In order to evade the cares of government, which had now become distasteful to him, he reduced himself to a private house in Brussels, where, says Segin,
g “he took great interest in clock-making, delighting in such machinery and in talking with the workmen and watching their work.” He began the formal abdication of his crown by making over the kingdom of Naples to his son (1554). Julius III approved this abdication, and received in the name of King Philip the homage paid to him by the kings of Naples as feudatories of the holy see. Thus the states of Milan and Naples changed their ruler somewhat earlier than Spain. But this separation of the kingdom of Naples and duchy of Milan from Spain, to which they were justly united, the former because of the ancient right of the king of Aragon, and the latter because of the will of Charles, who bestowed it upon the heir presumptive of the throne of Spain, was only temporary, for the next year (1555) Charles further bestowed the Low Countries upon his son, and a little later (1556) the kingdom of Spain and the dominions of the new world.[f]
RENEWED HOSTILITIES; THE TREATY OF CATEAU-CAMBRÉSIS
At the time of the abdication of Charles V the flames of war which had raged in Europe with such intense violence during the greater part of his long reign seemed already expiring in their embers. But they were rekindled in Italy, almost immediately after the accession of Philip II, by the fierce passions of Paul IV, a rash and violent pontiff. In his indignation at the opposition which Charles V had raised against his election, and moreover to gratify the ambition of his family, Paul IV had already instigated Henry II of France to join him in a league to ruin the imperial power in Italy; and he now, in concert with the French monarch, directed against Philip II the hostile measures which he had prepared against his father.
Philip II, that most odious of tyrants, whose atrocious cruelty and imbecile superstition may divide the judgment between execration and contempt, shrank with horror from the impiety of combating the pontiff, whom he had regarded as the vicegerent of God upon earth. He therefore vainly exhausted every resource of negotiation, before he was reconciled by the opinion of the Spanish ecclesiastics, whom he anxiously consulted, to the lawfulness of engaging in such a contest. At length he was prevailed upon to suffer the duke of Alva to lead the veteran Spanish bands from the kingdom of Naples into the papal territories. The advance of Alva to the gates of Rome, however, struck consternation into the sacred college; and the haughty and obstinate pontiff was compelled by the terror of his cardinals to conclude a truce with the Spanish general, which he immediately broke on learning the approach of a superior French army under the duke de Guise (1556).
[1556-1557 A.D.]
This celebrated captain of France, to whom the project was confided of conquering the kingdom of Naples from the Spaniards, was, however, able to accomplish nothing in Italy which accorded with his past and subsequent fame. Crossing the Alps at the head of twenty thousand men, he penetrated, without meeting any resistance, through Lombardy and Tuscany to the ecclesiastical capital. If he could effect the reduction of the kingdom of Naples, it was imagined that the Spanish provinces in northern Italy must fall of themselves; and having, therefore, left the Milanese duchy unassailed behind him, he passed on from Rome to the banks of the Garigliano, where he found Alva posted with an inferior force to oppose him. The wily caution of the Spanish general and the patient valour of his troops disconcerted the impetuosity of the French and the military skill of their gallant leader: and disease had already begun to make fearful havoc in the ranks of the invaders, when Guise was recalled, by the victory of the Spaniards at St. Quentin, to defend the frontiers of France.[c]
The Colonnade, St. Peter’s, Rome
The confusion at Rome was great. But the pope, though considerably grieved, gave no external sign of being disturbed or alarmed. “The ambassador of France has just assured me,” wrote the bishop of Anglone on the 25th of August, 1557, “that the pope felt greatly the constable’s defeat, and is troubled; yet in spite of his affliction he does not say cease, but that his courage is greater than ever, and, from what he sees and believes, his holiness is more than ever disposed to continue the friendly relations, as he well knows he cannot bear the cost alone and has need of the king’s aid.” Nevertheless, Paul IV could not be unmindful that he was left alone to face the victorious enemy, bolder in their pretensions, as they knew themselves superior to their adversary.