Renaissance in Italy Volume III Part 24

'Tis not enough, dear Lord, to make me yearn For that celestial home, where yet my soul May be new made, and not, as erst, of nought: Nay, ere Thou strip her mortal vestment, turn My steps toward the steep ascent, that whole And pure before Thy face she may be brought.

In reading the two next, we may remember that, at the end of his life, Michael Angelo was occupied with designs for a picture of the Crucifixion, which he never executed, though he gave a drawing of Christ upon the cross to Vittoria Colonna; and that his last work in marble was the unfinished "Pieta" in the Duomo at Florence.[436]

SCARCO D' UN IMPORTUNA

Freed from a burden sore and grievous band, Dear Lord, and from this wearying world untied, Like a frail bark I turn me to Thy side, As from a fierce storm to a tranquil land.

Thy thorns, Thy nails, and either bleeding hand, With Thy mild gentle piteous face, provide Promise of help and mercies multiplied, And hope that yet my soul secure may stand.

Let not Thy holy eyes be just to see My evil past, Thy chastened ears to hear And stretch the arm of judgment to my crime: Let Thy blood only lave and succour me, Yielding more perfect pardon, better cheer As older still I grow with lengthening time.

NON FUR MEN LIETI

Not less elate than smitten with wild woe To see not them but Thee by death undone, Were those blest souls, when Thou above the sun Didst raise, by dying, men that lay so low: Elate, since freedom from all ills that flow From their first fault for Adam's race was won; Sore smitten, since in torment fierce G.o.d's son Served servants on the cruel cross below.

Heaven showed she knew Thee, who Thou wert and whence, Veiling her eyes above the riven earth; The mountains trembled and the seas were troubled: He took the Fathers from h.e.l.l's darkness dense: The torments of the d.a.m.ned fiends redoubled: Man only joyed, who gained baptismal birth.

The collection of his poems is closed with yet another sonnet in the same lofty strain of prayer, and faith, and hope in G.o.d.[437]

MENTRE M' ATTRISTA

Mid weariness and woe I find some cheer In thinking of the past, when I recall My weakness and my sins and reckon all The vain expense of days that disappear: This cheers by making, ere I die, more clear The frailty of what men delight miscall; But saddens me to think how rarely fall G.o.d's grace and mercies in life's latest year.

For though Thy promises our faith compel, Yet, Lord, what man shall venture to maintain That pity will condone our long neglect?

Still, from Thy blood poured forth we know full well How without measure was Thy martyr's pain, How measureless the gifts we dare expect.

From the thought of Dante, through Plato, to the thought of Christ: so our study of Michael Angelo's sonnets has carried us. In communion with these highest souls Michael Angelo habitually lived; for he was born of their lineage, and was like them a lifelong alien on the earth.

FOOTNOTES:

[412] See Guasti's _Rime di Michel Agnolo Buonarrote_, Firenzi, 1863, p.

189. The future references will be made to that edition.

[413] "I can translate, and have translated, two books of Ariosto at the rate nearly of one hundred lines a day; but so much meaning has been put by Michael Angelo into so little room, and that meaning sometimes so excellent in itself, that I found the difficulty of translating him insurmountable."--Note to Wordsworth's English version of some sonnets of Michael Angelo.

[414] See above, Chapter VIII, The Pieta.

[415] See Gotti's Life, p. 48, and Giannotti's works (Firenze, Le Monnier, 1850), quoted by Gotti, pp. 249-257.

[416] See Appendix to Gotti's Life, No. 25.

[417] See Gotti's Life, p. 256.

[418] Guasti, pp. 153-155.

[419] Guasti, pp. 156, 167.

[420] Guasti, p. 158.

[421] See above, Chapter VIII, Vittoria Colonna.

[422] Guasti, p. 226.

[423] Guasti, p. 218.

[424] _Ib._ pp. 182, 210.

[425] Guasti, p. 212.

[426] Delivered before the Florentine Academy in 1546. See Guasti, p.

173, for the sonnet, and p. lxxv. for the dissertation. See also Gotti, p. 249, for Michael Angelo's remarks upon the latter.

[427] Guasti, pp. 189, 188.

[428] See _Archivio Buonarroti_; and above, p. 318, note 2.

[429] _Rime_, p. xlv.

[430] Gotti's Life, pp. 231-233.

[431] Guasti, pp. 190-202.

[432] Ib. p. 162.

[433] Guasti, p. 205.

[434] Guasti, pp. 230-232.

[435] Guasti, pp. 244, 245.

[436] Ib. pp. 241-245.

[437] Guasti, p. 246.