In spite of his worldliness, Leo prayed, fasted, and was exact in religious observance. To the virtues of liberality, charity and clemency he added the Machiavellian qualities of falsehood and shrewdness, so highly esteemed by the princes of his time. He failed entirely in his general policy of expelling foreigners from Italy, of restoring peace throughout Europe, and of prosecuting war against the Turks. He failed to recognize the need of reform within the church and the dangers which threatened the papal monarchy; and he neglected the spiritual needs of the time. He was zealous in establishing the political power of the Holy See; he made it unquestionably supreme in Italy; he successfully restored the papal power in France ; and he secured a prominent place in the history of culture.
life of Leo X. was written shortly after his death by Paolo Giovio, bishop of Nocera, who had known him intimately. Other important contemporary sources are the Italian History of the Florentine writer Guicciardini, covering the period 1492-1530 (Milan, 1884) ; the reports of the Venetian ambassadors, Marino Giorgi (1517), Marco Minio (1520) and Luigi Gradenigo (1523), in vol. iii. of the 2nd series of Le Relazioni degli ambasciatori Veneti, edited by Alberi (Florence, 1846) ; and the Diarii of the Vene tian Marino Sanuto (58 vols., 1879-1903). Other materials for the biography are to be found in the incomplete Regesta edited by Joseph Cardinal Hergenrother (Freiburg-i.-B., 5884 ff.) ; in the Turin collec
tion of papal bulls (1859, etc.) ; in 11 Diario di Leone X. dai volumi manoscritti degli archivi Vaticani della S. Sede connote di M. Armellini (Rome, 5884) ; and in "Documenti risguardanti Giovanni de' Medici e it pontifice Leone X.," appendix to vol. I of the Archivio storico Italian° (Florence, 1842).
See L. Pastor, Geschichte der Piipste ins Zeitalter der Renaissance u. der Glaubensspaltung von der Wahl Leos X. bis zum Tode Klenzens VII. part I (Freiburg-i.-B., 1906) ; M. Creighton, History of the Papacy, vol. 6 (19o1) ; F. Gregorovius, Rome in the Middle Ages, trans. by Mrs. G. W. Hamilton, vol. viii., part I (1902) ; L. von Ranke, History of the Popes, vol. i., trans. by E. Foster in the Bohn Library ; Histoire de France, ed. by E. Lavisse, vol. 5, part I (1903) ; Walter Friedensburg, "Ein rotulus familiae Papst Leos X.," in Quellen u. Forschungen aus italienischen Archiven u. Bibliotheken, vol. vi. (1904) ; W. Roscoe, Life and Pontificate of Leo X. (6th ed., 1853), a celebrated biography but out of date in spite of the valuable notes of the German and Italian translators, Henke and Bossi ; F. S. Nitti, Leone X. e la sua politica secondo documenti e carteggi inediti (Florence, 1892) ; A. Schulte, Die Fugger in Rom 1495-1523 (Leipzig, 5906) ; and H. M. Vaughan, The Medici Popes (1908).