"(133)
Michael Angelo had a wholesome fear of the law, not because he was guilty
but because of the power of his antagonist. There can be no doubt that he
was perfectly honest in these transactions, and, as Pope Clement said, he
was rather creditor than debtor. Clement appears to have arranged matters
to some extent with the executors, and we have a hint of the new
arrangement in a letter by Michael Angelo to Fattucci,(134) dated
Florence, October 24, 1525:--
"MESSER GIOVAN FRANCESCO,--In reply to your last, the four statues
I have in hand are not yet finished, and much has still to be done
upon them. The four others, for rivers, are not begun, because the
marble was wanting, but now it has come. I do not tell you how
because there is no need. With regard to the affair of Julius, I
wish to make the Tomb like that of Pius in St. Peter's, as you
have written, and will do so little by little, now one piece and
now another, and will pay for it out of my own pocket, if I hold
my pension and my house, as you have written; that is to say, the
house where I lived yonder in Rome, with the marbles and movables
therein. So that I should not have to give to them, I mean to the
heirs of Julius, in order to be quit of the Tomb contract,
anything of what I have received hitherto, except the said Tomb,
completed, like that of Pius in Saint Peter's. Moreover, I
undertake to perform the work within a reasonable time, and to
finish the statues with my own hand.
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