THE PAPACY DURING THE RENAISSANCE 77 



its splendid growth, and Julius II whose savage temper, 

 fiery oaths, and utterly unscrupulous cunning do not savour 

 of piety did nothing to alter it. 



Then the son of Lorenzo the Magnificent, Leo X, mounted 

 the throne, and the Vatican became again a pleasure-palace. 

 Two of the chief historians of the time accuse him of vice, but 

 I will not press their charges. Beyond any dispute he, at a 

 time when Germany was seething with revolt, maintained 

 about him a band of dissolute cardinals and based a more 

 than princely luxury on a sordid traffic in sacred things. 

 His chief favourite was Cardinal Bibbiena, a man of notorious 

 vice, the author of one of the most indecent comedies of the 

 time, the " Calandria." This comedy, and the equally loose 

 comedies of Machiavelli (" Mandragola " and "Elizia")and 

 Ariosto (" Cassario," " Suppositi," and "Lena"), beside 

 which the comedies of Terence and Plautus are pale and 

 virtuous, were played before Leo and the Papal Court, while 

 Luther thundered in Germany. His official conduct was 

 marked by a duplicity and mendacity to which it would be 

 hard to find a parallel, his dinners were enlivened by the 

 coarsest vulgarity, and his vanity was such that at his death 

 he left more than a hundred thousand pounds' worth of 

 jewels. 



By that time the storm of the Reformation was in full 

 blast, but the Papacy yielded very slowly and reluctantly. 

 Clement VII and Paul III (the brother of Pope Alexander's 

 mistress) vainly endeavoured to retain some at least of the 

 old gaiety and luxury. The latter had been in his time one 

 of the loose-living cardinals, and he resisted the demand 

 of a reforming council until the Church in Europe was 

 threatened with almost total destruction. But the Papacy 

 was compelled to choose between its luxury and its power, 

 the Council of Trent was set to "reform the Church in head 

 and members," and a series of rigorous Popes were called 

 to the throne. The reign of license in the sanctuary was 

 closed. 



So the story runs, even when we have set aside all 

 honestly disputable authorities. I recall it for two reasons. 

 First, because in meeting, as I have frequently done, the 

 Catholic jibes at the morality of pagans, I have briefly 

 retorted that this reign of license at Papal Rome was not 

 less prolonged, and is, in view of the religious character of 

 the persons, far more repulsive. Here I sketch, a little more 

 fully, the chief period to which I refer for comparison, and 



