"Different perhaps, but better, no!" he answered.

The letter to Clement just quoted is interesting in several respects.

The boldness of the beginning makes one comprehend how Michelangelo was terrible even to Popes:-- "Most Blessed Father,--Inasmuch as intermediates are often the cause of grave misunderstandings, I have summoned up courage to write without their aid to your Holiness about the tombs at S.Lorenzo.

I repeat, I know not which is preferable, the evil that does good, or the good that hurts.

I am certain, mad and wicked as I may be, that if I had been allowed to go on as I had begun, all the marbles needed for the work would have been in Florence to-day, and properly blocked out, with less cost than has been expended on them up to this date; and they would have been superb, as are the others I have brought here." After this he entreats Clement to give him full authority in carrying out the work, and not to put superiors over him.