at Pisa--His Entrance into Florence--Piero Capponi--The
March on Rome--Entry into Rome--Panic of Alexander VI.--The March on
Naples--The Spanish Dynasty: Alfonso and Ferdinand--Alfonso II. escapes
to Sicily--Ferdinand II. takes Refuge in Ischia--Charles at Naples--The
League against the French--De Comines at Venice--Charles makes his
Retreat by Rome, Siena, Pisa, and Pontremoli--The Battle of
Fornovo--Charles reaches Asti and returns to France--Italy becomes the
Prize to be fought for by France, Spain, and Germany--Importance of the
Expedition of Charles VIII. P. 537.

* * * * *

APPENDICES.

No. I.--The Blood-madness of Tyrants 589

No. II.--Translations of Nardi, 'Istorie di Firenze,' lib. l. cap. 4;
and of Varchi, 'Storia Fiorentina,' lib. iii. caps. 20,
21, 22; lib. ix. caps. 48, 49, 46 592

No. III.--The Character of Alexander VI., from Guicciardini's
'Storia Fiorentina,' cap. 27 603

No. IV.--Religious Revivals in Mediaeval Italy 606

No. V.--The 'Sommario della Storia d' Italia dal 1511 al 1527,
by Francesco Vettori 624

RENAISSANCE IN ITALY.

CHAPTER I.

THE SPIRIT OF THE RENAISSANCE.

Difficulty of fixing Date--Meaning of Word Renaissance--The Emancipation
of the Reason--Relation of Feudalism to the Renaissance--Mediaeval
Warnings of the Renaissance--Abelard, Bacon, Joachim of Flora, the
Provencals, the Heretics, Frederick II.--Dante, Petrarch,
Boccaccio--Physical Energy of the Italians--The Revival of Learning--The
Double Discovery of the World and of Man--Exploration of the Universe
and of the Globe--Science--The Fine Arts and Scholarship--Art Humanizes
the Conceptions of the Church--Three Stages in the History of
Scholarship--The Age of Desire--The Age of Acquisition--The Legend of
Julia's Corpse--The Age of the Printers and Critics--The Emancipation of
the Conscience--The Reformation and the Modern Critical
Spirit--Mechanical Inventions--The Place of Italy in the Renaissance.

The word Renaissance has of late years received a more extended
significance than that which is implied in our English equivalent--the
Revival of Learning. We use it to denote the whole transition from the
Middle Ages to the Modern World; and though it is possible to assign
certain limits to the period during which this trans