Guicciardini was advanced to the governorship of Bologna, the most important of all the Papal lord-lieutenancies. This post he resigned in 1534 on the election of Paul III., preferring to follow the fortunes of the Medicean princes at Florence. In this sketch of his career I must not omit to mention that Guicciardini was declared a rebel in 1527 by the popular government on account of his well-known Medicean prejudices, and that in 1530 he had been appointed by Clement VII. to punish the rebellious citizens. On the latter occasion he revenged himself for the insults offered him in 1527 by the cruelty with which he pushed proscription to the utmost limits, relegating his enemies to unhealthy places of exile, burdening them with intolerable fines, and using all the indirect means which his ingenuity could devise for forcing them into outlawry and contumacy.[3] Therefore when he returned to inhabit Florence, he did so as the creature of the Medici, sworn to maintain the bastard Alessandro in his power. He was elected a member of the Senate of eighty; and so thoroughly did he espouse the cause of his new master, that he had the face to undertake the Duke's defense before Charles V. at Naples in 1535. On this occasion Alessandro, who had rendered himself unbearable by his despotic habits, and in particular by the insults which he offered to women of all ranks and conditions in Florence, was arraigned by the exiles before the bar of Cæsar. Guicciardini won the cause of his client, and restored Alessandro with an Imperial confirmation of his despotism to Florence. This period of his political career deserves particular attention, since it displays a glaring contradiction between some of his unpublished compositions and his actions, and confirms the accusations of his enemies.[4] That he should have preferred a government of Ottimati, or wealthy nobles, to a more popular constitution, and that he should have adhered with fidelity to the Medicean faction in Florence, is no ground for censure.[5] But when we find him in private unmasking the artifices of the despots by the most relentless use of frigid criticism, and advocating a mixed government upon the type of the Venetian Constitution, we are constrained to admit with Varchi and Pitti that his support of Alessandro was prompted less by loyalty than by a desire to gratify his own ambition and avarice under the protective shadow of the Medicean tyranny.[6] He belonged in fact to those selfish citizens whom Pitti denounces, diplomatists and men of the world, whose thirst for power induced them to play into the hands of the Medici, wishing to suck the state[7] themselves, and to hold the prince in the leading-strings of vice and pleasure for their own advantage.[8] After the murder of Alessandro, it was principally through Guicciardini's influence that Cosimo was placed at the head of the Florentine Republic with the title of Duke. Cosimo was but a boy, and much addicted to field sports. Guicciardini therefore reckoned that, with an assured income of 12,000 ducats, the youth would be contented to amuse himself, while he left the government of Florence in the hands of his Vizier.[9] But here the wily politician overreached himself. Cosimo wore an old head on his young shoulders. With decent modesty and a becoming show of deference, he used Guicciardini as his ladder to mount the throne by, and then kicked the ladder away. The first days of his administration showed that he intended to be sole master in Florence. Guicciardini, perceiving that his game was spoiled, retired to his villa in 1537 and spent the last years of his life in composing his histories. The famous Istoria d' Italia was the work of one year of this enforced retirement. The question irresistibly rises to our mind, whether some of the severe criticisms passed upon the Medici in his unpublished compositions were the fruit of these same bitter leisure hours.[10] Guicciardini died in 1540 at the age of fifty-eight, without male heirs.
[1] See the 'Apologia de' Cappucci,' Arch. Stor. vol. iv. part 2, p. 318.
[2] For the avarice of Guicciardini, see Varchi, vol. i. p. 318. His Ricordi Politici amply justify the second, though not the first, clause of this sentence.
[3] See Varchi, book xii. (and especially cap. xxv.), for these arts; he says, 'Nel che messer Francesco Guicciardini si scoperse più crudele e più appassionato degli altri.'
[4] Knowing what sort of tyrant Alessandro was, and remembering 'hat Guicciardini had written (Ricordi, No. ccxlii.): 'La calcina con che si murano gli stati de' tiranni è il sangue de' cittadini: però doverebbe sforzarsi ognuno che nella città sua non s'avessino a murare tali palazzi,' it is very difficult to approve of his advocacy of the Duke.
[5] Though even here the selfish ambition of the man was apparent to contemporaries: 'egli arebbe voluto uno stato col nome d' Ottimati, ma in fatti de' Pochi, nel quale larghissima parte, per le sue molte e rarissime qualità, meritissimamente gli si venia.'—Varchi, vol. i. p. 318.
[6] Guicciardini's Storia Fiorentina and Reggimento di Firenze (Op. Ined. vols. i, and iii.) may be consulted for his private critique of the Medici. What was the judgment passed upon him by contemporaries may be gathered from Varchi, vols. i. pp. 238, 318; ii. 410; iii. 204. Segni, pp. 219, 332. Nardi, vol. ii. p. 287. Pitti, quoted in Arch. Stor. vol. i. p. xxxviii., and the 'Apologia de' Cappucci' (Arch. Stor. vol. iv. pt. 2). It is, however, only fair to Guicciardini to record here his opinion, expressed in Ricordi, Nos. ccxx. and cccxxx., that it was the duty of good citizens to seek to guide the tyrant: 'Credo sia uficio di buoni cittadini, quando la patria viene in mano di tiranni, cercare d'avere luogo con loro per potere persuadere il bene, e detestare il male; e certo è interesse della città che in qualunque tempo gli uomini da bene abbino autorità; e ancora che gli ignoranti e passionati di Firenze l' abbino sempre intesa altrimenti, si accorgerebbono quanta pestifero sarebbe il governo de' Medici, se non avessi intorno altri che pazzi e cattivi.'
[7] See Varchi, vol. iii. p. 204. 'Che Cosimo … succiarsi lo stato.'
[8] Pitti dips his pen in gall when he describes these citizens: 'Cotesti vogliosi Ottimati; i quali non hanno saputo mai ritrovare luogo che piaccia loro, sottomendosi ora al Medici per l'ingorda avarizia; ora gittandosi al popolo, per non potere a modo loro tiraneggiare; ora rivendendolo a' Medici, vedutisi scoperti e raffrenati da lui; e sempre mai con danno della Repubblica, e di ciascuna parte, inquieti, insaziabili e fraudolenti.—'Apologia de' Cappucci,' Arch. Stor. xv. pt. ii. p. 215.
[9] Here is a graphic touch in Varchi's History, vol. iii. p. 202. Guicciardini is discussing the appointment of Cosimo de' Medici: 'Gli dovessero esser pagati per suo piatto ogn' anno 12,000 fiorini d' oro, e non più, avendo il Guicciardino, abbassando il viso e alzando gli occhi, detto: "Un 12,000 fiorini d' oro è—un bello spendere."'
[10] Pitti seems to have taken this view: see 'Apologia de' Cappucci' (Arch. Stor. vol. iv. part ii. p. 329): 'Tosto che 'l duca Cosimo lo pose a sedere insieme con certi altri suoi colleghi, si adirò malamente; e se la disputa della provvisione non l' avesse ritenuto, sarebbe ito a servire papa Pagolo terzo. Onde, restato confuso e disperato, si tratteneva alla sua villa di Santa Margarita a Montici; dove transportato dalla stizza ritoccò in molte parti la sua Istoria, per mostrare di non essere stato della setta Pallesca; e dove potette, accattó l' occasione di parere istrumento della Repubblica.'