ch, whether successfully or not,
have endeavored to exhibit the causal relation of events to one another.
In them, historic occurrences are viewed as the evidence, confirmatory
or illustrative, of certain laws of progress, the elucidation of which
is the main object of the work. A similar change has occurred in the
manner of writing biography. The Life of Robespierre, and the still more
elaborate and finished Life of Goethe, by Mr. Lewes, have aimed at
presenting the circumstances which influenced the development of their
heroes,--at showing us the steps by which they have obtained, the one an
infamous and horrible notoriety, the other the love and veneration of
mankind, both now and as long as mankind shall endure. The work of M.
Grimm is in some respects similar to these. The author is not content
with telling us when the great Michael Angelo was born, when he died,
who his parents were, what he painted, wrote, sculptured, and builded,
where he lived, and how many feet and inches he measured in his
stockings. He aims at more than this. He presents us with a vivid
picture of the life and manners, the opinions and feelings of Italian
men at the time when this great creative genius lived. He sets before us
the circumstances which guided his career, the occurrences upon which
his intellect was brought to bear, and the objects with which his
imagination was nurtured. In short, he shows us Michael Angelo in his
environment. The life of Michael Angelo is, indeed, peculiarly
susceptible of such a treatment. To a far greater extent in him than in
most creators can be traced the influence of external circumstances. His
long life, extending over nearly a century, was affected for good or ill
by very many of the great political events contemporaneously
occurring,--and few other ages have been more fruitful in great events.
Born in 1475, in the good old days of Florentine freedom under the
earlier Medici, when the Arabs still ruled from the Alhambra the fairest
portion of Spain, when America was yet undiscovered, and before England
had recovered from the civil wars of the Roses, his life extended to
1564, to the times of Elizabeth, of Philip II., and of William the
Silent. He saw the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modern
times. He beheld the rise and fall of Savonarola; the invasions of
Naples by Charles VIII. and Louis XII., and its conquest by Gonsalvo;
the struggle for supremacy between Charles V. and Francis I.; the