Note 55 — BOOK I. (continued 3)

He drew his head of San Niccolo a' Frari from a cast of the Laocoon; and from other models of the antique, that of S. John the Baptist, and of the Magdalen of Spain. From a Greek basso relievo he likewise copied the angels of his S. Peter Martyr. The same artist drew the Cesars, at Mantua, a work very highly commended, and impossible to have been so well executed without a knowledge of ancient sculpture, of which there yet exists a fine collection at Mantua. But what he drew from the antique, he also inspired with nature, the sole method of profiting by it, when a painter aspires to a higher character than that of a mere statuary. See Ridolfi, p. 171.