Page:Vasari - Lives of the Most Excellent Painters, Sculptors, and Architects, volume 5.djvu/286

274 turning with an expression of ineffable sweetness towards the mother, as if entreating for the breast; while the Virgin, holding him with one hand and supporting herself with the other, is bending forward to give it him. The figures are not finished in every part, yet, in the imperfection of what is merely sketched, there clearly appears the perfection which is to be the final result.

But still more did he surprise all beholders by the Tombs of the Dukes Giuliano and Lorenzo de’ Medici, in which he appears to have proceeded on the conviction that Earth alone would not suffice to give an appropriate burial-place to their greatness, he would therefore have other powers of the world to take part, and caused the Statues to be placed over the Sarcophagus in such rich sort as to overshadow the same, giving to the one Day and Night namely, and to the other the DawR and the Twilight. All these Statues are beautiful, whether in form or attitude, while the muscular development is treated with so much judgment, that if the Art of Sculpture were lost, it might, by their means, be restored to all its pristine lustre. The Statues of those Princes, in their armour, also make part of the ornaments; Duke Lorenzo, thoughtful and reflective, with a form of so much beauty that eyes of mortal could see nothing better; and Duke Giuliano, haughty of aspect, but with the head, the throat, the setting of the eyes, the profile of the nose, the chiseling of the mouth, and the hair, so truly divine, as are also the hands, arms, knees and feet, with all besides indeed, accomplished by our artist in this place, that the spectator can never be satisfied with gazing, and finds it difficult to detach his eyes from these groups; and, of a truth, he who shall examine the beauty of the buskins and cuirass, must believe it to be celestial rather than of this world.

But what shall I say of the Aurora?—a nude female form, well calculated to awake deep melancholy in the soul, and to make the Art of Sculpture cast down her chisel. Her attitude shows her to have hastily risen from her bed, while she is still heavy with sleep; but in thus awakening, she had found the eyes of that great prince closed in death; wherefore she turns in bitter sorrow, bewailing, as an evidence of the great suffering she endures, her own unchangeable beauty.