rdice and secrecy. Caustic Forsyth,
speaking of the Romans, begins with the bitter remark, that "the
national character is the most ruined thing at Rome"; and in the same
section he adds, "Their humor is naturally caustic; but they lampoon,
as they stab, only in the dark. The danger attending open attacks
forces them to confine their satire within epigram; and thus
pasquinade is but the offspring of hypocrisy, the only resource of
wits who are obliged to be grave on so many absurdities in religion,
and respectful to so many upstarts in purple." Thus if the Romans
lampoon only in the dark, the fault is to be charged against their
rulers rather than themselves. The talent for sarcastic epigram is
hereditary with the people. The pointed style of Martial was handed
down through successive generations. The epigram in his hands was no
longer a mere inscription, an idyl, or an elegy; it had lost its
ancient grace, but it took on a new energy, and it set the model,
which the later Romans knew well how to copy, of satire condensed into
wit, in lines each of whose words had a sting.

The first true Pasquinades--that is, the first of the epigrams which
were affixed to Pasquin, and hence derived their name--are perhaps
those which belong to the reign of Leo X. We at least have found no
earlier ones of undoubted genuineness; but satires similar to those of
Pasquin, and possibly originating with him, as they now go under the
general name of Pasquinades, were published against the Popes who
preceded Leo. The infamous Alexander VI., the Pope who has made his
name synonymous with the worst infamies that disgrace mankind, was not
spared the attacks of the subjects whom he and his children, not
unworthy of such a father, degraded and abused. Two lines could say
much:--

"Sextus Tarquinius, Sextus Nero, Sextus et iste:
Semper sub Sextis perdita Roma fuit."

"Sextus Tarquinius, Sextus Nero, this also a Sextus" (Alexander
Sextus, that is, Alexander the Sixth): "always under the Sextuses has
Rome been ruined." And as if this were not enough, another distich
struck with more directness at the vices of the Pope:--

"Vendit Alexander claves, altaria, Christum:
Emerat ille prius, vendere jure potest."

"Alexander sells the keys, the altars, Christ. He bought them first,
and has good right to sell."[3]

Alexander had gained his election by bribes which he did not pay, and
promises which he did not keep; and Guicciardini tells