Historical essays, and reviews

Preface

I CANNOT claim that there is any special connexion between the paperswhich I have collected in this volume, but they illustrate different sides of Dr. Creighton's activities. The earlier ones were written during the years which he spent in a quiet country parish, when he not only studied the history and literature of Italy and the characteristics of the district in which he lived, but was able occasionally to enjoy some weeks of foreign travel. A visit to Rimini roused his deep interest in the wonderful monument to the art of the early Renaissance period which Gismondo Malatesta raised there. The article on **The Italian Bishops of Worcester" was written during the years when he was Canon of Worcester and loved to study every point connected with the history of his beloved Cathedral. It appeared in the ''Report of the Worcester Diocesan Architectural and Archaeological Society," by whose permission it is included in this volume. The paper on ''The Harvard Commemoration " was written by special request for the Times, immediately after the vi PREFACE

function in which, as the representative of his Cambridge College of Emmanuel, he played an important part. I have thought it best to leave it exactly in the form in which it was written. The paper on the Moscow Coronation commemorates one of the most interesting episodes in his life.

I have added four of his reviews from the Historical Review, which deal with important books bearing on the periods in which he was specially interested.

The articles on " Dante," " ^neas Sylvius," " A Schoolmaster of the Renaissance," " A Learned Lady of the Sixteenth Century," and " The Northumbrian Border," were first published in MacmillarCs Magazine; that on " A Man of Culture " in the Magazine of Art ; on "John Wiclif" in the Theological Review; the article on " The Harvard Commemoration" in the Times ; that on " The Imperial Coronation at Moscow " in the Cornhill Magazine; and that on " The Fenland " in the Journal of the Royal Archceo logical Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. I have to thank the respective editors for their kind permission to reprint them.

LOUISE CREIGHTON.

Contents

PAGE

Dante, Part I . . . i

Dante, Part II. 26

Part I

Once, and once only, in its history has the Papacy been identified with the general course of European literature and culture, and the experience of that epoch certainly does not encourage it to repeat the experiment. The Renaissance came so suddenly, and came from so many sides at once, that the Papacy in its enfeebled condition at the time had no opportunity for really examining it, whilst it had lost its firm hold upon its old traditions, and found itself committed to the new movement before it had weighed the consequences or really determined upon its policy. It was no longer the vigorous mediaeval power that had crushed the rising movements of the twelfth century, had cowed Abelard, had uprooted the growing literature of Provence, had stopped the political speculations of Arnold of Brescia, and had reasserted its sway over the rebellious intellect of Europe ; but the Papacy of the Renaissance was the crippled power that emerged from the French captivity, the long schism, the bonds of the general councils, — emerged an object of general suspicion, degraded even in its own eyes, with no weapons but its own craftiness, with no aim but its own restoration, at all events in Italy, to decent respect, with no policy except that prevalent in Italy at the time — to promise everything asked, and perform as little as possible.

Under such circumstances the Papacy was not disposed to add to its many enemies the men of the new learning : it stood in too great need of them. The reforming views of the Council of Constance had been supported by men of high reputation and great erudition, such as Gerson and D'Ailly. The Papacy must have similar champions on its side ; and it was useless in its hour of need to look for a deeper qualification than a power of writing elegant Latin prose. The rising scholars were only too ready to offer themselves to any one who would appreciate their services : to minds exulting in the glories of antiquity the enthusiasms and aspirations of the day mattered little; culture had made them ambitious, and they longed for a sphere in which they might distinguish themselves. They wanted money, if only to buy books : ought not the world to belong to the wise? But wisdom unfortunately was badly paid by those in power ; the Pope was more likely to appreciate it than any one else who had money to expend : and then at the Papal Court they might write letters in the style of Cicero, and histories in the style of Livy, and deliver orations equal to any of the great productions of antiquity on the occasion of every fresh arrival of ambassadors from a foreign prince. Hence came the alliance between the Papacy and the scholars of the Renaissance, by which Poggio, Leonardo Bruni, Guarino, and Francesco Filelfo were all Papal secretaries. Even Laurentius Valla, in spite of his audacious use of iENEAS SYLVIUS PICCOLOMINI, POPE PIUS II. S7

criticism in proving the falsity of the Donation of Constantine, was pardoned after a slight apology ; and honest souls like Campano were rewarded for sprightly epigrams and jovial manners by bishoprics which they never visited, and the revenues of which they thought needlessly encumbered by the obligation to wear a long and inconvenient garment and look solemn in public.

The Papacy reaped for a while the advantages of this alliance. Rome, from the time of Nicolas V. to that of Leo X., was the literary and artistic capital of Europe ; the Popes recovered their external position, the open antagonism of France and Germany was for a while extinguished, and the Papal revenues flowed in securely ; but these advantages were bought at a heavy price. Rome, given up to art and literature, ceased to have much care for religion ; and Erasmus was startled to find in Rome that no one was considered to be in the fashion who did not hold some false or erroneous opinion about the dogmas of the Church, that the Cardinals made oath " by the immortal gods," and proved the souls of men and beasts to be the same. The Papacy , which had so long held fast to the orthodox faith at all hazards, had now fallen victim to a heresy worse than any she had in former times combated — the heresy of the Renaissance. It needed the voice of Luther and the defection of half Christendom to rouse Rome from its refined sensualism, and bring back the old severe rigid system, which won new victories and put forth new strength in the Counter- Reformation.

The most characteristic personage in the history of the Papacy during the Renaissance period is without doubt ^neas Sylvius Bartolomeus Piccolomini, Pope Pius II. Born in 1405 at Corsignano, a little village near Siena, of an old noble family, which had decayed owing to the democratic movement of mediaeval Italy, he made his way in the world solely by his own abilities and tact — a veritable Gil Bias of the Middle Ages, who saw that the world was all before him, and was determined to use it for his own ends. In early life he had little to help him, as he was one of a family of eighteen, and in his youth worked with his own hands in the few fields his father still possessed ; but all his brothers and sisters died except two, and at the age of eighteen ^neas, the only surviving son, left home to study law in Siena. Law, however, was distasteful to him, and his ambition soared higher than an advocate's gown : he preferred general literature, and was an unceasing student of the classics — nay, he even managed to scrape together money to go for a little while to Florence and attend the lectures of Francesco Filelfo. He obtained a reputation in Siena by writing Latin love poems, and by other small literary eftbrts, and so when he had reached the age of twenty-six he was recommended as a clever young man, well fitted to fill the post of secretary to Domenico da Capranica, who was passing through Siena on his way to Basle, where the Council had just begun to sit. Capranica had a complaint against the new Pope, Eugenius IV., who had refused to confirm him in a cardinalate conferred by his predecessor.

^neas was delighted to leave Siena and plunge into the great world of politics ; and his first experiences at Basle showed his penetrating mind the path to success. He found the Council full of needy adventurers and place-hunters, men of culture like himself, who hoped in these troubled times to turn their wits to good purpose, and reap advantages which quiet days would never have put within their reach. There were undoubtedly many worthy and high-minded men who were the chief movers of the Council, but still the efforts for reform rested upon no sure foundation, since the whole movement was little more than a rising of the ecclesiastical aristocracy against the Papal monarchy, stimulated by the ordinary aristocratic desire to share the monarch's plunder. Hence, in spite of the efforts of many honourable men, the question at issue between the Pope and the Council soon became a struggle who should get the larger share in a general scramble for Church patronage.

iEneas soon learned to estimate the Council at its true value, and also had opportunities of studying the condition of Europe generally. Between the years 1432-35 he was in the service of various masters, with whom he visited almost every country in Europe — saw the weakness of Germany by attending a Diet at Frankfort, learned the exhaustion of France after its English wars, and admired the power of Burgundy and the wealth of Flanders ; saw the barbarism of Scotland ; travelled in disguise from Newcastle to London in the company of a justice in eyre, who little knew to whom he was revealing his views on English politics and his complaints against the feeble Henry VI. ; in Italy also he learned the policy of Filippo Maria Visconti of Milan, and saw the immense influence of Niccolo Piccinino, the great leader of condottieri. So in 1436 he came back to Basle an expert in intrigue, and with a reputation which was sure to be of service.

yEneas himself gives an instance of the Council's zeal for reform. He had managed to insinuate himself into the good graces of the Archbishop of Milan, who showed his appreciation of his elegant Latinity by conferring on him, though still a layman, a cannory in the church of San Ambrogio at Milan. For this irregular appointment the dispensation of the Council was necessary : true, the Council professed to be engaged in putting down such irregularities, and attacked nothing more fiercely than Papal dispensations ; but -^neas was a worthy man who had done good service to the Council — it was hard to refuse one who had such good capacities for business, so pleasant a manner, such ready tact, such a happy way of glozing over difficulties and settling disputes ; finally, the charming modesty and graceful deference of his speech quite decided the matter : " I ask nothing which may be contrary to your honour : I would prefer your favour. Fathers, without possession of the canonry, to a capitular election with full possession ". What wonder that a universal murmur of applause followed this delightful compliment, and ^neas's adversaries were not even allowed to speak ?

This was ^neas's first taste of ecclesiastical preferments : as yet he had no intention of taking orders. He lived in a small circle of humanists, and we know from his letters to his friends that his life at this time was one of the grossest sensuality. It was in fact the

^NEAS SYLVIUS PICCOLOMINI, POPE PIUS II. 6i

utter and unrestrained character of his indulgences, unredeemed by any noble feeling,^ that saved him from the fatal crime of marriage, by which so many of the early humanists, before they clearly saw their way in life, were unfortunate enough to cut themselves off from the golden road of clerical preferment. Principles, ^neas had none : his Basle speeches are eloquent, suave, and empty. When the breach between the Pope and Council openly broke out, and they excommunicated one another, ^neas, bound by his canonry to the Council, composed tractates, pronounced scathing invectives, and wrote scurrilous libels against the Pope ; although, as he says in his first letter of retractation, " I was like a young bird that had escaped from the University of Siena, and knew nothing either of the manners of the Curia or the life of Eugenius ". He was a literary adventurer, ready to turn his pen to the best account.

In this respect he was merely a representative of the general character of the early Renaissance, which was a reaction against scholasticism, against the monkery and bigotry of the Middle Ages. It was of little consequence what side was taken, what principles supported — all were equally unimportant to the man of culture — he must only be careful to act in a becoming way in public, and express himself in good Latin. It is very characteristic that ^neas, after he became Pope, still made no effort to stop the publication of the more immoral of his youthful letters, or of his novel Lucretia and Euryalus ; the entire series was

revised by him in his later days, and all were allowed to descend to posterity together. Pope Pius, it is true, wrote a letter of penitence, to be published with the rest. He wrote them, he says, when he was young in years and in mind — (yet Lucretia and Euryalus was written when he was forty) — they contain moral and edifying doctrines, to those who will use them aright. " What we wrote in our youth about love, avoid it, O men, despise it. Follow what we now say, and believe the old man more than the youth. Regard not the layman higher than the priest. Reject ^neas ; receive Pius " (" ^neant rejicite ; Pium suscipite "). Really, these letters were among the most popular that ^neas wrote, and he was proud of them ; his literary fame required their circulation: as humanist he could justify them by many excellent parallels from antiquity ; as Pope he made a decent apology for them.

^neas was prepared to turn his hand to anything : he wrote love-verses ; he delivered speeches ; he was even appointed by the Archbishop of Milan to preach a sermon in honour of St. Ambrose. The theologians were indignant at this preference of a layman, but the majority of the Council preferred the more sparkling style and lively manner of ^neas, and listened, he tells us, " with wondrous attention ". He wrote a history of the Council of Basle in the style of Caesar's Commentaries y and dialogues in defence of its principles after the style of Cicero's Tusculans. If it were possible to satisfy everybody, ^neas would try and do so.

By this means he obtained a secure position at Basle, and held many offices in the Council ; but Basle day

.ENEAS SYLVIUS PICCOLOMINI, POPE PIUS II. 63

by day became a less important place, and a less satisfactory field for a man of ability who wished to succeed. The Council had sat so long and done so little that it began to lose prestige. In 1438 France withdrew, and settled its own Church Reform by the Pragmatic Sanction of Bourges, while Germany at the same time proclaimed itself neutral between Pope and Council. The assembled Fathers of Basle ventured, when it was now too late, upon a decisive step : they brought their conflict with Eugenius to an issue by deposing him, and elected in his stead Amadeus, the retired Duke of Savoy, in the hope that his name and political influence would win back to the Council the allegiance of the princes of Europe. But they were doomed to disappointment, for Felix V. was too unused to ecclesiastical matters to act the Pope to the satisfaction of those around him, and was too skilled in the ways of the world to spend his money without a due return. The place-hunters of Basle found that they would have to maintain their Pope instead of receiving from him ; he refused to rob his children of their inheritance, and the various national Churches showed no disposition to give him so much recognition as to confer a right over their revenues. Under these sad circumstances the Council began to thin daily, ^neas, though he was made Pope Felix's secretary, thought he had better move elsewhere ; and, accordingly, while on an embassy to Frederic of Germany, he contrived to produce a favourable impression on the Bishop of Chiemsee, by whom Frederic was induced to confer upon him the honour of crowning him Poet with his own hand.

It was an odd distinction, and would be little understood by the Germans. Frederic himself cared little about poetry, and ^neas certainly was not a poet ; but it pleased his vanity to think that his talents were now appreciated, and he transferred himself from the service of Felix to that of Frederic, as clerk in the Imperial Chancery. He is not ashamed to account for his conduct later : " When all were leaving Felix and refusing to recognise his Papacy, I betook myself to the Emperor Frederic ; for I did not wish to change directly from one side to the other ". JEneas wished to get a good position in Germany, and use it as a vantage-ground from which to reconcile himself decently with the Papacy, and even gain its gratitude. So at the age of thirty-seven ^neas left Basle, and went into Germany as a prophet of culture. At first he was bitterly disappointed. He writes soon after his arrival, in utter despair, to a friend : " Here must I live and die, without relations, without friends, without acquaintances, without any conversation with you and my other friends. Would that I had never seen Basle, for then I should have died in my own land, and laid my head on my parent's bosom. Now I may say I am as good as dead, for my life does not differ from Ovid's when he lived in banishment in the land of Tomi." The Emperor took no notice of him ; he was merely a clerk in the Chancery ; he was disgusted with the German manners of his fellow-clerks, and they were disgusted by his morals ; even his talents were not appreciated, for he wrote a comedy in the style of Terence, which only increased their contempt for his moral character. But ^neas was supported in his trials. " Many things there are which compel us to persevere, but nothing more powerfully than ambition, which, rivalling charity, truly beareth all things, however grievous, that it may attain to the honours of this world and the praise of men. If we were humble and laboured to gain our own souls rather than hunt after vain -glory, few of us indeed would endure such annoyances." Under the influence of these feelings ^neas wrote his most popular treatise. On the Miseries of Courtiers^ in which he details with querulous humour all the grievances of his position, from the ingratitude of the prince to the sordor of the table-cloths and the hardness of the black bread. But hardest to bear of all is the contempt shown towards literature : " In the courts of princes literary knowledge is held a crime ; and great is the grief of men of letters when they find themselves universally despised, and see the most important matters managed, not to say mismanaged, by blockheads who cannot tell the numbers of their fingers and toes".

But presently things looked more bright to him, for he gained the favour of Gaspar Schlick, the Chancellor, a man who had risen by his own talents, and who was opposed to the aristocratic party at court. Schlick knew the value of the keen-eyed Italian in watching court intrigues and letting him know about them ; and there are many letters from ^neas to Schlick which show how acutely he could serve his patron. And so, through Schlick's favour, iEneas became better known at the court, and his talents consequently were more appreciated. The young Sigismund, Duke of Austria, a boy of seventeen, under Frederic's guardianship, asks ^neas to write him a Latin love-letter, which he does with an appropriate address on the uses of love and literature and the connexion between the two. Now, too, he wrote his very questionable novel of Lucretia and Euryalus. His private life seems still to have been one of unprincipled self-gratification.

But meanwhile, in his ecclesiastical opinions, -^neas is slowly feeling his way round to that side which he sees will ultimately prevail ; at present he wishes to follow his masters and be neutral. His letters consequently utter sentiments favourable to Eugenius or to the Council, or expressive of entire indifference, as he may think most convenient ; but his purpose is fixed to make the best of his position and take no false step. " The whole of Christendom," he writes to a friend, " favours Eugenius. Germany only is divided, though I could wish to see her united, and so adapt myself to her ; for I regard this nation as very important, since it is not influenced by fear, but by its own caprice or judgment. To whichever side the King and the Electors incline, thither will my little soul follow them ; for I may not trust myself more than others." He professes in another letter the most fervent intention of following his master : " You know that I serve a neutral prince, who, holding the middle course, strives after reconciliation. It is not right for servants to wish other than their master's will. I will win the king's favour ; I will obey the king, will follow him where he will ; I will oppose him in nothing ; I will meddle with nothing that does not concern me. I am a foreigner ; my purpose is to act the part of Gnatho : what they say, I say ; what they deny, \ deny. If they act wisely, they shall enjoy the praise ; if foolishly, they shall bear the disgrace. I envy no man's glory, and wish to grieve over no man's infamy."

But ^neas soon had reasons for taking a keener interest in Church affairs. His patron Schlick wished to get the bishopric of Prising for his brother, but the canons elected another. Schlick, however, did not despair ; the bishopric might be obtained from others than the canons, and so he turned his attention to Pope Eugenius in the hope of securing what he wanted by his means. It entirely suited ^neas's plans to follow his master in this ; by securing the recognition of Eugenius in Germany, he would obtain a strong hold upon the gratitude of Rome, and Rome was the only patron from whom a man of ability could gain substantial rewards, ^neas was now past middle age : he had laboured hard and won very little ; for a small canonry at Aspach in the Tyrol was all he had to eke out his scanty salary as secretary. Politics, he now clearly saw, would never lead him to distinction or riches in Germany ; the Church alone could give him wealth ; the Pope only could restore him to his native Italy, and confer upon him that position which he deserved. To take orders, be reconciled to the Pope, and, if possible, command his gratitude, were now the objects of ^neas's policy.

The first of these was tolerably easy, as the conscientious objections which ^Eneas had felt in his early days had now disappeared. The fire of youth had burnt out, and his hair was now turning grey. The worship of Bacchus, he wrote to a friend, pleased him more than that of Venus ; he had become practically convinced of the ill effects of his former follies, and wrote letters of sound moral advice to his friends. There was nothing in his religious opinions to hinder him from becoming a good servant of the Church. He had always had strong religious feelings : while a boy at Siena he had been so deeply moved by the preaching of Father Bernardino as to wish to become a monk, and in Scotland he had shown his thankfulness for an escape from shipwreck by making a painful pilgrimage of ten miles barefoot to a shrine of the Virgin. Nor had he any temptation to be free-thinking in his opinions : but he regarded religious opinions and religious observances as the especial province of the priesthood, and thought that others need not be troubled with them. At the end of his dialogues on the Basle Council he gives his opinion that men of letters ought not to be disturbed by the sound of so many church-bells, and ought to be reckoned good Christians without being required to take so many hours from their studies for religious services, ^neas was never accused of unorthodoxy : he had reformed his morals, and so at the age of forty he felt he could conscientiously take orders. " I have a piece of news for you," he writes, " that will surprise you. I am now a subdeacon — a thing I once used to shudder at. But the light-mindedness that grows amongst laymen has now left me, and there is nothing I love so much as the priesthood."

^neas next entered upon the career on which his political fame is founded, and became the means of bringing back to the Papacy the still neutral German

.ENEAS SYLVIUS PICCOLOMINI, POPE PIUS II. 69

Church. He was a bold man to undertake an embassy to Pope Eugenius, whom he had covered with every kind of infamy, and against whom he had brought to bear every kind of argument three years before. When he reached Siena, his relatives besought him not to venture into Rome, ^neas answered with dignity that the Emperor's ambassador need have no fear ; he knew, however, that he had a more effectual title to the Pope's consideration. After being privately assured of his acceptance, he made in public a decent apology to Eugenius : he had gone astray, but who had not ? He had acted for the glory of God and of the Church, and now mature reflection had brought change of mind. Eugenius assured him of forgiveness, and the secret negotiations were commenced.

The task which .Eneas had undertaken was a hard one, and the bargain which he negotiated was most scandalous : partly for ready money, partly for rights to spoil the German Church, Frederic sold the German obedience. Still it was a hard matter to win over the independent and strongly national feeling of the Electors, who despised Frederic's feebleness and were repelled by the monastic sternness of Eugenius. .Eneas, however, succeeded : he cajoled the king ; he bribed the Archbishop of Mainz ; and on the night before the final vote of the Diet he ventured to alter with his own hand the Pope's instructions to his Legates, so as to make them just endurable to the Electors' ears. By this means he secured a majority for the Pope, and hurried at once to Rome to have the matter formally settled.

The Pope was ill in bed, and wished before he died

JO HISTORICAL ESSAYS AND REVIEWS

to see this lingering quarrel brought to an end. Against the wish of the Cardinals he signed the Provisions a few days before his death, and almost the last act of his eventful pontificate was to confer on ^neas the bishopric of Trieste, ^neas had well earned his reward, and had gained what was of equal importance to him, a claim to the remembrance of posterity. He had given the last blow to the Basle Council, to the anti-pope Felix, to the rebellion of Germany against the Papacy : he had not lived in vain. But ^neas, like all great men, was not at once appreciated. The successor of Eugenius, Tommaso Parentucelli, Pope Nicolas V., was a high-minded and honourable man, entirely devoted to study ; of an excitable temperament, which, under the burden of the Papacy, led him into excess in wine ; choleric even to his friends, self-willed, with a contempt for the intrigues of the Curia, and a desire to make the Papacy the centre of European learning. To a man of such aims and of such a character ^Eneas, whom he had well known in his youthful days, must have seemed the most contemptible of men ; and though Nicolas was compelled to use his services, he never trusted him. iEneas was sent back to Germany, where he had leisure to write letters of recantation and apology for his former life and opinions ; and was obliged, sorely against his will, to apply himself again to German politics.

His talents were there principally employed in arranging Frederic's marriage, and preparing for his journey to Rome to receive the Imperial Crown. His account of the proceedings in which he took part gives us a strange picture of the feebleness of Frederic and the suspicions of the Italians, ^neas went to Siena to await there the coming of Leonora of Portugal, Frederic's betrothed bride : the people of Siena were afraid of the presence of their influential countryman ; they feared that he would plot some revolution in their Republic ; and ^neas found it prudent to retire to the port of Talamone, where he spent sixty days in tedious expectation. Frederic met his bride in Siena, the citizens of which, in spite of their former fears, testified their loyalty in a painfully modern way. " They erected afterwards a marble column as a perpetual memorial to posterity, that the Emperor who came from the East, and the Empress who came from the West, there first encountered one another." But -^neas had not only to make loyal speeches ; he had also to exert himself to keep the Pope from being at the last moment terrified at the thought of the possible consequence of receiving so powerful a guest in his rebellious city. Nicolas tried to put off the coronation, but ^neas stoutly resisted ; he wrote that he marvelled at this sudden change of the Apostolic mind : that it was not honourable for the Pope to withdraw from his promise. Nicolas was comforted by his guarantee of Frederic's good behaviour, and the ceremony passed off without any disturbance. ^Eneas appeared on that occasion as the Emperor's chief adviser, and rumour began to destine him to the Cardinalate.