This is much more in the strain of fanciful passionless ideality (like Petrarch's mistress, and his praises of her), than warm, ingenuous, honest love, "whose dwelling is the heart of man," and whose language is that of nature, which all may understand who ever knew affection. In the same vein of ingenious artificial compliment and conceit (often, indeed, elegant and captivating to the mind at ease, and amusing itself with love in idleness) are the Elegies, Sonnets, and Madrigals of Ariosto;—all calculated more to set off the beauties of his Muse than of his mistress; and rather to command admiration of himself, than to do honour to her, whom, though a divinity in song, and adored with magnificent rites, he worships with nearly as little devotion as an idol deserves. Of the following sonnet (the nineteenth in the series), Paolo Rolli says, "non è stata mai scritta poesia più sublime,"—"poetry more sublime was never written." It would be hard to persuade any Englishman of this.

The foregoing version has been rendered as little paraphrastic as might be (though the eighth line is interpolated); but all rhymed translations from the Italian, in the same number of lines as the original, must be encumbered either with additional thought or verbiage—our language being altogether more brief in syllabic composition.

The society of Ariosto was courted by the learned and the polite; not for his wit and intelligence only, but for the privilege of hearing his latest compositions, as they came warm from his mind, or were gradually wrought to perfection by that patient labour for which he was distinguished, and to which he is indebted for as much of his glory as to the creative energy of his genius itself. For when he had originated, by force of invention, his most admired performances, he never ceased to improve them afterwards by touches innumerable, exquisite, and undiscerned by ordinary eyes, till the art which effected the changes at length disappeared in its own consummation, and those seemed to be the first thoughts in the first words, which were really the last transmigrations of the former through the latter. No poet of any age has more inseparably identified his conceptions with his language than Ariosto; in fact, his ideas themselves are so vernacular, that they can scarcely be made to speak any other than their native tongue; they defy translation. Nothing, indeed, can be easier than to render the literal meaning in dictionary terms; yet nothing less resembling the original in all that constitutes its prime excellence—grace, freedom, and simplicity—can be imagined than these. Of the "Orlando Furioso" there are three English versions: that by sir John Harrington, in the reign of queen Elizabeth, is coarse, careless, and unfaithful; that of Hoole, about fifty years ago, tame, diffuse, and prosaic; the recent one by W. S. Rose, esq., elegant, spirited, and probably as true to the text as any readable paraphrase can be under the difficulties aforementioned.

While this magnificently wild and sportive work was in progress, and after its first publication, during the refining process through which it was continually passing till the last year of his own life, the poet was accustomed to read, at the courts of Hippolito and Alfonso, and in other favoured circles, the cantos as they were produced, revised, or had received their final polish. This accounts partly for the manner in which the hundredfold story is told,—not as recorded in a book, but as delivered spontaneously before princes and prelates, scholars and gentry, assembled to listen to the marvellous adventures of knights and ladies, giants and enchanters, from the lips of the gifted narrator. Ariosto excelled in the practice of reading aloud, whether the subjects were his own, or those of his illustrious predecessors or contemporaries; to which his melodious voice, distinct utterance, and versatile spirit gave peculiar emphasis and animation. This accomplishment was of great value after the revival of letters, when books were scarce, and authors depended, for pecuniary recompence, more upon the gratuities of patrons, than upon honourable profits from extensive sales of their writings. But though he was thus master of the rarest art of speech,—good reading, especially of verse, being seldomer attained (perhaps because it is less duly appreciated) than eloquent declamation,—he was never forward either to begin, by obtruding it upon his friends for his own gratification, nor slow to leave off when he had wearied himself for others. As his ear was nice, and his taste pure in this respect, he was proportionately offended by indifferent, vulgar, or boisterous recitation. The story is told of him, that one day, passing a potter's shop, he heard the unlettered artisan singing, in harsh and ill-accented numbers, a stave of the "Orlando." According to sir John Harrington, it was the thirty-second in the first canto[109],—and this will do as well as any other in a questionable tale,—in which Rinaldo tries to catch his horse, with as little success as many a groom and gentleman has done before and since. The poet, as little able to keep his temper as his hero on the occasion, rushed among the crockery, smashing now one piece, then another, on the right hand and on the left, with his walking-stick. The potter, half paralised and half frantic, hastily, yet hesitatingly, enquired why the gentleman should thus injure a poor fellow who had done him no harm? No harm, man?" replied the enraged author, "I am scarcely even with thee yet: I have cracked three or four wretched jugs of thine, not worth a groat, and thou hast been mangling and murdering a stanza of mine worth a mark of gold!" Unluckily for the credit of this sally of professional petulance, the same anecdote has been told of Camoens, the Portuguese, who lived half a century later; and something like it of Philoxenus, who lived nearly 2000 years earlier. Yet the tradition concerning Ariosto may be true; who, remembering the classic precedent, might choose to follow it in a case where no redress could be looked for, except from taking the law into his own hands. At the worst, such an outrage must have been a piece of caustic pleasantry; and it may be taken for granted, that the sufferer was well compensated for having afforded the poet no very disagreeable opportunity of indulging his humour; since, however the learned may pretend to despise the opinions of the multitude, there is scarcely any proof of fame more flattering to the proudest aspirant, than a cross-wind of popular applause. Cervantes, who well understood the secrets of a poet's breast, goes farther, and, with consummate propriety, makes the student, whose verses had been commended to the skies by Don Quixote, say within himself,—"How sweet is praise, even from the lips of a madman!"

Of Ariosto's personal habits, some whimsical peculiarities have been mentioned, not worth repeating, except to gratify the very natural curiosity—call it impertinent who will—which most readers feel to learn all that they can about a favourite author. He himself confesses that he could scarcely distinguish the different kinds of food; and it has been already seen that he was in the practice of eating voraciously.—A friend, who had invited him to an entertainment for the diversion of the company, ordered a roasted kite to be palmed upon him for a partridge. By the blunder of a servant, the carrion was set before a nicer guest, who smelled the joke, if he did not relish it, and the poet escaped the savoury snare.—A stranger, calling upon him once when he had just sat down to dinner, Ariosto eagerly ate up all the "short commons" which had been provided, while the other was entertaining him with most excellent discourse. Being afterwards reproved by his brother for lack of hospitality, he coolly replied,—"The loss was the gentleman's own; he should have taken care of himself." His rudeness and hurry at table were attributed principally to fits of rumination or absence of mind; and if he sometimes over-satisfied his appetite, he did not usually indulge it with more than one meal a day.

Quite in consonance with the poet's reveries were his raptures of execution. After wandering in a day-dream of thought, he would suddenly sit down and disburthen his overcharged brain with effusions of song, that seemed as spontaneous as spring showers that fall in gusts through broad sunshine, though they have been long collecting in the zenith; or, he would start from "a brown study" at midnight, and call upon his servant Gianni to bring pen, ink, and paper immediately, that he might fix, before they vanished for ever, the imaginations which had charmed him in his trance. The "Orlando" thus appeared to come to him, canto by canto, as the Koran to Mahomet; and no doubt the one was as truly inspired as the other. His early reading had so filled and fertilised his mind, that he subsisted in thought almost exclusively on the inexhaustible harvests perpetually produced from the remembrances of that; and in his latter years was so indolent, or so indifferent a searcher of the writings of others, that he frequently passed weeks without turning over the pages of any except his own,—in which, like the spider, he seemed to have a personal existence; so diffusing himself through them, that it might be said of him, that, not with a touch only, "exquisitely fine," he could "feel the whole thread," but also "live along the line."

In his last hours, he is represented as maintaining his philosophical tranquillity,—neither affecting stoical sternness, nor the hideous jocularity of some, who, to hide their misgivings, die "as a fool dieth." He professed to leave the world without much regret—having never, indeed, been very well satisfied with his portion in it; and, believing that in a future state men would know each other, he observed, that he should be happy to meet many whom he loved, and who had gone before him. How content to die in the dark are men of the highest faculties, and otherwise of the most inquisitive minds, who have never known, or who have rejected, the truth of that Gospel by which life and immortality were brought to light!

As might be expected on the demise of one so celebrated for genius, sonnets, elegies, and epitaphs in abundance were composed and published to his honour. His body was buried in the church of the Benedictines at Ferrara, when the monks of that order, contrary to their usual reserve, accompanied the funeral procession: a plain slab of marble being laid over the grave, was presently over-run with Greek, Latin, and Italian verses, as the natural products of so poetical a spot. His son Virginio afterwards prepared a chapel and sepulchre for his parent, in the garden of the house which he had himself built, and where he had spent many of his last and happiest days. But the good fathers had such reverence for the relics of a poet, who certainly was any thing rather than a saint, and whom no pope would canonise, that they would not allow their removal. In process of time. Agostino Mosti, a man of letters, who in early life was a disciple of the deceased, seeing no memorial worthy of his master's fame erected, at his own expense caused a tablet (worthy at least of himself) to be placed in the aforesaid church of the Benedictines, with a bust upon the tomb beneath, and a Latin inscription by Lorenzo Fiesoli. A monument more superb was erected, nearly a century later, by Ludovico his grand-nephew, bearing also a Latin inscription. Neither of these, nor even that which the poet composed in the same language for himself, need be inserted here; the two former being in the common-place style of posthumous panegyric, and the latter quaint and puerile, though of sufficient significance to have been imitated by Pope, with reckless profaneness, in the ribald lines which he wrote for himself.

The house which he built (as formerly mentioned), with its humble inscription, is yet shown as a monument more interesting to the eye of the enthusiastic admirer of the poet, than any marble effigies, however gorgeously or exquisitely wrought, could be: it brings the spectator into personal contact with himself, by local and domestic association. But in this respect, the chair in which he was wont to meditate; and the inkstand from which he filled his pen to disburthen his thoughts, when they flowed, as they did at times, like the juice of full ripe grapes from their own pressure,—if these relics are genuine,—must be incomparably the most touching and inspiring memorials of his life and his labours.

Of Ariosto's grand performance, it would be vain to sketch the outline, or enter into formal criticism here: sufficient indications of the present biographer's estimate of the author's powers and style of composition have been already given. It would be idle and hopeless to censure or carp at particulars, where little can be commended beyond the talent with which a web of wonders and horrors (the easiest and cheapest products of invention) has been so skilfully woven into poetical tapestry, as not only to invest the most preposterous fictions with the vividness of reality, but to charm or conciliate readers of all classes, from those of the severest taste to those most akin to mere animal appetite; disarming the indignation of the former by exquisite playfulness, and transporting the latter by that marvellous intrepidity of fibbing to which many a minstrel and romancer was formerly indebted for his popularity. The fact is, that though, with inimitable gravity, Ariosto tells story after story (or rather story within story), deserving no better appellation than that which his patron Hippolito bestowed upon his fictions when he asked, "Messer Ludovico, dove avete cogliate tante coglionere?" "Where, master Ludovico, have you picked up so many fooleries?" yet Cervantes himself had not a keener sense of ridicule, nor in his happiest sallies was he more expert in humour or irony, than this "prince of liars," as the curate in "Don Quixote" designates a certain traveller. He describes, indeed, every scene, event, and character throughout his world of nonentities, as they might have been described, had they been actual and not imaginary: yet it is frequently manifest, that, while he appears to be writing romance, he is composing satire; and though he delights in prodigies for their own sake, yet, wherever they exceed the probable of the marvellous, he is not only alive to their absurdity, but rejoices to expose it, and turn extravagance itself into pleasantry.

In canto XXVI., Rinaldo, Ricciardetto, and Ruggiero, assisted by Marphisa (whom, in her martial accoutrements, they do not perceive to be a woman of war), massacre, without let or hindrance, two bodies of Moors and Magauzes, whom they surprise at market together. This, in plain prose, is the style in which the butchery is described:—"Marphisa, as she fought by their side, often turned her eyes towards her companions in arms; and witnessing with wonder their rival achievements, she extolled them all in turn: but the stupendous prowess of Ruggiero, especially, appeared to her without example in the world; so that she was ready to imagine him Mars, who had descended from the fifth heaven to that quarter. She beheld his terrible strokes; she beheld them falling never in vain: it seemed as though, against Balisarda (his sword), iron was paper, and not hard metal; for it split helmets and strong cuirasses; it cleft riders down to their saddles, throwing one half of the man on the right hand, the other on the left; and not stopping there, the same blow slew the horse with his lord. Heads from their shoulders it hurled into the air, and often cut sheer the trunk from the loins; five, and even more, with one motion it sometimes despatched; and if I did not fear that truth would not find credit, but be taken for a lie, I could tell greater things: it is, therefore, expedient rather to tell less than I might. The good archbishop Turpin, who knows very well that he speaks the truth, and leaves every one to believe it or not as he pleases, relates such marvellous feats of Ruggiero, that, hearing them repeated, you would say they were falsehoods. Before Marphisa, every warrior seemed to be ice, and she consuming flame: nor did she less attract the eyes of Ruggiero towards herself, than he had won hers to him; and if she deemed him to be Mars, he might have thought her to be Bellona, had he as well known her to be a lady as her appearance indicated the contrary. Perhaps the emulation then begotten between them, was no good thing for those miserable people, on whose flesh, blood, bones, and sinews, proof was made how much each could do."

Now, what sympathy can be felt in such unequal conflicts? No more, verily, than with the fate and fortunes of the elephants and castles, the kings, queens, bishops, knights, and commonalty on a chess-board, in a game between an adept and a novice, which is up in a few moments, neither exalting the winner nor disparaging the loser, nor affecting life, limb, character, or feeling in regard to one of the puppets employed in the play. Of the same class are all the combats between invulnerable heroes, and those who wield weapons of enchantment: the irresistible spear of Bradamante, that unhorsed every antagonist whom it touched; the magic horn of Astolpho, that routed armies with a blast; Ruggiero's veiled shield, the dazzling splendour of which, when suddenly disclosed, struck with blindness and astonishment all eyes that beheld it. Of the latter, the author himself grows weary or ashamed, and makes his hero so too; though, with remarkable dexterity, he turns into a glorious act of heroic virtue, the voluntary riddance of it by the indignant Ruggiero, who throws it into a hidden well, in a nameless forest in an undiscovered land, after having won too cheap a victory by its accidental exposure. In these two instances (and many others might be quoted), Ariosto laughs at his own extravagances, with as much pleasantry as Cervantes himself at those of others: and it may, perhaps, be affirmed that he does it with more tact and good sense, for it must be acknowledged that few outrages upon nature in the tales of chivalry, which the Spaniard justly ridicules, are felt by the reader to be more improbable than the crazy imitations of them by the knight of La Mancha, whose pranks could only be attempted by one absolutely insane, and therefore were as little a fair mark for satire as for censure. Ariosto has this advantage over Cervantes,—that whatever is great, glorious, or admirable in romance, he can seriously set forth in all the pomp and eloquence of verse of the highest species; while whatever is mean, farcical, or monstrous, he can exhibit in strains of facetiousness, at once as grave and as poignant as those in which the celebrated assault on the windmills, the rout of the sheep, or the gross sensuality of Sancho Panza, are given, without descending into caricature; though no small portion of his whole poem belongs to the grotesque, and happily the plan admits of every variety of style from Homer to Lucian.

Neither the dulness nor the licence of allegory can be pleaded in extenuation of those unnatural circumstances, in which absurdity is at once exemplified and ridiculed, as though the caprice of genius delighted as much in the offence against taste as in the castigation of it. Allegorical, indeed, some of his fancies notoriously are; but those who have attempted to "moralise" the "fierce wars and faithful loves" of his song, as many have done (and few more egregiously than sir John Harrington, in the quaint essay annexed to his barbarous translation), might have employed their time as profitably in raking moonshine out of water, which flies off into millions of sparkles the moment it is disturbed, but is no sooner let alone than it subsides into the quiet and beautiful image of the orb above, which it showed before. It cannot be said of Ariosto, as Addison, in a miserable couplet, says of Spenser—

The moral may be there, but it would require a diviner's rod to detect its presence, and the skill of him who set himself to extract sunbeams from cucumbers, to draw it thence.

The "Orlando Furioso" of Ariosto is a continuation of the "Orlando Innamorato" of Boiardo, lord of Scandiano, his contemporary, but elder, the latter having died in the year 1494. The relative circumstances of the two poems form one of the most curious chapters in the history of literature. Boiardo's work, in the original, is comparatively little known, and less read, even in Italy; but it has been made famous throughout the world, by having given birth to its more illustrious successor. Whatever were the defects of the one author, or the excellences of the other, Ariosto was undoubtedly indebted to his forerunner, not only for many of the most powerful and captivating fictions of his poem, but for its intelligibility and popularity from the beginning. The latter was an immense advantage: half of the success in a race depends upon a good start; the eagle himself cannot rise from flat ground as from the rock, whence he launches at once into mid-air. By the "Morgante Maggiore" of Pulci, the legends and songs of the Provençals, and the pretended chronicle of archbishop Turpin, the public mind had been familiarised with the traditions concerning Arthur and his knights of the round table; of Merlin the British enchanter, and the Lady of the Lake; and of Charlemagne and his peers. Yet it was the intense interest and curiosity excited by Boiardo's magnificent but uncompleted plot, which (so far as the principal personages are concerned), like

it was these which had prepared the eager and delighted multitude of readers, or rather listeners, for any sequel to his "tales of wonder," which should keep up the spirit of the original, and bring it to a crowning conclusion. These, therefore, with transport proportioned to their surprise, hailed the appearance of Ariosto's production, when, after having been long promised, they found that it not only exceeded their expectations, but eclipsed in splendour, beauty, and variety, the prototype itself. This was so remarkably the case, that one of the wittiest and most ingenious of his contemporaries recomposed the whole of Boiardo's poem; imitating, with farcical extravagance, the fine raillery and unapproachable humour of Ariosto; and falling in the same ratio beneath him in elegance, majesty, and grace, when the themes admitted or required adornment. Thus, by an unexampled fatality, the "Orlando Innamorato" was outshone by a sequel, and superseded by a rifacimento (we have no English word to express the renovating process). Authors themselves have almost universally failed in second parts to their most successful performances; and as rarely have they re-written such works, so as to take place of the first form in which they obtained public favour[110]; yet here, on the one hand, is a second part, by an imitator, that leaves the original in obscurity, yet covers it with glory—like Butler's description of die moon's veil—

while, on the other hand, we have the example of a new gloss of that original, by a meddler becoming the substitute for it, like the new skin of a serpent when the old slough is cast aside.

The mischances of Boiardo's poem ended not here. It was not published during the author's life, except by oral communication among his friends; what he had composed, had not received the corrections due to its worth and his own talents; and the work itself being left imperfect at the ninth canto, one Nicolo degli Agostini took up the strain there, and added so much matter as brought the various subjects involved in it to a consistent termination. A fourth experiment was made upon this polypus production, which multiplied its vitality the more, the more it was mangled. Ludovico Dominici recomposed the whole, and printed the metamorphosis at Venice in 1545: of this, several editions appeared; but it neither supplanted Berni's, nor even rivalled the original in popularity. Thus the love and madness of Orlando was conceived, and partly executed, by one mind; continued to a certain point by another; new-modelled and incorporated with his own inventions by a third; re-written by a fourth; but, above all, imitated, completed, and excelled by a fifth.

The felicity of fortune which distinguished Ariosto's poem, was not less rare than the eccentric transmigrations to which Boiardo's was condemned. The "Orlando Furioso" was both an imitation and a sequel of the "Orlando Innamorato;" yet, contrary to all precedent, and without example in subsequent literature, the imitation surpassed the original, and the sequel the first draught. It was the offspring of one mind; it was produced entire by the inventor, and never altered by any hand but his own. Yet, after its first completion, it underwent a process of revisal nearly as long and laborious as that of composition; like a bird, it arrived not at the perfection of its song, or the full glory of its plumage, in the breeding season, nor till after its first moulting. It is strange, that, with all these advantages, there should still remain several glaring inconsistencies, which one hour's pains would have removed, had the author been aware of what any ordinary reader might detect.

The poem consists of the contemporaneous adventures of many knights, ladies, and other personages, travelling in all lands, known and unknown, of the old continent, the moon, hell, and purgatory; those of each individual, in fact, forming a distinct story, begun, dropped, renewed, or concluded according to the pleasure of the narrator, who excites and keeps up, by every species of provoking artifice, the tortured yet unwearying curiosity of his hearers. And these materials, anomalous as they may seem, and as they are, he moulds and mixes with inimitable skill, and bodies them forth, as by magic, into such captivating forms, by varying, interweaving, disentangling, and cutting short the numberless threads of his many-coloured web, that he fails not to produce a present effect in every passage, with little recollection on the reader's part of its agreement with the past, as little regard to its connection with any thing but itself, and no care whatever about its future influence on the issue of the whole. The fable is a hydra, of which the Orlando, whose name it bears, is only one of the heads; and no otherwise entitled to pre-eminence, than as the hero of some of the most stupendous, amusing, and puerile events in a series not less heterogeneous or tragi-comic than the changes and chances of a holiday pantomime. It cannot be denied that the poem has a beginning and an end, with a prodigious quantity of action between, as the succession of pages, and the number of cantos, evince; but to prove that it has a necessary beginning, a decided progress, and a satisfactory end, would be a task which the author himself would have laughed to see a critic employed upon.

A hundred rivers springing from one well-head upon a mountain-top above the clouds; descending, as the slope broadens, in as many directions; and varying towards the lowlands with such sinuosities, that whoever traces one stream, will find it suddenly disappearing under ground; another emerging at that very point, traversing the surface in a contrary direction for a while, then dipping in like manner; while a third, a fourth, a fifth, and onward to the hundredth, in succession, do the same; each, in the track of the untiring explorer, showing itself and vanishing again and again, till utterly lost;—such are the vagaries of this romance of imagination, yet conducted in such organised confusion, that the mind is bewildered but for a moment, when a fresh "change comes o'er the spirit of the (poet's) dream," and the reader is absorbed, borne away, and contented to float along the tide of the tale, unfinished before, then newly taken up, and never flagging in interest, nor eventually impaired by all its abrupt discontinuances.

Incoherent, however, as the whole tissue of this and every other romance of chivalry must be, there is a moral interest in such fables, that lies deeper than any affected allegory, or the innocent gratification which marvellous stories will ever supply to human minds, loving and grasping at whatever is beyond their reach; an appetite for the great, the glorious, and the unknown, which intimates their spiritual nature, and their immortal destiny, by desires towards things out of the body, independent of the material universe, and contrary to the results of ordinary experience. These fictions, notwithstanding their unnatural and impossible details, picture real manners, characters, and events, such as were peculiar to the transition-age of modern society, in the most civilised regions of the Old World, when the blood of Goths and Vandals from the north, Greeks and Romans from the south of Europe, Moors from the west of Africa, and Arabs from the east of Asia, mingled in confluent streams round the shores of the Mediterranean; when, often engaging in war, commerce, or political alliances, they gradually associated their races, and originated new nations according to their respective localities. Hence the superstitions, customs, languages, and habits of life among the most heterogeneous tribes, bordering on the fallen empire of the Cæsars (their common prey), were engrafted upon those of the refined and intellectual people whom luxury had effeminated and prepared for subjugation by more enterprising and energetic, though at best but semi-barbarian, conquerors. Hence we frequently find, in chivalrous records, the most gross and incongruous stories of Oriental, African, or Scandinavian growth, allied to archetypes in classical mythology, or derived from ancient history; and only modified, enriched, distorted, or aggravated in grandeur, complexity, or terrible beauty, by those who adopted them,—the rhymers and romancers, even in the rudest periods, blending all together, or borrowing from each, according to their fancy. There is scarcely an image, a monster, or an incident in all their raving chronicles—wild as the dreams of lunatics, or beautiful as those of infants are supposed to be—which cannot be traced to Homer, Virgil, Ovid, Lucan, or Statius; so narrow is the range of human invention; and so inextricably connected with what we have heard, and read, and seen, are all the imaginations or the thoughts of the heart of the most original genius.

But the champions and the damsels, the giants and enchanters, nay, the dragons, the hippogriffs, and the demons themselves, in these legends, are but poetical representations of real classes and characters in society, such as existed, or were formed by the circumstances of the times, when war was the business, and gallantry the pastime of life, among the hybrid populations both of Christian and Mohammedan countries. The actors in the dramas of romance were, indeed, masked and buskined to raise them to heroic stature; yet the most disguised of these personages, in principle, passion, taste, and pursuit, were real men and women, magnified into monsters, like flies and spiders when looked upon through the eye-glass of a microscope. Orlando was but an exaggeration of the chevalier Bayard, as was the British Arthur of the English Richard, and Charlemagne himself of Francis I.

Ariosto, in following the fashion of contemporaries, lighted upon a theme to which his wayward and versatile genius was peculiarly adapted, and which gave it an opportunity of displaying all its peculiarities to the utmost advantage. Of these, the most enviable and least imitable is that perfection of art, which he perhaps possessed beyond every other writer, to say things naturally. All his wonders and prodigies are made so easy and probable, that to the most fastidious reader, who does not resolutely resist the spell of the poet, and deprive himself of the pleasure of being beguiled by it, they appear as they would do if they were actual events, from the daylight effect of his truth-telling style; for whenever his delight in the extravagant carries him beyond the legitimately marvellous, he disarms resentment, and prevents the laugh against himself by a quiet pleasantry,—becoming himself the Cervantes of his own Quixotes. Satirists, however, have done little to improve mankind: they have condemned and promoted vice; they have ridiculed and recommended folly. Instead of being the most chaste, severe, and instructive, it is notorious that (with few exceptions) they have been the most profligate, pernicious, and corrupting of all writers. Many of the most illustrious deserve to be crowned and decapitated, and their laurelled heads fixed on poles round the heights of Parnassus, as warnings to others, while they affect to expose sin, not to betray virtue; and while they declaim against lewdness, not to become panders to debauch the young, the innocent, and the unsuspecting. To go no farther than the example before us. If ever man deserved poetical honours, Ariosto did; and if ever poet deserved the curse of posterity for the prostitution of high talents, Ariosto does. Without presuming to judge him, even for his worst offences, beyond the present world, it had been better for many of his readers,—why should we not say, at once, for all of them?—that he had never been born. Whatever be her beauty, his Muse has a cancerous sore upon her face, which cannot be looked upon without loathing by any eye, not wilfully blind, where it ought to be eagle-sighted.

MACHIAVELLI

1469-1522

There is no more delightful literary task than the justifying a hero or writer, who has been misrepresented and reviled; but such is human nature, or such is the small progress that we have made in the knowledge of it, that in most instances we excuse, rather than exculpate, and display doubts instead of bringing forward certainties. Machiavelli has been the object of much argument, founded on the motives that impelled him to write his celebrated treatise of the "Prince," which he declares to be a manual for sovereigns, and Rousseau has named the manual of republicans. The question of whether he sat down in cold blood, and as approving them, or whether he wrote in irony, the detestable maxims he boldly and explicitly urges, has been disputed by many. Voltaire has joined in the cry against him, begun by our countryman cardinal Pole. It is a curious question, to be determined only by the author himself. We must seek in the actions of his life, and in his letters, for a solution of the mystery. Ample materials are afforded, and if we are unable to throw a clear light on the subject, at least we shall adduce all the evidence, and, after summing it up impartially, leave the jury of readers to decide.

The family of Machiavelli carried back its origin to the ancient marquesses of Tuscany, and especially to a marquis Ugo, who flourished about the year 850, who was the root whence sprung various nobles, who possessed power over territories, which the growing state of Florence speedily encroached upon. The Machiavelli were lords of Montespertoli; but preferring the rank of citizens of a prosperous city, to the unprofitable preservation of an illustrious ancestry, they submitted to the laws of Florence, for the sake of enjoying the honours which the republic had to bestow. The Machiavelli belonged to that portion of the Guelph party which abandoned their native town in 1260, after the defeat of Monteaperti. Being afterwards re-established in their country, they enjoyed thirteen times the rank of gonfaloniere of justice, an office corresponding to the better known one of doge, except that it was an annual magistrature; and fifty-three different members of the family were elected priors, another of the highest offices of government.

1469.

Niccolò Machiavelli was born in Florence on the 3d of May, 1469; his father was jurisconsult and treasurer of the march, and by aid of these offices, maintained in some degree the lustre of his family, which was obscured by the poverty into which it had fallen. His mother Bartolomea, daughter of Stefano Nelli, was equally well descended. Her family derived itself from the ancient counts of Borgonuovo of Fucecchio, who flourished in the tenth century, and her ancestors had been elected to the highest offices in the Florentine state. She had been previously married to Niccolò Benizzi, and was distinguished for her cultivated understanding and talent for poetry.

Nothing is known of the childhood and education of Machiavelli. Paul Jovius wishes to prove that he scarcely understood Latin, but this opinion finds no credit: Paul Jovius is a writer, whose celebrity is founded on his unblushing falsehoods and baseless calumnies[111]: he was sold to the Medici, and attacked without scruple, and with a total disregard for truth, those persons who were inimical to them. 1494.
Ætat.
25. At the age of five and twenty, Machiavelli was placed as secretary under Marcello di Virgilio de' Adriani, or, as he is commonly called, Marcellus Virgil, whose pupil he had formerly been. Marcellus Virgil had been at one time professor of Latin and Greek, and was now one of the chief officers of the Florentine court of chancery. Paul Jovius gives Machiavelli the name of his clerk and copyist, and adds, that, from this master, he obtained those flowers of ancient learning which are interspersed in his works. Nothing is at once more base and futile than these attempts to degrade celebrated men, by impeaching their station in society, or adventitious acquirements. It only serves to display the detractor's malice, and to render more conspicuous the merit which could triumph over every disadvantage.

There is no trace of Machiavelli's taking any part in the political disturbances of Florence at this time. The city was then agitated by the pretensions and turbulence of the prophet Salvanorola. There is a letter extant of his, which gives some account of the preaching and denunciations of the ambitious friar, which shows that, if he did not belong to the party opposed to him, he was, at least, not duped by his impostures[112]:—"In my opinion," he says, "he temporises and gives to his falsehoods the colour of the occasion." Mar.
8.
1497.
Ætat.
28. The disposition of Machiavelli was observing and industrious; his ambition was under the rule of judgment, and his hopes fixed on the favour secure from the heads of government. For five of the best years of his life he was content to exercise the unostentatious functions of secretary to an officer of chancery, nor were any of his writings composed at this period: they were the fruits of thought and experience, and there is nothing to tell us, that, as a young man, he was warmed by that self-confidence and restless aspiration, which he displayed in maturer life. It may be supposed, however, that his employer, Marcellus Virgil, distinguished his talents and recommended them to observation, as they were both promoted at the same time, Marcellus being elected high chancellor, and Machiavelli preferred over four other candidates, to the post of chancellor of the second court. 1498.
Ætat.
29. A month afterwards he was named secretary to 1498. the council of ten (the chief council of the state), which situation he retained till the revolution, which, fourteen years afterwards, overthrew the government he served.

During this period. Machiavelli pursued an active career: he was continually employed on missions to various sovereigns and states. His letters to his government on these occasions are published, and he wrote besides brief surveys of the countries to which he was sent. His active and enquiring mind was continually on the alert, and he stored up with care the observations and opinions that resulted from the personages and scenes with which he was brought into contact.

1492.

Italy was at this time in a state, of convulsion, torn by foreign armies and domestic quarrels: the peace of the peninsula had died with Lorenzo de' Medici. That sagacious statesman saw the safety of his country in the preservation of the balance of power among its several rulers. It was his endeavour to check the encroachments of the king of Naples and the pope, who ruled southern Italy, by the influence of the duke of Milan, and of the Venetian republic; while these again were prevented from attempting war with Florence, or trespassing on the smaller states of Romagna, by the jealousy of the sovereigns of the south. For many years no foreign army had crossed the Alps, and the battles of the condottieri became more and more innoxious.

This fine system of policy fell to the ground on the death of Lorenzo. His son Piero, who succeeded him, was a rash, impolitic, and feeble statesman, defying dangers till they were close at hand, and then yielding weakly to them. He had not feared to make an enemy of Ludovico Sforza, who reigned over Milan in the name of his nephew Giovan Galeazzo, the rightful duke. Ludovico wished to play the old part of his wicked uncle, and to supplant the youthful prince; but he feared to be prevented by the king of Naples. To occupy and weaken him, he invited Charles VIII. of France into Italy, instigating him to assert his right to the Neapolitan crown, which he claimed through Rene, who inherited it, together with the counties of Anjou and Provence. This was the origin of all the evils which overwhelmed Italy, crushed its spirit of liberty, destroyed its republics, and after making it a field of battle for many years, caused it in the end to become a mere appanage to the crowns of Germany, Spain, or France, according as these kingdoms enjoyed alternately the supreme power in Europe.

1493.

The entrance of the French into Italy caused great commotion in the city of Florence. It was considered by Lorenzo to be the policy of the Florentines to keep allies of the king of France: but Piero acted a thoughtless and unstable part; he at first opposed the French, and then threw himself into their hands. The Florentines were enraged at the sacrifices he made to pacify an enemy which he had brought upon himself, and the result was his expulsion from the city, and the overthrow and exile of the Medicean family.

Charles VIII. overran Italy, and possessed himself of the kingdom of Naples without drawing a sword, except to massacre the defenceless people. The Italians were accustomed to a mild system of warfare; they carried on their military enterprises by condottieri, or captains of independent bands of soldiers, who hired themselves to the best bidder. These condottieri consisted of foreign adventurers, who came into Italy on the speculation of turning their military talents to profit, or of the minor native princes, or lords of single towns, who augmented their consequence and revenue by raising troops, commanded by themselves, but paid by others. These mercenaries were inspired by no spirit of patriotism or party; they fought for pay and booty; they changed sides at the beck of their captain, who was influenced by the highest offer. They fought to-day side by side with men whom the next they might attack as enemies: they fought, therefore, in a placid spirit of friendly enmity; often not a single soldier fell upon the field of battle. Add to this, they were very indifferently provided with fire-arms. The ferocity of the French, their artillery, discipline, and massacres, filled the unwarlike population with alarm and horror. They fled, or submitted without a blow. But Charles lost his conquest almost as soon as he gained it; he returned to France, and the crown of Naples fell from his head at the same moment.

His death followed soon after; and his successor, Louis XII., on turning his eyes to Italy, rather fixed them on the duchy of Milan, to which he had pretensions by right of inheritance. 1498. His conquest of this dukedom was speedy and complete, and he then proceeded to possess himself of Naples. The king then reigning, Frederic of the house of Aragon, called in the Spaniards to his aid, and he was crushed in the collision of the two warlike nations. He was banished Naples and confined in France, while Louis and Ferdinand at first amicably divided, and then hostilely fought for, the possession of his kingdom.

1501.
Ætat.
32.

Meanwhile the first entrance of Charles VIII. into Italy had left the seeds of discord and disaster in Tuscany. Pisa was at that time under the rule of Florence, but repining at its servitude. When Charles entered Pisa, its citizens implored him to restore to them their independence: he promised to comply; and though afterwards he made treaties to a contrary effect with Florence, the Pisans profited by his secret inclination in their favour, and the sympathy afforded them by the officers and men that composed his army, to shut their gates against their Florentine governors, and to assert their liberty. From this time it became the ardent desire of Florence to subdue the rebel city; they exhausted all their resources in prosecution of this favourite object. Each year they attacked the walls, and destroyed the crops, of the unfortunate but resolute Pisans; and, in each treaty they made with France, the chief article was a promise of aid in this desired conquest. 1500.
Ætat.
31. At one time they formed the siege of Pisa, and solicited Louis XII. to supply them with troops and artillery. That politic sovereign, who wished to strengthen himself in Italy, sent them double the force they required. These auxiliaries, composed of Swiss and Gascons, pillaged both friends and foes, quarrelled with the Florentine commissaries, came to a secret understanding with Pisa, and, finally, on a pretence of a delay of pay, raised the siege. The king of France accused Florence of being the cause of this affront sustained by his arms; and, to appease him, and to obtain, if possible, further assistance, the republic deputed Francesco della Gaza, and Machiavelli, as envoys to the French court.

A year before Machiavelli had been employed on a mission to Caterina Sforza, countess of Forli, with regard to the terms of engagement offered to her son, for serving Florence as condottiere; but the legation to France was of greater importance. The commissions, or instructions of the government to Machiavelli, and his letters to the state during this and all his other missions, are published. They are long and minute, but far less tedious than such correspondences usually are; and the reading them is indispensable to the forming a just notion of his character, and a view of the actions of his life. There is something curiously interesting in the style of his instructions on the present occasion; they display a civic simplicity of manners and language, and a sagacity in viewing the personages and events in question, combined with true Italian astute policy. Guicciardini observes, that when the French first entered Italy, they were astonished and disgusted by the want of faith and falsehood which prevailed in their negotiations with the native princes and states. In this commission the Florentine government gave instructions to their envoys savouring of the prevalent vice of their country. The commander of the French forces before Pisa, Beaumont, had been appointed at their own request: he failed without any fault of his own, through the insubordination of the troops under him. The state of Florence instructed its envoys:—"According to circumstances you may accuse him violently, and cast on him the imputation of cowardice and corruption; or free him from all blame, and, speaking honourably of him, throw all the fault upon others. And take care how you criminate him, as we do not wish to lose his favour, without gaining any thing elsewhere by such a proceeding."

Machiavelli and his fellow envoy remained in France three months, following the king and his court to Montargis, Melun, Plessis, and Tours. They were faithful and industrious in fulfilling their duties, especially Machiavelli; Francesco della Caza being taken ill, and spending the greater part of his time at Paris. They failed in their object: the king wishing Florence to engage troops from him on the same terms, of paying all the expenses, and the Florentines wishing to induce him to form the siege at his own risk, reimbursing him only in case of success. Machiavelli meanwhile was very desirous to return home; "because," he writes, "my father died only a month before my departure, and since then I have lost a sister, and all my affairs are in disorder, so that I am injured in many ways." Towards the end of October, Florence sent an ambassador with greater powers to the French court, and the envoys returned to Italy.

His next legation was to Cæsar Borgia. It is necessary to enlarge upon this mission. The great doubt that clouds Machiavelli's character regards the spirit in which he wrote the "Prince,"—whether he sincerely recommended the detestable principles of government which he appears to advocate, or used the weapons of irony and sarcasm to denounce a system of tyranny which then oppressed his native country. The example he brings forward most frequently in his treatise, is that of Cæsar Borgia: his mode of governing his states, and the artifice and resolution with which he destroyed his enemies, are adduced as worthy of applause and imitation. We must, therefore, not only enquire what the deeds of this man were, but endeavour to discover the real sentiments of Machiavelli, the opinion that he formed upon his conduct, and the conclusions which he drew from his success. We may also mention that the secretary has been accused of being Borgia's confidant in his plots. Mr. Roscoe has lightly adopted this idea; but the course of the present narration will easily disprove it.

Soon after the death of Lorenzo de' Medici, died Innocent VIII.; and Roderigo Borgia, a native of Valentia in Spain, and one of the most ancient of the cardinals, was chosen pope in his room. His election was carried by force of bribery and intrigue, to the horror and amazement of the whole Christian world; since not only the methods by which he rose were known, but also the character and actions of the man thus exalted.[113] The new pontiff assumed the name of Alexander VI. "He was a man," to use the words of Guicciardini, "of singular prudence and sagacity; endued with great penetration, and marvellous powers of persuasion, and always acting with extreme forethought and policy. But these good qualities were darkly clouded by the worst vices. His depraved life, his total want of shame, his contempt for good faith, religion, and truth, his matchless deceit, insatiable avarice, barbarous cruelty, and unbounded desire to exalt his numerous offspring, who were not less dissolute and unprincipled than himself, stained his character, and marked his reign with inexpressible infamy."

Cæsar Borgia, his younger son, had been educated for the church; and, despite his illegitimate birth, was raised to the rank of cardinal. But Caesar disliked the sacerdotal profession, and was jealous of his elder brother, the duke of Candia, whom his father was desirous of raising to the highest temporal rank, both because of his success in arms, and also on account of the preference shown him by their sister Lucretia. Incited by these criminal passions, he one night caused the duke to be waylaid, murdered, and thrown into the Tiber. The pope was at first overwhelmed with grief on his son's death, and made great show of repentance and reformation; but soon after he cast aside all thoughts of this kind, and returned with renewed eagerness to his former pursuits and projects. Cæsar gained the point at which he aimed. He was permitted to abdicate the cardinal's hat; and, in reward for the dispensation which the pope granted Louis XII. to divorce his first wife, and to marry Anne of Britany, he obtained the duchy of Valence in France, and henceforth was commonly called by the name of the duca Valentino, or Valentian duke.

It was the chief ambition of this new temporal noble to form a principality in Italy. The territories of the marquisate of Savoy, of the duchy of Milan, and of the Venetian republic, embraced the greater portion of the peninsula north of the Apennines. To the south, the kingdom of Naples, Rome, and the republic of Florence, were the principal states; but other territories remained, a sovereignty over which was claimed by the popes, but which obeyed a variety of petty lords, whose families had for centuries enjoyed the rule. The various cities of Romagna to the east, Bologna to the north, Piombino to the west, and Perugia to the south, formed the chief: of these Cæsar Borgia resolved to possess himself, extending a prophetic eye to the future conquest of Tuscany. Already he had acquired dominion over Romagna: he dispossessed the duke of Urbino and the prince of Piombino of their states, and now he turned his eyes towards Bologna. Giovanni Bentivoglio had long been lord of this wealthy city; good fortune, rather than talents or a spirit of enterprise, had raised him, and he spared no blood in confirming his power. Cæsar Borgia was supported in his encroachments by an alliance with Louis XII. In vain was it represented to this monarch[114], "that it ill became the splendour of the French crown, and the title of most Christian king, to show favour to an infamous tyrant, the destroyer of many states; a man who thirsted for human blood, and was an example to the whole world of perfidy and inhumanity; who, like a public robber, had broken faith with and murdered so many princes and nobles; one stained with the blood of his nearest kindred, and whose crimes of poisoning and stabbing were unequalled in a Christian country." Louis favoured him, not so much from his own inclination, as at the instigation of the cardinal d'Amboise, who was desirous of currying favour with the pope; and who, by protecting his son, obtained the high office of legate to France.

At the moment of the commencement of his attack on Bologna, while running a full career of success, Cæsar Borgia received a check from the revolt of his chief condottieri. Like all the other princes of Italy, the army of the duke of Valence consisted of various bands, independent of each other, and obeying several distinct captains. The chief among these were Vitellozzo Vitelli, lord of Città Castello, Oliverotto da Fermo, in the March, and Paolo Orsino, who was master of a large portion of the patrimony of St. Peter, and the duke of Gravina, also of the Orsini family. These men assembled at Magione, near Perugia; they were joined, in their consultations by cardinal Orsini, chief of the family, and then at enmity with the pope; Giovanpaolo Baglioni, lord of Perugia, Hermes Bentivoglio, who represented his father, lord of Bologna, and Antonio da Venafro, minister of Pandolfo Petrucci, lord of Siena. These last-named nobles feared the encroachments of Borgia, and gladly availed themselves of an opportunity to seduce away his captains, and to check his enterprises. It is to be remembered that the individuals thus conspiring were men stained with the crimes of treachery and assassination, then so rife in Italy—men whose aim was power, and who thought every method that led to it justifiable. For Cæsar ran no new career of crime: he travelled in the same path with many of his contemporaries, while he excelled them all in resolution, intrepidity, and remorseless cruelty: his abilities were greater, his conscience more seared. Inhuman, stern, and treacherous, he was yet sagacious, eloquent, courteous, and plausible. It was a common saying at Rome, that the pope never did what he said, and that his son never said what he did.[115] Prudence and success meanwhile gained for him the respect even of those by whom he was abhorred.

The conspirators at Magione were at once aware of the character of the man with whom they had to deal, and the small faith they could repose in each other; but they saw their destruction in the fulfilment of Borgia's ambitious schemes; and this served as a common bond between them. They took care to gather together their troops, and, occupying the country between Romagna and Rome, they hoped to prevent Caesar from receiving aid from his father. The duke of Urbino, whose duchy Borgia had lately seized, joined the league, and suddenly appearing at the head of some forces, repossessed himself of his territories, in which he was greatly beloved. Borgia was at Imola with but few troops when he heard of the loss of Urbino, and the revolt of his captains. These men invited the Florentines to join them. The republic feared Borgia, but they hated yet more the conspirators, as there existed between them various and urgent motives of enmity: they feared also to displease the king of France by taking part against his ally. They discountenanced, therefore, the advances of the captains, and sent Machiavelli to the duke at Imola, to inform him of this circumstance, and to assure him in general terms of their continued amity; and, moreover, to watch the progress of the conspiracy, and to learn what hope Borgia entertained of repelling the menaced injury.

1502.
Ætat.
33.

Machiavelli approached without any feeling of abhorrence, a man honoured and protected by the king of France. He had no sympathy with the conspirators, but rather hated them, as the enemies of his country, and as traitors. Borgia commanded more respect. He was a man of greater powers of mind; a high and commanding spirit, running a prosperous career, who had hitherto overcome every obstacle to his advancement.[116] It was a curious study to observe the methods he would use to crush the nest of traitors in league against him.

Machiavelli arrived at Imola on the 7th of October, and was instantly admitted to an audience with the duke. Borgia received him with every show of courtesy and kindness. He was in high spirits, declaring that the stars that year were inimical to rebels, and that the revolt was a piece of good fortune, since it enabled him to distinguish his friends from his foes, at a critical moment. He declared that his clemency had been the cause of this disaster, and frankly entered into details concerning the progress made by the confederates.

From day to day Machiavelli continued to see and converse with Borgia, who exerted the grace of manner for which he was renowned, and a show of cordiality, to win the suffrage of the yet inexperienced secretary. "I cannot express to you," Machiavelli writes to his government, "the earnest demonstrations he makes of affection towards the republic, and how eagerly he justifies himself with regard to his threatened attack last year, throwing the blame upon Vitellozzo Vitelli." Borgia's chief endeavour at this moment was to influence the secretary to persuade his government to give some public testimonial of its attachment to him. He spoke with the utmost confidence of his ultimate success; assuring Machiavelli, that among the many fortunate events that had befallen him, this conspiracy was most lucky of all, as it had caused his more powerful friends to declare for him.

Meanwhile, though he thus "vaunted aloud," he was acting with consummate prudence and caution. His object was to gain time. He wished to remain inactive till he had gathered together a sufficient number of troops to insure success. He was at one time thwarted in this purpose by two Spanish captains in his pay, whom he had summoned to Imola; who, fancying that a good opportunity presented itself of attacking the enemy, had themselves been vanquished and put to flight. Borgia kept this disaster as secret as possible; he expected troops from France and Switzerland, and gathered together all the broken-off lances in the country. A lance was a term used to signify a mounted cavalier with five or six followers; and the condottiere formed a greater or less number of lances into a troop. But often single cavaliers with their followers broke off from the band to which they belonged, and were thence called Lande Spezzate.

Besides these more evident methods of defending himself, Borgia hoped that dissention might be introduced among the confederates; that he should be able to entice away a portion, and then, by policy and artifice, bring them to terms. His hopes were not deceived. About the middle of October, Paolo Orsino sent to say, that if the duke would send a hostage in pledge for his safety, he would repair to Imola. Caesar eagerly seized on this opening for negotiation; cardinal Borgia was put into the hands of the confederates, and Paolo Orsino arrived at Imola on the 25th of October. Machiavelli watched with intense interest the progress of this visit, and the subsequent proceedings. "No military movement is made on either side," he writes to the signoria of Florence, "and these treaties for reconciliation benefit the duke, who readily entertains them; but I cannot judge with what intentions." He goes on to state the difficulties that must stand in the way of the renewing of amity; "so that," he continues, "I do not find any one who can guess how the reconciliation can be effected. Some people think that the duke will entice away a part of the confederates; and when they no longer hold together, he will cease to fear them. I incline to this opinion, having heard him let fall words that have this tendency to his ministers. Yet it is difficult to believe that so recent a confederacy can be broken up."