Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2

esses by reactionary forces.

It would not be just to condemn Spain and the Papacy because, being
reactionary powers, they quenched for three centuries the genial light
of Italy. We must rather bear in mind that both Spain and the Papacy
were at that time cosmopolitan factors of the first magnitude, with
perplexing world-problems confronting them. Charles bore upon his
shoulders the concerns of the Empire, the burden of the German
revolution, and the distracting anxiety of a duel with Islam. When his
son bowed to the yoke of government, he had to meet the same
perplexities, complicated with Netherlands in revolt, England in
antagonism, and France in dubious ferment. A succession of Popes were
hampered by painful European questions, which the instinct of
self-preservation taught them to regard as paramount. They were fighting
for existence; for the Catholic creed; for their own theocratic
sovereignty. They held strong cards. But against them were drawn up the
battalions of heresy, free thought, political insurgence in the modern
world. The _Zeitgeist_ that has made us what we are, had begun to
organize stern opposition to the Church. It was natural enough that both
the Spanish autocrat and the successor of S. Peter should at this crisis
have regarded Italian affairs as subordinate in importance to wider
matters which demanded their attention. Yet if we shift our point of
view from this high vantage-ground of Imperial and Papal anxieties, and
place ourselves in the center of Italy as our post of observation, it
will be apparent that nothing more ruinous for the prosperity of the
Italian people could have been devised than the joint autocracy accorded
at Bologna to two cosmopolitan but non-national forces in their midst.
An alien monarchy greedy for gold, a panic-stricken hierarchy in terror
for its life, warped the tendencies and throttled the energies of the
most artistically sensitive, the most heroically innovating of the
existing races. However we may judge the merits of the Spania

John Addington Symonds (October 5, 1840 - April 19, 1893) was an English poet and literary critic. He was an early advocate of the validity of male love which included for him pederastic as well as egalitarian relationships, and which he would refer to as lamour de limpossible.

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