Название: The Life of Cesare Borgia
Автор: Rafael Sabatini
Издательство: Bookwire
Жанр: Документальная литература
isbn: 4064066400255
isbn:
Under Innocent’s lethargic rule the Church again began to lose much of the vigour with which Sixtus had inspired it. If the reign of Sixtus had been scandalous, infinitely worse was that of Innocent—a sordid, grasping sensualist, without even the one redeeming virtue of strength that had been his predecessor’s. Nepotism had characterized many previous pontificates; open paternity was to characterize his, for he was the first Pope who, in flagrant violation of canon law, acknowledged his children for his own. He proceeded to provide for some seven bastards, and that provision appears to have been the only aim and scope of his pontificate.
Not content with raising money by the sale of preferments, Innocent established a traffic in indulgences, the like of which had never been seen before. In the Rome of his day you might, had you the money, buy anything, from a cardinal’s hat to a pardon for the murder of your father.
The most conspicuous of his bastards was Francesco Cibo—conspicuous chiefly for the cupidity which distinguished him as it distinguished the Pope his father. For the rest he was a poor-spirited fellow who sorely disappointed Lorenzo de’Medici, whose daughter Maddalena he received in marriage. Lorenzo had believed that, backed by the Pope’s influence, Francesco would establish for himself a dynasty in Romagna. But father and son were alike too invertebrate—the one to inspire, the other to execute any such designs as had already been attempted by the nepots of Calixtus III and Sixtus IV.
Under the weak and scandalous rule of Innocent VIII Rome appears to have been abandoned to the most utter lawlessness. Anarchy, robbery, and murder preyed upon the city. No morning dawned without revealing corpses in the streets; and if by chance the murderer was caught, there was pardon for him if he could afford to buy it, or Tor di Nona and the hangman’s noose if he could not.
It is not wonderful that when at last Innocent VIII died Infessura should have blessed the day that freed the world of such a monster.
But his death did not happen until 1492. A feeble old man, he had become subject to lethargic or cataleptic trances, which had several times already deceived those in attendance into believing him dead. He grew weaker and weaker, and it became impossible to nourish him upon anything but woman’s milk. Towards the end came, Infessura tells us, a Hebrew physician who claimed to have a prescription by which he could save the Pope’s life. For his infusion12 he needed young human blood, and to obtain it he took three boys of the age of ten, and gave them a ducat apiece for as much as he might require of them. Unfortunately he took so much that the three boys incontinently died of his phlebotomy, and the Hebrew was obliged to take to flight to save his own life, for the Pope, being informed of what had taken place, execrated the deed and ordered the physician’s arrest. “Judeus quidem aufugit, et Papa sanatus not est,” concludes Infessura.
Innocent VIII breathed his last on July 25, 1492.
1. In a letter to Francesco Gonzaga.
2. Istorie Florentine.
3. Istoria d’Italia.
4. See the supplement to the Appendix of Thuasne’s edition of Burchard’s Diarium.
5. D’Arignano is as much a fiction as the rest of Infessura’s story.
6. “Facendomi intendere the epsa Duchessa é di etá di anni ventidui, li quali finiranno a questo Aprile; in el qual tempo anche lo Illmo. Duca di Romagna fornirá anni ventisei.”
7. A contract never executed.
8. “Item mes attenent que dita Dona Lucretia a XVIIII de Abril prop. vinent entrará in edat de dotze anys.”
9. The glory of the Sistine Chapel, however, is Michelangelo’s “Last Judgement,” which was added later, in the reign of Pope Julius II (Giuliano della Rovere).
10. The gold florin, ducat, or crown was equal to ten shillings of our present money, and had a purchasing power of five times that amount.
11. Macchiavelli, Istorie Fiorentine.
12. The silly interpretation of this afforded by later writers, that this physician attempted transfusion of blood—silly, because unthinkable in an age which knew nothing of the circulation of the blood—has already been exploded.
CHAPTER III.
ALEXANDER VI
The ceremonies connected with the obsequies of Pope Innocent VIII lasted—as prescribed—nine days; they were concluded on August 5, 1492, and, says Infessura naïvely, “sic finita fuit eius memoria.”
The Sacred College consisted at the time of twenty-seven cardinals, four of whom were absent at distant sees and unable to reach Rome in time for the immuring of the Conclave. The twenty-three present were, in the order of their seniority: Roderigo Borgia, Oliviero Caraffa, Giuliano della Rovere, Battista Zeno, Giovanni Michieli, Giorgio Costa, Girolamo della Rovere, Paolo Fregosi, Domenico della Rovere, Giovanni dei Conti, Giovanni Giacomo Sclafetani, Lorenzo Cibo, Ardicino della Porta, Antoniotto Pallavicino, Maffeo Gerardo, Francesco Piccolomini, Raffaele Riario, Giovanni Battista Savelli, Giovanni Colonna, Giovanni Orsini, Ascanio Maria Sforza, Giovanni de’Medici, and Francesco Sanseverino.
On August 6 they assembled in St. Peter’s to hear the Sacred Mass of the Holy Ghost, which was said by Giuliano della Rovere on the tomb of the Prince of the Apostles, and to listen to the discourse “Pro eligendo Pontefice,” delivered by the learned and eloquent Bishop of Carthage. Thereafter the Cardinals swore upon the Gospels faithfully to observe their trust, and thereupon the Conclave was immured.
According to the dispatches of Valori, the Ferrarese ambassador in Rome, it was expected that either the Cardinal of Naples (Oliviero Caraffa) or the Cardinal of Lisbon (Giorgio Costa) would be elected to the Pontificate; and according to the dispatch of Cavalieri the ambassador of Modena, the King of France had deposited 200,000 ducats with a Roman banker to forward the election of Giuliano della Rovere. Nevertheless, early on the morning of August 11 it was announced that Roderigo Borgia was elected Pope, and we have it on the word of Valori that the election was unanimous, for he wrote on the morrow to the Council of Eight (the Signory of Florence) that after long contention Alexander VI was created “omnium consensum—ne li manco un solo voto.”
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