s never achieved in
any miniature. And, of a truth, the terrible force and grandeur of the
work, with the multitude of figures, are such that it is not possible
to describe it, for it is filled with all the passions known to human
creatures, and all expressed in the most marvellous manner. For the
proud, the envious, the avaricious, the wanton, and all the other
suchlike sinners can be distinguished with ease by any man of fine
perception, because in figuring them Michelagnolo observed every rule
of Nature in the expressions, in the attitudes, and in every other
natural circumstance; a thing which, although great and marvellous,
was not impossible to such a man, for the reason that he was always
observant and shrewd and had seen men in plenty, and had acquired by
commerce with the world that knowledge that philosophers gain from
cogitation and from writings. Wherefore he who has judgment and
understanding in painting perceives there the most terrible force of
art, and sees in those figures such thoughts and passions as were
never painted by any other but Michelagnolo. So, also, he may see
there how the variety of innumerable attitudes is accomplished, in the
strange and diverse gestures of young and old, male and female; and
who is there who does not recognize in these the terrible power of his
art, together with the grace that he had from Nature, since they move
the hearts not only of those who have knowledge in that profession,
but even of those who have none? There are foreshortenings that appear
as if in relief, a harmony of painting that gives great softness, and
fineness in the parts painted by him with delicacy, all showing in
truth how pictures executed by good and true painters should be; and
in the outlines of the forms turned by him in such a way as could not
have been achieved by any other but Michelagnolo, may be seen the true
Judgment and the true Damnation and Resurrection. This is for our art
the exemplar and the grand manner of painting sent down to men on
earth by God, to the end that they may see how Destiny works when
intellects descend from the heights of Heaven to earth, and have
infused in them divine grace and knowledge. This work leads after it
bound in chains those who persuade themselves that they have mastered
art; and at the sight of the strokes drawn by him in the outlines of
no matter what figure, every sublime spirit, however mighty in design,
trembles and is afraid. And while the eyes gaz