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the civilization of the renaissance in italy-第21部分

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 of an agreeable taste was made use of; which  did not work on the spot; but slowly and gradually; and which could be  mixed without notice in any dish or goblet。 Prince Djem had taken some  of it in a sweet draught; before Alexander surrendered him to Charles  VIII (1495); and at the end of their career father and son poisoned  themselves with the same powder by accidentally tasting a sweetmeat  intended for a wealthy cardinal。 The official epitomizer of the history  of the Popes; Onofrio Panvinio; mentions three cardinals; Orsini;  Ferrerio and Michiel; whom Alexander caused to be poisoned; and hints  at a fourth; Giovanni Borgia; whom Cesare took into his own charge though probably wealthy prelates seldom died in Rome at that time  without giving rise to suspicions of this sort。 Even tranquil scholars  who had withdrawn to some provincial town were not out of reach of the  merciless poison。 A secret horror seemed to hang about the Pope; storms  and thunderbolts; crushing in walls and chambers; had in earlier times  often visited and alarmed him; in the year I 500; when these phenomena  were repeated; they were held to be 'cosa diabolica。' The report of  these events seems at last; through the well…attended jubilee of 1500;  to have been carried far and wide throughout the countries of Europe;  and the infamous traffic in indulgences did what else was needed to  draw all eyes upon Rome。 Besides the returning pilgrims; strange white… robed penitents came from Italy to the North; among them disguised  fugitives from the Papal State; who are not likely to have been silent。  Yet none can calculate how far the scandal and indignation of  Christendom might have gone; before they became a source of pressing  danger to Alexander。 'He would;' says Panvinio elsewhere; 'have put all  the other rich cardinals and prelates out of the way; to get their  property; had he not; in the midst of his great plans for his son; been  struck down by death。' And what might not Cesare have achieved if; at  the moment when his father died; he had not himself been laid upon a  sickbed! What a conclave would that have been; in which; armed with all  his weapons; he had extorted his election from a college whose numbers  he had judiciously reduced by poisonand this at a time when there was  no French army at hand! In pursuing such a hypothesis the imagination  loses itself in an abyss。

Instead of this followed the conclave in which Pius III was elected;  and; after his speedy death; that which chose Julius II both  elections the fruits of a general reaction。

Whatever may have been the private morals of Julius II; in all  essential respects he was the savior of the Papacy。 His familiarity  with the course of events since the pontificate of his uncle Sixtus had  given him a profound insight into the grounds and conditions of the  Papal authority。 On these he founded his own policy; and devoted to it  the whole force and passion of his unshaken soul。 He ascended the steps  of St。 Peter's chair without simony and amid general applause; and with  him ceased; at all events; the undisguised traffic in the highest  offices of the Church。 Julius had favorites; and among them were some  the reverse of worthy; but a special fortune put him above the  temptation to nepotism。 His brother; Giovanni della Rovere; was the  husband of the heiress of Urbino; sister of the last Montefeltro;  Guidobaldo; and from this marriage was born; in 1491; a son; Francesco  Maria della Rovere; who was at the same time Papal 'nipote' and lawful  heir to the duchy of Urbino。 What Julius elsewhere acquired; either on  the field of battle or by diplomatic means; he proudly bestowed on the  Church; not on his family; the ecclesiastical territory; which he found  in a state of dissolution; he bequeathed to his successor completely  subdued; and increased by Parma and Piacenza。 It was not his fault that  Ferrara too was not added the Church。 The 700;000 ducats which were  stored up in the Castel Sant' Angelo were to be delivered by the  governor to none but the future Pope。 He made himself heir of the  cardinals; and; indeed; of all the clergy who died in Rome; and this by  the most despotic means; but he murdered or poisoned none of them。 That  he should himself lead his forces to battle was for him an unavoidable  necessity; and certainly did him nothing but good at a time when a man  in Italy was forced to be either hammer or anvil; and when per…  sonality was a greater power than the most indisputable right。 If  despite all his high…sounding 'Away with the barbarians! ' he  nevertheless contributed more than any man to the firm settlement of  the Spaniards in Italy; he may have thought it a matter of indifference  to the Papacy; or even; as things stood; a relative advantage。 And to  whom; sooner than to Spain; could the Church look for a sincere and  lasting respect; in an age when the princes of Italy cherished none but  sacrilegious projects against her? Be this as it may; the powerful;  original nature; which could swallow no anger and conceal no genuine  good…will; made on the whole the impression most desirable in his  situationthat of the 'Pontefice terribile。' 26 He could even; with  comparatively clear conscience; venture to summon a council to Rome;  and so bid defiance to that outcry for a council which was raised by  the opposition all over Europe。 A ruler of this stamp needed some great  outward symbol of his conceptions; Julius found it in the  reconstruction of St。 Peter's。 The plan of it; as Bramante wished to  have it; is perhaps the grandest expression of power in unity which can  be imagined。 In other arts besides architecture the face and the memory  of the Pope live on in their most ideal form; and it is not without  significance that even the Latin poetry of those days gives proof of a  wholly different enthusiasm for Julius than that shown for his  predecessors。 The entry into Bologna; at the end of the 'Iter Julii  Secundi' by the Cardinal Adriano da Corneto; has a splendor of its own;  and Giovan Antonio Flaminio; in one of the finest elegies; appealed to  the patriot in the Pope to grant his protection to Italy。

In a constitution of his Lateran Council; Julius had solemnly denounced  the simony of the Papal elections。 After his death in 1513; the money… loving cardinals tried to evade the prohibition by proposing that the  endowments and offices hitherto held by the chosen candidate should be  equally divided among themselves; in which case they would have elected  the best…endowed cardinal; the incompetent Raphael Riario。 But a  reaction; chiefly arising from the younger members of the Sacred  College; who; above all things; desired a liberal Pope; rendered the  miserable combination futile; Giovanni Medici was elected the famous  Leo X。

We shall often meet with him in treating of the noonday of the  Renaissance; here we wish only to point out that under him the Papacy  was again exposed to great inward and outward dangers。 Among these we  do not reckon the conspiracy of the Cardinals Petrucci; De Sauli;  Riario; and Corneto (1517); which at most could have occasioned a  change of and to which Leo found the true antidote in the un…heard…of  creation of thirty…one new cardinals; a measure which additional  advantage of rewarding; in some cases at least; real merit。

But some of the paths which Leo allowed himself to tread during the  first two years of his office were perilous to the last degree。 He  seriously endeavored to secure; by negotiation; the kingdom of Naples  for his brother Giuliano; and for his nephew Lorenzo a powerful North  Italian State; to comprise Milan; Tuscany; Urbino and Ferrara。 It is  clear that the Pontifical State; thus hemmed in on all sides; would  have become a mere Medicean appanage; and that; in fact; there would  have been no further need to secularize it。

The plan found an insuperable obstacle in the political conditions of  the time。 Giuliano died early。 To provide for Lorenzo; Leo undertook to  expel the Duke Francesco Maria della Rovere from Urbino; but reaped  from the war nothing but hatred and poverty; and was forced; when in  1519 Lorenzo followed his uncle to the grave; to hand over the hard…won  conquests to the Church。 He did on compulsion and without credit what;  if it had been done voluntarily; would have been to his lasting honour。  What he attempted against Alfonso of Ferrara; and actually achieved  against a few petty despots and Condottieri; was assuredly not of a  kind to raise his reputation。 And this was at a time when the monarchs  of the West were yearly growing more and more accustomed to political  gambling on a colossal scale; of which the stakes were this or that  province of Italy。 Who could guarantee that; since the last decades had  seen so great an increase of their power at home; their ambition would  stop short of the States of the Church? Leo himself witnessed the  prelude of what was fulfilled in the year 1527; a few bands of Spanish  infantry appeared of their own accord; it seems at the end of 1520;  on the borders of the Pontifical territory; with a view to laying the  Pope under contribution; but were driven back by the Papal forces。 The  public feeling; too; against the corruptions of t

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