NORTHWESTERN
UNI VERSITY
LIBRARY
EVANSTON
ILLINOIS
IPSISSIMA, I'. I'AULI N'ENETI, VIKI AD MlKACl'Ll'M DOCTl,
INTEtlKI, Jl'STI, DBDOKMIENTIS IN DOMIND, EKEU.IES,
Si'l' iSl
FRA PAOLO SARPI
THE
«Greatest of tlji S^mtians
by the
REV. ALEXANDER ROBERTSON.
author of "count campeelo and catholic reform in
italy."
With Illustrations and a fac-simili Letter.
NEW YORK
THOMAS WHITTAKER
2 AND 3 Bible House
1894
[iill rights reserved,^
PREFACE
For over three hundred years, Fra Paolo Sarpi, the
Greatest of the Venetians, has been before the
world, and throughout the greater part of these
centuries he has been known as, to use the words
of Gibbon, " the incomparable historian of the
Council of Trent," and yet an edition of that classic
work has never been set up from his original
manuscript in St. Mark's Library in the Doge's
Palace. For nearly three hundred years the famous
Decree of the old Venetian Republic, that a monu¬
ment should be erected to his name and fame in
Venice, stood unhonoured on the Statute Book, in
spite of every effort put forth by patriotic citizens
throughout that period to carry it out. For over
two hundred years his body found no secure resting-
place, but had to be built up into walls and altars,
concealed in private houses, and surreptitiously intro¬
duced in boxes, " contents unknown," into seminaries
and libraries, to hide it from the wolf-like hunt of its
enemies.
iv
PREFACE.
But now a project is on foot for the publication
of his Tridentine History from the long neglected
manuscript. On the 20th of September, 1892, his
statue was unveiled in Venice, amid the rejoicings
not only of the Venetians, but of the whole Italian
people. And his body has at last found an honoured
resting-place in the church of the quiet Campo
Santo, on the island of San Michele.
These facts are sufficient to show the tremendous
forces that have been in operation for centuries to
hide Fra Paolo Sarpi and his work from public
view ; but they also show that now at length times
have changed, and these forces, if not destroyed,
are held in check, and the wrongs done to his
memory are being redressed ; whilst liberty has
been secured for all to examine his character, and
his writings, and to set forth his worth.
I have called Fra Paolo Sarpi the Greatest of
the Venetians. The words express my own inde¬
pendent estimate of the man, and I use them the
more confidently in the title to this biography,
because, since choosing them, I have learned that
they accord with the judgment of the leading
Venetians themselves. Venice has produced many
great men—Doges, soldiers, sailors, statesmen,
writers, poets, painters, travellers—^but I agree with
Mrs. Oliphant, that Fra Paolo is " a personage more
grave and great, a figure unique in the midst of
this ever animated, strong, stormy, and restless
PREFACE.
V
race ; " and with Lord Macaulay, who has said of
him that "what he did, he did better than
anybody." I believe that it is impossible to produce
from the long roll of the mighty sons of Venice,
one name to be placed above, or even to be set
beside his. He was supreme as a thinker, as a
man of action, and as a transcript and pattern of
every Christian principle.
In the domain of astronomy, Galileo called him,
" My father and my master." As a mathematician
the same great authority said, " No man in Europe
surpasses Master Paolo Sarpi in his knowledge of
the science of mathematies." As an anatomist,
making invaluable discoveries, such as that of the
valves of the veins, and dividing with Dr. Harvey
the honour of that of the circulation of the blood,
Acquapendente, the famous surgeon of Padua,
called him, "The oracle of this century." As a
magnetician. Porta of Naples, and Gilbert of
Colchester, acknowledged his learning, the former
saying, " I do not blush, but confess myself honoured
to confess, that many things concerning magnetic
phenomena 1 have learned from Fra Paolo, a true
ornament of light, not only of Venice, but of Italy,
and of the whole world." The Frenchman Vieta,
and the Scotsman Robert Anderson, sent him
their books on algebra and geometry for revision.
As a metaphysician, in his work " The Art of
Thinking Well," he anticipated, as Lord Macaulay
vi
PREFACE.
says, Lxjcke in his "Essay on the Understanding;"
and the same holds true in regard to some of the
discoveries of Kepler. Foreigners who came to
Venice sought above all things to see him as
"the greatest genius of his age;" and Dr. Wm.
Bedell, chaplain to Sir Henry Wotton, the English
Ambassador at the Court of the Republic, writing
to the tutor of Henry, Prince of Wales, said Era
Paolo was " holden for a miracle in all manner
of knowledge, divine and human." As a states¬
man, the great Republic of Venice committed all
its interests to his guidance, and he made its
history, while he lived, an unbroken series of
triumphs ; and, in an age when the Papacy lifted
high its head, and rode roughshod over the rights
of kings and peoples, he forced Pope Paul V., one
of the haughtiest of Rome's Pontiffs, to his knees,
and so shattered in his hands the weapon of
Interdict and Excommunication that never again
has it served the interests of a wearer of the tiara.
Constitutional government everywhere owes some¬
thing to Era Paolo ; and modern Italian history is
the outcome and embodiment of the principles he
laid down in his voluminous State Papers. He
was stronger than the Papacy, for, in spite of the
hatred, persecution, and protest of Pope and
Curia, he lived and died within the pale of the
Church, enjoying the esteem and affection of its
clergy, performing all his priestly duties, and
PREFACE.
receiving, as the Senate wrote in its circular
announcing his death to the Courts of Europe, " li
santtssimi sagramenti con ogni maggior pieth" And
he was stronger than the Republic, for immediately
after his death, it began to succumb to Papal
domination, and to totter to its fall. And yet
with all his greatness he was, to use the words
of Sir Henry Wotton, " One of the humblest
things that could be seen within the bounds of
humanity ; the very pattern of the precept, ' quanta
doctiory tanto suhmissior^ " Well might Dr. Robert
Sanderson, Bishop of Lincoln, lament to Izaak
Walton, " O that I had gone chaplain to that
excellently accomplished gentleman, your friend Sir
Henry Wotton, which was once intended when
he first went Ambassador to the State of Venice,
for by that employment .... I might also
have known, or at least have had the satisfaction
of seeing, one of the late miracles of general
learning, prudence, and modesty. Sir Henry Wotton's
dear friend Padre Paolo .... a man whose
fame must never die, till virtue and learning shall
become so useless as not to be regarded."
Such was Era Paolo Sarpi in the estimation of his
contemporaries, and such I have seen him to be as I
have studied his works, and the records of his life. I
have endeavoured in the following pages to set him
forth as I have found him, although I am conscious
that there is much yet to be learned and to be told of
• • •
VIH
PREFACE.
his greatness. The work has been to me a labour of
love, and an unbroken source of interest and delight.
Living in Venice, in the changed times to which I
have referred, when "the heresies of the sixteenth
century have become the inviolable conquests of
the nineteenth," and when "the reprobates of that
age have become the heroes of this," I have been able
to draw my facts from the many books and manu¬
scripts, written by and about Fra Paolo Sarpi, that
now lie open to the inspection of all in the great
libraries of the city. A reference to these will be
found in the course of the narrative, but here I desire
to mention specially amongst Italian biographies
that of Fra Fulgenzio Micanzio, who, living with
Fra Paolo, by day as his private secretary in the
Doge's Palace, and by night as his brother-friar
within the same monastic walls, knew him as perhaps
no other could, and who was linked to him with love
and admiration as disinterested and beautiful as that
which bound Jonathan to David. Of English books
on Fra Paolo, which are all too few, I have consulted
his life written by Miss Campbell, and T. Adolphus
Trollope's " Paul the Pope, and Paul the Friar." The
year 1892 having been a fertile one in Italy in the
production of literature bearing on Fra Paolo,
owing to the erection of his monument in Venice, to
which attaches such a unique history, I have been
aided in my researches by the Italian press, and by
the pamphlets of distinguished Venetians, which throw
PREFACE.
ix
light on special features of his life, and above all by
the writings of Commendatore Alessandro Pascolato,
a member of the Senate of Italy, to whom I am also
indebted for the fac-simile of a letter of Fra
Paolo's, inserted in this work.
ALEXANDER ROBERTSON.
Ca' San Leonardo,
Venice.
December, 1893.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
The Scholar.
1552—1570. cetat. I—18.
page
Pietro Sarpi's Birth . i
Character of his Father i
Character of his Mother, his first Teacher ... 2
His Uncle, a Priest, his second Teacher . ... 2
The Scuola del Cristo ....... 2
Pietro's wonderful Memory 3
'* We to our frivolities, Perino to his books " . . . 4
Perino's School Friendships .....*. 4
A Servite Friar his third Teacher 5
Origin of the Order of the Servites 5
Their Monastery and Church in Venice .... 6
Pietro enters the Monastery, and becomes Paolo . . 7
His Foster-father, Fra Giulio 7
Paolo the Thinker and Critic 8
He shakes his Master's Faith in Duns Scotus ... 8
He becomes the public Disputant 9
He disputes at the Frari 9
He disputes at Mantua
He disputes again at Mantua 10
Bishop Boldrino appoints him Professor . . . .11
The Duke of Gonzaga appoints him Theologian . . 11
Yearly Book-grant from his Confraternity . . .11
xii
contents.
CHAPTER II.
The Professor.
1570—1578. cetat. 18—26.
page
Order of the Barnabites at Mantua . . . . .12
Era Paolo lodged in their Monastery .... 12
The Wine and Water Struggle ..... 13
Bishop Boldrino gains in him a good Professor . . 13
He is accused of Heresy ....... 13
He nonpluses in Hebrew the Inquisitor .... 14
The Stripling David at Gonzaga's palace ... 14
He gains in Breadth and Freedom of Thought . . 15
The Influence of the Reformation ..... 15
The Influence of the Council of Trent .... 16
Fra Paolo gathers Facts about the Council ... 16
He resolves to write its History . . . . »17
He takes Holy Orders 18
His Reasons for leaving Mantua . . . . .18
The Horoscope of the Mule 18
The Imprisonment of a friar ...... 19
Fra Paolo called to " come up higher " .... 19
Non verra mai più un Fra Paolo " .... 19
At Milan with Cardinal Borromeo 20
Fra Paolo's views on Confession ..... 20
Borromeo aids him in his Tridentine History . . .21
Back to Venice as Professor of Philosophy in his Monastery 21
Plague of 1576 in Venice 21
Death of Fra Paolo's Mother 21
Church and Festival of II Redentore .... 22
He becomes Professor of Mathematics .... 22
He receives the Degree of Doctor from the University of
Padua .......... 22
H is Friendship with Arnauld Ferrier .... 22
Ferrier at the Council of Trent 23
Ferrier advocates the Gallican Church Liberties . . 23
Other Reforms advocated by Ferrier # ... 23
contents.
xüi
page
Fra Paolo's Devotion to Study 24
A List of the Subjects he mastered 24
The moral Weight of his Character ..... 25
" Padrone dise'^ 25
E qua la Sposa 25
The Scriptures in the Vernacular 26
Fra Paolo " railroading his Bible " ..... 26
He frames his Life by Christ's precepts .... 26
He lends, " hoping for Nothing again " .... 26
The Promise fulfilled " your Reward shall be great " . 26
CHAPTER III.
The Provincial and Procurator.
1579—1588. œtat. 27—36.
Fra Paolo elected Provincial 27
The Duties of this Office 27
He is elected Reggente lo Studio ..... 28
Chapter of the Servîtes held at Parma .... 28
The Farnese Family and Pope Paul III 28
Fra Paolo once more the Theological Disputant . . 29
The " fretting Leprosy " of Monasteries .... 29
How dealt with in England 29
Disorders in the Servite Houses 30
The Remedy determined upon 30
Fra Paolo President of the Triumvirate .... 31
Unification of the Servite Constitution carried out at Rome 31
Fra Paolo's Fame as a Legislator 31
His Struggle with the Jesuits 32
He combats Mariolatry ....... 32
He traces the Origin and Growth of Mariolatry . . 33
He goes to Rome for the Election of a General . . 34
The Gregorian Calendar brought into use • • • 35
Fra Paolo elected Procurator 35
The Nature of this office 36
xiv
contents.
PAGE
Fra Paolo and the Swineherd Pope 36
Sixtus V. dying à propos for the Jesuits .... 37
Ecclesiastics jealous of Fra Paolo 37 '
He despises Church Dignities ...... 38
H is Friendship with Bellarmine and Bobadilla . . 38
Father Bobadilla's criticism of his own Order ... 38
Fra Paolo and Cardinal Castagna, Urban VII. . . 39
Ideo raptus est ne malitia mutaret intellectum ejus . 39
Fra Paolo's Studies 39
CHAPTER IV.
The Scientist and Philosopher.
1589—1605. cetat. 37—53.
Loss of Fra Paolo's earlier Manuscripts .... 40
Our Sources of Information ...... 41
His " Pensieri" in St. Mark's Library .... 41
His Letters ......... 42
Testimony of his Contemporaries 43
His Biography by Fra Fulgenzio 43
Lando's Extracts in the Archives 43
Fra Paolo's Polemical Works 44
Current popular Judgment 44
His Devotion to Anatomy 44
His Discovery of the Valves of the Veins ... 45
His Discovery of the Circulation of the Blood ... 46
Indebtedness of Harvey to Fra Paolo .... 47
Fra Paolo and Animal Statics ...... 47
His discoveries in Optics ....... 47
Oracolo di questo Secolo ....... 48
His Study of Astronomy 48
Testimony of Galileo ....... 48
With Galileo he constructs the Telescope . . 49
Frescoes of him and Galileo at Florence . . 49
CONTRNTS.
XV
PAGE
He foretells Galileo's Fate .... *49
His Study of Heat and Light 50
With Galileo he invents the Thermometer ... 50
His Study of Sound and Colour ..... 50
He explains Iridescence of old Glass .... 50
He anticipates Kepler 50
His Study of Pneumatics 51
H is Study of Hydrostatics 51
H is Study of Magnetism 51
He corresponds with Wm. Gilbert of Colchester . . 51
*'The Ornament of the World " ..... 52
He invents the Declinometer 52
He is the greatest Mathematician in Europe ... 52
He invents Proportional Compasses 52
He corrects Vieta's Algebra 52
His Correspondence with R. Anderson .... 52
"UArte di ben pensare " . . . . . . »53
He anticipates Locke 53
His Study of Metallurgy and Chemistry .... 53
" Manugna's fine gold " . . . . . . -54
His Knowledge of Architecture, Botany, &c. • • • 55
His inventive Genius «55
II Miracolo di questo Secolo ...... 56
His Religious Works 57
He frequents Ridotti 57
The Ridotto of Morosini the Historian .... 58
The Ridotto of the Aldos 58
The Aldine Printing-press and Classics • • . . 5q
The Ridotto at Sechini's Nave d^Oro .... 60
" The greatest Genius of his Time " .... 60
The Ridotto of Penelli at Padua 61
His Journey to Rome on behalf of Fra Giulio ... 61
His Journey to Rome on behalf of his Order ... 61
H is Journey to Ferrara with Mocenigo .... 62
He meets Clement VIII. at Ferrara .... 62
He is refused two Bishoprics 63
Strained Relations between Venice and the Pope . . 64
xv¡
contents.
PAGE
Dispute about trading with Heretics 64
The Pope deceives Venice about Patriarch ... 64
The present Italian Government and the Patriarch . . 65
Dispute about Venetian Book-trade .... 65
The Index and the Concordat 65
The Pope's Grudge against him 65
Fra Paolo counsels Resistance 66
Fra Paolo and the Bishopric of Melopotamus ... 66
^'Le sue Pianelli cannonizzate" . . . . 67
Fra Paolo and Sir Henry Wotton ..... 67
Fra Paolo and Dr. William Bedell 67
CHAPTER V.
The Theological Counsellor.
1606—1607. cetat. 54—55.
The Law Counsellors of the Republic .... 68
A Theological Counsellor wanted 68
Fra Paolo chosen 68
He accepts Office with his General's Consent ... 69
His Secretary Fra Fulgenzio 69
He becomes sole Counsellor for life 69
The Senate's treatment of him 70
Paul v., the make-shift Pope 71
The braggart Cardinal becomes the coward Pope . . 72
The " perspiring " Madonna at Subiaco .... 72
The Flemish Astrologer's prediction .... 72
The Pope unmanned by Superstition .... 73
A Pagan Cure 73
Astrology at Oxford "73
Quarrels of Pope Paul V. with the Republic • • • 73
The Installation of a Patriarch 74
Taxing Priests for the Ramparts of Brescia ... 74
Imprisonment of offending Ecclesiastics .... 74
Passing of Ecclesiastical Property Laws .... 75
CONTENTS.
xvii
PAGE
A fattening Church and a famishing Country ... 76
The Pope not seeking the ** Things that make for Peace " 76
His Minatory Briefs ........ 77
The new Doge, Leonardo Donato 77
Duel between the Pope and the Friar .... 78
Arguing the Case de jure 78
Pope Leo Xth.'s In cœna Domini ..... 78
Fra Paolo advises the de facto Course .... 79
He goes back to first Principles 80
European Opinion on the side of Venice .... 81
The Die cast 82
Venice under Interdict and Excommunication ... 82
The Nature of these Maledictions ..... 82
Seven previous Interdicts against Venice .... 83
Spiritual Arms serve Temporal Uses .... 84
Pope Paul V. counts without his Host .... 85
The Pope commands, the Republic forbids ... 85
The " Protest " of the Republic ..... 86
Catholicism versus Popery ...... 87
The Loyalty of the Clergy 87
Recalcitrant Priests ........ 87
The crafty Jesuits ........ 88
''Andè in Malora'^ ........ 89
The Jesuits' Mould for Caps ...... 90
The Interdict a dead Letter 90
Europe offers help to Venice 90
The Pope's " most cunning Invention " . . . .90
Fra Paolo summoned to Rome ...... 91
"La Fune ed il Fuocof or the Rope and the Stake . . 91
His Books burnt in lieu of him . . . . . ■ 91
Bribery and foul Play 92
The Senate doubles Fra Paolo's Stipend • • • • 93
He is Excommunicated -93
Pope Paul begins to knuckle down 94
Venice besieged by Advisers 94
England's Conduct under an Interdict • • • • 95
King James offers to help Venice with Arms • • . 95
b
xviii
contents.
PAGE
Efforts to introduce Protestantism into Venice ... 96
Fra Paolo a Catholic Reformer ..... 97
Christianity in Venice in the i6th Century ... 98
Order of Baptism and Visitation . . . . . 98
King James's " Premonition " . . . . . • 99
Fra Paolo's Counsel to Sir H. Wotton .... 99
Nature of King James's Book ...... 100
Spain threatens through Don di Castro .... loi
France flatters through Cardinal de Joyeuse . . . loi
Pope Paul beaten to his Knees ...... 102
Reconciliation effected ....... 103
Venice spurns both Absolution and Benediction . . 104
The blank " St. James's Day " . ..... 104
The Pope seeks to save a Rag of Credit .... 105
The Proud Pope vanquished by the Humble Friar . . 105
CHAPTER VI.
The Martyr.
1607. œtat. 55.
How Fra Paolo is regarded by Senate and Pope . .106
He is appointed by Senate sole Counsellor . . . 106
He is given Access to the State Archives .... 107
He is desired by the Pope as a Peace-offering . . 108
The Pope seeks to lure him to Rome . . . . 109
The Pope instructs de Joyeuse and the Nuncio to damage
him . . . , . . . . . .no
Pope Paul grasps the Assassin's Knife . . . .no
The Pope's *'long Arm " . . ... . . .in
The Ambassador reveals a Plot . . . . .111
Conspirators captured at the Frontier . . . .112
Fra Paolo's Body-guard 113
The black 5th of October ^*3
Fra Paolo stabbed on the Bridge 114
contents. xix
PAGE
" Videat Dominus et requirat . . • • - HS
" Stylo Romance Curiœ^^ . . . . . • - HS
The Chemist and the Stiletto II5
Denouncement of the Assassins 116
Their Escape to Papal Territory Ii6
Pope Paul the Author of the Plot . . . . • 117
Who his Instruments were . . . . . • n?
The " Wages of Iniquity " . . . . . .118
A Pilgrimage to Loreto . . . . . . . iig
The Pope's bad Debt recovery Scheme . . . .119
He breaks Faith with the Assassins . • . . .120
Poma's Imprisonment and Death . . . . .120
" Rejoice not when thine Enemy falleth " . . .121
Era Paolo's Expenses voted Materia Publica . . .122
His Stipend again doubled 122
Measures to protect his Life 123
"He that is greatest shall be your Servant " . . .123
His Letter to de Lisle Groslot about his Assassination . 124
" Dei Filio Liberator" . . . . . . .125.
CHAPTER VIL
The Statesman-Author.
1608—1623. cetat. 56—71.
Fra Paolo Sarpi back at his Post 126
The Sovereign Guide of the Republic . . . .127
The Sovereign Guide of the People 127
The Dutch Ambassador's Ambition 127
The " Dagger " the Hope of the Papacy . . . .128
A Period of Literary Activity 128
Fra Paolo's Works preserved as they left his pen . . 129
His "Treatise on the Interdict" 130
His Teaching acted on in 1870 131
Papal Plot to poison him 131
XX
CONTENTS.
PAGE
His Translation of Gerson's Book 132
His Defence of it against Bellarmine .... 133
His " Consideration of the Censures " . . . . I33
His " War of Pope Paul V. with the Venetians" . . I33
H is " Rights of Sovereigns defended " .... 133
His " History of Ecclesiastical Benefices "... 133
Pope Paul V, and his " Nephews " I34
The Church's mad Hunt for Wealth .... 134
Gibbon and Hallam on Sarpi's " Benefices " . . . 135
The Opere Pie Bill of 1889 I37
His Treatise on the *'Inquisition in Venice" . . . 137
Pope Paul springs a Mine on Fra Paolo . . . .138
His Treatise on " The Bishop of Ceneda Case" . . 139
Another Plot to kill him ....... 141
His Treatise on " Sanctuaries for Offenders" . . 141
His Treatise on " Immunity of the Clergy " . . . 142
His supplementary " History of the Uscocks " . . 143
His Treatise on " Trading with Dutch Heretics" . . 143
His Treatise on " Education given by the Jesuits " . . 144
His " History of the Council of Trent " .... 144
Advantages he had for writing it .... . 145
The " Labour of eight Lustres " . . . . . 146
Opinions regarding it ...... . 147
Its unexpected Publication ...... 148
Pallavicino's rival History ...... 148
Fra Paolo's unused Manuscript ..... 149
The Pope's dying Curse on him ..... 150
His old Age and Weakness 151
" My Duty is to Serve, and not to Live " . . • 152
" Your Turn to comfort me " 152
He views Death as an Act ...... 152
" Being justified freely by His Grace " . . . -153
Dying in Harness 153
" Let us go to St. Mark's " 153
Esto Perpetua'^ ........ 154
Christ before his Eyes 154
Death of the Greatest of the Venetians .... 154
contents.
xxi
CHAPTER VIII.
In Tomb and on Pedestal.
1623—1892.
page
Fra Paolo's Death universally felt ....
• 155
Public Funeral at State Expense ....
• 155
His Burial in the Servile Church ....
• 155
The Prior's Testimony ......
. 156
Decree announcing his death to Foreign Courts
•
Decree regarding his Writings ....
• 157
' Decree concerning his Monument ....
• 157
The proposed Inscription ......
. 158
Papal Persecution of his Memory and Remains
. 159
Gregory XV. opposes his Monument
• 159
Urban VIII. opposes his Monument
. 160
The Ambassador Zeno temporises ....
. 160
Monument postponed, then given up . . .
. 160
Name-Stone proposed, then given up . . .
. 161
The Pope seeks to erase Decree for Monument
. 162
He seeks to destroy Fra Paolo's Body
162
The Friars hide it in a Wall .....
. 162
They bury it in an Altar
. 163
It is disturbed and replaced
. 163
A Latin Inscription put in the Urn .
. 163
His Resting-place a Shrine
. 164
His Body disturbed and interred for the fifth time .
. 165
His Character attacked in " Vita Arcana "
. 165
" Vita Arcana " exposed in 1892 ....
^ . 166
His Body again disturbed
. 167
It is hidden in the Papal Seminary ....
. 167
It is hidden in a private House ....
. 168
It is smuggled into St. Mark's Library
. 168
It is buried in the Church of San Michele
. 169
His Memorial Tablets
*. 169
Cicogna's Book and Gregory XVI
. 170
c
xxii
CONTENTS.
PAGE
The red Rag to the Bull 170
The Pope in a fit of '* Paolomania " . . . .170
Last Disturbance of Tomb, 1846 171
Spirit of Fra Paolo and the War of Freedom . . - 173
A free Venice thinks of his Monument . . >173
A free Italian Nation helps Venice 174
The Monument 174
The last opposing Efforts of the Papacy . . . -175
Manifesto for the Unveiling 175
A significant Sight, and an auspicious Day . . .176
The Unveiling of the Statue 177
The Syndic's Speech at the Unveiling . . . .177
Commendatore Pascolato's Speech in the Doge's Palace 179
The Syndic's Speech at the Banquet . . . .180
Fra Paolo's Portrait and Bust in the Doge's Palace . 181
Marble Group in the Querini Library . . . .182
Last Look at the Statue 183
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
CHAPTER I.
'^he Scholar.
1552—1570. œtat. I-18.
PlETRO Sarpi, better known to the world by his
monastic name of Era Paolo Sarpi, was born in Venice
on the 14th of August, 1552. His father, Francesco
Sarpi, was a native of San Vito, a small village in the
Tagliamento Valley, amongst the Friulian Mountains,
about fifty miles north-east of Venice. Like many of
the mountaineers of those parts, he was early drawn
to the great commercial city of the lagoons, by the
hope of making money, and of getting on in the
world. Generally these mountaineers realised their
hopes, as they were intelligent, steady, active, and
persevering. At the present day the success of the
peasants of the Dolomite Alps in Venice, and in other
places to which they emigrate, is proverbial. But
Francesco Sarpi was to prove himself an exception to
this rule. He started in business, but his hardy
frame, his bold nature, and his rather pugnacious
b
2
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
temper fitted him better for the arts of war than of
peace. As a merchant his career was neither long
nor prosperous, for a few years after his settlement in
Venice he died ; leaving his family, which consisted of
his wife, his son Pietro, and a daughter, in straitened
circumstances.
The widowed mother of Fra Paolo, Isabella Morelli,
was a native of Venice, and belonged to a family
of some status, as she possessed, by birth, the
rights of citizenship. She was a typical Venetian,,
tall, slight, and fair, and we are told that in these
respects, as well as in disposition and temperament,
being retiring, gentle, devout, and contemplative, she
differed marvellously from her husband. Intellectually
she was altogether a superior woman, and her sagacity
and judgment were such that she was said to possess
the " spirit of prophecy." Pietro, or, as he was called
at this time, from the slightness of his figure, by
the diminutive Pierino, is said to have resembled her ;
and as she was his first teacher, he owed, like many
other great men, not a little to his mother by
inheritance and by training.
Pierino's second teacher was his mother's brother,
Ambrogio Morelli, who was a priest and a school¬
master—a combination of professions which obtained
in Ifcaly until a few years ago, when, owing to the
ignorance of the clergy, and their disloyalty towards
the king and the constitution, it came to an end.
Don Ambrogio Morelli's church was that of SS.
Ermagora and Fortunato, which is still standing, but
is generally known by its Venetian name of S.
Marcuola. It is situated on the Grand Canal, half
THE SCHOLAR.
3
way between the Rialto bridge and the railway
station. By the side of it was the school, a memorial
of which still survives in the name of the street, Calle
della Scuola del Cristo.
Pietro's uncle was a man of worth and scholarship,
and the school of which he was the head was a high-
class one, as is seen by the fact that the patricians of
Venice were in the habit of sending their sons to it.
On account of the poverty of his sister, Don Ambrogio
not only educated his nephew free of charge, but also
took him into his house. During the few years
Pierino remained under his uncle's care, he was taught,
besides elementary subjects, Latin, Greek, Hebrew,
mathematics, and philosophy. There is an idea
abroad that the " duxes " at school become the dunces
of after life, whilst these latter mount over their heads
into places of distinction. The case of Fra Paolo
Sarpi does not lend itself to the support of this notion,
which is, I believe, to a large extent a popular
fallacy. The place he took in this school he held
through life, and that was the top of his class. Don
Ambrogio soon discovered the remarkable abilities,
and the industry and perseverance of his nephew.
Passionately devoted to books and learning, he
mastered with ease everything put into his hands.
His powers of memory were extraordinary, and many
stories were current of how he could repeat whole
pages of Virgil, or other classic authors, after reading
or hearing them read but once. Fra Paolo, in after
life, used to discredit these stories, saying that he
never, when at his uncle's school, could repeat more
than thirty lines of Virgil after a single hearing!
B 2
4
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Very much earlier than was common with Venetian
boys, he had finished the course of instruction given
at the Scuola del Cristo, for at the age of twelve he
left it, his uncle telling his sister that he could carry
her boy no further.
Before quitting this period of Fra Paolo Sarpi's life
there are some things I wish to mention, as they
reflect credit on the general tone and spirit of the
school, as well as shed light on his character. Young
Pierino contrasted with the majority of his school¬
mates in many respects. Socially he was their inferior.
He was poor, whilst they represented the wealth,
luxury, and nobility of their proud city. He did not
join with them in their sports and games. He was
delicate, retiring, serious, silent, thoughtful, almost
melancholy. There was a saying common amongst
the scholars, " Tuttinoi altri a hagattellari^e Pierino
a lihri"—"All we others to our frivolities, and
Pierino to his books." There was one kind of play
to which Venetian boys then, as now, were addicted,
namely, gambling. As I write I see, in a boat under
a bridge, lads of from eight to ten years of age -
playing at cards, nor can one go anywhere in Venice
without noticing similar sights in its streets and
canals. Pierino not only never gambled, but used to
rebuke those who did, by saying " I cannot understand
the taste of those who gamble, if they are not affected
by avarice." Then, too, he had beaten all his com¬
panions, beyond any possibility of comparison, in
every department of study. In such circumstances
there might easily have sprung up feelings of un¬
friendliness and jealousy on the one side, and of
THE SCHOLAR.
5
aversion and disdain on the other. But nothing of
the kind took place, indeed it was the very opposite.
The utmost generosity, kindness, and affection were
shown towards Pierino, which he unstintingly returned.
Many friendships were formed then which lasted
through life, and which bore profitable results when
he and some of his first class-mates—such as Andrea
Morosini, the historian, and Leonardo Donato, the
Doge—were bearing the strain of responsible positions
in Church and State, during troublous times.
Pietro's third master was Fra Gianmaria Capella, a
friend of his uncle, and a friar in the Servite
Monastery, which stood just beyond the bridge of the
Campo di Santa Fosca, at no great distance from Don
Ambrogio's church and school. As Pietro was
destined soon to enter the Order of the Servîtes, and
as this monastery became his home for life, I shall
now say a few words about both.
The word Servite means simply servant ; and the
fraternity adopted this name because it devoted itself
to the service of Christ and his Mother, especially in
the aspect of the suffering ones : Christ—" The man of
sorrows Mary—the afflicted, receiving
in herself the fulfilment of Simeon's prophecy, " A
sword shall pierce through thy heart also." The
order was founded in Florence, in 1233, by seven
wealthy merchants, who adopted in doing so the rule
of St. Augustine. These men, having sold their
palaces, and disposed of their wealth on behalf of the
poor, resolved, as many had done before them, to lead
as hermits a life of solitude and privation. The hills
around Florence offered them every facility for the
6
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
carrying out of their vow, and so retiring to Monte
Senario, about ten miles from Florence, they dwelt in
cells and caves on its wooded slopes. In after years
a monastery was raised, which was destroyed in
modern times, but which has been rebuilt, and exists
to-day, like the few still found in Italy, as a private
institution ; its friars being, what the remnant
members of monastic orders have generally become,
distillers of liqueur. These first Servites also built the
church of the S.S. Annunziata in Florence, which still
stands, though enlarged and modernised. Its cloister
has a series of frescoes representing the founding of
the Order. To be in keeping with their mission the
Servites assumed a black habit, with a white cape and
hood. It is to be noted that they were not monks,
but friars ; not padri but frati. Although the dis¬
tinction between these is often lost sight of, it is yet
an important one. They differed from each other in
many particulars, but it is sufficient for our present
purpose to mention one of these only. The monks
lived a cloistered life, and took no interest in the
affairs of the outside world. The friars, on the
contrary, went out into the world, and, although in
Holy Orders, could follow secular, or quasi-secular,
callings. They were free to take part, and indeed
were expected to take part, in the questions that
happened at the time to be agitating Church or State.
A branch of these Servite friars came to Venice in
1310, and established the monastery tp which I have
referred. It was a large and wealthy institution, with
a most beautiful Gothic church, adorned in a later
century with pictures and frescoes by Titian,Tintoretto,
THE SCHOLAR.
7
and Paolo Veronese—all of which famous masters
were alive at this period of Fra Paolo's life. The
monastery was burned in 1769, but several of its marble
columns, and fragments of its walls are still to be seen,
having been used in the building of the reformatory
school that now occupies its site. The church was
destroyed with many others in 1812 by order of
Napoleon. Its ruins form one of the interesting, though
sad, sights of the Venice of to-day. The west and
south entrances, both beautiful Gothic portals—the
former with a medallion of Christ in its tympanum—
are still standing in good preservation, and its Luchese
chapel is being restored.
For about a year Pietro attended this monastery as
a day scholar, but he was soon inspired with the wish
to enter it as a novice. His mother and uncle, however,
wishing him to become a priest, withheld their consent,
and used every means, even resorting to hard treatment,
to bend him to their will. But he knew his own mind.
He wished to become a priest, but one who would not
be tied to the performance of Church offices, but who
would possess the advantages of the cloister for quiet
and study, and of the world for action. At the end of
the year Pietro, backed up by Fra Gianmaria, who
knew the gain he would be to the Order, overcame the
resistance of his guardians, and, on the 24th of
November, 1565, when little more than thirteen years
old, was received into the monastery, when he
exchanged his name Pietro for Paolo—a rathef signi-
fícant change in view of his future career.
Besides Fra Gianmaria his master, there was another
friar in the monastery, named Fra Giulio, who took a
8
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
deep and lasting interest in the young Paolo. This
friar was the confessor of Isabella Morelli, and from
the moment her son entered upon his novitiate, he
became a foster-father to him. He supplied him with
books, and other things necessary for the prosecution
of his studies, at the time when he was least able to
procure them for himself ; and looked after his clothing,
food, and all his material comforts, so that for the next
forty years or so of his life (that is as long as Fra
Giulio lived) he never had to give a thought to these
things. How Fra Paolo was enabled to requite his
kindness will appear in the sequel.
The young Paolo's novitiate lasted about five years.
During this time he continued ardently to pursue the
subjects he had begun at his uncle's school, Latin,
Greek, Hebrew, philosophy, and mathematics, to which
were added theology in all its branches, and many of
the sciences. In all these departments of learning he
eminently excelled.
But Paolo was more than a mere student during his
novitiate, he was also a critic and a thinker. This
notably appeared in his treatment of Duns Scotus.
Although a quarter of a century before this the text
books of that famous Schoolman had been literally
thrown to the winds in the University of Oxford, where
he had been a student and a professor, they were still
regarded as standard works on the Continent, and Fra
Gianmaria was said to have had few equals in the know¬
ledge he possessed of them, and in the skill with which
he could impart his knowledge to others. But he found
in his pupil Paolo one who saw through the fallacies
of Duns Scotus's reasonings ; and his criticisms were
THE SCHOLAR.
9
SO just and powerful that they shook the faith of the
master, so that he was used to say, " I have learned not
a little from Paolo in the very subjects I am teaching
him."
Paolo also appeared during his novitiate in the
character of a public disputant—a part little to the
taste of the retiring boy, but one to which he was
called by the customs of the times. The monastic
orders were in the habit of holding periodically
great public intellectual disputations, when their best
scholars were put forward in dialectic contests, so as
to show the people that their cloisters " were not
haunts of idleness, but schools of learning." It was
natural that the Servîtes should show off, on such
occasions, the phenomenal talents of young Paolo.
Accordingly we find that he was chosen three times for
these exhibitions—once at the beginning, again at the
middle, and a third time at the close of his novitiate.
His first appearance was in that church which is a
sort of Westminster Abbey of Venice—Santa Maria
Gloriosa del Frari (or, as it is more commonly called,
the Frari), which belonged to the Minor Franciscans,
whose monastery, now used as the Archives of the
city, adjoined it. It so happened that the annual
disputation held by these friars took place on the
25th of November, 1565, the very day after Paolo had
joined the rival Servîtes, which enabled them to enter
him on the list as their youngest champion. The huge
building was filled to overflowing by the confrater¬
nities, the clergy, the nobles, and the richest and most
talented men of Venice. The practice at these
dialectic displays seems to have been to place a
10
FRA PAOLO SARFL
number of theses in the hands of the disputants, who
wfere called upon to defend or disprove them by every
argument they could invent for themselves, or cite
from the Church Fathers and Councils. The picture
we are now invited to see is this : the quiet, shrinking,
delicate boy Paolo, but thirteen years and three
months old, clad in the black gown and white cape and
hood, and leathern girdle of his Order, standing up
before that brilliant assemblage, and demolishing with
such ability and ingenuity and apt quotation the
positions of his antagonists, as to beat every one set up
against him ; so that, to use the phrase of Fra
Fulgenzia, his valued secretary, beloved friend, and
faithful biographer, to whom I have referred in the
preface, "he held firmly the crown against them
all." The great audience were amazed and delighted,
and also, we are told, not a little amused, for Paolo,
feeling the discomfort of his new habiliments, and for¬
getting that he had no hat to raise when he bowed to
his adversary or the audience, unconsciously doffed his
white hood instead, and, holding it in his hand,
emphasized with it his reasonings.
Paolo's second public appearance as a disputant
was at the old classic town of Mantua, the home of
Virgil, and the ancient seat of the Dukes of Gonzaga,
whose court at this time was a great centre of art and
culture. Here, at a general chapter of the Servite
Order, Paulo, now fifteen years old, showed forth his
immense knowledge of sacred canons, papal bulls, and
decrees of councils. Printed programmes and invita¬
tions were issued for this exhibition, and it is to one of
these, that has somehow escaped the ravages of time.
THE SCHOLAR.
that we are indebted for our knowledge of it. This
year, 1567, Paolo took his vows, which included,
besides poverty, chastity, and obedience, certain tenets
regarding peace, brotherly love, and care of the sick
that are peculiar to the Augustinian Order.
Paolo's third public disputation took place also at
Mantua. It was the year 1570. He had reached the
age of eighteen. He had finished his novitiate, and
had become a fully equipped Servite friar. This
exhibition may be considered as a demonstration of
his fitness to represent his Order. He had put into
his hands a long list of three hundred and eighteen
most difficult theological and philosophical proposi¬
tions, which he was called upon to defend. The
assemblage took place in the church of San Barnaba,
There were present all the ecclesiastics of Mantua
headed by the Bishop Boldrino, and its aristocracy
and representative citizens led by the great Duke
Guglielmo Gonzaga himself. Fra Paolo Sarpi, as on
the two former occasions, more than fulfilled the high
expectations formed of him. As a result of his
success Bishop Boldrino appointed him to the Chair
of Positive Theology and Sacred Canons in his
Cathedral, and the Duke attached him to his Court as
his private theologian. The Superior of his Order in
Venice consented to his accepting these positions, and
the brotherhood, desirous of showing its appreciation
of his worth and learning, assigned him seven scudi
a year, in order to help him to buy books necessary
for the prosecution of his studies.
12
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
CHAPTER II.
'^he Professor.
1570—1578. 3stat. 18—26.
We have thus seen how Era Paolo Sarpi, in the year
1570, whilst but a lad of eighteen, was called upon
to fill important offices in the College and Court of
Mantua. He entered at once upon his duties.
In connection with the church of San Barnaba, in
which he had made his public appearance, there was
a monastery belonging to the Barnabites, or, as they
preferred to call themselves, the " Regular Clerks of
St. Paul." The founders of this order of friars, in
accordance with their title, dedicated themselves to a
double mission, that of being " Sons of Consolation,"
like St. Barnabas, and preachers of the gospel, like
St. Paul. Their mission was thus to a certain extent
the same as that of the Servites, and they wore the
same black habit. Fra Paolo, in settling in Mantua,
naturally took up his abode with them. Their frugal
table suited him, for he was very abstemious, taking
no meat and no wine, but living mainly on a little
bread and fruit. When, somewhat later in life, he
had to follow St. Paul's advice to Timothy, " Drink
no longer water, but use a little wine for thy
THE PROFESSOR.
13
stomach's sake, and thine often infirmities," it is
curious to find him saying : " No man ever vanquished
himself with greater difficulty than I have, by giving
up water for wine." We can easily understand, too,
how grateful to him must have been the privacy and
quiet of the cloister, after the publicity and excite¬
ment of the day's labours in class-room and Cathedral,
in the Episcopal palace, and at the gay Court of
Gonzaga.
It was soon apparent that Bishop and Duke, in
securing the services of Era Paolo, had acted wisely.
He discharged all the duties of his chair with excep¬
tional ability and success. No one had ever lectured
on positive theology and the sacred canons with
the accurate and comprehensive grasp of these
subjects that he showed. He was thoroughly con¬
versant with the Scriptures in their original tongues,
and he knew perfectly the Apostolic traditions, the
writings of the Fathers, and the decrees and decisions
of Church Councils. Indeed, his fame as a Hebrew
and Greek scholar and as a theologian spread far
beyond the walls of Mantua. That it was recognised
at Rome we learn from the following incident. A
Barnabite friar, jealous of Era Paolo's growing fame
and influence, denounced him to the Inquisition, as
guilty of heresy, because of the view he took of
certain passages in the first chapter of Genesis,
bearing on the doctrine of the Trinity. Era Paolo
refused to appear before the Inquisitor on the ground
that, not knowing Hebrew, he was an incompetent
judge, and he boldly appealed from his tribunal to
that of the Inquisition in Rome. The result was that
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
lie was fully justified and the Inquisitor was censured,
heing told to let the professor alone, and to give
his attention to matters that he was capable of under¬
standing. By Bishop Boldrino, who was at this time
an old man, the young frate was esteemed, not only
as a professor, but as a personal friend. He took
him entirely into his confidence in the affairs of his
diocese, which presented many and serious difficul¬
ties because of the intrigues of the Jesuits ; and he
always found his judgment sound, and his advice
valuable.
The Duke Gonzaga, not less than Bishop Boldrino,
had cause to congratulate himself on Fra Paolo's
presence. The Court of Mantua during the time of
his father, Frederick II., was one of the most illustrious
in Europe, and its reputation did not suffer in the
hands of his son. If it was less splendid from a
military point of view—for the Duke, being a hunch¬
back, was not the soldier his father was—it was more
so from a literary one, for he surrounded himself with
all the talent and culture of his own and other lands.
Gonzaga felt that his young theologian was not only
worthy of his Court, but that he contributed not a
little to its tone and character. Theological disputa¬
tions, such as those of which I have already spoken,
were at this time very much in vogue, and the Duke
Gonzaga was so fond of them that they formed a
prominent feature in the business and amusement of
his life. Fra Paolo was constantly called upon to
take a part in them. He was, indeed, the stripling
David amongst the Goliaths that came up to the
•Court, and nothing delighted Gonzaga more than to
THE PROFESSOR.
15
provoke a scholastic and intellectual combat between
him and them, and to see how his theologian would
invariably come off victor.
But the advantages of Fra Paolo Sarpi's residence
and work in Mantua were not wholly on one side. If
his brilliant genius cast a fresh lustre on Church and
Court, contact with such men as Bishop Boldrino and
the Duke Gonzaga, and with those who frequented the
palace and the castle, braced and developed, and
expanded his whole being. He does not seem ever to
have had any monkish prejudices and narrownesses
about him, so that I cannot say that he was now
delivered from these to walk freely abroad in the open
air of heaven with world-wide sympathies, but he did
breathe at Mantua a wholesome atmosphere of inde¬
pendent intellectual thought, and moral strength and
courage. In explanation of this, it is necessary to
remember two things. First, that the time of which
I am now speaking was separated by but a brief
interval from that event that rent Christendom in two—
the Reformation, for Luther died in 1546, only twenty-
four years before the opening date of this chapter ;
and, secondly, that it was separated by a still shorter
interval from that other event that was designed to
re-knit the cleavage caused by the Reformation, but
which widened it beyond all possibility of healing, and
further, re-split the already broken Roman Church into
two—into a party of progress, and a party of retro¬
gression, into a Papal party, and a Catholic one—
namely, the Council of Trent. That extraordinary
assembly, which began its sittings in 1545, a year before
Luther's death, sat with intermissions and interrup-
i6
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
tions until 1563, but seven years before the date of
which I write. Both Bishop Boldrino and the Duke
Guglielmo attended the Council, both belonged to the
progressive or Catholic party, and both were being now
made to suffer for their opinions and principles. The
intrigues of the Jesuits, to which I referred as making
trouble in the diocese of the Bishop, were set on foot
in order to frustrate the reforms that he was seeking
to carry out. The Duke Gonzaga had been threatened
by Pope Pius V. with excommunication, because he
afforded shelter to some poor hunted heretics, and he
risked open rupture with Gregory XIII., rather than
forego showing to some others the same charity.
This intolerance of the Papal party alienated him
and Bishop Boldrino still further, and caused them to
see that Protestantism was not so far removed after
all from primitive Catholicism. Fra Paolo readily
appreciated their position, and identified himself with
it. In doing this, he not only sided with them, but
with popular feeling in Mantua, and indeed throughout
Italy ; for, doubtless at this time there prevailed a
state of matters similar in nature, though different in
range and intensity, to that which obtains to-day,
when, according to statistics, twenty out of the thirty
odd millions of the country's inhabitants, or two-thirds
of the entire population, are firmly attached to the
Catholic Church, but are just as firmly opposed on
patriotic and intellectual and spiritual grounds to the
Roman Curia and the Papacy.
Another advantage which Fra Paolo derived from
his residence in Mantua was, that he was enabled to
collect facts about the Council of Trent from the lips
THE PROFESSOR.
of those who had been present, and who had taken
part in its transactions. It was thus that he was led
to become its earliest, most famous, and authentic
historian. Amongst those who supplied him with
information at first hand, besides Bishop Boldrino and
the Duke Gonzaga, was Gamillo Olivo of Cremona.
Olivo attended the Council as secretary to one of the
Papal legates. Cardinal Ercole di Gonzaga, brother of
the Duke, who was president of the Council from 1561
till his death, in March, 1563, nine months before the
Council broke up. From his position, Olivo not only
knew all the proceedings of the Council that saw the
light of day, but he knew also its manifold works of
darkness. He was conversant with the way in which
the assembly was packed by mercenaries in the pay of
the Pope, and how it was gagged by his legates. He
knew the hypocrisies and dishonesties, the craft and
cunning, that made that nominally free deliberative
Council to be despised by both Catholic and Protestant
alike, as simply a machine for the registration of
decrees prepared beforehand by the Pope, and sent to
Trent from Rome. All this information Olivo gave
to Era Paolo ; and in doing so he did not rely on his
memory alone, but drew upon notes which he had made
on the spot at the time. It is said that it was he who
first inspired him with the idea of writing the history
of the Council. Era Paolo was himself so far contem¬
porary with it, as that the last eleven years of its
duration were the first eleven of his life. It is necessary
here to state that neither Cardinal Gonzaga, although
he was a legate, nor Olivo, had much sympathy with
the extreme Papal party. Indeed, like Bishop Boldrino
C
i8
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
and the Duke Gonzaga, both had been made to suffer
for their straightforwardness and liberality. The
Cardinal had been censured by the Pope, and Gamillo
Olivo had been imprisoned in Mantua by the Inquisi¬
tion, and was afterwards cut off from all Church
preferment. Fra Paolo often expressed the profit and
delight that the friendship of Olivo afforded him.
Fra Paolo's stay in Mantua was not a lengthened
one. It terminated in or about 1574, so it thus lasted
not quite four years. It was during this time that
he became a priest, taking Holy Orders at Cremona
in 1572.
Various reasons have been assigned for his leaving
Mantua. A rather singular one, which has been
repeatedly given, is the following. The Duke
Gonzaga, it seems, was somewhat eccentric in his
behaviour and liked a practical joke. One night a
mule was foaled in his stables, and he asked Fra Paolo
to go and observe the state of the heavens and make
a horoscope. Fra Paolo had studied astrology,
although, as we learn from a letter written to a friend,
he did not believe in it. However, he did as desired,
and drew it out in accordance with the laws of that so-
called science. Of this the Duke sent copies to all
the leading astrologers in Italy; and, telling them that
it was the horoscope of one born in his palace, desired
their interpretation of it. The answers sent in greatly
amused him, as all kinds of eminent careers, in Church
and State, were foretold, some saying that the new¬
born child would be a great warrior, others a famous
philosopher, others a cardinal, and one that it was
destined to become a Pope ! Fra Paolo was not
THE PROFESSOR.
19
pleased at being mixed up with this joke, but Fra
Fulgenzio asserts that it had nothing to do with his
leaving Mantua.
When Gentile Bellini painted at Constantinople the
head of John the Baptist on a charger, and showed it
to his friend the Sultan, the latter's practised eye at
once detected a flaw in the anatomy. "No neck remains
when the head is taken off," was his criticism. Bellini
did not at once agree with him, so without more ado he
gave him ocular demonstration, for, calling forward a
slave, he had him beheaded then and there. " Not
knowing," we are told, " but that some day a similar
jest might be played upon him," the startled painter
got out of Constantinople, and back to Venice as soon
as possible. Without being a despot like this Sultan,
Gonzaga, with all his learning and culture, was yet not
above doing acts that savoured of cruelty, and it is
said that his wanton imprisonment of a friar made
Fra Paolo anxious to quit his Court. This, however,
is also without foundation. Gonzaga did imprison a
friar, but he explained fully to Fra Paolo his reasons
for doing so, and the latter deemed them satisfactory.
The true reasons for his leaving Mantua were the
death of his friend Bishop Boldrino, the unsuitable-
ness of a prolonged Court life to his tastes and habits,
and the call " Come up higher " from the Superior of
his Order in Venice, who appointed him to the Chair
of Philosophy in his old monastery, wishing to secure
for the Servites the credit and benefit of his splendid
gifts. The deep regret felt in Mantua at his leaving
found expression in the words, " Non verrà mai plu
un Fra Paolo "—" There will never more come another
Fra Paolo."
C 2
20
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Before returning to his native city Fra Paolo went
to Milan. His stay there was necessarily a brief one,
but it proved, nevertheless, very important, as it
brought him into contact with Cardinal Borromeo,
with whom he soon became most intimate. The name
of Cardinal Borromeo is indelibly associated with Milan
because of what he accomplished as an ecclesiastic,
but more so on account of what he did as a
philanthropist during the awful plague that visited the
city in 1576. He was, like other Church dignitaries
of those days to whom I have had occasion to refer, a
wise and enlightened ruler, and like them he was at
this time suffering a measure of persecution because
of his repression of irregularities and corruptions that
were prevalent in his archiépiscopal see. One of the
most crying of these evils was the immorality that was
the fruit of confession. So widespread was this
mischief that he had absolutely to forbid most of his
priests from hearing confessions altogether. Eager to
avail himself of the services of such a pure minded
man as Fra Paolo, he begged him to undertake for a
time that duty in his Cathedral, but he refused. He
thus early took the stand that he held through life that
confession is unscriptural and demoralizing to con¬
fessor and confessed. Like Count Campello, the
present leader of the Catholic Reform movement in
Italy, when he was Canon of St. Peter's, and other
worthy priests that might be named, F ra Paolo would
never hear confessions, and so run the risk of becom¬
ing an accomplice with his penitents in their sin, as is
the case with so many priests in Italy at the present
day. He directed those who came to him to confess
to God. In other ways, however, he was well able to
THE PROFESSOR.
21
render valuable service to Cardinal Borromeo, who
repaid him by giving him not a few facts for his
Tridentine history. Cardinal Borromeo was well
versed in the proceedings of the Council, for he held
at it the post of secretary to his uncle, Pope Pius IV.,
and he took a large share in directing and moulding
its deliberations, especially during the latter half of its
sittings.
In 1575, when Fra Paolo was about twenty-three
years of age, we find him back once more in his quiet
cell in Venice, teaching philosophy in the class-room
in which but a short time before he had sat as a student.
In this new sphere his success was as conspicuous
as it had been at Mantua. His lectures were so
popular that he drew many lay students and men
of business from the Rialto to hear them.
The year 1576 was a disastrous one for Venice.
The plague, the ravages of which in Milan had called
forth the self-sacrificing devotion of Cardinal
Borromeo, decimated the city. Amongst the tens of
thousands that itsweptoff was Isabella Morelli,the aged
mother of Fra Paolo Sarpi. The well-known Church
of the Redentore on the Giudecca stands as a memorial
of this awful scourge. It was built as a thank-offering
to the Redeemer, for having caused the plague to
cease in answer to the united prayers of the people.
In connection with it a yearly festival was established,
to be observed in July, which has come down to the
present time, and is the only one that retains some¬
thing of its ancient popularity. Long years ago,
however, it lost almost everything of its religious
character, and it is now celebrated as a great " holy
22
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
fair," when the church and its precincts are turned
into a " house of merchandise," if not into a " den of
thieves," for fortune-tellers and lottery ticket hawkers,
with sellers of meats and drinks, pictures of saints,
and images and rosaries blessed by the Pope, pursue
their trade around and on the steps of the church,
and even in the church itself, the discordant babble of
their voices mingling with the hoarse singing of the
priests, and drowning the soft tinkle of the silver
mass-bell ; and the Church of Rome sanctions this
paganism, for in the notices it posts up to announce
the approach of this festival (which I have myself
seen and read) this irreverent title is applied to it,
"// Bacchanale del Redentore^^—"the Bacchanalia
of the Redeemer."
In 1578 Fra Paolo Sarpi was transferred from the
Chair of Philosophy in the Servite Monastery to that
of Mathematics, of which science he was the acknow¬
ledged head, not in Venice merely but in Italy. In
this same year the University of Padua recognised
his ability and learning by conferring upon him the
degree of Doctor in Theology. Being but twenty
years old, he was the youngest man ever so honoured
by this ancient university.
The period of Fra Paolo's life of which I am now
speaking closed in 1578, and in regard to it I have but
a few more things to say. First, about this time he
made the acquaintance of Arnauld Ferrier, Ambassador
of King Henry III. of France. This acquaintance
ripened speedily into friendship, which influenced him
in many important ways. It materially helped him in
his studies bearing on the Council of Trent, for Ferrier
THE PROFESSOR.
23
had there represented his Sovereign, and, what is
of more consequence, it confirmed and enlarged his
already enlightened ideas as to the rights of kings and
governments, as being outside those of Pope or Church;
for Ferrier had boldly demanded at the Council that
the charter of the liberties of the Gallican Church
should not be touched. This charter was embodied
in the two canons passed by the Council of Bâle, and
confirmed by that of Bourges in 1438, which affirmed
that the Pope had no right to command anything in
which the temporalities and civil rights of the kingdom
of France were concerned ; and that, whilst his
supremacy in things spiritual was admitted, his power
was limited by the decrees of ancient French Councils.
Ferrier, together with the other French Ambassadors,
further advocated at the Council of Trent the return
of the Church to its ancient usages in the matter of
giving the Scriptures to the laity,.of permitting the
faithful to communicate in both kinds, of revising the
breviaries and missals, of having the service in all its
parts read in the vernacular, and of permitting the
clergy to marry. Like those members of the Council,
of whom I have already spoken, he belonged to
the great Liberal, or Old Catholic, party in the Church.
The seed sown in Fra Paolo's mind by Ferrier bore
fruit in after life.
Secondly, Fra Paolo's studies, during this period,
were very varied and interesting, and his progress in
them was most astonishing. And yet this is not to be
so wondered at when we take into consideration his
marvellous powers, and equally marvellous application.
It is said that he never delayed a moment when he
24
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
wanted to ascertain any fact. He would rise from
table, or from his bed, and go to search it out at once;
and in thinking out any difficulty or problem he would
work steadily on, day and night, until he could say
" L'ho pur vinto, or più non ci voglio pensaré "—"I
have vanquished it, I will now think of it no more."
Then, from the frailty of his constitution (and Fra
Fulgenzio tells us that he was " of incredible thinness
of body ") he lived realising the uncertainty of life as
few do. To quote again from his biographer on this
point, "As no one is so old, but that he thinks he might
live another year, so Fra Paolo was never so young,
that he expected to live one." This made him redeem
the time by stimulating him to constant daily labour.
Here I shall give but an imperfect list of his studies
in illustration of what I have said. Besides Hebrew,
Greek, and mathematics, of which I have already
spoken, he mastered history, astronomy, the nutrition
of life in animals, geometry, including conic sections,
magnetism, botany, mineralogy, hydraulics, acoustics,
animal statics, atmospheric pressure, the rising and
falling of objects in air and water, the reflection of
light from curved surfaces, spheres, mechanics, civil
and military architecture, medicine, herbs, and that
subject, which, next to mathematics, had the greatest
fascination for him—anatomy. Nor was it that he
simply dipped into these studies, that he was, as it
were, content to wade in their shallows. He sounded
all their known waters, and was destined, as we shall
afterwards see, to reach depths that others had never
fathomed, and to bring to light unheard of treasures,
which he never for an instant retained in his own
THE PROFESSOR.
35
possession, but made immediately the property of
those capable of appreciating their value and of
turning them to account. In this wa) Galileo,
Kepler, Acquapendente the eminent surgeon of the
University of Padua, and Ostilio Riccio the cele¬
brated mathematician of the same seat of learning,
and our own Dr. Harvey, were all indebted directly
or indirectly to him.
Lastly, we must notice the moral weight of
character that Fra Paolo, though but a young man,
began now to exercise, and which increased with his
years. It was not intellect alone that made him what
he was, but moral worth. One of his brother friars
said of him, Nella mia vita, non conohbi mai alcuno
piü padrone di se "—" In my life I have never known
any one more master of himself." The servant of a
public religious teacher in Italy once said to me,
" When I hear my master preach he raises me up a step,
but when I see his daily life he pushes me down two."
It was very different with Fra Paolo. In his case
preaching and practice were not divorced. His
example told for more than his words. His very
presence was sufficient to raise the tone of manners
and conversation. " E qua la sposa, mutiamo
proposito "—" Here comes the bride, let us change the
subject "—became, we are told, the watchword of the
more frivolous in the monastery on the approach of
Fra Paolo. One secret of his strength was his know¬
ledge of Scripture, and his regulating his life by the
example of Christ and by the principles of His
teaching. The Scriptures, I may say, were not for¬
bidden to the Servites, and, indeed, at this time, there
26
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
was a turning of the general attention of the Church
to them. For, as we have already noted, Ferner
brought the subject before the Council of Trent, and
the result of its deliberation was that the Vulgate,
St. Jerome's translation, was declared to be the
" authorised " version ; and a decree was carried that
the Papal Court should prepare an " authenticated "
edition, the carrying out of which decree was daily
looked for. Fra Paolo, then, excelled in Bible know¬
ledge as in other things. The modern practice of
" railroading " Bibles is an invention as old at least
as his day, for there was " not a word in his Greek
Testament which he had not marked with his red
lead." He was accustomed to quote Scripture in his
letters and writings as aptly as does Mr. Ruskin. And
he is the only one I ever heard of who literally put in
practice such precepts of our Lord's Sermon on the
Mount, as, " from him that would borrow of thee turn
not thou away ... do good and lend, hoping for nothing
again." This was Fra Paolo's custom. He lent
willingly, but with the condition that it should not be
returned to him unless he asked for it. " Let us
imitate in this," he used to say, " God and nature, who
give but never lend." And if he conspicuously obeyed
this precept, he realised as conspicuously the fulfilment
of the promise, so doing " your reward shall be great,"
for no friar, I believe, ever received such an income as
he, as we shall see by and bye, when the Republic of
Venice put all its resources at his command, and
doubled, and doubled again, the stipend assigned to
him as its public servant.
the provincial and procurator. 2^
CHAPTER III.
J^rovincial and Jßrocurator.
1579—1588. œtat. 27-36.
In April, 1579, an important Chapter of the Servites
was held in the old and interesting town of Verona, when
Fra Paolo Sarpi was elected a Provincial of his order;
that is to say, he was set over all the Servite
monasteries within a certain radius, which formed a
monastic province. On the present occasion that
included at least the whole of the modern province of
Venetia. Amongst the duties and the privileges of the
Provincial were the following : he had to receive
money for his Order, authorise expenditure, examine
into the management of the different houses under
his charge, rectify any irregularities and abuses, and
even to punish offenders ; he could go where he liked,
and reside in any monastery he chose, and retain a lay
brother in his service, and all at the expense of his
Order. Fra Paolo's election to this post shows that
he was held in immense esteem and admiration by his
brethren, and that they placed in him unbounded
confidence, for he was but twenty-seven years of age
and never before in the history of the Order had one
so young been called upon to fill it.
28
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
His new duties did not involve his vacating his Chair,
so we find him continuing his lectures, only, as he was
often called here and there on monastic business, his
work in that department was liable to be interrupted
and occasionally for a time suspended. But as if not
to lose even for a brief period his invaluable services
as a teacher, and a guide to teachers, he was elected
Reggente lo studio, which enabled him wherever he
went to examine into the state of the monastic
colleges, and make what alterations he deemed
desirable in the interests either of the professors or
the students. In this way the loss of Venice became
the gain of the whole Order.
The first duty to which he was called as Provincial
was to attent a general Chapter which was convoked
at Parma almost immediately after his election. This
ancient university town, linked to classic days by its
association with Augustus, Mark Antony, and Cassius,
and even to prehistoric days by the lake-dwelling
discovered in its midst some thirty years ago, was
then governed by the Farnese family. Cardinal
Farnese, who became Pope Paul III. in 1534, had
given it, together with Piacenza, as a gift to his
worthless son, Pietro Luigi Farnese. It was this
dissolute Pope who in 1538 placed England under
interdict, and attempted to dethrone King Henry
VIII., and so hastened on the English Reformation.
At the time of Era Paolo's visit to Parma, the great
grandson of Pope Paul III., Alessandro Farnese, was
the ruling prince.
Before Fra Paolo was permitted to appear at this
Chapter as an administrator and legislator, in which
THE PROVINCIAL AND PROCURATOR. 2g
capacity he was destined to show a mind of great
organising and constructing power, he had once more
to show himself in his old role of a public disputant.
This was a part he did not care to play, but for the
credit of his Order it had to be undertaken. The
Prince of Parma was not present to hear Fra Paolo,,
for he was away warring under Philip II. against the
Prince of Orange, and in organising Philip's un¬
successful expedition against England. But all the
other celebrities of the town and Duchy were there, as;
well as the lights of the ecclesiastical world of Italy.
As on former occasions the young Provincial's,
learning and eloquence astonished and delighted all
who heard him.
Of all human institutions, monasteries seem most-
liable to slide into disorder, degeneracy, and depravity.
About half a century before the date of which I now
write, their condition in England was enquired into by
Royal Commission with a view to reformation. But
the disclosures were such as to convince Parliament
and the country that the only reformation possible was
destruction. A " fretting leprosy " had infected the
very stones and timber. Charnel houses, they were
poisoning the air, and spreading corruption all around
them, and their suppression had to be hastened. In
Italy they were in a healthier state, but still irregu-.
larities and corruptions abounded, and one of the few
reformatory decrees of the Council of Trent, was to.
the effect that their condition should be-enquired into,
and that abuses should be stopped. In accordance-
with this statute the General Chapter of the Servîtes
at Parma took up the question. By way of remedying-
30
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
the disorders of their houses, the unification of the
Servite Constitution was resolved upon. The Order
already formed a corporate body. The whole of its
monasteries, not only in Italy, but in other lands, owed
allegiance to one head, the Pope; second to whom
was their General ; next to whom came their
Procurator ; and then their Provincials and lesser
•dignitaries. But whilst this ought to have carried
with it the placing of all the monasteries with their
friars under one and the same code of laws and
regulations, it did nothing of the kind. One monastery
had obtained grants and privileges from this Pope, and
another had obtained concessions from that one, and
all had more or less made their own regulations—
had become a law unto themselves—so that there was
the greatest diversity in their internal government.
It will be remembered that such irregularities formed
one of the charges made against the English monas¬
teries. Monks were found to hold dispensations from
their superiors, and even from the Pope himself,
absolving them from the observance of their vows.
Mr. Froude tells us, in his History of England, that he
discovered among the MSS. in the Rolls House, a list
of eighteen priests and laymen in one diocese who had,
or professed to have, dispensations to break their vow
of chastity. It was expected that the unification
would put a stop to all such irregularities. But it
was a tremendous undertaking, and it would have
kept the Chapter sitting too long to have carried it
out at Parma. It determined therefore, to do it by
Commission, and to entrust the task to three of the
most learned, wise, pious, and prudent of the Order.
THE PROVINCIAL AND PROCURATOR. 31
The first who was chosen for this select triumvirate
was Fra Paolo, who was also,made its president, and
the other two who were associated with him were
patriarchal friars. The Commission proceeded to
Rome, where, under the eye of the General of the
Order, and of Pope Gregory XIII., represented by the
two Cardinals Severino and Farnese, the work was
done. The main part of it, we are expressly told, was
accomplished by Fra Paolo alone, because of his
superior knowledge of the decisions of Councils, of
civil jurisprudence, and of the laws of the monastic
life. His knowledge of Church Canons was such that
he not only knew all of them by heart, but the dates
when they were enacted, and the motives that led to
their being framed, and the circumstances in which
they were passed. The merits of the new " constitu¬
tion " were at once recognised, and high tributes of
praise were bestowed upon it The leading authorities
in Rome said, that it was worthy of those who had
devoted their whole lives to jurisprudence ; and
Lomonico, as quoted by Bianchi-Giovini, did not
hesitate to affirm " that it would have been the wonder
of posterity, had he (Fra Paolo) been the legislator
for a people, instead of for a convent."
One or two further facts bearing on Fra Paolo's
conduct as a member of the Commission are worthy of
notice. Whilst considerate as a legislator, he was also
inflexibly just. Servîtes who were favourites of the
General, or of the Cardinals, used to pray these
dignitaries to obtain some modification of a statute,
or some concession on their behalf. What happened
on these occasions, we are told, was this. The General
32
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
or Cardinal would say, " The judgments of Fra Paolo
do not admit of revision, but I shall speak to him to
obtain, if possible, something as a favour for you."
Then, when Sarpi was spoken to he invariably refused :
I am not able to do it, for justice knows no favourites."
Another fact is that it was at this time that Fra Paolo
began his struggle with the Jesuits, a struggle that was
destined to close only with his life, but one in which
he was invariably the victor. Although the Society of
the Jesuits, founded in 1534, was at this time but
forty-five years old, it was already exercising consider¬
able influence in Italy. It watched keenly the
proceedings of the Commission in the matter of
Mariolatry, for it was working not only for the reten¬
tion, but for the extension of everything in the services
of the Church that tended to the glorification of the
Madonna. Fra Paolo on the other hand wished to
restore the devotion already given to her back to her
Son, and as far as the offices of the Servite Order were
concerned, he accomplished his purpose, for he carried
his colleagues with him, and influenced both Gregory
XIIL, and the General to give their consent that he
should strike out of them the " Salve Regina,^* a
prayer to Mary. This, unfortunately, was re-inserted,
but not until about the year 1640, eighteen years or
so after Fra Paolo's death. I may here add that in
the second book of Fra Paolo's Tridentine History,
when telling of the discussion that arose in the
Council regarding the doctrine of Original Sin, he
sketches in a most interesting passage the rise and
progress of Mariolatry in the Church of Rome. He
shows how the pictures of the Madonna and Child
THE PROVINCIAL AND PROCURATOR. 33
were introduced in the fifth century, not in honour of
Mary, but to remind the faithful, in opposition to the
errors of Nestorius, that even as a babe, Christ, being
divine, was worthy of worship ; but how, gradually,
the worship was transferred from Him to his mother,
^"restando egli nella pittura come appendice." He
shows further that it was not till the eleventh century
that a canonical office was instituted in her honour ;
and not till the middle of the fifteenth century that the
"invented novelty'' of the Virgin's freedom from
original sin was mooted at the Council of Bâle, and
that the bull issued by Pope Sixtus IV. towards the
close of that century, declared only that it was not
heresy to hold such a doctrine^ which shows the
repugnance of the Church towards it. Fra Paolo in
thus seeking to get rid of the " novelty " was but
showing himself in this, as in so many other matters,
an adherent of the great reforming, or Old Catholic
party. We cannot but think how, in spite of such
protests, the descent of the Papacy in Mariolatry has
gone on steadily, and has reached its climax in our
own day, when the decree of the Immaculate Con¬
ception was pronounced by Pius IX. in St. Peter's, on
December 8th, 1854; and when Leo, XIII., the " Pope
of the Rosary" as he has been called, in an Encyclical
Letter of September 8th, 1892, confesses, in speaking
of himself, "all our hopes and fears, our joys and
sorrows, have been deposited in her bosom ; and it
has been our constant care to entreat her to show to
us a mother's kindness, to be always at our side,"
and exhorts the faithful to her worship thus : " When
we betake ourselves in prayer to Mary, we betake
D
34
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
ourselves to the mother of mercy, well disposed
toward us," that she "may lavish upon us the treasure
of that grace which, from the beginning, was given to
her in full plenty from God, . , . therefore let us
not approach Mary timidly, or carelessly, ... let us
piously invoke her ready help in that method of
prayer which she herself has taught us, and accepts."
Fra Paolo Sarpi continued to hold the office of
Provincial for the usual period of three years, that is,
till April, 1582. Nothing, however, that he was after¬
wards called upon to do equalled in importance the
work of unification of which we have spoken, which
was more than enough to render ever memorable his
provincialship. Another fact regarding it is interest¬
ing. In no case was any decision he made, or any
judgment he pronounced, or any sentence he passed,
reversed, or even modified. An instance is on record
of Cardinal Severino being so anxious to cancel
certain sentences pronounced against some erring
friars, who were his intimate friends, that he referred
their cases for re-examination to his own auditors.
On receiving their report, even he was constrained to
fall in with the judgment of Fra Paolo, and say
frankly, " There is; nothing to be done on the score of
justice." None knew better than he that nothing else
weighed with the Provincial.
Towards the close of 1582 Fra Paolo was again
in Rome on a mission of importance. Tafani, the
General of the Order, had died, and he was sent to
co-operate with the Pope in the election of a successor.
Whenever the Order had important business on hand
which required sound judgment, enlightened views,
THE PROVINCIAL AND PROCURATOR. 35
and incorruptible probity, its execution was entrusted
to Fra Paolo. It was during this visit of his to Rome
that the Gregorian Calendar came into use, dis¬
placing the Julian. The error in the Calendar of
Julius Caesar was a very slight one, but, in the course
of the past sixteen centuries, it had mounted up to ten
days. Pope Gregory XIII. rectified it by arranging
that the 5th of October of this year should be reckoned
the 15th, and that a day should be dropped every hundred
years, by reckoning the month of February of the first
year of each century, which is a leap year, to have
but twenty-eight days. Fra Paolo took a deep interest
in the calendar, and it has been thought, not without
some degree of probability, that the Pope consulted
him in his great enterprise. Though Gregory XIII.
in this matter, and in others of an educational
character, acted wisely and well, yet on him rests the
stain of having had a Te Deum sung in Rome, and a
medal struck, to commemorate the massacre of St.
Bartholomew, with which he has indelibly associated
himself, for the medal, the die of which is now in the
hands of the Italian Government, shows Pope Gregory's
effigy on one side, and on the other men and women
weltering in blood under the sword of a destroying
angel, and the words " Ugonottorum strages, 1572."
The next event of importance in Fra Paolo's life
was his election to the dignity of Procurator of his
Order. As we have already seen, this office was
only second to that of General ; and, Fra Fulgenzio
tells us, no one was ever chosen to fill it who was not
extremely learned, and in whom the whole Order did
not place unbounded confidence. For the Procurator
D 2
36
FRA PAOLO SARPl.
had to appear before the Courts and Congregations at
Rome to defend the Order in all questions and
discussions that might be referred to them. He had
also to preach before the Pope on behalf of the
Servîtes at certain stated times. The whole interests
of the Order were in his hands. Fra Paolo's election
to this responsible position took place at a Chapter
held at Bologna in 1585, when he was but thirty-
three years of age, and, as was the case when he was
chosen Provincial, never before had one so young
held the post. The procuratorship was tenable for
three years, and the holder of it was bound to reside
at Rome with the General, so immediately after Fra
Paolo's election, he left Venice to take up his abode
in the capital, where he remained until the expiry of
his term of office.
The following incidents of this period of Fra
Paolo's life have an interest for us. He became
the friend of Sixtus V., who had just ascended the
papal throne. This was the famous " Swineherd
Pope," who, from feeding swine as a boy at
Montalto, became the proud occupant of the Papal
chair. Sixtus proved himself an energetic, and, in
many respects, an enlightened ruler. Fra Paolo
deeply regretted and openly disapproved of his foreign
policy, which was one of bitter persecution directed
against all who disowned his authority, and which the
French Huguenots, the German Lutherans, and the
English Protestants were made to feel. But he
fully endorsed his home policy, which was of a
reformatory character. For Sixtus V. suppressed the
lawlessness then rampant in Rome ; he purified the
THE PROVINCIAL AND PROCURATOR. 37
judicial tribunals which were centres of corruption ; he
extended the Vatican Library; he carried out the
long-delayed revision of the Vulgate in obedience
to the decree passed at the Council of Trent; and he
also brought out a translation of the Scriptures in
Italian. Unfortunately the revision of the Vulgate
was badly done, and the Italian Bible was suppressed
owing to the determined opposition of the cardinals.
Sixtus V. died, as is well authenticated, a martyr to
reform, for he was poisoned by the Jesuits when about
to introduce certain modifications into their Order.
As the French historian J. Cretineau-Joli says, he died
" quite à propos for the Company." In the carrying
out of many of these drastic measures of reform,
which cost him his life. Pope Sixtus V. consulted Era
Paolo. He also employed him to settle controversies
that arose from time to time in the Congregations on
difficult and important matters of doctrine, and he
frequently appointed him arbiter on special causes
relating to the prelates of the Court.
But Era Paolo was called upon to suffer for his
friendship with the Pontiff. Ecclesiastics, intriguing
for place and power, eyed him with jealousy, and
sought to give him annoyance. An incident that
happened in the streets of Rome brought their
persecutions to a head. As the Pope was being
carried along in his litter. Era Paolo chanced to pass.
Immediately Sixtus caused his servants to stop, and
calling the modest friar to him, he entered into a
friendly conversation, which lasted a considerable
time, to the surprise of every one. Very soon the
rumour was current-in Rome that such free and easy
38
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
colloquy meant nothing less for Sarpi than a cardinal's
hat. Ambitious prelates now resorted to almost open
persecution. All the while nothing was further from
Fra Paolo's mind than Church preferment; indeed,,
at this very time, in answer to a friend in Venice
who wrote to him on the subject, he said so, adding,
with reference to the unworthy means too often
adopted to secure them, " I hold in little account
these Church dignities got by bad acts ; in fact, I
abominate them."
Another friendship he formed while at Rome was
with Bellarmine, the famous Jesuit theologian and
writer, who was afterwards made a cardinal. I need
not say that Fra Paolo and he were diametrically
opposed in everything characteristic of Jesuitism,
and more than once they were publicly called upon
to show this opposition, when, some twenty years
later, the Republic of Venice, under the direction of
Fra Paolo Sarpi, gave the Order of the Jesuits its
first decisive check and rebuff. Yet the friendship
cemented now was not loosened even then, as it was
founded on genuine mutual respect, and similarity of
literary tastes and pursuits. Fra Paolo was also in
friendly relations with Father Bobadilla, one of the
ten founders of the Jesuit Company, who sympathised
with Fra Paolo in his opposition to the evil ways of
his own Order, saying, " It never entered the mind of
Father Ignatius Loyola that the Company should
become what it now was," and that " if he returned
again to the earth he would not recognise it as his
own."
Cardinal Castagna, the Genoese, who in 1590 was
THE PROVINCIAL AND PROCURATOR. 39
raised to the pontificate under the title of Urban VII.,
was another of Fra Paolo's chief friends at this period.
They had much in common, both intellectually and
spiritually, and the Cardinal so loved to converse with
him that he used to say, "The oftener you come
to see me the more grateful I am." Castagna had
been a member of the Council of Trent, and was
President of the section charged with the arranging
and classifying of its decrees. He put all his
extensive and accurate knowledge at the command of
Era Paolo, and thus very materially aided him in his
history of the Council. Urban VII.'s pontificate lasted
but thirteen days. When he died Fra Paolo exclaimed
Ideo raptus est ne malitia mutaret intellectum ejus,"
" Therefore was he snatched away that wickedness
should not spoil his intellect."
In closing this period of Fra Paolo's life, I have but
to add that he made good use of his stay in Rome for
the carrying on of his studies in all their varied
directions. He spent much of his time in the Vatican
Library, and also availed himself of the select
collections of private friends, reading voraciously, and
remembering all he read. The fruits of his studies
and researches will appear in the next chapter.
40
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
CHAPTER IV.
'^he Scientist and Philosopher.
1589—1605. œtat. 37—53.
At the close of the two preceding chapters I referred
to the scientific and philosophic studies that Fra Paolo
Sarpi was never weary of pursuing ; and in the earlier
of these references, I said that not only did he make
himself complete master of all known truth in those
departments of knowledge, but that he made in most,
if not in all of them, new and fresh discoveries that
contributed to their enrichment and enlargement. It
was during the period of his life now under considera¬
tion that most of these discoveries were made, and I
therefore proceed to tell briefly what they were.
Before doing so, however, it is necessary to state
that when claiming for Fra Paolo this philosophic
thought, or that scientific discovery, it is not always
possible to quote directly from him, citing authorita¬
tively chapter and verse. The reason is that the
originals of most of his writings of this period have
perished. Few of his works were published during
his life-time. After his death his scientific and philo¬
sophical manuscripts remained, with his private papers
and diaries, in the Servite monastery, where they were
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 41
carefully preserved; and, as late as 1740, were
minutely examined, and arranged in order by the
learned Fra Guiseppe Bergantini. Twenty-six years
later, that is in 1769, all were entirely destroyed by
the disastrous fire which then reduced the great pile of
buildings to a heap of blackened ruins. What then
are our sources of information regarding the nature of
these writings? Happily they are not a few. (i)
There is in St. Mark's Library, in the Ducal Palace,
a book in manuscript, called Pensieri. It has 200
pages, and contains 674 propositions on all kinds of
subjects—astronomical, mathematical, philosophical—
and on every branch of natural science. It is a copy
of a manuscript of Fra Paolo's that existed in the
monastery of the Servîtes, and its accuracy is
guaranteed by the fact that it was made by order of
the Doge, Marco Foscarini, when he was Procurator of
St. Mark's, who required it when preparing his
well-known work on "Venetian Literature." Marco
Foscarini was the third last Doge of Venice, ruling
for a short period in 1762-1763, so the transcription
took place but a few years before the fatal fire. When
the Doge died his library was sold, and the librarian of
St. Mark's secured this precious manuscript. Although
it is very fragmentary (for it consists chiefly of notes,
supposed to have been made by Fra Paolo for use in
his lectures), still it is invaluable, as it shows us the
profundity of his researches ; and how, anticipating
the discoveries of the scientists and philosophers of a
later day, he was undoubtedly one of the greatest
thinkers the world has ever seen. I shall have
occasion often to refer to it in this chapter, when
42
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
speaking of the subjects of his studies separately.
(2) There are Fra Paolo's Letters. As he carried on
an immense correspondence, having communication
with the most eminent men in every country in
Europe, in every department of learning, and as his
letters were copied and translated into different
languages, many of them have come down to us.
Collections of them are preserved in the national
libraries of Paris, of Vienna, of Geneva, and of course
of Venice ; and, indeed, there are few continental
libraries that do not possess some of them. It is true
that the majority of these belong to a later period of
his life than that of which I am speaking, and deal
with questions of Church and State, which then almost
exclusively occupied him ; still, not a few belong to
this time, and treat of science and philosophy. Then,
as his sympathies were wide as the interests of
humanity, and he knew everything that was going on
ôf importance in the world, and, as I have already
said, he never retained to himself any knowledge he
possessed or any discovery he made—^he was too great
a man for that—and as his letters have no stiffness
and no formality, for, as he himself tells us, he wrote
as he talked, they sparkle with gems of thought as
thick as stars in a winter's sky. Some of these letters
are only now being discovered, like the " Lettere
Inedite," which, after having passed from library to
library, and from one dealer in antiquities to
another, were traced by Commendatore Stefani, the
Director of the Archives in Venice, and handed over
by him to Commendatore Castellani, the Director of
St. Mark's Library, by whom they have just been
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 43
published. (3) There is the Testimony of his Con¬
temporaries. The same impulse that made him write
to others of his discoveries made him talk of them. He
followed Emerson's advice, " If you have discovered
anything, shout it out in the hearing of all men in the
market-place." This he did ; not, however, for the
reason Emerson gives, " lest some one should antici¬
pate you in your discoveries," nor did he do so
to gratify any personal pride and ambition, for
he was entirely free from any such feelings, but
simply to give others the benefit of them, and
so to advance learning. " A miracle of learning
and of modesty," as Bishop Sanderson of Lincoln
called him, he, to use Era Fulgenzio's words, "com¬
municated his great knowledge with the greatest
readiness to others." Not a few who thus profited
by his researches and discoveries, acknowledge, and
not in gprudging terms, but fully and frankly, and with
honest pride, their indebtedness to him. (4) Era
Eulgenzio Miccanzio gives in his Biography of Fra
Paolo a full account of his writings, and this work is
preserved in manuscript in the library of St, Mark's,
where it can now be seen. (5) Shortly after Era
Paolo's death, the Senate ordered Girolamo Lando, a
learned patrician, to examine all his writings, and
make extracts of everything bearing on the
affairs of the State. In doing this he not only
examined his later polemical works (the manuscripts
of which were in the hands of the Senate), but
all the documents that were at the Servite monastery.
These Extracts alone form twenty-nine volumes in
folio, containing seven hundred different papers, which
44
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
are now in the Archives of Venice at the Frari ; and
although they refer mainly to affairs of State, still
they have also a philosophic and scientific interest.
Notes made by Fra Paolo for his own use, such as are
in the " Pensieri," are also found here, although to a
very limited extent. (6) All Fra Paolo's later
Polemical Works have been preserved. The manu¬
scripts of them are to be seen in Venice, and most of
them have been translated into different languages,
and published in the leading capitals of Europe. In
these not a few of the thoughts of his earlier
scientific and philosophical writings are reproduced.
(7) Lastly, as two hundred and forty-six years elapsed
between Fra Paolo's death and the loss of his earlier
works, and as during all that time they were available
for reference in the library of the Servite monastery,
they were widely read and widely quoted, and a
general popular idea was formed of their invaluable
contents.
One of the sciences to which Fra Paolo Sarpi was
zealously, I may say even passionately, devoted
during his whole life was Anatomy. In this he made
very many valuable discoveries. These he communi¬
cated to doctors in Venice, but more especially to the
eminent professors of surgery and medicine in the
University of Padua. The famous surgeon, Fabrizio
d'Acquapendente repeatedly acknowledges his in¬
debtedness to him; and the celebrated French
physician, Pierre Asselineau, who studied and
practised at this time in Venice, when questioned
on the subject, used to raise both his hands in the air,
put his head to one side, and exclaim, " Oh, how
THE SCIENTtST AND PHILOSOPHER. 45
many things Father Paul has taught me in anatomy,
in minerals, and in simples. His is a pure soul, in
which shines out a candour, a goodness of nature, and
a not knowing how to do anything but good." The
discovery in anatomy with which the name of Era Paolo
Sarpi is permanently associated is that of the valves
of the veins. It enhances the credit due to him for
this great discovery to know that he attained to it by
pure reasoning and reflection. He was examining the
specific gravity of the blood, and his determination of
that led him to the conclusion that there must be
some machinery in the veins by which the blood
can be suspended and its flow regulated, so
as to avoid dilatation and congestion, as in
varicose veins. Having arrived at this conclusion, a
careful examination with the dissecting knife and
microscope confirmed his theory. This discovery is,
of course, most closely connected with that still
greater one the circulation of the blood, and some
have not hesitated to say that Era Paolo anticipated
Harvey in that discovery with which his name is
so inseparably linked. Dr. Albrecht von Haller,
physician to King George II., President of the Royal
Academy of Sciences, and the " Father of Physiology,"
as he has been termed, and many other eminent
physicians, have held that opinion. The great Italian
patriot and moralist Mazzini, when an " outlaw in
every kingdom of the world except in England," writing
in the "Westminster Review" for April, 1838, advances
what, to his judgment, were incontrovertible proofs of
it. Here I need only say that many contemporary
doctors and writers attributed the discovery to Era
46
FRA PAOLO SARPL
Paolo. Wesling, for example, states that he saw in
the hand of Fra Fulgenzio a paper in the hand¬
writing of Sarpi on the subject ; and Bartolino, who
was a friend of Harvey, always openly asserted, with¬
out contradiction, that whilst Harvey was the first to
give experimental proofs of the circulation of the
blood, yet to Fra Paolo belonged the merit of its
discovery. But what to my mind is proof sufficient of
itself that Fra Paolo did arrive at the discovery, is that
he incidentally claims it. In a letter in which he
speaks of a treatise by Andrew Vesalius, who was a
celebrated lecturer on anatomy in Sarpi's day at Pavia^
Bologna, and Pisa, he wrote : " Certain things in
this work with great pleasure I have found, because
they seem to be analogous to those things by me
already discovered and registered as to the circulation
of the blood in the body of animals, and upon the
structure and uses of their valves." This quotation
suggests my saying, what is well known to be the
case, that it not unfrequently happens that different
men in different countries, in their study of the same
subject make the same discoveries ; and more
frequently still it happens that whilst an im¬
portant discovery is associated with the name of
one man, it was not his labours alone, but the
continued labours of many that led up to it. The
spirit of the times tended in a certain direction, and
one, filled more than others with that spirit, first"
reached the goal. At the same time allowing to-
Harvey the independent discovery of the circulation
of the blood, these two facts are to be noted. His
famous work on the subject, " Exercitatio Anatómica
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 47
de Motu Cordis et Sanguinis," was not published till
1628, five years after Fra Paolo's death. Then,
Harvey attended, as a student, the lectures of
Acquapendente in the School of Medicine at Padua
between the years 1590 and 1602, and Acqua¬
pendente in these lectures spoke of the valves of the
veins, of which he had learned from Fra Paolo Sarpi.
Thus not only to Fra Paolo would seem to belong
the merit of priority in the discovery of the circulation
of the blood, but also, by his discovery of the valves
of the veins communicated to Harvey, through
Acquapendente, that of having put him in the way of
making the discovery of the circulation for himself,
and of developing it in all its fulness, and of giving it
forth to the world.
Fra Paolo was also the first to examine the effects
of the artificial introduction of air into the lungs and
blood. He insisted on the utility of this in cases of
asphyxia, syncope, and fainting. It was he who thus
gave to Professor Santorio of Padua the idea of
Animal Statics.
Optics was another branch of science materially
advanced by him. In this he not only discovered the
dilatation and contraction of the uvea of the eye in all
animals, but by dissection of the eye itself he was able
to explain its cause. He was no mean oculist, and
he it was who by his discoveries paved the way to the
investigation of theories of vision. In his "Pensieri"
some of his notes on this subject have come down to
us. He communicated all he learned in optics to
Acquapendente, who made use of the information in
his lectures. Also, as he embodied and developed
48
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
what Paolo Sarpi told him about the valves of the
veins in a work entitled " Ostiales Venerum," so he
did in this matter of vision, in a work called " De
Oculo Visus Organo," in which he speaks of his
obligation to Fra Paolo in these words, " Quod
arcanum ohservatum est, et mihi signißcatum a Rev.
Pater M agist r o Paolo, Venetoß whom in another place
he calls " I'oracolo di questo secolo." Indeed, Fra
Fulgenzio tells us that all that was new in Acqua-
pendente's treatise on vision was by Fra Paolo himself.
A third subject in. which he was also deeply versed
was Astronomy. The sixteen years of his life of which
I am now treating almost exactly correspond with the
period that Galileo spent in Padua as professor of
astronomy in its University, to which chair he had
been appointed by the Senate of Venice. During the
whole of this time Fra Paolo and he were close friends.
Sarpi was ten years older than Galileo, and as he had
had the start by that period of his friend in the study
of astronomy and its cognate sciences, the advantage
lay with him. Galileo, instead of being jealous of Fra
Paolo, was jealous only for his honour and pre¬
eminence, calling him "// mio padre e maestro "—" my
father and my master." Fra Paolo was the first to
prepare maps of the moon, and to observe that the red
light which is seen around it during an eclipse is sun¬
light reflected from the surface of the earth. Galileo
bore witness to his knowledge of stelenography by
sending to him for criticism all his own observations on
the moon's surface. When, in February, 1610,
Galileo made discoveries about the planet Saturn and
the movements of Venus, we are told that he at once
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 49
communicated them to Fra Paolo. These two
geniuses were associated in the construction of the
telescope, which was afterwards presented to the Doge
Leonardo Donato. We do not possess many details
of Fra Paolo's astronomical knowledge, but the broad
fact of the relations existing in this matter between
him and Galileo shows that it must have been pro¬
found, and conducive to the true advancement of the
science. It is worth noting that Leopold II, the last
Grand Duke of Tuscany, who was compelled to
abdicate in 1859 to make way for the incorporation in
i860 of Tuscany with the Kingdom of Italy under
Victor Emmanuel, in the frescoes painted for him to
commemorate Galileo's connection with Florence,
introduced Fra Paolo. The two astronomers stand
side by side. I may here quote a very remarkable
passage in Fra Paolo's writings, which shows his
profound conviction of the truth of all Galileo's
discoveries, his affection for him, and his distrust
of those into whose hands Galileo committed himself
for judgment. The passage is in part a prophecy.
Fra Paolo writes : " I hear that Master Galileo
is transferring himself to Rome, invited there by
various Cardinals to show his discoveries in the
heavens. I fear that if in such circumstances he
brings before them the wise reasons which have led
him to support the theory of Copernicus concerning
our solar system, he will not fall in with the genius of
the Jesuits and of other friars. The physical and
astronomical question will be changed into a
theological one, and I foresee to my great displeasure
that to live in peace, and without the mark of heresy
E
50
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
and excommunication, he will have to retract \i\s state¬
ments on the subject. The day will come, however,
of this I am nearly certain, that men, illuminated by
greater studies, will deplore the misfortune of Galileo,
and the injustice used against so great a man. In the
meantime he will have to suffer and lament himself,
but in secret."
Heat and Light were searched into by him as to
their natures and effects, and governing laws. In
illustration of heat he instances its generation by
beating iron with a hammer, and says that it is motion.
Light he also says is motion, and that it comes to us in
waves or pulsations through a medium less material
than the atmosphere. He divides with Galileo the
honour of inventing the thermometer. He tell us that
the sun is fed, and that stars are suns.
Sound and Colour also treated of. "Sound,"
he says in the " Pensieri," " is motion, but not motion
of the atmosphere, for it travels to us against the wind
and through water. It comes to us like light in waves
or pulsations." " Colour" he says, " is caused by the
atmosphere, and by the reflection of different rays of
light." He then identifies in a way sound, colour,
light, and heat. The varied and beautiful colouring
that is seen in old glass he thus accounts for. " Glass
in damp putrifies. Then in drying, this putrified
material arranges itself in laminae of changing colour."
In this he forestalls, I believe, observations made by
Newton.
Reflection and Refraction were also investigated by
Fra Paolo. In the subject of Reflection he anticipated
Kepler, who was nineteen years Fra Paolo's junior, in
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER.
51
some of his observations on the reflection of light from
curved surfaces. In that of Refraction he says, " If
the medium through which you look condenses itself,
the object, however stable, will appear to move towards
the eye, and if the medium be rarefied it will appear
to recede."
In Pneumatics he made many interesting experi¬
ments, and it was to him Galileo turned when studying
the condensation and rarefication of the atmosphere ;
and he it was who gave to Torricelli the thoughts he
developes in his book on " Atmospheric Pressure."
Hydrostatics^ too, received his careful investigation,
and he wrote a treatise on the movements of water,
recording correct observations on buoyancy, flotation,
and the weight of immersed bodies. Notes of this
treatise have been preserved in his " Pensieri."
Of Magnetism Fra Paolo knew more perhaps than
any one of his time. Fra Fulgenzio tells a story of a
great magnetician who came to Venice from " beyond
the mountains," and who had an interview with Fra
Paolo in his cell. He apparently thought to enlighten
him on the subject, but he soon found that Fra Paolo
knew all he did about it, and a great deal more
besides, so that " he was so astonished that he did not
know where he was." Sarpi corresponded with William
Gilbert of Colchester, the eminent physician, and
accepted the theory developed in his work " De
Magnete," that the earth is a great magnet. Gilbert
bears testimony to Fra Paolo's knowledge of
magnetism, setting him above Porta, a distinguished
Neapolitan professor of this science, and the inventor
of the camera obscura. Porta, who was himself the
E 2
52
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
centre of a scientific circle which Fra Paolo used to
frequent when he was residing in Rome, magfnani-
mously says, " I do not blush, but confess myself
honoured, to confess that many things concerning
magnetic phenomena I have learned from Fra Paolo,
a true ornament of light, not only of Venice, but of
Italy, and of the whole world." Fra Paolo knew all
about the variation of the needle, and invented a
declinometer for determining it.
In Mathematics Fra Paolo, as I have already noted,
knew no rival. This assertion is borne out by the
testimony of Galileo. When the subject was being
discussed at Milan, and Baldasaro Capra, a scholarly
Milanese, was taking the credit of having invented
proportional compasses, Galileo, ever jealous of the
rights of his "father and master" interrupted him,
claiming the invention for Fra Paolo, and added "no
one in Europe, it can be said without exaggeration,
surpasses Master Paolo Sarpi in the knowledge of the
science of mathematics." In this connection I may
also state that Vieta, the great French mathematician,
always sent copies of his books to Fra Paolo, not
merely in token of friendship, but for revision and
correction. Fra Paolo was able also to correct Vieta's
treatise on algebra, of which, as a symbolic science,
he is considered to have been the founder. Robert
Anderson, the Scottish geometrician, also sent to Fra
Paolo his books for revision, and from a letter to him,
which has been preserved, we are led to believe that
Fra Paolo wrote a valuable work entitled "Recognition
of Equations." He has also left in his " Pensieri "
notes of his studies in conic sections.
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 53
yurisprudence was another department of learning
which he had made his own. His fame in this subject
was such that all the chief jurists—not of Italy only,
but of Europe—entered into correspondence with him.
Letters are still extant showing his friendship with
Lord Bacon, with Lescasseries (who was in the habit
of sending his books to him, as did Vieta and
Anderson), and with many other well known men.
In Metaphysics Fra Paolo wrote a treatise called
" L'Arte di Ben Pensare"—"The Art of Thinking
Well." In this he distinguished between sensation and
reflection, and referred our ideas of sound, colour,
taste, and smell to reflection. In it he also spoke of
human language, of words, of genus and species, of
faith and truth, and error, of the law of association,
of demonstration and probability, and to a very large
extent he covered the same ground as Locke did
about a hundred years later in his celebrated " Essay
on the Understanding." Lord Macaulay speaks of Fra
Paolo as having anticipated Locke in the sphere of
metaphysics. Of that fact there can be no doubt,
and there is reason for thinking that it also is true
that he supplied Locke with the germs of many of
the ideas which we find expanded in his writings.
What seems to be more than a synopsis of Fra
Paolo's lost work on " The Art of Thinking Well "
(for parts of it appear to be fully copied out), exists
in the volume of " Pensieri."
Other subjects that Fra Paolo studied were Metal¬
lurgy and Chemistry. At this time many everywhere,
and more especially monks and hermits, were busy
with their pestles and mortars, crucibles and retorts.
54
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
trying to distil the elixir of perpetual youth, and to
transmute baser metals into gold. Fra Paolo Sarpi
was as busy as any with these instruments—not in
the chimerical search that occupied so many of his
fraternity, but to discover the nature of minerals, and
the chemical properties of bodies. He was no visionary
alchemist, but a practical metallurgist and chemist.
A rather amusing story brings this out. There came
to Venice an alchemist called Mamugna. In southern
Italy he had gained a tremendous reputation, having
succeeded in persuading the Pope and his Prelates,
Princes and Potentates, and the people everywhere,
that he possessed the secret of the transmutation of
metals. The Church so far took him under its aegis
that those who ventured to doubt his power were
branded " unbelievers and heretics." All Venice was
in a state of excitement over this Mamugna, and Fra
Paolo was appealed to. Fra Paolo not only did not
believe in him, but refused to go near him, saying to
those who urged him to visit Mamugna's laboratory
that it would not be simply folly on his part to do so,
but madness. Fra Paolo's disbelief and scorn brought
the people back to their senses, and the alchemist was
mocked and satirised. Men, dressed up to resemble
Mamugna and his assistants, had a boat fitted up like
his laboratory, with a furnace and all the apparatus
necessary for the transmutation of metals, in which
they rowed up and down the canals in the chief parts
of the city, shouting, " Mamugna's fine gold at three
francs a pound!" Covered with ridicule the great
alchemist slunk out of Venice.
I must content myself with doing little more than
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 55
mentioning other branches of Fra Paolo's wide
learning. He was versed in Architecture^ and the
anatomical theatre of the University of Padua was
built to his plans. He also designed several palaces
in Venice, one being that of the Doge Donato, which
is still standing in the then fashionable, now deserted,
quarter of Venice—the Fondamenta Nuova. Great
military commanders used to consult him as to the
construction of forts and ramparts. In this taste for
architecture Fra Paolo exhibited one of the chief
excellences of his time, which found its highest
expression in the works of Michael Angelo, Palladio,
Sansovino, Vignola, and of Antonio da Ponte, who
was now building the famous marble bridge of the
Rialto. He knew Botany well, and he is said to have
laid out the first botanical garden ever seen in Padua.
Sir Henry Wotton, the English Ambassador to the
Republic from the Court of James I., testifies to Fra
Paolo's knowledge of botany in these words, he is "as
expert in the history of plants as if he had never
perused any book but nature."
In Geology, Mineralogy, Animal and Vegetable
Physiology, and in Herbs and Medicine he was deeply
read. He was a great Mechanician. Fra Fulgenzio
tells us that all inventors brought their instruments
and contrivances to him, and he would, on the instant,
tell the uses they were intended to serve, and whether
or not they were well adapted, and how they could be
perfected. Sometimes he would rapidly draw out the
plans of a new machine, constructed on a different
principle, that would serve the inventor's purpose
better. Every one who consulted him went away
56
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
satisfied, and feeling as if Fra Paolo had devoted
his whole life to that one subject in which he himself
happened to be interested ; for there was no depart¬
ment of human knowledge about which he did not
know everything that had been ascertained by others,
and few to which he did not make substantial contri¬
butions. There lived at Padua at this time a most
worthy, scholarly man, called Gian Vincenzo Penelli.
He was very rich and very generous—seeking out and
encouraging struggling talent in the world of letters.
It is said that he helped many students at the
University of Padua. When Fra Paolo was visiting
him one day (for they were great friends), there
chanced to be with Penelli, Marino Ghetaldo, a
famous mathematician. As Fra Paolo was leaving,
Penelli showed him most marked respect, accom¬
panying him to the door, although he was hardly able
to move a limb through gout. The mathematician
noticed this with astonishment, and afterwards
asked rather disdainfully, " Who is that friar to whom
you pay so much attention ?" "A* il mir acolo di
" questo secolo "—" He is the miracle of this age,"
was the answer. Ghetaldo, judging he referred to
scholarship, inquired, " In what profession ? " The
answer was, " In whichever you please." Then
Penelli, seeing the increased surprise of his friend,
said, " I will give you a proof. All know that you are
a great mathematician. I will invite Fra Paolo Sarpi
to dinner to-morrow. Meantime you can prepare,
as a touchstone, the most difficult problems in your
science that you can think of. I do not wish you to
tell me anything about them, and Fra Paolo will be
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 57
quite unprepared. At dinner I will introduce mathe¬
matics as a subject of conversation, when you can put
your questions." The plan was carried out. Fra
Paolo, without the slightest hesitation, resolved all
Ghetaldo's problems ; and showed a knowledge of the
science so vastly superior to that which the mathema¬
tician himself possessed, that he remained " astonished
and confounded," and said that he never believed
any one to have the knowledge possessed by Fra Paolo.
From this time onward—some thirty years—Ghetaldo
remained not only his friend, but his pupil, for he
communicated to him every thing he did as a mathe¬
matician that he might receive his guidance and
approval.
I add the names of a few works by Fra Paolo
that partook of a religious, as well as of a scientific
character. These were, "The Unity of all Science
and of all Goodness ;" " Atheism Repugnant to Human
Nature;" and "The Medicine of the Soul," in which
he applied to the soul the principles of health and
healing which he applied to the body. David's prayer,
" Search me, O God, and know my heart ; try me»
and know my thoughts ; and see if there be any
wicked way in me, and lead me in the way ever¬
lasting," was often on his lips, as we learn from his
having written the tractate. " An Examination of our
own Defects, and how to cure them." Defects visible
to no one else he saw in himself, and mourned over.
During this period Fra Paolo was in the habit of
attending various Ridotti, and as this fact has a close
relation tó his studies, I must now speak of it. The
word ridotto, which, derived from reductus—led back.
58
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
means literally " retreat," is in common use now in
Italy, but is almost exclusively applied to a place of
popular entertainment where there is music and
dancing. I need hardly say that the Ridotti Fra
Paolo frequented did not answer to that description,
but were purely literary clubs or societies, which
were held in the houses of distinguished citizens.
One of the chief of these was at the house of his old
schoolmate, Andrea Morosini, who belonged to one of
the oldest Venetian families, was eminent as a senator,
and is now remembered as a trustworthy historian of
Venice. In this Ridotto assembled regularly from
twenty-five to thirty of the most distinguished literary
men of Venice, and there were always present at their
gatherings any illustrious strangers who were either
resident in Venice, or who chanced to be there on a
visit. The leader in this Ridotto was Fra Paolo Sarpi,
who alone was able to converse on any subject in
almost any language. But he was never an excessive
talker, he chose rather to draw out others in conversa¬
tion. "He made people," as Fra Fulgenzio puts it,
" develope themselves."
Another Ridotto resorted to by Fra Paolo was held
in the house of Paolo and Aldo Manuzio. These were
the son and grandson of the celebrated Greek scholar,
editor, printer, and publisher, Aldo Pio Manuzio ; who
came to Venice in 1489, who invented the Aldine, or
Italic type (a facsimile of the handwriting of
Petrarch), and who did so much to make general a
knowledge of Greek literature by bringing out the
famous " Aldine Classics," which were so accurate in
point of scholarship, and so beautiful in type. It is
interesting to note that the original house where Aldo
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 59
Pio set up his printing press in 1494 is still standing.
It is a fine old Gothic building, but sadly dilapidated,
in a calle running out of the Campo San Agostino.
By its door there are the remains of an old inscription
which is illegible, but higher up on the wall there is
another, put therein 1876 by the Greek School of Padua,
which says that " In this house, which was Aldo Pio
Manuzio's, the Academy met, and from it a knowledge
of Greek literature was dispersed throughout Europe."
The Academy referred to was a literary society for
the study of Greek, which was the only language
allowed to be spoken at its meetings. Aldo Pio
transferred his home and press in 1506 to Campo San
Paternian, which is now named Campo Manin, and
it was here that his son and grandson lived and
worked; and here that the RidottOy which Era Paolo
attended, assembled. The building was taken down
some years ago to make room for a Savings-bank, but a
marble slab let into the wall recalls the connection of
the three Aldos with the spot, in these words, " Aldo
Pio, Paolo, and Aldo II. Manuzio, princes in the art
of typography, in the sixteenth century, diffused, with
classic books from this place, a new light of cultured
wisdom." A curious inscription, which was over Aldo's
door in Era Paolo's day, ran as follows : " Whoever
you are, Aldo requests you if you want any thing to
ask it in few words, and depart ; unless, like Hercules,
you come to lend the aid of your shoulders to the
weary Atlas. Here will always be found in that case
something for you to do, however many you may be."
Aldo says he was forced to put up this intimation,
because of the multitude of curious and idle people
who came to see his press. We may be sure that Era
6o
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Paolo, and his brother-members of the RidottOf
all went " like Hercules," and that Sarpi's wide
classical scholarship must have been of great service
to the Aldos. The Aldos had one of the finest libraries
in Italy, consisting of nearly 100,000 volumes, which
to-day would probably have been in Venice, had not
Pope Clement VIII,, immediately on the death of the
owners, wrongfully taken possession of it, carrying
away all its most valuable books to Rome.
A third Ridotto frequented by Fra Paolo, was at
the shop of Sechini in the Mercería, at the sign of
the " Nave d'Oro" or " Golden Ship." The Mercería
was then, as now, the chief business street in Venice,
and here were to be found the shops of the leading
booksellers. Sechini, however, was not a bookseller,
but a general merchant, having many foreign trade
connections. Perhaps he had, in keeping with his
symbol, " Argosies with portly sail like Signiors, and
rich burghers on the flood." In any case, to his Ridotto
were drawn travellers and foreigners, who, like the
Polos of an earlier time, had quaint tales to tell of
strange new places, of foreign peoples, customs,
modes of living, faiths, superstitions, legends, and
politics. Fra Fulgenzio makes a remark that bears on
the last mentioned subject, which is to this effect, that
those attending this Ridotto had often cause to note
how Fra Paolo could foresee and foretell unerringly
the drift and results of the actions of political men
throughout the world. His forecastings looked like
prophecies. Foreigners who met Fra Paolo Sarpi at
Sechini's used afterwards to boast that they had seen
" the greatest genius of his time."
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 6l
A fourth Ridotto to which Fra Paolo often went was
held at Padua, in the house of that worthy and liberal
patron of literature to whom I have already had
occasion to refer, Gian Vincenzo Penelli. He
possessed a splendid library, and a museum rich in art
antiquities. His house was frequented by Galileo,
Acquapendente, and by other professors in Padua, such
as Santorio, Fabricio, Alpino, Mercuriale, and Ghetaldo
the mathematician. It was on these occasions that
notes were compared, and that Fra Paolo communi¬
cated his discoveries in science and philosophy.
During this period Fra Paolo made three journeys
which have an interest for us—two to Rome, and
one to Ferrara. The first of those to Rome was made
about the beginning of the year 1590. It was under¬
taken on behalf of Fra Giulio, who has already come
laefore us as Fra Paolo's foster-father. Fra Giulio had
l)ecome one of the patriarchs of the monastery, and
was greatly esteemed and beloved, yet he was falsely
accused of misdemeanours, then subjected to various
indignities, and finally removed from Venice to a
monastery in Bologna. Fra Paolo was absent from
Venice when these things took place. As soon as he
returned he inquired into them ; and, convinced that
Fra Giulio was blameless, he set out for Rome, where
he laid the case before Sixtus V., with the result that
the Pope immediately ordered Fra Giulio to be sent
back to Venice, and to be reinstated in all his old
privileges and honours.
The second journey to Rome was made in 1598, on
behalf of the Order. Under incompetent and jealous
.officials things had fallen into a state of thorough
62
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
disorder. Ambitious men in lower positions were
seeking to oust those above them, and there was much
mutual distrust and recrimination. At last the case
went to Rome. The Pope at once called in Fra Paolo
to investigate matters and settle them. Auditors, who
were eminent theologians and lawyers, were chosen by
those who thought that their characters and interests
were at stake. These men often differed in their
judgments from Fra Paolo ; but on appeal, in every
instance his judgments were sustained, and theirs were
quashed.
His journey to Ferrara was also made in 1598, with
his old friend and pupil Leonardo Mocenigo, who
went there to be consecrated by Pope Clement VIIL
to the Bishopric of Ceneda. Mocenigo was a liberal-
minded man, who used to attend the Ridotto at
Morosini's, and Fra Paolo prepared him in theology
and sacred canons for the office he was about to fill.
Fra Paolo's visit to Ferrara, which lies about sixty
miles south of Venice, must have been full of interest
for him, as it had been the home of Ariosto, and was
that of Tasso and Guarini, his own contemporaries,,
and as it was the seat of the great House of Este,
whose court under Alfonso II., who had just died,
rivalled in brilliancy that of the Duke of Gonzaga at
Mantua. Here Fra Paolo met for the first time Pop&
Clement VIIL, wnth whom he had frequently been in
communication. Their meeting could not have been
a source of unmixed satisfaction to Fra Paolo, for the
Pope was not visiting Ferrara simply for the consecra¬
tion of a Bishop, but to take possession of the Duchy,
which he had most unjustly seized on the late Duke'a.
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 63
dying childless. Clement had a reputation for
moderation and statesmanship, but such an act of
brigandage must have lowered him in Fra Paolo's
eyes.
Another fact that I wish to mention in connection
with this period of Fra Paolo's life is that Clement
VIII. twice declined to appoint him to a bishopric,
once in the case of Caorle, which became vacant in
1601, and once in that of Nona, which became vacant
in 1602. Caorle is a small town half-way between
Venice and Aquileia, in the lagoon formed at the
mouths of the rivers Livenza and Lemene. It was of
little account in Fra Paolo's day, having not more
than six thousand inhabitants, but as it was a very
anciënt place, for we find it mentioned by Sagornino,
(one of the earliest of Venetian chroniclers) as one of
the twelve original lagoon settlements, it was the
seat of a Bishop. Nona was another small place,
almost opposite Venice on the coast of Dalmatia,.
which now belongs to Austria. Fra Paolo always
professed himself the servant of the State not less
than of the Church; in him, as in the Reformed
Catholics of the present day, religion and patriotism
were ever united. The fact that both these places
belonged to the Republic—thus affording scope for
this dual devotion ; that they were small—thus
leaving him ample leisure to pursue his ^studies
and experiments; and that they were within easy
reach of the capital, weighed with Fra Paolo in,
offering himself, or in allowing himself to be offered,,
as a candidate for them. The appointments lay with
the Senate and the Pope. The Senate most warmly^
64
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
recommended Fra Paolo—speaking of him as a man
most highly esteemed in Venice, and throughout
Italy, and well known for his goodness, his
exemplary life, and his possession of rare qualities.
However, the relations between the Pope and the
Republic were not a little strained at this time. The
seizure by Clement of the Duchy of Ferrara made the
river Po at once a separating and a connecting line
of boundary between his territory and that of the
Republic, and this gave rise to endless disputes. Of
all neighbours the Republic dreaded most the Pope,
as the most troublesome. Again, the Pope com¬
manded the Republic not to trade with heretics, but
as obedience to this order would have crippled its
trade with Germany, it was disregarded. Clement
had also deceived the Republic in a matter concerning
the Patriarch of Venice. The Senate always made
the appointment, but it was customary for the Prelate
chosen to go to Rome for the Pope's benediction ; but
for nothing else—not for examination, nor for
approval. On that understanding Matteo Zane, who
was chosen Patriarch in 1601, went to Rome, and the
Pope, having asked him a few questions in friendly
converse, gave out to the world that he had examined
him, and finding, him qualified for the office, had given
him the Patriarchal hat. The Republic was indignant,
both at the dishonesty of the Pope and at his arrog¬
ance, for he had been guilty of a breach of faith and
of trespassing on their province, and it instantly
replied by a law forbidding any future Patriarch to
go to Rome for his blessing. Henceforth that
might be transmitted through the Nuncio, or with-
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 65
held as the Pontiff pleased; but in any case the
possibility of his again imposing on the Republic
would be put out of his power. It is interesting to
note that this old right of the Republic, which was
given up to the Papal See by the Austrian Govern¬
ment, when it had domination over Venetia, has
been re-asserted by the Government of Italy. At
the present moment, whilst I write, there is no
Patriarch in Venice, nor has there been one
these three years past. The reason is that
when the last Patriarch died, in 1890, a successor
was nominated for the office by the Pope, but the
Government refused to grant the Exequatur in his
favour. Up to now no settlement has been come to,
and in the present hostile attitude of Church and
State, the Government is well content to leave the
place vacant. Another matter of disagreement con¬
cerned the printing and sale of books. The Pope,
by a new Index ExpurgatoriuSy published in 1596,
sought to control this traffic. As on this Index no
immoral or irreligious books were placed, but only
such as upheld the rights of conscience and of States,
it had been clearly issued, not in the interests of
religion, but solely to uphold the Temporal Power.
Venice, therefore, refused to accept it until the Pope
signed a Concordat, by which only books printed out
of Venice, that attacked religion, were prohibited.
She thus vindicated her independence, made the
Index serve a better purpose than that for which it
had been framed, and preserved her commerce, for
she was a great printing and publishing centre,
and one of the chief markets for books in Europe.
Clement VIII. had thus a sore grudge against the
F
66
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Republic, and one not unpersonal to Fra Paolo
himself, for in all these matters he was known to
have sympathised with the State, and not with the
Church ; and, indeed, he was not incorrectly sus¬
pected of having advised the Republic to adopt
the line of resistance to Papal claims which it
followed. It is not surprising then that Clement
should refuse to appoint Fra Paolo either to the
Bishopric of Caorle or of Nona, thus showing at
once his displeasure both with the Republic and the
friar. Indeed, Clement expressly gave as one of his
reasons for passing by Fra Paolo, that he frequented
Ridotti, keeping company with heretics and Jews.
I may state that shortly before this time Cardinal
San Severine had of his own free will asked for Fra
Paolo Sarpi the bishopric of Milopotamus in Cahdia.
This island had been sold to Venice by Boniface of
Montferrat, the leader of the fourth crusade, and as it
is the " Crete " of Scripture, and the " hundred-citied "
island of Homer, and the birthplace of the great law¬
giver Minos, it must have had for Fra Paolo many
attractions. The Cardinal's application, however, was
made too late to prevent ecclesiastical changes, which
rendered the filling up of the See unnecessary.
But whilst Fra Paolo's liberality and patriotism,
displeasing to Clement and the Papal party, hindered
his preferment, the esteem in which he was held by the
Church at large was even on the increase, for it knew
that loyalty to the Catholic Church, as it existed in
earlier and purer times, not less than love to Venice,
explained his conduct.
Amidst all his studies and doings the duties devolving
upon him as a friar were never neglected. The
THE SCIENTIST AND PHILOSOPHER. 67
brotherhood at the Servite monastery, and, indeed, the
whole Servite Order, loved him, and his influence
amongst them was as great as ever. A curious incident
that happened at the close of the period of which I
now write brought this out. The General of the
Order died, and his nephew, who was rather a worth¬
less fellow, was ambitious to gain the office. Believing,
however, that Fra Paolo would oppose him, he thought
to lessen his influence, and to a certain extent discredit
him in the Order, by bringing against him various
charges. These were frivolity itself, for they dealt,
amongst other trifles, with the kind of cap and the
kind of shoes he wore, which were said to smell of
heresy. The complaints came up at a Chapter held
in Venice, and the offending slippers were brought into
court. The charges were dismissed, as they deserved,
with derision and hisses, and the shoes were carried
back in triumph to their owner ; and it became a
common saying that Father Paul " era cost inculpahile
e puro che fino le sue pianelli er ano statt cannoniz-
zate"—"was so blameless and pure that even his
slippers had been canonized."
In closing this chapter I have but one thing more to
state. It was in the year 1604 that there came to
Venice one to whom I have already referred. Sir
Henry Wotton, between whom and Fra Paolo there
was destined to spring up a very close friendship.
In this same year, or it may be somewhat later, there
also came to Venice, his chaplain. Dr. William Bedell,
who became afterwards Bishop of Kilmore, whose
intimacy with Fra Paolo was not less than the
Ambassador's.
F 2
68
fra paolo sarpi.
CHAPTER V.
'^he 'theological Qoumellor.
1606—1607. aetat. 54—55.
In the Constitution of the Republic at this time there
were three permanent officials called Counsellors of
Law, or State Counsellors, whose duties were to
instruct the Doge and Senate on the legal bearings
of any question in dispute in which the Republic was
involved. But at the beginning of this year, because
of the ecclesiastical element that frequently appeared
in these quarrels (for they were mostly between the
State and the Pope), the Senate resolved to create a
new office, namely, that of Teologo-Consultore, or
Theological Counsellor. In looking about for one to
fill this office the choice of Doge and Senate unani¬
mously fell upon Fra Paolo Sarpi.
Fra Paolo, as we have seen, whilst deep in scientific
and philosophical studies, was perfectly alive to all
that was going on in the Government; and, indeed,
he had already given to its affairs Such careful thought
and study that his advice had frequently been sought
by those in authority, and he had even counselled
the Senate how to act on many occasions. Whilst,
therefore, he would have preferred to have been left
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 69
to the quiet of his cell, where he had ample leisure
for his studious pursuits, yet his patriotism prompted
him at once to sacrifice his own wishes, and accede to
those of the Senate. Foreseeing, however, with the
same prescience that he displayed in Galileo's case,
danger to himself and embarrassment to the Republic
if he accepted the office on his own responsibility, he
requested the Doge and Senate to obtain first of all
the sanction of the General of his Order, who was
supposed to act under the Pope.. They adopted Era
Paolo's suggestion, which proved to be a very wise
and necessary one, as it enabled him rightfully to
keep at his post, when he was afterwards sum¬
moned to Rome, again and again, to answer for his
conduct. On the 28th of January, 1606, he entered
upon his public duties. It was at this time that he
called to his side, as his secretary, that brother-friar
in whom he could believe as he believed in himself,
who lived to be his biographer, and from whom I
have so often had occasion to quote—Era Eulgenzio
Micanzio of Brescia. Era Paolo "perfectionised many
men," said Eulgenzio,"and he it was who trained me."
The love between these two was like that between
David and Jonathan.
This office, then, of Theological Counsellor, together
with those of all the three Counsellors of Law (for,
as we shall see, as the holders of these offices died the
Senate appointed no successors, but handed over
their duties to Era Paolo, so that the whole of the
affairs of the Republic were in his hands) Era Paolo
held onward to the day of his death—a period of
seventeen years. During this time question after
question arose for settlement, many of which were of
70
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
momentous import, the resolution of which bore, not
upon the interests of Venice merely, but of Europe;
and affected, not the then living generation only, but
a remote posterity. In every case Fra Paolo's advice
was sought, in every case it was followed, and in
every case it was right. The consequence was that the
history of the Republic during these seventeen years
was one unbroken record of great intellectual and moral
victories. His friend, Acquapendente of Padua, and
his enemy. Cardinal Borghese, were both right when
the former called him, as we have already seen, " The
oracle of the age," and when the latter complained
that he was regarded as such by the Government and
people.
Much has been said and written about the capri-
ciousness and ingratitude, the despotism and cruelty,
of the Republic towards her servants—how they were
liable to be suspected, seized, tried, tortured, and
executed, and all in the secrecy of darkness. Her
treatment of Fra Paolo Sarpi is a set-off to such
stories. Never was there in any land, by any Govern¬
ment, a servant more honoured and more beloved.
The solicitude of the Doge, of the dreaded Council
of Ten, of the Senate, of the whole people, for the
safety and well-being of their Consultores was like
that of a mother for her only child. " Fate largo a
Fra Paolo "—" Make room for Fra Paolo," was often
heard as he passed along the crowded Mercería.
Fra Paolo loved Venice with an undying devotion,
and Venice loved him with a romantic and tender
affection.
The Pope, whose quarrels with the Republic were the
chief cause of the creation of the office of Theological
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 71
Counsellor, and of Fra Paolo's election to it, was
Paul v., who was little known to the world before his
elevation to the Pontificate. His name was Gamillo
Borghese, the son of a Sienese lawyer. He was born
in Rome in 1552, so that he was of the same age as
his great enemy and conqueror, Fra Paolo. Before he
became Pope he had filled several important offices.
For five years he held that of Auditor of the Apostolic
Chamber, or Executor of the Papal Censures ; then he
went as Papal Nuncio to the Court of Spain ; after
which he was raised by Clement VIII. to the Cardina-
late ; and he ascended the Papal throne on the i6th of
May, 1605. He was not, however, the immediate
successor of Clement, for the Pontificate of Leo XL
came between, which only lasted twenty-six days.
Paul V. was a make-shift Pope. When the members
of the Sacred College met in Conclave, on the nth of
May, 1605, for the election of a successor to Leo XL,
no one ever dreamt of Cardinal Borghese obtaining
that coveted honour. The names of half-a-dozen or
more Cardinals were before the Conclavists, each with
a strong body of supporters, but Borghese was not one
of them. He was but a humble adherent of the Jesuit
Cardinal Bellarmine's faction. It was only when, after
days and nights spent in plotting and counterplotting,
intriguing, and deceiving, it was apparent that no
party could carry its favourite, that rival leaders, to do
despite to each other, fixed on him as a neutral man,
and elected him, to the surprise of everyone—not
least to that of Borghese himself.
At the close of the last chapter I called attention to
the strained relations that existed between Venice and
the Vatican during the last years of Clement VIII.'s
72
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
Pontificate. His seizure of the Duchy of Ferrara, his
conduct in the matter of the Patriarch Zane's appoint¬
ment, his attempt to cripple the book-trade of Venice
by means of the Index Expurgatorius^ all led to
serious disputes, in every one of which he got the
worst of it. Pope Paul V., who was then Cardinal
Borghese, chafed at what he considered Clement's
pusillanimity. Talking of these matters to the
Venetian ambassador at Rome, Leonardo Donato, he
once said, " If I were Pope, I would place Venice
under interdict and excommunication;" " And if I were
Doge," was the reply, " I would trample your interdict
and excommunication under foot." Curiously enough,
both were called upon to fill these offices, and both
proved as good as their words, with what result we
shall see in the sequel. Meanwhile, the incident
serves to show us the temper of the new Pope, and
what might be expected of him.
Paul V. would fain have entered at once on a
struggle with Venice, yet he dared not. The braggart
Cardinal was at first the coward Pope. And this for
the strangest of reasons. At Subiaco, a mediaeval
town about thirty miles from Rome, once a favourite
residence of the Popes, and famous now as the place
where books were first printed in Italy, there was a
Madonna which was said sometimes to perspire, which
phenomenon always presaged the death of a Pope.
Paul V. was informed that this had just taken place.
Again, a Flemish astrologer had foretold that Clement
VIII. would be succeeded first by a Leo, and then by
a Paul, both of whom would die within a brief space of
time. The prophecy had so far been fulfilled. A Leo,
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 73
as we have seen, had succeeded Clement, and had died
within a month ; and now a Paul, in his own person,
sat upon the throne. Two witnesses had thus foretold
his death, so there was no escaping it. So he believed,
and superstition unmanned him. He dismissed his
cook, and those who served him, for fear of being
poisoned. When people came suddenly upon him he
started and trembled. When any one approached him
in the street to present a petition, he would nervously
grasp the paper, and then drop it at his feet. He
spent the first months of his Pontificate irresolutely,
suspicious of every thing and every one, and constantly
dreading death. The means taken to disabuse his
mind of its fears were as strange as reprehensible.
As in pagan times, omens were consulted. The Roman
astrologers examined the aspect of the heavens, and met
in the house of the Pope's brother, Cardinal Borghese,
to compare notes. The outcome of this was that
they were able to assure the Pope that the evil influ¬
ences had passed, and that the stars were now
propitious. It is curious to find that at the time of
the English Reformation, as Mr. Froud relates in his
" History of England," Dr. London, the Warden of
New College, Oxford, employed astrology to track the
path of flight of some students, whom he and other
Church dignitaries were hunting to the death for
studying and distributing the New Testament.
Paul v., relieved by the astrologers from his super¬
stitious fears, was free to follow the bent of his own
will, and enter the lists against Venice. Instantly he
found several excuses for quarrel. The Patriarch,
Matteo Zane—he whose appointment had been a
74
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
matter of dispute with Clement VIII.—died, and the
Senate appointed Francesco Vendramin as his
successor. Pope Paul claimed the right of presenta¬
tion, and demanded that he should be sent to Rome
for examination and approval. The Senate replied
by ordering his investiture, and forbidding him to leave
Venice. Again, money had to be raised in Brescia
for the restoration of the ramparts, and the Senate
imposed a tax on all the citizens—laymen and eccle¬
siastics alike. Pope Paul V. claimed exemption for
the latter, as being his subjects. The Senate refused
to listen to him on the ground that, as the clergy
benefited in common with others from the protection
afforded them in Brescia, in common with others they
must pay for it. These differences were causing both
the Pope and the Republic to look to their armoury
and to try the temper of their weapons, when two more
serious matters occurred which brought them into
open warfare. The prologue was passed, the drama
was about to open. First, two priests in high
position were leading flagrantly wicked and criminal
lives. Cruelty, wholesale poisoning, murder, and
licentiousness, of a most revolting and even unnatural
kind, were laid to their charge. Centres of corrup¬
tion, they were spreading a pestilence around them,
destructive of all innocence and happiness. One of
these ecclesiastics was Count Brandolini, Abbot of
Nervosa, in Friuli ; and the other was Canon Saraceni
of Vicenza. The Senate sent its officers, and had the
offenders seized and brought to Venice, and locked up
from further mischief in the dungeons of the Ducal
Palace. Pope Paul V. angrily remonstrated, and
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 75
peremptorily demanded their instant liberation, on the
ground that being priests they were not amenable
to the secular arm, but could only be tried in eccle¬
siastical courts, which, I may say in passing, were
great sources of revenue to the Church, as all manner
of crimes were expiable by fines. Secondly, two
ecclesiastical property laws were in force throughout
the Republic ; by one the Church was prohibited from
building any new monasteries, convents, or churches
without the consent of the Government under penalty
of forfeiture ; and by the other it was disqualified from
retaining property which it might become possessed
of by donation or by inheritance, but was bound to
turn it into money. That is to say, it was forbidden
to alienate in perpetuity lay property to the Church.
Both of these were old Venetian laws, the former
dating from 1333, and the latter from 1337 ; but
both were re-enacted about this time—the former in
1603, and the latter in 1605, when its operation,
which up till then was limited to Venice, was extended
to include all Venetia.
The existence of such laws need surprise no one.
No State can long exist beside the Papacy without
passing some such enactments to defend its citizens
against the notorious propensity of the Church to
possess itself of their property. In England there
are the Mortmain laws to protect the dying against
priests importuning them to make over their real
property to the Church, and in Scotland the very
ancient Death-bed law has a similar intention. In
Italy at the present time the Church of Rome cannot
hold real property, and it is illegal to tie up an inch of
Italian soil for purposes exclusively ecclesiastical.
76
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
The re-enforcement of the old Venetian laws was
urgently called for. Half the area of the city of
Venice was occupied by buildings and gardens
belonging to the Church, and one-fourth of all the
real property in the province of Venetia was in its
hands. And it was an ever-increasing, but never
diminishing, quantity, as the Church absolutely forbade
any return of property back into the hands of the
laity. Once the Church got hold of it, it held it for
ever. Then, as the property of the Church was
exempt from taxation, that of the laity had to bear its
own share, and that of the Church besides. The ruinous
combination of a fattening Church and a famishing
country, pride in the clergy and poverty in the people,
which the Papacy ever tends to produce, was
threatening the Republic. Pope Paul V., regardless
of all interests but his own, demanded the repeal of
these property laws.
These two demands, regarding the imprisoned
ecclesiastics and the property laws, were first put
forward in October, 1605. On the 21st of that month
the Pope personally made them at an interview he held
with the Venetian Ambassador in Rome ; then, about
a week later, his Nuncio at Venice presented them, in
the name of his master, to the Senate. At Rome the
Ambassador, though taken unawares by the Pope,
acquitted himself well in his pacific endeavour to show
him how in these matters the Republic had not
gone beyond its rights ; but, as Paul V. was in no
mood " to seek the things that make for peace," he
lost his temper, and began railing against the Republic
so hotly that all arguments were thrown away upon
him. The Senate dealt somewhat sharply with the
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 77
Nuncio, whose insolent manner would have destroyed
even a less worthless cause. Other interviews of a
similar kind took place at Rome and at Venice during
the month of November. Then, early in December,
the Pope, impatient to bring the quarrel to a head,
threatened to place Venice under interdict and
excommunication if it did not yield to his demands,
saying, "We are above all. God has given to us
power over all. We are able to depose Kings, and ta
set up others, and we are over those things which
tend to a supernatural end." On the loth of
December, against the better judgment of his
Cardinals, he so far made good his words by despatch¬
ing to Venice two minatory briefs. These were
presented to the Senate by the Nuncio on Christmas
morning, but were not even looked at till the loth of
January, 1606. The reason for this delay in opening
them was the death of the Doge Marin Grimani, and
the election of a successor. And the successor was
none other than Leonardo Donato, the same who had
bearded the Pope when he was Cardinal Borghese, and
who was as ready as the Pope to make good the
words he had used. When the two bulls came to be
opened, it was found that both dealt with the property
laws. Pope Paul V. had prepared two separate briefs,,
one dealing with the property laws, and the other with
the imprisoned ecclesiastics ; but, in his hot haste and
bad temper, he had by mistake sent two copies of the
same one.
Things had now become serious. The Pope
evidently meant to fight, and the Republic was not
loath to break a lance with him. It was at this acute
78
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
stage of the quarrel that the Republic laid hold of Fra
Paolo Sarpi, and, as we have already noted, made him
its Theological Counsellor, and the struggle hence¬
forth became, to a large extent, a duel between " Paul
the Pope, and Paul the Friar."
On the very day that Fra Paolo accepted this office
he informed the Senate that two courses of action were
open to them. They could argue the case either de
jure or defacto. de jure, that is, they could
appeal against the judgment of the Pope to a Church
Council. From the days of the Apostles, who first
instituted Church Councils at Jerusalem, down to the
fifteenth century, the supreme authority of decisions
arrived at by them was universally recognised. The
Council was above the Pope. As late as 1414, the
Council of Constance deposed three Popes who were
then fighting with each other for the throne. But
a century after that there came to the Pontificate one
who, Fra Paolo tells us, had many gifts, and " would
have been a perfect Pope, if to these he had added
some knowledge of the things of religion, and a little
more inclination to piety, to neither the one nor the
other of which did he show himself much inclined."
That Pope was Leo X., and he it was who published
the famous, or rather infamous, bull, "InCœna Domini,"
in which he put forth the most extraordinary preten¬
sions, making the kings and rulers of the earth but his
vassals, forbidding them to receive into their dominions
persons not of the Roman Catholic faith, or to trade
with them ; to exact taxes from ecclesiastics of any
grade, or from their relations, agents, and dependants,
or to punish them for any crime; to occupy lands
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR.
79
belonging to the Church ; to make war against the
Pope, although he has the right to make war on every
one ; or to appeal to a Church Council against any
sentence of the Pope reputed to be unjust—all under
pain of excommunication and eternal perdition.
These monstrous claims of Leo X. were resisted by
Christendom, but still his successors adhered to them,
and especially to that of being independent of, and
superior to, Church Councils. Paul V. especially did
so, therefore Fra Paolo at once said it was useless to
appeal to a Council against him, which would only be
in his eyes an additional offence, meriting excommuni¬
cation. Henry VIII. had appealed to a Council, and
the unsatisfactory result was fresh in the minds of all.
Secondly, the Republic could adopt the de facto
course ; that is, it could rely on its own authority and
strength. It could set these over against the Pope's,
and whilst willing to argue out the matter in a spirit
of reason with him, yet meet his force with opposing
force. If he turned a deaf ear to right, there was
no help for it but to make it a question of might. The
de facto course was therefore the one Fra Paolo
recommended ; adding very significantly, " He who
appeals to a Council admits that the righteousness of
his cause may be questioned, whereas that of Venice
is indisputable." The Senate hailed the advice thus
given, and instructed him to draw out a reply to the
Pope's brief in accordance with it. This Fra Paolo
immediately did, not only refusing, in terms most
decisive though most courteous, the Pope's demands,
but denying his right to interfere at all in the civil
affairs of the Republic.
8o
FRA PAOLO SARFI,
From the moment this reply was received a bitter
controversy was set on foot. Renewed demands
came from Rome, and renewed refusals were sent
from Venice. The merits of the case were entered
into. Fra Paolo was able to show how the Pope's
demands were without precedent in the history of the
Republic ; how they were contrary to Scripture, to
the Fathers, to Church Canons, to the decisions of
Councils, and to the bulls of former Popes. Then he
carried the question at issue back to first-principles,
by declaring, and reiterating the declaration, that the
Pope's claim to intermeddle in civil matters was a
usurpation ; and that in these the Republic of Venice
recognised no authority but that of God. " God has
instituted two kingdoms in the world," he said, " one
spiritual and the other temporal, each in its own
sphere is supreme and independent. The Kingdom
of Christ is not of this world, but in heaven, there¬
fore, religion walks by a heavenly way, the Govern¬
ment of the State by an earthly one, and the one ought
never to interfere with the other. God wishes to be
served in such a way as to preserve this harmony
between the two powers which he has instituted ;
maintaining them balanced so that one may not usurp
the place that belongs to the other." The Pope, on
his part, displayed no judicial temper—advanced no
logical arguments, but thrust forward his commands on
the ground of his personal Pontifical authority. The
Papal Nuncio at Venice, and the Venetian Ambassador
at Rome, were kept busy day by day, and week
by week, presenting the despatches and supporting
the arguments of their respective Governments.
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 81
On the 25th of February the Nuncio delivered to
the Senate the brief which the Pope had omitted to
send on the 28th of January, regarding the two
imprisoned ecclesiastics. To the imperious demand
therein contained for their instant liberation, under
pain of incurring the Papal censures, Fra Paolo
set Pope against Pope, quoting the bulls of
Paul II., Sixtus IV., and Paul III., which expressly
admitted (not granted) to the Republic the very right
which this Pope would fain deny it—that of punishing
offenders, whether clerical or lay. Having thus put
the Pope in the wrong, by showing him that it was not
the Republic that in this matter was encroaching on
the privileges of the Church, but the Church that was
usurping those of the State, he, in digfnified terms,
re-asserted the right of the Republic to deal with all
criminals within its bounds as its inalienable preroga¬
tive, for the exercise of which it was responsible to
God alone.
Meanwhile the eyes of all the Courts of Europe
were directed to the gjreat struggle, and Venice made
them more than spectators by laying its case as
prepared by their Consultora fairly and fully before
them. The time had not arrived for any nation to
enter as a party into the contest, but all frankly
expressed their opinions, which were, with the
exception of that of Spain, unequivocally on the side
of Venice.
Further negotiations went on uninterruptedly during
the next six or seven weeks, the Pope using language
of increasing vehemence in his threats against the
Republic ; Venice calmly standing on its rights, and
G
82
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
refusing to acknowledge in civil matters any earthly
authority outside its own realm. At last the Pope
determined to put into execution the threats contained
in the briefs, and to place the Republic under interdict
and excommunication.
On the 17th of April, 1606, the bull of interdict and
excommunication was launched; twenty-four days being
allowed Venice for repentance, with three more added
of the Pope's gracious clemency. The die was thus
cast by Pope Paul V., by which he was either to
humble the Republic, or discredit himself and his
" spiritual arms " in the sight of Europe. The bull
was a sweeping one, embracing in its anathema not
only the rebellious Doge, the Consultare, and the
other members of the Government, but the whole
mass of the people throughout the length and breadth
-of Venetia, and its dependencies. All alike, young
and old, innocent and guilty, were caught within the
sweep of this tremendous measure. By the interdict,
all were prohibited from receiving the so-called saving
sacraments of the Church, and the consolations of
religion. By excommunication all were declared to be
severed from the body of Christ, which is the Church,
and to have become accursed. No more masses were
to be said. Baptism, marriage, and burial services
were to cease. The churches were to be- locked up,
and the priests could withdraw from the devoted land.
All social relationships were dissolved. Marriages
were declared invalid, and all children born were
illegitimate. Husbands could desert their wives, and
children disobey their parents. Contracts of all
kinds were declared null and void. Allegiance to the
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 83
Government was at an end. Subjects were absolved
from their obligation to pay taxes, and to respect the
laws of the land. The design of this wicked invention
was to let loose the elements of disorder and rebellion,
and throw the whole body politic into a state of
anarchy and terror. Then, whilst the Pope preached
the doctrine that he was above all law, and all peoples
and princes, receiving his commission direct from
God, whose representative he was, he as diligently
preached this opposite one, that kings and rulers
existed by the people, and for the people ; and as it
was they who set them up, they could legitimately
cast them down. Thus the hope was entertained
that the people, made to suffer for their rulers faults
and sins, would rise in rebellion and depose them.
This was not the first time that Venice had been
placed under interdict and excommunication. Seven
times before she had been thus banned, but never in
her whole history for a cause that had anything to do
with religion. That is to say, as Fra Paolo Sarpi
shows, in every case in which the Popes made use
of this spiritual weapon, they did so never to secure
anything of a spiritual nature, but only some worldly
object, in which they had a direct interest. I need
not go into all these seven cases, but shall instance
some of them in illustration. Their history casts a
strange lurid light on the character of the Papacy.
The first time Venice was excommunicated was by
Innocent III. in 1201, because she put down the revolt
of Zara in Dalmatia against her authority, which
revolt the Pope himself had deliberately stirred up.
The second time was by Pope Martin IV. in 1282,
G 2
84
FRA PAOLO SARPl.
because Venice would not interfere in the quarrel
between Charles I. of Anjou, and Peter of Aragon,
regarding the kingdom of Sicily. The first time was
because they went to war justly, and the second time
because they would not go to war unjustly. Clement
v., in 1309, put Venice under excommunication for
supporting the lawful heir to the Duchy of Ferrara,
the son of the former Duke, against his uncle the
nominee of the Pope ; and Sixtus IV., in 1483, did the
same, because Venice opposed him when he sought,
like another covetous Ahab, to add this vineyard to
the already swollen possessions of the Church. It is
worth while letting this nepotic Pope recite his own
manifesto. After excommunicating Venice, he orders
" All kings, dukes, princes, marquises, barons, commu¬
nities, universities, and every other ruler over land or
people, and captains, to take up arms for the honour
of the Apostolic See against the Venetians, and to
procure means to persecute them, and to debilitate
them "; and to those who should thus rouse themselves
in such a war against the Venetians, for the defence
of the said city of Ferrara, and thus of the Roman
Church, we concede plenary indulgence, and the
remission of all their sins." The last occasion when
Venice was excommunicated was in 1509, by Pope
Julius II., for civil matters arising out of the Leagpieof
Cambray, almost exactly similar to those in dispute
with Paul V. In every one of these instances victory
lay with the unscrupulous Popes, not with the Chris¬
tian Republic. Well then might Pope Paul V. think :
" If the spiritual weapon of interdict and excom¬
munication served so well my predecessors in their
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 85
mundane aggressions, why should it not serve me ? If
they humbled Venice by its use, why should not I ?"
The more so might he have thus thought and reasoned,
that he had already used the weapon of excommuni¬
cation to some purpose. He had not been quite a year
on the throne, yet by means of it he had humbled
Naples, Genoa, France, and Spain, and had settled
his quarrels with these powers, regardless of all right
and justice, in his own favour. He would bring the
proud Republic, too, to its knees. So he thought ;
but he had not yet crossed swords with a Fra Paolo
Sarpi.
The action of the Pope in fulminating his bull of
interdict and excommunication, took no one by
surprise, least of all Fra Paolo, who had from the first
foreseen this issue of the struggle, and had prepared
for it. Long before the twenty-seven days of grace
had expired, everything was in readiness. Moral
means had been tried, and had failed. The time for
discussion was therefore past, and the time for action
had come. Defiance must be met with defiance, the
commands of the Pope by the counter-commands of
the Republic. The Pope had interdicted all religious
services, let the Republic order their continuance.
He had commanded the priests to shut their churches,
let the Republic order them to keep them open. He
had charged the priests to read publicly the censures,
and to affix them to the doors of their churches, let the
Republic order them to send all documents coming
from Rome unopened to the Doge's Palace. He had
permitted them to quit the " accursed land," let the
Republic forbid them to stir from their dioceses and
86
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
parishes. He had sought to cancel contracts and
dissolve relationships, let the Republic see to it that
all obligations were fulfilled, and all orderly ties main¬
tained. He had pronounced the people cut off from
the body of Christ—the Church, let them falsify his
utterance by remaining in connection with the true
Catholic Church, which was not dependent upon him.
And, since fear of death was the sanction of the
Pope's bulls, let fear of death be that of the Senate's
decree. The Pope's death penalty was to be executed
on the soul hereafter, let that of the Republic be
executed on the body now.
Accordingly a penal statute, embodying these resolu¬
tions was enacted, and the struggle was transferred
from the domain of argument to that of strength.
At the same time, as the loyalty of the great bulk
of the clergy could be depended upon, a formal
and calmly worded protest against the Pope's
action was drawn up and put into the priests' hands ;
and this was deemed sufficient for their guidance.
This protest was sent in the name of " Leonardo
Donato, by the Grace of God, Doge of Venice," and
it was addressed to "the Most Reverend the
Patriarchs, Archbishops, and Bishops throughout our
States, and to the Vicars, Abbots, Priors, and Rectors
of Parish Churches, and to all other ecclesiastical
dignitaries." But though addressed to them, it was
intended to be read by the laity. Indeed, the priests
were to affix it to their church doors instead of the
Papal bull. Copies of it, too, were sent to Foreign
Courts, and it was seen also by the Pope. In this
protest the action of the Pope, in issuing the bull of
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 87
interdict and excommunication, was stigmatised as a
moral wrong. In promulgating it he was declared to
have shut his ears to the voice of reason, of Scripture,
of the Fathers and of the Sacred Canons, and to have
trampled on the divinely granted rights of Kings and
Governments. The bull was therefore pronounced to
be null and void, and a thing to be utterly despised
and ignored ; and ecclesiastics were called upon to
show their loyalty, not less to the Catholic Church
than to the Republic, by treating it in that manner,
and by obeying the commands of the State.
It is interesting to note that in this document a
distinction is drawn between the Pope and Catholicism,
between the Curia and the Church. The one is set
in opposition to the other, and the clergy are
enjoined to be loyal to the Church by being disloyal
to the Pope. The same distinction was made by
Dante and other thinkers in Italy centuries before
this time ; and it is being made to-day by the Italian
nation, which is strongly Catholic, though the most
anti-Papal one in Europe.
The confidence of the Senate in the general loyalty
of the clergy was not misplaced; but at the same
time the wisdom of providing against disaffection by
the most stringent measures was abundantly justified.
The Patriarch of Acquileia and the vicar of the
Bishop of Vicenza both proved disloyal. They were
immediately apprehended, brought to Venice, and
lodged in prison. The priest of an influential parish
in Venice let it be known that he would obey the
Pope, and not the Doge. On Sunday he would
keep his church closed. On the Saturday night an
88
FR A PAOLO SARFI.
official was sent from the Doge's Palace to ask him
how he intended to act on the morrow. His reply
was that he could not then definitely say, as it
would depend on how the Spirit would prompt him
at the time. The official delivered this answer to the
Council, and was immediately sent back to the cautious
priest with the message, that, whilst the Council found
no fault with his answer, they yet considered it well
to inform him that if the Spirit prompted him to alter
or curtail his services in any way on the morrow, that
same Spirit would infallibly prompt them to hang him
at his church door before midday. It is said that
another recalcitrant priest felt all his disloyalty ooze
out of his finger tips by seeing one fine morning a
•gibbet erected opposite his church. Some others
purposed escaping out of the country, but thought
better of it when they found instructions had been
given to carry out the penal statute, and hang all
such at the frontier. It was expected that the Jesuits
would give trouble, and the expectation was not
disappointed. True to their crafty character, they
proposed to compromise matters with the State by
offering to keep their churches open, and to go on
hearing confessions and preaching, and to abstain
only from offering the sacrifice of the mass. They
would thus obey both Pope and Doge. Their motive
—^which Fra Paolo was clear sighted enough to
detect at once—was not only to retain their footing
in Venice, but by means of the confessional to worm
out the secrets of the Government for transmission to
Rome. They wanted to act as traitors in the citadel.
As was shortly afterwards discovered, they kept
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 89
for political ends records of confessions heard by
The same discovery was made in Venice in
1848-49, when registers of confessions were found
which were intended for the Austrian Government.
Of course, no compromise could for a moment be
thought of ; but, as the Senate could not very well
hang all the Jesuits, it passed on them the sentence of
perpetual banishment, with the forfeiture of all their
possessions. Venice had found Fra Paolo's words
about them true, " that never from their schools came
forth a son obedient to his father, loving to his
country, and dutiful to his Prince." The Jesuits had
arranged to depart by day, in solemn procession, with
banners, crucifixes, and various paraphernalia of
their order, shaking the dust off their feet against the
doomed city. But the authorities and the people
rather upset their plans. At the dead of night they
were turned out of their beds, bundled into boats, and
packed off to Papal territory—the people crying with
one voice, " Andè in malora! Andè in malora!^^—
" Misfortune go with you ! " In one point they
contrived to overreach the Government. With the
help of the Papal Nuncio and the Spanish Ambassador,
who acted as go-betweens, they managed to hide their
treasures, "wrung from the very vitals of noble citizens
and subjects," and ultimately had them smuggled
across the frontier. They left piles of burned papers in
their monastery, which told a tale as to the means
they adopted to get rid of compromising documents ;
but in this they were not quite successful, as the
registers of confessions, to which I have already
referred, escaped the flames; and Fra Paolo tells us
90
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
he found amongst the things left behind them " a die
for uttering base coin," afterwards explained by one
of their number to be a mould for making caps ! Of
the other Orders only two failed in loyalty, and
obtained permission to depart from Venetia—the
Theatines (a small brotherhood founded about a
hundred years before by Paul IV. when he was Bishop
of Theate), and the Franciscans.
The Pope's interdict and excommunication were thus
thoroughly discredited and made inoperative, and his
prestige began to suffer; whilst, on the other hand,
the dignity of Venice was enhanced, as she so success¬
fully vindicated the independence of her civil juris¬
diction. The European nations, always excepting
Spain, recognising that in this she was asserting a
principle vital to their interests as well as to her
own, advanced from expressions of sympathy to offers
of help—England doing so with the utmost enthusiasm.
The Pope, having no arguments wherewith to convince
them of the righteousness of his side of the quarrel,
adopted the tactics of Sixtus IV., and made a bid for
their favour by offering to condone all their sins.
He ordained a jubilee, proclaiming forgiveness and
plenary indulgences to all Europe, outside the devoted
land of Venice. The jubilee was celebrated on the
19th of June, 1606. Era Paolo calls it a "most
cunning invention," but it met the fate it deserved,
which was conspicuous failure.
Three more months passed in bitter, fruitless con¬
troversy. Then the Pope, knowing well that Era
Paolo was the guiding and sust£iining spirit of the
Republic, and realising that he could gain nothing so
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 91
long as he held his post, summoned him, in September,
1606, to Rome, to appear before him to answer for
his writings. Fra Paolo returned to him the reply
the prophet Nehemiah sent to Sanballat, " I am doing
a great work, so that I cannot come down." He
reminded him that he was now Consultore to the
Republic, a post which he had only accepted after the
General of his Order, and thus presumably the Pope
himself, had authorised him so to do; and that the
duties of his office absolutely prevented his quitting
Venice. At the same time, he offered frankly to place
all his writings in his hands, and to give him what
satisfaction he could on any parts of them to which
he took exception. Fra Paolo's foresight in making
him a party to his accepting his present office, thus
stultified the Pope. Moreover, he knew the ways of
Rome too well to have gone thither. He was
accustomed to say, "that the arguments most con¬
vincing which she adopted were the rope and the
stake "—" la fune ed it fuocol^ Of course the
Republic was one with its Consultore in this matter.
Fra Fulgenzio Manfredi, a defender of the Republic,
and a friend of Fra Paolo (not Fra Fulgenzio Micanzio,
his biographer), who went to Rome under a safe
conduct from the Pope at a later date, was put
through a mock trial, and burned.
Unable to get hold of Fra Paolo to burn him, the
Pope lost no time in doing what he considered to be
the next best thing, and that was to burn his books.
By a solemn decree, passed by the Curia on the 20th
of September, i6o6, this was done. Then the Pope
took one step further, which greatly amused the
92
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Venetians. He placed in the Index " all the books
of every kind, printed in whatever time past, or to be
printed at any time in the future, by Roberto Majetti
of Venice." This Roberto Majetti was Fra Paolo's
printer.
The next move of Paul V. was one equally con¬
genial to the traditions of the Vatican. It was to
send emissaries to Venice to buy over whom they
could to the Papal side. But whilst these did,
unhappily, succeed with one or two ecclesiastics, they
did not dare even to broach the subject to Fra Paolo.
That bribery was their only mission there is cause to
doubt. The Senate, which was well able to judge,
suspected them of nothing less than designs on the life
of Fra Paolo, as we learn from the following decree,
passed on the 28th of September, 1606, which also
testifies to its affection for him, and to its solicitude
for his personal safety : " As the Reverend Father
Paul continues to render to us, with singular valour,
as is well known, inestimable services through his
writings full of profound learning, sustaining on valid
grounds, and with most powerful and indisputable
reasons, the quarrel which the Republic has at present
with the Court of Rome; placing our interests and our
pleasure before every interest of his own, however
important; therefore it is a thing just and reasonable,
and worthy of the usual munificence of this Council,
to afford him means whereby he may preserve his life
from every danger that may hang over it, and also may
supply his daily needs ; although he has never made
any request on the subject, but rather has shown
himself averse to any kind of recognition that we may
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 93
have had the intention of showing him, such is his
modesty and so great is his desire that it should be
known that no aspiring to reward, but only his
devotion to the Republic, and the justice of our cause,
moves him to give himself with such study and such
fatigue to our service; therefore we decree that to
the stipend of 200 ducats a year assigned him on the
28th of January last, there be now added other 200
ducats, so that in the future he may have 400 ducats ;
in order that, being cheered by this spontaneous and
benignant public testimony, he may be able to continue
his good and devoted service, and may be able with
ease to provide better for the security of hi« life."
The exasperated Pope could only reply to the
favours shown to his enemy, by the empty bombast
of excommunication. On the 5th of January, 1607,
the Holy Inquisition launched against him the greater
excommunication, the bull being affixed to the door
of St. Peter's, and to that of its office. The bull was
never published in Venice, but when Fra Paolo heard
of its fulmination in Rome, he thus calmly wrote, " If
then, I shall be, as an excommunicated one, separated
from your communion, against every divine and human
right, I am prepared, by the help of God, to support it
with tranquillity, certain that an iniquitous sentence
is not able to damage any one in the sight of God,
and of His Church."
In this struggle time was on the side of Venice, and
against the Pope. The longer his interdict lay a dead
letter, the more the dignity and the prestige of the
Papacy suffered, and the more imminent became the
danger of the rupture becoming permanent. Pope
94
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Paul V. seems gradually to have realised this, for at
the close of November he began to sue for a recon¬
ciliation ; not directly, but through an Ambassador
Extraordinary from the Court of Spain. As he still,
however, insisted on some recognition of his claims,
and as Venice was determined to give none, the
mediation came to nothing, and this eventful year
closed, bringing no change in the position of parties.
Early in 1607, Venice found herself besieged by
advisers—Spain and France, representing the Pope,
pleading for a reconciliation; England, Holland, and
Germany inciting her to break with him for ever.
Philip III. sat on the throne of Spain, and his
ambassador to Venice was Don Francesco di Castro ;
Henry IV.—who had submitted to the Pope some
thirteen years before, saying, " Paris vaut bien une
messe^'—was King of France, and was represented at
Venice by Cardinal de Joyeuse. James I. was reigning
over England, and his Ambassador was Sir Henry
Wotton, to whom, with his chaplain Dr. Bedell, after¬
wards Bishop of Kilmore, I referred at the close of the
preceding chapter, as the friends of Era Paolo.
I shall speak first of the part England played in
this matter. Naturally she was anxious that Venice
should throw off the Papacy, though not necessarily
Catholicism. Seventy years before this, under Henry
VIII., she had engaged in asimilar struggle with Pope
•Clement VIII. Clement used the same weapons that
Paul V. was now using, and England used those now
.adopted by Venice. She trampled the Pope's
interdict and excommunication under foot, forbade
its publication, commanded the priests to go on with
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 95
their services, declared that " to separate from the
Pope was not to separate from the Church, the Head
of which was Christ," and she came out of the struggle
victorious ; and, free and strong, she entered on a new
career of material and intellectual, of moral and
spiritual life and progress. Venice, too, had identified
herself with England against the Pope in that
struggle, for she, whilst every nation but France
abstained, sent her Ambassador to represent her on
the occasion of Henry's marriage with Anne Boleyn
in May 1533. In the spring of 1545, the year the
Council of Trent met, a corps of Venetians, under
the patrician Ludovico de I'Armi, maintained the
interests of Henry VIII. against the Papacy ; so that
Pope Paul III. had to condescend to ask a passport for
the traitor, Reginald Pole, to go to the Council, which
was refused him. James I., with his views on the
" divine rights of kings," felt the keenest interest in
the quarrel, and was eager that Venice should follow
in the wake of England, and he wrote to that effect
to the Doge, promising to join arms with those of the
Republic against the Papacy, should the struggle, as
was not unlikely, issue in war, for which Venice
herself was now arming. The Doge was not dis¬
inclined to listen to his proposals. In open Senate he
spoke in his praise, and when the Nuncio repeated
that absurdity, which is heard even to this day, that
Protestants are not Christians, the Doge, Leonardo
Donato, boldly and wisely replied that " The King of
England did believe in Jesus Christ, but what others
did believe in, he knew not." Sir Henry Wotton and
Dr. Bedell earnestly seconded the efforts of their
96
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Sovereign, believing that the future life of Venice
was bound up with a permanent rupture from the
Roman See, and the acceptance of the principles of
the Reformation. Diodati's classic translation into
Italian of the Holy Scriptures, which was published
this year, was introduced into Venice ; and the
eminent theologian himself was urged to come and
begin Reform work. Dr. Bedell, who had been taught
Italian by Fra Paolo, translated into that language the
Book of Common Prayer. It has been said that at this
time there were ten or twelve thousand Venetians,
amongst whom were some hundreds of the most noble
and influential in the city, who had embraced the
Reformed faith, and who were seeking to gpve it a
permanent footing in their midst. A very important
question, and one that has been much discussed,
and very variously answered, is : " How did Fra
Paolo Sarpi view these efforts to introduce Reform
into Venice ? " Some have not hesitated to say that
he was the leading spirit in the movement. Lord
Macaulay has said : " As to the attempt to make out
that he was a real Roman Catholic, even according
to the lowest Gallican notions, the thing is im¬
possible." On the other hand, eminent Venetians
scout the idea that he was a Protestant, whilst they
acknowledge freely that he held intimate intercourse
with the leaders of Protestantism in other lands, and
followed their actions with the liveliest interest. I
think it cannot be denied that, so far as the efforts
of those who were working for the introduction of
Reform into Venice were aimed at the overthrow of
the Temporal Power of the Pope; at the stripping
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 97
of the Church of its ill-gotten wealth, at its exclusion
from every sphere that touches the prerogatives of
kings and governments, and the civil rights and
liberties of the subject, and at the purging of the
Church from all Papal abuses and scandals, he was one
in heart and hand with them. That was the very
battle he was fighting. But so far as these reformers
aimed at setting up Lutheranism or Calvinism in
Venice it may be doubted if they had his sympathy.
He was a reformer, but a reformer on Catholic lines.
He did not consider the Pope to be of the essence of the
Church, but to be an innovation that the Church
could very well do without ; and in the same way he
regarded the Curia, as we learn from his work on
"Ecclesiastical Benefices," in which he traces the
low origin of Cardinals—an Order for which, he said,
" the world does not seem to afford titles pompous
enough." He wished, what intelligent Italians wish
to-day, a return to the simplicity and purity of the
early Church, to the practices of what he termed,
"those happy times, when the name of the Church
was common to all gatherings of the faithful, to whom
also pertained the control and the use of the
properties that are called ecclesiastical; when from
the common purse were supplied the food and the
clothing of the poor, and of the ministers—when,
indeed, more thought was given for the needs of
those, than of these." At the same time it must be
remembered, that Venetia, in Era Paolo Sarpi's day, did
not stand in need of Reform in the same degree that
other countries did. Just because she held herself
independent of Papal domination her faith was com-
H
98
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
paratively pure ; for, as we have already seen, when
the plague visited Venice, in the year 1576, the
Church raised in thanksgiving for its cessation was to
the Redeemer, not to S. Maria della Salute—"our
Lady of health "—as was the case when the plague
• came again a century later ; and, as has also been
noted, Fra Paolo obtained the sanction of his General
and of Gregory XIII. to strike out of the offices of
the Servites the " Salve Regina^ A striking proof,
too, of the purity of the doctrines held by the
Venetians at this time is seen in the religious
books that were published. One of these, to which
my attention has been called, entitled " Orde
Baptizandi et Visitandi "—" An Order for Baptism
and Visitation "—contains the following questions :—
*' Credis non proprijs mentis sed Passionis Domini Nostri
J. C. vertute ac mérito ad gloria pervenire?
" Credis quôd Dom®. Noster J. C. pro nostra salute mortuus
sit, et quod ex proprijs meritis vel altro modo nullus possit
saluari, nisi in mérito passionis ipsius ?
"Non erit desperandum vel dubitandum de salute illius qui
supra positas petitiones corde crediVerat, etc., ore confessas
fuer it.
" Dost thou believe that not by thy own merits, but by the
virtue and merit of the passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, thou
wilt attain to glory ?
" Dost thou believe that our Lord Jesus Christ died for our
salvation, and that no one can be saved by his own merits, or
in any other way than by the merit of His death ?
" The salvation of one who believes in his heart, and confesses
with his mouth, the above statements, is not to be either
despaired of or doubted."
It was at this time that the following incident
occurred, upon which Fra Paolo lays some stress, and
which, if his advice had been taken, might have had
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. 99
not unimportant consequences. King James I. had
sent to Sir Henry Wotton a copy of his book : " A
Premonition to all most mighty Monarchs, Kings, free
Princes, and States of Christendom," with instructions
that he should present it to the Doge on St. James's
day. Fra Paolo did not always admire the doings
and writings of our British Solomon, for, having heard
of his going to Cambridge to take part in a theological
discussion, he wrote, in a letter to the Ambassador at
Rome, Simone Contarini, " It is a fine thing that
every one loves so much to take up the trade of
another, and to abandon his own ; " and again in
another letter he said, " The King of Great Britain, in
these times so perilous for the affairs of Italy and of
Flanders, has occupied himself in writing a book,
which has just been printed, against the harangue of
the Cardinal of Perron. I have seen almost the whole
of it, and there is nothing royal about it but the name,"
In the case of King James's " Premonition," Fra
Paolo's opinion was different. So pleased was he with
it, and such was his idea of its usefulness, that he
urged Sir Henry Wotton to present it to the Doge at
once, and not to wait till St. James day (which would
not come for some months), for he was afraid that if
its presentation were delayed till then, something
might happen to prevent its acceptance. I may here
briefly say what the book is. It is a " preamble " to,
and reprint of, a former book by King James, his
" Apologie for the Oath of Allegiance," and was
called forth by the attacks that were made upon it by
one signing himself " Matthews Tortus, Cardinal
Bellarmine's Chaplain," but who is judged by King
H 2
100
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
James to be Bellarmine himself. Its subject matter
deals with the very question then at issue in Venice,
"Whether the Pope may lawfully pretend any
temporal power over kings or no ? " The Gunpowder
Plot, King James says, " made the Oath of Allegiance
necessary, and excused its severity ; yet the Popes
had issued brief after brief, prohibiting all Catholics
from taking it. Hence the writing of the ' Apologie,'
wherein I proved that as this oath contained nothing
but matter of civill and temporall obedience, due by
subjects to their Sovereign Prince, so this quarrelling
therewith was nothing but a late usurpation of Popes
(against the warrant of all Scriptures, Ancient
Councils, and Fathers) upon the temporall power of
kings." King James proceeds to show historically,
that so far from the Pope being above sovereigns,
" Emperors and Kings did not acknowledge the Pope's
temporal supremacy, but in fact created Popes,
assented to their election, and deposed them." The
" Premonition " also had a direct bearing on the ques¬
tion of Catholic Reform, for Bellarmine (Matthews
Tortus), having called James, to whom the oath was
sworn, " a heretic," the King refutes this by showing
(i) that he is no apostate, seeing that he has been
brought up in the religion he now professes ; and (2)
that he is no heretic, for he believes in the Apostle's,
the Nicean, and the Athanasian Creeds ; he approves
the first four General Councils ; reverences the
Fathers ; believes the Scriptures ; and honours the
Saints and the Virgin Mary, though without praying
to them as divine. The new things which the Romish
Church had coined, such as Masses and Transubstan-
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. lOI
tiation, he rejects ; but in this, though he was a
schismatic from Rome, he was no heretic. King
James ends by calling upon " all Princes to wake out
of their slumber, to spread the truth, to look to the
security of their own States, and not to suffer this
encroaching Babylonian Monarch to winne still ground
upon us ; " and he urges all who are already persuaded
of the truth to keep to it j and he prays God to open
the eyes of the others. Fra Paolo's advice in regard
to this book, however, was not taken. Sir Henry
Wotton knowing his Sovereign's vanity in the matter
of St. James's day, for he had even chosen it as his
coronation day, abode by his instructions.
The efforts of the kings of France and Spain, and
of their Ambassadors, on behalf of the Pope, to effect a
reconciliation, were as earnest and unremitting as those
of King James and his representatives were to bring
about a rupture with him. The tactics of Don di
Castro and Cardinal de Joyeuse, who were seeking the
same end, offered a marked contrast. Di Castro
backed up his pleadings for reconciliation with threats,
de Joyeuse his, with promises. If Venice did not
reconcile herself with the Pope, said the former, then
Spain would join him in arms against her. If a
reconciliation on reasonable terms should be proposed
and should fail, said the latter, then France would join
arms with the Republic against the Pope. The efforts
of Spain were, as was to be expected, resented by
Venice, and if she alone had acted as mediator, she
would have effected but little. Even those of the
French Ambassador promised for a time to be equally
ineffectual. When he urged Venice to reconcile
102
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
herself with the Pope, the reply was, in substance,
"Urge the Pope to Teconcile himself with us. We
have nothing to confess, nothing to repent of ; he it is
who is the aggressor, and he it is who must withdraw."
Interview after interview was granted to de Joyeuse
by the Senate, but all was fruitless. He could get
nothing to lay before the Pope as a basis of recon¬
ciliation. At last, at the end of March, after nearly
three months spent in these useless negotiations, he
was fain to set out for Rome, having got Venice to
yield on no point, save, that on the censures being
removed by the Pope, the Senate would give up
the two prisoners to the King of France ; who
might afterwards hand them over to the Pope if he
chose, but without prejudice to the right of Venice
to deal with ecclesiastical as she dealt with lay
offenders.
The issue of the struggle lay with the Pope. If he
humbled himself to the last degree, conceding to Venice
in every particular her claims, then a reconciliation
could not be refused ; but, if he at all held out, on any
point, then there would be open rupture. Early in
April de Joyeuse returned to Venice, and again pressed
for some concession to the Pope, " if only to save his
credit in the eyes of Europe," but having a bull in his
pocket for the raising of all the censures. Fra Paolo,
surmising that de Joyeuse had instructions to bring
about a reconciliation as favourable to the Pope (or, at
any rate, as little humiliating to him) as possible, but
at any cost to bring it about, again urged Sir Henry
Wotton not to delay, but immediately, while things
were yet favourable, to present to the Doge King
THE THEOLOGICAL COUNSELLOR. IO3
James's book. Sir Henry Wotton again declined to
give it before the specified time.
It was a lost battle. De Joyeuse was forced to
retreat, although he fought every step as he was
driven from the field. Point after point was yielded
to Venice. The ecclesiastical property laws were to
remain in force. The right of the Republic to punish
priests was conceded. The Jesuits were not to be
allowed to return to Venice, although the Pope
begged for this as a personal favour. The protest of
the Republic against the Pope's conduct was not to
be revoked, but, on the Pope removing the censures,
it was declared thereby to fall to the ground.
The Cardinal was to take the censures off in the
Doge's Palace, and not in the Cathedral. Venice
was to accept no Papal blessing, to allow no popular
rejoicings, and to send no intimation of the removal
of the censures to any foreign court; for, asserting
to have done no wrong, and denying the validity
of the censures, she would acknowledge no sense of
deliverance on their being raised.
On the 18th of April these conditions—so humiliating
to the Pope, and so honourable to Venice—were
accepted by Cardinal de Joyeuse in the name of Paul V.
and on the 21st they were most scrupulously carried
out. Early in the morning of that day the two
prisoners, Don Brandolini and Canon Saraceni,
were conveyed to the palace of M. de Fresne, the
French Ambassador, and handed over to him by
Ottobon, the Secretary of the Senate, who stated that
the Republic did this " as a gratification to His Most
Christian Majesty, and without prejudice to its right
104
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
to judge ecclesiastics;" to which the Ambassador
answered, " And so I receive them." The prisoners
being thus in the power of France, M. de Fresne said
to Cardinal de Joyeuse, " Here are the prisoners to be
given to the Pope." The Cardinal, addressing a
priest in his suite, said, "Take them;" who thereupon
touched them on the shoulder in token of acceptance.
The Venetian guards were then ordered to conduct
them back to prison. This done de Joyeuse went to
the Ducal Palace, where Doge and Senate were
assembled, and formally announced that the censures
were removed. The Doge therefore delivered to him
a document which stated that, as a consequence, their
protest became void. After this Cardinal de Joyeuse
went to the Cathedral and celebrated mass, from
which senators and citizens purposely absented them¬
selves, because Venice, secure in her innocence,
wanted neither Papal absolution nor Papal benedic¬
tion.
Two episodes remain to be mentioned. At last St.
James's day, the ist of May, came round. Sir
Henry Wotton, duly armed with his Sovereign's book,
appeared at the Palace to present it, in King James's
name, to the Doge. The Doge expressed his thanks
for the King of England's royal favour, but added,
that the reconciliation with the Pontiff having already
taken place, he was not in - a position to receive the
gift. Fra Paolo's judgment and counsel were right,
and whether much or little hinged upon the accept¬
ance of the book, all was lost through delay.
The other episode was, that soon after the recon¬
ciliation had been effected, the Pope sought to
the theological counsellor. io5
repudiate it, on the ground that Cardinal de Joyeuse
had gone beyond his instructions in accepting terms
so humiliating to him ; and he demanded that the
Senate should say that it revoked its protest, and not
simply that it fell to the ground through his having
removed the censures. The truth Avas that the Pope
felt that in the struggle his credit had been torn to
shreds ; and this was a last attempt to save a rag of
it. About the middle of May the matter came before
the Senate. It was pointed out by the French and
Spanish Ambassadors, that to arrange the document
so as to satisfy the Pope, hardly any alteration was
necessary. No sentence, no clause, no word even,
required to be changed. The cancelling of the small
prefix re from one word would suffice. Then the
phrase " T^e censures having been taken off, the
protest ' è restate rivocato '—' remained revoked ' "
(as a consequence), would read " è state rivecate "—
" has been revoked " (unconditionally). To effect this
Cardinal de Joyeuse once more took up his old policy
of coaxing, and Don di Castro his of threatening, but
all was in vain. Guided by the counsel of Era Paolo
Sarpi, Venice refused even this concession, and
demanded, aS its ultimatum, the Pope's complete
submission at the peril of final rupture, and she
obtained it. The proud pope was vanquished
by the humble priar.
io6
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
CHAPTER VI.
The Wilartyr.
1607. setat. 55.
The campaign being ended, and peace restored, the
first thoughts of Church and State were turned towards
Era Paolo Sarpi, to whom the issue of the struggle,
vindicating so completely the civil rights of the one,
and crushing so ignominiously the arrogant pretensions
of the other, was recognised as due. The Senate
thought of him, in its hour of triumph, with pride and
pleasure ; the Pope, in his hour of discomfiture, with
chagrin and hate. The former, full of gratitude,
planned to show him honour; the latter, inflamed
with revenge, sought to compass his destruction.
Neither party lost time in embodying its feelings in
action. I shall speak first of the Senate. The three
Councillors of State, to whom I referred in a previous
chapter, being now dead, the Senate formally made
over to Era Paolo the duties of their offices. As
Era Eulgenzio said, "all matters of peace, of war, of
confines, of compacts, of jurisdiction, of feudal rights,"
indeed, everything of national interest, no matter what
its nature came before him for sifting and for settle¬
ment. In thus committing all these matters into Era
THE MARTYR.
107
Paolo's hands, the Doge and Senate once more publicly
testified to their confidence in his judgment, and
manifested their appreciation of his devotion to the
State. They next proceeded to show him an altogether
unprecedented token of favour and affection. Nothing
in Venice was guarded with greater vigilance than the
secret Archives of the Republic. Only a very few
members of the Government had access to them, and
these were placed under a solemn oath to divulge
nothing. These secret State records were thrown
open without restriction to Fra Paolo. As this fact
has been denied by the Papacy, I here quote the testi¬
mony of the Nuncio Zachia. Writing to Cardinal
Ludovisi, he said, "that to Sarpi was permitted
that which was denied to the chiefest of the Senators,
namely, to examine the most secret Archives of the
Republic." No favour more acceptable to Fra Paolo
could have been granted him. It enabled him to
pursue his literary and historical studies, and especially
those for his great work on the Council of Trent,
under exceptionally advantageous conditions. All
the reports of the Venetian delegates to the Council
were in his hands. This favour also enabled him the
better to defend the Republic, in the different matters
of controversy with the Pope, with which he was
afterwards called upon to deal.
Let us now look at the Pope's action in regard to
Fra Paolo. The reconciliation was effected, as we
have seen, towards the end of April, 1607. A few
months later, that is at the beginning of June, we find
that diplomatic relations were re-established with the
Vatican, a new Papal Nuncio was at Venice, and a
io8
FRA PAOLO SARPI,
new Venetian Ambassador at Rome. This latter was
Francesco Contarini, and at his very first interview
with Paul v., the Pope sought to further the plans he
had at heart. He talked flatteringly of Venice, saying
she had always been an obedient child to the Church,
and pretended to believe she would not have acted as
she had done if she had been left to herself in the late
conflict. Her disobedience was all due to the
influence of one man, and he hinted that if only that
one man were given up to him, their relationship as
father and child would become nearer and closer than
ever. In subsequent interviews he complained that
Fra Paolo maintained friendship with the English
heretics. Sir Henry Wotton and Dr. Bedell, and that
the former had sent the Consultore's portrait to King
James. He also said that he knew that Fra Paolo
and his colleagues frequented Ridotti, where Dutch
and English Protestants met together; and that his
books contained many heretical opinions. At one
time he would ask, with sinister look, if the Ambassador
thought that Fra Paolo was a man whom the Republic
should protect and pension ; and at another he would
say, with blandest smile, that he expected the Signori
to form some holy resolve, becoming their piety,
concerning the theologians. He then referred to his
having been urged to follow the established custom in
regard to heretics, by having them publicly burned
in effigy. The Ambassador replied prudently, yet
boldly, telling the Pope he thought it better not to
discuss such matters, as the Serene Republic would
never abandon those who had served her so ably in
the late struggle. Contarini knew well what the
THE MARTYR.
109
Pope meant by a " holy resolve " and by " burning in
effigy," and, judging rightly his deeply vindictive
spirit, he added to his dispatches about these inter¬
views significant hints that the Republic should guard
well Fra Paolo, as the Pope was bent on mischief.
The warning was needed. Pope Paul, as the sequel
will show, was ready to scruple at nothing in order
to destroy him, even though the indulgence of his
revengeful passion should carry him, step by step,
downward, until it brought him to the level of the
common assassin. First, an attempt was made to
lure Fra Paolo to Rome. His presence was wanted in
order that the Pope might show him honour. Why
should Venice have a monopoly of that pleasure?
Promotion, in all probability a cardinal's hat,
awaited him. Pope Paul spoke to the Ambassador
to this effect, and said (his words having special
reference to Fra Paolo), " Let the theologians come,
for we will gladly embrace them. They shall be
caressed and well received. Fra Paolo knew that
the promotion that awaited him in Rome, would
prove to be promotion in suffering, and that the
embrace and caress would be those of death. He
looked upon Pope Paul as a cunning serpent sliming
over the victim he was going to swallow; but Fra
Paolo was not to be caught by any invitation—he was
a morsel too big for the designing Pontiff. He
suggested to the Senate that it should veto his leaving
Venice, which was done. Next, Cardinal de Joyeuse,
who had not yet left Venice, was instructed by the
Pope to sound the feelings of the Senators towards
Fra Paolo, and to see if there were any chance of the
no
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Republic's dispensing with his services. The Nuncio,
Berlingero Gessi, had a similar mission, and in giving
him his instructions Paul V. said that he ought to have
no great difficulty in persuading the Senate to gfive
Sarpi up to the Holy Office, and to withdraw the
stipend it had given him, con tanto scandalo net
mondo "—" to the so great scandal of the world."
But in the face of the new honours heaped upon
him, both Cardinal and Nuncio saw that their
missions were vain. Lastly, the Pope ordered these
two emissaries to seek private interviews with Fra
Paolo himself. What they sought to accomplish by
this move is not known, but doubtless his own
suspicion that they wished to compromise him, by
giving out to the world a garbled version of what
passed between them, was correct. The Senate,
accepting his view, once more stood between him and
danger, and, on his suggestion, forbade his receiving
them. At the same time Fra Paolo indicated his
willingness to meet them, but it must be in the presence
of the Senate, that "before witnesses every word should
be established." Such an interview apparently would
not serve their purpose, for it was declined.
Having tried these means and failed, then it was
that Pope Paul V.—the so-called Vicar of Him who
said, " Whosoever shall smite thee on the right
cheek, turn to him the other also"—^took up the
assassin's knife.
During the months of July and August, warning^ of
danger to Fra Paolo were sent to Venice from private
sources in -Rome, as well as from the Venetian
Embassy. Trajan Boccalini, the well-known satirist.
THE MARTYR.
III
who was a friend of Fra Paolo, wrote to him, " For
heaven's sake take care of yourself, for the Court of
Rome is determined to take from Venice its champion
at any cost." Gaspar Scioppius, the German scholar
and controversialist, who a few years before this had
renounced Protestantism, and, as is commonly the
case with such perverts, had become a rabid Papist,
was another who warned him. He was a great
favourite with Paul V., which was natural, for he was
a man after his own heart, seeing that he recommended
the extermination of Protestants as a holy duty.
Scioppius, when passing through Venice on his way
to Germany, with letters from the Pope to the
Protestant princes, whom he hoped to bring back to
Rome, called upon Fra Paolo, and offered to become
a mediator between him and the offended Pontiff.
He sought to threaten him into acceptance of his
good offices, by saying, "The Pope has a long arm,
and could have taken your life before now, only he
wishes to have you alive." Fra Paolo declared that
he required no mediator, as he was included in the
general reconciliation ; and, whilst unwilling to believe
the Pope capable of the baseness ascribed to him, he
was, in any case, superior to the fear of death. He
virtually said, like Nehemiah, " Should such a man as
I flee ? And who is there, that, being as I am, would
go into the temple to save his life ? I will not go in."
Scioppius, like the hired messenger of Tobiah, was
repelled. As he departed he said that Fra Paolo was
"Non indoctum, nec timidum,"
At last, on September 29th, the ever watchful
Ambassador at the Papal Court, Francesco Contarini,
112
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
sent definite and detailed information to the Senate of
a plot on Fra Paolo's life Rome was full at this time,
just as London and many English cities had been up
till the Reformation, of sanctuaries, within whose walls
debtors, robbers, felons, and malefactors of all sorts,
found shelter from law and justice. Such was the
Duke of Orsini's palace. In it there lived an
unfrocked friar and brigand, called Rotilio Orlandini.
The Ambassador, through a confidant of this man, who
was also screening himself from justice in the same
asylum, ascertained that the Papal Court had hired
him for 8000 crowns to capture or to kill Fra Paolo ;
and that he would be assisted by two other desperados,
his brothers-in-law. A safe conduct had been granted
to these three for their passage through the Papal
States, and Orlandini held an absolution for the crime,
which he said he had received from the Pope's own
hand. The Ambassador was enabled to describe most
minutely the appearance of Orlandini and his accom¬
plices, and the route they had chosen by which to enter
Venice. The result was that the Senate tracked
them to Ferrara, and the moment they left that town,
and crossed from Papal into Venetian territory, they
were arrested and thrown into prison.
These warnings of peril, and this frustrated attempt
on Fra Paolo's life, whilst they did not seem to have
troubled him much, who believed that " nothing hurries
on danger like too gpreat shunning of it," thoroughly
alarmed the Doge and Senate, who insisted that he
should never walk alone in the very narrow, or less
frequented, calles of the city. Accordingly, except in
the more open and frequented parts, such as the
THE MARTYR. II3
Piazza of St. Mark and the Mercería, he was accom¬
panied by a guard, which was composed, generally, of
Fra Fulgenzio and other faithful friends. As the short
days of the late autumn drew on, these friends regularly
waited for him, evening after evening, at the Doge's
Palace, and accompanied him to his quiet abode in the
Servite Monastery. But it so happened that on
October 5th he was insufficiently guarded. A fire
had broken out amongst some dwelling houses in the
parish of San Lio, a populous district in the north-east
quarter of the city, and his usual escort went off to
see it, intending to return in time to walk home with
him. But they were detained, and Fra Paolo, after
waiting for some time, started for home, accompanied
only by his servant, Fra Marino, and an aged patrician,
Alessandro Malipiero. These three had passed safely
up the crowded Merceria, and through the busy
quarter of the Rialto, and, threading the intricate
narrow calles of the district beyond, had reached the
quiet Campo di Santa Fosca. On the north side of this
Campo runs a canal, spanned by the Ponte della Pugna,
one of those stair bridges without parapets, on which
bouts of wrestling, a favourite pastime with the
Venetians, though now fallen into disuse, were wont
to be held. The Servite Monastery was but a few
hundred yards distant. To get to it Fra Paolo and
his friends had only to cross the bridge, and walk
along the Fondamenta dei Servi, which forms the
north bank of the canal. They had mounted the
bridge, and were descending its further steps. In
crossing it they went in single file, and were separated
from each other—the aged patrician being a little
I
114
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
ahead of Fra Paolo, and the servant at a longer
interval behind him. Suddenly five ruffians sprang
out of the darkness upon them. The patrician and
the servant were instantly overpowered, while the
leader of the gang set upon Fra Paolo with a dagger,
and, stabbing him in mad fury about the head and
neck, left him for dead with the stiletto buried in his
temple. Malipiero instantly obtained assistance, and
had him carried to the monastery. The news of the
infamous deed flew from lip to lip throughout Venice,
producing an extraordinary effect. The whole city
was united, as one man, in grief for Fra Paolo, and in
wrath against his assassins. The Senate was in council
when the intelligence reached it. At once the sitting
broke up, and the senators rushed off to the Servite
monastery. To their intense relief they found that
Fra Paolo was not dead. He was lying in his cell,
weak from pain and loss of blood, but perfectly
conscious. By order of the Senate the most noted
physicians in Venice were soon by his side, and not
content with that, it despatched messengers post¬
haste to Padua, and other towns, "for Acquapendente,
Spigelio, Vedova, Comino, and other eminent surgeons
and doctors. Fra Paolo was sorely wounded, and yet
he had been wonderfully preserved. Of fifteen stiletto
thrusts, marked by holes in his cap, hood, and collar,
only three had taken effect. Two of these wounds
were in the neck. In the last thrust the stiletto
entered the right temple, and came out between the
nose and the cheek, breaking his upper jaw in its
passage. The stiletto, too, was bent by the violence
of the stroke, and could not be easily withdrawn,
THE MARTYR.
which accounts for the assassin leaving it in the
wound. Everything was done for Era Paolo that skill
and money could effect. Acquapendente and Spigelio
were ordered by the Doge not to leave the monastery
until he was either out of danger, or had died. The
Senate each day received and published an official
bulletin of his condition. For three weeks his life
hung in the balance. When his deposition was taken,
he said that he forgave his enemies; and, judging
rightly äs to who was at the bottom of the mischief,
expressed the hope that his assassins might not be
captured, as their examination would still further bring
a scandal on the Church, and a danger to religion.
"Videat Dominus et requirat," he was wont to say.
He did not often refer to his enemies, but one or two
of his utterances have come down to us. When the
surgeon, Acquapendente, probing the most severe of
the wounds, enlarged on its '* stravagansa^* (extrava¬
gance or rudeness). Era Paolo said, "II mondo vuole
che sia stata fatta 'stylo Romanee Curiœ'"—"And
yet the world says it was done in the style of the
Roman Curia." The other occasion was when,
referring to the fact that if he died he would die as
a Christian martyr, and that martyrs, like their Master,
commonly damage more the powers of darkness, and
advance more the cause of truth and righteousness,
by their deaths than by their lives, he said, " Gli
fard piîi male morto che vivo *'—" I shall do them
(the enemies of the Republic) more harm dead than
alive." The Senate was anxious to know if the
stiletto had been poisoned. It was given to a chemist
to test, who experimented with it on a dog and a
I 2
ii6
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
chicken, and after a time reported to this effect : " As
the dog and chicken, which I stabbed with the dagger,
are recovering completely from their wounds, I
cherish the hope that Fra Paolo will recover also."
But Fra Paolo himself had thought of that danger
the very night he was attacked, and had set his own
mind at rest on the subject, for, asking for the dagger,
he felt it, and said, "It is not filed."
Fra Paolo's constitution, temper, and habits of life
were all in favour of his recovery. He was spare,
wiry, of a happy disposition, and of temperate—
almost abstemious—^habits. About the end of October
Venice breathed freely again, for its Consultora was
pronounced to be out of danger.
Simultaneously with ' its care for Fra Paolo, the
Senate used extraordinary measures to bring to justice
his assassins. A denunciation of the atrocity was
published throughout the length and breadth of the
Republic. All officers of the Government were
charged to use every means in their power to track
and seize the perpetrators of the villainy. Four
thousand ducats were set on the head of the leader of
the gang, and two thousand on that of each of his
subordinates. But all was soon seen to be of no
avail, for they had escaped to Papal territory. Imme¬
diately after the execution of the deed, the assassins
divided, some going straight to the palace of the
Papal Nuncio, and others rushing through narrow
calles to the Misericordia, where their gondola lay,
by which they soon reached the open lagoon outside
the Fundamenta Nuova. By the help of the Nuncio,
all met afterwards on the Lido. Crossing this island
THE MARTYR.
117
they found a ten-oared sloop waiting for them,
anchored near the shore in the Adriatic. Hurrying
on board, sails and oars were pressed into service,
and before morning dawned they had safely reached
Ravenna. There they found carriages and an escort
in readiness, by means of which they made, what
Fra Fulgenzio calls, a "triumphal march" to Ancona.
Papal enthusiasm for the heroes of the villainy only
cooled when they learned that after all Fra Paolo
Sarpi was not dead. But if these men had escaped
the justice of Venice, the Nuncio, who was virtually
part and parcel of the gang, was in its power. An
infuriated populace surrounded his palace, and would
have burned him inside his own house, had they not
been restrained by the authorities ; and weeks passed
before he could show himself in the streets of
Venice.
From information obtained through various
channels, but chiefly through that of the Venetian
Embassy in Rome, the history of the dark plot was
fully unravelled, and its author and his instruments
unmasked, and set in the light of day.
Its author was none other than Pope Paul V. He
it was who imbrued his " immaculate " hands in the
blood of Fra Paolo. His instruments were desperados
from different towns in Italy who were sheltering
from justice in Roman asylums. The chief of these
was one Ridolfo Poma, who had originally been an
oil merchant doing business in Venice, but who was
now known as a swindler, a bankrupt, and, in every
sense of the word, a thorough scoundrel. This man
was the friend of a priest as worthless as himself,
ii8
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
called Alessandro Franceschi, who introduced him to
Cardinal Borghese, the Pope's nephew, by whom he
was introduced to the Pope himself. Pope Paul
finding him to be just the man he wanted to do his
infamous mission entrusted it to him. In advance he
paid him large sums of money, so that he was heard
boasting that he was now a rich man, and was able to
clear off all his debts. Like Orlandini, he held an
absolution from the Pope for the crime. Poma chose
as his accomplices three outlaws, Alessandro Parasio
of Ancona, Giovanni of Florence, and Pasquali of
Bitonto, besides another vagabond priest, named
Michele Viti. This priest, under the cloak of
religion, used to frequent the services at the
Servite Monastery, his true object being to make
himself acquainted with the life and movements of
Fra Paolo. He acted as the guide of the other four.
The plot was thus negotiated between low priests.
One brought the author of the plot into contact
with the instruments of it, another brought these
instruments into contact with the victim. Well
might the Doge, Leonardo Donato, tell the Papal
Nuncio that there never was a deed of guilt and
shame concocted in any part of the Republic, but
some profligate priest was at the bottom of it.
The moment Poma, the three outlaws, and Michele
Viti the priest, set foot in Ancona, they were met by
the priest Alessandro Franceschi, who had been sent by
the Pope to meet them, and to pay them the "wages
of iniquity." Franceschi took them to the counting
house of Girolamo Scalamonti, the Pope's agent and
banker in Ancona, who paid them, to the Pope's
THE MARTYR.
119
order, the sum of a thousand ducats. The restrictions
put upon them as desperados were taken off. They
moved about freely, boasting of what they had done,
and receiving the congratulations of many of the
Papal fanatics. Not only so, but they were allowed,
contrary to law, to go about armed to the teeth, lest
the princely rewards offered by the Senate of Venice
might induce any one to kill them. And as, through
the charm of absolution, piety in the Church of Rome
marches hand in hand with profligacy and crime,
these, her worthy children, went as holy pilgrims to
the Santa Casa, or Holy House, of Loreto. This
so-called Santa Casa, shown at Loreto, fifteen miles
from Ancona, consists of four roofless brick walls,
now encased in marble, which the Church asserts is
the cottage that Mary dwelt in at Nazareth, which
was transported to this place by angels in 1294. This
pious fraud, so lucrative to the Papacy from that day
to this, owes something to Pope Paul V., who by the
gift of three magnificent bronze doors enriched the
church, under which stands the santa casa.
From Ancona the assassins went to Rome under a
safe conduct, and, having reported themselves at
headquarters, were lodged in the sanctuary palace of
Cardinal Colonna. The Pope, as we learn from the
Ambassador's despatches, had undertaken to protect
and pension them, notwithstanding that he had given
out to the world that he would not permit them to
remain in Rome one hour. For about a year he
maintained his promise, then feeling their presence
a burden and a scandal, he sent them to Naples,
ordering the Neapolitan government to pay them
120
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
annually 1500 ducats out of a debt which he alleged
was due to himself. This scheme to collect a bad
debt fell through, and his five protégés were soon
again upon his hands in Rome. The devising of a
fresh scheme for the taking of Fra Paolo's life
afforded them occupation for a time. But it came to
nothing. Meanwhile, in face of the storm of disgust
and indignation that was rising, in almost every
quarter of Europe, against the author and instruments
of the infamous crime. Pope Paul V. found it a very
impolitic thing to harbour these men. Gradually
their supplies were cut off, and the result looked for
followed. They became discontented, and complained
of breach of faith. Charged with disaffection towards
the Holy See, they were seized, in violation of
sanctuary privileges, in the Colonna Palace itself.
Ridolfo Poma made a stand for his life, and fought
determinately, killing one of the shirriy but soon all
were secured, and sent off to the prison at Civita
Vecchia. What became of his companions we do
not know, but Poma spent the rest of his life, which
lasted seven or eight years, in prison, dying there
of slow fever on the 6th of January, 1615. When I
was speaking lately to some Roman Catholics of the
part Pope Paul V. played in this tragedy, the following
defence was set up : " It was the Pope who brought
Fra Paolo's assassins to justice." That is true, but
his doing so only added to his guilt, for it was not for
anything that they did to Ffa Paolo that he punished
them, but for grumbling against his breach of faith
with them, and for resisting his authority. The
Venetian Ambassador at Rome, Simone Contarini,
THE MARTYR.
121
in notifying the Senate on the loth of January of
Poma's death, wrote, " It is said that four days ago
the scoundrel Poma, who wounded Fra Paolo of
Venice, Theologian to your Serenity, died of a slow
'fever in the prison of Ci vita Vecchia, where he was
placed for having killed a shirro*' then he added,
"certainly he did not merit such a quiet death."
When the news was communicated to Fra Paolo,
he, ever mindful of the words " Rejoice not when
thine enemy falleth, and let not thine heart be glad
when he stumbleth lest the Lord see it, and it dis¬
please him," deprecated any thought of vengeance.
Writing to the Ambassador he said, "I have felt no
pleasure at the death of that miserable Poma, because
I did not fear more from him after he was put in
prison ; and as for the past I thank God for His
protection of my life, which I may say was
miraculous ; and for the rest I count myself to be so
indebted for that as not to desire any greater thing.
May His Majesty be always praised ! "
We must now retrace our steps to resume our story
of Fra Paolo. We left him convalescent, according
to the opinion of the physicians, at the end of
October, 1607. On the 27th of that month, the Senate
met to deliberate concerning his affairs. Several
important questions came up for settlement. First,
public money had been freely spent on him during his
illness, in securing doctors, medicines, and every thing
that could be thought of fitted to aid his recovery, and
much more might yet have to be spent for his benefit
in the future. But to spend public money for private
uses, according to a law passed but forty years
122
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
before, was illegal. Secondly, the life of Fra Paolo
having been more than once threatened and
attempted, and, on this last occasion, almost success¬
fully, and there being no reason to think that it would
not be attempted again, it became the Senate to see
that every means possible should be provided to
secure his safety. Thirdly, as his late assassins had
escaped justice, -measures must be taken to prevent
such a thing happening again, in the case of any
who should attempt to injure him. The following
were the resolutions unanimously arrived at by ballot
to meet these questions : First, that the law of the
24th of March, 1567, against using public money for
private uses should be dispensed with in Fra Paolo
Sarpi's case, and that everything that had been, or
that might be, done for him should be considered
as materia publica—matters affecting the public—
and therefore payable out of the public treasury.
Secondly, that the stipend of Fra Paolo, which in
1605 was 200 ducats, and which was doubled in 1606,
making it 400 ducats, should be again doubled, so that
it should be 800 ducats, in order that he might be
enabled to keep a private gondola, have servants, and
procure whatever he thought necessary for the pre¬
servation and comfort of his life. Further, that a
dwelling should be provided for him near the Doge's
Palace, so that he might be spared the risk of passing
through the more retired parts of the city, as going
to and from his monastery at present entailed. Thirdly,
that "if in the future any person or persons be found,
of any degree or condition whatsoever, who shall attack
in any place or manner whatsoever, without exception,
THE MARTYR.
123
Father Paul, he or they who shall kill such a person
or persons, shall receive the reward of 2000 ducats ;
and he or they who shall take them alive shall receive
4000 ducats, to be paid immediately either out of the
confiscated property of such persons, or out of the
public treasury ; further, that whosoever shall inform
the Senate of any person or persons coming to Venice
with intent to injure the said Father Paul, he shall
receive the sum of 2000 ducats, and if the informer be
an accomplice he shall receive a pardon." In the
document embodying these resolutions the Senate
speaks of their Consultare as " the meritorious and
well-deserving Fra Paolo, a man of rare learning,
great valour and virtue, and of exemplary goodness,
who with faith and devotion has rendered good,
honourable, and most fruitful service to the Republic ; "
and it added these significant words, that its wish was
" that by these, and similar declarations already made,
all should know how dear the Republic held the most
beloved person of Fra Paolo."
Fra Paolo in his letter of thanks, said that he served
the Republic from a sense of duty, following the
dictates of his conscience and his sense of religion,
and with no sinister interests. In harmony with his
Masters words, "Whosoever will be chief among you
let him be your servant," he said his highest ambition
was to be honoured with the title " Servant of the
State." The terms in which the Senate had spoken
of him and his actions he would not take as describing
what he already was, and had already accomplished,
but as setting before him what the Senate wished him
to become, and to; doadding " I will therefore strive to
124
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
copy the model depicted for me in the Senate's words
of praise, so that I may become a servant not use¬
less to the Republic." One favour he begged to be
allowed to decline, and that was the dwelling provided
for him near the Doge's Palace. He wished to
continue to live in his monastic cell, within the
cloisters of the Servite Monastery, the home he had
chosen for himself when but a boy, " not knowing," as
he said, "how to live elsewhere." This the Senate
granted, but not till it had made an examination of
the monastery, and built a special staircase, and
arranged a special entrance for Fra Paolo's use, so
that he might go and come in his gondola without
being exposed to danger, or even being seen by any
one.
About the close of the year Fra Paolo had almost
completely recovered. Writing to de Lisle Groslot
on the nth of December, 1607, about his attempted
assassination, he said, " You will have heard of the
happy issue I have had out of what befell me on the
5th of October, when by three assassins I was assaulted
from behind, and before that either those who were
with me, or I myself, could perceive it, they gave me
three wounds, two in the neck and one in the temple,
all penetrating more than four fingers, with a stiletto,
according to their idea, poisoned. It pleased God
that all the wounds were oblique ones, a mercy which
I know was from God alone, whom it pleased to work
this wonder. I have no doubt that they could have
killed me on the spot a thousand times if the
Divine protection had not succoured me, which be
always praised. It would not have displeased me to
THE MARTYR.
125
have died for the cause which has moved them against
me, nor does it please me to remain in life unless
it should please the Divine Majesty that I should be
occupied in the service of the same cause."
The dagger that had transfixed his face he carried
into the church of the Servites ; and hung it up as a
votive offering at the foot of a crucifix, with the
inscription " Dei Filio Liberator
126
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
CHAPTER VII.
'^he Statesman-oAuthor.
1608—1623. ¿etat. 56-71.
A SPECIAL element of gladness entered into the
rejoicings with which the Venetians greeted the
opening of the New Year. Their martyr-counsellor
was restored to health. Once more he mingled with
his fellow-citizens in the great Piazza of St. Mark ;
and once more he took his place amongst their
representatives in the Ducal Palace. The scars of
the dagger-stabs, which he was destined to carry to
his grave, were regarded by Doge and people as the
battle wounds of a hero ; and never could they look
on them without a glow of patriotic pride in the
character and conduct of Fra Paolo, and a feeling of
detestation for the vindictive spirit and dark plottings
of Pope Paul.
With this year we enter on a review of the last
period of Fra Paolo Sarpi's life, which, ending with
his death in 1623, covers the space of fifteen years.
It has several prominent features.
Throughout this time he was the busy Statesman,
for, as we have already seen, he was now sole
Consultare for the Republic, and all its affairs passed
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
127
through his hands. Although not officially at the
head of the Government, he was in reality its sovereign
guide. And he was so to the end, for he died in
harness. Even by the side of his dying bed, in his
humble cell in the Servite Monastery, the Doge sought
his opinion, and acted upon it. And well he might,
for the soundness of Fra Paolo's advice had never
been falsified by results, and sad days were in store
for Venice when his voice could counsel her no more.
Although engrossed with the high interests of
State, his advice was ever at the command of the
humblest citizen. Fra Fulgenzio tells us that he was
consulted by every one. "Wills, matrimonial contracts,
heirships, trusteeships, the affairs of universities and
colleges, points of honour in quarrels, gifts, ecclesias¬
tical controversies," are a few of the things he was
continually asked to deal with. And never in one
instance would he consent to receive any reward
either from rich or poor. His reward was to do good,
giving " to his God all he could ; to his Prince all
that he owed ; and to his neighbour more than he
owed by any law but that of charity."
The esteem and admiration felt for Fra Paolo by
the Senate was reflected in all the foreign Courts.
His reputation was emphatically a European one. No
man of note ever came to Venice without seeking an
interview with him. although often, to his own regret,
such interviews had to be refused. A story is told of
the Dutch Ambassador, Francis Alarsen, who was most
anxious to meet him, but was continually disappointed.
Reduced to extremities, he one day waylaid him as
he passed from the Senate Hall to the Archives.
128
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Gazing fixedly at his remarkable face, so full of
sympathy, penetration, and power, and catching sight
of his dark lustrous eyes, that seemed by their glance
to read the innermost thoughts, so that it was said,
" everybody had a window in his breast to Fra Paolo,"
the Ambassador broke out in these words, "Now I
shall go back contented to Holland, even though I fail
in the mission that brought me here."
The cause of the difficulty that foreigners experi¬
enced in meeting Fra Paolo lay with the Senate ; and
the reason for their thus jealously guarding him was
the old one, his life was known to be in constant
peril. During these fifteen years he carried it
in his hand. With the previous chapter I would
gladly have closed the record of Papal attempts to get
rid of him, but it is impossible. His enemies, with
dogged persistency, never for a moment desisted from
that purpose. In the Papal Court nothing but regret
was expressed that Poma's knife-thrusts had not
proved fatal, and the saying was current that "for
others threats or promises might avail, but for Fra
Paolo nothing would serve but the dagger." Happily
all fresh plots were frustrated, and, therefore, though
I shall have to speak of them, and trace them home to
the Curia, and its directing head. Pope Paul V., yet I
shall do so in as few words as possible.
As the heading prefixed to this chapter indicates,
the most prominent feature of this period of Fra
Paolo's life was its literary activity. Treatise after
treatise appeared from his pen, so that he never loses
in our eyes the character of the Author ; and, as all
these works were written by him in his official capacity
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
129
as Consultare^ and, as all deal with questions arising
out of the relation of the Republic to the Papacy—of
that of the Church to the State, I have called him the
Statesman-Author. The questions he discussed are
not, even now, after the lapse of nearly three centuries,
out of date. This shows that the Papacy is not yet
powerless to make good, in some quarters, its arrogant
claim to interfere in the civil affairs of nations ; and
it therefore gives a present-day interest to Fra Paolo's
works. As it so happens, many of the questions they
treat of have come up in Italy for settlement during
the last twenty years ; and have been, for the most
part, decided on the lines laid down by him. His
treatises have thus a special interest for students of
modern Italian history. All these works, too, by Fra
Paolo are possessed by us exactly as they left his pen.
They have not been altered in any way. This cannot
be said of all the consultations that were prepared
for the Republic, for there was a State official whose
duty it was to give a literary form and finish to such
writings. This official took Fra Paolo's works in
hand, and began to clothe his sentiments in beautiful,
but stiff and stilted language. The consequence was
that they lost strength and force, point and meaning.
The Senate soon realised that his style belonged to
himself, and could not ,be altered without damage to
his works, so they ordered their official to leave them
untouched.
The original manuscripts of Fra Paolo's political
works exist, as I have said, in the Archives of Venice,
but they have been almost all published, and repub¬
lished, again and again, in different languages, and can
K
130 FRA PAOLO SARPI.
be found in the chief European libraries. An edition,
very easy of access, is that of Jacopo Mulleri, published
in Helmstat, in 1761. Several copies of this exist in
the different public libraries in Venice, and it is chiefly
to it that I have referred in writing the following
pages.
One of the first works that occupied Fra Paolo's
pen, and which was produced before the close of
1608, was a "Treatise on the Interdict." When the
dust and smoke of the late battle had cleared away, it
was seen that the Republic had vindicated not only
its own interests, but those of other countries as well.
Great principles affecting the elementary rights of
nations had been brought to light. It was not only the
claims of Paul V. that had been shown to be inconsistent
with the laws of the free Republic of Venice, but the
claims of the Papacy that had been demonstrated to be
in antagonism with the birth-rights of humanity. It
was, therefore, thought desirable to publish a full and
accurate account of the late struggle, and to scatter it
broadcast over Europe. The full title of the book is
" A Treatise on the Interdict of Pope Paul V., by Fra
Paolo Sarpi, in which he shows that it was not legally
published ; and that for many reasons it is not obliga¬
tory on the ecclesiastics to execute it, and that they
cannot observe it without sin." We have seen that,
by the decree of the Republic, the clergy could not
have executed the interdict without putting in peril
their bodies, here Fra Paolo completely turns the tables
on the Pope, by proving that they could not have done
so without putting in peril their souls.
The publicity given to the conflict helped to secure
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
one of its results, namely, that though the Papacy
has not abated one jot or tittle of its arrogant
pretensions, no wearer of the tiara has since ever
been able to force them upon a nation by excom¬
munication and interdict. Fra Paolo Sarpi once and
for ever dispelled that delusion. Unhappily, after
his death, Venice voluntarily abdicated her proud
position, and became, like the rest of Italy, the
slave of that sacerdotal despotism which held it,
during long centuries, in a state of material, intel¬
lectual, and spiritual bondage. But in recent times
the teachings of Fra Paolo have been given effect to;
for, when, on the 20th of September, 1870, the troops of
Victor Emanuel entered Rome, the Temporal Power of
the Pope was destroyed for ever, and a free and united
Italy began a new career of progress and prosperity.
The immediate result, personal to Fra Paolo, of the
publication of this treatise, was a fresh attempt upon
his life. A packet of letters falling accidentally into
the hands of the authorities brought this plot to their
knowledge, and enabled them to seize two of the
conspirators, who, before their execution, confessed
their guilt and revealed every detail of the dark
intrigue. A number of cardinals in Rome were privy
to it; but the man responsible for it, and whose
"hired servants" tbe assassins were, was again the
Pope. The chief of the accomplices were three
frates^ one of whom had free access to the Pope,
another of whom had free access to Fra Paolo, whilst
the third acted as the go-between. The one who
had contact with the Pope was a certain worthless
fellow called Fra Bernardo, who had helped him
K 2
132
FRA PAOLO SARFl.
when he was a young man " sowing his wild oats,"
and whom he now found it convenient to keep near
his person. The one who had access to Fra Paolo
was Fra Antonio, a lay-brother in the monastery.
The go-between was a certain Fra Francesco, who
lived at Padua. These three had been bought at the
price of 5000 scudi each, and the promise of Church
preferment. The plot was to kill Fra Paolo during
the Lent of 1609, by poison to be sent from Rome.
Before that time the discovery took place. Francesco
and Antonio were condemned to death, which was
changed to banishment through Fra Paolo's inter¬
cession. Paul V. rewarded his friend Fra Bernardo,
by making him a cardinal. I may here say that again
and again attempts were made to poison Fra Paolo,
but, as Fra Fulgenzio tells us, there was no chance of
such a plan succeeding, for "his sense of taste was
so exquisite, that he could infallibly distinguish the
ingredients in his food and drink."
It was now that Fra Paolo came into conflict with
his old friend Bellarmine, the Jesuit. Fra Paolo had
translated from the Latin, Gerson's work, "A Treatise,
and Resolutions, on the Validity of Excommunications,"
and had published it with a preface by himself. The
Pope ordered Bellarmine to reply to it ; who, in doing
so, to please his master, said that Fra Paolo's transla¬
tion was a faulty one, parts of it not fairly representing
Gerson's meaning, and parts of it being not Gerson's
at all, but Sarpi's own. None knew better than
Bellarmine the falseness and absurdity of these
charges. Fra Paolo immediately exposed to the
world the hollowness of Bellarmine's stateme nts, and
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
*33
reiterated and defended Gerson's conclusions in a work
entitled " A Defence against the Opposition made by
Bellarmine to Gerson," to which he affixed as a motto
these words of our Lord to Pilate, " Regnum meum
non est de hoc mundo " (St. John xviii., 36).
Another work by Fra Paolo against Pope Paul
V.'s conduct towards Venice is called " Consideration
of the Censures of Pope Paul V. against the Serene
Republic of Venice." On the title page are these
words from the 28th verse of Psalm CIX., which
so aptly express the contrasting spirits of the two
Pauls, " Maledicent Uli, e tu henedicesP
Two other works bearing on the famous struggle I
need do little more than name. One goes minutely
into the facts of the case as between Venice and the
Pope ; the other applies the principles of the struggle
to the relationship that should exist between Govern¬
ments and the Papacy. The first is entitled "A
Particular History of the things that passed between
the Pope Paul V. and the Serene Republic of Venice,"
or '* The War of Paul V. with the Venetians," with the
motto "Viva San Marco; " the second work is called
"The Rights of Sovereigns defended against the
Excommunications and Interdicts of the Popes."
In 1610, Fra Paolo produced a volume of great and
lasting value, namely, "A History of Ecclesiastical
Benefices." In this work he traces the history of the
connection of the Church with the temporalities from
the time of the Apostles, who, in order that they
might be free from the care of such things, and give
themselves " continually to prayer, and to the ministry
of the Word," instituted the office of the deaconship ;
134
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
to the time of Pope Paul V., who scrupled at nothing
in order to enrich himself and his " nephews,"
excommunicating at this time Fra Fulgenzio of Padua,
chosen by the monks as Abbot of Santa Maria delia
Vangadizza, near Legnago, in order to give its
income to his " nephew " Cardinal Scipione Borghese,
who already held more than thirty benefices of a
gross annual value of 2,000,000 francs. The Pope
had, year by year, "during his long Pontificate, so
added field to field and house to house, that he and
his *' nephews " possessed, to quote the words of
Sismondi in his " History of the Venetian Republic,"
" A considerable part of the Agra Romana, and these
vast estates . . . saw the number of their inhabitants
diminish, for the Borghese, too rich not to dissipate
in princely extravagance the incomes procured for
them by their uncle, were not rich enough to cultivate
their lands, which therefore fell back into mere cattle
ranges." Fra Paolo, in his book, traces, step by
step, with lucid precision, the story of Ecclesiastical
Benefices during the sixteen centuries that inter¬
vened between the spirituality of the Apostles and
the worldliness of Paul V. He shows how for a few
hundred years Apostolic unworldliness continued,
more or less, to characterise the Church; but how
afterwards the love of Mammon crept in, and gained
in strength, surely though gradually, and somewhat
fitfully, until the era of the Papacy ; after which it
became the Church's dominant passion, and increased
in power, until, overmastering every other considera¬
tion, the career of the Church became simply a mad
hunt after wealth that it might consume it upon its
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
135
lusts. The most atrocious means were adopted in
order to gain money. Not only were tithes levied
on the fruits of the earth, but on every kind of labour
and traffic—beggars being made to pay them on their
pittances, and thieves and robbers, gamblers and
harlots, on the gains of their sins and crimes. The
Church turned itself into an annuity office, and
doubled and quadrupled the annual incomes of spend¬
thrifts and profligates who made over to it their
estates, no matter though their doing so might be an
act of cruel injustice to their families and heirs, who
might be thereby reduced to beggary and starvation.
Simony of the grossest kind, he says, was everywhere
prevalent. The practice of one man holding several
benefices became general ; and worse still, those
benefices were given not only to those who performed
no religious functions, but to men who were not
priests; and they were, moreover, freely bestowed
upon the mistresses of Popes and cardinals, and were
utilised as sources of revenue for their illegitimate
offspring. Fra Paolo goes on to advocate the strip¬
ping of the Pope and Curia of all their temporalities,
and the return of all their illegal wealth to the
separate congregations for which it had been intended,
for the supplying of the needs of the clergy and of
the poor, and especially of those of the latter.
The historians. Gibbon and Hallam, speak in the
highest terms of this work. The former says, " In
the treatise ' Delle Materie Beneficiare,' the Papal
system is deeply studied and freely described. Should
Rome and her system be annihilated, this golden
volume may still survive, a philosophical history, and
136
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
a salutary warning." Mr. Hallam writes equally
warmly, and more fully of it. He says, " The treatise
' Delle Materie Beneficiare,' in other words, ' On the
rights, revenues, and privileges in secular matters'
(of the Church), is a model in its way. The history
is so short, and yet so sufficient, the sequence so
natural and clear, the proofs so judiciously introduced,
that it can never be read without delight and admira¬
tion of the author's skill. And this is the more
striking to those who have toiled at the verbose books
of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, where
tedious quotations, accumulated, not selected, disguise
the arguments which they mean to confirm. Except
the first book of Machiavelli's 'History of Florence,'
I do not remember any earlier summary of facts so
lucid and pertinent to the object. That object was
neither more nor less than to represent the wealth and
power of the Church as ill-gotten and excessive. The
treatise on benefices led the way, or rather was the
seed thrown into the ground that ultimately produced
the many efforts, both of the press and of public
authority, to break down these privileges."
The principles laid down by Fra Paolo in this work,
like those in the previous one, have been embodied
by the Government of Italy in recent legislation. All
the ecclesiastical property in the land belongs now
not to the Church but to the State. Even the Pope
in the Vatican is practically but a "tenant at will."
Indeed, it is illegal for the Church of Rome to own
property, and not an inch of Italian soil can be
alienated for Church purposes. Moreover, the Govern¬
ment holds the ecclesiastical property it has taken,
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
137
not in the interests of the Papacy, but in those of the
people ; and therefore should the Papal Guarantees be
cancelled, it will be free to grant the use of the churches
for Reformed services, or for whatever form of
worship the people may choose to demand. All the
charity funds have been also taken out of the hands
of the Church, and are now in those of the State.
This was effected by the passing of the " Opere Pie"
Bill in 1889, which came into operation in 1891. The
amount that thus changed hands was 135,000,000
francs, or ¿^5,400,000 of annual income. The ground
of the Government's action was the scandalous mal¬
administration, by the Church of Rome, of this trust-
money. Very little of it went to relieve real poverty
and suffering. The poor were left to perish of
hunger, cold, and nakedness, and then the money
which should have been spent upon their bodies,
found its way into the pockets of priests to have
masses said for their souls. Now local boards in the
different towns and cities of the land, elected in part
by the people and in part nominated by the Govern¬
ment, administer the moneys. And such is the distrust
felt of the Church that on these boards it is illegal for
a priest to hold a seat, and, in the event of one being
chosen, the Government cancels his election.
The following year Fra Paolo brought out a work
on "The Origin, Forms, Laws, Customs, and Uses of
the Inquisition in the City and Dominion of Venice."
In this work Fra Paolo shows how the Republic
resisted every attempt of the Pope to set up the
Inquisition in Venice ; and that when at last, in the
latter half of the thirteenth century, it was introduced,
138
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
it was not by virtue of any bull of his, nor had it ever
been dependent on Rome. The Republic introduced
it, and maintained and controlled it. In Venice itself
three nobles, chosen by the Senate, called the Savii
all' her esta, acted on it as lay assessors, and initiated
and controlled all its proceedings in the name of the
Government. The Church, represented chiefly by the
Nuncio and his auditor, could in nothing take inde¬
pendent action. Everything, too, was excluded from
the jurisdiction of the Inquisition but heresy, and it
had no control over foreigners. The Senate further
decreed that every judgment of the Inquisition before
being valid should be submitted to it for examination
and ratification. Thus the Republic preserved intact
the rights of the citizen and the supremacy of civil
law. Outside of the city of Venice, throughout the
dominions of the Republic, local civil authorities took
the place of the Savii all' heresia.
The attempts of the Pope to destroy Era Paolo by
any means in his power, no matter what, never for a
moment desisted, and this year he sprung on him a
mine that he, and his sappers and miners, had been
laying for some months past. Era Paolo, as we
have seen, held correspondence with men of talent
and worth the world over, whether they were
Catholics or Protestants, Jews or Turks, and in
Erance he held communication with the jurist de
Lisle Groslot, and with one Erancesco Castrino.
By the aid of the Erench Nuncio, and of emissaries
in his pay, the Pope intercepted some letters of
Era Paolo's addressed to these men. Then he wiled
Francesco Castrino to Ferrara, using as a decoy
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
139
Castrino's own brother, who was a Jesuit, and who
practised as a doctor in that city. Fra Paolo knew
that Castrino's fate was sealed if he went there,
and he said, " I do not wish that it should even
enter into his thoughts to go to such a place, believing
it to be a thing of great danger." But he went, and
instantly the Inquisition seized him. Francesco
Castrino had acted as a sort of intermediary for Fra
Paolo in France, and in his possession were found
more letters addressed to de Lisle Groslot, to Antonio
Foscarini, the Venetian Ambassador in France, and to
others. The Inquisition murdered poor Castrino,
took possession of these letters, and despatched them
to Rome. Pope Paul V. had garbled and twisted
extracts made from them, to prove Fra Paolo to be both
an eretica pravità^'—"a depraved heretic," and a
traitor, holding fieri sentimenti contro la sua indita
patria^^—"proud sentiments against his distinguished
country." These extracts were sent to the Papal
Nuncio in Venice, who presented them to the Senate.
When Fra Paolo was told of what the Pope had
done, he simply laughed at his puerility, and the
Senate only saw in it another form of Papal dastard-
liness. As Commendatore Castellani says, in his
" Lettere Inedite," none of these things " moved the
Government, I will not say to hand over Sarpi to his
butchers, but to shake by an iota the implicit trust it
reposed in him."
In i6i2, the Senate requested Fra Paolo to prepare
a pamphlet on the case of the Bishop of Ceneda.
Ceneda is an ancient town lying about forty miles to
the north of Venice, at the foot of the Dolomite Moun-
140
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
tains. It was in those days a most important place,
as it commanded the approach to the great Piave
valley, which was the chief commercial and military
highway through the Italian Tyrol into Austria and
Germany. Its most prominent feature now, as in Fra
Paolo's time, is the episcopal castle, that, situated on a
hill, dominates the town and surrounding country.
Previous to 1388, it had been more or less inde¬
pendent; and its bishops were its princes, celebrat¬
ing the mass with their swords on the altar, and
grinding the faces of the poor to keep up their
extravagant living and princely display. But at
that date Ceneda became subject to the Republic,
which at once put a stop to clerical oppression,
and cut short the line of martial prelates. Its
bishops were forbidden to levy taxes, and, stripped of
all civil authority, were forced to confine themselves
to their spiritual duties. Still at intervals difficulties
arose, and, in Fra Paolo's day, both Clement Vlll.
and Paul V. sought to restore to its bishops the rights
of princes. Venice withstood their efforts, and in
this pamphlet Fra Paolo defends its action, and shows
that a State cannot permit the Church to intermeddle
in civil affairs, and levy taxes, without divest¬
ing itself of its most elementary rights, for the
exercise of which it is answerable to God alone.
It was not till 1870, when the Kingdom of Italy
got a Constitution, that the principles developed by
Fra Paolo in this work were fully put into practice;
for, when forced by European opinion to establish
in its midst a Church that is its worst enemy, and
to put a clause in its Constitution that gives to the
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
141
Pope the status of a King, it was careful to insert
another clause debarring him from raising a penny
of taxation in Italy for any purpose whatever ; and
the imposing by the Pope within the last few years
of entrance fees to the Vatican and the Lateran, is
a breach of the Constitution, which the State is biding
its time to make use of.
A copy of this work on the Ceneda case found its
way to Rome, with the result that a fresh conspiracy
against Sarpi's life was set on foot. The ever-
watchful Ambassador got wind of it, and was able to
forewarn Venice of the coming danger. The Senate
urged Fra Paolo to greater care of himself, and bade
him ask what he liked for his personal security, and it
would be given him. The conspirators were scared,
and the plot was abandoned.
The next two treatises, written in 1613, were on
"Sanctuaries for Offenders," and on the "Immunity
of the Clergy." The sanctuaries in Rome have already
come before us, as nests for outlaws and criminals,
for, as we have seen, they supplied the Pope with
ready instruments for the attempted assassination
of Fra Paolo, and they afforded shelter to such
of them as escaped justice at the hands of the
Venetian authorities. Although less numerous else¬
where than in Rome, they were scattered thickly
enough throughout Italy, and everywhere they were
not only asylums but nurseries of offenders, as their
existence put a premium on vice and crime. Fra
Paolo shows that in their origin these sanctuaries
for offenders were an institution not of the Church
but of the State, and that they served not as asylums
142
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
for criminals, but for the weak, the innocent, and
the oppressed. It was not until the Church usurped
the control of them that degeneracy set in, when the
churches themselves became "cages of unclean birds"
and " dens of thieves." Fra Paolo pleads for the
abolition of the majority of them, and for the restora¬
tion of the rest to their primitive use, under the direct
control of the civil power. Grotius calls this work of
Fra Paolo's a "great book." "Immunity of the
Clergy " answered much the same purpose for
villainous priests that sanctuaries did for villainous
laymen. The " immunity " meant immunity from law
and justice, or, in other words, permission to live in
sin, and to commit crime with impunity. So far was
this carried, that, as Fra Paolo tells us in his " History
of the Council of Trent," the priests wished to have
it extended to their concubines, " for as they were of
the family of the priest, they were amenable only to
ecclesiastical courts." We already know Fra Paolo's
views on such matters from his defence of the
imprisonment of Brandolin and Saraceni by the
Republic. He wished the subjects, lay and clerical
alike, of all States to be equal in the sight of law, and
to be answerable alike to civil tribunals alone. He
wished the priest's garb to be the badge of special
sanctity, and not a shield for lawlessness and depravity.
We know how up to the Reformation both these
institutions, " Privilege of Sanctuary " and " Benefit
of Clergy," were not less productive sources of evil
in England than they were in Italy ; and how, in
the reign of Henry VIII., both were first modified,
and then swept utterly away. Fra Paolo's treatises
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
143
were a not unsuccessful attempt to bring about a
similar reformation of these matters in Continental
countries.
Fra Paolo's next work was a " History of the
Uscocks," supplementary to that of Minuci, Arch¬
bishop of Zara. The Uscocks were a small, but
desperate, band of pirates, who, from the Dalmatian
coast, infested the Adriatic to the damage of Venetian
commerce. They were at all times, and especially at
this time, a sore thorn in the side of the Republic,
which found great difficulty in crushing them, or even
in holding them in check, because of the shelter the
rugged Dalmatian coast afforded them, and because
they exercised their piracy under the special patronage
of the Church—Pope Paul not denying, but only
excusing his conduct, when taxed by Venice with
supplying these ocean robbers with arms and ammu¬
nition.
Trading with heretical countries formed a sort of
chronic ground of complaint against Venice on the
part of the Holy See, and a league with Holland, into
which she entered this year, brought a fresh
remonstrance from the Pope. Fra Paolo was again
instructed to defend the action of the Republic. This
he did in an able treatise, which not only met with
the approval of the Senate, but of public opinion in
Europe. He was able to show how the Papacy itself
did not scruple to employ heretics when it served its
purpose, the help of the Turks having been called in
by Julius II., and that of the Protestant Grisons of
Switzerland by Paul III. This latter Pope was also
accused by Venice of having been in alliance with the
144
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Turks under Barbarossa; and Mr. Froude states that
Dr. Wotton, then the English resident at Brussels,
wrote to King Henry of that strange union thus, " It
stood well with all reason that the Turk and Bishop of
Rome, being both of one mind and purpose, and both
going about one thing, that is, to destroy the Christian
faith, should live like brethren and help each other."
Another treatise produced by Era Paolo was on
" The System of Education given by the Jesuits." In
this work he firmly establishes his terrible indictment
against them, which I have already had occasion to
quote, that " never from their schools came forth a
son obedient to his father, loving to his country, and
dutiful to his prince."
The last work which I have to notice as coming
from the Consultare's pen is that great one, by which
he is best known to the world, namely, " The History
of the Council of Trent." As the Papacy, imputing
to Era Paolo something of its own unworthy temper
and spirit, has asserted that he wrote this work late in
life to avenge himself on Pope Paul V. and the Jesuits,
and that it is therefore full of partiality and prejudice,
mistakes, and representations, which statement has
been widely circulated; and as even modern Protestant
writers on the subject have been so far in error as to
say that " Sarpi holds a brief against the Council,"
and that " as he had not access to its minutes, he is
often inaccurate in chronological matters," it may be
better here to recall what we already know regarding
his manner of writing it. We have seen that in 1570,
when he was but a youth of eighteen, holding a pro¬
fessional chair in the College of Mantua, he formed
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
145
the resolve to write this history ; and, as the Council
only broke up in 1563, this determination was taken
within seven years of its close, when its doings were
on everybody's lips. Then at Mantua, Cremona,
Milan, Rome, and other places, he was brought into
contact with men, who, like Bishop Boldrino, Camillo
Olivo, Cardinal Borromeo, Arnauld Ferrier, M. de
Fresnes, Sixtus V., and Cardinal Castagna (afterwards
Pope Urban VIL), were not only present at the
Council, but were leading actors in its affairs ; and
we have seen how Fra Paolo, becoming the intimate
friend of these men, obtained from them abundant
stores of facts in regard to its proceedings. We have
also seen how Camillo Olivo, as secretary to the
president. Cardinal Gonzaga, took copies of the
Council's minutes, and how Arnauld Ferrier took notes,
all of which were given to Fra Paolo. Then, when at
Rome as the friend of Sixtus V. and Urban VIL, there
is reason to believe that the minutes of the Council,
and other documents preserved in Rome, bearing on
its doings, were open for his examination. We
further know how the Republic, immediately after the
reconciliation with the Pope, granted to Fra Paolo the
unprecedented privilege of free access to all the most
secret Archives of the State, and how Fra Paolo used
for his history the reports of the Venetian delegates
to the Council there preserved. Indeed, the Papacy
itself becomes our witness on this matter, for the
moment his history appeared in Italy under the
pseudonym which Fra Paolo adopted, the Pope and
the Curia said, " It is the work of Fra Paolo Sarpi, for
during a long line of years, by means of money and
L
146
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
friendships, he spared no pains in getting information
about the Council, in Rome, throughout Italy, and
beyond it in other kingdoms. He has penetrated all
secrets." This bears out what Fra Paolo himself said,
that " it was the labour of eight lustres."
Besides these exceptional advantages, Fra Paolo
brought exceptional qualifications to his task. The
extensivehess and profundity of his knowledge of
theology and Church history rendered him at
home in every subject that came before the Council.
Further, in grasp of intellect, in penetrating dis¬
criminating judgment, in depth of moral feeling, in
sterling honesty of purpose, in painstaking industry,
in skill of composition, he had all the qualifications of
the historian. There is little wonder that from the
moment the work appeared it was recognised as
bearing the stamp of a standard history, that it was
translated into almost all European languages, that
edition after edition were called for in these languages,
and that it stands the most complete and only accu¬
rate repository of facts connected with the Council.
This is not the place to enter into the merits of the
work, but I may say that no one can take it up with¬
out finding it, apart altogether from its value as a
history, one of the most fascinating pieces ofJiterature
it is possible to read. I have already compared Fra
Paolo to Mr. Ruskin, and the comparison arises in my
mind again in connection with the style and composi¬
tion of this book. Carlo Botta, the Italian historian,
writes of it, *' The History of the Tridentine Council
is one of the most manly and robust works that was
ever produced by human genius. Flowers and
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
H7
oraaments it has none, there reigns a complete
austerity from its. beginning to its close, and yet it is
such a delight to read it, although it treats of dry
material, that no one who takes it up can lay it down
until he has read it to the very end. Than this of the
Venetian friar, no more naked, and, at the same time,
more attractive and more delightful narrative, exists in
any of the greatest libraries. This proceeds, according
to my idea, from the immense power he possessed of
forming his thought, and then clothing it in the most
brief, most clear, most adapted, and most rounded
language possible. The style of Sarpi is entirely
peculiar to himself, it resembles that of no one else,
and that of no one else resembles it." Commendatore
A. Pascolato says of it, " The justness of its propor¬
tions, the harmony, the constantly sustained serenity,
the simplicity, the rapidity of narration, the clearness
that he knew how to use even in matters the most
thorny and obscure, make the work of Sarpi one of
the monuments, the most notable and the most worthy
of study in the literature of our country. The style of
Sarpi .... is full of nerve, of colour, of life, of
power, and never wearies .... without rhetoric,
without declamation, without elegant contortions,
without superlatives, almost without adjectives.
There are things, facts, reasons, nothing else." Lord
Macaulay, in a letter written from Ventnor, in
September, 1850, says, "Fra Paolo is my favourite
modern historian. His subject did not admit of vivid
painting; but, what he did, he did better than any¬
body." And the late Mr. Rawdon Brown, of Venice,
said, " Any one who would attempt to improve the
L 2
148
FRA PAOLO SARPl.
diction of Sarpi, would act like one who wished to
correct Shakespeare. The one and the other are
perfect writers."
The publication of Fra Paolo's great history came
about in a strange way. It was published in Italian,
in London, m 1619, byjohan Billio, printer to King
James, with the title " The History of the Tridentine
Council, in which are unveiled all the artifices of the
Court of Rome to prevent the truth of dogmas from
being made plain, and the Reform of the Papacy and
of the Church from being dealt with ; by Pietro Soave
Polano," and it had a laudatory dedication to King
James. The name Pietro Soave Polano is a perfect
anagram of Paolo Sarpio Veneto, and it was the
pseudonym Fra Paolo usually wrote under, from the
time that his works were condemned by the Roman
Curia. Strange as it may seem Fra Paolo was
responsible neither for the title nor the -dedication, nor
the publication of his work at this time. He had lent
the manuscript to Marco Antonio de Dominis, the ex-
Archbishop of Spalatro in Dalmatia, who had thrown
in his lot with him and the Republic against Pope
Paul V. De Dominis made a copy of it, which he took
to London, and without asking Fra Paolo's consent he
published it, changing Fra Paolo's simple title " The
History of the Council of Trent," to the longer and
objectionable one, and adding the flattering dedication.
Thirty years after Fra Paolo's death. Cardinal
Pallavicino, a scholarly, but unscrupulous Jesuit, was
employed by the Roman Curia to write a rival history
of the Council. The title of his work, which suggests
its character, runs thus ; " A true History of the
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
149
Tridentine Council, against the false narrative of
Pietro Soave Polano." Through the influence of the
Jesuits this book has had a somewhat extended
circulation, and it has received a credence it most
certainly does not deserve. Commendatbre Pascolato
says, "Le Courayer demonstrates that the pretended
errors extracted by Pallavicino (from Sarpi's History)
with ridiculous ostentation, and with a maliciousness
worthy of censure, reduce themselves to trivialities of
names and dates, and to some conjectures advanced
without sufficient reflection. On the other hand,
Pallavicino's history is full of errors as to facts, and as
he could find nothing in the most scandalous actions
of Pope and Prelate to blame, he is not so much to be
regarded as an historian of the Council, as, what he
has been often called, its panegyrist." Fra Paolo
remains, what Gibbon calls him, " the incomparable
Historian of the Council of Trent."
The original manuscript of the History is preserved
in the library of St. Mark in the Doge's Palace. It is
in the handwriting of Marco Fanzano, one of Fra
Paolo's secretaries, with corrections and notes by the
author himself, showing that he had carefully revised
what had been copied or written to his dictation.
Professor Teza, of Padua, in a recent pamphlet shows
how de Dominis did not make a very perfect transcript
of Fra Paolo's manuscript, and, what does seem a
strange thing, that in all the many subsequent editions,
in various languages, of the Tridentine History, not a
single one was ever set up from it. Editors sought
again and again to obtain the manuscript in order
to print it ; but the influence of the Papacy, which.
150 FRA PAOLO SARPI.
gaining power after Fra Paolo's death, did not
terminate till the close of the Austrian domination in
Venice, frustrated their efforts. Now that there is
once more free speech and a free press in Italy, a
new edition of the History, to be printed from this
original manuscript, is being called for ; and Professor
Teza has already made extensive preparation for the
work, long due, as he says, to Sarpi, "// re degli
scrittori Veneziani'^—"The king of Venetian writers."
We come now to the year 1622. Fra Paolo has
reached the mature age of three score years and
ten. His enemy. Pope Paul V., who during the
whole of his long Pontificate had thirsted, like a
sleuthhound, for his blood, had passed to his account
a few months before. It is pitiable to learn that this
Pontiff, even when tottering on the edge of the
grave, spent his feeble thought and ebbing strength
in seeking revenge on Fra Paolo. He died in
January, 1621, and in the previous June we find him,
when sending Lodovico Zacchia as his Nuncio to
Venice, giving him particular instructions to use all
means in his power to get Fra Paolo Sarpi turned
out of his office as Consultora. Fifteen years before
this, as we have seen, he gave similar instructions
to his Nuncio, saying he ought to have little
difficulty in getting the Republic to throw over Fra
Paolo; now, however, he seems to have felt that it
might not be such an easy matter, for he concluded
his commission to Zacchia in these words, " Ma
finalmente non è da sperar molto: converrà aspettare
il remedio di Dio, essendo tanto inanzi negli anni che
non pub essere grandemente lontano dalle suepene*^
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
*5*
—" But after all there is not much to be hoped. We
may await the remedy from God, he (Fra Paolo)
being so advanced in years that he cannot be very
far from his punishment." Exhibiting this eminently
pious spirit, and breathing this pious wish, died,
" the Vicar of Christ," " leaving his house full of
riches, of which he was always studious," and of
which there remain to this day as his becoming
monument, Borghese chapels, Borghese gardens,
and Borghese palaces—the chief palace being now,
by the strange irony of fate, the headquarters of the
Roman Freemasons !
Fra Paolo, by the good hand of God upon him, still
continued to live and work, and to bless all around
him. Morning by morning he was seen to pass, as
he had done during the last fifteen years, from his
humble cell to the Doge's Palace, and back again,
evening by evening, from palace to cell. In the one
place and in the other he was ever the same. His
presence brought home to the hearts of friars and
senators alike a sense of calm, and a sense of power.
He soothed and he sustained. But physically never
very strong, he felt this year the frailties of old age
creeping upon him. The cold, wet months of the
new year tried him, and when Easter came he was
laid down with inflammation of the lungs and fever.
He felt that, though he rallied, this was the beginning
of the end. He had no misgiving, no slavish clinging
to life. As cord after cord snapped, he was wont to
say, " Lord, now thou art letting thy servant depart in
peace." But he determined to work to the end. All
through the summer and autumn he continued at his
152
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
daily duties. Christmas came with its hallowed
memories, and its friendly greetings, which he
enjoyed none the less—but perhaps the more—^because
he felt, and said, they were the last for him. When
urged to rest, he answered, " My duty is to serve, and
not to live; there is some one daily dying in his office."
Another new year began, and he still met the calls of
duty. On the evening of Epiphany, 1623, returning
to the monastery from the palace, very tired and
feeble, he said to the brothers, " I have tried to comfort
you whenever I could ; now I am no longer able to do
it, it is your turn to comfort me." On Sunday, the
8th of January, he officiated in the old Servite church.
It was his last service. When it was over he was
pressed to have his food in his cell, but he preferred
to join the fraternity in the refectory. It was his
last supper with his brother friars. On Monday,
the gth, when dressing, he fainted. Physicians were
hastily called and they confirmed his own opinion that
he was dying. When told of the fact, he said, " Sta
lodato Dio, mi piace do che a Lui piace "—" Let God
be praised, what pleases him pleases me." Then he
added these very remarkable words, which show how
he calmly, and correcfly, viewed death as an act, not
as a state—a painful act it might be, but one which
he, as a living man, would do, leaning on the Divine
arm, E col Suo aiuto faremo bene quesf ultima
azione^^—" And by His help we will do this last action
well." He lingered on throughout the week. His
mind was clear and peaceful, though fever was
slowly sapping his remaining strength. He had the
Scriptures constantly read to him, especially the
THE STATESMAN-AUTHOR.
153
closing chapters of St. John's Gospel, and those in
St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, where the Apostle
dwells upon the great fact of justification by faith.
He knew the whole of the New Testament by heart,
both in Greek and in Latin, and Era Fulgenzio tells
us that he often repeated such texts as this, " Being
justified freely by his grace through the redemption
which is in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to
be a propitiation through faith in his blood," He
spoke of his hope and confidence in Christ, so that
" the onlookers were as much edified as touched."
During these days his advice had frequently been
asked on affairs of State, and, notwithstanding his
extreme feebleness, he always gave it with his
accustomed clearness. On Saturday, the 14th, he
was almost too weak to sit up in bed, yet, when once
again the Doge sent to consult him, he gathered up
his strength, grasped the position of affairs, and gave
in writing his latest counsel. His public duties closed
thus only with his life. The doctors were doubtful if
he could live many hours. Realising this, he said to
his faithful friend Fra Fulgenzio, Andate, ne restate
più a vedermt in questo state. Andate reposarvt,
cK io fra tanto tornerd a Dio donde son venuto "—
" Go, do not longer stay to see me in this state.
Go and rest, and I meantime will return to God
from whom I came." Fra Fulgenzio went away,
but only to call the other brothers, who watched
beside him to the end. He lived through the
night. In his broken slumbers he was heard
to say, " Let us go to St. Mark's, for it is
late, and I have much to do." Sunday morning
154
fra paolo sarpi.
dawned. The religion and patriotism that had
illumined every action of his life shone forth at his
death. His failing thoughts, lingering around his
well-loved Venice, gave themselves utterance in the
half-formed prayer " Esto perpetua "—" May it last
for ever." Then, opening his eyes wide, he fixed
them for a moment on the image of the Saviour
hanging before him. Closing them with a smile, and
laying himself back upon his pillow, he deliberately
crossed his already cold and rigid hands on his breast,
and died. Thus passed away on the morning of
Sunday, the 15th of January, 1623, in the 71st year of
his age, Fra Paolo Sarpi, the Greatest of
the Venetians.
in tomb and on pedestal. 155
CHAPTER VIII.
in Tomb and on Pedestal.
1623—1892.
The death of Era Paolo Sarpi cast a profound
gloom over Venice. It was realised by all that one of
the greatest of her sons, and one who had rendered
her unparalleled service, had been taken away. The
loss was mourned by hundreds amongst rich and
poor, in ducal palace and in monastic cell, as that of a
personal friend ; and it made itself felt throughout the
length and breadth of the Republic, and in lands far
beyond its bounds. It was regarded as a national—
almost a European—calamity. Steps were at once
taken by the Doge and Senate to manifest their
feelings, and to honour Era Paolo's memory.
Eirst, it was decreed that his funeral should be an
affair of the State. His confraternity was allowed to
conduct it according to the rites of the Servites ; but
it was ordered to be on a magnificent scale, and at
the public expense. This was done ; and he was
interred, not in the common burying-ground of the
friars, but in a sacred spot at the foot of an altar in
the Servite church. The Prior of the monastery, in
his official report of the funeral to the Doge, spoke of
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
Fra Paolo as " a holy man, of the greatest intellect
that ever was;" and, referring to the vast crowds of
sorrowing monks and people, said, " it is to be
esteemed a divine impulse that which united them in
the wish thus to begin to honour even the body of
that holy soul that had been received into heaven,"—
words worthy of note in contrast to those of hatred
and detraction used of him by the Papacy.
Secondly, the Doge and Senate communicated the
news of his death and funeral, through the resident
Ambassadors, to all the Courts of Europe ; thus
pursuing the course taken by nations when their
sovereigns die. The terms of the document, which is
dated the 21st of January, .1623, a week after his
death, are as follows : " The Father Master Paul, the
Servite, of Venice, has been called by the Lord God
to Himself, a subject most beloved by us because of
his lofty gifts, and because at all times, and on all
occasions, he showed, with equal faithfulness, strength,
and devotion, a great ardour for the advancement of
our affairs. Hence we have felt that grief which
becomes the loss of a subject most dear to us, who
was adorned with those excellent virtues which
worthily instigated him in all his actions. Having
adjusted the end of his life according to the obliga¬
tions of his religion, having himself delivered into the
hands of the Prior of his monastery everything that
had been granted to his use, and having requested
and received the most holy Sacraments with the
greatest piety at the hands of the same Prior in the
presence of all the Chapter, he rendered his spirit to
God, to the evident edification of all the monks who,
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
157
with affectionate prayers and copious tears, were
watching beside him. At his funeral were present
the four Mendicant Orders—Dominicans, Franciscans,
Eremites, and Carmelites, each in large numbers, and
a vast concourse of people from all parts of the city,
who spontaneously desired to follow it, We (the
Doge) in consequence of the high esteem which the
Republic has always felt for his person, and for the
important services which at all times it received from
him, have wished, with the Senate, to give you this
notice for your information,"
Thirdly, the Senate ordered Gerolamo Lando, a
learned patrician, to go over Era Paolo's writings,
and make extracts of everything relating to affairs of
State. I have already referred to this fact when
speaking, in a former chapter, of our sources of in¬
formation in regard to his works. These extracts
form twenty-nine folio volumes, which are now to be
seen in the Archives of Venice, near the church of the
Frari.
Finally, the Doge and Senate decreed that the
Republic should honour and perpetuate its Consultare's
memory by the erection of a public monument with
an inscription. This was a step only taken on very
rare occasions, and one that embodied the highest
distinction it was in the power of Venice to bestow.
This famous decree was passed on February 7th,
1623, about three weeks after his death ; and the
words in which it was couched enhanced its value.
These are as follows : "Since the late Father Master
Paul, has proved on every occasion not only his
virtue and great learning, but a supreme devotion
158
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
and faith towards the public service, with that great
advantage to, it which is very well known, it is be¬
coming to the gratitude of our Republic to make to
appear some evident and perpetual testimony of the
satisfaction received from his important and most
fruitful labours, which, corresponding to the merit
acquired by him, will serve also as an incentive to
others to exert themselves with equal fidelity and
utility in the public service. It is therefore decreed
that of the money of our Signoria shall be spent two
hundred ducats on a suitable and worthy memorial of
the above-named Father Master Paul, to be placed in
the church of the Servites in this city, in such a
position, in such a form, and with such an inscription
as our College shall deem proper. Therefore, all
those orders must be given which may be considered
necessary for the execution of this present decree."
As soon as the decree was made public, other three
hundred ducats were added to the fund from private
sources. All was quickly decided. The site was to
be a niche in a conspicuous part of the Servite church,
the form was to be a marble bust of Fra Paolo, to be
executed by Gerolamo Campagna, a famous sculptor
of the school of Sansovino, and the inscription, written
by a scholarly noble, was as follows : " Paul, a
Venetian, a member of the Order of Servites, a
theologian so prudent, upright, and wise, that greater
knowledge of either human or divine things, or a
more upright and holy life you could not desire;
endowed with intelligence that searched all things,
and with a wisdom ruling by its impulses, never
prompted by any greed, nor disturbed by disease of
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
159
mind ; always constant, moderate, perfect, a true
example of guilelessness, devoted to God with admirable
piety, religion, continence ; doing eager faithful work
by such great virtues for the State, which is moved
with a longing for him (inasmuch as we believed that
a religious is not separate from God while he
serves his country), defending the public cause by
consummate force of counsel and argument, and with
a free upright mind, warding off by his own wisdom
great attacks upon the liberty of Venice, exhibiting
to the Venetians a greater defence of liberty dwelling
in his own person than in towers and armies ; making
mortals doubt whether he was more to be loved, to
be admired, or to be venerated ; secure as to the
eternity of his fame among the good, and as to the
immortality of his soul with God; neglecting sickness,
despising death, influencing the actions of the living
by speaking, teaching, praying, studying—in the
seventy-first year of his age, greatly lamented by
good men, I will not say died, but departed from life,
and flew away into life."
I have told the story of the persistent hatred with
which Paul V. hunted for the life of Fra Paolo; I have
now to tell of the same passion animating his succes¬
sors against his remains and his memory.
Pope Gregory XV. was now on the throne. He
had said, when Fra Paolo was nearing his end,
"There can never be complete peace between the
Holy See and Venice until he is out of the way."
Any sense of "peace" he may have felt when he
heard that at last the great Consultare was "out of
the way " must have been short-lived, for, on hearing
i6o
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
of the proposed monument and its inscription, he fell
into a "frenzy of rage," which vented itself in "much
talk and noise." What action he might have taken
we cannot tell, for a few months later he died. His
successor. Urban VIII., inherited to the full the Papal
mania against Fra Paolo, for it burst out, as we leam
from the despatches of the Venetian Ambassador,
Renieri Zeno, on the day of his enthronement, and was
his almost " daily preoccupation." Unhappily, the
mantle of Fra Paolo had fallen on none in Venice,
and Renieri Zeno was a weak-kneed man. In his very
first despatch about the outburst of Urban against the
proposed monument, instead of telling the Senate of
how he had "bearded the lion in his den," as his
predecessors were wont to do, he wrote : " He (the
Pope) wishes that his words should be regarded as
an irrevocable decision ; and he shows himself so
difficult to deal with, and so austere in the matter of
ecclesiastical jurisdiction, that it is highly necessary
to go dexterously and to temporise." The first result
of this temporising policy was the postponement pro
nunc of the erection of the monument. The Pope,
emboldened by this success, demanded that the project
should be entirely given up—denouncing it in violent
language as a thing to be almost counted accursed.
From a despatch from Renieri Zeno, dated October yth,
we learn that the Pope varied, as usual, threatening
with flattery. After saying : " This stone for the
tomb of Fra Paolo is a thing unjust, we shall certainly
not be able to tolerate it," he added, " but we trust to
receive from the Republic favour and kindness." A
fortnight later, on the Ambassador, Pietro Contarini,
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL. l6l
who had taken Zeno's place, remarking to the Pope
that if, in compliance with his wish, the Republic
abstained from raising even a modest memorial of Fra
Paolo, that of itself would recall to mind and revive
past disputes, Urban VIII. passionately interrupted
him, saying, " We will never consent to it. We will
do all we can to put a stop to this serious impropriety.
We shall advise of it all the princes, and France in
particular. We shall then consider how best to act,
proceeding with deliberation, yes ; but we will do that
which is due to our dignity and reputation. If in
France, when we were simply a prelate, we were able
to pull down certain monuments raised against the
Jesuits, who were then very badly regarded by the
people ; and acted in such a manner as to bring the
king in person, with more than 2000 horsemen and
4000 infantry, to hold the people back, and in one
night dismantled all ; now, when we are Pontiff, we
shall not permit that to one excommunicated should be
raised a stone, or an epitaph of honour, in any spot
whatever." The Republic, feebly yielding, gave up
the idea of the monument altogether ; but, seeing that
Fra Paolo's remains were already buried in the
Servite church, proposed simply to mark the spot by
a stone bearing nothing but his name. The Pope
refused to make even this concession, " for," as the
Ambassador wrote on November i8th, 1623, "although
Fra Paolo is buried in the church, the Pope wishes to
pretend not to know nor to believe it ; whereas, if his
name were there, it would not be possible to dissemble
it; and it would be well not to revive the memory
of things past, which have been the occasion of so
M
102
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
much trouble." The result of this was that even the
name-stone was abandoned ; and so in January, 1624,
but one year after Fra Paolo's death, when a new
Nuncio entered Venice, he was authorised to address
the Doge and Senate in this"fulsome language, "The
Pope loves Úi'fSignori most tenderly, and every day
his love increases with their good works." One other
" good work " the Pope desired at their hands, which
he would supplement by a good work on his part, and
then their love would be cemented for ever. He
wished them to cancel the decree of the 7th of February,
1623, regarding the monument, and to delete all trace
of it from the public records, "because," said the
Nuncio, " in no shape or form can our Lord {Nostro
Signare) tolerate this work of impiety, not even that
Fra Paolo should live in his sepulchre." These last
words, as after events showed, contained a hint of the
" good work " that Pope Urban proposed doing, which
was to desecrate Fra Paolo's tomb, and secure his
body, to destroy it from off the face of the earth.
Papal insolence and vindictiveness could go no
further, and happily Venice once more stood firm. She
refused to perform her part of the infamy, and she
checkmated the Pope in the accomplishment of his.
The decree stood to be carried out in far-off better
days, by better men. The Servite friars, getting wind
of the intended outrage on the tomb, dug up the body
of Fra Paolo, and carrying it out of the church, built it
up into a wall inside their monastery. This was in
January, 1624. Wishing it, however, ultimately to lie
in the church, as being more worthy of their loved
brother, they, in the following October, when the
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL. 163
bitterness of the first fight over his grave was passed,
brought it back, and buried it inside the altar, at
the foot of which he was first interred, in the chapel
of the Mater Addolerata. Fra Fulgenzio was forced
to console himself, amid Venetian pusillanimity and
Papal revengeful arrogance, by saying of his lost friend
and master, " He will live in the memory of men by
his heroic virtues—a monument which neither time,
nor the evil deeds of bad men, can avail to destroy."
For a hundred years we hear little more of Fra
Paolo. Venice had yielded to Papal domination ; and
her history, which might have been, like that of all
European nations which cast from them the Papal
yoke, an upward march, became, like that of those
which clung to the Papacy, a steady descent into
deeper and deeper depths of ignorance and fanaticism,
bigotry, and cruelty, accompanied by that social and
political strife and division, which it is ever the policy
of the Roman Church to secure. But the memory and
the work of her great champion were destined not to
be forgotten, nor to be ultimately lost upon her.
In 1722, when the altar which contained the remains
of Fra Paolo was being restored, they were brought
to light. After being officially identified by the
wound-marks on the skull and cheek bones, they were
reverently gathered together, and transferred from the
coffin to an urn, which was built up behind the altar.
The following inscription written in Latin on parch¬
ment was affixed to the urn : " In the Ides of June, in
the year of our salvation, 1722, since it was by God
whose ways are inscrutable so arranged, almost a
hundred years to a day after its burial, on the occasion
M 2
164
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
of rebuilding the altar of our Lady of Sorrow trans¬
fixed by the sword, on the sixth of the Nones of June
of the current year, the most illustrious Giovanni
Cornelio, Doge of Venice, happily ruling, the dead
body—entire and uncorrupted—of Paolo Sarpi of
Venice, Theological Counsellor of the Most Serene
Republic, a man, true, pure, just, and learned to a
miracle, by chance having been found near this altar,
the Commissioners of Public Health, acting by
authority of the Council of Three, and the Prior, and
the Monks, that the injury of time and the humidity of
the place, might not consume it, took care to make
this monumental urn, and to have it decently placed
in it. On the first of the Ides of August, in the year of
our Lord 1552, he saw the light, on the first of the
Ides of January, 1623, he fell asleep in the Lord.
' Let them curse, but bless thou.' Ps. cix., v. 28."
Had it served the purpose of the P^acy on this
occasion to trade on popular superstition, which
generally it is ready enough to do, Fra Paolo would
have been canonised, for not only did the people
consider it a miracle that his body had been preserved
from decay a hundred years, but they said that
wonderful prodigies of grace were wrought by it, and
accompanied its removal and reburial. Indeed, his
resting place became a shrine of pilgrimage and
devotion^ so that we have the strange spectacle of Fra
Paolo, consigned by the Pope to the place of perdition,
and declared by him to be there, being worshipped
and invoked by that same Pope's faithful ones as a
saint in heaven ! In this case no impartial mind can
avoid the conclusion that vox populi was vox Dei.
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL. 165
Twenty years later Fra Paolo's remains were again
disturbed, when a generous donor reconstructed
with costly marbles the altar of the Mater
Addolorata. The Papacy seized the opportunity to
endeavour anew to get hold of his body. But the urn,
with its precious contents, was removed by friends to
a place of safety, and then it was once more rebuilt
into the back of the altar. The piece of parchment
with, its long inscription was taken out of the urn,
and a leaden plate affixed to it instead with this
briefer one, also in Latin, " Paolo Sarpi, formerly
buried near this altar, was discovered, not without
prodigies, in 1722. By Order of the Council of Three
he was reburied 1742." Thus the remains of Fra
Paolo were interred for the fifth time.
One might have supposed that now at length Fra
Paolo's bones would have been allowed to rest in
peace, but this was far from being the case. A long
train of disturbances had yet to follow. I have to
note, however, that such outrages did not at all
exhaust the malice of the Papacy, which also vented
itself in incessant attacks on his character and
writings. One of these that happened in an interval
of tomb disturbance I will now relate.
In 1803 there was published, with the benediction of
Pope Pius VII., and the approval of the Austrian
Government, a book entitled " Storia Arcana della
Vita di Fra Paolo Sarpi, Servite "—" Secret History of
the life of Fra Paolo Sarpi, Servite." The book pro¬
fessed to be compiled from Sarpi's own letters, and
from documents that were gathered from many private
sources ; by which his real hidden character and
FRA PAOLO SARPL
life were made known, and which showed him to be,
not the great and good man he got credit for being,
but. On the contrary, a hypocrite and a scoundrel.
The book further purported to have been written by
Monsignor Fontanini, Archbishop of Ancira, who was
known to the world as having been a prelate of good
character, and of considerable literary standing, and
whose writings always commanded acceptance. But
the Archbishop Fontanini died in 1736, that is sixty-
seven years before the book was published, and no
trace of such a work was found amongst his effects,
which were taken possession of by the Venetian
Government, so that to be able to father it upon him it
was further represented to have " come by chance, or
rather to have been sent by Providence," into the
hands of Don Giuseppe Ferrari of Mantua, who edited
it. The authenticity and genuineness of the book
have been always doubted, but it is only now that the
fraud that was perpetrated, with the blessing of the
Pope, has been fully exposed. The Director of the
Archives in Venice has shown conclusively that
Monsignore Fontanini had nothing to do with the
work, and that its contents are utterly unworthy of
credence. He has proved it to be simply a reprint,
with a slightly changed title and arrangement, of a
book written in 1771 by a worthless friar, called
Barnaba Vaerini. The book had been confiscated by
the Venetian Government, and its author imprisoned.
Why the fraud was not before discovered is explained
by the fact that the documents, bearing on this matter,
were amongst the piles of State papers carried off
by the Austrian Government to Vienna, which were
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL. 167
only brought back to Venice in 1866. The process
against Vaerini still exists, and the manuscript of his
book is in the library of St. Mark.
In June, 1828, the place of repose of Fra Paolo's
remains was again changed. On this occasion they
were removed from the bounds of the monastery
altogether. The Servite church was now a ruin, and
this year the Papal authorities demolished the chapel
of the Mater Addolerata^ which had been allowed to
stand for sixteen years in the roofless church, on the
excuse of wishing to save the precious marbles of its
famous altar. The Papacy entertained the hope of
being able at last to " scatter for ever the ashes of Fra
Paolo," and so the work was carried on in secret.
But a certain doctor, Antonio Zoppetti, got news of it,
and with Cav. Cigogna, the Venetian author, and
some other friends, succeeded in obtaining possession
of the urn. The urn was opened, and the remains
were again identified. It was then inclosed in a
strong box of wood, which was securely locked, and
sealed with three seals.
Fra Paolo's remains now started on fresh wander¬
ings in search of a resting-place. Curiously enough
the Papal seminary, which stands next to the well-
known church of S. Maria della Salute, opened its
doors to them, by the order of its good rector, Canon
Moschini, and the urn was deposited in a small
chamber off the grand staircase. He, however, soon
realised that it was no safe place for it, and so we find
him praying those Venetians who were interesting
themselves in the matter, to seek as quickly as possible
another hiding place, for he feared to incur the wrath
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
of the Patriarch, if he should come to know that the
bones of Fra Paolo were sheltered in the seminary.
For the seventh time, then, the remains were
disturbed. In the darkness of night they were placed
in a gondola, and conveyed to a private house in San
Biagio, a district of Venice, near the public gardens,
and a special guard was placed to see that no mischief
happened to them. Here, however, they could be
kept for but a limited time, and so the friends once
more bore them away in secrecy.
Their eighth resting-place was one not unworthy
of them. It was the Library of St. Mark, in the
Doge's Palace. But here, too, danger threatened;
and a measure of safety was only secured by a policy
of concealment. Fearing, apparently, for himself as
well as for the trust committed to him, the Director
of the Library would only receive the box on condition
that in the document of consignment its contents
should not be specified.
Application was now made to the Austrian Govern¬
ment for permission to do two things. The first was
that Fra Paolo's remains should be placed in a tomb in
the church of the Island of San Michele, which, lying
out in the lagoon, was then being made, for sanitary
reasons, the Campo Santo of the city. The second
was that a monument should be erected to him, and
thus the long standing decree of the Republic be
fulfilled. The first request was granted ; the second was
refused. At the same time the decree of the Austrian
Government for the entombment, provided against
the " relics " of Fra Paolo being lost sight of, for it
ordered that they should " be buried in a special
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
169
place, in such a way as not to be dispersed, and with
such marks that at any moment they might be
recognised."
The decree was literally carried out. The bones
were carefully deposited in a new stone coffer, in
which was placed—enclosed in a glass vase—a
parchment containing an account of the many and
perilous journeys they had made. This coffer was
securely clasped with strong metal bands. A deep
grave was prepared in the centre of the atrium of the
church of San Michele, into which, in the presence of
the Syndic and the little band of faithful friends, the
coffer was lowered on the 15th of November, 1828.
The mouth of the tomb was built over, and on it was
placed, level with the pavement, a large diamond
shaped white slab, edged with bardiglio marble,
bearing in Latin the following inscription : " The
bones of Paolo Sarpi, Theologian of the Venetian
Republic from the House of the Servites : here
translated 1828 by Public Decree." On the same
occasion a stone was placed on the outside wall of
the ruined Servite church, to the left of the main
door, with this memorial inscription in Latin : "Paolo
Sarpi, Theologian of the Republic of Venice, formerly
buried here where the House of the Servites rose in
the fifteenth century, to S. Michele of Murano, was
translated, by Public Decree, 1828."
It was fondly hoped that the remains of Fra Paolo,
thus deposited for the ninth time, had now for ever
found a place of undisturbed repose, but the hope was
doomed soon to be disappointed. Cav. Cicogna had
written a very learned and useful book on " Venetian
FRA PAOLO SARFI.
Inscriptions." In the year 1841, in an evil hour, he
sent a copy to Pope Gregory XVI. This Pope, whose
birthplace was at Belluno in the mountains, not far
from Venice, had been brought up as a monk in the
monastery of San Michele. He read with amazement
of the burial of Fra Paolo in the atrium of that
church, and of the inscription cut upon his tomb. It
was the red rag to the bull. He flung the book back
to its author, and threatened to put it in the Index.
Five years passed, during which time no outrage was
effected, whatever may have been planned ; but that
he was nursing his wrath we know from the account
given of their interview with him in 1844 by two
eminent Venetians, Count Medin and Count Donà.
Here is the edifying picture, handed down to us, of
the Pope with a fit of Paolomania on him. " He
spoke of his dear island of San Michele, saying they
had defiled and contaminated it by placing there the
bones of that heretic. Warming himself up greatly
as he discoursed, and throwing his handkerchief in a
passion on the table, he cried out, ' They have
profaned my church. They have buried that one
before the monument of my most holy Cardinal
Delfino. It will be necessary to take him up, and
cast him amongst the common bones, that his memory
may perish eternally.' And here breaking out into
abuse of the poor friar, he used words not very
polite of those who had been the authors of the
burial ; and it took all the tact of the two nobles to
pacify the irrational disorder of the mind of the
Blessed Father."
In 1846, when, on the ist of November—^the " Day
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL. I7I
of the Dead"—^the Venetians flocked through the
great door of San Michele (usually kept shut) to visit
the graves of their friends in the Campo Santo, they
were astonished to find that all trace of Fra Paolo's
tomb had disappeared. The marble slab was gone,
4nd the pavement of the atrium was restored to its
original condition. The news of the desecration
spread far and wide, causing great excitement and
indignation. The first thing done by the authorities
was to see if Fra Paolo's remains had been touched
or not. Happily the stone coffer was in its place, and
examination showed that it was still intact. With
its metal bindings it had proved too strong for
the sacrilegious hands of the spoilers, who, it was
believed, hoped, if they were not found out, to complete
their work at some future time. The next thing was
to institute a strict inquiry as to who were the authors
of this outrage, In doing this no time had to be lost,
as indignation gatherings were being held, especially
amongst the students of Venice and Padua, and
violence against the clericals was feared. The result
of the inquiry, as is recorded in the books of the
Austrian police, was to trace it to the monks of San
Michele, who got their orders from the Patriarch of
Venice, who received his direct from Pope Gregory
XVI. But that Pontiff, who had bided his time so
long, had not even the satisfaction of knowing of the
despite done to Fra Paolo's tomb, for, between his
giving the order to rifle it, and the abortive attempt
to do so, he had been called to his account. The slab
with the inscription, which the monks, not as yet
daring to destroy, had hidden away, was produced.
172
FRA PAOLO SARPl.
The authorities, unwilling too openly to befriend the
memory of Fra Paolo " for fear of the Jews," ordered
the restoration to be done under cover of darkness.
At nine o'clock on the evening of November 19th,
1846, the work of rebuilding up the sepulchre and
replacing the slab was begun, and at midnight it was
finished. Amongst those who were present at this
weird tenth reburial, were some of the little faithful
band who had lowered the coffer into its place sixteen
years before. During the years that have since
elapsed, the dust of the great Consultare, after its
many weary wanderings, has been suffered to rest in
peace ; and his tomb can be seen to-day as it was
left that dark November night, well-nigh half a
century ago.
Even if the Papacy had succeeded in getting
possession of the remains of Fra Paolo, and scattering
them to the winds, it would not have affected
ultimately his name and fame. As it was, every
futile attempt recalled him to the minds of the
Venetians, and awoke afresh their admiration for his
character and work, and their detestation of his
persecutors. This was notably the case on the last
occasion, for the cup of iniquity of the Papacy was
about full. For centuries, to serve her own worldly
ambition, her lust of power and pleasure, and her
greed of gain, she had broken up Italy into fragments ;
and, sowing disunion amongst them, kept them in
hostility to each other that she might the more easily
hold them in slavery to herself. But the idea of
welding these fragments into a compact whole, which,
with united will and strength, might turn against their
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
173
common .enemy, was now entering into the minds of
the leading spirits of the land. " Union and free¬
dom " became the watch-word of Italy. All through
the struggles of Venice in the holy war, which lasted
from 1847 to 1866, when by popular vote she became
an integral part of the kingdom of Italy, the name
of Fra Paolo Sarpi was never forgotten. It was
becoming Venice that the year 1870—signalised for
Italy by the successful termination of her war in the
overthrow of the Temporal Power, and the occupation
of Rome by Victor Emmanuel, as the capital of a free
and united kingdom—should be signalised for her by
a fresh attempt to carry out the decree of the old
Republic, and to erect a monument to him who gathered
up in himself all the aspirations of the people.
Accordingly Luigi Borro, an eminent sculptor, pre¬
pared a sketch for a statue of Fra Paolo ; and a
scholar. Carlo Leoni, an inscription in Italian, which
ran as follows : " Paolo Sarpi, Counsellor of the
Venetian Republic ; a foreseer of truths before their
time ; independent, firm, severe ; driving back the
papal pretensions ; beating down the rabid sect ;
saving the Venetians from the horrors of the stake ;
in a most corrupt age incorruptible ; alive—conquering
persecutions and dagger stabs ; dead—impotent
hatreds that only rendered greater his fame ; Venice,
in vindication of his memory, to so great a citizen,
has placed." The enterprise was a strictly local one,
and success was not fated to attend it, for Papal
intrigues were as yet too strong.
When, in 1876, the movement for the monument
again took shape, it was no longer local in character,
174
FRA PAOLO SARPl.
but national ; and, indeed in the following year, to
a certain extent, international. A committee was
formed of twenty-nine members, amongst whom were
a number of leading Venetians, several representatives
from other parts of Italy, and some foreigners. A
programme was issued, and subscriptions were
solicited. Some few thousand francs were collected,
when, owing to a variety of causes, the project again
fell through.
Finally, in January 1888, a new committee of
thirty-five members was organised, which was destined
to carry the work to a successful issue. Subscriptions
poured in from all quarters. The committee resolved to
place a large bronze statue of Era Paolo in the Campo di
Santa Fosca, through which he had passed daily as he
went to and fro between his adjacent monastery and the
Doge's Palace, and which was but a few steps from the
spot made sacred by his blood. The site was granted
by the Municipality, which also voted a sum of money
to prepare the foundations, by the removal of an old
well, and the filling up of a huge cistern that occupied
nearly the whole of the Campo. In July, the com¬
mittee issued an invitation to Venetian artists, to send
in designs for a monument to cost 18,000 francs.
None of the competitors' designs giving complete
satisfaction, and more money having been received, a
second invitation was issued in December, the cost of
the monument being advanced to 22,000 francs.
Nineteen models were sent in answer to the second
appeal, which were exhibited to the public, in May,
1889, in the palace of Robert Browning, the poet.
After much careful consideration, the work of the
Srr paces 174—/.?J.
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
175
well-known sculptor, Sig. Emilio Marsili, was chosen.
As the gfrant for the preparation of the site was found
to be inadequate, the Municipality generously under¬
took to bear the whole expense.
Meantime the Papacy was not idle. Inflamed with
the same vindictiveness that had marked all down the
centuries its policy towards Era Paolo, it made a last
desperate effort to stop the work. Openly and
publicly it could do nothing, but something might
still be accomplished by secret and unworthy means.
There were men, both on the committee and in the
Municipal Council, who, through family connections,
were accessible to the influence of the " black party,"
and pressure of all kinds was brought to bear upon
them. The result was that, though to stop the enter¬
prise was an impossibility, its smooth and rapid
advance was interrupted. Still progjress was made,
and at last, in the summer of 1892, all was ready. In
recognition of the fact that Era Paolo embodied the
spirit, not only of the old Republic of Venice, but
also of the new kingdom of Italy, the day chosen for
the unveiling of the statue was the auspicious one—
the 20th of September. On the previous day the com¬
mittee placarded Venice with the following manifesto:
"Citizens, on Tuesday, the 20th of September, will be
unveiled the monument that Italians and foreigners
have raised to Era Paolo Sarpi. At the moment
when all the Peninsula is commemorating the day in
which Italy became finally mistress of herself in
Rome, the austere figure of our great citizen will
return, as alive, in the sight of the people. Thus,
through three centuries, the thought of Sarpi links
176
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
itself with the thought of modern times. The
independence of the State has extended itself from
the narrow territories of a region, into the vaster and
more fruitful ones of the great country of Italy ; and
the resistance of the glorious Republic to the Papal
interdict has its consecration in the breach of Porta
Pia. Citizens, in ,inviting you to to-morrow's
ceremony we intend to discharge a sacred debt of
reverence to one of the greatest intellects, and one of
the strongest characters, who have been the honour
of our land."
Never since the days of the old Republic had Venice
presented such a spectacle as she did on that 20th of
September. The sun rose in a cloudless sky, falsifying
the sinister words of a priest who, the evening before,
on seeing a rain-cloud come up over the city,
exclaimed : " Heaven is going to avenge itself on the
impious audacity of the liberals ! " It shone down, in
the early morning in the Court of the Doge's Palace,
on hundreds of Venetians representing all the political,
military, maritime, and commercial associations of the
city, who there forming into procession, marched with
music and banners to the Campo of Santa Fosca, along
the route Fra Paolo had trodden so often. Thousands
cheered them as they passsd, from door and window,
terrace and balcony, bridge and boat, and every
vantage-ground that land or water could afford. In the
Campo di Santa Fosca itself, on gaily decorated stands,
were gathered the representatives of the Government,
Senate and Chamber of Deputies, of the chief Muni¬
cipal, Literary, Scientific, Medical, and Artistic bodies
of Italy, the Military and Naval Authorities, the
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
177
Consuls of the chief European nations, and of the
United States, and the Syndic of Venice, surrounded
by the members of the Giunta, and other leading
citizens.
At ten o'clock Senator Dr. Minich, president of the
committee, gave the signal to withdraw the veil that
concealed the statue. There was a moment of eager
expectation. Then—as the calm, dignified, erect form
of Era Paolo Sarpi stood out on its lofty pedestal, the
suppressed emotion of the crowd broke out into loud
and prolonged applause that echoed far and wide.
When it ceased. Dr. Minich, in an able speech, having
eulogised the great Consultores handed the monument
over to the care of the Syndic, Signor Riccardo
Selvático, in the following terms : " To you, the worthy
representative of our glorious and unique Venice, the
Committee confide the custody of this monument,
which records a famous epoch in the history of our
Republic. Let us bow before the great Thinker, who
first clearly developed the idea of civil government in
its modern form ; forecasting the great principle of ' a
free Church in a free State.' Let him be to the people
an example, inspiring them to fortify their minds with
study, with love of country, and with religious faith—
virtues which only when united render a people truly
powerful."
Than the Syndic of Venice no one had done more
to bring the enterprise of the monument to a successful
issue ; and now, when he rose to accept the trust, his
eloquent words roused the people to enthusiasm. He
said, " Half a century has not yet passed since a Pope
marked in history by his blind aversion to every idea
N
PRA PAOLO SARPI.
of progress, maligning one day, in the presence of
Venetians, the name of Sarpi, wished that his memory
might perish for ever." Then, pointing to the statue,
he added : "To that evil augury of Gregory XVI., we
answer with this monument " " Fra
Paolo " he continued, " has for us a double value—an
actual one, measurable by what he personally thought,
wrought, and suffered ; and a symbolic one, because
he incarnated the spirit of a great people and govern¬
ment, devoted, yes, to the Gospel of Christ, but not
subservient to the ambition of his Vicars. He fondly
dreamt for the Catholic Church such a reform in
government, in end and object, and in manners and
customs, as would lead it back to the spiritual purity
of its origin. An austere love of truth is what
characterised him in every department of action. As
State Counsellor he broke down juridical sophisms;
as a Christian, he condemned the dissimulations of
hypocrisy ; as a Scientist, he scrutinised with a fearless
eye all the aspects of truth ; as an Historian, he laid
bare the human motives that cloaked themselves with
religious pretensions ; as a Writer, he disdained every
artifice, and used his words as a chisel that cuts, and
not as a flower that decorates. And all his intellectual
qualities were sustained and consolidated by his moral
force, which bore witness in favour of his ideas and
contributed to their triumph. How happy would his
adversaries be if they were able to set the man Sarpi
against the thinker Sarpi! But no matter-how rabid
their hatred, and how dexterous their malignity, the
life of the friar shines forth immaculate before our
eyes. The enemies of Fra Paolo affirm that to-day we
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL.
179
vilify Christianity. No; we respect the religious
sentiment, in all the forms in which it may invest
itself, in the conscience, and upon the altar. We
combat only those who drag it in the dust, who deform
it, who belittle it amongst the conflicts of mundane
passions ; and the bronze that stands before us means
not a provocation to any, but a homage to a great
soul who knew how to both adore his God and serve
.his Country." In closing his speech he said, that he
confided the statue of the immortal Servite to the
reverent custody of the Venetian people.
Later in the day, in the very same hall of the Doge's
Palace where the Senate, 270 years before, had passed
the decree just carried out, a great assembly met to
hear an impressive lecture by Commendatore Pascolato
(then a member of the Chamber of Deputies and now
a Senator) on the character and work of Fra Paolo.
He put clearly and succinctly before his audience the
part the great Consultare played in the prolonged
struggle of the Republic with Pope Paul V., and the
soundness of the principles that led him on to victory.
Fra Paolo's character, he showed, needed no defence,
as his bitterest enemy had to admit its irreprehensi-
bility. He then passed in review several of Fra
Paolo's books, especially those that treat of " Sanctu¬
aries for Offenders," " Immunity of the Clergy," and
" Ecclesiastical Benefices," which, as we have seen,
touch questions of moment in modern Italian history.
The lecturer summed up, in conclusion, in these words :
" Sarpi was a Christian politician, a precursor of the
modern liberal school. He gave body, order, and form
to a doctrine which is the essential foundation of all
N 2
i8o
FR A PAOLO SARPI.
civil progress—a doctrine which to-day has triumphed
amongst all nations, even Catholic ones, having
become a universal patrimony. Thanks to this
doctrine—thanks to the work of Sarpi—to-day a
government—a dynasty—which would attempt to re-
ascend the stream of time, and to concede to the
Vatican the minutest part of that which it has lost,
would disappear like a straw carried away by a flood.
The Vatican itself knows—understands—admits—that
it speaks of revindication without hope, and that it is
reduced to fight for the mere preservation of what
remains to it."
The festivities of the day were fittingly brought to
a close by a banquet given by the Syndic. In a
masterly speech he showed how the spirit of Fra
Paolo animates the Italy of to-day, and how his ideas
are embodied in its policy. Referring to the repre¬
sentative character of his guests, gathered together
on a day that commemorated the fall of the Temporal
Power and the fulfilment of the old vote of Venice,
he said: "This is a proof that although minor political
questions divide us, we are one in upholding all those
higher principles without which our liberty, our unity,
and our civilisation would expire, like a living
organism deprived of vital air. To the systematic
opponents of all progress we answer to-day by placing
in luminous contrast to the Rome of the Pontificate,
as Fra Paolo saw and condemned it, the Rome of the
Italian people and of Humbert of Savoy. In that sad
sixteenth century the Roman Curia brought into the
field its invading pretensions. The sanctuary of the
conscience was spied into and violated, political
IN TOMB AND ON PEDESTAL. l8l
thought was attacked by the dagger that stabbed Fra
Paolo, and the sovereignty of the State was fulminated
against by the Interdict on the Republic of Venice,
By one of those solemn, righteous vindications, that
come slowly but surely in the course of history, the
heresies of the sixteenth century have become the
inviolable conquests of the nineteenth. Sarpi, Galileo,
and their fellows, who were the reprobates of that age,
are the heroes of this. The idea of the lay indepen¬
dence of the State dominates modern legislation.
The breath of modern times scatters the empty
thunders of the Interdicts. The Rome of Paul V.
holds within its walls the sepulchre of the monarch
who reconstituted the country—obedient to the Church
as a Christian, but rebellious as a patriot and a King,
whose son, surrounded and sustained by the love of
his Italy, personifies in Rome that lay power which,
as far back as Dante's time, he, a Catholic, yearned
for, to curb ambitions and cupidities which ill-befittingly
call themselves by the name of Christ."
Before taking farewell of Fra Paolo Sarpi let us
enter the Library of the Doge's Palace. There, in the
first room, over the door that leads into the Great
Council Chamber, hangs a portrait of the Consultores
his fine expressive face deeply scarred on the right
cheek and temple by the dagger-wounds. This
is believed to have been painted by da Ponte during
Fra Paolo's life-time, and the likeness at the
beginning of this volume is from it. An inscription
on the background, added at a later date, is a
quotation from the one that was written on parchment
and put in his urn in 1722, and runs as follows: "The
FRA PAOLO SARPI.
true image of Father Paul of Venice, a man to
a miracle learned, pure, and just, sleeping in the
Lord." Let us now walk round the upper loggia of
the quadrangle of the Palace, which is called the
Pantheon of Venice, from the number of marble busts
of her chiefest sons that adorn it. Not the least
striking of these is one of Fra Paolo, under which is
the somewhat temporising inscription (having been
put up in 1847, when the Papacy was still strong in
Venice) : " Paolo Sarpi disputing ardently for the
Republic of which he was Theologian, endured signal
hatreds. His celebrity varies according to the
historian. For his foreseeing acumen in physical
studies he has indisputable glory." From here let us
go to the Querini Library, in the Campo di Santa Maria
Formosa, where is a group in marble, representing
him immediately after his assassination. He lies on the
lower step of the bridge of the Campo di Santa Fosca,
supported by the aged Malipiero, who tries to staunch
the blood flowing from his temple. On the ground
are the dagger which the patrician has just drawn
from the wound, and a bundle of papers which have
fallen from Fra Paolo's hand. Lastly, let us return to
the Campo di Santa Fosca, and look once more at the
monument. At its foot lies a wreath, deposited there
by the orphans of the Italian Protestant Home, when
they were admitted to form part of the group of
honour round the statue, on the inauguration day.
On the front of the massive stone pedestal is inscribed,
in letters of bronze set in relief, the name "Paolo
Sarpi." Below this, on the centre of the plinth,
is carved a fac-similé of his private seal, which
in tomb and on pedestal. 183
consists of a globe resting on an horizontal plane,
with thewords around it, "/« piano qutesco" indicative
of his calm and balanced mind, and of the fact that all
his actions rested on the eternal principles of truth and
justice. Above it all rises the figure of Fra Paolo.
He stands clothed in the habit of his Order. His arms
are crossed, and in his left hand he holds a roll of
papers. His head is bare, and slightly bent forward.
His expression is that of earnest thought, but thought
that never worries, never perplexes. Calmness and
strength, gentleness and firmness, justice and kind¬
ness, love to God and love to country, can be read in
the noble head and expressive face of Fra Paolo
Sarpi, the last and Greatest of the Great
Venetians.
INDEX.
Acquapendente, professor of surgery, Padua, indebted for dis¬
coveries to Sarpi, 25 ; in anatomy, 44 ; in optics, 47 ;
calls him "The Oracle of the Age," 48, 70; attends him
when stabbed, 114, 115.
Alarsen, Francis, the Dutch Ambassador, and Sarpi, 127.
Aldo Fio Manuzio, printer of Aldine classics, 58-60.
Algebra, Sarpi's knowledge of, 52.
Anatomy, Sarpi's devotion to, 44 ; discovery of the valves of
the veins, 45 ; of the circulation of the blood, 46.
Anderson, Robert, the Scottish geometrician, and Sarpi, 52.
Architecture, Sarpi's knowledge of, 55.
Archives of State, Venice, 43, 107, 157.
" Arti di Ben Pensare," work by Sarpi, 53; in it Locke antici¬
pated, 53.
Assassination of Sarpi, resolved on by Pope Paul V., no ; first
attempt frustrated, 112; second attempt, Sarpi wounded,
114; the plot unravelled, 117, 118; how viewed at Papal
Court, 128; third attempt frustrated, 131, 132; fourth
attempt abandoned, 141 ; marble group representing, 182.
Asselineau, Pierre, French physician, his opinion of Sarpi, 44.
Astrology, how viewed by Sarpi, 18 ; by Pope Paul V., 72, 73 ;
by Dr. London of Oxford, 73.
Astronomy, Sarpi's knowledge of, 48.
Austrian Government, and Sarpi's burial, 168 ; its inquiry as
to outrage on his tomb, 171.
o
i86
IKDEX.
Barnabites, Order of, at Mantua, 12.
Bedell, Dr. Wm., chaplain to the English Embassy, Venice,
67. 95. 96.
Bellarmine, Cardinal, his friendship with Sarpi, 38 ; at election
of Pope Paul v., 71 ; replied to by King James, 99, 100 ;
opposed by Sarpi, 132.
Bible, Sarpi railroading his, 26 ; Italian version suppressed,
37 ; Diodati's version introduced into Venice, 96.
Boccalini, the satirist, warns Sarpi of danger, 110.
Body of Sarpi, buried in Servite church, 155 ; Urban VIII.
seeks to destroy it, 162 ; exhumed and built into a wall,
162 ; exhumed and built into an altar, 163 ; exhumed and
rebuilt into an altar, 165 ; exhumed and carried into Papal
seminary, 167 ; removed to a private house, 168 ; thence to
the Doge's Palace, 168 ; buried in San Michele, 169 ; last
attempt of Papacy to get hold of it, 171 ; left in peace, 172.
Boldrino, Bishop, and Sarpi, 11, 14, 16, 17, 145.
Borghese, Cardinal Camillo, elected Pope, 71 ; his nephew
Scipione, 134.
Borromeo, Cardinal, and Sarpi, 20, 21, 145.
Brandolini, Count, Abbot of Nervosa, imprisoned, 74, 103, 104.
Briefs, Papal, sent to Venice, 77.
Bust of Era Paolo in marble, 182.
Campo di Santa Fosca, 5 ; scene of Sarpi's assassination, 113 ;
site of Sarpi's monument, 174, 176, 182.
Caorle, bishopric of, refused to Sarpi, 63.
Capella, Era, the Servite, Sarpi's teacher, 5, 7.
Castro, Don di, Spanish Ambassador, Venice, 94, loi, 105.
Catholicism versus Popery, 16, 66, 87, 94, 97, 181.
Ceneda case, Sarpi's treatise on, 139, 140.
Cigogna, Venetian writer, 167, 169.
Circulation of the blood, Sarpi's discovery of, 45, 46.
Civil rights of Venice vindicated by Sarpi, 79, 81, 140, 143.
Clement V. puts Venice under interdict, 84.
Clement VIII. seizes Aldo's library, 60; and the Duchy of
Ferrara, 62 ; refuses to make Sarpi a bishop, 63 ; his
quarrels with the Republic, 64, 65, 72,.
INDEX.
187
Colour and sound, Sarpi's study of, 50.
Confession, evils of, 20 ; used for political ends, 88, 89.
" Consideration of the Censures," Sarpi's work, 133.
Contarini, Francesco, Ambassador at Papal Court, 108, 110,
III, 112, 117.
Contarini, Pietro, Ambassador at Papal Court, 160.
Contarini, Simone, Ambassador at Papal Court, 121.
Council of Trent, its effect on the Papal Church, 15; History
of, by Sarpi, see History.
Councils, Church, origin and authority of, 78.
Counsellor in theological matters, Sarpi appointed, 68.
Counsellors of State, 68 ; their duties assigned to Sarpi, 6g,
106.
"Dante distinguishes between Catholicism and Popery, 87, 181.
Decrees of Senate in favour of Sarpi, 92, 122, 155, 156, 157.
Degree of D.D. conferred on Sarpi, 22.
Disputations, public, of Sarpi, 9, 10, 11, 29.
Dominis, de. Archbishop of Spalatro, publishes Sarpi's Triden-
tine History, 148.
Donato, Leonardo, Doge, 5, 72, 77, 95, 118.
Duns Scotus, Sarpi's criticism of, 8.
Ecclesiastical property laws, 75, 137.
" Ecclesiastical Benefices," History of, by Sarpi, 133, 179.
" Education given by the Jesuits, System of," by Sarpi, 144.
England supports Venice against Paul V., 94, 95.
Excommunication, see Interdict.
" Extracts," from Sarpi's works, officially ordered, 43, 157.
Farnese family and Parma, 28.
Ferrara, 62, 84, 112, 138.
Ferner, Arnauld, and Sarpi, 22, 145.
Foscarini, Marco, Doge, and " Pensieri " of Sarpi, 41.
France, attitude towards Venice in Papal quarrel, 94, loi.
Friars and monks, distinction between, 6.
Fulgenzio, Fra Micanzio, Sarpi's biographer, lo, 24, 35, 43, 48,
68, 69, 106, 127, 153, 163.
i88
INDEX.
Galileo, indebted to Sarpi, 25 ; made professor of astronomy at
Padua, 48 ; calls Sarpi " My father and my master," 48 ;
fresco of him with Sarpi at Florence, 49 ; his fate foretold
by Sarpi, 49 ; turns to Sarpi when studying the atmos¬
phere, 51 ; testifies to Sarpi's knowledge of mathematics,
52 ; frequents Penelli's ridotto, 61.
Gerson's "Treatise on the Validity of Excommunications,"
132.
Ghetaldo, the mathematician, and Sarpi, 56, 57,
Gibbon, on Sarpi's Tridentine History, 135.
Gilbert, Wm., of Colchester, and Sarpi, 51.
Giulio, Era, Sarpi's foster-father, 7, 61.
Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, appoints Sarpi his theologian, 11 ;
character of his Court, 14; his catholicity, 16; his joke on
birth of a mule, 18 ; his imprisonment of a friar, 19.
Gonzaga, Cardinal, Papal legate, 17, 145.
Gregory, Pope, XIII., 16, 31, 35.
Gregory, Pope, XV.'s, hatred of Sarpi, 159.
Gregory, Pope, XVI.'s, hatred of Sarpi, 170, 171 ; Syndic of
Venice's reference to, 178.
Harvey, Dr., indebted to Sarpi, 25,47.
Heat and Light, Sarpi's knowledge of, 50.
" History of Council of Trent," by Sarpi, facts for it gathered
from Bishop Boldrino and others, 17 ; from Cardinal
Borromeo, 20 ; from Arnauld Ferrier, 23 ; from Pope
Urban VII., 39 ; from the archives of Venice, 107 ;
quotations from it, 142 ; how it was written, 144, 145 ;
opinions regarding it, 146, 147 ; how published, 148 ;
contrasted with Pallavicino's history, 149 ; original MS. in
the Ducal Palace, 149 ; no edition yet printed from it, 150.
" History of Council of Trent," by Pallavicino, 148 ; errors
of, 149.
History of " Ecclesiastical Benefices,"by Sarpi, 133; Hallam's
criticism of, 135.
"History of the Uscocks," by Sarpi, 143.
History, Secret, of life of Sarpi, 165; its fraudulent character
discovered, 166.
INDEX.
189
"Immunity of Clergy," Sarpi's work, 141, 142, 179,
Imprisonment by Venice of ecclesiastics, 74, 87.
Index Expurgatorius, and the Concordat, 65 ; works by Sarpi's
printer put on it, 92.
Inquisition in Venice, Sarpi's work on, 137, 138.
Inscriptions for Sarpi's monument, 158, 163, 165, 169, 173 ;
on his portrait in Ducal Palace, 181 ; on his bust, 182.
Interdict and excommunication, Venice put under, 82, 83 ; their
nature and design, 82, 83 ; used only for worldly purposes,
83; used against Naples, &c., 85; against England, 94;
resisted by Venice, 85 ; discredited and made inoperative,
90 ; used against Sarpi, 93 ; taken off Venice, 104; treatise
on, by Sarpi, 130 ; dread of, destroyed by Sarpi, 131 ;
treatise on, by Gerson, 132; the "Rights of Sovereigns
defended " against, by Sarpi, 133.
Italian modern legislation, embodying Sarpi's principles, 129,
136, 140.
Italic type fac-simile of Petrarch's writing, 58.
Italy Catholic, but anti-Papal, 16, 87.
James I., offers to aid Venice with arms, 95; sends his book,
"A Premonition," to the Doge, 99 ; his writings criticised
by Sarpi, 99; nature of the "Premonition," 100, loi ;
presentation of book too late, 104.
Jesuits, intrigues of the, 14 ; they promote mariolatry, 32 ; they
poison Sixtus v., 37 ; checked by Sarpi, 38 ; Bobadilla's
criticism of, 38 ; their crafty policy in Venice, 88 ; Era
Paolo's stricture on, 89 ; banished from Venice, 89 ;
utterers of base coin, 90; denied return to Venice, 103;
" System of Education " of, by Sarpi, 144.
Joyeuse, Cardinal de, 94, 101-105, 109.
Julius II. puts Venice under interdict, 84; has Turks as allies,
143-
Jurisprudence, Sarpi's knowledge of, 53.
Kepler, indebted to Sarpi, 25 ; anticipated by Sarpi, 50.
Lando, Girolamo, makes " Extracts " from Sarpi's writings, 43,
157.
INDEX.
Leo X., bull In Cœna Domini, 78.
Leo XIIL, "The Pope of the Rosary," 33.
Letters, Sarpi's, 42 ; " Inedite," 42, 139.
Light and heat, Sarpi's studies of, 50.
Locke anticipated by Sarpi, 53.
Loreto, Santa Casa at, 119.
Macaulay, Lord, on Sarpi as a metaphysician, 53 ; on Sarpi as
a historian, 147.
Madonna and child, origin of pictures of, 33 ; the " perspiring,"
72.
Magnetism, Sarpi's knowledge of, 51.
Mamugna, the alchemist, 54.
Manfredi, Fra Fulgenzio, betrayed and burned, 91.
Mantua, Sarpi at, 10, 11, 12.
Manuscripts of Sarpi, in Servite monastery, 40 ; destroyed by
fire, 41 ; in archives of Venice, 129 ¡ in Ducal Palace, 149.
Mathematics, Sarpi professor of, 22 ; his knowledge of, 52, 56.
Metallurgy, Sarpi's knowledge of, 53, 54.
Metaphysics, Sarpi's knowledge of, 53.
Milopotamus, Sarpi proposed as bishop of, 66.
Monasteries as centres of corruption, 29.
Monastery, Servite, see Servite.
Monument to Sarpi, decreed, 157 ; site and inscription for,
158 ; opposed by Popes, 160 ; idea given up, 161 ; refused
by the Austrians, 168 ; its erection attempted, 173 ; com¬
mittee to promote it, 174; completed, 175; final Papal
opposition, 175; inauguration day, 176; unveiling, 177;
last look at, 182.
Morelli, Don Ambrogio, Sarpi's uncle and teacher, 2, 3, 7.
Morosini, Andrea, the historian, 5 ; ridotto at his house, 58.
Newton, Isaac, anticipated by Sarpi, 50.
Nona, bishopric of, refused to Sarpi, 63.
Olivo, Gamillo, gives Sarpi facts for his Tridentine History, 17,
145 ; imprisoned by the Pope, 18.
Opere Pie Bill of 1889, ^37*
INDEX.
191
Optics, Sarpi's discoveries in, 47,
" Order for Baptism and Visitation," Venetian, 98,
Orlandini hired by Pope Paul to assassinate Sarpi, 112.
Pallavicino's '* History of the Council of Trent," 148, 149.
Parma, Chapter of Servîtes held at, 28.
Pascolato, Comm., Venice, on Sarpi's Tridentine History, 147 ;
on Pallavicino's History, 149; speech on Sarpi, 179.
Patriarch of Venice, election rested with Venice, 64, 73; rests
with the Italian Government, 65.
Paul III., Pope, 28, 143.
Paul v., Pope, his birth and early career, 71 ; a make-shift
Pope, 71 ; with Leonardo Donato, 72; his superstitious
fears, 73 ; comforted by astrology, 73 ; his quarrel with
Venice, 74-76 ; sends minatory briefs, 77 ; Sarpi's reply to
them, 79; puts Venice under interdict, 82 ; had used that
weapon against other States, 85 ; proclaims a jubilee, 90 ;
summons Sarpi to Rome, 91 ; burns Sarpi's books, 91 ;
plots against Sarpi, 92 ; excommunicates Sarpi, 93 ; sues
for reconciliation with Venice, 94; concedes everything to
Venice, 103 ; conquered by Sarpi, 103 ; plots Sarpi's des¬
truction, 106 ; complains to ambassador against Sarpi, 108 ;
seeks to lure Sarpi to Rome, 109 ; takes up assassin's knife,
1x0 ; his " long arm," m ; hires Orlandini to kill Sarpi,
112; imbrues his hands in Sarpi's blood, 117; gives
absolution to Sarpi's assassins, 118; pays them the
"wages of iniquity," 118; protects and pensions them,
119; he finds this impolitic, 120; breaks faith with them,
120; imprisons them, 121 ; fresh attempt on Sarpi's life,
131 ; enriches his "nephews," 134; springs a mine on
Sarpi, 138 ; allies himself with pirates, 143 ; testifies
regarding Sarpi's Tridentine History, 145 ; his death, and
dying curse on Sarpi, 150.
Penelli's regard for Sarpi, 56 ; ridotto at his house, 61.
■" Pensieri," work by Sarpi, 41, 47, 51, 53.
Plague in Venice, 108, 181.
Plots to destroy Sarpi, 92. 106, 109, 111, 112, 117, 120, 131,
138, 150.
IQ2
INDEX.
Pneumatics, Sarpi's knowledge of, 51.
Poma, Ridolfo, hired by Pope Paul V. to assassinate Sarpi,
117 ; rewarded by the Pope, 118 ; goes on pilgrimage to
Loreto, 119; pensioned by the Pope, 119; betrayed and
imprisoned by the Pope, 120; dies in prison, 121.
Pope, status of, in Italy, 136,141,
Porta, the magnetician, indebted to Sarpi, 51, 52.
Portraits of Sarpi, 108, 181.
" Premonition," King James's book, 99.
Priests, recalcitrant, how dealt with, 88; worthless, 117, 118,
131-
Procurator of Servite Order, Sarpi chosen, 35 ; duties of the
office, 36.
Professor, Sarpi elected, of theology, 11 ; of philosophy, 19;
of mathematics, 22.
Property, laws for ecclesiastical, 75 ; Venetian, possessed by
Church, 76.
Proportional compasses invented by Sarpi, 52.
Protestant, was Sarpi a, 96 ; orphanage, Venice, 82.
Provincial of Servite Order, Sarpi chosen, 27.
Quarrels of Pope Clement VIII. with Venice, 64, 65, 72.
Quarrels of Pope Paul V. with Venice, 73-76, 143.
Querini Library, Venice, 182.
Reconciliation between Venice and Pope Paul V., 104.
Redentore, church of the, 21 ; festival of the, 22.
Reflection and Refraction investigated by Sarpi, 50, 51.
Reformed Catholic, Sarpi a, 16, 33, 63, 97.
Religious works by Sarpi, 57.
Republic, Venetian, see Venice.
Ridotti, nature of, 57 ; at Morosini's 58 ; at Aldo's, 58 ; at
Sechini's, 60; at Penelli's, 61.
" Rights of Sovereigns defended," work by Sarpi, 133.
"Sanctuaries for Offenders" 112, 119, 120, 141.
Sanderson, Bishop, on Sarpi, 43.
INDEX.
*93
Santa Casa, at Loreto, 119.
Saraceni, Canon, prisoner of the Republic, 74, 75, 103.
Sarpi, Francesco, Fra Paolo's father, i.
Sarpi, Isabella Morelli, Fra Paolo's mother, 2, 21.
Sarpi, Fra Paolo, his birth, i ; his teachers and school-mates,
2-5 ; he becomes a Servite friar, 7 ; his public disputations,
8-11 ; professor of theology at Mantua, 12, 13; theo¬
logian at the Duke Gonzaga's Court, 14 ; benefits he
received in both positions, 15-18; his reasons for leaving
Mantua, 18, 19; at Milan with Cardinal Borromeo, 20,
21 ; professor in Servite Monastery, Venice, 21, 22 ; his
friendship with Arnauld Ferrier, 22; his studies, 23, 24;
his moral weight of character, 25 ; as Provincial of his
Order, 27-31 ; his conflict with the Jesuits, 32 ; at Rome on
Servite business, 34 ; as Procurator of his Order, 35 ; his
friendship with Sixtus V., 36 ; with Bellarmine, 38 ; with U rban
VII., 39; about his writings, 40-44; his scientific studies,
44-57 ; his religious works, 57 ; the ridotti he attended,
57-61 ; his journeys to Rome and Ferrara, 61-63 ! bishoprics
refused him, 63, 66 ; his friendship with Sir Henry Wotton
and Dr. Bedell, 67 ; appointed Theological Counsellor, 68 ;
beloved by the Republic, 70 ; directs its struggle with Pope
Paul v., 78-90 ; summoned to Rome by the Pope, 91 ;
decree of Senate in his favour, 92, 93 ; excommunicated by
Pope, 93 ; in relation to the Reform movement, 96 ; his
criticism of King James's writings, 99 ; vanquishes the
Pope, 105 ; made sole Counsellor of State, 106 ; secret
archives opened to him, 107 ; complaints of Pope against
him, 108; plots of Pope to destroy him, 109-112; stabbed
on the bridge, 113; anxiety of Senate, 114-117; decree of
Senate in his favour, 122, 123; his letter to Senate, 123,
124; to de Lisle Groslot, 124; the busy statesman, 126;
his writings and modern Italian history, 129 ; his political
works—see Treatises; his "History of the Council of
Trent," 144-150; his sickness and death, 151-154; decree
of Senate as to his funeral and monument, 155-159 ;
exhumations and interments, 159-165 ; exposure of
the book his "Secret Life," 165, 166; fresh wanderings
p
194
INDEX.
of his body, 167, 168; its final resting-place, 169; last
disturbance of his tomb, 170-172; the battle for his
monument fought and won, 173-175 ; its inauguration,
176-181; his portrait and bust, 181, 182; last look at his
statue, 182, 183.
Savii all' heresia, 138.
Scioppius, Gaspar, interview with Sarpi, iii.
Scriptures, Sarpi's knowledge of, 13, 25, 153.
Senate of Venice, its quarrel with Clement VIII., 64, 65 ; it
appoints Sarpi Teologo-Consultore, 68; its quarrel with
Paul v., 74; it follows Sarpi's advice, 78; its dealings
with the Jesuits and recalcitrant priests, 87 ; it passes
decrees in favour of Sarpi, 92, 121-3, 156, 157 ; makes
Sarpi sole Counsellor of State, 106 ; opens to him the
archives, 107; stands between him and danger, 109, no;
sends physicians to attend him, 114; takes extraordinary
measures against his enemies, 116; jealously protects
Sarpi, 128 ; controls the Inquisition, 138.
Servite Church, 6 ; Sarpi buried in it, 155 ; re-buried in it, 163 ;
destroyed, 167 ; memorial stone to Sarpi on its wall, 169.
Servite Monastery in Venice, 6; its destruction by fire, 41 ;
special staircase in it for Sarpi, 124 ; Sarpi's body hidden
in it, 162.
Servite Order, its origin, 5 ; Sarpi enters it, 7 ; unification of
its constitution, 30.
Sixtus IV. puts Venice under interdict, 84.
Sixtus v., the Swineherd Pope, 36, 37, 61, 145.
Sound and colour investigated by Sarpi, 50.
Spain, attitude towards Venice in Papal quarrel, 81, 90, 94,
lOI.
St. James's Day, and King James's book, 99, loi, 104.
Statue, Fra Paolo's, in Venice, 158, 174, 175, 177, 183.
Stiletto left in Sarpi's temple, 114 ; was it poisoned? 115, 116;
how dealt with by Sarpi, 125.
Stipend of Sarpi, doubled by Senate, 93 ; doubled a second
time, 122.
Studies, scientific, of Sarpi, 44-57.
Style of Sarpi, 129, 146, 14.7.
INDEX.
195
Syndic of Venice, speeches on Sarpi, 77, 180.
Telescope invented by Sarpi and Galileo, 49.
Temporal power destroyed, 131, 180.
Teologo-Consultore, Sarpi chosen as, 68.
Teza, Professor, of Padua, on Sarpi's Tridentine History, 149,
150.
Theatines, allowed to quit Venice, 90.
Thermometer invented by Sarpi and Galileo, 50.
Treatises by Sarpi, on the " Interdict," 130 ; on the " Validity
of Excommunications " (translation), 132 ; " Consideration
of the Censures," 133 ; " War of Pope Paul V. with the
Venetians," 133 ; " The Rights of Sovereigns defended,"
133 ; on " Ecclesiastical Benefices," 133 ; on the "Inqui¬
sition," 137; on the "Bishop of Ceneda" case, 140; on
Sanctuaries for Offenders," 141 ; on the " Immunity of
the Clergy," 141 ; on the " Uscocks," 143 ; on the "System
of Education given by the Jesuits," 144.
Urban VII. and Sarpi, 38, 39, 145.
Urban VIII. and Sarpi's monument, 160, 161, 162.
Uscocks, the, history of, by Sarpi, 143.
Valves of the veins, Sarpi's discovery of, 45.
Venice, its quarrels with Clement VIII., 64, 65 ; with Paul V.,
73 ; under interdict, 82, 83 ; resists interdict, 85 ; it
banishes the Jesuits, 89 ; question of the Reformation in,
96-98 ; its conditions of reconciliation with Pope Paul V.,
103 ; under Papal domination, 163.
Vieta, the algebraist, and Sarpi, 52.
" Vita Arcana," its character exposed, 165.
Vulgate, Council of Trent's decree about, 26 ; this carried out,
37-
" War of Paul V. with the Venetians," by Sarpi, 133.
Works by Sarpi, see Treatises.
196
INDEX.
Wotton, Sir Henry, his friendship with Sarpi, 67 ; counsels
Venice to resist Paul V., 95 ; bearer of King James's book
to the Doge, 99, loi, 102, 104; sent Sarpi's portrait to
King James, 108.
Wotton, Dr., English Ambassador at Brussels, 144.
Zane, Matteo, Patriarch of Venice, 64, 73.
Zeno, Renieri, Venetian Ambassador at Rome, 160.