There was one poet, however, of some note who may be mentioned as an exception to the consistently high character of the literary women of a notably wicked period; but even her poems were largely religious in tone. Tullia d’Aragona, who discussed affairs in Latin and wrote Greek when a child, was a wit, a genius, and a brilliant woman. She had a bad father, though he was a cardinal, and a mother who was beautiful but is not plainly visible at this distance. The clever Tullia, who had a questionable salon at Rome, with plenty of cardinals and princes in her train, carried with her to other courts a certain prestige which they did not scrutinize too closely, and she fascinated many men who were not quite equal to the moral and intellectual altitude of a Vittoria Colonna or an Olympia Morata. “Vittoria is a moon, Tullia a sun,” said an enthusiastic admirer and fellow-poet. But in the waning of her charms she turned seriously to literature, and wrote a poem of thirty thousand lines, besides a curious dialogue on “The Infinity of Love,” and many sonnets. At this time in her life, which verged toward the twilight, she had put off frivolous things and was disposed to moralize. In the preface to her poem she says that reading is a resource for women when everything else fails; but she mourns over the fact that Boccaccio, who claimed to write for them, said so many things not fit to be read; that even Ariosto was not above reproach; and closes by declaring that she has not put down a word that might not be read by “maiden, nun, or widow at any hour”--all of which goes to show the final tendency of women toward moral ideals, in spite of the entanglements of very mundane surroundings. They take refuge in charity and religion from a world that has ceased to charm, as men do in cynicism and stimulants. This versatile poet of more esprit than decorum had a great deal of incense offered her, and in the end won even the patronage of the grave, virtuous, and sorrowful Eleanor of Toledo, but she died in penitence and misery. As she lived and shone in the most dissolute society of her day, and was trained from childhood with special reference to pleasing men of brilliant position and gifts but low morals, she by no means fitly represents the learned women of Italy, whether of court or university. She belonged to a class apart. We lift our eyes at the laxity of a society which could receive and smile upon her, but we have not far to go to find the same complaisance even in a period that prides itself on its superior morals. Our censor of the twenty-fifth century may find here a text for a sermon on the wickedness of the scientific age, which he will otherwise prove by copious quotations from the glaring headlines of our daily journals.