matters taken for Christopher Urswick, as he undoubtedly is in his supposed writings on the Civil Law. What were his duties on his mission to the Court of Julius the Second in 1509, and how he discharged them, may be in part gathered from the following extract. "By the intrigues of this ambitious Pontiff, (says Hume) a league had been formed at Cambray (1508) between himself, Maximilian, Lewis, and Ferdinand; and the object of this great confederacy was to overwhelm by their united arms the Commonwealth of Venice. Henry without any motive from interest or passion allowed his name to be inserted in the confederacy. This oppressive and iniquitous league was but too successful against the Republic. The great force and secure situations of the considerable monarchies prevented any one from aspiring to any conquest of moment, and though this consideration could not maintain general peace, or remedy the natural inquietude of men, it rendered the Princes of this age more disposed to desert engagements, and change their alliances in which they were retained by humour and caprice rather than by any natural or durable interest. Julius had no sooner humbled the Venetian Republic, than he was inspired with a nobler ambition, that of expelling all Foreigners from Italy, or to speak in the style affected by the Italians of that age, the freeing of that Country entirely from the dominion of Barbarians. He was determined to make the tempest fall first upon Lewis, in order to pave the way for this great enterprise, he at once sought for a ground of quarrel with the Monarch, and courted the alliances of other Princes. He declared war against the Duke of Ferrara-the confederate of Lewis. He solicited the favor of England, by sending Henry a sacred rose perfumed with musk, and anointed with chrism. He engaged in his interests Bainbridge, Archishop of York, and Henry's Ambassador at Rome, whom he soon after created a Cardinal.*** Henry, naturally sincere and sanguine in his temper, and the more so on account of his youth and inexperience, was moved with a hearty desire of protecting the Pope from the oppression to which he believed him exposed from the ambitious enterprises of Lewis. Hopes had been given him by Julius, that the title of Most Christian King (which had hitherto been annexed to the Crown of France, and which was regarded as its most precious ornament) should in reward of his services be transferred to that of England. Impatient also of acquiring that distinction in Europe to which his power and opulence entitled him, he could not long remain neuter amidst the noise of arms, and the natural enmity of the English against France as well as their ancient claims upon that Kingdom led Henry to join that alliance which the Pope, Spain, and Venice had formed against the French Monarch. A herald was sent to Paris to exhort Lewis not to VOL. I. E wage impious war against the Sovereign Pontiff, and when he returned without success another was sent to demand the ancient Patrimonial Provinces of Anjou, Maine, Guienne, and Normandy. This message was understood to be a declaration of war, and a Parliament being summoned readily granted supplies for a purpose so much favored by the English Nation*." Although Christopher Fisher was the bearer of this golden or sacred roset, all historians agree in ascribing to the Archbishop's skill and influence with the English Monarch his espousal of the cause of the Sovereign Pontiff, and joining the Holy League against Lewis-an interference fatal to the ambition of the French Monarch, as regards Milan and Naples, and no less fatal, without just cause or scintilla of interest in England, to the finest balance of power Europe ever saw, perhaps may ever see again. What countless treasures have been expended, what quantities of human blood been spilt by England in such like Quixotic errands! When will she learn to be wise, and content herself by fighting her own battles? But it is an ill wind that blows nobody good: it was out of gratitude to the Legate for this signal service, that Julius got for him what (according to Ciaconius) he had long coveted, namely, a Cardinal's cap. These additional honors were heaped upon Baynbrigg in the month of March 1511, under the * Hume's Hist. of England. + See Rymer's Fœdera, 1510, p. 289. title of Cardinal St. Praxede or St. Praxis. One step higher, and he would have robbed Nicholas Breakspeare (Hadrian the 4th) of the proud distinction of being the only Englishman that ever filled the Papal Throne. But "Non cuivis homini contingit adire Corinthum." It is not every man's fortune (nor perhaps wish since the 24th February 1848) to wear a Crown. The sun of our Cardinal was now culminating and somewhat overcast. A few days after he donned the scarlet cap, he was appointed Legate of the Ecclesiastical Army which had been sent against the Duc of Ferrara-the confederate of Lewis, then besieging the fort of Bastia. What his duties were on this embassy we are quite at a loss to understand; remembering, however, that the Holy Pontiff himself was wont to doff his sacred jacket, and actually work in the trenches with the spirit of one fleshed in human blood, as he did at Mirandola, it is no unfair surmise That Baynbrigg too Was also of that stubborn crew; And prove their doctrine orthodox By apostolic blows and knocks; Call fire and sword and desolation For nothing else but to be mended*." The active and enterprising spirit of Julius II. had now run its courset; and John De Medicis had become the Sovereign Pontiff, by the style and title of Leo X.; a name associated with everything that adds dignity to human nature; the patron of every art, the friend of every virtue. It is written somewhere, that after Julius' death, this our Cardinal undertook to defend his memory from some attacks made upon it; and the letters are said to be in Rymer's Fœdera. We have searched in vain for them; there is only one, and upon another subject; one from Baynbrigg to Henry the 8th bearing date the 12th September 1513 beginning with some idle compliments upon La Journée d'Espérons, and ending with Your Most Humble Beedman and Subject. But one, yet that one how fatal to his character and to his memory! how revolting its suggestions to every well-regulated mind! It is a recorded saying that Ambassadors are persons sent abroad to tell lies for the benefit of their country. There seems, indeed, to be something in diplomacy which eats like a canker-worm into the moral sense, * Hudibras. +21 February 1513. 13 Rymer's Fœdera, 349. |