394 DEATH OF GONSALVO. PART II. His perfidy. over their actions and enterprises, frequently dis- guising their true character, even from themselves. It will not be so easy to acquit Ferdinand of the reproach of perfidy which foreign writers have so deeply branded on his name,^^ and which those of his own nation have sought rather to palliate than to deny. ^^ It is but fair to him, however, even here, to take a glance at the age. He came for- ward when government was in a state of transition from the feudal forms to those which it has assumed in modern times ; when the superior strength of the great vassals was circumvented by the superior policy of the reigning princes. It was the dawn of the triumph of intellect over the brute force, which had hitherto controlled the movements of nations, as of individuals. The same policy which these monarchs had pursued in their own domestic relct-tions, they introduced into those with foreign states, when, at the close of the fifteenth century, the barriers that had so long kept them asunder were broken down. Italy was the first field, on 55 Guicciardini, Istoria, lib. 12, p. 273. — Du Bellay, Memoires, apud Petitot, Collection des Me- moires, torn. xvii. p. 272. — Giovio, Hist, sui Temporis, lib. 11, p. 160 ; lib. 16, p. 336. — Machiaveili, Op- era, torn. ix. Lett. Diverse, no. 6, ed. Milano, 1805. — Herbert, Life of Henry Vni., p. 63. — Sismondi, R^publiques Italiennes, torn. xvi. cap. 112. — Voltaire sums up Fer- dinand's character in the following pithy sentence. " On I'appellait en Espagne le sage, 1e pruf/ait ; en Italie le pieux ; en France et a Lon- dres le perfide.^ Essai sur les Moeurs, chap. 114. 56 " Home era de verdad," says Pulgar, "como quiera que las ne- cesidades grandes en que le pusieron las guerras, le facian algunas veces variar." (Reyes Catolicos, part. 2, cap. 3.) Zurita exposes and condemns this blemish in his hero's character, with a candor which does him credit. " Fue muy no- tado, no solo de los estrangeros, pero de sus naturales, que no guar- dava la verdad, y fe que prometia; y que se anteponia siempre, y so- brepujava el respeto de su propria utilidad, a lo que era justo y iiones- to." Anales, tom. vi. fol. 406.
