This group, placed in S. Peter's, was made for the French Cardinal de Saint Denys. It should be said that the first work of Michael Angelo in Rome was the "Bacchus" now in the Florentine Bargello, executed for Jacopo Gallo, a Roman gentleman.
Pitti approved of the form of government represented by Soderini. Machiavelli despised the want of decision that made him quit Florence, and the euêtheia of the man. Hence their curiously conflicting phrases.
See the chapter entitled "Della Malitia e pessíme Conditioni del Tyranno," in Savonarola's "Tractato circa el reggimento e governo della Citta di Firenze composto ad instantia delli excelsi Signori al tempo di Giuliano Salviati, Gonfaloniere di Justitia." A more terrible picture has never been drawn by any analyst of human vice and cruelty and weakness.
Guasti's edition of the Rime, p. 26.