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brated improvisatore exhibited his talents at the Opera house of Milan. The reading of the theses handed in for the subjects of his poetry was received by a very numerous audience, for the most part in silence, or with laughter; but when the assistant, unfolding one of the papers, exclaimed, "The Apotheosis of Victor Alfieri," the whole theatre burst into a shout, and the applause was continued for some moments. The lot did not fall on Alfieri; and the Signor Sgricci had to pour fourth his extemporary common - places on the bombardment of Algiers. The choise, indeed, is not left to accident quite so much as might be thought from a first view of the ceremony; and the police not only takes care to look at the papers beforehand, but, in case of any prudential after thought, steps in to correct the blindness of chance. The proposal for deifying Alfieri was received with immediate enthusiasm, the rather, because it was conjectured there would be no opportu→ nity of carrying it into effect.

Note 29, page 120, line 9.

Here Machiavell's earth return'd to whence it rose. The affectation of simplicity in sepulchral inscriptions, which so often leaves us uncertain whether the structure before us is an actual depository, or a cenotaph, or a simple memorial not of death but life, has given to the tomb of Machiavelli no information as to the

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Germanis non de Gallis duo triumphant Consules, saying worth a record, were it nothing but a good pun [C. Vell. Paterculi Hist. lib. ii. cap. lxxix. pag. 78. edit. Elzevir, 1639. Ibid. lib. ii. cap. lxxvii.]

place or time of the birth or death, the age or parentage, of the historian.

TANTO NOMINI NVLLVM PAR ELOGIVM

NICCOLAVS MAGHIAVELLI.

There seems at least no reason why the name should not have been put above the sentence which alludes to it.

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It will readily be imagined that the prejudices which have passed the name of Machiavelli into an epithet proverbial of iniquity, exist no longer at Florence. His memory was persecuted as his life had been for an attachment to liberty, incompatible with the new system of despotism, which succeeded the fall of the free governments of Italy. He was put to the torture for being a libertine, " that is, for whishing to restore the republic of Florence; and such are the undying efforts of those who are interested in the perversion not only of the nature of actions, but the meaning of words, that what was once patriotism, has by degrees come to signify debauch. We have ourselves outlived the old meaning of 'liberality,' which is now another word for treason in one country and for infatuation in all. It seems to have been a strange mistake to accuse the author of the Prince, as being a pandar to tyranny; and to think that the inquisition would condemn his work for such a delinquency. The fact is that Machiavelli, as is usual with those against whom no crime can be proved, was suspected of and charged with atheism; and the first and last most violent opposers of the Prince were both Jesuits, one of whom persuaded the Inquition, "benchè fosse tardo," to prohibit the treatise, and

the other qualified the secretary of the Florentine republic as no better than a fool. The father Possevin was proved never to have read the book, and the father Lucchessini not to have understood it. It is clear, however, that such critics must have objected not to the slavery of the doctrines, but to the supposed tendency of a lesson which shows how distinct are the ininterests of a monarch from the happiness of mankind. The Jesuits are re-established in Italy, and the last chapter of the Prince may again call forth a particular refutation, from those who are employed once more in moulding the minds of the rising generation, so as to receive the impressions of despotism. The chapter bears for title, "Esortazione a liberare la Italia dai Barbari,” and concludes with a libertine excitement to the future redemption of Italy. “Non si deve adunque lasciar passare questa occasione, acciocchè la Italia regga dopo tanto tempo apparire un suo redentore. Nè posso esprimere con qual amore ei fusse ricevuto in tutte quelle province, che hanno patilo per queste illuvioni esterne, con qual sete di vendetta, con che ostinata fede, con che lacrime. Quali porte se li serrerebeno? Quali popoli li negherebbeno la obbedienza? Quale Italiano li negherebbe l'ossequio? AD OGNUNO PUZZA QUESTO BARBARO DOMINIO."

I Il Principe di Nicolò Machiavelli, etc. con la prefazione e le note istoriche e politiche di Mr. Amelot de la Houssaye e l'esame e confutazione dell' opera. mopoli, 1769.

Cos

Note 30, page 121, line 10.

Ungrateful Florence! Dante sleeps afar.

Dante was born in Florence in the year 1261. He fought in two battles, was fourteen times ambassador, and once prior of the republic. When the party of Charles of Anjou triumphed over the Bianchi, he was absent on an embassy to Pope Boniface VIII, and was condemned to two years banishment, and to a fine of Sooo lire; on the nonpayment of which he was further punished by the sequestration of all his property. The republic, however, mas not content with this satisfaction, for in 1772 was discovered in the archives at Florence a sentence in which Dante is the eleventh of a list of fifteen condemned in 1302 to be burnt alive; Talis perveniens igne comburatur sic quod moriatur. The pretext for this judgment was a proof of unfair barter, extortions, and illicit gains. Baracteriarum iniquarum, extorsionum, et illicitorum locrorum, ▾ and whith such an accusation it is not strange that Dante should have always protested his innocence, and the injustice of his fellow citizens. His appeal to Florence was accompanied by another to the Emperor Henry, and the death of that sovereign in 1313 was the signal for a sentence of irrevocable banishment, He had before lingered near Tuscany with hopes of recal; then travalled into the north of Italy, Where Verona had to boast of his longest residence, and he finally settled at Ravenna, which was his ordinary but not constant

Storia della Lett. Ital. tom. v. lib. iii. par. 2. p. 448. Tiraboschi is incorrect: the dates of the three decrees against Dante are A. D. 1302, 1314 and 1316.

abode until his death. The refusal of the Venetians to grant him a public audience, on the part of Guido Novello da Polenta his protector is said to have been the principal cause of this event, which happened in 1321. He was buried ("in sacra minorum aede,") at Ravenna, in a handsome tomb, which was erected by Guido, restored by Bernardo Bembo in 1483, pretor for that republic which had refused to hear him, again restored by Cardinal Corsi in 1692, and replaced by a more magnificent sepulchre, constructed in 1780 at the expense of the Cardinal Luigi Valenti Gonzaga. The offence or misfortune of Dante was an attachment to a defeated party, and, as his least fa-vourable biographers allege against him, too great a freedom of speech and haughtiness of manner. But the

next age paid honous almost divine to the exile. The Florentines, having in vain and frequently attempted to recover his body, crowned his image in a church, L and his picture is still one of the idols of their cathedral. They struck medals, they raised statues to him. The cities of Italy, not being able to dispute obout his own birth, contended for that of his great poem, and the Florentines thought it for their honour to prove that he had finished the seventh Canto, before they drove him from his native city. Fifty-one years after his death, they endowed a professorial chair for the expounding of his verses, and Boccaccio was appointed to this patriotic employment. The example was imitated by Bologna and Pisa,and the commentators, if they

So relates Ficiro, but some think his coronation only an allegory. See Storia, etc. ut sup. p. 453.

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