thinks that he has robbed you of me does not benefit by his great crime because of his great fear. The fulness of pleasure, which extinguishes desire, is a less joy to lovers than misery, which is full of hope."[1]
We must try to imagine what the sack of Rome and the fall of Florence meant to the men of those days: the bankruptcy of justice—the most terrible of cataclysms. Many never recovered from it.
Men like Sebastiano del Piombo became laughingly sceptical.
"I have reached such a point that, for all I care, the world may come to an end. I laugh at everything … It does not seem to me that I am still the Bastiano I was before the sack. I cannot recover myself."[2]
Michael Angelo thought of committing suicide.
"If ever it is permissible to kill oneself, it would indeed be just that this right should belong to the one who, though full of faith, lives in slavery and misery."[3]
His mind was thoroughly upset. In June 1531 he
- ↑ "Poems," cix, 48. (See Appendix, vii.)
- ↑ Letter from Sebastiano del Piombo to Michael Angelo (February 24, 1531). It was the first letter which he wrote to him after the sack of Rome. "God knows how glad I have been that, after so many miseries, troubles, and dangers, the all-powerful Lord, through his mercifulness and pity, has left us living and in good health—a truly miraculous thing, when I think of it … Now, my friend, that we have passed through fire and water, and supported unimaginable things, let us thank God, and spend the little life which remains to us as much as possible in rest. We must count very little on what Fortune will do for us, so wicked and painful is she. …"
Their letters were being opened. So Sebastiano recommended Michael Angelo, who was a suspect, to disguise his writing. - ↑ "Poems," xxxviii. (See Appendix, viii.)
