ister spectacle of so world-embracing an organism, persistently
maintained in action for an anti-social end. There is something Roman in
the colossal proportions of Loyola's idea, something Roman in the
durability of the structure which perpetuates it. Yet the philosopher
cannot but agree with the vulgar in his final judgment on the odiousness
of these sacerdotal despots, these unflinching foes not merely to the
heroes of the human intellect, and to the champions of right conduct,
but also to the very angels of Christianity. That the Jesuits should
claim to have been founded by Him who preached the Sermon on the Mount,
that they should flaunt their motto, A.M.D.G., in the sight of Him who
spake from Sinai, is one of those practical paradoxes in which the
history of decrepit religions abounds.

CHAPTER V.

SOCIAL AND DOMESTIC MORALS: PART I.

How did the Catholic Revival affect Italian Society?--Difficulty of
Answering this Question--Frequency of Private Crimes of
Violence--Homicides and Bandits--Savage Criminal Justice--Paid
Assassins--Toleration of Outlaws--Honorable Murder--Example of the
Lucchese Army--State of the Convents--The History of Virginia de
Leyva--Lucrezia Buonvisi--The True Tale of the Cenci--The Brothers
of the House of Massimo--Vittoria Accoramboni--The Duchess of
Palliano--Wife-Murders--The Family of Medici.

We are naturally led to inquire what discernible effect the Catholic
Revival and the Counter-Reformation had upon the manners and morals of
the Italians as a nation. Much has been said about the contrast between
intellectual refinement and almost savage license which marked the
Renaissance. Yet it can with justice be maintained that, while ferocity
and brutal sensuality survived from the Middle Ages, humanism, by means
of the new ideal it introduced, tended to civilize and educate the race.
Now, however, the Church was stifling culture and attempting to restore
that ecclesiastical conception of human life which the Renaissance had
superseded. Did then her resuscitated Catholicism succeed in permeating
the Italians with the spirit of Christ and of the Gospel? Were the
nobles more quiet in their demeanor, less quarrelsome and haughty, more
law-abiding and less given to acts of violence, than they had been in
the previous period? Were the people more contented and less torn by
factions, happier in their homes, less abandoned to the insanities of
bal