the Church in her pristine purity, and the defence of Christendom
against the onslaught of the infidel. While he preaches earnestly the
Headship of Christ, and exhorts all men to put their trust in God
rather than in mortal men, he is also never tired of enjoining
reverence for the Emperor, and urging them to unite in loyal obedience
to his wishes and aspirations. Apparently unconscious of his
inconsequence, he upheld the principle of absolute Papal domination,
and yet early associated himself with that august dream of the Middle
Ages--the universal monarchy of the Emperor. For him he claimed the
same power in the temporal, as the Pope exercised in the spiritual
world. As the Pope was the organ of religion, so was the Emperor the
source of Law; and the revival of his power as temporal head of
Christendom was to coincide with the re-establishment of that order and
discipline whose absence Brant so frequently laments. The whole fabric
of these vast aspirations Brant rested upon Maximilian. He could not
foresee that this prince, so brilliant, so chivalrous, so sympathetic,
would disappoint the rich promise of his youth and fail to restore the
fallen grandeur of the Empire owing to his schemes of {86} family
aggrandisement. He greeted his election with adulatory verses,
protesting that under such a prince the Golden Age could not fail to
return. The news of Maximilian's imprisonment at Bruges rouses a very
whirlwind of indignant phrases, contrary to the whole spirit of his
later teaching. "Destroy the Flemings," he cries, "extirpate the very
race of this crime, hang and behead the miscreants, overturn their
walls, and make the plough pass over this accursed soil. Such is the
demand of justice."[106] His belief in omens and portents is
unlimited, and they are generally connected with Maximilian in some
quaint and high-sounding verses. Thus the killing of an enormous deer
on some hunting expedition inspires Brant with an absurd and laboured
comparison. "No animal is nobler than the stag: thou, Maximilian, art
the most noble of Princes. He stops astonished before things which
seem new; thou also dost admire things new and great. At the approach
of danger he pricks up his ear and places his young in safety; thou
hearest the menacing noises of thine enemies, and dost protect thy
people."[107] A number of falcons which were seen to assemble and fly
southwards is acclaimed as a symbol of Maximilian, aided by the Princes
in his Italian expedition. "Destiny calls you, O Germans; go and
restore the Empire in Italy." Even when it became evident that
Maximilian was not destined to realize the poet's high ideals, such
extravagances did not cease. Moreover, he was sustained by a personal
attachment for the Emperor, which was deepened by his various visits to
the Court and closer acquaintance {87} with his early hero, and
doubtless strengthened by the Imperial favours bestowed upon him. And
thus it is with unfeigned grief that Brant celebrates his death. "O
magnanimous Caesar, that hope is vanished which we had founded on thee
while thou didst hold the sceptre. How should I restrain my tears?
Thou wert worthy to live, thou the sole anchor of safety for the German
nation. One swift hour hath removed thee: thou art no more, and
misfortune assails the Empire."[108] Our subject is Maximilian, not
Brant, and we may not linger. But the epitaph on the Strasburg poet's
tomb should not be omitted, even in the translation; for it gives us a
sure clue to a character which was sweet and winning in spite of all
its extravagances. "Toi qui regardes ce marbre, souhaite à Brant le
ciel!"
[Illustration: CONRAD PEUTINGER]
If in Strasburg the movement assumed a theological and educational
character, in Augsburg it was rather directed towards politics and the
study of history. Alike from its geographical position[109] and from
its industrial and commercial importance,[110] Augsburg was thrown into
close relations with Italy and Italian thought; and enthusiasm for
classical studies was early introduced by Sigismund Gossembrot, one of
the leading merchants of the city. The direction of the movement was
further influenced by the Diets which were held within the city,[111]
and by the frequent visits of the Emperor Maximilian.[112] The place
of {88} Gossembrot was worthily filled by Conrad Peutinger,[113] who
returned from Italy in 1485, as a doctor of law, embued with all the
ardour of a scholar. He became a prominent official of his native
city, and retained his position for many years from inclination rather
than from necessity, betraying throughout his writings the sharp eye
and critical knowledge of the practitioner. His first meeting with
Maximilian probably took place at Augsburg in 1491, and from this time
onwards he was continually employed by the Emperor in various positions
of trust. As ambassador, secretary or orator, he visited many
countries in Europe, and, besides ordering affairs of politics, was
entrusted with the truly humanist task of presenting and answering
formal addresses and greetings. While in his foreign relations he was
eager to maintain the honour of the German name, he skilfully used his
double position as Imperial Councillor and Town-official to smooth over
differences between Maximilian and Augsburg, to the advantage of both
parties. The Emperor's love of Augsburg led him to purchase various
houses within the walls, and the castle of Wellenburg in the
neighbourhood. His action was far from welcome to the burghers, who
did not wish this powerful citizen to acquire too much property in
their midst; and they were only pacified by the assurances of Peutinger
that Maximilian would raise no fortifications round the castle. On the
other hand, during his honourable mission to Hungary (1506), he
obtained from the {89} Emperor a substantial grant of privileges for
his native city--notably the right "de non appellando." But Peutinger
was Maximilian's confidant not merely in political affairs. Indeed,
his employment in Imperial diplomacy directly arose from his
intellectual and artistic relations with Maximilian, who sought the
support of every scholar in his attempt to place the Fatherland in the
forefront of Art and Science. In Italy Peutinger had learned the value
of old Roman inscriptions, and in 1505 he was encouraged by Maximilian
to publish a collection of the inscriptions of German antiquity.[114]
The Emperor and the scholar kept up a correspondence on the subject of
ancient coins, large consignments of which were sent to Augsburg, by
order of the former, from every part of the Empire. During Peutinger's
visit to Vienna in 1506 he was monopolized for three whole days for
learned conversation, and received a new and more important commission
from Maximilian. He was to examine the letters and documents of
members of the House of Hapsburg, and to prepare a selection of them
for publication; and with this object he was assigned a special
apartment in the castle of Vienna, to which chronicles and histories
were brought for his use from all quarters. Here he remained for
almost three months, and the fruit of his labours was the _Kaiserbuch_,
or Book of the Emperors, which was unfortunately never published and
which is now extant only in a few fragments. During his labours for
Maximilian he seems to have acquired a great number of valuable
manuscripts; and had his literary projects been fully realized, we
should have gained {90} an astonishing contribution to the
historiography of the sixteenth century. But apart from his own
unfinished writings, he edited and published, with Maximilian's
approval, various early historical works,--the chronicles of Paul the
Deacon and of Ursperg being of especial value.[115] Moreover, he was
charged by the Emperor with a species of censorship, by virtue of which
he prevented the appearance at Augsburg of a Swiss Chronicle,
containing statements derogatory to the House of Hapsburg. In short,
in almost every phase of the struggle of culture and civilization,
which Maximilian so gallantly led, we find Peutinger intimately engaged
as his friend and fellow-labourer; and with Beatus Rhenanus we may
truly exclaim, "Our Conrad Peutinger is the immortal ornament, not
merely of the town of Augsburg, but also of all Swabia!"
The activity of Augsburg was not confined to historical studies. The
rising art of Germany had found here a worthy representative in Hans
Holbein, who, though not strictly a Humanist himself, took the deepest
interest in the movement. His attitude is clearly visible from his
portraiture of Erasmus, More, and other leaders of the Renaissance, and
from his illustrations to the _Praise of Folly_ and the _Dance of
Death_. But Holbein, though the greatest of the Augsburg School, was
too much of a wanderer to be {91} thrown into close contact with
Maximilian. The latter none the less found capable artists to give
expression to his own literary projects. Hans Burgkmair, the most
distinguished of their number, produced over one hundred illustrations
of _Weisskunig_, seventy-seven for the _Genealogy_, which consists of
portraits of Maximilian's ancestors, and close upon seventy for the
_Triumphal Procession_, the main idea of which belongs to Dürer.
Leonhard Beck illustrated a book of _Austrian Saints_, and the greater
part of the famous _Teuerdank_; whilst Freydal represented in his
_Mummereien_ the various tournays and festivities of which Maximilian
was the central figure. All these woodcuts and engravings were
executed under the supervision of Peutinger, who also directed the
casting of figures for Maximilian's tomb at Innsbruck, and the making
of armour and warlike equipments for the Emperor's own person. Indeed,
Maximilian put his Humanist friend to very strange uses; for among the
manifold commissions of Peutinger we find the selection of tapestries
from the Netherlands, inquiries after the inventor of a special kind of
siege-ladder, the building of hatching-houses for the Imperial falcons,
and the establishment of an important cannon foundry. The climax is
reached when Maximilian employs Peutinger's historical knowledge to
obtain the names of a hundred women famous in history, after whom he
may christen the latest additions to his artillery!
[Illustration: WILIBALD PIRKHEIMER]
Of the three centres of German Humanism, Nuremberg is the greatest and
the most fascinating. The home of invention as well as of industry, it
made no mere empty boast in the proverb, "Nürnberg Tand geht durch alle
Land." Its churches and {92} public buildings were the glory of the
age, its craftsmen and designers perhaps then unequalled in the world.
Its literary circle contains a larger number of distinguished names
than any of its rivals. Meisterlin, the author of the famous Nuremberg
chronicle, Cochläus, the bitter satirist of Luther; Osiander, the
celebrated Hebrew scholar and Reformed preacher; Jäger the
mathematician; above all Hans Sachs, the cobbler-poet, "the sweet
singer of Nuremberg"--all these fill an honourable place in the annals
of the city. But the central figures of its life are, beyond any
doubt, Wilibald Pirkheimer and Albrecht Dürer; in any case they would
monopolise our attention on account of their intimate connexion with
Maximilian. When still King of the Romans, he had resided at
Nuremberg, and the joyous animation with which he entered into the life
of the city won for him wide popularity. "When about to depart, we are
told he invited twenty great ladies to dinner; after dinner, when they
were all in a good humour, the Markgrave Frederick asked Maximilian in
the name of the ladies to stay a little longer and to dance with them.
They had taken away his boots and spurs, so that he had no choice.
Then the whole company adjourned to the Council House, several other
young ladies were invited, and Maximilian stayed dancing all through
the afternoon and night, and arrived a day late at Neumarkt, where the
Count Palatine had been expecting him all the preceding day."[116] As
Emperor, Maximilian paid many visits to Nuremberg, and his first Diet
was enlivened by a succession of brilliant masques, dances and
tournaments, such as roused the enthusiasm of the local {93}
chroniclers. He remained on terms of great intimacy with Pirkheimer,
who in many ways is the most typical figure of the German Renaissance.
After an excellent education, at Padua and Pavia, in jurisprudence,
literature and arts, Pirkheimer became councillor in Nuremberg, and won
the special confidence of the Emperor both by his skilful diplomacy and
by his patriotic assistance in the Swiss War. His great riches he
employed not merely for the adornment of his own house, but also in
generous support of less-favoured followers of the Muse. While he
resembled Peutinger as diplomat, as historian, and as theologian, he
had less of the temperament of a pedagogue, and more of the joyous
nature of a true poet. As the representative of a great movement of
the intellect, he was open to all its various methods and aspirations,
and yet understood the lesson of self-restraint and concentration too
well to exhaust his powers in a labyrinth of alternatives. With the
true cheerfulness and humour of the man who knows the world, yet
remains unsullied by contact with it, he and his friends devoted
themselves to what is after all the highest philosophy, the study of
mankind--hiding under a smiling face, nay, often a mocking mien, their
confidence in the great destinies of the race. And yet a deep pathos
attaches to Pirkheimer's closing days. Disappointed in his dreams of
moral and spiritual regeneration for the people, he turned wearily back
from the paths of the new doctrine to the bosom of Mother Church. His
violent attack upon Johann Eck, his noble defence of Reuchlin, had
seemed to foreshadow him as a leader of the Reformation.[117] But his
ideals were in reality of {94} the past rather than of the future; and,
brooding over his shattered hopes, he lingered out a solitary old age,
whose sadness is but deepened by his swan-like lament for Dürer.
[Illustration: ALBRECHT DURER]
Dürer was indeed well worthy of all the praise which has been lavished
upon him; for from all his works there shines forth the noble modesty
of a pure good man. Though scarcely a scholar himself, his deep
sympathy with the great movement is manifest not only in the manner in
which his art interprets it, but also in his own written words.[118]
His letters to Pirkheimer from Venice form delightful reading and show
the keenness of his sympathy and observation. The years which followed
his return to Nuremberg, 1507-1514, were the most productive period of
his life, as well as the period of his most intimate connexion with
Maximilian. From them date the ambitious designs of the "Ehrenpforte"
(Triumphal Arch), which, though executed under Maximilian's direct
supervision, were entirely the idea of Dürer. No less than ninety-two
large woodcuts, the production of which occupied Dürer for two years,
go to {95} make up this imposing metaphorical picture. A structure in
itself impossible is overburdened by portraits of all the ancestors of
Maximilian, mythical as well as real, and by the many exploits and
adventures of the Emperor's own life. But the work must be estimated
less by the quaintness of its composition than by its sterling artistic
qualities and by the important place which it holds in the development
of German Art. The idea was further developed in the "Triumphzug" and
the "Triumphwagen," which was completed in 1516. The Imperial and
other triumphal cars were drawn by Dürer in sixty-three woodcuts, while
the remaining seventy-four were prepared in Augsburg by Hans Burgkmair
and L. Beck.[119] The procession, whose magnificence was to idealize
Maximilian as the greatest of Princes, includes sketches of almost
everything that ever roused the Emperor's interest. Landsknechts,
cannon, huntsmen, mummers, dancers of every rank and variety, the noble
ladies of the Court, are mingled with allegories of every Imperial and
human virtue, elaborately grouped upon triumphal cars. The keen
personal interest of Maximilian in the progress of the work is well
attested. Indeed, he showed his impatience, while the various blocks
were in progress, by frequently visiting not merely Dürer himself, but
also the "formschneider" or block-cutter, who lived in a street
approached by the Frauengasslein. Hence the old Nuremberg proverb,
"The Emperor still often drives to Petticoat Lane."[120] Dürer was
appointed painter to Maximilian, with a grant of arms and a salary of
100 florins a year; and {96} a letter of the Emperor to the Town
Council of Nuremberg is still extant, in which he demands Dürer's
exemption from "communal imposts, and all other contributions in money,
in testimony of our friendship for him, and for the sake of the
marvellous art of which it is but just that he should freely benefit.
We trust that you will not refuse the demand we now make of you,
because it is proper, as far as possible, to encourage the arts he
cultivates and so largely develops among you."[121] These earnest
words of Maximilian reveal to us very clearly his attitude towards the
great movement of his day. Yet, sad as it is to relate, Dürer never
received payment for the ninety-two sheets of the "Triumphal Arch,"
which had cost him so much time and labour, and after Maximilian's
death they were sold separately. But the Emperor may fairly be
absolved from the charge of mean treatment of Dürer, for his own needs
were great and many, and it is strictly true that he spent very little
upon himself. The great artist was always treated with distinction as
a personal friend of the Emperor, who, besides granting him a fixed
salary, gave him material assistance in checking the forging and
pirating of his engravings. He sometimes resided at Court, when
Maximilian held it at Augsburg, and often employed his time in making
sketches in chalk of the illustrious persons whom he met. On one
occasion Maximilian was attempting to draw a design for Dürer, but kept
breaking the charcoal in doing so. When the artist took the pencil
and, without once breaking it, easily completed the sketch, the Emperor
expressed his surprise and probably showed his annoyance. But {97}
Dürer was ready with his compliment. "I should not like your Majesty,"
he said, "to be able to draw as well as I. It is my province to draw
and yours to rule."[122] Not the least interesting and important of
Dürer's commissions was to paint that portrait of the Emperor which now
hangs in the Imperial Gallery at Vienna. The prominent nose, the
hanging eyelid, the half-contemptuous, half-mournful turn of the lips,
the wrinkled cheeks and neck, the long hair falling over the ears, the
pointed bonnet with its clasp, the sombre flowing robes, form a
striking picture and suggest a speaking likeness. Disappointment, but
also that peculiar attribute of the Hapsburgs, resignation, are clearly
marked upon Maximilian's face. In the other two portraits by Dürer--a
chalk drawing executed at the Diet of Augsburg (1518) and a woodcut
completed shortly before his death--the features are less rugged, and
reveal somewhat more of the sanguine spirit of Maximilian's early days.
With the exception of these sketches,[123] Dürer's last commission for
Maximilian was the exquisite decoration for the latter's private
Gebetbuch (Book of Prayer), of which only ten copies were printed,[124]
and which will ever remain one of the gems of artistic and devotional
literature. With Dürer's career after 1519 we are not concerned; but
it is worthy of notice that his most brilliant work dates from the
reign of Maximilian, and that his sympathy with "the nightingale of
Wittenberg" seems to have partially diverted his attention from his
art. {98}
It must not be supposed that Maximilian's humanistic enthusiasms were
confined to the three great centres which have just been described, or
that he only helped on such movements as were already animated by a
vigorous existence and a fair prospect of success. His own hereditary
dominions were even more directly indebted to his efforts than were
other parts of the Empire.
[Illustration: DAS ROSENKRANZFEST. Painting by Dürer, with Kneeling
Figure of Maximilian]
During the first century of its existence, Vienna University[125] was
an autonomous ecclesiastical corporation, over which the methods of the
mediaeval Schoolmen held complete sway. But during the long reign of
Frederick III., several circumstances combined to cast a blight upon
its hitherto flourishing condition. During the Council of Basel it
assumed a hostile attitude to the Pope, and its surrender of that
position only emphasised its folly; while in the struggle of Frederick
and his brother Albert the professors were unwise enough to dabble in
politics and thus to throw off the immunity which guarded their proper
sphere. Their open sympathy with Albert was fatal to a good
understanding with Frederick, who never showed any favour to their
body. Vienna further suffered from a six months' siege by Matthias of
Hungary (1477) and from a violent outbreak of the plague (1481); and
this had scarce abated, when war was renewed and Matthias overran the
whole of Lower Austria. During the ensuing siege (December 1484 to
June 1485) all lectures were inevitably suspended, and the whole work
of the University was at a standstill. The refusal of the University
authorities to take the oath of {99} allegiance to Matthias--on the
ground that, as a clerical corporation, they were independent of the
temporal power--induced the conqueror to stop all the revenues which
they derived from the government; and though he at length granted[126]
a sum sufficient for the payment of the Professors and other
necessities, yet he never extended to Vienna the same liberality
towards Art and Science which had distinguished his relations with
Buda-Pest. By the time of his death (1490) Vienna University was in a
state of almost complete decay.
Under such circumstances the recovery of Austria by Maximilian was
greeted with joy on the part of the authorities, and immediate steps
were taken to restore the tottering fabric of the University.
Maximilian set himself definitely to transform it from a clerical
corporation to a home of the new Humanism, and was aided in this
difficult task by the Superintendent Perger, the intention of whose
office was not only to control the Government grants, but also to
decide upon their expenditure, and to refer to the Emperor all
questions of professorial appointments. In spite of much internal
opposition, the Humanists ere long acquired predominance in the
philosophical Faculty, the medicals threw off the monstrous
requirements of Scholasticism, and the jurists began to study Roman as
well as ecclesiastical law. The revival of Vienna soon roused the
interest of that peculiar product of the Renaissance period, the
wandering scholar. The first to visit the University was Johann
Spiesshaimer--more celebrated as Cuspinian--who rapidly won favour with
the Hapsburgs by a poem in praise of St. Leopold, Markgrave of Austria,
and {100} who was crowned poet by Maximilian shortly after his father's
death, in presence of a brilliant and representative assembly. Soon
afterwards he began to hold regular lectures on poetry and rhetoric,
discussing such writers as Cicero, Sallust, Horace, Virgil and Lucan.
But Perger's preference lay decidedly with the Humanists of Italy, many
of whom he had known personally during his residence at Padua and
Bologna. At his recommendation, Maximilian in 1493 summoned Hieronymus
Balbus from Venice to Vienna, and appointed him lecturer on the Roman
Poets. But the Italian's fiery temper soon led him into disputes with
the University authorities, and after an unsatisfactory career of two
years he found a fresh outbreak of plague in the city a convenient
pretext for returning to Italy. Krachenberger and Fuchsmagen, the two
councillors whom Maximilian had appointed to assist Perger, doubtless
influenced by the unseemly brawling of Balbus, were loud in their
complaints of Perger's favouritism, and urged their Imperial master to
encourage German rather than Italian scholars. But Maximilian was,
after all, only following his own judgment, when in 1497 he sent a
cordial invitation to Stabius and Celtes to fill professorships at
Vienna.