70
books, which is the first Italian effort of the kind with which we are acquainted. Neither was Vergerio idle in repelling the attack, and in exposing the character of the infamous censor.
That the character of infamous properly belongs to the Archbishop of Benevento, is, in effect, freely acknowledged by his friends. It is plainly admitted by his latest biographer, Casotti; and though there should remain any doubt as to the most formidable charge against his morals, in an infamous poem which he could not disown, the very ambiguity and the shuffling defence which he has made of himself, are sufficient to convict him of quite guilt enough.[1] The scurrilous Dissertatio levelled against his main accuser carries with it its own confutation, if it had not been completely repelled by the learned Schelhorn, in a particular treatise to that effect, Ulmæ, 1754.[2] It is not at all unlikely that Casa had something to do with both the Catalogues of 1554, at least the Venetian, as well as with the first.
