and Germans at length withdrew from the field of battle: Milan, Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, and the sea-coast of Tuscany were firmly possessed by the Spaniards; and it became their interest to maintain the peace and dependence of Italy, which continued almost without disturbance from the middle of the sixteenth to the opening of the eighteenth century. The Vatican was swayed and protected by the religious policy of the Catholic king; his prejudice and interest disposed him in every dispute to support the prince against the people; and, instead of the encouragement, the aid, and the asylum, which they obtained from the adjacent states, the friends of liberty or the enemies of law were inclosed on all sides within the iron circle of despotism. The long habits of obedience and education subdued the turbulent spirit of the nobles and commons of Rome. The barons forgot the arms and factions of their ancestors, and insensibly became the servants of luxury and government. Instead of maintaining a crowd of tenants and followers, the produce of their estates was consumed in the private expenses, which multiply the pleasures, and diminish the power, of the lord. 104 The Colonna and Ursini vied with each other in the decoration of their palaces and chapels; and their antique splendour was rivalled or surpassed by the sudden opulence of the papal families. In Rome the voice of freedom and discord is no longer heard; and, instead of the foaming torrent, a smooth and stagnant lake reflects the image of idleness and servitude) clesiastical A Christian, a philosopher,105 and a patriot will be equally The ecscandalized by the temporal kingdom of the clergy; and the govern local majesty of Rome, the remembrance of her consuls and ment triumphs, may seem to embitter the sense, and aggravate the shame, of her slavery. If we calmly weigh the merits and de from the vicar of Christ; yet the holy character, which would have sanctified his victory, was decently applied to protect his defeat. [For the Popes of the 16th century, see Ranke, History of the Popes, their Church and State (Eng. translations by Kelly, 1843; E. Foster, 3 vols., 1847-8; J. H. Merle d'Aubigne, 2 vols., 1851).] 104 This gradual change of manners and expense is admirably explained by Dr. Adam Smith (Wealth of Nations, vol. i. p. 495-504), who proves, perhaps too severely, that the most salutary effects have flowed from the meanest and most selfish causes. 105 Mr. Hume (Hist. of England, vol. i. p. 389) too hastily concludes that, if the civil and ecclesiastical powers be united in the same person, it is of little moment whether he be styled prince or prelate, since the temporal character will always predominate. Sixtus V. A.D. 15851590 fects of the ecclesiastical government, it may be praised in its present state as a mild, decent, and tranquil system, exempt from the dangers of a minority, the sallies of youth, the expenses of luxury, and the calamities of war. But these advantages are overbalanced by a frequent, perhaps a septennial, election of a sovereign, who is seldom a native of the country; the reign of a young statesman of threescore, in the decline of his life and abilities, without hope to accomplish, and without children to inherit, the labours of his transitory reign. (The successful candidate is drawn from the church, and even the convent; from the mode of education and life the most adverse to reason, humanity, and freedom. In the trammels of servile faith, he has learnt to believe because it is absurd, to revere all that is contemptible, and to despise whatever might deserve the esteem of a rational being; to punish error as a crime, to reward mortification and celibacy as the first of virtues; to place the saints of the calendar 106 above the heroes of Rome and the sages of Athens; and to consider the missal or the crucifix as more useful instruments than the plough or the loom. In the office of nuncio, or the rank of cardinal, he may acquire some knowledge of the world, but the primitive stain will adhere to his mind and manners from study and experience he may suspect the mystery of his profession; but the sacerdotal artist will imbibe some portion of the bigotry which he inculcates. The genius of Sixtus the Fifth 107 burst from the gloom of a Franciscan cloister. In a reign of five years, he exterminated the outlaws and banditti, abolished the profane sanctuaries of Rome,108 formed a 106 A Protestant may disdain the unworthy preference of St. Francis or St. Dominic, but he will not rashly condemn the zeal or judgment of Sixtus V. who placed the statues of the apostles St. Peter and St. Paul on the vacant columns of Trajan and Antonine. 107 A wandering Italian, Gregorio Leti, has given the Vita di Sisto-Quinto (Amstel. 1721, 3 vols. in 12mo), a copious and amusing work, but which does not command our absolute confidence. Yet the character of the man, and the principal facts, are supported by the annals of Spondanus and Muratori (A.D. 15851590), and the contemporary history of the great Thuanus (1. lxxxii. c. 1, 2; 1. lxxxiv. c. 10; 1. c. c. 8). [The source of Leti was a collection of anecdotes, of apocryphal character, entitled Detti e fatti di papa Sisto V., of which the Ms. is in the Corsini library at Rome. This discovery was made by Ranke. See his Sämmtliche Werke, vol. 39, pp. 59-65 (in Appendix to his Lives of the Popes).] 108 These privileged places, the quartieri or franchises, were adopted from the Roman nobles by the foreign ministers. Julius II. had once abolished the abominandum et detestandum franchitiarum hujusmodi nomen; and after Sixtus V. they again revived. I cannot discern either the justice or magnanimity of Louis XIV. who, in 1687, sent his ambassador, the marquis de Lavardin, to Rome, with an naval and military force, restored and emulated the monuments of antiquity, and, after a liberal use and large increase of the revenue, left five millions of crowns in the castle of St. Angelo. But his justice was sullied with cruelty, his activity was prompted by the ambition of conquest: after his decease, the abuses revived; the treasure was dissipated; he entailed on posterity thirty-five new taxes, and the venality of offices; and, after his death, his statue was demolished by an ungrateful or an injured people.109 The wild and original character of Sixtus the Fifth stands alone in the series of the pontiffs: the maxims and effects of their temporal government may be collected from the positive and comparative view of the arts and philosophy, the agriculture and trade, the wealth and population, of the ecclesiastical state. For myself, it is my wish to depart in charity with all mankind; nor am I willing, in these last moments, to offend even the pope and clergy of Rome.110 armed force of a thousand officers, guards, and domestics, to maintain this iniquitous claim, and insult Pope Innocent XI. in the heart of his capital (Vita di Sisto V. tom. iii. p. 260-278; Muratori, Annali d'Italia, tom. xv. p. 494-496; and Voltaire, Siècle de Louis XIV. tom. ii. c. 14, p. 58, 59). 109 This outrage produced a decree, which was inscribed on marble and placed in the Capitol. It is expressed in a style of manly simplicity and freedom: Si quis, sive privatus, sive magistratum gerens de collocandâ vivo pontifici statuâ mentionem facere ausit, legitimo S. P. Q. R. decreto in perpetuum infamis et publicorum munerum expers esto. MDXC. mense Augusto (Vita di Sisto V. tom. iii. p. 469). I believe that this decree is still observed, and I know that every monarch who deserves a statue should himself impose the prohibition. 110 The histories of the church, Italy, and Christendom have contributed to the chapter which I now conclude. In the original Lives of the Popes, we often discover the city and republic of Rome; and the events of the xivth and xvth centuries are preserved in the rude and domestic chronicles which I have carefully inspected, and shall recapitulate in the order of time. 1. Monaldeschi (Ludovici Boncomitis) Fragmenta Annalium Roman. A.D. 1328, 2. Fragmenta Historia Romana (vulgo Thomas Fortifiocca), in Romana 3. Delphini (Gentilis) Diarium Romanum (A.D. 1370-1410), in the Rerum Italica- 4. Antonii (Petri) Diarium Rom. (A.D. 1404-1417), tom. xxiv. p. 969. [See Savignoni, Giornale d'Antonio di Pietro dello Schiavo, in the Arch. della Società Rom. di stor. patr. xiii. p. 295 sqq.] 5. Petroni (Pauli) Miscellanea Historica Romana (A.D. 1433-1446), tom. xxiv. p. 1101. 6. Volaterrani (Jacob.) Diarium Rom. (A.D. 1472-1484), tom. xxiii. p. 81. 7. Anonymi Diarium Urbis Romæ (A.D. 1481-1492), tom. iii. p. ii. p. 1069. 9. Historia Arcana Alexandri VI. sive Excerpta ex Diario Joh. Burcardi (A.D. Except the last, all these fragments and diaries are inserted in the Collections of Muratori, my guide and master in the history of Italy. His country and the public are indebted to him for the following works on that subject: 1. Rerum Italicarum Scriptores (A.D. 500-1500), quorum potissima pars nunc primum in lucem prodit, &c. xxviii. vols. in folio, Milan, 1723-1738, 1751. A volume of chronological and alphabetical tables is still wanting as a key to this great work, which is yet in a disorderly and defective state. [After the lapse of nearly a century and a half this great Collection has been supplied with Chronological Indices by J. Calligaris and others Indices Chronologici ad Script. Rer. Ital., 1885. A new ed. of the collection, by Carducci and Fiorini, is in course of publication, 1900-] 2. Antiquitates Italiæ medii Ævi, vi. vols. in folio, Milan, 1738-1743, in lxxv. curious dissertations on the manners, government, religion, &c. of the Italians of the darker ages, with a large supplement of charters, chronicles, &c. [Also published in 17 quarto volumes at Arezzo, 1777-80. Chronological Indexes have been prepared to this work too by Battaglino and Calligaris, 1889, &c.] 3. Dissertazioni sopra le Antiquità Italiane, ii. vols. in 4to, Milano, 1751, a free version by the author, which may be quoted with the same confidence as the Latin text of the Antiquities. 4. Annali d'Italia, xviii. vols. in octavo, Milan, 1753-1756, a dry, though accurate and useful, abridgment of the history of Italy, from the birth of Christ to the middle of the xviiith century. 5. Dell' Antichità Estense ed Italiane, ii. vols. in folio, Modena, 1717, 1740. In the history of this illustrious race, the parent of our Brunswick kings, the critic is not seduced by the loyalty or gratitude of the subject. In all his works, Muratori proves himself a diligent and laborious writer, who aspires above the prejudices of a Catholic priest. He was born in the year 1672, and died in the year 1750, after passing near sixty years in the libraries of Milan and Modena (Vita del Proposto Ludovico Antonio Muratori, by his nephew and successor, Gian. Francesco Soli Muratori, Venezia, 1756, in 4to). [Several biographies of Muratori have appeared since, e.g. by Reina in 1819; by Brigidi in 1871. In 1872, the centenary of his birth, were published: Belviglieri, La vita, le opere, i tempi di L. A. Muratori ; and Roncaglia, Vita di L. A. Mur.] |