MICHAEL ANGELO. 253 



oppose the authority of the Church, hence the inau- 

 guration of the Reformation. Although the basilica 

 of St. Peter's is the grandest display of architectural 

 splendor in the Christian world, its magnificence can 

 not atone for the schism its expenditures created in 

 the Catholic fraternity. The builder of St. Peter's 

 called a Luther into being. 



As soon as the design of Michael Angelo was ap- 

 proved the great painter, sculptor and architect went 

 to Carrara to procure the marble necessary for the un- 

 dertaking, the Pope giving him an order upon a banker 

 in Florence to pay for the material. That suitable 

 blocks might be quarried successfully, Michael Angelo 

 took up his residence for eight months in the im- 

 mediate vicinity of the famous mountain of marble. 

 He sent most of the blocks to Rome, yet enough to 

 Florence to occupy his chisel during the heated season 

 when the Vatican was considered unwholesome on ac- 

 count of the malaria of the Campagna. While 

 Michael Angelo was at Carara he conceived the idea 

 of erecting a pillar on the marble mount which should 

 rival the leaning tower of Pisa, but no opportunity 

 occurred for carrying the design into executon. His 

 conception was to quarry a monolith of the finest 

 marble, erect it on the mountain top, and then chisel 

 the monumental shaft into human shape, so that its 

 outline, and perhaps its features, might be seen from 

 the sea as a mark for mariners. 



After Michael Angelo returned to Rome the Pope 

 held daily conversations with him, even making a 

 covered bridge from the Vatican Palace to the sculp- 

 tor's studio, that he might pass to and fro without 

 being observed. " This honorable partiality," says a 

 chronicler, " was too apparent not to excite jealousy 



