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Lodovico, called II Moro, not, as the great historian asserts, because he was of dark complexion, but because he had adopted the mulberry-tree for his device, was in himself an epitome of all the qualities which for the last two centuries had contributed to the degradation of Italy in the persons of the despots.
Poor human kind! is it always to breed serpents from its own bowels? In one country, it chooses its representatives, and they sell it and themselves; in others, it exalts despots; in another, it resists the despot when he consults the good of his people! Can we wonder mankind is wretched, when men are such beings? Parliaments run wild with loyalty, when America is to be enslaved or butchered.
As far as I am permitted to divulge this secret, I am a conspirator in an immense revolution, terrible to charlatans and despots, to all exploiters of the poor and credulous, to all salaried idlers, dealers in political panaceas and parables, tyrants in a word of thought and of opinion. I labor to stir up the reason of individuals to insurrection against the reason of authorities.
Naturally it appeared that the function of the republic in the progress of the world was to till its own garden, and to afford a haven of refuge to the oppressed and impoverished who poured in from all lands; and this idea was strengthened by the great number of immigrants who were driven to the New World by the failure of the successive European revolutions of the nineteenth century, and by the oppressive tyranny of the Habsburg monarchy and the Russian despots.
Such a state of mind is incompatible not only with the democratic introduction of high civilization, but with the comprehension and maintenance of such civilized institutions as have been introduced by benevolent and intelligent despots and aristocrats. We Must Reform Society before we can Reform Ourselves
But the difference is in degree, not in principle; and the best despots often go the greatest lengths in chaining up the free agency of their subjects.
When he helped to establish despots in Milan and Bologna he was rendering the presidency of his own family in Florence necessary. Lorenzo, having received this invitation, called attention to his youth and inexperience.
Few indeed have been the despots who have refrained from acts of cruelty, or who have uniformly been governed by reason. Even in private life, very successful men have an imperious air, as if they were accustomed to submission and deference; but a monarch of Russia, how can he be otherwise than despotic and self-conscious?
Though their fiefs in Romagna and the March were still held but loosely, though their provinces swarmed with petty despots who defied the Papal authority, and though the princely Roman houses of Colonna and Orsini were still strong enough to terrorise the Holy Father in the Vatican, it was now clear that the Papal See must in the end get the better of its adversaries, and consolidate itself into a first-rate Power.
To speak honestly, and with all deference to the feelings of this very respectable gentleman, John had no legitimate right to be thus mixed up in this squabble of European despots; nor should he have permitted himself to be led into it on the one side by that imperial transgressor, and driven on the other by his own beer-shop politicians.
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