The massacre of Sinigaglia has been condemned by every writer except Machiavelli, and posterity has in severe retribution suspected him of abetting it. This charge possesses a twofold interest, as inculpating the character of the historian, and as affecting the morality of the age.[*3] In the latter view alone does it fall under our consideration: yet however horrible these wholesale murders, they are more remarkable in Italian history as the crowning crime of an ambitious career, and as widely influencing the political aspect of Romagna and La Marca, than from their relative enormity. The fates of the young Astorre Manfredi of Faenza, of Fogliano of Fermo, of the Lord of Camerino and his three sons, have all been mentioned in these pages as occurring within a year or two of this event. It would be easy to swell the catalogue of slaughter; and we find Baglioni and Vitellozzo both classed with Cesare himself in the category of murder, by a chronicler of Alexander VI., who also quotes from the mouth of Giovanni Bentivoglio, at the diet of La Magione, this bravado, "I shall assassinate Duke Valentino should I be so lucky as to have opportunity."[4] The spirit of the age is further illustrated by its unnumbered poisonings: and the fact that Machiavelli should neither have used his influence with Valentino to avert the massacre of the confederates, nor his pen to brand the treachery of that foul deed, is but another link in the evidence from which we may deduce the total extinction of moral feeling, which, anticipating the worst doctrines of Loyola, carried them out with a selfishness, falsehood, and cruelty unparalleled in the annals of human civilisation.[*5] [Footnote *3: It is unlikely that Machiavelli abetted the massacre, though he certainly approved it dispassionately enough. By it the Papacy was rid at last of the houses of Colonna and Orsini. Cesare met Machiavelli after the affair "with the best cheer in the world," reminding him that he had given him a hint of his intentions, but adding, "I did not tell you all." He urged on Machiavelli his desire for a firm alliance with Florence. Cf. MACHIAVELLI, _Legazione al Valentino_, Lett. 86, and the _Modo tenuto dal Duca Valentino nel ammazzare Vitellozzo_. See also CREIGHTON, _op. cit._, vol V., p. 40.] [Footnote 4: VERMIGLIOLI: _Vita di Malatesta Baglioni_.] [Footnote *5: The schemes of Cesare were in his age no more unscrupulously carried out than Bismarck's in his. "It is well," said Cesare, "to beguile those who have shown themselves to be masters of treachery."] [Illustration: _Alinari_ IL CASTELLO DI SINIGAGLIA]