Critical and Historical Essays, vol 1 | Page 5

of the
high estimation in which both his works and his person were held by
the most respectable among his contemporaries. Clement the Seventh
patronised the publication of those very books which the Council of
Trent, in the following generation, pronounced unfit for the perusal of
Christians. Some members of the democratical party censured the
Secretary for dedicating The Prince to a patron who bore the unpopular
name of Medici. But to those immoral doctrines which have since
called forth such severe reprehensions no exception appears to have
been taken. The cry against them was first raised beyond the Alps, and
seems to have been heard with amazement in Italy. The earliest
assailant, as far as we are aware, was a countryman of our own,
Cardinal Pole. The author of the Anti-Machiavelli was a French
Protestant.
It is, therefore, in the state of moral feeling among the Italians of those
times that we must seek for the real explanation of what seems most
mysterious in the life and writings of this remarkable man. As this is a
subject which suggests many interesting considerations, both political
and metaphysical, we shall make no apology for discussing it at some

length.
During the gloomy and disastrous centuries which followed the
downfall of the Roman Empire, Italy had preserved, in a far greater
degree than any other part of Western Europe, the traces of ancient
civilisation. The night which descended upon her was the night of an
Arctic summer. The dawn began to reappear before the last reflection
of the preceding sunset had faded from the horizon. It was in the time
of the French Merovingians and of the Saxon Heptarchy that ignorance
and ferocity seemed to have done their worst. Yet even then the
Neapolitan provinces, recognising the authority of the Eastern Empire,
preserved something of Eastern knowledge and refinement. Rome,
protected by the sacred character of her Pontiffs, enjoyed at least
comparative security and repose, Even in those regions where the
sanguinary Lombards had fixed their monarchy, there was
incomparably more of wealth, of information, of physical comfort, and
of social order, than could be found in Gaul, Britain, or Germany.
That which most distinguished Italy from the neighbouring countries
was the importance which the population of the towns, at a very early
period, began to acquire. Some cities had been founded in wild and
remote situations, by fugitives who had escaped from the rage of the
barbarians. Such were Venice and Genoa, which preserved their
freedom by their obscurity, till they became able to preserve it by their
power. Other cities seem to have retained, under all the changing
dynasties of invaders, under Odoacer and Theodoric, Narses and
Alboin, the municipal institutions which had been conferred on them
by the liberal policy of the Great Republic. In provinces which the
central government was too feeble either to protect or to oppress, these
institutions gradually acquired stability and vigour. The citizens,
defended by their walls, and governed by their own magistrates and
their own by-laws, enjoyed a considerable share of republican
independence. Thus a strong democratic spirit was called into action.
The Carlovingian sovereigns were too imbecile to subdue it. The
generous policy of Otho encouraged it. It might perhaps have been
suppressed by a close coalition between the Church and the Empire. It
was fostered and invigorated by their disputes. In the twelfth century it
attained its full vigour, and, after a long and doubtful conflict,
triumphed over the abilities and courage of the Swabian princes.

The assistance of the Ecclesiastical power had greatly contributed to
the success of the Guelfs. That success would, however, have been a
doubtful good, if its only effect had been to substitute a moral for a
political servitude, and to exalt the Popes at the expense of the Caesars.
Happily the public mind of Italy had long contained the seeds of free
opinions, which were now rapidly developed by the genial influence of
free institutions. The people of that country had observed the whole
machinery of the Church, its saints and its miracles, its lofty
pretensions and its splendid ceremonial, its worthless blessings and its
harmless curses, too long and too closely to be duped. They stood
behind the scenes on which others were gazing with childish awe and
interest. They witnessed the arrangement of the pulleys, and the
manufacture of the thunders. They saw the natural faces and heard the
natural voices of the actors. Distant nations looked on the Pope as the
Vicegerent of the Almighty, the oracle of the All-wise, the umpire from
whose decisions, in the disputes either of theologians or of kings, no
Christian ought to appeal. The Italians were acquainted with all the
follies of his youth, and with all the dishonest arts by which he had
attained power. They knew