The most glorious era of the Italian republics immediately preceded their downfall. Like shining lights, they perished by their own effulgence. The mutual jealousies of Florence, Pisa, Genoa, Lucca, and the numerous independent cities and states, stirred up in them a “noble and emulous rage” to excel each other in the encouragement they gave to art and letters, and the mighty works produced by their respective citizens. But the same sentiment also roused them to deadlier feuds, and the common field of national patriotism being shut up, they exhausted themselves and each other by desperately-protracted struggles and incredible sacrifices of blood and treasure. Thus they paved the way to the introduction of the foreigner and the mercenary, who completed their ruin; until, in place of the small but illustrious republics which formed a diadem of brightest gems, arose a system of petty tyrants, who plunged the country into misery and degradation. These, in turn, were swept away by the strong arm of a despotism which has never since relaxed its grasp of this loveliest country of the earth.
No influence played a more important part in bringing about this catastrophe than that of the court of Rome. By the intrigues of the Roman pontiffs the mutual jealousies of the states were exacerbated and their quarrels fomented. While these results were caused by the political actions of the popes and their advisers, the worst effects were produced upon public manners and morals by their example. The abuses which had established themselves among the Roman hierarchy were the natural consequences of long and undisturbed enjoyment by the clergy of their vast immunities and privileges. The demoralization and dissoluteness which thus existed, and which spread its poison throughout the civilized world, but especially throughout Italy, are attested to posterity by all contemporary writers.
The enormous iniquity which distinguished such men as John XXII., Sextus IV., or Alexander VI., is notorious to all. Although the character of communities is not to be inferred from the actions of exceptional prodigies, either of virtue or vice, it is evident that the system which could place monsters like these in the august positions they filled must have been rotten to the core. The worth of a Leo X. or a Clement VII. consisted in the absence of the grosser vices rather than in any positive excellence, and the encouragement given by such men to objectionable practices did more to confirm a laxity of morals than the odious and unpardonable offenses of their predecessors.
Some of the political profligacy of the court of Rome, and, through its example, of the other Italian courts, was owing to the system which had sprung up of each pope providing for his family. The term nepote (nephew) was in common use as expressing the relationship which existed between the pope and the individuals selected for advancement. The priests of all denominations had nephews and nieces to provide for, and the abuses covered by the term were objects of the keenest satire. In fact, Innocent VIII. thus provided for eight openly avowed sons and daughters.[215] The pseudo-avuncular obligations of Sextus IV. were also well known. Other popes, whose sins were not in this particular direction, having no sons, adopted a bona fide nephew, and one or two, feeling the want of ties of kindred or family relationship, actually adopted strangers. In one instance, the Donna Olimpia, a niece by marriage, and “a lady of ability and a manly spirit,” took the place of a nephew in the court of Innocent X., without any imputation on the character of either pope or niece.[216]
The effect produced by this example in high places, particularly upon the clergy, and through them on the community, can be imagined. By a decree of the Church in the eleventh session of the Lateran Council it appears that the clergy were accustomed to live in a state of public concubinage, nay, more, to allow others to do so for money paid to them by permission. Dante, in one of his daring flights, compares the papal court to Babylon, and declares it a place deprived of virtue and shame. In the nineteenth canto of the Inferno, Dante, visiting hell, finds Nicholas III. there waiting the arrival of Boniface, who again is to be succeeded by Clement.
The Reformation compelled some attention to morals among the clergy, and for a time an earnest endeavor was made at a purification of the Church. This was one of the chief labors of the famous Council of Trent. That council certainly did repress the abuses among the general clergy, but the law-makers were law-breakers. They could not touch the cardinals, archbishops, or the Pope himself, and thus little radical change was effected among the chief dignitaries.[217]
There are not wanting writers who acquit the Italian national character of blame in the matter, attributing the general corruption partly to the frightful example of foreign invaders. The invasion of Charles VIII., himself a dissolute monarch, with the universal licentiousness of the French troops, did undoubtedly contribute largely to ruin the morals of the people at large, but, to use the words of Machiavelli, “If the papal court were removed to Switzerland, the simplest and most religious people of Europe would, in an incredibly short time, have become utterly depraved by the vicious example of the Italian priesthood.”[218]
The ecclesiastics did not confine themselves to licentiousness of conduct. The clerical writers are charged with a taste for that lowest practice of debased minds, obscenity, in which particular they exceed the lay writers. Roscoe, an accomplished Italian scholar and a man not given to railing, maintains this allegation.[219] This reminds us of Pope’s lines:
“Immodest words admit of no defense,
For want of decency is want of sense.”
For the limited range of our present subject, history, so profuse of illustration of war, bloodshed, and the personal adventures of men noteworthy by their position or character, is exceedingly chary of materials. In the case of Italy the testimony as to the morals of men in high places is superabundant, and these and the legislative enactments of the period will furnish some of the information of which we are in search.