[2] In the sentences which close the 11th chapter of the _Prince_.
[3] Mach. _Prince_, ch. xvii. In the Satires of Ariosto (Satire i. 208-27) there is a brilliant and singularly outspoken passage on the nepotism of the Popes and its ruinous results for Italy.
Former Pontiffs had raised money by the sale of benefices and indulgences: this, of course, Alexander also practiced--to such an extent, indeed, that an epigram gained currency: 'Alexander sells the keys, the altars, Christ. Well, he bought them; so he has a right to sell them.' But he went further and took lessons from Tiberius. Having sold the scarlet to the highest bidder, he used to feed his prelate with rich benefices. When he had fattened him sufficiently, he poisoned him, laid hands upon his hoards, and recommenced the game. Paolo Capello, the Venetian Ambassador, wrote in the year 1500: 'Every night they find in Rome four or five murdered men, Bishops and Prelates and so forth.' Panvinius mentions three Cardinals who were known to have been poisoned by the Pope; and to their names may be added those of the Cardinals of Capua and of Verona.[1] To be a prince of the Church was dangerous in those days; and if the Borgia had not at last poisoned himself by mistake, he must in the long-run have had to pay people to accept so perilous a privilege. His traffic in Church dignities was carried on upon a grand scale: twelve Cardinals' hats, for example, were put to auction in a single day in 1500.[2] This was when he wished to pack the Conclave with votes in favor of the cession of Romagna to Cesare Borgia, as well as to replenish his exhausted coffers. Forty-three Cardinals were created by him in eleven promotions: each of these was worth on an average 10,000 florins; while the price paid by Francesco Soderini amounted to 20,000 and that paid by Domenico Grimani reached the sum of 30,000.
[1] See the authorities in Burckhardt, pp. 93, 94.
Former Popes had preached crusades against the Turk, languidly or energetically according as the coasts of Italy were threatened. Alexander frequently invited Bajazet to enter Europe and relieve him of the princes who opposed his intrigues in the favor of his children. The fraternal feeling which subsisted between the Pope and the Sultan was to some extent dependent on the fate of Prince Djem, a brother of Bajazet and son of the conqueror of Constantinople, who had fled for protection to the Christian powers, and whom the Pope kept prisoner, receiving 40,000 ducats yearly from the Porte for his jail fee. Innocent VIII. had been the first to snare this lucrative guest in 1489. The Lance of Longinus was sent him as a token of the Sultan's gratitude, and Innocent, who built an altar for the relique, caused his own tomb to be raised close by. His effigy in bronze by Pollajuolo still carries in its hand this blood-gift from the infidel to the High Priest of Christendom.