Before, however, Lorenzo could proceed to the execution of his beneficent system, he had to thank his stars for a second escape from a new conspiracy formed against his life, at the instigation of his old and inveterate enemies, the Riarii, by Battista Frescobaldi. This attempt, conducted with less prudence, had none of the atrocious consequences of the first, but ended in the immediate destruction of Frescobaldi and his Tuscan accomplices. Cursorily however, as it is related by our author, it appears to have made a deep impression on the mind of his hero, since he adopted, in consequence of it, a measure of safety which even the homicide Cesar had scorned, that of appearing in public guarded by a select band of armed friends.
The author now proceeds at length, and with equal perspicuity, impartiality, and diligence, to detail the progress of Lorenzo's measures to secure and establish the independence of Florence, and to compose the jarring interests of Italy. Popes, kings, petty princes, republics, appear in succession, poised, supported, checked, advised, reconciled, to cement his generous plan. Eloquence, military skill, caution, liberality, intrepidity, stamp him by turns the soul of his own, and the arbiter of the surrounding states, till at length the whole is composed and well poised,—Italy enjoys security and peace. Such is the general outline; a more minute detail, as it would exceed our limits, could in a meagre summary serve only to weary the reader: the materials vary, the contending parties are not equally important, the heroes sometimes relax; conquests give way to a leader's indisposition, and battles are fought which remind us of Virgil's winged squadrons;
"Hi motus animorum, atque hæc certamina tanta,
Pulveris exigui jactu compressa quiescunt."
Chap. VII. From politics, negotiations, and war, we follow our author to his academic shades, to the improvements in classic learning made under the fostering patronage of Lorenzo; to the importation of Greek literature by Emanuel Chrysoloras, Joannes Argyropylus, Demetrius Chalcondyles; to the introduction of printing, the progress of the Laurentian library, and the establishment of a Greek academy at Florence. We are made acquainted with Politiano; his merits as a civilian, critic, translator, controvertist, and poet: Giovanni Pico, Prince of Mirandola, next excites our wonder; and after him, Linacer Landino, and the two Verini might claim our attention, were they not eclipsed by the female efforts of Alessandra Scala, and Cassandra Fidelis.
'It might have been expected,' says our author, p. 55, after having premised some observations on the seemingly unattainable excellence of Dante, Petrarca, and Boccaccio, 'that the successful efforts of these authors to improve their native tongue, would have been more effectual than the weak, though laudable, attempts made by them to revive the study of the ancient languages; but it must be remembered, that they were all of them men of genius, and genius assimilates not with the character of the age. Homer and Shakspeare have no imitators, and are no models. The example of such talents is perhaps, upon the whole, unfavourable to the general progress of improvement; and the superlative abilities of a few, have more than once damped the ardour of a nation. But if the great Italian authors were inimitable in the productions of their native language, in their Latin writings they appeared in a subordinate character. Of the labours of the ancients, enough had been discovered to mark the decided difference between their merits and those of their modern imitators; and the applauses bestowed upon the latter, were only in proportion to the degree in which they approached the models of ancient eloquence. This competition was, therefore, eagerly entered into; nor had the success of the first revivers of these studies deprived their followers of the hope of surpassing them. Even the early part of the fifteenth century produced scholars as much superior to Petrarca, and his coadjutors, as they were to the monkish compilers, and scholastic disputants, who immediately preceded them; and the labours of Leonardo Aretino, Gianozzo Manetti, Guarino Veronese, and Poggio Bracciolini, prepared the way for the still more correct and classical productions of Politiano, Sannazaro, Pontano, and Augurelli. The declining state of Italian literature, so far then from being inconsistent with, was rather a consequence of the proficiency made in other pursuits, which, whilst they were distinguished by a greater degree of celebrity, demanded a more continued attention, and an almost absolute devotion both of talents and of time.'
It would be injustice to suppose that, by this well turned and energetic passage, our author could mean to depreciate the benign influence of original genius, or to insinuate aught against the necessity of it's periodical appearance: his aim is to assign their proper place to the literati of the epoch he describes, to trace the probable motives of their pursuits, and to show, that by a judicious choice they supplied, in some degree, their want of innate power, and even of discernment in their objects of imitation. Who, better than our historian, knows, that, if Nature be inexhaustible in her resources and productions, and genius be merely a power, seizing and representing with clearness some of her features, the appearance of one man of genius can no more check the perceptions, than preclude the existence of another? He who takes Homer or Michael Angelo for his model, adopts him merely as his medium to see Nature more distinctly or on a grander scale; he imitates without copying, like Virgil and Pelegrino Tibaldi, for whom it will be difficult to find a name, if they be refused that of imitators of the Ionian and the Tuscan genius. If the supposed inaccessible excellence of Dante and his contemporaries dispirited the Italians of the fifteenth century from the cultivation of the higher Italian poetry, it proved not that they had exhausted Nature, but that they were no longer understood; and that they were not, almost every line of their pedantic commentators proves. Machiavelli, Ariosto, Tasso, appeared after them, with the same models before their eyes, and each produced works none would wish to exchange for all the laboured lucubrations of Tuscan Latinists: the fact is, it was easier to shine before a partial public formed by themselves, with glittering compilations of classic lines, almost always dishonoured by some clumsy or gothic addition of their own, than to emulate the pace of their great predecessors before the general eye.
The domestic character of Lorenzo, the wit, the husband, father, friend, appear in the eighth chapter. The author examines and acquits him of the charge of having been addicted to licentious amours, and exhibits him, if not as a tender, at least as a civil husband: but "in no point of view," says he, "does the character of this extraordinary man appear more engaging than in his affection towards his children, in his care of their education, and in his solicitude for their welfare." He accordingly, on each of these particulars, enters into very interesting details: we are introduced to the characters of his sons, Piero and Giovanni, the first known as his successor, the second celebrated as supreme pontiff under the assumed name of Leo X. From his children, we pass on to Lorenzo's domestic concerns. His villas, Poggio Cajano, Careggi, Fiesole, and other domains, pass in review. The visits of Piero to Rome and Milan, his marriage with Alfonsina Orsini; the exaltation of Giovanni to the dignity of cardinal at the age of fourteen, his father's admirable admonitory letter to him on that occasion; the death of Madonna Clarice, Lorenzo's wife; his patronage of learned ecclesiastics; the assassination of G. Riario, and the tragic death of Galeotto Manfredi, Prince of Faenza, occupy the remainder.
If the subject of the ninth chapter, the progress of the plastic arts, under the patronage of the Medici, reflect a new lustre on the beneficent grandeur of that family, the judgment, perspicuity, elegance of taste, and 'amore,' with which it is treated by our author, reflect almost equal honour on himself. From the obscure dawn of Cimabue to the noonday splendour of M. Angelo, we are gradually led to form our ideas of art with a precision and distinctness, in vain looked for in the loquacious volumes and indiscriminate panegyrics of Vasari. Among so many beauties, the choice of selection is difficult; a short extract from one or two passages will inform the reader what he is to expect from the whole. After mentioning the successful efforts of Lorenzo, Ghiberti and Donatello, the author continues:
P. 189.—'Notwithstanding the exertions of these masters, which were regarded with astonishment by their contemporaries, and are yet entitled to attention and respect, it does not appear that they had raised their views to the true end of the profession. Their characters rarely excelled the daily prototypes of common life, and their forms, although at times sufficiently accurate, were mostly vulgar and heavy. In the pictures which remain of this period, the limbs are not marked with that precision which characterizes a well-informed artist. The hands and feet in particular appear soft, enervated, and delicate, without distinction of sex or character. Many practices yet remain that evince the imperfect state of the art. Ghirlandajo and Baldovinetti continued to introduce the portraits of their employers in historic composition, forgetful of that simplex duntaxat et unum with which a just taste can never dispense. Cosimo Roselli, a painter of no inconsiderable reputation, attempted, by the assistance of gold and ultramarine, to give a factitious splendour to his performances. To every thing great and elevated, the art was yet a stranger; even the celebrated picture of Pollajuolo exhibits only a group of half-naked and vulgar wretches, discharging their arrows at a miserable fellow-creature, who by changing places with one of his murderers, might with equal propriety become a murderer himself.[36] Nor was it till the time of Michaelagnolo, that painting and sculpture rose to their true object, and instead of exciting the wonder, began to rouse the passions and interest the feelings of mankind.'
Though indignant at the doating tradition which still presumes to foist the bedlam trash of Titus Andronicus among Shakspeare's pieces; and certainly as little partial to the rubric of martyrologies as our author or Mr. Tenhove; we yet believe, that their observation receives it's force rather from the insensibility, perhaps brutality, of artists, than from the subject itself. Let horror and loathsomeness be banished from the instruments of art, and the martyrdom of Stephen or Sebastian, Agnes or John, becomes as admissible as that of Marsyas or Palamedes, Virginia, or Regulus. It is the artist's fault if the right moment be missed. If you see only blood-tipt arrows, brain-dashed stones, excoriating knives, the artist, not the subject, is detestable; this furnished heroism, celestial resignation, the features of calm fortitude and beauty, helpless, but undismayed; the clown or brute alone, who handled it, pushed you down among the assassins from the hero's side. Humanity may avert our eyes with propriety from the murdered subjects of Pietro Testa, Joseph Ribera, sometimes even of Domenicho himself; but apathy, phlegm,[37] effeminacy, alone would prefer an Andromeda, an Agave, or a Venus hanging over an expiring Adonis, to the "Madonna del Spasmo" of Raffaello, or M. Angelo's Crucifixion of St. Peter.