IL CORTEGIANO. 'The Cortegiano) of Baldassare Castiglione (1528) deals with the "formation of the perfect courtier." The author represents these dialogues as a social °game" actually played at the court of Urbino,presided over by the Petrarchistic genius of Cardinal Pietro Bembo and reckoned as the most elegant centre of fashion in Italy at that time. 'The Cortegiano> thus gives striking and authorita tive portraits of leading personalities of the Italian Renaissance, and its vivid picture of society ranks, for scope and reliability, above the prefaces to Bandello's tales and even above the autobiography of Cellini. In central intent the volume has a narrow purpose: it is the handbook of the professional court gentleman, hard to distinguish from the perennial Italian adventurer. No inconsiderable portion of the maxims of Castiglione reflect that hard-headed materialism made so famous by Machiavelli in sociology and political theory. Castiglione is as free from delusions about human nature as the great Florentine secretary. He is equally ex pert in the psychology of malice. 'The Cor tegiano> like 'The Prince' places sagacity above other virtues. The courtier's business is to succeed in life, not by good intentionz, but by a triumph of wits. But upon this aspect of Cas tiglione's ethics, so typical of -his race and period, the vast public ws' ich
Cortegiano' has reached through the centuries has been loath to linger. In a broader sense the "per fect courtier)) has been taken as the •model for any gentleman of the leisure class. The Italian tyrannies, in fact, of the early 16th century, reached the perfection of Italian social life at a time when Italy, assimilating the best that French and especially Spanish chivalry had to offer, was leading the world in good manners and setting to a large extent the standards of cultivated elegance that have ever since pre vailed.
aghast at the demands they make on the ideal gentleman, and his partner, the Heal lady (Book III). The courtier must be expert in arms and statecraft, learned in "the two lan guages," a scholar and writer in his own tongue, accomplished, at least as connoisseur, in the fine arts, with some skill in music and a flawless training in dancing, games of chance and skill, hunting, athletics, as well, of course, as in conversation for all situations and people, in etiquette and the art of dress. Never was a book on manners so nobly and liberally con ceived. For Castiglione would have his courtier incarnate the highest moral ideals and express the widest culture of his environment. In its review of the ethical, philosophical and aesthetic problems that preoccupied the cultivated people of its time,