No. 1404.-April 29, 1871.

CONTENTS.

1. THE BORGIAS AND THEIR LATEST HISTORIAN, North British Review,
2. SEED-TIME AND HARVEST: or, DURING MY AP-
PRENTICESHIP. Part XVIII. Translated for
The Living Age from the Platt-Deutsch
of.

259

Fritz Reuter,.

269

Fortnightly Review,

278

Saint Pauls, .

290

300

304

308

8. THE ETHICS OF SUCCESS,

9. THE DIGNITY OF MAN,

10. THE IDEA IN THE REVOLT,

11. FRUITS OF IMPERIALISM,

13. AN ANCIENT BUDDHIST INSCRIPTION,

The publishers are in want of Nos. 1179 and 1180 (dated respectively Jan. 5th and Jan. 12th, 1867) of THE LIVING AGE. To subscribers, or others, who will do us the favor to send us either or both of those numbers, we will return an equivalent, either in our publications or in cash, until our wants are supplied.

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A SPRING PSALM.

"SWEET primal season, effluence divine!
Thou bright perennial from the fields of life!
Make earth once more thy consecrated shrine,
And hush the tumult of tempestuous strife.
"Come, as of old, with vivifying breath,

Pearl, blue, and silver, sunny sky, and cloud,
And Beauty, springing from the bed of death,
Shall break the trammels of her icy shroud."

The hills are touched, and, lo! their summits smoke,

The sea-fowl seek again their native strand; The hawthorns redden underneath the oak, Broad rivers laugh, and greener grows the land.

Deep in the dell the wild bee's harp is heard, High in the azure Heaven's own minstrel sings;

Impassioned music fires the forest bird,

While tremulous raptures vibrate in his wings.

The flowers are all devotion, Nature's nun

In snow-veil drops her head in silent prayer; With conscious joy the crocus greets the sun, And fragrant with thanksgiving is the air.

A holier impulse stirs in every soul

With each new revelation from above;
Thou Spring, art one, we yield to thy control,
And hear creation whisper, "God is Love."
Gentleman's Magazine.

SUNLIGHT.

A BLUE haze in the distance lies,

Caught out of pain, its beating done for aye.
For ever? While the unknown ages roll.
More lonely now we stad: another link

Is loosed, that bound us to this cold white world.
To God be thanks for all: to Him all dear

All hearts: so runs the word. In this our grief
We feel His love, like rose-light on the snow.

The crisp green meadows are newly shorn, We grieve to think the snow will cover him

Cloudlets drift in the Summer skies,

Birds are loud in the fragrant thorn.

The leaves, like lovers, kiss in the breeze;
And over the fields of glossy wheat,
Like ripples glancing on sunny seas,
Light winds dance on their fairy feet.
The river, glimmering to the sun,

Like a forest of Templar lances shows,
Motionless as a kneeling nun,

The gray spire shines from cottage rows. Swifter than swallow down the wind,

O'er the bridge, and through the vale, The engine rushes, and far behind Wreaths of luminous vapour sail.

To one long pent in city lane,

Noting the Spring by slow degrees;
Of Summer little but warmth and rain,
What magic in such morns as these!
The breast expands, as to night dew,
Wood violets spring in haunts of dove,
Hope brightens to her brightest hue,
And the heart glows with faith and love.
Dublin University Magazine.

Our brother, sleeping by the grey old spire,
Where gravestone shadows mark the circling

hours:

A causeless grief: nor sun nor snow can harm.
To us this sorrow, but to him repose
And those rich gifts a Saviour sent confers.
So will we hope; and by the time-worn spire
Leave him, near her he loved, with God alone.
Dublin University Magazine.

TRANSLATION FROM DANTE.
FORTH from the fold as troop a flock of sheep,
By one, two, three; while th' others still
stand by,

Timid, and low aground their faces keep,
And with the leader all at once comply;
Stop, if she stops, quick huddling to her
side,

Simple and still; nor know the reason why;
So saw I those advance, who foremost guide
The movements of that life-predestin'd flock,
In mien so chaste, in step so dignified.
Ford's Translation of Dante's Divina Commedia.

From The North British Review. THE BORGIAS AND THEIR LATEST

HISTORIAN.

him appeared only a few years ago. But the
pontificate of Alexander VI. is described
with elaborate care, and occupies great
part of the volume. These chapters are
among the best and most solid that Gre-
gorovius has written. Continuous reports
by the envoys of Florence, Venice, and
Ferrara at the court of Rome enable him
to emancipate himself from the trivial
diarists on whom every writer since Ray-
naldus has been obliged to depend for the
secret history of the Vatican.
He is so
well supplied with unpublished documents,
and he employs them with so little regard
for purposes of vulgar controversy, that
his estimate of Alexander, which contra-
dicts the unanimous judgment of all the
contemporaries of the Pope, cannot be put
aside, at once and without examination,
among historical paradoxes. Alexander
VI. is described by his latest historian as
a man whose everyday mediocrity reflects
the sinfulness of a godless age, whose mo-
tives were the love of pleasure and the
advancement of his family, who had neither
political capacity nor serious design, and
whose nature was too frivolous and too
passive even for ambition. *

THE Renaissance is the only epoch of history that has equal charms for idle and for thoughtful men, and stands in visibly intimate connection with the civilization of the present time, yet beyond the range of its controversies. The interest it awakens is undisturbed by the contests that immediately followed it. Neither religious nor political differences affect the feelings with which men regard the age to which they owe the knowledge of Pagan, of Jewish, and of Christian antiquity, the formation of modern literature, and the perfection of art. The degradation which Italy suffered under native tyrants cannot prevent the pride with which she remembers the days of her national independence and her intellectual supremacy. Stores of new materials continue to be produced in uninterrupted profusion by patriotic scholars; and the way in which they modify the aspects of the fifteenth century is shown in several recent works. Zeller's Italie et Renaissance and Reumont's Geschichte der Stadt Rom, mark the progress which has been made beyond the This excessive depreciation of a man range of Roscoe and Sismondi. Both are whose talents and success were the adwell-written books; and the authors are miration of Europe in his time is not due perfectly familiar with the spirit of those to an irrelevant indignation at his debrilliant times. Burckhardt's Cultur der pravity, but to the historian's habit of Renaissance in Italien is the most penetrat- avoiding the ecclesiastical part of his subing and subtle treatise on the history of ject. Looking at secular and profane things civilization that exists in literature; but its only, he does not see that Alexander fills merit lies in the originality with which a great space in history, because he so the author uses common books, rather blended his spiritual and temporal authorthan in actually new investigations. The ity as to apply the resources of the one last traveller over the ground is Gregoro-to the purposes of the other. The strain

vius.

The seventh volume of his History of Mediæval Rome virtually completes his task, for it reaches the beginning of the sixteenth century. Another volume will include the age of Leo X., and terminate with the siege and devastation of the city in 1527. The work gains in breadth and variety as it proceeds: and at times it is little less than a history of the Popes. The treatment is unequal. Pius II., the ablest and most interesting pontiff of the fifteenth century, receives but little attention, probably because a voluminous life of

which his policy as an Italian sovereign laid on his power in the Church was fruitful of consequences in the next generation, and for all later times. His energy in making the prerogative of the Holy See profitable and exchangeable in the political market was an almost immediate cause

* In Wahrheit zeigt es sich, wie gewohnlich und Pontifikat zeigt keine einzige grosse Idee weder in klein dieser Mensch gewesen ist. . . . Sein ganzer Kirche noch Staat. . . . Nichts von jenem rastlosen Thatendrange und Herrschersinn eines Sixtus IV. oder Julius II. erscheint in der wollustigen und pas1500-502..

siven Natur dieses kleinen Genussmenschen. - Pp.

of the revolt of Northern Europe. The very countenance was divine. The golden system which Luther assailed was the sys-age came back again: Astræa returned to tem which Alexander VI. had completed earth at his accession. It was really beand bequeathed to his successors. It was lieved that he would be a glorious pontiff.* his work and example that Adrian meant Ferrante of Naples and Ferdinand of Arato repudiate when he attributed the cor-gon were hostile to him from the beginruption of the Church to the recent usur- ning; but in many countries the illusion pations and immorality of the Papacy. was not dispelled until the cardinals who And Julius II. attempted to liberate the had refused his bribes published his iniChurch from the responsibility of his acts quity. Julian della Rovere, afterwards by declaring that a Pope elected by si- Pope Julius II., insisted that a Council mony could never become legitimate. † should be summoned in order to judge him. †

*

The leading fact that governs his whole pontificate is the notorious invalidity of The idea was taken up by the Court of his election. There had been no hypocri- France, when the Pope appointed one of sy in the transaction; and all Europe was his kinsmen to the archbishopric of Rouen, able to learn the exact sums that he whilst the chapter elected George d'Amhad paid or promised to his supporters, boise.‡ The ministers boasted that the and even to their attendants. His seat King possessed an infallible means of subnever became secure. His right was per-jugating Alexander, by calling a Council.§ manently threatened. The shadow of an Charles VIII. claimed the crown of Naples, impending Council darkened his life and and threatened, if investiture should be ruined his authority. He was obliged to create for himself the power which belonged in theory to his See. He could not have held his position without perpetual activity and effort.

He was hailed at first with flattery so general and excessive that it must have been more than conventional. Men said that he was more than human, that he surpassed all mankind in righteousness, that the splendour of Christ himself shone forth when he ascended the throne. His

* Scimus in hac sancta Sede aliquot jam annis multa abominanda fuisse, abusus in spiritualibus, excessus in mandatis, et omnia denique in perversum mutata. (Indicat hic optimus Pontifex ea, quæ nos in Alexandro VI. deploravimus;) nec mirum si ægritudo a capite in membra, a summis Pontificibus in alios inferiores prælatos descenderit. — Raynaldus, Annales Ecclesiastici, 1522, 70.

+ Contra dictum sic electum vel assumptum de simoniaca labe a quocumque Cardinali, qui eidem electioni interfuerit, opponi et excipi possit, sicut de vera et indubitata hæresi.- Raynaldus, 1506, 1.

Politian, speaking in the name of Siena, said: Præstans animi magnitudo, qua mortales crederes omnes antecellere - Magna quædam de te nobis rara, ardua, singularia, incredibilia, inaudita pollicentur. The Orator of Lucca: Quid iste tuus divinus et majestate plenus aspectus? The Genoese: Adeo virtutum gloria et disciplinarum laude, et vitæ sanctimonia decoraris, et adeo singularum, ac omnium rerum ornamento dotaris, quæ talem summam ac venerandam dignitatem præbeant, ut valde ab omnibus ambigendum sit, tu ne magis pontificatui, an illa tibi sacratissima et gloriosissima Papatus dignitas offerenda fuerit.- Ciaconius, Vitæ Pont. iii. 152, 159. The Venetian Senate rejoiced: Prop

refused, to depose the Pope, not by force, but by canonical proof that he was a heretic and an intruder. When Alexan

ter divinas virtutes et dotes quibus ipsum insignitum et ornatum conspiciebamus, videbatur a divina providentia talem pastorem regi, dominio et sacrosanctæ romanæ ecclesiæ vicarium suum fuisse delectum et præordinatum. — Romanin, Storia di Venezia, v. 10. The Archbishop of Colocza wrote: Omnes id satis exploratum habent, mitiorem Pontificem nec optari, nec creari potuisse, cui tantum sapientiæ, probitatis, experientiæ, ac integritatis est, quantuin in quovis alio unquam audiverimus.- Petrus de Warda Epistolæ, 33. A priest of Parma wrote: Hominem non dicam, sed divinum hominem, magnanimum pietate gravem ac meritis sapientissimum, ingenio præstantem, consiliis et sententiis probatissimum, omnibus denique virtutibus ornatissimum.

↑ Dicesi che sara glorioso pontefice.- Manfredi to the Duchess of Ferrara, Aug. 17, 1492: Atti e Memorie, iv. 323.

Quid enim felicis recordationis Alexandro VI. Romano Pontifici prædecessori nostro magis nos odiosos fecit, nisi studium et cura generalis concilii celebrandi? Quid nos terra marique jactavit, cum nobis idem Alexander prædecessor esset infensus? quid toties Alpes transcendere transalpinas, Gallias peragrare per æstus, nives et glacies compulit, nisi quod nitebamur, ut a Romano Pontifice concilium indiceretur, convocaretur et celebraretur? - Raynaldus, 1511, 10.

* Sdegnati di questa collazione contro del Papa, il Rè tenne il di medesimo gran consiglio, dove furono proposte e trattate piu cose contro del Papa, in riformazione della chiesa.- Desp. of Aug. 31, 1493: Canestrini, Négociations avec la Toscane, i. 249. † Venetian despatch of the same month of August, in Romanin, v. 33.

Soggiungeva che rifiutando le cose che ricer cava, considerasse bene essere a Carlo cosa libera,

der took the side of the house of Aragon, I cannon were pointed against the fort; and and the French invaded Italy, his pros- part of the walls suddenly gave way. pects seemed hopeless. He expected to When it seemed that nothing could save be deposed.* The Cardinal of Siena, whom he sent to mollify the king of France, could not obtain an audience, and wrote to warn his master of the approaching danger.t The French intended to summon a Council at Ferrara to sit in judgment on the Pope; and they believed that the consciousness of his guilt would make him pliable. § They occupied Rome without resistance. Alexander shut himself up in St. Angelo with a small group of faithful prelates; but the majority of the cardinals were urging the King to depose him. The instrument pronouncing his deposition was drawn up; ¶ French

† Aiunt etiam multo vulgo inter alios iactari, regem Romam venturum et statum Romanæ Ecclesiæ reformaturum.- Piccolomini to Alexander, Lucca, Nov. 4. 1494.

Le quali cose sono di qualita, secondo che me concluso dicto oratore (the French envoy at Florence), che daranno materia al prefato Re Christ: de fare praticha con qualche Cardinale, come gia se fece, de chiamare Sua Santita a Concilio, dicendomi che el credeva che non passariano molti giorni che'l se ordinaria dicto Concilio, et de farlo a Ferrara, dove pare che se debba fare per omni rispecto. Et a questo gli è molto inclinata prefata Regia Mta.Manfredi to Duke of Ferrara, February 16, 1495: Atti e Memorie, iv. 341.

§ Crediamo che la Santita di nostro Signore, il quale di sua natura è vile e è conscius criminis sui ancora de facili si potrebbe ridurre alle cose oneste, per dubio delle cose di qua.- Florentine Desp., Lyons, June 6, 1494: Canestrini, i. 399. Eulx deux (Borgia and Sforza) estoient a l'envy qui seroit Pape. Toutesfois, je croy qu' ilz eussent consenty tous deux d'en faire ung nouveau au plaisir du Roy, et encores d'en faire ung francois.- Comines, Mémoires, ii. 386. Nostre Saint l'ère est plus tenu au roy qu'on ne pense, car si ledit seigneur eust voulu obtemperer a la plupart de Messeigneurs les Cardinaulx, ilz eus. sent fait ung autre pappe en intention de refformer léglise ainsi qu'ilz disaient.- Briconnet to the Queen of France, Rome, Jan. 13, 1495: De la Pilorgerie, Campagne d'Italie, 135.

This was stated by Paul IV.: Sua Santita entro a deplorar le miserie d'Italia, et narro l'historia dal principio che fu chiamato Rè Carlo in Italia da Lu

Alexander, Charles relented and made terms with him. The reforming cardinals quitted Rome, indignant at the failure of their design. As the Pope instantly broke the treaty that had been forced upon him, Briçonnet himself thought that the King would proceed to extremities against him on his return from Naples.* Alexander escaped by flight. He afterwards said that Charles had been restrained from acts of violence by the piety of his courtiers; † but the language of Briçonnet and Comines proves that the opinion of the French camp was in favour of a bolder policy, and the King had not courage to attempt it. When he was gone, and the danger was over, Alexander excommunicated him. Shortly before he died, the Sorbonne exhorted him to convoke a Council, and accomplish the reforms which the Pope persisted in refusing.

Under his successor, Lewis XII., the plan was revived. The Cardinal d'Amboise opened negotiations with Ferdinand and Maximilian with a view to a new elec

dovico Moro et Alfonso d'Aragona, con li particolari del parentado fra questi due, la causa dell' inimicitia, il passar Rè Carlo per Roma, la paura di Papa Alessandro di esser deposto, come publicamente dicevano li Cardinali che vennero co❜l Rè tra quali erano S. Pietro in Vincola, che fu poi Giulio Secondo; che furno fatti li capitoli della privatione da un Vicentino Vescovo di [illegible], all' hora auditor della Camera.- Desp. of B. Navagero, Rome, May 23, 1577: Ms. Foscarini, 6255.

* Divinendo in ragionamento col Card. de S. Malo (Briconnet) del facto del Papa, sua Revma Sigria me disse che il Re chmo non ne remaneva cum quella bona satisfactione che'l sperava, havendose portato non troppe bene in queste pratiche de Spagne, etc., concluendo dicto Carde che'l dubitava assai, che, finita che fosse questa impresa del Reame, de Napoli, la Mta del Re non se desponesse a pigliare qualche expediente per reformare la chiesa, parendogli che'l sia molto necessario, vedendosi come sono gubernate le cose della chiesa et sede apostolica.- Manfredi to Duke of Ferrara, Feb. 25, 1495: Atti e Memorie, iv. 342.

† Adducendo su questo proposito quello che accadette al Christianissimo Re Carlo quando andava in lo reame: che avendo pur contra sua santita malo animo, non solo fu consentito per il Sigri francesi che ageret contra eam, ma fu necessitato ad inclinarseli et basarli lo pede, et tenerli la staffa in mezo la fango.- Desp. of Saracini to Dnke of Ferrara, Rome, Oct. 27, 1501.