It is the change in government--the fatal change in the political destiny of the Italian, which has wrought this melancholy change in his whole nature. When this beautiful land was covered with leagues of independent states, inspired with the genius of liberty and political independence,--the stimulating influence of the government was felt every where--it animated and aroused all--it communicated the spirit of activity and enterprise, the love of home and the ardent love of country to all the citizens alike--from the proud lord of Venice, whose stately palace was lashed by the wave of the Adriatic, to the poor peasant whose thatched and humble cottage lay in some secluded solitary hollow of the Alps or the Appenines. Under this system of government there was no favored spot upon which the treasures of the nation were expended; there was no Thebes, no Babylon, no imperial Rome built up, adorned and beautified by the degradation and utter prostration of all the rest. We might almost say of Italy what has been affirmed of Omnipotence itself--its centre was every where, its circumference no where. Every little independent state, no matter how limited its area or small its population, had its great men, its thriving cities, its noble monuments. The little Florentine democracy with but eighty thousand souls, had more great men within its limits than any of the great kingdoms of Europe; and all were animated with the spirit of patriotism, of industry,[13] of learning. [Footnote 13: "The habit of industry," says Sismondi, "was the distinctive characteristic of the Italians even to the middle of the 15th century. The first rank at Florence, Venice, and Genoa, was occupied by merchants; and the families who possessed the offices of the state, of the church or the army, did not for that reason give up their business. Philip Strozzi, brother-in-law of Leo X, the father of Mareschal Strozzi, and the grandfather of Capua, the friend of several sovereigns, and the first citizen of Italy, remained even to the end of his life chief of a banking house. He had seven sons, but in spite of his immense fortune, he suffered none of them to be brought up in idleness."]