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A DECADE OF ITALIAN WOMEN . A Decade of Italian Women . By T . Adolphus Trollope . In 2 vols . Chapman and Hall . The position of woman in societ : one of the most significant types of the civilisation of a country . Impressed with this- truth , Mr . Trollope has , in the present work , sought to illustrate the condition of Italy , by tracing the lives often of its most eminent women . For this purpose he commences with the fourteenth century , and continues his selection down to the present . In forming an opinion of the character of these ladies , it is expedient , if not needfuL as our author virtually cautions us , to consider their environment—the circumstances by which they were surrounded , and modifiedand partly formed . The conditions of
, the stage on which they exhibited were peculiar , encumbered with difficulties and dangers , full of illusions and temptations , and for the most part as arbitrary as they were false and noxious . Only one of the selected ten appears in true Avomauly proportions , free from the vices and impurities of time and place , and altogether a genuine heroine . That one was the popular actress of the sixteenth century , Isabella Andreini;—in the words of the author , " a daughter of the people , and in that , as is said , perilous walk in life , a model of correct conduct in the midst of loose-lived princesses ^" Nor does there seem in her time to have been that opposition between " the world and the stage " which has since existed ; in her case , all the vices
were on the side of the former , all the virtues on heir . own . Even . the Church seems to have exhibited no antagonism against her ; but , not only to have permitted her burial in consecrated ground , but the erection of a monument to her memory , which still exists to her glory :- ^ - ¦¦ " All tin ' s gifted woman ' s . contemporaries are Tmanimous in testifying to her perfect propriety of conduct . In an age when-the relaxation of morals was extreme and general , when princesses led the lives of courtesans , when nunneries were scenes of disorder , and princes of the church were noticeable among other princes for greater dissoluteness , this flattered and courted
beautiful and universally actress won her way through all the difficulties , dangers , and snares that must have beset her path , without a stain on her character . We know that much of what she must have been obliged to touch , was pitch ; and yet she remained undefiled . Mnzzuchelli writes : ' What was most remarkable in her was , that in a profession universally j udged to be dangerous to female honour , she joined to a rare beauty the most perfect correctness and a most blameless life . ' And he adds , oddly , enough , ' the value of these good gifts was 'increased by her skill in singing , aud music , and by her knowledge of Spanish !' Isabella died in child
" On the 10 th of June . 1604 , - birth , at Lyons , in the forty-second year of her age , and was buried by the municipality of that city with much pomp , and all sorts of honours . Her husband placed the following inscription ovqr her tomb : — - " ' D . O . M . " ' Isabella Andreina , Patavina , IkIulior magnii virtute prajdita , Honqstatis Ornamentum , maritalisque I ' udicities Decus , Ore facuiida , Monte foocunda , religiosa , pia , Musis arnica , et Artis scenicao Caput , hie Itesurrectionem oxpoctat . Ob Obortum obiit iv . Idus Junii , MDCIV . annum agons XLII . Franciscus Andreinus Coirjux moostissimus posuit . ' " In English , freely i *
endercdr" 'Isabella Andreini , of Padua , a most highly gifted woman , the Soul of Honour , a model of conjugal chastity , eloquent of tongue , fertile of genius , religious , pious , beloved by the Muses , and a most distinguished member of the histrionic profession , here awaits her Resurrection , She died from a miscarriage on the loth of June , 100-1 , in the 42 nd year of her age . JiVanoosco Andreini , her deeply afflicted husband , placed this monument . ' " Baylo romarks on the close juxtaposition of the statement of hop profession , and her expectation of resurrection ; and observes that the circumstanco may servo to prove that the severity of tho Church
on tho subjoct of the sepulture of comedians hud been much exaggerated . But it would bo more correct to say , that 4 t proves tho action of tho Church in carrying out its views and principles to havo boon fitful , irregular , and subordinated to circumstances , as it in truth ever has boon . In the long , coasoloss battle of tho Church through century aftor century , against all that is not-church , it has always known how to retire temporarily from a point likely to bo too hotly contested , without by any means abandoning tho hope of reconquering tho ground at a more favourable moment . Always pushing on tho advanced posts of its pretensions in accurate correspondence with the amount of resistance It has been
met by , the polemical battle-front which , it has shown to its enemies from Pekin to Peru , has never been straight drawn by the rule of immutable principles , but ever a wavy line , with . undulations constantly in movement . And the startling fact that at Lyons , in the year 1604 , Isabella Andreini , avowing her calling , was at the same time permitted to assert publicly , that she hoped for" resurrection to life eternal , sIioavs only that so audacious a solecism was overlooked , because her standing in the public esteem , and the mood of the Lyons world at the moment , made it unwise to select that occasion for asserting the ecclesiastical claims . "
Af ter alL her peculiar profession is a world in itself ; and perhaps that fact may account for her comparative freedom from the baleful influences for which-the outer world was distinguished . It is by the principle of sacerdotal celibacy that Roman society is governed . It is this that , for the doubtful benefit of one class , sacrifices all the others a doubtful benefit indeed ! For the nature is violated in their persons that takes its revenges on the rest . The supposed policy has operated with a fatal skill , though with marvellous success . It has indeed , to adopt in part our author ' s language , cut off its priests from the great family of mankind , fenced out their hearts from all the most
sanctifying and ennobling sympathies of humanity , and made their interests , affections , prejudices , ambitions always distinct from , and oftea hostile to , those of their fellow creatures . Still , in this , as in every case of battle with the laws of nature , the measure of success accomplished does not attain to the reversal of these laws , but is limited to causing them ,-to operate injuriously instead of beneficially , for the race : More or less the female character must suffer from the corruption necessarily consequent on such an institution . From the Saint to . the . Arcadian Improyisatrice with which the series concludes , the women of every class are tainted with the general plague-spot" the trail of the serpent is over them ail . "
The _ earliest manifestations in which the _ system originated have a profound psychological interest . Mr ; Trollope has indeed endeavoured to trace this iii his ' biography of Saint Catherine of Siena , who was born in 1347 . There are not , lie tells us , many chapters of history more extraordinary and more perplexing than that which relates her . story . Even in * ' the dim despised wilderness of Romish hagiography" a stranger instance is scarcely discoverable : yet is it " not the product of
the dark night-time of history . " Petrarch aud Boccaccio were writing while she was working miracles . The scene of her strange doings was " one of the centres of human civilisation and progress . " Their historian was " the Blessed Raymond of Capua , " whose biograghy Mr . Trollope subjects to sevei-e criticism . The reprint of it , published in 1851 , in a popular form and at a popular price , he regards with no favourable eye . The circulation of such " safe literature" he characterises as so much " deliberate , calculated
and intentional soul-murder . " He passes , however , a milder opinion on Father Burlamacchi , who has edited her letters with tho learning and leaning of a Jesuit . Tho fact of tho case -appears to be that St . Catherine was a person subject to tho cataleptic trance , which by practice she was enabled voluntarily to induce . By these means she gained such influence , that even Pope Gregory listened to her advice and returned to Rome at her request . She practised severe austerities , and liad , when a child , a great dislike to washing her face ; whon induced to do it by her mother and sister , she felt that she had committed a great sin , and ever after spoke of her fault , at conlossion particularly , with sobs and tears . So abstinent was she , that at lust
she contrived to live , without food for many years . She had many visions , in ono of which she was espoused by the Lord , who loft on her finger a golden ring , with four pearls and a magnificent diamond in it , as witness of tho transaction ; only it was invisible to all but the saint herself . She was also a recipient of tho stigmata , thus imparting to the Dominicans tho distinction which the Franciscans had long exclusively possessed . She
could also turn water into wine . Indeed , there is no ond of her miracles , and in , all she excels all previous miracle-doers . Tho literary works of which she is the reputed , author wore taken from her dictation whon entranced . Similar phenomena and similar works are witnessed and written . among tho American Spiritualists , at the present day . Modem soienoo is now familiar with such eases , and their natural solution is not hard to hit . But
the fourteenth century was blind to the philosophy by which the eighteenth is able to explain such anomalies . We might hesitate , however , and justly , to admit that the story of the female saint in any sense was one that illustrated the position of Italian womon '; had the case been that of a cataleptic man , it might equally have answered the purpose of priestcraft . Nevertheless , the example serves to lay bare the-root , of the matter . Ignorance is the foundation of ' superstition .- The different degrees of ignorance mark the difference of periods . The later have fewer of these marks ; and in proportion as man ascends the ladder , and approaches the summit of the scale where the light of intelligence begins to dawn , the ages show an amelioration of manners and si < rns of social
improvement . The historian passes on into the fifteenth century ; from the affected poverty of the cliarch . into the pride , pomp , aiid circumstance" of state life , while he describes the progress of the feudal Chatelaine , and invokes what he calls the "Nemesis of despotism . " It was the time of the greatfainilyfounding Popes , and nepotism was at its height . Caterina Sforza is the heroine . Gorgeous hospitalities , glittering cavalcades , revellings , costumings , and reckless profusions of all kinds , diversified the scene . Catherine , only just eleven years old , was
a bride , betrothed publicly to Girolamo Kiareo , and was dazzled and delighted with -magnificence and splendour , and perhaps shocked also , by the occurrence of assassination and tyrannicide . The wild justice of revenge was then a social principle , and law was but little respected . Profligate debauchery was then the rule of life . Her beauty seems to have made a great impression on the Roman courtier , s ; and soon it happened that she found herself more powerful and eminent than any woman in Italy had been before ; so great a favourite" with- the Pope that most of the native jn-inces who had to of her
petition the apostolic see , availed themselves intercession . But she was surrounded with _ perils as wety . as with pleasures . Her husband w ; ls implicated , with Pope Sixtus , in the celebrated Pazzi murders . It is uncertain whether his young wife shared in the knowledge of the guilt . She seems , however , to have been equal to stern ( luties , as occasion -required in that irregular and disjointed state of society , when the safety of the mass consisted in imposing such inert resistance as was possible to the unreasonable will of an unrespected master . Even in her fall , Catherine was-not stunned . Increasing difficulties only showed her the more heroic : in our author ' s words , " Catherine was
the very belle-ideate of a sovereign Chatelaine in that stormy fifteenth century . At the age of twenty-six , her husband having been assassinated , she became a widow with six children . Her daring rose with the occasion , and the conspirators of Forli found themselves checkmated by a woman ; by her prudence , also , the city was saved from sack- She proved herself " capable of standing alone , and . holding her own and her son ' s inheritance , by her sole unaided prudence and energy . " Indeed , Mr . Trollopo has written her story to show how a woman under the feudal system could occupy a man ' s place , and demonstrate herself to be masculine enough to sustain its responsibility . Into the story of her second and third marriages , and tho murder of her second husband , we cannot
enter . Altogether Caterina Sforza is a strong dramatic character , and therefore it is that wo have been at pains to sketch it rather fully . Her faults were those of , 'her age . Passing into tho sixteenth century , we recognise changes' m Italian life , and in Vittoria Colonna an intellectual princess , highly educated , and uttering the fulness of her rich nature in poetry . Her sonnets , however , betray that a potential Protestantism was insinuating itself into the weft and wool of Catholic thought , and preparing tliu way lor further and moro important oliungori . Witu her
portrait , the first volume of tho work is ompellished . She was a great writor of ' aunnolH , some ot which fro fairly tmrwlutod . Hor moral conduct , both as a wife and mother , was irreproachable She was evidently n person in advance of her nge . . Tho njie , meanwhile , knoll' advancon ; and tho life of Tullia D'Arngona testifies to it » growing literary ohoraotor . Education then meant a knowledge Of Greek and Latin literature—it was classx * cal and pagan . The famous Tullia was tho daughter of Cardinal Tagliavia d' Aragonia , by GiuSa of Fcrrara , a kind of Asporia in her timo
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No . 473 ,. Apbu , 16 , TS 5 Q . 1 THE LEADER 4 9 3
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), April 16, 1859, page 493, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2290/page/13/
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