The liberality of the northern princes of the
thirteenth century was confined to the knights, to the nobility which
served and sang. It was otherwise with the Italian despot. With his
thirst for fame and his passion for monumental works, it was talent,
not birth, which he needed. In the company of the poet and the scholar
he felt himself in a new position, almost, indeed, in possession of a
new legitimacy.
No prince was more famous in this respect than the ruler of Verona, Can
Grande della Scala, who numbered among the illustrious exiles whom he
entertained at his court representatives of the whole of Italy. The men
of letters were not ungrateful. Petrarch, whose visits at the courts of
such men have been so severely censured, sketched an ideal picture of a
prince of the fourteenth century. He demands great things from his
patron, the lord of Padua, but in a manner which shows that he holds
him capable of them. 'Thou must not be the master but the father of thy
subjects, and must love them as thy children; yea, as members of thy
body. Weapons, guards, and soldiers thou mayest employ against the
enemy---with thy subjects goodwill is sufficient. By citizens, of
course, I mean those who love the existing order; for those who daily
desire change are rebels and traitors, and against such a stern justice
may take its course.
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