eparation has been leading is the liberation of Italy from
the barbarians. The slavery of Israel in Egypt, the oppression of the
Persians by the Medes, the dispersion of the Athenians into villages,
were the occasions which enabled Moses and Cyrus and Theseus to display
their greatness. The new Prince, who would fain win honor in Italy and
confer upon his country untold benefits, finds her at the present moment
'more enslaved than the Hebrews, more downtrodden than the Persians,
more disunited than the Athenians, without a chief, without order,
beaten, despoiled, mangled, overrun, subject to every sort of
desolation.' Fortune could not have offered him a nobler opportunity.
'See how she prays God to send her some one who should save her from
these barbarous cruelties ind insults! See her all ready and alert to
follow any standard, if only there be a man to raise it!' Then
Machiavelli addresses himself to the chief of the Medici in person. 'Nor
is there at the present moment any place more full of hope for her than
your illustrious House, which by its valor and its fortune, favored by
God and by the Church, whereof it is now the head, might take the lead
in this delivery.' This is followed by one of the rare passages of
courtly rhetoric which, when Machiavelli condescends to indulge in them,
add peculiar splendor to his style. Then he turns again to speak of the
means which should immediately be used. He urges Lorenzo above all
things to put no faith in mercenaries or auxiliaries, but to raise his
own forces, and to rely on the Italian infantry. If Italian armies have
always been defeated in the field during the past twenty years, it is
not due so much to their defective courage as to the weakness of their
commanders. Lorenzo will have to raise a force capable of coping with
the Swiss, the Spanish, and the French. The respect with which
Machiavelli speaks at this supreme moment of these foreign troops,
proves how great was their prestige in Italy; yet he ventures to point
out that there are faults peculiar to each of them: the Spanish infantry
cannot stand a cavalry charge, and the Switzers are liable to be
disconcerted by the rapid attack of the wiry infantry of Spain. It is
therefore necessary to train troops capable of resisting cavalry, and
not afraid of facing any foot soldiers in the world. 'This opportunity,
therefore, must not be suffered to slip by; in order that Italy may
after so long a time at last behold her s