Note *99 — Chapter XXV

This hardly needs comment: it has become universally accepted as the truth. The Prediche Volgari of Fra Bernardino afford ample evidence, as do the Novelle generally. I shall therefore confine myself to referring to two English writers who have treated of this subject: William Heywood, The Ensamples of Fra Filippo (Siena, 1902), pp. 118, 122 et seq. and 295 et seq., who gives an infinite number of authorities and is exhaustive in his evidence; Vernon Lee, Euphorion (Fisher Unwin, 1899), pp. 25-109, who treats of it in two essays, The Sacrifice and The Italy of the Elizabethan Dramatist, with exquisite understanding and the wide tolerance of a poet. Nothing is to be gained by going into this subject so casually as Dennistoun does. He speaks of the Italian genius without understanding either its strength or its weakness. He judges Machiavelli, for instance, or Cesare Borgia, as one might have judged an Englishman of the depressing age he himself lived in, and thus his judgment is at fault in regard to nearly every great man of whom he writes.