Renaissance in Italy Volume I Part 8

It is worth while to consider more in detail the different magistracies by which the government of Florence was conducted between the years of 1250 and 1531, and the gradual changes in the const.i.tution which prepared the way for the Medicean tyranny.[1] It is only thus an accurate conception of the difference between the republican systems of Venice and of Florence can be gained. Before the date 1282, which may be fixed as the turning-point in Florentine history we hear of twelve Anziani, two chosen for each Sestiere of the city, acting in concert with a foreign Podesta, and a Captain of the People charged with military authority. At this time no distinction was made between n.o.bles and plebeians; and the town, though Guelf, had not enacted rigorous laws against the Ghibelline families. Towards the end of the thirteenth century, however, important, changes were effected in the very elements of the commonwealth. The Anziani were superseded by the Priors of the Arts. Eight Priors, together with a new officer called the Gonfalonier of Justice, formed the Signoria, dwelling at public charge in the Palazzo and holding office only for two months.[2] No one who had not been matriculated into one of the Arti or commercial guilds could henceforth bear office in the state. At the same time severe measures, called Ordinanze della Giustizia, were pa.s.sed, by which the n.o.bles were for ever excluded from the government, and the Gonfalonier of Justice was appointed to maintain civil order by checking their pride and turbulence.[3] These modifications of the const.i.tution, effected between 1282 and 1292, gave its peculiar character to the Florentine republic.

Henceforward Florence was governed solely by merchants. Both Varchi and Machiavelli have recorded unfavorable opinions of the statute which reduced the republic of Florence to a commonwealth of shop-keepers.[4]

But when we read these criticisms, we must bear in mind the internecine ferocity of party-strife at this period, and the discords to which a city divided between a territorial aristocracy and a commercial bourgeoisie was perpetually exposed. If anything could make the Ordinanze della Giustizia appear rational, it would be a cool perusal of the _Chronicle_ of Matarazzo, which sets forth the wretched state of Perugia owing to the feuds of its patrician houses, the Oddi and the Baglioni.[5] Peace for the republic was not, however, secured by these strong measures. The factions of the Neri and Bianchi opened the fourteenth century with battles and proscriptions; and in 1323 the const.i.tution had again to be modified. At this date the Signoria of eight Priors with the Gonfalonier of Justice, the College of the twelve Buonuomini, and the sixteen Gonfaloniers of the companies--called collectively _i tre maggiori_, or the three superior magistracies--were rendered eligible only to Guelf citizens of the age of thirty, who had qualified in one of the seven Arti Maggiori, and whose names were drawn by lot. This mode of election, the most democratic which it is possible to adopt, held good through all subsequent changes in the state. Its immediate object was to quiet discontent and to remove intrigue by opening the magistracies to all citizens alike. But, as Nardi has pointed out, it weakened the sense of responsibility in the burghers, who, when their names were once included in the bags kept for the purpose, felt sure of their election, and had no inducement to maintain a high standard of integrity. Sismondi also dates from this epoch the withdrawal of the Florentines from military service.[6] Nor, as the sequel shows, was the measure efficient as a check upon the personal ambition of encroaching party leaders. The _Squittino_ and the _Borse_ became instruments in the hands of the Medici for the consolidation of their tyranny.[7] By the end of the fourteenth century (about 1378)the Florentines had to meet a new difficulty. The Guelf citizens began to abuse the so-called Law of Admonition, by means of which the Ghibellines were excluded from the government. This law had formed an essential part of the measures of 1323. In the intervening half-century a new aristocracy, distinguished by the name of _n.o.bili popolani_, had grown up and were now threatening the republic with a close oligarchy.[8] The discords which had previously raged between the people and the patricians were now transferred to this new aristocracy and the plebeians. It was found necessary to abolish the Admonition, which had been made a pretext of excluding all _novi homines_ from the government, and to place the members of the inferior Arti on the same footing as those of the superior.[9] At this epoch the Medici, who neither belonged to the ancient aristocracy nor y the more distinguished houses of the _n.o.bili popolani_, but rather to the so-called _gente gra.s.sa_ or substantial tradesmen, first acquired importance. It was by a law of Salvestro de' Medici's in 1378 that the const.i.tution received its final development in the direction of equality. Yet after all this leveling, and in the vehement efforts made by the proletariat on the occasion of the Ciompi outbreak, the exclusive nature of the Florentine republic was maintained. The franchise was never extended to more than the burghers, and the matter in debate was always virtually, who shall be allowed to rank as citizen upon the register? In fact, by using the pregnant words of Machiavelli, we may sum up the history of Florence to this point in one sentence: 'Di Firenze in prima si divisono intra loro i n.o.bili, dipoi i n.o.bili e il popolo, e in ultimo il popolo e la plebe; e molte volte occorse che una di queste parti rimasa superiore, si divise in due.'[10]

[1] I will place in an appendix (No. ii.) translations of Varchi, book iii. sections 20-22, and Nardi, book i. cap. 4, which give complete and clear accounts of the Florentine const.i.tution after 1292.

[2] See Machiavelli, _Ist. Fior._ lib. ii. sect. II. The number of the Priors was first three, then six, and finally eight. Up to 1282 the city had been divided into Sestieri. It was then found convenient to divide it into quarters, and the numbers followed this alteration.

[3] Machiavelli, _Ist. Fior._ lib. ii. sect. 13, may be consulted for the history of Giano della Bella and his memorable ordinance.

Dino Compagni's _Chronicle_ contains the account of a contemporary.

[4] See Varchi, vol. i. p. 169; Mach. _Ist. Fior._ end of book ii.

[5] _Archivio Storico_, vol. xvi. See also the article 'Perugia,' in my _Sketches in Italy and Greece_.

[6] Vol. iii. p. 347.

[7] See App. ii. for the phrases 'Squittino' and 'Borse.'

[8] Of these new n.o.bles the Albizzi and Ricci, deadly foes, were the most eminent. The former strove to exclude the Medici from the government.

[9] The number of the Arti varied at different times. Varchi treats of them as finally consisting of seven maggiori and fourteen minori.

[10] Proemio to _Storia Fiorentina_. 'In Florence the n.o.bles first split up, then the n.o.bles and the people, lastly the people and the mult.i.tude; and it often happened that when one of these parties got the upper hand, it divided into two camps.' For the meaning of _Popolo_ see above, p. 55.

In the next generation the const.i.tutional history of Florence exhibits a new phase. The equality which had been introduced into all cla.s.ses of the commonwealth, combined with an absence of any state machinery like that of Venice, exposed Florence at this period to the encroachments of astute and selfish parvenus. The Medici, who had hitherto been n.o.bodies, begin now to aspire to despotism. Partly by his remarkable talent for intrigue, partly by the clever use which he made of his vast wealth, and partly by espousing the plebeian cause, Cosimo de' Medici succeeded in monopolizing the government. It was the policy of the Medici to create a party dependent for pecuniary aid upon their riches, and attached to their interests by the closest ties of personal necessity. At the same time they showed consummate caution in the conduct of the state, and expended large sums on works of public utility. There was nothing mean in their ambition; and though posterity must condemn the arts by which they sought to sap the foundations of freedom in their native city, we are forced to acknowledge that they shared the n.o.blest enthusiasms of their brilliant era. Little by little they advanced so far in the enslavement of Florence that the elections of all the magistrates, though still conducted by lot, were determined at their choice: the names of none but men devoted to their interests were admitted to the bags from which the candidates for office were selected, while proscriptive measures of various degrees of rigor excluded their enemies from partic.i.p.ation in the government.[1] At length in 1480 the whole machinery of the republic was suspended by Lorenzo de' Medici in favor of the Board of Seventy, whom he nominated, and with whom, acting like a Privy Council, he administered the state.[2] It is clear that this revolution could never have been effected without a succession of coups d'etat. The instrument for their accomplishment lay ready to the hands of the Medicean party in the pernicious system of the Parlamento and Balia, by means of which the people, a.s.sembled from time to time in the public square, and intimidated by the reigning faction, intrusted full powers to a select committee nominated in private by the chiefs of the great house.[3] It is also clear that so much political roguery could not have been successful without an extensive demoralization of the upper rank of citizens. The Medici in effect bought and sold the honor of the public officials, lent money, jobbed posts of profit, and winked at peculation, until they had created a sufficient body of _ames d.a.m.nees_, men who had everything to gain by a continuance of their corrupt authority. The party so formed, including even such distinguished citizens as the Guicciardini, Baccio Valori, and Francesco Vettori, proved the chief obstacle to the restoration of Florentine liberty in the sixteenth century.

[1] What Machiavelli says (_Ist. Fior._ vii. 1) about the arts of Cosimo contains the essence of the policy by which the Medici rose.

Compare v. 4 and vii. 4-6 for his character of Cosimo. Guicciardini (_Op. Ined._ vol. ii. p. 68) describes the use made of extraordinary taxation as a weapon of offense against his enemies, by Cosimo: 'us le gravezze in luogo de' pugnali che communemente suole usare chi ha simili reggimenti nelle mani.' The Marchese Gino Capponi (_Arch.

Stor._ vol. i. pp. 315-20) a.n.a.lyzes the whole Medicean policy in a critique of great ability.

[2] Guicciardini (_Op. Ined._ vol. ii. pp. 35-49) exposes the principle and the _modus operandi_ of this Council of Seventy, by means of which Lorenzo controlled the election of the magistracies, diverted the public moneys to his own use, and made his will law in Florence. The councils which he superseded at this date were the Consiglio del Popolo and the Consiglio del Comune, about which see Nardi, lib i. cap. 4.

[3] For the operation of the Parlamento and Balia, see Varchi, vol.

ii. p. 372; Segni, p. 199; Nardi, lib. vi. cap. 4. Segni says: 'The Parlamento is a meeting of the Florentine people on the Piazza of the Signory. When the Signory has taken its place to address the meeting, the piazza is guarded by armed men, and then the people are asked whether they wish to give absolute power (Balia) and authority to the citizens named, for their good. When the answer, yes, prompted partly by inclination and partly by compulsion, is returned, the Signory immediately retires into the palace. This is all that is meant by this parlamento, which thus gives away the full power of effecting a change in the state.' The description given by Marco Foscari, p. 44 (loc. cit. supr.) is to the same effect, but the Venetian exposes more clearly the despotic nature of the inst.i.tution in the hands of the Medici. It is well known how hostile Savonarola was to an inst.i.tution which had lent itself so easily to despotism. This couplet he inscribed on the walls of the Council Chamber, in 1495:--

'E sappi che chi vuol parlamento Vuol torti dalle mani il reggimento.'

Compare the proverb, 'Chi disse parlamento disse guastamento.'

This tyranny of a commercial family, swaying the republic without the t.i.tle and with but little of the pomp of princes, subsisted until the hereditary presidency of the state was conferred upon Alessandro de'

Medici, Duke of Civita di Penna, in 1531. Cosimo his successor, obtained the rank of Grand Duke from Pius V. in 1569, and his son received the imperial sanction to the t.i.tle in 1575. The re-establishment at two different periods of a free commonwealth upon the sounder basis of the Consiglio Grande (1494-1512 and 1527-30) formed but two episodes in the history of this masked but tenacious despotism. Had Savonarola's const.i.tution been adopted in the thirteenth instead of at the end of the fifteenth century, the stability of Florence might have been secured.

But at the latter date the roots of the Medicean influence were too widely intertwined with private interests, the jealousies of cla.s.ses and of factions were too inveterate, for any large and wholesome form of popular government to be universally acceptable. Besides, the burghers had been reduced to a nerveless equality of servitude, in which ambition and avarice took the place of patriotism; while the corruption of morals, fostered by the Medici for the confirmation of their own authority, was so widely spread as to justify Segni, Varchi, Giannotti, Guicciardini, and Machiavelli in representing the Florentines as equally unable to maintain their liberty and to submit to control.

The historical vicissitudes of Florence were no less remarkable than the unity of Venice. If in Venice we can trace the permanent and corporate existence of a state superior to the individuals who composed it, Florence exhibits the personal activity and conscious effort of her citizens. Nowhere can the intricate relations of cla.s.ses to the commonwealth be studied more minutely than in the annals of Florence. In no other city have opinions had greater value in determining historical events; and nowhere was the influence of character in men of mark more notable. In this agitated political atmosphere the wonderful Florentine intelligence, which Varchi celebrated as the special glory of the Tuscan soil, and which Vasari referred to something felicitous in Tuscan air, was sharpened to the finest edge.[1] Successive generations of practical and theoretical statesmen trained the race to reason upon government, and to regard politics as a science. Men of letters were at the same time also prominent in public affairs. When, for instance, the exiles of 1529 sued Duke Alessandro before Charles V. at Naples, Jacopo Nardi drew up their pleas, and Francesco Guicciardini reb.u.t.ted them in the interest of his master. Machiavelli learned his philosophy at the Courts of France and Germany and in the camp of Cesare Borgia. Segni shared the anxieties of Nicolo Capponi, when the Gonfalonier was impeached for high treason to the state of Florence. This list might be extended almost indefinitely, with the object of proving the intimate connection which subsisted at Florence between the thinkers and the actors. No other European community of modern times has ever acquired so subtle a sense of its own political existence, has ever reasoned upon its past history so acutely, or has ever displayed so much ingenuity in attempting to control the future. Venice on the contrary owed but little to the creative genius of her citizens. In Venice the state was everything: the individual was almost nothing. We find but little reflection upon politics, and no speculative philosophy of history among the Venetians until the date of Trifone Gabrielli and Paruta. Their records are all positive and detailed. The generalizations and comparisons of the Florentines are absent; nor was it till a late date of the Renaissance that the Venetian history came to be written as a whole. It would seem as though the const.i.tutional stability which formed the secret of the strength of Venice was also the source of comparative intellectual inertness. This contrast between the two republics displayed itself even in their art. Statues of Judith, the tyrannicide, and of David, the liberator of his country, adorned the squares and loggie of Florence.

The painters of Venice represented their commonwealth as a beautiful queen receiving the homage of her subjects and the world. Florence had no mythus similar to that which made Venice the Bride of the Sea, and which justified the Doge in hailing Caterina Cornaro as daughter of S.

Mark's (1471). It was in the personal courage and intelligence of individual heroes that the Florentines discovered the counterpart of their own spirit; whereas the Venetians personified their city as a whole, and paid their homage to the Genius of the State.

[1] Varchi, ix. 49; Vasari, xii. p. 158; Burckhardt, p. 270.

It is not merely fanciful to compare Athens, the city of self-conscious political activity, variable, cultivated, and ill-adapted by its very freedom for prolonged stability, with Florence; Sparta, firmly based upon an ancient const.i.tution, indifferent to culture, and solid at the cost of some rigidity, with Venice. As in Greece the philosophers of Athens, especially Plato and Aristotle, wondered at the immobility of Sparta and idealized her inst.i.tutions; so did the theorists of Florence, Savonarola, Giannotti, Guicciardini, look with envy at the state machinery which secured repose and liberty for Venice. The parallel between Venice and Sparta becomes still more remarkable when we inquire into the causes of their decay. Just as the Ephors, introduced at first as a safeguard to the const.i.tution, by degrees extinguished the influence of the royal families, superseded the senate, and exercised a tyrannous control over every department of the state; so the Council of Ten, dangerous because of its vaguely defined dictatorial functions, reduced Venice to a despotism.[1] The gradual dwindling of the Venetian aristocracy, and the impoverishment of many n.o.ble families, which rendered votes in the Grand Council venal, and threw the power into the hands of a very limited oligarchy, complete the parallel.[2] One of the chief sources of decay both to Venice and to Sparta was that shortsighted policy which prevented the n.o.bles from recruiting their ranks by the admission of new families. The system again of secret justice, the espionage, and the calculated terrorism, by means of which both the Spartan Ephoralty and the Venetian Council imposed their will upon the citizens, were stifling to the free life of a republic.[3]

Venice in the end became demoralized in politics and profligate in private life. Her narrowing oligarchy watched the national degeneration with approval, knowing that it is easier to control a vitiated populace than to curb a nation habituated to the manly virtues.

[1] Aristotle terms the Spartan Ephoralty [Greek: _isotyrannos_].

Giannotti (vol-ii. p. 120) compares the Ten to dictators. We might bring the struggles of the Spartan kings with the Ephoralty into comparison with the attempts of the Doges Falieri and Foscari to make themselves the chiefs of the republic in more than name.

Muller, in his _Dorians_, observes that 'the Ephoralty was the moving element, the principle of change, in the Spartan const.i.tution, and, in the end, the cause of its dissolution.'

Sismondi remarks that the precautions which led to the creation of the Council of Ten 'denaturaient entierement la const.i.tution de l'etat.'

[2] See what Aristotle in the _Politics_ says about [Greek: _oliganthropia_], and the unequal distribution of property. As to the property of the Venetian n.o.bles, see Sanudo, _Vite dei Duchi_, Murat. xxii. p. 1194, who mentions the benevolences of the richer families to the poor. They built houses for aristocratic paupers to live in free of rent.

[3] A curious pa.s.sage in Plutarch's _Life of Cleomenes_ (Clough's Translation, vol. iv. p. 474) exactly applies to the Venetian statecraft:--'They, the Spartans, wors.h.i.+p Fear, not as they do supernatural powers which they dread, esteeming it hurtful, but thinking their polity is chiefly kept up by fear ... and therefore the Lacedaemonians placed the temple of Fear by the Syssitium of the Ephors, having raised that magistracy to almost regal authority.'

Between Athens and Florence the parallel is not so close. These two republics, however, resemble one another in the freedom and variety of their inst.i.tutions. In Athens, as in Florence, there was constant change and a highly developed political consciousness. Eminent men played the same important part in both. In both the genius of individuals was even stronger than the character of the state. Again, as Athens displayed more of a Panh.e.l.lenic feeling than any other Greek city, so Florence was invariably more alive to the interests of Italy at large than any other state of the peninsula. Florence, like Athens, was the center of culture for the nation. Like Athens, she give laws to her sister towns in language, in literature, in fine arts, poetry, philosophy, and history.

Without Florence it is not probable that Italy would have taken the place of proud pre-eminence she held so long in Europe. Florence never attained to the material greatness of Athens, because her power, relatively to the rest of Italy, was slight, her factions were incessant, and her connection with the Papacy was a perpetual source of weakness. But many of the causes which ruined Athens were in full operation at Florence. First and foremost was the petulant and variable temper of a democracy, so well described by Plato, and so ably a.n.a.lyzed by Machiavelli. The want of agreement among the versatile Florentines, fertile in plans but incapable of concerted action, was a chief source of political debility. Varchi and Segni both relate how, in spite of wealth, ability, and formidable forces, the Florentine exiles under the guidance of Filippo Strozzi (1533-37) became the laughing-stock of Italy through their irresolution. The Venetian amba.s.sadors agree in representing the burghers of Florence as timid from excess of intellectual mobility. And Dante, whose insight into national characteristics was of the keenest, has described in ever-memorable lines the temperament of his fickle city (_Purg._ vi. 135-51).

Much of this instability was due to the fact that Florentine, like Athenian, intelligence was overdeveloped. It pa.s.sed into mere cleverness, and overreached itself. Next we may note the tyranny which both republics exercised over cities that had once been free. Athens created a despotic empire instead of forming an Ionian Confederation.

Florence reduced Pisa to the most miserable servitude, rendered herself odious to Arezzo and Volterra, and never rested from attempts upon the liberties of Lucca and Siena. All these states, which as a Tuscan federation should have been her strength in the hour of need, took the first opportunity of throwing off her yoke and helping her enemies. What Florence spent in recapturing Pisa, after the pa.s.sage of Charles VIII.

in 1494, is incalculable. And no sooner was she in difficulties during the siege of 1329, than both Arezzo and Pisa declared for her foes.

It will not do to push historical parallels too far, interesting as it may be to note a repet.i.tion of the same phenomena at distant periods and under varying conditions of society. At the same time, to observe fundamental points of divergence is no less profitable. Many of the peculiarities of Greek history are attributable to the fact that a Greek commonwealth consisted of citizens living in idleness, supported by their slaves, and bound to the state by military service and by the performance of civic duties. The distinctive mark of both Venice and Florence, on the other hand, was that their citizens were traders. The Venetians carried on the commerce of the Levant; the Florentines were manufacturers and bankers: the one town sent her sons forth on the seas to barter and exchange; the other was full of speculators, calculating rates of interest and discount, and contracting with princes for the conduct of expensive wars. The mercantile character of these Italian republics is so essential to their history that it will not be out of place to enlarge a little on the topic. We have seen that the Florentines rendered commerce a condition of burghers.h.i.+p. Giannotti, writing the life of one of the chief patriots of the republic,[1] says: 'Egli stette a bottega, come fanno la maggior parte de' nostri, cosi n.o.bili come ign.o.bili.' To quote instances in a matter so clear and obvious would be superfluous: else I might show how Bardi and Peruzzi, Strozzi, Medici, Pitti, and Pazzi, while they ranked with princes at the Courts of France, or Rome, or Naples, were money-lenders, mortgagees and bill-discounters in every great city of Europe. The Palle of the Medici, which emboss the gorgeous ceilings of the Cathedral of Pisa, still swing above the p.a.w.nbroker's shop in London. And though great families like the Rothschilds in the most recent days have successfully a.s.serted the aristocracy of wealth acquired by usury, it still remains a surprising fact that the daughter of the mediaeval bankers should have given a monarch to the French in the sixteenth century.

[1] _Sulle azioni del Ferruccio_, vol. i. p. 44. The report of Marco Foscari on the state of Florence, already quoted more than once, contains a curious aristocratic comment upon the shop-life of ill.u.s.trious Florentine citizens. See Appendix ii. Even Piero de'

Medici refused a Neapolitan fief on the ground that he was a tradesman.

A very lively picture of the modes of life and the habits of mind peculiar to the Italian burgher may be gained by the perusal of Agnolo Pandolfini's treatise, _Del Governo della Famiglia_. This essay should be read side by side with Castiglione's _Cortegiano_, by all who wish to understand the private life of the Italians in the age of the Renaissance.[1] Pandolfini lived at the time of the war of Florence with Filippo Visconti the exile, and the return of Cosimo de' Medici. He was employed by the republic on important missions, and his substance was so great that, on occasion of extraordinary aids, his contributions stood third or fourth upon the list. In the Councils of the Republic he always advocated peace, and in particular he spoke against Impresa di Lucca. As age advanced, he retired from public affairs, and devoted himself to study, religious exercises, and country excursions. He possessed a beautiful villa at Signa, notable for the splendor of its maintenance in all points which befit a gentleman. There he had the honor on various occasions of entertaining Pope Eugenius, King Rene, Francesco Sforza, and the Marchese Piccinino. His sons lived with him, and spent much of their spare time in hawking and the chase. They were three, Carlo, who rose to great dignity in the republic, Giannozzo, still more eminent as a public man, and Pandolfo, who died young. His wife, one of the Strozzi, died while Agnolo was between thirty and forty; but he never married again. He was a great friend of Lionardo Aretino, who published nothing without his approval. He lived to be upwards of eighty-five, and died in 1446. These facts sufficiently indicate what sort of man was the supposed author of the "Essay on the Family," proving, as they do, that he pa.s.sed his leisure among princes and scholars, and that he played some part in the public affairs of the State of Florence. Yet his view of human life is wholly _bourgeois_, though by no means ign.o.ble. In his conception, the first of all virtues is thrift, which should regulate the use not only of money, but of all the gifts of nature and of fortune. The proper economy of the mind involves liberal studies, courteous manners, honest conduct, and religion.[2] The right use of the body implies keeping it in good health by continence, exercise and diet.[3] The thrift of time consists in being never idle. Agnolo's sons, who are represented as talking with their father in this dialogue, ask him, in relation to the gifts of fortune, whether he thinks the honors of the State desirable. This question introduces a long and vehement invective against the life of a professional statesman, as of necessity fraudulent, mendacious, egotistic, cruel.[4] The private man of middle station is really happiest; and only a sense of patriotism should induce him, not seeking but when sought, to serve the State in public office.

The really dear possessions of a man are his family, his wealth, his good repute, and his friends.h.i.+ps. In order to be successful in the conduct of the family, a man must choose a large and healthy house, where the whole of his offspring--children and grandchildren, may live together. He must own an estate which will supply him with corn, wine, oil, wood, fowls, in fact with all the necessaries of life, so that he may not need to buy much. The main food of the family will be bread and wine. The discussion of the utility of the farm leads Agnolo to praise the pleasure and profit to be derived from life in the Villa. But at the same time a town-house has to be maintained; and it is here that the sons of the family should be educated, so that they may learn caution, and avoid vice by knowing its ugliness. In order to meet expenses, some trade must be followed, silk or wool manufacture being preferred; and in this the whole family should join, the head distributing work of various kinds to his children, as he deems most fitting, and always employing them rather than strangers. Thus we get the three great elements of the Florentine citizen's life: the _casa_, or town-house, the _villa_, or country-farm, and the _bottega_, or place of business. What follows is princ.i.p.ally concerned with the details of economy. Expenses are of two sorts: necessary, for the repair of the house, the maintenance of the farm, the stocking of the shop; and unnecessary, for plate, house decoration, horses, grand clothes, entertainments. On this topic Agnolo inveighs with severity against household parasites, bravi, and dissolute dependents.[5] A little further on he indulges in another diatribe against great n.o.bles, _i signori_, from whom he would have his sons keep clear at any cost.[6] It is the animosity of the industrious burgher for the haughty, pleasure-loving, idle, careless man of blood and high estate. In the bourgeois household described by Pandolfini no one can be indolent. The men have to work outside and collect wealth, the women to stay at home and preserve it. The character of a good housewife is sketched very minutely. Pandolfini describes how, when he was first married, he took his wife over the house, and gave up to her care all its contents. Then he went into their bedroom, and made her kneel with him before Madonna, and prayed G.o.d to give them wealth, friends, and male children. After that he told her that honesty would be her great charm in his eyes, as well as her chief virtue, and advised her to forego the use of paints and cosmetics. Much sound advice follows as to the respective positions of the master and the mistress in the household, the superintendence of domestics, and the right ordering of the most insignificant matters. The quality of the dress which will beseem the children of an honored citizen on various occasions, the pocket money of the boys, the food of the common table, are all discussed with some minuteness: and the wife is made to feel that she must learn to be neither jealous nor curious about concerns which her husband finds it expedient to keep private.

[1] I ought to state that Pandolfini is at least a century earlier in date than Casliglione, and that he represents a more primitive condition of society. The facts I have mentioned about his life are given on the authority of Vespasiano da Bisticci. The references are made to the Milanese edition of 1802. It must also be added that there are strong reasons for a.s.signing the treatise in question to Leo Battista Alberti. As it professes, however, to give a picture of Pandolfini's family, I have adhered to the old t.i.tle. But the whole question of the authors.h.i.+p of the Famiglia will be fully discussed in the last section of my book, which deals with Italian literature.

Personally. I accept the theory of Alberti's authors.h.i.+p.

[2] A beautiful description of the religious temper, p. 74.

[3] What Pandolfini says about the beauty of the body is worthy of a Greek: what he says about exercise might have been written by an Englishman, p. 77.

[4] Pp. 82-89 are very important as showing how low the art of politics had sunk in Italy.

[5] P. 125.

[6] P. 175.

The charm of a treatise like that of Pandolfini on the family evaporates as soon as we try to make a summary of its contents. Enough, however, has been quoted to show the thoroughly _bourgeois_ tone which prevailed among the citizens of Florence in the fifteenth century.[1] Very important results were the natural issue of this commercial spirit in the State. Talking of the Ordinanze di Giustizia, Varchi observes: 'While they removed in part the civil discords of Florence, they almost entirely extinguished all n.o.bility of feeling in the Florentines, and tended as much to diminish the power and haughtiness of the city as to abate the insolence of the patriciate.'[2] A little further on he says: 'Hence may all prudent men see how ill-ordered in all things, save only in the Grand Council, has been the commonwealth of Florence; seeing that, to speak of nought else, that kind of men who in a wisely const.i.tuted republic ought not to fulfill any magistracy whatever, the merchants and artisans of all sorts, are in Florence alone capable of taking office, to the exclusion of all others.' Machiavelli, less wordy but far more emphatic than Varchi, says of the same revolution: 'This caused the abandonment by Florence not only of arms, but of all n.o.bility of soul.'[3] The most notable consequence of the mercantile temper of the republics was the ruinous system of mercenary warfare, with all its attendant evils of ambitious captains of adventure, irresponsible soldiery, and mock campaigns, adopted by the free Italian States. It is true that even if the Italians had maintained their national militias in full force, they might not have been able to resist the shock of France and Spain any better than the armies of Thebes, Sparta, and Athens averted the Macedonian hegemony. But they would at least have run a better chance, and not perhaps have perished so ign.o.bly through the treason of an Alfonso d'Este (1527), of a Marquis of Pescara (1525), of a Duke of Urbino (1527), and of a Malatesta Baglioni (1530).[4]

Machiavelli, in a weighty pa.s.sage at the end of the first book of his Florentine History, sums up the various causes which contributed to the disuse of national arms among the Italians of the Renaissance. The fear of the despot for his subjects, the priest-rule of the Church, the jealousy of Venice for her own n.o.bles, and the commercial sluggishness of the Florentine burghers, caused each and all of these powers, otherwise so different, to intrust their armies to paid captains. 'Di questi adunque oziosi principi e di queste vilissime armi sara piena la mia istoria,' is the contemptuous phrase with which he winds up his a.n.a.lysis.[5]

[1] Varchi (book x. cap. 69) quotes a Florentine proverb: 'Chiunque non sta a bottega e ladro.' See above, p. 239.

[2] Varchi, vol. i. p. 168; compare vol. ii. p. 87, however.

[3] _Ist. Fior._ lib. ii. end. Aristotle's contempt for the [Greek: _technitai_] emerges in these comments of the doctrinaires.