Page:The Life of Benvenuto Cellini Vol 1.djvu/66

Rh is really worthy of a nature so generous as yours/' These phrases might pass for merely complimentary, did they not so exactly confirm Cellini's own narrative. They give us good reason to believe that what he spoke about himself was the truth.

In the next place I will adduce the opinions of two Italian critics who have been occupied with Cellini's autobiography. Antonio Cocchi, its first editor (Naples, 1730), says in his preface: "I will not conceal my belief that there are some things scattered through his narrative in blame of contemporaries to which we ought to lend a somewhat doubting ear. It is not that the author was not an impassioned friend of truth, but he may have accepted vague reports or yielded to conjectures." This admission is too cautious. It is certain that Cellini wrote his Memoirs in no critical spirit; and what Cocchi calls "his habit of excessive frankness, his harsh manners, readiness to take affront, and implacable hatreds," betrayed him into great unfairness when dealing with people whom he disliked. This does not, however, imply of necessity that he fabricated falsehoods against the folk he could not tolerate. Truth is ever a more trenchant weapon than mendacity in most cases. When Aretino, that unscrupulous gladiator of the pen, was asked how men might best speak evil of their neighbours, he replied: "By telling the truth—by telling the truth." And Cellini understood with keen sagacity this force of plain unvarnished statement. I take it that the most disagreeable things he said of Paul III., of Luigi Pulci,