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Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction by John Addington Symonds
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became the fashion here. Yet the Papal capital did not wholly cease to
be the resort of students and of artists. The universities maintained
themselves in a respectable position--- far different, indeed, from that
which they had held in the last century, yet not ignoble. Much was
being learned on many lines of study divergent from those prescribed by
earlier humanists. Padua, in particular, distinguished itself for
medical researches. This was the flourishing time, moreover, of
Academies, in which, notwithstanding nonsense talked and foolish tastes
indulged, some solid work was done for literature and science. The names
of the Cimento, Delia Crusca, and Palazzo Vernio at Florence, remind us
of not unimportant labors in physics, in the analysis of language, and
in the formation of a new dramatic style of music. At the same time the
resurgence of popular literature and the creation of popular theatrical
types deserve to be particularly noticed. It is as though the Italian
nation at this epoch, suffocated by Spanish etiquette, and poisoned by
Jesuitical hypocrisy, sought to expand healthy lungs in free spaces of
open air, indulging in dialectical niceties and immortalizing
street-jokes by the genius of masqued comedy.

This most ancient and intensely vital race had given Europe the Roman
Republic, the Roman Empire, the system of Roman law, the Romance
languages, Latin Christianity, the Papacy, and, lastly, all that is
included in the art and culture of the Renaissance. It was time,
perhaps, that it should go to rest a century or so, and watch uprising
nations--the Spanish, English, French, and so forth--stir their stalwart
limbs in common strife and novel paths of pioneering industry.

After such fashion let us, then, if we can contrive to do so, regard
the Italians during their subjection to the Church and Austria. Were it
not for these consolatory reflections, and for the present reappearance
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