Norwich bulletin., 1922-04-10
FAMOUS MEN.
MICHAEL ANGELO

A sadder life than was that experienc- ca by Michelangelo 1t would be hard to ind in the history of the great art Ex- ce41t for four years, between the ages of hfteen and eighteen, his days were sad. stern and lonely. He was born on the 9th cf March, in 1475. His genius for sculp- turing and painting was shown at an early age but much of his greatest work was acomplished when he was fifty.
 In 1854 he was commissioned by Pope Paul III to carry out an idea which had been originated by one of the latter's pre- decessors-the completion of the decora- tton of the interior of the Sistine Chapel py painting fresco on the wall above the altar. He spent eight years in pre- pairing cartoons and painting this vast space, and on Christmas Day, 1541. the fresco representing The Judgment Day. was uncovered to the public gaze. and ali Rome fiocked to see this new wonder.
 The success was so marked that he was appointed chief architect to the Pope. All Of the glorious Italian art of that period may be said to start with this appoint nent. The greatest sadness in the artists life appears to have been the loss of his faithful servant, Urbino. Regarding his death the artist wrote: T have kept him seven and twenty years and always found him sure and faithful. I had made him rich and now that I had counted on his being a prop to my old age, he is taken from me, and I have no other hope but to meet him again in Paradise, where God, through the very blessed death he made, has shown that he has gone What he felt more bitter than death was to leave me in this deceitful world and in the midst of many anxieties. The best of me is gone with him, and there is nothing left to me here but infinite misery Michael Angelo's great, unhappy, but | taken in all, glorious and spdendidIy pro life life came to an end in his eighty ninth year. He had fallen i'll on the 12th 1 of February, 1884, but had struggled 1 brayely against pain and weakness. and i only a few days before his death had at | tempted to mount his horse.
 He was well cared for during these last l days by a few devoted friends After l three days of mortal weakness his spirit l passed away about o'clock in the aft
 ernon of the 18th of February Ills last i look on earth may have possibly beer 1 turned toward the great dome then rising l above Rome, the noolest architecture creation which the genius of any man has accomplished.
 According to his own wish the body o Michelangelo was taken from Rome tt | E1Or6nce, where ne was DuTleq Tn Llt Church of Santa Croce as it was lnowl
 by his friends that he wished his re
 mains to be placed in that church an ap propriate spot. for he had added to it
 beauty both by his paintings and hi
 sculpture. His tomb was designed by Va
 sari and above the sarcophagus in whicl
 the body of the master lies, his bust wa
 placed in such position that it's eyes ar
 turned to the western door of the church
 through which Brunelleschis Cathedra
 can be seen, that building beloved by Buo l narotti above all others
 1 The greater part of AIichelangelo's lat
 CT life was passed in Rome, and ther , forty years of his career were given b i him to work on the tomb of Pope Juliu 1T. In 1547. when Michelangelo was sey
 enty-two years of age, he was aTi9ointe
 architect-in-chief for the construction C
 the great Basilica of St. Peters. an ar
 pointment for which he refused all salar. ; working, as he nobly expressed 1t, 'fo the love of God alone"
 What the world owes to Michelangelo
 St. Peters is the glorious dome and cupc
 la, the noblest management that tn l skill of man has accomplished. It is, 6 3 Symonds writes, the triot, Michelangel 2 takes his place genius as creative al
 tist" In concluding his biography of tn . artist Lord Cover writes: tPainte sculptor. architect, engineer. poet and ps triot Michae! Angelo takes his hlac
 amongst the Dantes the Brunellschis, tt l Raphaels and the Leonardos, and of all them he is the greatest, the most amazin f genius of the modern world"