Italian literature subject to new influences--The
academies--Federigo Comandino--Guidobaldo del Monte--The
Paciotti--Leonardi--Muzio Oddi--Bernardino Baldi--Girolamo
Muzio--Federigo Bonaventura.
"For a long lapse of years, Italy had been an organised body of
highly civilised states, different in their origin, laws, and
constitutions, divided by local jealousies and opposite interests,
constantly engaged in their endeavours to establish a political
equilibrium by the manoeuvres of a wary and even unprincipled
diplomacy, baffled oftentimes in their ambitious schemes, and brought
into sudden collision, but still deriving new energies from their
very rivalry, and promoting, with their own, the interests of social
progress."[131]
[Footnote 131: MARIOTTI'S _Italy_, II., p. 177.]
It was in a state of things thus happily described that letters and
art attained their zenith of glory in the Peninsula. But the close
of the fifteenth century had introduced elements of change, which
a fatal policy permitted to spread. Those foreign aggressions and
domestic convulsions which we have seen extirpating nationality and
crushing independence were not less destructive to mind and its
efforts. A struggle of thirty-five years against her ultramontane
invaders,--a series of unavailing because ill-directed and discordant
efforts,--closed with the coronation of Charles V., and left Italy
for nearly two centuries at the mercy of Spain. The states which
escaped the direct miseries of that iron domination, and retained
a nominal independence under the papal sway or their native
dynasties, sank unresisting before an influence affecting at once
their politics, their manners, and their literature. The pride of
the Spaniard had long been proverbial, and was little susceptible
of modification even in a new country. The conquered race quickly
conformed to fashions which they could neither shake off nor
exclude. They aped a pompous bearing that sat with singularly bad
grace upon a vanquished people, and the affectation which at first
loaded their language with fulsome epithets, soon corrupted their
writings by elaborate adulation. It is difficult for those whose
taste has been formed upon the models of a less copious language to
judge fairly of Italian ornamental literature, for its authors, in
availing themselves of the resources at their command, are prone to
lavish them too unsparingly. When tried by such a standard their
prose may seem tedious or tumid verbiage, their epics may teem with
overstrained hyperbole, and even their lighter poetry may appear
to substitute subtle conceits and elaborate epithets for graceful
ease and flexibility. But these idiomatic peculiarities are but
echoes of the national genius, and ought not perhaps in fairness to
be subjected to canons of criticism unknown to their authors. Yet
it cannot be denied that facilities such as the language of Italy
affords to flowery composition are virtually premiums on feebleness,
and that decorations of style afford a tempting disguise for
indolence of mind or poverty of matter. The influence of petty courts
was peculiarly and fatally favourable to such qualities. Trifling
incidents there assumed an importance that justified magniloquence
befitting loftier themes, whilst the narrow views common to limited
circles found ample scope in exaggerated phrases of metaphor and
hyperbole. Thus came abundance without fertility, exuberance yielding
only redundancy.
Associations and clubs for political or social objects being
then incompatible equally with the spirit of governments and the
habits of the people, men readily formed themselves into religious
confraternities or literary academies. But these academies acted as
drags upon the progress of that literature which they were instituted
to promote; they clogged its chariot wheels with devices originally
dictated by pedantry, and soon degenerating into puerile verbiage.
From the draughts of inflated poetry and corrupted rhetoric which
they manufactured, every stimulating ingredient was gradually
withdrawn, while opiates were freely introduced in their stead. They
thus lulled to sleep what little public spirit had survived the
subjugation of the Peninsula; and the governments of the new régime,
quickly aware of their emasculating tendencies, lavished upon them
patronage until they deluged the land, and stifled the energies of
the national mind in all-prevailing mediocrity. The classic spirit
of the fifteenth century had originated this mischief, by diverting
letters from the sphere of popular sympathy, and nourishing that
affectation to which an almost exclusive study of the dead languages
must ever lead. But the evil was aggravated by Spanish influence.
Ingrafting frigid forms and stately phrases upon the lively
intercourse of a naturally light-hearted people, it did for the
manners what pedantry had effected for the letters of Italy. Nature
and originality were replaced by imitation and servility. Parodies
suppressed inspiration, compliments chilled cordiality. In both
cases genius languished, epithets multiplied, and terse and vigorous
diction passed with independence to happier lands.
In all histories of Italian literature the academies occupy a
conspicuous place, and we have already noticed the Assorditi of
Urbino, for whom municipal vanity has asserted an origin in the
reign of Duke Federigo.[132] They appear to have occasionally met
as early at least as that of his successor, although not formally
constituted until about 1520. Their name, like that of most similar
associations, being probably adopted from some foolish whim, the next
step was to invent a badge suited to the humour of the times, so they
assumed "the ship of Ulysses surrounded by sirens"; and for motto,
playing at once on sound and sense _Canitur surdis_, "They sing to
the deaf." The word _assorditi_ properly means "the deafened," but
its signification might be stretched by punning to include absurdity,
niggardness, or filth, none of them very flattering qualities to
connect with the epithet. The rolls of this fantastic association
included many authors who were harboured at Urbino, but it is in no
way identified with their reputation. Having fallen into neglect, it
was revived in 1623, and, after nearly a century of provincialism,
was once more reconstituted in 1723.
[Footnote 132: See vol. II., p. 112.]
As these literary associations rose, their predecessors, the
scholastic academies, declined. That which Lorenzo the Magnificent
had founded at his villa of Carreggi, was closed in 1522, and
Platonism having consequently waned, the Stagirite philosophy was
once more master of the field. But another and more deadly struggle
awaited it. When men began to study nature and base their reasonings
upon her laws, the deficiencies of their old guide were detected, and
its authority was impugned. Yet the peripatetic system was too deeply
founded to be at once dismissed, and the ingenuity of its disciples
was long directed to accommodate its dogmas to modern discoveries,--a
vain effort which only divided their ranks and led them into
inextricable dilemmas, until Galileo appeared "to furnish forth
creation," and conduct them clear of the labyrinth by a silver thread
of truth. But though a new light had dawned, new snares beset the
way. From bold investigation and speculative inquiry, ecclesiastical
authority and civil despotism had much to lose, nothing to gain.
Their side was therefore soon chosen. War was declared against
thought, backed by the whole armoury of oppression. Where prevention
failed, persecution followed, and the censor's veto was enforced by
rack and faggot.
Thus was it that the Reformation had but an indirect influence on
the Italian mind. The scanty seeds wafted across the Alps fell upon
stony ground, and ere long withered away. But the great reaction of
the papacy was not only directed against the new truths; it waged
war upon every thing calculated to afford them a disguise under
which they might become dangerous. The policy of pontiffs and the
duty of the Inquisition tended to exclude all light, lest any rays
of Protestantism should reach the faithful. During three centuries
have these efforts been continued; and when we consider the talent by
which they have been directed, the stern ministers by whom they have
been carried out, we well may wonder that the Italian mind has not
been utterly debased by foreign tyranny and priestly domination. They
have sown the wind; it remains to reap the whirlwind.
The fashion for classic imitation was succeeded in Italy by an
age of rhetoricians, with Bembo at their head, and the academies
as their strongholds. But they either encouraged or inadequately
repressed a too fluent facility which has ever since been the
blemish of their mellifluous language. In Boccalini's satirical
_Ragguagli di Parnaso_, some prolix writer is condemned to a perusal
of Guicciardini's narrative of the Pisan war; but, after a brief
essay, he avows his preference for the galleys to pursuing, through
dreary details, the siege and capture of a pigeon-house. This biting
jest is applicable in a far greater degree to other writers of the
sixteenth century, whose cumbrous grandiloquence is often diluted
by trivialities, or tinselled with factitious pomp. Yet there were
some authors of purer taste, who resisted such extravagance, and it
is curious to find Caro, della Casa, and Bernardo Tasso concerting
measures for curtailing the use of superabundant compliments. The
two principal points of their attack were the recent substitution
of the feminine pronoun in the third person singular for the second
person plural in addressing any one, and the indiscriminate use
of Lordship, Excellency, Gentility, as courteous phrases, to the
entire exclusion of Master and Madam. Against the former of these
abuses Caro and Tasso declare open war; but, although they unite in
condemnation of the latter as still more fatal to vernacular purity,
and avow themselves ready to support any onset, each shrinks from
leading the charge. "This age of ours is altogether given up to
adulation. Every one, in inditing a letter, bandies 'lordship'; all
expect it when addressed. And not, forsooth, our grandees alone,
but even the middle classes and the very plebeians aspire to such
distinctions, taking affront if they receive them not, and noting
as blunderers all who do not offer them the like. Most silly and
revolting does it seem to me that we should have to speak to one
person as if he were another, always talking to a sort of ideal
abstraction, quite different from the individual himself. Yet this
abuse is now established and general." Thus far Caro, to whom Tasso
replies, "Oh the wonderful charm of Italy, which every one seeks
to destroy! It sufficed not that the Goths, the Vandals, and other
strange and barbarous nations have sought, and still seek, to possess
thee, and that multitudes flock hither from earth's farthest corners;
even Lordships, never previously seen or known here, quitting their
native Spain, are come in swarms to sojourn among us, and have so
mastered our vanity and ambition that we cannot shake them from our
shoulders." In a subsequent letter to Claudio Tolomei, Bernardo
congratulates him on having applied the lash to such empty titles,
and promises to follow his example by retrenching them all when he
revises his own letters for the press.[133] But these attempts met
with little success; redundant superlatives still lead Italian
literature, and an Italian letter is little more than a tissue of
exaggerated epithets, from its address to its signature.[134]
[Footnote 133: _Lettere di Bernardo Tasso_, edit. 1733; vol. I., pp.
14-22 and 427-30.]
[Footnote 134: In proof of this I give in IX. of the Appendix a
letter of introduction, of which I was bearer, from one of the most
accomplished _professori_ of Rome.]
* * * * *
Few branches of human knowledge more flourished during the palmy
days of Italian literature than the exact sciences, especially
in connection with military affairs, and the elegant arts. Their
application to both objects was received with marked favour by the
successive Dukes of Urbino, who, for a century and a half, combined
the pursuit of arms with the patronage of art. We have seen this
done by Federigo and Guidobaldo I., for the defence of their duchy
and the decoration of their capital; we now have to mention the
progress of similar studies under the della Rovere princes. During
the latter epoch, pure mathematics were brought into fashion by
numerous translations of standard Greek works into Latin or Italian,
a labour shared by various literati of Urbino, but especially by
Comandino, Baldi, and Alessandro Giorgi. This, however, but served
to facilitate their practical development in pursuits more congenial
to those martial dispositions for which the inhabitants of Romagna
have in all ages been noted. Whilst the revived literature of Greece
and the philosophy of Plato flourished on the banks of the Arno,
the exact sciences were cultivated in the highlands of Umbria, and
took the practical turn of strengthening those fastnesses with
which nature had provided that mountain-land. Francesco di Giorgio,
of Siena, was less in request by Dukes Federigo and Guidobaldo as
architect of their stately palaces, than as the most famous military
engineer of his time. Events which made their duchy the seat of
repeated invasions early in the sixteenth century, as well as the
warlike character of Francesco Maria I., maintained a demand for
fortifications, and, from the school which thus grew up in his
capital, there issued a series of military architects whose fame and
services extended beyond the Alps.
* * * * *
The first of these whom we shall mention was FEDERIGO
COMANDINO, born at Urbino, in 1509, of a noble family. His
grandfather was secretary of Duke Federigo, whose last confidential
instructions he received, when death surprised that veteran general
in the fens of Ferrara. Baldi has claimed the invention of those
bulwarks in fortification called _baluardi_ for his father, Gian
Battista,[135] who built the walls at Urbino in the beginning of
the sixteenth century. After a liberal education, Federigo passed
several years at the court of Clement VII., nominally as a privy
chamberlain, but really to amuse with learned disquisitions the
Pontiff's leisure hours, on whose death he repaired to Padua, where
he devoted ten years to the study of philosophy and medicine. Having
graduated, he settled for clinical practice at Ferrara, but seems
soon to have abandoned the healing art for mathematical research.
He accompanied his sovereign, Guidobaldo II., to the camp at Verona
when in the Venetian service, and, having gained his confidence by
successfully treating him in a severe illness, he was selected to
instruct him in astronomy and cosmography, as well as in military
tactics and engineering. Soon, however, resuming his more abstruse
studies, under the patronage of Cardinal Ranuccio Farnese, brother of
Duchess Vittoria, he was carried by him to Rome, and introduced into
the society of Annibale Caro, Fulvio Orsini, Baldassare Turrio, and
Cardinal Cervini, the last of whom was cut off too quickly after his
election as Marcellus II. to be able to benefit his friends. But for
Comandino ambition offered few temptations, and courts had no charm.
In studious retirement he devoted to the exact sciences the matured
powers of a comprehensive and most retentive mind. He explored all
that classical authors were known to have left on these subjects, and
rendered again accessible much that lay forgotten among the rubbish
of by-gone learning. He translated, and copiously edited, Ptolemy's
treatise on the planisphere, which was published at Venice, in 1558,
and, four years afterwards, gave to the world a work on the analemma,
founded upon the same author's previous and imperfect discoveries.
His labours were then transferred to the writings of Archimedes,
several of which he printed for the first time, as well as the
dissertations of Serenus and Apollonius upon conic sections, all with
elaborate commentaries.
[Footnote 135: This has also been imputed to Francesco di Giorgio, to
Sanmichele, and to Bartolomeo Centogatti of Urbino.]
After spending the prime of life in these pursuits at Rome, he
returned to his native duchy, where his instructions in mathematics
were sought by Prince Francesco Maria, with whom he read and
expounded Euclid's _Elements_; and afterwards, at the request of his
pupil, published a Latin translation of them. It was about 1569 that
he was visited there by a young Englishman named John Dea, whose
love of the exact sciences induced him to seek so distinguished a
professor, and who supplied him with some Arabic MSS., hitherto
unknown.[136] Six years thereafter he was surprised by death, with
many unfinished works on his hands, part whereof saw the light under
the superintendence of the Marquis Guidobaldo del Monte. The life of
a hard student is rarely one of varied incident; and even the voluble
pen of his pupil Baldi has failed to illustrate that of Comandino
with interest, beyond his scholiast labours.[137] Yet severity formed
no part of his social character, and he was ready at all times to
relax his toils by Epicurean indulgences, which are said eventually
to have curtailed his life. To the last, however, his engrossing
pleasure was in books; and, although his works number more
translations than original compositions, he is ranked by Montucla
among the most able and judicious of commentators.
[Footnote 136: GROSSI, _Uomini Illustri di Urbino_.]
[Footnote 137: It is printed in the Raccolta Calogeriana, XIX., 140.]
* * * * *
One of the pupils whom Comandino left in his native state was
GUIDOBALDO, MARQUIS DEL MONTE, who was born of distinguished
lineage, in 1544. Tiraboschi has cited, as a singular proof of the
engrossing nature of his studies, the fact that his life offers a
nearly total want of incident. So tranquilly did his days flow on
at his castle of Monte Baroccio, amid abstruse occupations, that he
seemed to have forgotten a world unconscious of his very existence,
and the only memorials of his life are his works. His treatise upon
Perspective successfully carried forward what had been indicated
by Pietro della Francesca in the preceding century, and he was
afterwards engaged upon the doctrine of Planispheres, the correction
of the kalendar, and the solution of astronomical problems. But
though thus devoted to abstruse science, he spared a portion of his
thoughts for its practical branches, working upon mechanics, and
translating from Archimedes. It is unnecessary here to go into an
examination of results which modern discoveries have left far behind;
the ground has been well sifted by Montucla, whose work indicates
whatever is still of value in this class of now somewhat superseded
labours. The Marquis was addressed by Torquato Tasso in a sonnet
beginning _Miserator de' gran celesti campi_, and died early in the
seventeenth century, survived by a younger brother, Francesco Maria,
who had been made cardinal by Sixtus V.
* * * * *
Among the names distinguished in Urbino for mathematical talent,
that of PACIOTTI was conspicuous. Jacopo Paciotti, who held several
situations of trust under the two first Dukes of the Rovere dynasty,
was father of three sons, all eminent proficients in the exact
sciences. Felice was one of those commissioned to rectify the
Gregorian Kalendar, and invented an instrument for constructing
dial-plates. Orazio became a military engineer, and erected
fortresses for the States of the Church, for Savoy, and for Lucca,
with such reputation that his services were sought for Poland and
for the Emperor Rudolph. But the most remarkable of the family
was Francesco,[*138] who, after enjoying a liberal education, and
thoroughly grounding himself in architecture under Girolamo Genga,
went to Rome, where, in 1550,[*139] he was named engineer-in-chief
by Julius III. Next year, he was employed to fortify Ancona against
the dreaded descents of the Turk; but, leaving this undertaking to
be completed by Fontana, he passed in 1551, to the service of the
Farnesi, and thence to that of Emanuel Duke of Savoy, with 60 scudi
of monthly pay. He soon afterwards published a plan of Rome; but his
attention was chiefly devoted to military architecture, in which his
reputation rapidly spread. In 1558, he was employed by Philip II. to
survey, and report upon, the principal defences of the Low Countries,
for which he was remunerated with 6000 scudi, and a massive gold
chain.
[Footnote *138: Cf. MADIAI, _Il Giornale di Francesco Paciotti da
Urbino_ in _Arch. St. per le Marche e per l'Umbria_, vol. III., p. 48
_et seq._]
[Footnote *139: This is the year in which the journal begins. In 1551
he tells us he left the service of the Pope to enter that of the Duke
of Parma.]
Paciotti was now on the ladder of royal favour, and, having
accompanied Duke Emanuel to Paris, for his marriage, was decorated
by Henry II. with another magnificent chain worth 1000 scudi. The
gorgeous compliment, however, nearly cost him his life, for, while
wearing it next day, he was set upon by two robbers, one of whom he
slew, and wounded the other, a feat which procured him new marks
of favour. The next ten years of his life were chiefly spent in
the service of Savoy; but he was at various times summoned for
engineering purposes to Spain and Flanders. The warm personal regard
in which he was held by Philip II. was proved by his winning a bet,
that he would make that proud monarch hold a light to examine his
plans, and was more substantially shown by many rich presents which
he carried from that court. In consequence of recommendations from
his Catholic Majesty, he had from the King of Portugal the order
of Jesus Christ; and in 1578, at the Duke of Savoy's request, the
Castle of Montefabri was erected into a countship in his favour, by
Francesco Maria II. of Urbino. After for several years superintending
fortifications in the papal states, and those of the Grand Duke of
Tuscany, he retired to his native place, and passed the remainder
of his life in honourable ease, enjoying from various sovereigns
pensions of above 3000 scudi a year. He died in 1591, aged seventy,
leaving behind him a European reputation, and three sons, in whom the
mathematical talents of the family were hereditarily developed, all
being military engineers of some note; one of them, Federigo, became
a Knight of Malta, and Guidobaldo was blown up by a mine, while in
the service of Charles V.
* * * * *
GIAN GIACOMO LEONARDI is mentioned by a recent writer[140]
as "one of those extraordinary men, so abundant in Italy during
the fifteenth and following century, who have left little fame to
posterity, and who, though universally known in their day, were
after death forgotten, and overlooked by subsequent writers." Nor
is this surprising in his case; for his distinction, gained in
the camp, was spread still wider by his diplomacy. He was at one
moment referred to on delicate points of honour between knights and
sovereigns; at another consulted on questions of legal intricacy;
whilst his writings have remained unedited and unknown. They are all
upon fortification and engineering, and are enumerated by Promis in
his elaborate compilation upon these subjects. His services, though
eagerly sought by great monarchs, were affectionately devoted to his
native princes, being long companion in arms of Francesco Maria I.,
and ambassador to Venice from Guidobaldo II. He was born at Pesaro,
near which he had from the latter the countship of Monte l'Abbate in
1540, with permission to bear the name and arms of della Rovere, and
died about 1560.
[Footnote 140: _Trattato di Architettura da Francesco di Giorgio_,
edited by C. Promis, Turin, 1841.]
* * * * *
Although we have been led to mention engineers in connection with
mathematical science, they were in these days usually architects, and
regarded as belonging to the class of artists. Ricotti informs us
that no vocation was more varied or laborious. Uniting the practice
of arms with an intimate knowledge of design, their services were
sought for in every part of Europe, either to plan fortresses, build
palaces, cast statues, paint frescoes, execute hydraulics, or command
troops. Lazzari, in his _Uomini Illustri del Piceno_, enumerates
sixteen such as conferring lustre upon Urbino, but of these we shall
only name one more. MUZIO ODDI was nobly born there, in
1569. In 1595, he accompanied, as military engineer, a contingent
sent by the Duke into Burgundy; and, three years after, employed his
architectural skill for the festive decorations in honour of a visit
by Clement VIII. to his native city. He had less success in placing a
cupola upon the cathedral there, in 1604, which was said to contain
100,000 pounds of iron-work and 80,000 of lead, the weight of which
brought it down in 1789. On some indistinctly recorded charge, he was
thrown into the citadel of Pesaro, and there detained many years in
a loathsome dungeon. Denied the use of books or writing materials,
he made for himself ink of charcoal and candle-soot, mixed with
water in a walnut-shell, and, by pasting together shreds of paper
with bread-dough, contrived to jot down mathematical treatises on
sundials and the square, using for compasses a couple of twigs tied
together. On his liberation, in 1609, he passed into Lombardy, and
spent above twenty years of exile in sighing for his country; nor was
it till within two years of the close of life that he was appointed
mathematical professor at Urbino. He died at seventy, leaving a
Treatise on Mathematics, in two volumes 4to.
* * * * *
BERNARDINO BALDI[*141] has a double claim upon our
attention, as the most prolific writer whom the duchy has produced,
and as one who devoted a large share of his literary labours to the
illustration of his native state. He was born at Urbino in 1553, of
a family which, during several generations, had held with credit
various important situations in the magistracy. By force of that
extraordinary diligence, which continued to stimulate his entire
life, his youthful studies advanced with precocious success; yet it
is singular to find him confessing that his early inclinations were
all towards painting, and that his preference of his pencil to his
grammatical exercises often brought him into intimate acquaintance
with the birch. We cannot echo the observation of his biographer
Affò,[*142] that this discipline may have deprived Urbino of a
second Raffaele; but though he assuredly was gifted neither with the
lofty genius nor the pervading sense of beauty which characterised
his countryman, a deep devotional feeling would doubtless have
inspired his paintings. The peculiar connection which existed at
Urbino between the exact sciences and the liberal arts frequently
attracts our notice; and this it may have been which led the thwarted
painter to turn with his accustomed energy to mathematical studies,
under Federigo Comandino, for whose edition of Euclid, published
in 1572, he is said to have drawn the diagrams. It was about this
time, that, urged by his parents to choose between law and medicine
for a profession, he preferred the latter, rather, as he tells
us, from its analogy with philosophical inquiries than with any
special liking for the healing art. With these views he was sent
to the University of Padua, where he brought his vast application
successively to bear upon logic, and ethical and physical philosophy,
varied by his favourite mathematics, and by a comprehensive cycle of
Greek literature. To that seat of learning there then resorted the
youth of ultramontane lands, whose harsh language so piqued Baldi's
curiosity, and developed his prodigious philological talents, that
in an inconceivably short time he mastered French and German. But
these multifarious pursuits did not suffice his versatile mind,
so he enlivened them by draughts of the Castalian spring. There
may seem something ludicrous in an epic, entitled "Artillery," and
illustrative of gunnery practice; but a theme so ponderous for
poetry was suited to the spirit of the age, as well as congenial to
its author's thoughts. A visit to the mountain home of Petrarch, at
Arqua, gave, however, a lighter turn to his muse, and taught his
number to flow in madrigals, to the honour of some nameless Laura of
his love or fancy, containing more borrowed classicism than inspired
passion.
[Footnote *141: Cf. ZACCAGNINI, _La vita e le opere edite e inedite
di B.B._ (Modena, 1903); UGOLINI, _Versi e prose scelte di B.B._
(Firenze, 1859); see also MADIAI, _Pierantonio Paltroni e B.B.
biografi di Federigo da Montefeltro in Le Marche_ (1902), vol. II.,
pp. 5-6.]
[Footnote *142: Cf. AFFÒ, _La Vita di B.B._ (Parma, 1783).]
In 1575 he returned home, to share the last labours, and watch the
death-bed, of his friend Comandino, and to encounter from his parents
many a remonstrance as to his neglected professional acquirements, of
which, in the various food with which he had appeased his literary
craving at the university, he seems entirely to have lost sight. But
their efforts were vain. The Eugubinean tables, that philological
enigma, having attracted his attention, he boldly encountered their
solution, and studied Arabic as a stepping-stone to the lost dialects
of Central Italy. His biographers insert Etruscan in the catalogue
of his polyglot acquirements, but the tables of Gubbio remain a
puzzle to antiquaries. Those who made literature a profession,
before there existed a "public" to remunerate their exertions,
looked for maintenance to princes or private patrons; and in 1580
Baldi gratefully accepted the offer of Don Ferrante Gonzaga, Lord
of Guastalla, to instruct him in mathematics, on an allowance of
ten scudi a month, besides board for himself and a servant,--an
appointment which made him favourably known to Cardinal (afterwards
St.) Carlo Borromeo, uncle of that prince, and to many persons of
literary reputation who frequented his miniature court. There his
time was divided between mathematical and poetic compositions,
until, in 1586, a sudden change took place in his position by his
adopting a clerical habit, at the request of Don Ferrante, in order
that he might hold the Abbacy of Guastalla, the emoluments of which
yielded him about 320 golden ducats. This promotion brought out a
curious feature in the character of so hard a student, and we find
him immediately repairing to Rome, to canvass for the higher honours
of a titular bishopric, on being refused which, he struggled for
permission to wear some trifling distinction in his canonical robes
with pertinacity befitting a worldling rather than a philosopher.
Neither was it from such a character that we should have looked for
a zeal in the maintenance of ecclesiastical discipline, which led
him beyond the bounds of prudence in wielding his inquisitorial
powers.[*143]
[Footnote *143: In Rome he pursued too his artistic studies; it was
this sojourn which inspired the _Sonetti Romani_. He seems to have
passed the years 1592-1609 between Rome, Urbino, and Guastalla.]
Those theological studies which usually precede ordination were
in his case followed out with his wonted energy, after obtaining
the preferment to which they are generally intended to lead, and
it was probably then that he added Hebrew and Chaldee to his
accomplishments. But his first great undertaking, after thus gaining
a position of leisure and independence, was a General Biography
of famous mathematicians. This he never completed for the press;
but a sort of vidimus of the three hundred and sixty lives, which
it was intended to contain, was printed after his death, with the
title _Cronica de' Mathematici_. Several minor works in science and
literature at the same time occupied his pen, among which were his
Description of the Urbino palace, his Eulogy of that state, and his
History of Guastalla. Nor were his poetic inspirations neglected,
and, besides a variety of occasional effusions, his _Nautica_, or
the Art of Navigation, was printed at Venice in 1590. We may include
among his lighter labours an Essay on History, dedicated in 1611
to the Duke of Urbino, and lately published by Cardinal Mai.[144]
Although, like most similar essays, some of its observations are
trite and even trivial, the various topics are well handled, and
many useful suggestions are offered as to the best method and style
for history, the qualities requisite in its author and desirable
for its students. It would have been well had Baldi attended, in
his historical biographies, to his own recommendation, that the
prolix and copious diction of Livy should be chastened by that terse
and sententious manner found in Tacitus and Sallust. Nor were it
amiss that he had construed less literally the maxim by which Pliny
the Younger pleads for mediocrity, Content yourself to do much
indifferently, if it be beyond you to do a little well.[145]
[Footnote 144: _Spicilegium Romanum_, I., xxviii., from Vat. Urb.
MSS.]
[Footnote 145: Satius est plurima mediocriter facere, si non possis
aliquid insigniter. Lib. V., Epist. 5.]
Although Baldi appears to have entered the Church rather from
temporal considerations than any spiritual vocation, no priest
was ever more tenacious of rights and privileges; and it was his
misfortune to find, in the exercise of his ecclesiastical functions,
ever-recurring misunderstandings with his clergy or the civil
authorities, and even with the superior tribunals at Rome. Through
these we shall not follow him. As early as 1590, the Duke of Urbino
interfered as a friendly counsellor to recommend him moderate
measures; but new jars from time to time recurred, and in 1609 he
carried into effect a step which he had proposed seventeen years
before, by resigning his benefice, under reservation of two-fifths
of its income. But these wranglings penetrated not within the portal
of his study, where his active mind and adamantine pen laboured
assiduously, through good report and bad, upon the most incongruous
matters.
The Abbot renounced his preferment on the plea of family matters,
requiring his presence in his native city, and, faithful to
this domestic duty, declined an offer from Cardinal d'Este of a
situation in his household. His own sovereign received him with that
friendship he ever extended to men of piety and literary merit,
and, in 1612, sent him on a mission to congratulate the New Doge of
Venice.[*146] The remainder of his life passed in peace, amid the
varied resources of an ever-busy mind, interrupted only by those
occasional bereavements, whereby, as years wear on, death warns us
that our turn will also come. Besides sad breaches in his domestic
circle, Baldi had to mourn his long-attached friend Baroccio, the
painter, who died in 1612. Prepared by such proofs of human frailty,
he resigned his spirit on the 10th of October, after a lingering
but lenient malady, and was carried to the tomb amid the sincere
regrets of many friends and admirers.[*147] It was remarked that,
in his long and minute will, he left no instructions regarding his
multifarious unpublished works, most of which passed into the library
of his relations, the Albani, where they remain at Rome. His epitaph
reckons his compositions at forty-eight,[*148] and the languages he
knew at twelve, which Crescimbeni increases to sixteen--substantial
testimony to that avidity of application which is said to have been
habitually appeased by perusing the Fathers whilst at table, and
by conning over Euclid in Arabic, as an aid to digestion. To detail
and criticise the results of labours as Protean as Herculean is a
task which we cannot attempt. His diligent biographer Affò enumerates
about thirty printed works, running to above two thousand 4to pages,
and seventy left in manuscript, some of which have been since
published. They may be thus classed:--
Printed. MSS.
In Theology and biblical criticism 13
" Mathematics 7 14
" Philosophy 2
" Geography 2
" Law 2
" History 1 8
" Topography and antiquities 4 4
" Poetry 10 8
" General literature and philology 4 16
[Footnote *146: Cf. ZACCAGNINI, _Un'ambasceria di B.B._ in _Rassegna
Crit. d. Lett. Ital._, vol. VII., p. 201.]
[Footnote *147: He died in Urbino, October 10th, 1617.]
[Footnote *148: I record the more important. In 1575 he wrote a
poem on _Artiglieria_, and in 1579 another on the _Invenzione del
bossolo da navigare_; this was published by CANEVAZZI (Livorno,
Giusti, 1901). Cf. concerning it, PROVASI in _Le Marche_ (1902), and
ZACCAGNINI in _Rass. Crit. d. Lett. Ital._, vol. VII., p. 166. His
masterpiece, _Nautica_, written between 1580-85, is a didactic poem
in four books imitating the Georgics. Concerning it see ZACCAGNINI,
_Le fonti della Nautica_ in _Giornale St. d. Lett. Ital._, vol.
XL., p. 366, and PROVASI, _Contributo allo studio della Nautica di
B.B._ (Fano, 1903). The _Egloghe Miste_ were dedicated to Ranuccio
Farnese in 1590, and consist of nineteen poems in various metres
in a Theocritan vein. Cf. RUBERTO, _Le Egloghe edite e inedite di
B.B._ in _Propugnatore_ (1882), and for _Epigrammi_, RUBERTO, _op.
cit. An. cit._ His youthful erotic poems were published under the
title _Lauro_ (Pavia, 1600), and, not to speak of other volumes, the
_Sonetti Romani_ appeared in _Versi e Prose_ (Venice, Franceschi,
1590). His works in prose were very numerous. I note here _La
Descrizione del Palazzo Ducale d'Urbino_ (_circa_ 1587), and the
_Vite_ of Federigo and Guidobaldo I. of Urbino, the first published
in Rome in 1820 and a bad edition of the second in Milan, 1821. He
wrote also a _Cronaca_ (Urbino, 1707), a life of Federigo Comandino,
the _Encomio della Patria_, cf. ZACCAGNINI, _Uno scritto inedito
di B.B._ in _Le Marche_ (Fano), vol. I., p. 4; and the _Lettere
Familiari_, cf. POLIDORI, _Lettere di Baldi_ (Firenze, 1854),
RONCHINI, _Lettere di B._ (Parma, 1873) and SAVIOTTI, _Lettere di B._
(Pesaro, 1887).]
Of these a number were translations, chiefly from Arabic and other
Oriental tongues. It is evident that his own preference lay towards
his compositions in verse, a judgment which wants confirmation if
continued popularity be the test. Yet several of his fugitive poems,
and especially some sonnets on the ruins of Rome, possess much lyric
beauty; and, though his epic on the Deluge is but a wretched attempt
at novelty in versification, that on the Art of Navigation is a
work of merit for the age which produced it. Hallam, after classing
it with Bernardo Tasso's _Amadigi_, as two of the most remarkable
productions of that sort then written in Italy, pronounces the
_Nautica_ "a didactic poem in blank verse, too minute sometimes, and
prosaic in detail, like most of its class, but neither low, turgid,
or obscure, as many others have been. The descriptions, though never
very animated, are sometimes poetical and pleasing. Baldi is diffuse,
and this conspires with the triteness of his matter to render the
poem somewhat uninteresting. He by no means wants power to adorn his
subject, but does not always trouble himself to exert it, and is tame
where he might be spirited. Few poems bear more evident marks that
their substance had been previously written down in prose." But what
he wanted in genius--for therein lay his great deficiency--he in
some degree supplied by wonderful versatility. Whichever of his many
subjects he took up seemed that in which he was born to excel. Of his
painstaking diligence we have said much, but we may add the pertinent
remark of Grossi, "that so extensive was his reading as apparently
to leave no time for writing, and yet that he wrote about as much
as it seemed possible for any one to read." To this Tiraboschi adds
the more flattering testimony that "his praises would be appropriate
to almost each chapter of this history, for there was scarcely any
department of literature and science in which he did not apply
himself and attain excellence."
By an author so prolific, redundancy and diffuseness, the
blemishes of his age, were inevitable. But in his lives of the two
Montefeltrian dukes, these are conjoined with a tendency to elaborate
his details into microscopic minuteness, which weary and distract
the reader, and which, though valuable adjuncts to the testimony of
an eye-witness, engender more suspicion than credit in a narrative
compiled, after a long interval, from less specific authorities.
Being, however, a shrewd observer and diligent narrator, anxious
to do full justice to his subject, these works, although deficient
in personal interest, and relieved by no enlarged views or general
application, fulfil the task prescribed by his patron, the last
Duke della Rovere; and, were his life of Francesco Maria I. to be
published,[149] Baldi would be our standard historiographer of the
duchy. In him are, indeed, wanting the qualities of a philosophic
historian,--elevation of sentiment, variety of matter, selection
of incident; but they belonged not to his age, and were scarcely
compatible with his position. The fate of Scarpi and Varchi gave
timely warning to the literary world, that historic verity might have
its martyrs, as well as metaphysical speculation of religious truth.
His life of Duke Federigo, written in 1603, was printed in 1824;
that of Guidobaldo I., completed in 1615, saw the light in 1821.
The substance of these narratives had, however, been appropriated
and published by Reposati, omitting imaginary conversations and
supposititious harangues. Of the degree of impartiality with which
they were compiled, an idea may be formed from the following extracts
of letters addressed to their author by his sovereign, proving that
his judgment was not by any means left unfettered:--"It has given me
satisfaction to hear all that you have written me in regard to the
life of Duke Federigo of happy memory, and I fail not to acknowledge
with pleasure your devotion and diligence. In mentioning my house,
I approve of your naming it of Montefeltro rather than Feltrian,
but as to seeking out its source and foundation, I do not recollect
telling you to pass these over in silence. On the contrary, I deem
it necessary to discuss this, yet not in the way I saw it treated at
Urbino, attributing to it a mere bourgeois and private origin, much
humbler than its deserts. It will, therefore, be well to keep this in
view, observing in your eulogies, and generally throughout the work,
a becoming consideration and regard for it, such as, without further
hint, I look for from your sound discretion."--"As to the Life of
Duke Federigo, only a few days have passed since I have done looking
through it; but we must talk it over together more than once, ere
anything can be decided on."[150]
[Footnote 149: Vat. Urb. MSS., No. 906.]
[Footnote 150: Oliveriana MSS. In 1602 the Duke instructed his
resident at Venice to procure for Gian Battista Leoni access to its
archives for the life of Francesco Maria I. he had commissioned him
to write, which was published three years later.]
Had Baldi lived among our fathers, he would have dwelt in Grub
Street, and become, by his powers of application and memory, a
successful book-maker; among ourselves, he would have proved valuable
as a penny-per-line scribe. In Italy, his renown was, for a time,
more brilliant, but it has now passed into comparative, and not
unmerited, neglect. Yet his is a name of which his native city may
justly be proud, and may cherish with respectful approbation this
epitaph, once proposed for his tomb:--
"Ah! happy he who spent a lengthened span,
Not in the vulgar dreams of grovelling man,
But passed his days in living truly well;
Urbino's honour! Passenger, farewell."
Among the literary labourers of this age GIROLAMO
MUZIO[*151] is entitled to a prominent place, more from the
variety and volume of his writings than from their actual worth. The
epithet Giustinopolite, usually applied to him, is latinised from
Capo d'Istria, the adopted home of his family, who were originally
emigrants from Udine, and spelt their name Nuzio. He, however, was
born at Padua, in 1496, and, after receiving a good education,
finding himself dependent upon his own exertions, was fain to sell
his services of sword or pen to the highest bidder. The same rule
of self-interest that actuated Italian condottieri was too often
followed by literary adventurers in that country, conscience and
glory being generally made subservient by both to a livelihood.
Girolamo had a double chance, in his twofold capacity of soldier and
author, and tells us "that it was ever his fate to earn his bread
by serving in the armies and courts of popes, emperors, kings, or
petty princes; sometimes with one Italian commander, sometimes with
another; now in France, then in Upper, again in Lower Germany."
Through these vicissitudes it were needless to follow him. For a
time he was rival or successor of Bernardo Tasso in the promiscuous
affections of Tullia d'Aragona, a lettered courtezan, and, without
her sanction, published, in 1547, her Dialogue on the Infinitude of
Love. In the preface he avowed a connection which occasioned him
neither compunction nor shame, and which, in days when love was a
science as well as a passion, was openly shared by Varchi, Speroni,
Strozzi, and Molza. Four years later a dangerous illness taught him
reflection on his past ways, and brought him to a devotional frame
of mind. It was about the same time that he became an inmate of the
court of Urbino, receiving from Duke Guidobaldo the ample pension of
400 scudi, with permission to "attend to his studies, appearing only
when he chose." The Duchess Vittoria countenanced him much, and he
spent a good deal of time in her society, probably in consequence of
his appointment as governor to her eldest son, and of his marrying a
lady of her suite. From thence he went to reside at Rome, about 1567,
and died in Tuscany, in 1576.
[Footnote *151: On Muzio, see GIAXICH, _Vita di Girolamo Muzio_
(Trieste, 1847); MORPURGO, _Girolamo Muzio_ (Trieste, 1893), NOMI,
in _Miscellanea Stor. della Valdelsa_, No. 24; NOTTOLA, _Appunti sul
Muzio poeta_ (Aosta, 1895).]
Tiraboschi declines the task of compiling the long catalogue of
his various writings, in poetry, sacred and profane history, moral
essays, and familiar letters,[*152] nor need we undertake it. A large
portion of his works were directed against protestant doctrines, and,
having reformed the habits of his somewhat stormy youth, he lent
willing and efficient aid in strangling the progress of Calvinism in
Italy, after a protracted struggle, upon which the investigations of
Dr. M'Crie have thrown much valuable light. Muzio is alleged to have
exhibited in this contest more of martial dexterity than theological
acumen; but his controversial effusions, being published in Italian,
and clothed in a homely slashing style, were probably supposed quite
as efficacious against the progress of heretical opinions among his
countrymen, as the disquisitions of more profound theologians. It was
not, however, for the dogmas of faith alone that Muzio wielded his
pen. The soldier of fortune was quite as happy, and more at home, on
topics belonging to the chivalry of his profession. His treatises
on Duels and the Point of Honour were suited to the spirit of the
age, and had in consequence a considerable run of popularity, now of
course long ago past. The like fate has befallen his didactic poem
on the Art of Poetry, in the literature of his own country. What
most concerns us are his Lives of Dukes of Urbino. That of Federigo
is dedicated to Guidobaldo II., and the original is deposited in the
Vatican Library. Having been compiled with considerable care, it
continues our best narrative of his reign, and has been greatly drawn
upon by Baldi and Riposati. The edition printed at Venice in 1605 is
but an abridgment, containing less than half the original matter. His
Life of Francesco Maria I. was left unfinished, and remains unedited
in the Vatican.[153]
[Footnote *152: The fullest collection of his letters seems to
be that of GIOLITI, 1551. Cf. also ZENATTI, _Lettere inedite_
(Capodistria, 1896).]
[Footnote 153: Vat. Urb. MSS. No. 1011, and No. 1023, f. 50.]
We shall mention but one more prose writer of Urbino. FEDERIGO
BONAVENTURA was born in 1555, and owed to Cardinal Giulio
della Rovere a fashionable education at Rome. On his return home,
the marked favour of Francesco Maria II. was attracted by his good
sense and winning manners; but finding his courtly accomplishments
unequal to the profound pursuits of that young prince, he laboured
assiduously to supply his own deficiencies. By close application, his
progress in Greek, mathematics, and natural philosophy was amazingly
rapid; but these studies were happily blended with the business of
life, and, directing his powerful judgment to political affairs, he
established his reputation by a work on public polity, which, for the
first time in Italy, methodised the principles of government. These
talents his sovereign turned to account by sending him on various
diplomatic missions. Conforming in many respects to the maxims
inculcated by the Cortegiano, he filled in the Duke's court somewhat
the same place which Castiglione had done in that of Guidobaldo I.,
and died in 1602.