ek teacher as clad in the mantle of a
philosopher, his countenance hideous, his face overshadowed with black
hair, his beard long and uncombed, his deportment rustic, his temper
gloomy and inconstant, but his mind was stored with the treasures of
learning. Leontius left Italy in disgust, but, returning again, was
struck dead by lightning in a storm while tied to the mast of the ship.
The author from whom I am quoting significantly adds that Petrarch
laments his fate, but nervously asks whether "some copy of Euripides or
Sophocles might not be recovered from the mariners."

The restoration of Greek to Italy may be dated A.D. 1395, at which time
Chrysoloras commenced teaching it. A few years after Aurispa brought
into Italy two hundred and thirty-eight Greek manuscripts; among them
were Plato and Pindar. The first endeavour was to translate such
manuscripts into Latin. To a considerable extent, the religious scruples
against Greek literature were giving way; the study found a patron in
the pope himself, Eugenius IV. As the intention of the Turks to seize
Constantinople became more obvious, the emigration of learned Greeks
into Italy became more frequent. And yet, with the exception of
Petrarch, and he was scarcely an exception, not one of the Italian
scholars was an ecclesiastic.

[Sidenote: Lorenzo de' Medici, his villas, gardens, and philosophy.]
Lorenzo de' Medici, the grandson of Cosmo, used every exertion to
increase the rising taste, generously permitting his manuscripts to be
copied. Nor was it alone to literature that he extended his patronage.
In his beautiful villa at Fiesole the philosophy of the old times was
revived; his botanic garden at Careggi was filled with Oriental exotics.
From 1470 to 1492, the year of his death, his happy influence continued.
He lived to witness the ancient Platonism overcoming the Platonism of
Alexandria, and the pure doctrine of Aristotle expelling the base
Aristotelian doctrine of the schools.

[Sidenote: Effects instantly produced by the Greek language.] The last
half of the fifteenth century revealed to Western Europe two worlds, a
new one and an old; the former by the voyage of Columbus, the latter by
the capture of Constantinople; one destined to revolutionize the
industrial, the other the religious condition. Greek literature, forced
into Italy by the Turkish arms, worked wonders; for Latin Europe found
with amazement that the ancient half of Christendom knew nothing
whate