[Illustration]
Early changes in the Athenian constitution—Murder of
Cylon—Fatalism—Usurpation of Pisistratus—His policy—Hippias and
Hipparchus—Conspiracy of Harmodius and Aristogiton—Expulsion of
Hippias—Cosmo de’ Medici, Lorenzo and Giuliano de’ Medici—Conspiracy of
the Pazzi.
For nearly four centuries subsequent to the age of Theseus, scarce any
mention of Athens occurs in Grecian history: a circumstance honourable
to that city, as denoting a long course of tranquil prosperity, and
indicative of candour and veracity in the writers, who were content
to relate the few incidents preserved by tradition, without taxing
their imaginations to cast a fabulous splendour over an unknown
period. The change of dynasty in the person of Melanthus, and the more
celebrated devotion of his son Codrus,[149] with the alterations in
the constitution subsequent to, and partly consequent upon, the death
of the latter, constitute the only remarkable events during this long
lapse of years; and when at length her authentic history commences, it
is in consequence of the interruption of that happiness which we are
led to believe she so long enjoyed. Upon the death of Codrus it was
resolved that no living person could be worthy to bear the title which
he had borne, and his son Medon was appointed chief magistrate, with
the title of Archon, or ruler. Twelve Archons followed in hereditary
succession, when a further change took place, the office being made
elective, and limited to the period of ten years; and at the end
of the seventh decennial Archonship the duties of the office were
divided between nine persons annually elected. After this change,
the possession of political supremacy became an object of strife
to the Eupatridæ, or nobles, in whom all power was vested: and the
Alcmæonidæ, or descendants of Alcmæon, the last hereditary Archon,
secured the prize. Cylon, a man eminent for rank and influence, bore
their superiority impatiently, and endeavoured by force of arms to
make himself master of the government. He seized the citadel; but the
people rose against him, and being unprovided for a siege he sought
safety in flight, abandoning his followers to the rage of the adverse
faction. As their best hope, they took refuge at the altars, where
violence could not be offered to them without incurring the guilt of
sacrilege. Megacles, the head of the Alcmæonidæ, was then Archon; and
by his partisans, some of the suppliants, induced to quit their refuge
upon condition of personal safety, were perfidiously executed; others
were put to death even at the dreaded altars of the Eumenides.[150]
Thus far there is nothing in this occurrence to distinguish it
from a hundred other instances of perfidy and cruelty: it is to the
remote consequences that we wish to direct the reader’s attention.
The Athenians, without caring for the murder, were deeply shocked at
the sacrilege; insomuch that not long after, when parties had changed
place, it was decreed that of those who had been concerned in it, all
yet alive should be condemned to banishment, and the bones of the
deceased be taken up and cast out of Attica. The exiles afterwards
returned; but, a prejudice long existed against their posterity, which
proved no ineffectual weapon in political warfare, and twice furnished
Sparta with the means of embarrassing her enemy by requiring the
expulsion of some of the leading citizens of the state. The demand was
aptly met by recalling to mind two similar transactions in which the
principal families of Sparta had been engaged, and bidding them set
the example of expiation.[151] It appears, however, from Aristophanes
(unless the passage is merely a squib against the Lacedæmonians) that
the charge of being “one of the polluted” had not, even after the lapse
of one hundred and sixty years, or more, lost all its influence.[152]
We have already mentioned that it was the insult offered to the gods,
rather than the crime against man, which produced so deep a sensation.
That the perpetrators of a cruel and treacherous action should be
regarded with abhorrence, will not indeed surprise us: but the lasting
ban entailed upon their posterity is connected with some remarkable
tenets, and deserves a few words in explanation. The Greeks were firm
believers in the doctrines of fatalism. Man, it was held, struggled in
vain to escape from the vortex of destiny; however repugnant to his
wishes, or abhorrent to his principles, he was borne on to do or suffer
that which was decreed, by an irresistible force, against which even
the immortal gods contended in vain. A very curious passage to this
effect occurs in Herodotus. Crœsus, after his defeat and captivity,
sent messengers to reproach the Delphian oracle with misleading to
ruin, by its false predictions, one who had merited the favour of the
god by the magnificence of his offerings. The answer ran thus:—“It is
impossible even for a god to escape from fate. Crœsus but expiates
the sin of his fifth ancestor,[153] who, being in the guard of the
descendants of Hercules, in subservience to a woman’s treachery, slew
his master, and seized upon a kingdom which belonged not to him. Fain
would Apollo have deferred the fall of Sardis until the time of the
sons of Crœsus; but he could not turn aside the Fates.”[154] Here,
coupled with the assertion of an immutable destiny, we find the not
unnatural deduction that the crime of an ancestor entailed misfortune
on his posterity: but this doctrine was extended much farther, and
it was taught that deeds of extraordinary blackness introduced a
malignant demon into the family of the offender, which empoisoned its
prosperity, and hurried generations yet unborn to inevitable guilt and
ruin. The office of inflicting this retribution was assigned with some
degree of confusion and uncertainty to the Fates, “who follow up the
transgressions of gods and men,”[155] to the Erinnyes, or Furies, or
to Nemesis, the personification of divine displeasure. But when once
these fearful visitants were established in a house, that house was
marked out for misery and ruin. Such was the fate of the descendants
of Pelops and Labdacus, the royal families of Argos and of Thebes,
whose misfortunes have furnished a never–failing theme to the Greek
tragedians, who abound in references[156] to the fatal curse upon these
races.[157] It is from the presence of these dread ministers of wrath,
visible to her inspired eyes, that Cassandra draws her fearful presages
of evil in that scene, perhaps the grandest in Grecian tragedy.
“For never shall that bard, whose yelling notes
In dismal accord pierce the affrighted ear,
Forsake this house. The genius of the feast,
Drunk with the blood of man, and fired from thence
To bolder daring, ranges through the rooms
Linked with his kindred furies: these possess
The mansion, and in horrid measures chaunt
The first base deed; recording with abhorrence
The adulterous lust which stained a brother’s bed.”[158]
So, after the catastrophe, the chorus refers to the same cause the
accumulated horrors and crimes which weigh down the house of Atreus.
“O thou demon, who dost fall
On the high Tantalid hall,
Well I know thee, mighty fiend,
Who here dost ever wend,
Haunting down the double line
From father unto son!
“_Clytem._ Aye, now thy words have sense and grace,
Calling on that thrice great fiend,
The demon of this race,
For ‘tis from him their bowels burn
With rage of lapping blood;
Ere the old grief has ceased to throb,
Young gore comes on amain.”[159]
With such ideas concerning an avenging destiny, it is no wonder that
the Greeks shunned contact with the inheritors of divine anger; and
national prejudice might be more strongly raised by the sacrilege
of the Alcmæonidæ, because many of the sufferers were slain at the
very altars of the Eumenides, to whom the punishment of such deeds
peculiarly belonged, and whose worship had been introduced into Attica
in amends for the judicial sentence which delivered Orestes from their
power. In modern times an analogous persuasion concerning the fortunes
of particular families has prevailed; in illustration of which we
may cite the belief in the ill–luck of the Stuarts, a belief almost
justified by the series of calamities and bloody deaths which beset
the princes of that house: and, indeed, this faith in the influence
of misconduct to produce hereditary misfortune has been general in
Ireland and the Scottish Highlands, and probably in other countries
where a vivid imagination is found in union with no high degree of
cultivation and knowledge. In Ireland it is the popular creed, that
an estate gained by fraud brings a curse along with it[160] (to open
force they seem to be more indulgent); that the possessor becomes a
doomed man, and neither he nor his descendants prosper. In Scotland it
was thought that a pious parent entailed a blessing upon his offspring,
while the punishment of the wicked and oppressor, if not immediately
manifested upon himself, or his children, yet surely descended even on
succeeding generations. This feeling extended to all classes; and a
striking instance of it is connected with the massacre of Glencoe, the
blackest incident in Scottish history. Colonel Campbell, of Glenlyon,
grandson of Glenlyon, who commanded the military upon that fatal day,
being with his regiment at Havannah, was ordered to superintend the
execution of a soldier condemned to be shot. A reprieve was sent, but
with directions that no person was to be told of it until the prisoner
was on his knees prepared to receive the volley, not even the firing
party, who were informed that the signal would be the waving of a white
handkerchief by the commanding officer. “When all was prepared, and
the prisoner in momentary expectation of his fate, Colonel Campbell
put his hand into his pocket for the reprieve, and in pulling out the
packet, the white handkerchief accompanied it, and catching the eyes
of the party, they fired, and the unfortunate prisoner was shot dead.
The paper dropped through Colonel Campbell’s fingers, and clapping his
hand to his forehead, he exclaimed, “The curse of God and of Glencoe
is here! I am an unfortunate, ruined man.” He soon after retired from
the service, not from any reflection or reprimand on account of this
melancholy affair, for it was known to be entirely accidental. The
impression upon his mind, however, was never effaced. Nor is the
massacre, and the judgment which the people believe has fallen on the
descendants of the principal actors in this tragedy, effaced from
their recollection. They carefully note, that while the family of the
unfortunate gentleman who suffered is still entire, and his estate
preserved in direct male succession to his posterity, this is not the
case with the family, posterity, and estate of those who were the
principals, promoters, and actors in this black affair.”[161]
In addition to the strife of faction consequent upon Cylon’s attempt,
Athens was convulsed by discord between the rich and poor, arising
from the oppressive rights possessed by creditors over the persons of
their debtors, and the difficulty experienced by indigent freemen in
supporting themselves by their own exertions, in consequence of the
general prevalence of slave labour. Solon was appointed archon, with
power to remodel the constitution; and having done so, he quitted
Athens, and remained abroad, it is said, for ten years, the people
having engaged not to alter his institutions within that time. But to
put an end to faction was beyond his power. The landholders of Attica
were divided into three parties, denominated from the lowlands, the
highlands, and the coast. The first consisted chiefly of the nobility,
the great proprietors; the second were a poorer class, among whom the
democratical interest predominated; and the third, consisting in a
great degree of men engaged in trade, held an intermediate station,
both in circumstances and politics. Lycurgus headed the first party;
Megacles was chief of the third; and during the absence of Solon,
Pisistratus, with whom we are more immediately concerned, advanced
to eminence, and assumed the direction of the second. Of his early
life few particulars have reached us; it is only said that he was
distinguished by eloquence and military talents, which he displayed
on different occasions in the wars against Megara. Not long after
Solon’s return, Pisistratus came in his chariot into the market–place,
complaining that, in consequence of the jealousy excited by his support
of the democratical interest, his life had been attempted while he was
on his road into the country, in confirmation of which he exhibited
wounds upon his own person and upon his mules. Whether the story
were true or false, has been controverted, and must remain a matter
of opinion; but that it was a fiction, seems to have been generally
thought by the ancient writers. At all events, the people believed
the tale, and a body of guards was decreed him, the numbers of which
were gradually augmented, until he was enabled to gain possession of
the Acropolis, or citadel, and, in the language of Greece, became
tyrant[162] of Athens.
Death and confiscation being the usual concomitants of a Grecian
revolution, it was a matter of course that the leaders of the defeated
party should consult their safety by flight; and accordingly, Megacles,
with the other chiefs of the Alcmæonidæ, withdrew from Athens. The
terms on which he was invited to return, which happened soon after, are
curious and characteristic. He was distinguished by victories gained
in the public games of Greece, and during his exile he had conquered
in the chariot–race at the Olympic festival. The condition of his
restoration was, that the glory of this success should be ascribed to
Pisistratus.[163] It may be doubted, though horse–racing in modern
days, and chivalrous exercises in the middle ages, have been cultivated
with ardour by men distinguished by birth and station, whether the
possession of the best horses in the world has at any time since
availed to procure the forgiveness of a political enemy. But the high
estimation of such honours forms a striking feature in the Grecian
character. We know from Homer, that, long previous to the institution
of public games, princes contended with each other in athletic
exercises: and when stated times were set aside, at which the flower
of all Greece might vie in displaying strength and activity under the
sanction and with all the pomp of religion, and the victor was rewarded
by the acclamations of his assembled countrymen, it is no wonder that
a nation highly imaginative and susceptible of the love of fame should
have been led to set an extravagant price upon the superiority in
qualities whose value was in truth great in times when the arm of one
man was sufficient to decide a battle, but diminished proportionably to
the progress of art and science. The chariot–race almost always formed
a part of these games; and naturally, for when warriors fought from
chariots, the possession of the best horses was a valuable distinction.
This method of warfare had been disused long before the time of
Pisistratus; but the chariot–race still formed a part, perhaps the most
important one, in the Grecian games. And the welcome of a conquering
general to his native city was less distinguished than that of an
Olympic victor, whose prowess reflected honour upon the state which
gave him birth: and thus such triumphs, by gratifying popular vanity,
might become important, even to the interests of a statesman.
The year 560 B.C. is fixed as that of Pisistratus’s
usurpation. The union of Megacles and Lycurgus produced his expulsion,
after he had possessed the tyranny, it is thought, for about six years;
of the transactions during which we have no information. He remained
in banishment for an equal time, when the enmity between the united
factions broke out afresh, and Megacles, to establish his superiority,
brought back Pisistratus, connecting their interests by giving him
his daughter in marriage. To gain the consent of the Athenians to
his return, they devised a plan, characterised by Herodotus, from
whom we have the story, as a most simple device to ensnare a people
distinguished for intellect and very far removed from a simple
good–nature. In one of the boroughs of Attica there lived a woman
named Phya, of extraordinary stature, and withal of handsome person,
whom they selected to personate the patron Goddess of Athens; and
having carefully instructed her how to act her part, they dressed her
in appropriate armour, placed her in a chariot, and sent her into the
city, preceded by heralds, making proclamation, “O Athenians, receive
with favour Pisistratus, whom Athene,[164] honouring him above all
men, herself brings back unto her own Acropolis.” The news flew abroad
throughout Attica, that Athene had brought back Pisistratus, and those
who were in the city, believing that it was the Goddess, paid divine
honours to a mortal and received the exile.[165]
His prosperity, however, was of very short duration: a domestic
quarrel is said to have produced his expulsion a second time, about a
year after his return, and he remained in banishment for a period of
ten years, at the end of which his son Hippias, who had now attained
manhood, induced him to attempt the recovery of his power. Thebes,
Argos, and other cities assisted him with loans, by means of which
he collected an army; and sailing from Eretria, where he had fixed
his abode, he disembarked at Marathon, was joined by many of his
countrymen, and defeating the ruling party, for the third time became
master of Athens. Both now and formerly his success was characterised
by moderation and lenity; for his only measure of precaution against
future conspiracies was to take as hostages the children of such of his
chief opponents as chose to remain in Athens, who were committed to the
charge of Lygdamis, the friendly ruler of Naxos.
That Pisistratus’s temper and character were mild and amiable, is
proved by the bloodless nature of the revolutions which he effected;
and confirmed even by the testimony of those authors who have
endeavoured to raise the reputation of Solon at his expense, by
narrating many not very probable stories of the sage’s pertinacious
opposition to his schemes of advancement. That Solon saw and lamented
the ambition of Pisistratus is probable, but we learn upon the same
authority that they lived on terms of intimacy and esteem from the
return of the former until his death; and Plutarch, whose object was
to exalt the patriot philosopher, has yet, in doing so, drawn a most
favourable picture of the tyrant. “He was courteous, and marvellously
faire spoken, and showed himself beside very good and pitifull to the
poore, and temperate also to his enemies: further, if any good quality
were lacking in him, he did so finely counterfeit it, that men imagined
it was more in him, than in those that naturally had it in them indeed.
As, to be a quiet man, no meddler, contented with his owne, aspiring
no higher, and hating those which would attempt to change the present
state of the Common Wealth, and would practise any innovation. By this
art, and fine manner of his, he deceived the poore common people.
Howbeit Solon found him out straight, and saw the mark he shot at: but
yet hated him not at that time, and sought still to win him, and bring
him to reason, saying oft times, both to himselfe and to others, that
whoso could pluck out of his head the worme of ambition, by which he
aspired to be the chiefest, and could heale him of his greedy desire
to rule, there could not be a man of more virtue, nor a better citizen
than he would prove.”[166] He adds a strong testimony to the beneficent
administration of Pisistratus, in saying that Solon afterwards became
one of his council; and while Herodotus has distinctly asserted that
he ruled Athens honourably and well, neither changing the magistracies
nor altering the laws, we learn from other authorities that he adhered
to the regulations of Solon. And it is to his credit that he obeyed
a citation to appear before the court of Areopagus, on a charge of
murder, even if we grant that he ran little risk of being condemned;
for it shows prudence, and good sense, and good feeling, that he
chose rather to wear the appearance of submission to authority, than
to outrage popular opinion by the visible assumption of irresponsible
power. Of his lenity towards those who personally offended or injured
him, several stories are told. A young man who was attached to his
daughter, with the help of his friends carried her off forcibly from
a sacrifice upon the sea–shore, at which she was assisting. Their
galley was intercepted by Hippias, who was then cruising in search of
pirates, and they were led captives to Athens. Being brought before the
injured father, they scorned to use the language of entreaty, boldly
declaring that they had held death cheap from the time of undertaking
the enterprise. Pisistratus, struck with the high spirit of the youth,
gave his daughter in marriage to the principal, and thus converted
dangerous enemies into valuable and attached friends.[167] The above
extract from Plutarch bears witness to his charity, which yet was not
indiscriminate, nor abused to the encouragement of idleness; against
which he not only enacted laws, but would inquire of any one whom he
saw unemployed in the market–place, whether it were owing to the want
of agricultural implements, and if it were so, he would supply the
deficiency.
In this, however, perhaps policy was as much concerned as charity.
Having obtained his power through the support of the democratical
party, it was now his object to consolidate and establish it upon
the downfall of that interest, by removing the multitude as far as
possible from the city, and compelling them to follow agricultural
labour. Another reason might be the improvement of the revenue, towards
which he exacted the tithes of all agricultural produce. A humorous
story is told of an old man, who was found by him cultivating a
stubborn and rocky piece of ground. “What harvest can you derive from
thence?” he said. “Aches and blisters, and the tithe of them goes to
Pisistratus.” The answer was well received, and procured for him an
immunity from the tax. On this subject, however, Pisistratus’s conduct
was generally unjust and oppressive, for he not only forced the poorer
Athenians to a rural life, but excluded them from the city, and made
them wear a particular dress, that this exclusion might be the better
enforced.[168] At the same time he proved himself not indifferent to
their interest, by appointing a public provision for those who were
wounded in the public service.
It were much to be wished that our information concerning the policy of
Pisistratus and the public affairs of Athens during his administration
were more minute; but the total silence of history concerning this
period indicates at least that it was one of tranquillity and
happiness. We have seen already that his private character was
amiable; it remains to be added that his tastes were elegant and
his mind cultivated. By many he is included in the list of worthies
distinguished as the seven sages of Greece; indeed all writers who
mention him bear testimony to the successful cultivation of his mental
powers; and he possesses a strong claim to the gratitude of the world
at large, if it be true that he collected and rendered into order the
scattered fragments of Homer’s poems before they were irretrievably
corrupted and confused by the inaccuracies of oral tradition.[169]
And he scarcely deserves less credit for having been the first to
establish a public library: an institution most valuable in all ages
and places, but especially before the introduction of printing, when
the price of books rendered it impossible for any but the wealthy to
possess them. He also devoted much of his attention and revenue to the
embellishment of the city; he built fountains, and a gymnasium, or
place of exercise; he threw his private gardens open to the public; he
dedicated a temple to the Pythian Apollo, and had commenced another to
Olympian Zeus, the Latin Jupiter, when his labours were interrupted
by death, B.C. 527, after he had enjoyed for ten years in
tranquillity the sovereignty which he had pursued for so many anxious
years. He left a name adorned by many virtues and accomplishments, and
blemished apparently only by one great fault, ambition: but this, the
master–passion of his life, has sullied his numerous great and good
qualities, as a tainted fountain pollutes the whole stream. Had he
been a rightful sovereign, he might have been hailed as the father of
his country: instead of which his fellow–citizens saw in him only the
parent of a hated and proscribed race, and later ages “damn him with
the faint praise” of being the best of tyrants.
His sons Hipparchus and Hippias[170] appear to have succeeded quietly
to his authority; which they shared in common, Hipparchus filling
the more prominent station. Their father’s virtues descended to
them, and Athens for some time flourished under their guidance. The
strong expression of Plato is, that the Athenians lived as in old
times under the reign of Saturn. He goes on to say that Hipparchus
made the collection of Homer’s poems which others have ascribed to
Pisistratus, and caused them to be publicly read in the order of their
arrangement at the Panathenaic festival; and further displayed his
taste in the patronage of Anacreon and Simonides, whom he induced
by his liberality to take up their abode in Athens. And having thus
provided for the mental cultivation of the citizens, he turned his
attention to the improvement of the rustic population, and with
this view caused Hermæ[171] to be erected in the main streets of
the city and boroughs, upon which he inscribed in verse the most
pithy maxims which he had heard or invented, that so the countrymen,
wandering about, might taste of his wisdom, and come from the fields
and woods to be further instructed in it. Two of these sentences are
preserved—“The memorial of Hipparchus. Do not deceive a friend.” “The
memorial of Hipparchus. Depart, meditating justice.” Further, we have
the testimony of Thucydides, that he oppressed not the many, but bore
himself ever inoffensively, and that “these tyrants held virtue and
wisdom in great account for a long time, and taking of the Athenians
but a twentieth part of their revenues, (they diminished, therefore,
Pisistratus’s impost by one half,) adorned the city, managed their
wars, and performed the rights of their religion. In other points they
were governed by the laws formerly established, save that they took
care ever to prefer to the magistracy men of their own adherence.” Thus
fourteen years they ruled in peace and honour, when at length a single
act of oppression and insult, a moment’s violation of the maxims of
temperance and virtue, which their conduct as well as their precepts
enforced, produced a revolution upon which probably the destinies of
all Greece have hinged.
Hipparchus had conceived a personal ill–will towards an Athenian
citizen named Harmodius, which he vented by insulting publicly the
offender’s sister. Another citizen, Aristogiton, had reasons of his
own for wishing ill to Hipparchus: he stimulated his friend Harmodius
to a keener sense of the injury, and they resolved to wash away their
wrongs in blood. But few associates were admitted to the knowledge
of their plot, which was to be executed at the Panathenaic festival,
when it was usual for all persons to appear in arms. Hipparchus
alone was personally offensive; but to dissolve the tyranny, and to
secure themselves from retribution, Hippias was to be involved in his
brother’s fate. On the morning of the festival, while Hippias, attended
by his guards, was in the Ceramicus,[172] ordering the procession,
Harmodius and Aristogiton saw one of the conspirators conversing
with him familiarly, “for Hippias was accessible to all.” Thinking
themselves betrayed, they resolved, at least, to take vengeance on the
more obnoxious party, and hastened to seek Hipparchus, whom they slew.
Harmodius was slain in the tumult which ensued. Aristogiton escaped for
a time, but was soon after taken and put to death.
The news being brought instantly to Hippias before others had heard
it, he dissembled his emotion, and bade the citizens repair to a
certain spot without their arms, as if he wished to address them
previous to the procession. He then summoned his guard, and selected
from the assembled multitude all whom he suspected, or found armed
with daggers, a weapon not generally worn by those celebrating the
festival. Thus for the present he preserved his power; but his temper
was changed by the danger which he had escaped, and his government
became jealous and intolerable. Many were slain, and many fled to
join the exiled Alemæonidæ, whose cause became daily more popular at
Athens, and throughout the rest of Greece, until at length they gained
strength sufficient to enable them, with the assistance of Lacedæmon,
to lay siege to Hippias in Athens, in the fourth year after the death
of Hipparchus. The city, however, was strong and well provisioned;
and he might have baffled their patience, but for a fortunate chance
which threw his children, with those of his leading partisans, into
the hands of the assailants. Parental anxiety prevailed, and the town
surrendered, on condition that the obnoxious should receive no injury,
but should quit Attica within five days. Hippias retired to Sigeum.
When advanced in years, he accompanied the armament of Darius in hope
of recovering his sovereignty; it was he that counselled its descent
upon the plain of Marathon, where once before he had landed under a
better star, and he is reported by Cicero to have been slain in the
memorable battle which ensued.[173]
After the expulsion of Hippias, the memory of Harmodius and Aristogiton
was hallowed by the Athenians in every way which the imagination of a
grateful people could devise. Brazen statues were erected in honour
of them (by the side of which, in after–times, those of Brutus and
Cassius were placed), their descendants were gifted in perpetuity with
the privilege of eating in the Prytaneum[174] at the public cost,
with select places at the public spectacles, and with immunity from
taxes: their names, forbidden to be borne by slaves, were ordered to
be celebrated at all future Panathenaic festivals: and if the orators
of Athens wished to find a theme agreeable to national vanity, it was
to the praises of the tyrant–killers, or the events of the Persian
war, that they resorted. Yet, after all these tributes of admiration,
it is asserted by Æschines, that “a temperate and governed feeling
so modified the character of those benefactors of the state, men
supereminent in all virtues, that those who have panegyrised their
deeds do yet appear therein to have fallen short of the things
performed by them.” This extravagant, or probably pretended, enthusiasm
may be endured, though not commended, as a privilege assumed by
advocates and public speakers in all ages: but we cannot extend the
same toleration to Simonides, who had benefited by the friendship
and liberality of the deceased, when he asserts “that a light broke
upon Athens when Harmodius and Aristogiton slew Hipparchus.” Their
exploit was a favourite subject of the odes[175] with which the musical
Athenians enlivened their entertainments, one of which, composed by
Callistratus, has been preserved, and is esteemed among the noblest
specimens of the lyric muse of Greece.
I’ll wreath my sword in myrtle bough,
The sword that laid the tyrant low,
When patriots, burning to be free,
To Athens gave equality.
Harmodius, hail! though reft of breath,
Thou ne’er shalt feel the stroke of death;
The heroes’ happy isles[176] shall be
The bright abode allotted thee.
I’ll wreathe the sword in myrtle bough,
The sword that laid Hipparchus low,
When at Minerva’s adverse fane
He knelt, and never rose again.
While Freedom’s name is understood,
You shall delight the wise and good;
You dared to set your country free,
And gave her laws equality.[177]
Nevertheless there seems not to be the smallest ground for supposing
that the actors in this tragedy were guided by patriotic motives.
The authors who speak of it vary somewhat in the circumstances which
they relate, but all agree that it was a private quarrel, a personal
offence, which inspired their resolution and their hatred. Many have
been the instances in which the wantonness of power exercised on an
individual has proved fatal to men who have trampled unopposed upon the
liberties of their country, as if it were beneficially ordained that
the vices of individuals should work out the general good.
But though this conspiracy can in no respect be regarded as the
proximate cause of the re–establishment of democracy; though neither
its motives nor its effects, so far as we can judge after the long
lapse of ages, merit the encomiums which have been showered on them
so profusely, it nevertheless affected vitally the interests of
Athens, and, through her, of the civilised world. The mind need indeed
be far–sighted and acute which presumes to trace the changes which
a single deviation from the ordained course of events would have
produced; yet it is neither uninteresting nor uninstructive to consider
in what way a nation’s destiny might have been modified, and to observe
the natural connexion by which crime results from intemperance and
injustice, misfortune and misconduct from crime; while the melancholy
series is still overruled to restore freedom to an injured people,
and to punish the ambition which produced such fatal effects. From the
apparently uninterrupted content which prevailed at Athens during a
period of twenty–four years, from the last return of Pisistratus to
the death of Hipparchus, there is good reason to believe that, but for
private enmity, the brothers might have borne uninterrupted sway for
the natural period of their lives. That of Hippias was prolonged for
twenty–three years; making a sufficient period in the whole to have
habituated the Athenians to usurpation, and to have enabled him to
transfer the sceptre to his children as easily as he received it from
his father. Athens, thus converted, like the Ionian cities, into a
tyranny,[178] would probably have offered no more effectual progress
than they did to the Persian power, and without her assistance all
Greece would have fallen under the dominion of the King.[179] To pursue
the subject further would be both rash and useless: it is obvious that
such an event would have exercised a most powerful influence over
the subsequent history of mankind: to define that influence would be
difficult to the most penetrating and comprehensive understanding, and
the attempt would be presumption here.
In the Italian republics of the middle ages we find the age of Greece
revived, though on a smaller scale and with diminished splendour.
They exhibit, in the same colours the results of multiplying small
independent states, where every citizen may feel that he has an
individual as well as a general interest in public affairs, and every
city that she is concerned in the domestic quarrels of her neighbours.
The effects of such a system are manifest alike in either country:
the good, in the remarkable number of distinguished men produced
by them; the bad, in the prevalence of external aggression and
internal discord, signalised alike by political acuteness, unblushing
profligacy, and revolting cruelty. Above all, Florence and Athens are
naturally associated by their kindred eminence in art and literature;
they were alike distinguished for the mercurial temper and lively
imagination of their citizens, and political resemblances are not
wanting to complete the comparison. The early changes in the Florentine
constitution, the gradual depression of the nobles, by the rise of
the commons to wealth and importance, their exclusion from public
offices and honours, the elevation of a plebeian aristocracy upon the
ruins of the feudal nobility, and the division of the commons into an
oligarchical and a democratical party, are briefly and clearly related
in Perceval’s History of Italy, and may not inaptly be compared to
the gradual subversion of the Athenian Eupatridæ. Towards the close
of the fourteenth century, the oligarchy, headed by the family of
Albizzi, succeeded in obtaining possession of the government, which
it held for fifty years with a mild and undisturbed sway. But their
opponents, though silent, were not crushed: as new families gained
wealth by trade, they grew impatient of political inferiority and
exclusion: and the Medici, one of the most distinguished houses of the
popular nobles, who had long ranked in opposition to the Albizzi, were
naturally regarded as the stay of the democratic cause. It was at this
time that Cosmo de’ Medici appeared in public life. The characters and
adventures of this distinguished man and of his immediate descendants
offer a singular number of coincidences with those of Pisistratus and
his family.
At the beginning of the fifteenth century, Giovanni, the father of
Cosmo, was the most distinguished person of his house and party. The
great wealth which he had acquired by commercial adventure was set
off by generosity and unblemished integrity: and though hereditarily
opposed to the ruling faction, his own disinclination to interfere
in politics, and the moderation of his opponents, left him in
undisturbed possession of his riches and influence. To these his son
Cosmo succeeded, and being possessed of greater talents and a more
stirring ambition, he took an active part in public life, and became
the recognised leader of the popular party. The older heads, under
whose temperate guidance Florence had enjoyed a long interval of
tranquillity, were now deceased, and Rinaldo degl’Albizzi, a young man
of inferior judgment and stronger passions, had succeeded to their
influence. He observed and endeavoured to check the growing spirit of
discontent, and thereby hastened a crisis which he was unprepared to
meet. By his machinations Cosmo was brought to trial upon a frivolous
and unfounded charge, and though his life, which was aimed at, was
preserved by a judicious bribe, he was convicted and sentenced to
banishment for ten years. He quietly submitted to the decree, and
retired to Venice, where he was received with distinguished honour:
but Rinaldo had miscalculated his strength; the next year a set of
magistrates came into office who were attached to the Medici, and
by them the dominant family was overthrown and expelled, and Cosmo
triumphantly recalled.
The youth then of Pisistratus and of the Florentine commenced under the
same political aspect, and was marked by the same adventures; but the
advantage thus far is clearly on the side of the latter, who owed his
first elevation to hereditary distinction and to his own merit, and
his recall to the voice of his countrymen constitutionally expressed.
And the resemblance of their youth holds good through their maturer
years: they alike retained their sway to the end of a prosperous life,
and alike employed it with beneficence and moderation; for though the
triumph of Cosmo was not unstained by blood, and he hesitated not to
ensure its stability, when threatened, by the exile of his opponents
and the retrenchment of popular rights, yet his measures seem dictated
by prudence, not by revenge: they are unpolluted by the atrocious
cruelties so common in Italian party contests, and Florence prospered,
and was respected under his administration. He avoided, even more than
Pisistratus, the ostentation of that power which it would have been
nobler not to have possessed; and presented to the world the spectacle
of a merchant raised to the head of a powerful state, pursuing his
original profession with industry and success, and declining the
alliance of sovereigns to marry his children among his fellow–citizens,
whom he treated as if they were in reality, no less than in appearance,
his equals. No superior magnificence distinguished his establishment
or his table; but his wealth was profusely employed in distributing
favours to all around him, until there was scarce a man of his party
who was not bound to him by some personal tie. To this happy temper,
and to the simplicity of his tastes and manners, he owes the enviable
reputation which he has gained. Had he assumed the ostentation of a
prince, which his riches and power might well have warranted, the
obligations which he dispensed would have carried with them the impress
of servitude. But men forgive injuries more easily than mortifications,
and his fellow–citizens reconciled themselves to the unconstitutional
superiority of one who treated them in every–day life as his equals,
or displayed his elevation only in the extent of his generosity, and a
freer cultivation and patronage of all that is fascinating in art and
literature.
We have described Cosmo de’ Medici as exercising a power little
less than regal in a republic whose magistrates were changed every
two months, and in which he neither possessed ostensible office and
authority, nor that armed support which has often enabled usurpers
to dispense with all other title. The reader, therefore, may be at a
loss to understand the nature of his influence; it is explained in
the following passage. “The authority which Cosmo and his descendants
exercised in Florence, during the sixteenth century, was of a very
peculiar nature, and consisted rather in a tacit influence on their
part, and a voluntary acquiescence on that of the people, than in any
prescribed or definite compact between them. The form of government
was ostensibly a republic, and was directed by a government of ten
citizens, and a chief executive officer, called the gonfaloniere,
or standard–bearer, who was chosen every two months. Under this
establishment the citizens imagined they enjoyed the full exercise
of their liberties; but such was the power of the Medici, that they
generally either assumed to themselves the first offices of the state,
or nominated such persons as they thought proper to those employments.
In this, however, they paid great respect to popular opinion. That
opposition of interests, so generally apparent between the people and
their rulers, was at this time scarcely perceived at Florence, where
superior qualifications and industry were the surest recommendations to
public authority and favour; and, satisfied that they could at any time
withdraw themselves from a connexion that exacted no engagements, and
required only a temporary acquiescence, the Florentines considered the
Medici as the fathers, and not the rulers of the republic. On the other
hand, the chiefs of this house, by appearing rather to decline than
to court the honours bestowed upon them, and by a singular moderation
in the use of them when obtained, were careful to maintain the
character of simple citizens of Florence, and servants of the state. An
interchange of reciprocal good offices was the only tie by which the
Florentines and the Medici were bound, and perhaps the long continuance
of their connexion may be attributed to the very circumstance of
its being in the power of either of the parties at any time to have
dissolved it.”[180] The state of things described in a former part
of this passage corresponds with what the Greeks called tyranny, and
in the same sense in which Pisistratus was tyrant of Athens, Cosmo
and Lorenzo de’ Medici were tyrants of Florence. But in his remarks
upon the nature of their power, Mr. Roscoe’s partialities appear to
have led him astray. The Medici, from their brilliant qualities, were
possessed of the affections of a large portion of their countrymen,
and it so chanced, therefore, that the one were as ready to submit
as the other to command. But it will scarcely be believed that the
connexion with a family which had usurped the entire command of the
state, the sole disposal of the magistracies, could have been dissolved
at any time; or indeed that it could ever have been dissolved, except
by force of arms: and the praise of moderation, however applicable to
the two elder Medici, is scarcely due to Lorenzo, who abolished even
the shadow of a popular magistracy, and asserted the dependence of all
functionaries upon himself,[181] whose expenditure was upon a scale
of regal extravagance, and who made his country bankrupt to prevent
the bankruptcy of his house. For he carried on the vast commercial
establishment by which his grandfather Cosmo had acquired wealth;
but with such different success, that he was compelled to debase the
national currency to raise means for meeting his mercantile engagements.
Cosmo, resembling Pisistratus in the elegance of his taste, lived,
like him, at a time which enabled him to confer singular benefits
upon society. To the Athenian we probably owe the preservation of
Homer’s poems in a connected form; to the Florentine and to his family
we are mainly indebted for those treasures of ancient literature
which time has spared; which, four centuries ago, were rapidly
decaying in obscurity, or, by a more ignoble fate, were defaced to
make room for lying legends and scholastic quibbles, until, early
in the fifteenth century, a few enlightened spirits eagerly devoted
themselves to rescuing what still remained. The vast wealth of Cosmo
and his extensive correspondence were ever ready to be employed in the
service of learning; at the request of the men of letters, by whom he
loved to be surrounded, his agents were continually charged to buy
or to have copied whatever manuscripts could be found in Europe or
Asia; he founded public libraries, and among them that which is still
named after his grandson, the Laurentian, and supported the cause of
literature by affording countenance to all who cultivated it with
success. His mansions were filled with gems, statues, and paintings,
the master–pieces of ancient and modern art, and he was the friend no
less than the protector of Donatello and Masaccio, to whom sculpture
and painting respectively are much indebted for their rapid advance.
Nor was he so much absorbed by these tastes, or by affairs of state,
as to neglect his domestic concerns, and the flourishing condition of
his estates of Careggi and Caffagiuolo bore witness to his skill and
attention to agriculture, as did his foreign dealings to his mercantile
knowledge and success.
Architecture, however, was his favourite pursuit. Like Pisistratus,
he spent vast sums in ornamenting his city, and if his glory as
a patron of the art be inferior to that of Pericles—if he cannot
boast, like Augustus, that he found Florence of brick, and left it
of marble, he has one claim to our praise which neither they nor
probably any other public improver of ancient or modern times has
possessed, namely, that the expenses of his works were defrayed from
his private fortune. It appears from a memorandum of his grandson,
Lorenzo, that in thirty–seven years their house had spent in buildings,
charities, and contributions to the state, no less than 663,755 golden
florins, equivalent to more than 1,300,000_l._ of the present day.
The magnificent edifice known as the Riccardi palace was built by
Michelozzi for Cosmo’s residence; under his patronage the dome of the
Florentine cathedral was reared; he built churches and convents, the
enumeration of which would be tedious, and erected a palace upon each
of his four country estates. To these retreats he betook himself in his
declining years, and, estranged from politics and surrounded by men of
letters, he passed the evening of his life in tranquillity, unmolested
by any enemy except the gout. Its close alone was clouded by the death
of his younger son, whom he regarded as the destined supporter of his
name and grandeur, for the bad health of the elder incapacitated him
for an active life; and the aged statesman, as he was carried through
the vast palace which he had no longer strength to traverse on foot,
exclaimed with a sigh, “This house is too large for so small a family.”
He died within a year of his son, in 1464, loved by his friends,
and regretted even by his enemies, who dreaded the rapacity of his
partisans when restrained no longer by the probity and moderation of
their chief; and Florence bore the best witness to his virtues, when
she inscribed on his tomb the title of Father of his Country.
Piero de’ Medici, his eldest son, in name succeeded to his father’s
influence; but owing to his infirmities he resided chiefly in the
country, while, under shelter of the respected name of Medici, a few
citizens monopolized the administration of justice and the management
of the state, and converted both to their own private and corrupt
emolument. He died in 1469, leaving two sons, Lorenzo, named the
Magnificent, and Giuliano; the former being less than twenty–one years
of age, and the latter five years his junior. Had the Florentines still
been animated by their ancient spirit, there was now a most favourable
opportunity for the recovery of liberty: but, under various pretexts,
most of the distinguished families under whom the people might have
ranked themselves had been driven into exile, and the personal virtues
of Cosmo, and his unquestioned pre–eminence as a party leader, had laid
the foundations of an hereditary influence, and prepared a way for
the entire change of the constitution. So fully was the predominant
party aware of this, that the men who had ruled Florence in the name
of Piero, but without reference to his will, and who had embittered
the close of his life by their profligacy and corruption, instead
of profiting by the youth of his sons to shake off this nominal
subjection, were eager to ascribe to them a power which they did not
possess. They took measures to continue, under an empty name, a junto
which assured to them the distribution of all places and the disposal
of the revenue. The ambassadors who had been used to treat with Thomas
Soderini, the citizens who had long been aware that their fortunes
depended on his favour, hastened to visit him, upon the death of Piero.
But Soderini feared to rouse the jealousy of his associates, and to
weaken his party by accepting these marks of respect. He sent the
citizens who waited on him to the young Medici, as the only chiefs
of the state; he assembled the men of most importance, and presenting
Lorenzo and his brother, advised them to preserve to those young men
the credit which their house had enjoyed during thirty–five years,
and suggested that it was far easier to maintain a power already
strengthened by time than to found a new one.
The Medici received with modesty the marks of attachment and respect
which were paid to them in the name of the commonwealth, and for
several years they did not endeavour to assume an authority which
ostensibly was centred in the magistrates alone, and which could not
be exerted in secret, except by men whose long services and known
abilities ensured attention. For seven years Florence enjoyed domestic
peace; the Medici, divided between their studies and the tastes of
youth, at one time entertained men the most distinguished in art and
letters, at another amused the people with brilliant spectacles. But
as they advanced to manhood, and took the administration into their
own hands, their rule became more absolute, and their innovations
on the constitution more obvious. They appointed a body of five
electors, who named the magistracy without any reference to the people:
they converted the _balia_[182] into a permanent council, in whose
hands they placed the legislative, the administrative, and judicial
power; and by its means they got rid of their enemies without legal
proceedings, imposed new taxes at pleasure, and diverted the revenue
to the maintenance of their commercial credit and the support of their
luxury. Unwilling that any should enjoy consideration, excepting as
it was derived from his own influence and favour, Lorenzo excluded
from office, and depressed to the utmost of his power, all those whose
rivalry seemed most to be feared, but especially the Pazzi, one of the
noblest and most powerful families of the state. At this period it
contained nine men of mature age, and of the first rank in the city:
yet since the death of Piero, but one of its members had been admitted
to the magistracy. This exclusion was the more offensive because
one of them had married Bianca, the sister of the Medici. Giuliano,
whose temper was less ambitious, as his talents were inferior to his
brother’s, expressed his dissatisfaction at this conduct, and said to
his brother, that he feared they should lose what they had by grasping
at too much. It was believed also that Lorenzo had interfered with the
course of justice to deprive Giovanni de’ Pazzi of a rich inheritance
which was justly his due; and Francesco, one of the brothers–in–law of
Bianca, a man of violent and haughty temper, withdrew from Florence,
and established a bank at Rome.
Sixtus IV., the reigning Pope, nourished also an inveterate hatred
against the Medici, and under his auspices a conspiracy was formed
to murder them and place Florence under the power of the Pazzi, in
which Francesco Pazzi and Salviati, Archbishop of Pisa, were the chief
actors. [183] “The design of the conspirators was to assassinate both
the brothers, Lorenzo and Giuliano, at the same instant, for the murder
of one would otherwise only have the effect of putting the other on his
guard.[184] The Pope therefore wrote to the Cardinal Riario, nephew
of Count Girolamo, a youth of only eighteen years of age, whom he had
just admitted into the sacred college, and who was then studying at
the University of Pisa, to desire him to obey whatever directions he
should receive from the Archbishop of Pisa; and Salviati accordingly
carried him to a seat of the Pazzi near Florence. The conspirators knew
that the new Cardinal must be welcomed with public entertainments,
at which they hoped that the Medici might be found present together,
and despatched while unsuspicious of danger. Jacopo de’ Pazzi gave a
fête, to which both the brothers were accordingly invited: Lorenzo,
however, alone came, for Giuliano was indisposed. But Lorenzo, as had
been foreseen, made sumptuous preparations to receive the Cardinal at
his villa at Fiesole; and there the conspirators fully resolved to
execute their purpose. The entertainment took place, but still Giuliano
was absent; and the Pazzi, thus again disappointed, and despairing of
securing the presence of the younger Medici, at a second festival to be
given by his brother, resolved to defer their enterprise no longer than
the following Sunday, when the Cardinal was to be present at high mass
at the cathedral of Florence; an occasion at which it was thought that
neither of the Medici could with decency absent himself. There it was
determined that, in the midst of the most solemn offices of religion,
the crime of assassination should be perpetrated; that the elevation
of the host, as the kneeling victims bowed their heads, should be
the signal of murder; and that at the moment of the sacrifice, the
Archbishop Salviati and others should seize the palace of the signiory,
while Jacopo de’ Pazzi was to raise the city by the cry of liberty.
Francesco de’ Pazzi charged himself, together with Bernardo Bandini,
a daring and devoted partisan of his house, with the assassination of
Giuliano. Giovanni Battista Montesecco, a condottiere in the papal
service, had boldly engaged with his single hand to despatch Lorenzo,
while he understood that the murder was to take place at a festival.
But when Montesecco found that it was before the altar of God that it
was intended he should shed the blood of a man whose hospitality he had
enjoyed, his courage failed him. The soldier declared that he dared not
add sacrilege to murder and perfidy; and his office was committed to
two ecclesiastics, who had not the same scruples.
“When the appointed morning arrived, the Cardinal Riario and Lorenzo
de’ Medici were already at the cathedral, the church was rapidly
filling with people, and still Giuliano de’ Medici did not appear. The
conspirators began to dread another disappointment, and Francesco de’
Pazzi and Bernardo Bandini left the cathedral to seek for him, and to
persuade him that his absence would be insidiously remarked. Every
feeling which revolts at murder and treachery is strengthened, when we
learn the terms of familiarity on which these men had just been living
with him whom they were hurrying to death. They passed their arms round
his waist, as if to draw him in playful violence towards the church,
but in reality to feel whether he had put on his cuirass, which he wore
with habitual timidity under his garments. But Giuliano was indisposed;
he had discarded his armour; and so unsuspicious was he at that hour
of impending evil, that he even left at home the dagger which usually
hung at his side. As he entered the church and approached the altar,
the two conspirators kept close to him; the two priestly assassins had
also fixed themselves in the throng beside Lorenzo; and when the host
was raised, and every knee was bending in adoration, Bandini struck
his dagger into the breast of Giuliano. The victim staggered and fell,
and Francesco de’ Pazzi threw himself upon him, with such blind fury,
that besides inflicting on him several blows with his dagger, the
least a death, he grievously wounded himself in the thigh. At the same
moment the two priests attacked Lorenzo. One of them struck at his
throat, but missed his aim; and the blow, which grazed the intended
victim’s neck, merely startled him to his defence.[185] Rapidly
throwing his cloak about his left arm for a shield, he drew his sword
and courageously defended himself until his attendants came to his aid.
The priests then lost courage and fled: but Bandini, his dagger reeking
with the blood of Giuliano, now endeavoured to rush upon Lorenzo, and
stabbed one of his train to the heart, who interposed to defend him.
Lorenzo, however, was by this time surrounded by his friends, who
hastily sought refuge with him in the sacristy, and closed its brazen
doors. Meanwhile the whole church was filled with consternation; and
the first moment of surprise and alarm had no sooner passed, than the
friends of the Medici collected from all quarters, and conveyed Lorenzo
in safety to his palace.
“During this scene in the cathedral, the Archbishop Salviati, with
a strong band of conspirators, attempted, as had been concerted, to
seize the palace of the signiory and the persons of the magistrates.
After filling the outer apartments with his followers, the archbishop
obtained by his rank an easy admission to the presence of the
gonfaloniere and priors who were sitting. But instead of immediately
attacking them he hesitated; and his manner betrayed so much confusion,
that the suspicion of the gonfaloniere being excited, he rushed from
the hall and assembled the guards and servants of the palace. The
doors were secured, and the conspirators were furiously assaulted by
the magistrates and their attendants with such motley weapons and
instruments as the furniture of the palace afforded. Dispersed and
intimidated, they made but a feeble resistance, and were all either
slaughtered on the spot, hurled from the windows, or made prisoners.
Jacopo de’ Pazzi, followed by a troop of soldiery, attempted to succour
them, after an abortive effort to excite the citizens to revolt by
crying liberty through the streets. But the magistrates held the palace
until numerous citizens came to their aid, and Jacopo, seeing that the
game was lost, fled into the country.
“The fate of most of the conspirators was not long delayed. The
Archbishop Salviati was hanged from a window of the public palace, even
in his prelatical robes. Francesco de’ Pazzi, who, exhausted by loss
of blood from his self–inflicted wound, had been obliged to confine
himself to his uncle’s house, was dragged from his bed, and suspended
from the same place of execution. Jacopo himself, being discovered
and arrested in the country by the peasantry, was brought into the
city a few days afterwards, and similarly executed, with another of
his nephews, whose knowledge of the conspiracy was his only crime,
for he had refused to engage in it: and the whole of the devoted
family of the Pazzi were condemned to exile, except Guglielmo, the
brother–in–law of Lorenzo. The priests who had attacked Lorenzo, the
condottiere Montesecco, and above seventy inferior persons besides,
suffered death; and even Bernardo Bandini, though he escaped for a
time to Constantinople, paid the forfeit of his crimes; for Lorenzo
had sufficient interest with Mahomet II. to cause him to be seized and
sent to Florence for execution. The young Cardinal Riario, rather an
instrument than an accomplice in the conspiracy, was with difficulty
saved by Lorenzo from being torn to pieces by the fury of the
Florentine mob; but his attendants were mercilessly butchered by them.”
The conspiracy of the Pazzi strikingly displayed the absoluteness of
the Medician dominion over the will and affections of the people of
Florence. So far from shewing any disposition to join the Pazzi in
revolt, the populace were filled with grief and fury at the murder of
Giuliano, and at the peril in which Lorenzo had stood. They had flown
to arms to defend the Medici: and they paraded Florence for whole days
to commit every outrage upon the dead bodies of the conspirators which
still defiled the streets. The cry of “Palle, Palle!” the armorial
device of the Medici,[186] continually resounded through the city;
and the memory of the tragedy wherein Giuliano had fallen, was always
associated in the public mind with a deepened and affectionate interest
for the safety of Lorenzo, and with an attachment to his person which
lasted to his death.
We might perhaps search history in vain to find two families, whose
fortunes, whose dispositions, and even whose tastes were so faithfully
reflected in each other, as those of Pisistratus and Cosmo de’ Medici.
If we consider the younger Medici as immediately succeeding to their
grandfather (and the concession is not important, for in the interval
no political changes occurred in Florence), the resemblance between
their fortunes, so far as we have traced them, is perfect. The founders
of either house, after similar reverses, established tyrannies in their
native cities, and yet lived and died beloved and respected by their
countrymen, and delivered their usurped sovereignty peaceably to their
successors. These successors were in either case two brothers, who
instead of running the usual course of jealousy and discord, exercised
their joint power for years in harmony, and were at length separated
by conspiracies which succeeded against the one, only to render more
despotic the sway of the other. With respect to personal character, the
resemblance between Pisistratus and Cosmo de’ Medici has been fully
dwelt upon. That between the brothers their descendants is necessarily
less completely made out, for we know very little of the political
conduct of the two Athenians; but we may observe the same hereditary
love of art and literature, the same absence of jealousy, and the
same superiority of one brother over the other in the cultivation of
learning. The resemblance of their histories, so far as we have traced
that of the Medici, fails only in one respect: the death of Hipparchus
was due to his own intemperance, the murder of Giuliano de’ Medici to
the arbitrary measures of his brother.
[Illustration]