698 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1617.
on his announcement that his predictions of future events came by divine revelation.^ At the same time, the pope expressed his great joy over the report that of all the workers in the Lord's vineyard, Savonarola was the most zealous, and he promised to welcome him to the eternal city with love and fraternal affection. Savonarola declined the pontiff's summons on the ground of ill-health and the dangers that would beset him on the way to Rome. His old rival in the pulpit, Fra ]\Iariano de Gennazzano, and other enemies were in Rome intriguing against him, and the Medici were fast winning the pope's favor.
Alexander's first letter inhibiting him from preaching, Sept. 9, 1495, condemned Savonarola's insane folly in mixing up with Italian political affairs and his announcement that he was a special messenger sent from God. In his reply Savonarola answered the charges and, at the invitation of the signory, continued to preach. In his third brief, Oct. ^^ 1495, the pontiff forbade him to preach openly or in private. Pastor remarks, " It was as clear as the sun that Savonarola was guilty of rank disobedience to the papal authority."^
For five months, the friar held himself aloof in his convent but, Feb. 17, 1496, at the call of the signory to preach the Lenten sermons, he again ascended the pulpit. He took the bold position that the pope might err. " The pope," he said, " may command me to do something that contravenes the law of Christian love or the Gospel. But, if he did so command, I would say to him, thou art no shepherd. Not the Roman Church, but thou errest." From that time j)n^ he lifted his voice against the corruptions of the papal city as he had not done befpre. Preaching on Amos 4: 1, Feb. 28, 1496, he exclaimed, "Who are the fat kine of Bashan on the mountains of Samaria? I say they are the courtesans of Italy and Rome. Or, are there none ? A thousand are too few for Rome, 10,000, 12,000, 14,000 are too few for Rome. Prepare thyself, O Rome, for great will be thy punishments."^
^ See the document in Lucas, p. 180, and O'Neil, p. 9 sq. The original in Rudelbach.
2 Zur Benrtheilung, p. CO. Pastor is refuting Luotto's position.
8 The Italian text in I'errens, I. 471 sq. Tlie sermons of this period were on Amos, Zachariah, Micah and Ruth. According to Burlaniacchi, the sultan had some of them translated into Turliish. Villari, II. 87.
§ 7G. GIROLAMO SAVONAROLA, 699
Finding threats would not stop Savonarola's mouth, Alexander resorted to bribery, an art in which he was well skilled. Through a Dominican sent to Florence, he offered to the friar of St. Mark's the red hat. But Alexander had mistaken his man and, in a sermon delivered August, 1496, Savonarola declared that neither mitres nor a cardinal's hat would he have, but only the gift God confers on His saints — death, a crimson hat, a hat reddened with blood. Lucas, strangely enough, ascribes the offer of the red hat, not to vicious shrewdness but to the alleged good purpose of Alexander to show his appreciation of "an earnest but misguided man."
The carnival season of 1496 and the seasons of the next two years gave remarkable proofs of the hold Savonarola had on the popular mind. The carniyalj^which had been the scene of wild revelries, was turned into a semi-religious festival. The boys had been accustomed to carry their merriment to rude excesses, forcing their demands for money upon older persons, dancing around bonfires at night and pelting people and houses promiscuously with stones. For this " festival of the stones," which the signory had been unable to abolish Savonarola and his co-helpers substituted a religious celebration . It was called the reform of the boys. Savonarola had established boys' brigades in different wards of the city and arranged tiers of seats for them against the walls of the cathedral. These "boys of Fra Girolamo," as Landucci calls them, marched up and down the streets singing hymns which Savonarola and Benivieni composed and taking their places at stands, erected for the purpose, received collections for the poor.
On the last day of the carnival of 1497, occurred the buxning of the vanities, as it was called. The young men, who had been stirred to enthusiasm by Savonarola's sermons, went through the city, knocking from door to door and asking the people to give up their trinkets, obscene books such as Ovid and Boccaccio, dice, games of chance, harps, mirrors, masks, cosmetics and portraits of beautiful women, and other objects of luxury. These were piled up in the public square in a pyramid, 60 feet high and 240 feet in circumference at the base. The morning of that day, throngs listened to the mass said