“I shall be satisfied with thy likeness.”
When Michael Angelo was born in 1475 according to the custom of the time they tools what is called his “horoscope.” That is to say, they observed the day and the hour at which the birth happened, viz., the 6th of March, between four and five o’clock in the morning, and then they noted the stars as they happened to be placed with regard to one another. With this result in the case of Michael, that they concluded he was born under a lucky star, and therefore they might expect wonderful things from his hands, and from his brain in the years to come.
And the stars were right. For when he was yet a boy, he astonished his people with his powers. Indeed, he made his father very angry by the way in which he was always drawing something or other instead of learning his lessons or doing the work he was told to do. But it began to dawn on them all that there was something very extraordinary about Michael’s drawing. That they could not make him stop it, was certain. The only other thing to do was to encourage him to go on with it, and this they did. His father sent him to a painter’s studio, where he might be taught properly. And we know that he grew up to be one of the world’s greatest painters and sculptors.
Now, one day, in Florence, where Michael lived, the overseers of the Cathedral wanted a giant statue of “David.” So they asked a local artist to execute the work. For a year or more this man was busy with the statue, and then the overseers desired to see what progress he was making with it. But when they saw it they were dissatisfied. For the artist had tried to carve a king, and it looked no better than a rude shepherd. So they told him it was of no use to them; he might finish it or not, just as he liked, but they refused to have anything to do with it. Then the angry sculptor left the half-finished statue in the Cathedral yard, where he had been working, and there it lay, neglected and useless, for nearly forty years. During that time, of course, the marble got stained and discolored and chipped, and some of the overseers died who knew the story of it, and others were appointed in their places. One of these came and looked at the fallen statue, and said it was a pity that such a beautiful piece of marble should be wasted. Surely something might be done with it. Why not ask Michael Angelo what he thought about it?
In the meantime Michael had been growing famous, and the overseers thought that, if anyone could use the marble to good purpose, it would be he. So they consulted with him. It was a very difficult thing, of course, to adapt another man’s work. It is always easier to begin anything than to alter it after someone else has begun it, especially when it is the case of a marble statue that has been cut and carved into a figure of “David,” and nearly finished. Michael would have preferred to take a new block, and work his own thought out of it, instead of trying to correct another man’s mistake. But he determined to do his best with the statue, and to make a figure of “David” out of it after all.
So he began. He erected a shed in the Cathedral yard, and worked away at his idea. First of all he made a model in wax, and then he mounted the scaffolding, which had been raised around the statue, and began his chiseling. It was a painfully slow proceeding. It took him three years before he could transform that poor old discolored and unshapely figure into something that was worth beholding.
At the end of that time, thirty of the best men of Florence, and among them, the most famous artists of the city, came to view it. They were delighted with it. For there stood “David,” just as he might have looked when he was called to face the giant—with one foot advanced, his left hand over his shoulder grasping the sling, and his right hand holding the pebble ready to put in it. It was David the shepherd lad, but looking every inch the King.
The greater part of them declared that the statue must stand in the square that was in front of the palace, so that the fathers of the city might look upon it day by day, and learn the lesson that they ought to defend the city with courage and govern it in righteousness.
It took four days to erect the giant figure in its place in the square.
Its unveiling was an event for the city, and the descriptions of the ceremony were carefully written down in the year-books and preserved.
For nearly 400 years, the work of Michael Angelo stood in the palace square of Florence. Before the end of that time, it occurred to the citizens that the weather was not improving their beautiful statue, and that it would be wise to put it under a roof.
In the year 1873, it was taken down from the square, and placed in the Academy, while a copy of it in bronze was erected in the Piazza Michael Angelo, on the south side of the city.
Many times has the story been told of that old misshapen block of marble, in which none could see any beauty, and with which nothing could be done till Michael Angelo saw that there was in it that beautiful work of art, the noble and manly figure of the Shepherd King.
God is a greater sculptor than Michael Angelo. His work is to fashion and carve the character into a thing of beauty and strength. Other people may see very little in us. God sees the perfect form of the King’s son or the King’s daughter, which was in His mind when we were made. What we have spoiled He is willing to transform into the likeness of Jesus Christ.