LAST YEARS OF LORENZO
[1486-1491 A.D.]
From this period until the death of Lorenzo Italy remained at peace and little of any moment occurred at Florence. Lorenzo’s power augmented daily, and like a deep and rapid stream looked clear and smooth and beautiful until crossed by some obstacle; then its force mounted up and swept everything violently away. Nor was it alone in Florence that its strength and volume were felt; Lorenzo’s true object and interest, like Ferdinand’s, was peace, and they held the balance in their hand; the unquiet nature of Alfonso was doubtful and dangerous, but Lorenzo ruled the unextinct energies of a powerful republic with the decision and unity of an absolute monarch and would allow no seeds of discord to be sown without an instantaneous effort to destroy; he influenced all the smaller states, and the vast weight of Florence cast on the side of one or other of the greater was never without its consequences. Disputes for instance occurred this year between Lodovico Sforza and Alfonso of Calabria about the former’s virtually usurping the whole sovereign authority of Milan from his nephew; and these, partly by persuasion, and partly by threats of placing himself on the side of the injured party, Lorenzo settled as he did most others; for he was well convinced that nothing would prove more dangerous to his own authority than any increase of power in either of these potentates. By such judicious management he maintained the peace of Italy, well knowing that no ties, whether of relationship, or obligation, or personal attachment, would ever have the beneficial effects that are produced by fear on sovereign princes.
If Cosmo purchased the liberties of Florence, Lorenzo received back the money with interest, not in power alone, but in gold and silver: under the gonfaloniership of Piero Alamanni in July and August, 1490, the disorder of his finances had become so great as to make a fresh grant of public money absolutely necessary to restore them, and in the year 1491, other fraudulent means were adopted to make up the deficiency. His extensive commercial establishments were necessarily left in the hands of agents who, puffed up with the importance of their master’s name, squandered his substance while they neglected his affairs; from the beginning his credit had been sustained by occasional grants of public money to a large amount; but now the evil was so alarmingly increased that a violent effort of the commonwealth became necessary to remove it, and that effort no less than public bankruptcy! On the 13th of August, 1490, a balia of seventeen members with the full powers of the whole Florentine nation was created to examine the condition of the coinage, the state of the various gabelle, and the public finances as connected with the private necessities of Lorenzo; to ascertain also what was spent on the occasion of making his son a cardinal, which with subsequent donations amounted to 50,000 florins. The disorder both of the public revenues and the private resources of the Medici was extreme, the former having even been anticipated and spent by his own and his agents’ extravagance: the portions of young women, already mentioned as forming a public stock based on national faith and moral integrity, were the first and greatest sufferers; this branch of the public debt which previously paid three per cent. per annum was at once reduced by the authority of the commission to half that interest; and the instantaneous fall of public credit reduced the luoghi di monte, or shares of 100 florins of public stock, from twenty-seven to eleven and a half! The young women who married were allowed a sufficient sum from their portions to pay the contract duty, which of course immediately returned to the treasury; the remainder was reserved, and a payment of seven per cent. promised at the end of twenty years!
One consequence of this was a sudden check to marriage; and when the portions were invested in public securities, dowers of 1500, 1800, and even 2000 florins were given by parties of equal rank to make up the deficiency between real and nominal portions, where 1100 had previously served. There were consequently few marriages except those accomplished by force of ready money, and even for these Lorenzo’s permission became necessary!
“Now,” says Giovanni Cambi,[n] with all the indignation that might be expected from the son of the persecuted Neri, “now let all reflect on what it is to set up tyrants in the city and create balias, and assemble parliaments.” The depreciated currencies of Siena, Lucca, and Bologna affected that of Florence, so that to keep the silver coin in the country it was in like manner depreciated; this measure was considered fair and necessary at the moment by many; but for the people’s quiet, who first and most sensibly feel such evils and who now justly began to murmur, it was announced as a measure for enabling government to pay those marriage portions which had been stopped the previous year. The public for a season appear to have acquiesced in this, not immediately perceiving that they were paying Lorenzo de’ Medici’s debts; but when this new money, called the quattrino bianco was issued at one-fifth more than its real value and not taken by the treasury for more than its actual worth, the citizens saw plainly that they were defrauded and that every species of taxation was virtually augmented by it to that amount, whereupon a deep murmur of indignation pervaded the community. Their anger was vain; Lorenzo’s private necessities required the sacrifice, and his power enforced it!
[1491-1492 A.D.]
When Innocent VIII made Lorenzo’s son, Giovanni de’ Medici, a cardinal ere the boy had completed the age of fourteen, being rather ashamed of his work he accompanied this honour by a stipulation that the hat was not to be worn for three years. That time had now elapsed; Innocent sent the long-desired insignia, and thus prepared the way for a pontificate which encouraged Italian genius and established Medicean grandeur. The ceremony of assuming this hat was performed with great pomp on the 10th of March, 1492, and on the 9th of the following April Lorenzo breathed his last at Careggi in the forty-fourth year of his age.
On his death-bed Lorenzo is said to have sent for Girolamo Savonarola (whom he had always unsuccessfully courted), to confess and grant him absolution. The monk first demanded whether he placed entire faith in the mercy of God, and was answered in the affirmative. He next asked if Lorenzo were ready to surrender all the wealth which he had wrongfully acquired. And this, after some hesitation, was also answered in the affirmative. The third question was if he would re-establish popular government and restore public liberty; but to this he would give no answer, or according to others gave a decided negative; upon which the uncompromising churchman quitted him without bestowing absolution. The authenticity of this anecdote has been questioned, but it is in keeping with the character of both men.[p]