hed
group in sculpture, the Deposition from the Cross, now behind the High
Altar of Santa Maria del Fiore at Florence, we have the only further
manifestation of Michael Angelo's genius in his favourite arts. Many of
these drawings appear to be designs for a great picture of the
Crucifixion. He went on executing them long after the death of the
Marchioness of Pescara, who first seems to have incited him to this work.
It almost appears to have become a religious exercise with him; they have
the same meaning as these last lines of a Sonnet.

Ne pinger ne scolpir fia piu che quieti
L' anima volta a quell' Amor divino
Ch' aperse, a prender noi, in croce le braccia.

Painting nor sculpture now can lull to rest
My soul, that turns to His great love on high,
Whose arms to clasp us on the Cross were spread.(158)

[Image #48]

THE PIETA OF SANTA MARIA DEL FIORE

FLORENCE
(_By permission of the Fratelli Alinari Florence_)

The marble group of the Deposition is so religious in character that it
can be compared with no work of art executed since Michael Angelo's own
early work the Pieta, in St. Peter's, the Madonna della Febbre. Both for
its earnestness and its noble religious sentiment it is an act of worship
to look at it, and the days and nights spent in its execution must have
been periods of the heartiest religious devotion and sorrowing love. The
old sculptor intended this work to have been his monument. The unfinished
head of Nicodemus, who sustains the body of his dear Lord, is his own
portrait, and, unfinished as it is, expresses the deepest devotion and
sadness. Vasari saw this work in progress, and gives us a glimpse into the
home-life of the aged worker, who was never content out of his workshop,
and spent his sleepless nights working at this huge marble with a paper
cap on his head, in which he stuck a lighted candle to see by. The
solitary figure of the old man in the vast and dimly lighted studio,
groping round the inchoate marble; the stillness of the night, broken only
by the sharp click of the mallet and the grating of the chisel, is a
picture of many of the bravest hours of his old age. Vasari, observing all
this, and wishing to do the revered artist a kindness, sent him 40 lbs. of
candles made of goat's fat, knowing that they gutter less than ordinary
dips of tallow. His servant carried them politel