BENVENUTO.
Incredible audacity!

MICHAEL ANGELO.
                   The heathen
Veiled their Diana with some drapery,
And when they represented Venus naked
They made her by her modest attitude,
Appear half clothed.  But I, who am a Christian,
Do so subordinate belief to art
That I have made the very violation
Of modesty in martyrs and in virgins
A spectacle at which all men would gaze
With half-averted eyes even in a brothel.

BENVENUTO.
He is at home there, and he ought to know
What men avert their eyes from in such places;
From the Last Judgment chiefly, I imagine.

MICHAEL ANGELO.
But divine Providence will never leave
The boldness of my marvellous work unpunished;
And the more marvellous it is, the more
'T is sure to prove the ruin of my fame!
And finally, if in this composition
I had pursued the instructions that he gave me
Concerning heaven and hell and paradise,
In that same letter, known to all the world,
Nature would not be forced, as she is now,
To feel ashamed that she invested me
With such great talent; that I stand myself
A very idol in the world of art.
He taunts me also with the Mausoleum
Of Julius, still unfinished, for the reason
That men persuaded the inane old man
It was of evil augury to build
His tomb while he was living; and he speaks
Of heaps of gold this Pope bequeathed to me,
And calls it robbery;--that is what he says.
What prompted such a letter?

BENVENUTO.
                             Vanity.
He is a clever writer, and he likes
To draw his pen, and flourish it in the face
Of every honest man, as swordsmen do
Their rapiers on occasion, but to show
How skilfully they do it.  Had you followed
The advice he gave, or even thanked him for it,
You would have seen another style of fence.
'T is but his wounded vanity, and the wish
To see his name in print.  So give it not
A moment's thought; it soon will be forgotten.

MICHAEL ANGELO.
I will not think of it, but let it pass
For a rude speech thrown at me in the street,
As boys threw stones at Dante.

BENVENUTO.
                    And what answer
Shall I take back to Grand Duke Cosimo?
He does not ask your labor or your service;
Only your presence in the city of Florence,
With such advice upon his work in hand
As he may ask, and you may choose to give.

MICHAEL ANGELO.
You have my answer.  Nothing he can offer
Shall tempt me to leave Rome.  My work is here,
And only here, the building of St. Peter's.
What other things I hitherto have done
Have fallen from me, are no longer mine;
I have passed on beyond them, and have left them
As milestones on the way.  What lies before me,
That is still mine, and while it is unfinished
No one shall draw me from it, or persuade me,
By promises of ease, or wealth, or honor,
Till I behold the finished dome uprise
Complete, as now I see it in my thought.

BENVENUTO.
And will you paint no more?

MICHAEL ANGELO.
                        No more.

BENVENUTO.
                           'T is well.
Sculpture is more divine, and more like Nature,
That fashions all her works in high relief,
And that is sculpture.  This vast ball, the Earth,
Was moulded out of clay, and baked in fire;
Men, women, and all animals that breathe
Are statues, and not paintings.  Even the plants,
The flowers, the fruits, the grasses, were first sculptured,
And colored later.  Painting is a lie,
A shadow merely.

MICHAEL ANGELO.
                Truly, as you say,
Sculpture is more than painting.  It is greater
To raise the dead to life than to create
Phantoms that seem to live.  The most majestic
Of the three sister arts is that which builds;
The eldest of them all, to whom the others
Are but the hand-maids and the servitors,
Being but imitation, not creation.
Henceforth I dedicate myself to her.

BENVENUTO.
And no more from the marble hew those forms
That fill us all with wonder?

MICHAEL ANGELO.
                           Many statues
Will there be room for in my work.  Their station
Already is assigned them in my mind.
But things move slowly.  There are hindrances,
Want of material, want of means, delays
And interruptions, endless interference
Of Cardinal Commissioners, and disputes
And jealousies of artists, that annoy me.
But twill persevere until the work
Is wholly finished, or till I sink down
Surprised by death, that unexpected guest,
Who waits for no man's leisure, but steps in,
Unasked and unannounced, to put a stop
To all our occupations and designs.
And then perhaps I may go back to Florence;
This is my answer to Duke Cosimo.

VI

MICHAEL ANGELO'S STUDIO

MICHAEL ANGELO and URBINO.

MICHAEL ANGELO, pausing in his work.
Urbino, thou and I are both old men.
My strength begins to fail me.

URBINO.
                          Eccellenza.
That is impossible.  Do I not see you
Attack the marble blocks with the same fury
As twenty years ago?

MICHAEL ANGELO.
                  'T is an old habit.
I must have learned it early from my nurse
At Setignano, the stone-mason's wife;
For the first sounds I heard were of the chisel
chipping away the stone.

URBINO.
                     At every stroke
You strike fire with your chisel.

MICHAEL ANGELO.
                           Ay, because
The marble is too hard.

URBINO.
                        It is a block
That Topolino sent you from Carrara.
He is a judge of marble.