Italy, so eloquent in their sublimity and beauty, were
apparently a blank to him. His world was the world of ideas, taking
visible form, incarnating themselves in man. One language the master had
to serve him in all need--the language of plastic human form; but it was
to him a tongue as rich in its variety of accent and of intonation as
Beethoven's harmonies.

In the Sistine Chapel, where plastic art is so supreme, we are bound to
ask the further question. What was the difference between Michael Angelo
and a Greek? The Parthenon with its processions of youths and maidens, its
gods and heroes, rejoicing in their strength, and robed with raiment that
revealed their living form, made up a symphony of meaning as full as this
of Michael Angelo, and far more radiant. The Greek sculptor embraced
humanity in his work no less comprehensively than the Italian; and what he
had to say was said more plainly in the speech they both could use. But
between Pheidias and Michael Angelo lay Christianity, the travail of the
world through twenty centuries. Clear as morning, and calm in the
unconsciousness of beauty, are those heroes of the youth of Hellas. All
is grace, repose, strength shown but not asserted. Michael Angelo's Sibyls
and Prophets are old and wrinkled, bowed with thought, consumed by vigils,
startled from tranquillity by visions, overburdened with the messages of
God. The loveliest among them, the Delphic, lifts dilated eyes, as though
to follow dreams that fly upon the paths of trance. Even the young men
strain their splendid limbs, and seem to shout or shriek, as if the life
in them contained some element of pain. "He maketh his angels spirits, and
his ministers a flame of fire:" this verse rises to our lips when we seek
to describe the genii that crowd the cornice of the Sistine Chapel. The
human form in the work of Pheidias wore a joyous and sedate serenity; in
that of Michael Angelo it is turbid with a strange and awful sense of
inbreathed agitation. Through the figure-language of the one was spoken
the pagan creed, bright, unperturbed, and superficial. The sculpture of
the Parthenon accomplished the transfiguration of the natural man. In the
other man awakes to a new life of contest, disillusionment, hope, dread,
and heavenward striving. It was impossible for the Greek and the Italian,
bearing so different a burden of prophecy, even though they used the same
speech, to tell the same tale; and this should be remembered by