[112] They were printed at Basle in 1569--at London in 1595--in
Amsterdam, 1663. How many attempts to echo the voice of suppressed
truth--_Haym's Bib. Ital._ 1803.
[113] My friend, Mr. Merivale, whose critical research is only
equalled by the elegance of his taste, has supplied me with a note
which proves but too well that even writers who compose uninfluenced
by party feelings, may not, however, be sufficiently scrupulous in
weighing the evidence of the facts which they collect. Mr. Merivale
observes, "The strange and improbable narrative with which Varchi
has the misfortune of closing his history, should not have been even
hinted at without adding, that it is denounced by other writers as a
most impudent forgery, invented years after the occurrence is
supposed to have happened, by the 'Apostate' bishop Petrus Paulus
Vergerius." See its refutation in Amiani, "Hist. di Fano," ii. 149,
et seq. 160.
"Varchi's character as an historian cannot but suffer greatly from
his having given it insertion on such authority. The responsibility
of an author for the truth of what he relates should render us very
cautious of giving credit to the writers of memoirs not intended to
see the light till a distant period. The credibility of Vergerius,
as an acknowledged libeller of Pope Paul III. and his family,
appears still more conclusively from his article in Bayle, note K."
It must be added, that the calumny of Vergerius may be found in
Wolfius's Lect. Mem. ii. 691, in a tract _de Idolo Lauretano_,
published 1556. Varchi is more particular in his details of this
monstrous tale. Vergerius's libels, universally read at the time
though they were collected afterwards, are now not to be met with,
even in public libraries. Whether there was any truth in the story
of Peter Lewis Farnese I know not; but crimes of as monstrous a dye
occur in the authentic Guicciardini. The story is not yet forgotten,
since in the last edition of Haym's _Biblioteca Italiana_, the best
edition is marked as that which at p. 639 contains "_la sceleratezza
di Pier Lewis Farnese_." I am of opinion that Varchi believed the
story, by the solemnity of his proposition. Whatever be its truth,
the historian's feeling was elevated and intrepid.
[114] Rapin.