“The interest of Michelangelo’s poems is that they make us spectators of this struggle; the struggle of a strong nature to adorn and attune itself; the struggle of a desolating passion, which yearns to be resigned and sweet and pensive, as Dante’s was.” The essay beautifully contrasts the extremes of that volcanic nature, the man who, as Raphael said, walked the streets of Rome like an executioner, and who yet, at the other end of the scale, could conceive and bring to perfection the exquisite sweetness, the almost over-composed dignity, of the great _Pietà_. The essay abounds in subtle and delicate characterisation of the manifestations of that desirous, rugged, uncomforted nature. Thus, in speaking of the four symbolical figures, _Night_, _Day_, _The Twilight_, _The Dawn_, which adorn the sacristy of San Lorenzo, Pater says that the names assigned them are far too precise.— “They concentrate and express, less by way of definite conceptions than by the touches, the promptings of a piece of music, all those vague fancies, misgivings, presentiments, which shift and mix and define themselves and fade again, whenever the thoughts try to fix themselves with sincerity on the conditions and surroundings of the disembodied spirit. I suppose no one would come to the sacristy of San Lorenzo for consolation; for seriousness, for solemnity, for dignity of impression, perhaps, but not for consolation. It is a place neither of terrible nor consoling thoughts, but of vague and wistful speculation.” Perhaps it may be said that in this essay Pater reveals an over-subtlety of conception in his desire to substantiate the contrast. There was an essential unity of character, of aim, about Michelangelo; and the contrasts are merely the same intensity of mood working in different regions, not a difference of mood. The chief value of the essay lies in its lyrical fervour, in the poetical and suggestive things that are said by the way.