te,
Both deaths I dread that both before me wait,
Yet feed my heart on poisonous thoughts no less.

(_Transl. by_ J.A. SYMONDS.)

And later on he thanks love again for being his deliverer, and not
death.

Michelangelo poured all his heart into these last sonnets. We see his
solitary and heroic age overshadowed by the thought of death. His whole
soul is wrapped in gloom; art is vanity, love is sorrow, the thought of
the futility of all things frames the portrait of his love with a wreath
of black laurel. He ponders on his life, and comes to the conclusion
that

Among the many years not one was his.

This man, the supremest creative genius the world has known, accused
himself of having wasted his life.

No song of praise ever rose to the Deity from Michelangelo's heart, as
it did at least once or twice during his lifetime from the heart of
Beethoven. He never had one hour of true inward peace. He represents the
metaphysical world-feeling which (in addition to love) is the foundation
of the deification of woman, but it has grown into immensity, and has
been lifted to a higher plane; not only love, but all life is felt as
fragmentary and pointing to a world beyond. If at an earlier stage it
was the love of woman which could not find its consummation on earth, it
is now the whole of our earthly life and all our aspirations which can
only attain to their highest meaning and to final truth in a
metaphysical existence. The tragedy of metaphysical love has deepened
into the supreme tragedy of life.

FOOTNOTES:

[2] The quotations from _Faust_ are from the translation of Anna
Swanwick.

[3] The quotations from the _Divine Comedy_ are from the translation of
Henry Francis Cary.

[4] The quotations from Tasso are from the translation of Anna Swanwick.

CHAPTER III

PERVERSIONS OF METAPHYSICAL EROTICISM

_(a) The Brides of Christ_

Hitherto I have confined myself to the analysis of the emotional life of
man, but there are two other points which must be taken into account.
The first is the question of woman's attitude towards the lofty position
assigned to her by man; the second and more important one is the
question as to whether the women of that period exhibit in their
emotional life any traces of a feeling akin to the deification of their
sex? The reply to the first question is simple enough. Naturally the
adoration and worship of their lovers could not have bee