The moral basis of their characters was entirely different. The French cardinal's was selfishness, pure and unmitigated. His religion, politics, his principles in short, in every sense, were subservient to this. Offences against the state he could forgive; those against himself he pursued with implacable rancor. His authority was literally cemented with blood. His immense powers and patronage were perverted to the aggrandizement of his family. Though bold to temerity in his plans, he betrayed more than once a want of true courage in their execution. Though violent and impetuous, he could stoop to be a dissembler. Though arrogant in the extreme, he courted the soft incense of flattery. In his manners he had the advantage over the Spanish prelate. He could be a courtier in courts, and had a more refined and cultivated taste. In one respect, he had the advantage over Ximenes in morals. He was not, like him, a bigot. He had not the religious basis in his composition, which is the foundation of bigotry.—Their deaths were typical of their characters. Richelieu died, as he had lived, so deeply execrated, that the enraged populace would scarcely allow his remains to be laid quietly in the grave. Ximenes, on the contrary, was buried amid the tears and lamentations of the people; his memory was honored even by his enemies, and his name is reverenced by his countrymen, to this day, as that of a Saint.
* * * * *
Dr. Lorenzo Galindez de Carbajal, one of the best authorities for transactions in the latter part of our History, was born of a respectable family, at Placencia, in 1472. Little is gathered of his early life, but that he was studious in his habits, devoting himself assiduously to the acquisition of the civil and canon law. He filled the chair of professor in this department, at Salamanca, for several years. His great attainments and respectable character recommended him to the notice of the Catholic queen, who gave him a place in the royal council. In this capacity, he was constantly at the court, where he seems to have maintained himself in the esteem of his royal mistress, and of Ferdinand after her death. The queen testified her respect for Carbajal, by appointing him one of the commissioners for preparing a digest of the Castilian law. He made considerable progress in this arduous work; but how great is uncertain, since, from whatever cause, (there appears to be a mystery about it,) the fruits of his labor were made public; a circumstance deeply regretted by the Castilian jurists. (Asso y Manuel, Instituciones, Introd. p. 99.)
Carbajal left behind him several historical works, according to Nic. Antonio, whose catalogue, however, rests on very slender grounds. (Bibliotheca Nova, tom. ii. p. 3.) The work by which he is best known to Spanish scholars, is his "Anales del Rey Don Fernando el Católico," which still remains in manuscript. There is certainly no Christian country, for which the invention of printing, so liberally patronized there at its birth, has done so little as for Spain. Her libraries teem at this day with manuscripts of the greatest interest for the illustration of every stage of her history; but which, alas! in the present gloomy condition of affairs, have less chance of coming to the light, than at the close of the fifteenth century, when the art of printing was in its infancy.
Carbajal's Annals cover the whole ground of our narrative, from the marriage of Ferdinand and Isabella, to the coming of Charles V. into Spain. They are plainly written, without ambition of rhetorical show or refinement. The early part is little better than memoranda of the principal events of the period, with particular notice of all the migrations of the court. In the concluding portion of the work, however, comprehending Ferdinand's death, and the regency of Ximenes, the author is very full and circumstantial. As he had a conspicuous place in the government, and was always with the court, his testimony in regard to this important period is of the highest value as that of an eye-witness and an actor, and, it may be added, a man of sagacity and sound principles. No better commentary on the merit of his work need be required, than the brief tribute of Alvaro Gomez, the accomplished biographer of Cardinal Ximenes. "Porro Annales Laurentii Galendi Caravajali, quibus vir gravissimus rerumque illarum cum primis particeps quinquaginta fermè annorum memoriam complexus est, haud vulgariter meam operam juverunt." De Rebus Gestis, Praefatio.
FOOTNOTES
[1] Carbajal, Anales, MS., año 1516, cap. 8.—Robles, Vida de Ximenez, cap. 18.—Gomez, De Rebus Gestis, fol. 150.—Quintanilla, Archetypo, lib. 4, cap. 5.—Oviedo, Quincuagenas, MS., dial. de Ximeni.
[2] Carbajal has given us Charles's epistle, which is subscribed "El Principe." He did not venture on the title of king in his correspondence with the Castilians, though he affected it abroad. Anales, MS., año 1516, cap. 10.
[3] The letter of the council is dated March 14th, 1516. It is recorded by Carbajal, Anales, MS., año 1516, cap. 10.
[4] It became permanently so in the following reign of Philip II. Semanario Erudito, tom. iii. p. 79.