The council had given an awful admonition to heretics. It had also, by an extraordinary exertion of authority, effected an union of the true believers under a legitimate head. But a most important and difficult matter remained unaccomplished, namely, the reformation of the church. The newly elected pontiff listened with apparent complacence to the petitions which were from time to time preferred to him, by the various subdivisions of the council, beseeching him to prosecute this good work by all the means in his power; but he contrived by studied delays so to protract the consideration of the particular heads of reform, that the members of the assembly, weary of their long residence in Constance, were eager to embrace the first opportunity of returning to their respective homes. This opportunity was afforded them on the twenty-second day of April, 1418, on which day the pope formally dismissed the council.[107] On the sixteenth of May he left Constance, and passing through Schaffausen, he proceeded by easy stages to Geneva, where he arrived on the eleventh of June.[108] At this city he kept his court for some months. Quitting Germany on the twelfth day of September, he proceeded to Milan, and afterwards to Mantua. Here he fixed his residence during the remainder of the year, being prevented from visiting his capital by the anarchy which the long absence of legitimate authority had occasioned in the states of the church. As a grateful return for the hospitality with which he was received by the duke of Milan, he mediated a peace between that prince and Pandolfo Malatesta, who, after having taken Bergamo, had directed his march to Brescia, and by the vigour of his operations had caused the duke to tremble for the safety of the rest of his dominions.[109]
Though it does not appear that Poggio held any office under the new pontiff, he travelled in the suite of Martin V. to Mantua. At this city he suddenly quitted the Roman court with a determination to spend some time in England, to which country he had been invited by Beaufort, bishop of Winchester. This prelate, who is well known to all the admirers of Shakspeare by the title of cardinal Beaufort, was the son of the celebrated John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster, and uncle to the reigning English monarch Henry V. whose studies he had superintended during his residence at Oxford. In the year 1397 he was elected bishop of Lincoln. After having enjoyed this promotion for the space of eight years, he succeeded William of Wickham in the see of Winchester. He was a man of boundless ambition, well versed in the crooked policy of court intrigue, and enormously rich. In the course of a pilgrimage which he undertook to make to Jerusalem, he visited the council of Constance,[110] where it is probable he first became acquainted with the merits of Poggio.
Nothing but some suddenly conceived dissatisfaction with his actual situation, or the prospect of considerable emolument, could have induced Poggio to fix his residence in Britain, a country regarded by the Italians as the remotest corner of the globe, and as the abode of ignorance and barbarity. He was in fact led to entertain great expectations by the magnificent promises of the bishop of Winchester. But when he arrived in London, he found himself doomed to the common lot of those who depend upon the patronage of the great. Beaufort wanted either leisure or inclination to minister to the wants and wishes of his guest; and Poggio began to feel all the inconveniences of straightened circumstances, aggravated by the reflection that he was situated at so serious a distance from his native land. His communication with his early friends, and the companions of his youthful years, was interrupted. He experienced the embarrassments necessarily incident to those who are thrown into a new circle of society, to the habits of which they are entirely unaccustomed; and his mind became the prey of discontent and anxiety. He was also much chagrined on observing the uncultivated state of the public mind in Britain, when compared with the enthusiastic love of elegant literature which polished and adorned his native country.[111] The period of his arrival in England has been justly pronounced by one of our most accurate historians, to be in a literary point of view one of the darkest which occur in the whole series of British annals.[112] Leland indeed and other writers enumerate long lists of scholars, whom they indiscriminately grace with the title of most learned. These champions of literature were however nothing more than monks and astrologers, who were regarded with superstitious admiration by an ignorant age, but whose works are now deservedly buried in oblivion. The occult sciences, scholastic philosophy, and the mysteries of theology, absorbed the attention of the contemptible few who advanced any pretensions to the cultivation of learning. Of the principles of composition and the graces of style they were totally ignorant—nay so imperfect was their knowledge of the Latin tongue, that almost every sentence of their writings is deformed by the barbarous introduction of English words, miserably metamorphosed by a Latin termination.[113]
The respectable author, whose opinion of the state of British literature in the fifteenth century has been quoted above, ascribes the neglect of learning which disgraces this portion of our history to the following causes.—The wars in which the English had been so long engaged against France—The schism of the west—The little encouragement afforded to learned men—and the scarcity of books.
With respect to the first of these causes, it may be observed, that a state of warfare by no means in itself precludes the extension of science, and the cultivation of letters. The most renowned luminaries of Greece flourished during the devastation of the Peloponnesian war. Julius Cæsar and Cicero were not diverted from their literary pursuits by the tumult of faction, and the din of arms. And at the time when literature was revived in Italy, the provinces of that country were frequently laid waste by hostile invasions, and its cities were agitated by the discord of contending parties. As to the second cause, namely, the distraction occasioned by the schism, it may be remarked, that though this distraction was felt to a superior degree in Italy, it did not in that country operate as the slightest check to the progress of learning.—The want of encouragement to learned men, is rather a consequence than a cause of the forlorn state of literature. Some degree of knowledge and taste is requisite to form the character of a patron of the studious.
The neglect of the liberal arts which spread the gloom of barbarism over our ancestors of the fifteenth century, may perhaps be more justly ascribed to the operation of the feudal system. This primary cause prevented that excitation of the public mind, which is necessary to the successful cultivation of literature. The feudal system was a system of strict subordination, which prescribed to every member of the political community his particular rank and place, and surrounded him by a circle, beyond which he was forbidden to pass. In the spirit of this system, till the reign of Henry IV., no farmer or mechanic was permitted to send his children to school; and long after that period, a license from his lord was necessary to enable a man of this description to educate a son for the church. Whilst the majority of the people were thus impeded in their approach to the fountains of knowledge, it was impossible for learning to raise her drooping head. The feudal superiors, exalted by the accident of their birth to the enjoyment of power and plenty, had no motive to induce them to submit to the labour of study. The younger branches of noble families were early taught to depend upon their swords for subsistence; and the acquisition of learning was an object far beyond the scope of the oppressed and humble vassal.
The influence of the feudal system in checking the progress of intellect will be more plainly visible, if we consider the circumstances of Italy during the period in question. In that country, the ambition of adventurers, and the extension of commerce, had broken the fetters of feudalism; and had enabled the bold and daring in every species of exertion to rise to the pitch of consequence which their talents could vindicate. Hence the dormant powers of the human mind were roused, and the expansion of learning and the liberal arts was promoted. The equalizing tyranny of the petty princes who usurped the sovereignty of various cities of Lombardy, whilst it repressed the power of the aristocracy, called into life the abilities of all the orders of society. The precarious title by which these chieftains held their exalted stations induced them to court popularity, by freeing the mass of the people from invidious restraints. During the residence of the popes at Avignon, and during the continuance of the schism, the feeble rule exercised by the pontifical deputies over the ecclesiastical cities enabled the inhabitants of those cities to defy the authority which endeavoured to confine their exertions within the limits of slavish subordination. The factions which disturbed the peace of the Italian republics tended also in an eminent degree to call forth the full energy of abilities, which in other circumstances would have been buried in obscurity. Great talents are too frequently united with turbulence of spirit. In times when the order of society is inverted by the tumults of civil broils, while men of peaceful souls retire trembling from the conflict, he who is endued with the energy of genius, comes forth, conscious of his strength, and despising every danger, exults in the hope of vindicating his claim to promotion.
It is evident, that these various stimulants of intellect which occurred in Italy did not occur in Britain. On this account, whilst the liberal arts were cultivated and respected in the former country, they were neglected and despised in the latter.