hostile critics agree, was emphatically not a cruel man, and rarely
consented to condemn even criminals to death. But, like many other
politicians who have great ends in view, he was often unscrupulous as to
the means which he employed, and, as Burckhardt very truly remarked,
would probably have been surprised at being held responsible for the
means by which he attained his object. Trained from early youth in the
most tortuous paths of Italian diplomacy, he acted on the principle laid
down by the Venetian Marino Sanuto, that the first duty of the really
wise statesman is to persuade his enemies that he means to do one thing
and then do another. But in these tangled paths he often over-reached
himself, and only succeeded in inspiring all parties with distrust; and,
as too often happens, this deceiver was deceived in his turn, and in the
end betrayed by men in whom his whole trust had been placed. Another
curious feature of Lodovico's character was the strain of moral
cowardice which, in spite of great personal bravery, marked his public
actions at the most critical moments. This sudden failure of courage, or
loss of nerve, that to his contemporaries seemed little short of
madness, absolutely inexplicable in a man who had faced death without a
thought on many a battle-field, ultimately wrought his own downfall as
well as that of his State.

And yet, in spite of all his faults and failings, in spite of the
strange tissue of complex aims and motives which swayed his course,
Lodovico Sforza was a man of great ideas and splendid capacities, a
prince who was in many respects distinctly in advance of his age. His
wise and beneficial schemes for the encouragement of agriculture and the
good of his poorer subjects, his careful regulations for the
administration of the University and advancement of all branches of
learning, his extraordinary industry and minute attention to detail,
cannot fail to inspire our interest and command our admiration. In more
peaceful times and under happier circumstances he would have been an
excellent ruler, and his great dream of a united kingdom of North Italy
might have been well and nobly realized. As it was, the history of
Lodovico Moro belongs to the saddest tragedies of the Renaissance, and
the splendour of his prosperity and the greatness of his fall became the
common theme of poet and moralist.

The story of Lodovico's childhood is one of the pleasantest parts of his
strangely chequered car