Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 3.djvu/144

136 nnd one wlio always took pleasure in the society of men distinguished by their talents and virtues His portrait was copied from one taken of him in his youth by Agnolo di Donino, and whereof we have the original itself in our book of designs, where there are, likewise, certain drawings, exceedingly well executed, by the hand of Benedetto, who, for the works we have enumerated, well deserves to be numbered among more eminent artists.

It is an opinion very general among men, that those who are negligent in pursuit of the occupation to which they should devote themselves, never attain to any eminence in the same; but this judgment was shown to be occasionally incorrect, when Baccio da Montelupo acquired the art of sculpture. Led away in his youth by the pleasures of the world, he would scarcely study at all, he had little or no esteem for art, and although frequently reproved and exhorted by many to a more industrious life, these counsels did not for the moment avail him. But when the years of discretion, which usually bring prudence with them, had arrived, these taught him effectually the extent to which he had departed from the right way; wherefore, covered with shame, as he thought of those who had passed before him in his vocation, he resolved with good courage to follow them, and thenceforward to devote himself studiously to those labours, which idleness had previously induced him to shun.

This determination, which he did not abandon, caused Baccio to attain an eminence in sculpture which many of