t employed for this
work. These Athletes are the very epitome of the work of Michael Angelo.
If a man does not love them he cannot care for the work of Michael Angelo.
They express his highest idea of beauty--man created in the image of God,
as he testifies in this vault, and in the sonnet ending:--

Ne Dio, suo grazia, mi si mostra altrove,
Piu che'n alcun leggiadro e mortal velo;
E quel sol amo, perche'n quel si specchia.

Nor hath God deigned to show himself elsewhere
More clearly than in human form sublime
Which, since they image Him, alone I love.(118)

No leaves or branches, minor works of the Great Artist, still less
draperies of cloth or even of gold brocade, the works of the hand of man,
shall cover any portion of the Divine Image. So all these figures are
frankly naked, the genii of the Beauty of the Human Race.

The festoons these Athletes carry support large medallions painted like
bronze. They were probably the portion that Michael Angelo intended to
finish with gilding, but owing to the impatience of the Pope they were
left in their present state. They are a most valuable part of the
decorative scheme. Continuity is given by the repetition of these
bronze-coloured circles.

[Image #30]

THE BRAZEN SERPENT

SISTINE CHAPEL, ROME
(_By permission of the Fratelli Alinari, Florence_)

A great cornice divides the scheme of the flat part of the vault already
described, and perhaps the first portion executed, from the curved part
containing the Prophets and Sibyls. They are larger in scale and freer in
style than any portion of the flat part of the vault, as though with
practice Michael Angelo's hand had grown even bolder than before. He may,
too, have thought the new scale of figures easier to see from the floor of
the chapel, for we must remember that this was his first experiment in
vault painting, and no doubt he would be glad to see its effect from below
when he was ordered to remove the scaffolding, and he must have learnt by
it. The Prophets and Sibyls appear to be the last word of Michael Angelo
in decorative painting, as Raphael knew, for he assimilated the teaching
both in the beautiful figures of Sibyls at Santa Maria della Pace and the
Prophet Isaiah of San Agostino. The motives of the genii or angels, wise
children whispering in the ears of the foretellers, seem to be inspired by
the