work of Taddeo Gaddi, Donato executed a Crucifix in wood, on which he bestowed extraordinary labour. When the work was completed, believing himself to have produced an. admirable thing, he showed it to Filippo di Ser Brunellesco, his most intimate friend, desiring to have his opinion of it. Filippo, who had expected, from the words of Donato, to see a much finer production, smiled somewhat as he regarded it, and Donato seeing this, entreated him by the friendship existing between them, to say what he thought of it. Whereupon Filippo, who was exceedingly frank, replied, that Donato appeared to him to have placed a Clown on the cross, and not a figure resembling that of Jesus Christ, whose person was delicately beautiful, and in all its parts the most perfect form of man that had ever been born. Donato hearing himself censured where he had expected praise, and more hurt than he was perhaps willing to admit, replied, “If it Were as easy to execute a work as to judge it, my figure would appear to thee to be Christ and not a boor; but take wood, and try to make one thyself.”[1] Filippo, without saying anything more, returned home, and set to work on a Crucifix, wherein he laboured to surpass Donato, that he might not be condemned by his own judgment; but he suffered no one to know what he was doing. At the end of some months, the work was completed to the height of perfection, and this done, Filippo one morning invited Donato to dine with him, and the latter accepted the invitation. Thereupon, as they were proceeding together towards the house of Filippo, they passed by the Mercato Vecchio, where the latter purchased various articles,[2] and giving them to Donato, said, “Do thou go forward with these things to the house and wait for me there, I'll be after thee in a moment.” Donato, therefore, having entered the house, had no sooner done so, than he saw the Crucifix, which Filippo had placed in a suitable light. Stopping short to examine the work, he
- ↑ Hence the proverbial expression, “piglia del legno e fanne uno tu” (take wood and make one thyself), which is constantly used to whoever disparages a thing which we think so good, that it could not be done better. — Masselli.
- ↑ An annotator of the seventeenth century, who has written notes on the margin of a copy of Vasari, which afterwards came into the possession of the painter Cav. Bossi, remarks that “in those days painters did not play the gentlemen as they do in our times,”— Ed. Flor. 1846-9.
