria Colonna.
[L]
S’I’ AVESSI CREDUTO AL PRIMO SGUARDO
_Had I believed, when first I met the glow
Of this bright soul, my sun, that I might rise
Through fire renewed in such triumphal wise
As doth the Phœnix from her ashes go,
Like some fleet-footed creature, pard or roe,
That seeks its joy and flieth from its fear,
To meet the act, the smile, the accent dear,
I would have leaped, now in my swiftness slow.
Yet why indulge regret, the while I see
In eyes of this glad angel, without cease,
My calm repose and everlasting peace?
More painful days, perchance, had dawned on me,
If I had earlier met, yet been denied
The wings she lendeth me to fly beside._
16 [XXXIX] The timid lover, who finds himself involved in the dangers
of a hopeless passion, endeavors to withdraw from the perilous
situation, but in so doing finds himself confronted by another
danger, that of losing the affection which has become his life. As
the vain desire will prove the death of the body, so the renunciation
will be that of the soul; thus the suitor, according to the familiar
metaphorical system furnished by plastic art, is said to see his
lady with a statue of Death on either hand.
The beautiful and mystic sonnet was written on a stray leaf bearing a
memorandum of 1529, and was probably composed in that year. According
to the statement of the nephew, Nos. 8 and 9 [XXIV and XXV] were also
written on letters of that year; and these two poems correspond in
sentiment with the present piece.
17 [XL] This most beautiful sonnet might conjecturally be referred to
the same period as No. 12 [XXIX]. The spirit of the verse ought to be
enough to satisfy any reader that it was composed with reference to a
woman. (See note to No. 13 [XXX].)
18, 19 [XLIII, XLIV] These two pieces, containing respectively
the dispraise and praise of night, are obviously intended to be
counterparts, the first forming an introduction to the second.
The consolations belonging to darkness and slumber have furnished
themes to very many writers of verse; but among all such pieces
Michelangelo’s tribute is entitled to preëminence. The emotion,
deepening with the progress of the rhyme, ends in one of those
outbursts which make the poetry a key to the character. Two other
sonnets treating of the same subject do not appear to be connected.
[XLI]
COLUI CHE FECE, E NON DI COSA ALCUNA
_He who did erst from primal nothing bring
Time, integral and property of none,
To half, dividing, gave the distant sun,
To half the moon, a lamp more neighboring.
All in a moment, Destiny and Chance
Began, and over mortals ruled with power;
To me they gave the still and sober hour,
As like to like, in birth and circumstance.
As attribute in action is expressed,
And darkness is the property of night,
So e’en to be myself is sad to be;
Yet is my troubled spirit soothed to rest,
Remembering, its dusk may render bright
The sun that Fortune lent for friend to thee._
In No. XLII Night is lauded, as the shadow in which man is
engendered, while in the day the soil is broken only for the seed
of the corn; but the composition does not rival the sweetness and
sublimity of No. XLIV.
20 [LII] This fine sonnet, belonging to the later period, may be
set down as among those inspired by Vittoria Colonna. Thoroughly
characteristic is the grand fifth line, in which the soul is said to
have been created as God’s equal. The nephew, of course, diluted such
daring conceptions into commonplace, and his restoration altogether
fails to convey the essential meaning of the piece. Wordsworth,
unfortunately, knew only the emasculated version.
Similar in theme is another sonnet, No. LX, also rendered by
Wordsworth, from a text more nearly representative. In this instance
the English poet has transcended his source, and furnished a proof
that on fortunate occasions a translation may belong to the very best
poetry, and deserve that immortality which commonly belongs only to
expressions of original genius.
_Yes! hope may with my strong desire keep pace,
And I be undeluded, undismayed;
For if of our affections none find grace
In sight of heaven, then wherefore hath God made
The world which we inhabit? Better plea
Love cannot have, than that in loving thee
Glory to that eternal peace is paid,
Which such divinity to thee imparts,
As hallows and makes pure all gentle hearts.
His hope is treacherous only, whose love dies
With beauty, which is varying every hour;
But in chaste hearts uninfluenced by the power
Of earthly change, there blooms a deathless flower,
That breathes on earth the air of Paradise._
21 [LVI] The sonnet is to be classed with the preceding. In a
variant, the theologic metaphor is carried further: “From without, I
know not whence, came that immortal part which separateth not from
thy sacred breast, yet traverseth the entire world, healeth every
intellect, and honoreth heaven.”
22 [LXI] As all tools used by man are formed by means of other tools,
the archetypal tool must be that celestial instrument by which the
world is fashioned. On earth, Vittoria Colonna had been the hammer
(as we now say, the chisel) by which had been inspired the creative
activity of the artist. By her death, this influence had been
withdrawn to heaven, there to become united with the all-forming
hammer of the eternal Maker; it is, therefore, only from on high that
the artist can look for the completion of his own genius.
To the text, in the hand of Michelangelo, is added a sentence
expressing his sense of the incomparable merit of Vittoria, as the
divine instrument which none other is able to wield, and a prayer
that his own hammer, as he metaphorically says, may also attain a
reception in heaven.
The mystically expressed, but in reality simple and direct verse is
crowded with ideas which strive for utterance. The sculptor seems to
have written prophetically; after the passing away of Vittoria, the
last of his animating impulses appears to have been removed, and his
life becomes that of a recluse, struggling with the infirmities of
advancing age.
Several other pieces relate to the death of Vittoria.
[LXII]
QUAND’EL MINISTRO DE’ SOSPIR ME’ TANTI
_When she who ministereth sighs, withdrew
From the world’s sight, from her own self and mine,
Nature, who made her in our eyes to shine,
Remained abashed, and downcast all who knew.
Yet be not Death of his loud vauntings rife
O’er the sun’s sun, as over others; Love
Hath him subdued, and her endowed with life
Both here below, and with the pure above.
Unjust and haughty Death did so engage
To hush her praises, and her soul bestow
Where it would seem less beautiful; and lo!
Reverse effects illuminate Time’s page;
On earth, more life than she in life possessed,
While Heaven who wished her, now enjoyeth blest._
The thought, that Nature is disgraced in the loss of its best
creation, is repeated in Michelangelo’s poetry. (See sonnet No. 4
[XVII], madrigal No. 9 [XIII].)
Two other sonnets, Nos. LXIII and LXIV, breathe an atmosphere of the
most gloomy despair. The first expresses a profound self-reproach;
the time to soar heavenward was while the sun of life still shone; it
is now too late. The second declares that the flame has expired, to
leave only ashes without a spark.
I do not doubt that here also belongs another sonnet, placed by
Guasti as if belonging to an earlier date.
[LI]
TORNAMI AL TEMPO ALLOR CHE LENTA E SCIOLTA
_Give me the day when free was cast the rein
For headlong ardor’s unreflecting race;
Restore to me the calm angelic face
Wherewith interred seems Virtue to remain;
Give back the wanderings, the steps of pain,
So slow to him by weary age oppressed;
Give water to my eyes, fire to my breast,
If thou wilt take thy fill of me again.
If, Love, ’tis true, thou livest on no more
Than sighs and tears of lovers bitter-sweet,
A weary age hath nought of thy desire;
The soul already near the further shore,
With shield of holier darts doth thine defeat,
And the burned wood is proof against the fire._
A madrigal relates to the same theme.
[VI]
PER NON S’AVERE A RIPIGLIAR DA TANTI
_That perfectness of beauty free from peer
Might be reclaimed and garnered without fail,
Upon a lady excellently clear
Was it bestowed beneath a shining veil;
The heavenly boon had hardly been repaid,
If scattered among all that Heaven had made.
Now, from world unaware,
In breathing of a sigh,
Hath God who reigns on high
Resumed, and hid away his beauty fair.
Yet, though the body die,
Cherish shall memory still
Sacred and sweet, her written legacy.
Compassionate and stern, if Heaven’s will
To all had granted what to her alone,
We all had died for making good the loan._
The madrigal recites that deity had chosen to embody in a single
life the sum of beauty, to the end that the celestial gift might
be more easily resumed. Similar _concetti_ are to be found in the
series of epitaphs composed on Cecchino Bracci, in 1544. Mr. Symonds
very unjustly criticises the verse as constrained, affected, and
exhibiting an absence of genuine grief.
NOTES ON THE EPIGRAMS
1 [I] THE NIGHT OF THE MEDICI CHAPEL. According to Vasari, when
the statues of the Medici Chapel were exposed to view, after
Michelangelo’s departure for Rome, early in 1535, an unknown author
affixed a quatrain to the image of Night. This person was afterwards
known as Giovanni di Carlo Strozzi, at the time eighteen years of
age. The verse, not ungraceful but superficial, recited that Night,
carved by an angel, was living, for the very reason that she seemed
to sleep, and if accosted, would make reply. To this fanciful
compliment, Michelangelo responded in the beautiful quatrain, which
exhibits his view of the Medicean usurpation.
It were to be wished that in presence of the awful forms, visitors
would bear in mind the sculptor’s advice. I have heard a young
American lady, in a voice somewhat strident, expound to her mother
the theme of the statue, reading aloud the information furnished by
Baedeker.
2 [II] DEATH AND THE COFFIN. The younger Buonarroti cites the
statement of Bernardo Buontalenti, that in his house in Rome, halfway
up the stair, Michelangelo had drawn a skeleton Death carrying on
his shoulder a coffin, on which were inscribed these lines. The story
is interesting, in connection with the part taken by Death in the
verse of the sculptor. Giannotti represents him as declining
to attend a merry-making on the ground that it was necessary to muse
on Death. (See madrigal No. 12 [XVI].) The idea appears to be that
death cannot be dreadful, since it bequeaths to life not only the
immortal soul, but even the body; probably the artist meant to say
the body made immortal through art.
3 [V] DEFINITION OF LOVE. With this definition from the subjective
point of view, may be compared madrigal No. 5 [VIII]. As usual the
imagination of the poet takes plastic form; Love, in his mind, is a
statue lying in the heart, and waiting to be unveiled. Akin is the
celebrated sonnet of Dante, _Amor e cor gentil sono una cosa_, which
contains the same conception, and which perhaps Michelangelo may have
remembered. But the more mystical idea of the sculptor borrows only
the suggestion.
NOTES ON THE MADRIGALS
1 [I] During his Roman residence, Michelangelo was brought into
intimate relations with Florentine exiles, who gathered in Rome,
where ruled a Farnese pope, and where certain cardinals favored the
anti-Medicean faction. From the course of a turbulent mountain-brook,
Florence, following an inevitable law, was obliged to issue into
the quiet but lifeless flow of inevitable despotism. It could
not be expected that the fiery Michelangelo could comprehend the
inexorableness of the fate which, in consequence of the necessities
of trade, compelled Florence to prefer conditions ensuring
tranquillity, though under an inglorious and corrupt personal rule.
The sublime madrigal shows the depth of his republican sentiments.
(See No. 22 [LXVIII].)
2 [III] The difficult but very interesting madrigal gives a profound
insight into the spirit of the writer, who felt himself to move in a
society foreign from the higher flight of his genius. His habits of
isolation are remarked by contemporaries. Giannotti, in the dialogue
above mentioned, discourses amusingly on this trait of character,
putting into the mouth of the artist a reply to an invitation. “I
won’t promise.” “Why?” “Because I had rather stay at home.” “For what
reason?” “Because, if I should put myself under such conditions, I
should be too gay; and I don’t want to be gay.” Luigi del Riccio,
introduced as interlocutor, exclaims that he never heard of such
a thing; in this sad world one must seize every opportunity of
distraction; he himself would supply a monochord, and they would
all dance, to drive away sorrow. To this comforting proposition,
Michelangelo returns that he should much prefer to cry. Giannotti
romances; but Francis of Holland is nearer the fact when he makes
the sculptor answer an accusation urged against solitary habits.
The artist declares that there is good ground for such accusation
against one who withdraws from the world by reason of eccentricity,
but not against a man who has something better to do with his
time. The particular occasion of the madrigal seems to have been
dissatisfaction with praise lavished on what to Michelangelo seemed
an unworthy work. Southey paraphrases the poem, but gives the idea
only imperfectly.
Here, in connection with the idea of beauty as furnished from within,
may be introduced a version of a madrigal interesting rather on
account of the philosophic conception than the poetic excellence.
(See also sonnet XVIII, translated in the note to No. XXX.)
[VII]
PER FIDO ESEMPLO ALLA MIA VOCAZIONE
_On me hath been bestowed by birthtide-gift,
Of both mine arts the mirror and the light,
Beauty, my model in my calling here.
It only hath the competence to lift
The vision of the artist to that height
At which I aim in form or color clear._
_If judgment rash and fantasy unwise
Degrade to sense the beauty, that doth bear
And raise toward heaven all sane intelligence,
Man’s wavering glances have no power to rise,
Above inconstant, faithful only where
They linger, unless mercy call them thence._
3 [IV] The madrigal is addressed to Luigi del Riccio, friend of
Michelangelo’s declining years, and a correspondent to whom were
transmitted many of the extant poems. In 1544 Luigi, during a
sickness of the sculptor, took him into his own house and acted
as his nurse; but shortly afterwards, he refused a request of the
artist, declining to suppress an engraving he had been requested to
destroy. The indignation of Michelangelo found vent in a bitter
letter. Riccio died in 1546. Symonds (Life, vol. ii, p. 194)
thinks that Michelangelo speedily excused his friend and repented
his anger. Here the whole heart of the artist is disclosed, and
we have a revelation of the manner in which internal brooding and
many disappointments had rendered somewhat morose a gentle and
affectionate nature, characterized by pride amounting to a fault.
With the idea may be compared Emerson’s essay on “Gifts.” “Hence the
fitness of beautiful, not useful things, for gifts. This giving is
usurpation, and therefore, when the beneficiary is ungrateful, as all
beneficiaries hate all Timons, not at all considering the value of
the gift, but looking back to the greater store it was taken from, I
rather sympathize with the beneficiary than with the anger of my lord
Timon. For the expectation of gratitude is mean, and is continually
punished by the total insensibility of the obliged person. It is
great happiness to get off without injury and heart-burning from one
who has had the ill-luck to be served by you. It is a very onerous
business, this of being served, and the debtor naturally wishes to
give you a slap.” He adds, entirely in the spirit of Michelangelo,
“No services are of any value, but only likeness.”
4 [V] The poet addresses to his friend Vittoria Colonna a theologic
inquiry, after the manner of the appeals of Dante to Beatrice.
Apparently the letter included a blank leaf for an answer. The
question is, “In heaven are contrite sinners less valued than
self-satisfied saints?” The obvious reply must be that in the nature
of things such saints are impossible. The inquiry, therefore, is
not to be taken as serious, but as playful and ironical. I should
be inclined to interpret the verse as asking, “Am I, an humble
artist, but sincerely devoted, of less value in your eyes than the
very courtly and important personages by whom you are surrounded?”
(as Vittoria was in close intimacy with high ecclesiastical
functionaries). The sentiment is gay and jesting, while full of
pleading affection.
5 [VIII] If of all the compositions of Michelangelo, one were asked
to name the most representative, it would be natural to select this
incomparably lovely madrigal. No lyric poet has brought into a few
words more music, more truth, more illumination. The four lines
cited at the end of the Introduction might well be taken as the
motto for a gathering of the poems; and if the arrangement had not
seemed inconsistent with the numbering of the pieces, I would gladly
have placed the madrigal at the end, as summing up the especial
contribution of Michelangelo to letters.
6 [IX] A charming and light-hearted piece of music, obviously
belonging to the earlier period of Michelangelo’s poetic activity.
The verse is written on blue paper, with the subscription, “Divine
things are spoken of in an azure field” (in heaven). The suggestion
is furnished by a conventional _concetto_ of the period; but the
familiarity does not prevent the thought lending itself to genuinely
poetical treatment. No. X is a pretty variant, in which the cruelty
of the lady is compared to the hardness of the marble in which her
image is wrought. The lines are subscribed “for sculptors” (_Da
scultori_). The close connection with his art lends to even the most
simple of these verses an unspeakable attraction.