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Show New Light on the Borgias. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH is not, of necessity, deeply concerned in the rehabilitation of the Borgias. The Papacy will stand even if it remains eternally proven that Alexander VI was a sixteenth-century man of the world, rather than an exotic. The heroic sanctity sanc-tity of Francisco de Borgia is suffcient proof that the family tree wa.s not entirely en-tirely rooted in degeneracy, and- the conflicting stories of the public needs and private habits of Alexindor make it quite possible that we shall have yet to, revise our notions of tho moral character of this great, if n t good, Pontiff, says the Catholic Transcript. Enemies he had, bitter and rerfidi-ous. rerfidi-ous. He lived in an age whose ideals were not those of the twentiich century. cen-tury. Money was then a might ;ower. It could marshal slanderers as v. ell as eulogists. It worked fjr and against the great. ' And malignity itself has been unable to invalidate Alexander's title to greatness. He has been assailed by Catholics and defended by Voltaire. Vol-taire. He was as able as he was ambitious, am-bitious, and one Pope at least ranked him among the very greatest cf those who had succeeded to the Throne of the Fisherman. The Chronicles of the House of Borgia, Bor-gia, a volume fresh from the pen of Frederick Baron Corvo, makes it clear enough that there is very little truth in the worst accusations brought against that family of notable men and women. The Borgia .women were neitn-er neitn-er "poison-bearing maenads" nor "ven-eficious "ven-eficious bacchanantes." Lucrezia, ! whose story has appealed to subse-.i quent ages with special force, is proven ! by the author to be a lady ol exef p- 4 ! tionally amiable qualities of mini and 1 'heart and personality. Speaking of her.j 1 at the time of her marriage to Don Alfonso d'Este, Duke of Ferrara, Baron Bar-on Corvo says: "She is now the wife I of royalty with a near prospect of a ! throne, worshiped by the poor for her transcendent beauty and In r charities, chari-ties, by the learned for her intelligence, intelli-gence, by her kin for her loving loyalty, by her husband for her perfect wifehood wife-hood and motherhood, by all for her transcendant beauty and her spotless name. Why it has pleased modern , writers and thinkers to depict this j pearl among women as a 'poison-bearing maenad.' a 'venificious bacchan-ante.' bacchan-ante.' stained with revolting and unnatural un-natural turpitude, is one of those riddles rid-dles to which there is no key." The Baron believes that physiognomy is an index to character, and the most superficial study of the effigy of Ma-dona Ma-dona Lucrezia Borgia must put her calumniators to shame. "In that simple profile of features, fea-tures, clean-cut. delicate, refined; in those chaste contours so gently rounded, round-ed, so sweetly fresh and .feminine; in the carriage of that Flavian head, well poised and nobly frank, there can lurk no taint of degeneracy." Her marriage with Don Alfonso wa.s one of exceptional happiness. The Duchess soon made herself beloved by-all, by-all, Ferrara. She issued an edict for the protection of the Jews wnj were the special objects of hatred ;.) Christians. Chris-tians. When Regent of Ferra-a, she carried her liberal-mindedness fo far as to appoint a Jewess to ctre for her wardrobe and to en?ie an Israelite for her physician. She v.-.as i-xpeeia'iy tender- to young girls, and guarded their virtue by proviiiig the.n wi.n suitable dowries. ; Contemporary writers an- eloquent in describing the evenings which this t mi-able mi-able lady spent in conversation with poets and scholars, wi':'n artists and musicians. Manuzio, the groat Vfne-t:an Vfne-t:an painter, wis ext;iv.igjnt in h!b praise of the Duvheas and his sincerity has never been question'id. "When she died at the age of 41, in June. 1519, she was deeply mou-ned by her husoiind, and it seemed to onlookers that all the inhabitants of Ferrara thronged around her bier. ' Writers, who. fov the sake of profit, have reviled the rn imovies ; Alexander Alexan-der VI. and I'n.e Duchess Lucrez-a, have so far trir.sgrosse 1 the bounds of probability that critics irimioal both to the Borgias an"i the 'nth i? 'iMji- n have been forced t.) demur. V.'i'h increasing in-creasing light, '.t may will appear that they wore more lintid against n sinning. Now, tnat TOO years have passed since tney ware inn ooservea ci all observers, it seems probaola that the interested will b? ib'e to r.id their careers in the ight cf nonest, unprejudiced un-prejudiced histvy. |