People place far too much faith in them. In short I can only grieve over all this and beg you again to use all your cleverness in order to arrange matters, for you have no idea how it vexes and irritates me. If you knew how much, you would never rest until you have taken it off my mind.--October 1489.[380] Lorenzo de’ Medici _to_ Monseigneur d’Argenton (Philippe de Comines) My illustrious Lord,--I have received a letter from Your Seigneury by the same hand that takes this, and am extremely concerned at the displeasure you express about the last account sent in by Cosimo Saxetti [Sassetti, head of the Medici bank at Lyons] to Your Seigneury. It would afflict me still more if I thought that this might cause you to doubt my gratitude towards Your Seigneury, to whom I am so much beholden in infinite ways, that I should indeed deserve to be called a most ungrateful man if I did not repay you the money I owe for the many benefits received from Your Seigneury in adversity and in prosperity. But after a strict examination of my conscience I can assure Your Seigneury that neither I nor any of my house will ever forget this. If therefore anything Cosimo Saxetti has said about Your Seigneury’s participation has given such an impression I should be deeply grieved, as it would be the reverse of the truth and of my intentions. I confess that for some time, as Your Seigneury well knows, the losses of our bank at Lyons have been so considerable that it has been impossible to conceal them, or to avoid lamenting over them with those who, like Your Seigneury, have been and are masters of what is mine. The aforesaid Cosimo has thus perhaps annoyed Your Seigneury, but you may be certain that I would never raise any question as to a statement of yours, either what you now write or at any future time. Your Seigneury can freely dispose not only of the entire sum which you mention as being a matter of dispute between Your Seigneury and Cosimo, but of everything I possess as though it belonged to you. You may therefore rest assured that all will be arranged between Your Seigneury and myself so satisfactorily that no question will ever arise, for I set greater store on the good graces of Your Seigneury than on the largest sum of money in the world.--December 11, 1489.[381] [Illustration: _Alinari_ LORENZO DI PIERO DE’ MEDICI, AND THREE MEMBERS OF THE SASSETI FAMILY. _In the fresco by Domenico Ghirlandaio in the Church of S. Trinità, Florence._]