Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 3.djvu/364

356 other works. These being completed, Maestro Cola then returned to finish his days at Matrice.

This artist would without doubt have acquitted himself very well if he had exercised his art in places where competition and emulation might have forced him to have given more attention to the study of painting, and compelled him to exert the good abilities with which it is manifest that he had been endowed by nature.

Among the many natives of Lombardy who have been endowed with the graceful gift of power in design, with a certain animation and spirit as regards invention, and with an especial ability in the delineation of beautiful landscapes, we are not to postpone to any; nay, we are rather to place before all the rest, the Parmigiano, Francesco Mazzuoli, who was indeed most liberally furnished by Heaven with all those qualities which are required to the production of an excellent painter. For, to say nothing of such advantages as we have already ascribed to many other artists, Francesco had the property of imparting to his figures a certain beauty and sweetness, with a singular grace of attitude, which was entirely peculiar to himself.

In the heads of this master also, there is ample evidence that all the consideration which can be given to works of art was bestowed by him, insomuch that his manner has been followed and imitated by a large number of painters, seeing that he has contributed to Art a grace so attractive, that his works must ever be held in esteem, and himself honoured by all who love the study of design. Would to God only that Francesco had confined himself to the pursuit of painting, and had not lost his time in running after such whimsies as the congelation of mercury, in the hope of rendering himself richer than he had already been made by the gifts of Nature