Michael Angelo (Longfellow)/Part III/Vigna di Papa Giulio

POPE JULIUS III. seated by the Fountain of Acqua Vergine, surrounded by Cardinals.

JULIUS. Tell me, why is it ye are discontent, You, Cardinals Salviati and Marcello, With Michael Angelo? What has he done, Or left undone, that ye are set against him? When one Pope dies, another is soon made; And I can make a dozen Cardinals, But cannot make one Michael Angelo.

CARDINAL SALVIATI. Your Holiness, we are not set against him; We but deplore his incapacity. He is too old.

JULIUS. You, Cardinal Salviati, Are an old man. Are you incapable? 'T is the old ox that draws the straightest furrow.

CARDINAL MARCELLO. Your Holiness remembers he was charged With the repairs upon St. Mary's bridge; Made cofferdams, and heaped up load on load Of timber and travertine; and yet for years The bridge remained unfinished, till we gave it To Baccio Bigio.

JULIUS. Always Baccio Bigio! Is there no other architect on earth? Was it not he that sometime had in charge The harbor of Ancona.

CARDINAL MARCELLO. Ay, the same.

JULIUS. Then let me tell you that your Baccio Bigio Did greater damage in a single day To that fair harbor than the sea had done Or would do in ten years. And him you think To put in place of Michael Angelo, In building the Basilica of St. Peter! The ass that thinks himself a stag discovers His error when he comes to leap the ditch.

CARDINAL MARCELLO. He does not build; he but demolishes The labors of Bramante and San Gallo.

JULIUS. Only to build more grandly.

CARDINAL MARCELLO. But time passes: Year after year goes by, and yet the work Is not completed. Michael Angelo Is a great sculptor, but no architect. His plans are faulty.

JULIUS. I have seen his model, And have approved it. But here comes the artist. Beware of him. He may make Persians of you, To carry burdens on your backs forever.

SCENE II.

The same: MICHAEL ANGELO.

JULIUS. Come forward, dear Maestro! In these gardens All ceremonies of our court are banished. Sit down beside me here.

MICHAEL ANGELO, sitting down. How graciously Your Holiness commiserates old age And its infirmities!

JULIUS. Say its privileges. Art I respect. The building of this palace And laying out these pleasant garden walks Are my delight, and if I have not asked Your aid in this, it is that I forbear To lay new burdens on you at an age When you need rest. Here I escape from Rome To be at peace. The tumult of the city Scarce reaches here.

MICHAEL ANGELO. How beautiful it is, And quiet almost as a hermitage!

JULIUS. We live as hermits here; and from these heights O'erlook all Rome and see the yellow Tiber Cleaving in twain the city, like a sword, As far below there as St. Mary's bridge. What think you of that bridge?

MICHAEL ANGELO. I would advise Your Holiness not to cross it, or not often It is not safe.

JULIUS. It was repaired of late.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Some morning you will look for it in vain; It will be gone. The current of the river Is undermining it.

JULIUS. But you repaired it.

MICHAEL ANGELO. I strengthened all its piers, and paved its road With travertine. He who came after me Removed the stone, and sold it, and filled in The space with gravel.

JULIUS. Cardinal Salviati And Cardinal Marcello, do you listen? This is your famous Nanni Baccio Bigio.

MICHAEL ANGELO, aside. There is some mystery here. These Cardinals Stand lowering at me with unfriendly eyes.

JULIUS. Now let us come to what concerns us more Than bridge or gardens. Some complaints are made Concerning the Three Chapels in St. Peter's; Certain supposed defects or imperfections, You doubtless can explain.

MICHAEL ANGELO. This is no longer The golden age of art. Men have become Iconoclasts and critics. They delight not In what an artist does, but set themselves To censure what they do not comprehend. You will not see them bearing a Madonna Of Cimabue to the church in triumph, But tearing down the statue of a Pope To cast it into cannon. Who are they That bring complaints against me?

JULIUS. Deputies Of the commissioners; and they complain Of insufficient light in the Three Chapels.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Your Holiness, the insufficient light Is somewhere else, and not in the Three Chapels. Who are the deputies that make complaint?

JULIUS. The Cardinals Salviati and Marcello, Here present.

MICHAEL ANGELO, rising. With permission, Monsignori, What is it ye complain of?

CARDINAL MARCELLO, We regret You have departed from Bramante's plan, And from San Gallo's.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Since the ancient time No greater architect has lived on earth Than Lazzari Bramante. His design, Without confusion, simple, clear, well-lighted. Merits all praise, and to depart from it Would be departing from the truth. San Gallo, Building about with columns, took all light Out of this plan; left in the choir dark corners For infinite ribaldries, and lurking places For rogues and robbers; so that when the church Was shut at night, not five and twenty men Could find them out. It was San Gallo, then, That left the church in darkness, and not I.

CARDINAL MARCELLO. Excuse me; but in each of the Three Chapels Is but a single window.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Monsignore, Perhaps you do not know that in the vaulting Above there are to go three other windows.

CARDINAL SALVIATI. How should we know? You never told us of it.

MICHAEL ANGELO. I neither am obliged, nor will I be, To tell your Eminence or any other What I intend or ought to do. Your office Is to provide the means, and see that thieves Do not lay hands upon them. The designs Must all be left to me.

CARDINAL MARCELLO. Sir architect, You do forget yourself, to speak thus rudely In presence of his Holiness, and to us Who are his cardinals.

MICHAEL ANGELO, putting on his hat. I do not forget I am descended from the Counts Canossa, Linked with the Imperial line, and with Matilda, Who gave the Church Saint Peter's Patrimony. I, too, am proud to give unto the Church The labor of these hands, and what of life Remains to me. My father Buonarotti Was Podesta of Chiusi and Caprese. I am not used to have men speak to me As if I were a mason, hired to build A garden wall, and paid on Saturdays So much an hour.

CARDINAL SALVIATI, aside. No wonder that Pope Clement Never sat down in presence of this man, Lest he should do the same; and always bade him Put on his hat, lest he unasked should do it!

MICHAEL ANGELO. If any one could die of grief and shame, I should. This labor was imposed upon me; I did not seek it; and if I assumed it, 'T was not for love of fame or love of gain, But for the love of God. Perhaps old age Deceived me, or self-interest, or ambition; I may be doing harm instead of good. Therefore, I pray your Holiness, release me; Take off from me the burden of this work; Let me go back to Florence.

JULIUS. Never, never, While I am living.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Doth your Holiness Remember what the Holy Scriptures say Of the inevitable time, when those Who look out of the windows shall be darkened, And the almond-tree shall flourish?

JULIUS. That is in Ecclesiastes.

MICHAEL ANGELO. And the grasshopper Shall be a burden, and desire shall fail, Because man goeth unto his long home. Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher; all Is vanity.

JULIUS. Ah, were to do a thing As easy as to dream of doing it, We should not want for artists. But the men Who carry out in act their great designs Are few in number; ay, they may be counted Upon the fingers of this hand. Your place Is at St. Peter's.

MICHAEL ANGELO. I have had my dream, And cannot carry out my great conception, And put it into act.

JULIUS. Then who can do it? You would but leave it to some Baccio Bigio To mangle and deface.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Rather than that I will still bear the burden on my shoulders A little longer. If your Holiness Will keep the world in order, and will leave The building of the church to me, the work Will go on better for it. Holy Father, If all the labors that I have endured, And shall endure, advantage not my soul, I am but losing time.

JULIUS, laying his hands on MICHAEL ANGELO'S shoulders. You will be gainer Both for your soul and body.

MICHAEL ANGELO. Not events Exasperate me, but the funest conclusions I draw from these events; the sure decline Of art, and all the meaning of that word: All that embellishes and sweetens life, And lifts it from the level of low cares Into the purer atmosphere of beauty; The faith in the Ideal; the inspiration That made the canons of the church of Seville Say, "Let us build, so that all men hereafter Will say that we were madmen." Holy Father, I beg permission to retire from here.

JULIUS. Go; and my benediction be upon you.

[Michael Angelo goes out.]

My Cardinals, this Michael Angelo Must not be dealt with as a common mason. He comes of noble blood, and for his crest Bear two bull's horns; and he has given us proof That he can toss with them. From this day forth Unto the end of time, let no man utter The name of Baccio Bigio in my presence. All great achievements are the natural fruits Of a great character. As trees bear not Their fruits of the same size and quality, But each one in its kind with equal ease, So are great deeds as natural to great men As mean things are to small ones. By his work We know the master. Let us not perplex him.