the Pope, was the head of all the Churches.” This idea was a devout imagination, and was never actually and fully expressed in fact. No Eastern nation or Church ever agreed with it; and the temporal lordship of the Emperors was never completely acknowledged even in the West. Still it ruled in men’s minds with all the force of an ideal. As the modern nations of Europe came gradually into being, the real headship of the Emperor became more and more shadowy. But both headships could prevent the national consolidation of the countries, Germany and Italy, in which the possessors dwelt. All this is, as has been said, a commonplace of history, and, like all commonplaces, it contains a great deal of truth. Still it may be questioned whether the mediæval idea was solely responsible for the disintegration of either Germany or Italy in the sixteenth century. A careful study of the conditions of things in both countries makes us see that many causes were at work besides the mediæval idea—conditions geographical, social, and historical. Whatever the causes, the disintegration of these two lands was in marked contrast to the consolidation of the three other nations. § 7. Italy. In the end of the fifteenth century, Italy contained a very great number of petty principalities and five States which might be called the great powers of Italy—Venice, Milan, and Florence in the north, Naples in the south, and the States of the Church in the centre. Peace was kept by a delicate and highly artificial balance of powers. Venice was a commercial republic, ruled by an oligarchy of nobles. The city in the lagoons had been founded by trembling fugitives fleeing before Attila’s Huns, and was more than a thousand years old. It had large territories on the mainland of Italy, and colonies extending down the east coast of the Adriatic and among the Greek islands. It had the largest revenue of all the Italian States, but its expenses were also much the heaviest. Milan came next in wealth, with its yearly income of over 700,000 ducats. At the close of the century it was in the possession of the Sforza family, whose founder had been born a ploughman, and had risen to be a formidable commander of mercenary soldiers. It was claimed by Maximilian as a fief of the Empire, and by the Kings of France as a heritage of the Dukes of Orleans. The disputed heritage was one of the causes of the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. Florence, the most cultured city in Italy, was, like Venice, a commercial republic; but it was a democratic republic, wherein one family, the Medici, had usurped almost despotic power while preserving all the external marks of republican rule.