The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci Part 53

Envy must be represented with a contemptuous motion of the hand towards heaven, because if she could she would use her strength against G.o.d; make her with her face covered by a mask of fair seeming; show her as wounded in the eye by a palm branch and by an olive-branch, and wounded in the ear by laurel and myrtle, to signify that victory and truth are odious to her. Many thunderbolts should proceed from her to signify her evil speaking. Let her be lean and haggard because she is in perpetual torment. Make her heart gnawed by a swelling serpent, and make her with a quiver with tongues serving as arrows, because she often offends with it. Give her a leopard's skin, because this creature kills the lion out of envy and by deceit. Give her too a vase in her hand full of flowers and scorpions and toads and other venomous creatures; make her ride upon death, because Envy, never dying, never tires of ruling. Make her bridle, and load her with divers kinds of arms because all her weapons are deadly.

Toleration.

Intolerable.

No sooner is Virtue born than Envy comes into the world to attack it; and sooner will there be a body without a shadow than Virtue without Envy.

[Footnote: The larger of the two drawings on PI. LXI is explained by the first 21 lines of this pa.s.sage. L. 22 and 23, which are written above the s.p.a.ce between the two drawings, do not seem to have any reference to either. L. 24-27 are below the allegorical twin figure which they serve to explain.]

678.

When Pluto's Paradise is opened, then there may be devils placed in twelve pots like openings into h.e.l.l. Here will be Death, the Furies, ashes, many naked children weeping; living fires made of various colours....

679.

John the Baptist Saint Augustin Saint Peter Paul Elisabeth Saint Clara.

Bernardino Our Lady Louis Bonaventura Anthony of Padua.

Saint Francis.

Francis, Anthony, a lily and book; Bernardino with the [monogram of] Jesus, Louis with 3 fleur de lys on his breast and the crown at his feet, Bonaventura with Seraphim, Saint Clara with the tabernacle, Elisabeth with a Queen's crown.

[Footnote: 679. The text of the first six lines is written within a square s.p.a.ce of the same size as the copy here given. The names are written in the margin following the order in which they are here printed. In lines 7-12 the names of those saints are repeated of whom it seemed necessary to point out the emblems.]

List of drawings.

680.

A head, full face, of a young man with fine flowing hair, Many flowers drawn from nature, A head, full face, with curly hair, Certain figures of Saint Jerome, [6] The measurements of a figure, Drawings of furnaces.

A head of the Duke, [9] many designs for knots, 4 studies for the panel of Saint Angelo A small composition of Girolamo da Fegline, A head of Christ done with the pen, [13] 8 Saint Sebastians, Several compositions of Angels, A chalcedony, A head in profile with fine hair, Some pitchers seen in(?) perspective, Some machines for s.h.i.+ps, Some machines for waterworks, A head, a portrait of Atalanta raising her face; The head of Geronimo da Fegline, The head of Gian Francis...o...b..rso, Several throats of old women, Several heads of old men, Several nude figures, complete, Several arms, eyes, feet, and positions, A Madonna, finished, Another, nearly in profile, Head of Our Lady ascending into Heaven, A head of an old man with long chin, A head of a gypsy girl, A head with a hat on, A representation of the Pa.s.sion, a cast, A head of a girl with her hair gathered in a knot, A head, with the brown hair dressed.

[Footnote: 680. This has already been published by AMORETTI Memorie storiche cap. XVI. His reading varies somewhat from that here given, e. g. l. 5 and 6. Certi Sangirolami in su d'una figura; and instead of I. 13. Un San Bastiano.]

[Footnote: 680. 9. Molti disegni di gruppi. VASARI in his life of Leonardo (IV, 21, ed. MILANESI 1880) says: "Oltreche perse tempo fino a disegnare gruppi di corde fatti con ordine, e che da un capo seguissi tutto il resto fino all' altro, tanto che s'empiessi un tondo; che se ne vede in istampa uno difficilissimo e molto bello, e nel mezzo vi sono queste parole: Leonardus Vinci Accademia". Gruppi must here be understood as a technical expression for those twisted ornaments which are well known through wood cuts. AMORETTI mentions six different ones in the Ambrosian Library. I am indebted to M. DELABORDE for kindly informing me that the original blocks of these are preserved in his department in the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. On the cover of these volumes is a copy from one of them. The size of the original is 23 1/2 centimetres by 26 1/4. The centre portion of another is given on p. 361. G. Govi remarks on these ornaments (Saggio p. 22): "Codesti gruppi eran probabilmente destinati a servir di modello a ferri da rilegatori per adornar le cartelle degli scolari (?). Fregi somigliantissimi a questi troviamo infatti impressi in oro sui cartoni di vari volumi contemporanei, e li vediam pur figurare nelle lettere iniziali di alcune edizioni del tempo."

Durer who copied them, omitting the inscription, added to the second impressions his own monogram. In his diary he designates them simply as "Die sechs Knoten" (see THAUSING, Life of A. Durer I, 362, 363). In Leonardo's MSS. we find here and there little sketches or suggestions for similar ornaments. Compare too G. MONGERI, L'Arte in Milano, p. 315 where an ornament of the same character is given from the old decorations of the vaulted ceiling of the Sacristy of S. Maria delle Grazie.]

[Footnote: 680, 17. The meaning in which the word coppi, literally pitchers, is here used I am unable to determine; but a change to copie seems to me too doubtful to be risked.]

681.

Stubborn rigour.

Doomed rigour.

[Footnote: See PI. LXII, No. 2, the two upper pen and ink drawings. The originals, in the Windsor collection are slightly washed with colour. The background is blue sky; the plough and the instrument with the compa.s.s are reddish brown, the sun is tinted yellow].

682.

Obstacles cannot crush me Every obstacle yields to stern resolve He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.

[Footnote: This text is written to elucidate two sketches which were obviously the first sketches for the drawings reproduced on PL LXII, No. 2.]

683.

Ivy is [a type] of longevity.

[Footnote: In the original there is, near this text, a sketch of a coat wreathed above the waist with ivy.]

684.

Truth the sun. falsehood a mask. innocence, malignity.

Fire destroys falsehood, that is sophistry, and restores truth, driving out darkness.

Fire may be represented as the destroy of all sophistry, and as the image and demonstration of truth; because it is light and drives out darkness which conceals all essences [or subtle things].

[Footnote: See PI. LXIII. L. 1-8 are in the middle of the page; 1. 9-14 to the right below; 1. 15-22 below in the middle column. The rest of the text is below the sketches on the left. There are some other pa.s.sages on this page relating to geometry.]

TRUTH.

Fire destroys all sophistry, that is deceit; and maintains truth alone, that is gold.

Truth at last cannot be hidden. Dissimulation is of no avail. Dissimulation is to no purpose before so great a judge. Falsehood puts on a mask. Nothing is hidden under the sun.

Fire is to represent truth because it destroys all sophistry and lies; and the mask is for lying and falsehood which conceal truth.

685.

Movement will cease before we are weary of being useful.

Movement will fail sooner than usefulness.

Death sooner than I am never weary of weariness. being useful, In serving others I is a motto for carnval.

cannot do enough. Without fatigue.

No labour is sufficient to tire me.

Hands into which ducats and precious stones fall like snow; they never become tired by serving, but this service is only for its utility and not for our I am never weary own benefit. of being useful.

Naturally nature has so disposed me.

686.

This shall be placed in the hand of Ingrat.i.tude. Wood nourishes the fire that consumes it.

687.

TO REPRESENT INGRAt.i.tUDE.

When the sun appears which dispels darkness in general, you put out the light which dispelled it for you in particular for your need and convenience.

688.

On this side Adam and Eve on the other; O misery of mankind, of how many things do you make yourself the slave for money!

[Footnote: See PI. LXIV. The figures of Adam and Eve in the clouds here alluded to would seem to symbolise their superiority to all earthly needs.]

689.