We had
connected Michael Angelo with the Renaissance, but we are here face to
face with the Reformation. We cannot help being a little surprised at
this. We cannot help being surprised at finding how well we know this
man.
Few of us are familiar enough with the language of the plastic arts to
have seen without prompting this same modern element in Michael Angelo's
painting and sculpture. We might, perhaps, have recognized it in the
Pieta in St. Peter's. We may safely say, however, that it exists in all
his works. It is in the Medicean statues; it is in the Julian marbles;
it is in the Sistine ceiling. What is there in these figures that they
leave us so awestruck, that they seem so like the sound of trumpets
blowing from a spiritual world? The intelligence that could call them
forth, the craft that could draw them, have long since perished. But the
meaning survives the craft. The lost arts retain their power over us. We
understand but vaguely, yet we are thrilled. We cannot decipher the
signs, yet we subscribe to their import.
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