Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 1.djvu/16

Rh and sheltered while he lived; for all these reasons, and because the greatness of your high fortune will largely contribute to the advantage of this work, and from your intimate acquaintance with its subject, the extent of its utility, with the care and industry bestowed on its execution, can be so fully appreciated by none as by your Excellency—it appears to me that I cannot suitably dedicate this work to any other than your Excellency, under the protection of whose most honoured name I desire that it may reach the hands of men.

Deign, then, to accept, to favour, and—if your exalted occupations permit—sometimes to read my book, having regard to the nature of the matters treated therein, and to the uprightness of my intention: for my object has not been to acquire praise as a writer; but rather, as an artist, to celebrate the industry, and revive the memory, of those who, having adorned and given life to these professions, do not merit that their names and works should remain the prey of death and oblivion, as they have hitherto been. I have, besides, thought that the example of so many able men, with the various notices, of divers kinds, collected by my labours in this book, might be of no small advantage to those who study the arts, and would gratify all others who have taste for, and pleasure in them. And I have laboured to execute the whole with that accuracy and good faith demanded in the relation of historical facts committed to writing. But if my fashion of writing—being uncultivated and simple, as I am wont to speak—is not worthy of your Excellency’s ear, or of the merits of so many men of illustrious ability—pardon me as to them—that the pen of a Draftsman, such as they were themselves, has not availed to give them a clearer outline or more effective shadows; and as to yourself, it shall suffice me if your Excellency will deign to look favourably on my simple work, remembering that the necessity I am in of providing myself with the daily necessaries of life, has not allowed me time for other studies than those of the pencil. Nor even in these have I yet attained to that point at which I now hope to arrive, now, when fortune promises to favour me so far, that, with more credit to myself, and more satisfaction to others, I may be able to express my thoughts, whatever they may be, to the world, as well with my pencil as my pen. For, in addition to the aid and protection which I may hope from your Excellency as my liege lord, and as the protector of poor artists, it has pleased the Divine goodness to elect the most holy and most blessed Julius III to be his vicar upon earth—a pontiff who acknowledges and loves every kind of excellence, more especially in these most noble and difficult arts; and from whose exalted liberality I expect indemnification for the many years I have consumed, and the heavy labours I have endured, up to this time, without any fruit whatever. And not only I, who have devoted myself in perpetual servitude to his Holiness,