Page:The Life of Benvenuto Cellini Vol 1.djvu/58

Rh to keep them steadily in mind while forming an estimate of Cellini's temperament and conduct; at the same time we must not run to the conclusion that people of his stamp were common, even at that time, in Italy. We perceive plainly from his self-complacent admissions that the peculiar hybrid between the gifted artist and the man of blood which he exhibited was regarded as something not quite normal.

Such being the groundwork of Cellini's nature, it follows as a necessary consequence that his self-conceit was prodigious. Each circumstance of his life appeared to him a miracle. Great though his talents were, he vastly overrated them, and set a monstrously exaggerated value on his works of art. The same qualities made him a fierce and bitter rival: he could not believe that any one with whom he came into collision had the right to stand beside him. This did not prevent him from being a clear-sighted and impartial critic. His admiration for Michel Angelo Buonarroti amounted to fanaticism. He properly appreciated Raphael, and gave the just amount of praise to Sansovino,Primaticcio, and Rosso—three artists with whom he was not on the best of terms. Nor will any one deny that his unfavourable estimates of Bandinelli and Ammanati were justified. Indeed, contemporaries acknowledged the wholesomeness of his sound, outspoken criticism. When Vasari's abominable frescoes on the cupola of the Florentine cathedral were exposed to view, the witty Lasca wrote as follows: