"It was plain," he
used to say, "that God Almighty ruled the world, or how could things
go on with a rogue like Alexander VI. at the head of the Church, and
a mere huntsman like himself at the head of the Empire." His bon-
mots are numerous, all thoroughly characteristic, and showing that
brilliancy in conversation must have been one of his greatest charms.
It seems as if only self-control and resolution were wanting to have
made him a Charles, or an Alfred, the Great.
The romance of his marriage with the heiress of Burgundy is one of
the best known parts of his life. He was scarcely two-and-twenty
when he lost her, who perhaps would have given him the stability he
wanted; but his tender hove for her endured through life. It is not
improbable that it was this still abiding attachment that made him
slack in overcoming difficulties in the way of other contracts, and
that he may have hoped that his engagement to Bianca Sforza would
come to nothing, like so many others.
The most curious record of him is, however, in two books, the
materials for which he furnished, and whose composition and
illustration he superintended, Der Weise King, and Theurdank, of both
of which he is well known to be the hero.
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