indicating superior elevation of character. In civil courage, in
perseverance, in presence of mind, those barbarous warriors, who
were foremost in the battle or the breach, were far his
inferiors. Even the dangers which he avoided with a caution
almost pusillanimous never confused his perceptions, never
paralysed his inventive faculties, never wrung out one secret
from his smooth tongue, and his inscrutable brow. Though a
dangerous enemy, and a still more dangerous accomplice, he could
be a just and beneficent ruler. With so much unfairness in his
policy, there was an extraordinary degree of fairness in his
intellect. Indifferent to truth in the transactions of life, he
was honestly devoted to truth in the researches of speculation.
Wanton cruelty was not in his nature. On the contrary, where no
political object was at stake, his disposition was soft and
humane. The susceptibility of his nerves and the activity of his
imagination inclined him, to sympathise with the feelings of
others, and to delight in the charities and courtesies of social
life. Perpetually descending to actions which might seem to mark
a mind diseased through all its faculties, he had nevertheless an
exquisite sensibility, both for the natural and the moral
sublime, for every graceful and every lofty conception. Habits of
petty intrigue and dissimulation might have rendered him
incapable of great general views, but that the expanding effect
of his philosophical studies counteracted the narrowing tendency.
He had the keenest enjoyment of wit, eloquence, and poetry. The
fine arts profited alike by the severity of his judgment, and by
the liberality of his patronage. The portraits of some of the
remarkable Italians of those times are perfectly in harmony with
this description. Ample and majestic foreheads, brows strong and
dark, but not frowning, eyes of which the calm full gaze, while