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When looking at the life of one of history’s greatest men, the lessons we might learn are countless, despite Irving Stone’s fictional twists. Before we can begin to examine The Agony and the Ecstasy, we must understand Michelangelo and other artists as Stone saw them. Stone considered the artist a creator as well as a part of creation, just as God is seen in many of today’s ideologies. Michelangelo’s life can likewise be paralleled to Genesis. At first Michael is lonely and friendless, he then decides to take up and apprenticeship and create works of art just as the Lord yearns to love and creates man. His creation however will face the evils of envy and jealousy just as we must in our everyday-lives. Knowing this we can best point out several themes and ideas one of which is the idea that we are always under the Lord’s watch and that while we may not always notice his deeds he is listening. This idea of God is personified in Bertolodo but may also be seen through Michelangelo’s life itself. Repeatedly he is spared from the anger of unsatisfied customers by the popes (messengers from God). While the popes also seem to cause him troubles however, the reality of the matter is that their imposing actually benefits him