not content with this, he complained of it to the Duke, and that so
warmly, that he was constrained to send for Leonardo and delicately
urged him to work, contriving nevertheless to show him that he was
doing all this because of the importunity of the Prior. Leonardo,
knowing that the intellect of that Prince was acute and discerning,
was pleased to discourse at large with the Duke on the subject, a
thing which he had never done with the Prior: and he reasoned much
with him about art, and made him understand that men of lofty genius
sometimes accomplish the most when they work the least, seeking out
inventions with the mind, and forming those perfect ideas which the
hands afterwards express and reproduce from the images already
conceived in the brain. And he added that two heads were still
wanting for him to paint; that of Christ, which he did not wish to
seek on earth; and he could not think that it was possible to
conceive in the imagination that beauty and heavenly grace which
should be the mark of God incarnate. Next, there was wanting that of
Judas, which was also troubling him, not thinking himself capable of
imagining features that should represent the countenance of him who,
after so many benefits received, had a mind so cruel as to resolve
to betray his Lord, the Creator of the world. However, he would seek
out a model for the latter; but if in the end he could not find a
better, he should not want that of the importunate and tactless
Prior. This thing moved the Duke wondrously to laughter, and he said
that Leonardo had a thousand reasons on his side. And so the poor
Prior, in confusion, confined himself to urging on the work in the
garden, and left Leonardo in peace, who finished only the head of
Judas, which seems the very embodiment of treachery and inhumanity;
but that of Christ, as has been said, remained unfinished. The
nobility of this picture, both because of its design, and from its
having been wrought with an incomparable diligence, awoke a desire
in the King of France to transport it into his kingdom; wherefore he
tried by all possible means to discover whether there were
architects who, with cross-stays of wood and iron, might have been
able to make it so secure that it might be transported safely;
without considering any expense that might have been involved
thereby, so much did he desire it. But the fact of its being painted
on the wall robbed his Majesty of his desire; and the picture
remained