Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/527

Rh ALEXANDER VI. 489 aggrandisement. The incurable vice, however, of his policy was imposed upon him by the lack of men and money to carry it into effect. To obtain the former, he was compelled to incline alternately to France and Spain, degrading the majesty of the Holy See, and forfeiting his liberty of action as a member of the Italian body politic. The finances had to be recruited by the sale of offices and spiritual privileges of every kind. Such practices had long been prevalent at Rome, but never had they attained the enormity, the effrontery, or the method imparted to them by Alexander. His enterprise was at first unfortunate. After some petty successes the papal forces were routed by the Orsini, January 1497. Spanish aid was invoked; the Great Captain checked the Orsini and recovered Ostia. Alex ander s spirits rose ; on 7th June he alienated Benevento in favour of his eldest son, the Duke of Gandia. That day week the duke disappeared ; his body, pierced with wounds, was soon found in the Tiber. The public voice attributed the murder to the pope s second son, the Cardinal Caesar Borgia, but on no other grounds than his capability of any atrocity, and the gain that accrued to him by this. Some historians know what he said to the pope in confessing his fratricide, and can report the pope s rejoinder; so is history written. Alexander secluded himself in a passion of grief. He talked of abdication, and actually appointed a commission to inquire into the abuses of the Church. While it ineffectually deliberated on reforms, the stake was preparing for a real reformer. The history of Savonarola must be related elsewhere ; it can only be said here that Alexander appears to have been most unwilling to proceed against him, and only to have consented to do so when the Dominican s hostile attitude rendered further forbearance impossible. Cassar Borgia, meanwhile, was bent on improving the opportunity which he had found or made. Three months after Savonarola s death he propounded to the assembled cardinals his desire to renounce ecclesiastical orders for his soul s health, and was soon at liberty to contract a royal alliance. After encountering a refusal from the daughter of the King of Naples he repaired to France, and there (May 1499) espoused a princess of the house of Navarre, receiving the title of Duke of Valentinois from the French king. Lucretia also benefited by her family s enlarged views ; her alliance with the lord of Pesaro was dissolved on a pretext of nullity, and she married the Duke of Bisceglia, a natural son of the King of Naples. This had occurred a year previously, when Alexander still attached weight to the Neapolitan alliance ; but the political horizon was now changed. In October 1499 a French army crossed the Alps and conquered Lombardy, almost without resist ance. The watchword was thus given for the papal campaign in the Romagna. Caterina Sforza, regent of Imola and Forli, received a summons to discharge certain arrears long owing to her suzerain. Caesar Borgia followed with an army on the heels of the messenger, and although the intrepid princess defended herself stoutly by sword and poison, she was compelled to succumb to the &quot; Gonfalonier of the Church.&quot; The Borgias enterprise coincided fortunately with the commencement (according to the then method of reckoning) of the new century and the mighty concourse of pilgrims to Rome for the jubilee, each representing some substantial contribution to the papal exchequer. France and Spain, meanwhile, had concerted their secret arrangement for the dispossession of the King of Naples, and Caesar Borgia prepared to remove the only obstacle to his own participation in it. In July 1500 the Duke of Bisceglia, Lucretia s Neapolitan husband, was attacked by assassins in broad day, and left desper ately voundcd. The pope placed guards over the prince ; Lucretia and her sister-in-law prepared his food to avoid poison ; but none the less &quot; quum ex vulneribus sibi datis mori noluisset&quot; Alphonso of Bisceglia was strangled by men in masks. &quot; All Rome,&quot; writes the Venetian ambassador, &quot; trembles before the duke,&quot; The worst times of the empire seemed returned, even to the amuse ments of the amphitheatre, where Caesar, whose tastes were those of a Spaniard, despatched six bulls successively, severing the head of one from the shoulders at a stroke. The pope looked on helplessly at the Frankenstein of his own creation ; &quot;he loves and hugely fears his son,&quot; reports the Venetian, who adds that Caesar had pursued his father s favourite secretary to his arms, and there butchered him, the pope s robe being saturated with the gushing blood. Alexander s easy temper stood him in good stead. &quot; The pope,&quot; according to the same authority, &quot; grows younger every day, and is extremely cheerful ; his cares and troubles endure only for a night ; he thinks continually of aggrandising his children ne d altro ha euro,&quot; In his conversations with foreign envoys he excused his son s violence as the error of youth. &quot; The duke,&quot; he said, &quot;is really a good fellow; it is only a pity that he cannot endure to be offended.&quot; Lucretia is extolled by all as &quot; lovely, discreet, and bountiful.&quot; Rumour, indeed, imputed to her an incestuous connection with her brother ; but this aspersion, like all others upon her, is to this day utterly destitute of proof. &quot; These devils cannot be cast out by holy water,&quot; Cardinal Juan Borgia had formerly reported of the turbu lent occupants of the Romagna. The experiment of casting out Satan by Beelzebub remained to be tried. In April 1501 Cassar entered upon his second campaign, and by perfidy or force quickly added Pesaro, Rimini, and Faenza to his former possessions. Attentive to the maxims of sagacious tyranny, he governed with substantial justice. If his coffers had to be filled by oppression, the odium would be cast on some subordinate agent, whose body, his mission fulfilled, would be found dismembered in the market-place. France and Spain, meanwhile, pro ceeded to the spoliation of the defenceless king of Naples, and Caesar (July 1501) shared in the conquest and the booty. In September Alexander himself undertook a campaign against the Colonnas, and humbled those haughty patricians by the capture of all their castles. Lucretia, to the general scandal, represented him in his absence. Worse scandals were in store, could we implicitly credit the con temporary diarist s account of the scenes enacted in the apostolic palace after Alexander s return, but the passage is probably interpolated. At this period the papal court was engrossed with preparations for Lucretia s marriage to Alphonso, son of the Duke of Ferrara, which was celebrated by proxy in December. The pope s daughter, cardinals and prelates in her train, undertook a stately progress through Italy to Ferrara, where she was received with extraordinary splendour. Piombino was reduced at this time, and in July Caesar treacherously rendered himself master of Urbino. Immediately afterwards his power received a severe shock from the defection of his principal condottieri. Caesar temporised until, to the admiration of Machiavelli, then Florentine envoy at his camp, his adver saries were decoyed into his hands, seized, and executed (31st December 1502). The news gave the signal at Rome for the arrest of the Orsini and the occupation of their castles ; thus was the humiliation of the Roman aristocracy completed. Cardinal Orsino was committed to Saint Angelo, where the services of the papal master of the ceremonies were soon required for his interment. &quot; But I,&quot; remarks Burcardus with quaint naivete&quot;, &quot; turned the business over to my assistant, for I did not want to know more than was good for me.&quot; It must be owned that in I. 62