First, the idea of living face to face with the absolute, and of

importing the absolute into life—pride of thought of the vainest kind!

To adopt St. Augustine’s figure, you might as well shut up the ocean in

a hole in the sand! As De Musset said: “My glass is small, but from my

glass I drink.” The realms of space do not furnish a substantial love,

and it is vexatious enough to leave that love grovelling on the earth.

Secondly, along with this supramundane mysticism, platonism developed

the exclusive contemplation of self, another deplorable mistake. We

live in virtue of a continual exchange, as physiological and moral laws

equally prove. God alone can rejoice in perfect independence of life and

happiness; the condition of us men is to be happy through give and take;

we have to receive everything, but also to give everything. To search for

happiness within oneself allows no room for enthusiasm or an enlarged

current of life, nor, consequently, for life itself: one withers up like

a tree which should forbid its roots to imbibe moisture from the soil,

its branches to breathe.

The poor dear women, once isolated in the boundless tracts of their

imagination, became giddy, fell a prey to needless torments, lost the

precious gift of simplicity, which was so natural to them in their

capacity as great ladies—that excellent and wise simplicity of mind

which assigns us our place in the vast sequence of things, according to

the will of God. They hovered too far out of touch with realities, they

generalised, wished to grasp too much, they grew restless and uneasy,

which rendered them a prey to intriguers: their sensibility had no

ballast. To influence humanity, they had first to influence the human

beings they had at hand. So long as their mission remained individual,

private, concrete, intimate, it produced satisfactory results. How many

men did they carry up with them into the heights! But when they wanted

to act upon mankind at large, the game was up. Trying to influence

everybody, they ended by influencing nobody. Thus Vittoria Colonna gave

to her beloved Michelangelo forces which he turned to admirable account;

but in her abstract efforts towards public regeneration she completely

failed.

Let us add that Frenchwomen had a much more difficult mission to fulfil

than the Italian women. Spell-bound by the example of Italy, they fancied

that what had succeeded there was sure to succeed here, and they did

not even see (so great was their taste for blind imitation) that they

were behind the fair, that they were importing among us the imitation

of a decadent art, the imitation of an imitation, a counterfeit love, a

counterfeit curiosity, a counterfeit scheme of life. What they should

have done was to inspire robust activities, to cause, no matter whence

or how, a gush of ideas beautiful, striking, original, soul-stirring;

instead, they refined and subtilised and complicated, they wasted their

ingenuity in seeking to discover which was the more aesthetic, poetry or

painting; complication seemed to them to be art, and not the apprentice

stage of art: they never attained that noble logic which is art itself.

Truly strong souls know well that you cannot nourish the world on

sweetstuffs merely, that a decided will is needed in life, and that the

beautiful becomes one with the true when truth has all its potency. Happy

are those who skilfully draw love from truth!—the ploughman who loves

his furrow, the poor man who loves his poverty, the maiden who loves her

purity! We find among women many valiant souls of the stamp of Anne of

France, able thus to lay hold of life. As to those who allow themselves

to be led astray by the obsession of an abstract and too lofty ideal,

they die.

Platonism, then, marked a great advance towards the idea of beauty,

but it did not accomplish any striking progress towards the idea of

happiness, and Nifo was not far wrong in predicting that the doctrine

of two loves, the one celestial, immaterial, good, and desirable, the

other terrestrial and carnal, would result in mere negation, by setting

men between impossible alternatives—a colloquy of angels, or, as M.

France says, a colloquy of chimpanzees. We may regret our condition,

but how escape from it? Natural law (that is, divine law) bids us

disdain none of the gifts of God, but to obtain from each its particular

beauty. Happiness consists really in loving what we have round about

us, in appropriating therefrom all that is beautiful and congenial,

and in affectionately conforming to Nature without coercing her, so as

to nourish ourselves upon her spiritual and physical forces, and to

assimilate her warmth and energy and her universal harmony.

In our own day John Ruskin has been one of the apostles of happiness

under this aspect, and though his doctrine may be difficult to define,

he has unquestionably carried the idea of platonism a stage further, in

harmony with the saying of Plato which we have already quoted: “Those who

know have impressions.”

The impressions on which he lived were often inconsistent, and still more

often nebulous, one might almost say musical. He has been taunted with

his apparent lack of logic, though the glitter of his thought by its very

brilliance often conceals a logic that is sufficiently real. But, after

all, he has unduly neglected the spiritual side of Nature, in particular

the human soul. While we cannot shut our eyes to the existence of the

body and the utility of earthly possessions, it is at the same time good

and necessary for happiness to keep the body and material well-being on

the lower plane. The body is essentially localised, wealth is limited,

and, for both, giving spells exhaustion; only the soul can spend itself

unceasingly, and grow the richer thereby. And thus social happiness

results, so to speak, from the socialism of souls.

Ruskin belongs to the old Venetian school, materialistic, and pagan; his

heart has echoed to physical harmonies, and to him a certain material

socialism would not have been unpleasing. Yet he has well shown what we

ought to feel in our communion with Nature, he has glorified the worship

of beauty and happiness, which consists in guessing at God, in seeing

Him, in acclaiming Him in the beauty of mountains as in the beauty of a

heart overflowing with tenderness and love, in all that is beautiful,

and beautiful for us. His essential idea is that everything around us

produces an impression upon us, and that we ourselves have a duty to

our environment. Gardens are no longer a mere setting of life, they are

alive. Ruskin goes so far as to extol the idea of sacrificing ourselves

for posterity—to plant forests under whose shade our descendants may

live, to build cities in which future nations will be able to dwell.

It is a far cry from these undulatory but noble theories to the egoistic

enjoyment of oneself; yet it is very certain that to carry them into

practice in reasonable measure is the way to find happiness.

That is essentially the moral system which women ought to teach—women

born for impressions, for devotion, generosity, the higher life.

Unhappily, Ruskin, little conversant with love and altogether

unacquainted with the domestic affections, never showed in his own life

a really high appreciation of women’s rôle, nor has he less misconstrued

it from the theoretical standpoint. Apart from some sonorous phrases

in which he recommends them to be queens, but in submission to their

husbands, or to practise good social economy in relation to their

dressmakers, it may be said that he did not understand the charm of

women, and that he felt no attraction for their particular beauty. When

he speaks of beauty, whether in regard to modern painters or to the

Greeks, it is always in general terms, without indicating in any way

whether the feminine expression of the beautiful has for him a special

signification. In his enthusiasm for the aesthetics of the Middle Ages

he even admires masculine beauty above all: his type in that case is the

beauty of a stalwart knight.

M. Bourget, for example, has more clearly conceived and accurately

interpreted the necessity of harmony with Nature; his sensations or

sentiments approximate to the philosophy of the Renaissance, and reflect

the spirit of penetrating sweetness which women had undertaken to develop.

“The sincere acceptance of the inevitable,” he says, “supposes a love

for the inevitable, the consciousness, and not merely the idea, that

this obscure universe has a mysterious and kindly signification. In the

depths of our sensibility there exists an indestructible craving that

this world shall contain something wherewith to satisfy our heart, since

this heart is the world’s own child; and the pure and guileless men

whose ever young and tender spirits speak to us across the ages—Francis

of Assisi, Savonarola, those who believed in this bountiful kindness of

the universe, as they breathed, as they lived, with the whole of their

being—these appear to us in a state of unanswerable protest against the

nihilism with which we are stifled. They become the accomplices in us of

a faith which is hardly conscious of itself, and sometimes seeks its way

with tears. ‘Thou wouldst not seek me,’ says the Saviour in the beautiful

_Mystery of Jesus_, ‘if thou hadst not found me.’ Is this phenomenon far

from that other mysterious one which true believers call prayer?”

We can, we must love Nature, because God has placed her all about us, and

because happiness consists in living with what we love. We love things

that are not ideally perfect, in other words, which are not superlatively

beautiful, because happiness presents itself to us under an essentially

relative aspect, and because there is no one but lays claim to it. It is

not even a question of loving beautiful things, then, but, as we said, of

loving what is beautiful in things.

In real life, to be sure, unpleasant things are as common as

blackberries, while pleasant things are few and far between. Nevertheless

the truth of the system of happiness through love is proved by its

efficacy. Just as the pure platonist, penetrated by his glorious ideal,

is cold, unprofitable, and unhappy, the man who loves is conscious

of being filled with strength and light. To love is to have real and

ardent emotions instead of locking oneself in the icy sentimentalism

of reasoning or of false mysticism; it is to become a wellspring of

sweetness, kindliness, activity, a mainstay of the world: it is to sow

life with flowers, to bestow happiness and to possess it. Though placed

by birth in a refractory medium, Ruskin, in spite of his insufficiencies,

contradictions, weaknesses, lacunae, has exercised a profound influence,

while the platonism of Ficino and Bembo, in a land of high sensibility,

amongst incomparable artists and charming women, stifled everything and

throttled itself.

There are, spread over the world, two unequal races which, living

continually side by side, yet never understand each other and never

blend—the race of pride, and the race of vanity. Pride tends to

enthusiasm and advancement; it would be well to have proud women.

Unhappily men, no matter who they are, do not love them, but much prefer

the feeble and the vain.

Yet the efforts of the Renaissance women have not been wholly wasted.

Those noble women sowed for the future, and the germ subsists.

Nor can it be said that their defeat was absolute. To form a sound

judgment on the question we should have to be able (failures being

invariably more noticeable than successes) to gauge the mysterious,

secret operations of their grace; to number the despondent men cheered by

a kind word or a glance of pity or affection; to fathom the resources,

in truth unfathomable, possessed by the spirit of love even when pure,

and possessed by it alone. Women of great soul, the Vittoria Colonnas of

the world, have drawn from it results almost miraculous; and many others,

without turning themselves into a sort of celestial dancing-mistresses,

or becoming lost in worthless caprices, have given us reason to hope

that, what with labour and earnestness and dignity, the end of their

usefulness will not be seen for many a long day.

In short, they took the lead in the profoundest revolution we have ever

experienced; from Louis XI. they led us to the boudoirs of the 18th

century.

We can give their work neither unqualified praise nor condemnation. But

we can praise many of these high-souled women—praise them for having

seen and followed their star, though they at first sight may not have

recognised the more excellent way. With all our reservations, we feel

their spell upon us, because they were interesting, sincere, devoted,

eminently tender, eminently feminine. We can commend them to the sympathy

of those many ladies of our own day who, as we know, are also seeking

their path, and even their star.

Some of my readers may not approve of this conclusion: some will think it

optimistic, others pessimistic: in such matters contradiction is easy.

Will they allow me to reply in advance that such criticisms would not

surprise me? More than once I myself have recast this book, now in the

optimistic direction, now in the pessimistic: a simple historian, in

contact with subtle, fleeting, elusive shades, with women I sought to

see through; as independent as a man may be, in presence of beauties for

three centuries in the grave, when he is grey with years, sated with the

two great spectacles which, according to Montaigne, quiet the soul—the

sight of government, the sight of death,—I would ever and anon catch

myself understanding their witchery, enthralled to their charm, or else

hating their charm, unjustly; and then, at the moment when I fancied I

could at last write my _veni, vidi, vici_, the ideas slipped from my

book like water through a sieve. It is thus I have acquired the right of

loving these dear ghosts.

And now adieu, princesses, cease to tempt us beyond our powers! Only

continue to live amongst us! Our age is very masculine, your spiritualism

pays us but angel visits now!—you have been driven in a thousand ways to

learn what a soulless commercialism is like. And yet, in your better,

spiritual part, you are with us always. We have lovable and accomplished

women, we have women in a true sense aristocratic, whose hearts are

capable of enthusiasm and heroic charities; there have been some whose

names even live after them as synonyms of intelligence and goodness. We

have our Margarets of Savoy, and, in goodly numbers, women whose moral

bearing surpasses that of men; we have even women of energy, and also, it

is said, of tenderness. The day when they proudly resume the motto _Non

inferiora secutus_, and when to their eminent good qualities they add the

talent of being themselves, the will to speak in their own true accents

rather than a borrowed tongue, they will give us back our illusions, and

with them what was not illusion.

Let them renounce public life! But let them take complete possession

of the home life. Let mannish women, if they must, turn doctors, and

womanish women turn priests! Let all be philosophers, comforters,

ministers of love human and divine; let them work through love, and love

through love! Let them have what we lack, let them excel us, enlighten

us, encourage us! And in our hearts we Latins shall bless them, as we

bless the sun. Passion is a warrant-royal of life.

The moral of our book is that good women should love the beautiful, and

that virtue can be neither tiresome nor torpid.

There is no need to be always a maiden of twelve. True sweetness,

true goodness, true love come, not of naïveté or feebleness, but of

intelligence and personal force.

FOOTNOTES

[1] Madame Vincent has reminded us, in an interesting memoir, that ladies

at one time sat as peers of France.

[2] As administrative authority depended on territorial possessions, it

was quite natural that women should exercise it on occasion. The village

gilds, though composed of men, sometimes elected a woman as president.

[3] “The history of marriage is the history of a relation in which women

have gradually triumphed over the passions, prejudices, and selfish

interests of men: that is the picture of true progress.” (F. Brunetière.)

[4] An Italian caricature of about the year 1450 (repeated by the French

in the sixteenth century) gives a satirical representation of women

violently struggling to wear trunk-hose.

[5] [The manual of religious instruction given to French girls on

attaining the age of twelve.]

[6] Clément Marot on the motto of Madame de Lorraine:

[If love fail, faith is surely slain;

If faith die, love flies hence amain;

So in one motto link the twain—

_Faith and love_.]

[7] One of the most distinguished women of Italy to-day, the Countess

Pasolini, assures us that the great influence still exercised by women

in Italy springs from their approximating more closely than men to

fifteenth-century ideas.

[8] We may say, in passing, that the Italianism of the end of the

fifteenth century, usually regarded as originating with the Italian

expedition of Charles VIII., really goes back to Louis XI. Louis was

Italian in education and tastes. Italians flocked into France during his

reign.

[9] Cornelius Vitelli, styled Corythius by the public, came to France in

1482, for the simple reason that his own country had become unsafe for

him. We have not many details about him or about his colleague, Girolamo

Balbi, a pompous and quarrelsome character. A third Italian, Fausto

Andrelini, made his appearance in 1488, under the auspices of the Marquis

of Mantua. Andrelini, who lived very comfortably at Paris till his death

in 1518, had no other effects than the memories of a little love-affair,

which he confided to us in three books of verses, his “pages of youth,”

as we should say to-day. Exiled, penniless, almost naked, but a poet, he

was, as soon as he arrived, petted, adopted, and idolised, the favourite

of Chancellor Guillaume de Rochefort and of fortune.

[10] Fausto Andrelini was the object of incredible adulation; Erasmus,

wise man, simply calls him “divine,” but some did not hesitate to

proclaim that “he alone had rendered France filled instead of famishing,

cultivated instead of waste, verdant instead of barren, Latin instead of

barbarous.” One of the noblest characters of the time, Guillaume Budé,

actually dedicated to him this amazing epitaph: “Here lies Fausto. If

the Fates had not given him to us, Gaeta herself would not have been

more barbarous than France.” But he was no sooner buried than everyone

regarded him as a knave.

[11] John Ruskin.

[12] [The most prolific and popular eclogue writer of the fifteenth

century (1436-1516).

“As the moste famous Baptist Mantuan,

The best of that sort since Poetes first began.”

—_Alexander Barclay._

Erasmus went so far as to match him with Virgil.]

[13] [The celebrated cabalistic philosopher (1486-1535). He stayed for a

time with Dean Colet in London. He wrote a book _De Nobilitate feminei

sexus_.]

[14] An extract from the marriage of Peregrino will give an idea of the

Romance (Book I., cap. i., p. 32):

“There standing and awaiting the wished-for end, I heard the voice of a

minister of Jupiter, who, regarding both of us, thus spake: ‘Peregrino,

and you Geneva, are you clear and free from every manifest or secret

bond?’ ‘We are free, nor anywhit bounden?’—_Minister_: ‘Are you not

conjoined in affinity?’ _Peregrino and Geneva_: ‘Naught in affinity, and

little in amity!’ _Minister_: ‘Have you promised marriage or betrothal to

any other man or woman?’ _Peregrino and Geneva_: ‘No, never.’ _Minister_:

‘Are you by common consent disposed to celebrate this present holy

sacrament of matrimony?’ _Peregrino and Geneva_: ‘We wish it heartily and

in faith.’ _Minister_: ‘Thee, woman, give I to him, and Peregrino will

put on the ring.’

“Having done his bidding, as it is the wont, we sat ourselves down,” and

a tender conversation ensues between the two spouses.

“O matchless eloquence!” cries Peregrino, “O thrice lucky hour! O blessed

day! O my hope in the sovran guerdon vouchsafed to me! With thee, sweet

my dame, love, and gentleness, and discretion, and prudence have their

habitation, in thee every good thing doth lie hid. Thou art very music,

of all discords the harmony. In all parts I find thee whole and perfect.

Thou art abundant in all humanity and sweetness, and in thy making the

lord and maker of heaven hath created the true copy and sovran revelation

of all things.” The couple dream their souls away in these platonic

effusions. The bride is bedded there and then, and the author omits no

detail. The sun is already high when a young maidservant ventures to come

in and light a fire of twigs.

[15] [The quotation is taken from the _Heptameron_, Tale 40. There the

lady is named Nomerfide, whom the author identifies with a certain Mlle

de Clermont.]

[16] “_Anna_: The maiden invokes with all her prayers the sweets of

wedlock, and yet with the first amorous intoxication begin the woes of

the conjugal bed; the woman is scarce nestled upon the heart of the man

than with one consent they long for separation. _Phyllis_: Anna, little

it recks me that thou decriest the bonds of wedlock and the crabbed sour

race of men; my heart is a-fire with love and I am tormented with thirst

for marriage.... I deem it better far to marry betimes; wedlock is a

refuge where modesty may shelter herself.”—(J. Cats, pp. 6, 7, 16.)

[17] _Heptameron_, Tale 21.

[18] [As these royal ladies are constantly cited in subsequent pages, the

reader will allow us to remind him once for all of their relationships.

Louise of Savoy was the wife of Charles, Count d’Angoulême, cousin-german

of Louis XII., and the mother of Francis I. and of Margaret of Valois.

She was a passionate and masterful woman and completely ruled her son,

and her greed and intriguing spirit brought disaster upon France. Anne of

France, also known as Anne of Beaujeu, was the eldest daughter of Louis

XI., and wife of Pierre II. of Bourbon. She was virtual ruler of France

during the first eight years of the reign of her brother Charles VIII.:

see further Book III., chapter i. She is connected with English history

in so far as it was largely her money that financed Henry of Richmond’s

successful enterprise against Richard III.]

[19] No law in the world had yet authorised them to marry “without the

knowledge, advice, and consent of their fathers” (Rabelais).

[20] The good Anne of France, married to a husband much older than

herself, had in her life a romance which has escaped notice. She was fond

of her first fiancé:

“Le prédit duc de Calabre, famé,

En l’espousant luy donna ung aneau,

Non de grant pris; mais si fut il amé

De par la dame et plus chier estimé

Qu’or ny argent, ne bague, ne joiau

Qu’elle garda, mieulx que plus riche et beau,

Jusque a la mort, c’est vérité patente....”

[“Calabria’s foresaid duke, a prince of fame,

Plighted his troth and gave his bride a ring,

Of no great price, I wot, but yet the dame

Loved him so dear, so high esteemed his name

As never gold nor any precious thing,

Silver nor gem, did her more pleasure bring,

Until her death. ’Tis very truth I tell.”]

The duke died six years after the betrothal,

“Qui fust ung deul qui bien tost ne passa,

Mais grefvement poingnit et trepersa

Le noble cueur de la jeune espousée.

Par quoy, tost fust la chose disposée

Qu’aultre mari prendroit notable et bon,

Ung sien prochain, feu Pierre de Bourbon.”

[“And ’twas a sorrow that not soon did pass,

But smote fell sore and heavily, alas!

The noble heart of this young winsome bride.

Nathless, ere yet her brimming tears were dried,

Another mate was found her, good and high,

Pierre de Bourbon, of her own family.”]

But the princess clung to the ring of her former lover, symbol of

“Loyalle amour dont estoit anoblie ...

... En cest aneau que luy avoit doné

Son amy mort, voullut Pierre espouser.”

[“Of loyal love’s ennobling influence.

And with this ring, gift of her lover dead,

Would she her husband Pierre de Bourbon wed,”]

in order to preserve the memory of him whom God, in his unfathomable

designs, had seen fit to take from her—

“Pour petit cueur, d’une jeune pucelle,

Bien garde est d’amour honneste

C’est quant jamais ne varie ou chancelle ...”

—_Poème inédit de La Vauguyon._

[“To the sweet guileless heart of tender maid

’Tis surety of a chaste and noble love

That changeth never, nor will ever fade.”]

The princess was as pure a woman as any of whom we have any account, but

the author dwells on this innocent romance in order to keep her memory

alive in the hearts of lovers.

[21] [Vittoria Colonna (1490-1547) was the most illustrious member of

an old and illustrious Roman family said to derive its name from the

_column_ to which Christ was bound for His scourging. At the age of

seventeen she married the Marquis of Pescara, and when he died of wounds

received at Pavia (1525) she refused many offers of marriage, and devoted

herself to literature and works of piety. She wrote poems in imitation of

Petrarch.]

[22] [Tiraqueau was the learned and genial seneschal of Fontenoy who

released Rabelais from the tender mercies of the Franciscans, for which

kindness he was eulogised in _Pantagruel_. He had a large family, wrote

many books, and was a water drinker; whence an anonymous epigram which,

roughly rendered in English, reads:

Tiraqueau, fruitful as the vine,

Got thirty sons, but drank no wine;

Not less prolific with the pen,

Produced as many books as men.

And had not water sapped his strength,

So strenuous a man at length

Had filled this world of ours—who knows?—

With books and little Tiraqueaux.]

[23] [A famous physician of Lyons (1471-1540), who founded the College of

Medicine there. He was also a man of action and a writer, and his _Nef

des dames vertueuses_ made him so popular with the ladies that he had to

choose back ways to avoid affectionate mobbing.]

[24]

“Ainsi, comme j’ayme m’amye,

Cinq, six, sept heures et demye

L’entretiendray, voyre dix ans,

Sans avoir paour des médisants,

Et sans danger de ma personne.”

—Clément Marot, _Dialogue nouveau_.

[Thus, as I love my doxy dear,

Five, six, seven hours, nay full ten year

I’ll court her, free from fear of slander:

And scatheless—for I but philander.]

[25] [The great general (1460-1525) who served Charles VIII., Louis XII.,

and Francis I. He conquered Lombardy for Charles, and was killed at

Pavia.]

[26] [See Book II., cap. v.]

[27] [_i.e._ Catherine Sforza, the natural daughter of Galeazzo Sforza,

Duke of Milan. She married the prince of Forli, and on his assassination

by rebels was thrown into prison with her children. But hearing that

Rimini held out for her against all assaults, she offered to carry in

person an order for its capitulation. On arriving before the city,

however, she bade the rebels lay down their arms, and cowed them by sheer

force of character. She married later Giovanni de’ Medici, father of

Cosimo. She defended Forli against Caesar Borgia, but was captured, and

imprisoned in S. Angelo; thence escaping, she retired to Florence, and

soon afterwards died there.]

[28] The countess’s lover.

[29] [Egnazio, a fellow-pupil of Leo X., teacher of eloquence and editor

of Ovid and Cicero, etc.]

[30] _Heptameron_, Tale 25.

[31] _Heptameron_, Tale 25.

[32] [The Yorick of French literature: see Victor Hugo’s _Le Roi

s’amuse_. When Panurge has vainly sought advice from everyone else on

the momentous question, ‘to marry or not to marry?’ he tries Triboulet,

who sends him to consult the oracle of the Divine Bottle (Rabelais,

_Gargantua_, Book III.). Triboulet was court jester to Louis XII. and

Francis I.]

[33] [Of the early part of the 17th century. Her chief work is the

_Angoisses douloureuses qui procèdent l’amour_.]

[34] A large number of these _cassoni_ exists. One of the most beautiful

that can be mentioned represents the story of Esther (Chantilly gallery).

The author possesses one that represents Filippo Maria Visconti before

the Emperor.

[35] Two days after his marriage, Girolamo Riario sent his bride a

casket containing diamond necklaces and robes of gold brocade and of

velvet, embroidered with fine pearls; one robe alone carried nearly 3000

pearls; there was also a purse of gold, silver-embroidered girdles,

etc.—(Pasolini.)

[36] _Anna Karenina._

[37]

“Y cuidez-vous avoir repos

En mariage, mes mignons?

Ouy dea!”

[“And think you then to find repose

In marriage bonds, my jolly joes?

Heigh ho!”]

chuckles Roger de Collérye, addressing himself here, however, to men.

[38] “It ought to be a voluptuousness somewhat circumspect and

conscientious.... Is not a man a miserable creature? He is scarce come to

his own strength by his natural condition, to taste one only complete,

entire and pure pleasure, but he laboureth by discourse to cut it off: he

is not wretched enough except by art and study he augment his misery.”

(_Montaigne_, bk. i. cap. xxix. [Florio’s translation]).

[39] [Elder sister (1492-1549) of Francis I., and head of the Renaissance

party in France. Her character is elaborately analysed in subsequent

pages of this book. The quotations under her name are from the

_Heptameron_, and the poems of which she is the reputed author.]

[40] _Heptameron_, Tale 40.

[41] [Baldassare Castiglione (1478-1529), the author of the famous

_Book of the Courtier_, Hoby’s translation of which has been recently

added to Mr. Henley’s ‘Tudor Translations.’ This book is frequently

quoted from and alluded to in the following pages. It purports to be a

record of conversations held at the Court of Guidobaldo, Duke of Urbino

(1472-1508), upon the qualities that make up the perfect courtier,

and many other subjects incidentally. The chief interlocutors who are

mentioned in these pages, are the duchess, Elizabeth Gonzaga; Cardinal

Pietro Bembo (1470-1547), of so fastidious a taste as to revise his works

forty times, the author of _Gli Asolani_, dialogues on platonic love;

Bibbiena; and the coarse and dissolute Pietro Aretino, called Unico

(1492-1557), who alternately satirised and sponged on the great; he wrote

several witty and indecent comedies, and his letters throw much light

on the social life of his time. The reader will find some specimens of

his work _La Cortigiana_ (the Courtesan) quoted in Burton’s _Anatomy of

Melancholy_.]

[42] The abate Serassi has preserved it: “My dear husband, I have got a

little daughter, for which I think you will not be sorry. I have been

much worse than last time, and, as I wrote you, I have had three attacks

of very high fever. To-day, however, I am feeling better, and hope to

have no more trouble. I will not try to write any longer, lest I be over

bold. With all my heart I commend myself to your lordship. Your wife, who

a little _starocca_ with pain. Mantua, August 20, 1520.”

[43] [The duke’s health was ruined by early excesses; Castiglione says

‘gout.’]

[44] [Paolo Giovio, Italian historian (1483-1552), an interesting but

untrustworthy writer. As Brantôme puts it, he used two pens, one of gold,

the other of iron, according as the princes he served treated him!]

[45] _Heptameron_, Tale 68.

[46] _Heptameron_, Prologue and Tale 45.

[47] By ‘amateurs’ we mean men who, while not professionally qualified,

have leisure to devote to extended scientific study. In our own day, as

is well known, M. Pasteur and M. Claude Bernard would not be entitled to

give professional advice.

[48] [Mistress of Henri II., an imperious and avaricious woman, but a

generous patron of the arts. See Hugo’s _Le Roi s’amuse_.]

[49] “I affirm not but I may one day be drawn to such fond opinions,

and yield my life and health to the mercy, discretion, and regimen of

physicians,” says Montaigne. “I may haply fall into this fond madness; I

cannot answer for my future constancy. But even then, if any ask me how I

do, I may answer him as did Pericles, ‘You may judge by that.’” (Bk. II.

chap, xxxvii.)

[50] “O heavenly physician!” cries St. Theresa, “thou dost resemble

only in name these physicians on earth! Thou visitest the sick without

summons, and more gladly the poor than the rich.”

[51] Doctors, further, had to take orders and were not allowed to marry.

[52] [An Italian writer (1508-1568) who “wrote in all styles but excelled

in none.” He wrote two dialogues on matrimony and the misadventures of

husbands.]

[53] Savonarola, who fought in vain against the vogue of astrology (_Opus

singulare contra l’astrologia_: a woodcut represents him disputing with

an astrologer), ridicules the Roman prelates who never moved a step

without consulting their astrologer. The great soldiers and sovereign

princes, such as Lodovico Sforza and Francesco di Gonzaga, were no whit

different. In princely houses a physician who would not condescend

to practise astrology led a sorry life. He points to his phials in

vain; “against death he has no medicine”; while the astrologer, a man

of position, handsome, fat, well-fed, rich, gazes into the boundless

heavens (_Dance of Death_); there was no profession more lucrative than

astrology, none more tempting to ambition. It lent itself to dramatic

effects. First the astrologer was usually a foreigner, no man having

honour in his own country—an Italian or German, or, better still, a Moor

or Gipsy. He puts on airs and keeps his clients waiting. If someone sends

him a birth date, to have his horoscope cast, he sends no reply; his eyes

are so fatigued by constant watching! he is so tired! And the awestruck

princesses in the waiting-room say to one another that patience is

necessary with “such geniuses.” And the stars were put to marvellous uses.

Bonaventure des Périers relates the amusing story of a physician of

Paris, who, alleging high astrological reasons, never showed any

amiability to his wife except on rainy days. The despairing lady at

last hit upon a very simple expedient: every evening she had a tub of

water emptied on the roof so as to produce the sound of a shower in

the gutter-spout, and it rained every day! At this game the physician

came off second-best and died; and his widow, who found herself very

well off, was besieged with numerous offers. She incontinently sent

all the physicians packing, then asked her other suitors if they were

familiar with the moon and stars. Everyone thought it well to make solemn

affirmation that he was, and received his _congé_. There was only one who

was simple enough to confess that his science was limited to taking moon

and stars to witness when he went to bed. He gained the day (_Contes et

Récréations_, Tale 95). No glory was wanting to astrology; physicians

and savants practised, defended, and taught it; great nobles gave it

their patronage. Marshal Trivulce accepted the dedication of Pirovano’s

_Defence of Astrology_. The science numbered eminent adepts. Luther

made use of it in support of his doctrines. Michel Servet, after vainly

trying theology and medicine, began to profess transcendental astrology;

he foretold eclipses, plagues, wars, and the deaths of potentates; he

achieved a very great success, pupils drank in his instruction. Unhappily

the jealous Faculty directed him to return to the natural sciences and

give up the “Almanac.” Servet then turned geographer, and it was not long

before he went back into the religious mêlée. The _Atlas of Astrologers_,

one of the most curious monuments of moral derangement, enumerates a

crowd of astrologers, among them the Sibyls of the Vatican and King

Alfonso of Naples.

[54]

Wing’d spirits, who the middle space

’Twixt earth and highest heaven possess,

God’s scouts, the outposts of his grace.

[55]

Unnumbered cords, frail strands full fraught with pain,

That join the soul to things of time and sense.

[56]

The body’s ruled by your command,

Like clay beneath the potter’s hand.

[57]

And this your will and pleasure, stars!

...

In vain doth man at eve and morn

Torment you with his useless prayer;

Fate sweeps him on, he knows not where,

As billows on the stream are borne.

[58] _Les Evangiles des quenouilles_ promise to a wife a son or a

daughter according as she loves battle stories or has longings for

dancing and music.

[59] One of the greatest ladies of the time, Marie de Luxembourg,

Countess of Vendôme, lived on an annual income of 16,000 livres.

[60] Book III.

[61] [“To the Mistletoe! the New Year!” The cry of Breton peasants,

“begging small presents or New-Year’s gifts, an ancient tearm of

rejoycing derived from the Druides, who were wont, the first day of

January, to go into the woods, where having sacrificed and banquetted

together, they gathered mistletow, esteeming it excellent to make beasts

fruitful, and most sovereign against all poyson” (Cotgrave). From a

patois corruption the Scots _Hogmanay_ is said to be derived.]

[62] She provided for so many maidens “by way of marriage, and had so

great care of them, that she deserved to be named their mother.”—_La

Vauguyon._

[63]

Quattuor sunt que mulieres summe cupiunt:

A formosis amari juvenibus,

Pollere filiis pluribus,

Ornari preciosis vestibus,

Et dominari pre ceteris in domibus.

—_Tractaculi sive opusculi._

[“Four things there are that women eagerly covet: to be loved by handsome

youths; to be good for many sons; to be decked out in costly array; and

to rule the roost.”]

[64] Montaigne relates that he was put out to nurse with peasants, “and

brought up in the humblest and most ordinary way of life.”

[65] Montaigne, Bk. II., cap. iii.

[66]

[Daughter and son gave her obedience,

Stored full of wit and virtue and good sense.]

[67] Maffeo Vegio, a disciple and the biographer of St. Bernardin of

Sienna, secretary of Pope Martin V., was a very eminent humanist at the

beginning of the 16th century. He added a supplementary book to the

_Aeneid_. He was ranked much higher than Petrarch. The book cited, _De

educatione liberorum et eorum claris moribus_, often republished since

1491 and issued in a French translation in 1508, is a very remarkable

work, and exercised a great influence. It seems, however, to have escaped

the researches of the historians of education.

[68] [Jean Lemaire de Belges (1475-1548), historian and poet. His chief

works quoted from in these pages are: _Illustrations et singularités des

Gaules_ and _Le Temple d’honneur et de vertus_.]

[69] Montaigne.

[70] [A friend of Calvin, and a professor, who reduced himself to beggary

by his unselfish efforts to improve the educational methods of his day

(1479-1559).]

[71] [A cardinal, and an ardent humanist (1477-1547). He took Cicero for

his model, and wrote moral philosophy and poetry. The work here alluded

to is his _Paedotropia_.]

[72] [Vivès accompanied Catherine of Aragon to England as her tutor and

chaplain. Siding with her on the divorce question, he had to leave the

country. His works were published at Basle in 1555.]

[73] He admits astrology among the exact sciences.

[74] [Ulrich von Hütten (1488-1523), friend of Luther and one of the

most energetic of the Reformers, by turns soldier, poet, theologian, and

politician. He is alluded to _passim_.]

[75] _Heptameron_, Tale 18.

[76] [A 16th century scholar who in an amusing book called _Apologie pour

Hérodote_ made an elaborate attack on the clergy of his day.]

[77] “My pupils do just as they please; most of the time they are digging

the soil,” writes an unlucky tutor, referring to the dauphin of France;

“I have grave doubts whether they’ll be fit for anything better.”

[78] Numerous Latin dialogues were written for children in France and

Germany.

[79] Montaigne.

[80] “My daughter is of the age wherein the laws excuse the forwardest to

marry. She is of a slow, nice, and mild complexion, and hath accordingly

been brought up by her mother in a retired and particular manner, so that

she beginneth but now to put off childish simplicity.” (Montaigne.)

[81]

Quid tibi praecipiam molles vitare fenestras?

Ad culpas aditum laxa fenestra facit.

Libera mens, captiva tamen sint lumina, quando

Hanc animo invenit saeva libido viam.

Cogite fallaceis, animus ne peccet, ocellos,

Cogite, libertas ne peritura cadat.

Pellite materiam, primasque extinguite flammas.

(Pontanus, _De Liberis_.)

[“Why should I admonish thee to shun the seduction of windows? An

unbolted casement is the door to vice. Keep the mind free, but the eyes

in durance, since concupiscence discovers this way to the soul. Restrain

thy eyes from tricks lest thy soul sin; yea, lest thy liberty fall and

perish. Thrust away the fuel, and extinguish the beginnings of flame.”]

[82] [A disciple of Thomas Aquinas: he died in 1316.]

[83] [The famous mystic and theologian (1363-1429), who so stoutly

opposed scholasticism, astrology and magic. The _Imitation of Christ_ has

been ascribed to him.]

[84] “Take care of your daughters; let them be always at home, gentle,

pious, scorning money and outward adornments. And thus you will preserve

not only these young girls, but the men who will one day wed them, and

you will assure a good posterity from a healthy stock.”

[85] “From a braying mule and a girl who speaks Latin, good Lord, deliver

us.” (Bouchot.)

[86] It was to an expert in high culture that Renée of France entrusted

her daughters, in the person of Olympia Morata, who was noted for the

eloquent Latin and Greek discourses she delivered as a precocious

child of thirteen. While still under fifteen, Olympia’s pupils were

sufficiently advanced to act a comedy of Terence before the pope. This

education by means of the theatre was completed with serious readings in

Ovid and Cicero, and the final polish was given by a Greek monk of known

liberal views, Francesco Porto. There was no idleness or melancholy here.

[87] [An Italian poet, pupil of Pontanus (1488-1530). The _Arcadia_, his

chief poem, ran into sixty editions.]

[88] Montaigne (who, however, deduces from these premises altogether

different conclusions).

[89] “Let us retard the age of marriage,” cries M. Legouvé, “if we wish

girls to exercise free choice and live free lives.”

[90] [_Praeter naturam est, feminam in masculos habere imperium._

(Erasmus.) “’Tis against nature for a woman to have rule over males.”] “I

allow woman to learn; to teach, never.” (Bruno.)

[91] [A poet of Lyons, who lived about the middle of the sixteenth

century.]

[92] [One of the most active of the Italian humanists (1380-1459). He

brought many ancient MSS. to Rome, and translated Xenophon and other

Greek writers. His _conti_ are as obscene as some of Boccaccio’s.]

[93]

Nil est simplicitate prius.

Haec placet; haud ulla est quaesitae gratia formae,

Quae studio peccas, simplicitate places,

Nulla est ornandi, nulla est, mihi crede, parandi

Gloria, naturae est forma, nec artis opus;

Ars odio digna est, ubi nullo fine tenetur.

(Pontanus, _De amore conjugali_.)

[“Nothing comes before simplicity. That is pleasing; there is no grace

in artificial beauty. By artifice thou wilt err, by simplicity thou wilt

please. There is no glory in adornment, none, believe me, in farding

oneself; beauty is the work of nature, not of art. Art is hateful when

not kept within bounds.”]

[94] [A vigorous and witty social satirist (1421-1510).]

[95]

[Some maidens, in their modest way,

With fools their garters stake at play.]

[96] Nifo sincerely admires princesses who go to their husbands _virgines

intactae_.

[97] [A doctor of the Sorbonne and a Dominican (1443-1514). In one of

his sermons occurs the story of the church bells, repeated by Rabelais à

propos of the marriage of Panurge.]

[98]

[A woman, a dog, and a walnut tree,

The more you beat ’em, the better they be.]

[99] In the long run the best things become wearisome: men at last

believe they are sacrificing themselves. “Christ died only once for

His church; we die every day for our wives,” is the heartfelt cry of a

husband; to which a lady retorts: “Go to the wars, then, and lie for a

month on the bare ground; and you won’t be sorry to get back to your

good bed! Men only appreciate their comforts when they’ve lost them.”

(_Heptameron_, Tale 54.)

[100]

Femme bonne qui a mauvais mari

A souvent le cœur marry.

...

Femme aime tant comme elle peut,

Et homme comme il veut.

—_L. de Lincy._

[A good woman with a bad husband has often a sore heart.... Woman loves

as much as she can; man as much as he will.]

[101] A woman, irritated at her husband reading in bed, calls out to the

servant: “Ah well! Bring me my distaff!” (Billon, _Le Fort inexpugnable

de l’honneur du sexe féminin_).

[102] “He who loves not him by whom he is loved is regarded as a

homicide, and not merely a homicide, but a committer of sacrilege and a

thief.” (Champier, _De vraye Amour_).

[103]

Il se commence à soucyer

Et à chagrin s’associer.

Il plaint la teste, puis les dents,

Et a les oreilles pendans

Ne plus ne moins comme un lymier.

—_R. de Collérye._

[He begins to fume and fret,

Becomes sworn brother to regret;

Headache, toothache he bemoans,

Chapfallen he sighs and groans.]

[104] _Dialogus de matrimonia._

[105] “You have been to seek a little school-miss, an angel who dared

not lift her eyes, and who to all appearance was candour to the

finger-tips.... She was thinking things over: she was enticing you into

her trap, because your rank and fortune suited her, but determined at the

bottom of her soul to give you a ‘combing’ later: she says in confidence

to her friends, ‘randy steeds need breaking in’.” (Jean d’Ivry: _Les

Secretz et Loix de mariage_).

[106] [Title of a brilliant comedy by Emile Augier and Jules Sandeau,

produced in 1854. M. Poirier is a wealthy retired cloth merchant who has

married his daughter to a spendthrift marquis in the hope of getting a

peerage through his influence.]

[107] [Charles had been solemnly betrothed to the daughter of Maximilian

of Austria, and Anne of Brittany had been wedded by proxy to Maximilian

himself. Both repudiated their contracts, and their alliance united

Brittany to the crown of France.]

[108] Cf. the following ballad by Alione:

Qui veut ouir belle chanson

D’une fillette de Lyon

Qui d’amour fut requise,

Ale houe!

En venant de l’église.

Mais elle en fut reprise!

Ale houe!

Un bon copain lui voulut donner

Cent florins pour la marier,

Mais (_Pourvu_) qu’elle fût s’amie.

Ale houe!

Prenez-les, je vous prie;

De cœur les vous octroie.

Ale houe!

A sa mère s’en conseilla,

Qui lui dit que bien la gardera

De cette maladie.

Ale houe!

Il peut bien dire pie,

Car il ne l’aura mie.

Ale houe!

“Les amoureux du temps présent

Font des promesses largement,

Et montrent main garnie.

Ale houe!

Mais folle est qui s’y fie:

Trop coûte la folie!

Ale houe!”

La fillette ne voulut pas

Son conseil croire, en celui cas;

Car elle eut plus grant joie,

Ale houe!

De gagner sa monnaie,

Cent florins de Savoie.

Ale houe!

Cent florins sont beaux et luisants;

S’elle eust fillé vint et cincq ans,

Voire toute sa vie,

Ale houe!

Toute sa fillerie

N’en vaudrait la moitié.

Ale houe!

[Who lists to hear a famous ditty

All on a maid of Lyons city,

Who as she came from church one day

(Hey nonny!)

Was sought in love the usual way—

And sore she smarted, gossips say—

(Hey nonny!)

The jolly youth would give, he said,

A hundred florins her to wed

If she would first his leman be.

(Hey nonny!)

“Prithee, take them, dear,” says he,

“With all my heart I give them thee.”

(Hey nonny!)

The hussy home did straight repair:

Her mother counselled her: “Beware!

Lest it repent thee by and by;

(Hey nonny!)

For though he speak thee fair and sigh,

His precious gold is all my eye!

(Hey nonny!)

“The young men of the present day,

Promise more largely than they pay,

And though their purse well filled appear,

(Hey nonny!)

The girl who trusts to it, I fear,

Will find her folly cost her dear.”

(Hey nonny!)

Alack! the hussy tossed her head,

Heedless of what her mother said,

For ’twas to her a greater joy

(Hey nonny!)

To get the money from her boy—

Those hundred florins of Savoy.

(Hey nonny!)

A hundred! how they gleamed and shone!

Had she sat spinning on and on

Full twenty year, till worn and old,

(Hey nonny!)

Not all the thread she’d spun and sold

Had brought her half that shining gold.

(Hey nonny!)]

[109] One of the friends of Margaret of France, the worthy La Perrière,

thunders against marriages for money or beauty, which only end in putting

“a fox into a hermitage.”

[110] _Heptameron_, Tale 37.

[111] [See Book III. chapter iii.]

[112] Vittoria Colonna’s bed, preserved in the Pescara palace at Naples,

is extraordinarily wide.

[113] A lady of Florence, Alessandra Bardi, on learning of the sudden

death of one of her sons, wrote to another the following beautiful

letter, so touching in its resignation: “My sweet son, I have learnt how,

on the 23rd of last month, it pleased Him who gave me Matteo to recall

him to Himself, in complete consciousness, in full possession of grace,

with all the sacraments necessary to a good and faithful Christian.

I have felt the bitterest grief at being deprived of such a son, and

methinks his death has done me great affliction apart from filial love,

and likewise to you two, my sons, now reduced to so small a band. I

praise and bless the Lord for all that is His will” (Müntz, _History of

the Renaissance_, i. 18).

[114] The story is given in Nifo’s _De Amore_, cap. cii.

[115] [Sister of Henry VIII. She was Louis’ third wife: he was in his

decrepitude, and died three months after the marriage. She at once

married the handsome Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, who had escorted

her to France.]

[116] The diplomatic agent of Mantua thus reports his visit of condolence

to the Duchess of Urbino: “I found her in her room among her ladies,

all in black, the shutters closed, the apartment lighted by a single

torch placed on the floor. She was seated on a cushion, a black veil on

her head, and wore a high-necked dress, or at any rate her bosom was

covered with a veil as high as her chin.... She held out her hand and

burst into tears; a moment passed before her sobs and mine permitted us

to speak. I handed her your lordship’s letter, and dispatched my visit,

my condolences, and my attempts at solace in a few words, so as not

to prolong her grief. I imparted to her also the recommendations and

offers with which I was charged by my most illustrious lord. Both were

well received.” Then they talked of Mantua and the Gonzaga family: the

Duchess kept the ambassador for more than two hours. Next day, there was

another visit of three hours; this time, her spirit got the upper hand,

an interesting discussion ensued, and the ambassador succeeded in making

her laugh.

[117] Montaigne, bk. ii. cap. xxxv. He himself desires no tears, no

funeral oration: “I renounce henceforth the favourable testimonies men

may will to give me, not because I am worthy of them, but because I am

dead.”

[118] June 8, 1508. Sisters Domicella and Elena, from Forli, to Catherine

Sforza.

[119] [Daughter of Maximilian of Austria, and regent of the Netherlands.

She was affianced as a child to the Dauphin of France (Charles VIII.),

then married to the Infant of Spain, who died in a few months: finally

at the age of twenty-one married Philibert of Savoy, who died after four

happy years of wedlock. She was a great patroness of agriculture and the

arts, and a poetess.]

[120] She herself, however, employed on occasion the most convincing

arguments. She had confiscated the jewels of her cousin, the Countess of

Montpensier, who was regarded as rather too hot-headed for a widow, and

she refused to restore them to her.

[121] The _Fifteen Joys of Marriage_ include among domestic calamities to

return from war after a long captivity and to find one’s wife wearing the

finery of a new lord and master.

[122] “There’s no man will have you!” is an insult flung by a peasant at

a woman during a squabble.

[123] “Be obedient to your mother, show her honour and reverence, and

take care to please her in everything you can, as is her due, as much

because it is God’s commandment as that I know she merits it, and that

you ought so to do if you wish to succeed, for having known her, I know

that she will advise you so well that you will be therewith content”

(Instructions of a Duke of Nemours to his sons).

[124] Ruskin.

[125] Ruskin’s favourite theory.

[126] [Minister of finance to Francis I., a faithful and honourable

servant of the crown. Lautrec, governor of Milan, having asked for

400,000 crowns as arrears of pay for his troops, the queen-mother, Louise

of Savoy, who had a grudge against him, seized all the money in the

treasury on the pretext that it was owing to her, and even intercepted

what little coin Semblançay was able to get together. The result was that

Lautrec’s army melted away and Milan was lost. Louise made Semblançay

the scapegoat, and when Francis, after his defeat at Pavia, was carried

a prisoner to Spain, she threw Semblançay (he was 72 years old) into the

Bastille, had him tried on trumped-up charges, and brought about his

execution.]

[127] [Bohier was a jurisconsult, Briçonnet, bishop of Lodève and Meaux,

and an insincere persecutor of the Reformers; Robertet was treasurer of

France under Louis XII. and Francis I.; and Duprat a venal minister of

Francis I. and a partisan of Louise of Savoy.]

[128] Coquillart.

[129] “Have you never reflected, then,” says an old author, “what this

smoke is worth?” (Baltazar Gracian).

[130] [Italian poet and historian (1426-1503), the most ‘elegant’ writer

of the sixteenth century. He wrote _Amorum libri ii._, on conjugal love.]

[131] _Heptameron_, Tale 51.

[132] Gallants, ambitious men, fashionable men late abed and late up,

those who live on credit, litigious fellows, spendthrifts, poor devils

who marry for love without a penny, loafers, philosophers who live from

hand to mouth, soldiers who run through a quarter’s pay in a month,

husbands ruined by their wives’ dressmakers’ bills or their servants’

guzzling, men who keep no accounts, who, without being princes or lords,

put eighteen yards of velvet into one costume, who spend much and get

little, who let their horses starve, their tapestries and furniture

moulder, who leave their orchards to be robbed, who would not spend a

penny but fling away a shilling, who endow their daughters too largely,

who toil without rhyme or reason, who accept financial responsibilities

... weak-kneed men who back out of their lawsuits, who are led by the

nose by those about them, who are always singing a _gaudeamus_ and never

a _requiem_, braggarts, giddypates, boasters, “Roger Goodfellows,”

gormandisers, debauchees.

[133] [George of Amboise, the wealthy Archbishop of Rouen: a great

builder and art-patron, who brought many painters and sculptors and

architects into France from Italy. When he died Pope Julius II. “thanked

God he was now Pope alone”! The cardinal’s tomb in Rouen Cathedral is one

of the finest pieces of Renaissance work in France.]

[134] Which included, we may say in passing, music and gymnastics.

[135] But he did not mean to be absorbed by either the one or the other.

[136]

To love money

Save for its use, is rank idolatry.

[137]

They have what pleasures they desire,

Honours whereto they dare aspire,

And wealth much more than they require.

[138] Almanque Papillon’s _La Victoire et Triomphe d’argent_ (Lyons,

1537). A copy belonging to Baron Pichon includes two miniatures: (1)

the Triumph of Money, (2) the Triumph of Honour and Love, represented

by Francis I. in a car drawn by two unicorns, and led by Diligence,

Sapience, Sobriety and Virtue.

[139] _Imitation of Christ_, book iii., chap. v.

[140] [Italian scholastic philosopher (1453-1538). His lectures attracted

lords and ladies who came to laugh at his ugly grimaces and ungainly

antics, and at his amusing anecdotes and witticisms. His works include

treatises on Beauty, on Love, _De Principe_, etc.]

[141] [The leading Italian humanist (1433-1499); the first professor

in Cosimo de’ Medici’s Florentine Academy. He translated Plato under

Cosimo’s auspices].

[142] [A prodigy of learning who wasted his energies in attempting to

reconcile theology and philosophy, and died young. He knew twenty-two

languages].

[143] [An illegitimate scion of the house of the Sanseverini (1425-1477).

He founded an academy for the study of antiquity, and pushed his

enthusiasm so far as to worship at an altar erected to Romulus, and to

roam the streets garbed as Diogenes].

[144] So that nothing should be wanting, a Diogenes started running about

the streets with his lantern and his tattered cloak (Paul Jove).

[145] Erasmus archly observes: “When Plato appeared uncertain whether to

set woman among rational animals or among the brutes, he did not mean

that woman is merely an animal; he merely intended to point out the

stupidity of this charming animal.”

[146] To this day this theory of two loves is commonly attributed to

Plato, even in philosophical treatises.

[147] His ardent oration has been reported in the _Courtier_ of

Castiglione, which became the breviary of the new society; we know that

Castiglione faithfully reproduced his words, and, for greater accuracy,

first submitted the manuscript to Bembo. [It may be as well to state that

the passage quoted here is not a continuous quotation, but an admirable

condensation of several pages of Castiglione. See pp. 343-363 of Hoby’s

translation in Mr. Henley’s “Tudor Translations.”]

[148] Sonnet viii.

[149] Sonnet lii.

[150] Distinguished as she necessarily was, the lady who inspired such

accents had herself nothing so tragic or so sublime. She wrote:

Amor, tu sai, che mai non torsi il piede

Dal carcer tuo soave, nè disciolsi

Dal dolce giogo il collo, nè ti tolsi

Quanto dal primo dì l’alma ti diede.

Tempo non cangiò mai l’antica fede;

Il nodo è stretto anchor, com’io l’avvolsi;

Nè per il frutto amar, ch’ognihor ne colsi,

L’alta cagion men cara al cor mi riede.

Visto hai quanto in un petto fido, ardente

Può oprar quel caro tuo più acuto dardo,

Contro del cui poter Morte non valse,

Fa homai da te, che’l nodo si rallente,

Che a me di libertà già mai nol calse,

Anzi di ricovrarla hor mi par tardo.

[Thou knowest, Love, I never sought to flee

From thy sweet prison, nor impatient threw

Thy dear yoke from my neck; never withdrew

What, that first day, my soul bestowed on thee.

Time hath not changed love’s ancient surety;

The knot is still as firm; and though there grew

Moment by moment fruit bitter as rue,

Yet the fair tree remains as dear to me.

And thou hast seen how that keen shaft of thine,

’Gainst which the might of Death himself is vain,

Smote on one ardent, faithful breast full sore.

Now loose the cords that fast my soul entwine,

For though of freedom ne’er I reck’d before,

Yet now I yearn my freedom to regain.]

[151] “Ye women who glory in your ornaments, your hair, your hands, I

tell you you are all ugly. Would you see the true beauty? Look at the

pious man or woman in whom spirit dominates matter: watch him, say, when

he prays, when a ray of the divine beauty glows upon him, when his prayer

is ended; you will see the beauty of God shining in his face, you will

behold it as it were the face of an angel.” (_28th Sermon on Ezekiel_).

[152] “Monsieur, si vous estiez aseuré de la prudence et discrétion que

vous dictes estre en moy, vous ne prendriez peine de m’escripre courte ne

longue lettre, car ou deux telles vertuz consistent, une n’a lieu: qui

servira de briefve response à tout ce que m’escripvez. De mon vouloir,

il est tel, sans jamais changer propos, que je seray telle que je doibz

estre, et que ne m’estimez estre si bonne par vostre lettre; ouy bien

autant qu’il me sera possible, et quelque jeune d’aage que je soye, si

cognois je bien que en suyvant ces deux devant dictes vertuz, l’on ne

se peult desvoyer. Quant à l’audience que me demandez, je ne puis, et

ne veulx; et, sans plus m’escripre, à Dieu prenez en gré et ne vous

desplaise.” (_La Fleur de toutes joyeusetez_).

[Here is the letter of a woman of the old style: “Sir, if you were

assured of the prudence and discretion you say are in me, you would not

waste your time writing letters, whether long or short, for where two

such virtues are conjoined, a letter is but vain: which will serve as a

brief response to all you write to me. My will is such that I am firmly

resolved to be good, as I ought to be, though from your letter you do not

think I am; ay, so far as lies in my power: and though I may be young in

years, yet know I well that in seeking after the two aforesaid virtues

one cannot go astray. As to the interview you ask of me, I cannot and I

will not; and, without writing further, I pray God you may take it in

good part and not be huffed.”]

[153]

La Françoise est entière et sans rompeure:

Plaisir la meine: au proffit ne regarde.

Conclusion: qui en parle ou brocarde,

Françoises sont chef-d’œuvre de nature ...

Pour le desduict (_le plaisir_).

—Marot, _Rondeau 13_.

[Our ladies flawless are and all complete:

’Tis pleasure leads them; they look not for gain:

Conclusion: men will talk and scoff in vain,

For pleasure they are Nature’s master-feat.]

[154] Cornelius Agrippa furnishes a curious piece of evidence on this

point. Disgraced by Louise of Savoy, he asked himself what had caused the

princess’s hatred. While pondering the matter he mechanically opened his

Bible and lit upon the passage where Ahab says in regard to the prophet

Micaiah, “I hate him, because he doth not prophesy good concerning me.”

“That’s my very own case,” cries Agrippa, and remembers that one day

he had foretold a victory for M. de Bourbon. What victory?—he did not

say, and for good reasons: but that was enough. So he takes his pen, and

writes a long address to prove that he is not, has not been, and will not

be of the Bourbon party, in spite of the overtures made to him. He got

nothing by his prose; some time afterwards Bourbon was killed at Rome,

and, adds Agrippa, “Jezebel possesses his vineyard. The angel of the Lord

has warned me and saved me from the evil woman. Nothing remains but to

fling Jezebel headlong and give her carcase to the dogs.”

[155]

Awaiting thus the seasonable hour

For justice or for God to interpose with power.

[156] _L’aisnée Fille de fortune._ [“If she had a little of that, she

would be the most accomplished lady God ever gave life to.”]

[157] La Vauguyon describes with emotion the sorrow of her servants and

vassals: “What will become of us now?... Death has seized our mother.”

[158]

Bonnet entendoit la magie

Aussi bien que l’astrologie:

Bonnet le futur prédisoit,

Et de tout présages faisoit....

Bonnet sçeut la langue hébraïque

Aussi bien que la caldaïque;

Mais en latin le bon abbé

N’y entendoit ny A ny B.

Bonnet avoit mis en usage

Un barragouin de langage

Entremeslé d’italien,

De françois et ... savoysien.

Bonnet fut de l’Académie,

De ceux qui souflent l’alchumie.

—Du Bellay, _Epitaphe de l’abbé Bonnet_.

[Bonnet knew astrology

As well as demonology.

Bonnet the future could foretell

And cast your horoscope as well.

Bonnet knew the Hebrew tongue,

And in Chaldee spake and sung,

But, good soul, in Latin he

Could not say his A B C.

Bonnet used with good intention

A jargon of his own invention—

Words from France he would employ,

From Italy and from—Savoy.

And in academic state

Of alchemy Bonnet would prate.]

[159] Montaigne, bk. iii. cap. x.

[160] A naïve French poet, with the words ‘grace’ and ‘hope’ ever on

his lips, somewhat scornfully depicts the French court guarded military

fashion by two Italians, Pasquil and Aretino, whom he styles Bohemians of

sinister aspect. ‘Diligence’ and ‘Bon Vouloir,’ old deities of the past,

had much difficulty in approaching. “Noble Cœur,” says a poet, “found his

‘temporal joy’ in chatting with and serving ladies; Nature encourages

Noblesse-Féminine to rule men, who include good and bad. In a delightful

garden the tree of Humanity flourishes; this splits into two equal

branches, that is, between the two sexes ‘one in being, one in substance,

one in dignity,’ and differentiated only by accident. Vilain-Cœur and

Malebouche have long been devising mischief against Noblesse-Féminine;

at the instigation of Nature, Noble-Cœur at length arms himself in her

defence.”

[161] [In reference to the group of seven literary men who banded

themselves together to reform and classicise the French language and

literature. Ronsard, Du Bellay, and Baïf were three members of the

Pléiade who reappear in the following pages. But as the manifesto of

this coterie was issued in 1549, the year of Margaret’s death, the name

Pléiade is anticipated for the literary court she maintained, the most

notable members of which were Marot and Bonaventure des Périers.]

[162] Margaret to the King, 1534.

[Ah, with what error Dante’s head is crowned,

Who comes to paint his Passion, antique tale,

And with his gloomy Hell our souls astound.]

[163] _Heptameron_, Tale 40.

[164] [French admiral (1488-1525), who after the defeat at Pavia

deliberately threw his life away. He rivalled Francis I. in gallantry,

paid sedulous court to Margaret, and is said to have been the luckless

(and well-scratched) hero of the nocturnal escapade described in the 4th

Tale of the _Heptameron_.]

[165]

[Loves like little budding flowers,

Loves to sweeten idle hours,

Likewise old amours.]

[166]

Amoureux suis d’une paintresse,

Qui est belle en perfection.

Son geste plein d’affection

La fait juger demie princesse.

—_Gilles d’Aurigny._

[I adore a painter dear,

Perfect grace and beauty she,

And her loving ways to me

Make her half princess appear.]

[167] _Heptameron_, Tale 18.

[168] _Ibid._, Tale 58.

[169] _Heptameron_, Tale 14.

[170] [Poet and translator (1493-1545), friend of Aretino. He wrote

‘amorous discourses’ in imitation of Boccaccio; comedies in imitation of

Plautus; a translation of the _Golden Ass_ of Apuleius; and a prose work

on the beauty of women.]

[171]

Son âge estoit d’envyron les quinze ans,

Qui est le temps que désirent amans.

La taille en fut longue, menue et droicte,

Espaulle platte, et par les flancs estroicte.

(Anne de Graville.)

Toutes les nuyctz, je ne pense qu’en celle

Qui a le corps plus gent qu’une pucelle.

(Marot.)

[Her age was fifteen, as I guessed,

The age that pleases lovers best;

Her figure long, slim, straight as arrow,

Her shoulders broad, her haunches narrow.]

[I lie awake o’ nights, and my thoughts are sure to go

To the maid whose body’s comelier than any maid’s I know.]

[172]

Is she plump, or is she lean?

My pleasure is the same, I ween.

[173] [Both these ladies were mistresses of Francis I.]

[174] [A poet (1463-1537) who having lost his all in the sack of Rome was

succoured by Bembo. He wrote sonnets and pastorals.]

[175] [The French Baedeker.]

[176] Castiglione, _Courtier_ [(Tudor Translations, pp. 212, 213.)]

[177] Castiglione, _ibid._, p. 166.

[178]

“Thy shape! Ah, lady! ’tis to me well known

Through him whose soul is thine, no more his own.”

[179] [Jean Clouet (1485-1545), painter to Francis I.: Janet was his pet

name at court. The reference is to Ronsard’s lines—

Peins-moy, Janet, peins-moy, je t’en supplie,

Sur ce tableau les beautés de ma mie.]

[180] [A master in portraiture in enamel (1505-1575.) As many as 1840 of

his works are known, all signed. Specimens may be seen in the Louvre.]

[181] [Sculptor to Francis I., born 1515, killed in the St. Bartholomew

massacre, Aug. 24, 1572. His statue of Diana adorned the front of Diana

of Poitiers’ palatial château of Anet. Diana is represented nude,

reclining upon a stag, with a bow in her hand, and surrounded by dogs.]

[182] [The _blason_ was a short poem celebrating a single feature, or

some small possession of a lady—an eyebrow, a rose, or a jewel, for

instance.]

[183] This portrait, painted by an Italian, no longer exists, but an

excellent miniature copy, executed in Henri IV.’s time, is to be found in

the rare manuscript known as the _Book of Hours of Catherine de’ Medici_.

The other miniatures in this manuscript are made after French portraits,

and do not admit of so extravagant an interpretation. Louise of Savoy is

represented as a widow, in the classical severe and ungainly costume.

[184] Night-dresses, by the way, were not yet in use.

[185] Tale 45.

[186] _Heptameron_, Tale 4.

[187]

Washed of her paint, of her vices bereft,

Body and soul there is nought of her left.

[188] [A painter of the Florentine school (died 1440) about whom nothing

is known but a treatise on painting discovered in 1820, and some frescoes

at Volaterra.]

[189] [Author of _Gli ornamenti delle donne_ (the ornaments of ladies),

published at Venice in 1574.]

[190] [A poetess of Lyons, author of some remarkable sonnets.]

[191]

For pleasure oft my black I wear,

More often than for woe or care.

[192] [Ludovico Sforza, Duke of Milan, one of the most vigorous opponents

of the French king’s Italian expeditions. The surname “Il Moro” came from

his cognisance, a mulberry-tree.]

[193] Alione, in one of his farces, has related the amusing story of a

Lombard lady (and she was not the only one) who gave herself to a French

soldier passing through, on the mere promise of a dress of Venetian

velvet, and to whom the rogue afterwards sent six crowns, with the excuse

that an everyday dress was good enough for a casual lady.

[194]

This ring is old and out of date,

This ruby’s badly cut:

This girdle’s precious ugly—wait,

This casket’s silver, but

I wish for one of beaten gold—

[195] [Librarian to Cardinal Farnese (1529-1600), a great authority on

antiquities, especially coins; he spent the greater part of his modest

income on pictures and bronzes.]

[196] [Historian and member of the academy of Pomponius Laetus

(1421-1481). He was Vatican librarian under Sixtus IV., wrote a history

of the popes, and a curious work on hygiene entitled _Opusculum de

obsoniis ac honesta voluptate_—the work here referred to.]

[197] [Sebastian Brandt (1438-1521), jurisconsult and poet of Strasburg,

author of the famous _Ship of Fools_, referred to in subsequent pages.]

[198] On ordinary days, the household of Marie of Cleves easily disposed

of half a calf, a quarter of an ox, five or six sheep, and dozens of

fowls.

[199] “Gout,” cries Cardan, “is queen, gout is noble! She is a synthesis

of ills! She is discreet and courteous; she attacks only the showable

parts of the body. There is nothing hideous about her as about leprosy.

She purifies man and raises his moral worth, as all pain does, but more

than any other pain. Why is she the enemy of grand dinners, and of

midnight toil, and of all the charming occupations of mind and body?”

(_De malo medendi usu._) A German song was dedicated to her:

O Gout my goddess, Gout my queen,

What mortal wight but fears thee?

Earth, sea and sky have ever been

Thy subjects: Jove reveres thee.

O mighty goddess, hear the prayer

Of those that now implore thee:

Give peace to every gouty toe,

And grant to all who limping go

Freedom from pain, release from care,

And perfect health before thee.

(_Podagrae Laus._)

[200] Gout was very common. Louise of Savoy suffered from it.

[201] [A sort of farcical comedy.]

[202] [Jean Gast, Swiss Protestant theologian (died 1553): author of

_Convivalium sermonum liber, meris jocis ac salibus refertus_.]

[203] Entering a lady’s house, a man would kiss her hands; and to recall

to mind a first presentation the graceful formula frequently employed

was: “The first time I kissed her hands.”

[204] To civilise his dominions, Peter the Great required his subjects

of both sexes to learn dancing, and he directed the performance, like a

general directing manœuvres. He insisted on the gentlemen kissing the

ladies on the lips.

[205]

“Ou soit d’un baiser sec, ou d’un baiser humide,

D’un baiser court ou long, ou d’un baiser qui guide

L’âme dessuz la bouche et laisse trespasser

Le baiseur ...

Ou d’un baiser donné comme les colombelles.”

[Dry kiss or wet kiss,

Long kiss or short kiss—

Kiss that lures the kisser’s soul,

Leading him to sin and dole—

Kiss that seals the purest loves,

Innocent as kiss of doves.]

[206] [One of the earliest of French theologians who accepted the

Reformed faith, born in 1530. He wrote a tractate on dancing.]

[207] _Heptameron_, Tale 21.

[208] Bonaventure des Périers, Tale 114.

[209]

Templa pudicitiam maculant, ni rite peractis

Rebus abis: templi noxia saepe mora est.

(_De Liberis._)

[The temples stain thy modesty unless when service is over thou

departest: to delay in the temple is often hurtful.]

[210] _Heptameron_, Tale 42.

[211] Margaret of France.

All hail! ye gardens, mansions, Edens of delight,

Whose comeliness and beauty put your vices out of sight!

[212] See the frescoes in the Borromeo palace at Milan.

[213] [In allusion to the wreaths used at the ceremony of laureation.]

[214] [Anne de Montmorency, the coarse, violent Constable of France,

who mumbled his prayers and his orders to his men together, because, as

Brantôme says, “he was so conscientious that he always tried to combine

the two duties.”]

[215] “Most illustrious and excellent lady, most respected madam,” wrote

the countess of Forli to the duchess of Ferrara: “the credible accounts

and perfect information brought in by innumerable persons about the

extreme kindliness and rare munificence of your excellency, inspire me

with the boldness to address you in confidence. I know that the most

illustrious lord your spouse and your most illustrious ladyship adore

hunting and birds, and that you always have in abundance dogs of all

kinds, excellent, perfect. I beseech your excellency very earnestly that

you would deign to make me a very beautiful and very precious present,

namely, a pair of greyhounds, well trained and fleet-footed, for the deer

of the Campagna, which are very swift: a couple of good deer-hounds and

a couple of handsome pointers, so good that I may hope to say regarding

their exploits when they catch their quarry, ‘these are the dogs the most

illustrious duchess of Ferrara gave me.’ I know that your excellency will

not send me anything but what is really good.” She cordially recommends

to the duchess the falconer she is sending, to fetch the hounds, and

probably to choose them. (Letter of Catherine Sforza to the duchess of

Ferrara, 1481).

[216]

King Louis Twelfth had perfect pastimes three:

Triboulet first, then Chailly, lastly me.

The author has collected the various pieces, still unpublished, in which

these hounds and hawks of Louis are celebrated.

[217] [Professor of mathematics and philosophy at the Cardinal Lemoine

college at Paris (1455-1537): a broad-minded man, the quarry of a heresy

hunt: chosen by Francis I. as tutor to his son Charles.]

[218] [Architect and antiquary of Verona (1445-1525). He spent eight

years in France at the invitation of Louis XII., designing bridges and

buildings: he was afterwards one of the architects of St. Peter’s at

Rome.]

[219]

Kathin alloit bien montée a la chasse,

Portant espieu. Cupido la pourchasse

Avecques son arc, et luy dit: “Combatons,

Puisqu’ainsi est que nous avons bastons.”

Elle respond: “Amour, que penses tu?

Longtemps y a que je t’ay combatu

Sans estre armée: a présent, je le suis;

Retourne-t-en, et plus ne me poursuis,

Car seure je suis que tu seroys batu.”

(Michel d’Amboise.)

[Kitty well mounted to the hunt was hying,

Holding a spear; Dan Cupid her espying,

Loosing his bow, gave chase and caught her. Said he:

“Come let us fight, since both are armed and ready.”

Then answered she: “Love, art thou then so daring?

Long have I fought thee, weapon never bearing;

Now am I armed, turn, never more pursue me,

For I would beat thee, ere thou couldst undo me.”]

[220] _Ship of Fools_, sixth engraving. Critics almost always represent

epicurism in a boat.

[221] [A Franciscan friar (1440-1508) and a vigorous and racy preacher.

His sermons were larded with buffooneries.]

[222]

C’est a l’image saincte Jame

Ou se vont baigner ces femmes;

Et baignez, et estuvez, allez.

Bien servies vous y serez

De varletz, de chambrière,

De la dame bonne chère.

Allez tost, les baings sont prestz.

(_Les Cris de Paris._)

[To the image of St. James

Go for bathing these fair dames.

Haste ye, ladies, bathe and stew,

Maids and varlets wait for you,

Service good, delightful fare;

The baths are ready: speed ye there.]

[223] “A work, for our epoch, in which the use of mineral waters is so

common, very useful to physicians, but still more to all other persons,

and very entertaining.”

[224] For example, _Le Bain de St Barthélemy_: “A man of Feltre named

Petrarch, after an accident to his knee, having been attended by a

series of, I will not say bone-setters but, bone-breakers, experienced

the keenest anguish; a flux resulted: astringents and cold remedies were

applied; and an induration ensued, which compelled him always to walk

with a stick or a crutch. At the end of two years, he came to see me; I

prescribed the baths. They did him so much good that after a fortnight he

left for home without his crutch.” (_De Balneis_, 1563).

[225] Gregorovius gives in his _Lucretia Borgia_ an account of an

extremely free fête got up at Sienna for fair bathers, from which

husbands and brothers were excluded.

[226] Poggio.

[227] [The _balle à grelot_ was a hollow ball of metal containing

something that caused a jingle when the ball was moved or thrown—like our

horse-bells.]

[228]

So many books there are, my memory fails

To number or to name them; but to see

Their fair array’s a pleasant sight to me.

...

And as for fearing what they have inside,

’Tis a mere folly I may not abide.

...

I piled a pillar of them, and methought

It heaven and earth together brought.

[229] Lucretia Borgia took to Ferrara for her personal use only

beautifully decorated Books of Hours, a few devotional books, a manual of

history, a collection of songs, a Dante, and a small Petrarch.

[230] Especially Castiglione, who borrowed entire passages from Cicero.

A translation of the _De Officiis_ was published at Lyons on Feb. 11,

1493-94.

[231]

All this is excellent good lore,

And none of it locked in the cupboard.

[232] [Rheinauer (Latinised as Rhenanus), a famous German philologist, a

friend and correspondent of Erasmus.]

[233] The duchess of Orleans was so fond of them that her husband could

find no finer present to give her than the romance of _Troilus and

Cressida_, and one day she sent a messenger in hot haste after a lady of

the court who had borrowed a _Cleriadus_ and forgotten to return it—as

often happens.

[234] The reading of _Lancelot of the Lake_ inspired Dante, as is well

known, with the exquisite passage on Francesca da Rimini.

[235] [“In which there are divers relations of the deceptions of servants

towards their masters, and of pimps towards lovers, translated from

Italian into French.” Paris: 1527.]

[236] He had got it in the library of the Palace.

[237] A woodcut, thrice repeated in the _Illustrations des Gaules_ (1528)

represents France on a throne, with Ill-hap at her feet; on her right

is Noblesse, represented as a maiden playing a violin; on her left, the

People, depicted as a young man playing a guitar.

[238] National Gallery.

[239] So well interpreted by Giovanni Bellini in his _Girl Singing_ in

Hampton Court Palace.

[240] Charles VIII. was even obliged to threaten serious consequences in

order to secure the restitution of a singer and a lute-player who had

been enticed away when he passed through Florence.

[241] Ockeghem, it has been said, “breathes into his music the soul of

song, envelops it in a vigorous harmonic body, and clothes it with a fine

tissue of ingenious thematic developments, imitations more or less close

and more or less extended. One finds in his pieces, often in their inner

parts, phrases of great melodic beauty, and full of an extraordinary

sweetness and depth of expression. His harmonies are often enough

peculiar and archaic, but they are striking and rich. He also brings his

pieces to a close in a manner sometimes surprising and odd, but certainly

very interesting.” (R. Eitner.)

[242] _Harmony_, by Paul Veronese (fresco at Masera): _Parnassus_, the

_Crowning of the Virgin_, by Raphael (Vatican).

[243] Neapolitan proverb.

[244] Erasmus.

[245] In the Louvre.

[246] The Madrid museum possesses a magnificent portrait of him by

Raphael.

[247] He was born, like Leo, in 1470.

[248] An opera-ballet was got up in the open-air by Bergonza di Botta,

in his park at Tortona, on the occasion of the marriage of Isabella of

Aragon.

[249] At Metz, in 1502, the public violently interrupted and rendered

impossible the representation of one of the comedies of Terence which

were constantly played at Rome; the performance had to be postponed till

next day, when it was continued before a select audience, composed in

great part of clergy.

[250] _E.g._ The Mystery of the Passion; of the Three Gifts, played in

1509; of St. Andrew, played in 1512; of St. Barbara, and St. Eustache,

played in 1504.

[251] [_Pochades_]

[252] Lorenzo de’ Medici, Pico della Mirandola, Agnolo Dovizio da

Bibbiena, Bernardo Ruccellai [see George Eliot’s _Romola_], Machiavelli,

and others: it was a singular, incoherent, burlesque procession of

characters of all sorts and sizes—devils, deaths, nymphs, courtiers, old

husbands, young wives, merry nuns, hunters and huntresses, pages, winds,

furies.

[253] “With the tongue seven men are not a match for one woman” (Erasmus,

_Colloquies_).

[254] “He who keeps his mouth shut knows no care” (P. Meyer).

[255] _Heptameron_, Tale 10.

[256]

Beneath the broidered sheets we lay—

Sheets flashing with gems and gold—

And whiled the dreary hours away

With comfortable tales of old,

And converse debonair and gay.

[257] [One of the Urbino coterie.]

[258] [A lawyer of Poitiers who is said to have composed a hundred

thousand verses, mostly dull. He called himself _Le Traverseur des

voies périlleuses_ (the traverser of perilous ways), and wrote moral

and familiar letters and _Les Regnars_ (foxes) _traversant les voies

périlleuses_.]

[259] [The brilliant Bishop of Orleans (1802-1878), noted equally for his

eloquence, his pugnacity, and the huge blue umbrella he carried on sunny

days. It was said of him that he was “a journalist who had strayed into a

bishopric.” He wrote _Letters on the Education of Girls_, and especially

opposed the opening of university courses to girls: he did not wish them

to go “from the bosom of the Church to the arms of the University.”]

[260] He adds: “We gambled, played music, took walks, supped, and worked

(not often that): no cares, no anxieties! We were often with the Venetian

nobles: my life flourished like a growing plant. Nothing could be more

pleasant than that life, which lasted five years and a half (September,

1526-February, 1532): we used to chat with the prefect, whose palace was

our kingdom and rostrum.”

[261] Raphael’s portrait of Castiglione in the Louvre.

[262] Like the good curé who, seeing a lady shedding hot tears at the

conclusion of a superb _exaltet_, charitably approached her to console

her for what he believed to be the effect of the music, and stopped

aghast when the good dame replied, “Ah! I fancied I heard my poor dead

donkey!”

[263]

O liberté aujourd’hui clairsemée

Et cher vendue, on te doit bien servir,

Car en tous lieux souvent est réclamée.

(Alione.)

[O liberty, to-day so rare

And dear sold, we must serve thee well,

For thou art asked for everywhere.]

[264] Here is an example: “Why, Dagoucin,” says Simontaut, “don’t you

yet know that women have neither love nor regret?”—“I don’t yet know

it,” he replies, “for I have never dared try for their love, for fear of

finding less than I hope for.”—“You live on faith and hope, then,” says

Nomerfide, “as the plover lives on wind? You are very easy to feed.”

(_Heptameron_, Tale 32.)

[265] “When women confess, they always tell what they have not done.”

(Old Italian proverb.)

[266]

Rusticus est vere, qui turpia de muliere

Dicit, nam vere sumus omnes de muliere.

(_Facetus._)

[He is truly a boor who speaks ill of women, for verily we are all of

woman born.]

[267] _Heptameron_, Tale 62.

[268] [Filippo Beroaldo (1453-1505), professor of ancient literature at

Bologna, so learned that Pico della Mirandola called him the ‘Living

Library.’ His most curious work is _Declamatio ebriosi, scortatoris et

aleatoris_, in which three brothers, a drunkard, a lecher, and a dicer,

dispute among themselves which of them, being the most vicious, their

father will disinherit.]

[269] [Italian poet (1445-1515) attached to the court of Ludovico il Moro

at Milan. When Ludovico was captured by the French, Fregoso went into

seclusion and became known as the Friend of Solitude.]

[270] An attempt was made to revive this system in certain notable salons

of the 18th century. The rules for the _Lanturelus_ drawn up in Madame

Geoffrin’s salon included the obligation of being just, loyal, cheerful

and kindly; they forbade one to grow old, that is, to become peevish and

misanthropical. The sittings held under the direction of a “queen” were

divided into two parts, one devoted to song, poetry and _facéties_, the

other to philosophy.

[271]

But that I fear to shock beyond forgiveness

The soilless purity of your chaste ears.

[272] He used to amuse himself with a drunken impromptu-monger, a Roman

named Querno, whom he jestingly called Archipoeta. Querno says to him:

Archipoeta facit versus pro mille poetis.

[Arch-poet makes enough verses for a thousand poets]

Leo replies:

Et pro mille aliis Archipoeta bibit.

[And drinks enough for another thousand]

Archipoeta responds:

Porrige quod faciat mihi carmina docta, Falernum,

[Give me some Falernian, to inspire my song]

and Leo:

Hoc etiam enervat debilitatque pedes.

[That also renders your feet weak and shaky]

[273] [A clerical poet (1466-1502) who translated Ovid’s Epistles into

French.]

[274]

“De son cheval on fait une rosse,

Et de sa femme une catin.”

[Of one’s horse one makes a jade,

And of one’s wife a harlot.]

[275] _Heptameron_, Tale 52.

[276] Seventy-five letters of this princess have been collected by M.

Amante.

[277] [Mistress of Francis I.]

[278] Anne of Laval, for example, writes to her sister: “J’ay entendu

que Monsieur mon frère ce vante que à son retour j’auré ung petit

neveu. Plust a Dieu qui fust ainsi, d’aussi bon cueur que je le desire.

L’espérance que j’en ay me faict vous envoyer des poix en gousse, qui est

viande de femme grosse.”

[I have heard that my brother is boasting that on his return I shall have

a little nephew. God grant it may be so, of as good heart as I desire it.

The hope I have induces me to send you some peas in the pod, which is a

food for pregnant women.]

[279] Here are some samples of these private letters:

“Monsigneur, tant et si tres humblement que je puis a vostre bonne grace

me recommende.

Monsigneur, je vous suplie tres humblement croire que la créance que

remais a ce porteur n’est que la plus grande obaissence que james tres

humble fille ne servente vous saroit porter et coume la plus obligée de

ce monde.

Monsigneur, prie Dieu qui vous dont tres bonne et tres longue vie.

Voutre tres humble et tres obaissente fille,

Magdalene.

_Address_: Au Roy mon souverain seigneur.”

[My lord, as truly and as humbly as I can I commend myself to your good

favour.

My lord, I beg you very humbly to believe that the letter of credit I

confide to this carrier is only the greatest obedience that ever humblest

maid and servant could bear to you, and like the most dutiful in the

world.

My lord, I pray God to give you a very good and very long life.

Your very humble and very obedient daughter,

Magdalene.]

“Ma cousine, je n’ay point voullu que ce porteur soit passé par Chantilli

sans vous porter de mes laitres; je vous en usses plutost envoié, mes les

piteulses nouvelles qu’avons repsues de Hedin m’an onst engardé, car je

n’aime poinct a mander de mauvesses nouvelles, et en cete perte j’ay esté

tres esse d’entendre que Monsieur le conte de Villars vostre frere est

seulement prisonnir (_sic_) avecq tant d’onneur que je suis sure que vos

prieres luy onst beaucoup servi. Vous feres tant pour moy, ma cousine,

de croire que tout ce qui vous touchera que je ceray mervelleucement

esse qu’il soint anci hureulx comme vous le desires et moy anci ce que

je suplie de bien bon cueur Dieu et de vous donner bonne vie et longue

et a moy l’eur de vostre bonne grasse a laquelle de bien bon cueur me

recommande.

Vostre melieure cousine et amie,

Marguerite de France.

A ma cousine Madame la connestable [duc]esse de Montmorency.”

[My cousin, I would not let this carrier pass through Chantilly without

taking some letters from me for you. I should have written sooner, but

the dreadful news we have received from Hedin has prevented me, for I

do not care to send bad news, and in this loss I was very glad to hear

that the count of Villars your brother is only a prisoner, with so much

honour that I am sure your prayers have much profited him. You will do

so much for me, my cousin, as to believe that, in all that touches you,

I shall be wonderfully glad if all falls out as lucky as you desire, and

myself too, and I pray God so with all my heart, both to give you a good

and long life, and me the bliss of your good favour, to which with all my

heart I commend myself.

Your best cousin and friend,

Margaret of France.]

“Mon pere, je ne voulu leser aler se pourteur sans vous faire savoir de

mes nouvelles, lequeles sont bonnes, pour se que je aeudire souvan des

vostres qai me pabise (?) bien, car s’et au proufit du roy et a vostre

ouneur. Je prie Dieu vous i vouloyr tenir; je ne veus oblier a vous faire

mes reconmandasions bien fort voustre bonne grase.

Vostre bonne fille,

Marguerite.

A Monsieur le grant maistre.”

[My father, I would not allow this carrier to go without letting you have

news of me, which are good, because I have often had news of you which

please me, for ’tis to the profit of the king and your honour. I pray

that God will keep you in the same; I do not forget to commend myself

very earnestly to your good favour.

Your good daughter,

Margaret.]

“Mon pere, j’ay esté tres esse d’entendre par vostre cegretere presant

porteur du bon partement du Roy et du vostre et aucy que toutes les

afaires continuent de mieulx en mieulx; cant a cele conpagnie, la Royne

et monsieur ce portent tres bien, aucy faict tout le reste. Nous ne

fesons faute de prier bien Dieu tout les jours pour le Roy; après luy,

mon pere, je vous puis assurer que vous estes le prumier (_sic_) en mes

auraisons. Je vous prire (_sic_), mon pere, presanter mes tres humbles

recommandasions au Roy et me tenir en sa bonne grasse et an la vostre. A

laquelle de bien bon ceur me recommande, et prie Dieu vous donner bonne

vie et longue.

Vostre milieure figle et cousine,

Marguerite de France.

A mon pere, Monsieur le connestable.”

[My father, I was very glad to hear by your secretary the present bearer

of the good departure of the king and yourself, and also that affairs are

going better and better: as to this company, the queen and _monsieur_

(the king’s brother) are very well, as are all the rest. We do not

neglect to pray God every day for the king: after him, my father, I can

assure you that you are the first in my prayers. I beg you, my father, to

present my very humble greetings to the king and to keep me in his good

favour and in yours. To which with much love I commend myself, praying

God to give you good and long life.

Your best daughter and cousin,

Margaret of France.]

[280] [She came near perishing by shipwreck on her way to join her young

husband, the Infant of Spain, and composed her epitaph:

Ci-git Margot, la gente demoiselle,

Qu’eut deux maris, et si mourut pucelle.]

[281] She died in 1530, barely fifty years old.

[282] Her portrait is in the Louvre.

[283]

Friends, know that I have changed my dame;

Another holds me at her will,

In soul Renée, Renée her name.

(Renée = re-born: the pun cannot be translated.)

[284] “I fatti sono maschi, le parole femine.”

[285] Clément Marot writes:

Adieu le bal, adieu la dance!;

Adieu mesure, adieu cadence,

Tanbourins, aulboys, violons,

Puisqu’à la guerre nous allons ...

Adieu les regards gracieux,

Messagers des cœurs soucieux;

Adieu les profondes pensées,

Satisfaictes ou offensées;

Adieu les armonieux sons

De rondeaulx, dixains et chansons ...

Adieu la lettre, adieu le page!

(To the court ladies.)

[Farewell to dance, farewell to ball,

And cadenced measures, farewell all!

Fiddles, hautboys, tambourines,

For we go to warlike scenes.

Sweet looks from ladies’ eyes, that tell

How much they love us, fare ye well!

Farewell to meditation deep,

That gives us joy or mars our sleep;

Farewell to all harmonious strains

Of ballads, rondeaux, and dizains;

Letters and pages, all farewell!]

[286] National Gallery.

[287] _Ibid._

[288] The brilliant captain whose Memoirs or Commentaries, it is said,

were afterwards called the Soldier’s Bible by Henri IV.

[289] “Catherine, if you make the dance go thus, Atlas will find the

world a lighter burden,” exclaims a poet.

[290] Francis I. regarded this as Michelangelo’s masterpiece.

[291] Emile Trolliet, _La Vie silencieuse_.

The veil of flesh is rent; the spirit’s light

Pierces and routs the clinging mist of sense;

And Earth, this Virgin and this God beholding,

Learns what Love is, and worships Womankind.

[292] [The sovereign family of Rimini and Romania, a race of warriors and

cut-throats. Robert, commandant of the troops of Sixtus IV., was poisoned

by Riario in 1483.]

[293]

En cas d’amour, c’est trop peu d’une dame,

Car si un homme aime une honneste femme,

Et s’il ne peut à son aise l’avoir,

Il fait très bien d’autre accointance avoir.

(Melin de Saint-Gelais.)

[In case of love, one dame doth not suffice,

For if a man loveth one fair of fame,

And cannot have her at an easy price,

’Tis well for him to have another flame.]

[294] _Heptameron_, Tale 42.

[295] Coquillart.

[296] _Heptameron_, Tale 8.

[297] _Heptameron_, Tale 38.

[298] Nifo, _De Amore_, cap. xvi.: _De viro aulico_, Bk. I., caps.

xxx.-xxxiv.

[299] _Heptameron_, Tale 4.

[300] _Heptameron_, Tales 18 and 25.

[301] _Heptameron_, Tale 24.

[302] _Ibid._, Tale 50.

[303] _Ibid._, Tale 5.

[304] Calvin regards his co-workers as “playactors,” worthy of

bespattering with mud. “The future appals me,” he cries: “I dare not

think of it: unless the Lord descends from heaven, barbarism will engulf

us.” (Preface to the Geneva Catechism.)

[305] Aretino wrote placidly: “I have legitimated my dear girls in my

heart; no other ceremony is needed.”

[306] Natural children easily obtained recognition by the concession of

the right to bear arms, or their legitimation. In Italy, legitimation

was only a fiscal formality; Innocent VIII. gave his nephew the right of

granting it.

[307] The Grecised name of Otto Schwartzmann, German jurisconsult

(1571-1670).

[308] The “Pomeranian doctor” (1485-1558). He married Luther, and buried

him, and was one of his coadjutors in the translation of the Bible.