efforts to introduce not only the beauties of pagan art and literature,
but likewise some of their licentiousness.

We may now turn our attention to a more detailed history of this revival
and its effect upon different peoples, and to a brief study of some of
its great leaders.

=Humanism in Italy.=--Italy was the first to catch the impulse of
humanism. Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio in the fourteenth century
inspired men with their new ideas, and set in motion influences which
were attended with results often far from good. They revived the study
of Latin and Greek classics, extracted manuscripts from their hidden
archives, incited in society a passion for learning, and created a
popular literature in their own vernacular. They implanted a love of
freedom of thought in the Italian masses. Their enthusiasm for the new
learning attracted scholars from Germany, France, and other countries,
who spread the influence in their own lands.

The effect of humanism upon the Italian mind and life was pernicious in
the extreme. It led to infidelity, to immorality, and to a return to
many pagan practices. This was owing to two chief causes. First, the
evil influence of many leaders of the Church, and second, the passionate
nature of the Italian people. Karl Schmidt says, "Humanism, but not
morality, ruled in the Vatican." Brother Azarias, in speaking of this
period, says:[50] "The clergy loved their own ease too well; they were
too great pleasure-seekers and gold-coveters to attend to their flocks
with that pastoral spirit of simplicity and good faith that is to be
witnessed in the Church to-day. The bishops were no better. They looked
for emoluments and court favor. Even the better class of ecclesiastics
gave themselves up to the intellectual luxury of admiring Plato and
imitating Cicero. While a general laxity of morals in all orders of
religious life--among priest and monk, pope and cardinal--was bringing
odium on the Church, and weakening her hold upon the people--especially
upon the Teutonic races--the seeds of regeneration were germinating in
her own body. She was even then the mother of sanctity.... The Catholic
hierarchy at last realized that with themselves should begin the
reformation they would see established; they therefore pronounced the
most withering denunciations upon the clerical and religious abuses of
the day."

The people interpreted the teaching of Petrarch that the world was made
for man's enjoyment, as