Ibn Batûta was 51 at the end of his recorded journeyings. In spite of the racket of thirty years, spent in unceasing travel, of shipwreck and battle, of privation and fevers and much suffering of many kinds, all of which he brushes lightly aside as matter of small moment, his natural vigour remained such that he lived three years beyond the allotted span. The “fitful fever” of his life ceased in the year 1377.
IV.—LUDOVICO VARTHEMA OF BOLOGNA,
RENEGADE PILGRIM TO MECCA. FOREMOST OF ITALIAN TRAVELLERS.
CHAPTER I. THE GREAT AGE OF THE RENAISSANCE AND OF DISCOVERY.
By the close of the Fifteenth Century, the relative stability of society and of its convictions during the Middle Ages was undone. The Italian, at least, had cast off the restraints of that rigid and traditional world, and was in reaction against it. For, social bonds were loosened, and the corporate life of guild and city was in decay. With the revival of letters, society became imbued once again with the Greek and Roman conception of man as a progressive creature, and was awakened to the richness of thought and feeling to be enjoyed in vigorous passionate life. Self-sufficiency, self-assertion, and force of will were admired above all other qualities, and it was the ambition of most men to achieve them. Each man strove to fulfil his own nature in his own way. Religion rapidly degenerated into an indispensable observance of formalities, a traditional habit, a customary cloak. The rigorous men of the Renaissance sought to live fully, freely, and with diversity; they thirsted for new and refreshing springs; they quaffed delightful and refreshing draughts; they boldly winged their way to unfamiliar spheres, or gratified sense and passion to the full. The age was aglow with all manner of ideality. On the whole its passions were unrestrained, save by prudence; unchecked by any moral curb, which it had counted foolishness. The religious rapture of Savonarola was an ephemeral phenomenon, and almost unique. Even in the gentle grace of Perugino’s Madonnas and the sweet innocence with which he invests the Child, we may mark the substitution of religious affectation for religious sincerity. The age loved pomp and magnificence; and these appear in the frescoes of Pinturicchio. It was a field for the development of a deep-seated, incalculable, yet persuasive force of Will: the spirit is portrayed in the subtle eye and inscrutable smile of Monna Lisa.
It was when the Renaissance was in full flood, but before Ariosto, “with his tongue in his cheek,” had achieved his cantoes of romantic chivalry; before Raphael plied his brush with too perfect and serene a finish; before Michael Angelo cast aside charm and beauty for the expression of strength and power, that the energy of the age found a new field for activity. The Turk swept the Ægean Sea and ruled the Western Roman Empire. But the great drama of History unfolds tragic irony surpassing the invention of poets. When the vast spaces of the great Church of Justinian rang with the shout of the victors, the knell of Moslem predominance sounded unheard. The Turk had captured the gateways of the East only to force the European, in adventures beyond the seas, to the domination of the world. Pioneers set out from Portugal and Spain, and tried to cut out the Moslem middleman; they steered to find a sea-way to the fabulous wealth of India. They coasted along amazing lands, peopled by strange races, and entered novel and unsuspected seas. Columbus found a new world beyond “wandering fields of barren foam”; Vasco di Gama was forcing his way round Africa. Many a narrow, ancient illusion was dispelled; and the minds of men were excited to a rapture of expectation. The hearts of pious Portuguese and Spaniards beat high at the hope of combining the salvation of heathen souls with the profitable enslavement of heathen bodies. All men were allured by the prospect of acquiring new markets, priceless gems, and the gold dust of El Dorado. The modern world of aggressive commerce was engendered in the very bosom of the High Renaissance.