After the painting of the “Last Judgment,” one more great labour was reserved for Michael Angelo.[331] By a brief of September, 1535, Paul III. had made him the chief architect as well as sculptor and painter of the Holy See.  He was now called upon to superintend the building of S. Peter’s, and to this task, undertaken for the repose of his soul without emolument, he devoted the last years of his life.  The dome of S. Peter’s, as seen from Tivoli or the Alban hills, like a cloud upon the Campagna, is Buonarroti’s; but he has no share in the facade that screens it from the piazza.  It lies beyond the scope of this chapter to relate once more the history of the vicissitudes through which S. Peter’s went between the days of Alberti and Bernini.[332] I can but refer to Michael Angelo’s letter addressed to Bartolommeo Ammanati, valuable both as setting forth his views about the structure, and as rendering the fullest and most glorious meed of praise to his old enemy Bramante.[333] All ancient jealousies, even had they ever stirred the heart of Michael Angelo, had long been set at rest by time and death.  The one wish of his soul was to set a worthy diadem upon the mother-church of Christianity, repairing by the majesty of art what Rome had suffered at the hands of Germany and Spain, and inaugurating by this visible sign of sovereignty the new age of Catholicity renascent and triumphant.

To the last period of Buonarroti’s life (a space of twenty-two years between 1542 and 1564) we owe some of his most beautiful drawings—­sketches for pictures of the Crucifixion made for Vittoria Colonna, and a few mythological designs, like the “Rape of Ganymede,” composed for Tommaso Cavalieri.  His thoughts meanwhile were turned more and more, as time advanced, to piety; and many of his sonnets breathe an almost ascetic spirit of religion.[334] We see in them the old man regretting the years he had spent on art, deploring his enthusiasm for earthly beauty, and seeking comfort in the cross alone.

    Painting nor sculpture now can lull to rest
    My soul, that turns to His great love on high,
    Whose arms to clasp us on the cross were spread.

It is pleasant to know that these last years were also the happiest and calmest.  Though he had lost his faithful friend and servant Urbino; though his father had died, an old man, and his brothers had passed away before him one by one, his nephew Lionardo had married in Florence, and begotten a son called Michael Angelo.  Thus he had the satisfaction of hoping that his name would endure and flourish, as indeed it has done almost to this very day in Florence.  What consolation this thought must have brought him, is clear to those who have studied his correspondence and observed the tender care and continual anxiety he had for his kinsmen.[335] Wealth now belonged to him:  but he had never cared for money; and he continued to live like a poor man, dressing soberly and eating sparely, often taking but one meal in the