Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/164

Rh 146 phon, Strabo, Lucian, Orpheus, Arrian, Dio, Procopius, Diodorus of Sicily, and Plato. At tlie same time they made Oriental architecture their own, impressing oa it the stamp of their special needs and national genius. The Arabs gave them the manufacture of gunpowder and glass, and taught them decorative art ; and from Persia they learned to weave costly tissues ; while their plastic arts retained a reflexion of the sunny lands which, for geo graphical reasons, were the source of their riches and the chief object of their preoccupation. The architecture, the painting, and the sculpture of Venice are separately treated (see below). Nor must it be forgotten that the city wel comed from the first the art of printing, and stamped it with its own individuality. Venice, more than any other town, has the credit of having rescued from oblivion, by editions and translations, the masterpieces of Greek litera ture. The work of the elder Aldus in this direction from 1495 to 1515 has been spoken of in the article MANUTITJS (q.v.). The literary talent of Venice did not shine in works of imagination ; but on the utilitarian side it was really great and original. In Venice history was written to order, and so is open to suspicion. In poetry, if we may cite Pietro Bembo, Molza, Berni, Lodovico Dolce, Doni, Niccolo Franco, Rucellai, Sperone Speroni, and L. Aretino, whom his contemporaries called II Divino, as all Venetians or refugees claiming the greater freedom of thought which Venice then afforded, we must yet admit the lack of a name of world -wide significance, a Dante or a Moliere. But the library of St Mark s shows the respect of the republic for letters; the building that housed the MS. collections bequeathed by Petrarch and Cardinal Bessarion is, perhaps, the most perfect model of 16th-century architecture; and the librarian of the Marciana was, in virtue of his office, so high a personage that he had a title to be voted on by the senate and the great council for the ducal crown. Such was Venice at the close of the 16th century, when some clearness of vision was still needed to foretell the approaching decay. She still had colonies, but their pre- century. servation became more difficult with the declining resources of the state. The customs were less productive, and the senate vainly sought to improve them by instituting at this period the &quot;consuls of the merchants,&quot; the &quot;provisors of commerce,&quot; the five &quot;experts in exchanges.&quot; Manners, too, were degenerating into indolence and luxury, and the courtesans of Venice were more famous than those of Rome. The proveditori alle pompe were designed to check the dilapidations of young patricians on the wealth their ancestors had gained by trade, and the like wastefulness of plain citizens, who consoled themselves for their exclusion from public charges and honours by squandering in idle profusion the money gained by trading commissions and illicit pursuits. If the old senators who had known austerer times were privately exercised by the perils approaching the state, they were careful in public to conceal its weakness and dazzle strangers by the splendour of their pomps and receptions, and the Oriental gorgeousness of their palaces, churches, and processions, as was seen in the magnificent fetes given in 1574 to Henry III. on his way to assume the throne of France. 1 They desired to make the king an ally as well as a guest, and some time later favourably en tertained his proposal for a loan of 100,000 crowns of gold. In 1575 the city was visited by the plague, the almost inevitable consequence of such constant communi cation with the East. Forty thousand Venetians fell, and the scourge passed on to the mainland, which it ravaged for four months. Next year the doge Mocenigo died, and the election fell to the old sea-lion Sebastian Venieri, the 1 The commemorative inscription can still be read on the threshold of the Hall of Giants. [HISTORY. hero of Lepanto, who already reckoned three &quot;most serene princes &quot; in his family. He niled but two years, and his last days were marred by the conflagration of the ducal palace. His successor was Nicolo da Ponte, a greybeard of eighty-eight years, whose age showed that in the doge the Venetians sought rather the symbol than the reality of authority. Yet he reigned for seven years, full of peace and useful public works : the ducal palace rose from its ruins ; the procurable or offices for the guardians of noble orphans were completed ; Palladio fulfilled the vow of the senate on the occasion of the late plague by erect ing the marble bridge of the Hialto to replace the old wooden structure, and began the church of the Redeemer ; and Corfu and the Friulian frontier were fortified. The peace of Italy had been mainly due to the religious wars of France ; but the senate had wisely sought and maintained the friendship of Henry III., and after his death in 1589 had been sagacious enough to be the first of European powers to recognize Henry of Navarre, thus securing a vigorous ally against Spain, which had turned against the republic since the battle of Lepanto. The French alliance proved durable ; Henry IV. mediated be tween Venice and the duke of Savoy, and on his marriage with Mary de Medici his name was inscribed in the Book of Gold. The doge Pasquale Cicogna, elected in 1585, was sue- Rivalry ceeded in 1595 by Marino Grimani, whose rule was marked between by grave dissensions between the senate and the Vatican. Velllce The house of Este came to an end in 1597, Pope Clement fj&quot; VIII. declaring Caesar d Este, the nephew of Alphonso II., duke of Ferrara, incapable of succeeding him. But Venice supported his claims and was ready to enforce them by war, when he ceded Ferrara to the pope, contenting him self with the dukedom of Modena and Reggio. This solution brought the Vatican into a permanent rivalry with Venice, a grave matter, since at the beginning of the century Ceesar Borgia had seized the Romagna in the name of Alexander VI., and Julius II. had occupied Bologna, so that the Estates of the Church bordered on those of the republic. There were other causes of dis sension also : Venice had never been on cordial terms with the Papacy; the recognition of Henry of Navarre had given umbrage at Rome ; and, though peace was made for a time, the quarrel recommenced, and in 1606 Paul V. launched an interdict at the republic. Venice affected the greatest formal respect for the holy see ; the legate sat by the side of the doge and took precedence of princes as well as ambassadors ; but under all the forms of respect the ex travagant pretensions of the popes were constantly repelled with inflexible firmness and energy. The ambassadors of Venice at Rome were always chosen from the most ex perienced and active men of affairs, and, though the pope had nearer relations with Venice than any other friendly sovereign, churchmen were constantly excluded from all political and civil posts in the republic. A man, it was held, could not serve two masters. Nay, in all discussions bearing on relations with Rome, whether in the senate or the great council, the usher s call &quot;Fuori i Papalisti &quot; ex cluded from the deliberations, not only patricians whose ties of family or interest bound them to the sacred see, but all who even held what would now be called ultramontane opinions. The Venetian clergy made no contribution to public burdens ; the tithes required in time of war could be raised only by a special papal brief, and this privilege the seriate claimed the right to suppress. To this Sixtus V. had consented ; but his successor was less complaisant. In face of the new pretensions of the Vatican the Venetians multiplied restrictive measures against the clergy, and the conflict grew hotter on both sides, till Paul V. laid the republic under the interdict, a step that still struck terror