The Pope was no less
detested at home than abroad. Thoughtful people were filled with
anxiety, hermits appeared upon the streets and squares of Rome,
foretelling the fate of Italy and of the world, and calling the Pope by
the name of Antichrist; the faction of the Colonna raised its head
defiantly; the indomitable Cardinal Pompeo Colonna, whose mere
existence was a permanent menace to the Papacy, ventured to surprise
the city in 1526, hoping with the help of Charles V, to become Pope
then and there, as soon as Clement was killed or captured. It was no
piece of good fortune for Rome that the latter was able to escape to
the Castel Sant' Angelo, and the fate for which he himself was reserved
may well be called worse than death. By a series of those falsehoods
which only the powerful can venture on, but which bring ruin upon the
weak, Clement brought about the advance of the Germano-Spanish army
under Bourbon and Frundsberg (1527). It is certain that the Cabinet of
Charles V intended to inflict on him a severe castigation, and that it
could not calculate beforehand how far the zeal of its unpaid hordes
would carry them. It would have been vain to attempt to enlist men in
Germany without paying any bounty, if it had not been well known that
Rome was the object of the expedition. It may be that the written
orders to Bourbon will be found some day or other, and it is not
improbable that they will prove to be worded mildly.
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