Federigo Zuccaro was invited to Madrid by Philip II. to execute some frescos in the lower cloister of the Escurial, which, failing to give satisfaction to his royal patron, were subsequently effaced, and their place supplied by Pellegrino Tibaldi; the king nevertheless munificently rewarded him. One day, as he was displaying a picture of the Nativity, which he had painted for the great altar of the Escurial, for the inspection of the monarch, he said, "Sire, you now behold all that art can execute; beyond this which I have done, the powers of painting cannot go." The king was silent for some time; his countenance betrayed neither approbation nor contempt; at last, preserving the same indifference, he quietly asked the painter what those things were in the basket of one of the shepherds in the act of running? He replied they were eggs. "It is well then, that he did not break them," said the king, as he turned on his way—a just rebuke for such fulsome self-adulation.
PIETRO DA CORTONA.
The name of this illustrious painter and architect was Berrettini, and he was born at Cortona, near Florence, in 1596. At the age of fourteen he went to Rome, where he studied the works of Raffaelle and Caravaggio with the greatest assiduity. It is said that at first he betrayed but little talent for painting, but his genius burst forth suddenly, to the astonishment of those companions who had laughed at his incapacity; this doubtless was owing to his previous thorough course of study. While yet young, he painted two pictures for the Cardinal Sacchetti, representing the Rape of the Sabines, and a Battle of Alexander, which gained him so much celebrity that Pope Urban VIII. commissioned him to paint a chapel in the church of S. Bibiena, where Ciampelli was employed. The latter at first regarded with contempt the audacity of so young a man's daring to attempt so important a public work, but Cortona had no sooner commenced than Ciampelli's disgust changed to admiration of his abilities. His success in this performance gained him the celebrated work of the ceiling of the grand saloon in the Barberini palace, which is considered one of the greatest productions of the kind ever executed. Cortona was invited to Florence by the Grand Duke Ferdinand II., to paint the saloon and four apartments in the Pitti palace, where he represented the Clemency of Alexander to the family of Darius, the Firmness of Porsena, the Continence of Cyrus, the History of Massanissa, and other subjects. While thus employed, the Duke, one day, having expressed his admiration of a weeping child which he had just painted, Cortona with a single stroke of his pencil made it appear laughing, and with another restored it to its former state; "Prince," said he, "you see how easily children laugh and cry." Disgusted with the intrigues of some artists jealous of his reputation, he left Florence abruptly, without completing his works, and the Grand Duke could never persuade him to return. On his return to Rome, he abounded with commissions, and Pope Alexander VII. honored him with the order of the Golden Spur. Cortona was also distinguished as an architect. He made a design for the Palace of the Louvre, which was so highly approved by Louis XIV. that he sent him his picture richly set in jewels. Cortona was a laborious artist, and though tormented with the gout, and in affluent circumstances, he continued to paint till his death, in 1699.
"KNOW THYSELF."
Mario Ballassi, a Florentine painter born in 1604, studied successively under Ligozzi, Roselli, and Passignano; he assisted the latter in the works he executed at Rome for Pope Urban XIII. His chief talent lay in copying the works of the great masters, which he did to admiration. Don Taddeo Barberini employed him to copy the Transfiguration of Raffaelle, for the Church of the Conception, in which he imitated the touch and expression of the original in so excellent a manner as to excite the surprise of the best judges at Rome. At the recommendation of the Cardinal Piccolomini, he was introduced to the Emperor Ferdinand III., who received him in an honorable manner. Elated with his success, he vainly imagined that if he could imitate the old masters, he could also equal them in an original style of his own. He signally failed in the attempt, which brought him into as much contempt as his former works had gained him approbation.
BENVENUTO CELLINI.
This eminent sculptor and famous medalist was in high favor with Clement VII., who took him into his service. During the time of the Spanish invasion, Cellini asked the Pope for absolution for certain homicides which "he believed himself to have committed in the service of the church." The Pope absolved him, and, to save time, he added an absolution in prospectu, "for all the homicides thereafter which the said Benvenuto might commit in the same service." On another occasion, Cellini got into a broil, and committed a homicide that was not in the service of the church. The friends of the deceased insisted upon condign punishment, and presumed to make some mention to the Pope about "the laws;" upon which the successor of St. Peter, knowing that it was easier to hang than to replace such a man, assumed a high tone, and told the complainants that "men who were masters of their art should not be subject to the laws."