Evangelista Torricelli

“ Cardinal Luigi Torrigiani was Secretary of State to Clement XIII.; his devotion to the Jesuits, and his blind obedience to their orders, nearly cost the Pope the allegiance of France, Spain, and Portugal. Dismissed by Clement XIV., he died in 1777, the last male representative of his house, leaving his possessions to his sister’s second son, Pietro Guadagni, with the obligation of taking his name. Rich, and of some consequence in the city, the Marquess Pietro Torrigiani was arrested by order of the French General Gauthier, and transported to France with other prominent citizens. ”

“ The merchants above mentioned ultimately invited our artist to proceed to England where he executed many works in marble, bronze, and wood for the king, competing with other masters, who were natives of that country, to all of whom he proved himself superior. And now did Torrigiano receive so many rewards, and was so largely remunerated, that, had he not been a most violent, reckless, and ill-conducted person, he might there have lived a life of ease, and brought his days to a quiet close, but being what he was, his career was ended in a manner which was altogether the reverse of peaceful. ”

“ While these royal works were going on, Torrigiano visited Florence in order to get skilled assistants. He tried to induce Ben. Cellini to come to England to help him, but Cellini refused, partly from his dislike to the brutal and swaggering manners of Torrigiauo, and also because he did not wish to live among "such beasts as the English." The latter part of Torrigiano's life was spent in Spain, especially at Seville, where some terra-cotta sculpture by him still exists. ”

“ He says, in conclusion, that it was only in the same year (1647) , after the publication of his own researches, that he learned “the very fine thought” of Torricelli concerning the cause of all the effects which had been attributed to the horror of a vacuum. But “as this was only a conjecture as yet unverified,” he then, with the view of ascertaining the truth or falsehood of it, conceived the plan of the experiments carried out by M. Périer at the top and the foot of the Puy de Dôme. “It is true, sir,” he adds, “and I say it boldly, that this series of experiments was my own invention ”

“ Don Torribio was not at Compostella when the courier of the holy father arrived. He had been to see his son, who still continued a priest in a small parish at Toledo. But he presently returned, and was not put to the trouble of asking for the vacant archbishopric. The prelate ran to meet him with open arms, “My dear master,” said he, “I have two pieces of good news to relate at once. Your disciple is created a cardinal, and your son shall—shortly—be advanced to the same dignity. ”

“ They had rowed out to Malamocco one day, and another they had gone to Torcello, the ancient mother of Venice, and she had found there a sort of tenderness for the earlier and now ruined and fevered town, just as—just as she found a tenderness for her husband’s mother. Torcello was the beginning of the magic, from Torcello the creation of what she so loved had come. On another day they had taken dinner out on to the great lagoon, had tied up to a clump of hoary gray-headed pali, notching the ferro of their gondola into the disc of the setting sun. ”

“ If Michael Angelo could ever have been handsome is more than doubtful. Early in his youth the quarrelsome and vain Torrigiani broke his nose with a blow of the fist, when they were drawing from Masaccio's frescoes in the Carmine together. [340] Thenceforth the artist's soul looked forth from a sad face, with small grey eyes, flat nostrils, and rugged weight of jutting brows. Good care was thus taken that light love should not trifle with the man who was destined to be the prophet of his age in art. ”

“ The Prince was summoned to the presence of the Duke, and I remained some fifteen minutes in conversation with a venerable and noble-looking man, the Marquis Torrigiani, one of the chamberlains. His eldest son has lately gone upon his travels in the United States, in company with Mr. Thorn, an American gentleman living in Florence. He seemed to think the voyage a great undertaking. Torrigiani is one of the oldest of the Florentine nobles, and his family is in high esteem. ”

“ She avoided the earnest, seeking eyes. A vivid crimson stained her cheek. In a tea-gown of peacock blue chiffon with transparent black lace sleeves, she was infinitely desirable.
Torrigiani drew his chair closer to hers. He searched her face wistfully.
“What do you mean he is nothing to you at present? Don’t try to spare me, carissima. I want to know the truth.”
She averted her head, and played nervously with the ends of her turquoise girdle.
“I scarcely know what I mean myself, Vittorio. It is impossible to foresee the future, you know. ”

“ Birthday of Evangeliste Torricelli, the Italian mathematician, and inventor of the barometer.
1634. About sixty men, women and children, with their horses, cattle and swine, commenced a journey from the vicinity of Boston, through the wilderness to Connecticut river. After a tedious journey of fourteen days through swamps and over mountains and rivers, they arrived at the place of their destination, and commenced the settlements of Hartford, Windsor and Weathersfield.
1644. Gabriel du Pineau, an eminent French avocat, died; celebrated for his genius and eloquence ”

“ And therefore it is indeed that so few attain the summit of excellence, for many are the pains that he must endure, and heavy the burthens that he must bear, who would arrive at perfection in these our noble arts; wherefore the number of those who start with impetuous eagerness from the post, is much greater than that of those who, by sustained efforts in the race, have merited and obtained the prize.
In the Florentine sculptor, Torrigiano, there was more pride than true artistic excellence, although he was, without doubt, a very able artist. ”

“ For this act of sacrilege, as it was deemed, to the work of his own brain and hand, Torrigiani was thrown into the dungeons of the Inquisition. There he starved himself to death in 1522 in order to escape the fate of being burned. This story helps to explain why the fine arts were never well developed in Spain, and why they languished after the introduction of the Holy Office into Italy. [351]
Instead of emigrating to England, Benvenuto, after a quarrel with his father about the obnoxious flute-playing, sauntered out one morning toward the gate of S. Piero Gattolini. ”

“ TORRIGIANO, PIETRO (1472–1522) , sculptor and draughtsman, was born at Florence on 24 Nov. 1472, and early devoted himself to the practice of art. He was one of the band of young artists protected by Lorenzo de' Medici. The studies of these youths were carried on chiefly in the Brancacci Chapel, at the Carmine, where they copied Masaccio's famous frescoes, and in the Medici gardens at San Marco, where they drew from the antiques under the supervision of Donatello's disciple, the aged Bertoldo. ”

“ Torella rejoiced that my minority would afford an opportunity for repairing my fortunes. Juliet and I had been affianced beside my father's deathbed—Torella was to be a second parent to me.
I desired to see the world, and I was indulged. I went to Florence, to Rome, to Naples; thence I passed to Toulon, and at length reached what had long been the bourne of my wishes, Paris. There was wild work in Paris then. The poor king, Charles the Sixth, now sane, now mad, now a monarch, now an abject slave, was the very mockery of humanity. ”

“ He and his son, he said, would both esteem themselves too happy if his holiness would bestow on them, together with his benediction, the smallest temporal benefice; such as an annuity for life, sufficient for the few wants of an ecclesiastic and a philosopher.
During this harangue the sovereign pontiff considered within himself how to dispose of his preceptor. He reflected he was no longer necessary; that he already knew as much of magic as was sufficient for a pope. After weighing every circumstance, his holiness concluded that don Torribio was not only an useless, but a troublesome pedant ”

“ Torcello is of a different quality. Burano is intensely and rather shockingly living; Torcello is nobly dead. It is in fact nothing but market gardens, a few houses where Venetian sportsmen stay when they shoot duck and are royally fed by kitcheners whose brass and copper make the mouth water, and a great forlorn solitary cathedral.
History tells us that in the sixth century, a hundred and more years after the flight of the mainlanders to Rialto and Malamocco, another exodus occurred, under fear of Alboin and the invading Lombards, this time to Torcello. ”

“ For a monastery of Friars of S. Jerome, without the city of Seville, he made another Crucifix; a S. Jerome in Penitence, with his lion, the figure of that Saint being a portrait of an old house-steward of the Botti family, Florentine merchants settled in Spain; and a Madonna with the Child. This last figure was so beautiful that it led to his making another like it for the Duke of Arcus, who, in order to obtain it, made such promises to Torrigiano, that he believed that it would make him [Pg 188] rich for the rest of his life. ”

“ Then it was patent to see that a violent struggle went on within the old gentleman. He sighed, moaned, clasped his hands before his face, and, whilst Toricelli was continuing to speak in a most impressive manner, and Marianna was appealing to him in the most touching accents, and the rest were extolling Antonio all they knew how, he kept looking down—now upon his niece, now upon Antonio, whose splendid clothes and rich chains of honour bore testimony to the truth of what was said about the artistic fame he had earned. ”

“ Wandering along the grassy paths beside the vineyards, the pomegranates, the golden thorn bushes of Torcello, we seem in a sleepy pastoral land where the sun always shines. Torcello seems ripe, rich ground for a new life rather than the cemetery of an old; and we may feed the fancy as we will, for she does not refuse her doom ”

“ The curve of her throat shone through the dusk like a white pillar. “Alexis is not a liar!”
Vittorio laughed grimly. It was worse than he had feared. “But you cannot mean to marry him. He is entirely out of your class, an artist, a Bohemian. If you cannot protect yourself from such people, I must do it for you.”
Anne succeeded in wrenching away her hands.
“I have not asked for your protection, Vittorio Torrigiani.” ”

“ In the passage already quoted from his autobiography Cellini relates that, when he was a lad of about seventeen, Torrigiano came to Florence to engage assistants for a great work in bronze he was about to execute for the king of England. He promised to make the fortune of his young compatriot if he would return with him to London. But Benvenuto refused; for, though he had a great wish to go, he would not serve the man who had defaced that divine work of the Creator, the great Michelangelo. ”

“ He laboured at the pictures of Massaccio in the Carmine also for many months, copying them with so much judgment that the artists were amazed thereat; but envy now increased with his fame; respecting this we find it related that Torrigiano, having formed an intimacy with Michelagnolo, and becoming envious of his distinction in art, one day, when jeering our artist, struck him so violent a blow in the face that his nose was broken and crushed in a manner from which it could never be recovered, so that he was marked for life; whereupon Torrigiano was banished Plorence as we have before related. ”

“ In 1522 Torrigiano, a Florentine sculptor, the same who, when a student and rival, had an altercation with Michael Angelo and broke his nose, received an order from a Spanish grandee, the Duke of Arcos, to carve a Madonna and Child of the natural size, for which he was told he would be well paid. The artist thereupon put forth all his skill, which was admitted to be great, and completed a matchless sculpture, which the purchaser was delighted with, and sent two servants carrying large bags of money wherewith to pay the sculptor and fetch away the gem. ”

“ There he was wont to gather round him the most illustrious authors and scholars of the day, amongst whom it will be sufficient to mention Evangelista Toricelli,6.2 Valerio Chimentelli, Battista Ricciardi, Andrea Cavalcanti, Pietro Salvati, Filippo Apolloni, Volumnio Bandelli, Francesco Rovai. They formed an association for the prosecution of artistic and scientific pursuits, whilst Salvator was able to contribute an element of whimsicality to the meetings, which had a singular effect in animating and enlivening the mind. ”

“ Everything is on a small and humble scale. The columns which support the roof are no higher than a man. Yet these columns are of pure Greek marble, and the capitals are enriched with delicate sculpture. One sees everywhere in this church an earnest and simple desire to do 158 honour to God in the temple they were erecting, and that it should not form too great a contrast to the churches they had loved and seen destroyed. Torcello is equally delightful in springtime and in autumn. ”

“ Carlo Torrigiani, his brother, devoted himself to ameliorating the condition of the prisons and to popular education. He started the society for building blocks of decent houses for small artisans, and gained the hearts of the Florentines by his fearless charity during the outbreak of cholera in 1855. An inscription to his memory was placed by the municipality of Florence on the façade of his small palace, which now belongs, as well as the larger one beside it, to his nephew, the present Marquess Torrigiani. It was begun by Baccio d’Agnolo for the Nasi family and finished by his son Domenico. ”