tifical residence, the Sixtine and Pauline chapels, the picture
galleries, the library, the museums of sculpture and archaeology, the
outbuildings, including the barracks of the Swiss Guards, and, lastly,
the gardens with the Pope's Casino. Of these the Sixtine Chapel, the
galleries and museums, and the library, are incomparably the most
important.

The name Sixtine is derived from Sixtus the Fourth, as has been said,
and is usually, but not correctly, spelled 'Sistine.' The library was
founded by Nicholas the Fifth, whose love of books was almost equal to
his passion for building. The galleries are representative of Raphael's
work, which predominates to such an extent that the paintings of almost
all other artists are of secondary importance, precisely as Michelangelo
filled the Sixtine Chapel with himself. As for the museums, the objects
they contain have been accumulated by many popes, but their existence
ought, perhaps, to be chiefly attributed to Julius the Second and Leo
the Tenth, the principal representatives of the Rovere and Medici
families.

On the walls of the Sixtine Chapel there are paintings by such men as
Perugino, Luca Signorelli, Botticelli, and Ghirlandajo, as well as by a
number of others; but Michelangelo overshadows them all with his ceiling
and his 'Last Judgment.' There is something overpowering about him, and
there is no escaping from his influence. He not only covers great spaces
with his brush, but he fills them with his masterful drawing, and makes
them alive with a life at once profound and restless. One does not feel,
as with other painters, that a vision has been projected upon a flat
surface; one rather has the impression that a mysterious reality of life
has been called up out of senseless material. What we see is not
imaginary motion represented, but real motion arrested, as it were, in
its very act, and ready to move again. Many have said that the man's
work was monstrous. It was monstrously alive, monstrously vigorous; at
times over-strong and over-vital, exaggerative of nature, but never
really unnatural, and he never once overreached himself in an effort. No
matter how enormous the conception might be, he never lacked the means
of carrying it to the concrete. No giantism of limb and feature was
beyond the ability of his brush; no astounding foreshortening was too
much for his unerring point; no vast perspective was too deep for his
knowledge and strength. His production was limited