. It is dated the 18th of September, 1511.

"To-morrow I shall send the Bishop of Guzk to the pope at Rome, to
conclude an agreement with him that I may be appointed his coadjutor,
and on his death succeed to the papacy, and become a priest, and
afterwards a saint, that you may be bound to worship me, of which I
shall be very proud. I have written on this subject to the King of
Arragon, intreating him to favor my undertaking, and he has promised me
his assistance, provided I resign my imperial crown to my grandson
Charles, which I am very ready to do. The people and nobles of Rome have
offered to support me against the French and Spanish party. They can
muster twenty thousand combatants, and have sent me word that they are
inclined to favor my scheme of being pope, and will not consent to have
either a Frenchman, a Spaniard or a Venetian.

"I have already began to sound the cardinals, and, for that purpose, two
or three hundred thousand ducats would be of great service to me, as
their partiality to me is very great. The King of Arragon has ordered
his ambassadors to assure me that he will command the Spanish cardinals
to favor my pretensions to the papacy. I intreat you to keep this matter
secret for the present, though I am afraid it will soon be known, for it
is impossible to carry on a business secretly for which it is necessary
to gain over so many persons, and to have so much money. Adieu. Written
with the hand of your dear father Maximilian, future pope. The pope's
fever has increased, and he can not live long."

It is painful to follow out the windings of intrigue and the labyrinths
of guile, where selfishness seemed to actuate every heart, and where all
alike seem destitute of any principle of Christian integrity. Bad as the
world is now, and selfish as political aspirants are now, humanity has
made immense progress since that dark age of superstition, fraud and
violence. After many victories and many defeats, after innumerable
fluctuations of guile, Maximilian accepted a bribe, and withdrew his
forces, and the King of France was summoned home by the invasion of his
own territories by the King of Arragon and Henry VIII. of England, who,
for a suitable consideration, had been induced to join Venice and the
pope. At the end of this long campaign of diplomacy, perfidy and blood,
in which misery had rioted through ten thousand cottages, whose
inhabitants the warriors regarded no more than the occupants of the
ant-