"If the Holy Father does not comply with my wishes, I swear by the sacred Cross that I will help the Turks to enter Italy," he declared to the Nuncio. He might have said, with the Latin poet, "Si flectere nequeo superos, Acheronta movebo."
His fertile and vehement imagination, and his far seeing, calculating intellect, combined in effecting his purposes. He flattered and threatened, he implored and commanded, he convinced or conquered or bribed his enemies. If he did not attain his ends by his logic and persuasive eloquence, or by his princely gifts, with swift dexterity he resorted to force. But if violent methods did not promise success, he forgot his former plan and once again became tranquil.
As a statesman, then, as in other respects, he was typical of the Renaissance. His cunning in design, his vigour in execution, the grand scale of his plans, and his indifference to the means, so long as the ends were achieved, made him seem like a pupil of the great Machiavelli, though long before Machiavelli's time. It is characteristic of the Renaissance politicians that they enlarged the stage for their combinations by involving one European country after another, and this feature may be seen in Matthias. His mind, his fertile imagination, and his feverish energy were typical of the fifteenth century. In respect of certain wild but majestic features in him, he had something in common with the famous lions which he used to keep in an enclosure of his palace, and which are mentioned by the poet Janus Pannonius.
Matthias was a consummate artist, with all the artistic intuitions of his age, but his art was politics, as that of Giovanni Dalmata was architecture, and that of Benedetto
