Renaissance in Italy Volume II Part 18

[Footnote 364: There is some discrepancy about this Antonio between Renouard and Didot.]

[Footnote 365: 'Sum ipse mihi optimus testis me semper habere comites, ut oportere aiunt, delphinum et anchoram; nam et dedimus multa cunctando, et damus a.s.sidue.' Preface to the _Astronomici_, dedicated to Duke Guidobaldo of Urbino, 1499. The observations of Erasmus on the motto deserve to be read with attention. See Didot, p. 299.]

In tracing the history of Aldo's enterprise, I have been carried beyond the limits of the period included in this chapter. Yet I knew not how to describe the activity of the press in Italy better than by concentrating attention upon the greatest publisher who ever lived.

Aldo Manuzio was no mere bookseller or printer. His learning won the hearty praises of ripe scholars, nor did any student of the age express more n.o.bly and with fuller conviction his deep sense of the dignity conferred by learning on the soul of man.[366] That he was amiable in private life is proved by the intimate relations he maintained with humanists, than whom even poets are not a more irritable race of men.[367] To his fellow-workers he was uniformly generous in pecuniary matters, free from jealousy, and prodigal of praise. Seeking even less than his due share of credit, he desired that the great work of his life should pa.s.s for the common achievement of himself and his learned a.s.sociates. Therefore he called his Greek library the fruits of the Neacademia, though no man could have known better than he did that his own genius was the life and spirit of the undertaking. His stores of MSS. were as open to the instruction of scholars as his printed books were given liberally to the public.[368]

'Aldo,' writes Erasmus, 'had nothing in his treasury but what he readily communicated.' Those who read the estimate of his services to learning made by eminent contemporaries, will find the language of Nicholas Leonicenus, Erasmus, and Anton Francesco Doni not exaggerated.[369] But, in order to comprehend their true value, we must bear in mind that until the year 1516, when Froben printed the Greek Testament at Basle, none but insignificant Greek reprints had appeared in Northern Europe.[370] Finally, what makes the place of Aldus in the history of Italian humanism all-important is the fact that, after about 1520, Greek studies began to decline in Italy all together. As though exhausted by the enormous energy wherewith Florence had acquired and Venice had disseminated Greek culture, the Italians relapsed into apathy. Posterity may be thankful that their pupils, Grocin and Linacre, Reuchlin and Erasmus, the Stephani and Budaeus, had by this time transplanted erudition beyond the Alps, while Aldo had secured the literature of ancient Greece against the possibility of destruction.

[Footnote 366: See the pa.s.sages from his letters and prefaces quoted and referred to on p. 239, above, note 2.]

[Footnote 367: The prospect of his visit to Milan in 1509 called forth these pretty April verses from Antiquari:--

Aldus venit en, Aldus ecce venit!

Nunc, O nunc, juvenes, ubique in urbe Flores spargite. Vere namque primo Aldus venit en, Aldus ecce venit.]

[Footnote 368: See above, p. 275, for his hatred of the [Greek: bibliotaphoi]. He was the very opposite of Henri Estienne the younger, who closed his library against his son-in-law Casaubon.]

[Footnote 369: Didot, pp. 89, 299, 423.]

[Footnote 370: _Priscian_, at Erfurt, 1501; _Alphabet_, _Batrachomyomachia_, Musaeus, Theocritus, Grammar of Chrysoloras, Hesiod's _Works and Days_, Paris, 1507; Aristotle on _Divination by Dreams_, Cracow, 1529; Lucian, [Greek: peri dipsadon], Oxford, 1521, are among the earliest Greek books printed out of Italy. The grammars of the Greek humanists were frequently reprinted in the first quarter of the sixteenth century in Germany.]

CHAPTER VII

FOURTH PERIOD OF HUMANISM

Fall of the Humanists -- Scholars.h.i.+p permeates Society -- A New Ideal of Life and Manners -- Latinisation of Names -- Cla.s.sical Periphrases -- Latin Epics on Christian Themes -- Paganism -- The Court of Leo X. -- Honours of the Church given to Scholars -- Ecclesiastical Men of the World -- Maecenases at Rome -- Papal and Imperial Rome -- Moral Corruption -- Social Refinement -- The Roman Academy -- Pietro Bembo -- His Life at Ferrara -- At Urbino -- Comes to Rome -- Employed by Leo -- Retirement to Padua -- His Dictators.h.i.+p of Letters -- Jacopo Sadoleto -- A Graver Genius than Bembo -- Paulus Jovius -- Latin Stylist -- His Histories -- Balda.s.sare Castiglione -- Life at Urbino and Rome -- The Courtly Scholar -- His Diplomatic Missions -- Alberto Pio -- Gian Francesco Pico della Mirandola -- The Vicissitudes of his Life -- Jerome Aleander -- Oriental Studies -- The Library of the Vatican -- His Mission to Germany -- Inghirami, Beroaldo, and Acciaiuoli -- The Roman University -- John Lascaris -- Study of Antiquities -- Origin of the 'Corpus Inscriptionum' -- Topographical Studies -- Formation of the Vatican Sculpture Gallery -- Discovery of the Laoc.o.o.n -- Feeling for Statues in Renaissance Italy -- Venetian Envoys in the Belvedere -- Raphael's Plan for excavating Ancient Rome -- His Letter to Leo -- Effect of Antiquarian Researches on the Arts -- Intellectual Supremacy of Rome in this Period -- The Fall -- Adrian VI. -- The Sack of Rome -- Valeriano's Description of the Sufferings of Scholars.

What is known as the Revival of Learning was accomplished before the close of the fifteenth century, and about this time humanism began to lose credit. The professional scholars who had domineered in Italy during the last hundred years, were now regarded with suspicion as pretentious sophists, or as empty-pated pedants. Their place was taken by men of the world, refined courtiers, and polite stylists who piqued themselves on general culture. This revolution in public opinion was the result of various causes which I shall attempt to set forth in another chapter. It is enough for my present purpose to observe that the learning possessed at first by a few teachers, acquired with effort, and communicated with condescension, had now become the common property of cultivated men. In proportion as a knowledge of the cla.s.sic authors diffused itself over a wider area, the mere reputation of sound scholars.h.i.+p ceased to form a valid t.i.tle to celebrity. It was necessary that the man of letters, educated by antiquity, should give proof of his genius by some originality of mind. The age of acquisition had ended; the age of application had begun. To this result the revived interest in Italian literature powerfully contributed. Writers were no longer, like Bruni and Poggio, ashamed of their _cose volgari_. On the contrary, the most splendid productions of the first half of the sixteenth century, the Histories of Guicciardini and Machiavelli, the Epic of Ariosto, the 'Cortegiano'

of Castiglione, and the burlesque poems of Berni were penned in powerful and delicate Italian. To what extent the influence of Lorenzo de' Medici, who was always more partial to vernacular literature than to scholars.h.i.+p, determined the change in question, is a matter for opinion. That Florence led the way by her great writers of Italian poetry and prose admits of no doubt.

At the same time the erudition of the fifteenth century had steeped the whole Italian nation. Humanism penetrated every sphere of intellectual activity, and gave a colour to all social customs. The arts of painting and of sculpture felt its influence. A new style of architecture, formed upon the model of Roman monuments, sprang up.

Science took a special bias from the cla.s.sics, and philosophy was so strongly permeated by antique doctrines that the Revival of Learning may be justly said to have checked the spontaneity of the Italian intellect. There was not enough time for students to absorb antiquity and pa.s.s beyond it, before the mortmain of the Church and the Spaniard was laid upon the fairest provinces of thought. To trace the course of Italian philosophy, is, however, no part of my scheme in this volume.

The Aristotelian and Platonic controversies on the nature of the soul, the materialism of Pietro Pomponazzo, the gradual emergence of powerful thinkers like Bruno and Campanella, the theological rationalism of Aonio Paleario, and the final suppression of free thought by the Church, belong to the history of the Counter-Reformation.

To the same sad chapter of Italian history must be relegated the labours of the earliest mathematicians, astronomers, and cosmographers, who, poring over the texts of Ptolemy and Euclid, antic.i.p.ated Copernicus, impelled Columbus to his enterprise, and led the way for Galileo. The infamy of having rendered science and philosophy abortive in Italy, when its early show of blossom was so promising, falls upon the Popes and princes of the last half of the sixteenth century. The narrative of their emergence from the studies of the humanists must form the prelude to a future work treating of Farnesi and Caraffas, Inquisitors and Jesuits. Only by showing the growth which might have been, can we demonstrate the atrophy that was.

It remains in this chapter to describe the fourth period of humanism, when Italy, still permeated with the spirit of the cla.s.sical revival, laid down laws of social breeding for the nations of the North. Few things are more difficult than to set forth without exaggeration, and yet with sufficient force, the so-called Paganism of Renaissance Italy. At first sight, and from certain points of view, it seems as though the exclusive study of the cla.s.sics had wrought a thorough metamorphosis of morality and manners. When, on reflection, this appearance is seen to be illusory, we incline, perhaps, to the contrary conclusion that scholars.h.i.+p only set a kind of fas.h.i.+on without taking deep hold even on the imagination of the people. A more complete acquaintance with the period makes it clear that the imitation of the ancients in thought, sentiment, and language was no mere affectation, and that, however partial its influences may have been, they were not superficial. In the first volume of this work I tried to show to what extent the patriotism of tyrannicides and the profligacy of courtiers were alike related to the prevailing study of the ancient world. It was no small matter that the vices and the virtues, the worldliness and the enthusiasm, of that many-featured age, together with its supreme achievements in art, its ripest productions in literature, should have gradually a.s.sumed a cla.s.sic form. The standards of moral and aesthetic taste were paganised, though the nation at large remained unchanged in Catholicity. It was precisely this discord between the professed religion of the people and the heathenism of its ideal that inspired Savonarola with his prophecy.

Cla.s.sical style being the requirement of the age, it followed that everything was sacrificed to this. In christening their children the great families abandoned the saints of the calendar and chose names from mythology. Ettorre, Achille, Atalanta, Pentesilea, Lucrezia, Porzia, Alessandro, Annibale, Laomedonte, Fedro, Ippolito, and many other antique t.i.tles became fas.h.i.+onable. Those who were able to do so turned their baptismal names into Latin or Greek equivalents. Ja.n.u.s or Jovia.n.u.s pa.s.sed for Giovanni, Pierius for Pietro, Aonius for Antonio, Lucius Gra.s.sus for Luca Gra.s.so; the German prelate John Goritz was known as Corycius,[371] and the Roman professor Gianpaolo Parisio as Ja.n.u.s Parrhasius. Writers who undertook to treat of modern or religious themes, were driven by their zeal for purism to the strangest expedients of language. G.o.d, in the Latin of the sixteenth century, is _Jupiter Optimus Maximus_; Providence becomes _Fatum_; the saints are _Divi_, and their statues _simulacra sancta Deorum_. Our Lady of Loreto is changed into _Dea Lauretana_, Peter and Paul into _Dii tutelares Romae_, the souls of the just into _Manes pii_, and the Pope's excommunication into _Dirae_. The Holy Father himself takes the style of _Pontifex Maximus_; his tiara, by a wild confusion of ideas, is described as _infula Romulea_. Nuns are Vestals, and cardinals Augurs. For the festivals of the Church periphrases were found, whereof the following may be cited as a fair specimen:[372] '_Verum accidit ut eo ipso die, quo domum ejus accesseram, ipse piae rei caussa septem sacrosancta Divm pulvinaria supplicaturus inviserit; erant enim l.u.s.trici dies, quos unoquoque anno quadragenos purificatione consecravit nostra pietas._'

[Footnote 371:

Namque sub Oebaliae memini me turribus altis Qua niger humectat flaventia culta Galesus _Corycium_ vidisse _senem_.--Virg. _Georg._ lib. iv. 125.]

[Footnote 372: From the exordium to Valeriano's treatise _De Infelicitate Literatorum_.]

It need hardly be added that, when the obligations of Latinity had reached this point, to read Cicero was of far more importance than to study the Fathers of the Church. Bembo, it is well known, advised Sadoleto to 'avoid the Epistles of S. Paul, lest his barbarous style should spoil your taste: _Omitte has nugas, non enim decent gravem virum tales ineptiae_.' The extent, however, to which formal purism in Latinity was carried, may be best observed in the 'Christiad' of Vida, and the poem 'De Partu Virginis' of Sannazzaro.[373] Sannazzaro not only invokes the muses of Helicon to sing the birth of Christ, but he also makes Proteus prophesy his advent to the river-G.o.d of Jordan. The archangel discovers Mary--described by the poet as _spes fida Deorum_--intent on reading nothing less humanistic than the Sibyls; and after she has received his message, the spirits of the patriarchs are said to shout because they will escape from Tartarus and Acheron and the hideous baying of the triple-throated hound.

[Footnote 373: Lilius Gyraldus, in his dialogue 'De Poetis Nostri Temporis,' _Opp._ vol. ii. p. 384, mentions a critic who was so stupid as to _desiderare in Pontano et si deis placet in Sanazario Christianam elocutionem, hoc est barbaram_!]

It might be reasonably urged against Milton that in the 'Paradise Regained' he somewhat impairs the religious grandeur of his subject by investing it with the forms of the cla.s.sical epic. If he has erred in this direction, it is as nothing compared with the pseudo-Pagan travesty of Vida. G.o.d the Father in the 'Christiad' is spoken of as _Superum Pater nimbipotens_ and _Regnator Olympi_--t.i.tles which had their real significance in Latin mythology, being transferred with frigid formalism to a Deity whose essence is spiritual, and whose cult has no admixture of nature wors.h.i.+p. Jesus is invariably described as _Heros_; this absurdity reaches its climax in the following phrase about the bad thief on the cross:--

Ipse etiam verbis morientem heroa superbis Stringebat.

The machinery whereby the Jews are brought to will the death of Christ is no less ridiculous. Instead of attempting to set religious or ethical motives into play, Vida introduces a gang of Gorgons, Harpies, Centaurs, Hydras, and the like. The bread of the Last Supper appears under the disguise of _sinceram Cererem_. The wine mingled with gall, offered to our Lord upon the cross, is _corrupti pocula Bacchi_. The only excuse for these grotesque compromises between the Biblical subject-matter and its mythological expression is, that in any other way it would have been impossible to give the form of pure Latinity to the verse. The poet failed to comprehend that he was producing a masterpiece of _barocco_ mannerism, spoiling at once the style he sought to use and the theme he undertook to ill.u.s.trate. It was enough for him to fit the Roman toga to his saints and Pharisees, and to tickle the taste of a learned audience by allusions that reminded them of Virgil. The same bathos was reached by Bembo when he invented the paraphrase of 'heavenly zephyr' for the Holy Ghost, and described the Venetian Council bidding a Pope _uti fidat diis immortalibus, quorum vices in terra gerit_. It is not the profanity of these phrases so much as their aesthetic emptiness, the discord between the meaning intended to be conveyed and the literary form, that strikes a modern critic.

When the same poets break out into honest Paganism, in the frank verses written by Bembo for Priapus, in Beccadelli's epigrams, or in the elegies of Acon and Iolas, we feel that they are more artistically justified. The following lines, for instance, from Vida's 'Poetics,'

have a true ring and beauty of their own. He is addressing Virgil as a saint:--

Te colimus, tibi serta damus, tibi thura, tibi aras, Et tibi rite sacrum semper dicemus honorem.

Or again--

Nos aspice praesens, Pectoribusque tuos castis infunde calores Adveniens pater, atque animis te te insere nostris.

There is no confusion here between the feeling and the language chosen to express it. The sentiment, if somewhat artificial and unreal, is at least adequate to the form.

I have entered at some length into the ill.u.s.tration of puristic Latinisms, because they seem to represent the culminating point of cla.s.sic studies, in so far as these affected taste in general, and also because they are specially characteristic of the period of which I have now to treat. It was at Rome, among the great ecclesiastics, that these Pagan fas.h.i.+ons princ.i.p.ally flourished. Eminence of all kinds found a home with Leo X., a.s.suming the purple of the prelate and the scarlet of the cardinal at his indulgent hands. The genius of the Renaissance seemed to have followed this first Medicean Pope from Florence. Though Leo was a man of merely pleasure-loving and receptive temperament, who left no lasting impress on his age, he knew at least how to appreciate ability, and found the height of his enjoyment in the arts and letters he enthusiastically patronised. This sybarite of intellectual and sensual luxury gave his name to what is called the golden age of Italian literature, chiefly because he attracted the best wits to Rome and received the flatteries of men whose work survived them.

History presents few spectacles more striking than that of Rome in the pontificate of Leo. While the Papacy has become a secular sovereignty, learning and arts have a.s.sumed the sacerdotal habit, and the boldest immoralities of a society comparable to that of the ancient Empire flourish in the petty Courts of ecclesiastical princes. The capital of Christendom is full of priests; but the priests are men of pleasure and the world--elegant Latinists and florid rhetoricians, raised to posts of eminence by reason of their brilliant gifts. We have seen already how the humanists made their way into the Roman Curia as writers and abbreviators, and how liberally Nicholas V. rewarded learning. Yet, however indispensable the scholars of the fifteenth century became, they rarely rose above the rank of Apostolic secretaries; while few of the professional humanists cared to take orders in the Church. They were satisfied with official emoluments and semi-secular benefices. All this was now altered. The most distinguished men of letters made the Church their profession.

Sadoleto, Bembo, and Aleander, who began their career under Leo, received the hats of cardinals from Paul III. Paulus Jovius was consecrated Bishop of Nocera by Clement VII., and retired to Como in disgust because he failed to get the scarlet in 1549. Marcus Musurus, created Bishop of Malvasia, is said to have died of disappointment when he saw the same dignity beyond his reach. Vida, the Latin poet, obtained the see of Alba in Piedmont, and Giberti, the accomplished stylist, that of Verona, from Clement VII. All these men had made their mark at Leo's Court, who set the example, followed by his Medicean successor, of rewarding mundane talents and accomplishments with ecclesiastical distinctions. The question, seriously entertained, of admitting Raphael to the Sacred College proves to what extent the highest honours of the Church had come to be esteemed as prizes, and justifies to some extent Pietro Aretino's arrogant offer to sell his services to the Papacy in exchange for a cardinal's hat.

The biographies of these favourites of fortune offer strong points of similarity. Whether born of n.o.ble families, like Bembo, or raised from comparative obscurity, like Bibbiena, they early in life attached themselves to some distinguished prince,[374] or entered the service of a great ecclesiastic. Their literary talents, social accomplishments, successes with women, and diplomatic service at the centres of Italian politics brought them still further into notice.

Thus Sadoleto's Latin poem on the Laoc.o.o.n, Bibbiena's 'Calandra,'

Inghirami's acting of the part of Phaedra in Seneca's 'Hippolytus,' and Bembo's friends.h.i.+p with Lucrezia Borgia might be cited as turning-points in the early history of these ill.u.s.trious prelates.

Having thus acquired position by their personal gifts, they travelled to Rome in the suite of their respective patrons, and obtained office at the hands of Leo. Sadoleto and Bembo became his secretaries.

Inghirami superintended the Vatican Library.[375] Bibbiena's versatile abilities were divided between the duties of State minister and master of the revels. As they had built their fortunes by the help of eminent protectors, they now in their turn took the rank of patrons. In addition to the Vatican, Rome displayed a mult.i.tude of petty Courts and minor circles. Each cardinal and each amba.s.sador held a jurisdiction independent of the Pope, and not unfrequently in opposition to the ruling power. To found academies, to gather clever men around them, and to play the part of Maecenas was the ambition of these subordinate princes. During the pontificate of Leo the Cardinals Riario, Giulio de' Medici, Bibbiena, Petrucci, Farnese, Alidosi, and Gonzaga, not to mention others, entertained their own following of flatterers and poets, who danced attendance at their levees, accompanied them in public, and earned a meagre pittance by compliments and dedications. Some of these priestly patrons affected the arts, others the sciences; others again, and these the majority, bestowed their favours upon literature. Ippolito de' Medici is said to have maintained a retinue of three hundred poets, among whom are mentioned the elegant Molza and the learned Valeriano. The fas.h.i.+on thus set by Leo and the Sacred College was followed by all the eminent men in Rome. The banker Agostino Chigi made himself a name not only by his patronage of painters, but also by the private Greek press founded in his house.[376] Balda.s.sare Turini devoted himself to the arts of building and of decoration. Balda.s.sare Castiglione, as amba.s.sador from Mantua and Ferrara, and Alberto Pio, as prince of Carpi and amba.s.sador from France, dispensed the hospitality of their palaces to scholars, among whom they held no inconsiderable rank on their own merits.

[Footnote 374: See Vol. I., _Age of the Despots_, p. 145.]

[Footnote 375: He held this post under Julius II.]

[Footnote 376: The first Greek book printed in Rome, an edition of Pindar by Cornelius Benignius, 1515, issued from Chigi's press under the superintendence of Zacharias Kalliergos of Crete. Concerning this printer see Didot, _Alde Manuce_, pp. 544-578.]

Libraries, collections of statues and of pictures, frescoes painted from mythological subjects, garden-houses planned upon the antique model, Latin inscriptions, busts of the emperors, baths and banquet chambers decorated in the manner of the Roman ruins--on such objects the wealth of the Church was being prodigally spent. Posterity has reason to deplore the non-appearance of a satirist in this Papal society, so curiously similar to that of Imperial Rome. Horace would, indeed, have found ample materials for humorous delineation, whether he had chosen to deride the needy clients leaving their lodgings before daybreak to crowd a prelate's antechamber, or the parasites on whom coa.r.s.e practical jokes were played in the Pope's presence, or the flatterers who praised their master's mock virtues in hour-long declamations. Fouler vices than vanity, hypocrisy, and servility supplied fit subjects for invectives no less fiery than the second and the sixth of Juvenal. At Rome virtuous women had no place; but Phryne lived again in the person of Imperia, and dignitaries of the Church thought it no shame to parade their preference for Giton.[377] In the absence of a Horace or a Juvenal, we have to content ourselves with Bandello and other novelists, and with one precious epistle of Ariosto describing the difficulty of conducting business at the Papal Court except by way of backstairs influence and antechamber intrigue.

[Footnote 377: The epitaph of Bella Imperia proves that the t.i.tle of Hetaera was thought honourable: 'Imperia, Cortisana Romana, quae digna tanto nomine, rarae inter homines formae specimen dedit. Vixit a. xxvi.

d. xii. Obiit MDXI., die XV. Aug.' Berni's _Capitolo sopra un Garzone_ may be referred to for the second half of the sentence.]

To over-estimate the moral corruption of Rome at the beginning of the sixteenth century is almost impossible. To over-rate the real value of a literature that culminated in the subtleties of rhetoric and style is easy. Nor is it difficult to mistake, as many critics have done, the sunset of the fine arts for their meridian splendour. Yet, while we recognise the enervation of society in worse than heathen vices, and justly regard Rome as the hostelry of alien arts and letters rather than the mother city of great men, we cannot blind our eyes to the varied lights and colours of that Court, unique in modern history.

The culture toward which Italian society had long been tending, was here completed. The stamp of universality had been given to the fine arts and to literature by the only potentate who at that moment claimed allegiance from united Christendom. As the eloquent historian of the town of Rome observes, 'the richest intellectual life here blossomed in a swamp of vices.' It was not the life of great poetry: that had perished long ago with Dante. It was not the life of genuine science: that was destined to be born with Galileo. It was not the life of comprehensive scholars.h.i.+p: that slept in the grave of Poliziano. It was not even the life of progressive art; for Raphael died in this age, and though Michael Angelo survived it, his genius had no successors. But it was the life of culture, rendering the rudest and most vicious sensitive to softening influences, and preparing for more powerful nations the possibilities of great achievements.

Amid political debility and moral corruption an ideal of refinement, adopted from antiquity, and a.s.similated to modern modes of living, had been formed. This was the most perfect bloom of the Renaissance, destined to survive the decay of humanism, and to be for subsequent civilisation what chivalry was for the Middle Ages. Through the continued effort of patricians and of scholars to acquire the tone of cla.s.sic culture, something like antique urbanity had reappeared at Florence and in Rome; while several general tions [Transcriber's Note: likely 'generations'] devoted to polite studies had produced a race distinguished above all things for its intellectual delicacy. The effect of this aesthetic atmosphere upon visitors from the North was singularly varied. Luther, who came to see the City of the Saints, found in Rome the sink of all abominations, the very lair of Antichrist. The _comitas_ and the _facetiae_ of the prelates were to him the object of unmitigated loathing. Erasmus, on the contrary, wrote from London that nothing but Lethe could efface his memory of that radiant city--its freedom of discourse, its light, its libraries, its honeyed converse of most learned scholars, its large style of life, and all those works of art that made of Rome the theatre of nations. The Italians themselves, lessoned by the tragedy of 1527, looked back with no less mingled feelings upon Leo's Rome. La Casa mentions the _nimia humanitatis suavitas_--the excess of sweetness in all that makes society humane--as a characteristic of the past age.

That excessive sweetness of civility, the final product of the arts and scholars.h.i.+p of Italy, when diffused through Europe and tempered to the taste of sterner nationalities, became the politeness of France under Louis XIV., the _bel air_ of Queen Anne's courtiers.

The Roman Academy still continued to be active, meeting at the palaces of more than one great prelate. The gardens of Angelo Colocci, Leo's secretary, a friend of John Lascaris, and himself no inconsiderable stylist, formed its headquarters. Sometimes the poet Blosius Palladius received the a.s.sociates in his villa by the Tiber; sometimes they enjoyed the hospitality of Egidius Canisius, General of the Augustine Order; at one time they sought the house of Sadoleto on the Quirinal; at another they feasted in the vineyard of John Goritz, the Corycius Senex. The festivals of this learned society, to judge by the descriptions of its members, were distinguished by antique simplicity and good taste, contrasting powerfully with the banquets of mere mundane prelates.[378] When Agostino Chigi entertained the Academicians in the Villa Farnesina, he chastened his magnificence to suit the spirit of their founder, Laetus, and omitted those displays of vulgar pomp that marked his wedding banquet.[379]