The Express.
London, England, 1851-06-07 00:00:00

THE EXPRESS; SATURDAY- EVENING, •

plate so loos as his aseaseree were Tieerriouo, and the so-
naseirise resanised West with their Weisel appendages of
realms sessin eager to ie his Wen i All opposition was
sow andek be Wile Mai wpm seek as advereary
Kassow—lbat is to war, the wi'vMditisp bud already can-
tonal. Ward was saashildwol is tin Slums alai the
swam el. annihilated.

Orations of Father Garazzi. Decade Me Second. WWI
Blertehes of Precious Reformer. of Me Beaman Chinch.
D. Bogue.

This collection of Orations, by the eloquent Barna-
bite, Omani, will be welcome wherever troth is
acceptable or talent admired. The readers of the
Express are already familiar with the character of
theserhetoricalefforts, but many who read and enjoyed
the sketchy reports which appeared from time to
time in our columns will gladly hail their re-publica-
tion in a corrected shape, and as a book fitted for the
table or the library. Appended to the orations wo
find some original sketches of previous labourers in
the field of Italian church reform, and in introducing
this new matter the writer says : " The eloquent
priest Gavaszi, now holding forth in London against
the gross abuses of tho establishment to which he
belongs, displays one other instance of a man
educated in a faith the absurdities and abuses of
which he is unable to hide in silence. Intimately
aware of the defects of his church, his patriotism, his
sense of religion, and his love for truth, compel him
to denounce them, regardless of the anger of its
temporal ruler, and in defiance of the spiritual terrors
which hold his fellow priests in check. Those who
have gone before him in the good work of reform
have too frequently sealed their sincerity with their
blood. happily for truth and its present expounder,
Father Gavazzi finds in the English metropolis not
only a sympathising audience, but an asylum, secure
alike from the angry power of Pio Nino and the
sbirri of the Austrian supporters of the papacy."
The first sketch introduces us to

To the teaching of Abeillard, at the opening of the twelfth
century, is mainly attributable the intellectual impulse
which, oace coinmunicated to Western Europe, paused not
In its onward career until it had precipitated the Reforma-
tion. The spirit of free inquiry was first awakened among
his scholars, and one of the most distinguished of these was
Arnaldo, attracted by the fame of the new philosophy in
Prance from the other side of the Alpe. Returning to Italy,
the monk of Brescia found no difficulty in arousing from the
torpor of medileval lethargy his native district and the whole
Lombard territory.
The dignitaries of the church were powerless to withstand
the onslaught of the eloquent reasoner; and in 111$ a
council was hastily assembled in the Lateran church, which
ordered the capture of the reformer, and a perpetual dun-
gees as his future abode. Recrossing the Alps, be unfurled
Ids standard at 'Lunch, in Switzerland, and quickly obtained
Ike adhesion of the whole country to his opinions, the Popes
legate included. It required all the efforts of the Abbot of
Citeaux to gain back the latter functionary. Rome itself
began to hesitate; and three successive pontiffs of that
capital (Innocent 11., Lucius, and Eugene III.) were en-
gaged in a desperate struggle with the inhabitants for the
aruntecance of their authority.
Arnold, feeling that the time hail come to strike a blow at
lead-quarters, re-entered Italy, and appearing at Rome,
found no difficulty in driving thence the feeble occupant of
authority, and fur ten successive years held undisputed per
of the metropolis, and of the popular sympathies.
The Romans were excommunicated, and placed und2r
in-
terdict; and after several insurrectionary commotiuns, is
one of which Cardinal Gerardis was killed, Arnold with-
drew into Tuscany, whither his popularity accompanied
him. Meantime Nieholus Breakspeare became pope, under
the name of Adrian IV. (A.D. 1154), and invoiced the aid
of the Emperor Frederic Barba:mat to deliver him from
his formidable rival.
The German auxiliary of the popedom, finding in Adrian
a useful ally, made nu scruple of using brute force again=
the champion of reform, caused him to be waylaid and
dragged to Rome, where he was delivered up to the amnia
of his antagonist, who burnt him alive in • street of that
city A.D. 115-5, and had the ashes of the victim cart into the
Tiber. But his doctrines long survived, both iu the capital
and the provinces; and utiriug the next century the results
became manifest in numerous outbreaks against sacerdotal
corruption and tyranny.
Next we find a short but graphic notico of
JEktOnit SAVUNAROLA.
This eloquent Dominican friar was born at Ferraro, la
lkl2, mid elected prior of St. Mark's Convent, at Florence,
to 1488. Lorenzo de Medici had contrived to extinguish
the freedom of that ancient republic, by grasping all the
powers of the commonwealth, and steeping the inhabitants
of Tuscany in vicious and inglorious voluptuousness. From
that ignoble condition the voice of the patriot-priest aroused
the citizens; and, during four years of Loreuzo's life, the
usurper was kept in check by the denunciations of the'
popular tribune. On his death-bed in 1492, he sought the
consolations of religion at the hands of the reformer, who
required a formal surrender of his assumed authority and
the revival of republican institutions. From that hour the
Florentines resumed the privilege of self-government, and
the manlier virtues of freemen superseded the grovelling
habits of slavery. Named ambassador of the republic, he
managed the negotiations with Charles VIII. of France to
the advantage of Florence, and established its full inde-
pendence. The rapid amelioration of all classes, and the
mad improvement consequent on the new order of things,
became the marvel of all Italy, and the terror of evil-doers
throughout the peninsula. Alexander VI. (the infamous
IBertria) was the occupant of the Roman sovereignty; and
feeling the terrible condemnation which such a contrast
suggested of his owe iniquitous government, and abominable
personal misconduct, set at work to destroy the glorious
fabric of a Christian commonwealth, the more dangerous
from its inconvenient vicinity. He summoned the indo-
mitable friar to Rome, to give an account of his faith (')
to his ecclesiastical superior; and finding that the indignant
contempt of the Florentines was the only answer he re-
ceiveal, and that they defied him to meddle with their chosen
guide and magistrate, his holiness put forth a menace of
excommunication against Savunarola, and interdict against
the city. Meantime the crowds that listened to his preach-
ing could scarcely be contained within the vast cathedral,
and the new hall fur popular assemblies, still extant as an
enduring monument of his influence over the people, was
constructed in what was then the municipality, but is now
the Grand Ducal palace. The progress of civil liberty kept
pace with the advancement in practical Chridianity.l (The
discomfited ambition of the Medici termed a league with
the affrighted jealousy of the tiara; and all the elements of
debauchery, tyranny, and corruption, entered into combina-
tion against the further developement of moral and intel-
lectual reform.
A conspiracy to restore the despotism of the Medici was
detected, and the traitors brought to justice by the vigour
of Savonarola. This was the signal fur an edict of excoin-
munication on the part of Pope Borgia, which the undaunted
friar set at naught, preaching with renewed energy against
the villanous and sacrilegious doings of the Vatican during
the Christmas festival of 1497. A fanatic monk offered to
test the approval of Heaven on the l'oge's conduct in this
business, by throwing himself into a blazing pile of fire-
wood, provided Savouarola was the partaker of his exploit.
This monstrous folly found abettors among the ignorant
populace, but was never realised on the part of the papal
diaaapion. Finally, after a series of intrigues and tree-
eiseries, from the partisans of the Medici and of Borgia,
fiattonarola was seised, put to the torture. and, continuing
Ito the last his denunciations of tyranny and hypocrisy, was
tied to the stake in the public square of Florence, and then
and there burnt alive, on the 23rd of May, 1498, and his
ashes east into the Arno. With him perished the chances
of Italian regeneration, and the liberties of Central Italy.
A Venetian church reformer stands next for his

portrait.
IRA PAULO AARPI,
Horn e Venice in 1552, entered the religious order of
Semites in ljrfsi, was at first theologian of the Duke of
Mantua, then officiating in the ministry, at Milan, under
St. Charles Borrorneo ; made a doctor, at Padua, in 1.579,
and provincial of his order; was intimate, at Rome, with
Rellarmine and the first celebrities of the day ; finally fixed
at Venice, became deeply versed in scientific inquiries
throughout the whole range of contemporary knowledge, as
his MSS. in the Venetian archives abundantly show to this
day. He is principally known by his vigorous resistance to
the Roman court in a struggle muds resembling the pre-
sent encounter between Piedmont and the Pope about the
Siccardi law. _

The scene was at Venice. The Protagonicta was
Paul V. (Camillo Borghese), founder of a very fashionable
if not otherwise distinguished family. He had just come
into enjoyment of the Popedom, and was flushed with his
new-blown honours to an extent natural in a young Pop.:,
when an opportunity arose of exhibiting in the eyes of
Europe.
Two clerical Lotharios, the Canon Scipio Saracen, and
Count Brandulisio, abbot of Nervosa, had 'hem carrying
their gallantry into the bosom of some Venetian families,
and had been punced upon by orders of the senate. The
affair made sonic nob?. Burghcse C4lllO to the res :ue of the
cloth, and summoned the republic to hand him over the
reverend culprits: he met with a flat refusal. Fired with
holy indignation, the pontiff issued a threat of excommuni-
cation against the refractory commonwealth, sad failing in
producing the expected submission, issued the Vatican
thunders in due form.

The old Doge happened just then to die, but no one
dared to treat him a la Santa Rosa, and refuse him sepul-
chral rites. The Senate met on the 10 January, 1606,
to elect his successor. Fancy the scene. The council is
met in the old pillared palace, known to us all by. Cana-
letti's yield hand. The mysterious Ten arc ranged in their
proper stalls. The thousand representatives of the Libro
d'Oro are in the inferior hall, adorned by the pencil of Tin-
, toretto. The Pope's nuncio is announced; he sweeps up
'through the assembly, and proclaims the acts of the republic
a nullity, and any election of supreme magistrate made by
the excommunicated senate illegal and void. Ile retires.
The senators of Venice fortwith elect Leonardo Donato
doge of the serene repdblie. The nuncio next day puts
forth &declaration absolving all Tanana= from their elle-
glance.
War to the knife ensues. By orders from Bombes) the
, Interdict le laid on: no bell shall ring, no nuns shalfbe sung,
no child receive baptismal regmendloa, no maiden be led to