“After this I met him several times in the outer cloisters of San Marco, whither I went first by chance with my uncle, who had some business with the prior of the convent, and who left me to wait for him in this place, which is assigned to the laity.
“Presently, while I waited here, Raphael came hastily in, having just completed his lesson in colouring with the Fra Bartolommeo, an artist who turned monk under the preaching of Savonarola, and whom Raphael has chosen as master during his stay in Florence. He told me somewhat of this good monk; how when he was a talented and rising young man, with life and ambition all before him, he gave his paintings to the flames with which the Piagnoni consumed the vanities of this world in the public streets, because he feared lest he loved his art more than God. But since he has renounced the world, the Prior has told him that he can best serve the Church by painting altar-pieces, so that his cell is changed to a studio, and God has granted him such access of genius that he paints more divinely than before, and churches and monasteries in Venice and other distant cities send daily for his paintings. But he knows not where they go, nor how much money they bring the convent, for he paints only for the love of God.
“Raphael told me also of the heavenly frescoes of Fra Angelico, with which the walls of the passages and even the cells of the convent, are covered, and he added, ‘Truly, I think that Art and a monastic life wed well together, and I would willingly retire to some cloistered garden afar from the world, if I might carry my box of colours with me, and might sometimes see in a vision a face like thine to paint from!’
“Then was I seized with a foolish timidity, so that I could in no wise answer, but my heart said, ‘And why afar from the world, why not in it, making all things better and happier?’
“Ah! sweet lady, I know you will say, ‘My little Maria is grown wondrous foolish and love-sick’; but I pray you chide me not, seeing that the matter cannot grow further, for I am not likely again to meet with Raphael, since I have come to visit for some days, on invitation of your sweet daughter Madonna Maddalena Strozzi. Nor were it best that I should see him often, for I do fear me that in such case my heart might become so rashly pitched and fixed upon him that I should in time most inconsiderately fall in love, which were a bold and unmaidenly thing to do; and I mind me that you were wont to tell me that no woman should allow her affections to conduct themselves thus insubordinately, until the church hath by the sacrament of marriage given her license thereto.
“And so, madame, praying Maria Sanctissima and Maria the sister of Lazarus, my patroness, to keep me constant in this mind, I rest your loving friend and devoted servitor,
“Maria Bibbiena.
“Niccolo Macchiavelli to Bramante, Architect to Pope Julius I, at Rome:
“Messer Bramante mio:
“We have no longer any politics in Florence. The Medici trusted to the luck of their name; but Florence would have none of them, and Piero had not the head for his position. He might have had the advantage of my brains if he had so chosen; but he had not the wit to appreciate wit. The Magnificent was right when he said that he had three sons, the one good, the second crafty, the third a fool. The good die young: Piero, the fool, has lost his inheritance; it remains for the crafty Giovanni to make good the prestige of his family. The chances are against him, but if he has something better than maccaroni under his tonsure, he will make the Church his ladder to power. I thought at one time that Savonarola was perhaps shrewder than he seemed, and that he would succeed in tumbling Alexander out of the Papal Chair and in taking his seat therein as the Pope Angelico. But it seemed that the dolt never cared for the Papacy, but only for saving souls! I fear no such cause of defeat for a Medici, but I hear rumours concerning Giovanni which make me fear that he is not crafty enough for success. He has been dissolute; that is no hindrance to a cardinal’s hat or even to the tiara; the folly I dread is more fatal. They say that he has reformed his life and is thinking of marriage. If this is true, I renounce his cause in favor of that of Cæsar Borgia, who has the audacity of a lion joined to the rascality of a fox, and who is not hindered from the putting in practice of my principles by any so cowardly and stupid a thing as a conscience. And yet they say that his superb physical manhood is now a wreck, bloated and permeated through and through with the subtle poison which his family alone knows how to prepare, and whose effects they can only partially eradicate. Savonarola, Borgia, Medici, blunderers all! What name will the next wave bring to the surface?
“But a truce to politics. You know this is a subject from which I can no more keep my thoughts than a greedy urchin can forbear thrusting his fingers into a pot of comfits. I am not so absorbed in my favourite pastime, however, but I can take an interest in all that interests my friends, especially in such matters as are flavoured with a spice of intrigue, than which no condiment soever is better suited to my palate. Touching, therefore, the matter concerning which you wrote me, I think that you, as chief architect to his Holiness, have indeed cause to fear the rivalry of Michael Angelo, for I am credibly informed that he is minded presently to journey toward Rome. Moreover, since it is the practice of popes to be always meddling with works of art, marring and defacing the excellent things done in the Pontificates of those preceding them,—when they cannot improve upon them,—and whereas they are a whimsical lot, not long contented with one object or one workman, be he ever so excellent, you have sufficient cause, I say, to fear, having now continued in favour for some time, that this Michael Angelo will supplant you in the favour of his Holiness. I would suggest, therefore, that you search about for some new artist, who shall occupy himself with a line of work as fresco painting, not in any way interfering with your own architectural designs, but rather depending upon them; and that you make haste to introduce him to the Pope, and if possible ingratiate him into his favour that, his mind being taken up with this new favourite, and his purse lightened by the dispensing of moneys for these new works, he will be less inclined to look favourably upon a new architect such as Michael Angelo. And inasmuch as it seemeth to me that this thing requireth haste, I have looked about me somewhat in Florence to find a man suited to your occasions.