But among these many-sided men, some, who may truly be called all-
sided, tower above the rest. Before analyzing the general phases of
life and culture of this period, we may here, on the threshold of the
fifteenth century, consider for a moment the figure of one of these
giants -- Leon Battista Alberti (b. 1404, d. 1472). His biography,
which is only a fragment, speaks of him but little as an artist , and
makes no mention at all of his great significance in the history of
architecture. We shall now see what he was, apart from these special
claims to distinction.
In all by which praise is won, Leon Battista was from his childhood the
first. Of his various gymnastic feats and exercises we read with
astonishment how, with his feet together, he could spring over a man's
head; how in the cathedral, he threw a coin in the air till it was
heard to ring against the distant roof; how the wildest horses trembled
under him. In three things he desired to appear faultless to others, in
walking, in riding, and in speaking. He learned music without a master,
and yet his compositions were admired by professional judges. Under the
pressure of poverty, he studied both civil and canonical law for many
years, till exhaustion brought on a severe illness. In his twenty-
fourth year, finding his memory for words weakened, but his sense of
facts unimpaired, he set to work at physics and mathematics.
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