Page:History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic Vol. III.djvu/423

395 DEATH AND CHARACTER OF FERDINAND. 395 which the great powers were brought into any chaptek thing like a general collision. It was the country, ^^'^' too, in which this crafty policy had been first studied, and reduced to a regular system. A single extract from the political manual of that age^' may serve as a key to the whole science, as then under- stood. " A prudent prince," says Machiavelli, " will not, and ought not to observe his engagements, when it would operate to his disadvantage, and the causes no longer exist which induced him to make them." ^^ Sufficient evidence of the practical appli- cation of the maxim may be found in the manifold treaties of the period, so contradictory, or, what is to the same purpose for our present argument, so confirmatory of one another in their tenor, as clearly to show the impotence of all engagements. There were no less than four several treaties in the course of three years, solemnly stipulating the marriage of the archduke Charles and Claude of France. Louis the Twelfth violated his engagements, and the mar- riage after all never took place. ^^ Such was the school in which Ferdinand was to his shrewd policy. make trial of his skill with his brother monarchs. He had an able instructer in his father, John the Second, of Aragon, and the result showed that the lessons were not lost on him. " He was vigilant, wary, and subtile," writes a French contemporary, 57 Charles V., in particular, tes- 59 Dumont, Corps Diplomatique, tified his respect for Machiavelli, by torn. iv. part. l,nos. 7, 11, 28, 29. having the " Principe " translated — Seyssel, Hist, de Louys XII., for his own use. pp. 228-230. — St. Gelais, Hist. 58 Machiavelli, Opera, torn. vi. de LouysXH., p. 184. II Principe, cap. 18, ed. Genova, 1798.