THE REPRODUCTION OF ANTIQUITY: LATIN CORRESPONDENCE AND ORATIONS.
There were two purposes, however, for which the humanist was as
indispensable to the republics as to princes or popes, namely, the
official correspondence of the state, and the making of speeches on
public and solemn occasions.
Not only was the secretary required to be a competent Latinist, but
conversely, only a humanist was credited with the knowledge and ability
necessary for the post of secretary. And thus the greatest men in the
sphere of science during the fifteenth century mostly devoted a
considerable part of their lives to serve the state in this capacity. No
importance was attached to a man’s home or origin. Of the four great
Florentine secretaries who filled the office between 1427 and 1465,[528]
three belonged to the subject city of Arezzo, namely, Lionardo (Bruni),
Carlo (Marsuppini), and Benedetto Accolti; Poggio was from Terra Nuova,
also in Florentine territory. For a long period, indeed, many of the
highest officers of state were on principle given to foreigners.
Lionardo, Poggio, and Giannozzo Manetti were at one time or another
private secretaries to the popes, and Carlo Aretino was to have been so.
Blondus of Forli, and, in spite of everything, at last even Lorenzo
Valla, filled the same office. From the time of Nicholas V. and Pius II.
onwards,[529] the Papal chancery continued more and more to attract the
ablest men, and this was still the case even under the last popes of
the fifteenth century, little as they cared for letters. In Platina’s
‘History of the Popes,’ the life of Paul II. is a charming piece of
vengeance taken by a humanist on the one Pope who did not know how to
behave to his chancery--to that circle ‘of poets and orators who
bestowed on the Papal court as much glory as they received from it.’ It
is delightful to see the indignation of these haughty and wealthy
gentlemen, who knew as well as the Pope himself how to use their
position to plunder foreigners,[530] when some squabble about precedence
happened, when, for instance, the ‘Advocati consistoriales’ claimed
equal or superior rank to theirs.[531] The Apostle John, to whom the
‘Secreta cœlestia’ were revealed; the secretary of Porsenna, whom Mucius
Scævola mistook for the king; Mæcenas, who was private secretary to
Augustus; the archbishops, who in Germany were called chancellors, are
all appealed to in turn.[532] ‘The apostolic secretaries have the most
weighty business of the world in their hands. For who but they decide on
matters of the Catholic faith, who else combat heresy, re-establish
peace, and mediate between great monarchs? who but they write the
statistical accounts of Christendom? It is they who astonish kings,
princes, and nations by what comes forth from the Pope. They write
commands and instructions for the legates, and receive their orders only
from the Pope, on whom they wait day and night.’ But the highest summit
of glory was only attained by the two famous secretaries and stylists of
Leo X.: Pietro Bembo and Jacopo Sadoleto.[533]
All the chanceries did not turn out equally elegant documents. A
leathern official style, in the impurest of Latin, was very common. In
the Milanese documents preserved by Corio there is a remarkable contrast
between this sort of composition and the few letters written by members
of the princely house, which must have been written, too, in moments of
critical importance.[534] They are models of pure Latinity. To maintain
a faultless style under all circumstances was a rule of good breeding,
and a result of habit. Besides these officials, private scholars of all
kinds naturally had correspondence of their own. The object of
letter-writing was seldom what it is nowadays, to give information as to
the circumstances of the writer, or news of other people; it was rather
treated as a literary work done to give evidence of scholarship and to
win the consideration of those to whom it was addressed. These letters
began early to serve the purpose of learned disquisition; and Petrarch,
who introduced this form of letter-writing, revived the forms of the old
epistolary style, putting the classical ‘thou’ in place of the ‘you’ of
mediæval Latin. At a later period letters became collections of
neatly-turned phrases, by which subjects were encouraged or humiliated,
colleagues flattered or insulted, and patrons eulogised or begged
from.[535]
The letters of Cicero, Pliny, and others, were at this time diligently
studied as models. As early as the fifteenth century a mass of forms and
instructions for Latin correspondence had appeared, as accessory to the
great grammatical and lexicographic works, the mass of which is
astounding to us even now when we look at them in the libraries. But
just as the existence of these helps tempted many to undertake a task to
which they had no vocation, so were the really capable men stimulated to
a more faultless excellence, till at length the letters of Politian, and
at the beginning of the sixteenth century those of Pietro Bembo,
appeared, and took their place as unrivalled masterpieces, not only of
Latin style in general, but also of the more special art of
letter-writing.
Together with these there appeared in the sixteenth century the
classical style of Italian correspondence, at the head of which stands
Bembo again.[536] Its form is wholly modern, and deliberately kept free
from Latin influence, and yet its spirit is thoroughly penetrated and
possessed by the ideas of antiquity. These letters, though partly of a
confidential nature, are mostly written with a view to possible
publication in the future, and always on the supposition that they might
be worth showing on account of their elegance. After the year 1530,
printed collections began to appear, either the letters of miscellaneous
correspondents in irregular succession, or of single writers; and the
same Bembo whose fame was so great as a Latin correspondent won as high
a position in his own language.[537]
But, at a time and among a people where ‘listening’ was among the chief
pleasures of life, and where every imagination was filled with the
memory of the Roman senate and its great speakers, the orator occupied a
far more brilliant place than the letter-writer.[538] Eloquence had
shaken off the influence of the Church, in which it had found a refuge
during the Middle Ages, and now became an indispensable element and
ornament of all elevated lives. Many of the social hours which are now
filled with music were then given to Latin or Italian oratory; and yet
Bartolommeo Fazio complained that the orators of his time were at a
disadvantage compared with those of antiquity; of three kinds of oratory
which were open to the latter, one only was left to the former, since
forensic oratory was abandoned to the jurists, and the speeches in the
councils of the government had to be delivered in Italian.[539]
The social position of the speaker was a matter of perfect indifference;
what was desired was simply the most cultivated humanistic talent. At
the court of Borso of Ferrara, the Duke’s physician, Jeronimo da
Castello, was chosen to deliver the congratulatory address on the visits
of Frederick III. and of Pius II.[540] Married laymen ascended the
pulpits of the churches at any scene of festivity or mourning, and even
on the feast-days of the saints. It struck the non-Italian members of
the Council of Basel as something strange, that the Archbishop of Milan
should summon Æneas Sylvius, who was then unordained, to deliver a
public discourse at the feast of Saint Ambrogius; but they suffered it
in spite of the murmurs of the theologians, and listened to the speaker
with the greatest curiosity.[541]
Let us glance for a moment at the most frequent and important occasions
of public speaking.
It was not for nothing, in the first place, that the ambassadors from
one state to another received the title of orators. Whatever else might
be done in the way of secret negotiation, the envoy never failed to make
a public appearance and deliver a public speech, under circumstances of
the greatest possible pomp and ceremony.[542] As a rule, however
numerous the embassy might be, one individual spake for all; but it
happened to Pius II., a critic before whom all were glad to be heard, to
be forced to sit and listen to a whole deputation, one after
another.[543] Learned princes who had the gift of speech were themselves
fond of discoursing in Latin or Italian. The children of the House of
Sforza were trained to this exercise. The boy Galeazzo Maria delivered
in 1455 a fluent speech before the Great Council at Venice,[544] and his
sister Ippolita saluted Pope Pius II. with a graceful address at the
Congress of Mantua.[545] Pius himself through all his life did much by
his oratory to prepare the way for his final elevation to the Papal
chair. Great as he was both as scholar and diplomatist, he would
probably never have become Pope without the fame and the charm of his
eloquence. ‘For nothing was more lofty than the dignity of his
oratory.’[546] Without doubt this was a reason why multitudes held him
to be the fittest man for the office, even before his election.
Princes were also commonly received on public occasions with speeches,
which sometimes lasted for hours. This happened of course only when the
prince was known as a lover of eloquence,[547] or wished to pass for
such, and when a competent speaker was present, whether university
professor, official, ecclesiastic, physician, or court-scholar.
Every other political opportunity was seized with the same eagerness,
and according to the reputation of the speaker, the concourse of the
lovers of culture was great or small. At the yearly change of public
officers, and even at the consecration of new bishops, a humanist was
sure to come forward, and sometimes addressed his audience in hexameters
or Sapphic verses.[548] Often a newly appointed official was himself
forced to deliver a speech more or less relevant to his department, as
for instance, on justice; and lucky for him if he were well up in his
part! At Florence even the Condottieri, whatever their origin or
education might be, were compelled to accommodate themselves to the
popular sentiment, and on receiving the insignia of their office, were
harangued before the assembled people by the most learned secretary of
state.[549] It seems that beneath or close to the Loggia dei Lanzi--the
porch where the government was wont to appear solemnly before the
people--a tribune or platform (_rostra ringhiera_) was erected for such
purposes.
Anniversaries, especially those of the death of princes, were commonly
celebrated by memorial speeches. Even the funeral oration strictly
so-called was generally entrusted to a humanist, who delivered it in
church, clothed in a secular dress; nor was it only princes, but
officials, or persons otherwise distinguished, to whom this honour was
paid.[550] This was also the case with the speeches delivered at
weddings or betrothals, with the difference that they seem to have been
made in the palace, instead of in church, like that of Filelfo at the
betrothal of Anna Sforza with Alfonso of Este in the castle of Milan. It
is still possible that the ceremony may have taken place in the chapel
of the castle. Private families of distinction no doubt also employed
such wedding orators as one of the luxuries of high life. At Ferrara,
Guarino was requested on these occasions to send some one or other of
his pupils.[551] The church simply took charge of the religious
ceremonies at weddings and funerals.
The academical speeches, both those made at the installation of a new
teacher and at the opening of a new course of lectures,[552] were
delivered by the professor himself, and treated as occasions of great
rhetorical display. The ordinary university lectures also usually had an
oratorical character.[553]
With regard to forensic eloquence, the quality of the audience
determined the form of speech. In case of need it was enriched with all
sorts of philosophical and antiquarian learning.
As a special class of speeches we may mention the addresses made in
Italian on the battle-field, either before or after the combat.
Frederick of Urbino[554] was esteemed a classic in this style; he used
to pass round among his squadrons as they stood drawn up in order of
battle, inspiring them in turn with pride and enthusiasm. Many of the
speeches in the military historians of the fifteenth century, as for
instance in Porcellius (p. 99), may be, in fact at least, imaginary, but
may be also in part faithful representations of words actually spoken.
The addresses again which were delivered to the Florentine Militia,[555]
organised in 1506 chiefly through the influence of Macchiavelli, and
which were spoken first at reviews, and afterwards at special annual
festivals, were of another kind. They were simply general appeals to the
patriotism of the hearers, and were addressed to the assembled troops in
the church of each quarter of the city by a citizen in armour, sword in
hand.
Finally, the oratory of the pulpit began in the fifteenth century to
lose its distinctive peculiarities. Many of the clergy had entered into
the circle of classical culture, and were ambitious of success in it.
The street-preacher Bernardino da Siena, who even in his lifetime passed
for a saint and who was worshipped by the populace, was not above taking
lessons in rhetoric from the famous Guarino, although he had only to
preach in Italian. Never indeed was more expected from preachers than at
that time--especially from the Lenten preachers; and there were not a
few audiences which could not only tolerate, but which demanded a strong
dose of philosophy from the pulpit.[556] But we have here especially to
speak of the distinguished occasional preachers in Latin. Many of their
opportunities had been taken away from them, as has been observed, by
learned laymen. Speeches on particular saints’ days, at weddings and
funerals, or at the installation of a bishop, and even the introductory
speech at the first mass of a clerical friend, or the address at the
festival of some religious order, were all left to laymen.[557] But at
all events at the Papal court in the fifteenth century, whatever the
occasion might be, the preachers were generally monks. Under Sixtus IV.,
Giacomo da Volterra regularly enumerates these preachers, and criticises
them according to the rules of the art.[558] Fedra Inghirami, famous as
an orator under Julius II., had at least received holy orders and was
canon at St. John Lateran; and besides him, elegant Latinists were now
common enough among the prelates. In this matter, as in others, the
exaggerated privileges of the profane humanists appear lessened in the
sixteenth century--on which point we shall presently speak more fully.
What now was the subject and general character of these speeches? The
national gift of eloquence was not wanting to the Italians of the Middle
Ages, and a so-called ‘rhetoric’ belonged from the first to the seven
liberal arts; but so far as the revival of the ancient methods is
concerned, this merit must be ascribed, according to Filippo
Villani,[559] to the Florentine Bruno Casini, who died of the plague in
1348. With the practical purpose of fitting his countrymen to speak with
ease and effect in public, he treated, after the pattern of the
ancients, invention, declamation, bearing, and gesticulation, each in
its proper connection. Elsewhere too we read of an oratorical training
directed solely to practical application. No accomplishment was more
highly esteemed than the power of elegant improvisation in Latin.[560]
The growing study of Cicero’s speeches and theoretical writings, of
Quintilian and of the imperial panegyrists, the appearance of new and
original treatises,[561] the general progress of antiquarian learning,
and the stores of ancient matter and thought which now could and must
be drawn from--all combined to shape the character of the new eloquence.
This character nevertheless differed widely according to the individual.
Many speeches breathe a spirit of true eloquence, especially those which
keep to the matter treated of; of this kind is the mass of what is left
to us of Pius II. The miraculous effects produced by Giannozzo
Manetti[562] point to an orator the like of whom has not been often
seen. His great audiences as envoy before Nicholas V. and before the
Doge and Council of Venice were events not to be soon forgotten. Many
orators, on the contrary, would seize the opportunity, not only to
flatter the vanity of distinguished hearers, but to load their speeches
with an enormous mass of antiquarian rubbish. How it was possible to
endure this infliction for two and even three hours, can only be
understood when we take into account the intense interest then felt in
everything connected with antiquity, and the rarity and defectiveness of
treatises on the subject at a time when printing was but little
diffused. Such orations had at least the value which we have claimed (p.
232) for many of Petrarch’s letters. But some speakers went too far.
Most of Filelfo’s speeches are an atrocious patchwork of classical and
biblical quotations, tacked on to a string of commonplaces, among which
the great people he wishes to flatter are arranged under the head of the
cardinal virtues, or some such category, and it is only with the
greatest trouble, in his case and in that of many others, that we can
extricate the few historical notices of value which they really contain.
The speech, for instance, of a scholar and professor of Piacenza at the
reception of the Duke Galeazzo Maria, in 1467, begins with Julius Cæsar,
then proceeds to mix up a mass of classical quotations with a number
from an allegorical work by the speaker himself, and concludes with
some exceedingly indiscreet advice to the ruler.[563] Fortunately it was
late at night, and the orator had to be satisfied with handing his
written panegyric to the prince. Filelfo begins a speech at a betrothal
with the words: ‘Aristotle, the peripatetic.’ Others start with P.
Cornelius Scipio, and the like, as though neither they nor their hearers
could wait a moment for a quotation. At the end of the fifteenth century
public taste suddenly improved, chiefly through Florentine influence,
and the practice of quotation was restricted within due limits. Many
works of reference were now in existence, in which the first comer could
find as much as he wanted of what had hitherto been the admiration of
princes and people.
As most of the speeches were written out beforehand in the study, the
manuscripts served as a means of further publicity afterwards. The great
extemporaneous speakers, on the other hand, were attended by shorthand
writers.[564] We must further remember, that all the orations which have
come down to us were not intended to be actually delivered. The
panegyric, for example, of the elder Beroaldus on Ludovico Moro was
presented to him in manuscript.[565] In fact, just as letters were
written addressed to all conceivable persons and parts of the world as
exercises, as formularies, or even to serve a controversial end, so
there were speeches for imaginary occasions[566] to be used as models
for the reception of princes, bishops, and other dignitaries.
For oratory, as for the other arts, the death of Leo X. (1521) and the
sack of Rome (1527) mark the epoch of decadence. Giovio,[567] but just
escaped from the desolation of the eternal city, describes, not
exhaustively, but on the whole truly, the causes of this decline.
‘The plays of Plautus and Terence, once a school of Latin style for the
educated Romans, are banished to make room for Italian comedies.
Graceful speakers no longer find the recognition and reward which they
once did. The Consistorial advocates no longer prepare anything but the
introductions to their speeches, and deliver the rest--a confused
muddle--on the inspiration of the moment. Sermons and occasional
speeches have sunk to the same level. If a funeral oration is wanted for
a cardinal or other great personage, the executors do not apply to the
best orators in the city, to whom they would have to pay a hundred
pieces of gold, but they hire for a trifle the first impudent pedant
whom they come across, and who only wants to be talked of whether for
good or ill. The dead, they say, is none the wiser if an ape stands in a
black dress in the pulpit, and beginning with a hoarse, whimpering
mumble, passes little by little into a loud howling. Even the sermons
preached at great papal ceremonies are no longer profitable, as they
used to be. Monks of all orders have again got them into their hands,
and preach as if they were speaking to the mob. Only a few years ago a
sermon at mass before the Pope, might easily lead the way to a
bishopric.’