ot promised too much
and did he not feel himself in a blind alley with no way out, where he
no longer dared either to advance or retreat?

All his efforts were unsuccessful, even those for the transportation of
the marble. He was cheated by his workmen, and four of the six
monolithic columns sent to Florence were shattered on the way, one of
them at Florence itself. At last the pope and Cardinal de' Medici grew
impatient at this useless loss of so much precious time in the marshes
and quarries of Pietra Santa and on March 10, 1520, an order of the pope
clearly and completely released Michelangelo from the agreement of 1518
concerning the facade of S. Lorenzo and from all obligations in regard
to it. Michelangelo only knew of this through the arrival at Seravezza
of the gangs of workmen sent by Cardinal Giulio to take his place. He
was cruelly hurt.

"I do not begrudge the cardinal," he says, "the three years which I
have lost here. I do not blame him because I am exhausted by this work
for S. Lorenzo. I do not blame him for the great affront of having
ordered me to do this work and then of taking it away from me--I do not
even know for what reason. I do not count against him all that I have
spent, which amounts to this: Pope Leo takes back the quarry with the
blocks already cut; I have left the money that I have in hand--500
ducats--and I am given my liberty."

He could not hold his patrons responsible. The fault was his own, as he
well knew, and that was his worst punishment. Justi has said, not
unreasonably, that he committed the sin against the Holy Ghost in
wasting so many years in such unimportant work. What did he accomplish
from 1515 to 1520 in the fulness of his vigour? Plans which he could
never carry out, plans for the facade of S. Lorenzo, plans for the tomb
of Julius II, plans for the tomb of Dante, whose remains the
Academicians of Florence wanted to bring back from Ravenna to his own
country[37]--for in October, 1519, in the midst of the very worst of his
difficulties he had not hesitated to offer his services to Leo X to
"raise to the divine poet a monument worthy of him."

One single work was realised amidst all these dreams: the Christ of the
Minerva, and it is the coldest and dullest thing he ever did--a work of
Michelangelo (and this is almost unbelievable) which is commonplace and
uninspiring. It can hardly even be called his, for he did not finish it
himself, but gave it over to the neglect of h