I doubt whether Raphael studied the minutest intricacies of the mechanism of the human body as thoroughly as the draughtsmen of our own time.

He did not attach the same importance to rigorous accuracy on this point as they do, because he aspired to surpass nature.

He sought to make of man something which should be superior to man, and to embellish beauty's self.

David and his scholars were, on the contrary, as good anatomists as they were good painters.

They wonderfully depicted the models which they had before their eyes, but they rarely imagined anything beyond them: they followed nature with fidelity: whilst Raphael sought for something better than nature.