was invented by Tassoni, a subject of the house of Este. The state of such a prince would perhaps be the most desirable in human life, if it were accompanied with that domestie security which a wealthy nobleman enjoys under the protection of a great empire. The long peace of Italy, in the seventeenth century, was interrupted only by some short and bloodless hostilities: but in the three great wars be tween the Austrian and Bourbon powers, the Duke of Modena has been thrice reduced to the alternative of slavery or exile. His neutrality was violated, his dominions were occupied by foreign troops, his subjects were oppressed by military contributions, and the mischievous expense of fortifications only served to expose his cities to the calamities of a siege.

I have long delayed, and I should willingly suppress, three disgraceful anecdotes, three criminal actions, which sully the honour of the name of Este: of these, the first and the third are piously dissembled by the librarian of Modena. 1. In his descent to the infernal regions, in the ninth circle of hell, the poet Dante beheld the condemnation of sanguinary and rapacious men: they were deeply immersed in a river of blood, and their escape was prevented by the arrows of the centaurs. Among the tyrants, he distinguished the ancient forms of Alexander and Dionysius: of his own countrymen, he recognised the black Eccelin, and the fair Obizo of Este, the latter of whom was dispatched by an unnatural son to this place of torment. This Obizo can be no other than the second marquis of that name, who died only seven years before the real or imaginary date of the Divine Comedy (A. D. 1300): his life does not afford the character of a tyrant: but he was one of the pillars of the Guelph faction; and were he not associated with a Ghibelline chief, we might impute his sentence to the prejudices, rather than the justice, of the Tuscan bard. But the parricide of his son, a crime of a much deeper dye, is attested by the commentary of Benvenuto of Imola, who observes from an old chronicle, that Azo VIII. was apprehensive of the same treatment which he had inflicted on his father. It must be added, that his commentary on Dante, which was composed only fourscore years after the event, is dedicated to Nicholas II., Marquis of Este, and great-grandson of Obizo II., who tacitly subscribes to the guilt of his ancestors. 2. Under the reign of Nicholas III. (A.D. 1425), Ferrara was polluted with a domestic tragedy. By the testimony of a maid, and his own observation, the Marquis of Este discovered the incestuous loves of his wife Parisina, and Hugo his bastard son, a beautiful and valiant youth. They were beheaded in the castle, by the sentence of a father and husband, who published his shame, and survived their execution. He was unfortunate, if they were guilty: if they were innocent, he was still more unfortunate: nor is there any possible situation in which I can sincerely approve the last act of the justice of a parent. 3. Guicciardini, the gravest of the Italian historians, records a bloody scene, which, in his own time (A.D. 1505), had sullied the court of Ferrara; the deed might revive the memory of the Theban brothers; "and the motive was still more frivolous, if love," says he, "be a more frivolous

motive than ambition." The Cardinal Hippolito was enamoured of a fair maiden of his own family: but her heart was engaged by his natural brother; and she imprudently confessed to a rival, that the beauteous eyes of Don Julio were his most powerful attraction. The deliberate cruelty of the cardinal measured the provocation and the revenge: under a pretence of hunting, he drew the unhappy youth to a distance from the city, and there compelling him to dismount, his eyes, those hated eyes, were extinguished by the command, and in the presence of an amorous priest, who viewed with delight the agonies of a brother. It may, however, be suspected that the work was slightly performed by the less savage executioners, since the skill of his physicians restored Don Julio to an imperfect sight. A denial of justice provoked him to the most desperate counsels and the revenge of Don Julio conspired with the ambition of Don Ferdinand against the life of their sovereign and eldest brother, Alphonso I. Their designs were prevented, their persons seized, their accomplices were executed; but their sentence of death was moderated to a perpetual prison, and in their fault the Duke of Ferrara acknowledged his own. These dark shades in the house of Este must not be excused by the example of the Italian tyrants; whose courts and families were perpetually defiled with lust and blood, with incest and parricide; who mingled the cruelty of savages with the refinements of a learned and polite age. But it may be fairly observed, that single acts of virtue and of vice can seldom be weighed against each other: that it is far more easy to fall below, than to rise above, the common level of morality: that three or four guilty days have been found in a period of two hundred years: and, that in the general tenour of their lives, the marquises of Este were just, temperate, and humane; the friends of each other, and the fathers of their people.

In a more superstitious age, I should boldly oppose to the sins of twenty generations the monastic virtues of Alphonso III., the son and successor of Don Cæsar. Yet even these virtues were produced by the blind impulse of repentance and fear. The nature of Alphonso was impetuous and haughty, and a deep indignant regret for the loss of Ferrara was the first sentiment of his childhood. As soon as he had released himself from the authority of a governor whom he hated, and a father whom he despised, the hereditary prince became the slave of his passions and the terror of Modena: his appetite for blood was indulged in the chase, and the city; and he soon considered the life of a man and of a stag as of equal value. One of the most considerable private families in Italy (such is the dark language of Muratori) was proved by some secret motive to form a design of assassinating Alphonso. Their dagger was turned aside from his breast; their chief was sacrificed to his justice; he threatened to extirpate the whole race; nor could the intercession of princes, or of the pope himself, avert the rage of persecution and revenge. The only voice that could soothe the passions of the savage was that of an amiable and virtuous wife, the sole object of his love; the voice of Donna Isabella, the daughter of the Duke of Savoy, and the grand-daughter of Philip

II., King of Spain. Her dying words sunk deep into his memory (A.D. 1626, August 22): his fierce spirit melted into tears, and after the last embrace, Alphonso retired into his chamber, to bewail his irreparable loss, and to meditate on the vanity of human life. But instead of resolving to expiate his sins, and to seek his salvation in the public felicity, he was persuaded that the habit and profession of a Capuchin were the only armour that could shield him from hellfire. The two years from the death of his wife to the decease of his father, were dedicated to prayer and penance, and no sooner had Alphonso attained the rank of a sovereign, than he aspired to descend below the condition of a man. With the approbation and blessing of the pope, who might possibly smile at this voluntary sacrifice, the Duke of Modena, after a reign of six months, resigned the sceptre to Francis, his eldest son, a youth of nineteen years of age, and secretly departed to a Franciscan convent among the mountains of Trent. By a special privilege, his noviciate and profession were consummated in the same day: the austere and humble friar atoned for the pride and luxury of the prince, and it was the wish of brother John Baptist of Modena to forget the world and to be for ever forgotten. But obedience was now his first duty, and the noble captive, for the honour of the order and of religion, was exhibited to the emperor, the archdukes, and the people of the Austrian provinces, by whom he was contemplated with curiosity and devotion. Three years he wandered between Venice and Vienna as an itinerant preacher he had the pleasure, in one of his journeys, to be half drowned in a river, and half starved on a rock, and he vainly hoped to convert the heretics of the North, or to receive from their hands the crown of martyrdom. During the last twelve years (A.D. 16321644) he was stationed in the convent of Modena, the humble slave of the subjects of his son: the city and country were edified by his missions and sermons; and as often as he appeared in the pulpit, the contrast of his dignity and dress most eloquently preached the contempt of this world. The conversion of the Jews, the reformation of manners, the maintenance of the poor, afforded a daily exercise to the zeal of the abdicated duke: but that zeal was always chargeable, often troublesome, and sometimes ridiculous: his death was a relief to the court and people; nor have the princes of Este been ambitious of adorning their family with the name and honours of a saint. The Capuchin might behold, perhaps with pity, and perhaps with envy, the temporal prosperity of his son. In peace and war, in Italy

and Spain, in the Austrian and French alliance, the Duke of Modena supported the dignity of his character (A.D. 1629-1658): and Francis I., in a larger field, would have ranked among the generals and statesmen of an active age.

The name of Rinaldo, a name immortalised by Tasso in epic song, had been applied to the youngest son of Duke Francis I.: he might faintly remember the last days of his father, and the short government of his brother Alphonso IV.: but he was no more than seven years of age when his infant nephew Francis II. succeeded to the ducal title.

In his early youth Rinaldo was proposed a candidate

for the crown of Poland, a wild, and had it not failed, a ruinous attempt: the example of so many of his kinsmen suggested a more rational pursuit; and in the thirty-second year of his age, he was promoted to the dignity of cardinal at the request of James II., King of Great Britain, who had married his niece. The long reign and short life of her brother Francis II. was an helpless state of minority and disease: he died without children, and had the right of female succession prevailed, the unfortunate race of the Stuarts might have found a safe and honourable refuge in the inheritance of Modena. But as the order of investiture preferred the more distant males, Cardinal Rinaldo ascended without a question on the vacant throne of his nephew. The resignation of his hat was accepted by the pope; but he might marry, without a dispensation, a princess of Brunswick, his cousin in the nineteenth degree; and his all'ance was soon dignified by the nuptials of her sister with Joseph, King of the Romans, the son and successor of the Emperor Leopold. The life of Rinaldo I., Duke of Modena, was extended beyond the term of eighty-three years: in the various fortunes of his long reign he supported a double exile with fortitude and patience; and in the intervals of peace the country was restored by a wise and paternal government. His son Francis III. was of a more active spirit. He signalised his valour in the wars of Hungary; followed the standard of the house of Bourbon; commanded, or seemed to command, in several battles and sieges, and extorted the confession, that, had his advice been followed, the events of the war would have been more successful. His wife was a princess of Orleans, the daughter of the regent she was noble, beautiful, and rich; but in the true estimate of honour, the meanest virgin among his subjects would have been a more worthy consort. Their son Hercules III., the reigning duke, acquired a valuable and convenient territory with the heiress of Massa Carrara. Their only daughter, by the command of his inexorable father, was delivered to the Archduke Ferdinand, the emperor's brother; the marriage has been fruitful in children of both sexes, and the duchies of Modena, Reggio, and Mirandola, will soon be the patrimony of a younger branch of the new family of Austria. In the decline of life, Hercules III. is the sole remaining male of the house of Este, and the long current of their blood must speedily be lost in a foreign stream.

834

AN ADDRESS, ETC.

THAT history is a liberal and useful study, and that the history of our country is best deserving our attention, are propositions too clear for argument, and too simple for illustration. Nature has implanted in our breasts a lively impulse to extend the narrow span of our exist ence, by the knowledge of the events that have happened on the soil which we inhabit, of the characters and actions of those men from whom our descent, as individuals or as a people, is probably derived. The same laudable emulation will prompt us to review, and to enrich our common treasure of national glory: and those who are best entitled to the esteem of posterity, are the most inclined to celebrate the merits of their ancestors. The origin and changes of our religion and government, of our arts and manners, afford an entertaining, and often an instructive subject of speculation; and the scene is repeated and varied by the entrance of the victorious strangers, the Roman and the Saxon, the Dane and the Norman, who have successively reigned in our stormy isle. We contemplate the gradual progress of society, from the lowest ebb of primitive barbarism, to the full tide of modern civilisation. We contrast the naked Briton who might have mistaken the sphere of Archimedes for a rational creature, and the contemporary of Newton, in whose school Archimedes himself would have been an humble disciple; and we compare the boats of osier and hides that floated along our coasts, with the formidable navies which visit and command the remotest shores of the ocean, Without indulging the fond prejudices of patriotic vanity, we may assume a conspicuous place among the inhabitants of the earth. The English will be ranked among the few nations who have cultivated with equal success the arts of war, of learning, and of commerce; and Britain, perhaps, is the only powerful and wealthy state which has ever possessed the inestimable secret of uniting the benefits of order with the blessings of freedom. It is a maxim of our law, and the constant practice of our courts of justice, never to accept any evidence, unless it is the very best which, under the circumstances of the case, can possibly be obtained. If this wise principle be transferred from jurisprudence to criticism, the inquisitive reader of English history will soon ascend to the first witnesses of every period, from whose testimonies the moderns, however sagacious and eloquent, must derive their whole confidence and credit. In the prosecution of his inquiries, he will lament that the transactions of the middle ages have been imperfectly recorded, and that these records have been more imperfectly preserved: that the successive conquerors of Britain have despised or destroyed the monuments of their predecessors;

* I allude to a passage in Cicero (de Naturâ Deorum, lib. ii. cap. 34). Quòd si in Britanniam, sphæram aliquis tulerit hanc, quam nuper familiaris noster effecit Posidonius, cujus singulæ conversiones idem efficiunt in sole, et in lunâ, et in quinque stellis errantibus, quod efficitur in coelo singulis diebus et noctibus: quis in illa barbarie dubitet, quin ea sphæra sit perfecta ratione?