“In that statues are more enduring, perhaps we might say they are of greater dignity; for being made as memorials, they fulfil better than painting the purpose for which they are made. But besides serving as memorials, both painting and sculpture serve also to beautify, and in this respect painting is much superior; for if less diuturnal (so to speak) than sculpture, yet it is of very long life, and is far more charming so long as it endures.” Then Giancristoforo replied: “I really think that you are speaking against your convictions and that you are doing so solely for the sake of your friend Raphael; and perhaps too the excellence you find in his painting seems to you so consummate that sculpture cannot rival it: but consider that this is praise of an artist and not of his art.” [Illustration: MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI 1475-1564 ] Reduced from a photograph, specially made by Soame, of an anonymous and hitherto unpublished bronze head at Oxford. From a death-mask, Michelangelo’s pupil Daniele Ricciarelli da Volterra (1500-1566) prepared a mould, of which this and the similar “Piot” head in the Louvre are believed to be unchased castings. See C. Drury E. Fortnum’s article “On the Bronze Portrait Busts of Michelangelo,” etc., in the Archæological Journal. Then he continued: “It seems clear to me that both the one and the other are artificial imitations of nature; but I do not see how you can say that truth, such as nature makes it, is not better imitated in a marble or bronze statue,—wherein the members are round, formed and measured, as nature makes them,—than in a painting, where we see nothing but the surface and those colours that cheat the eyes; nor will you tell me, surely, that being is not nearer truth than seeming. Moreover I think sculpture is more difficult, because if a slip is made, it cannot be corrected (since marble cannot be patched again), but another statue must be made anew; which does not happen with painting, for one may change a thousand times, and add and take away, improving always.” 51.—The Count said, laughing: “I am not speaking for Raphael’s sake; nor ought you to repute me so ignorant as not to know the excellence of Michelangelo in sculpture, your own, and others’. But I am speaking of the art, and not of the artists.