He was born in Paris in 1815; and his parents, plain
working-people who were ambitious for their boy, gave him unusual
advantages for one of his class.
working-people who were ambitious for their boy, gave him unusual
advantages for one of his class.
Warner - World's Best Literature - v16 - Lev to Mai
The wind was rising again, and getting
very loud, and full of rushes and whistles. He was sure some
one was talking-and very near him too it was. But he was
not frightened, for he had not yet learned how to be; so he sat
up and hearkened. At last the voice, which though quite gentle
sounded a little angry, appeared to come from the back of the
bed. He crept nearer to it, and laid his ear against the wall.
Then he heard nothing but the wind, which sounded very loud
indeed. The moment, however, that he moved his head from the
wall he heard the voice again, close to his ear. He felt about
with his hand, and came upon the piece of paper his mother had
pasted over the hole. Against this he laid his ear, and then he
heard the voice quite distinctly. There was in fact a little cor-
ner of the paper loose; and through that, as from a mouth in
the wall, the voice came.
"What do you mean, little boy-closing up my window? "
"What window? " asked Diamond.
"You stuffed hay into it three times last night. I had to
blow it out again three times. "
"You can't mean this little hole! It isn't a window; it's a
hole in my bed. "
"I did not say it was a window: I said it was my window. "
"But it can't be a window, because windows are holes to see
out of. "
"Well, that's just what I made this window for. "
"But you are outside: you can't want a window. "
"You are quite mistaken. Windows are to see out of, you
say. Well, I'm in my house, and I want windows to see out
of it. "
"But you've made a window into my bed. "
"Well, your mother has got three windows into my dancing-
room, and you have three into my garret. ”
"But I heard father say, when my mother wanted him to
make a window through the wall, that it was against the law,
for it would look into Mr. Dyves's garden. ”
## p. 9468 (#492) ###########################################
9468
GEORGE MACDONALD
The voice laughed.
>>
"The law would have some trouble to catch me! it said.
"But if it's not right, you know," said Diamond, "that's no
matter. You shouldn't do it. "
"I am so tall I am above that law," said the voice.
"You must have a tall house, then," said Diamond.
"Yes, a tall house: the clouds are inside it. "
"Dear me! " said Diamond, and thought a minute. "I think,
then, you can hardly expect me to keep a window in my bed for
you. Why don't you make a window into Mr. Dyves's bed? "
"Nobody makes a window into an ash-pit," said the voice
rather sadly: "I like to see nice things out of my windows. "
"But he must have a nicer bed than I have; though mine is
very nice so nice that I couldn't wish a better. "
--
"It's not the bed I care about: it's what is in it. But you
just open that window. "
"Well, mother says I shouldn't be disobliging; but it's rather
hard. You see the north wind will blow right in my face if I
do. »
-
"I am the North Wind. "
"O-o-oh! " said Diamond thoughtfully. "Then will you prom-
ise not to blow on my face if I open your window? »
"I can't promise that. "
"But you'll give me the toothache. Mother's got it already. "
"But what's to become of me without a window? "
"I'm sure I don't know. All I say is, it will be worse for
me than for you. "
-I prom-
Just you
"No, it will not. You shall not be the worse for it
ise you that. You will be much the better for it.
believe what I say, and do as I tell you. "
"Well, I can pull the clothes over my head," said Diamond;
and feeling with his little sharp nails, he got hold of the open
edge of the paper and tore it off at once.
In came a long whistling spear of cold, and struck his little.
naked chest. He scrambled and tumbled in under the bed-clothes,
and covered himself up: there was no paper now between him
and the voice, and he felt a little-not frightened exactly, I told
you he had not learned that yet-but rather queer; for what a
strange person this North Wind must be that lived in the great
house" called Out-of-Doors, I suppose," thought Diamond -— and
made windows into people's beds! But the voice began again;
-
## p. 9469 (#493) ###########################################
GEORGE MACDONALD
9469
and he could hear it quite plainly, even with his head under the
bedclothes. It was a still more gentle voice now, although six
times as large and loud as it had been, and he thought it sounded
a little like his mother's.
"What is your name, little boy? " it asked.
"Diamond," answered Diamond under the bedclothes.
"What a funny name! "
"It's a very nice name," returned its owner.
"I don't know that," said the voice.
"Well, I do," retorted Diamond, a little rudely.
"Do you know to whom you are speaking? "
"No," said Diamond.
And indeed he did not. For to know a person's name is not
always to know the person's self.
"Then I must not be angry with you. You had better look
and see, though. "
-
"Diamond is a very pretty name," persisted the boy, vexed
that it should not give satisfaction.
"Diamond is a useless thing, rather," said the voice.
"That's not true. Diamond is very nice- as big as two- and
so quiet all night! And doesn't he make a jolly row in the morn-
ing, getting up on his four great legs! It's like thunder. "
"You don't seem to know what a diamond is. "
"Oh, don't I just!
―――――
Diamond is a great and good horse; and
he sleeps right under me. He is Old Diamond, and I am Young
Diamond; or if you like it better,-for you're very particular,
Mr. North Wind,- he's Big Diamond, and I'm Little Diamond:
and I don't know which of us my father likes best. "
A beautiful laugh, large but very soft and musical, sounded
somewhere beside him; but Diamond kept his head under the
clothes.
"I'm not Mr. North Wind," said the voice.
"You told me that you were the North Wind," insisted Dia-
mond.
"I did not say Mister North Wind," said the voice.
"Well then, I do; for mother tells me I ought to be polite. "
"Then let me tell you I don't think it at all polite of you to
say Mister to me. "
"Well, I didn't know better. I'm very sorry. ”
"But you ought to know better. "
"I don't know that. "
་
## p. 9470 (#494) ###########################################
9470
GEORGE MACDONALD
"I do. You can't say it's polite to lie there talking, with
your head under the bedclothes, and never look up to see what
kind of person you are talking to. I want you to come out with
me. »
"I want to go to sleep," said Diamond, very nearly crying;
for he did not like to be scolded, even when he deserved it.
"You shall sleep all the better to-morrow night. "
"Besides," said Diamond, "you are out in Mr. Dyves's gar-
den, and I can't get there. I can only get into our own yard. ”
"Will you take your head out of the bedclothes? " said the
voice, just a little angrily.
"No! " answered Diamond, half peevish, half frightened.
The instant he said the word, a tremendous blast of wind
crashed in a board of the wall, and swept the clothes off Dia-
mond. He started up in terror. Leaning over him was the large,
beautiful, pale face of a woman. Her dark eyes looked a little
angry, for they had just begun to flash; but a quivering in her
sweet upper lip made her look as if she were going to cry.
What was most strange was that away from her head streamed
out her black hair in every direction, so that the darkness in the
hay-loft looked as if it were made of her hair; but as Diamond
gazed at her in speechless amazement, mingled with confidence,
- for the boy was entranced with her mighty beauty,- her hair
began to gather itself out of the darkness, and fell down all
about her again, till her face looked out of the midst of it like a
moon out of a cloud. From her eyes came all the light by which
Diamond saw her face and her hair; and that was all he did see
of her yet. The wind was over and gone.
"Will you go with me now, you little Diamond? I am sorry
I was forced to be so rough with you," said the lady.
"I will; yes, I will," answered Diamond, holding out both his
arms. "But," he added, dropping them, "how shall I get my
clothes? They are in mother's room, and the door is locked. "
"Oh, never mind your clothes. You will not be cold. I shall
take care of that. Nobody is cold with the North Wind. "
"I thought everybody was," said Diamond.
"That is a great mistake. Most people make it, however.
They are cold because they are not with the North Wind, but
without it. "
If Diamond had been a little older, and had supposed himself
a good deal wiser, he would have thought the lady was joking.
## p. 9471 (#495) ###########################################
GEORGE MACDONALD
9471
But he was not older, and did not fancy himself wiser, and there-
fore understood her well enough. Again he stretched out his
The lady's face drew back a little.
"Follow me, Diamond," she said.
arms.
"Yes," said Diamond, only a little ruefully.
"You're not afraid? ” said the North Wind.
"No, ma'am: but mother never would let me go without
shoes; she never said anything about clothes, so I daresay she
wouldn't mind that. "
"I know your mother very well," said the lady.
"She is a
good woman. I have visited her often. I was with her when
you were born. I saw her laugh and cry both at once. I love
your mother, Diamond. "
"How was it you did not know my name, then, ma'am?
Please, am I to say ma'am to you, ma'am? ”
"One question at a time, dear boy. I knew your name quite
well, but I wanted to hear what you would say for it. Don't
you remember that day when the man was finding fault with
your name—how I blew the window in? "
"Yes, yes," answered Diamond eagerly.
"Our window opens
like a door, right over the coach-house door. And the wind-
you, ma'am-came in, and blew the Bible out of the man's
hands, and the leaves went all flutter-flutter on the floor, and
my mother picked it up and gave it back to him open, and
there- »
―――――――
"Was your name in the Bible - the sixth stone in the high-
priest's breast-plate. "
"Oh! a stone, was it? " said Diamond. "I thought it had
been a horse-I did. "
"Never mind. A horse is better than a stone any day. Well,
you see, I know all about you and your mother. "
"Yes. I will go with you. "
"Now for the next question: you're not to call me ma'am.
You must call me just my own name— respectfully, you know
just North Wind. "
"Well, please, North Wind, you are so beautiful, I am quite
ready to go with you. "
"You must not be ready to go with everything beautiful all
at once, Diamond. "
"But what's beautiful can't be bad. You're not bad, North
Wind? »
## p. 9472 (#496) ###########################################
GEORGE MACDONALD
9472
"No; I'm not bad.
But sometimes beautiful things grow bad
by doing bad, and it takes some time for their badness to spoil
their beauty. So little boys may be mistaken if they go after
things because they are beautiful. "
«
Well, I will go with you because you are beautiful and good
too. "
"Ah, but there's another thing, Diamond: What if I should
look ugly without being bad-look ugly myself because I am
making ugly things beautiful? what then? "
You tell me
"I don't quite understand you, North Wind.
what then. "
―
"Well, I will tell you. If you see me with my face all black,
don't be frightened. If you see me flapping wings like a bat's,
as big as the whole sky, don't be frightened. If you hear me
raging ten times worse than Mrs. Bill, the blacksmith's wife,-
even if you see me looking in at people's windows like Mrs. Eve
Dropper, the gardener's wife, you must believe that I am doing
my work. Nay, Diamond, if I change into a serpent or a tiger,
you must not let go your hold of me, for my hand will never
change in yours if you keep a good hold. If you keep a hold,
you will know who I am all the time, even when you look at
me and can't see me the least like the North Wind.
I may
look something very awful. Do you understand? »
"Quite well," said little Diamond.
"Come along then," said North Wind, and disappeared behind
the mountain of hay.
Diamond crept out of bed and followed her.
## p. 9473 (#497) ###########################################
9473
JEAN MACÉ
(1815-)
EAN MACE is a benign child-lover, and has never lost the
childlike simplicity and zest in life which characterize his
style.
He was born in Paris in 1815; and his parents, plain
working-people who were ambitious for their boy, gave him unusual
advantages for one of his class. His course at the Collège Stanilaus
was not completed without self-sacrifice at home which made him
prize and improve his opportunities. At
twenty-one he became instructor in history
in the same college, and he was teaching
in the Collège Henri IV. , when he was
drafted as a soldier. After three years'
service he was bought out by his friend
and former professor M. Burette, whose pri-
vate secretary he became. Always inter-
ested in politics, and an ardent republican,
he welcomed the revolution of 1848 with
an enthusiasm which involved him in diffi-
culties a few years later. With the restor-
ation of the Empire under Louis Napoleon
he was banished; and in exile, at the age of
thirty-seven, he discovered his true vocation.
JEAN MACE
The "Little Château," at Beblenheim in Alsace, was a private
school for girls, kept by his friend Mademoiselle Verenet, who now
offered Macé a position as teacher of natural science and literature.
He loved to teach, loved to impart fact so that it might exercise a
moral influence upon character; and he was very happy in the calmly
busy life at Beblenheim, where, as he says, "I was at last in my
true calling. "
In 1861 he published the 'Histoire d'une Bouchée de Pain,'. a
simple yet comprehensive work on physiology, made as delightful as
a story-book to child readers. Its wide popularity both in French,
and in an English translation as The Story of a Mouthful of Bread,'
prompted a sequel, Les Serviteurs de l'Estomac' (The Servants of
the Stomach), also very successful. But the 'Contes du Petit Châ-
teau,' a collection of charming fairy tales written for his little pupils,
is Macé's masterpiece. These stories are simple lessons in thrift,
XVI-593
## p. 9474 (#498) ###########################################
9474
JEAN MACÉ
truth, and generosity, inculcated with dramatic force and imaginat-
ive vigor. Translated as 'Home Fairy Tales,' they have long been
familiar to English and American children.
After ten years at Beblenheim, Macé returned to Paris, where in
company with Stahl he established the popular Magasin d'Éducation
et de Récréation. One of his strongest desires has always been to
extend educational influences; and for this purpose he established in
1863 the Société des Bibliothèques Communales du Haut Rhin, and
later organized a League of Instruction for increasing the number of
schools and libraries.
THE NECKLACE OF TRUTH
From Mace's Fairy Book. Translated by Mary L. Booth, and published by
Harper & Brothers
THE
HERE was once a little girl by the name of Coralie, who took
pleasure in telling falsehoods. Some children think very
little of not speaking the truth; and a small falsehood, or a
great one in case of necessity, that saves them from a duty or
a punishment, procures them a pleasure, or gratifies their self-love,
seems to them the most allowable thing in the world. Now
Coralie was one of this sort. The truth was a thing of which
she had no idea; and any excuse was good to her, provided that it
was believed. Her parents were for a long time deceived by her
stories; but they saw at last that she was telling them what was
not true, and from that moment they had not the least confidence
in anything that she said.
It is a terrible thing for parents not to be able to believe
their children's words. It would be better almost to have no
children; for the habit of lying, early acquired, may lead them
in after years to the most shameful crimes: and what parent can
help trembling at the thought that he may be bringing up his
children to dishonor?
After vainly trying every means to reform her, Coralie's par-
ents resolved to take her to the enchanter Merlin, who was cele-
brated at that time over all the globe, and who was the greatest
friend of truth that ever lived. For this reason, little children
that were in the habit of telling falsehoods were brought to him
from all directions, in order that he might cure them.
The enchanter Merlin lived in a glass palace, the walls of
which were transparent; and never in his whole life had the
## p. 9475 (#499) ###########################################
JEAN MACÉ
9475
idea crossed his mind of disguising one of his actions, of causing
others to believe what was not true, or even of suffering them
to believe it by being silent when he might have spoken. He
knew liars by their odor a league off; and when Coralie ap-
proached the palace, he was obliged to burn vinegar to prevent
himself from being ill.
Coralie's mother, with a beating heart, undertook to explain
the vile disease which had attacked her daughter; and blushingly
commenced a confused speech, rendered misty by shame, when
Merlin stopped her short.
"I felt
"I know what is the matter, my good lady," said he.
your daughter's approach long ago. She is one of the greatest
liars in the world, and she has made me very uncomfortable. "
The parents perceived that fame had not deceived them in
praising the skill of the enchanter; and Coralie, covered with
confusion, knew not where to hide her head. She took refuge
under the apron of her mother, who sheltered her as well as she
could, terrified at the turn affairs were taking, while her father
stood before her to protect her at all risks. They were very
anxious that their child should be cured, but they wished her
cured gently and without hurting her.
"Don't be afraid," said Merlin, seeing their terror: "I do not
employ violence in curing these diseases. I am only going to
make Coralie a beautiful present, which I think will not displease
her. "
He opened a drawer, and took from it a magnificent amethyst
necklace, beautifully set, with a diamond clasp of dazzling lustre.
He put it on Coralie's neck, and dismissing the parents with a
friendly gesture, "Go, good people," said he, "and have no more
anxiety. Your daughter carries with her a sure guardian of the
truth. "
Coralie, flushed with pleasure, was hastily retreating, delighted
at having escaped so easily, when Merlin called her back.
"In a year," said he, looking at her sternly, "I shall come
for my necklace. Till that time I forbid you to take it off for a
single instant: if you dare to do so, woe be unto you! "
"Oh, I ask nothing better than always to wear it, it is so
beautiful. "
In order that you may know, I will tell you that this neck-
lace was none other than the famous Necklace of Truth, so much
talked of in ancient books, which unveiled every species of false-
hood.
## p. 9476 (#500) ###########################################
9476
JEAN MACÉ
The day after Coralie returned home she was sent to school.
As she had long been absent, all the little girls crowded round
her, as always happens in such cases. There was a general cry
of admiration at the sight of the necklace.
"Where did it come from? " and "Where did you get it? "
was asked on all sides.
In those days, for any one to say that he had been to the
enchanter Merlin's was to tell the whole story. Coralie took
good care not to betray herself in this way.
"I was sick for a long time," said she, boldly; "and on my
recovery, my parents gave me this beautiful necklace. "
A loud cry rose from all at once. The diamonds of the clasp,
which had shot forth so brilliant a light, had suddenly become
dim, and were turned to coarse glass.
"Well, yes, I have been sick! What are you making such a
fuss about ? »
At this second falsehood, the amethysts in turn changed to
ugly yellow stones. A new cry arose. Coralie, seeing all eyes
fixed on her necklace, looked that way herself, and was struck
with terror.
"I have been to the enchanter Merlin's," said she humbly,
understanding from what direction the blow came, and not dar
ing to persist in her falsehood.
Scarcely had she confessed the truth when the necklace re-
covered all its beauty; but the loud bursts of laughter that
sounded around her mortified her to such a degree that she felt
the need of saying something to retrieve her reputation.
"You do very wrong to laugh," said she, "for he treated us
with the greatest possible respect. He sent his carriage to meet
us at the next town, and you have no idea what a splendid car-
riage it was,-six white horses, pink satin cushions with gold
tassels, to say nothing of the negro coachman with his hair pow-
dered, and the three tall footmen behind! When we reached his
palace, which is all of jasper and porphyry, he came to meet us
at the vestibule, and led us to the dining-room, where stood a
table covered with things that I will not name to you, because
you never even heard speak of them. There was, in the first
place- »
The laughter, which had been suppressed with great difficulty
ever since she commenced this fine story, became at that mo-
ment so boisterous that she stopped in amazement; and casting
her eyes once more on the unlucky necklace, she shuddered
## p. 9477 (#501) ###########################################
JEAN MACÉ
9477
anew. At each detail that she had invented, the necklace had
become longer and longer, until it already dragged on the ground.
"You are stretching the truth," cried the little girls.
"Well, I confess it: we went on foot, and only stayed five
minutes. "
The necklace instantly shrunk to its proper size.
"And the necklace- - the necklace - - where did it come from? »
"He gave it to me without saying a word; probabl—"
She had not time to finish. The fatal necklace grew shorter
and shorter till it choked her terribly, and she gasped for want
of breath.
"You are keeping back part of the truth," cried her school-
fellows.
She hastened to alter the broken words while she could still
speak.
"He said that I was
world. "
-
-
one of the greatest-liars-in the
Instantly freed from the pressure that was strangling her, she
continued to cry with pain and mortification.
"That was why he gave me the necklace. He said that it
was a guardian of the truth, and I have been a great fool to be
proud of it. Now I am in a fine position! "
Her little companions had compassion on her grief; for they
were good girls, and they reflected how they should feel in her
place. You can imagine, indeed, that it was somewhat embar-
rassing for a girl to know that she could never more pervert the
truth.
ever.
"You are very good," said one of them. "If I were in your
place, I should soon send back the necklace: handsome as it is,
it is a great deal too troublesome. What hinders you from tak-
ing it off? "
Poor Coralie was silent; but the stones began to dance up and
down, and to make a terrible clatter.
"There is something that you have not told us," said the little
girls, their merriment restored by this extraordinary dance.
"I like to wear it. "
The diamonds and amethysts danced and clattered worse than
"There is a reason which you are hiding from us. "
"Well, since I can conceal nothing from you, he forbade me
to take it off, under penalty of some great calamity. "
## p. 9478 (#502) ###########################################
9478
JEAN MACÉ
You can imagine that with a companion of this kind, which
turned dull whenever the wearer did not tell the truth, which
grew longer whenever she added to it, which shrunk whenever
she subtracted from it, and which danced and clattered whenever
she was silent, a companion, moreover, of which she could not
rid herself, it was impossible even for the most hardened liar
not to keep closely to the truth. When Coralie once was fully
convinced that falsehood was useless, and that it would be in-
stantly discovered, it was not difficult for her to abandon it. The
consequence was, that when she became accustomed always to
tell the truth, she found herself so happy in it—she felt her
conscience so light and her mind so calm-that she began to
abhor falsehood for its own sake, and the necklace had nothing
more to do. Long before the year had passed, therefore, Merlin
came for his necklace, which he needed for another child that
was addicted to lying, and which, thanks to his art, he knew
was of no more use to Coralie.
---
-
No one can tell me what has become of this wonderful Neck-
lace of Truth; but it is thought that Merlin's heirs hid it after
his death, for fear of the ravages that it might cause on earth.
You can imagine what a calamity it would be to many people—
I do not speak only of children—if they were forced to wear it.
Some travelers who have returned from Central Africa declare
that they have seen it on the neck of a negro king, who knew
not how to lie; but they have never been able to prove their
words. Search is still being made for it, however; and if I were
a little child in the habit of telling falsehoods, I should not feel
quite sure that it might not some day be found again.
## p. 9478 (#503) ###########################################
## p. 9478 (#504) ###########################################
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## p. 9478 (#505) ###########################################
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## p. 9478 (#506) ###########################################
## p. 9479 (#507) ###########################################
9479
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
(1469-1527)
BY CHARLES P. NEILL
ICCOLO MACHIAVELLI, perhaps the greatest prose writer of the
Italian Renaissance, was born in Florence May 3d, 1469, and
died there June 22d, 1527. He was of ancient and distin-
guished lineage on both his father's and his mother's side, and many
of his more immediate ancestors had been honored by republican
Florence with high offices of State. His father Bernardo was a re-
spectable jurist, who to a moderate income from his profession added
a small revenue from some landed possessions. His mother was a
woman of culture, and a poet of some ability.
Of Niccolo's early life and education we know nothing. No trace
of him remains previous to his twenty-sixth year. But of his times.
and the scenes amid which he grew up, we know much. It was the
calm but demoralizing era of Lorenzo the Magnificent, when the
sturdy Florentine burghers rested satisfied with magnificence in lieu
of freedom, and, intoxicated with the spirit of a pagan renaissance,
abandoned themselves to the refinements of pleasure and luxury;
when their streets had ceased for a while to re-echo with the clash
of steel and the fierce shouts of contending factions, and resounded
with the productions of Lorenzo's melodious but indecent Muse.
Machiavelli was a true child of his time. He too was thoroughly
imbued with the spirit of the Renaissance; and looked back, fasci-
nated, on the ideals of that ancient world that was being revivified
for the men of his day. But philosophy, letters, and art were not the
only heritage that the bygone age had handed down; politics—the
building of States and of empire- this also had engaged the minds
of the men of that age, and it was this aspect of their activity that
fired the imagination of the young Florentine. From his writings we
know he was widely read in the Latin and Italian classics. But Vir-
gil and Horace appealed to him less than Livy, and Dante the poet
was less to him than Dante the politician; for he read his classics,
not as others, to drink in their music or be led captive by their
beauty, but to derive lessons in statecraft, and penetrate into the
secrets of the successful empire-builders of the past.
It is equally
-
## p. 9480 (#508) ###########################################
9480
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
certain, from a study of his works, that he had not mastered Greek.
Like Ariosto, Machiavelli was indebted for his superb literary tech-
nique solely to the study of the literature of his own nation.
With the expulsion of the Medici from Florence, Machiavelli, at
the age of thirty, emerged from obscurity to play a most important
rôle in the Florentine politics of the succeeding decade and a half.
In 1498 he was elected secretary to the Ten of War and Peace,-a
commission performing the functions of a ministry of war and of
home affairs, and having in addition control of the Florentine diplo-
matic service. From 1498 to 1512 Machiavelli was a zealous, patriotic,
and indefatigable servant of the republic. His energy was untiring,
his activity ceaseless and many-sided. He conducted the voluminous
diplomatic correspondence devolving upon his bureau, drew up me-
morials and plans in affairs of State for the use and guidance of the
Ten, undertook the reorganization of the Florentine troops, and went
himself on a constant succession of embassies, ranging in importance
from those to petty Italian States up to those to the court of France
and of the Emperor. He was by nature well adapted to the peculiar
needs of the diplomacy of that day; and the training he received in
that school must in turn have reacted on him to confirm his native
bent, and accentuate it until it became the distinguishing character-
istic of the man. His first lessons in politics and statecraft were
derived from Livy's history of the not over-scrupulous Romans; and
when he comes to take his lessons at first hand, it is in the midst
of the intrigues of republican Florence, or at the court of a Caterina
Sforza, or in the camp of a Cesare Borgia. Small wonder that his
conception of politics should have omitted to take account of hon-
esty and the moral law; and that he conceived "the idea of giving
to politics an assured and scientific basis, treating them as having
a proper and distinct value of their own, entirely apart from their
moral value. "
During this period of his political activity, we have a large num-
ber of State papers and private letters from his pen; and two works
of literary cast have also come down to us. These are his 'Decen-
nale': historic narratives, cast into poetic form, of Italian events.
The first treats of the decade beginning 1494; and the second, an
unfinished fragment, of the decade beginning 1504. They are written
in easy terzine; and unfeigned sorrow for the miseries of Italy, torn
by internal discord, alternates with cynical mockery and stinging wit.
They are noteworthy as expressing the sentiment for a united Italy.
A third literary work of this period has been lost: 'Le Maschere,' a
satire modeled upon the comedies of Aristophanes.
When in 1512, after their long exile, the Medici returned to Flor-
ence in the train of her invader, Machiavelli, though not unwilling
## p. 9481 (#509) ###########################################
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
9481
to serve the restored rulers, was dismissed from his office and ban-
ished for a year from the confines of the city. Later, on suspicion
of being concerned in a plot against the Medici, he was thrown into
prison and tortured. He was soon afterward included in a gen-
eral pardon granted by the Cardinal de' Medici, then become Leo
X. But notwithstanding Machiavelli's earnest and persistent efforts
to win the good graces of the ruling family, he did not return to
public life until 1525; and this interval of enforced leisure from
affairs of State was the period of his literary activity. A number of
comedies, minor poems, and short prose compositions did not rise
above mediocrity. They were for the most part translations from
the classics, or imitations; and the names are hardly worth recount-
ing. But in one dramatic effort he rose to the stature of genius.
His 'Mandragola' achieved a flattering success both at Rome and in
Florence. It has been pronounced the finest comedy of the Italian
stage, and Macaulay rated it as inferior only to the greatest of
Molière's. In its form, its spontaneity, vivacity, and wit, it is not
surpassed by Shakespeare; but it is a biting satire on religion and
morality, with not even a hint of a moral to redeem it. Vice is
made humorous, and virtue silly; its satire is "deep and murderous";
and its plot too obscene to be narrated. In it Machiavelli has har-
nessed Pegasus to a garbage cart.
His lesser prose works are the 'Life of Castruccio Castracani,'
a "politico-military romance" made up partly from incidents in the
life of that hero, and partly from incidents taken from Diodorus Sicu-
lus's life of Agathocles, and concluding with a series of memorable
sayings attributed to Castruccio, but taken from the apophthegms of
Plutarch and Diogenes Laertius; and the Art of War,' a treatise
anticipating much of our modern tactics, and inveighing against the
mediæval system of mercenary troops of mail-clad men and horses.
A more ambitious undertaking, and in fact his largest work, is the
'History of Florence. ' At the suggestion of the Cardinal de' Medici,
the directors of the studio of Florence commissioned Machiavelli to
employ himself in writing a history of Florence, "from whatever
period he might think fit to select, and either in the Latin or the
Tuscan tongue, according to his taste. " He was to receive one hun-
dred florins a year for two years to enable him to pursue the work.
He chose his native tongue; and revised and polished his work until
it became a model of style, and in its best passages justifies his claim
to the title of the best and most finished of Italian prose writers.
He thus describes the luring of Giuliano de' Medici to his place of
assassination:-
:-
"This arrangement having been determined upon, they went into the
church, where the Cardinal had already arrived with Lorenzo de' Medici. The
## p. 9482 (#510) ###########################################
9482
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
church was crowded with people, and divine service had already commenced;
but Giuliano had not yet come. Francesco dei Pazzi, therefore, together with
Bernardo, who had been designated to kill Giuliano, went to his house, and by
artful persuasion induced him to go to the church. It is really a noteworthy
fact that so much hatred and the thoughts of so great an outrage could be
concealed under so much resoluteness of heart, as was the case with Francesco
and Bernardo; for on the way to church, and even after having entered it, they
entertained him with merry jests and youthful chatter. And Francesco, even.
under pretense of caressing him, felt him with his hands and pressed him in
his arms, for the purpose of ascertaining whether he wore a cuirass or any
other means of protection under his garments. »
But though Machiavelli had the historical style, he lacked histori-
cal perspective; he arranged his matter not according to objective
value, but placed in the boldest relief those events that best lent
support to his own theories of politics and statecraft. He makes his
facts to be as he wishes them, rather than as he knows them to be.
He wishes to throw contempt on mercenary troops, and though he
knows an engagement to have been bloody, prefers for his descrip-
tion such a conclusion as this: "In the tremendous defeat that was
noised throughout Italy, no one perished excepting Ludovico degli
Obizzi and two of his men, who being thrown from their horses were
smothered in the mud. " To Machiavelli history was largely to be
written as a tendenz roman,-manufactured to point a preconceived
moral.
Though Machiavelli wrote history, poetry, and comedy, it is not
by these he is remembered.
very loud, and full of rushes and whistles. He was sure some
one was talking-and very near him too it was. But he was
not frightened, for he had not yet learned how to be; so he sat
up and hearkened. At last the voice, which though quite gentle
sounded a little angry, appeared to come from the back of the
bed. He crept nearer to it, and laid his ear against the wall.
Then he heard nothing but the wind, which sounded very loud
indeed. The moment, however, that he moved his head from the
wall he heard the voice again, close to his ear. He felt about
with his hand, and came upon the piece of paper his mother had
pasted over the hole. Against this he laid his ear, and then he
heard the voice quite distinctly. There was in fact a little cor-
ner of the paper loose; and through that, as from a mouth in
the wall, the voice came.
"What do you mean, little boy-closing up my window? "
"What window? " asked Diamond.
"You stuffed hay into it three times last night. I had to
blow it out again three times. "
"You can't mean this little hole! It isn't a window; it's a
hole in my bed. "
"I did not say it was a window: I said it was my window. "
"But it can't be a window, because windows are holes to see
out of. "
"Well, that's just what I made this window for. "
"But you are outside: you can't want a window. "
"You are quite mistaken. Windows are to see out of, you
say. Well, I'm in my house, and I want windows to see out
of it. "
"But you've made a window into my bed. "
"Well, your mother has got three windows into my dancing-
room, and you have three into my garret. ”
"But I heard father say, when my mother wanted him to
make a window through the wall, that it was against the law,
for it would look into Mr. Dyves's garden. ”
## p. 9468 (#492) ###########################################
9468
GEORGE MACDONALD
The voice laughed.
>>
"The law would have some trouble to catch me! it said.
"But if it's not right, you know," said Diamond, "that's no
matter. You shouldn't do it. "
"I am so tall I am above that law," said the voice.
"You must have a tall house, then," said Diamond.
"Yes, a tall house: the clouds are inside it. "
"Dear me! " said Diamond, and thought a minute. "I think,
then, you can hardly expect me to keep a window in my bed for
you. Why don't you make a window into Mr. Dyves's bed? "
"Nobody makes a window into an ash-pit," said the voice
rather sadly: "I like to see nice things out of my windows. "
"But he must have a nicer bed than I have; though mine is
very nice so nice that I couldn't wish a better. "
--
"It's not the bed I care about: it's what is in it. But you
just open that window. "
"Well, mother says I shouldn't be disobliging; but it's rather
hard. You see the north wind will blow right in my face if I
do. »
-
"I am the North Wind. "
"O-o-oh! " said Diamond thoughtfully. "Then will you prom-
ise not to blow on my face if I open your window? »
"I can't promise that. "
"But you'll give me the toothache. Mother's got it already. "
"But what's to become of me without a window? "
"I'm sure I don't know. All I say is, it will be worse for
me than for you. "
-I prom-
Just you
"No, it will not. You shall not be the worse for it
ise you that. You will be much the better for it.
believe what I say, and do as I tell you. "
"Well, I can pull the clothes over my head," said Diamond;
and feeling with his little sharp nails, he got hold of the open
edge of the paper and tore it off at once.
In came a long whistling spear of cold, and struck his little.
naked chest. He scrambled and tumbled in under the bed-clothes,
and covered himself up: there was no paper now between him
and the voice, and he felt a little-not frightened exactly, I told
you he had not learned that yet-but rather queer; for what a
strange person this North Wind must be that lived in the great
house" called Out-of-Doors, I suppose," thought Diamond -— and
made windows into people's beds! But the voice began again;
-
## p. 9469 (#493) ###########################################
GEORGE MACDONALD
9469
and he could hear it quite plainly, even with his head under the
bedclothes. It was a still more gentle voice now, although six
times as large and loud as it had been, and he thought it sounded
a little like his mother's.
"What is your name, little boy? " it asked.
"Diamond," answered Diamond under the bedclothes.
"What a funny name! "
"It's a very nice name," returned its owner.
"I don't know that," said the voice.
"Well, I do," retorted Diamond, a little rudely.
"Do you know to whom you are speaking? "
"No," said Diamond.
And indeed he did not. For to know a person's name is not
always to know the person's self.
"Then I must not be angry with you. You had better look
and see, though. "
-
"Diamond is a very pretty name," persisted the boy, vexed
that it should not give satisfaction.
"Diamond is a useless thing, rather," said the voice.
"That's not true. Diamond is very nice- as big as two- and
so quiet all night! And doesn't he make a jolly row in the morn-
ing, getting up on his four great legs! It's like thunder. "
"You don't seem to know what a diamond is. "
"Oh, don't I just!
―――――
Diamond is a great and good horse; and
he sleeps right under me. He is Old Diamond, and I am Young
Diamond; or if you like it better,-for you're very particular,
Mr. North Wind,- he's Big Diamond, and I'm Little Diamond:
and I don't know which of us my father likes best. "
A beautiful laugh, large but very soft and musical, sounded
somewhere beside him; but Diamond kept his head under the
clothes.
"I'm not Mr. North Wind," said the voice.
"You told me that you were the North Wind," insisted Dia-
mond.
"I did not say Mister North Wind," said the voice.
"Well then, I do; for mother tells me I ought to be polite. "
"Then let me tell you I don't think it at all polite of you to
say Mister to me. "
"Well, I didn't know better. I'm very sorry. ”
"But you ought to know better. "
"I don't know that. "
་
## p. 9470 (#494) ###########################################
9470
GEORGE MACDONALD
"I do. You can't say it's polite to lie there talking, with
your head under the bedclothes, and never look up to see what
kind of person you are talking to. I want you to come out with
me. »
"I want to go to sleep," said Diamond, very nearly crying;
for he did not like to be scolded, even when he deserved it.
"You shall sleep all the better to-morrow night. "
"Besides," said Diamond, "you are out in Mr. Dyves's gar-
den, and I can't get there. I can only get into our own yard. ”
"Will you take your head out of the bedclothes? " said the
voice, just a little angrily.
"No! " answered Diamond, half peevish, half frightened.
The instant he said the word, a tremendous blast of wind
crashed in a board of the wall, and swept the clothes off Dia-
mond. He started up in terror. Leaning over him was the large,
beautiful, pale face of a woman. Her dark eyes looked a little
angry, for they had just begun to flash; but a quivering in her
sweet upper lip made her look as if she were going to cry.
What was most strange was that away from her head streamed
out her black hair in every direction, so that the darkness in the
hay-loft looked as if it were made of her hair; but as Diamond
gazed at her in speechless amazement, mingled with confidence,
- for the boy was entranced with her mighty beauty,- her hair
began to gather itself out of the darkness, and fell down all
about her again, till her face looked out of the midst of it like a
moon out of a cloud. From her eyes came all the light by which
Diamond saw her face and her hair; and that was all he did see
of her yet. The wind was over and gone.
"Will you go with me now, you little Diamond? I am sorry
I was forced to be so rough with you," said the lady.
"I will; yes, I will," answered Diamond, holding out both his
arms. "But," he added, dropping them, "how shall I get my
clothes? They are in mother's room, and the door is locked. "
"Oh, never mind your clothes. You will not be cold. I shall
take care of that. Nobody is cold with the North Wind. "
"I thought everybody was," said Diamond.
"That is a great mistake. Most people make it, however.
They are cold because they are not with the North Wind, but
without it. "
If Diamond had been a little older, and had supposed himself
a good deal wiser, he would have thought the lady was joking.
## p. 9471 (#495) ###########################################
GEORGE MACDONALD
9471
But he was not older, and did not fancy himself wiser, and there-
fore understood her well enough. Again he stretched out his
The lady's face drew back a little.
"Follow me, Diamond," she said.
arms.
"Yes," said Diamond, only a little ruefully.
"You're not afraid? ” said the North Wind.
"No, ma'am: but mother never would let me go without
shoes; she never said anything about clothes, so I daresay she
wouldn't mind that. "
"I know your mother very well," said the lady.
"She is a
good woman. I have visited her often. I was with her when
you were born. I saw her laugh and cry both at once. I love
your mother, Diamond. "
"How was it you did not know my name, then, ma'am?
Please, am I to say ma'am to you, ma'am? ”
"One question at a time, dear boy. I knew your name quite
well, but I wanted to hear what you would say for it. Don't
you remember that day when the man was finding fault with
your name—how I blew the window in? "
"Yes, yes," answered Diamond eagerly.
"Our window opens
like a door, right over the coach-house door. And the wind-
you, ma'am-came in, and blew the Bible out of the man's
hands, and the leaves went all flutter-flutter on the floor, and
my mother picked it up and gave it back to him open, and
there- »
―――――――
"Was your name in the Bible - the sixth stone in the high-
priest's breast-plate. "
"Oh! a stone, was it? " said Diamond. "I thought it had
been a horse-I did. "
"Never mind. A horse is better than a stone any day. Well,
you see, I know all about you and your mother. "
"Yes. I will go with you. "
"Now for the next question: you're not to call me ma'am.
You must call me just my own name— respectfully, you know
just North Wind. "
"Well, please, North Wind, you are so beautiful, I am quite
ready to go with you. "
"You must not be ready to go with everything beautiful all
at once, Diamond. "
"But what's beautiful can't be bad. You're not bad, North
Wind? »
## p. 9472 (#496) ###########################################
GEORGE MACDONALD
9472
"No; I'm not bad.
But sometimes beautiful things grow bad
by doing bad, and it takes some time for their badness to spoil
their beauty. So little boys may be mistaken if they go after
things because they are beautiful. "
«
Well, I will go with you because you are beautiful and good
too. "
"Ah, but there's another thing, Diamond: What if I should
look ugly without being bad-look ugly myself because I am
making ugly things beautiful? what then? "
You tell me
"I don't quite understand you, North Wind.
what then. "
―
"Well, I will tell you. If you see me with my face all black,
don't be frightened. If you see me flapping wings like a bat's,
as big as the whole sky, don't be frightened. If you hear me
raging ten times worse than Mrs. Bill, the blacksmith's wife,-
even if you see me looking in at people's windows like Mrs. Eve
Dropper, the gardener's wife, you must believe that I am doing
my work. Nay, Diamond, if I change into a serpent or a tiger,
you must not let go your hold of me, for my hand will never
change in yours if you keep a good hold. If you keep a hold,
you will know who I am all the time, even when you look at
me and can't see me the least like the North Wind.
I may
look something very awful. Do you understand? »
"Quite well," said little Diamond.
"Come along then," said North Wind, and disappeared behind
the mountain of hay.
Diamond crept out of bed and followed her.
## p. 9473 (#497) ###########################################
9473
JEAN MACÉ
(1815-)
EAN MACE is a benign child-lover, and has never lost the
childlike simplicity and zest in life which characterize his
style.
He was born in Paris in 1815; and his parents, plain
working-people who were ambitious for their boy, gave him unusual
advantages for one of his class. His course at the Collège Stanilaus
was not completed without self-sacrifice at home which made him
prize and improve his opportunities. At
twenty-one he became instructor in history
in the same college, and he was teaching
in the Collège Henri IV. , when he was
drafted as a soldier. After three years'
service he was bought out by his friend
and former professor M. Burette, whose pri-
vate secretary he became. Always inter-
ested in politics, and an ardent republican,
he welcomed the revolution of 1848 with
an enthusiasm which involved him in diffi-
culties a few years later. With the restor-
ation of the Empire under Louis Napoleon
he was banished; and in exile, at the age of
thirty-seven, he discovered his true vocation.
JEAN MACE
The "Little Château," at Beblenheim in Alsace, was a private
school for girls, kept by his friend Mademoiselle Verenet, who now
offered Macé a position as teacher of natural science and literature.
He loved to teach, loved to impart fact so that it might exercise a
moral influence upon character; and he was very happy in the calmly
busy life at Beblenheim, where, as he says, "I was at last in my
true calling. "
In 1861 he published the 'Histoire d'une Bouchée de Pain,'. a
simple yet comprehensive work on physiology, made as delightful as
a story-book to child readers. Its wide popularity both in French,
and in an English translation as The Story of a Mouthful of Bread,'
prompted a sequel, Les Serviteurs de l'Estomac' (The Servants of
the Stomach), also very successful. But the 'Contes du Petit Châ-
teau,' a collection of charming fairy tales written for his little pupils,
is Macé's masterpiece. These stories are simple lessons in thrift,
XVI-593
## p. 9474 (#498) ###########################################
9474
JEAN MACÉ
truth, and generosity, inculcated with dramatic force and imaginat-
ive vigor. Translated as 'Home Fairy Tales,' they have long been
familiar to English and American children.
After ten years at Beblenheim, Macé returned to Paris, where in
company with Stahl he established the popular Magasin d'Éducation
et de Récréation. One of his strongest desires has always been to
extend educational influences; and for this purpose he established in
1863 the Société des Bibliothèques Communales du Haut Rhin, and
later organized a League of Instruction for increasing the number of
schools and libraries.
THE NECKLACE OF TRUTH
From Mace's Fairy Book. Translated by Mary L. Booth, and published by
Harper & Brothers
THE
HERE was once a little girl by the name of Coralie, who took
pleasure in telling falsehoods. Some children think very
little of not speaking the truth; and a small falsehood, or a
great one in case of necessity, that saves them from a duty or
a punishment, procures them a pleasure, or gratifies their self-love,
seems to them the most allowable thing in the world. Now
Coralie was one of this sort. The truth was a thing of which
she had no idea; and any excuse was good to her, provided that it
was believed. Her parents were for a long time deceived by her
stories; but they saw at last that she was telling them what was
not true, and from that moment they had not the least confidence
in anything that she said.
It is a terrible thing for parents not to be able to believe
their children's words. It would be better almost to have no
children; for the habit of lying, early acquired, may lead them
in after years to the most shameful crimes: and what parent can
help trembling at the thought that he may be bringing up his
children to dishonor?
After vainly trying every means to reform her, Coralie's par-
ents resolved to take her to the enchanter Merlin, who was cele-
brated at that time over all the globe, and who was the greatest
friend of truth that ever lived. For this reason, little children
that were in the habit of telling falsehoods were brought to him
from all directions, in order that he might cure them.
The enchanter Merlin lived in a glass palace, the walls of
which were transparent; and never in his whole life had the
## p. 9475 (#499) ###########################################
JEAN MACÉ
9475
idea crossed his mind of disguising one of his actions, of causing
others to believe what was not true, or even of suffering them
to believe it by being silent when he might have spoken. He
knew liars by their odor a league off; and when Coralie ap-
proached the palace, he was obliged to burn vinegar to prevent
himself from being ill.
Coralie's mother, with a beating heart, undertook to explain
the vile disease which had attacked her daughter; and blushingly
commenced a confused speech, rendered misty by shame, when
Merlin stopped her short.
"I felt
"I know what is the matter, my good lady," said he.
your daughter's approach long ago. She is one of the greatest
liars in the world, and she has made me very uncomfortable. "
The parents perceived that fame had not deceived them in
praising the skill of the enchanter; and Coralie, covered with
confusion, knew not where to hide her head. She took refuge
under the apron of her mother, who sheltered her as well as she
could, terrified at the turn affairs were taking, while her father
stood before her to protect her at all risks. They were very
anxious that their child should be cured, but they wished her
cured gently and without hurting her.
"Don't be afraid," said Merlin, seeing their terror: "I do not
employ violence in curing these diseases. I am only going to
make Coralie a beautiful present, which I think will not displease
her. "
He opened a drawer, and took from it a magnificent amethyst
necklace, beautifully set, with a diamond clasp of dazzling lustre.
He put it on Coralie's neck, and dismissing the parents with a
friendly gesture, "Go, good people," said he, "and have no more
anxiety. Your daughter carries with her a sure guardian of the
truth. "
Coralie, flushed with pleasure, was hastily retreating, delighted
at having escaped so easily, when Merlin called her back.
"In a year," said he, looking at her sternly, "I shall come
for my necklace. Till that time I forbid you to take it off for a
single instant: if you dare to do so, woe be unto you! "
"Oh, I ask nothing better than always to wear it, it is so
beautiful. "
In order that you may know, I will tell you that this neck-
lace was none other than the famous Necklace of Truth, so much
talked of in ancient books, which unveiled every species of false-
hood.
## p. 9476 (#500) ###########################################
9476
JEAN MACÉ
The day after Coralie returned home she was sent to school.
As she had long been absent, all the little girls crowded round
her, as always happens in such cases. There was a general cry
of admiration at the sight of the necklace.
"Where did it come from? " and "Where did you get it? "
was asked on all sides.
In those days, for any one to say that he had been to the
enchanter Merlin's was to tell the whole story. Coralie took
good care not to betray herself in this way.
"I was sick for a long time," said she, boldly; "and on my
recovery, my parents gave me this beautiful necklace. "
A loud cry rose from all at once. The diamonds of the clasp,
which had shot forth so brilliant a light, had suddenly become
dim, and were turned to coarse glass.
"Well, yes, I have been sick! What are you making such a
fuss about ? »
At this second falsehood, the amethysts in turn changed to
ugly yellow stones. A new cry arose. Coralie, seeing all eyes
fixed on her necklace, looked that way herself, and was struck
with terror.
"I have been to the enchanter Merlin's," said she humbly,
understanding from what direction the blow came, and not dar
ing to persist in her falsehood.
Scarcely had she confessed the truth when the necklace re-
covered all its beauty; but the loud bursts of laughter that
sounded around her mortified her to such a degree that she felt
the need of saying something to retrieve her reputation.
"You do very wrong to laugh," said she, "for he treated us
with the greatest possible respect. He sent his carriage to meet
us at the next town, and you have no idea what a splendid car-
riage it was,-six white horses, pink satin cushions with gold
tassels, to say nothing of the negro coachman with his hair pow-
dered, and the three tall footmen behind! When we reached his
palace, which is all of jasper and porphyry, he came to meet us
at the vestibule, and led us to the dining-room, where stood a
table covered with things that I will not name to you, because
you never even heard speak of them. There was, in the first
place- »
The laughter, which had been suppressed with great difficulty
ever since she commenced this fine story, became at that mo-
ment so boisterous that she stopped in amazement; and casting
her eyes once more on the unlucky necklace, she shuddered
## p. 9477 (#501) ###########################################
JEAN MACÉ
9477
anew. At each detail that she had invented, the necklace had
become longer and longer, until it already dragged on the ground.
"You are stretching the truth," cried the little girls.
"Well, I confess it: we went on foot, and only stayed five
minutes. "
The necklace instantly shrunk to its proper size.
"And the necklace- - the necklace - - where did it come from? »
"He gave it to me without saying a word; probabl—"
She had not time to finish. The fatal necklace grew shorter
and shorter till it choked her terribly, and she gasped for want
of breath.
"You are keeping back part of the truth," cried her school-
fellows.
She hastened to alter the broken words while she could still
speak.
"He said that I was
world. "
-
-
one of the greatest-liars-in the
Instantly freed from the pressure that was strangling her, she
continued to cry with pain and mortification.
"That was why he gave me the necklace. He said that it
was a guardian of the truth, and I have been a great fool to be
proud of it. Now I am in a fine position! "
Her little companions had compassion on her grief; for they
were good girls, and they reflected how they should feel in her
place. You can imagine, indeed, that it was somewhat embar-
rassing for a girl to know that she could never more pervert the
truth.
ever.
"You are very good," said one of them. "If I were in your
place, I should soon send back the necklace: handsome as it is,
it is a great deal too troublesome. What hinders you from tak-
ing it off? "
Poor Coralie was silent; but the stones began to dance up and
down, and to make a terrible clatter.
"There is something that you have not told us," said the little
girls, their merriment restored by this extraordinary dance.
"I like to wear it. "
The diamonds and amethysts danced and clattered worse than
"There is a reason which you are hiding from us. "
"Well, since I can conceal nothing from you, he forbade me
to take it off, under penalty of some great calamity. "
## p. 9478 (#502) ###########################################
9478
JEAN MACÉ
You can imagine that with a companion of this kind, which
turned dull whenever the wearer did not tell the truth, which
grew longer whenever she added to it, which shrunk whenever
she subtracted from it, and which danced and clattered whenever
she was silent, a companion, moreover, of which she could not
rid herself, it was impossible even for the most hardened liar
not to keep closely to the truth. When Coralie once was fully
convinced that falsehood was useless, and that it would be in-
stantly discovered, it was not difficult for her to abandon it. The
consequence was, that when she became accustomed always to
tell the truth, she found herself so happy in it—she felt her
conscience so light and her mind so calm-that she began to
abhor falsehood for its own sake, and the necklace had nothing
more to do. Long before the year had passed, therefore, Merlin
came for his necklace, which he needed for another child that
was addicted to lying, and which, thanks to his art, he knew
was of no more use to Coralie.
---
-
No one can tell me what has become of this wonderful Neck-
lace of Truth; but it is thought that Merlin's heirs hid it after
his death, for fear of the ravages that it might cause on earth.
You can imagine what a calamity it would be to many people—
I do not speak only of children—if they were forced to wear it.
Some travelers who have returned from Central Africa declare
that they have seen it on the neck of a negro king, who knew
not how to lie; but they have never been able to prove their
words. Search is still being made for it, however; and if I were
a little child in the habit of telling falsehoods, I should not feel
quite sure that it might not some day be found again.
## p. 9478 (#503) ###########################################
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9479
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
(1469-1527)
BY CHARLES P. NEILL
ICCOLO MACHIAVELLI, perhaps the greatest prose writer of the
Italian Renaissance, was born in Florence May 3d, 1469, and
died there June 22d, 1527. He was of ancient and distin-
guished lineage on both his father's and his mother's side, and many
of his more immediate ancestors had been honored by republican
Florence with high offices of State. His father Bernardo was a re-
spectable jurist, who to a moderate income from his profession added
a small revenue from some landed possessions. His mother was a
woman of culture, and a poet of some ability.
Of Niccolo's early life and education we know nothing. No trace
of him remains previous to his twenty-sixth year. But of his times.
and the scenes amid which he grew up, we know much. It was the
calm but demoralizing era of Lorenzo the Magnificent, when the
sturdy Florentine burghers rested satisfied with magnificence in lieu
of freedom, and, intoxicated with the spirit of a pagan renaissance,
abandoned themselves to the refinements of pleasure and luxury;
when their streets had ceased for a while to re-echo with the clash
of steel and the fierce shouts of contending factions, and resounded
with the productions of Lorenzo's melodious but indecent Muse.
Machiavelli was a true child of his time. He too was thoroughly
imbued with the spirit of the Renaissance; and looked back, fasci-
nated, on the ideals of that ancient world that was being revivified
for the men of his day. But philosophy, letters, and art were not the
only heritage that the bygone age had handed down; politics—the
building of States and of empire- this also had engaged the minds
of the men of that age, and it was this aspect of their activity that
fired the imagination of the young Florentine. From his writings we
know he was widely read in the Latin and Italian classics. But Vir-
gil and Horace appealed to him less than Livy, and Dante the poet
was less to him than Dante the politician; for he read his classics,
not as others, to drink in their music or be led captive by their
beauty, but to derive lessons in statecraft, and penetrate into the
secrets of the successful empire-builders of the past.
It is equally
-
## p. 9480 (#508) ###########################################
9480
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
certain, from a study of his works, that he had not mastered Greek.
Like Ariosto, Machiavelli was indebted for his superb literary tech-
nique solely to the study of the literature of his own nation.
With the expulsion of the Medici from Florence, Machiavelli, at
the age of thirty, emerged from obscurity to play a most important
rôle in the Florentine politics of the succeeding decade and a half.
In 1498 he was elected secretary to the Ten of War and Peace,-a
commission performing the functions of a ministry of war and of
home affairs, and having in addition control of the Florentine diplo-
matic service. From 1498 to 1512 Machiavelli was a zealous, patriotic,
and indefatigable servant of the republic. His energy was untiring,
his activity ceaseless and many-sided. He conducted the voluminous
diplomatic correspondence devolving upon his bureau, drew up me-
morials and plans in affairs of State for the use and guidance of the
Ten, undertook the reorganization of the Florentine troops, and went
himself on a constant succession of embassies, ranging in importance
from those to petty Italian States up to those to the court of France
and of the Emperor. He was by nature well adapted to the peculiar
needs of the diplomacy of that day; and the training he received in
that school must in turn have reacted on him to confirm his native
bent, and accentuate it until it became the distinguishing character-
istic of the man. His first lessons in politics and statecraft were
derived from Livy's history of the not over-scrupulous Romans; and
when he comes to take his lessons at first hand, it is in the midst
of the intrigues of republican Florence, or at the court of a Caterina
Sforza, or in the camp of a Cesare Borgia. Small wonder that his
conception of politics should have omitted to take account of hon-
esty and the moral law; and that he conceived "the idea of giving
to politics an assured and scientific basis, treating them as having
a proper and distinct value of their own, entirely apart from their
moral value. "
During this period of his political activity, we have a large num-
ber of State papers and private letters from his pen; and two works
of literary cast have also come down to us. These are his 'Decen-
nale': historic narratives, cast into poetic form, of Italian events.
The first treats of the decade beginning 1494; and the second, an
unfinished fragment, of the decade beginning 1504. They are written
in easy terzine; and unfeigned sorrow for the miseries of Italy, torn
by internal discord, alternates with cynical mockery and stinging wit.
They are noteworthy as expressing the sentiment for a united Italy.
A third literary work of this period has been lost: 'Le Maschere,' a
satire modeled upon the comedies of Aristophanes.
When in 1512, after their long exile, the Medici returned to Flor-
ence in the train of her invader, Machiavelli, though not unwilling
## p. 9481 (#509) ###########################################
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
9481
to serve the restored rulers, was dismissed from his office and ban-
ished for a year from the confines of the city. Later, on suspicion
of being concerned in a plot against the Medici, he was thrown into
prison and tortured. He was soon afterward included in a gen-
eral pardon granted by the Cardinal de' Medici, then become Leo
X. But notwithstanding Machiavelli's earnest and persistent efforts
to win the good graces of the ruling family, he did not return to
public life until 1525; and this interval of enforced leisure from
affairs of State was the period of his literary activity. A number of
comedies, minor poems, and short prose compositions did not rise
above mediocrity. They were for the most part translations from
the classics, or imitations; and the names are hardly worth recount-
ing. But in one dramatic effort he rose to the stature of genius.
His 'Mandragola' achieved a flattering success both at Rome and in
Florence. It has been pronounced the finest comedy of the Italian
stage, and Macaulay rated it as inferior only to the greatest of
Molière's. In its form, its spontaneity, vivacity, and wit, it is not
surpassed by Shakespeare; but it is a biting satire on religion and
morality, with not even a hint of a moral to redeem it. Vice is
made humorous, and virtue silly; its satire is "deep and murderous";
and its plot too obscene to be narrated. In it Machiavelli has har-
nessed Pegasus to a garbage cart.
His lesser prose works are the 'Life of Castruccio Castracani,'
a "politico-military romance" made up partly from incidents in the
life of that hero, and partly from incidents taken from Diodorus Sicu-
lus's life of Agathocles, and concluding with a series of memorable
sayings attributed to Castruccio, but taken from the apophthegms of
Plutarch and Diogenes Laertius; and the Art of War,' a treatise
anticipating much of our modern tactics, and inveighing against the
mediæval system of mercenary troops of mail-clad men and horses.
A more ambitious undertaking, and in fact his largest work, is the
'History of Florence. ' At the suggestion of the Cardinal de' Medici,
the directors of the studio of Florence commissioned Machiavelli to
employ himself in writing a history of Florence, "from whatever
period he might think fit to select, and either in the Latin or the
Tuscan tongue, according to his taste. " He was to receive one hun-
dred florins a year for two years to enable him to pursue the work.
He chose his native tongue; and revised and polished his work until
it became a model of style, and in its best passages justifies his claim
to the title of the best and most finished of Italian prose writers.
He thus describes the luring of Giuliano de' Medici to his place of
assassination:-
:-
"This arrangement having been determined upon, they went into the
church, where the Cardinal had already arrived with Lorenzo de' Medici. The
## p. 9482 (#510) ###########################################
9482
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI
church was crowded with people, and divine service had already commenced;
but Giuliano had not yet come. Francesco dei Pazzi, therefore, together with
Bernardo, who had been designated to kill Giuliano, went to his house, and by
artful persuasion induced him to go to the church. It is really a noteworthy
fact that so much hatred and the thoughts of so great an outrage could be
concealed under so much resoluteness of heart, as was the case with Francesco
and Bernardo; for on the way to church, and even after having entered it, they
entertained him with merry jests and youthful chatter. And Francesco, even.
under pretense of caressing him, felt him with his hands and pressed him in
his arms, for the purpose of ascertaining whether he wore a cuirass or any
other means of protection under his garments. »
But though Machiavelli had the historical style, he lacked histori-
cal perspective; he arranged his matter not according to objective
value, but placed in the boldest relief those events that best lent
support to his own theories of politics and statecraft. He makes his
facts to be as he wishes them, rather than as he knows them to be.
He wishes to throw contempt on mercenary troops, and though he
knows an engagement to have been bloody, prefers for his descrip-
tion such a conclusion as this: "In the tremendous defeat that was
noised throughout Italy, no one perished excepting Ludovico degli
Obizzi and two of his men, who being thrown from their horses were
smothered in the mud. " To Machiavelli history was largely to be
written as a tendenz roman,-manufactured to point a preconceived
moral.
Though Machiavelli wrote history, poetry, and comedy, it is not
by these he is remembered.
