ancient Greece; his
heads, he says, and his design of the naked, were 'maravigliosamente
bene,' his style full of grace, his sole defect the somewhat curtailed
stature of his figures. He was no less excellent in minuter works as a
goldsmith, and in that capacity had worked for his patron a 'tavola
d'oro,' a tablet or screen (apparently) of gold, with his utmost care
and skill; it was a work of exceeding beauty--but in some political
exigency his patron wanted money, and it was broken up before his eyes.
Seeing his labor vain and the pride of his heart rebuked, he threw
himself on the ground, and uplifting his eyes and hands to heaven,
prayed in contrition, 'Lord God Almighty, Governor and disposer of
heaven and earth! Thou hast opened mine eyes that I follow from
henceforth none other than Thee--Have mercy upon me!'--He forthwith gave
all he had to the poor for the love of God, and went up into a mountain
where there was a great hermitage, and dwelt there the rest of his days
in penitence and sanctity, surviving down to the days of Pope Martin,
who reigned from 1281 to 1284. 'Certain youths,' adds Ghiberti, 'who
sought to be skilled in statuary, told me how he was versed both in
painting and sculpture, and how he had painted in the Romitorio where he
lived; he was an excellent draughtsman and very courteous. When the
youths who wished to improve visited him, he received them with much
humility, giving them learned instructions, showing them various
proportions, and drawing for them many examples, for he was most
accomplished in his art. And thus,' he concludes, 'with great humility,
he ended his days in that hermitage.'"--Vol. iii., pp. 257-259.

* * *

55. We could have wished that Lord Lindsay had further insisted on what
will be found to be a characteristic of all the truly Christian or
spiritual, as opposed to classical, schools of sculpture--the scenic or
painter-like management of effect. The marble is not cut into the actual
form of the thing imaged, but oftener into a perspective suggestion of
it--the bas-reliefs sometimes almost entirely under cut, and sharpedged,
so as to come clear off a dark ground of shadow; even heads the size of
life being in this way rather shadowed out than carved out, as the
Madonna of Benedetto de Majano in Santa Maria Novella, one of the cheeks
being advanced half an inch out of its proper place--and often the most
audacious violations of proportion admitted, as i