Various
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 60, No. 373, November 1846
"A fine view, mon ami!" said I, at last, in pure despair.
He gave a shrug with his shoulders.
"Very high mountains those," I went on.
He turned round and looked at them; and then tapped his pipe against his whip.
"What splendid forests!" I added.
"Monsieur! voyez-vous! it is the most villainous road I know; and if we do not push on, we shall not get to Mont Dor before dark. I would not go over the bridge at the bottom there in the dark, no Monsieur, not if I had the honour to be carrying M. Le Préfet himself. They were never found, Monsieur!"
"Who were never found?"
"Why, sir, when Petit-jean was driving M. le Commandant, the last year but one – he was going to the Baths for the gout, sir – he did not get down to the bridge till near ten at night; there was no parapet then, the horses did not know the road, and over they went, roll, roll, all the way into the Dor at the bottom; thirty feet, sir, and more, and then the cascade to add to that."
"Dreadful! and did no trace remain of the unfortunate traveller and your poor friend?"
"Oh, certainly yes! they got well wetted; but they rode the horses into the village the same evening."
"Who were lost, then?"
"Petit-jean's new boots, and 'twas the first time he had put them on."
I jumped into the cabriolet; "drive on," said I pettishly, "and go to the – "
"Hi! hardi! Sacré coquin!" and crash went the whip over the off horse's flank, enough to cut a steak of his lean sides had there been any flesh to spare. In a quarter of an hour we found ourselves going down a steep rough road, such as might break the springs of the best carriage, chariot, britscha, &c., that ever came out of Long-Acre; and the thumps that I got against the sides of my own vehicle, light as it was, made me call out for a little less speed, and somewhat more care.
"Don't be afraid, Monsieur! Hi! hardi! heugh!"
I thought it was all over with me; so, holding in my breath, and firmly clenching the top of my apron, I looked straight a-head, and made up my mind for a pitch over the wall at the bottom, and down through the wood, like the commandant and Petit-jean.
Just as we got to the bottom of the hill, we turned a sharp corner, that I had not before perceived, and charged, full gallop, right into an old shandrydan, that had pulled up, and, with a single horse, was beginning to climb the ascent. Our impetus seemed to carry us over the poor animal that was straining against its load, for he fell under our two beasts, and the shafts of the cabriolet catching the shandrydan under the driver's seat, turned it completely topsy-turvy into the midst of the road.
Such a shriek, or rather such a chorus of confused cries, came forth from the dark sides of that small and closely-shut vehicle!
"Au secours!" "Jesus-Maria!" "Vite, vite!" "Relevez-nous!" "Pour l'amour de Dieu!"
They were women's voices: —
"Ah ça, j'étouffe!" said a deep, gruff voice, in the midst of the hubbub.
As neither the postilion nor myself were hurt, we were quickly on our legs: he trying to get the horses disentangled – for they were kicking each other to pieces – and I to aid a thin, meek-looking peasant lad, who had been driving the shandrydan, to right the crazy vehicle.
'Twas a square, black-looking thing, covered at top, with no opening whatever but a small window in the door behind. It might have been built some time in the reign of Louis le Bien-aimé, and its cracked leather sides and harness seemed as if they had been strangers to oil ever since. If people were not very corpulent, four might have squeezed into it – not that they would have been comfortable, but they could have got in, and would have sat on the opposite seats, without much room to spare.
Some honest old Frenchman, thought I to myself, with his wife and daughter, and perhaps their maid. Poor man! he is coming from the Baths, cured of some painful malady, and now has had the misfortune to run the risk of his life – if, indeed, his bones be not broken – and all through that étourdi of a postilion. "If I do not report him to the maître de poste!" said I to myself.
"For the love of God, messieurs," said a faint voice, "get us out!"
"The door! the door! open the door then!" said at least three other voices, one after the other and all together.
"Je meurs!" wept the bass-voice from the inmost recesses of the vehicle – or it might have been from under ground, so deep and sepulchral was its tone.
"Don't disturb yourself, monsieur," grumbled the postilion, who had now got one of his horses on its legs; "'tis nothing! Come along, you varmint!" said he to the poor young peasant, who stood wringing his hands and looking distractedly at his whip – 'twas broken clean in half – "Arrive, te dis-je! – pousse bien là! – là bien! encore! hardi! houp!"
The door of the shandrydan burst open, and there emerged, in sadly rumpled state, a pitiable confusion of rustled petticoats and tumbled headgear, red as the roses on a summer's morn, and dewy as the grass on an autumn eve —six sœurs-de-charité, all white and black like sea-fowl thrown from the shooter's bag – and after them, slowly toiling forth and writhing through the door in unwieldy porpoise-guise – M. le Curé!
HONOUR TO THE PLOUGH
Though clouds o'ercast our native sky,
And seem to dim the sun,
We will not down in languor lie,
Or deem the day is done:
The rural arts we loved before
No less we'll cherish now;
And crown the banquet, as of yore,
With Honour to the Plough.
In these fair fields, whose peaceful spoil
To faith and hope are given,
We'll seek the prize with honest toil,
And leave the rest to Heaven.
We'll gird us to our work like men
Who own a holy vow,
And if in joy we meet again,
Give Honour to the Plough.
Let Art, array'd in magic power,
With Labour hand in hand,
Go forth, and now in peril's hour
Sustain a sinking land.
Let never Sloth unnerve the arm,
Or Fear the spirit cow;
These words alone should work a charm —
All Honour to the Plough.
The heath redress, the meadow drain,
The latent swamp explore,
And o'er the long-expecting plain
Diffuse the quickening store:
Then fearless urge the furrow deep
Up to the mountain's brow,
And when the rich results you reap,
Give Honour to the plough.
So still shall Health by pastures green
And nodding harvests roam,
And still behind her rustic screen
Shall Virtue find a home:
And while their bower the muses build
Beneath the neighbouring bough,
Shall many a grateful verse be fill'd
With Honour to the Plough.
LUIGIA DE' MEDICI
The study of literary history offers an extraordinary charm, when it tends to raise the veil, frequently thrown by inattention and forgetfulness, over noble and graceful forms, which deserved to excite the interest, or even to receive the active thanks of posterity. At such moments, we find the mysterious sources of inspiration admired, through a long period, for their fulness and sincerity: we go back to the forgotten or falsely interpreted causes of celebrated actions, of classic writings, of resolutions, whose renown rang through many ages; the vagueness of poetic pictures gives place to positive forms; and that which appeared but a brilliant phantom is sometimes transformed into a living reality.
Among the glorious titles which have borne the name of Michel Angelo Buonarotti to so high a pitch of celebrity, the least popular is that derived from the composition of his poetical works. The best judges, however, regard these productions not only with profound esteem, but yet more often with an ardent admiration. Michel Angelo lived during the golden age of the Lingua Toscana. Among the poets who filled the interval between the publication of the Orlando and that of the Aminta– first, in order of date, of the chefs-d'o[eu]vres of Torquato – not one has raised himself above, nor, perhaps, to the level, of Buonarotti. In the study of his writings, we recognise all the essential characteristics of his genius, as revealed to the world in his marbles, frescos, and the edifices erected by his hand. It is a copious poetry – masculine and vigorous – fed with high thoughts – serious and severe in the expression. Berni wrote truly of it to Fra Sebastiano – "Ei dice cose: voi dite parole!" The poet exists always in entire possession of himself: enthusiasm elevates, carries him away, but seduces him never. We admire in his mind a constitution firm, healthful, and fertile – a constant equilibrium of passion, will, and conception – often of fervency – nowhere of delirium. The qualities necessary to the artist do no harm to those which make the thinker and good citizen – every where, as in the literary laws of ancient Greece, consonance, sophrosyne, moderation. Michel Angelo, amid the passions and illusions of his time, knew how to hold the helm of "that precious bark, which singing sailed."50 Sincere and humble Christian, with a leaning to the austere, he succeeded in keeping himself free from all superstition; declared republican, he avoided all popular fanaticism, and bore, even during the siege of Florence, the honourable hostility of the Arrabiati; admirer of Savonarola, he combated the sickly exaggerations of the esprit piagnone, and remained faithful to the worship of art; and last, guest of Leo X., favourite sculptor of Julius II., he never suffered himself to be seduced by the Pagan intoxication of the Renaissance; from his early youth, the frame, in which he was destined to form so many sublime conceptions, was irrevocably determined.
But, in the poetical works of Michel Angelo, as in his works of sculpture and design, there is a side of grace and delicacy; the fire of a masculine and profound tenderness circulates, so to speak, in all the members of this marvellous body. Angelo's regularity of morals was never altered by doubts; it acquired, even at an early period, the externals of a rigid austerity. But had he, in his youthful years, experienced the power of a real love? We have nothing to reply to those who, after an attentive perusal of his writings, see in them nothing more than a jeu-d'esprit produced by a vain fantasy. But to those who think, with us, that truth and force of expression suppose reality and depth of sentiment – to those who discover the burning traces of a passion which has conquered the heart, and imprinted a new direction on the thoughts of the writer, in the precious metal of this classical versification, we propose to follow us for a few moments. We shall seek whatever historical vestiges have been left of the object of this affection, as durable as sincere: we shall afterwards examine the manner in which Michel Angelo has expressed it in his rhyme; what order of philosophical and religious ideas developed themselves in his mind, in intimate connexion with the ardour that penetrated his heart; whatever influences, in short, which a love, whose object quitted this life so early, appears to have exercised upon the whole duration of a career prolonged, with so great eclat, for more than sixty years afterwards.51
The smallest acquaintance with the character of Michel Angelo would lead to the belief that, according to the expression of his epoch, he could "have fixed his heart nowhere but in a lofty sphere. The conjectures which have been formed bore reference to the house of the first citizen of Florence and of Italy, at the period of Angelo's entrance on his career, to the family of the grandson of Cosmo Pater Patriæ," of the man to whom the disinterested voice of foreigners and of posterity has confirmed all that his contemporaries attributed to him, in the great work of the Italian Renaissance – scientific, literary, artistic even – namely, the chief and most brilliant honour.
Lorenzo the Magnificent, born in 1450, married Clarice Orsini in 1468. There were born from this alliance, besides the children who died in the cradle, three sons and four daughters. In 1492, Pietro succeeded to the offices and dignity of his father, and lost them in 1494; Giovanni mounted the Pontifical throne, and became the illustrious Leo X.; Giuliano died Duke of Nemours and "prince du gouvernement" of Florence. Of the four daughters, Maddalena became the wife of Francesco Cybo, Count dell Anguillara, Lucrezia married Giacopo Salviati; and Contessina, Piero Ridolfi. Luigia was the youngest, according to certain authorities; Count Pompeo Litta, however, in his Illustri Famiglie Italiane, places her in order of birth immediately after Maddalena. Whichever it may be, Clarice Orsini dying in 1488, Lorenzo contracted no other alliance, and, at the end of four years, followed his wife to the tomb. We have no means of determining the age Luigia had reached at the time of this melancholy event; but, as her marriage was then talked of, we cannot give her less than from fifteen to sixteen years. Michel Angelo, born the 6th March 1475,52 wanted a month of his seventeenth year when he lost the generous protector of his early youth.
It was in 1490 that Angelo first went to live in the house of the Magnificent Lorenzo. Apprenticed, the 1st April 1488, to the "master of painting," Domenico di Tommasso del Ghirlandajo, he astonished the grave and learned artist by his rapid progress and fire of imagination. Ghirlandajo, finding his disposition more decided for sculpture than for the pencil, hastened to recommend him to Lorenzo, who, in his gardens, situated near the convent of Saint Mark, was exerting himself to create a school capable of restoring to Florence the glorious days of the Ghiberti and the Donatello. It was no easy task for the prince of the Florentine government to buy the child of genius from the timorous avarice of his father, Lodovico Buonarotti.53 At length, an office in the financial administration of the state, conferred upon the father, and a provision of five ducats monthly settled on the son, but of which it was agreed that Lodovico should derive the profit, conquered the scruples of the old citizen; and Michel Angelo, adopted as it were, among the children of Lorenzo, was enabled, at his own pleasure, to divide his hours between the practice of his favourite art, and the lessons that Pietro, Giovanni, and Giuliano received at "the Platonic Academy," of which the illustrious Politiano was director.
This society, of which Lorenzo was the soul as well as the founder,54 reckoned among its members certain individuals, whose names are still held in respect by posterity; and many others who, less distinguished or less fortunate, exercised, nevertheless, a useful influence on the regeneration of good studies, and the diffusion of the knowledge that may be derived from the works of antiquity. Among the former, the first rank was unanimously given to Politiano, Pico della Mirandola, Leon-Battista Alberti, and Marsilio Ficino. Lorenzo required that his sons should be present at the learned discourses of the academy. Michel Angelo listened to them in company with Pietro, and Cardinal Giovanni, and received most flattering consideration from Politiano. The subtilties of Grecian metaphysics, and the technical language of logic, discouraged Buonarotti's clear and free understanding; but the sublimity of conception, and majesty of expression of the Attic Bee, met with marvellous affinities in the disposition of the young Florentine. These studies developed in Michel Angelo, the poetical genius of which he has left admirable proofs in his marbles, his cartoons, and his writings.
It was not only the affectionate interest of Lorenzo, the intimacy with his sons, and the generous cares of Politiano, in the house of the Medici, which aided the progress, and inflamed the energy of Michel Angelo. At this same time, more profound lessons were repeated in an austere pulpit, not far from the delicious gardens of Valfondo. Girolamo Savonarola, the celebrated dominican of Saint Mark, was at the zenith of his reputation; and his influence over the people of Florence, without directly thwarting that of Lorenzo, began, nevertheless, to counterbalance it. Michel Angelo, says the most exact of his biographers, (Vasari, Vite dei Pittori,) read "with great veneration" the works written by the enthusiastic and eloquent monk. From him he learned to seek in the Holy Scriptures for the pure and direct source of the highest inspiration; and, during his whole life, Buonarotti had constantly in his hand the sacred volume, and the Divina Comedia of Dante, which he regarded as a commentary at once philosophical, theological, and, above all, poetical upon the former. An ardent love of art confined within due bounds the effect which Savonarola's exhortations produced upon the true and serious soul of the young sculptor; he neither followed the Dominican in his fanatical hostility to the artistic and literary Renaissance, then displaying all the riches of its spring, nor in the political aberrations which Savonarola, after the death of Lorenzo, had the misfortune to display in the public squares of Florence, and even in the heart of her councils.
In the midst of a life so full and already fruitful, which the approach of a glory almost unequalled illuminated by a few precursive rays, Michel Angelo appears to have opened his heart to the sentiment of a love as true and elevated as the other emotions which swayed his soul, and directed his faculties: Luigia de' Medici seems to have been its object. It is, as already remarked, in the poetical compositions, forming the first part of Angelo's collection, that we must endeavour to find the imperishable memorials of this tenderness, to which the illusions even of early youth appear to have never lent, for a single moment, any hope of the union with which it might have been crowned. Michel Angelo's timid pride combined with his respect and gratitude to interdict to him all designation, even indirect, of the woman to whom his affections were bound by a chain whose embrace death alone could have relaxed. We shall see in the poetry of Buonarotti none of the artifice made use of by Petrarch to render the name of Laura intelligible, which Camoëns afterwards employed to celebrate Donna Caterina, and from which, still later, the unhappy Torquato regretted, with much bitterness, to have wandered, when, in the intoxication of his illusions, he traced the fatal name of Eleonora.
"Quando sara che d'Eleonora mia
Potro goder in libertade amore."
(Verse stolen from Tasso and given to the Duke of Ferrara.)
It is but rarely, and with a light touch, that Angelo makes allusion to the extreme youth of her whom he loves, —
– "il corpo umano
Mal segue poi … d'un angelletta
il volo." – (Sonnetto 15.)
Once only he speaks of light hair: —
"Sovra quel biondo crin" …
(Sonnetto ultimo.)
Never does he write a word that can be referred to the difference of rank existing between them, to the splendour which had surrounded the cradle even of the daughter of the great citizen whom all Italy seems to have made the arbiter of her political combinations. Michel Angelo speaks only of the touching beauty of her who has subjugated him by "that serene grace, certain mark of the nobility and purity of a soul in perfect harmony with its Creator;" (Sonnetto 3, et passim in the first part.) Never does he give us to understand that his love received the least encouragement. It has been thought, however, that Luigia had detected the attachment of the youth whose genius had as yet been attested by no great work, and that she rewarded it by the tenderest friendship. It is certain that, in a transport of gratitude, Angelo wrote the beautiful verse —
"Unico spirto, e da me solo inteso!"
(Sonnetto 16.)
and that, in another morceau, he thanks "those beautiful eyes which lend him their sweet light, the genius that raises his own to heaven, the support that steadies his tottering steps,"
"Veggio co'bei vostri occhi un dolce
lume." … – (Sonnetto 12.)
But, checking himself immediately in these half-revelations, the poet, on the contrary, multiplies the complaints torn from him by the coldness and apparent indifference of her whose beauty he celebrates, whom he can render immortal. See more particularly Sonnet 21 —
"Perchè d'ogni mia speme il verde è spento."
He exclaims even that he has rarely enjoyed the presence on which his happiness depends: – "You know neither custom nor opportunity have served my affection: it is very rarely that my eyes kindle themselves at the fire which burns in yours, guarded by a reserve to which desire scarcely dares to approach —
– 'gli occhi vostri
Circonscritti ov' appena il desir vola.'
A single look has made my destiny, and I have seen you, to say truly, but once." – (Madrigale 5.)
It has been said that the "divine hand" of Michel Angelo painted the portrait of Luigia de' Medici. This is the name given, in reality, during the last century, to the head of a young female, "handsome rather than really beautiful," writes father Della Valle – a work in which Buonarotti's drawing was said to be recognised, with a softer and more lively colouring than obtains in the other pictures from his easel. Angelo's repugnance to paint portraits is one of the best established traits of his character. But he sculptured several – among those positively known are that of Julius II., lost in the chateau of Ferrara, and another of Gabriel Faërne, preserved in the Museum Capitolinum. We know, besides, that he consented to paint the portrait of the noble and witty Messer Tomasso de' Cavalieri, (see Vasari,) of the natural size; but that was a rare favour. "For," said he, "I abhor the obligation to copy that which, in nature, is not of infinite beauty." In another place, sonnet nineteen, addressing the object of his tenderness, Michel Angelo reminds her, that works of art are endowed, so to say, with eternal life and youth. "Perhaps," he adds, (Sonnetto 19 ,) "I shall be able to prolong thy life and mine beyond the tomb, by employing, if thou wilt, colour, or marble, if thou preferest, to fix the lines of our features and the resemblance of our affection!"
Again he writes – "While I paint her features, why cannot I convey to her face the pallor which disfigures mine, and which comes from her cruelty to me?" – (Madrigale 24.) But in some others of Angelo's poems, mention is made of a statue, or more probably of a bust, on which the young artist worked with an impassioned mixture of zeal and faint-heartedness.
"I fear," he says, "to draw from the marble, instead of her image, that of my features worn, and void of grace." – (Madrigale 22.) And when he drew near the term of his labour – "Behold," he exclaims, "an animated stone, which, a thousand years hence, will seem to breathe! What, then, ought heaven to do for her, its own work, while the portrait only is mine; for her whom the whole world, and not myself alone, regard as a goddess rather than a mortal? Nevertheless the stone remains, while she is about to depart." – (Madrigale 39.)
It was probably on this occasion that Michel Angelo wrote those charming, and mysterious verses, whose sense it is otherwise difficult to determine: -
"Qui risi e piansi, e con doglia infinita,
Da questo sasso vidi far partita
Colei ch 'a me mi tolse, e non mi volse."
(Sonnetto 29.)
The bust of Luigia de' Medici, if it really came from the hands of Angelo, has shared the fate of many other chefs-d'œuvres, of which his contemporaries appear to have spoken with such great enthusiasm, only to increase our regret; while the most diligent researches have led to no recovery since their disappearance, caused by the disasters that visited Florence, and by the culpable negligence which, throughout the whole of Italy, followed the period of which Buonarotti was the principal ornament.
If it be to the affection of Luigia de' Medici that Angelo's nineteenth sonnet55 really refers, we are led to the belief that this lofty soul, temperate in its own hopes, yet imbued with a generous ambition, had suffered itself, for a moment, to be carried away by the illusion of a permanent happiness; but a blow, as terrible as unforeseen, scattered these thoughts. The "Magnificent" Lorenzo, scarcely in his forty-second year, sunk at his seat of Careggi, under a short illness, but of which he foresaw the inevitable term with great resignation from the earliest moment. With Lorenzo de' Medici descended to the tomb all that was yet bright in the glory of his family – all that was real in the prosperity of Florence – all that was assured in the fortune, or attractive in the labours of the young Buonarotti, then only seventeen years of age.
Of the three sons left by Lorenzo, not one was capable of replacing him. The Cardinal Giovanni had a cultivated mind, engaging manners, and vast ambition; but, overwhelmed already, in spite of his youth,56 with the weight of his benefices and ecclesiastical dignities, he pursued, at the Papal Court, the high fortune of which he then foresaw the accomplishment. Giuliano, born in 1478, was as yet little more than a child, in whom appeared the germ of amiable and even generous qualities, spoiled by pride, the hereditary vice of his house. With regard to Pietro, the new prince of the government – for he succeeded without opposition to the ill-defined and conventional, rather than regularly constituted authority which his ancestors and his father had left in his possession – he evinced only incapacity, presumption, improvidence, and foolish vanity. Aged twenty-one, he had already espoused Alfonsina Orsini, and drew a false security from an alliance in which he hoped for the support of one of the most warlike and powerful families of southern Italy. Michel Angelo felt the necessity of quitting the abode of the Medici, where Pietro, of too vulgar a mind to appreciate the artist's character, displayed a soul mean enough to make him feel the bitterness of protection. He returned to the paternal home; and although he continued to show a marked attachment for the legitimate interests of the Medici, and was even again sometimes employed – but not in important matters – by the younger members of the family, the separation was final, and the republican convictions of the young artist developed themselves, after that time, at full liberty. Angelo's poetical collection proves to us how cruelly his removal, from the house where Lorenzo had entertained him with the most agreeable hospitality, affected his heart. In future it must become a stranger, at least in looks and conversation, to her whom he loved with an inquiet fervour.
"How, separated from you, shall I ever have the power to guide my life, if I can not, at parting, implore your assistance?
Lest absence condemn my loyal devotion to forgetfulness, in remembrance of my long affliction, take, Signora, take in pledge a heart which hereafter belongs no more to me." – (Madrigale 11. )
And in another place:
"He who departs from you has no more hope of light: where you are not, there is no more heaven." – (Madrigale 9. )
The hour approached, however, when, according to the usage of the country, and the relations of her family, Luigia's lot should be decided. Various projects of alliance were discussed. The choice hesitated between two brothers, descended from Giovanni de' Medici, a branch from the dominant house, and of that which took the name of its individual ancestor, Lorenzo. The latter, brother of Cosmo, Pater Patriæ, had, by Ginevra Cavalcanti Piero Francesco, to whom his wife, Landomia Acciajuoli, brought two sons, Lorenzo and Giovanni. Both had arrived at the age of maturity, and were reckoned among the most considerable citizens of Florence. The marriage, however, did not take place. It is said that Luigia herself prevented its conclusion, until a misunderstanding, caused by some opposition of interests, had definitely separated Pietro from the two brothers, more especially from Giovanni, upon whom the reigning prince appears principally to have reckoned. Others, however, have supposed that the obstacles to the proposed union arose only on the part of Giovanni and his brother, who, in fact, followed the principal citizens in the opposition, then planned, against Pietro's unskilful administration. And last, it has been asserted, that Luigia was betrothed to Giovanni, but died before the time fixed for the marriage. Among these opinions, Litta appears to incline to the second; Roscoe adopts the last. However it may be, it is only certain that, alone of all Lorenzo's daughters, Luigia left the paternal house but to exchange it for the repose of the tomb.
According to the historians, she died a few days before the catastrophe which overturned Pietro's government, and condemned all the descendants of Cosmo l'Antico to an exile of sixteen years. It was consequently late in the autumn of 1494 that Luigia departed this life. Amid the passionate prejudices which prepared, and the convulsions which followed, the Florentine revolution, the extinction of the beauteous light excited no sensation.
Michel Angelo was not at that moment in Florence. Politiano's death seems to have broken the last ties that attached him to the obligations contracted in his early youth. His penetrating intelligence warned him of the coming fall of the Medici. He neither wished to renounce his ancient attachments, nor to give them the predominance over the duties of a citizen, to a free state, which it was of the highest importance to wean from a blind and dangerous course. In this painful alternative, Michel Angelo determined to withdraw for a time. He went first to Venice, and afterwards to Bologna, where the warm reception of the Aldrovandi kept him during an entire year, and even longer.
According to all appearance, on quitting Florence, Buonarotti was aware of Luigia's declining health; and his poetry shows us the courageous artist sinking under the burden of his melancholy presentiments: —
"Be sure, O eyes, that the time is past, that the hour approaches which will close the passage to your regards, even to your tears. Remain, in pity to me, remain open while this divine maiden deigns yet to dwell on this earth. But when the heaven shall open to receive these unique and pure beauties … when she shall ascend to the abode of glorified and happy souls, then close; I bid you farewell." – (Madrigale 40. )
It was while at Venice, at least so it is believed, that Michel Angelo learned the death of Luigia de' Medici. An expression of profound sadness and manly resignation pervades the poems which escaped from his oppressed soul, already familiarized with grief: he knew "that death and love are the two wings which bear man from earth to heaven."