FRA SEBASTIANO.
And the dullest;
And only to be read in episodes.
His day is past. Petrarca is our poet.
MICHAEL ANGELO. Petrarca is for women and for lovers And for those soft Abati, who delight To wander down long garden walks in summer, Tinkling their little sonnets all day long, As lap dogs do their bells.
FRA SEBASTIANO.
I love Petrarca.
How sweetly of his absent love he sings
When journeying in the forest of Ardennes!
"I seem to hear her, hearing the boughs and breezes
And leaves and birds lamenting, and the waters
Murmuring flee along the verdant herbage."
MICHAEL ANGELO. Enough. It is all seeming, and no being. If you would know how a man speaks in earnest, Read here this passage, where St. Peter thunders In Paradise against degenerate Popes And the corruptions of the church, till all The heaven about him blushes like a sunset. I beg you to take note of what he says About the Papal seals, for that concerns Your office and yourself.
FRA SEBASTIANO, reading.
Is this the passage?
"Nor I be made the figure of a seal
To privileges venal and mendacious,
Whereat I often redden and flash with fire!"—
That is not poetry.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
What is it, then?
FRA SEBASTIANO. Vituperation; gall that might have spirited From Aretino's pen.
MICHAEL ANGELO.
Name not that man!
A profligate, whom your Francesco Berni
Describes as having one foot in the brothel
And the other in the hospital; who lives
By flattering or maligning, as best serves
His purpose at the time. He writes to me
With easy arrogance of my Last Judgment,
In such familiar tone that one would say
The great event already had occurred,
And he was present, and from observation
Informed me how the picture should be painted.
FRA SEBASTIANO. What unassuming, unobtrusive men These critics are! Now, to have Aretino Aiming his shafts at you brings back to mind The Gascon archers in the square of Milan, Shooting their arrows at Duke Sforza's statue, By Leonardo, and the foolish rabble Of envious Florentines, that at your David Threw stones at night. But Aretino praised you.
MICHAEL ANGELO. His praises were ironical. He knows How to use words as weapons, and to wound While seeming to defend. But look, Bastiano, See how the setting sun lights up that picture!