ent on more slowly, _for it did not please the Doge[129]
to restore it in the form in which it was before_; and they could not
rebuild it altogether in a better manner, so great was the parsimony of
these old fathers; because it was forbidden by laws, which condemned in
a penalty of a thousand ducats any one who should propose to throw down
the _old_ palace, and to rebuild it more richly and with greater
expense. But the Doge, who was magnanimous, and who desired above all
things what was honorable to the city, had the thousand ducats carried
into the Senate Chamber, and then proposed that the palace should be
rebuilt; saying: that, 'since the late fire had ruined in great part the
Ducal habitation (not only his own private palace, but all the places
used for public business) this occasion was to be taken for an
admonishment sent from God, that they ought to rebuild the palace more
nobly, and in a way more befitting the greatness to which, by God's
grace, their dominions had reached; and that his motive in proposing
this was neither ambition, nor selfish interest: that, as for ambition,
they might have seen in the whole course of his life, through so many
years, that he had never done anything for ambition, either in the city,
or in foreign business; but in all his actions had kept justice first in
his thoughts, and then the advantage of the state, and the honor of the
Venetian name: and that, as far as regarded his private interest, if it
had not been for this accident of the fire, he would never have thought
of changing anything in the palace into either a more sumptuous or a
more honorable form; and that during the many years in which he had
lived in it, he had never endeavored to make any change, but had always
been content with it, as his predecessors had left it; and that he knew
well that, if they took in hand to build it as he exhorted and besought
them, being now very old, and broken down with many toils, God would
call him to another life before the walls were raised a pace from the
ground. And that therefore they might perceive that he did not advise
them to raise this building for his own convenience, but only for the
honor of the city and its Dukedom; and that the good of it would never
be felt by him, but by his successors.' Then he said, that 'in order, as
he had always done, to observe the laws,... he had brought with him the
thousand ducats which had been appointed as the penalty for proposing
such a meas