[1831.]
Hitherto the Abate Mezzofanti has appeared chiefly, if not exclusively,
as a linguist; and the estimate of his attainments which has long been
current, assumes him to have cultivated that single accomplishment to
the exclusion of all other branches of study. The report, however, of a
visitor, who saw him about the time at which we have now arrived, will be
found to present him in a new character.
In introducing this notice of him, a brief preliminary explanation
will be necessary—perhaps, indeed, this explanation is indispensable
even in itself; for, although the political history of the period does
not properly fall within the scope of this biography, yet, as the most
important event in the life of Mezzofanti—the transfer of his residence
to Rome—arose directly out of his mission to that capital at the
termination of the Revolution of 1831, it is necessary to revert, at
least in outline, to the most notable occurrences of the preceding years.
The discontent and turbulence which marked the closing years of the
reign of Pius VII. had in great measure subsided under the impartial
but vigorous administration of Leo XII.; nor was the short pontificate
of his successor, Pius VIII. who succeeded on the 31st of March,
1829, interrupted by any overt expression of popular discontent. It
was well known, nevertheless, throughout this whole period, that an
active secret organization was in existence, not alone in the Papal
States, but in Naples, in the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom, in the minor
principalities of Parma, Piacenza, and Modena, and indeed throughout
the entire of Italy. Everywhere throughout Italy, too, in addition to
these secret associations, still subsisted a remnant of the old French
or Franco-Italian party, who, while they submitted to the existing
state of things, and offered no resistance to the established regime,
concealing their discontent, and cautiously repressing their aspirations
after the cherished vision of a “united and independent Italy,” yet were
notoriously dissatisfied with the domestic governments, and lost no
opportunity of embarrassing their administration. Of this, in the Papal
States, Bologna had long been the centre.
The Abate Mezzofanti had never taken any part in political affairs; but
his principles were well known, and his antecedents had long marked him
out as an ardent and devoted adherent of the Papal rule. Personally
inoffensive and amiable as he was, therefore, he was on these grounds,
distasteful to certain members of the anti-papal party. But by the great
body of his fellow-citizens he was regarded as a man of thoroughly
honourable principles; and we shall see that in a crisis of great
delicacy and importance he was selected as one of their delegates to the
court of Gregory XVI.
It is to these political animosities that allusion is made in the
following extremely interesting account of Mezzofanti. It is from the pen
of the distinguished historian of the mathematical sciences in Italy, M.
Libri; whose name is in itself sufficient to stamp with authority any
statement bearing upon a subject in which he has proved himself a master.
For this most interesting communication I am indebted to the good offices
of Mr. Watts, to whom it was addressed by M. Libri, in reply to an
inquiry kindly made on my behalf by that gentleman. M. Libri’s letter
is in English, and the purity of its language and elegance of its style
are in themselves no slight evidence of his competence to pronounce
upon Mezzofanti’s accomplishments as a linguist, no less than as a
mathematician.
M. Libri’s meeting with Mezzofanti occurred at Bologna early in 1830, in
the course of a literary tour in which M. Libri was then engaged.
“Among all these eminent men, the one that interested me
most was unquestionably the Abbé, (afterwards Cardinal)
Mezzofanti, who was then librarian at Bologna, and respecting
whose astonishing power in languages I had heard the most
extraordinary anecdotes. During a short excursion which I had
previously made to Bologna, I had already got a glimpse of
that celebrated man; but it was not until 1830 that I could
be said to have seen him. I was presented to him by one of
my friends, Count Bianchetti, and I was received by him with
great kindness. He made me promise to go and see him again,
and offered to show me the library. I accepted his offer
eagerly; but it was principally in the hope of having a long
conversation with him that I repaired to the library next day.
Before going farther, I ought to say that I approached him
with mixed feelings. Personally, I have always been disposed
to respect and admire every man who possesses an incontestible
superiority in any branch of human knowledge; and in this point
of view, M. Mezzofanti, whom every body acknowledges to be the
man who knew and could speak more languages than any other
living man, had certainly a right to boundless admiration on my
part. It was popularly reported at Bologna, that M. Mezzofanti,
then fifty years old, knew as many languages as he counted
years; and I had heard related in respect to him, by men in
whose veracity I have full confidence, so many extraordinary
histories, that he became in my eyes a sort of hero of legend
or romance; but a hero of flesh and blood, who realized or
even surpassed all the wonders attributed to Mithridates as a
linguist. On the other hand, the liberal party, who certainly
had no sympathies with the Abbé Mezzofanti, spread reports
against him, by no means flattering; among which the one
that had most frequently reached my ears, consisted in its
being ceaselessly repeated, that the celebrated librarian at
Bologna was a sort of parrot, endowed with the faculty of
articulating sounds which he had heard, that he was only a
miracle of memory, understanding having nothing to do with
it; and that, independently of this trick of getting words by
heart, this extraordinary man possessed no solid information,
and little philological erudition. Without blindly adopting
this bare assertion, I must acknowledge that the judgment
passed on Mezzofanti by persons of some consideration, had
made an impression upon my mind, far from being favourable to
him: but that impression was soon dissipated in the course of
the interview I had with him. Before leaving Florence, I had
just read and carefully studied the treatise on Indefinite
Algebra, composed several ages before by Brahmegupta, and
which, translated and enriched with an admirable introduction
by Colebroke, had been published in London, in 1817.[434]
Being still filled with admiration for the labours of the
ancient Hindoos on indeterminate analysis, I mentioned the book
casually to Mezzofanti, and merely to show him that even a man
almost exclusively devoted to the study of mathematics, might
take a lively interest in the labours of the Orientalists. I
had no intention of introducing a scientific conversation on
this subject with the celebrated librarian; and I must even
add, that I thought him quite incapable of engaging in one. How
great then was my surprise, when I saw him immediately seize
the opportunity, and speak to me during half an hour on the
astronomy and mathematics of the Indian races, in a way which
would have done honour to a man whose chief occupation had been
tracing the history of the sciences. Deeply astonished at so
specific a knowledge, which had taken me quite unexpectedly, I
eagerly sought explanation from him on points which had seemed
to me the most difficult in the history of India; such, for
instance, as the probable epoch when certain Indian astronomers
had lived, before the Mahometan conquest, and how far those
astronomers might have been able, directly or indirectly, to
borrow from the Greeks. On all those points Mezzofanti answered
on the spot, with great modesty, and as a man who knows how
to doubt; but proving to me at the same time, that those were
questions on which his mind had already paused, and which he
had approached with all the necessary accomplishment of the
accessory sciences. I cannot express how much that conversation
interested me; and I did not delay to testify to Mezzofanti
all the admiration which knowledge at once so varied and so
profound, had excited in me. No more was said of visiting
the library, or of seeing books. I had before me a most
extraordinary living book, and one well calculated to confound
the imagination. Encouraged by his courtesy and modesty, I
could not resist my desire of putting questions to him on the
mode which he had employed in making himself master of so many
languages. He positively assured me, but without entering
into any detail, that it was a thing less difficult than was
generally thought; that there is in all languages a limited
number of points to which it is necessary to pay particular
attention; and that, when one is once master of those points,
the remainder follows with great facility. He added, that,
when one has learned ten or a dozen languages essentially
different from one another, one may, with a little study and
attention, learn any number of them. I strenuously urged him
to publish his experience on the subject and on the result of
his labours; but I observed in him a great aversion to the
publication of his researches. He affirmed that the more we
study, the more do we understand how difficult it is to avoid
falling into errors; and, in speaking to me of several writings
which he had composed, he told me that they were only essays
which by no means deserved to see the light. In the midst of
the conversation, as I was still urging him, he rose and went
to look in a box for a manuscript with coloured designs, which
he showed me, and which had for its object the explanation of
the Mexican hieroglyphics. Having begged him to publish at
least that work, he told me that it was only an essay, still
imperfect, and that his intention was to recast it completely.
This excursion to America suggested to me the idea of putting a
new question to him. I had collected at Florence, particularly
with relation to bibliography, several translations of the
whole Bible, or certain portions of the sacred books, in
different foreign languages. Some of these translations were
into languages spoken by North American savages; and in
looking through them I had been struck with the measureless
length[435] of most of the words of these tongues. Since the
opportunity presented itself naturally, I asked M. Mezzofanti
what he thought of those words, and whether the men who spoke
languages apparently so calculated to put one out of breath,
did not seem to be endowed with peculiar organs. Immediately
taking down a book written in one of those languages, the
celebrated linguist showed me practically how, in his opinion,
the savages managed to pronounce these interminable words,
without too much trouble. For fear of making mistakes, I cannot
venture, after twenty-five years, to reproduce this explanation
from memory. According to my usual practice, I had written
out, on my return home, the conversation which I had just had
with the celebrated linguist, and if I still possessed that
part of my journal you would find there almost the exact words
of the Abbé Mezzofanti; but those papers having been taken
away from me by people who, under a pretext as ridiculous as
odious, despoiled me, after the revolution of 1848, of all that
I possessed at Paris, I must confine myself to mentioning the
fact of the explanation which was given to me, without being
able to tell you in what that explanation consisted.
After what I have just recounted to you, I could add nothing
to express to you the opinion which that long conversation
with M. Mezzofanti (which during the few days that I passed at
Bologna was followed by some other interviews much shorter, and
as it were fugitive,) left in my mind on the subject of the
erudition, as profound as it was various, of that universal
linguist. As, however, I express here an opinion which
certainly was not that of everybody, permit me to corroborate
that opinion by the testimony of Giordani, a man not only
celebrated in Italy for the admirable purity of his style, but
who also enjoyed deserved reputation as a profound Grecian, and
a consummate Latin scholar. The testimony of Giordani on the
subject of the Abbé Mezzofanti is the more remarkable, because,
besides Giordani’s having (as is generally known) a marked
antipathy for the ultra-catholic party to which Mezzofanti
was thought to belong, he and the Abbé had had some little
personal quarrels the remembrance of which was not effaced.
Notwithstanding this, I read in the letters of Giordani lately
published at Milan, that, in his opinion, Mezzofanti was quite
a superior man.”
M. Libri[436] proceeds to cite several passages from Giordani’s letters,
which, as I have already quoted them in their proper place, it is
needless to repeat here. Indeed no additional testimony could add weight
to his own authority on any of the subjects to which he refers in this
most interesting letter.
Soon after this interview, the quiet of Mezzofanti’s life was interrupted
for a time. The Revolution of Paris in July, 1830, and the events in
Belgium and Poland by which it was rapidly followed, were not slow to
provoke a response in Italy. The long repressed hopes of the republican
party were thus suddenly realised, and the organization of the secret
societies became at once more active and more extended. For a time the
prudent and moderate policy adopted by Pius VIII. in reference to the
events in France, had the effect of defeating the measures of the Italian
revolutionists; but his death on the thirtieth of November in that year,
appeared to afford a favourable opportunity for their attempt. During the
conclave for the election of his successor, all the preparations were
made. The stroke was sudden and rapid. The very day after the election
of Gregory XVI., but before the news had been transmitted from Rome, an
outbreak took place at Modena. It was followed, on the next day, by a
similar proceeding at Bologna,—by the calling out of a national guard,
and the proclamation of a provisional government. The Papal delegate was
expelled from Bologna. The Duke of Modena fled to Mantua. Maria Louisa,
Duchess of Parma, took refuge in France. And on the 26th of the same
month, deputies from all the revolted states, by a joint instrument,
proclaimed the United Republic of Italy!
This success, however, was as short-lived as it had been rapid. The duke
of Modena was reinstated by the arms of Austria on the 9th of March.
Order was restored about the same date at Parma: and, before the end of
the month of March, all traces of the revolutionary movement had for the
time disappeared throughout the States of the Church.[437]
It has been customary for the cities and _communi_ of the Papal States on
the accession of each new Pontiff, to send a deputation of their most
notable citizens to offer their homage and present their congratulations
at the foot of the throne. Many of the chief cities had already complied
with the established usage.[438] Bologna, restored to a calmer mind,
now hastened to follow the example. Three delegates were deputed for
the purpose—the Marchese Zambeccari, Count Lewis Isolani, and the abate
Mezzofanti. They arrived in Rome in the beginning of May,[439] and on
the 9th of the same month, were admitted to an audience of the Pope,
who received them with great kindness, and inquired anxiously into the
condition of Bologna, and the grievances which had given occasion to the
recent discontents.
To Mezzofanti in particular the Pope showed marked attention. It had
been one of his requests to Cardinal Opizzoni, the archbishop, when
returning to Bologna on the suppression of the Revolution, that he
should send Professor Mezzofanti to visit him. He still remembered
the disinterestedness which the professor had shewn in their first
correspondence; and the time had now come when it was in his power to
make some acknowledgment. A few days after Mezzofanti’s arrival he was
named domestic prelate and proto-notary apostolic, and at his final
audience before returning to Bologna, the pope renewed in person the
invitation to settle permanently in Rome, which had formerly been made
to him by Cardinal Consalvi on the part of Pius VII. Mezzofanti was
still as happy in his humble position as he had been in 1815. He still
retained his early love for his native city and for the friends among
whom he had now begun to grow old. But to persist farther would be
ungracious. He could no longer be insensible to a wish so flattering and
so earnestly enforced. It was not, however, until, as the Pope himself
declared, “after a long siege,” (_veramente un assedio_) that he finally
acquiesced;—overpowered, as it would seem, by that genuine and unaffected
cordiality which was the great characteristic of the good Pope Gregory
XVI.
“Holy Father,” was his singularly graceful acknowledgment of the kind
interest which the Pope had manifested in his regard, “people say that I
can speak a great many languages. In no one of them, nor in them all, can
I find words to express how deeply I feel this mark of your Holiness’s
regard.”
It is hardly necessary to say that one of the very first visits which he
paid in Rome, was to the Propaganda. On the morning after his arrival,
the feast, as it would seem, of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, he
went to the sacristy with the intention of saying mass; and having,
with his habitual retiringness, knelt down to say the usual preparatory
prayers without making himself known, he remained for a considerable
time unobserved and therefore neglected. He was at length recognised by
Dr. Cullen, the present archbishop of Dublin, (at that time professor of
Scripture in the Propaganda,) who at once procured for the distinguished
stranger the attention which he justly deserved in such an institution.
It is a pleasing illustration, at once of the retentiveness of his memory
and of the simple kindliness of his disposition, that in an interview
with Dr. Cullen not very long before his death, he reminded him of this
circumstance, and renewed his thanks even for so trifling a service.
After mass, he made his way, unattended, to one of the _camerate_, or
corridors. The first room which he chanced to meet was that of a Turkish
student, named Hassun, now archbishop of the United Greek Church at
Constantinople. He at once entered into conversation with Hassun in
Turkish. This he speedily changed to Romaic with a youth named Musabini,
who is now the Catholic Greek bishop at Smyrna. From Greek he turned to
English, on the approach of Dr. O’Connor, an Irish student, now bishop
of Pittsburgh in the United States. As the unwonted sounds began to
attract attention, the students poured in, one by one, each in succession
to find himself greeted in his native tongue; till at length, the bell
being rung, the entire community assembled, and gave full scope to the
wonderful quickness and variety of his accomplishment. Dr. O’Connor
describes it as the most extraordinary scene he has ever witnessed; and
he adds a further very remarkable circumstance that, during the many
new visits which Mezzofanti paid to the Propaganda afterwards, he never
once forgot the language of any student with whom he had spoken on this
occasion, nor once failed to address him in his native tongue.
The deputation returned to Bologna in the end of June. Mezzofanti
accompanied it, but only for the purpose of making arrangements for his
permanent change of residence.
He had accepted the commission with exceeding reluctance, and it is
painful to have to record that on this, the only occasion on which he
consented to leave his habitual retirement, he was not suffered to escape
his share of the rude shocks and buffets which seem to be inseparable
from public life.
All who were most familiar with Mezzofanti, to whatever party in
Italian politics they belonged, have borne testimony to the sincerity
of his convictions and the entire disinterestedness of his views—a
disinterestedness which had marked the entire tenor of his life, and had
been attested by long and painful sacrifices. Nevertheless, on the return
of the Bolognese deputation from Rome, he had the mortification to find
his conduct misrepresented and his motives maligned. The marked attention
which he had experienced at the hands of the Pope, was made a crime.
His simple and long-tried loyalty—the spontaneous homage which a mind
such as his renders almost by instinct—was denounced as the interested
subserviency of a courtier; and the favours which had been bestowed on
him in Rome, were represented as the price of his treason to Bologna.
Mezzofanti felt deeply these ungenerous and unfounded criticisms. His
health was seriously affected by the chagrin which they occasioned; and
these memories of his last days in Bologna often clouded in after years
the happier reminiscences of his native city on which his mind delighted
to dwell.
Owing to the unsettled condition of Italy during this year, but few
Englishmen visited Bologna. Among these were Dr. Christopher Wordsworth,
Canon of Westminster (who also saw Mezzofanti in the following year in
Rome,) and Mr. Milnes, of Frystone Hall, Yorkshire, father of the poet,
Mr. Richard Monckton Milnes. The latter was much amused by Mezzofanti’s
proposing, when he heard he was a Yorkshire man, to speak Welsh with him,
“_as Yorkshire lay so near Wales!_”
It would hardly be worth while to note this amusing blunder in English
topography, (a blunder more remarkable in Mezzofanti, as in all
geographical details he was ordinarily extremely accurate,) were it not
that it is another testimony on the disputed question of his acquaintance
with the Welsh language.
He left Bologna finally for Rome in October, 1831. The Pope afterwards
used jokingly to say, that “the acquisition of Mezzofanti for Rome was
the only good that came of the Revolution of Bologna in 1831.” By the
kind care of the Pope, he was provided with apartments in the Quirinal
Palace, nearly opposite the Church of Saint Andrew—the same apartments at
the window of which the lamented Monsignor Palma was shot during the late
Revolution.