have done, the commons were crushed, and the liberties of Spain have been ever since in abeyance.

By the talents, the valour, and the barbarous cruelty of Cortes and Pizarro, the empires of Mexico and Peru were at this time subjected to Spain.

Don John III., a wretched bigot, with whom dates the decline of Portugal, introduced the inquisition and the new society of the Jesuits into that country. Priestly and regal authority conspired to oppress and degrade the nation.

The Portuguese power was, meantime, under the valour and the ability of the great Albuquerque, Almeida, Castro, and others, extended from the gulf of Persia to the isles of Japan. At no period have greater actions been achieved: unhappily, they were disgraced by a spirit of savage cruelty and unprincipled rapacity.

Italy.

In the holy see the polished Leo X. was succeeded by the honest, well-meaning Adrian VI. It then passed to

the timid, uncertain Clement VII., a Medici: next to the designing Paul III., only concerned to aggrandize the Farnesi, his own family: then to the lavish and tasteful Julius III.; and, finally, to Paul IV., an aged monk, who fancied himself possessed of the power of a Gregory or an Innocent, and that the 16th century might be treated like the 13th.

In Florence, Piero, son of Lorenzo de' Medici, had A. D. given up Pisa and Leghorn to the French, when 1494. Charles VIII. invaded Italy. He was in consequence forced to leave the city; his palaces were plundered, and a price set on the head of the Medici. The old republican tumults ensued. Julian and John, the brothers of 1512. Piero, now dead, were restored by the Spanish arms at the desire of pope Julius II.; and John succeeding that pope under the name of Leo X., his influence strengthened his brother, and, after the death of Julian, his nephew Lo- 1516. renzo, son of Piero. Lorenzo, equal to any of his family in the qualities that distinguished them, had meditated

A. D.

the extension of his power from sea to sea; but his early death, in his 27th year, cut short all his great projects. He left an only child, the celebrated Catherine, afterwards queen of France.

Julius, the natural son of the brother of Lorenzo, who was murdered by the Pazzi, took the government. A conspiracy was formed against his power; but he was supported by the emperor. He became pope as Clement VII.; and Alexander, his own or Lorenzo II.'s natural son, governed Florence. He was obliged to fly when the pope was besieged by the army of Bourbon; but when Clement made peace with the emperor, Charles gave his natural daughter Margaret in marriage to Alexander, and engaged to restore him to the wealth and power of his family. Florence resisted; and after the peace of Cambray the imperial arms besieged it for ten months, and forced it to surrender, and the emperor declared Alexander hereditary duke of Florence. The rule of this protégé of the pope and the emperor was, as 1537. was to be expected, tyrannical and oppressive. His death was owing to his vices. His cousin Lorenzino de' Medici, who had been the ready agent of his lust, resolved to destroy him. Under pretext of putting him in possession of the person of a lady whose beauty had inflamed him, he decoyed him to his house, where he secretly murdered him. Lorenzino fled to Venice: the better disposed citizens wished to re-establish the republic, but the Medici party forced the senate to declare duke Cosimo, descended from a brother of the first Cosimo. A subtle, cruel, and ungrateful tyrant, Cosimo oppressed the people, and banished those to whom he owed his power. He 1557. was himself but the mere slave of Spain. Cosimo added Sienna to his dominions, and in 1569 the pope, Pius V., conferred on him the title of Great duke of Tuscany.

Genoa had, on account of her internal dissensions, put herself under the protection of France, and her nobles had served in the army of Francis I. She did not by this expedient escape the turbulence of the Adorni and Fregosi, whose feuds ran as high as ever. Andrew Doria determined to be the Timoleon of his country.

A D.

He formed a league with Charles V., entered the port of 1528. Genoa, proclaimed an amnesty, broke up the parties, and new modelled the government, excluding only the Adorni and Fregosi from office. Doria sought neither power nor reward for himself; he never bore the office of doge. He died, honoured and lamented, in his 94th year.

1560.

Venice remained the most independent state in Italy, and was always on good terms with Charles V., by whose territories she was now nearly surrounded. The popes had brought Bologna, Ravenna, and Ancona fully under their power. Parma and Piacenza were, with the consent of Charles V., given by Paul III. to his son Piero Farnese, and on his death to Ottavio Farnese, 1547. married to a natural daughter of the emperor. Ottavio was succeeded by Alexander, the celebrated general of Philip II.

Italy was now tranquil; all her states either belonged to or were in amity and alliance with Spain. She had no disturbances to dread; her ancient spirit declined; she sank into luxury, occupied in the enjoyment of her arts and natural advantages.

Denmark and Sweden.

These countries do not yet enter on the great theatre of Europe. Christian II. had proved victorious, by the employment of treachery and force, in the struggle for Swedish independence. He was crowned at Stockholm, and he and his confederate, the archbishop of Upsala, by an almost unparalleled piece of perfidy, publicly executed ninety-four of the Swedish nobles. But Gustavus Vasa, the son of one of those who were murdered, escaped from the prison in which he was confined, roused the miners of Dalecarlia to take arms for their country, and was successful in his first attempts; gradually all the people rose against the tyrant, Gustavus was elected king of 1523 Sweden, and he governed with wisdom and good policy. Gustavus established the Lutheran religion in Sweden, 1560. over which he reigned 37 years.

Christian II. was for his tyranny deposed, and the

Z

crown given to his uncle Frederic duke of Holstein, who A D. entered into an alliance with Gustavus and the Hanse 1533. towns against the deposed tyrant. Frederic's son, Christian III., was one of the best princes of the age. He also established the Lutheran religion in his dominions. 1559. He died a year before Gustavus.

1520.

Turkey.

Suleiman I., called by the Christians the Great, and the Magnificent, by his own subjects the Lawgiver (Kanooni), the greatest of the Ottoman monarchs, succeeded his father Selim. In the first year of his reign a war broke out with Hungary, in which Belgrade and 1522. other fortresses were taken by the Ottomans. The following year the island of Rhodes was conquered, after a most gallant defence made by the knights of St. John. In the second Hungarian campaign of Suleiman he took Peterwaradin, and the Hungarian king, Ladislaus, lost the 1526. battle and his life on the plain of Mohacs, and Ofen, the capital of Hungary, opened her gates. In a third Hun1529. garian campaign Ofen was taken by storm, Vienna was

besieged; but Suleiman was forced to retire from before 1532. its walls. Suleiman again invaded Hungary at the head

of 200,000 men; but he was unable to overcome the 1534. resistance of the town of Güns. A war with Persia, in which Tebreez was again taken, and which gave Bagdad to Suleiman, next followed.

Khair-ed-deen Barbarossa, the celebrated corsair, con1535. quered Tunis for Suleiman; but it was retaken, and restored to Muley Hassan, by the emperor Charles V. Suleiman next conquered the isles of the Archipelago, and he fitted out a fleet in the Red Sea, to oppose the Por1547. tuguese in India. Two more campaigns against Hungary followed, and peace was at length concluded with Ferdinand and the emperor; but war soon broke out again. A large fleet and army were sent against Malta, which the emperor had given to the knights of St. John ; 1565. but the valour of the knights forced them to retire with disgrace. Suleiman, the greatest of the Ottoman sultans,

headed his armies in thirteen campaigns, and gave the empire its greatest extent, at which it continued for more than a century ere it began to decrease. Genius and learning were encouraged by this munificent prince, whose reign was the Augustan age of Turkey; but the deaths of no less than ten princes of the blood, most of them his sons and grandchildren, fix an indelible stain on his memory.

CHAP. III.

TIMES OF PHILIP II.

State of Europe at Philip's Accession.

No monarch ever ascended a throne with fairer prospects than Philip II.; none ever had himself more thoroughly to blame for the extinction of his brightest hopes. His father had left him Spain, humbled under absolute power, but not yet degraded by it, Milan, Naples, and Sicily, the Netherlands, Mexico, and Peru, now in the vigour of their gold and silver harvest; he was married to the queen of England; his uncle was emperor of Germany, king of Bohemia and Hungary, and possessor of the Austrian dominions. Genoa and the catholic cantons of Switzerland were allied with Spain; Venice feared her; the pope was obliged to support a prince who proclaimed himself the defender of the faith. His nephew, Sebastian king of Portugal, was a child. France, after the death of Henry II., had fallen into weakness and confusion. Suleiman had been succeeded by Selim, a weak unenterprising prince. Finally, the Spanish armies were still the first in Europe, and were commanded by the duke of Savoy, Don John of Austria, and the prince of Parma, three of the greatest generals of the age.