truth of this, past history furnishes many instances; as when, by the
help of Charlemagne, the Popes expelled the Lombards; and when in our
own days they humbled Venice by the aid of France, and afterwards drove
out the French by calling in the Swiss. So then the Church, being on the
one hand too weak to grasp the whole of Italy, and at the same time too
jealous to allow another power to do so, has prevented our union beneath
one head, and has kept us under scattered lords and princes. These have
caused so much discord and debility that Italy has become the prey not
only of powerful barbarians, but also of every assailant. And this we
owe solely and entirely to the Church. In order to learn by experience
the truth of what I say, one ought to be able to send the Roman Court,
armed with like authority to that it wields in Italy, to take up its
abode among the Swiss, who at the present moment are the only nation
living, as regards religion and military discipline, according to the
antique fashion; he would then see that the evil habits of that Court
would in no long space of time create more disorders than any other
misfortune that could arise there in any period whatever.' In this
scientific and deliberate opinion pronounced by the profoundest thinker
of the sixteenth century, the Papacy is accused of having caused both
the moral depravation and the political disunion of Italy. The second of
these points, which belongs to the general history of the Italian
nation, might be illustrated abundantly: but one other sentence from the
pen of Machiavelli exposes the ruinous and selfish policy of the Church
more forcibly than could be done by copious examples:[2] 'In this way
the Pontiffs at one time by love of their religion, at other times for
the furtherance of their ambitious schemes, have never ceased to sow the
seeds of disturbance and to call foreigners into Italy, spreading wars,
making and unmaking princes, and preventing stronger potentates from
holding the province they were too feeble to rule.'

[1] Lib. i. cap. 12.

[2] _Ist. Fior._ lib. i.

Guicciardini, commenting upon the _Discorsi_ of Machiavelli, begins his
gloss upon the passage I have just translated, with these emphatic
words:[1] 'It would be impossible to speak so ill of the Roman Court but
that more abuse would not be merited, seeing it is an infamy, an example
of all the shames and scandals of the world.' He then proceeds to argue,
like Machiavell