Читать книгу Rebels and Reformers: Biographies for Young People онлайн

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This brought on a crisis in the city. The panic-stricken Piero de Medici, uncertain how to act, went out at last himself to meet the French King, fell prostrate before him, and accepted at once the hard terms he laid down. His cowardice was the signal for Florence to rise up in fury. Piero was deposed, and other ambassadors, of whom Savonarola was one, were commissioned to confer with Charles. The King was much impressed by the Dominican preacher, but nevertheless he entered the city and imperiously demanded the restoration of the Medici as rulers. The Florentines boldly refused. “What,” asked Charles, “if I sound my trumpets?” “Then,” answered Gino Capponi, one of the magistrates, “Florence must toll her bells.” The idea of a general insurrection startled the King, and after a further conference with Savonarola he left the city.

The Medici had fallen for the moment, Charles VIII had withdrawn, Florence was now free. It was not to the Medici family, to their magistrates, or to their nobles that the people turned in their good fortune, but to the Prior of San Marco, who, they considered, was chiefly responsible for the favorable turn events had taken. After seventy years of subjection to the Medici the people had forgotten the art of self-government. Partly in gratitude, partly in confidence, and partly in awe, they chose Savonarola as their ruler, and he became the lawgiver of Florence. He began by exercising his power with discretion and justice. His first thought was for the poor, for whom collections were made. He proposed also to give more employment to the needy and lighten the taxation that weighed too heavily upon them. His whole scheme was inspired by his deep religious feeling. “Fear God,” was his first command to the people whom he summoned to meet him in the Cathedral. Then he exhorted them to prefer the republic to their own selfish interests. He promised a general amnesty to political offenders and the establishment of a General Council. He had studied the principles of government and desired to set up a democratic system, that is to say, to give the people the responsibility of governing themselves instead of submitting to the aristocratic rule of a prince and his nobles. With all his enthusiasm and apparent fanaticism, he showed himself in many ways to be a practical man of affairs. His preaching continued to be his chief method of exercising his influence. The maintenance of the constitution, he told the people, depended on God’s blessing: its head was Jesus Christ Himself. His aim was to establish there and then practical Christianity such as Christ taught, so that Florence might become the model city of the world. Men may scoff and say this was the impossible dream of a madman. But it is better to aim too high and fail than to accept, as many people do, a low standard because it is too difficult and too much trouble to fight against a vicious public opinion.