The intellectual culture of the newly awakened civilization began after Petrarch had abandoned his scholastic methods of rea soning and the Dantesque scourge made use of ridicule to undo scholastics, astrologers, physi cians and other charlatans, and placed the ignored Plato above the dominant Aristotle. And it did not stop here; Florence, Arezzo, Bologna, Ferrara, Venice, also the seats of the Renaissance. At Naples, the king of preachers, converted by Petrarch; in Milan, the Archbishop Giovanni Visconti, his . host; in Piacenza, Mantua, Padua, Verona, the da Cor reggio, the Gonzaga, the Da Carrara, the Della Scala, friends of Petrarch; in Avignon, 'popes not indifferent to the new philosophy, his gener ous admirers, formed the first nucleus of that company of Ma.cenates of the Renaissance, numerous even in the 14th century, innumer able in the succeeding century.
Already the movement was becoming ever J more intensified; little by little the faint voice of the Classics was made more audible, and the ruins uttered their words, and the treasures were brought forth from the cloisters and churches.. At the end almost of the 1st century of Humanism (about 1414), those persons who were only moderately cultured were already animated by the spirit of the, new age, and classical culture had become an indispensable requisite to all who loved civilized society.
In the middle of the 14th century all minds were so well disposed that the design of Cola di Rienzi, so nobly conceived, seemed feasible. In Italy, Humanism' had from the beginning patriotic characteristics. It is worthy of note that precisely in the 14th century there arose in' Sicily a Latin faction in opposition to a foreign faction — the Catalana; Alberigo da Barbiano with an Italian character in a com pany of adventurers till then foreigners. The whole of Italy, either by money or by peaceful and unopposed usurpation, acquired political in dependence. Humanism, meanwhile, invaded the pontifical domain; first in Avignon, with the friends of Petrarch— Zanobi da Strada and Francesco Bnini; thence (when the schism was almost at an end), in Rome, where it soon mastered the papal secretary. In Florence and Bologna, with the Visconti and the Estensi, and all through the too numerous states of the Peninsula, convents, bishoprics and universi ties with more or less caution opened their gates to Humanism. At the time of the Coun cil Of Constance (1414-18) the Renaissance re ceived another impulse from the many and happy discoveries of Poggio, and subsequently from .those of other unwearying searches of the Codices. They filled up deplorable gaps and improved our knowledge of classical eiviliza tie*, The Humanists of the recent school diffused the knowledge of Greek civilization from the rostrum, searched for, guarded and preserved Greek Codici; excavations and travel enriched with inscriptions and the results of precious labor the museums which were then being established. Ciriaco Ancottitano and
Aurispa da Noto made themselves famous; the former by his collection of inscriptions, and the latter by his ferreting out of manuscripts; while Flavio Biondo, of Forli, with Poggio, the Florentine, restored archaeology. Then for the second time the• favor of princes and re publics, of universities, cardinals, magnates was sought in order to obtain the rarest antiquities, the best manuscripts.
In 1447 Humanism issued triumphant, amid universal plaudits and rejoicing, in the very chair of Saint Peter (Tommaso Parentucelh, Nicholas V). In 1488, the poet, whom an em peror had crowned with laurel, assumed the name of Pius II (Enea Silvio Piccolominiy. In the 15th century it had, besides the popes', the splendid protection of Alfonso the Mag nanimous, of 'the Estensi, the Sforzas, the Mala testas, the Gonzagas and the Montefeltros; but at the head of them all stood Cosimo de' Medici, and Lorenzo de' Medici the Magnificent, who were •the most sincere lovers of Humanism.
At the very time when the students of moral science approached the thought of the classics, the artists demanded of antiquity the secret by which they' might produce artificially the fascination which the beauty of nature'exercises over the human. mind. Although their attempts were not always successful they arrived at the first transformation of mediaeval art, which is distinguished by the glorious names of Dona tello, Mantegna, Leon Battista Alberti. AR the artistic manifestations of human sentiment be came modified, from the greatest to the least. There is the Humanistic literature and the liter ature of the Renaissance. At this time, Human ism had reached its apex. Humanism brought discord into the camp of the Latinists. All minds were partisans of Plato or Aristotle. At Padua, Averroism began to revive. The Middle" Ages also seemed about to revive. The orators became rhetoricians; writers sometimes became awkward imitators; canvases and walls became peopled with fauns; and the philosophers in reviving the forms of ceremonies no longer understood made themselves an object of• ridi cule to the Humanists themselves. The reaction came, and even before Savonarola planned his Catholic reform other men in the Church had set out to fight the spirit of the Renaissance, which now entrenched on the very foundations of the religion of which they were the ministers. At the same time sincere Humanists reacted not so much against the Boccaccio sincerity as against the obscurity which never was, and never can be, the aim of any true art.