The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1928-04-26

HINDER Leo x Q513-2D, So Of
~ Lorenzo de- NIedici, the Renais-
sance migrated from Florence to
Rome, taking gold and glory with
it; Leo cares less for piety than for
art; and while mismanaging papal
finances masterfully he spreads
Peters pence among the writer's
and artists of his time, and wins
the devotion of painters, poets and
humanistS.
Hadrian vi, LeO's successor, being
less lavish, becomes the favorite
enemy of the intelligensia; when ne
does the house Of his physician is
hung with garlands by midnight
jewellers, and marked with the crate
full inscription "Libe1atori Patriae
S. P. Q. R."-"From the Senate and
the Roman People to the Liberator
of His Country"
The humaniSts heretofore, though
by their very name they announce
their abandonment of heaven for
the earth, take care not to attack
the church; they do not for a mo-
ment desire its fall. Indeed, for the
humanists, the church is not a sys-
tenn of beliefs, but a nurse and
patron of the arts.
Hundreds of scholars are being
supported by bishops and cardinals,
and the popes are building the Vat
lean library for the use of them all
Catholicism has ceased to be n erely
a religion, it has become itself an
art; the old ascetic mood has been
replaced with a sensuous cerenOn-
ialiSm of incense, stained glass,
music, architecture, sculpture, paint
ing, and drama.
The humaniSts DO not understand
the Teuton hunger for truth; why
should they be converted from
Catholicism, when they have con-
verted Catholicism TO themselves?
Their art began as an instrument
of the church; they are willing that
the church should continue as an
instrument of their art. The church
is the glory-and the treasury-of
all Italy; no sensible Italian, the
humanists feel, can abandon it.
II
NEVERTHELESS, in every in
N ward sense, they have
abandoned it. They no longer care
for divinity, they are absorbed in
the "humanities;;" the sense of wor-
ship passes, and proud spirit of
control begins. These men love
Greece more than Judea, Virgil
more than Peter, Plato more than
Christ. Instead of the Gospels and
the lives of the saints, they read
Plutarch and Livy and Cicero; in
stead of reverencing the martyrs of
the faith, they worship at the
shrines of HarmodiuS and Aris
togiton, Socrates and Seneca, Cat
and Brutus; fifteen centuries after
his great betise, a monument of
Brutus is set up in a public square
of Florence.
One of the Medici, after murder
ing his cousin defends himself with
apparent success by arguments
from pagan ethics; Petrarch,
arguing for Immortality, quotes
Plato and Cicero, but never men
lions the Bible. Scholars begin to
say that the ancient poets and
philosophers were inspired too, as
well as the Bible; soon they will be-
lieve that neither was inspired at
all.
Naturally, the theological basis
having crumbled, the old moral code
collapses; and all Italy frolics in the
rediscovery of the flesh. The influx
of luxuries adds to the difficulties of
restraint; and the increase of wealth
multiplies the number of people who
can afford to be immoral. Adultery
flourisheS, for girls are secluded be-
fore marriage and mated by their
parents to men much older than
themselves; romance can come only
after marriage; hence Italian and
French fiction begins with mat
rimony, as respectable fiction ends
with it.
This does not destroy the family,
as one might think; the Italians, as
Burckhardt says, wish to live as they
please, but by no means to renounce
the family, even when they are not
sure that it is all their own. 1t is true
that husbands regularly kill wives
and paramours whom they detect;
but this does not reduce the num-
Der of adventures. it merely adds
romance to brutality and dishonor.