i84 FLORAL SYMBOLISM 



ate, till its inclination to magnificence was severely- 

 checked by Savonarola, whose influence on art 

 has usually been wrongly estimated. He was 

 no blind iconoclast, though without doubt 

 objects of great artistic worth were burnt in 

 his famous holocaust of * vanities,' which 

 finished the Carnival of 1497. On the contrary, 

 as Senator Pasquale Villari points out, he was 

 always surrounded by the best artists of his 

 century. Fra Bartolommeo, for four years after 

 his death, did not touch a brush, such was his 

 grief. The Delia Robbias were devoted to him; 

 two received the habit from his hands. Lorenzo 

 di Credi was his partisan ; Cronaca ' would speak 

 of nothing but the things of Savonarola.' Botti- 

 celli illustrated his works, and Michael Angelo 

 was a most constant listener to his preaching. 



He spoke plainly to the painters from his 

 pulpit. The beauty of the Divinity, of the 

 Virgin and the Saints was the beauty of holi- 

 ness, not of outward adornment of fine raiment, 

 gold and jewels, and ' the beauty of man or 

 woman in so far as it approaches to the primal 

 beauty, so is it great and more perfect.' ' 



' Sermon on Ezekiel. 



