The Pulpit and the Press in Reformation Italy 9780674075290

Citation preview

i tatti studies in italian r enaissance history

Sponsored by Villa I Tatti Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies Florence, Italy

The Pulpit and the Press in Reformation Italy

Emily Michelson

h a rva r d uni v er sit y pr ess Cambr idge, Massachuset ts London, Engla nd 2013

Copyright © 2013 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College a l l r ig h t s r e s e rv e d Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Michelson, Emily. The pulpit and the press in Reformation Italy / Emily Michelson. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index. ISBN 978-0-674-07297-8 1. Reformation—Italy.  2. Sermons—History and criticism.  3. Sermons—Italy. 4. Italy—Church history. I. Title. BR390.M53 2013 274.506—dc23 2012034735

For my father, in thanks

Contents

Introduction

1

1. Where Sermons Mattered

15

2. Mendicant Preachers

54

3. Sermons and Diocesan Reform

87

4. Treatises for Laypeople

112

5. The Generation after Trent

140

Epilogue: Sermons and Their Reception

172



Appendix: Key Preachers in Italy Notes Acknowledgments Index

183 185 251 255

The Pulpit and the Press in Reformation Italy

Introduction

I wrote this work only for my own benefit, because it seemed strange to me that although I read and I preached every day, I also said psalms every day, yet without understanding a word I was saying.1

With this apology, Francesco Panigarola, the most celebrated Italian preacher of the sixteenth century, identified a potent mixture: reading books, preaching sermons, understanding scripture, and making personal choices. According to those in his profession, it was this recipe, poorly handled, that had brought their era to religious catastrophe. This book follows Italian preachers like Panigarola as they found themselves on the front lines of a more desperate war than anything they had ever imagined. The war—the splintering of western Christendom into conflicting sects during the Reformation—was physically but also spiritually violent. Throughout the uncertainty, preachers had to keep preaching. For most people in the Catholic world, the sermon was the sole moment of comprehension in a religious culture that existed entirely in Latin, and it would remain so until the middle of the twentieth century.2 In the Middle Ages,

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the sermon was the vehicle for nearly all religious education. The requirement to speak from the pulpit daily, weekly, or seasonally launched preachers into the midst of battles they had not expected and did not welcome and forced them to confront the hottest controversies of their day. During the Reformation it was their job to help their flocks survive “the most radical and dangerous moment” in the history of the Catholic Church, and in many ways of western religious history.3 Such preachers could rely on centuries of professional tradition to help them with this new charge, but religious crisis also led to innovation. Many preachers turned to the printing press, extending the reach of their sermons by remaking them as readable texts. The printed sermons that resulted served as models for later generations of Catholic reformers and as spiritual guides for laypeople. These works became an essential tool both for preserving the Church in a time of tremendous uncertainty, and also for refashioning Catholicism for a new era. They reveal the emergence of a consensus that would characterize Catholic culture for centuries to follow, but they also draw attention to the difficulties and contradictions within it. By deploying their pulpits, their pens, and their publishers, preachers in Italy sought to create a new religious culture that would survive in an unprecedented atmosphere of competition and religious choice. Above all, their sermons capture sixteenth-­century Italy at one of its most uncomfortable moments: when Catholicism and Protestantism first collided.4 Italy never became a Protestant region, but in the mid-­sixteenth century, the danger seemed grave and the outcome uncertain. The Catholic Church faced unprecedented assaults on its theology and competition for its laypeople. Social, religious, and cultural changes engulfed early modern Italy: changes in the Italian literary tradition, in the nature of religious authority, and in the technology used to disseminate ideas. Sermons bear testimony to all these currents, both violent and peaceful. By reading them, we learn how clergymen steered a course through the choppy waters of the sixteenth century: how they thought, and what they taught. The sermons express both the real and the perceived challenges facing the Catholic Church, as it struggled to adapt to new demands without compromising its traditions. They reveal preachers as the key agents in the re-­creation and lasting survival of Catholic culture, and thus as the builders of many of the institutions that shaped the modern world. [  2  ]

introduction

Some of the men in this study, such as Cornelio Musso or Luigi Lippomano, were renowned and illustrious in their day; the power of their words and personalities gave their ideas broad influence. Others, such as Giovanni Del Bene or Evangelista Marcellino, were relatively unknown, but produced works that turned out to be practical and useful, and as a result reached clerics all over the peninsula. Yet others were anomalies, but they show us individuals who were privately confronting the same problems that troubled all of Europe and who sought to make their answers available to a wider public by printing them. This book concentrates primarily on the middle decades of the sixteenth century, when religious tensions between and within faiths were at their height. During this period, the religious landscape of Europe was wholly transformed. Laypeople increasingly sought to participate in religious life. The challenge of Protestantism had become impossible to ignore, but at the same time, clear guidance from Rome was still lacking. The Council of Trent, which would thoroughly review major areas of Catholic doctrine and establish norms for reform, took a generation to complete (1545–1563).5 The Tridentine decrees themselves took even longer to implement. During these decades, new institutions were born that would define the Catholic Church in Italy and the world for the following centuries, including the Jesuits and other new religious orders, the Tridentine liturgy, the Congregation of the Holy Office, and the Index of Forbidden Books. This was the period of greatest challenge for a preacher, but it was also the time of greatest independence and influence. In response, preachers embraced the press. The printing of Italian sermons skyrocketed after 1540, and preachers began editing and packaging their own works for publication. For the first time, readers could buy sermons written by their contemporaries, and the volumes they chose would permeate the Italian book world into the seventeenth century. I.  To these preachers and their audiences, the biggest threat to religious unity came not from Protestant iconoclasm, although it was violent, and not from Protestant theology, although it upended Church hierarchies. What upset them, instead, was the Protestant promise of sola scriptura, the idea that scripture could be read directly, free from the interpretative traditions that had accreted to it through 1500 years of apostolic commentary. What seemed [  3  ]

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like liberation to Luther seemed like arrogance to Catholics. In their view, scripture was powerful but dangerous. To approach it without the wisdom of earlier theologians was to think oneself smarter than the greatest minds of the past. It could easily lead to misinterpretation, and thence to quick damnation. This led Catholic preachers to a conundrum. They had to find ways to continue, or adapt, their own traditions of preaching scripture without leading the faithful astray, even though interest in the Bible and knowledge of its contents had quickly become a hallmark of Protestant sympathy. The problem was unprecedented, and individual preachers had little guidance from authoritative sources. As a result, their sermons and other writings repeatedly discussed whether, when, where, and how to teach scripture to the laity. The scripture question is therefore the primary test case for this study. The conclusions these men reached appeared in a variety of genres: sermon collections, guides for preachers, and treatises. Sermons published strictly because they were delivered from a pulpit and later transcribed are inseparable from the broader body of sermon literature: sermons reprinted as examples for future preachers, or collections of passages for use in sermon composition, or even many devotional treatises and exegetical literature. Those who composed such works had often preached the material earlier, and those who read them often found in them material for future sermons.6 Many libraries in Italy and quite a few in the United States and Britain possess volumes of these sermons in copious numbers, but their content and their very existence have been all but ignored in modern depictions of early modern religious life, especially in English. Yet they contain some of the earliest articulations of typically post-­Tridentine attitudes toward scripture, and more broadly, toward the faithful; they show the future face of Catholicism. Preachers decided early on that the safest way to learn scripture was by hearing it: Bishops should explain the gospels in church, in year­round preaching. The laity’s job was to listen, not read.7 The Council of Trent would codify this formula, and much of the Roman Church’s energy and attention would shift, in the later sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, to the pastoral efforts of bishops. Although they came to agree on how to teach scripture, preachers often took widely varying stances on its inherent nature and accessibility; [  4  ]

introduction

a­ greement did not mean uniformity. They show a range of acceptable opinions and approaches within the Catholic fold. Even on a topic as essential as scripture, reform efforts did not require an unvarying policy; they accommodated preachers’ individual personalities and judgments and allowed for, in Simon Ditchfield’s terminology, regularization rather than standardization.8 Preachers contradicted each other—and sometimes themselves— without, for the most part, calling their own orthodoxy into question. Doctrinal variation was part of Catholic orthodoxy in the years before the close of the Council, and it continued in print long afterwards. Any conclusions about actual social or religious change must be firmly grounded in descriptive sources as well as prescriptive ones, and must consider the imperfections of transmission as the step between theory and practice.9 Perhaps no material is better suited for this work than the sermons of ordinary preachers. Preachers not only reflected but also created the broader metamorphosis of the Catholic Church in the age of reform. They voiced support for embattled Church institutions (such as the Council itself), helping to stabilize them. By teaching simultaneously about the need to know scripture and the need to obey the clergy in interpreting it, preachers acknowledged lay needs while also reinforcing traditional clerical authority. They increasingly focused their attention on humbler and less educated groups of laity—those who had the most to gain from the Protestant message of lay empowerment, who were therefore considered to be the most at risk of apostasy, and whose growing demand for scriptural access demanded reply. Above all, preachers recognized that they had entered a new era, one in which they had to compete for the loyalty and the souls of the laity. The sermons in their volumes thus became the foundational building blocks of modern Catholicism—but they are vast and rich even beyond this and have a great deal still to tell us about the perspective and concerns of the early modern world. II.  For many historians, especially social historians, the high point of Italian preaching is found in the vibrant sermons of late medieval preachers such as Bernardino of Siena or Girolamo Savonarola, filled with exempla, parables, and real-­world metaphors; the subsequent centuries receive little mention.10 Scholars of later periods writing in English have concentrated on sermons given at the most elite level, in Latin, and in decades well on either side of [  5  ]

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the Reformation crisis.11 A revived interest in preaching over the past two decades has now laid a path for examining sermons as a broad genre that mediated between different social groups. Studies of preaching in Europe have increasingly emphasized vernacular sermons, the central role of preachers in their societies, and the importance of preachers’ monastic training.12 Despite their centrality to religious life and social culture on the Italian peninsula, Italian vernacular sermons have received far too little attention as conveyers of reform. Attention to these sermons redirects many older accounts of the course of the Reformation. Scholars generally agree that the growth of Lutheranism and other denominations posed a crisis for the Roman Church, but they have disagreed about the nature of that crisis, and about what the Italian response to it means for religious history. The most stereotypical of these pictures is based on the “no book, no Reformation” German model.13 That familiar cliché assumes that Protestants succeeded by preaching and printing, and that Catholics’ efforts on those fronts were reactionary, dogmatic, and uncreative. In this version of events, the Roman Church’s only response to the Reformation crisis was to pursue its own survival and the allegiance of its faithful at any cost. Its defensiveness ensured that the lasting Catholic contribution to religious development was the Inquisition; its contribution to book history was censorship. Innovations within Catholicism, though influential, were nonetheless elaborate forms of obedience—Ignatius Loyola’s Jesuit order or Carlo Borromeo’s model of episcopacy. Moreover, the individuals who spearheaded these new models were not easily imitated. By failing to engage in the novel concerns of Protestants, according to this thinking, the Roman Church also failed fully to enter the modern world.14 Long-­standing stereotypes of Catholicism as monolithic and repressive have thus persisted in both the academic and the popular mindset, despite half a century’s worth of challenges. But on the eve of the Reformation, Italy’s preachers were among the era’s most dynamic and beloved. Its presses had dominated the religious print industry for decades. Neither party suddenly fell silent in the face of religious threats, particularly when those threats were seen to come from the same two strengths: preaching and printing. The copious works written and published by Italian preachers challenge the primarily continental model of progressive Protestantism and reactionary Catholicism.15 [  6  ]

introduction

Scholars who look more closely into Italian Catholic affairs have often described a similarly stark contrast, but have defined its poles differently; in their depiction, the Protestant challenge pitted two groups of Italian reformers against each other: the broad-­m inded spirituali, a group of learned clerics and laypeople who accommodated ideas receptive to some Protestant theology, and the repressive intransigenti or zelanti, who ultimately forced the Church to reject any position of tolerance or flexibility. In this picture, the small size of each group made its members easier to identify. The direction of Catholic reform was settled at the most elite levels, and for ill; the increasing influence of the Holy Office on the Council of Trent over time ensured the eventual success of the intransigente position.16 Scholars bemoan the triumph of the intransigenti’s repressive restrictions over spirituale progressive hopes. Although scholarship in English increasingly questions the strictness of the spirituali/intransigenti divide, it dies hard, especially in Italian scholarship.17 Recent attempts to soften these dichotomies have emphasized that Catholic reform did not take place in a vacuum, nor was it a unidirectional force that successfully streamlined and homogenized ecclesiastical practice. Instead, they emphasize continuity with past reform movements, competing models of reform, cooperation among supposed antagonists, and local resistance to a centralizing Church authority.18 Some even emphasize local variation to the point of asserting that “the Church” as “a coherent if not monolithic organization with a clear doctrine . . . ​was never achieved. The ‘Church’ itself was made up of competing institutions and individuals, following different ideal ‘models,’ or selfish interests.”19 These schools of thought share the assumption that reform practices or attitudes were not simply measured and discarded until a victor emerged. Their adherents instead emphasize the concurrence of seemingly opposite approaches, indebted to Hubert Jedin’s endorsement of the term “Catholic Reform and Counter-­Reformation” to explain coexisting tendencies within orthodoxy.20 John O’Malley recommends the term “Early Modern Catholi­ cism” for this period, in order to draw the focus of study away from binary questions of reform and toward a broader and more holistic view of the period as one in which Catholic identity was renewed and reconfirmed.21 Adriano Prosperi has argued that the Inquisition succeeded in exercising its power in Italy, thereby Catholicizing and bureaucratizing Italians, through [  7  ]

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a twofold approach consisting of coercion and persuasion.22 The preachers in this study substantiate such an approach by refusing to settle into easy or predictable categories even as they promoted increasingly strict doctrinal positions. III.  These broader attempts to capture the religious complexities of the sixteenth century are often deployed to explain the later course of Italian ­h istory: why Protestantism gained so little official foothold, and how modernization was achieved. On the first point, if we could ask the preachers in this study whether they thought Italy had a Protestant reformation, to a man they would have said yes. That is why their efforts were so fervent.23 Unlike elsewhere in Europe, Italy’s “Protestants,” at the time, were largely indistinguishable from its Catholics. In German-­or French-­speaking regions, denominational lines were more clearly and politically drawn. In Catholic Spain, a powerful monarchy managed religious affairs, and fears of Lutheranism bled into fears of marginalized Judaizers and Moriscos. But in Italy the seam of reformers was broad, influential, and extremely hard to delineate. It was inextricable from the wide range of opinions and positions within Catholicism before 1563.24 Over the course of the 1540s and 1550s, as confessional lines hardened throughout Italy and Europe, many reform-­m inded Italians increasingly had to choose sides. Prominent examples in Italian historiography ended up across the denominational spectrum; they included—to give the briefest sample—Pier Paolo Vergerio, Bishop of Capodistria until his rejection of Catholicism and his flight out of Italy; Giulia Gonzaga, patron, editor, and friend of many convicted or suspected heretics, who died in her convent; and Cardinal Reginald Pole, who championed justification by faith and shielded reformers during his decades in Italy, but who also served as papal legate during the first period of Trent and later returned to England to administer Marian reform as Archbishop of Canterbury. Many Catholics continued to regard Pole as with suspicion as a philo-­Protestant, but the celebrated preacher Franceschino Visdomini, among others, championed his role in restoring England to the Roman faith.25 Those who ended up explicitly heterodox, or who harbored known sympathies toward aspects of Protestant doctrine, have received by far the most attention in this period’s history, especially for the years between 1540 and 1570. But in fact it is [  8  ]

introduction

only in retrospect, and anachronistically, that their positions can be classified. Heresy as a distinct body of thought was defined only in the prosecuting of it.26 The same crucible also forged new definitions of Catholicism. In scholarship, the orthodox side has been represented either by Catholic apologetic or local, parochial histories, or later by studies of religious institutions such as the Holy Office.27 This book, instead, examines some of the individuals who helped to draw the new, darker borders of orthodoxy or who manned those borders—including some who tried many options before determining their final position and others who simply adhered to those boundaries from the outset and reinforced them by writing and preaching. The second point, modernization, is best explained through the confessionalization thesis, which argues that the religious reformations helped to modernize Europe: As religious denominations, or confessions, became distinct from each other, they all imitated and cooperated with civil modes of governance. This increase in administration and institutionalization of religious practice supported the emerging state system. Scholars within Italy have returned to confessionalization, and its related term, social discipline, to describe increasing hegemony and repressiveness within the Roman Church, as well as an increased centralization and bureaucracy, all in the name of proving Catholicism’s contributions to general history and the ultimate “cultural profile, however differentiated, of modern western Christians.”28 This approach promoted the study of orthodoxy and emphasized institutional or ecclesiastical history, especially of the Inquisition, episcopal visitations, or new religious orders, but it also included renewed attention to methods of surveillance and intimidation. In doing so it has sometimes returned to old stereotypes through new methodology. Harsh terms such as social discipline and institutional force have not precluded complex and ambiguous readings of confessionalization. Even when considered from a top-­down institutional perspective, enforcing behavior and winning hearts were two sides of the same coin. As Adriano Prosperi has shown, bishops, members of religious orders, parish priests, and Inquisitors all shared the common goal of re-­Catholicizing Italy, using the various coercive or persuasive tools at their command.29 Some pictures of Catholic confessionalization start from the bottom, emphasizing the active participation of laypeople and their appropriation of devotional [  9  ]

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p­ ractices, well beyond the efforts of bishops and Inquisitors. The very terms “discipline” and “confessionalization” imply an inflated level of effectiveness and success, when in fact local case studies reveal a much more equivocal but richer picture of negotiation, manipulation, appropriation, failure, and “undiscipline.”30 The preachers and bishops in this study best meet this last description in seeking, like Prosperi’s persuasive coercers, to do everything. They wanted to preserve the orthodoxy of their flock and maintain the authority of the Roman Church, while also responding to an undeniable lay demand for inclusion and participation. They lived in contradiction, trying to give laypeople all the access to scripture they demanded, while making sure to prevent any false and dangerous interpretations. They fought for their roles as preachers while recognizing the structure of a Church that had changed around them. As Luigi Lippomano, Bishop of Verona, demonstrated, preachers were compelled to confront circumstances they did not welcome, and so their encounters were not always successful. Lippomano introduced his great work on lay orthodoxy by grumbling, “I regret in my very soul doing this task, but necessity forces me to it . . .”31 Preachers were flanked in these endeavors by more dramatic and explicit innovators—members of new religious orders, especially Jesuits, and affiliates of new institutions, such as Inquisitors. For the most part, the preachers in this study steered a middle course. They did not subscribe to explicit innovation on either side of the confessional line, nor were they, for the most part, either famously seduced out of the Catholic fold or famously prosecutorial within it. In the end they are the barely known mainstream, mostly left out of other historical accounts of this change: neither Inquisitors, nor heretics, nor Jesuits, nor primarily bishops. Yet in practicing the Church’s oldest and most popular form of teaching, they accelerated the dramatic evolution of early modern religion. Trained in educating and moving their listeners, they had the potential for profound emotional and religious influence. When they turned to the printing press, they could make that influence reach across the peninsula. In arguing for the importance of preachers in Reformation Italy, this study also seeks to redress a number of other wrongs. It subscribes broadly to the confessionalization thesis in that it portrays the creation of a new Catholic culture and identity through the contestation of heretical others [  10  ]

introduction

and through the imposition of a new set of behavioral standards—but it also sees those processes as the products of personal decisions, contradictions, and failures. Its protagonists do not fit neatly into institutional or class distinctions; they range from powerful cardinals to relatively humble or unknown priests. By stepping up their efforts to keep the laity loyal and the heretics at bay, and by arguing in print for the best tactics in that battle, they also show the increasing professionalization of the clergy that became a hallmark of a confessionalized Church.32 While recognizing that the criticism of abuses long preceded Luther, the texts studied here document responses to Lutheran and other Protestant innovations. This study therefore also generally describes the “Counter-­ Reformation” while demonstrating, I hope, the insufficiency of that term. The course of that countering was not inevitable, or simple. It was the product of many decisions, by individual people who cannot easily be reduced into camps. They reveal heterogeneous, individualized approaches to reform and scripture among the Church’s most trusted and orthodox representatives. Reform, therefore, was determined not simply through debates between a few men within elite factions at Trent, but through the efforts of scores of unremembered preachers in hundreds of sermons both heard and read. Their actions show that the “reform tendency” that characterized many spirituali and their known opponents also extended to a broader cross­section of clerics and could tend in more than one direction.33 There is no doubt that many of the preachers’ measures arose out of fear of heresy and distaste for the laity. But for the preachers in this study, the social discipline obtained in the regularization of preaching and in the teaching of obedience was but one aspect of the greater task of protecting souls from heresy and creating a new Catholic culture, which encouraged more pious, more engaged Catholics. Scholars need to take into account that Catholic reactions to heresy, even in indisputably Catholic areas, could be as diverse as the new confessions they opposed.34 IV.  The title of this book includes the infrequently used phrase “Reformation Italy,” which more typically refers to Protestant activity in Italy. That is not the sense I intend here; I use it because this book’s protagonists were overwhelmingly concerned with reform—not only the Protestant Reformation that propelled much of their activity, but also the reform of the Roman [  11  ]

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Church and of the souls of its followers. More common terms for sixteenth­century Italy, such as Early Modern or High Renaissance, draw attention away from these themes. Nor is “Reformation Italy” intended as yet another contribution to the debate about what to call Catholic activity in this period. It is a reflection of the priorities of my subjects, and a conscious use of the word “reformation” as a universal, not denominational, term. The following five chapters will thus examine how preachers in different contexts, working in different genres, helped to reshape Catholic identity during the tumultuous sixteenth century. The first chapter examines the many ways people encountered sermons in the sixteenth century and the contexts where sermons mattered: as part of Mass on Sundays and festivals, as public spectacles every day of Lent, and in their printed form, as private aids to religious devotion and as teaching manuals for other preachers. Many sixteenth-­century sermon practices were inherited from the Middle Ages, but distinctly new phenomena such as the Protestant threat, episcopal reform, growing opportunities for lay participation, and the Council of Trent led to a crisis of authority in which traditional guides for preachers became insufficient. Chapter 1 also describes the development of different groups of preachers with different rhetorical styles: educated elite preachers from mendicant monastic orders and bishops or secular priests in dioceses.35 It places the printing of sermons in the context of sixteenth-­century book culture by describing how sermon literature could be printed and marketed. Chapter 2 examines the practices and impact of elite Franciscan preachers with access to power, arguing that preachers who were present at the Council of Trent were unusually influential in publicizing its messages and in seeking to combat Protestantism. Cornelio Musso (1511–1574) and Franceschino Visdomini (1516–1573) were closely linked to the Council and its powerful delegates. In marked contrast to many of their contemporaries, they used their status to convey new Tridentine ideas about scripture. They supported the decisions of the Council and actively promoted its authority in their sermons, creating a more explicit doctrinal position than their contemporaries. Yet even a Tridentine agenda did not create uniformity of opinion; even Musso and Visdomini differed in their answers to the key question of how to teach scripture. Chapter 3 explores the difference of opinion between two other preachers, [  1 2  ]

introduction

this time in a diocesan context. The Roman Church’s principal answer to the question of how to teach scripture, and of how to protect and educate the laity, lay ultimately not with traditional mendicant preachers but with the diocesan bishop. It relied increasingly on its bishops to oversee Catholic reform and education. Bishops and their staff addressed new challenges and a different population as they took up the task of preaching and residing in their dioceses for the first time in centuries. Yet they faced many of the same problems as their mendicant counterparts. Chapter 3 analyzes the reform messages of two early and respected bishops from the generation before Borromeo: Luigi Lippomano in Verona and Girolamo Seripando in Salerno. Both of these men played important roles on the national stage and at the Council of Trent. Both embarked with energy and enthusiasm on the task of reforming their dioceses. Nonetheless, a close analysis of their sermons and episcopacies reveals divergent attitudes toward the laity and toward the process of reform and pedagogy. Their personal attitudes and emotions infused the process of reform at every level, making it an inevitably heterogeneous, and sometimes inconsistent, process. Luigi Lippomano also sought to reach the faithful by producing a treatise in Italian on Catholic doctrine and the refutation of heresy. He was not the only preacher to do so. Chapter 4 identifies five such works as a distinct genre within the larger body of vernacular anti-­Protestant polemic. This group of treatises shows that preachers went to great lengths to reach the uneducated laity using new media, even when their skills were better suited to other genres. In these works, preachers tackled difficult questions about how to provide an orthodox religious education to the faithful. The various answers they proposed anticipate the decisions of the Council of Trent and provide early indications of the direction of the Roman Church in the post-­ Tridentine period, but at the same time, they reveal unwitting problems in the clerical approach to lay education and reform. The final chapter of the book points to the future of Italian preaching by analyzing the new role mendicant preachers created for themselves in the midst of a rapidly changing religious culture. It argues that the later sixteenth century witnessed a revitalization of preaching styles. Mendicant sermons contributed to the re-­creation of Catholicism by emphasizing the glories of Rome and of the Catholic Church at large. In so doing, they brought to a wider audience the same priorities as the Latin orators at the [  13  ]

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papal court. At the same time, they increasingly emphasized scriptural exegesis and comprehension in their sermons, making a point of explaining that the laity should be educated and informed, not merely obedient. Mendicant preachers showed increasing mastery of the innovations of the printing press. They took explicit pride in their books’ appearance and employed a wide range of printing techniques, believing that this would make their books more effective and successful. The epilogue continues that story by examining ways we might assess the lasting influence of both mendicant and diocesan sermon volumes into the seventeenth century, using newly available data on book circulation. These Italian sermons capture a moment in early modern history between oral and written culture, between Christian unity in Europe and its permanent fracture, between potential directions of reform. Such great uncertainty translated for many people into great fear. Catholic preachers feared that the many changes they witnessed—from Protestants, among their own leadership, and in the very laity they served—would ultimately devastate both the temporal and the spiritual worlds. Their sermons gave voice to those fears, but the sermons also show, equally, how fear is not the whole story. They suggest that it is misleading to overstate the extent of the Church’s anxieties. Preachers used their sermons and writings to contemplate a variety of solutions to the chaos that they felt might engulf them. Their individual voices draw a picture of Catholic reform that is not purely about obedience, authority, or clerical factionalism, but also about personal, emotional, dedicated, and wide-­ranging efforts to save souls.

[  1 4  ]

1 Where Sermons Mattered

When two confessed Protestants in Milan sought to repent of their heresy, their return to Catholic society was chaperoned by Angelo Castiglione, a Carmelite monk and preacher. In October 1553, before a large crowd at the cathedral of Milan, Castiglione preached a sermon inviting the heretics to atone in a public ceremony.1 “Until now,” he proclaimed, the two men had held “heretical, Lutheran, and sacramentarian opinions, but now, illuminated with the truth by the grace of God, they have retreated from their errors, and have come to despise them in their very souls. This morning, in plain view in this church, when the sermon is over, they intended to renounce them . . . ​and abjure every heresy, position, and dogma contrary to the Catholic faith.”2 In his sermon, Castiglione described how easily heresy could tempt a person. “Poisonous” books written in the vernacular were readily ­available, he explained, and readers, with their wild imaginations and passionate biases, were all too likely to misunderstand what they read. Above all, said Castiglione, the greatest provocation to heresy was arrogant self-­reliance: All those who without humility, without the spirit of God, arrogantly relying on their own strength and ingenuity, have

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly attempted to explain and preach the holy scripture, have erred terribly, and fallen into a thousand errors, and slid into many heresies, however learned they were, however armed with man­made doctrines, however practiced and versed in sacred letters . . . ​Because in their understandings and expositions of Holy Scriptures, they departed from Catholic opinion, disdained the authority of the universal Church, and stubbornly adhered to their own findings, they are heretics.3

Churchmen throughout the Italian peninsula faced unprecedented religious turmoil in Castiglione’s day. Castiglione’s sermon captures many of their worries. He feared a total and imminent infiltration of heterodox thought and told his listeners to pray for the preservation of Catholic doctrine against corruption in every congregation, college, confraternity, place, city, and realm. He believed that the biggest problem with heretics was their misuse of scripture; he saw it as a hostile takeover from which stemmed all their other errors. But Castiglione also believed that the best antidote to heresy was not simple obedience to Catholic authority; moral behavior and true devotion were equally necessary. He told his listeners not to congratulate themselves if they merely avoided heresy. Rather, they must seek to live by the promises of their baptism. Anything less might lead them astray. Castiglione sought to balance antiheretical polemic with pro-­Catholic pedagogy. Above all, Castiglione put his faith in sermons. By preaching so publicly, he showed his conviction that a sermon was his best, most effective weapon against the perceived onslaught. He collected his sermons for the rest of his life and published them as a three-­volume set with the official printers of the archbishop of Milan, thirty years after he preached for the penitent heretics.4 One of Castiglione’s colleagues would make the point thus: “The first way to discuss divine things, as established by Saints Peter, Paul, all the apostles, and by Christ himself in the gospel, is through public sermons; then through disputes, and finally through consultations.”5 By publishing his sermons, Castiglione also joined a venerable group of preachers who felt that sermons must be both heard and read in order to do their best work. Public religious life developed dramatically in sixteenth-­century Italy, with the founding of new and energetic monastic orders, the growth of confraternities, new commitments to religious education, and the development [  16  ]

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of new devotions. Preaching played a critical role in all of these. The sermons of Castiglione and his colleagues thus highlight some of the Roman Church’s most profound changes: the rise of the reforming bishop, the simultaneous continuation and reassessment of medieval practices, and above all the redefinition of Catholic identity and the emergence of a narrower, stricter, path of orthodoxy through the broad field of positions that had characterized the late medieval period and the opening decades of the sixteenth century.

Mendicant and Diocesan Preaching In the late Middle Ages, itinerant hermits, often self-­appointed prophets, wandered the country preaching apocalyptic doom. At the other end of the social spectrum, the country’s best preachers wielded great influence at the sumptuous papal court, where they wrote elegant Latin sermons to be recited before the pope.6 The sermons in this study fall between these two extremes. They were intended to reach broad swaths of Christendom, and they were usually delivered on feast days, on Sundays after Mass, or during the liturgical seasons of Advent, preceding Christmas, and especially Lent, the forty days before Easter. Such preaching permeated Italian culture. It became a form of public religion alongside processions and public ceremonies, where the laity could derive both personal and social spiritual benefits from participating together in religious rituals. Sermons were also a form of public entertainment, and a sermon audience was a desirable place to be seen. Popular preachers traditionally filled churches to capacity or had to move outside to the adjoining piazza in order to accommodate the crowds. The introduction to the printed version of Castiglione’s 1553 sermon boasted that it drew fifteen thousand listeners who could not all hear him no matter how much he shouted. Local governments invited illustrious preachers to their cities and competed with each other to get the best ones. During Lent, sermons were delivered daily as a cycle, instead of weekly or on feast days. A preacher with a good reputation could spend nearly his entire career traveling from city to city, taking up temporary residence and delivering a sermon cycle to the local population. As a result of the close connections that grew up between preachers and citizens, traveling preachers were often credited with restoring peace and establishing good citizenship in the cities they visited.7 [  1 7  ]

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Preachers were meant to embody the Word of God and transmit it to the laity. Both their rhetorical skill and their personal presence were considered reflections of divine grace; they were judged in part by how well they recalled the earliest apostles in their lives as well as their words. Nobody questioned a sermon’s intended effect on listeners: preachers were always supposed to transform the hearts of their listeners and bring them closer to God. By encouraging individual penitence, sermons sought to effect divine harmony by increasing social harmony.8 When progress toward that harmony was threatened, preachers were divinely charged to respond. On the eve of the Reformation, then, there was no better way to broadcast criticism, change, or moral encouragement than through preaching. Egidio da Viterbo famously used his sermon opening the Fifth Lateran Council (1512–1517) to call for improved clerical behavior and a purified, renewed Church. In the face of the religious predicaments that characterized the early part of the century—clerical corruption, the lay desire for scripture, Lutheran and other schisms, the long stagger toward the Council of Trent—preachers responded in the pulpit, as they did to Turkish and French invasions and royal deaths or coronations. This is one reason sermons provide a revealing window into sixteenth century society; they can show reactions to current events. Egidio was the prior general of the Augustinian order; Castiglione was a Carmelite. Like them, most medieval preachers were members of monastic orders. From the first years of their existence in the thirteenth century, the mendicants, particularly Franciscans and Dominicans, made preaching their specialty. Both orders were founded to serve the laity through preaching. They specialized in “missionary” sermons as opposed to liturgical ones: Their sermons originally took place not during Mass, but whenever and wherever they might find a crowd to listen—in a town square or field—and they called on listeners to repent of sinful behavior. Francis of Assisi, known for preaching even to birds, is the most famous exemplar. Because these orders were known for their loyalty to the pope, their dedication to preaching, and a lack of bureaucratic infrastructure, they were flexible travelers and thus ideal itinerant preachers.9 The profile of these mendicants only increased in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. When the papacy returned to Rome in 1415 after more than a century of absence and schism, its credibility and authority were [  18  ]

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sorely compromised. Mendicants stepped up their sermonizing in order to help repair the damage. They preached that the Church was the sole dispenser of salvation, and they addressed directly the social disorder that Italy had seen during the papacy’s absence.10 Many previously sporadic opportunities for preaching, such as parochial sermons on feast days and daily preaching during Lent, were made habitual. Some mendicant preachers took up permanent positions in cathedrals and city churches, while traveling preachers made more frequent rounds. During Lent, the visiting preacher held his sermons every day after Mass, often in front of as much of the population as could squeeze into the central piazza of the city; it was a season of preaching. By the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, Franciscans and Dominicans reigned as preachers, informed by centuries of tradition. Of the 181 preachers who preached in Bologna’s Cathedral of San Petronio between 1450 and 1550, for example, all but six were Franciscan or Dominican (or Lateran canons, who had their house nearby). Dominicans preached thirty-­four preaching cycles, but Franciscans, in their various subbranches, had the most, with thirty-­t wo cycles preached by Conventual Franciscans and twenty-­three by Observant Franciscans. Conventuals typically had a university education, which gave them a thorough grounding in Latin and Greek authors and the ability to create refined, stylized oratory influenced by classical humanism. They often lived in monasteries near university centers and soon became the most sought-­after preachers in universities, ecclesiastical and secular courts, and illustrious cities. Franciscan preachers were so influential in circles of power that the Franciscan motif of preaching “vice and virtue” ultimately influenced the text of Tridentine decrees on preaching.11 Scholarship on preaching—in Italy and elsewhere—tends therefore to equate preachers with these elite mendicants. In contrast, the secular clergy in the dioceses—priests who had joined no monastic order and who owed obedience to bishops—rarely preached at all, despite being charged with the care of souls and the supervision of sermons. Bishops and archbishops, usually nobles, might have had the education to preach, but they often chose to spend most of their time at the papal court in Rome, where they could live in splendor and stay close to the center of power, rather than in the remote dioceses that paid their income. Before the Council of Trent, it was entirely possible and not uncommon for a bishop to receive a lifelong stipend, or [  19  ]

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benefice, from a diocese with which he had no particular connection and of which he had no local knowledge, and which he might never visit during his episcopacy. He might frequently enjoy the benefices of multiple dioceses at once but make his home in none of them. Bishops commonly devoted their time to diplomatic, administrative, and scholarly pursuits while enjoying the income from dioceses that vicars or other clerics ran in their absence. In addition, those vicars and curates whom the absentee bishops left behind to govern in their place often had no interest in preaching or no education to teach them how to do it. At the bottom of the social spectrum, the local priest of an impoverished parish might not even have known enough Latin to understand the words of the Mass he performed, and he certainly would have had few chances to develop his rhetorical skills. Thus at the start of the sixteenth century, a city’s best-­k nown preachers were likely to be Franciscan or Dominican monks, either living in a nearby monastery or traveling from town to town as itinerant preachers, filling in for secular clergy with little training or impetus to preach. Gasparo Contarini’s De Officio Viri Boni et Probi Episcopi, from 1517, described preaching in dioceses as a distant dream: “I admonish the bishops of our day against completely omitting the very ancient practice preserved most carefully by our fathers: those illustrious men were wont . . . ​to give a sermon to the whole people . . . ​ This task the religious in our times have usurped because of the lethargy and laziness of the bishops . . . ​I would like to see this custom restored, if not completely, at least to some degree and returned to its original form by the bishop whom we are teaching.”12 Yet by the century’s end, as we shall see, bishops and their vicars and curates had shown that they too could be highly effective and influential preachers, though in a different context from mendicants. These changes demonstrate the first results of half a century of internal efforts at reform, codified and given backbone at the Council of Trent. The impetus behind this shift was the increased pressure in the sixteenth century for bishops to return to their dioceses and to implement consistently the preaching that they had long ignored. This is a second reason to study sermons; changes in preaching practice reflect broader shifts such as this in religious life. The movement to have bishops live, preach, and govern in their dioceses began in the early part of the sixteenth century. At the Fifth Lateran Council, convened in 1512, Pope Julius II and his councilors tried for the first time to [  20  ]

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address the abuses within the Church and admitted that preaching practice needed reform. Their diligence was driven in large part by fear of the recent activities of Italy’s best known preacher, Girolamo Savonarola, whose apocalyptic prophecies and ardent followers threatened the social and political order in Florence in the 1490s.13 The ninth session of the council (Decem­ ­ber 19, 1516), held when Savonarola’s execution was in living memory and his publications still in wide circulation, tried to stem the tide of apocalyptic preaching. The participants argued that it was impertinent to the Church and the pope when such preachers inveighed against clerical abuses, and that it was dangerous for an uneducated and credulous laity to listen to them. “Perverting the multiple sense of Holy Scripture . . . ​[they] preach terrors, threats, imminent catastrophes . . . ​daring to affirm that they speak through the inspiration and impulse of the Holy Ghost . . . ​so that simple people, who are the most disposed to be tricked, easily turn to many errors.”14 If more people were exposed more regularly to orthodox sermons, argued the council fathers, they would be less easily led astray. Consistent preaching could only take place if bishops lived in their appointed dioceses and supervised the sermons. It is important to remember how rarely, in that era, bishops were involved in pastoral work or even seen as pastoral figures. The Council of Trent finally determined that episcopal residence and frequent preaching were a divine requirement, and some of the delegates who took this position are featured in this study. The preaching of reforming bishops targeted rural parishes, poor city dwellers, and, in general, people who might never before have received a systematic catechetical education. This kind of preaching was very much a product of Catholic reform, and its goal was to make sure that everybody knew at least the rudiments of faith. It thus tended toward straightforward explanation and clarification of doctrine. As a result, a new population of untrained preachers arose over the course of the sixteenth century: local curates and priests newly expected to preach regularly to an uneducated laity. At the same time, members of monastic orders continued to preach publicly around the country, as they had since the Middle Ages. They no longer held as much of a monopoly on preaching, but they remained the country’s most celebrated preachers, who preached to the public and also to private, more elite audiences. City councils still invited them for the great sermon [  21  ]

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cycles of Lent and Advent. These men remained among the most prized celebrities of their day—sought after across the peninsula, brought by special request to the most elite churches in Rome, and sometimes sent to represent Catholicism in increasingly tense religious confrontations with Protestants. Their high status and their familiarity with the decision-­making bodies of the Church made them spokesmen for the Church and conveyers of orthodoxy to the lay faithful. Their sermons were not only delivered but published and republished. What they taught their audiences is what the Church wanted audiences to know.

Rhetoric and Rhetorical Guides These two populations of preachers, mendicants and bishops, naturally employed radically different rhetorical styles, reflecting their different audiences or different levels of education. Mendicants gave long, elaborate, and literary orations; bishops and their staff gave simple, straightforward talks. The formal, public sermons of mendicants can be termed “oratorical” or “elite” or simply “mendicant” preaching as opposed to the more pedagogical “episcopal” or “diocesan” preaching. The sermons of Cornelio Musso, the most prolific mendicant preacher after Savonarola, embody the mendicant style of the sixteenth century. This had evolved away from the medieval sermo modernus or thematic sermon, which in turn was a move away from the simpler homily of the patristic era. The sermo modernus followed a precise formula and relied on biblical and patristic proof texts grouped into categories and subcategories. Although such sermons could be animated and even humorous, their fundamental goal emphasized docere (teaching) over the other two traditional classical goals of rhetoric: movere and delectare (moving and delighting).15 Its hyperarticulated structure reflected the scholastic training of its mendicant practitioners. From the late fourteenth century, humanist attention to classical rhetoric and its three genres—deliberative, demonstrative, and judicial—led to a shift in both oratorical styles and goals. Preachers increasingly emphasized the goal of delectare, delighting listeners, over docere, teaching them, as they took up the classical genus demonstrativum, which transformed the sermon “from an exercise in proof and dialectical argumentation to an exercise in praise.”16 In exchanging medieval terminology and idioms for ­classical ones, preachers changed the content and goals of preaching. The [  2 2  ]

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new sermon style both encouraged the early Renaissance motif of the “dignity of man” and, by the early seventeenth century, contributed to Rome’s— and the papacy’s—vision of itself as a model of a holy, radiant, and fully reformed Christian community. These changes in genre took place primarily at the most elite levels; its most extensive documentation comes from sermons given in Latin at the papal court. But the growth of humanist studies also encouraged the development of the literary vernacular, and soon enough, vernacular sermons, often given by the same preachers, quickly came to imitate their Latin counterparts. With a new grounding in classical literature and a growing standardization of the Italian language, vernacular sermons could appeal across regions and social classes and become suitable for elite audiences. By the sixteenth century, vernacular sermons were considered capable of fulfilling all the goals of classical oratory, again oriented toward the demonstrative, or epideictic, genre; they were lavish and ornate, with the goal of delighting the listener. By the late sixteenth century, mendicant preaching had traveled so far from its homiletical origins that it was seen as more literary than pedagogical. The developing Italian literary canon made room for a special genre of “sacred oratory,” of which Musso has been called the earliest practitioner. The emphasis on affect and emotion continued to characterize Catholic preaching and distinguish it from Protestant varieties well into the seventeenth century.17 Tommaso Porcacchi and Francesco Sansovino, both literary men, published anthologies of sermons because they saw them as an indispensable part of rhetoric and vernacular literature in general.18 Musso’s sermons are stylistically formal, with a proem and three or four divisions. They cover a wide range of topics, from divine love to the supremacy of Peter, and could stray far from the prescribed pericope, or scriptural excerpt, for the day. Musso shows a taste for elaborate metaphors, long digressions, and copious quotations. His primary sermon collection, for example, opens with the sermon that marked his entrance into Bitonto as its bishop, and its first words compare “a great field full of lovely sweet-­ smelling flowers, [in which] it is very difficult to identify, in one glance, the most beautiful one of all,” to “the Christian religion, which embraces only the good and beautiful aspects dispersed among other laws; it is not at all easy to judge immediately and decide which virtue best deserves the palm, the greatest praise, the biggest prize.”19 Musso used his skills to compose elaborate exhortations to better Christian behavior. In a sermon on “Christ [  23  ]

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the Shepherd,” given in Rome soon after Easter in 1539, he described the problems with absentee bishops and with the lost sheep, their abandoned flocks.20 He excoriated bishops for not attending to their duties, but when he imagined what would happen when bishops did as they ought, he turned to poetic repetition: You will help the poor, liberate the oppressed, reward the good; you will even tolerate sinners up to a point, then you will chide them like a father, you will make them see their errors; you will love everyone; you will embrace everyone, you will send nobody away from your bosom; you will admonish the angry; reconcile the litigious; protect the poor from violence; console the cowards; support the weak; tame the contumacious; teach those who do not know; arouse the lazy; reign in the haughty; humiliate the contentious; mortify the insolent.21

Like many mendicant preachers, Musso moved easily between teaching and declaiming, blending pedagogical or moral messages with elaborate rhythms, repetitions, and alliteration. He did not shy away from preaching the vices and virtues that were his Franciscan heritage and that he would bring to bear on the deliberations at Trent about preaching.22 The most elusive aspects of these celebrated sermons are visual and physical: We can know the words the preacher spoke, but we can rarely reconstruct his carefully honed gestures, intonation, and speech patterns.23 Yet these were crucial to his success in the pulpit, especially before a large crowd who could see farther than they could hear.24 Gesturing typically meant deploying props such as crucifixes and the careful placement of the hands—extended out, placed on the heart, or pointing upward, as the text dictated—but it could veer into melodrama. Medieval preachers might stretch their arms in imitation of the cross and stay in position for half an hour. They might hold their noses, feign playing a trumpet, assume a fetal position, wear dramatic costumes or remove parts of their clothes, sing, spit, groan, or cry. It is no surprise that medieval preaching guides insisted over and over on restraint.25 Physical performance remained important throughout the rise in stylistic rhetoric during the sixteenth century. Preachers’ guides routinely [  2 4  ]

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addressed gesture and intonation along with composition. Luca Baglione devoted a section to each in his L’arte del predicare of 1562, exalting the preacher by drawing advice from the classical orators Cicero and Demosthenes. With gestures, he insisted, less was more, for they signaled the preacher’s modesty and saintliness as well as his skill. Preaching guides argued that too much drama led easily to ridicule. Francesco Panigarola’s Il Predicatore mocked preachers who deployed sensational gambits such as hammering on an anvil to evoke the act of crucifixion: “We have certainly never done this: nor have we found it anywhere in our studies from which we could conjecture that the Holy Fathers ever did it either.”26 Serafino Razzi closed his instructions to preachers by reminding them to keep their arms folded in their sleeves until they ascended the pulpit and spoke their introduction, for the sake of majesty and gravitas. Only then, and only with “few and appropriate” gestures, should they draw out their hands and proceed to the rest of the sermon.27 Intonation was arguably even more important than it had been in the Middle Ages, for it marked the greatest difference between the printed page and the spoken word. Timoteo Buonamici, Razzi’s acolyte, justified the printing of sermons precisely because the printed text could not capture the “live voice, external actions, and the spirit of the preacher.”28 Panigarola, like the Spanish Dominican Luis de Granada, who was widely popular in Italy, reinforced the medieval emphasis on variation in tone, volume, and emphasis, again urging that dramatics be reserved for critical moments. Reading word for word was the mark of the untrained preacher too dependent on the text, especially the texts of others.29 These repeated pleas for moderation suggest, nonetheless, that mendicant preachers still tended toward excess in their delivery. A preoccupation with practiced gesture and tone remained a hallmark of Catholic preaching into the seventeenth century.30

In this era, the older, humbler, and simpler homily also had its own renaissance in the vernacular, both in Catholic Italy and in Protestant circles elsewhere.31 This sermon style originated in the patristic era and had retained some popularity throughout the Middle Ages alongside the newer sermo modernus. The homily was a running commentary on a passage of scripture, [  25  ]

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often with little other structure. A growing interest in original sources, and thus in the direct meaning of scriptural passages, contributed to this revival; so too did the need for clear explanations in a time of growing doctrinal confusion. Diocesan preachers with less classical training could profit from this revival and make use of the homily genre as they developed simpler sermons for a humbler audience.32 The sermons of Pope Gregory the Great, translated into Italian and reprinted at least three times in this era (1502, 1505, and 1543), embody the homiletic style. Gregory’s homily for the fourth Sunday of Advent opens with no metaphor or elaborate comparison, but with only a brief introduction of the pericope. He begins, “This lesson demonstrates the era in which the precursor of our Redeemer received the word of preaching by naming the prince of the Roman Republic and the king of the Jews,” and it goes immediately on to quote the pericope, Luke 3:1: “In the fifteenth year of the reign of Emperor Tiberius, when Pontius Pilate was governor of Judea, and Herod was ruler of Galilee. . . .”33 In this way, the revival of the homily and of the diocesan preacher returned preaching to its earliest origins. The best near-­contemporary examples of homiletic sermons were those of Ludovico (or Luigi Bigi) Pittorio, a member of illustrious literary and noble circles in Ferrara and a student of the notable humanist teacher Battista Guarino. Pittorio’s published work, from early in the century, includes a volume of exegetical homilies linked to the Lenten cycle, as well as a lectionary and similar volumes on psalms.34 Pittorio’s homilies are direct and conversational. They move from the scriptural reading for the day, presented verse by verse in abbreviated vernacular paraphrases, to a direct and emotional exhortation to penitence and charitable living, as befits the Lenten season. They include no patristic or scholastic references, and they have none of the classical rhetorical flourishes that one might have expected, given Pittorio’s classical training. His openings are straightforward and set the tone for the entire sermon: “Appropriately, in the first of Lent, season of penitence, does God exhort us through the mouth of his prophet Joel to convert ourselves to him: Convertimini ad me, convert yourselves to me . . . ​A nd in what way does God want us to convert to him?”35 Introductions such as these lost no time in bringing readers directly to the scrutiny of scriptural passages. The astonishing publication rate of Pittorio’s Homilarium throughout the century—it was reissued regularly, more than thirty-­five separate times, between 1506 and 1599—shows the enduring appeal of sermons, especially homilies, as a written genre. Pittorio makes this point explicitly by including [  2 6  ]

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in his lectionary some works composed purely for the spiritual benefit of the sermon form: “So as not to be at all remiss in doing things useful and healthy for my dear readers, and knowing that in the pilgrimage from this present life confession, compunction, and communion are necessary for the true Christian . . . ​I thought to have printed at the end of this book of ours four written sermons.”36 The Homilarium alone made Pittorio one of the most-­printed sermon authors of the century (see Appendix), yet he was not a preacher, or even a cleric; he was a layperson—a secular poet and epigrammatist with classical training and a penitential streak, who wrote of a religious experience in his thirties and devoted his life thereafter to devotional texts.37 Pittorio’s lay status might have given his works a special everyman’s appeal, but it also suggests, perhaps, a voracious appetite for devotional, comprehensible printed sermons, and a potential market for more and better-­fitting examples.

Thus in the sixteenth century, two parallel preaching genres developed, split more or less along class lines. The two genres were often seen as wholly different, even unrelated, activities. Preaching guides, sermon anthologies, and individual authors, when they discussed preaching, referred either to ornate sermons by mendicant orators, or to the homilies of secular clerics, but never both. In 1562 Luca Baglioni published his guide for novice mendicant preachers. Baglione was an Observant Franciscan, and he dedicated his work to the superior of his order, because he had heard him preach at the Council of Trent. Baglioni compared preachers to classical orators and dwelt on the rhetorical principles and Greek authors he thought they should master. The same year, the curate Giovanni Del Bene also produced a guide for new preachers, but in a diocesan context. His book of sermons, he wrote, should be given to curates to read or draw from during Mass. Like the homilies of Pope Gregory the Great, they paraphrase and explain gospel passages line by line, according to the liturgical year.38 Neither of these authors considers the questions that interest the other. This development by no means implies that Italy had a social system or a religious culture that fell into separate (and simplistic) categories of “elite” and “popular.” The categories describe the formation and context of the preachers, not the audience. In reality, preachers could switch genres, and [  27  ]

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sermons were preached to mixed audiences more often than not. Different social groups not only had amorphous borders, but could appropriate the same text in different ways.39 I emphasize the distinction between the two preaching genres in order to point out that the term “preaching,” which to us has one general meaning, referred to two separate activities in the sixteenth century. Modern scholars continue to reinforce this dichotomy, distinguishing “professional, itinerant” preachers, for example, from “the humble curator of souls who—out of institutional duty sanctioned by Trent—is designated to deliver homilies to his own flock on feast days.”40 As with all categorizations, that which distinguishes diocesan from mendicant preachers is imperfect. But in describing the broad contours in Italian preaching, it is helpful to honor those categories by treating preachers in their particular groups. To do so highlights each of their evolutions in the sixteenth century.

Sermons in Print Almost no living preachers in Italy saw their sermons into print before the middle of the sixteenth century; readers of sermon volumes turned to authors of earlier generations: Savonarola, Pittorio, or the fifteenth-­century Franciscan Roberto Caracciolo. The 1540s saw the beginning of a dramatic surge, both in sermon publication in general and in works by contemporary preachers. Sermon production rose sharply in the years surrounding the opening of the Council of Trent and continued to rise thereafter (Figure 1). Vernacular religious printing on the whole increased even more in the post­Tridentine period. Its growth from that point can be attributed in part to a developing consensus about Italy’s Catholic future and also to printers’ profitable adaptations to this new religious climate.41 In France, a similar situation held: few Catholic (or Protestant) sermons were published between 1530 and 1560, in large part because the market was glutted with previously printed sermons and because live preaching was considered a better weapon against heresy, given the fluid and uncertain political and religious situation. After 1560, Calvinism became more of a central threat and led to an increase in published sermon rates among Catholics.42 Yet in Italy, all genres of sermon literature, though they reflected the same leap in the 1570s, started to increase decades earlier. In content, as the follow­ ­i ng chapters will show, the sermons published before the end of the Council [  28  ]

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addressed contentious, unresolved issues. Preachers used the press in order to seek, not reflect, resolutions to problems of reform. Although both Italian and Latin sermon publication rose in the latter part of the century, Italian sermons consistently and increasingly outstripped Latin, reflecting the development of the literary vernacular and perhaps the growing social importance given to preaching in general (Figure 2). The turn to vernacular sermons also suggests the growing need to equip and train new diocesan preachers. The increase in sermon literature held true both for mendicant and diocesan or homiletical styles of preaching. Further investigation shows even that when episcopal reform was difficult to implement, it nonetheless prompted a new genre of preaching literature: Because so few of these secular clerics had any experience or training in 180 160

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Figure 1 ​General trends in sixteenth-century Italian sermon literature Source: Edit16/USTC, accessed May 2010. These charts are intended to give a sense of general directions in printing and should not be taken as final or completely definitive. Each year on the x-axis represents five years of cumulative production: the 1535 point, for example, shows sermon literature from 1535–1539. Sermon liter­ ature is determined by the following key words, which were checked manually for duplicates and for unrelated works, especially medical and grammatical texts: —Italian sermon books: prediche, sermoni, homelie, omelie, discorsi, quadragesimali, predicabili. —Italian single sermons: predica, sermone, homelia, omelia. —Latin sermon books: sermones, conciones, quadragesimales. —Latin single sermons: sermo, concio, contio.

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delivering sermons, the more conscientious bishops ordered the production of treatises, manuals, and books of model sermons designed to help them learn. The middle years of the century thus saw a change in the nature—and a sharp increase in the number—of works specifically devoted to the sorts of sermons that would serve a diocesan preacher (Figure 3). Published vernacular sermons therefore form a large proportion of early modern religious literature. What no publication data can capture, it must be remembered, are the many more sermons that have not survived—those that were not recorded, or were recorded in manuscript but not printed, or were printed but not in a lasting format, or were printed in a lasting format but subject to later destruction. The majority of sermons that do survive from the mid-­sixteenth century were prepared by preachers editing collections of their own texts in the hope of broadening their audience.43 From our perspective, a sermon preached long ago is now inextricable from its published form, but they were closely related in the early modern world as well. If the latter did not substitute for the former, it supplemented it. Laypeople in confraternities were encouraged to write down the sermons they heard in order to transform them into books of piety for their own use or those of others; these found ready equivalents in popular printed form. Ludovico Pittorio, in 1546, told his public that a reader should read the relevant entry in a sermon volume for each feast

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Figure 2 ​Italian and Latin sermon literature Source: Edit16/USTC accessed May 2010

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day before going to church or upon returning, so that the spiritual benefit would accrue “both in reading, and in hearing it, or after having heard it.”44 Sermons could travel farther in print than their authors did in person, to reach people in regions where preachers had not ventured. Through a printed sermon in any form, a solitary reader could find a sense of community and feel himself part of the original preached event. Printed sermons could reach more people over more time than a preached sermon could; in addition, they bore the approval both of censors and of the reading, book-­purchasing public. While scholars have devoted much attention to the words of controversial or heterodox preachers, few of their actual sermons survived.45 The majority of printed sermons easily available for sale in the sixteenth century and for consultation today, in contrast, are an excellent indicator of the positions that would eventually be considered Catholic orthodoxy. They are part of the laity’s increasing demand not only for new ideas, but for religious involvement. The egalitarian aspects of printed books, which brought written texts to many more people, accompanied a growing participatory impulse in religious life, less and less the preserve of monastic orders.46 As clergy sought to accommodate these changes, printed sermons responded to both.

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Figure 3 ​Homilies Source: Edit16/USTC accessed May 2010. Keywords for this query were “homelie” and “omelie”. The related term “discorsi” is also used in many other contexts and was therefore not included.

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*   *   * It can be difficult to decide what distinguishes a preacher from a cleric who gives the occasional sermon, just as today it is difficult to distinguish a professional public speaker from an expert who earns honoraria for occasional lectures in her field. Clergymen in the early modern world could hold many simultaneous offices and perform many functions, and preaching was almost always among them. Publication could make the difference; going to the effort to prepare the volume could be on occasion the act that changed a person from someone who gives sermons into a preacher. Once printed, sermons reached more than one audience. An expensive collection might appeal to another preacher who would use it for inspiration or direct plagiarism in his own preaching. A cardinal trying to build an impressive religious library or a well-­off monk who wanted to consult the scholarly marginalia might also want to purchase it. Such collections could equally appeal to literate and educated laypeople: not only the cardinal but his wealthy brother or the tutor to his sons, the religiously minded diplomat, or the newly rich silk merchant wanting to prove his piety and property—all these sorts of laypeople who might want to own a book of sermons and could afford it.47 Furthermore, published sermons, like many books, were as likely to be read aloud as silently, and often in groups, thus recreating some of the sermons’ original audible drama. The silk merchant’s wife and the woman who helped her with spinning; the youngest daughter who still lived at home and the suitor apprenticed to her father—all might hear a sermon as part of family devotional reading. The written or printed word could have influence among people who could not read it. Books and reading had a trickle-­ down effect; the border between oral and written culture was porous.48 But how do we know that a printed sermon had ever been preached at all? Sermons revised for publication after delivery were typically prettied up; stripped of jokes, colloquialisms, and local references; and refitted with biblical and other Latin quotations. The level of rhetoric could be raised, and complicated subjects could be explained in greater depth. Rarely did a ­complete and accurate transcript of a sermon exist before publication, since a preacher usually spoke extemporaneously from notes and did not read his [  3 2  ]

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sermons word for word.49 In Musso’s published sermons, scriptural citations noted throughout the margins demonstrate the care and revision that went into preparation before print. The sermons could easily run up to eighty pages each in the large quarto format, an improbably long transcription of even a feast day sermon. The four decades that elapsed between the start of Musso’s career in the 1530s and the publication of his compendium saw the establishment of ever stricter standards of censorship. Scholars must therefore take all printed sermons with a grain of salt, and be alert to possible anachronisms—especially in the most extreme cases, such as the sermon that Musso supposedly delivered in 1530 as a nineteen-­year-­old student in Padua, nearly fifty years before publishing it. Nonetheless, published sermons bear clear marks of their oratorical origins, through details in the titles of sermons and in the texts themselves. Every sermon in Musso’s largest collection is printed with the year and city in which it was given, and often with the name of the church, the specific date, and further details. A typical sermon title in this volume is the sixth sermon in volume II: Sermon on the Primacy of St. Peter, Given in Rome, in the Church of San Lorenzo in Damaso, the First Saturday of Lent, which was the Twenty-­Second of February, 1545. Similarly, a sermon title from volume IV notes the presence of the Duchess of Milan in the cathedral of Pavia.50 Topical details in the sermons themselves also contribute evidence, such as Musso’s thanks, as he began the third part of one sermon, that the heavy rain had begun to let up, and that he no longer had to shout to be heard.51 All these details make it plausible that the sermon published is at least an approximate record of a sermon preached.52 Musso himself was aware of these difficulties. In the preface to his second volume of sermons, he explained his choice of Italian over Latin by pointing out that he had published them “more or less as they were spoken.” In the preface to the third volume, Musso wrote that he was tempted to alter his sermons before publishing them and only refrained for fear of being chided by people who had heard the original versions. As a result, he published the sermons “not quite as naked as they were born, but not especially embellished either,” even though they might not flatter him.53 This passage is not fully reassuring, because it shows that Musso did revisit his sermons before publishing them, but it also demonstrates his commitment to accuracy. Musso carefully supervised the publication of all of his sermons, editing [  33  ]

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many volumes himself and protesting vehemently, for example, at an item listed poorly in the table of contents of one of his sermon collections. He wrote to both his editor and his publisher that it did not accurately reflect his ideas or his sermon.54 Franceschino Visdomini, a contemporary of Musso, also made energetic use of the press, clearly believing that a sermon could double its usefulness with a second life in print. But his published sermons avoided some of the problems of retouching. Where other great preachers produced long, multi­ volume collections of pericopic sermons for the liturgical year and published their collected works near the end of their lives or posthumously, Visdomini did not take this route. His published sermons were almost never linked to the traditional preaching cycles of Lent and Advent. Instead, he published many sermons singly, or in small collections, soon after their delivery, particularly if the sermons had commemorated a special event or were part of a visit to another city. A typical example is The Comfort of Death for a Good Christian, Preached . . . ​in Genoa . . . ​on the Fifth of May, 1553, which was published singly in Venice in the same year.55 The relatively rapid rate of publication gave Visdomini little time to revise his sermons in detail. The printed versions are therefore more likely to reflect his actual words in the pulpit and less likely to have been altered to conform to later standards. Visdomini was most active during the three decades of the Council of Trent. Many of his works and most of his singly published sermons were printed in the 1550s, before the Council closed in 1563. Because he wrote and published so many sermons between the Council’s first and last session, Visdomini’s preaching better reveals the kinds of teaching that reached the public during this period of flux. Printing was always a collaboration among authors, printers, and others; between the composition of the sermon’s text and its arrival on a reader’s lectern, many hands changed it. Mendicant preachers tended to develop relationships with established, highly regarded preachers. Musso published primarily with Gabriele Giolito and the Giunti family; Franceschino Visdomini worked with Andrea Arrivabene.56 Yet the same printers could also publish humbler works: Francesco Senese published both Gabriele Fiamma’s mendicant prediche and his more modest discorsi for beginning diocesan preachers. Arrivabene published Del Bene’s Sermoni ovvero Homelie for diocesan preachers, but so did five other printers, including Giorgio de’ Cavalli, printer of the famed anthologizer and letterato Tommaso Porcacchi. [  3 4  ]

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Finally, printing sermons was always also an act of strategy and marketing. Possibly the most prescient words that the preacher Cornelio Musso ever wrote were these: “By putting [these books] in print, they may produce some fruit for the glory of God.”57 Although he was the star preacher of his generation, it was his deliberate use of the press that enabled his listeners to revisit his words and brought them to broader audiences. And while we rarely find material that shows us enough about how sermons were read, looking closely at how they were published reveals the hope that preachers and printers harbored for them.58 A sample of Musso’s publications alone shows us the editorial strategies that marketed sermons for different audiences. The smallest and cheapest technique was to print a quick pamphlet, like the 1546 publication of Musso’s most famous sermon, preached at Trent against the Lutherans to commemorate Charles V’s campaign against the Schmalkaldic League.59 The pamphlet is two simple gatherings quickly stitched together, with no cover. The title page bears only the title, subject, and author, and no information about the publisher (Figure 4). It includes the barest of illustrations: a repurposed wood­­cut in sorry shape, with broken or missing borders. This sort of treatment—small, quick, and cheap—had been traditional for sermon publication since at least the 1480s and was typically used to disseminate the Latin sermons delivered at the papal court to a wider audience. In fact, the woodcut on the title page in Figure 4 shows a preacher speaking from a pulpit to a seated pope, surrounded by solicitous cardinals and some armed laypeople; it bears no resemblance to the context of Musso’s sermon and had probably been used dozens of times before. The publishers, Valerio and Luigi Dorico, in Rome, printed much official material for the Church.60 Despite the relative shabbiness of this publication, they tended to publish material at the upper end of the literary spectrum. On the other hand, three other printers also made this sermon into a pamphlet, so clearly it was a safe bet. Pamphlets like this were easily affordable and intended for a wide audience; their small size, cheap production, and quick turnaround made them objects to be read and used, not prized. Whereas most larger books had a first print run of about a thousand copies, a very popular pamphlet could see double or triple that; then again, it is impossible to know how many copies of a pamphlet have since been lost.61 Slightly up the economic scale came pamphlets such as Musso’s 1553 [  35  ]

Figure 4 ​Musso’s sermon in Trent, 1546 pamphlet Source: The Newberry Library

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sermon on justification and the remission of sin, given in Padua—still published singly and inexpensive to produce, but of higher, more booklike, quality.62 The topic was polemical, which is probably why it merited immediate publication. This pamphlet has a complete title page, with a lengthier, more descriptive title and a printer’s mark. Internal sections are set off with woodcut initials of classical scenes.63 The pamphlet is bound loosely in vellum, and an early owner has scrawled a couplet on the cover about chasing away the devil. The sermon itself comes heralded by a proemio and a dedication from the printer—not the author—to his patron, the wealthy nobleman Luigi Cornaro (Figure 5). Preachers were immensely admired; their sermons, written down, could claim near-­universal usefulness and popularity. They were a likely seller. Yet to publish a sermon volume in the mid-­sixteenth century seems to have been an ambivalent task. In a time of doctrinal flux and increasing standards of censorship, it was more risky to publish a living preacher than a safely orthodox dead one like Roberto Carracciolo or even Girolamo Savonarola, both of whose sermons saw dozens of reprints in the sixteenth century.64 Perhaps for both these reasons, printers, like preachers, took special care with their sermon volumes, and with surprising frequency for the period, explained in print what they were trying to do. The printing techniques and the paratexts—such as the dedication letter, tables of contents, and supporting material—reveal that each publication was a complex negotiation in which the status of the printer, the preacher, the dedicatees, and the readers all hung in the balance. Andrea Arrivabene’s dedication in his pamphlet publication of Musso’s sermon is an unusually frank look at a printer’s calculations of risk and at an author’s potential involvement in printing. Arrivabene began his letter with hyperbolic praise for Musso, calculated to appease the preacher from the outset. He described Musso’s great fame and the moment, on the Octave of Easter, when Musso delivered the sermon in Padua to a crowd that overflowed the church. Musso seemed divine and miraculous that day, gushed Arrivabene, not only in comparison with other preachers, but even compared to himself at other times. Arrivabene insisted that he was so moved by the sermon that he determined to publish it without sponsorship and even without Musso’s knowledge. He hesitated for a few days, fearing that Musso would scorn him and refuse to work with him or with other printers again. Only the thought of [  37  ]

Figure 5 ​Arrivabene’s pamphlet of Musso’s “Justification” sermon, 1553 Source: The Newberry Library

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obtaining Luigi Cornaro’s patronage gave him confidence. Cornaro was one of Padua’s wealthiest and most influential citizens. He lived down the street from the church where the sermon was delivered and had probably heard it.65 Arrivabene noted that Musso had always held Cornaro in tremendous affection. In fact, Arrivabene hoped that the plan would be so successful that Musso would not only forgive him but also would condone such unauthorized publications by Arrivabene and other preachers in the future and “pretend to sleep until noon, to let himself be robbed of his most precious items, in order for them to be given to you.” He hoped Cornaro’s status would convince Musso to overcome any reluctance at Arrivabene’s audacity. Arrivabene’s letter is full of standard tropes for dedicatory letters, but his concerns about offending Musso are detailed enough to make him sound genuinely nervous. For whatever reason, Arrivabene’s hopes were not fulfilled. Despite great success as a printer, Arrivabene never published Musso again. Arrivabene had been known for a decade for associating with heterodoxy, and perhaps Musso wanted to steer clear of him; from then until the end of his life Musso published almost exclusively with the more reputable Gabriele Giolito.66 Indeed, after Pentecost of 1553, Musso never published another sermon as a pamphlet but only in collected editions. Both of the sermons discussed here in pamphlet form reappeared in Musso’s collected volumes; they were not specifically pitched at a humbler audience or written with the pamphlet format in mind. The same sermon was assumed to have appeal to a wide range of audience, both the very learned and wealthy layperson and the humble buyer of pamphlets; once a sermon was in print, it was the format, not the content, that was adapted to socioeconomic level.67 Sermon collections like Musso’s were common; preachers published them by theme, or more typically, at the end of a lifetime in the pulpit. Sermons published in collections aimed at a higher market from pamphlets: more affluent and leisurely buyers, who were better able to appreciate the finer qualities of a well-­printed book and well-­researched scholarship. Yet collections of sermons, too, could vary in quality. The same title could also be destined for devotional or for scholarly use, depending on the size of the book and the care in its preparation. A mid-­range publication frequently appeared in an octavo format, the most common size for popular and ­devotional literature in the sixteenth century. In deference to the book’s [  39  ]

Figure 6 ​Giolito’s 1580 collection of Musso’s sermons Source: The Newberry Library

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importance, it might have a full-­page woodcut with floral borders preceding every sermon, as Giolito’s 1580 edition of the third volume of Musso’s collected sermons did (Figure 6). Yet the woodcuts might be recycled from a book of hours or a missal, with only general regard to their placement in the new volume.68 In that 1580 volume, a picture of Saints Peter and Paul at the foot of the cross precedes not only the sermon for Ascension Day but also the sermon on the Good Samaritan. A pietà showing the dead Christ in the arms of a pope accompanies, with varying ink quality, sermons on Christ’s death, on the Resurrection, an Easter sermon, and another on Christian religion. This is a collection intended for frequent and practical use, which in this case, it seems to have received: Although the volume came with an extensive table of topics, a contemporary hand has added the titles and page ­numbers of each sermon on the flyleaf for immediate reference. An earlier octavo version of Musso’s sermons, also by Giolito, is much more elegant; its juxtaposition with the 1580 volume shows how Giolito actively sought different markets for his author and defended his own reputation as a fine printer.69 Giolito had everything riding on this volume, so much that he wrote a special letter to readers to explain the stakes. Earlier, he explained, he had published an elaborate edition of this collection in the larger quarto format that was used for scholarly and patristic literature.70 He had then granted other printers the right to reprint the sermons in the more popular octavo format, but was dismayed to see that what a poor job they had done. The spelling was off, the type quality was poor, and Musso’s careful wording had been altered. Giolito decided to show his colleagues how a book by such an illustrious preacher ought to look. He warned his readers that even if unscrupulous printers had usurped his printer’s mark, the phoenix, a careful reader would recognize the higher quality of his own work. As a result, the 1556 edition of occasional sermons is as beautifully presented as a sermon volume could be (Figure 7).71 Despite its small size, the book has biblical citations throughout the margins, keyed to Musso’s text. Giolito pointed out that Musso had specifically requested the glossing; preacher and printer had clearly collaborated on the need for the volume to meet high standards. The woodcut initials in the paratext are carefully chosen to reflect scenes from the Passion. The typeface throughout is a well­proportioned cursive. Figure 7 shows not the title page, but the internal page beginning Musso’s sermon against Lutherans. This is the same sermon [  4 1  ]

Figure 7 ​Musso’s sermon in Trent, in Giolito’s 1556 collection of Musso’s sermons Source: The Newberry Library

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i­ llustrated in Figure 4, yet in this edition, it has received a much more formal treatment, with a full title that announces its contents and the circumstances of its delivery. The spacing on the page, the variations in typeface, and the length of the title with its careful divisions all serve to exalt the sermon itself and emphasize its value. Giolito’s quarto edition paid homage not only to Musso’s words but also to the man himself. In its various editions, it included a biography of the preacher as well as an endorsement by the editor and tastemaker Girolamo Ruscelli praising the power of sermons, the devotion of the Franciscans, and even the eloquence of the biographer, Bernardino Tomitano, another humanist belletrist.72 Some editions also added a grateful letter of response to Tomitano from Musso, and a portrait of the preacher. This is in addition to the standard dedication and table of contents, all executed with floral borders and decorations. Extensive paratexts like this served to place Musso within literary humanist circles. They celebrated his sermons for their beauty, rhetoric, and emotionality, although not necessarily for their pedagogical usefulness. The benefit could extend to the printer, too. Giolito included in both volumes the dedication he had written to Vittoria Farnese della Rovere, Duchess of Urbino, in which he emphasized not only Musso’s piety and his connections to her family (the Farnese family had given Musso his start as a preacher), but also his own merit. Giolito sought to flatter Guidobaldo della Rovere, Duke of Urbino, by dedicating the sermons to his wife and “most precious possession,” and he praised the duchess for her sanctity and morals. He tried to win favor for the couple’s “humble and admiring” subject, his own uncle. Giolito presented the book as a triple coup for himself. He would gratify the Urbino court, but in addition, “Messer Cornelio will appreciate this noble choice, and the world will praise my judgment; the first taking joy in my dedication [to the duchess] for so honoring his efforts; the second enjoying the fruits of his sublime and prolific ingenuity.”73 In this way preacher and printer alike could use paratext to create or boost his reputation.

Reformation Because of their vast differences, mendicant and diocesan preachers have rarely been considered together, as two sides of the same coin. Yet together they were subject to the broader crises that reformation brought. In Europe, [  43  ]

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in the world, and at home in Italy, the middle decades of the sixteenth century were an uncertain time for a Catholic cleric—most urgently, from his perspective, because the Roman Church itself was under serious attack, and not only theologically. Protestant propaganda mocked and ridiculed the papacy. Rumors spread about iconoclastic rioters who rampantly destroyed churches and property. The fear of that violence haunted preachers even in primarily Catholic lands. Half a century after Luther’s rise, Italian preaching guides still included lamenting descriptions of Protestant-­led turmoil: “They have profaned the temples, desecrated the altars . . . ​d ishonored the saints, exhumed sacred corpses, burned them, and thrown them in the sea!”74 Catholic preachers described their foes as “heretic” or “Lutheran”— which they meant in a generalized, nondenominational way. For many of the preachers in this study, Protestants were a threat both ancient and modern: ancient, because Catholic theology tended to see all heresies as the same old devil with a new mask; modern, because their popularity and the schisms they wrought within Europe were unprecedented. What is important here is that the threat seemed grave, even in a country characterized ever since by its Catholicism. For mendicant and diocesan preachers alike, the most immediate and most problematic manifestation of the reform crisis was the question of scripture. Angelo Castiglione, after welcoming the penitent heretics at the Milanese cathedral, devoted the first half of his sermon to explaining how to interpret scripture correctly; he was only one of many to do so. Intimacy with scripture had become the hallmark of Protestant sympathy. Catholic preachers defined “modern heretics” as those who arrogantly misappro­ priated scripture and believed that they could interpret it for themselves, without benefit of apostolic tradition. Within the Catholic fold, the two greatest examples of Italian preachers of scripture in recent memory were Savonarola, whose prophetic claims had brought violent political chaos, excommunication, and execution in the 1490s, and Bernardino Ochino, the beloved Capuchin preacher who revealed his Protestant sympathies and fled north to Geneva in 1542. In the wake of religious schism and tightening definitions of orthodoxy, neither of these preachers provided a good Catholic role model for preachers who wanted to avoid controversy. Yet Catholics could not do without scripture nor assert that it was unnecessary for their faith simply because reformers had claimed it.75 They had to find new ways [  4 4  ]

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for laymen to learn the Biblical foundations of their faith without courting heretical ideas. This conundrum pushed the topic of scripture to the forefront of early discussions of reform. When the Council of Trent was convoked after many years of attempted Church reform, the Council fathers made the study of scripture their foremost priority; it was the first matter of dogma they addressed. These early discussions, in session IV of the Council, resulted in two decrees on scripture. A decree on the reform of preaching followed almost immediately after, in session V, with the Council fathers paying particular attention to the preaching of scripture. The Council would produce more decrees on preaching before it closed, but not for another decade and a half. Only then would the decisions of the previous eighteen years of ­deliberation be presented to the pope for ratification, and subsequently ­published. Preachers into the 1570s and 1580s had to contend with the more streamlined and less flexible attitude to doctrine established at the Council of Trent, as well as with increasingly strict controls on what could be printed. In addition to various local indices, the Index of Prohibited Books was first established alongside the Roman Inquisition in 1559, and a more authoritative (and less strict) version determined at the Council of Trent was published in 1564. Subsequent revisions and new indices were announced in the following decades under new popes, starting with the Clementine Index of 1596.76 Books on the Index were generally classified as prohibited, suspicious, or in need of expurgation. The Index banned some authors completely and only certain titles of others; other works were permissible in expurgated versions, but the standards could change from list to list. The preachers in this study were among the authors who best avoided or negotiated the disapproval of Inquisition commissioners. They represented Roman doctrine at its most orthodox. None of their preaching works were censured; in fact, preachers were often the first to publicize the appearance of a new Index. Many praised the Index and Inquisition for fostering Italian peace and security.77 Yet they too had to contend with a climate of ever-­i ncreasing controls, investigation, censorship, and general suspicion of printed books, all of which could have straitened the opinions they were willing to express in print. The most difficult kind of censorship to assess is self-­censorship; we can never know what an author chose not to say. [  45  ]

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Crisis of Authority In the process of reform, both mendicant and diocesan preachers faced a crisis of authority peculiar to their profession. Because of the novelty of the Protestant sects and the slow response of Catholic authorities, neither mendicants nor diocesan preachers had clear guidance about how to preach. But preach they had to, without waiting for new and authoritative guides. In the decades leading up to and during the Council of Trent, the need for sermons on scripture became ever more urgent as the rift between Protestants and Catholics grew. But when it came to scripture, preachers were entirely on their own. Much modern scholarship about sixteenth-­century preaching has relied heavily on theoretical literature, works that told a preacher what to say. Yet none of these genres could be both fully relevant and fully authoritative for navigating the tricky and unfamiliar waters of sixteenth-­century Catholicism. Mendicant preachers typically learned their craft from a medieval Ars Praedicandi such as Alan of Lille’s Summa de arte praedicatoria. Such works typically circulated in manuscript and eventually in printed versions as well; in some parts of Europe, they continued to be printed throughout the sixteenth century and were cited by authors of newer preaching treatises.78 Yet Artes Praedicandi were inadequate to Reformation-­era problems. They derived their authority from their antiquity and had little relevant information about novel heresies that interpreted scripture in their own ways. Alan of Lille says almost nothing about preaching to heretics or about the dangers of heresy.79 His chapter on scripture comments only on its absence, not its potential misuse; he says, “Learn as though you were to live forever . . . ​read Scripture, inquire into its meaning.” He complains above all that clerics ignore learning, “for clerks of our own day follow more readily the schools of Antichrist than Christ, are rather given to gluttony than glosses . . . ​Now all learning goes cheap, all reading is half-­hearted; there is no-­one who reads books.”80 The preachers in this study, in contrast, thought the laity was trying to learn too much, not the clergy too little. Furthermore, Artes Praedicandi were written primarily as guides for the sermo modernus, a form largely outdated by the sixteenth century, especially in vernacular preaching. A preacher using the more popular genus demonstrativum could have used Alan of Lille to find authorities to quote, but the many divisions and the [  46  ]

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r­ eliance on proof might have been less useful to him stylistically. Over­ dependence on such a work might even have marked him as outdated. New theoretical works appeared in the late fifteenth century, encouraging or reflecting new preaching priorities, but these too were only of limited use to the learned sixteenth-­century preacher. The earliest of these was the Margaritae Eloquentiae Castigatae of Lorenzo Traversagni, the first to apply classical rhetorical ideals to Catholic preaching. Traversagni’s work, however, was not republished after 1480. It “seem[s] to have been singularly ignored by his contemporaries” and to have had little lasting influence.81 Other early works about preaching were similarly ineffective for Italian preachers, either because they came from Protestant or otherwise controversial authors (such as Melanchthon or Reuchlin), or because they were quickly superseded by the most important Latin preaching treatise of the era, Erasmus’s Ecclesiastes, sive de ratione concionandi, of 1535.82 With the Ecclesiastes, his last and longest major work, Erasmus provided the most comprehensive history of Christian preaching and the most thorough application of classical rhetoric to sacred oratory. In so doing, he obviated the thematic sermon. Erasmus encouraged preachers to find their material in ancient biblical, patristic, and classical sources. He imagined simpler, more scripturally based sermons and argued that the preacher himself must embody the piety that enables true imitation of Christ. The Ecclesiastes was immediately popular, running through ten editions in the first decade after its publication. It became an important reference for preachers writing after 1535 and eventually influenced post-­Tridentine preachers in Italy such as Carlo Borromeo. Yet it was also criticized almost immediately for being extremely long, repetitive, unstructured, and unwieldy. In addition, its author had no practical experience preaching in public. In 1559 it was placed on the Index of Prohibited Books with the rest of Erasmus’ works. As a result, the work might well have benefited those with sufficient learning to appreciate it, but it could not provide widespread guidance to mendicant preachers on preaching scripture in light of recent heresies.83 Diocesan preachers, primarily concerned with transmitting basic catechism to the laity, would have had little use for a Latin Ars Praedicandi, for the erudition of Erasmus, or for other treatises on rhetoric. Instead the resurgence of diocesan preaching inspired new preaching literature in the sixteenth century, much of which was tailored to contemporary problems. [  47  ]

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Yet too often its scope was limited. Ludovico Pittorio’s Homilarium and his other works were much beloved and were printed throughout the century, but Pittorio died in 1525 and could not anticipate the scope of the Reformation and the scripture crisis. Other possible aids were either hard to find, not comprehensive, or limited to particular dioceses and particular circumstances. In an era when everything was in transition, none of this new literature could be wholly prescriptive. The best advice a bishop could get on the specific question of scripture and heresy came from the writings of his colleagues in other dioceses. Yet those texts were often composed in the context of individual diocesan synods and would have been difficult to apply more broadly.84 Three well-­ known and much-­studied bishops, Gian Matteo Giberti, Gasparo Contarini, and Marcello Cervini (the future Pope Marcellus II), wrote preaching guides and other works in the 1530s and 1540s that found rapid circulation and application in broader circles and that might have been taken as authoritative. As Bishop of Verona (1524–1543) and one of the most influential voices for reform in Italy, Giberti produced two works specifically devoted to preaching: Breve Ricordo di quello hanno da fare i chierici of 1530 and the more elaborate Per li Padri Predicatori of 1540, as well as a thorough set of guidelines for clergy culled from his episcopal synods. These works encouraged preachers to preach frequently, based on their scriptural reading. Giberti also counseled preachers to avoid heretics and to keep company only with good men, but in keeping with many other bishops in the early decades of the Reformation, he chose not to bring up Protestants directly.85 His brief mention of heretics in the Breve Ricordo is embedded, undistinguished, in a longer list of bad company: practitioners of superstition, schism, or witchcraft. Giberti drew a straight line from the priest’s good morals and behavior, through his education in scripture, to good preaching: Let them flee all indolence, giving themselves to some honest effort or study. Their studies, if perhaps one of them does not know what to study, are of Holy Scriptures. And they should in any case own a Bible, and some commentary on it like Nicholas of Lyra and the Catena Aurea on the Gospels, and the Psalms; they should have the homilary for the year and for feast days, and a Summa . . . ​a nd to better remember what they have [  48  ]

wher e ser mons matter ed studied, and for the benefit of their parishioners, every feast day they should declare the Gospel, and with it, as it seems best to them, some commandment of God. . . .86

These seem like simple rules, yet they represent a very idealized curate. Giberti’s Costituzioni codified his lifelong position supporting scriptural preaching and touching only lightly on the topic of heresy. The Council fathers at Trent largely approved of the Costituzioni. They, too, encouraged episcopal residence and straightforward preaching. Giberti’s later successor in Verona, Agostino Valier, would republish the work in 1589 with only minimal changes, and it appeared twice more in the seventeenth century. The success of the Costituzioni is due in large part to its endorsement by the Council and by later, more powerful bishops, including Borromeo, but its usefulness to earlier preachers is less clear.87 It would have been hard for any preacher other than Giberti himself to implement fully any program that he advocated. Even beyond the usual problems facing a reforming bishop— recalcitrant mendicants with papal privileges, unlettered clergy, and minimal support in his church—the outspoken Giberti was a unique case. He was only able to carry out his own reform plans because he enjoyed the lifelong extensive support of Clement VII, Paul III, and the Republic of Venice. Bishops with less of a network could not hope to imitate him.88 Nonetheless, diocesan preachers who read these two sources could well have found support for a program of frequent preaching. They could take Giberti’s brief words on the topic to mean that all of their sermons should center on scripture. Giberti’s omission of any specific references to heretical doctrine might have led them to model a similar approach, emphasizing Catholic practice without addressing Lutheran ideas directly. Yet as the following chapters will make clear, this is not in the end the model that diocesan preachers would necessarily adopt after mid-­century. Gasparo Contarini, a prominent figure in papal circles and another early advocate for reform, also believed, like Giberti, in the general importance of diocesan preaching.89 Contarini’s views on preaching are found in the Modus Concionandi of 1537 and his Instructioni pro praedicatoribus of 1541, as well as in his treatise on the office of a bishop from 1517. Contarini’s Modus Concionandi was composed in 1538 for the clergy of his diocese of Belluno, where Contarini remained an absentee bishop. It addresses the eternal question of how to [  49  ]

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teach complicated doctrine to an unlearned congregation and asks more specifically whether it is possible to teach the gospel and difficult matters of faith. Contarini’s “double truth” solution to this problem is well known and differs from the approach of Giberti. Contarini advocated different solutions for different audiences. He allowed open intellectual debates among those with the education to participate but maintained that when an ignorant population might misunderstand a controversial doctrine or be led into error by a complicated argument, the preacher should omit those topics and only preach simple matters: “We must definitely avoid discussing these deep questions before the ignorant people. Let the pious and prudent preacher therefore descend to the [level of] knowledge and capacity of the people, and treat of divine things in such a way as to be understood by the people and be able to instruct the sheep of Christ in charity.”90 Contarini’s emphasis on protecting, not educating, the laity and on obeying Church authority made it impossible for him to advocate direct scriptural exegesis or the direct discussion of heretical arguments, even though he was deeply concerned about the penetration of Protestants into Italy. Contarini’s stance in this work reflects his personal belief that justification by faith was compatible with Catholic doctrine but too complicated to be understood by the uneducated. His position could not have been maintained later after the Council of Trent clarified the Catholic position on justification.91 Contarini changed his approach to preaching in his later set of instructions for preachers, the Instructio pro praedicatoribus, which he wrote for Paul III in 1541. It reflects the decision he made after the Council of Regensburg to be wholly obedient to the Church. The fear of Lutherans prompted him to write; he opens by citing the recent “stain” of Lutheranism that had spread into many cities in Italy in recent years. This second work advocates much stricter adherence to Church authority. It tells preachers to emphasize the role of the priest and to follow established doctrines. He no longer makes a distinction between the educated and the ignorant but instead encourages preachers to teach the explicit rites and observances of the Catholic Church, always mindful that they could be misunderstood. Despite Contarini’s prominence in the Church and his intimacy with popes and reformers, the immediate influence of either of his treatises at the time is unclear. Modus Concionandi circulated only in manuscript until the nineteenth century. Instructio pro praedicatoribus may have been published in [  50  ]

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a papal brief, but no clear evidence of this remains.92 In addition, Contarini’s advice on preaching reflects the words of a man who had almost no practical experience as a bishop; Contarini was never able to reside in his diocese and only visited once in five years. Thus in the 1530s and early 1540s, the most prominent treatises for bishops on preaching, by Giberti and Contarini, took different positions on the prominence and treatment of heresy, and none could be easily emulated by other bishops. In the years surrounding the opening of the Council of Trent, Marcello Cervini’s Instructio ad praedicatores suae diocesis also influenced other bishops. Before his election to the papacy in 1555, Cervini served as Bishop of Nicastro and administered the dioceses of Reggio and Gubbio. Cervini’s instructions for preachers from 1549 is more explicit than those of either Contarini or Giberti on preaching about heresy, perhaps because he composed them when he was Bishop of Gubbio in correspondence with his vicar, Carlo Vanetti, over local heresy trials.93 The work directly instructs preachers to avoid talking about heresy: “Preachers . . . ​should be as careful as possible not to recite the opinions of heretics to a populace that does not know them.” Instead, a preacher must say nothing ambiguous but stick to basic Catholic truths, “so that every single listener will be able to grasp the same meaning of the law.”94 Unlike Giberti, Cervini made no mention of scripture as the foundation of a sermon, nor did he refer to the explication of the gospel when he discusses preaching. The text says only that a preacher’s arguments should concur with scripture, apostolic tradition, the Church fathers, and sacred councils. For Cervini, the point of preaching was to teach dogma and catechism, not scripture. When it came to the most controversial topics— original sin, justification, free will—Cervini explicitly told his preachers to follow the doctrines of the Council of Trent in their preaching. Because of his prominence in Rome, his influence as one of three presiding legates during the first period of the Council of Trent, and his relationship with other bishops, Cervini was the most authoritative of the three authors on the subject of diocesan preaching before the close of the Council of Trent. Yet because his treatise dates from after the opening of the Council, Cervini alone cannot be seen as the last word on the subject. His writing already reflects some of the emphasis on centralized authority that would characterize the post-­Tridentine period. Thus to some extent, the most prominent guides for preachers disagreed [  51  ]

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on key controversies: whether to preach scripture directly and whether to address heresy explicitly. Their advice could not constitute a clear consensus for other preachers to follow. None of them managed to be at once fully current, fully applicable, and fully authoritative. Mendicants also had their superiors to obey, and secular curates their bishops. Although the Council of Trent would eventually supersede the suggestions of many bishops, and prove authoritative, its decrees were not widely distributed until after the final close of the Council in 1563.95 In the area under investigation in this study, the positions of Giberti, Contarini, and Cervini contradict their traditional scholarly polarizations. They articulate three answers to problems no Catholic had yet solved, and they do not do so in neat party lines. Contarini is one of the most-­i nvoked symbols of the spirituali wing of Catholic reform and is sometimes treated like a patron saint of tolerance.96 Giberti, too, has been held up as a sort of spirituale for his emphasis on pastoral care and his respect for his flock. Yet Giberti and Contarini reach opposite conclusions about the accessibility of scripture, implying deeper differences of attitude toward reform. All three seem to believe that discussions of heresy are best avoided in a sermon, although Giberti makes this point by dodging the topic while Cervini ­hammers it home.

Finally, it is important to ask whether preachers even took the proffered advice when the Church at large, or individuals within it, sought to help them handle the unforeseeable circumstances of the sixteenth century. Preachers who had spent their lives in the pulpit might have a very different view of what was necessary than a theologian with little pastoral experience, such as Contarini or Erasmus. Sermons, composed frequently and tailored to the moment, must necessarily transform more quickly than preaching guides could keep up with.97 In the end, preachers in the pulpit had to make their own decisions. The decisions of a sixteenth-­century preacher are best assessed, then, not through preaching guides but through his own words. Many aspects of Italian preaching remained unchanged for centuries. It is critical for scholars to see the changes in sixteenth-­century preaching in a [  52  ]

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broader context and to remember how many aspects of Italian religious life—some of them unspoken and unquestioned—continued from well before the sixteenth century to after it. Preaching remained arguably the most important moment in Catholic religious life, as it had been for centuries. It continued to attract the same vast crowds, to take place in the same churches and piazzas, and to occur at the same moments: during the Mass, daily during Lent and Advent, on special religious holidays, and at monumental civic events. Franciscans and Dominicans continued to travel the country and to speak at the invitation of cities and courts. They maintained their position as Italy’s most illustrious and highly praised preachers, even though they could no longer boast of being its only ones. Above all, preaching remained central to Italian communal and religious life. It remained, as Corrie Norman has described it, public, ritualistic, and interactive, a moment when the populace could behold the sacred made visible.98 Yet it was precisely these continuities—the tremendous respect for preachers, the ancient origins of their authority, and the strength of their tradition—that gave preachers, in the end, the most potential to remake an obedient Catholic into a devout one, and to make the case for the Roman Church against its new competition.

[  53  ]

2 Mendicant Preachers

Cornelio Musso, who preached up and down the Italian peninsula for many decades, was convinced that Protestants were on the verge of taking over Italy: This gangrene, this plague does not infect just a finger or a fingernail: it occupies hands, arms, legs, entire bodies, cities, peoples, countries, nations, realms . . . ​it has penetrated through the city, the castle, the villa, every class, every state, every sex. Don’t you see that even boys and girls are heretics today? And how many schoolteachers? And young men? And great princes? And, woe is me to have to say it, how many preachers?1

For him the threat was real. Not only had he addressed Protestants directly in a few sermons in Trent; he delivered this sermon in Naples in 1554, where some well-­k nown Erasmian and Protestant sympathizers had long since made their home. Musso took the city to task for its moments of temptation: And you, Naples, which claims to be so religious, and which glories in so much chivalry, you too have let yourself be tempted by

mendicant pr eacher s these heretics—I said tempted, do not worry, my Lords, I did not say seduced—but, my Naples, such a city as this one should have recognized the threats immediately.2

Musso was a Conventual Franciscan, and as such he had inherited centuries of preaching tradition. Yet fears of heresy gave new urgency to his traditional role as excoriator and exhorter to the city of Naples. The tumult of the sixteenth century changed the stakes for mendicant preachers and their well-­honed techniques. Adopting a new weapon for a new foe, mendicant preachers also turned to the printing press in a conscious effort to battle the heretics. Their many stories, some told here, exemplify the continuing significance of mendicant sermons to religious reform in Italy. Nowhere is their efficacy more apparent than in efforts by Cornelio Musso and his colleague Franceschino Visdomini to fight Protestantism and to promote and disseminate the decisions of the Council at Trent. Long before those decisions would be codified and published, Musso and Visdomini gave sermons that echoed the Council’s discussions, explained their importance, and promoted the authority of the Council, laying the foundations for its lasting impact. At the same time, the changing and contradicting messages of these very sermons remind us that even firmly within orthodoxy, more than one path led to reform. Cornelio Musso and Franceschino Visdomini make for an apt compar­ ison because they preached at the same time under very similar circumstances. They were both Conventual Franciscans, deeply involved with the Council of Trent, active participants in the sixteenth-­century sermon revival, and the two preachers best represented in print between the generations of Savonarola and, a century later, Panigarola. Both were so well known and beloved that even thirty years after their deaths they were on a first-­name basis with the reading public.3 This makes them fitting examples of the old and new roles for mendicant preachers in the sixteenth ­century.

In the Pulpit The written records of Musso’s and Visdomini’s lives capture the renown that rewarded the most successful preachers. Their peers praised them for their learning, their precocity as children, and their deft pulpit skills, while revealing the busy and peripatetic life of a preacher in demand. [  55  ]

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Although less famous now than his Franciscan forerunner Bernardino of Siena or successor Francesco Panigarola, Musso was the best known and most esteemed preacher of the mid-­sixteenth century. His colleagues hailed him as a verbal equal of Titian and Michelangelo, able to shape people’s hearts the way artists sculpted in marble and make his listeners forget to eat, drink, sit, walk, or sleep.4 This accolade appears in the biography by Bernardino Tomitano that preceded the 1554 and 1560 editions of Musso’s occasional sermons, making the character of the preacher rival the content of his sermons in importance. According to Tomitano and another early biographer, Cornelio’s relative Giuseppe Musso, Cornelio Musso’s exposure to the preaching life started early: He began to study with the Conventuals at the age of nine, after the death of his mother, Cornelia Volpi, whose name he adopted. He astounded adults by memorizing and repeating at home the sermons he heard in church. He delivered his first sermon at thirteen. Musso was that rarest of performers—a child prodigy whose fame increased as an adult.5 In Piacenza and later in Padua, his studies extended to the history of dogma and Church councils, as well as to Latin, Greek, and Hebrew; he would use words and phrases in these languages in his sermons years later. As an adult, he was frequently called to Rome in the service of Paul III, Paul IV, and Pius IV. Paul III Farnese installed him as theologian to his nephew, Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, in his titular Church of San Lorenzo in Damaso—one of the most renowned churches in Rome, which had been recently rebuilt. It was also one of the premier churches in Rome for hearing Lenten sermons.6 Musso preached four Lenten cycles there and returned often in later years. The sermons at San Lorenzo in Damaso would make his reputation as a preacher to the stars. Musso’s contemporary and fellow Conventual, Franceschino Visdomini, shared with Musso a reputation for greatness and a lifetime of preaching to the nobility. Visdomini was born to a noble family in Ferrara in 1514 or 1516.7 As a child, he studied grammar, rhetoric, poetry, philosophy, and theology, and later Greek, Hebrew, arithmetic, astronomy, geometry, and music, in addition to his sacred studies. According to his biographers, Francesco Visdomini was nicknamed Franceschino not so much because he was small, although he was, but because he was sweet and approachable. Neither his size nor his demeanor kept him from rising through the administrative ranks of the Conventual order. He taught theology and philosophy and became regent of the order in Venice, Naples, and Bologna, staying longer in each place [  56  ]

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than the customary three years. Later he was elected to the higher administrative offices of provincial minister and assistant of the order. As a preacher, Visdomini traveled throughout northern Italy, preaching in Bologna, Brescia, Padua, and Venice. He worked as a preacher in Milan under the auspices of Carlo Borromeo.8 He preached not only to the elite but also to loose women (zitelle periclitanti), prostitutes, and in Rome, to the Jews. Despite a lifelong stutter and difficulty making himself audible in daily life, he was known for his charisma and his ability to use not only his voice but his eyes, ears, face, and hands in the pulpit. Visdomini won the approval of his colleagues as well as his listeners. Musso himself, who was five years his senior, revered him, saying “my little Francesco is the delight of the pulpit and the oratorical lyre of our times.” Cardinal Federico Borromeo, in the first volume of his com­ pendium of preachers, De sacris nostrorum temporum oratoribus, commended Visdomini’s virtue, manner of speech, and grace; Luca Machiavelli did the same in an oration praising Ferrarese preachers. Francesco Panigarola explicitly cited Visdomini as a role model. When the anthologizer Tommaso Porcacchi collected fourteen model sermons for the education of new preachers, he included five by Visdomini. No other preacher merited even two sermons. Porcacchi’s work would become the best-­k nown anthology of sixteenth-­century sermons. One devoted listener even rewrote Visdomini’s series on the penitential psalms as a series of poems in octava rima.9 Visdomini’s sermons served as a witness to current events and a recorder of fleeting moments. He was called to preach in Ferrara to raise funds for the Church of San Francesco, which had been destroyed in an earthquake, raising 3200 scudi with one sermon. In Naples, he successfully converted a group of prostitutes. In Sorrento, he raised money to redeem thousands of Christians taken hostage by Muslim pirates. He preached formal sermons on Mary I of England’s reconciliation with the Catholic Church in 1555, and four years later in Naples on her death. He was on hand to preach on Psalm 121 at the announcement of an accord, in 1557, between the pope and Philip II of Spain.10

Cornelio Musso’s preaching survives most often in large editions of the multi­volume collection of occasional sermons that he began to publish in [  5 7  ]

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1554. These volumes were reprinted many times, singly and together, in the sixteenth century.11 Musso also published two collections of Lenten sermons, two collections of Latin sermons taken from his other anthologies, and various exegetical and other sacred works. After his death, his sermons would be published in France and Germany, and many of his Italian sermons would be translated into Latin.12 Visdomini’s best-­selling work by far was Homelie dello spirito santo, which originally appeared in 1551. Homelie dello spirito santo is a collection of ten sermons of about fifteen folio pages each, explaining the Pentecost and the related seven gifts of the Holy Spirit. Visdomini preached them in Venice no later than 1551, presumably on that festival. The collection would be republished seven times in the next decade by three different publishers, including in a pocket-­sized octavo edition in 1557, and four more times before the end of the century. In addition to his single sermons for special events, Visdomini also produced small collections of thematically linked sermons, homilies, or discourses, such as five “consolatory” sermons on Psalm 90 or the Discorsi Morali for the convent of San Silvestro in Ferrara.13

The Fight Against Heresy Like many of their contemporaries, Musso and Visdomini both saw the printing press as a critical weapon in the fight against heresy. For Musso the link was overt. His two most reprinted sermons attacked the Protestants directly, once even on their own ground, in the German Church in Trent, in 1552.14 In many ways, the fight against heresy defined Musso’s life as a preacher. The theme of heretics appears ubiquitously in his sermons and in the introduction to his works. In his unusually long dedication to Pius IV in the second volume of his collected sermons, Musso makes this clear: Blessed Father, since the Christian Religion, due to the lofty and secret judgments of God’s infinite providence, finds itself besieged and afflicted in these calamitous times, perhaps more than ever before, by the burning flames of the ill-­conceived and ill-­gotten heresies which ascend from the gates of Hell and burn not only the walls and rooftops, but also the foundations of our faith; thus it behooves every Christian, as a citizen of this [  58  ]

mendicant pr eacher s ­ onored Republic, and as a member of such a precious body h (even if he is neither the eye, nor the hand, but only the smallest toe on the foot), when he sees it injured and lacerated in so many places—even entire nations, provinces, and kingdoms—to be heartily offended, and to hasten with all his abilities to help it as much as he can.15

Musso thus defined the publication of his sermons as an act of defense against an unprecedented onslaught; a civic duty that every Christian was bound to take up. At the same time, he recognized that his skill with language gave him a unique edge in battle: I would like to be able to remain as agile as ever with tongue and voice, as I used to be, no longer with much hope of confounding the indomitable and undominated heretics, but with great hope of confirming the Catholics who have been seduced and deceived like innocent doves. But because the years weigh heavily upon me now, in order for me to do as much as I can, I ply my trade with pen and stylus, and exhort myself so that I will not be lazy and useless in the vineyard and the house of the Lord; in my sermons I collect the scattered vines and grapes, and as a sign of loyalty, I bring the books I wrote myself to the Master of the house.16

Thus Musso saw his publishing as an extension of his preaching and as part of a lifelong commitment to fighting heresy. When his talents in the pulpit faltered as he aged, he took up the pen. Musso saw his sermons as representing him and furthering his reach, like the “domme preachers” that served as surrogate priests to support isolated Catholics in England.17 In France, Catholic polemical sermons were often directed at the faithful and the fallen together, but in Italy, Musso’s words, written during the early 1560s, reflect the impossibility at that time of complete reconciliation with Protestants.18 Instead, Musso turned his efforts to preserving the souls of Catholics. He considered them to be still in danger and in need of arguments to counter the smooth words of unorthodox preachers. That is why, as his letter explains, he chose to write his sermons in Italian. He argued that even [  59  ]

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though the language was rarely used outside of Italy, he hoped that its similarity to Latin would make it familiar to people in the rest of Europe.19 To be sure, a book of vernacular sermons also had wider appeal, and better market value, than Latin sermons. Clergy increasingly turned to vernacular works in their preparations, and laypeople, even perhaps children, increasingly made use of books for clergy.20 Thus for Musso, despite its inherent dangers, the vernacular was absolutely necessary: Since these false brothers of ours have familiarized themselves with our language, we see that while we are sleeping they furtively go about spreading so many seeds of their pestilence in our fields, thinking, perhaps, that if only they could isolate all of Italy from the true faith, without difficulty they would reign over everything. I have decided that it is a debt of kindness to make it so that, using the same language common to every type of person, one can distinguish the grain from the chaff, the body from the shadow, the Church from the Synagogue, faith from heresy; furthermore, so many Catholic and deserving preachers leave off popular topics . . . ​a nd set themselves to discuss the highest mysteries of the Christian religion, which, in the past, perhaps with greater reverence, were kept secret in the bounds of the three languages which our betters wrote down all the arts and sciences. As a devoted servant . . . ​i nstead of the Latin homilies I usually produced, I pray that you will listen to or read these Italian sermons.21

Musso fought fire with fire, using the vernacular because his enemies did. Because they reached people through preaching, so must he, although he was clearly discomforted at having to discuss doctrine and theology in public. Visdomini, too, was deeply preoccupied with the problem of heresy. Many of his best-­k nown sermons have an explicitly polemical agenda, either from their subject matter, or from the circumstances of their delivery. These include the much-­reprinted sermon on the occasion of the announcement in 1560 of the reopening of the Council of Trent, his sermon on the cult of saints, and his sermon on purgatory, all of which were included in Tommaso Porcacchi’s collection. In many of these sermons, Visdomini’s abhorrence of [  60  ]

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Protestants is evident. In his sermon on the Council, he describes his own era as particularly full of heresy: And not just one [heresy], but as many as there have ever been in all previous centuries, as though all the demons of hell conspired against us, so that the scriptures would be profaned, the texts badly explained, Doctors disdained, sacraments mistreated, saints dishonored, monuments violated, relics dispersed, images defaced, vows revoked, religious orders disordered, ceremonies effaced, the living scandalized, and the dead abandoned.22

His sermon on the cult of saints takes a similarly vehement tone. At its outset he explains the nature of his disagreement with heretics: And if the heretics of our time, like many in the past, oppose us, [saying] that we make the creature equal to the creator, so that (since they are impudent, and quick to insult) they are wont to call us idolaters, saying that we worship the saints equally with God, this comes from their most obvious blindness and ignorance, which judges our worship based on a few exterior actions.23

Most of the sermon provides a thorough defense of the cult of saints and the Eucharist, backed up with scriptural and patristic sources. Yet Visdomini also erupts into long, angry inventories of the iconoclastic violence he finds detestable: These Antichrists cannot abide the reverence that we bear toward Saints . . . ​moved by these angers and hellish passions they crush statues, destroy images, violate monuments, melt tabernacles, burn bones, scatter ashes, especially those enclosed in vessels of gold and silver, and under the guise of zeal they nourish their detestable savagery, and foment the greed of the Princes, who, to satiate their inordinate desires, blind with avarice, lend favor and spirit to impiety, and place the ancient religion of their fathers under their reckless and accursed feet . . . ​so much so that their [  61  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly impure and sacrilegious jealousy ends in their claiming to have violated the honor of God, as they put it, by the worship we give to saints—it ends, I say, in laying waste to and destroying, with open theft, sacred houses, vessels dedicated to God, with amass­ ­i ng treasure for the greed of tyrants, and tolerating matrimonial abominations, the filthy and polluted beds, the dissolute and immodest tables of the Antichrists, so that with such a rush they upset and displease every good thing, because the Devil nourishes and satisfies them out of their iniquity.24

Protestant thought, in his view, is innately hypocritical; it glorifies scripture while ignoring its precepts: The Lutherans cry out “Gospel! Gospel!” They translate scripture into every language, speak highly of it, fill up books about it, wear out the presses, explain all its teachings in favor of the holy word of God, yet with all these marvelous exaggerations, they do not do a thing that the Gospel commands; rather their immodest lives show the animosity and mortal hatred they bear toward the Gospel.25

Even sermons written far from this explicitly antiheretical context are given a more polemical cast at publication, if not on delivery. Visdomini’s Discorsi Morali, for example, were written for a group of nuns in the convent of San Silvestro in his home town of Ferrara. Visdomini intended the Discorsi to be wholly unlike his sermons: “Common, far from any subtlety, they flee the sublime, try as much as possible to abase themselves and to speak like one of you.”26 Yet even here, in a discussion of the Lord’s Supper, Visdomini’s antagonism toward heresy reared its head. He tells the nuns that he is relieved not to have to worry about their willingness to partake of communion, and continues: This has to do with the heretics who, with the evil and disloyal opinion that those accursed people have of this supper, flee it and abhor it like idolatry. These bitterest enemies of Christ and his love, these dogs and rabid, poisonous scorpions, with such [  62  ]

mendicant pr eacher s impiety reject the greatest piety that the world ever enjoyed from God, and like infidels, have judgment already upon them.27

Just prior to this passage, Visdomini had complimented the nuns on their piety. He may, in fact, have been trying to protect them—Ferrara had been known earlier for its heterodox sympathies—but this is unlikely by the 1560s, when the work was published.28 Given the calmly pedagogical nature of the rest of the Discorsi, this vivid passage stands out for its fury. The fight against heresy also forms the setting of Visdomini’s Homelie. In the opening dedication, Visdomini indicates that he intends the entire group of sermons to help battle heresy: Since the hope has developed in me that in an alert and active century such as this one, in which, thank God, so many Angels in heaven tire themselves out seeking to uproot and extirpate the unfortunate and importunate seeds of discord which the Devil has sown in [the field of] Christian purity, drawing the beloved city of God, Jerusalem, out of the anguish and dangers with which clouds of heretics, apostates, and infidels besiege her and do not let her breathe—and to show the world the true path of right belief and right living, which is the ancient, Roman, and Christian one, into whose bosom we are born, and must live and die.29

The dangerous seeds of discord, a metaphor that permeated all sixteenth-­ century Catholic polemic, lent extra urgency to all of Visdomini’s work. By mid-­century, casting published sermons as antiheretical polemic became commonplace. In 1566 the astronomer, theologian, and penitent heretic Francesco Giuntini published a sermon on the subject of the real presence, in order to refute the theology of Calvin, Beza, and others. When the Augustinian preacher Gabriele Fiamma collected his sermons for publication, he pointed out almost reflexively in the title that they were intended both “to profit the spiritual life” and to “drive away the errors of these times.” Guides for preachers, such as the Discorsi Predicabili of Sebastiano Ammiani, included picturesque passages detailing the devastation Lutherans had wrought in the world.30 Other predominantly Catholic countries, such as France and Spain, [  63  ]

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c­ ertainly also addressed heresy in their sermons; French preachers like the Dominican Guillaume Pepin and later, Francois LePicard, railed directly against heresy in their sermons between the 1530s and 1560s with a vehemence that recalls Visdomini’s. Yet these preachers and their colleagues tended to advocate internal reform as the best antidote to the “incorrigible, obdurate, pertinacious” Protestants.31 They believed that heresy could be refuted through preaching but did not make it the primary impetus for publishing. With the approach of the Wars of Religion, French Franciscans sought to prevent not simply heresy, but the threat of a Protestant monarchy and state; their spirited efforts through preaching, patronage, and political influence with the Catholic League helped to ensure France’s Catholic future.32 Spanish preachers also undertook some direct refutation of heresy, but the danger of a political or religious victory for Protestants was remote in Spain, leading preachers to engage less in polemic and to endorse more broadly a widespread teaching of core Catholic doctrines and an explicit message of the parity of scripture and apostolic tradition.33 In England and Germany, where Catholic congregations faced much greater marginalization, it was too dangerous to give sermons an explicitly anti-­Protestant cast. While English Catholics read a great deal of anti-­ Protestant polemic, their preachers focused, necessarily, on “re-­igniting zeal and intensifying and spiritualizing personal piety” rather than refuting doctrines that had become law.34 Catholic preachers in Germany had to confront the enormous energy that Lutherans poured into their preaching; Lutheran pastors placed the sermon at the center of all worship. German Catholic priests countered with their own preaching revival; approximately 180,000 copies of complete sets of Catholic sermon collections were put into circulation between 1530 and 1563, many written in direct response to the Protestant output. Many of these sermons explained the significance of specifically Catholic forms of devotion, such as visual spectacles, the Eucharist, or the cult of saints, but many others were written in direct response to the Protestant output and necessarily addressed controversial issues of doctrine or addressed Protestants directly.35 Italian preachers, in contrast, had far less reason to consider Protestants explicitly than did their colleagues in France, England, or Germany, yet they seem to flaunt their opposition to heresy far more explicitly than their counterparts in Spain. Their vehemence might be explained by the very [  64  ]

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d­ ifficulty of drawing denominational lines in Italy. Italian preachers might well have recalled the recent example of Bernardino Ochino, the wildly popular Capuchin preacher and general of his order, who had once served as a prominent example of an inspiring Catholic role model.36 Ochino’s gradual, covert endorsement of Protestantism, capped by his sudden flight to Geneva, called into question what such a role model might be. Ochino had espoused a piety that was never obviously heretical, because it focused primarily on inner piety. His later break with the Roman Church would make such vagueness less acceptable. Very few published works remain from before Ochino’s flight, having been few in number and later banned, but they include a volume of sermons written in 1539, three years before his definitive departure for Geneva.37 These sermons differ in both style and content from those of his Conventual colleagues. They are much simpler, hewing closely to biblical episodes, which Ochino recounted in Latin and explained in the vernacular. They include the sort of direct moral castigation that in retrospect appears to foreshadow his dramatic fate, but that equally characterized much mendicant preaching, especially the sermons of his fifteenth-­century namesake, Bernardino of Siena: But you, my city of Venice, not to mention myself, but [despite] so many preachers in this city of yours who do not preach philosophy, or fables, as they did in the past, but the word of God, and of the living Christ, truly and sincerely, and your health, and the emendation of sins, but you are the same as you always were. And speaking of myself, because with so much true charity and love I have exhorted you toward your health with so much effort, and so many vigils, without any fruit in this world. I am completely certain that if in Germany, or even in England so many words were disseminated, or among Turks or Jews, it would have more fruit than what I have done, from the way it looks; even though I still hope to see good and sincere Christians.38

The sermons contain almost no mention of Catholicism’s external trappings: They omit the papacy, scholastic or patristic references, saints, sacraments, or penitential works. Instead Ochino, like his friend and mentor Juan [  65  ]

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Valdes, concentrates entirely on internal piety. Despite the pedagogical emphasis on biblical parables, Ochino’s final sermon emphasizes introspection even over scripture: I came across a book, in which is written everything true and appropriate about the highest and most holy Trinity, and so easy that children and women can read in it, and in reading it, they will have such pleasure, as much as one can, but if you want me to tell you what it is, I want you to promise me to have it printed. Not to waste words, I will say: this book is the gracious Jesus: questo e breve quia verbum abbreviatum fecit dominus. Approbato: Hic est filius meus dilectus, facile, lugum enum meum suave etc. Every person who is ignorant, reading it, will feel such sweetness and pleasure as ever one could say. For this the son of God came to earth, so that people would read in his book, and all become doctors in the Gymnasium of Heaven.39

The theology endorsed here thus evades any confessional labels. In its complete focus on moral, spiritual, and personal reform, it could, and did, work for Catholics and Protestants alike.40 Yet Ochino’s defection, like the choices of many other reformers, limited options for other preachers, encourag­­ing them to endorse the institutional Church more explicitly, and to shy away from ambiguity by proclaiming that they fought heretics.

Trent and Its Impact in the Pulpit Heresy concerned the Council fathers at Trent as much as it did Musso and Visdomini. For all of them, the primary sin at the heart of Protestantism was not theological or behavioral but scriptural: Protestants were understood to take scripture, misread it in arrogance, and hand it naked to an unprepared laity at the peril of all their souls. This error, in turn, led to others, such as the disregard for apostolic tradition and the rejection of papal authority. For that reason, the Council fathers made scripture the first topic of discussion at the Council after procedure had been set, arguing that scripture was not only a particularly vulnerable point, but also the foundation of

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all their dogma. The previous sessions had been devoted to determining protocol. Unlike the doctrine of original sin, which many legates had proposed as an opening subject, the topic of scripture would also allow the Council fathers to implement their hard-­won decision to discuss both dogma and Church reform simultaneously throughout the Council.41 Musso and Visdomini were both deeply involved in the Council and privy to its discussions. But as preachers, they also could carry its messages to the wider world, and they did. Both Musso and Visdomini mediated between the highest levels of Church authority and the lay public. They used the question of scripture to endorse the Council’s decisions and uphold its authority to a broader, vernacular audience. Their sermons on scripture reflect the decisions, and more broadly, the priorities of the Council’s fourth session. They did this a full decade before the Council would close and its decisions would be ratified, published, and disseminated. In the meantime, life went on—there were Masses to hold, uneducated children who were not getting any younger, and perceived Protestant infiltrations to beat back. That is why it matters what was preached in the intermediate years of the Council. The importance of sermons during the Reformation period should not be underestimated, because listening to sermons was the most participatory aspect of religious culture.42 The Tridentine decree on scripture, from April 8, 1546, bears the marks of many bitter struggles and carefully wrought compromises.43 At the session on scripture—the council’s session IV—delegates discussed the definition of the biblical canon, the permissibility of Bible translations, the permissions and appropriate formats for the printing of scriptural works, and the relationship of scripture to apostolic traditions. These were difficult subjects, and months of heated disagreement passed before the session’s decrees were presented to the general congregation. Even then, the final decrees could not rule on all the topics raised. The discussion on the weight of apostolic traditions, for example, foundered on questions of whether to treat “tradition” as singular or plural, whether those traditions should be ranked or catalogued, and whether the discussion of tradition should precede or follow discussion of abuses in the use of scripture and the linguistic corruptions of the Vulgate. Discussion of vernacular translations, hindered by vast regional differences in their popularity, led directly into questions of

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preaching and printing: the training of preachers in exegesis and the printing of Bibles without supervision. In this context, Cardinal Girolamo Seripando (discussed in Chapter 3) strongly argued for the need for better exegetical training for preachers, in line with his Augustinian heritage. Underlying all these debates lay the fundamental but often unstated assumption that scripture was closely linked to heresy. Those positions that might raise suspicions of Lutheranism—scriptural primacy, vernacular translations, a revised biblical canon—were in each case eventually suppressed.

Martin Luther’s attacks on the canon and the apostolic tradition formed the subtext of Tridentine discussions of the biblical canon. Luther had refused to accept Church tradition on this subject as binding. Using the techniques of textual criticism, he had called into question the unity of the biblical canon and denied the canonical status of Hebrews, James, John, Revelations, and parts of the Apocrypha. In his 1522 preface to the New Testament, and again in his prefaces to individual epistles, Luther identified what he considered anachronisms and linguistic contradictions in the Epistle of St Jude, and he denied the apostolic authorship of the Epistle of St James, famously calling it “an epistle of straw.” Luther’s criticisms severely undermined Catholic authority.44 He encouraged readers to forgo the traditional apparatuses of glosses and commentaries, saying that “many unscholarly expositions and introductions have perverted the understanding of Christian people till they have not an inkling of the meaning of the gospel.”45 Luther’s innovations and rearrangements of the canon hit close to Rome, finding their way into early Italian vernacular translations of the Bible. In his Italian translation of 1532, Antonio Brucioli had adopted some of Luther’s changes to the canon, consigning the books of Baruch, Tobias, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, and I and II Maccabees to an appendix. Other Italian translations from the 1530s followed in Brucioli’s footsteps.46 During the debates of session IV at the Council, neither the three supervising legates, Cardinals Marcello Cervini, Giovanni del Monte, and Reginald Pole, nor the broader body of attendees in their discussion groups could decide whether to address directly the recent Protestant criticisms in their discussions of what to include in the biblical canon, and how to weight the [  68  ]

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authority of its constituent volumes. The ultimate decision to follow the number and order of books as determined by the Council of Florence in 1441 ignored a long tradition of debate among Catholic theologians. Nonetheless, and perhaps in tacit response to Luther’s criticisms, the first decree of session IV of the Council pointedly listed every book in the canon. It went on to explain that the truth of the Gospel was contained in them and passed down in continuous succession to the modern Catholic Church: “if any one receive not, as sacred and canonical, the said books entire with all their parts . . . ​let him be anathema.” The term “anathema” reflects the opinion that the decisions of previous councils ought not to be revisited. This was the Catholic Church’s first universal promulgation on the scriptural canon.47 The Council also asked whether translations of the Bible could be permitted and whether the current Vulgate translation needed revision. Before the Council, various regions of the Italian peninsula, like other parts of Europe, had enjoyed a widespread diffusion of vernacular Bible translations.48 The first complete Italian translation, by Nicolò Malerbi, appeared in 1471, well before Luther. With eleven editions printed by the end of the century, Italy stood second only to Germany in vernacular translations. Eight more editions appeared during the early sixteenth century. Brucioli’s translation was reprinted six times in its entirety and six more as the New Testament alone. Before Felice Peretti, as Inquisitor of Venice, forbade the printing of vernacular Bibles in 1558, Venetian printers had put out fifteen full editions of vernacular translations and another sixteen of the New Testament alone in twenty-­eight years. These translations demonstrate what Gigliola Fragnito has called an “indiscriminate thirst for biblical knowledge” among the laity and the non-­latinate.49 When the Council opened, many vernacular Bibles were still in circulation. Their popularity caused more controversy in the fourth session than any other topic, because many Council fathers were convinced that the use of the vernacular was likely to spread heresy, while others thought them valuable.50 The disagreements were so harsh that the fathers gave up and did not mention vernacular translations in the final decree. The first comprehensive prohibition of Italian Bible translations appeared only later, in 1559. As for the Vulgate, the investigating committee (and ultimately the Council) came to hold a contradictory position, claiming that the Vulgate was the [  69  ]

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primary authoritative text of the Bible, but that it needed to be revised and thoroughly re-­edited based on earlier Greek and Hebrew versions.51 In the same decree on canonical scriptures, the Council fathers also determined, after much debate, that unwritten apostolic traditions were nearly of equal standing to scripture; they too contained divine truths passed down through the apostles and later recorded by the Church fathers. This was a position strongly advocated by Cornelio Musso. The following decree from that session emphasized that the correct interpretation of scripture rested solely with the Church: No one, relying on his own skill, shall—in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine— wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church—whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures—hath held and doth hold; or even contrary to the unanimous consent of the Fathers; even though such interpretations were never (intended) to be at any time published.52

Musso and Visdomini each saw the Tridentine debates up close. Musso preached at least four sermons in Trent as preparations for the Council were underway, and he delivered the inaugural sermon at the Council’s opening session, in addition to his sermon to the Lutherans.53 Musso also oversaw the organization and direction of the conciliar sessions on justification, and probably influenced the wording of its first decree on preaching, from the fifth session. During the drafting of the decree on the biblical canon, he argued strongly in favor of the parity of apostolic tradition with scripture.54 Both Musso, in his capacity as Bishop of Bitonto, and Girolamo Seripando found themselves in the deputation to identify abuses in preaching and make recommendations; Musso was eventually named its spokesman.55 The deputation’s findings catalogued discrepancies in the versions of scripture in circulation, the need to emend the Vulgate, the Church’s obligation to oversee the right interpretation of scripture and not leave it to the individual judgment of preachers, and the necessity of limits on the circulation of

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printed Bibles. Their findings avoided the contentious question of vernacular translation, which is not even mentioned in the final decree.56 Visdomini attended the fourth session of the Council as a prelate representing his order and also preached to the Council fathers both in Trent and Bologna. On the fifteenth of October, 1546, while the Council members conferred on the doctrine of justification, he addressed the congregation of his order at the Council on that subject; in the following year, he gave them two sermons on sacraments. His 1557 sermon calling for the Council to reconvene became one of his most famous and most reprinted works. Both Musso and Visdomini produced sermons on scripture in the 1550s that bear the marks of exposure to Tridentine debates on scripture.57 Visdomini’s sermon on scripture, Della Scienza [On Knowledge], is one of his ten Homelie, first published just at the opening of the second period of the Council of Trent. In the sermon, Visdomini tackles secular and classical learning as well as sacred, and he repeatedly explains that the former must serve the latter. “Human science is never studied or learned for the sake of improving our souls, but for serving, adorning, and embellishing holy and sacred letters.”58 Scripture appears as the embodiment of sacred learning and thus the highest form of all knowledge. Musso’s sermon on scripture, Della Sapientia Christiana [On Christian Wisdom], appears in the second volume of his collected occasional sermons. He delivered it in the Sala Reale in Naples on October 18, 1554.59 The sermon has four parts, each built around a central comparison. In the first part, Musso contrasts the wisdom of ancient Christians and classical philosophers with the misguided values of his own era, using the conceit of the wise and the foolish. In the second, he distinguishes between worldly, scientific learning and divine wisdom. In the third, he explains how knowledge must be grounded in faith in order to lead to a true understanding of God. He also provides historical justifications for the validity of Christianity. The fourth and longest section is an extended warning against heresy and an apology for the Catholic Church. Musso’s sermon, like Visdomini’s, discusses the entire body of human knowledge, sacred and secular, and gives scripture pride of place within that body. In the first two parts, Musso devotes long passages to its glory and omnipotence: Scripture is a divine book, free from human flaws; it won over

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the Roman Empire, converted countless peoples with its truths, and united sages living in different eras and under different empires with the same beliefs. But as with Visdomini, the grandiloquent rhetoric gives way to explicit instruction. Musso’s sermon on scripture even evokes the very language of the decrees that he had helped to draft. Where the decrees condemn fanciful interpretations “by which the words and sentences of sacred Scripture are turned and twisted to all sorts of profane uses, to wit, to things scurrilous, fabulous, vain, to flatteries, detractions, superstitions, impious and diabolical incantations, sorceries, and defamatory libels,” Musso says “as fables are corruptions of histories, the invented ideas of the heretics are corruptions of the true doctrine; truly they are inventions, fictions, flights of fancy.”60 Like the Tridentine fathers, both sermons treat the biblical canon and vernacular translation in Tridentine terms. They equate scripture with apostolic tradition and make a point of explaining to their audience the reasoning behind the decrees. More broadly, they promote obedience to the Council. Above all, they define the Protestant heresy primarily as a matter of scripture, not theology or behavior, where sermons of their colleagues did not.

Visdomini’s discussion of the biblical canon explicitly reiterates the concerns of the Council and makes its anti-­Lutheran context explicit: The Lutherans do not consider the books of Judith, Wisdom, or Maccabees to be authentic, saying that they are not in the Hebrew canon, and that the Jews don’t receive them. But Jerome says that we, thanks be to God, are Christian, and not Jewish! The Jews renounce them, because they are not in the Hebrew canon. We receive them, because they are in the canon and the catalogue determined and organized by the sacred councils of Carthage, Florence, and in modern times, Trent.61

Musso describes changes in the canon as the first offense in a process that would ultimately destroy Christian unity: “You mutilate the scriptures, heretic, you fool with the number of the holy books and of the sacraments . . . ​ [  72  ]

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is that not breaking the bones of Christ?”62 Echoing the Tridentine decree, he runs through almost every book of the Bible by name, to show that each one contains an important Christological lesson: Genesis, to start from the beginning, shows you Christ as the fatherly Word, for whom everything is created. Exodus, as a Moses thrown into the waters of the river of our mortality, so that he may become the Redeemer of the faithful. . . . ​Behold the five books of the law; let us go on to the histories. In Joshua we see how he, as a captain, gives the land of the living to his soldiers. In Judges, as a lord, that he judges the living and the dead . . .63

Lists like these were a common tactic for preachers and writers of polemical treatises. The actual lessons change from instance to instance, but the lists always include at least one of the books that Catholics defended against Luther.64 Musso’s list is one of the longest and most extensive, and it makes special mention of Hebrews and the Book of Revelation, whose canonicity Luther had contested. Musso and Visdomini’s sermons both skim over the most contentious aspect of that session’s debate: translation of biblical texts into the vernacular. Even though their elite, learned audiences were a potential market for vernacular translations, and even though Musso was deeply involved in conciliar debates on the topic, neither he nor Visdomini chose to broach that part of the session in their sermons. In so doing, they remained faithful to the final decrees of session IV, which, despite much heated internal debate, omitted any reference to vernacular translations.65

Where the Council decreed that scripture and apostolic tradition bore equal weight, Musso and Visdomini went a step further by clarifying to a wider public why scripture needed Church tradition and authority to make it comprehensible. Visdomini asked: “Who can be the judge if not the Church, without which we have no certainty at all about that Epistle [I Corinthians]— whether it is any good, or whether it is even by Paul?”66 In so doing, he reinforced Church authority, citing instances in Deuteronomy and Galatians [  73  ]

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where the right to interpret is reserved to authorities and arguing that advanced theological knowledge “belongs only to those who, within the Church, have the gift of erudition, interpretation, and doctrine: pastors, apostles, doctors, who are like columns, whose job is to support the weak in the Church, teach the ignorant, convince the heretics, and defend the truth.”67 Musso, likewise, belabored to his audience in Naples the idea that an unbroken chain of Church fathers, doctors, martyrs, and bishops had led down to the modern day. His defense of apostolic tradition in his sermon directly recalls his arguments in its favor at the Council a decade earlier. This tradition, he maintained, is necessary for the correct interpretation of scripture, he argued, not because scripture is insufficient, but because it can be misinterpreted and used as a weapon against itself: If the heretic were not so impudent, I would give you no other rule but scripture, because in scripture for certain every heresy can be uprooted. It is a book of God, not of men . . . ​but because the sons of the devil do not spare the word of God, which as you know, they have learned from their father to violate, and interpret in their own way, they make the Gospel a weapon against the Gospel, the prophets against the prophets, Saint Paul against Saint Paul, Christ against Christ. Thus it is necessary to find the correct line of meaning of the scriptures, so that the world will realize that when one sways from that line, you are no longer Catholic, but called heretic.68

For both preachers the emphasis on apostolic tradition and the need for Church oversight smoothly evolves into a defense of councils, both generally and at Trent. Musso chides Catholic clergy for not having acted sooner to convoke the Council of Trent, when it could have nipped Luther’s nascent movement in the bud, and he condemns Protestant groups for refusing to attend the Council: “Why did they not come to show this gold of theirs, that they found in their mines, to see if it is gold, or alchemy? A council is the judge of Catholic or heretical doctrines; that is where they needed to go.” Reflecting the post-­Regensburg disillusionment with reconciliation, Musso wrote that finding an accord between Catholics and Protestants would be akin to uniting water and fire, or God and the devil.69 By actively promoting [  74  ]

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the Council, a preacher could model obedience to the Church and the papacy, as Musso does in his dedication to Pius IV: With a most grateful soul I will always pray devotedly that the Lord God will favor your holy thoughts, efforts, labors, and expenditures, and will give grace to your Blessedness, through this sacrosanct Council, which, against all hope, you have convened in such numbers that it can almost be compared with ancient ones; and that it will be able to lead and steady the weary little ship of which it is the captain in some quiet corner of the sea: converting, I pray, the heretics, who, like giants, with such haughty arrogance dare to challenge the people of God to battle, will reform the abuses within the Christian fold; reuniting the scattered and divided members to their head; and restoring to its former standing and earlier glory the authority and majesty of the Holy Roman Church.70

Visdomini, writing between sessions of the Council, prays for its success: Pray that God gives a council, that he makes it prosper, that He be present at it and lead it until its end; the Devil will see his own ruin and do everything to prevent it, but in the end we will win; God will win. Pray without pause; whoever does not know how good and useful and necessary a council is, let him see, if he has eyes, how much the world does to disturb it, and from this let him judge that the Council is the work and medicine of God to heal the world.71

Visdomini argued for councils not only in his sermon on Trent, but elsewhere in his preaching from the 1550s: The Holy Scriptures are a testimony, alleged by us, and authenticated by the holy fathers, but they are interpreted in a different way by the heretics, and those which receive no commentary are expressly (because they are so impudent) negated and refuted. What end can this contest have? On one side, the heretics; on the [  75  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly other, us; in the middle, scripture. The case is debated back and forth: what we affirm, they negate—how can this dispute ever end? Not by scripture alone, because the heretics are astute, and ingeniously seek to bend them to their interpretations, and when they cannot, they feel free to pass judgment, and refute it with the excuse of the Hebrew canon . . . ​besides, we know that the Angel of Satan has in all eras used scripture to seduce the world.72

Visdomini’s sermon in honor of the Council’s reconvening in 1560 went on to provide reassuring examples of councils that had eradicated heresy and promoted renewal while excoriating Protestants for manhandling scripture as they ignored its precepts. In this way, both preachers showed their loyalty while justifying the Tridentine debates to their audiences. Like the Council fathers, Musso and Visdomini both believed that the Protestants’ command of words—scriptural or spoken—was the ultimate secret to their power. Musso wrote, “Heresy is a rotten cistern full of filth and ugliness. It would be better to drink poison than to bend one’s lips to it even a little bit. But what is important is that the heretics presume to have the Gospel, even the pure Gospel, pure Scripture, pure St Paul.”73 Visdomini’s words were even angrier: How can these ingrates, apostates, and degenerate sons of such a good, humble, sincere, and Catholic mother have left so much of Europe contaminated and apostate?—so many souls conquered, so many schools infiltrated, churches desecrated, cemeteries violated, monasteries plundered, liberties withdrawn, and princes undermined—if not with eloquence? With splendid words and the art of writing and speaking well! . . . ​Others study in order to teach, and they are not content to teach men, but prefer to teach the very books they read! Nor do they seek to understand or know what the book is demonstrating, but instead they want to make it say what they want it to say, which can’t be done without violence. They deprave, corrupt, and contaminate scripture, mixing up chaff with grain, and these are the heretics.74

Yet not all preachers defined heresy in terms of scripture, or turned dis­ cussions of scripture into antiheretical polemics. Sebastiano Ammiani’s [  76  ]

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compilation of anonymous sermon excerpts contains many long and vivid sections devoted to new heresies, many apologetic sections about scripture, and even polemical Discorsi against Pier Paolo Vergerio, the Italian heretic and former bishop. Yet none of the excerpts ever mentions unorthodox uses of scripture or any of the Tridentine concerns common to Musso and Visdomini. One lists all the regions in Europe that have fallen to “Lutheranism” and berates the heretics for their disrespect to Church, clergy, saint, and sacrament, but does not mention their use of scripture. Another takes specific issue with Martin Luther, but again treats him mostly as an object of creative insult and emphasizes primarily his iconoclasm. Ammiani closes his book with a long essay on how the printing press teaches Catholics about Protestant ideas and behavior—but even this essay focuses only on Protestant behavior and attacks on the Catholic Church.75 Scriptural canonicity and apostolic authority merit barely a mention. Preachers in other regions did not seek to replicate and justify the Tridentine decrees quite so specifically in the Council’s interim years. In Reformation Germany, the Augsburg Interim presented at the Augsburg diet of 1547–1548 provided preaching guidelines intended to reinforce the new Council; they were only intended to last until its definitive close (whenever that might be) and emphasized reform themes like attendance at sermons. During those years, the vital and vastly productive German Catholic preachers preached extensively, but not in order to promote the Council explicitly; instead they stuck to medieval or Erasmian themes and sought to improve the quality of Catholic preachers and their libraries.76 Nor did other Italian sermons about scripture necessarily link scripture and heresy. The Augustinian Gabriele Fiamma and the Franciscan Conventual Felice Peretti da Montalto (the future Pope Sixtus V) each wrote sermons on scripture during the same decade as Musso and Visdomini, but neither used them to discuss heresy or promote a Tridentine agenda.77 Fiamma’s sermon mentions heretics only once, in an unspecific and passing reference. For him, as his other sermons corroborate, the Lutherans’ worst sin is their disrespect for the papacy and the clergy, not for the Bible: You blaspheme the lives of prelates in order to join up with Lutheran doctrine. Here is the truth, without a doubt: there has never been a prelate, even if dissolute, who was not a saint [  7 7  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly c­ ompared to these infidels. . . . ​They openly confess that they are enemies of all good works, and are content only with a faith that is dead and malignant; that with the sweet words of the Gospel and of Christ, and of liberty they ruin all good habits.78

Fiamma was not present at the Council of Trent, although in later years, after its decrees were widely known, he would become an advocate of the Tridentine agenda and take up the question of scripture and heresy.79 But in 1558, when he wrote this sermon, his position was not evident in his works, and he does not associate scripture and heresy. Felice Peretti’s sermon on scripture was published in 1554. Peretti would soon be appointed inquisitor in Venice, where he would enthusiastically enforce Paul IV’s strict Index of 1558/1559 from the pulpit and exert pressure on booksellers and others to purge their stock.80 He might therefore have been expected to take up antiheretical polemic in a sermon on scripture, but that sermon never mentions heresy at all. In a companion sermon, Peretti did briefly link heresy with scripture, but only in order to elaborate the ways that the Church could use scripture to battle heresy: “This holy Church, even though it has been betrayed by heretics, has triumphed over them in the end, and with the text of the holy scriptures has confused every heresy, thrown it to the ground, and burned it up.”81 He lists, in pairs, heretical errors and a scriptural passage to refute each one. Neither the technique nor the argument is unique to Peretti. Quotations refuting heresies one by one appear in many sermons and polemical treatises from the same period. Thus while Peretti and Fiamma drew occasional links between scripture and heresy, they did not consider them inextricable, as Musso and Visdomini chose to do. The evidence suggests that their presence at Trent led Musso and Visdomini, the era’s most prolific and acclaimed preachers, directly to adopt and disseminate Tridentine values in their sermons. Sixteenth-­century reform efforts form part of a chain of attempts to improve the Church that is almost as old as the Church itself. A great deal of reforming activity took place at the congregational or diocesan level, independent of the Council, during the first half of the sixteenth century and the decades between the opening and closing of the Council of Trent. Much of this activity had a fundamentally historical or restorative orientation and was the result of, or was inspired by, earlier formal attempts at reform, such [  78  ]

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as the Fifth Lateran Council, the written Libellus to Leo X, or the Consilium de emendanda ecclesia (see Chapter 3).82 Yet Musso and Visdomini’s two sermons show something new coexisting with these older forms of reforming activity: an enthusiastic adoption of Tridentine policy and aggressive, energetic attempts to spread it as soon as possible. They show preachers addressing the unprecedented crisis in the Catholic Church and publicizing the Church’s solutions.

Rhetorical Evolution and Variation In their printed form, therefore, these sermons appear to be yet another example—arguably more effective than any other—of an authoritarian, top­down early Catholic response to printed Protestant propaganda.83 Under these circumstances, the strict fidelity to the Council that Musso and Visdomini display is unsurprising. In an era of doctrinal uncertainty and very high stakes, both preachers were very careful to toe the line of orthodoxy. The greater surprise, then, is to find Musso and Visdomini taking opposing positions on the scripture question. The fundamental problem, for Catholic clergy, was the question of how to teach scripture to the laity when laypeople knowing scripture was thought to lead to heresy. This was a tricky issue, and not one that admitted of much variation, particularly among Council attendees. And yet when it came to the question of how laypeople should read scripture, Musso and Visdomini displayed fundamentally different beliefs. Musso, in keeping with his strict position on Church authority and apostolic tradition, argued that scripture was, and ought to be, mysterious and inaccessible: “the scriptures . . . ​are like the garments, which in a thousand veils of sacred symbols, figures, and metaphors envelop and hide that great majesty, which we cannot see with our own eyes.”84 From the outset of his sermon, he reminded his listeners that Christ himself spoke mysteriously and in parables. St Paul in his epistles and the prophets in their sermons were deliberately opaque, emphasizing God’s authority and majesty by mak­­ing the divine word secret and difficult.85 Musso did his best to discomfit even an audience he addresses as learned (dotti). Divine wisdom is an “an infinite chaos, infinitely long, infinitely wide, infinitely high and deep: It is enough to confuse every great mind that arrogantly sets out to contemplate it.”86 His [  79  ]

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emphasis on the mystery and allegorical nature of scripture was not a simple post-­Tridentine accommodation. It dated back at least fourteen years to the Lenten sermon cycle of 1540.Throughout his Lenten sermons, Musso had argued that the worst sin of the Protestants was their misinterpretation of scripture: Have you noted the devil’s weapons? His weapons are the Holy Scriptures, but perverted, truncated, stripped bare, depraved. O heretics, O heretics, recognize your master today! He has taught you to mutilate the Gospels, to corrupt St Paul, to falsify the entire Old and New Testament. This is the particular habit of heretics, never to recognize an authority in its entirety.87

Even in the context of a discussion of scriptural interpretation, he insisted that scripture was obscure and difficult: What is the point of having anything to do with the holy scriptures, if you don’t have to work hard to penetrate them? . . . ​ these sacred sentences would be vilified if they were so clear that everyone could understand them. You must sweat, and try with all your might, if you want to understand . . . ​Leave your pride, your bad will, your arrogance; go humbly to the reading of holy scripture. Brilliance is not as necessary as a purified mind, a pious attitude, a servile heart, deep prayer, a dedicated mind, living faith, burning charity, and great desire.88

In arguing that scripture benefits from impenetrability, Musso evoked Augustine’s On Christian Doctrine. His position thus had the weight of Christian tradition behind it. Musso’s familiarity with the debates of the Council and the decisions it reached led him to treat scripture as an ideal and an inspiration, but in placing it on a pedestal he ultimately removed it from the public realm. Visdomini took the opposite approach, assuming that his listeners were capable of and accustomed to reading scripture on their own. In his sermon and elsewhere, he made it clear that one of his duties as a preacher was to teach his listeners how to read. “One must read and use books with judiciousness and delight, and all the scriptures that there are, for [  80  ]

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there will never be others besides those sacred ones, and as a general rule, whatever does not agree with them, must be entirely damned, and scorned.”89 Where Musso made scripture remote, Visdomini placed it at the heart of lay religious life. He argued that scripture pertains to every Christian: [Christ] provided interpreters, doctors, apostles, councils, in his Church, so that at all times and in all places the world could be worthy and certain of his just will, and could learn to live in his glory . . . ​It remains that the use, study, and comprehension of it, dealing with it, reading it, hearing it, or in some way knowing the will of God, is necessary for everyone. This is the law that Moses gave to the people, “Haec est sapientia vestra, & intellectus vester, ut audient universi &c.” [“for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, which shall hear all these statutes.” Deuteronomy 4:6].” In this way he showed his desire that we all be prophets, and receive the spirit of the Lord.90

Visdomini reminded his listeners that all knowledge is fundamentally based in scripture, and provided a list of morals and behaviors to fit all human types. Through scripture, the proud could learn to fear, the learned to speculate, the rich to show mercy, and the poor to have patience. He matched each description with a brief biblical quotation. This kind of repetition, supplemented with biblical one-­liners, is a literary device common to polemical literature and also to mendicant sermons. Behind the rhetoric, however, was an incontrovertible and controversial belief: scripture speaks to every­­one, benefits all, and responds to every need. Given his concerns and anger about the misappropriation of scripture, this emphasis on individual reading is unexpected. And in fact, Visdomini was deeply concerned about the hazards of inappropriate lay reading practices: There are other scholars, or rather, doctors, as they are called today, who lack either spirit or learning: carpenters, millers, fishmongers, barkeepers. They don’t simply read, or study, but expound, judge, and teach sacred letters. And not merely histories or moral lessons, but the highest prophets, the profundities of St Paul, the mysteries of St John, the secrets of predestination, [  81  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly justification, and retribution. And if they can find any greater or more difficult question to scratch at, they freely pronounce on it with the bold temerity of the idiot, and of the ignorant fool. They gloss, and interpret, and make proofs, and deliberate . . . ​ and if some truth, or Church father, or council, or canon, or church doesn’t agree with their opinion, they discount it.91

Yet what bothered Visdomini most was not the act of reading, but the act of misreading, or reading outside one’s station. Despite his low opinion of fishmongers and bartenders, Visdomini implied that even they should be allowed to read scripture, as long as they approach their books humbly. Like many of his contemporaries, Visdomini believed that every social group had a role to play in maintaining society. The laity’s job was not to explicate scripture—that was for theologians—but to receive it; for them to do otherwise would upset the entire social fabric and lead to chaos and the breakdown of civilization. This theme appears throughout sixteenth-­century literature on scripture.92 The fear of social chaos ran deep. This was hardly a tolerant, respectful approach to lay intellect; it is coercive and disdainful. Nonetheless it would have been far easier for Visdomini not to distinguish at all between correct and incorrect reading. He could have argued, as others had, that in order to protect their ignorant souls, the laity should not read at all. The opposite position was expressed at the fourth session of Trent by Cardinal Pietro Pacheco, and more famously by Cardinal Gasparo Contarini and the “double truth” approach of his Modus Concionandi of 1538. Instead Visdomini set out a highly regulated system that allotted scriptural books for each place on the social spectrum. He told the humble: He who knows how to read, let him read, there is food for everyone. There are histories; there are the parables of Solomon, the moral stories, the narrations in the Gospel, many epistles of Paul and all the ones of John, the two by Peter, and one by James—all easy and suited for every spirit. . . . ​There is no lowly mind or humble intellect that should ever despair of being able to learn what it should learn for its health—but do not search to know beyond its limits, or search to know with other means that [  82  ]

mendicant pr eacher s those valid ones: reading, prayer, and counsel with true, loyal and appointed teachers.93

He gave equally clear instruction to the learned: Let teachers and doctors read everything freely, treating the scriptures with skill, seeing and understanding everything: the literal meaning, the senses, figures, tropes, allegories, analogies, and all the heights and depths there are, but always with modesty, and Christian humility—far from that presumptuous audacity which does not study in order to adapt oneself to the scriptures, but in order to bend the scriptures to one’s own meaning. Let them, too, pray that their erudition is a gift of God, and not merely human effort. In controversies, they should never accept the judgment of any other spirit than the common ecclesiastical meaning. Thus in reading they will believe, and in believing they will understand.94

The idea of allotting specific books to specific social groups was not especially new. But where others have argued that the fourth session of Trent “forbade the reading of the Old and New Testament in the vernacular . . . ​ and entrusted to preaching the task of administering, in proper doses, the content to the laity,” Visdomini’s strict dosing applies to learned and ignorant alike, and is nonetheless based on the belief that everyone has a right to read scripture on his own. A wholly negative picture of Catholic scripture after Luther is thus made more complicated by this example of a preacher whose fear of heresy clashed with his belief in the importance of scripture.95 Indeed, Visdomini ventured a near-­mystical attitude toward scripture, to the point where he also reassured his audience, even the least learned listeners, that individual, internal prayer would lead to right interpretation. In listing the books for each social group, he told them in the same breath: The reader must turn to the Holy Spirit, and pray that God will enlighten him, and never doubt the truth of what he reads, but be very certain that it is all true and good, and if something [  83  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly d­ ispleases him, the fault is his; either he does not understand it, or he does not have the right attitude toward it. Nor should he ever fear that he cannot understand what he reads; it is a gift of God, who is never lacking where there is good will.96

Visdomini shows some faith in the laity’s ability to read within the confines of Catholic dogma—at least the educated laity—and to come up with the proper interpretations on their own. While his sermon was a tool for disseminating Tridentine ideals, those did not come at the complete expense of lay spirituality. Musso, too, shows that the process of reform, as seen through the lens of scripture, was not monolithic in the inter-­Tridentine years. Musso’s attitude to exegesis changed notably from his early sermons, such as his 1540 Lenten cycle, preached when Musso was still a rising star, well before the Council of Trent and before the Council of Regensburg had disproved the possibility of reconciliation. Musso devoted large sections of his 1540 Lenten sermons to exegesis and to verse-­by-­verse analyses of biblical passages. Preachers in Rome traditionally did not continue their sermon cycles on Saturdays; and in that year, Musso instead devoted his Saturday sermons to a thorough analysis of a scriptural passage, the Magnificat.97 Yet he quickly began to emphasize doctrine over scripture, substituting a line-­by-­line exegesis of the catechism for a scriptural passage. During Lent of 1542 he delivered a series of sermons on the Apostles’ Creed, the Decalogue, and other catechetical works; the series was published posthumously. Later editions of this cycle contain a letter praising Musso as the first preacher ever to preach on these topics.98 By the time he preached Della Sapientia in the 1550s, exegesis had largely disappeared from his occasional sermons. Della Sapientia, for example, refers briefly to St Luke, but the liturgical pericope appears only in the prologue and the final sentences of an extremely long sermon. The decline of exegesis in Musso’s sermons, treated here briefly, could be attributed partially to the difference between Lenten and occasional sermons, but it also supports scholars who describe the decline of scriptural teaching at elite levels over the course of the sixteenth century.99 Indeed, Musso may have provided much of the early evidence for their theories. In parallel fashion, internal criticism of the Catholic laity or of the clergy appeared frequently in Musso’s early sermons but gradually disappeared [  84  ]

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over time as the religious culture of Italy changed. In sermons from the 1530s, even in their post-­Tridentine reprints, Musso made no bones about naming abuses in the Church. He reserved most of his anger for the problem of absentee bishops, many of whom came to hear him preach in San Lorenzo in Damaso in Rome. He even implied that absenteeism in the Church was responsible for the spread of heresy: If you only knew how things stand at this point [in your home dioceses] in the hands of your mercenaries, your vicars, who attend to nothing except their own interests . . . ​how many false preachers, who pretend to be holy, and are devils, go about corrupting and depraving the Gospel of Christ, and who, since the foolish and ignorant populace have no bridle, make new sects against the Catholic Church every day? . . . ​Do you not see the heretics prevail every day against the Catholics, and the house of Peter, to which you are so obligated, enter into such danger, and Christ himself, his body and blood, be trampled publicly—and do you not leave every other thought to run to help? Christ parted heaven to save one lost lamb and left the ninety-­n ine safe ones, and you do nothing for ninety-­n ine, or for one hundred, because none are safe.100

In later sermons, such criticism wholly disappeared. By the 1570s, preparing his sermons for publication, Musso refused to say anything controversial: “The Church does not need a single thing for its own edification.”101 In his reluctance to criticize, as with his reluctance to explicate, Musso made clear his dedication to protecting and defending the Church—whether from external attacks, or internal—as well as protecting himself, as criticism of the Church was increasingly suspect. Visdomini’s belief in reading, and Musso’s willingness to criticize his fellow clergy in print, demonstrate that in the 1550s and earlier, flexibility and variety in doctrine was not restricted to the corridors or councils of power but was visible and available even to the laity. More broadly, they represent what Euan Cameron has called the “inchoate” or “primitive” phase of reform, in which opposing, questionable, or unclassifiable ideas could coexist.102 Since the early 1540s, the spectrum of Catholic thought had gradually narrowed, [  85  ]

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excluding approaches like Ochino’s, but it was still a spectrum, along which Musso and Visdomini could hold different positions. This position would harden over time, especially with the establishment of the Congregazione dell’Indice, causing problems for preachers whose ideas were orthodox enough in the earlier period.103 Yet the frequency of their republication throughout the century reminds us that through print, and despite censorship, these equivocal ideas could continue to circulate within orthodoxy even in the more controlling post-­Tridentine years. Musso’s criticisms of the Church from the 1540s circulated widely in the 1570s (perhaps because he advocated reforms, such as episcopal residence, that Trent itself endorsed). Yet because of their efforts to disseminate Tridentine ideals, these sermons are equally and simultaneously part of later, more controlling, stages of reform. In other words, they are simultaneously both “Catholic Reform” and “Counter-­Reformation” texts.104 Preachers were not only the mediators between clergy and laity but also between strands of reform. At the same time, the direction of mendicant preaching was changing, not only because of the rise in censorship after the Council of Trent, but also because the growth of the literary vernacular created new ideals for educated preachers. Sacred and profane literary styles gradually fused, resulting in the late sixteenth century in the creation of a new genre of sacred eloquence within the developing Italian literary canon.105 As some mendicant preachers became more literary, their sermons became more elaborate, more recherché, and less directly pedagogical. The questions that concerned Musso and Visdomini at mid-­century would be taken up in other contexts by the men increasingly charged with overseeing spiritual life: bishops and their staffs.

[  86  ]

3 Sermons and Diocesan Reform

Complaints about absentee bishops were common among reformers of all stripes, as they had been for centuries. Absenteeism, along with its companions simony, nepotism, and plural benefice holding, were among the best known and most criticized abuses of the late medieval church. But by the middle of the sixteenth century, the criticisms had begun to sink in; roles and expectations for bishops had been raised. In 1537, Pope Paul III commissioned suggestions for reform from some of Italy’s most prominent cardinals and prelates, including Gasparo Contarini, the English expatriate Reginald Pole, and the future Paul IV, Gian Pietro Carafa. The resulting treatise, the Consilium . . . ​di Emendanda Ecclesia, dwelt extensively on episcopal privilege.1 The Council of Trent later turned its attention to reforming many areas of diocesan administration, condemning the core issues of simony and pluralism, and establishing that residency in one’s diocese was a divine requirement. In addition to preaching frequently, bishops were to establish schools, hold frequent diocesan or provincial synods, and conduct regular visitations of their dioceses in order to ensure that local churches and convents were functioning properly. Every cathedral church was expected to set up a seminary under episcopal control for educating local clergy.2

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The ultimate goal of these wide-­ranging efforts was to create a better trained and consistently capable class of professional clergy.3 Even though the reality fell far short of the ideal, the concept of a renewed episcopate, run by a bishop who vigorously implemented Tridentine standards, came to typify the Catholicism of the Baroque era. The best-­k nown example is Carlo Borromeo, bishop of Milan from 1563 to 1584.4 At the heart of these broad and intricate issues of diocesan reform lay a hard, practical problem: how a bishop should approach preaching—both in his own sermons and as a system to be implemented throughout his diocese. What follows is the story of two bishops, Luigi Lippomano and Girolamo Seripando, who actively took on this question even though both would continue to be absent from their dioceses because they had larger political commitments. Their personal circumstances and choices reveal the difficult and contradictory nature of implementing reform.

Lippomano and Verona When Luigi Lippomano became Bishop of Verona in 1549, he lamented the ignorance of his flock and feared that Protestant heretics would take advantage of an easy audience and “spread all sorts of error among them.”5 But Verona, of all places, should not have caused a bishop to despair. Lippomano’s episcopate there began shortly after that of Gian Matteo Giberti, who is beloved among scholars of reform in Italy not only for being one of the century’s first resident reforming bishops but also for having, they claim, an open-­m inded, tolerant, and loving approach to episcopal reform.6 Giberti was one of the first Italian bishops to model residency in his diocese. He undertook frequent visitations throughout Verona and its regions, wrote extensively on the nature of priestly life and the administration of a diocese, surrounded himself with like-­m inded curates and theologians, and paid special attention to convent reform and lay education. Giberti’s Verona became a model for bishops of later generations, including Girolamo Seripando in Naples and Carlo Borromeo in Milan. Since Giberti’s death, however, the situation in Verona had changed and many of Giberti’s innovations had deteriorated. In his first year as bishop, Lippomano had to re-­examine priests and clerics in many churches, re-­ educate them in their duties and their doctrine, and remove the ones who [  88  ]

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were incapable. Incidences of heresy were on the rise. In 1550, Lippomano presided over an extensive series of heresy trials in Verona. His letters show that he was increasingly worried about its spread.7 Reform efforts were always the product of particular circumstances and personal impulses. Episcopal reform in any context depended on local features: a bishop’s own personality and priorities and a diocese’s particular institutions and population. Local, specific circumstances and traditions ensured that the nature and extent of reform varied across Italy and even within a diocese or city.8 Verona was no exception—congregants heard a variety of messages, sometimes contradictory. Reform in Verona during the 1550s depended above all on the individual choices of its bishop, Luigi Lippomano, and Lippomano was a very different man from Giberti. Those differences influenced his multifaceted approach to reform. Unlike Giberti, Lippomano had to adhere to the decisions of the Council of Trent, in which he had been active. He had participated actively in the Council of Trent’s fourth session, transferring with it to Bologna, and he had taken part in the heated discussions of session VI on justification. Later, when the Council convened for the second time, Julius III named him its co-­ president. Furthermore, Lippomano did not enjoy the same extensive support network among the Italian elite, which had allowed Giberti to implement his reforms in the face of anyone who challenged him. Giberti was well connected, but Lippomano was the illegitimate son of a Venetian banker and his serving-­maid; he never attended university. His ecclesiastical successes, though many, were hard won, and the stigma of his birth probably kept him from the cardinalate.9 Lippomano’s entire career was also marked by a deep and personal sense of the danger of what he called “the perfidious and evil Lutheran heresies, which . . . ​lacerate the Church, spreading throughout a good part of Italy and elsewhere, bringing moral infection.”10 Lippomano’s antipathy to heresy came from direct experience. His many diplomatic appointments had exposed him to foreign, sometimes heterodox ways of thought. In 1542 Paul III sent him as nuncio to Lisbon, charged with convincing Portugal to adhere to the bull of convocation for the Council of Trent. In 1548 the pope sent him abroad again, this time as nuncio to Germany with Sebastiano Pighino, Bishop of Ferentino. In Germany the two men were supposed to meet with [  89  ]

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Charles V and convince him to support the Catholic clergy and distance himself from Protestant preachers. They were sorely disappointed, and wrote home that “we did not realize how changed the souls of these Germans are: nobody, neither monk, nor priest, nor layman has been willing to see us and recognize us as servants of His Holiness. May God illuminate their minds, so that our coming here will bear some fruit; for our part we will omit nothing in trying to win back these poor souls.”11 He and Pighino stayed in Germany until 1550, but returned home no more optimistic about the fate of Catholicism in Germany. In 1555 Julius III sent him to Poland, where he presided over diets bitterly divided between Catholics and Protestants. Again Lippomano despaired at the growth of heresy and at the internal divisions plaguing the Catholic Church. He hated and feared Protestants for the rest of his life, as his written works make clear, and that hatred lay beneath many of his reforming efforts.12 This picture of Lippomano makes him seem rigidly defensive; a perfect embodiment of a fearful, reactionary, intransigent Counter-­Reformation. It appears to support the version of Reformation history in which broad-­ minded spirituali, influenced by humanism and a spirit of tolerance, battled but eventually lost out to more fearful intransigenti or zelanti, who encouraged the Inquisition, the Index of Prohibited Books, and attempts at papal absolutism. Historians who subscribe to these divisions have treated access to scripture as a barometer of broader attitudes to reform: spirituali based their reforms on New Testament principles; intransigenti tried to limit scriptural knowledge. Such scholars have placed Lippomano firmly in the latter category, defining his episcopate as the triumph of paranoia over tolerance, a “defensive and inquisitorial rigidification” of the work of his predecessor, Gian Matteo Giberti, and lacking any positive content. Lippomano has been called “a Counter-­Reformatory figure” with a “hierarchic, sacerdotalist, authoritarian ideology.”13 Yet such a picture is incomplete without a broad analysis of Lippomano’s own works and those he commissioned during his episcopacy. Most scholars who label Lippomano draw their evidence solely from one work, a preaching edict by his vicar, Paolo Aleni, in 1552. They see this work as an example of how preaching under Lippomano became nothing greater than a polemical instrument against heresy, with the clear intent of assuring a rigidly orthodox religious instruction.14 [  90  ]

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Aleni depicted a preacher’s primary task as the imposition of right dogma and religious conformity. Nowhere did he discuss the preaching of scripture, refer to the role of scripture in sermons, or suggest that teaching ­scripture was one of the goals of preaching. Instead, he reminded preachers of only the final Tridentine outcome that decreed Church traditions to be of equal weight with scripture.15 Above all, Aleni was concerned that both preachers and congregants stay far from “novelty,” that is, heresy. Lippomano’s detractors are correct insofar as Aleni’s text took a cautious, even polemical approach to educating the faithful and earned Lippomano’s approval by doing so. In the same year that Aleni composed his treatise, Lippomano wrote him a letter from Trent regarding that year’s Lenten preaching. “I am very relieved to hear that the preachers did not misbehave,” he said, “but if they all behaved well, why should we be content that they did not say anything bad, if they said nothing good?”16 He told tell Aleni that it was time to start keeping track of local Lutherans. Lippomano’s guiding hand reveals itself in Aleni’s interest in heresy. But Aleni’s work was only a prescriptive text, and a very short one at that—it tells us what Aleni thought ought to happen but cannot reveal either what Lippomano thought or what his preachers might actually have said. For that, we need Lippomano’s words and the texts of relevant sermons. In addition, Aleni’s preaching edict is only one of the works Lippomano commissioned, and by itself it gives only a partial picture of Lippomano’s preaching and reform efforts. A close reading of other detailed works from Lippomano’s episcopate in Verona makes it impossible to see Lippomano in such stark terms. Though fearful and defensive, he cannot be simplistically cast as Giberti’s polar opposite. These works reveal a more accurate picture of Lippomano’s thought and demonstrate a broader, more pastoral agenda, in which Aleni’s restrictive approach is the exception, not the rule.

Although he employed other measures, such as treatises and episcopal visitations, Lippomano relied especially on the pulpit and the press to implement reform.17 One result is the doctrinal and polemical treatise Lippomano commissioned, Confirmatione et Stabilimento di tutti li dogmi Cattolici (discussed more fully in the following chapter). That treatise showed Lippomano [  91  ]

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taking the unusual position of fearing heresy so much that he told his congregations all about it. It also led him to propose a solution to the problem of learning scripture: Scripture must be declared and taught publicly, ideally by a bishop in a sermon. Although the approach in this treatise may have been both cautious and orthodox, Lippomano, unlike Aleni, emphasized the need for frequent, careful explications of scripture despite its many dangers. Learning scripture orally solved a number of problems that concerned Lippomano. It addressed, though it may not have satisfied, the indisputable lay desire for access to scripture. It ensured that proper interpretations would accompany exegesis and that the clergy would have closer oversight of lay religious activity. Finally, it placed the burden on the “preachers, readers, prelates, and curates,” increasing the need for the clergy, too, to play their proper role in society and live up to the standards set for them. This message was reinforced and corroborated in the sermons of Gio­ vanni Del Bene, Sermoni overo Homelie Devote [Sermons or Devout Homilies].18 Del Bene was a vicar in Lippomano’s employ, and a few years after Aleni’s treatise appeared, Lippomano pressured him into writing this book of model sermons in response to his fears of heresy. They had worked together on the treatise, and Lippomano knew he could trust Del Bene to do a good job. Lippomano also brought the book to Rome when it was completed, showed it to Tullio Crispoldi, a renowned preacher and theologian whom he knew from Verona, and had Tullio correct and approve it. Two other people from the city of Verona knew the importance of this project. The first was Giovanni Del Bene himself, who eventually agreed to take on this book and even give it priority, recognizing that it would be useful “not only to priests and to the uneducated populace, but even to monks and to cloistered nuns, and other pious folk, who enjoyed reading this sort of Christian book.”19 The second was Giovanni’s brother, Niccolò, a doctor who had left his native city for Rome. After Giovanni’s death, Niccolò received a package containing his brother’s effects, including Giovanni’s last project, the model sermons. Realizing its importance, Niccolò had the book published himself, “so as not to hold back any of the spiritual benefit that could be expected from reading every part of it.” Lippomano and Giovanni Del Bene had died within a few days of each other, and so it was left to Niccolò and to Tullio Crispoldi to get the book to press. [  92  ]

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Niccolò tempted prospective buyers by touting the book’s usefulness for “every faithful Christian” on the title page. The sermons would provide a remedy for an endangered population “fed with rotten poisonous nourishment, and lacking true and solid spiritual food.” But despite these universalist claims, Niccolò Del Bene emphasized the book’s specific educational mission. It was intended for secular priests who were taking up the burden of preaching for the first time and still developing their skills. He told them that Lippomano had intended them to “read it halfway through Mass to their parishioners, or at least, to scavenge in it for useful exhortations.” The book was a resource for novice preachers: They could crib the sermons entirely if they liked, or, if they were more confident, they could use it for inspiration as they wrote their own. The model sermons are deliberately simple, “to allow for the weak intellects of the listeners,” and they are supposed to teach readers, or listeners, “not only to reject pernicious doctrines alien to the Church, but also to work to improve themselves, and dedicate themselves to Christian living for the great good of their souls.” Del Bene’s book is unassuming, unadorned, and unrenowned. It was typically published in octavo format, with a plain title page, a simple roman typeface, and small and poorly inked woodcut initials; inside, the dense blocks of text had none of the glosses, italics, floral borders, or foreign-­letter typefaces that characterized a high-­end sermon collection. Yet perhaps more than any other sermon volume of the century, Del Bene’s work indicates the future of preaching in the Catholic Church and the strategies the Church employed for its own survival. Faced with the problem of teaching the laity and keeping them Catholic, the Church refocused its attention on bishops and diocesan priests, making them responsible for lay education and holding them accountable. Bishops would become the central agents in the resurgence of Catholicism in the late sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and they were closely watched and supervised. The best of them, in turn, closely watched and supervised the priests and administrators in their care, making sure that they finally learned to preach regularly and teach scripture to laypeople, and that their commentary stayed well within the boundaries of orthodoxy. Del Bene’s sermons embody both the new standards for preaching by diocesan priests and also this careful monitoring of a priest’s words. [  93  ]

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They are tools in the effort to re-­equip the episcopacy for pastoral work. Bishops newly committed to their dioceses had to raise the standards for the priests they supervised, teach them how to preach, and give them material for sermons week in and week out. They relied on printed sermon collections as critical professional resources.20 Such preachers needed a style of preaching that fit their task. They eschewed the long and elaborate sermons of medieval orators and instead took up the older, humbler, and simpler homily form. The homily was a running commentary on a passage of scripture, often with little other structure, and it tended to strive for emotional rather than analytical appeal. Diocesan preachers saw in the homily an apt tool for basic catechism and pedagogy.21 A growing interest in original sources and in the direct meaning of scriptural passages contributed to this revival; so, too, did the need for clear explanations in a time of growing doctrinal confusion. Del Bene’s Sermoni ovvero Homelie is typical of the homily genre. It is a collection of de tempore sermons, providing a year’s worth of short, straightforward material for Sundays and festivals.22 Each homily explains the liturgical gospel reading for that day, verse by verse. Del Bene’s model sermon collection derives from the tradition of Latin model sermon collections that flourished with the coming of the printing press, but it is distinct from this tradition in a number of ways. It is in the vernacular, written explicitly for lay readers as well as clerical, and directly inspired by the specific threat of heresy in Verona. Thus the purpose, the language, and the very existence of Del Bene’s book of sermons reflect the new opportunities facing bishops in the sixteenth century. Perhaps for that reason, it saw six editions in its first twenty years, as preachers returned to their dioceses and looked for ways to make consistent preaching common practice. Their efforts determined much of the preaching literature published in the sixteenth century. They printed those sermons both to help other novice preachers and to boost their own reputations.23 Del Bene’s model sermon collection was closely linked with Lippomano’s longer treatise, the Confirmatione et Stabilimento. They both stemmed directly from Lippomano’s concern for heresy in Verona. They appeared in the same year, 1562, and Del Bene worked on both of them. In other words, when Lippomano in his treatise told his lay readers that they should learn their scripture in church, it was no idle promise. He immediately commissioned

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the model sermons to make sure that his clergy learned to do exactly what they were supposed to do and did right by their congregations. Del Bene’s sermons indicate Lippomano’s pastoral agenda more clearly than Aleni’s edict, not only because we know that he read and approved of them, but also because they were intended to have the broadest reach of all of these three works. In these sermons, we see what messages Lippomano wanted the entire congregation to hear on Sundays. Lippomano read the book of sermons after it was written, showed it to his superiors, and approved it for publication. Furthermore, it was published a full ten years after Aleni’s edict and was much more widely distributed. While Aleni’s work may have been distributed and known to clergy, it was not intended to have as broad a reach as Del Bene’s Sermoni. It does not appear to have been printed until the twentieth century, whereas Del Bene’s volume went through six editions with five publishers in the twenty years following its publication and remained popular and useful long after the Council had closed.24 Del Bene’s sermons show a strong fear of heresy combined with frankness toward the laity. They echo Lippomano’s harsh stance on heretics. Like many of his Catholic contemporaries, Del Bene considered the doctrine of justification by faith to be a lazy excuse to avoid difficult works. He described modern heretics as “instructed, or rather perverted, by the Devil.” He turned the Protestant doctrine of justification by faith into an explanation of the role of faith and a plea for good works: Then the lies of the current heretics, who want faith to suffice, will be made clear. Faith has always sufficed, but for what? For healing people’s souls, when joined with charity; the entire holy Gospel says this. But that it suffices to save a man without his working?—that will never be true for all eternity. It will always be the case that one must do works, and that faith without good works is dead, and signifies nothing, as James says. And St. Paul affirms that good works are the means by which we attain heaven . . . ​Someone who makes no spiritual exertion, when he feels that his soul is healed, will never be healed, and will never live as a healthy person. Whoever negates this negates the clearest thing that can be said.25

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But for Del Bene, the Protestants’ worst sin of all was not justification by faith but their approach to scripture, because it had grave theological ramifications. He believed that when Protestants taught laypeople to claim scripture for themselves, they were gambling with their souls: Some will say: It seems today that . . . ​artisans are the ones who talk scripture and St Paul all day. They are wrong, they are wrong! Those people don’t want to learn, as is their duty. They want to teach, which is not their duty, and they will realize it someday when nobody believes them because of their blinding presumption and temerity. You might say to me, isn’t preaching and teaching free to anyone (if they are speaking of godly matters)? . . . ​But not everyone is a learned Doctor, nor can everyone prophesy.26

At first glance, such words simply reinforce the restrictive social hierarchy to which so many Italian clerics clung in fear, and which mandated that different members of society must approach scripture differently. For the unlearned, it could be heard, understood, contemplated, and comprehended intimately, but only through the explanations of trained priests. But these limitations did not necessarily prevent the laity from having access to scripture. Rather, they reveal how sermons could, in fact, provide a layperson with a thorough catechetical education. As homilies, Del Bene’s sermons stayed close to exegesis, forming a continuous biblical commentary. His goal was to reach complete beginners and leave them with a working knowledge of scripture, mediated through its liturgical context. Del Bene’s sermons might include interpretations and moral lessons, but these never strayed far from the scriptural text. This puts the sermons in a gray zone of scriptural material, between vernacular Bible translations on the one hand, which were suspect and would soon be censored, and works of pure catechesis, with all scripture removed, on the other.27 His direct approach is evident from the first sermon, which opens without preamble by identifying the period of Advent and explaining its spiritual function. From there it proceeds directly to commenting on scripture: “Now that we have begun this way . . . ​let us enter into the declaration of the holy Gospel text for today.” Del Bene’s sermon paraphrases the text directly into the [  96  ]

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v­ ernacular as though reading aloud—his first sermon continues, “Saint Luke, in the twenty-­fi rst chapter, narrates that Our Lord Jesus said to his disciples, ‘there will be signs in the sun, and moon, and stars. . . . ​’   ”28 Although he sometimes brought in other scriptural quotations, he used no patristic or medieval commentaries. Along the way, Del Bene declared his intent to follow the text, with comments such as, “Continuing in the first chapter, of which we covered a great deal the other day. . . .” His discussion of apparitions in the gospel of Luke included disputed interpretations of the location of Galilee, compared the versions in Luke and Mark, and tried to relate a chronological version of events that reconciles both gospels.29 This style of preaching was considered especially appropriate for preach­ ­i ng during weekly Mass, when preachers could hope for higher and more regular attendance.30 Feast days required something more elaborate, but except on major holidays, laypeople could not be expected to miss work for the sermon. Lippomano’s endorsement of this form through Del Bene’s work shows a pastoral approach that recognized the basic needs of his flock, long before Borromeo and other preachers recommended its use. Above all, Del Bene believed that scripture must be understood. For him, scripture was the ultimate weapon against all demonic temptations. But unlike devotions such as the name of Jesus, which had long been used as a magical antidote, scripture was no talisman to Del Bene.31 To be useful, it had to be understood, even if an artisan’s comprehension was more limited than that of a theologian: Whoever has scripture, and the holy commandments of God at hand, can answer to and confound the enemy; thus the Lord always answered the Devil with scripture . . . ​So we see that it isn’t enough to have scripture at hand, if you don’t understand it, because the enemy uses it himself too, as he commonly does through the mouths of heretics.32

Del Bene argued that because of heretics, Catholics must learn not to avoid scripture for its dangers, but to comprehend it, in order to beat the heretics at their own game. In these sermons, Del Bene’s overall goals and vision for laypeople went far beyond rote obedience. In his approach to Catholic reform, to scripture, [  97  ]

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and to heresy, Del Bene showed concern for the spiritual state of his readers. He emphasized the internal renewal of faith and piety as much as possible, and balanced negative messages with positive Catholic values whenever he could. Acts of devotion should not be performed by rote, he said; they are meaningless without the proper attitude. People who counter every curse word with an Ave Maria or a Paternoster must learn instead not to blaspheme in the first place. Those who attend Mass or confession out of rote habit are “false servants of God” who have not in fact performed any good works and who will face damnation. His constant scriptural exegesis was intended to create a more devout, obedient, and committed laity. He told them, for example, that in the days of Jesus, even fishermen knew their scripture well enough to expect the Messiah, unlike in his own day, when humble people and peasants tended to avoid learning anything about divine matters and instead left Mass in search of good food and dancing as soon as the priest turned to the altar.33 He wanted his readers, he wrote, not just to obey but to “delight in the divine things necessary for their health.”34 His words reflect a vision of Catholicism that fostered personal devotion and individual faith, albeit within an explicitly institutional model. His emphasis on comprehension and belief over obedience, superstition, and rote recalls the spirituality of Erasmus far more than the fearful and dogmatic tactics of the intransigente model. Heretics were rarely Del Bene’s main subject; as often as not, he invoked them theoretically, only in order to goad his readers into being better Catho­ lics. References to the Lutheran doctrine of justification by faith became in his hands explanations of the role of faith and a plea for good works. The goal, for Del Bene, and for his supervisor Lippomano, was not simply to crush heretics, but to create Catholics. Although the volume was inspired by fear, it combatted heresy as much through education as through obedience. Prior to Lippomano’s appointment, Del Bene had worked for the reform­m inded Giberti, and some of Giberti’s openness to scriptural preaching comes through in Del Bene’s sermons. Lippomano’s decision to retain Del Bene, and Del Bene’s willingness to stay, shows the impossibility of grouping the most elite level of reformers into camps. Del Bene’s work, which has received no extensive scholarly attention, shows that actual sermons present a more complicated approach to reform than Aleni’s brief set of policies. They could simultaneously foster individual Catholic piety and construe [  98  ]

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devotion as a shield against heresy. They could give their audience tools for understanding scripture and still maintain a close grip on its interpretation. Above all, Del Bene’s homilies show that in Verona, preaching could emphasize positive Catholic behavior, demand true devotion and intent, and also transmit a detailed understanding of scripture, even while keeping the laity on a very short leash. Lippomano’s paradoxical agenda discourages easy categorization. As his critics have intimated, Lippomano really was more defensive, fearful, and rigid than his predecessor in office—but with good reason. Given his background and his experiences, he could not afford to take risks or appear to tolerate heretical sympathies in any way. It is no surprise that he was more cautious than Giberti. Under these circumstances, the surprise is that he worked so hard both to teach his faithful explicitly about the dangers surrounding them and to create a secure environment for scriptural learning.35 Yet Lippomano’s desire to make sure that his flock did learn scripture trumped even his disdain for their intelligence. This is clear from the very nature of the sermons, with their linear translation and exegesis, as well as from the sermons’ frequent citations and comments on the organization and intent of particular scriptural passages. The scriptures are intended to help people understand divine mysteries: The Lord uses the Holy Scriptures to explain his truth; in order to condescend to our level of weakness he foretold in the Old Testament, in the law, and in the holy prophets what would happen to his son, so that when it was about to happen, not only would the world not be shocked, but would have a way to confirm it in truth.36

Scripture appears here as an integral part of the divine plan, and as part of the bridge between divine and human understanding. Even if it is heard in a group and not read individually, scripture is still an immediate and necessary part of religious education. “It is impossible to dip into the Holy Scriptures with a pure heart and the desire to be illuminated, and not reap some fruit.”37 Multiple points of view thus reached the faithful concurrently in Verona. Lippomano’s hatred of heresy and strong pastoral sense sat awkwardly with [  99  ]

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his clear disdain for lay intelligence. His vicars, too, put their own spin on their works. Aleni’s edict for preachers and Del Bene’s model sermons appeared in the same year, but they presented vastly different visions of preaching and even of how to be a good Catholic. They both earned Lippomano’s approval. Lippomano’s episcopate shows how messages of reform could vary even in one city and in one year. Even at it its most microscopic level, Catholic reform could be a multilayered and sometimes contradictory process.

Seripando and Salerno Less than five years earlier, another more renowned bishop, Girolamo Seripando, also faced the problem of preaching scripture in his diocese, and of turning his personal beliefs into useful lessons for the faithful. To scholars of Italian reform, Seripando is very familiar. He reached the pinnacle of three different ecclesiastical careers: superior general of his monastic order, the Augustinians; papal legate at the Council of Trent; and archbishop of Salerno. But tensions lay between the second and third of these three roles. Seripando’s role as an important public figure on the national stage differed notably from his role as a curator of souls in Salerno. Seripando’s life was very different from that of his humblest listeners, though he tried hard to bridge the gap between them.38 He was comfortable and highly esteemed in the most elite circles in the Italian Church. He was noted for his humanist training and elite connections. As a young Augustin­ ­ian, Seripando received a thorough classical education and worked closely with Church authorities, particularly Egidio da Viterbo, the superior general of his order, whom he would eventually succeed. Later he taught in Bologna and in Naples, his native city. Seripando was a lifelong preacher and was present and extremely active during the first period of the Council of Trent. In the years following that session, he was appointed archbishop of Salerno, but constant diplomatic and ecclesiastical duties called him away from home. Pius IV named him a cardinal in 1561 and later invited him back to the Council to oversee its third meeting—in fact, Seripando died in Trent in 1563. Seripando’s career was marked equally by his success and by a profound commitment to ecclesiastical reform; Gian Matteo Giberti in Verona was one of his role models. While in his thirties, Seripando gave up his humanist [  100  ]

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studies in order to devote his time to the more practical topics of theology and ecclesiastical reform.39 As general of his order, he undertook visitations of monastic houses throughout Italy, France, Spain, and Portugal, and he held frequent general chapters with very specific directives to improve communal life and education for Augustinian brothers. As papal legate during the Council’s third period, he oversaw debates on the subject of episcopal residence so bitter that they threatened to break up the Council, and in which his own views were sometimes defeated. At Trent, he sought to standardize the education and examination of priests. Although as an Augustinian he advocated for the rights of the mendicant orders, he also argued strongly that a bishop’s obligation to reside in his diocese was divine law. As Arch­ bishop of Salerno, Seripando battled local opposition and a perpetual lack of funds; nonetheless he conducted a thorough visitation, convoked a diocesan synod on the importance of clerical behavior, and tried to appoint competent clergy who would always reside within their benefices. As much as he could, he too resided in his diocese and made preaching the center of his efforts. When he gave his entrance sermon, no other bishop had even lived in Salerno much less preached in the pulpit in more than a generation.40 Furthermore, Seripando set himself the task of preaching directly to the humblest and least educated, and to children. He even opened one sermon by saying “Let me say a few words to these children, who by my orders have come to hear the word of God, because . . . ​my hope in seeing some renewal in Salerno, and some true light of Christian life, lies more in them than in you of greater age.”41 Seripando’s sermon literature reveals a chasm between advocating reform at Trent and implementing it in Salerno, where he found it difficult to teach the same positions from the pulpit that he had argued for at the Council. As with Lippomano, analyzing the words meant for delivery in the pulpit changes traditional depictions of the bishop and the nature of his reforming activity. Seripando’s attitude toward scripture is a case in point. Seripando is known for having argued publicly and forcefully for the primacy of scripture within the Catholic Church. He resisted the proposal (eventually adopted) that ecclesiastical traditions should rank equal to scripture, arguing before the Council that “Holy Scripture contains everything that is necessary to attain salvation.” When the final decree was drafted, he wrote a [  101  ]

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t­ reatise (De Traditionibus, 1546) criticizing the result, out of concern, it has been argued, that it would limit freedom of thought about scripture.42 Seripando also argued in favor of vernacular translations of the Bible because, he said, God speaks all languages and wishes to be glorified in them. His opinion did not prevail; the Council did not rule on vernacular translations, and the Index of Prohibited Books would later forbid them. Seripando also argued against the immediate approval of the Vulgate, in part out of fear that scholars would lose interest in other biblical languages and ancient translations, and he defended study of the Bible in Hebrew and Greek. Even as late as 1561, he continued to insist on better editions of the Vulgate and the continued use of older translations.43 Part of Seripando’s contribution to the Council was a piece discussing scripture that he presented for the fourth session. It argued for transparency and the straightforward teaching of scripture, saying, “Sermons should be derived from scripture . . . ​[and] should be clear and straightforward, not ambiguous or equivocating. . . . ​They should not preach one doctrine in public speeches and another in private conversation, but the same thing everywhere and always, for the edification of the listeners.”44 This position was more than personal; Seripando not only sat on the committee to investigate abuses in preaching, he also oversaw the appointment of Augustinian preachers for Lent throughout Italy. Thus Seripando’s position also seems clear and straightforward: Scripture should have primacy of place, should be accessible in the vernacular, and should be taught clearly in sermons. Yet when he preached in Salerno, he found these positions harder to maintain. As Archbishop of Salerno, Seripando sought to make good on his commitment to reform and on the efforts of the Council of Trent to establish regular preaching and Bible reading in every parish.45 Records of two sermon cycles have survived from early in his episcopate in Salerno, which began in the late 1550s, as well as extensive notes for other sermons. One cycle is on the Paternoster, the other on the Apostles’ Creed. Seripando’s dedication to preaching is evident in the very fact of these sermons’ existence. Whereas bishops had not preached regularly before, he delivered his sermons in the Cathedral of Salerno to enormous effect.46 The sermons taught moral reform and proper behavior at the simplest, most concrete level, using scripture as a foundation. When Seripando preached his tenth sermon in the cycle, on the phrase “fiat voluntas tua,” he [  102  ]

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pointed out that God’s will is frightening sometimes because it is unknowable: “Might not God send us some great evil? A war? A plague? An invasion of the Turkish army? . . . ​We not only wouldn’t ask for these things; we would flee them with all our might.”47 He went on to list biblical characters who did not know God’s will for them—Abraham, Jeremiah, Hosea, Jonah— and he resolved the question by explaining a quotation from Psalm 143: “Teach me to do your will, Lord, because you are my God.” The sermons were informal, intimate, and pedagogical, conforming to the general homiletic style that diocesan preachers increasingly adopted with their lay congregations in the sixteenth century. Seripando also generally followed the recommendations of his mentor, Giberti, who had encouraged preachers to preach regularly at festivals, to preach on scripture along with “some commandment of God,” to pay special attention to the status of the listeners, and to remember that everyone under their care is a child of God and should be loved as such.48 Thus on one level Seripando did in the pulpit exactly what he argued for at Trent: he resided in his diocese and preached straightforward pedagogical sermons based on scripture. Nonetheless, there is a level of scriptural teaching that Seripando avoided. His sermons are based on scripture, but they were not intended to teach scripture, and they firmly stop short of doing so. Seripando rarely quoted scripture extensively. He referred to biblical figures only in order to provide moral examples, not to tell their complete stories. He was aware that studying scripture might lead to confusion, and he chose to use scriptural verses—such as when Paul says that God wants everyone to be saved—as an opportunity to explain his own position on justification. The use of scripture was important, but secondary. Above all, Seripando explicitly replaced direct scriptural explication with catechism by devoting this cycle to the Paternoster (a text that functions as liturgy despite its scriptural origins). Other preachers did this too, but Seripando’s decision in this regard made a greater statement.49 Seripando was an archbishop devoting a very public and prominent sermon cycle to a liturgical text, not to biblical exegesis. His larger goal in these sermons was not to increase his listeners’ knowledge of scripture but to teach doctrine and instill obedience. Perhaps Seripando’s more exegetical homilies were never published or did not survive. Or perhaps he thought that direct scriptural exegesis should [  103  ]

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be left to someone less illustrious, such as a vicar or curate. This was the path Lippomano chose. But Seripando spent twelve years as prior general of the Augustinian Order, during which time he had traveled through Europe to visit the order’s houses; one of his tasks was to root out any sympathy for that most famous Augustinian: Martin Luther.50 Seripando thus knew well the dangers of sola scriptura, and in his twelfth sermon of the Paternoster cycle, Seripando taught his listeners the opposite: that they did not need to know scripture at all. This discussion appeared in Seripando’s explanation of the phrase “our daily bread.” Because the scriptures understand “bread” to mean “word of God,” he interpreted “daily bread” to mean a daily dose of scripture. A close reading of this sermon reveals some of the contradictions that Seripando faced. The beginning of the sermon seems to affirm the primacy of scripture, and most scholars who read it interpret it that way.51 “   ‘Pane’ in the scriptures principally signifies the word of God,” the sermon explains. “Every day we need this bread of the word of God spoken or written. So every day we must either read or hear the word of God.”52 Seripando began the sermon with a general introduction to the four gospels: the relationship between the four evangelists, the differences in their gospels, and how to understand the phrase “in the beginning was the word.” Reading further in this sermon, however, reveals Seripando’s deep ambivalence about teaching scripture to the laity. At first he told his listeners that they must do their best to hear a piece of scripture every day: Oh, how good it would be if every evening, everyone made an accounting with himself and asked, “Did I say the prayer Jesus Christ taught me this morning: our daily bread? . . . ​Did I hear or read any of the word of God? Did I listen with attention to what I heard? Did I understand what I read? Did I obey with readiness what God commanded?53

The passage goes on, however, to acknowledge the difficulty in obtaining the recommended dose of “daily bread.” Some clerics did not preach regularly enough, and Seripando noted that this was a real problem, but ultimately he placed more blame on the lay faithful for their improper criticism of the clergy and for their lack of commitment: [  104  ]

ser mons and diocesan r efor m Some might say, how can we eat this bread every day if it is not dispensed every day; if there is not a sermon every day? I do not like this ignorance, or negligence, which means that the bread of the word of God is dispensed a very few times. What would it be like if every day in church fifty words were said simply, without much pride, without much subtlety, according to the dictates of the Holy Spirit. I don’t know whether this lack comes from the populace, which doesn’t want to eat this bread, or from the pastors who do not want or do not know how to feed them. But it is certain that on those days when this bread is dispensed, there are more who do not come to take it than those who do, and more who seek bread for their stomachs than bread for the mind. But I tell you that this bread is dispensed every day. The fault is yours in not coming to take it. Isn’t Mass said every day in many churches? The canonical hours? In the Mass, isn’t the word of God dispensed in the Epistle, in the Gospel? Even in the canonical hours isn’t the same thing done with the psalms and the other things said from the word of God?54

By the end of this passage, Seripando had also reduced scriptural learning to the scripture that is recited liturgically, in the Mass and the canonical hours (and for that matter, the Paternoster). He concluded that scripture was in fact so dangerous that listeners would do better not to understand it or think about it. I know well your murmurings. You say, “We don’t understand what is said in Mass and in the divine Offices, because they are in Latin, which we don’t understand, and neither do many priests who read it badly.” Let me not have to explain to you today why our Church uses the Latin language in its sacrifices, its sacraments, and in all divine worship, as it has done not only in our times but always. All you need to know is that in this, as in everything else, it is guided by the Holy Spirit. All you need to understand is that in those countries where they have wanted to know more about the Holy Spirit and have recently introduced the Mass in their vernacular languages, God has worked his [  105  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly ­ iracles, and has had revenge on their temerity and presumpm tion because he has divided their tongues in matters regard­ ­i ng faith and salvation. In one single house a husband and a wife believe and think differently; the father one way, the son another.55

With these words, Seripando discouraged his flock from questioning as well as criticizing. He insisted on blind obedience to Church authority, warning his listeners not to seek too much knowledge or to ask, like Protestants, for the vernacular. Finally, Seripando taught his flock that proper belief was a sufficient substitute for daily scripture. Merely thinking about faith or performing charity could fulfill the requirement. Let me explain this to you from another angle. You who say that you do not understand what is said every day in the Mass and the divine offices when this holy bread is dispensed daily, and that you do not eat it for that reason, tell me, do you not know the articles of the faith? Do you not know the commandments of the law? How else can you be Christians? Therefore, every day by yourselves you should think about something pertinent to your faith, or do some work of charity, knowing for sure that whatever is said in Mass, whatever is sung in the Offices, whatever is written in scripture, whatever is commanded in the law is either about faith or about charity. In this way you yourselves will both dispense to yourselves and eat this holy bread.56

The worst culprit, in Seripando’s mind, was the Protestant use of the vernacular. This passage above is one of only a very few occasions in the Paternoster series when Protestant doctrine seems a specific, imminent threat. Unlike other preachers of the era, notably Musso, Visdomini, and Lippomano, Seripando’s sermons do not betray an explicit fear of Protestant infiltration. His preaching rarely refers to “modern heretics” or blames them for the calamitous times or for the lack of faith among his listeners. References to Turks, Jews, and “false [i.e., impious] Christians” appear equally frequently. Seripando’s sermons only treat Protestant doctrine as an urgent danger [  106  ]

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when it came to the vernacular. At Trent, Seripando had strongly defended the vernacular, but in a pastoral context he saw only its dangers. Where mendicant preachers had delicately omitted the controversial topic, Seripando reversed his position entirely. The “daily bread” sermon illustrates a complicated response to Seripando’s own pastoral duties. He clearly recognized the importance of scripture to the life of the Church. He also understood that his parishioners had a real desire to interact with scripture and a hunger to comprehend. He sought ways for them to address it from safely within the tradition, concentrating on liturgical excerpts. Whatever he might have wanted in theory, he knew that Protestants had taken over the vernacular, and he ultimately taught his listeners that comprehension and direct access were too dangerous. By the middle of his sermon, comprehending scripture has become unnecessary to the laity. By its end, good works and pious thoughts substitute entirely for the daily dose of scripture that at first seemed so important. Seripando truly was a champion of scripture at the Council of Trent. Yet a close reading of his actual sermons reveals that in Salerno, he would neither advocate for it nor teach it wholeheartedly. Seripando was deliberately more cautious in Salerno than he was at Trent. Understanding scripture seemed to him too dangerous; it could not remain the central focus of all sermons. Instead, he emphasized right behavior, piety, and introspection, based on his humanist training and his Augustinian background.57 Yet Seripando’s changing stance on such topics as the vernacular and the role of scripture in sermons did not make him an uncommitted bishop or a hypocrite. Seripando did defend the primacy of scripture at Trent, going against the norm and advocating positions that the Council rejected. In Salerno, he did his utmost to bring basic religious education to his flock. His preach­ ­i ng was direct, effective, and catechetical. It was even a form of scripture preaching. But it also conformed to the stricter decrees at the Council that Seripando himself had opposed. Seripando’s preaching shows us that both exegesis and reform have their limits. The hopes Seripando had expressed in the Tridentine discussions could never have survived in Salerno, which was desperately poor, open to frequent Turkish attacks, and receptive to heretical ideas.58 Seripando himself was aware of these difficulties. As a commissioner of the Inquisition, he personally oversaw the heresy trials of suspected local Augustinians.59 A few [  107  ]

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years earlier, he had written to his colleague Pietro Camaiani, bishop of Fiesole, about the problem of reforming the Church, pointing out “how big the difference is between imagining a thing, reasoning and writing about it, and setting out to execute it. In imagining it . . . ​we feel neither fatigue, nor bitterness, nor anything displeasing . . . ​but when it falls to us to do the thing, and to put the designs and words into action, we find those efforts, the trials, perhaps more than we ever imagined.”60 Thus practical concerns regarding Salerno separated Seripando the archbishop from Seripando the Tridentine reformer. Seripando’s own career was also at stake. Seripando was known in the Church for promoting a liberal position on scripture and the vernacular that was rejected at Trent for its proximity to Lutheranism. With his humanist and elite connections, he was friends with such illustrious doubters as Reginald Pole, Vittoria Colonna, Marcantonio Flaminio, and Giulia Gonzaga. He had spent much time in Naples, and from these experiences, he knew personally the appeal of the new religious ideals. His own embrace of Neoplatonist ideas in Naples, it has been argued, helped to make the city more receptive to Juan Valdes’s circle. Although Seripando stayed within the Catholic fold, people in heresy trouble in Salerno turned to him.61 Taking a more conservative position in practice thus may have been first of all a move of self-­preservation, declaring his orthodoxy, conceding his defeat at the Council, and responding to the changing climate of the 1540s and 1550s and the hardening of doctrinal lines. It is the move of someone who, like Contarini, has thought hard about his position, faced his own ambivalence, and knows the alternative. Yet it is simplistic to see this tactic as mere hypocrisy; rather, it is the move of someone who has decided to put the preservation and unity of the Church first at any cost. In so doing, Seripando turned back in many ways on the positions he had advocated as general of the Augustinian order in the 1530s and 1540s. When he became general, his humanist education and close associations with spirituale theologians were more recent, and his hopes for internal renewal as well as external reform of abuses were high. But his visits to European houses persuaded him otherwise, and those in Germany were nearly impossible to supervise.62 As he became better acquainted with the flaws in his order, Seripando became convinced that the threat of heresy had

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brought it to the brink of collapse, and he took increasingly harsh measures against the spread of heresy. In the decrees of the general chapter, convened in 1539 upon his return home, Seripando prohibited any house in the order from harboring fellow monks suspected of heresy, and he prohibited outright the reading of Lutheran books, though he had read them himself in his youth and also at the behest of the pope in preparation for the Council.63 His greatest concern, however, was to prevent heretical preaching. The chapter decrees imposed clearer, harsher limits on who could preach and what they could say. They revoked the preaching licenses of any suspected monk. They required preachers to obtain explicit permission directly from the general or the provincial, especially before lecturing on scripture. Those who held certificates of orthodoxy were requested to send copies to Rome for safekeeping. Most strikingly, Seripando provided a list of doctrines on which preachers should be especially cautious—purgatory and indulgences, the primacy of the papacy, saints, justification, prayers for the dead—and explained the nature of the doctrines they should teach.64 As general, Seripando also sought to reform the Augustinian educational curriculum, making provisions for the education of novices and establishing houses for higher study throughout Italy, France, and Spain. Despite his own strong humanist formation, Seripando insisted that these schools focus on the more traditional topics of logic, philosophy, and systematic theology rather than on biblical and patristic studies. Novices were intended to become theologians first, and Seripando was explicitly concerned that they not encounter too much scripture before having the sufficient theological training to interpret it. Only at the end of their education could scripture be introduced; it was a topic for mature theologians, not for students.65 This treatment of scripture is far more consonant with Seripando’s Salerno sermons. Seripando’s more accepting position on scripture at Trent suited the trusted and learned clergymen he debated there. But when it came to reforming an impoverished and undereducated diocese, rescuing a religious order in near-­total crisis set a better precedent; Seripando’s position as general of the Augustinians served him better in Salerno than did his role as papal legate. Both as monk and as archbishop, his primary concern was preventing heresy and promoting Catholic piety; for that to happen, scripture could only be approached with caution and training.

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Diocesan Preaching Reformers in Salerno and Verona shared many priorities, perhaps most of all the conviction that in delicate matters such as the teaching of scripture, it was necessary to tread extremely carefully in a climate of fear. Aleni’s strict guide, Seripando’s flexible definition of “daily bread,” and Del Bene’s insistence that scripture must be heard but not read are all ways of keeping a tight rein on scriptural interpretation. A misstep could lead to disaster, heresy, souls lost. At the same time, these men also shared the view—at least giving it lip service if not following it in practice—that the teaching of scripture must remain central to their efforts as pastors and bishops. Scripture was among the most contentious topics for the Church at large. As a result the faithful could encounter, sometimes simultaneously, different messages about what to do with scripture and more broadly about what the process of reform actually meant. The differences in actual approaches to scripture show us how heterogeneous and contradictory the implementation of reform could be. In each case, local and particular circumstances and a bishop’s personal experiences determined what was preachable. The result was a process of reform that varied not only among cities but also among individuals, and even within one person at different times. Lippomano commissioned and endorsed both the doctrinal treatise of Paolo Aleni and the scriptural homilies of Giovanni Del Bene. Aleni avoided teaching scripture while Del Bene embraced it. Seripando modified his positions on scripture depending on his audience and in order to support a Council with which he personally disagreed. As a bishop, he argued that moral lessons could substitute for learning scripture, while Del Bene took the opposite tack, arguing that learning and understanding scripture were necessary to maintaining faith. Yet it is important to note that these choices all fall within the realm of Catholic acceptability, and that the process of Catholic reform was not a drastically homogenizing one. Multiple strategies, all suitably orthodox, could address the needs of the faithful concurrently. These varied stances on scripture demand a reconsideration of both Lippomano and Seripando. When Lippomano is seen in the context of the works he commissioned in Verona, he appears attentive to the needs of his congregants, willing to convey positive Catholic content to them, and prepared to teach scripture directly. He did not repress, but rather encouraged, [  110  ]

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aspects of the heritage left him by his predecessor, Giberti. Seripando reveals himself to have been much more cautious in his diocese than he was as a champion of the vernacular at Trent. At best, he was ambivalent about the teaching of scripture to laypeople, and at worst, fearful. He did not trust his listeners to be satisfied with the scripture preached to them in church, and as a result he reduced or eliminated the amount of scripture he told them they needed. Common to all these models, however, is agreement about the general Catholic way to teach scripture in a dangerous era. In Salerno as in Verona, bishops believed that the solution was not to read but to hear scripture—in church, through sermons, and from an appropriate teacher. Del Bene’s model sermon collection showed how it could be done. Yet whereas scholars have argued for the post-­Tridentine demise of scripture, Del Bene continues a model of scriptural exegesis that was articulated before the Council began and that supposedly disappeared by the time it ended. His works for new curates point to the continuation of scripture in some form as an indispensable part of lay religious life. At the same time, they show the limits of understanding sermons at all through the printed record alone. Not having been present ourselves, we cannot truly know how much scripture was transmitted to the laity and how thoroughly it was taught, with how much explanation. Even the best records that survive of a sermon’s delivery are incomplete, and this is especially true of the straightforward style employed by a preacher who lived among and knew his congregation. The true impact of the homiletic, dio­c­ esan sermon is oral. Scholars who mourn the demise of scripture knowledge among Catholics have yet to measure its survival as a spoken event.66

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4 Treatises for Laypeople

Like many of his fellow priests, Ippolito Chizzola feared that deceitful Protestants had commandeered pulpits throughout Italy, avoiding detection through evasive tactics. These Protestant preachers made equivocal statements such as, “I believe in purgatory as much as I believe in papal authority,” and they nicknamed their friends “Holy Roman Church,” so that if questioned, they could honestly say, “I believe only what Holy Roman Church believes.” Chizzola, a preacher himself and a Lateran canon, worried about the effect of such slippery equivocation on innocent, ignorant laypeople. How could they distinguish a true preacher, filled with the divine spirit, from a smooth talker sent by the devil? How would they learn which doctrine would save them and which would send their souls to perdition? How could they resist a shameless preacher’s tempting promise that they could read scripture for themselves?1 These were new problems for Chizzola and for his colleagues in the pulpit. The loyalty of social groups that they had previously taken for granted was suddenly no longer certain. The more educated laity increasingly demanded access to scripture. But in addition, women, peasants, and the urban poor were now seen as potential Protestant recruits, seduced by promises of scriptural

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access and by the apparent simplicity of Protestant doctrine. The Catholic clergy came to realize that laypeople, even the most humble, would be key to Catholic survival. They had to be wooed or flattered back into the Catholic fold for their own salvation and for that of the Church. Chizzola, along with some of his colleagues, turned to the printing press as a relatively new medium. He scoured ancient and contemporary authorities for arguments against heresy, and compiled them all into a dense book of 300 pages, which he claimed would help simple Christians to withstand “the poison of Protestant heretical doctrine.” Chizzola called the book Discorsi per confuter le particulari eresie [Discourses to Refute Particular Heresies] and pub­ lished it with the well-­k nown Venetian printer Andrea Arrivabene in 1562.2 Chizzola was not alone in choosing to write a treatise addressed to a lay audience. Between mid-­century and the close of the Council of Trent, at least four other preachers produced similar vernacular theological treatises, some of them very popular: Giovanni Pili da Fano’s Incendio di Zizanie [The Burning of the Lutheran Tares] (1532), also called “A very useful vernacular work against the very pernicious Lutheran heresies, for simple folk”; Vincenzo Giaccari’s Enchiridio Christiano [Christian Enchiridion] (1535); Paolino Bernardini’s Concordia Ecclesiastica [Ecclesiastical Concordance Against All Heresies] (1552); and Luigi Lippomano’s Confirmatione et Stabilimento di tutti li dogmi Catholici [Confirmation and Establishment of All Catholic Dogma] (1553). All the authors had preaching experience. Giovanni Pili da Fano preached the Lenten season in Modena in 1530.3 Paolino Bernardini, a Dominican, had publicly defended Savonarola in the past and hoped to move up the ranks of his order. He was appointed head of the Inquisition in Lucca in 1549. His position would later be revoked, but he would go on to become head of the Dominican order in Chieti and to work closely with Filippo Neri.4 Vincenzo Giaccari preached in Verona for All Saints’ Day under the episcopate of Gian Matteo Giberti, to whom he dedicated one of his earliest works, a defense of the doctrines of purgatory and the efficacy of prayers for the dead.5 Luigi Lippomano, like Giberti before him, became Archbishop of Verona (as discussed in the previous chapter) and also published a volume of sermons.6 These five treatises form a distinct and significant genre within sixteenth-­ century Italian writing. They benefited from the explosive growth of vernacular literature in the first half of the century, which was due in turn to the spread of the printing press. They are also related to the new genres of [  113  ]

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Italian vernacular religious writing and of Latin polemical works against Protestants.7 To the extent that any of these five treatises have been studied at all, it is for their polemical stance as antiheretical works. They have not been analyzed as a genre closely related to sermons or as works of Catholic formation. Yet these works are part of a specific discourse of vernacular Italian writings against heretics. The threat of deep schism in the Church proved inspirational to priests, theologians, and laypeople alike; all manner of people took up the pen against Luther, producing idiosyncratic, widely varying attempts to warn their fellows against his innovations. These works came in many forms. Treatises could be apocalyptic, such as Serafino da Fermo’s commentary on the Book of Revelation, or Jacopo Moronessa’s “The Model of Martin Luther,” which sought to establish a parallel between John the Baptist and Martin Luther by establishing each as the precursor of, respectively, Christ and Antichrist.8 They could be poetic or liturgical, such as the mocking anti-­Lutheran “Te Deum” attached to the end of Giovanni da Fano’s work. They could be scholarly, such as the many works by the papal theologian and polemicist Ambrogio Catarino Politi, who produced, in addition to a notable corpus of Latin works against Protestants, three vernacular works: a “Compendium of Lutheran Errors and Deceits,” written against the anonymous, Protestant-­sympathizing Beneficio di Cristo; a “Sum­ mary Resolution” against another anonymous work, the Sommario della sacra Scrittura; and an “Antidote to the Pestilent Doctrine of Fra Bernardino Ochino.”9 Finally many laypeople took the initiative to produce anti-­ Lutheran works. Chief among these was Girolamo Muzio, a courtier and poet, who produced not only works on the primacy of the Italian language and the importance of behavior among the nobility, but also a series of works against particular heterodox individual and doctrines, including Pier Paolo Vergerio, Bernardino Ochino, and Heinrich Bullinger.10 What sets these five treatises apart, within these broader bodies, is their structural similarity to each other, their attempt to encompass all heretical ideas and all of Catholic doctrine, rather than responding to specific events or people, and their stated intent to put all this information into the hands of laypeople. The authors were clearly addressing problems that lay outside the purview of mendicant preaching and that had never before risen in Catholic circles: the need to attend to social classes whose loyalty had never been so seriously threatened and the growth of an educated laity with access to [  11 4  ]

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printed religious books and a growing desire to read scripture. They show Catholics turning to the printing press, making the most of new media to address new (or newly important) audiences with new concerns. The very existence of these treatises, in other words, testifies to the rapid transformation of religious culture. Above all, treatises such as Chizzola’s Discorsi are critical to understanding how the Italian clergy treated and felt about its laity in the turbulent middle part of the sixteenth century. Because most of the authors were relatively ordinary priests and preachers, their contact with laypeople typically exceeded their contact with Church luminaries. The solution that these men ultimately chose articulates most clearly the Catholic approach to the triple challenge of educating the laity, warding off heresy, and transmitting scripture—in other words, the heart of Catholic education and reform. In their attempts to be comprehensive, they demonstrate growing cultural consensus on many theological issues at a moment when consensus within the Church was rare. At the same time, the modus operandi of these books seemed to doom them from the start. Filled with orthodox doctrine, they might have seemed like the best way to protect uneducated laypeople from heresy, and the best way to keep them Catholic. In fact they carried with them an inherent contradiction. Although explicitly written for “simple” and “ignorant” laypeople, they relied heavily on scholastic argumentation and a millennium’s worth of Church authorities. In aiming to summarize all of Catholic truth and to reverse Protestant error, the books became unwieldy and complicated. Chizzola’s Discorsi, for example, ran to 238 dense quarto pages. The first part contained forty-­t wo chapters on the nature of the Church, ranging from “How the Church is honored by God, and how miserable a thing it is to depart from it,” to “The errors of those who do not have compassion on those who err in faith, and the great piety with which they must be received.” Chizzola reviewed Church doctrine on the origins of heresy, the necessity of apostolic tradition, and the differences between a true Church and a false one (members of false churches act secretively, for one). The second part, also in many chapters, elaborated specific points under Protestant attack: saints and images, predestination, purgatory, justification, eternal life. The Discorsi was a difficult, erudite, expensive, and even pedantic work of theology, imprac­­tical and inappropriate for the very laypeople it claimed to court. [  115  ]

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Other ­treatises shared this approach, which seems destined to fail. Lippomano’s octavo edition was twice as long again as Chizzola’s. Adding insult to injury, the authors failed to hide their reluctance at having to explain theology to laypeople, at times scorning and belittling their intended audience. At best, this attitude might have hampered the books from meeting their stated goals and hurt clerical efforts to reach the laity. At worst, it inadvertently demonstrated the appeal of Protestantism, which was at least perceived to value lay opinion. Given that many Italian clergy were skilled and beloved pastors, the utter unsuitability of these books for their stated purpose raises two questions. First, what were the authors really intending when they wrote these works in this format? Second, what other means did they use to reach the people these books were supposed to reach? These questions are related, of course. On closer inspection, the treatises in this genre display as much attention to the authors’ colleagues as to the laity; their most effective audience is clerical. Even though the authors claimed at length to be writing for laypeople, the works make more sense as works of self-­promotion for their authors, written with their colleagues of the cloth in mind. More specifically, their authors used these works not to teach laypeople directly, as they claimed, but to articulate a broader agenda for pastoral care and to emphasize the importance of reaching the laity in other ways—in particular, through the training of bishops and preachers, provisions for regular sermons in church, and attention to lay education. Thus the treatises were not the clergy’s answer or even their primary stratagem for wooing the laity; they are not really intended for laypeople at all. Rather, they became a forum to express other strategies of reform—a blueprint for rebuilding the Catholic Church. As a result, these texts are crucial for understanding how Catholic clergy felt they should respond to Protestant challenges, real and perceived.

Structure and Content Amidst all the tumult of the sixteenth century, the problem most visible, and most urgent, to an Italian cleric was retaining the loyalty of the laity, and it is this task that the treatise authors took up. What biographical [  116  ]

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i­ nformation they left behind shows that they all possessed the proper combination of skills and experience for this task: time logged in the pulpit, real pastoral experience, a burning desire to address—or at any rate condemn— controversial ideas, and at least a passing acquaintance with the doctrines they sought to refute. This last characteristic was hard to come by; only those priests who in theory had good reason to read heretical books were permitted access. In addition, some authors had personal reasons to feel strongly about the issues. Chizzola had been tempted by heresy himself early in his career, as we shall see, and thus became more rigorous later in his defense of orthodoxy. As discussed in the previous chapter, Luigi Lippomano commissioned his treatise, the longest and most successful of the group, only after a series of unsuccessful interactions with Protestants overseas and growing fears of heresy at home. The authors do not appear to have known each other and their publications spanned a thirty-­year period, beginning in the 1530s and ending in the year that the Council of Trent closed, at which point, presumably, more official voices could take up the same problems.11 Nonetheless, the treatises are strikingly similar in their organization, their intent, and their content. Structurally, the authors followed the same basic organizational contours, using short chapters to explain individual points of doctrine and moving from general theoretical concerns to increasingly specific arguments. This format bears some debt to Latin treatises against heresy. They do not follow the structure of early polemical works such as those of Irenaeus and Tertullian. Nor do they much resemble the first official Catholic catechism, which the Council of Trent would prescribe and which first appeared in 1566.12 The Catechismus Romanus explicated the Apostles’ Creed, the sacraments, the manner of prayer, and the Decalogue. Likewise, the treatises do address the sacraments, but where the catechism pointedly lacked an antiheretical orientation, most of the treatise authors devoted the first half of their work to refuting heretics. The treatises do, however, bear some resemblance to some earlier Catholic catechisms. The popular catechisms of Peter Canisius appeared in three forms in the 1550s. John Hamilton, the Catholic Archbishop of St. Andrews, Scotland, published a catechism in 1552.13 Both works follow a traditional format, explicating the Ten Commandments, the twelve articles of the Apostles’ Creed, the seven sacraments, and the Paternoster. Both claim [  11 7  ]

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laypeople as their primary audience. Given its genesis in a distinctly more polemical city and context than anywhere in Italy, it is not surprising to find a chapter in Hamilton’s work on recognizing and battling heretics and distinguishing faith from heresy. Like the Italian treatises, it follows Augustine and Jerome in defining heresy as the misinterpretation of scripture. Yet where the Italian treatises elaborate on this topic, Hamilton’s chapter is only about 1250 words long and sticks closely to patristic sources; it mentions no current controversies. In neither Hamilton’s nor Canisius’s case does anti­ heretical polemic determine the work as a whole. Lippomano, in contrast, begins his treatise by asking, “What is heresy?” Only after fifteen further sections on heresy and the true Church does he move on to explain papal authority and points of doctrine. A better known work, Alfonso de Castro’s Adversus omnes haereses, does begin, like the treatises, with broad definitions and descriptions of heresy in the first of its fourteen books, and like them, it emphasizes the heretical misinterpretation of scripture. It was recent and widely disseminated, and it could well have provided inspiration for these treatises. De Castro’s work, however, does not follow an identical model to these treatises, because it treats its subjects alphabetically rather than thematically, and because, being in Latin, it could not claim the same broad lay audience.14 In the end, these five treatises are more similar to each other than they are to any related genre of polemic or religious instruction. The authors also all claimed the same audience; they insisted that they were writing for Catholic laypeople. “Laity” is a broad term, and the books were simultaneously aimed at more than one social level. Their structure and format were best suited for laypeople with no Latin and no training in theology, but with vernacular literacy and religious instruction. Yet the authors also talked a great deal about lower social positions and people with little education. They all explained that they were inspired to write out of the fear of heresy, believing, like Chizzola, that total Protestant infiltration of Italy might be imminent. These works were written specifically in light of and in urgent fear of news about Protestants. The titles and dedicatory letters of the treatises made this clear. Each author emphasized the burden of writing in Italian as simply as possible: “For the ‘semplici et idioti’ I have forced myself with great charity to condense, in my mother tongue, the most necessary ideas.”15 Vincenzo Giaccari’s [  118  ]

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dedication emphasizes his book’s usefulness “for every type of person” (ogni grado di persone) and justifies his plainspoken language over modern literary Italian, which he says is increasingly ornate, full of ornamentation instead of spirituality. Ippolito Chizzola explains that his book is meant for “simple Christians” and that he has amassed his own arguments and those of others without regard to literary style. Paolino Bernardini takes up the same idea: “Just as learned men have disputed heretics with their various incisive tractates, convincing them of their evident falseness, and defending every Catholic Church, I too . . . ​i ntend to demonstrate to the common people . . . ​ what the short and easy path is which will guard every good Christian from deceit and keep him sure in his faith.”16 “Semplice” and “idiota” were not terms of insult; they referred to people (even noble women) ignorant of Latin or lacking a full classical scholarly formation. It was an apt term for denoting the very class of elite artisans who were often the most likely group to embrace heretical doctrine. Yet it was not necessarily the social status of readers that concerned these authors most, but the need to resort to the vernacular.17 “Can these scoundrels [Protestants] be allowed to give Christians forbidden books in order to seduce them, and profane what is sacred, while a pastor is forbidden to give them a book with which to resist the evildoers and preserve themselves, or, if they have already caught some of the contagion, with which to heal themselves immediately?” The burden the authors perceived was often made explicit: “I regret in my very soul doing this task, but necessity forces me to it . . .”18 Each of these authors, then, promoted his book as a work for the common layperson with little education. Each emphasized that the language was simple and the discussions of doctrine direct. Like many Italian preachers, they feared more than anything else that Protestant doctrine was spreading in Italy from the bottom up—sermon after sermon mentions that ignorant or illiterate laypeople were suddenly exposed to and espousing ideas that had long been the province of monks and theologians, and that they were the entry point for heretical thought in Italy. Yet this seems an ill-­chosen route for reaching the intended audience, especially because the authors’ ambivalence about laypeople of any status is clear. The authors were convinced that the laity needed their attention, but they were equally certain in their doubts about their audience’s intellectual skills. As a result, their works are laced with paternalistic warnings and [  119  ]

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show a firm belief in the need to maintain social hierarchy. They called the laity “base and lowly,” “fishmongers,” and “peasants.” Chizzola compared untrained readers of scripture to dogs who cannot comprehend human speech. Lippomano mocked potential Protestant targets; he described “the idle chatter of a few gossips . . . ​and women at their spinning, who don’t even know whether they are alive” and worried about how “every scoundrel [will] be free to blather about whatever he wants.” Even while he acknowledged flaws in the clergy, he argued that the humble should not read scripture, because they lacked the purity of life, simplicity of mind, and goodness necessary to interpret it. Their harshest disdain was reserved for women. These authors were aware that reformers afforded women in particular new access to scripture, and they had difficulty imagining that women might be legitimate readers of it. In the hierarchy of people who should not be debating the gospel, women ranked somewhere below fishmongers. Instead, the authors countered the perceived egalitarianism of Protestants. Bernardini defended Church hierarchy when he reminded his readers that Paul had forbidden women from teaching priests and confessors: “Women must be silent, and if they don’t know, they must ask, and not teach.”19 By emphasizing their personal reluctance to write and by refusing to flatter their potential readers, the authors revealed the enormous distance they perceived between their scholarly selves and their lowly audience. Nonetheless, they all confronted their fear and disdain by using their treatises to explain Catholic doctrine to that ignorant laity. Like Catholic preachers in general, the authors of these treatises all believed unequivocally that the Protestants’ worst sin was their arrogant appropriation and misinterpretation of scripture, even more than their misguided theology. In consequence, the treatise authors all argued that the Roman Church offered the only consensus on scripture: Only the Church had the authority to control and interpret it. Their reasoning for this method was that the Church was not limited to the scriptural canon but predated it and was bolstered by apostolic tradition. With this argument, the treatises corroborated the debates of Trent’s fourth session and the sermons of Musso and Visdomini, but their format gave them more room to elaborate the dangers of unguided reading. Chizzola warned that left to interpret it on their own, people would read [  1 20  ]

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scripture like any secular literature, thereby creating as many interpretations as there are readers. They would fail to interpret its words on a spiritual plane. The theological errors of Jews and of past heretics, he argued, demonstrated how easy it was to reach false interpretations.20 Similarly, Bernardini argued that reading without guidance would lead to literalism: If the Bible said grammatically that God has a body, untrained readers would believe it.21 Lippomano was more explicit: Readers would learn to gratify their basest instincts, he argued, from reading about Judah approaching a prostitute. They would learn idolatry from the animal sacrifices in Leviticus, envy and inebriation from the stories of Noah after the flood and Joseph in Egypt, and magic and soothsaying from the stories of Moses and Daniel. Like Musso, he believed that to derive real benefits from scripture required exertion: “We seek the fruits of scripture, which is the spirit, and which are not obvious. Thus the fruit of the spirit is found with much effort, and sweat, and worthy practice in reading.”22 For these authors, the authority of apostolic tradition might even exceed the authority of scripture, because the Church preceded the gospels. Da Fano asked whether it seemed likely that St Peter, who lived for thirty-­six years after the Ascension, left no traces of his friendship with Jesus other than two epistles.23 Chizzola explained at length that the Church came to life through preaching, not through writing, and that the patriarchs and prophets lived long before scripture was recorded. He even concluded that scripture, though an extremely useful teaching tool, is not entirely indispensable: “This statement [that scripture is useful] does not say, as the heretics do, that the scriptures are necessary, but it says that they are useful; they are not so necessary that without them the Church cannot perform the teachings, the warnings, the corrections, and the rest, in order to make men perfect in their works.”24 The role of scripture, for him, was to testify to the authority of the Church, from which it received its authority. Such lockstep uniformity on this question was no given, especially when, as we have seen, sermon literature could embrace many different approaches within orthodoxy. The relationship of scripture to tradition had been questioned at least since the days of Augustine, without consensus. Heiko Oberman has documented two parallel lines of argument, one of which restricted apostolic traditions of interpretation and privileged scripture far more. In this view, which dates to the fifth century and can be attributed to [  1 21  ]

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Vincent of Lerins, the function of ecclesiastical interpretation was to preserve scripture as the standard of revealed truth. Interpretation was valid only when it followed very strict guidelines: that the interpretations be explicit, not secret; that they be held by all the Church fathers; and that they be repeated in identical formulations, continuously over time.25 The alternative Augustinian line of thought saw apostolic tradition and scripture as two equal pillars of the Church. It justified the authority of apostolic tradition by tracing it back to apostolic sermons that were never written down. Both lines of thought had their medieval proponents, but the debates at Trent would ultimately favor the latter one. The treatise authors, even those who wrote long before the opening of the Council, invariably followed it as well. The authors were equally certain in their solution to the problem of teaching scripture: catechetical education. They agreed that under no circumstances should laypeople be allowed to read scripture without supervision; instead, the laity should learn scripture aurally, by hearing it read and explained by qualified preachers, ideally by a bishop in a sermon. This method allowed post-­Tridentine Catholicism to be, or remain, as Protestant denominations claimed to be, a religion of the Word, albeit under much tighter control than before. Viewing the treatises chronologically shows how the Catholic position on this topic solidified over the years; the treatises, too, became more and more specific about the need to hear scripture in church. Giovanni da Fano and Vincenzo Giaccari, in the 1530s, wrote only that many had erred through misunderstanding scripture, and that “Holy Scripture, because of its many difficulties, must be declared.”26 Giaccari explained that “those who do not know how to read must humbly listen and learn from those who do know . . . ​ they must first humbly wait, and with due reverence read, or better, hear the sermons where the holy Gospel is declared, and then set themselves to fixing it in their memories.”27 In 1552, Bernardini wrote that scripture existed as a doctrine only to be taught, to remind the student how much he or she has received from the Church. In his own recommendations from the same year, Lippomano was far more explicit about the roles of clergy and laity: Common people should not read scripture for themselves, but must rather listen to others who make them understand and explicate it, and who are practiced in this, such as preachers, [  1 2 2  ]

tr eatises for laypeople readers, prelates, and curates. And for this reason we give sermons to the populace, and preach, and read in church, so that those whose God-­g iven office it is to teach perform their duties, and educate the people entrusted to them . . . ​but the “common people” must not read scripture by themselves, when they don’t understand it, nor can they understand it, unless the master interpret it for them.28

Chizzola, writing at the close of the Council, was the first to mention bishops specifically: “If the power to interpret [scripture] lies with each person, it will impede the bishop from converting the people through scripture, because the sheep will become the judge of his pastor.”29 All five authors emphasized that such precautions helped to preserve the rigorous social hierarchy that would keep broader social chaos at bay: To some it is given to know for themselves and for others, and so they teach; some only know for themselves, and there are some who must learn from others, nor move unless they are moved by others, nor think that they can clarify anything by themselves. The reason is that because we are members of the body of Christ, and not all the members have the same function . . . ​we must believe that different jobs are given to those who are in the position of the eye, or the position of the foot, etc. . . . ​thus it is ­tremendous madness that the artisans, or any other person, pronounce judgment on sacred matters, and religion, and will, and that each one teach and call himself a master in this. It upsets the entire order of the Church. It is a desire to usurp the office of someone else, given by the grace of God . . . ​their office is to let themselves be guided and commanded by those who know and speak in the Church.30

Here Chizzola adapts Livy’s metaphor of the disruptive body with rebellious parts, which links physical disorder to social chaos. But in classifying his audience as the foot in the body of the Church, he and the other authors not only showed what they thought of the laity, but at the same time revealed their deep-­seated fear that the new Protestant sects brought disorder and bedlam. [  1 23  ]

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The fear of social chaos erupting in Italy did not diminish, even as the new faiths failed to make lasting headway there. However ambivalent, such claims about the laity show Catholic clerics at least reacting to the Protestant challenge of making scripture available to all levels of society. They show the authors making use of the printed word, a stereotypically Protestant technique for appealing to the laity. The theological consensus among these authors is notable. They agreed that the most urgent problem facing the Church was to teach scripture while averting confusion or heresy. They all suggested the same solution to that problem and offered the same justifications. To some extent, of course, a uniform approach was natural for this genre. Catechetical treatises were not a forum for displaying individual creativity or personality; rather, an author needed to show the orthodoxy of his words by aligning himself with as many other authorities as possible. Nonetheless the mid-­sixteenth century, before the end of the Council of Trent, was a time of doctrinal fluidity in which the Church could not provide a preacher with many clear answers or guidance about how to proceed. Sermons themselves, as we have seen, were certainly not fully consistent on this topic. Only these treatises and their unified voice make the solution to the scripture problem evident. Even though none of these works was published again after 1563, they reflect the growing importance of the diocesan approach over time. Viewed chronologically again, the treatises also suggest changing perceptions of the Protestant presence in Italy. The earliest authors saw heretics as an immediate and local danger. Giovanni da Fano, for example, included much more practical material about how to encounter and debate with heretics. One should never dispute with them, he explained, but should flee from their presence and even from their friends. Priests should refuse them the sacrament. Princes and emperors should vow to extirpate them. Their belongings should be confiscated and their books burned; ultimately, da Fano quoted scriptural and patristic authorities stating that heretics should be killed.31 Vincenzo Giaccari told his readers, “It is in no way permitted for unlearned Christians and laypeople to hold disputations on faith.” Women, particularly widows and girls, should be especially wary of those who teach false doctrine with sweet words and quick praise; better that they should stay home and pray or be involved in good works than listen to false preachers.32 [  1 2 4  ]

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Later treatises were less specific about physical encounters. Bernardini recommended giving up on a heretic after one or two attempts to correct him, but otherwise his chapter on dealing with heretics emphasized personal faith and rectitude over practical advice.33 Lippomano was primarily concerned with recognizing heretics from a theological, not a practical, perspective. By the time of Ippolito Chizzola’s treatise in 1562, the sense of heresy as a local problem had completely disappeared. Chizzola’s discussion of Protestants listed indications of their errors, but with no material about how to interact with them directly. The earliest of these treatises, those of da Fano and Giaccari, date from the 1530s, when religious affiliations in Italy were still unclear. They reflect the assumption that a near neighbor might harbor heretical sympathies. Their specificity implies that the authors continued to believe that heresy was a real danger, and that their audience might have heard or read particular arguments that it was their duty to refute. Many future dissenters were still living in Italy (Bernardino Ochino and Pier Paolo Vergerio, among the most famous, would not leave until the 1540s) and many who never quite left the Catholic fold were nonetheless involved in controversial discussions about faith and works. Thus it is logical that Lippomano, who recorded his fear that heretics had infiltrated his diocese, would have gone to some lengths to lay out the arguments those heretics might have been using. By the time Chizzola published his treatise in 1562, however, Italy’s future as a Catholic region was definitively assured. Yet Chizzola’s work still demonstrates that even if the sense of heretics as neighbors diminished over time, the fear of heretical ideas did not.

Europe and Italy When read in a group, these five works echo each other. Their uniformity makes them mostly predictable; moreover, they are undeniably clunky and pedantic. It is hard to imagine them as best-­selling vernacular reading, competing effectively with the smaller devotional treatises and books of hours that kept printers’ shops afloat.34 Yet in many ways their uniformity and predictability cannot be taken for granted. These are not inevitable works; they did not have to take the form they did. Catholic clergy in France, Germany, Spain, and England responded differently to similar threats, real or perceived. [  1 25  ]

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France in the same period produced at least two kinds of vernacular literature against Protestants: set pieces designed in response to particular political crises and pamphlets that emphasized the immorality and licentiousness of the Protestant camp. Polemical pamphlets in France viewed typical Protestant rectitude as a mask for debauchery. They claimed that the freedom from works was a license for sodomy, incest, ritual infanticide, gluttony, and sexual anarchy. Comprehensive defenses of Catholic doctrine were reserved for theologians and written in Latin. Germany also produced anti-­Lutheran broadsheets, among other genres of Catholic writing, although in volume they did not rival their Protestant counterparts. Such broadsheets, as Robert Scribner has famously noted, used images and their written commentary to associate Luther himself and Lutheran ideas with the devil as a fomenter of rebellion.35 Hyperbolic or apocalyptic polemic against Lutherans appeared in Italy as well, but these five treatises, despite some shared concerns about social disruption, take a different route both in genre and in content.36 As a result, they also differ notably in the way they portray Protestants in their text. It might seem likely that a Catholic polemicist would do everything in his power to exaggerate heretical ideas or present them falsely, and to paint them as more extreme than they are, in order to vilify Protestants to his readers. Instead, these authors draw a reasonably accurate, if generalized, picture of the most basic tenets of early Protestant thought: that scripture prevails over apostolic tradition; that the laity has the right to read and interpret scripture; that the papacy and the cult of saints are unnecessary; that works do not save.37 These concepts are not subtle theology—they echo the ideas a layperson might hear in a sermon or in a clandestine conversation—and while they may play up the dangers of Protestant thought, they do not exaggerate Protestant characteristics or dwell on debauched behavior. Some of this divergence can be attributed to the difference between a pamphlet and a scholarly treatise, but compared with these other genres of anti-­ Protestant literature, the Italian treatises present a more reasoned, moderate, and fairly accurate view of their antagonists.38 A format more similar to the Italian treatises appeared in Spain, where a small group of clerics from mid-­century Spain, including Martín de Frías, Juan de Bautista, Juan Bernal Díaz di Luco, Domingo de Valtanás, and the more famous Juan de Avila and Bartolomé de Carranza, produced a group [  1 2 6  ]

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of treatises that echo the Italian authors.39 They, too, deliberately used the vernacular (except for Carranza) and relied on homiletic techniques. They sought to elucidate and raise standards of proper Catholic behavior and advocated frequent preaching. They, too, had contact with the Council of Trent and duplicated many of its conclusions. A few also found some foothold in Italy. Bernal’s treatise was published in seven Italian-­language editions between 1551 and 1583, along with other works of his. Carranza’s work on episcopal residence appeared in Venice in 1547.40 Yet the Spanish treatises differ strikingly from the Italian ones in two ways. First, their primary intent was to create a new standard for clergy, and their lay audience was more explicitly secondary; they addressed topics that mostly concerned clerics, such as episcopal residency and the proper practice of diocesan visitations. The goal was not to teach doctrine to the laity. In addition, they were not motivated by the desire to fight heresy and their content is not organized polemically. Rather, they sought to set better standards for clerical behavior, concentrating on pastoral instruction regarding episcopal residence, gentle rhetoric, and baptism practices. Compared with them, the Italian treatises show more incidences of panic and vitriol. The efforts of Spanish clergy, despite internal differences, show more clearly the development of the clergy into a separate professional group over the sixteenth century, and in so doing highlight the growing distance between clerics and laypeople. England provides a more complex comparison. A few English treatises show the same general approach as the Italian authors. English clerics spoke of the inherent difficulty of scripture and the dangers of translating it out of Latin.41 These English texts generally date from the 1550s, the period of Marian Catholicism. The apparent victory of Catholicism in England in those years was hard-­won and bitterly contested, unlike in Italy, where the threat of mass conversion was feared but not actually experienced. Nonetheless the treatises resembled each other in approach. Authors such as John Gwynneth wrote treatises that claimed to benefit the ignorant and that are notable for their inflexibility; they too preferred patristic sources and hairsplitting discussions of doctrine. It has been said that they show a similar condescension and general failure to comprehend the laity, and that they contained “little in the way of positive catholic exhortation or instruction and nothing to suggest spontaneous enthusiasm for a return to the papal jurisdiction.”42 [  1 27  ]

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One obvious connection between these two different contexts is Cardi­ ­nal Reginald Pole, the English nobleman who spent decades in elite ecclesiastical and humanist circles Italy. Pole served as one of the three organizing legates in the early sessions of Trent before returning home to help his cousin, Mary Tudor, restore England to Catholicism.43 His influence in both spirituale and papal circles was profound. Pole’s Italian period is characterized by his efforts to renew the Catholic Church, his early receptivity to the doctrine of sola fide, and his optimism about the possibility of reuniting Europe’s fractured faith. Nonetheless, by the time that most of these treatises were being written, both English and Italian, Pole had become disillusioned by the extent of religious strife he had witnessed and had decided that the only hope for Catholicism was in complete and unquestioning obedience to Rome. In addition, Pole’s extended exile in Italy had shown him only heretics who were learned, thoughtful, and primarily clerical. He had never been forced to confront devout heterodox faith among less educated laypeople, and he could not comprehend their sincerity or the need to take them seriously. In his mind, the blame for their mistakes lay solely with priests who had failed them or led them astray. Pole would explicitly argue that laypeople should not study scripture on their own; instead, those with the office and authority to teach it must nourish but not overindulge the lay desire for scripture, nor let the curious lead themselves.44 These attitudes are common to both sets of treatises, even those written before Trent opened. The Italian incomprehension of lay devotion might be one legacy Pole brought home with him to England. Thus French, English, and Spanish comparisons help us to understand what is distinctive about these Italian treatises: their desire to protect laypeople from heresy and the threat of heresy, offset by a marked distance from practical engagement with those laypeople.

Treatises and the Laity This high-­handed approach bolstered the status of the clergy at the expense of the laity, despite—or perhaps because of—a very real rise in lay partici­ pation in public religious life throughout the sixteenth century, above all through the increasing activities of confraternities. In addition to extensive [  1 28  ]

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patronage and charity work, confraternal processions marked every feast day, and confraternal activities influenced every rite of passage, in both urban and rural settings.45 Many confraternities focused directly on lay education, especially for children and in a family context. The most influential confraternities had tremendous power to shape public opinion, determine local religious practices, influence political activity, and inculcate religious values across their societies. Much of this confraternal activity also involved many clerics who collaborated closely with lay members. Ordinary laypeople thus experienced Christian society as driven by clergy and laity together.46 Over the course of the sixteenth century, both secular and regular clergy increasingly sought to exert control over the organization and pursuits of confraternities. Bishops increasingly tied confraternities to a parish structure and included them in visitations, especially after the Council of Trent asserted episcopal control over confraternities in session XXII. Only a year after its close, the archbishop in Genoa followed Tridentine legislation in requiring secular clergy to participate in confraternal processions. New religious orders, particularly the Jesuits, founded and directed confraternities in new forms (such as Marian sodalities) or to address unprecedented religious needs (such as the extensive Roman effort to convert Jews). Older religious orders changed their tactics by promoting new or developing devotions such as the Quarant’ore, the Rosary, or Nome di Dio societies.47 This clerical oversight sometimes clashed with local political priorities, but it was not necessarily unwelcome. Confraternities might consciously adopt the norms that the councils or their bishops set for them. In Borromeo’s Milan, new or updated confraternity statutes began to promote Borromeo’s goals of better education, daily prayer, and examination of conscience. Lay and clerical groups shared the goal of “shaping conscience and Christianizing society.”48 The integration of confraternities into post-­Tridentine clerical society thus required at best an approach based on negotiation and cooperation. Clerics of all kinds could only capitalize on the power and influence of confraternities if they found ways to preserve their local and traditional ­systems. Yet any such collaboration seems unthinkable in the bulky printed treatises. Perhaps that is simply the nature of the genre, but the treatises are emphatically institutional: They emphasize only the obedience and passivity of laypeople and treat them only in the abstract. Perhaps their disdain [  1 29  ]

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stemmed from the very fact that lay contributions to religious life were impossible to ignore. The treatise authors thus might have felt it necessary to claim that they spoke directly to laypeople, even when in fact they did no more than speak at them or talk down to them. Yet even in talking down, their treatises could nonetheless convey a great deal about both heresy and doctrine, and also about the underlying concerns driving their authors. Both Chizzola and Lippomano considered that greater specificity about the enemy, rather than vague allusions and appeals to obedience, would ensure a more doctrinally sound laity. Their decisions make it clear that the laity could not be ignored. They also make visible the gradual consolidation of one identifiable orthodox position. Chizzola’s personal history effectively illustrates this latter point. He was tempted by Protestant thought in the late 1540s and brought to trial for the controversial ideas in his sermons. In his adolescence he had joined a monastery where one of his fellow brothers, Celso Martinengo, would later embrace Protestantism. Chizzola preached throughout northern Italy, often so well that he “left certain aged preachers without an audience,” but in 1549 he was censured, first in Cremona for being too audacious in his Holy Tuesday sermon, and then in Venice for suspicions of heresy. The Holy Office summoned him to Rome, where he was investigated but escaped conviction, seemingly by employing some of the slippery techniques he later described among heretics. The investigation of his alleged heresy started in July 1551 and lasted perhaps as long as a year. During that time, Martinengo fled Italy for Geneva, and Chizzola, according to one contemporary, “as he himself testified, saw the entirety of Lutheran doctrine, and having compared it with that of Catholic doctors, came to the clear recognition of the truth, and of his error; penitent, he voluntarily went to confess his sin.”49 Where some might have abjured for the sake of convenience or self-­ preservation, Chizzola appears to have had a true change of heart. After his renunciation of heresy, he turned actively to repairing the doctrinal damage he felt he had inflicted, returning to cities, especially Venice, “where he had spread the bad seed, in order to extirpate it and replace it with the good.” Because he had spread his heterodoxy through preaching, he also repented in an unusual set of public sermons in Venice, in which he explicitly endorsed the virtues both of the pulpit and of transparency: He “explained eruditely and at length, that the truly faithful must speak publicly and clearly about [  130  ]

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their faith.”50 He then devoted himself to the fervent promotion of obedience to Rome. In addition to his Discorsi, he is known for a mudslinging exchange of virulent printed polemics with the Italian heterodox reformer and former bishop of Capodistria, Pier Paolo Vergerio the Younger, who accused him of, among other things, being a turncoat who persecuted his former friends.51 Chizzola ended his days in the embrace of the political and papal elite: preaching throughout northern Italy, admired by the ruling Gonzaga family of Mantua, painted by his Brescian compatriot Sofonisba Anguissola, and nominated for the bishopric of Termoli. Chizzola’s treatise, published a decade after his abjuration, bears marks of the knowledge he gained during his flirtation with heterodoxy. He wrote knowledgeably about internal dissent among Protestant sects. His Discorsi cite Luther and Zwingli’s differences on the Eucharist, Luther’s own changing position on purgatory, Melancthon’s antipathy toward the Anabaptists, and Bucer’s disagreements with Luther at the Marburg Colloquy. Most strikingly, one of his longest chapters lists forty-­one authorities that he claimed Protestants used to support their positions. Many of these authorities are scriptural; each entry cites the biblical verse, and then explains how Protestants read it incorrectly. Luigi Lippomano’s treatise, written in Verona in the 1550s, was equally, if not more detailed, explicit, verbose, and honest. This is clear even from the way the book was printed. Lippomano apparently decided that new printing techniques made it safe to reprint the arguments of heretics in their own voice—a tactic that had previously been controversial, lest an ignorant reader mistake the devil’s-­advocate positions as true ones. He did this by setting the Protestant ideas in italics, so that they were clearly distinguishable from orthodox Catholic doctrine (Figure 8). The only other Catholic author from this period to take a similar risk was the Englishman John Gwynneth, whose treatise from the same year, “A declaracion [sic] of the state wherin all heretics do lead their lives,” was set up as a Catholic– Protestant dialogue, with the speakers marked “Catholic” and “Heretic.” Yet even Gwynneth’s work did not separate the opinions by paragraph, as Lippomano did, nor by typeface; Gwynneth used the same gothic typeface for his whole work.52 This sort of relentless specificity extended from Lippomano’s use of italics to his discussions of doctrine. In this way, Lippomano’s treatise provides the [  131  ]

Figure 8 ​Polemical use of typeface in Lippomano’s Confirmatione et stabilimento Source: Bayerischen Staatsbibliothek. The words in italics are attributed to Lutherans.

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clearest answer to broader questions about the function of these treatises: what the books are really for, and how priests ought to reach the laity. Lippomano’s treatise was set up for people with enough education to appreciate his paraphrases of Tertullian and his lengthy polemics. In discussing the vernacular, Lippomano offered separate rebuttals to five possible Protestant objections in its favor and provided extensive patristic and conciliar precedents for relying on the Vulgate. Yet in the same section, he argued that the laity, his supposed readership, needed only the simplest doctrine: It is enough for the “vulgari” to know the commandments of the law, which are ten, if they want to go to heaven, and the two precepts of charity . . . ​a nd the two precepts of natural law, which are: do not do to others what you would not like done to you, and whatever you would like people to do to you, do to them. And with this, believing also in the mediator between God and men, and trusting in his precious blood, they will earn health.53

Contradictions like these suggest that treatises like Lippomano’s functioned better as a manifesto for other preachers and pastors rather than as a book for laypeople. More than any other religious writing of the time, it laid out for other clerics the agenda for the real Catholic solution to the problem of scripture, heresy, and the laity. Where the treatise was most useful for his colleagues, Lippomano backed up its principles in his works for laypeople. Giovanni Del Bene’s volume of model sermons from Verona (discussed in the previous chapter) took ideas from this treatise and repackaged them for a broader and less educated public. The treatise included, for example, lengthy discussions of who had the right to interpret scripture, the ways in which the Church predated scripture, and the relative weight of scripture and tradition. The model sermons made no explicit mention of these arguments—they were unnecessary for a congregation already limited to learning their scripture aurally and free from the dangers of unorthodox interpretations—but those very ideas nonetheless undergird the entire volume. When one sermon attempts to reconcile two disparate stories in the gospels of Mark and Luke, it relies on the belief that the Church preceded scripture, explaining: “The Lord [  133  ]

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made many apparitions in the forty days before the Ascension, which are not written down, as St. Luke shows at the beginning of the Acts.”54 The sample sermons enact principles laid out in the treatises: the primacy of the Church, the centrality of scripture, the need for strict interpretation, and the goal of lay comprehension. Thus the sermons equipped preachers in Verona to practice what their bishop’s treatise preached. The treatise on its own, like those of Lippomano’s colleagues, was not meant to suffice to meet the needs of the laity.

Creating a Common Catholic Opinion Thus when considering how to educate and protect the laity, Chizzola, a self-­proclaimed heretic in early adulthood, came to promote essentially the same positions as Lippomano, a lifelong papal operative, or Paolino Bernardini, who ran the Inquisition in Lucca. In the end, these treatises all offered the same basic vision for the future of lay education, making them forerunners of the Counter-­Reformation. They were written not to recapture the hearts of laypeople directly, but to give clerics a platform to define their strategy toward the laity. This makes them unusual because they promote another genre, sermons, over their own. Ultimately, the solution they proposed for scripture was primarily against reading, certainly individual reading—and yet they proposed it in a format only suited to individual use. The treatises were almost asking not to be read. Instead, explicitly or not, they all endorsed the bishop—the person responsible for lay education and instituting regular preaching—to save the souls of the laity and the future of the Church. This is, of course, the direction the Church would take after the Council of Trent and its endorsement of episcopal reform. These treatises, some of which were written far outside of a Tridentine context, offered some of the earliest and most comprehensive opinions on this topic. The treatises functioned on multiple levels at once. Both educated and uneducated lay audiences were increasingly considered important parts of the body of the Catholic Church. By referring to both groups, authors could doubly prove their usefulness to the Catholic Church. The most plausible third audience for these works is the Church leadership itself. By taking up a recent challenge and addressing it (even unwillingly) head-­on, the authors

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could display their learning and their value to their fellow clerics, to potential employers, and to people who might doubt their orthodoxy. Seeing the treatises in this way makes them resemble works of performance, such as sermons, as well as works of transition. The authors promoted themselves as authors and authorities, touting their credentials by demonstrating their orthodoxy and their conformity with past authorities. They couched their self-­promotion in modesty and in claims of being derivative. At a time when the very idea of definitive authorship was uncertain, these authors were experimenting with taking a public stance. Only Lippomano was ranked highly enough to promote himself overtly and to flaunt his defiance of expectations. The very existence of these books also reveals ambivalence about the new technology of printing. The authors knew that prohibiting or controlling printed material was increasingly difficult, and these works show them searching for a way to manage or interpret the growing diffusion of information. They were equally ambivalent about the changing role of the laity. They clearly had determined that, in the long run, not writing for the laity would be even worse than writing for them. Yet this is not to discount their genuine snobbishness and antipathy toward laypeople; they wrote without acknowledging the substantial lay contribution to religious life and the many instances of lay and clerical cooperation they had no doubt witnessed. Protestants forced them to address lay needs directly, and these Catholic writers resented it. Their use of terms such as “base” and “lowly” and comparisons to dogs and feet reveal the terrible position—at least in their own minds—in which they found themselves. Their awkwardness and unsuitability shows clergymen who recognized that a new style was called for, but who had not yet figured out what that style should be. They wrote for the laity as though for the clergy, because that was the only way they knew how to write.55 With their disdain for their readers, their lack of clarity about their audience, and their inability to match the style to the reader—not to mention their endorsement of a passive and strictly regulated form of scriptural exegesis—they might well have inadvertently driven people to embrace the new sects. But ultimately, the authors of these treatises knew that their books were insufficient, only a partial remedy or deterrent to the Protestant threat.

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Their endorsement of scripture as an oral pursuit suggests that they knew the limits of their writings; the real hope for their flocks would be in personal contact, in face time in church, in instilling good habits in laypeople, and in providing them with an education of substance. In other words, at their most generous they hoped to generate a “culture of belonging” around shared experience and ritual. This, it has been argued, is the only way a religion can succeed. In order to create that shared culture, whether in a new religion or in applying an old religion to a new population of converts, religions must adapt and show flexibility.56 A far-­off but relevant example from premodern India echoes claims about the relative appeal of Catholicism and Lutheranism, and by virtue of its distance, it highlights the abstract process of creating a new religious culture. The indigenous population of Bengal converted to the religion of their Muslim rulers in overwhelming numbers although people in neighboring regions did not. One early and widespread explanation for this conversion to Islam claimed that Sufi shaikhs preached a message of social equality that appealed to a people who were oppressed for centuries by the rigid and hierarchical caste system of the Hindu religion. Yet in the Bengali case, the egalitarian hypothesis has been more recently replaced by a cultural one: that Islam was ultimately successful in Bengal not because of its doctrine, but because it promoted a religious ideology that gradually absorbed local culture and sanctified aspects of Bengal’s expanding agrarian civilization.57 Similar claims of egalitarianism have been used to explain the appeal of Protestantism over Catholicism from a theological or social perspective: Proselytes supposedly responded to Luther’s promises of equality through access to scripture and the priesthood of all believers, liberating them from a rigid Catholic hierarchy.58 We should not entirely disregard the argument that Catholic doctrine was oppressive by nature. New Catholic institutions such as the Holy Office and the Congregation of the Index only added fuel to the fire. Nonetheless, the Bengali example reminds us of the need to consider adaptation alongside theology in understanding why people make confessional choices. Closer to home, Marc Forster has shown how the creation of new religious cultures in the Reformation required the collaboration of laypeople. He argues that Catholic identity and culture in the diocese of Constance [  136  ]

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were built up gradually from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries through lay identification with ritual practices. These in turn required the support of clerics whose only hope of success was in adapting to lay demands and earning the trust of their parishioners, however uneasy or fluctuating the lay partnership with the clergy might be. Constance’s priests had to learn that their flock considered them servants of the city; parishioners would refuse to pay heed to any priest who seemed to disrespect them. In Burkheim, the priest who was too heavy-­handed in his authority and who attacked local authorities from the pulpit during important festivals found that his congregants sought his removal, and when they failed, chose other churches for their Easter confession. In Forster’s contested region of southwest Germany, bishops and local priests also had to contend with local town councils and state officials, for whom political affiliation and faith reflected the region’s confessional division.59 Similarly, the promotion of pilgrimage in Reformation-­era Bavaria, through sermons, processions, and hagiographies as well as pilgrimage guides, helped to create a mythical past for Bavaria which, in strengthening its cultural identity, promoted adherence to the Roman Church. In both cases, lay participation in liturgical rituals ensured the creation of a Catholic culture ultimately strong enough to survive the bloody Thirty Years’ War.60 An even more compelling example comes from southern Italy, where priests functioned as only one part of a broader sacred system that also included aspiring saints, witches, healers, and wise women. Within that system, no strict distinction separated clergy from laity or “official” from “popular” religion. Local priests were equally embedded in local peasant culture and obliged to the often foreign standards of orthodoxy; their multiple allegiances could make a priest simultaneously “a minister of God and a sorcerer-­healer.” The efforts of bishops, missionaries, members of religious orders, and confraternities to inculcate post-­Tridentine Catholic values took nearly three centuries to bear fruit and then only inconsistently.61 We cannot directly compare the circumstances of our preachers to politically divided Germany or to the isolated Terra d’Otranto; nor do sermons and treatises tell us much about lay participation. But these examples all show that we must ultimately consider how much Catholic clergy in different contexts depended on the laity in their efforts. Catholic clergy had to demonstrate what made Catholic culture appealing in light of competition, [  137  ]

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and that meant addressing lay needs in some fashion, even poorly or unwillingly. This is the very sort of work that new religious orders and burgeoning confraternal activity manifested in Italy. It was accompanied by a variety of new printed material—not only sermons, but also catechisms, broadsides, hagiographies, and devotional treatises. All this activity was aimed at making the laity more deeply, explicitly, and knowledgeably religious, connected by more cultural bonds to the Roman Church.62 These five treatises are only a small part of that printed output. They are belligerent, disdainful, and unsubtle, and they probably failed in their stated intent. These flaws do not, however, prove that the Italian clergy was utterly incompetent in the face of Protestant attractions; if they were, many more Italians would have left the Church. Instead, they clearly show the nuts and bolts of greater efforts. They show us first that preachers with practical pastoral concerns were indeed engaged in adapting their religion to create a new culture that would appeal to the laity. That culture was based not on their writing but on regular preaching that laypeople could attend, and on attentive bishops who cared about lay education. Their ultimate goal was a re-­establishment of religious unity: “Just as there is one God and one baptism, there is in us one faith, as it is written, ‘and we are not separated by our divisions.’   ”63 That unity was based on education and true faith, and not mere behavior: “[Because] some still think that God is content with the external appearance, it is necessary to see to those errors and clarify doctrine, so that they may know that the truth of God is not in the opinion of humans, but in the manner of life, in true acts, and not in vain or false words.”64 Without these treatises, the enterprise of creating that new religious culture for the laity would not be as visible to us as it is. Second, by offering ways to standardize procedures for educating and restricting the laity, they show the concomitant growth of a professional clerical class, concerned with lay needs precisely because of its growing distance from them.65 This too is part of the re-­creation of Catholicism in the Reformation. The treatises could not serve on their own as examples of confessionalizing tools because of their unfeasibility as instruments of direct instruction—but they do display the process of clericalization and a tacit assumption that lay religious identity was best developed through practice and ritual as well as through print.66 Third, these treatises also show us just how difficult that enterprise was [  138  ]

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for the Catholic clergy, burdened as it was with two major obstacles. One was a theology that was inherently exclusive, emphasizing the difficulty of scripture and the importance of mastering a tremendously complex edifice of scholarship. The other was a clear and undeniable belief in the social hierarchy and in clerical superiority over laypeople. Marc Forster has described the “supreme confidence of all [Counter-­Reformation] authorities that reform from above would change religious practice at all levels of society. From this hierarchical and elitist perspective, decrees from above would lead to a reform of the clergy . . . ​[and] loyal and obedient parishioners.”67 The authors of these treatises display that same confidence, or arrogance, even though they did not assume that their books alone would suffice. This made them deeply reluctant to create a religious culture that honored and valued lay participation. Their desire to reach out to the laity was offset by the desire to remind them of their subaltern status. These obstacles, and the efforts of these treatises to overcome them, help us to appreciate how hard-­won was the success and resurgence of Catholicism in Italy. Unlike in the newly missionized Americas and Asia, Catholic culture in Europe was familiar and old, with systems already in place. That made the creation of new pathways for lay involvement and lay education more difficult, and any accomplishment greater.

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5 The Generation after Trent

The Dominican preacher, theologian, and hagiographer Serafino Razzi, writing in 1590, wanted to make very sure that nobody underestimated a preacher. His volume of predicabili, model ­sermons or preachable conceits, included a special preface called “How very excellent is the office of preaching the word of God and the sacred Gospel.”1 The office of preaching the gospel is perhaps the most noble position in the Christian Church . . . ​useful, productive preachers are especially favored by God, which is why they are often granted especially long life . . . ​They are greatly honored on earth, and even more among the angels and the blessed men in heaven. They are ever more capable of persuading and moving people toward good works. They are the salt of the earth, the spiritual condiment of the soul, the spiritual source of the rivers of wisdom, the treasure from which to mine the doctrines of the Old and New Testament.2

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The flattering comparisons went on: Preachers are like mountains, clouds, heavens, angels; they enjoy the ear of the pope, the glamour of travel, and the power to deliver souls from vice to virtue. Razzi’s defense of preaching, with all its bluster, voiced concerns that many of his mendicant colleagues must have shared in the generation after Trent. When the Council shifted the burden of religious education largely to bishops, the traditional role of mendicant preachers was called into question. More broadly, the close of the Council brought the Roman Church into a new era. New religious orders, such as the Barnabites, Oratorians, Ursulines, Theatines, and above all the Jesuits, showed astonishing energy and growth. Clerics in all categories actively fostered devotional practices aimed at a more participatory lay piety. For centuries, it had been the mendicants’ job to preach and minister to the laity, maintaining them in their faith and right behavior. Faced with so much vibrant novelty, these older religious orders found themselves in crisis, facing potential marginalization.3 Bishops oversaw the Council to an extent unprecedented in conciliar history, and debates about episcopal rights and obligations had been among its most bitter deliberations. Even when the growing influence of the Holy Office prevented diocesan reform from succeeding as desired, the Council’s support of the moral, legal, and practical authority of bishops ensured a lasting change in attitude. Henceforth bishops, not mendicants, would be held responsible for the work of spiritual formation, and their parishes would be considered the locus of pastoral activity. The decrees raised expectations of episcopal responsibility, furthered by the examples of model bishops such as Giberti, or later Carlo Borromeo and Gabriele Paleotti. New religious orders, in turn, often found ways to support bishops and their increased responsibilities.4 Preaching was one of many areas in which bishops and new orders ­competed with traditional mendicant tasks. Razzi’s vehement defense of preachers, although it echoed the praise usually reserved for mendicants, was in fact a warning to secular bishops: “And those who oversee preaching above all, and by merit of their office, must pay special attention; that is, most reverend bishops.”5 New religious orders competed even more directly with mendicants when they undertook to preach. Jesuits considered preaching the most

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important of their mandates and adopted the same medieval heritage and Renaissance innovation, primarily a rhetoric of praise and blame and a desire to inspire rather than instruct. Their vast preaching activity invited direct comparison with mendicants. In Italy they preached on Sundays year round, which mendicants traditionally did not do, and they preached in new locations— outdoors or in fields, and not only in churches—much the way the Franciscans and Dominicans themselves had in their early years.6 Where religious education was perceived to be especially weak, Jesuits and Capuchins also staged sessions of mission preaching throughout Italy, amplified from its medieval precedent, as they would overseas.7 Mission activity concentrated primarily, though not exclusively, on southern Italy—the mezzogiorno—and increased throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Missions suggested to many that in Italy, laypeople and even clerics needed just as much sustained attention as they might in “other Indias” if they were to be sufficiently Christianized to keep non-­Roman heresies at bay.8 Together with new religious orders, bishops sought to supervise religious education to an unprecedented extent. The Council of Trent had mandated seminaries or colleges in every diocese to train boys for the priesthood; until then, priests had trained in monasteries or by apprenticeship. It also attempted to establish catechism or parish schools for children, another job that had previously fallen largely to mendicants. Education became, above all, the province of Jesuits, who after their founding in 1540 established a popular network of schools that started in Italy and quickly spread throughout Europe, growing from thirty-­five Jesuit colleges in 1556 to 144 twenty years later. The numbers would nearly triple by the 1620s. In addition to training future secular priests and laypeople, the Jesuit schools, with their prestige and rigor, attracted recruits who might otherwise have joined older mendicant orders.9 The result of many such clerical efforts was an immense new banquet of religious options for laypeople. Whereas sermons in the Middle Ages had been the primary form of religious entertainment, they now took place as only one part of a vast liturgical, artistic, and devotional revival that provided “sensational and environmental excitement” and “swamped the general public with colour and sound” in the later decades of the sixteenth century.10 Bishops, new orders, and the papacy worked together. Although religious orders founded new confraternities and sodalities for laypeople, for [  1 4 2  ]

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example, the supervision of these organizations often fell to the diocese. Confraternities, in turn, sponsored ever more elaborate processions and public shows of piety and artistic patronage. Gregory Martin, the English cleric and traveler whose Roma Sancta of 1581 is full of indispensable detail about religious life in Rome, meticulously describes the procession for the feast of Corpus Christi. The roads were prepared, covered, and decorated two weeks in advance, the arms and hangings of every cardinal were publicly displayed, and representatives of every group at the papal court proceeded through the city in pairs with candles. Martin tells us that “the Popes quyer continewe all the way with most excellent musicke” and that “in the middle way by the Cardinal of Trent his palace is there a stage and new musicke of the best, for the time that the Procession resteth there. Then goe they forward to S. Peters Church, and so to his Chapel and aultar.”11 The influence of new confraternities is clear. The processions were organized, Martin tells us, by the new confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament, which was founded in Rome in 1539 and which decreed processions with the sacrament not only on Corpus Christi Day, but on the first Sunday of every month, after Mass in each parish of the city.12 St. Peter’s Church, the procession’s ultimate destination, was itself undergoing renovation on a grand scale. Processions might well include sermons, but as Martin’s account demonstrates, they might equally feature performances of sacred music or ­d rama—rich, developing genres that emerged out of the Jesuit network of schools. Jesuit plays elaborate the sacre rappresentazioni of medieval Italy into more elaborate dramas, involving music, poetry, dance, spectacular animated scenery, and advanced stage design. They began as a way for students to demonstrate their skills but quickly became public entertainment for the city. Jesuits also developed religious oratorios and full sacred operas that carried their message of saintly living into both carnival and political settings.13 New religious orders also developed entirely new devotions, such as the Forty Hours devotion, or Quarant’ore, promoted by Barnabites and Oratorians in the 1520s and later supervised or staged by Jesuits. This involved forty continuous hours of displaying and venerating the host, with laypeople keep­­ing vigil in turns. The Quarant’ore was intended to counter the secular spectacle of carnival by providing spectacular sacred drama of its own. It involved silent devotion, but also preaching, processions, singing, [  1 43  ]

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and specially ­constructed temporary sets for the high altar, designed by prominent artists. Publicity for Quarant’ore devotions included their promotion and celebration in prints and broadsheets and their uninterrupted continuous transmission from one church to another.14 This kind of theatricality in religious devotions would develop over the seventeenth century into what is commonly, if controversially, labeled Baroque Catholicism, but its signs were already visible in the late sixteenth century, perhaps nowhere more than in the papal Jubilee year of 1575, which sought to embody a holistic vision of lay piety. It focused on pilgrimage to a renewed and vibrant Rome, but to an extent unprecedented in earlier papal Jubilees, it also involved processions, sacramental journeys among churches in Rome, new religious orders (such as the Company of the Blessed Trinity, which focused on pilgrim hospitality), public preaching, charity, and extensive architectural patronage and renovation.15 In Rome in 1575, as in many other places in Italy, laypeople had more ways than ever to engage in devotional activities. Visual, dramatic, and theatrical events like these were intended above all to arouse the emotions of laypeople; in so doing, they both echoed and rivaled the long-­stated goals of mendicant sermons. Under these changed circumstances, what kind of role did mendicant preachers construct for themselves? How did they make sure that their listeners everywhere understood how important the sermon continued to be, and how necessary their own role was as guardians of preaching tradition?

Panigarola One traditional answer is that preachers became orators. Their sermons became more ornate, more elaborate, more literary, and, we are given to understand, more irrelevant from an educational perspective.16 There is some truth in that description—some of these sermons, at least in their printed form, are long and rarified, delivered in a format that discouraged frankness or direct pedagogy. The Franciscan Francesco Panigarola (1548– 1594), perhaps the greatest Italian preacher of the Baroque period, also embodied all that was valued in this kind of preacher: familiarity with and willingness to quote a staggering range of authorities, from Chrysostom to Pythagoras to Virgil; an ear for alliteration and a mind for metaphor; and an explicit intention to exhort and inspire rather than to instruct.17 Sermons [  1 4 4  ]

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like his typically lasted for an hour or two at a time, or even longer, and yet ostensibly explained only one verse of scripture. They were brilliant and inspiring verbal feats, but they were not a vehicle for rendering people literate in scripture, doctrine, or catechism. Francesco Panigarola was celebrated not simply for his sermons in Italy but also for his two guides on preaching and composing sermons, his work on memory, and for a series of anti-­Calvinist sermons delivered for Carlo Emanuele, Duke of Savoy, in 1582.18 Carlo Borromeo spent six years trying to bring him to Milan, succeeding in 1581 as part of the archbishop’s attempts to make a strong preaching culture central to the “foremost laboratory of the Counter-­Reformation.”19 Panigarola explained his preaching priorities in two style guides, Modo di comporre una predica [How to Compose a Sermon] and Il Predicatore [The Preacher]. He wrote the earlier and more popular of these, Modo di comporre una predica, in 1584 for a group of observant Franciscan postulants or novices, but in that year it also appeared nearly simultaneously in four different cities, and was reprinted in 1599 and 1603.20 Modo di comporre una predica has a firmly oratorical orientation; it begins by reviewing the classical genres of oratory and the subsections of a rhetorical argument. It dwells on such points of style as maintaining thematic unity, creating appropriate preambles to the first and second parts of a sermon, and crafting a pleasing conclusion. Within these sections, Panigarola created a separate category for the teaching of scripture, the didascalica, differentiating it from a broader category of materia preaching, which included the traditional deliberative, judicial, and demonstrative genres. The latter category could serve a range of purposes, from praising a saint to denouncing a heresy; the former was meant to teach through explanation or exegesis. Both categories, the materia and the more exegetical didascalica, subordinated scripture to the needs of rhetoric. Throughout the volume, Panigarola referred to “rhetorici,” in general, and not to any specific preachers. Panigarola considered materia preaching explicitly nonexegetical. “Although it relies on all or part of the Gospel, as it relates to saints and heretics, it is not called Gospel preaching, because our main objective is the material, or the saint, or the heretic, nor do we use the Gospel primarily to explain it, but to make it serve one of these other goals.”21 But even didascalica preaching presented problems. Panigarola’s main [  1 45  ]

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priority in Modo di comporre una predica was to explain how to reduce a sermon to one overarching proposition. This could be difficult, he acknowledged, when trying to do exegesis, especially of one single book. His proposed solution was to demonstrate that a given verse was true by means of all the other verses, and to remember that doing so would usually lead a preacher back to doctrinal or historical teaching, that is, the nonexegetical styles he preferred.22 The demands of rhetoric even dictated a preference for obscurity over clarity. In beginning the introduction to a sermon, Panigarola warned, a preacher should deliberately mix up propositions, add ornament, and blur the argument from the outset: “The main principal point of all preaching must contain confusions and stretchings, or three propositions, or at least two.”23 The short Modo di comporre una predica was ultimately insufficient for Panigarola, who printed it reluctantly, was embarrassed by its brevity, and wrote in its introduction that he would have preferred to keep all the printed copies for himself and his students. His comprehensive views on preaching appeared in Il Predicatore, the magnum opus on rhetoric that he completed before his death, but which was only published fourteen years later, in 1609. Il Predicatore gave full reign to Panigarola’s ideas on style. At about 1200 pages, it is fascinating in its detail but impractically unwieldy; of its two parts, for example, Panigarola devoted fully half of one to the manner of constructing a sentence. Il Predicatore is an extended commentary on a classical work of rhetoric, Demetrius of Phaleron’s De Elocutione. It consists of 194 brief rules, or particelle, of classical elocution, each one rendered in the original Greek and in Italian paraphrase (by Pier Vettori), and followed by two much longer commentaries by Panigarola: a “commento” and a “discorso ecclesiastico.” These serve to adapt classical rhetorical principles to the needs of modern orators and preachers.24 Il Predicatore addressed the wide range of questions that Panigarola thought should concern an Italian preacher. These were primarily stylistic, often practical, and rarely doctrinal or moral. In an acknowledged departure from Demetrius’s text, Panigarola provided a strong valorization of the vernacular by introducing a series of questions on the uses of Florentine and Tuscan dialects by preachers who came from other regions, or who travelled farther afield, or who needed to use words those dialects could not provide; he thus aligned himself with Florentine bembismo in the great language [  1 46  ]

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debates of early modern Italy.25 His style guidelines covered the assonance of letters in adjacent words, the introduction of poetry and foreign phrases, and the uses of comparison, vehemence, and epithet. As before, he insisted on the need to disguise the clarity of scripture, primarily by changing verbs to participles: “In this way, I think, nobody has such weak understanding that he will not see how much clarity is removed and obscurity added . . . ​ we must remember that in a prophetic way of speaking, too much clarity does not suit.”26 He also advised preachers on such issues as nervousness, joking in the pulpit, not insulting themselves, and dealing with very learned audiences. Throughout the work, Panigarola provided examples of techniques executed well or badly. He frequently cited his own preaching (including, to be fair, his own mistakes). He also referred to patristic sermons such as those of Pope Leo I, but most often he named and quoted preachers of the generation before his, especially Visdomini, Gabriele Fiamma, and above all, Cornelio Musso: “Monsignor Cornelio, and Fiamma, and Franceschino knew far better than we do how to do this.”27 Musso appears in approximately one out of every three particelle, often quoted for a few lines or more and always with the highest praise. With his frequent quotations and citations, Panigarola helped to cement the canon of great Italian orators of his century.

Religious reformation changed many things about religious life, but not all at once. As they had for centuries, mendicant preachers continued to travel around the Italian peninsula. In the final decades of the sixteenth century, new churches were built and old ones were renovated to conform to post-­ Tridentine standards; new pulpits needed filling. Preachers were still booked for the Advent and Lenten sermon cycles and were expected to advance the religious life of the city during their stay, transforming the hearts of their listeners. They continued to found charitable institutions, arrange for the retiring of prostitutes and closing of brothels, and reconcile warring families. They were still considered to be messengers of God and their sermons continued to draw crowds.28 In this aspect, little changed—except, perhaps, the need to defend the traditional role of the mendicant preacher more vigorously amid newer forms of devotional activity. Ilarione da Genova stood [  1 47  ]

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up for preachers everywhere when he declared in the middle of a sermon, “People will ask me what the word of God is.” He explained, “It is clear that the apostle (Paul) means the word and speech proceeding from the mouth of those who preach the faith. . . . ​The sermon spoken aloud is nothing less than the divine word.”29 The recherché Panigarola model remained the industry standard for these preachers through the seventeenth century.30 Panigarola’s close relationship with Borromeo highlights the influence and popularity of mendicant public preaching. It is not to be taken lightly. At their best mendicant sermons in this style were inspirational, and more prosaically they were increasingly seen as a kind of literary entertainment. In neither case were they an opportunity for direct exegesis or pedagogy.

Yet the Panigarola model could not fully serve the entire mendicant population. Many could not hope to match Panigarola’s level of rhetorical prowess or enjoy the rewards it brought him. Steeped in traditions of religious education and dynamic preaching, mendicants did not easily give up their sense of mission and pedagogy or their pastoral concerns. Their sermons, and even the way they had them printed, published, and presented to the public, also show that their concerns with rhetoric accompanied a lasting involvement in the practical new tasks facing the Church. In the last part of the century, preachers also defended their role at the center of Christian life, upheld and disseminated the messages of Trent, and sought to defend and glorify the Church in broad terms. They continued to print in increasing quantities. Their works provided the bulk of sermon literature in the late sixteenth century, and thus their stances, built on both their long preaching traditions and their mid-­century response to crisis, remained a critical educational tool for the reading public.

Scripture After Trent In their sermon volumes, preachers upheld and promoted many decrees of the Council of Trent. Specifically, they took seriously the Tridentine validation of scripture as critical for the laity. While formal adherence to the [  1 48  ]

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Council is to be expected, especially in an age of tightening religious controls, the endorsement of this particular was not a given. By no means was it obvious that a mendicant preacher of the late sixteenth century would also see himself as a teacher of scripture. Luca Baglioni’s guide for orators from 1562 includes only one reference to scripture, in a chapter on recommended books. Even then, he emphasized two other books above scripture—the “book” of the life of Christ, which preachers could learn through meditation and prayer, and the “book” of the preacher’s own ingenuity, to which every book, whether ancient, modern, Greek, Latin, or barbarian, could contribute.31 In this context, Baglioni’s initial reference to scripture sounds like lip service and nothing more. Likewise, both of Panigarola’s guides subsume not only exegesis but doctrinal clarity to the demands of high art; in his Modo di comporre una predica he did not assume that preachers owned a Bible. It is something of a surprise, then, to find moments where actual sermons and preaching material from the generation after Trent did consider it important to explain and understand scripture. Although the Tridentine mandate to teach scripture did not directly apply to them, mendicants still took it seriously; many of their sermon volumes reflected a growing interest in teaching scripture and an increasing awareness that they would do well to promote this new standard. Ilarione da Genova echoed Musso and Visdomini before him when he paused his sermon to list the books of the Bible, explaining, “before we proceed . . . ​let me refer you to the canonical books of the Old Testament, which the universal Council of Trent established for us in the fourth session.”32 Mendicant involvement seems all the more significant given the context of the final Tridentine decree on scripture, produced at the twenty-­fourth session of the Council. This took place in 1562, fully eighteen years after the earlier sessions on scripture: The holy Synod, desirous that the office of preaching, which peculiarly belongs to bishops, may be exercised as frequently as possible . . . ​ordains, that the bishops shall themselves in person, each in his own church, announce the sacred Scriptures and the divine law, or if lawfully hindered, it shall be done by those whom they shall appoint to the office of preaching . . . ​a nd this at least on all Lord’s Days and solemn festivals; but, during the [  1 49  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly season of the fasts, of Lent and of the Advent of the Lord, daily, or at least on three days in the week, if the said bishop shall deem it needful; and, at other times, as often as they shall judge that it can be opportunely done. And the bishop shall diligently admonish the people, that each one is bound to be present at his own parish church, where it can be conveniently done, to hear the word of God.33

The decree thus placed all responsibility for preaching and education in the hands of the bishops; it positioned the discussion of preaching between chapters on episcopal visitations and on criminal trials against bishops. Furthermore, it made no mention of exegesis and no longer treated it as a priority. The decree thus appeared to paint a grim picture, delegating scriptural preaching entirely to bishops, who could then ignore it.34 The growing climate of censorship and control over publication marginalized vernacular scripture even further. Fears of its misuse both as heresy and as superstition prompted a stricter separation of clergy and laity, and in some views destroyed a rich medieval culture of lay biblical literature. But recent research has also made it clear that, contrary to the popular image of the Index as a well-­oiled and comprehensive mechanism of thought control, application of censorship and expurgation laws was inconsistent and contradictory. The Congregation of the Index and the papacy found themselves at odds, licenses to read prohibited material were granted erratically, and banned books were always available to those who knew the right people.35 Although the Congregation condemned vernacular Bibles outright in 1559, other scriptural works such as summaries, lectionaries, and commentaries were harder to define, and thus in the decades between the 1559 Index, the 1564 Index, and the Clementine Index of 1596, they were more readily available than Bibles.36 In the midst of this shifting and ambiguous climate, mendicants carved out a place for themselves. Many mendicant sermon collections published in the 1570s and beyond show rising standards for scriptural comprehension. New translations of lectionaries appeared to help laypeople better understand what they heard in Mass. Even when preachers did not preach about scripture learning or employ actual exegesis, we can discern their changing

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assumptions from corollary evidence, including the printing styles of their sermon collections, references to scripture in the paratext of their books, and the adoption of an exegetical or homiletical style that mirrored the work of the sacred lectureships that the Council also established. Even though it only scratches the surface, this evidence points to both a more widespread acceptance of scripture and a broader interpretation of Tridentine values than the Council fathers may even have intended.

Increasingly, scripture—or more broadly, the idea that scripture was something to be prized and comprehended—made its way into the introductory paratext and the scholarly apparatuses that accompanied a sermon collection. Silvestro Cigno, a preacher and theologian from Vicenza, aimed in his sermon collection of 1572 to ensure “that the gospel which is heard all year in Mass can be more easily understood by many.”37 He therefore included additional prefatory sections beyond the normal dedication, letter to readers, and table of contents. The first was a short summary of the four senses of scripture, in which he explained each level of interpretation, using the traditional example of manna to differentiate them, and warning readers that they should treat even the “senso letterale” with caution, and not take it too literally. The next section reviewed the seven rules of scriptural interpretation of Tichonius the Donatist, as articulated in Augustine’s De Doctrina Christiana. Cigno explained that scripture was created with great artfulness and must be approached with enormous care, and that the seven rules were intended to help guide the reader toward comprehension. These, he promised, would lead the truly faithful to “gain the meaning of the most holy letters, which God grants to clergymen so that they, illuminated, can then illuminate their subjects and teach them the truth of the gospel.”38 Onofrio Zarrabini, an Augustinian theologian, showed a similar approach in the prefaces to his predicabili. They included a list of all the biblical citations used in the book and a special table correlating the subjects he treated with the gospel readings for Lent, “for the convenience of preachers of the gospel.” Likewise, the Franciscan Pietro Ridolfi, whose collected sermons appeared in 1584, included a table that listed each verse that the volume

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e­ xplicated in alphabetical order, “for the greater understanding of the reader,” with the citation and then the page number provided for each entry.39 Panigarola, who explicitly disdained exegesis, went the furthest in this regard, relying on a good paratext to substitute for any other kind of scriptural learning or teaching. He warned his students never to buy a book without absolutely perfect tables, one which lists the material, and one with scriptural references, and then make a distinction in this way: that all books either treat scripture directly (ex professo), as a commentary . . . ​or have a sermon on homily on a given passage or a given book of scripture . . . ​so that if you need to do a gospel sermon you can see all the authors for scripture, and where they treat scripture ex professo themselves; however many books you have in your cell, using the scripture tables you can see if perhaps they are ever mentioned.40

These elite preachers were all working in the same general genre as Panigarola, and thus explicating scripture was never their primary goal. Even so, the proud inclusion of these supplemental tables suggests that they increasingly assumed that understanding scripture was important for their readers.

The authors themselves explicitly emphasized the increased need for comprehension near the beginning of their collections—in their introductions, table titles, and earliest sermons. The Capuchin preacher Girolamo da Pistoia, after a lifetime of preaching in Rome, Naples, Venice, Florence, and Bologna, included a letter to readers in his collection, except that instead of calling them “readers” as was typical, he addressed them as “students of sacred letters, who want to understand the lofty and beautiful secrets they contain.”41 He emphasized the simplicity of his style and the need to be clear in difficult times: “I intend not to undertake a beautiful mode of speaking, but to open up those concepts which today are so necessary to the Christian, such that no doubt or difficulty will remain, that has not been addressed.”42 [  152  ]

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Onofrio Zarrabini almost immediately discussed the learning of scripture in general in his predicabili—on page two—even though the entire volume was based on one four-­verse psalm: “it does not seem a digression to me to demonstrate, in this second chapter, the divisions of the two Testaments, Old and New, so that everyone can easily know which part has the Book of Psalms.”43 Where other preachers simply listed the books of the Bible, Zarrabbini also divided them into eight categories depending on the style of teaching they embodied. Only after explaining all eight did he see fit to return to the Book of Psalms in greater detail. These gradually changing standards are most evident in the era’s new Epistole et Evangelii, or lectionaries—collections of gospel readings according to the liturgical year. Lectionaries were by no means a new genre, but the later sixteenth century saw a need for new translations.44 Ludovico Pittorio’s Homilarium, essentially a lectionary with direct paraphrases of scripture and straightforward, simple messages, remained consistently popular through­ ­out the century, with approximately thirty-­five separate editions. Yet editors and printers updated the later editions, fitting them out with new translations, more elaborate engravings, and especially, as their title pages proclaimed, better paratexts with scriptural citations.45 The most prominent new lectionary was the work of Remigio (Nannini) Fiorentino, a Dominican humanist and editor who translated classical and modern texts and who wrote sermons and poetry.46 His official preparation of this text for the Catholic Church was published twenty-­t wo times between 1567 and the end of the century. Because of his literary background, Remigio was especially attuned to issues of language and comprehension. His introduction addressed the topic directly in a letter to readers: Having often considered that many Catholics desire to understand in their own language the Epistles and Gospels that are read at Mass . . . ​I judged it neither novel nor unwelcome to retranslate them, and since the old translations were fairly obscure . . . ​I have labored to render them in the clearest and most beautiful language possible.47

In other words, the new translation was necessary because scriptural comprehension was increasingly becoming the norm, and the old translations did [  153  ]

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not meet the new standard. Remigio’s edition emphasized comprehension. Each entry comprises a translation or close paraphrase of the pericope, a summary of its moral lessons, and a brief, broader discussion. Remigio started with the epistle for the first Sunday of Advent, Romans 13:11–14, which begins: “Besides this you know what hour it is, how it is full time now for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.” Under the heading “St. Paul the Apostle’s Letter to the Romans,” Remigio gave a translation in a simple vernacular. His commentary is separated by another heading, “Annotation of the Epistle.” It starts by hewing closely to the text: “In this epistle to the Romans, St. Paul is exhorting us to awake from the sleep of ignorance and sin, because grace and health though Jesus Christ is approaching near to us.”48 The following two paragraphs drive the point home in specific ways. It then exhorts readers to leave off sin and briefly explains why the apostle singled out six vices in particular. The gospel reading for the same day follows immediately afterward with the same format. This was a book for educated laypeople as well as for clergy, and it is clear that they were supposed to learn both text and morals from reading it. Lectionaries suffered various degrees of prohibition after Trent. At times Remigio’s work was the only approved version, and at times it too was discouraged or its reading strictly controlled; at best, it was only for “persone pie e dabene.” Yet lectionaries would nonetheless become standard fare for a wide-­ranging group of readers, from learned lawyers who had some Latin, to clergy who preferred the vernacular, to members of monastic orders, to Niccolò Machiavelli’s nephew.49

The task of reading and explaining scripture fell to the ecclesiast, the official lecturer appointed in accordance with the Tridentine decrees. Although it has been argued that religious institutions at the end of the century sought to “distance the faithful from biblical literature as much as possible,” the existence of such lecturers makes the reality as executed more complicated.50 The best known of these is Evangelista Marcellino, an Observant Franciscan, who was appointed explicator of scripture at the Observant Church of Santa Maria in Aracoeli in Rome sometime during the 1580s.51 Marcellino was a prolific and popular preacher whose output included sermons, scriptural [  154  ]

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exegesis, theological treatises, and in 1582, “On Metamorphosis, or the Transformation of the Virtuous,” a literary work so popular that it merited six subsequent editions and a French translation. Marcellino’s long career as a preacher translated in print into explications of at least half a dozen different books of the Bible—Ruth, Tobias, Judges, Habakkuk, Daniel, Jonah, Song of Songs, and some psalms—reflecting his particular remit. He also preached on other occasions to Jews in the Roman ghetto, in accordance with a series of papal decrees establishing and regularizing this practice in the 1570s and 1580s. For Marcellino, this was a particularly local duty, as his home church of Aracoeli bordered on the edge of the ghetto, and the churches that hosted conversionary preaching were only a few streets away.52 Marcellino’s approach to preaching could not have differed more in style from that of Panigarola or other mendicants. He proceeded through each book verse by verse, first reciting a verse in Latin and then translating it, explaining the significance and context of difficult words, and finally draw­ ­i ng a moral lesson. He often used more than one of the standard levels of biblical interpretation, but moved rapidly from one verse to the next.53 His introduction has no flourishes: “My intention, dearest ones, is to explain to you the Book of Ruth, in which we emphasize in advance the extreme poverty suffered by this Ruth, and by her mother-­i n-­law, and the great goodness of Boaz . . . ​which will give us occasion to patiently tolerate the poverty of these present days.” His first commentary continues without preamble, paying special attention to the book’s various contexts in the biblical canon: “The Book of Ruth, placed by the Jews in second place, that is among the prophetical books, must be an example to the poor to be patient, and to the rich to be liberal and honest; it appears to be written by Samuel and to have taken place under one of the judges before Eli.”54 Where he deemed it necessary, Marcellino discussed the title of each work and its placement in the canon, speculated about its authorship, and brought a range of biblical commentaries to bear on each of these issues.55 Compare this to Serafino Razzi’s opening sermon for the first Sunday of Advent. The epistle for that day begins at Luke 25: “There will be signs in the sun, the moon, and the stars, and on earth nations will be in dismay, perplexed by the roaring of the sea and the waves.” Razzi began by invoking God’s mercy in sending celestial signs. He described the portents that accompanied Philip of Macedon’s attack on Greece, Vespasian’s conquering of [  155  ]

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Jerusalem, and the Saracen destruction of Genoa in 920. Only then did he introduce the periocope, his first scriptural reference. He did not explain or paraphrase it, but followed it immediately with a lengthy comparison between an infant, swaddled at birth and then increasingly free, and the spiritual infancy of humankind in this life, needing swaddling in the fear of God so as to be free in the next life. In elite sermons like these, the topic, or the scriptural pericope, came a distant second to moral instruction alongside beauty and ornamentation. Marcellino was well aware of the difference in style between himself and his more famous colleagues. He once mocked Panigarola for exclaim­ ­i ng, in a sermon on the head of St. Andrew, “O mouth! O eyes! O nose!” Marcellino, from the pulpit, told his listeners, “Rome, do not expect ‘O mouth, O eyes, O nose’ and such from me—because it would be better to say nothing than to say that.”56 Marcellino’s informality was his hallmark, and he defended it to critics by arguing that the elaboration, quotations, and multiple languages of a “high” sermon would only mystify his least educated listeners. He compares himself and preachers like him to the biblical figure of Ruth gleaning leavings in the field, following after the great preachers of the past who have left him only “holy preaching in a mean style, with simplicity, in such a way that it can give copious nourishment to the poor populace, and I say copious, because sometimes a simple sermon bears more fruit than one that is learned and eloquent.”57 Panigarola responded in kind. The novices for whom he wrote Modo di comporre una predica were, in fact, students at Marcellino’s own Church of Santa Maria in Aracoeli; Panigarola stayed there in 1581 to great acclaim.58 His letter to them emphasized his embarrassment at writing something so basic. He begged them never to show the work to anybody, or at least to clarify that the work did not really explain true rhetoric. He referred them instead to the work on memory that he had given them a year earlier.59 In his second chapter of Modo di comporre una predica, which addresses the difficulties of gospel preaching, he took direct aim, informing Marcellino’s circle that “he who explains a gospel text verse by verse without providing any thematic unity, surely does good paraphrasing, or commentary, but it is not oration, or preaching.”60 The difference between mendicant and homiletical styles was therefore a point of pride on each side. Whereas the exegetical style explicated a [  156  ]

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b­ iblical passage verse by verse, the mendicant style collected verses from all of scripture to reinforce a point. This could be true even if the sermon ­collection followed the liturgical year, with its short passages tied to the occasion, rather than explaining entire scriptural books as Marcellino’s did.

Bridging the Genre Gap The level of detailed explanation in commentaries like Marcellino’s and the establishment of sacred lectureships in scripture contributed to the gradual rise in standards for scriptural comprehension. They might well also have influenced even mendicant preachers. The best example of this phenomenon comes from Gabriele Fiamma, an Augustinian who wrote sermons in both mendicant and diocesan genres and who showed unusual attention to scripture. Fiamma is best remembered for a set of religious poems, the Rime Spirituali (1570), but in his day he was celebrated as a famous and learned preacher, and that is how he defined himself. In the dedication letter of one of his sermon volumes he wrote, “I have never been able to do anything but preach and write.”61 Fiamma, an Augustinian from Venice, became one of the stars of his generation, preaching up and down the peninsula and in Rome for the 1575 papal Jubilee to great success. His brief denunciation to the Neapolitan Inquisition during a Lenten pulpit there in 1562, and the listing of his Rime Spirituali on the Index, did not leave lasting stains on his orthodox reputation.62 Eventually he was made the general abbot of his congregation, and a year before his death in 1584 he became Bishop of Chioggia. Fiamma’s special attention to scripture is especially evident in his series of short sermons, or “discorsi,” that correspond to the liturgical year. Discorso is a specific term for a less formal sermon, and Fiamma wrote them specifically to be published, not delivered orally. He explained in the introduction that he wrote them for three reasons: to counter heretics, to provide sermons for those who could not go in person to hear them, and finally “to aid those who are learning in seminaries, and who, because they have to preach and have care of souls, ought to make a habit of reading and contemplating these lessons, which they will have to teach to the populace if they want to do their duty and satisfy their consciences.”63 In other words, the Discorsi was a manual for new preachers, similar to the predicabili of Serafino Razzi [  15 7  ]

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or Onofrio Zarrabinni. But in using the phrase “care of souls” (cura d’anime), Fiamma made it clear that he was seeking to appeal not to mendicant ­novices but to curates just learning to preach under episcopal reform, much like the Sermoni ovvero Homelie of Giovanni Del Bene. As a result, the discorsi were aimed at a pastoral audience. They adopted the same exegetical style as Marcellino and Giovanni Del Bene. The Discorsi reflected a more detailed and thorough approach to scripture. Not surprisingly, they display little flourish and much attention to introducing basic concepts. In his first discourse, Fiamma stopped to explain how the pericope of a sermon works, saying, “Just as doctors change their medicines with the seasons, so too does the holy mother Church recite different scriptures according to the time, and to the mysteries celebrated.”64 He inserted instructive comments: “If you read the sacred letters carefully, you will find that rarely or never has the heavenly king done any great deed without first giving some sign of it beforehand.”65 He gave examples of specific words, explained the same word at different levels of interpretation, and remarked explicitly on the difficulty and importance of understanding the material: “Where many, moved by piety and zeal in speaking to the populace, turn directly to the moral sense of scripture in order to reform the habits of the faithful rather than entering the deep and profound sea of allegory, which we instead will try to make smooth and easy with divine help.”66 In Fiamma’s Discorsi, we see an introductory and comprehensive approach to scripture, one well suited for seminarians learning to preach for the first time. But Fiamma’s attention to scripture was not limited to the Discorsi. His other surviving sermons appear in a collection from 1570 containing occasional sermons from the 1550s and 1560s and in another set of six sermons preached in the Church of the Annunciation in Naples in 1573.67 These volumes represent a completely different genre from Fiamma’s discorsi and employ the elite, elaborate style typical of his mendicant training. Yet even within this more formal style, Fiamma frequently abandoned his highly rhetorical flourishes and metaphors in mid-­sermon to examine scriptural passages very closely in a way that much medieval preaching had done. In the first of his six sermons from 1573, Fiamma’s goal was to show how to read the story of Noah and the ark as an allegory of the sacraments. This meant giving listeners solid knowledge of the relevant passage, and so his sermon maintains an exegetical focus. When retelling the story, he explained: [  158  ]

the gener ation after tr ent You must understand who sends, who is sent, when, and from where he is sent, and the return, and the result of his return, along with all the other circumstances which are useful and necessary to understand this sacrament. Who sends? Noah. Who is sent? The dove. From where? From the ark. Where to? Into a flood. When? After seven days. When does it return? The eighth day, bearing an olive.68

Sometimes he paused on just one word: “But the eternal father, when Christ baptized himself, said, ‘Hic est filius meus dilectus, in quo mihi bene complacui.’ He didn’t say, ‘He pleased me,’ nor ‘I pleased him,’ but ‘I am pleased in him,’ that is, what pleased me about myself, is all in him.”69 Fiamma also filled his sermons with comments about the importance of scripture: “Note how the scriptures always speak with propriety,” or “Search, and search again diligently in the holy scriptures, penetrate inside them, don’t stand on the threshold.”70 For Fiamma, scripture remained central to the act of preaching, whatever the genre. In insisting so much on clarity, Fiamma showed that he still considered himself above all a teacher of scripture whose job was to teach others how to read and interpret it. In both genres, he continued to regard the teaching of scripture as central to his mission as a preacher, no matter the audience, and to believe that Catholics across the social spectrum had a duty to learn it. Fiamma thus attempted to retain scripture as a central aspect of Catholic identity. Because he wrote for different audiences, his work also reminds us that the split between mendicant and diocesan preaching was not as total as it might seem, and that the gap could be bridged. The practice of adapting to different audiences was not in itself unusual. Throughout the Middle Ages, preaching guides taught their readers to be aware of their audiences and to alter their sermons to suit each population.71 Fiamma’s decision to write two different kinds of sermons for two audiences that had very little overlap, and to do so in an era when the two genres were generally diverging stylistically, points to a trend that needs further attention. His works do not prove that these parallel tracks for preaching did not exist, but they clearly imply that a preacher could cross between them—as Fiamma did when he explained the levels of scriptural interpretation to his novice preachers—and that preachers could deem it necessary and [  159  ]

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important to do so. He defies the criticism of Carlo Borromeo himself, who complained that mendicant preachers only published old sermons from past years without ever considering the particular needs of the populace.72 Many mendicant preachers were rewarded with bishoprics, including Fiamma, Musso, and Panigarola himself (elected Bishop of Chrysopolis in 1586 and of Asti in 1587). Fiamma’s work highlights the difficulty they must have faced in taking on, or at least supervising, a style of preaching directly opposite to their own training. Whereas Fiamma tried to accommodate the new population of preach­ ­ers, Serafino Razzi was reluctant. His predicabili, like those of Fiamma, were explicitly geared toward new preachers in the secular realm, but unlike Fiamma, he doubted whether the experiment could succeed. Buonamici, Razzi’s acolyte, tells us that some of Razzi’s mendicant colleagues warned him that if he published sermons for curatori d’anime, they would be too embarrassed to use the book for themselves.73 In addition, “if the seculars have these printed sermons on them, they can show them to their gangs and cliques and claim that they have grasped the exhortations and reasonings of the preacher, and have learned to preach from books.”74 These potential problems of audience led Razzi to hesitate for a long time before publishing his sermons. When at last he decided to proceed, he consoled himself by pointing out that it was not so bad for secular clerics to own such a book. Reading sermons would teach them to appreciate the spoken sermon “with greater attention and clearer intelligence” when they heard a preacher, “just as intelligent and diligent disciples learn the lessons of their preceptors and masters, when they have first read and studied them for themselves.”75 If nothing else, the book would save them from worse: “God wants secular priests these days to buy books of preaching and of printed spiritual sermons, and not, as they often do, books of nonsense and novelties.”76 Razzi understood one of the key tenets of modern scholarship on the history of reading: Different social groups could appropriate the same text in their own way.77 Yet he remained condescending toward secular clerical readers, imagining them only as listeners and in no way as colleagues. These insults to diocesan preachers immediately precede his lengthy defense of the office of preacher. Although Razzi may have been speaking to secular priests in training, his words would resonate strongly with his mendicant colleagues as well—and in fact, he dedicated the work not to a bishop [  160  ]

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but to the vicar general of his order, Ipolitomaria Beccheria.78 Seen together, his praise of the refined art of preaching, his instructions to bishops to pay attention, and his warnings of trouble for those who fail to preach carry a defiant defense of tradition: Mendicant preachers still know best how to preach, and those who have any hope of success in the pulpit must be humbly prepared to learn from them.

The decisions of preachers like Fiamma and Razzi demonstrate that mendicant preachers, as conveyers of orthodox doctrine and religious education, not only remained central to Catholic identity in the post-­Tridentine era but helped to reinforce that identity by embracing, if reluctantly, different Catholic audiences within their purview. Most scholars of vernacular Italian preaching have concentrated primarily on literature about preaching, such as Artes Praedicandi and instructions to clerics.79 In the sources they use, the difference between mendicant oratory and diocesan homily is straightforward. But Fiamma and Razzi each wrote for two separate audiences, and in fact they wrote for people whose concept and practice of preaching were vastly different from their own. Their choice to do so reminds us that what people do is always a little less clear-­cut than what they are supposed to do, and that no discussion of preaching is complete if it is based only on the theoretical literature and not on sermons themselves. Mendicant sermons also show that scripture did not disappear in Italian Catholicism after Trent. In an era of increased clerical control, direct access to scripture through texts such as vernacular Bible translations was indeed severely limited, but by looking at indirect access, we see that scriptural teaching remained important to the Church. Mendicant sermon volumes could not undo the damage of frequent and ever-­stricter Indices but could in a small way compensate for them, both by building increased access to scripture into their publications and because in doing so preachers assumed that their lay readers would continue to demand such access. Mendicant sermons became, in fact, only one element of a proliferating assortment of texts intended to teach scripture without actually handing Bibles to laypeople. Besides sermons and lectionaries, a rich tradition of commentary on specific biblical books continued well into the seventeenth [  161  ]

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c­ entury. One of its most typical and most popular specimens was the work of that most literary and nonscriptural of mendicant preachers, Francesco Panigarola. His Dichiarationi dei Salmi gave detailed commentary on the entire Book of Psalms. It enjoyed twenty-­one editions between its first publication in 1585 and 1600, and it stayed in print throughout the next century. Panigarola also produced a commentary on the Book of Lamentations and a vernacular translation of the seven penitential psalms.80 Ultimately, even the preachers who directed their sermons to other ends than exegesis understood that laypeople needed scripture, and that they needed it to be delivered in unobjectionable ways. Panigarola’s impeccable orthodoxy, his close ties to Borromeo and to Rome, and his reputation all helped his commentaries to cushion the potential impact of the raw biblical texts he published.81 Preachers also made it explicit that the job of the clergy was not simply to preach scripture but also to make sure the laity understood it. This may seem a point too obvious to mention, but understanding scripture was in fact dangerous. It could lead to that irreverence and contempt that the Tridentine decrees mentioned. In the 1550s Lippomano reiterated Cornelio Musso’s elitism when he insisted, “The more [the scriptures] are hidden from plebeians, the more they are held in greater credit, authority, majesty, and reputation . . . ​we seek the fruits of scripture, which are not manifest. They are found with much effort, and sweat, and practice. . . .”82 Yet toward the end of the century, preachers and publishers increasingly began to treat the task of scripture preaching as an obligation to make sure that they were really teaching the laity. Lay comprehension of scripture is not mentioned in the Tridentine decrees themselves, and it certainly was not the goal of the Congregation of the Index, but it appears more explicitly in works like Marcellino’s commentaries and in the continuous publication of Pittorio and Remigio’s lectionaries.83 Theirs was not a subversive activity; these were, by and large, the Roman Church’s most orthodox preachers, whose works met with little reproach, expurgation, or external censorship. Even though the 1596 Index would take much harsher steps against the vernacular, the intentions of the Congregation of the Index or of the Council cannot be taken as the unequivocal position of the “Church” at large. Mendicant volumes could not compare with reading a complete vernacular Bible, but they could nonetheless

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inspire and sometimes enable an assiduous reader to absorb a great deal of scripture in other ways.84 Promoting scripture even at arm’s length helped mendicant preachers to retain their centrality in Italian religious life by continuing to preach and publish their sermons. None of the examples in this chapter except for Fiamma’s Discorsi was written in a diocesan context. Very few mendicant sermon collections after Trent were even dedicated to bishops, much less written or commissioned by one. Preachers were equally likely to dedicate their works to the pope directly, or even to a city council.85 Yet the paratexts and styles and content of their works show their constant awareness of the lay desire for scripture and the need to meet it; not only did bishops in dioceses recognize this need, but so did elite mendicant preachers and theologians. These sermon collections hint at more widespread changes in the way that preachers taught scripture, and at a more widespread assumption that doing so was the preacher’s job. It appeared in many styles of preaching and many genres of printed preaching material and was not limited to the official institutions and venues relating to the bishop. Tridentine decrees reflected a deep-­seated fear of chaos that Indices only furthered, but even in such unsettled times mendicant preachers took up the challenge of teaching scripture. They did so almost entirely outside of the diocesan system to which the Tridentine decrees had relegated it.86

Negotiating the Printed Sermon Post-­Tridentine preachers also enjoyed a level of exposure that their predecessors lacked. Eleven editions of the sermons of Franciscan Roberto Caracciolo, one of the most beloved preachers of the fifteenth century, were reprinted in the sixteenth, along with nine editions of his devotional treatises. Francesco Panigarola, who lived a century later, published approximately one hundred titles by the year 1600. After a full century of the press, as printed books increased in popularity and distribution and decreased in price, printed sermons rivaled the value of the sermon spoken aloud. Preachers in the later decades of the sixteenth century took great pride in the printing of their sermon collections. Like many of this colleagues, Silvestro Cigno described how a lifetime of preaching came to fruition with

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the publication of his sermons: “Having faithfully preached the gospel with my weak abilities from age thirty-­one until now, finding myself at sixty-­six, and thinking that it would not do to bury the talent granted me in the ground, I decided to send out this effort into the light of the world, part of my small intellect which, if it is not learned, is at least Catholic and Christian.”87 Ilarione da Genova may have believed that the spoken word was divine, but he soon embraced the printed one as well: “The spoken and written word are part of a common tradition. They are distinct from each other, but both are instruments for bringing the divine word to us; one confirms the other . . . ​and both are needed to bring men to the true religion.”88 Yet sermons preached and sermons printed could sit awkwardly with each other. Printing placed a mendicant preacher in direct competition with himself for the first time, and it forced the question of the value of the spoken word. An unparalleled defense of the singularity of a spoken sermon, and the reasons for printing it anyway, comes from Timoteo Buonamici, who contributed a preface to Razzi’s predicabili. Buonamici chronicled Razzi’s ambivalence toward committing his sermons to print and along the way listed the benefits of each form. The advantages of printing, they argued, were both practical and spiritual. Printing would give a more secure future to a preacher’s labors. Befriending a printer would allow the preacher to share his efforts with others and earn him more divine merit, and a reader who read one volume of sermons would be more likely to take up another as well. It would spare many copyists hours of labor. Finally, printing allowed a preacher like Razzi “to preach not only with his live voice, as he has done for so many years and continues to do, but also with the pen and the written word.”89 At the same time, printed sermons had their limits, which reassured their authors that the spoken word ultimately triumphed. Razzi felt that his pulpit skills were protected because his printed sermons could not create competitors: “No preacher, in my view, is so crude, so inept, so slow of mind, as the one who sets out to recite word for word the sermon of another.”90 Buonamici reminded incipient preachers that delivery was everything: “The spoken word, external gestures, and the attitude of the preacher toward the things he is teaching and preaching, some measure of energy, efficacy, and valor in persuasion, all give qualities which private reading and mute writing [  164  ]

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cannot confer . . . ​i ntonation is, as Demosthenes said, the first, second, third and foremost part of preaching.”91 Different preachers could render the identical sermon sublime and marvelous or thin and forgettable. Buonamici was not alone in this sentiment. Giovanni Battista Cavota di Melfe, when he introduced Panigarola’s sermon collection (and supplemented it with sermons of his own), insisted that repeating a sermon word for word weakened the moral message and made the sermon sound insipid and feeble instead of gracious and powerful.92 Panigarola raised the question himself in Il Predicatore; he was slightly more generous toward unskilled preachers, who could not memorize more than one sermon and who might not be preaching at all if they could not repeat their sermons year to year or recite them from a text word for word. Nonetheless, he concluded that pulpits and even Cathedral schools risked being “full of parrots, that is, of people who recite the words written by others and often do not understand what they are saying.”93 Printed sermons, it seemed, did their best work as inspiration and guidance for other preachers, not as scripts. These arguments were not knee-­jerk rejections of potential threats; their authors defended their positions by explaining how a living preacher could improve on a printed sermon. Panigarola cautioned against being like the preacher who insisted that he would only change his sermons when the Church changed gospels.94 Buonamici instructed new preachers to make the sermons their own, and to collect material from many different volumes of predicabili. The weakness of human memory, he warned, ensured that a preacher who poached verbatim from one collection would run the very real risk of forgetting that he had delivered the same sermon on the same day in the same city the year before. Buonamici instructed preachers to pick apart the sample sermons and reorder the pieces, so “that which furnishes a proemio for one preacher, another will adopt for an introduction.”95 If a preacher did not make a sermon his own, he could never fully honor God with it. Giving a preacher a piece of paper with a sermon on it, noted Buonamici, was like giving a rider a horse with no reins. “That is to say, it means giving [readers] the material and the subject to be preached, but not the way of speaking, and the intonation, nor the graceful gestures, or the spirit of persuasion.”96 Only the conviction that a book could never replace him in the pulpit convinced Razzi to publish his sermons. [  165  ]

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Yet once they had made the decision to publish, preachers delighted in the physical capacities of their printed books. Printers had long prefaced published sermon collections with illustrations, decorated each sermon with woodcut flourishes and borders, and experimented with italics and different typeface sizes, but in the later part of the century the preachers’ enjoyment of the new technology and its new possibilities became increasingly clear. When Remigio Fiorentino finished the preface to his newly translated lectionary, he deliberately thanked his printer, the famous Gabriele Giolito, for making his book beautiful. Lectionaries were often elaborate productions, but Remigio nonetheless took explicit pride in the beauty of his work: If the book seems pleasant to you to behold, and adorned with many beautiful figures, give the praise to the magnificent and honorable Mr. Gabriel Giolito, who seeks to delight and please spiritual persons with his publications, and who has sought to decorate them as much as his strength would allow.97

When another printer, Giorgio Angelieri, reissued the work in 1602, with badly worn woodcut blocks and poorly printed borders, Remigio’s dedication was retained, but without the reference to Giolito. Cristoforo Silvestrani Brenzone, a Carmelite theologian, published a series of lessons on scripture based on sermons he delivered in Siena that took advantage of the possibilities of the press by experimenting with the placement of words on the page. He arranged most of his lessons not in paragraphs, but in memory trees. His lessons on the first chapter of Romans listed his key topics in brackets on the left side of the page, with amplifications on the right or in the center, and further commentary on the far right. Every page displayed a different arrangement. Borrowing from rhetoricians and philosophers, preachers—including Panigarola, Agostino Valier, and Federico Borromeo—adapted memory trees as a method for distilling, reconstituting, and remembering the elements of sermons. These visual aids reveal how much the medium of printing, which allowed for the easy diffusion of these methods, influenced the content of the printed text. By arranging his material in memory trees, Brenzone conveyed his faith in the reader’s capacity to reconstruct his lessons on their own and draw new meaning from them; his lessons on Psalm 136 include, for example, ­scriptural [  166  ]

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quotations that can be used to illustrate moral qualities. This technique encapsulated both the possibilities of printing and its ideal use as a complement, not a competitor, to the pulpit.98 A typical religious book of the era might contain some paratext: a dedication, an elaborate table of contents, and perhaps a letter to the reader. Onofrio Zarrabini included much more. His collection of predicabili gives the impression of a man seeking hard to make his reputation. It begins with nine separate prefatory sections: a dedication to Pope Sisto V, an index of all of Zarrabini’s other works, a list of all the other authors cited in the course of his book, the verses of the psalm that the sermon series is explicating, a woodcut portrait of himself; an Italian translation of his biography originally written in Latin by Carlo Sigonio, a list of the chapter titles in the first section of his book, a list of all of the biblical citations he has employed, and finally a thorough table of contents. Serafino Razzi showed a similar appetite for prefaces in his volume of predicabili. Between the dedication to the general of his order and the table of contents, Razzi also included the preface by Timoteo Buonamici, a discourse of his own on the value of preaching, four essays of advice for new preachers, an excerpt from the twenty-­n inth Canto of Dante’s Paradiso on the power of gospel preaching, the texts of six orations for a preacher to say on various sacred occasions, and a calendar of moveable feasts. Whenever a blank half-­page between entries provided opportunity, Razzi and his publishers filled it with scriptural verses translated into Italian tercets. Such an abundance of material shows as much passion for the capacities of the actual book itself as for its potential readers. Panigarola considered paratexts an absolute scholarly necessity. When he listed the books preachers should own, he recommended not simply any “Catena Aurea” of Aquinas, but the one printed in Paris by Somnio, “which has notes in the margin, not simply of names, but even of the most minute places (references) of the author, because in this way you study together both scripture and patristics, and because these annotations are exact, instead of one book, you are bringing into the pulpit more than a thousand.”99 Mendi­ cant preachers thus continued to preach and to argue for the inimitability of the sermon while avidly adopting new avenues of publicity. In so doing, they reaffirmed both the importance of the press to the Catholic enterprise and also their own role as central figures in religious life. [  167  ]

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Glorifying the Church Vernacular preachers at their most grandiose brought to their listeners a new vision of Catholicism. They described a Church that was global, multiethnic, and aware of diversity, both within Catholicism and among its enemies. The self-­promotion was necessary, of course, to demonstrate that the Church was being rebuilt; heretical sects would not triumph. In 1567 Girolamo da Pistoia dedicated two of his twenty-­one sermons to the refutation of Lutheranism. One of these elaborated fifteen distinctions between the true Catholic Church and the misguided ideas of the heretics. The other chronicled the history of enemies of the Church and argued that Lutherans were the worst of all, lower than Turks, Gentiles, Jews and even the devil.100 By 1567 Italy could be fairly confident about its Catholicism, but fully twenty years later, Pietro Ridolfi continued to preach as if it were still in imminent danger of apostasy. He returned to the threat of insolent heretics to convince his readers that the stakes were still high for their spiritual survival: Because the adversaries of our faith do not spare the altars, the priests, the churches, the crosses, the crucifixes, in befouling the truth and in rending its ironclad garments, in order to lacerate the sacred breasts of the Church of Christ where they were (to its dismay) nursed and nourished.101

Preachers had by then been making this argument for fifty years. But at the same time, Ridolfi insisted that rebuilding the Church and staving off heresy were two sides of the same coin: With one hand, we must grip the sword against the evil heretics, more insolent than ever, and with the other, build up as much as possible the disheveled and ruined walls of this mystical Jerusalem.102

Ridolfi dedicated the second part of his collected sermons to the government of the city of Raugia (Ragusa), where he had preached. In his dedication to them he described the city as the ideal of the restored Church:

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the gener ation after tr ent These things promote the faith (to tell the truth): the magnificence of the churches within and without the city; the special care for holy and revered relics of saints; the altars; the hospitals; the sumptuous monasteries. In addition, then, that natural modesty which shines out in you toward all foreigners as though in the clearest mirror, and which makes the whole world admire your glory when they consider the purity of your lives, the immense charity toward your citizens.103

Heresy and universal glory were twinned again at the beginning of Zarrabini’s predicabili. Zarrabini dedicated the work to Sixtus V, “Pontifex Maximus of the great city of Rome, and universal pastor of all the spiritual flock of Jesus Christ scattered from the Orient to the Occident and from one pole to the other, to present themselves to you and to kiss your holy feet and adore you as God on earth.” But the spiritual flock was not as universal as it could be. Zarrabini hoped that the pope would “be able to wage powerful war against the enemies of His holy name, and wipe out the impious heresies, such that everyone may know and follow Christ, the only and sole truth, and that there is one sole living and immortal God, one sole faith, and one sole baptism, one sole Catholic and Apostolic Roman Church, with one sole head, prince, and pastor.”104 The persistence of heretics made the insistence necessary. The need to articulate an idealized, glorious vision of the Church is even more explicit in the sermons of Sebastiano Avezzano, a Carmelite philosopher who bookended his collection with a pair of sonnets. The first mocked Martin Luther as a monster who obscured the eternal light of truth, but the second countered it by describing “Noble Rome,” which would surpass even ancient Rome in glory, treasure, immortality, and triumph, because it would rise again with Christ to a new life.105 Many Catholic apologists of the sixteenth century regarded the exploration of new countries as recompense for the loss of much of Europe to heresy. Preachers often took an even broader and more universal outlook. They spoke of a Catholicism whose glory derived from its wide reach and its internal diversity. Franceschino Visdomini proclaimed that the world’s many nations and languages were gifts from God, and that even Gentiles were given the Holy Spirit, though they did not know what to do with it.106 Giovanni

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Battista Cavoto di Melfe, in his introduction to Panigarola’s sermons, wrote how wonderful it was that Catholic doctrine is the same from India to Peru to Africa. The world is divided into five parts, he said, Asia, Africa, Europe, America and what he calls the “Magellan” continent, and the Catholic Church has conquered all of the latter three and most of the first two.107 Panigarola himself exclaimed: Not just in one way do men convene to adore God, but among all men, you can barely find two provinces, or nations, or regions, even small ones, who have the same method . . . ​[yet] whether they live together, in cities and families, or spread out, in the open, under the trees, in caves, in pavilions, Greeks, Barbarians, every nation in some way worships, and offers up sacrifices and vows and prizes to this great Deity. I don’t know why, but as it is natural for fishes to swim and horses to run, it is natural to every man, and only to man, in every age, to adore God.108

This broad perspective still seems unprecedented. But diversity in these sermons was to be celebrated not for its own sake but because it mirrored universal Catholic unity and obedience in service to the Church. Panigarola argued that there was equal variety in the ways all these people erred in their religion, and that his listeners should pride themselves on having been born into the one true faith. He mounted an elaborate proof of why Catholicism was true and the other faiths were false, and this too is new; the defense would not have been as necessary a century earlier. His proof exalts the Church by comparing it at great length to all the other alternatives in the world. The presence of other religions, in his view, only makes Catholicism more worthy: It is certain that there is only one true religion found on this earth, and given that there is only one, and that it is ours, and all the other ones are false, we must be sure to be happy and grateful, not only that we were not born animate, and intelligent . . . ​but also that we were born among those who have true worship of God; this is the greatest of favors, the highest of graces; it is so great, that we can never be sufficiently grateful.109 [  1 70  ]

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This new picture of the Catholic Church as one faith among many was not just conveyed through sermons; it was formed in the sermons. Because preachers sought to be explicit about the future of the Church, they also came to define it. In so doing they proved that preachers and sermons were critical tools of identity formation for the Catholic Church in the sixteenth century. This glorifying tone was set at the papal court, where Latin sermons of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries created a new vision of the Church triumphant and splendid, as well as a new Catholic identity. Those preachers helped to determine how the Church thought about itself in the new Tridentine era. What these vernacular sermons show us is that this vision was also made explicit to the laity. These sermons, which go to such pains to explain so much, are more than just preacherly self-­preservation. By publishing their sermons, by teaching scripture where it was not fully necessary, and by preaching glory to laypeople, preachers also proved the necessity of the laity in this new Catholic identity. In the sixteenth century, the Church had to redefine itself in the face of a new world, one that required it to confront not only new and competing doctrines close to home, but also new countries and new customs all over the globe. What we see in these sermons is a Church that did not dwell publicly on its errors but that tried instead to prove its validity and to celebrate it. The Catholic Church was competing for the first time with multiple religious truth claims in Europe and its tactic was to enter the race by declaring itself the triumphant and glorious winner.

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Epilogue Sermons and Their Reception

I.  The sermons and treatises reviewed in this study tell a story in large part about fear. They show Catholic clergymen fearing Protestants, fearing changes within their own leadership, fearing their own laity, and fearing above all the end of the world as they knew it—the devastation of both the spiritual and the temporal realms. For preachers, the fear was also specific: the problem of scripture. Protestants appeared not merely to offer the laity direct access to scripture but also to sanctify the act of their reading it. Naturally, this offer threatened to undermine the importance of all clerical authority and the vast edifice of apostolic tradition. It is no wonder that in their sermons and other works, preachers expected the worst and wrote as though the ultimate triumph of heresy was imminent throughout the Italian peninsula. Luca Baglioni still argued that heresy was on the rise in 1562: Today, heresies more than ever are at their peak, troubling the house of good Peter, I mean the Holy Church; and because she needs to be defended, it falls on every Catholic preacher to defend her ardently with the force of truth in every place and at every necessary opportunity. With all this the evangelical and

epilogue: ser mons and their r eception Catholic preacher must truly sweat, suffer, and exert himself with prayers to Christ . . . ​that he may find the proper mode of preaching against heretics.1

But for Catholic preachers, lay access to scripture put more than their own careers in jeopardy. It presented scripture—the bedrock of their faith— to the laity, a group they found repugnantly ignorant and menial, and forced them to confront that group directly in order to prevent mass apostasy. Preachers’ fear of and disdain for the laity is evident throughout the sources in this study: in Luigi Lippomano’s explanation that he “regrets in his very soul” having to teach doctrine to the Veronesi; in Franceschino Visdomini’s description of “carpenters, millers, fishmongers, barkeepers” who “lack either spirit or learning” but are full of the “bold temerity of the idiot and of the ignorant fool;” in Cornelio Musso’s references to the “foolish and ignorant populace”; and in Girolamo Seripando’s injunctions to his listeners, “let me not have to explain to you today . . .” and “all you need to understand is. . . .” Such a picture—men who are fearful to the point of paranoia, who build up dangers in order to clamp down on curiosity, who appear to despise the very audiences and congregations they serve—conforms to long-­standing and long-­lived pictures of a repressive Tridentine Church. Musso and Visdo­ mini’s descriptions continually remind us that to them heretics were Anti­ christs, servants of the devil who uprooted the institutions and rituals that ordered the world. Lippomano and the other treatise authors insisted that laypeople must obediently perform their duties and receive, not give, instruction. Questioning or seeking to know more would destroy the natural order of the universe. The fierce antiheretical stance of many sermons and treatises, Chizzola’s journey from potential heretic to Catholic zealot, and the exclusion of positions that did not explicitly endorse the institutional Church all show how the path of orthodoxy became narrower in this period, and the precipices alongside it steeper. Preachers and laypeople alike had to be more outspoken and less ambiguous about their loyalties. Under such circumstances, it is perhaps remarkable that any layperson in Catholic Italy heard scripture at all, especially in the post-­Tridentine period. But repressiveness and fear are not the only stories these sermons tell. In the very sermons that gave voice to their fears, some preachers recognized that the desire to know scripture was not itself a heresy. Some went [  1 73  ]

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out of their way to allow the laity to learn scripture under the new guidelines. Visdomini, though he delimited who could read what, insisted on the right of every person to read scripture and reminded his readers that “there is food for everyone.” Fiamma, too, believed that his job was to make scripture accessible and to use his sermons to teach textual lessons. Giovanni Del Bene showed other preachers in great detail how to explicate scripture in the pulpit throughout the year, and Luigi Lippomano commissioned him to do so despite his own deep-­seated disdain for commoners. Marcellino essentially read and explained books of the Bible to his listeners. Later mendicant preachers increased the paratexts that introduced their printed sermons in order to emphasize their scriptural content. Meanwhile, other illustrious preachers, such as Musso, Seripando, Panigarola, and Luca Baglioni, did not display the same willingness to open scripture to their audiences. These differing opinions about scripture are not marginal; they were at the heart of the Roman Church’s hopes for reform. Flexibility was a crucial attribute for a preacher—indeed, the ability to adapt in the pulpit and tailor a sermon to a congregation was already an old adage in preachers’ guides—but it also helped to make the pulpit the most important means of reform. The need for variety continued to define preaching even in the very changed contexts of post-­Tridentine Catholicism.2 Divergent positions on scripture, such as those of Musso and Visdomini, or Aleni and Del Bene, were evident in both the pulpit and the diocese. They appeared in printed books available for repeated reading. The continuing acclaim of preachers, the letters of endorsement in their publications, and the popularity and reprints of their sermons all sanctioned them. The need for differing approaches was embedded in the core of Catholic reform, even if it sometimes resulted in opposing messages. The Council fathers did not give preachers a script to follow in the pulpit. They trusted preachers to use their judgment and to present the material in whatever way seemed most likely to reach their audience. Moreover, the lack of effective, centralized oversight, especially during the middle decades of the century, allowed for an even greater range of preaching styles, personal preferences, and variability far beyond the assortment of different preaching traditions. Nor is this flexibility and internal diversity unique to Italy. Recent studies show that clerics in Spain used the same sort of initiative and personal dynamism in caring for their faithful, although Spain’s Catholicism, even more [  1 74  ]

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than Italy’s, has typically been characterized as monolithic and obedient. These clerics considered diversity—or haphazardness—a key characteristic of the clergy, for good or for ill, and assumed that affection for the laity was inextricably part of religious conceptions of a bishop’s job, even in its sternest and most disciplinarian aspects.3 These sorts of examples should put to rest long past their due, any lingering black legends and stereotypes about lockstep and unthinking Catholic conformity.4

Let us leave aside, for the moment, the question of what the preachers felt and thought, and look at what they did. On the eve of the Council of Trent, preachers were left with little guidance on the unprecedented and widespread transformation of the role of scripture in the Catholic Church. Scholars have argued that in the mid-­sixteenth century, scripture ceased to be central to preaching activity. But the undeniable fact remained: Laypeople wanted to know what was in the Bible, and Catholic preachers, however reluctantly, had to teach it to them. In sermons and even more obviously in preachers’ treatises, we see the emergence of a consensus around bishops, and the beginnings of its dissemination as an official position. Treatises, with their overlapping arguments, show how diocesan sermons could become the bedrock of the Catholic future—both for voicing new policies and for carrying them out. Lippomano and Seripando set up programs of regular preaching in their dioceses in order to both provide and control access to scripture. Gabriele Fiamma endorsed the diocesan model by writing for it despite his training in a very different rhetorical style. This approach confirmed traditional Church hierarchies and closed many doors to individual study of scripture; it narrowed the options for an ardent laity while placating a nervous clergy.5 Yet the teaching of scripture also survived in other ways: through paratexts, tables of contents, introductions, lectionaries, commentaries, printed sermons, and spoken exegesis. The lasting focus on scripture in all these contexts signals not its demise, but its continuing importance to the Catholic enterprise. As certain forms of devotional literature were cut off, such as vernacular Bibles, many alternatives emerged, and their long-­term effect merits further study. Scriptural teaching here is perhaps best understood, in [  1 75  ]

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Danilo Zardin’s term, as an arsenal, not a narrative; not a fixed body but a resource that could be tapped in a variety of formats.6 Preachers, both in the press and in the pulpit, undertook to preserve scriptural knowledge in a variety of ways, both oral and written. Their efforts remind us that preachers, for good or for ill, were at the heart of all efforts to recreate and redefine Catholicism for a post-­Luther, post-­Tridentine era.7 II.  Scholars must also remember that “reform” is not a one-­way street. These sources tell us a great deal about the hopes of preachers for their listeners and the articulation of ideas to different audiences. But they cannot tell us how those ideas were received, retold, or altered by the people who heard or read them. Nor can sermons tell us how ideas of reform traveled in other directions. Laypeople inevitably influenced preachers, and by extension, their sermons. To begin to imagine how sermons were received, we must turn to other less explicit sources and approach sermons indirectly. In this we are helped by resources both old and new that help us to learn the fate of printed books and something of how they were bought, sold, and kept.8 Between the publication of the Index librorum prohibitorum of 1596 and 1603, for example, Italian monastic communities sent inventories of their library holdings to the Congregation of the Index; so did a few individual monks and friars and a small number of female convents. These lists of books have now been compiled into a database, which allows for more direct analysis of the reading material available to monks at the turn of the seventeenth century.9 Inventories like these can demonstrate how widely printed sermons were disseminated, at least among monastics. For example, take the case of Giovanni Del Bene. His Sermoni overo Homelie was described in these pages as influential and popular. From the 1596 census, we learn that copies of the work were held in fifty-­five monasteries, even though monastic houses were theoretically among the least likely to need it.10 Copies of Del Bene’s work are listed under thirteen separate titles, which translate to roughly six or eight distinct and verifiable editions. Sermoni overo Homelie was Del Bene’s most frequently owned work, with his Discorsi on the passion accounting for approximately ten more of his thirty-­three listed titles. Only one institution possessed a copy of his rules for novices in a convent.11 [  1 76  ]

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Fifty-­five monasteries is a miniscule percentage of those reporting.12 By the numbers alone, Del Bene’s work barely registers. But the library lists nonetheless show us that his model sermons found their way to monasteries around the peninsula, from Sicily to Milan and many points in between. The great library of Santa Maria Incoronata in Pavia held a copy, along with 1800 other titles. Santa Maria Incoronata, a large Barnabite convent, somewhat predictably held a range of works relating to preaching, including books and pamphlets from the major preachers of the sixteenth century, but their preaching material only amounts to about fifty titles out of a total of 1882, evenly split between Italian and Latin.13 In that context, Del Bene’s work becomes more a prominent resource. The monastery also owned about half a dozen polemical treatises against heretics in Italian or Latin (including works by Paolino Bernardini), and even a German Bible. The inventory of Santa Maria Incoronata tells us little except that the monastery library was extensive and well furnished. But fifty miles down the road near Cremona, Fra Gotardo, prior of the tertiary convent of San Salvatore in Casalbuttano, listed Del Bene’s Sermoni among his eleven books. From his small collection, we see that Fra Gotardo took preaching seriously—he also possessed Remigio Fiorentino’s lectionary and Musso’s Lenten sermon collection—as well as his role as confessor. He owned three manuals for priests or confessors, two catechisms, one meditation on the life of Christ, one guide for Christian perfection, and one history of the Franciscan orders. Works written by members of mendicant orders, unsurprisingly, fared even better in these libraries. In these lists, ninety separate editions by Franceschino Visdomini appear; eighty are vernacular sermon works and six are in Latin.14 This does not even account for multiple convents holding the same title; Visdomini’s 1554 edition of his Homelie alone was held by twenty different institutions. These included none of the houses of Con­ ventuals, Visdomini’s own order, but did include twelve other Franciscan branches, one Franciscan tertiary organization, and eight houses from other orders. His work had appeal across the monastic world.

A seventeenth-­century sale catalogue from the famed Giunti printing house also hints at the lasting availability and circulation of sermons, and to a wider [  1 7 7  ]

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population than solely monasteries.15 In 1604, the heirs of Filippo Giunti prepared a list of Filippo’s books, which they published in the hope of attracting more elite and appreciative buyers. Filippo’s holdings ran to thousands of books, ranging from Greek and Latin classics to Hebrew works, medicine, mathematics, music, theology, and a large section of vernacular Italian works. This last category alone, with about 2850 titles, accounted for approximately a third of the total holdings. It included secular as well as devotional works, ranging from agricultural treatises (twelve) to family trees of noble families (twenty-­four) to letters and histories (fifty-­six and one hundred). Of these vernacular books, approximately seventy-­five volumes were devoted to sermons, scriptural commentaries, or predicabili. Giunti’s collection included five commentaries by Marcellino, six volumes of Musso’s sermons, two of Visdomini’s, three titles from Serafino Razzi, and two from Onofrio Zarrabini. Sermons from authors previously mentioned in this book account for about 60 percent of all the sermons in the catalogue; the others include patristic sermons from Augustine (two editions) and Bernard (three editions), and some from medieval preachers. Only two titles from Savonarola appear, reflecting perhaps the claim by the catalogue’s editors in their letter to readers that although they are trying to be comprehensive and cannot guarantee the complete orthodoxy of the collection, they have excised any material they knew to be condemned or suspect.16 The catalogue also includes the treatises of Chizzola and Lippomano. Sermons are not the single largest category of vernacular literature—there are about 150 comedies, 115 books of verse, and 100 lives of saints or heroes—but they make a sizable showing, especially compared to other religious works. A great deal more remains to be learned from approaching sermons as printed materials. But even this most cursory glance confirms at least that preaching material was collected and preserved. We rarely know for certain whether, or how often, it was read, but we know that it was available. Works published during the middle of the sixteenth century, a time of doctrinal vagueness and disagreement, survived and circulated for decades after the close of the Council and the arrival of an active program of censure. Although tactics such as those of Lippomano or Visdomini—printing heretical doctrines in italics, or telling listeners that a humble approach to scripture prevented heresy—could not easily be composed toward the end of the century, they could still be found and read. [  1 78  ]

epilogue: ser mons and their r eception

III.  Evidence for how sermons were read, however, is the most elusive evidence of all. It is rare for a sixteenth-­century listener to write down a record of a sermon attended, and even rarer for the record to survive. Yet on occasion such an account surfaces. One of the most vibrant examples comes from the last quarter of the century and shows how sermons continued to organize religious life for the faithful, especially in Italy. In 1580, an unknown priest followed his patron, Cardinal Ippolito Aldobrandini, from Spain to Rome. On his arrival, he found that every major church in the city had its own Lenten preacher and held daily sermons during Lent. He discovered a buyer’s market for sermons, in which he could choose a different preacher in a different church every day of Lent or pick one speaker and listen to his entire series of thirty-­six sermons for the season.17 He could crisscross the city in pursuit of his favorites, and he did just that. Preaching dominated public religious life in the sixteenth century as it had in centuries past. The priest’s diary shows a sanctification of public space in Rome, presenting the city as a permanent festival of public preaching, especially during Lent. It confirms much of the picture drawn by the English pilgrim Gregory Martin.18 Yet unlike Martin, the diary author was writing for personal reasons, without Martin’s desire to glorify the city and its piety to his countrymen. Aldobrandini’s servant took full advantage of the wealth of sermon offerings. For at least twelve years, from the first Lenten season he spent in Rome to his presumed death in 1593, he attended a sermon every day of Lent, and he never failed to note in his diary what, where, and whom he had heard preaching.19 His diary reveals how sermons were part of the fabric of religious life in Rome. Its author notes the presence of important preachers, the churches where they spoke, and the subjects of their sermons. He treats the Lenten cycle as a coherent unit, tending to seek out the same preacher for the entire period. Usually this meant frequenting the same church throughout Lent, but when his chosen preacher gave an extraordinary sermon elsewhere, the author followed him. This cleric’s record illustrates how an average listener might react to and understand a sermon. The author was educated—he was not one of the “semplici” disdained by so many preachers—and a member of a clerical household with ties to the inner workings of the Holy See. Nonetheless, he was not a preacher or a theologian himself, but a busily employed servant. Apart from sermons, his main concerns as recorded in the diary were the [  1 79  ]

t h e pu lpi t a nd t h e pr e ss i n r efor m at ion i ta ly

weather, the dinner menu, and the health and activities of his patron, Cardinal Aldobrandini, especially after the latter’s elevation to the papacy as Clement VIII in 1592 (where he would issue the Index that led to the aforementioned monastic library lists). At the same time, the author was a deeply religious man who took seriously the job of listening to a sermon. He chose his own sermons and preachers instead of accompanying the cardinal, and he felt it necessary to apologize to himself when, in 1590, he had to miss one sermon after the cardinal sent him a last-­m inute dinner guest.20 Scripture is central to his understanding of sermons. The author almost always notes the verse on which the sermon in based, even when he records nothing else. He is more likely to note the subject of a sermon than the preacher. For Thursday, April 9, 1581, he writes in a typical entry, “Station at S. Martino in Montagna. Sermon at the Jesu Church, on ‘Adolescens sibi dico surge’.”21 Over the course of many years, the same themes return every season and become ritualized. Above all, the diary demonstrates how much a sermon could matter to a listener. During his sojourn in Spain, its author did not mention attending sermons but wrote down who came over to play cards with the cardinal in the evening. In Rome, however, he often mentioned nothing except the sermon he heard that day. Sermons are the most consistent topic in the diary. Over the course of twelve years, the diary becomes increasingly detailed about sermons. Its author, an astute listener, began to note not just the location, preacher, and subject, but the content as well. He noted the different sections of the sermon and the subjects and scriptural texts of each. Starting in 1589, he began to summarize or paraphrase most of the sermons he heard. Summaries could be as short as three lines of keywords or as long as a page. On Thursday, February 28, 1591, he wrote, I went . . . ​to the sermon of Father Carlo, which discussed how we must act before God, having discussed yesterday how we must act with ourselves, and tomorrow how we must act with others, and these are three fundamental elements. The prologue, on how important it is to hear the Word of God, and how necessary, as a hammer is to a smith, a sword to a soldier, a pen to a writer, a book to a scholar, a navigation map to a sailor, ­confirming everything with the authority of Holy Scripture. [  180  ]

epilogue: ser mons and their r eception The theme, “Nam et ego homo son,” with essential, final, material, and formal arguments, “ideo mihi adherere Deo bonum est,” “puer iaces paraliticus e male torquet” on the corruption of human nature. “puer,”—the intellect, “iaces,”—the will, “paraliticus,”—the senses, “male torquetur,”—the miserable body. The rule in all matters being, “Deus in adiutorium meum intende Domine ad adiuvandum me festina”—call on Holy God in aid, for he is always ready to give us the grace which he concedes to us. Amen.22

His summary shows how a preacher might use the biblical verses that are the theme of his sermon. More important, it demonstrates that sermons could penetrate the hearts and minds of their hearers. The author’s final “Amen” might suggest a personal adherence to the message of the sermon. Other entries are more explicit. In his entry for Thursday, April 4, 1591, he noted that he heard a sermon on Mary Magdalen and ended his summary with the words, “Thus may it please God to give me, and all sinners, a heart of contrition and penitence. Amen.”23 The author’s attendance at sermons led him to reflect later in the day on what he had heard, to use the sermon as a tool for spiritual growth, and to write down its message for future contemplation. It seems unlikely that Father Carlo knew how his sermon affected any listener, much less this one, but his carefully constructed sermon clearly made a deep impression. This is why so much of the Tridentine reform agenda was entrusted to preachers and why in the end preachers were perhaps most responsible for the suppression of heresy and the reformation of Catholic identity in Italy.

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Appendix: Key Preachers in Italy

70 Cornelio Musso Francesco Panigarola Francesco Visdomini Girolamo Savonarola Lodovico Pittorio Luis de Grenada

60

Works Published

50

40

30

20

10

Year of Publication

Figure 9  ​Key preachers in Italy Source: Edit16/USTC accessed May 2010

1595

1590

1585

1580

1575

1570

1565

1560

1555

1550

1545

1540

1535

1530

1525

1520

1515

1510

1505

1500

0

a ppendi x: k ey pr each er s i n i ta ly

Pre-­Trent: Girolamo Savonarola (1452–1498) Ludovico Pittorio (1454–1525) The generation of Trent: Cornelio Musso (1511–1574) Franceschino Visdomini (1516–1573) The generation after Trent: Luis de Granada (1504–1588) Francesco Panigarola (1548–1594) These preachers represent three distinct generations and are also among the most prolific authors of sermon literature in the sixteenth century. This chart shows the total numbers of works each of them published, including reprints, subsequent titles, and works with no explicit reference to sermons in their titles. The chart documents the general increase in printing towards the end of the century and the great popularity of Luis de Granada and Panigarola, but it also reveals the continuing publication of Musso’s works after his death in 1574 and the abiding interest in sermon literature in general.

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Notes

Introduction 1. “Io non la feci, se non per servigio di me medesimo, parendomi strano che leggendo, e predicando ogni giorno, ogni giorno anche salmeggiassi senza intender parola di quello che io diceva,” Dichiarazione de’ salmi di Davide (Venice, 1680), in Danilo Zardin, “Tra Latino e Volgare: La ‘Dichiarazione dei Salmi’ del Panigarola e i filtri di accesso alla materia biblica nell’editoria della controriforma,” Sincronie IV, no. 7 (2000): 125. Unless otherwise noted, all translations are my own. 2. Lina Bolzoni, “Oratoria e prediche,” in Letteratura Italiana, vol. III.2 (Turin: Einaudi, 1984), 1041–1074. 3. Adriano Prosperi, Tribunali della Coscienza: Inquisitori, confessori, missionari (Turin: Einaudi, 1996), ix. 4. In this study, I will usually call the adherents to Protestant denominations “heretics” or “heterodox.” These terms, though obviously problematic, reflect the perspective of my Catholic subjects (not my own). I will also use the term “Protestant,” although it is anachronistic for this period, as a way of reflecting the same level of undifferentiation that characterized Catholic descriptions. Alternative terms are insufficient: “reformer” because it excludes reformers who remained within the Catholic Church; “Lutheran” because it now denotes

no t e s t o pag e s 3 – 4 a particular denomination and is no longer the catchall term it was for Catholics in the early sixteenth century. I define heretics simply as those at odds with the Roman curia, following the lead of John Martin, although fully aware that both “orthodoxy” and “heterodoxy” are porous and shifting terms. The subjects of this study, and the Church that housed them, are described as “Catholic”—a term only common in sermons toward the end of the sixteenth century—or, their term of preference, “Roman.” John Jeffries Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies: Italian Heretics in a Renaissance City (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 9. 5. Norman P. Tanner, Decrees of the Ecumenical Councils (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 1990). The first and most famous history of the Council of Trent, and the first to address the background and debates behind the decrees, is that of Paolo Sarpi in 1619: Istoria del Concilio Tridentino, ed. C. Vivanti, 2 vols. (Turin, 1974). The range of documentation for the Council, including personal diaries of participants, correspondence (especially with Rome), and records of votes and theological discussions, were not made fully available until the early twentieth century; they are now collected in Concilium Tridentinum: Diariorum, actorum, epistularum, tractatuum nova collectio, ed. Societas Goerresiana, 13 vols. in 18 (Friburgi Brisgoviae: Herder, 1901–2001). The most comprehensive and authoritative narrative history is Hubert Jedin, Geschichte des Konzils von Trient, 4 vols, Freiburn 1949–1975, or Hubert Jedin, A History of the Council of Trent, vol. II, 2 vols. (St. Louis: B. Herner, 1957). See also Alain Tallon, Le Concile De Trente (Paris: Cerf, 2000); John W. O’Malley, “The Council of Trent: Myths, Misunderstandings, and Misinformation,” in Spirit, Style, Story: Essays Honoring John W. Padberg, S.J., ed. Thomas M. Lucas (Chicago: Loyola Press, 2002), 205–226; John W. O’Malley, Trent: What Happened at the Council (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press, 2013); Adriano Prosperi, Il Concilio di Trento: Un’introduzione storica (Turin: Einaudi, 2001); Guy Bedouelle, The Reform of Catholicism, 1480–1620 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Mediaeval Studies, 2008); Simon Ditchfield, “Trent Revisited,” in Per Adriano Prosperi, Vol. I: La Fede degli italiani, ed. Guido Dall’Olio, Adelisa Malena, and Pierroberto Scaramella (Pisa: Scuola Normale Superiore, 2011), 629–54; Paolo Prodi and Wolfgang Reinhard, eds., Il Concilio di Trento e il moderno (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1996); Cesare Mozzarelli and Danilo Zardin, eds., I Tempi del concilio: Religione, cultura e società nell’europa tridentina (Rome: Bulzoni, 1997). 6. Danilo Zardin, “Bibbia e apparati biblici nei conventi italini del Cinque-­ Seicento,” in Libri, biblioteche e cultura degli ordini regolari nell’Italia moderna attraverso la documentazione della congregazione dell’Indice (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2006), 63–103; Marc Saperstein, Jewish Preaching 1200–1800: An Anthology (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), 20.

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no t e s t o pag e s 4 – 6 7. I use the term “post-­Tridentine” to refer to the period after the Council, and not to refer to a new period beginning after a so-­called “Tridentine era”. 8. Simon Ditchfield, Liturgy, Sanctity, and History in Tridentine Italy: Pietro Maria Campi and the Preservation of the Particular (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 10. 9. “Finally, there is so much more to know about transmission of ideas. . . . ​we also need to do more work on sermons and hymns, because we have hardly exploited all there is to know about how people heard and understood words and music.” Mack P. Holt, “The Social History of the Reformation: Recent Trends and Future Agendas,” Journal of Social History 37, no. 1 (October 1, 2003): 140–141; William Hudon, “Religion and Society in Early Modern Italy—Old Questions, New Insights,” The American Historical Review 101, no. 3 (June 1996): 783–804; Wietse de Boer, “The Conquest of the Soul: Confession, Discipline, and Public Order in Counter-­Reformation Milan,” (Leiden: Brill, 2001). 1316– 1317. De Boer’s study of Milan demonstrates one way to compare legislation with implementation, but more such studies are needed. 10. This approach perhaps begins with the treatment in Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, ed. Peter Burke (Penguin, 1860), 297–306. 11. John O’Malley, Praise and Blame in Renaissance Rome: Rhetoric, Doctrine, and Reform in the Sacred Orators of the Papal Court, c. 1450–1521 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1979); Frederick McGinness, “Preaching Ideals and Practice in Counter-­Reformation Rome,” Sixteenth Century Journal 11 (1980): 109–129; Frederick McGinness, Right Thinking and Sacred Oratory in Counter-­Reformation Rome (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995). 12. See Larissa Taylor, Soldiers of Christ: Preaching in Late Medieval and Reformation France (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1992); Corrie Norman, Humanist Taste and Franciscan Values: Cornelio Musso and Catholic Preaching in Sixteenth-­ Century Italy. (New York: Peter Lang, 1998); Megan Armstrong, The Politics of Piety: Franciscan Preachers During the Wars of Religion, 1560–1600 (Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2004); Susan Wabuda, Preaching during the English Reformation (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2002); John Frymire, The Primacy of the Postils: Catholics, Protestants, and the Dissemination of Ideas in Early Modern Germany (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010); Benjamin Wood Westervelt, “The Prodigal Son at Santa Justina: The Homily in the Borromean Reform of Pastoral Preaching,” Sixteenth Century Journal 32 (2001): 109–126; Larissa J. Taylor, ed., Preachers and People in the Reformations and Early Modern Period (Leiden: Brill, 2001). 13. Bernd Moeller, “Stadt und Buch. Bemerkungen zur Struktur der reformatorischen Bewegung in Deutschland,” in Stadtbuergertum und Adel in der

[  187  ]

no t e s t o pag e s 6 – 7 Reformation ed. Wolfgang J. Mommsen, P. Alter, and Robert Scribner (Stuttgart: Klett-­Cotta, 1979), 25–39. 14. For an overview of the Italian anti-­Catholic tradition in this vein, see Massimo Firpo, “Historiographical Introduction,” in The Italian Reformation of the Sixteenth Century and the Diffusion of Renaissance Culture: A Bibliography of the Secondary Literature (ca. 1750–1997), by John Tedeschi and James M. Lattis, Istituto di Studi Rinascimentali Ferrara (Ferrara: Franco Cosimo Panini Editore, 2000), xxii–xxv. Silvana Seidel Menchi, “The Age of Reformation and Counter-­Reformation in Italian Historiography, 1939–2009,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 100 (2009): 193–217. 15. For example, the well-­k nown heterodox Beneficio di Cristo was widely distributed, and was not the only such treatise to circulate in Italy. Heterodox preachers also travelled throughout Italy in the 1530s and 1540s, often preaching in the same venues as their more orthodox colleagues. Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies, 81–89; for the insufficiency of Reformation models based solely on Lutheran Germany, see Andrew Pettegree and Matthew Hall, “The Reformation and the Book: A Reconsideration,” The Historical Journal 47, no. 4 (December 1, 2004): 785–808. 16. Alain Tallon, “Concilio di Trento,” in Dizionario storico dell’inquisizione, ed. Adriano Prosperi, Vincenzo Lavenia, and John Tedeschi, vol. 1, 4 vols. (Pisa: Scuola Normale Superiore, 2010), 362–367. 17. This binary thesis is most closely associated with Massimo Firpo. See Inquisizione romana e controriforma: Studi sul cardinal Giovanni Morone e il suo processo d’eresia. (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1992); Adriano Prosperi, Tra evangelismo e controriforma: G. M. Giberti (1495–1543) (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1969); Vittorio Coletti, Parole dal pulpito: Chiesa e movimenti religiosi tra latino e volgare nell’Italia del medioevo e del rinascimento (Casale Monferrato: Marietti, 1983); “The Papacy in the Age of Reform, 1513–1644,” in Early Modern Catholicism: Essays in Honour of John W. O’Malley, S.J. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001), 46–66; Anne Jacobson Schutte, “Periodization of Sixteenth-­Century Italian Religious History: The Post-­Cantimori Paradigm Shift,” The Journal of Modern History 61, no. 2 (June 1989): 269–284. A recent edition of the most popular Reformation textbook, although it captures some of the complexity of Catholic responses to reform, reinforces this binary grouping: Carter Lindberg, The European Reformations (Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers, 2009). It survives unquestioned in much Italian literature; see, for example, Daniele Santarelli, “Paolo IV, Papa,” in Dizionario storico dell’inquisizione, ed. Adriano Prosperi, Vincenzo Lavenia, and John Tedeschi, vol. 3, 4 vols. (Pisa: Scuola Normale Superiore, 2010), 1164– 1166, which relies on Firpo’s interpretation. 18. See Robert J. Bast and Andrew C. Gow, eds., Continuity and Change: The Harvest

[  188  ]

no t e s t o pag e s 7 – 8 of Late Medieval and Reformation History: Essays Presented to Heiko A. Oberman on His 70th Birthday (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2000); Giovanni Baffetti, Ginetta Auzzas, and Carlo Delcorno, eds., Letteratura in forma di sermone (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2003); Stephen Bowd, Reform Before the Reformation: Vicenzo Querini and the Religious Renaissance in Italy. (Boston; Leiden: Brill, 2002). Although Bowd groups his subjects into spirituali and intransigenti, he is at pains to demonstrate their cooperation and common background. See also Paul V. Murphy, “Between ‘Spirituali’ and ‘Intransigenti’: Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga and Patrician Reform in Sixteenth-­Century Italy,” The Catholic Historical Review 88, no. 3 (July 2002): 446–469, and Ruling Peacefully: Cardinal Ercole Gonzaga and Patrician Reform in Sixteenth-­Century Italy (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America Press, 2007). William Hudon’s studies of Marcello Cervini seek to show that Cervini, a supposed ‘intransigente,’ cooperated closely with many ‘spirituali,’ in Marcello Cervini and Ecclesiastical Government in Tridentine Italy (DeKalb, IL: Northern Illinois University Press, 1992); Gleason and Fragnito’s studies of Contarini complicate his spirituale stereotype: Elisabeth Gleason, Gasparo Contarini: Venice, Rome, and Reform (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993); Gigliola Fragnito, Gasparo Contarini: Un magistrato veneziano al servizio della cristianità, vol. IX (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1988); Simon Ditchfield advocates the addition of a local/peripheral dichotomy in “In Search of Local Knowledge: Rewriting Early Modern Italian Religious History,” Cristianesimo Nella Storia 19 (1998): 255–296, and Liturgy, Sanctity, and History. 19. Christopher F. Black, Church, Religion, and Society in Early Modern Italy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 225. Black argues that the early modern period generally saw a revival and reinvigoration of Catholic activity, but no development of an overbearing Church or papal monarchy. This contradicts the argument of Adriano Prosperi’s Tribunali della Coscienza, discussed below, that the Inquisition was the great instrument for centralizing and modernizing Italy. 20. See Hubert Jedin, “Catholic Reformation or Counter-­Reformation,” in The Counter-­Reformation: The Essential Readings, ed. David M. Luebke (Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing, 1999); Jedin, History, II; H. Outram Evennett, The Spirit of the Counter-­Reformation (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1968). 21. John W. O’Malley, Trent and All That: Renaming Catholicism in the Early Modern Era (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000). 22. Prosperi, Tribunali della coscienza; Simon Ditchfield, “In Sarpi’s Shadow: Coping with Trent the Italian way,” in Studi in memoria di Cesare Mozzarelli, vol. 1, 2 vols. (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 2008), 585–606. 23. On the related topic of whether heterodox thought in Italy was considered a foreign import or an indigenous product, preachers were vague and could describe the threat as insidiously Italian or monstrously German, as needed.

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no t e s t o pag e s 8 – 1 1 This question is summarized in Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies, 4–9. The history of orthodox refomers is less well documented. 24. “Catholic doctrine was not a free-­for-­a ll before 1563 but there were any number of issues on which good Catholics might differ; the debates that took place on the Council floor were proof enough of that.” Frymire, Primacy of the Postils, 256. 25. Emily Michelson, “An Italian Explains the English Reformation (with God’s Help),” in A Linking of Heaven and Earth: Studies in Religious and Cultural History in Honor of Carlos Eire, ed. Emily Michelson, Scott K. Taylor, and Mary Noll Venables (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2012). 26. The focus on heretics is due largely to the influence of Delio Cantimori, Eretici Italiani Del Cinquecento (Turin: Enaudi, 1939), and continues through to John Tedeschi and James M. Lattis, The Italian Reformation of the Sixteenth Century and the Diffusion of Renaissance Culture; see also Seidel Menchi, “Age of Reformation.” “There was no such thing even as theoretical orthodoxy before Trent and not for a long time thereafter in practice.” Thomas F. Mayer, Reginald Pole: Prince and Prophet (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 7–8; see also Anne Jacobson Schutte, “Adelisa Malena. L’Eresia dei perfetti: Inquisizione romana ed esperienze mistiche nel seicento italiano,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 36, no. 2 (July 1, 2005): 559–561. 27. Firpo, “Historiographical Introduction”; Wietse De Boer, “Social Discipline in Italy: Peregrinations of a Historical Paradigm,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 94 (2003): 294–307; Wietse de Boer, “An Uneasy Reunion: The Catholic World in Reformation Studies,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 100 (2009): 366–389; Seidel Menchi, “Age of Reformation.” 28. De Boer, “An Uneasy Reunion,” 378; For the general contours and history of the confessionalization thesis, see R. Po-­Chia Hsia, Social Discipline in the Reformation: Central Europe 1550–1750 (London and New York: Routledge, 1989); De Boer, “Social Discipline in Italy”; Prodi and Reinhard, Il Concilio di Trento e il moderno; Paolo Prodi and Carla Penuti, Disciplina dell’anima, disciplina del corpo e disciplina della società tra medioevo ed età moderna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1994). 29. Prosperi, Tribunali della Coscienza. 30. See Forster, Marc R., Catholic Revival in the Age of the Baroque: Religious Identity in Southwest Germany, 1550–1750 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001); David Gentilcore, From Bishop to Witch: The System of the Sacred in Early Modern Terra d’Otranto (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 1992). 31. Luigi Lippomano, Confirmatione et Stabilimento di tutti li dogmi Catholici (Verona, 1553), dedicatory letter. 32. De Boer, “Social Discipline in Italy,” 304.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 1 – 16 33. Thomas Mayer proposes the phrase “reform tendency” as a more flexible characterization of Reginald Pole’s circle. Mayer, Reginald Pole, 7–9. See also Ronald K. Delph et al., eds., Heresy, Culture, and Reform in Early Modern Italy, 2006. 34. “Historical writing begins to describe the human character of the societies it seeks to decipher only when it demonstrates complexity and contradiction. In this case, that would require not only assessing the political, intellectual, social, and economic factors behind Venetian “heretical” evangelism, as Martin has admirably done, but at the very least, acknowledging that a similar complexity lay behind the ‘orthodox’ response.” William V. Hudon, “John Martin. Venice’s Hidden Enemies: Italian Heretics in a Renaissance City,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 25, no. 4 (December 1, 1994): 952–953. 35. Orders of monks that require a specific vow of poverty are called mendicant orders; the term refers to Franciscans, Dominicans, Carmelites, and Augustinians. Mendicants in fact often came from or frequented noble, elite, and educated circles; thus “elite mendicant” is not a contradiction in this period. All members of monastic orders, mendicant or not, are called “regular” clergy because they belong to an order with a rule. Priests who belong to no order, such as parish priests, are called secular clergy.

1. Where Sermons Mattered 1. Predica del Reverendo p. frat’Angelo Castiglione da Genova Carmelita. Havuta nel Duomo di Milano, la terza Domenica d’Ottobre, nel MDLIII per far animo e consolar’ alcuni, quali sospetti, d’Heretica pravità, quella stessa mattina, subbito doppò la predica, in presenza di tutt’il Popolo, abgiurarono (Milan, 1553). 2. “Hanno havute openioni Heretiche, Luterane, e sacramentarie, ravedutisi de suoi errori, e dentro per gratia illuminati di verità, non solamente, co l’animo gli hanno detestati. Ma anchora stamane palesamente qui in Chiesa, finiti questi nostri sermoni, intendono di detestargli . . . ​abgiurando ogno heresia, positione, e dogma, contrario alla Fede Catholica.” Ibid. 3. “Tutti quei che senza humiltà, senza spirito di Dio, superbamente presumendo delle forze, del loro ingegno, han voluto spore, e dichiarare la scrittura santa, pessimamente hanno errato, e caduti sonno in mille errori, e sdruciolati in molte heresie, quantunque dotti, quantunque armati delle dottrine humane, quantunque essercitati, e versati nelle sacre lettere . . . ​Nulladimeno percioche nell’intendere, e nel spore le scritture sante, si dipartivano dal Catholico sentimento, sprezata l’autorita della Chiesa universale, pertinacemente ad’herivano a i loro trovamenti, eran’heretici.” Ibid. 4. Homelie del Reuerendo padre f. Angelo Castiglione per le domeniche, et tutte le feste principali dell’anno. Parte prima [-­terza]. (Milan, 1584–1585).

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no t e s t o pag e s 16 – 19 5. “Questo veramente, Padre Santo, è il primo genere dal tratare le cose divine, posto in uso tra noi da San Pietro, da San Paolo, e da tutti gli Apostoli, e da Christo istesso, nell’Evangelio, per sermoni publici, e popolari, al quale seguitano nel secondo luogo le dispute, e nel terzo le consultationi.” Cornelio Musso, I tre libri delle prediche del Reverendissimo Mons. Cornelio Musso (Venice, 1577), dedication to Pius IV preceding part II. Pius IV reigned from 1559 to 1565 (the volume was not published until later). 6. See Ottavia Niccoli, Prophecy and People in Renaissance Italy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990); Frederick McGinness, “Preaching Ideals and Practice in Counter-­Reformation Rome,” Sixteenth Century Journal 11 (1980): 109–129; Frederick McGinness, Right Thinking and Sacred Oratory in Counter-­ Reformation Rome (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995); John O’Malley, Religious Culture in the Sixteenth Century (Ashgate, UK: Variorum, Ashgate Publishing Limited, 1993); John O’Malley, Praise and Blame in Renaissance Rome: Rhetoric, Doctrine, and Reform in the Sacred Orators of the Papal Court, c. 1450–1521 (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1979). 7. See Cynthia L. Polecritti, Preaching Peace in Renaissance Italy: Bernardino of Siena and His Audience (Washington, DC: Catholic University Press, 2000). 8. Corrie Norman, “The Social History of Preaching,” in Preachers and People in the Reformations and Early Modern Period ed. Larissa Taylor (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2001), 129–130. 9. Anscar Zawart, The History of Franciscan Preaching and of Franciscan Preachers (1209–1927). A Bio-Bibliographical Study (Athol Springs, NY: Franciscan Educa­ tional Conference, 1927), 242–587. As of the beginning of the thirteenth century, mendicant preachers were allowed to preach in churches, as well as outdoors. At the Council of Vienne, in 1312, the papal bull of Clement V, Super Cathedram, gave friars full liberty to preach and to perform other pastoral duties. Nonetheless, they traditionally remained free from direct episcopal control, which included control over the nature and content of their sermons. 10. Roberto Rusconi, “Predicatori e predicazione (secoli IX–XVIII),” in Storia d’Italia. Annali, vol. 4: Intellettuali e potere (Torino, 1981), 951–1030. 11. Samuele Giombi, Libri e pulpiti: Letteratura, sapienza e storia religiosa nel rinascimento (Rome: Carocci, 2001), 263–268; Zawart, “Franciscan Preaching,” 377–378, notes that the division of labor between regular and secular clergy created considerable friction. John O’Malley, “Form, Content and Influence of Works About Preaching Before Trent: The Franciscan Contribution,” in I Frati minori tra ’400 e ’500: Atti nel XII convengno internazionale (Assisi: Centro di Studi Francescani, 1984), 44–47; Corrie Norman, Humanist Taste and Franciscan Values: Cornelio Musso and Catholic Preaching in Sixteenth-­Century Italy. (New York: Peter Lang, 1998).

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no t e s t o pag e s 2 0 – 2 3 12. Gasparo Contarini, The Office of a Bishop (de officio viri boni et probi episcopi) (Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 2002), 105. 13. Recent works on Savonarola include Riccardo Fubini, Savonarola Riformatore: radicalismo religioso e politico all’avvento delle guerre d’Italia (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2009); Tamar Herzig, Savonarola’s Women: Visions and Reform in Renaissance Italy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007); Stefano Dall’Aglio, Savonarola in Francia: Circolazione di un’eredita politico-­religiosa nell’Europa del Cinquecento, Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento (Florence: Nino Aragno Editore, 2006); Lauro Martines, Fire in the City: Savonarola and the Struggle for the Soul of Renaissance Florence (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2006); Donald Weinstein, Savonarola: The Rise and Fall of a Renaissance Prophet (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011); Mario Bruschi, Le Prediche sopra Ezechiel propheta di Fra’ Girolamo Savonarola: un esemplare “pistoiese” postillato e censurato (Pistoia: Nuova FAG, 2008). 14. Niccoli, Prophecy and People, 104; Rusconi, “Predicatori e Predicazione,” 987. 15. This formula was most clearly delineated in Thomas Chapham’s Summa de arte praedicandi but is laid out in most Artes Praedicandi. See James J. Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages: a History of Rhetorical Theory from Saint Augustine to the Renaissance. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974); Carlo Delcorno, “Medieval Preaching in Italy (1200–1500),” in The Sermon, ed. Beverly Mayne Kienzle, vol. 81/83, Typologie Des Sources Du Moyen Âge Occidental (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2000), 449–560; and the various titles of David D’Avray. It is important to note that the sermo modernus was not the sole preaching genre practiced in Italy, but it was the most prevalent. For early modern preaching rhetoric in Italy, see O’Malley, Religious Culture; Carlo Delcorno, “Dal ‘sermo modernus’ alla retorica ‘borromea,’   ” Lettere italiane 39 (1989): 465–483; Carlo Delcorno, “Forme della predicazione cattolica fra cinque e seicento,” in Cultura d’élite e cultura popolare nell’arco alpino fra cinque e seicento (Boston: Mirkhaeuser Verlag, 1995), 275–302; Samuele Giombi, “Dinamiche della predicazione cinquecentesca tra forma retorica e normativa religiosa: Le istruzioni episcopali ai predicatori,” Cristianesimo nella storia 13 (1992): 73–102; John McManamon, Funeral Oratory and the Cultural Ideals of Italian Humanism (Chapel Hill and London: University of North Carolina Press, 1989); Thomas Worcester, “The Catholic Sermon,” in Preachers and People in the Reformations and Early Modern Period, ed. Larissa Taylor (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 3–34. 16. John O’Malley, “Content and Rhetorical Forms in Sixteenth-­Century Treatises on Preaching,” in Renaissance Eloquence (Berkeley, 1983), 240; see also “Form, Content and Influence”; Praise and Blame. 17. Lina Bolzoni, “Oratoria e prediche,” in Letteratura Italiana, vol. III.2 (Torino: Einaudi, 1984), 1057–1058; Maria Teresa Girardi, “Cornelio Musso, predicatore e

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no t e s t o pag e s 2 3 – 2 4 vescovo francescano dell’età conciliare,” in Milano borromaica atelier culturale della Controriforma, ed. Danilo Zardin and Maria Luisa Frosio, Studia Borromaica 21 (Milan: Biblioteca Ambrosiana, 2007), 308; Samuele Giombi, “Livelli di cultura nella trattatistica sulla predicazione e l’eloquenza sacra del XVI secolo,” in Cultura d’élite e cultura popolare nell’arco alpino fra Cinque e Seicento (Boston: Mirkhaeuser Verlag, 1995), 252; Susan C. Karant-­Nunn, The Reformation of Feeling: Shaping the Religious Emotions in Early Modern Germany (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2010), 15–62. 18. Predicatori della parola di Dio (Venice, 1565), and Diverse orationi volgarmente scritte (Venice, 1561). 19. “Sicome in un gran prato pieno di vaghi, e odorosi fiori, è difficilissima cosa ad un girar d’occhio saper discernere il piu bello tra tutti . . . ​cosa nella Christiana religione, in cui sola è raccolto quanto di bello, e di bene si vede sparso in tutte l’altre legge, non è molto facile il poter giudicar subito, e dar sententia à qual virtù meritamente si converga la palma, la maggior laude, e’l maggior premio.” I tre libri delle prediche, I.1. Musso’s three-­volume collection sermons will be cited by volume, sermon number, and where possible, page. All references are to the 1577 edition. 20. Predica di Christo Pastore, fatta in Roma, in S. Lorenzo in Damaso, la seconda Domenica dopò Pasca, Sopra l’Evangelio corrente. Ego Sum Pastor Bonus. L’anno MDXXXIX. Ibid., II.3. 21. “Voi aiuterete i poveri, libererete gli oppressi, premierete i buoni: tollerete infino ad un certo segno i peccatori: poi gli castigherete paternamente, gli farete riconoscere de’ loro errori: gli amerete tutti, gli abbraccerete tutti, non caccerete huomo alcuno dal grembo vostro; ammonite gl’inquieti, concorderete i litiganti, non lascerete fare violentia a’ poverelli, consolerete i pusilli, sostenerete gli infermi domerete i contumaci, insegnerete à quelli che non sanno, ecciterete i pigri, raffrenerete i superbi, humilierete i contentiosi, mortificherete gl’insolenti.” Ibid., II.3, 123. 22. O’Malley, “Form, Content and Influence,” 44–47; Norman, Humanist Taste. 23. For the re-­creation of sermons through artistic evidence, see Nirit Ben-­A ryeh Debby, The Renaissance Pulpit: Art and Preaching in Tuscany, 1400–1550 (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2007). 24. Michael Baxandall argues that gestures allowed Italian preachers to preach in non-­Italian-­speaking northern Europe without compromising too much content. Painting and Experience in Fifteenth-­century Italy (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1988), 64; see also Beverly Mayne Kienzle, “Medieval Sermons and Their Performance,” in Preacher, Sermon and Audience in the Middle Ages, ed. Carolyn Muessig (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2002), 109. 25. Kienzle, “Medieval Sermons,” 98–103; Maria Giuseppina Muzzarelli, Pescatori di uomini: Predicatori e piazze alla fine del Medioevo (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005), 118–126.

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no t e s t o pag e s 2 5 – 2 6 26. “Noi certo fatto non lo habbiamo mai; ne luogo habbiamo trovato studiando, dal quale habbiamo potuto cavare coniettura, che i Santi Padri antichi lo facessero.” Francesco Panigarola, Il Predicatore, 1609, Fff 8v (p. 828). 27. Serafino Razzi, Sermoni predicabili dalla prima domenica dell’Avvento fino all’ottava Pasqua di Resurrezzione (Florence, 1590). 28. “La viva voce, l’azzioni esterne, e lo spirit del predicatore . . . ​non puo l’istessa privata lezzione, e muta scrittura [insegnare],” Timoteo Buonamici, preface to Razzi’s Sermoni Predicabili, unpaginated. 29. Francesco Panigarola, Il Predicatore, D2v (p59). Todd Borgerding, “Preachers, ‘Pronunciatio,’ and Music: Hearing Rhetoric in Renaissance Sacred Polyphony,” The Musical Quarterly 82, no. 3/4 (October 1, 1998): 586–598; Carolyn Valone, “The Art of Hearing: Sermons and Images in the Chapel of Lucrezia della Rovere,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 3 (Autumn 2000): 753–777. 30. Theories of gesture among Protestant preachers in England developed in response to their perceptions of Catholic, especially Jesuit, histrionics. Arnold Hunt, The Art of Hearing: English Preachers and Their Audiences, 1590–1640 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2010), 84–90. 31. John O’Malley, “Luther the Preacher,” Michigan Germanic Studies 10 (1984): 6–16. 32. Benjamin Wood Westervelt, “The Prodigal Son at Santa Justina: The Homily in the Borromean Reform of Pastoral Preaching,” Sixteenth Century Journal 32 (2001): 109–126. Gigliola Fragnito sees diocesan preaching as a flash in the pan, arguing that a lack of training manuals for secular curates encouraged a “resigned acceptance of the monopoly of regular clergy over preaching” toward the end of the century. She cites two preaching guides, Possevino and Crispoldi (writing for Giberti) as exceptions but does not consider the wider genre of model sermons or the works of Del Bene or Fiamma, to be discussed below. See Proibito capire: La chiesa e il volgare nella prima età moderna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005). Whether bishops were in fact as successful as they should have been in their dioceses is secondary to the unmistakable shift, documented here, in attitudes toward a preacher’s responsibility, backed up by works to help him and his staff in their new task. For the difficulties facing bishops, see Barbara McClung Hallman, Italian Cardinals, Church Reform, and the Church as Property, 1492–1563 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1985). 33. “In questa lettione si dimostra in che tempo il precursore del nostro redemptore ricevette la parola della predicatione nominato il principe della Romana republica & li Re di iudea dicenco, Nell’anno quindecimo dell’imperio di Tiberio cesare procurando ponto Pilato la iudea& essendo tetrarcha di galilea herode:” Omelie di santo Gregorio papa sopra li Euangelii (Venice, 1543). 34. Ludovico Pittorio, Homiliario quadragesimale fondato de uerbo ad uerbum su le Epistole & Euangelij si como corrono ogni dì secondo lo ordine de la sancta Romana

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no t e s t o pag e s 2 6 – 3 0 Giesia (Venice, 1532; first published 1506); Pittorio, Questo è vn dominicale, et vn santuario, doue si contiene una dolce & morale expositione sopra li Euangelij, & spesso etiam sopra le Epistole che corrono per tutto l’anno; (Venice, 1532; first published 1513). 35. “Assai commodamente nel primo de la quaresima tempo di penitentia ci exhorta Dio nel hodierna Epistola per bocha del propheta suo Iohel al convertirse a lui. Convertimini ad me, Convertivi a mi. Et in che modo o Iohel vuole Dio: che a lui se convertiamo?” Homilario, a ii r. 36. “Per non mancare (quanto mi persuado) in nulla de fare cosa grata & anche salutare a li mei cari lectori per quanto puo/no le debile forze mia, & conciosia che al vero christiano siano necessarie ne la peregrinatione de la presente vita la confessione componctione & communione . . . ​m i è parso de fare etiam stampire nel fine de questo nostro libro quarto sermoni scripti.” Dominicale, x iv r. 37. Lorenzo and Giannandrea Barotti, Memorie istoriche di letterati ferraresi, vol. 2 (Ferrara: eredi di Giuseppe Rinaldi, 1792), 37–44; Mario Emilio Cosenza, Biographical and Bibliographical Dictionary of the Italian Humanists and of the World of Classical Scholarship in Italy, 1300–1800, vol. 5 (Boston: G.K. Hall & Co., 1962), vol. 5; Luigi Ughi, Dizionario storica degli uomini illustri ferraresi (Ferrara: Eredi di Giuseppe Rinaldi, 1804), 67–68. 38. L’arte del predicare contenuta in tre libri, secondo i precetti rhetorici, composta dal Reverendo Padre fra Luca Baglione de l’ordine de’ frati Minori osservanti (Venice, 1562); Sermoni overo Homelie Devote del Reverendo M. Giovanni Del Bene Veronese sopra gli Evangelii di tutto l’anno, secondo l’ordine della Santa Madre Chiesa, utili ad ogni fedel Christiano (Venice, 1562). 39. Roger Chartier, The Cultural Uses of Print in Early Modern France (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987), 4–6. 40. Michele Miele, “Attese e direttive sulla predicazione in italia tra cinquecento e settecento,” in La predicazione in Italia dopo il Concilio di Trento tra Cinquecento e Settecento. Atti del X convegno di studio dell’Associazione Italiana dei Professori di Storia della Chiesa, Napoli, 6–9 Settembre 1994 (Rome: Edizioni Dehoniane, 1996), 84. 41. “In the 1560s the Italians reached the conclusion that their religious consciences were fundamentally Catholic . . . ​after decades of uncertainty, the Italian religious revival emerged strong, unified, and sure of its means and goals.” Paul Grendler, The Roman Inquisition and the Venetian Press, 1540–1605 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977), 128, 131. 42. Larissa J. Taylor, Soldiers of Christ: Preaching in Late Medieval and Reformation France (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1992), 210–212; and Heresy and Orthodoxy in Sixteenth-­century Paris: François Le Picart and the Beginnings of the Catholic Reformation (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 1999), 11. 43. Preached sermons came to be published in two other ways, but these methods were less frequent in the sixteenth century: through reportationes transcribed

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no t e s t o pag e s 3 1 – 3 2 by an attentive listener, often a female religious; or through a posthumous publication, often by the preacher’s family or monastic order. See Delcorno, “Forme della predicazione.” 44. Roberto Rusconi, “Practica culturale ed istruzione religiosa nelle confraternite italiane del tardo medio evo: ‘Libri da compagnia’ e libri di pietà,” in Le Mouvement confraternel au moyen age: France, Italie, Suisse (Geneva: Librairie Droz, 1987), 149–50; “Per che si nel legere, si dopo ne l’udire la messa overo havendola udita,” Ludovico Pittorio, Homilario overo espositione. . . . ​sopra le Epistole e Evangelii (1546), in Fragnito, Proibito Capire, 262–263. 45. Although many of Savonarola’s works were protected and later published, only a handful of sermon transcripts by Bernardino Ochino, the most popular preacher of his day, survived his apostasy. Of the twenty-­n ine works listed in the Edit16 database, only four predate his flight (the others were published outside of Italy): two titles from Bernardino’s 1539 sermons in Venice (each Venice, 1541); his Dialogi sette del reuerendo padre frate Bernardino Occhino senese generale di frati Capuzzini (Venice, 1540); and Dialogo della diuina professione di frate Bernardino da Siena (Asti, 1540). These four titles appear to have survived in one copy each. Edit16 accessed July 2011. 46. The laicization of late medieval Christianity is well documented in modern scholarship, stemming from Peter Burke’s characterization of the “triumph of Lent” over Carnival in Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe (New York: Harper & Row, 1978). It is considered from a variety of angles in Steven Ozment, The Age of Reform, 1250–1550 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980); John Bossy, Christianity in the West (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985); John Jeffries Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies: Italian Heretics in a Renaissance City (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 18–20; Edward Muir, Ritual in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1997), 118. 47. For libraries, see Andrew Pettegree, The Book in the Renaissance (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2010); Anthony Grafton, Rome Reborn: The Vatican Library and Renaissance Culture, 1993; Marcella Grendler, “A Greek Collection in Padua: The Library of Gian Vincenzo Pinelli (1535–1601),” Renaissance Quarterly 33, no. 3 (October 1, 1980): 386–416; Paul F. Grendler, “Form and Function in Italian Renaissance Popular Books,” Renaissance Quarterly 46, no. 3 (October 1, 1993): 451–485; Martin Lowry, “Two Great Venetian Libraries in the Age of Aldus Manutius,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 57, 128–66 (1975–1974). 48. On the oral nature of sixteenth-­century European culture, see Gugliemo Cavallo and Roger Chartier, eds., A History of Reading in the West (Boston and Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999); Chartier, Cultural Uses of Print.

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no t e s t o pag e s 3 3 – 3 5 49. Marc Saperstein, Jewish Preaching 1200–1800: An Anthology (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), 13–25; Hilary Dansey Smith, Preaching in the Spanish Golden Age: A Study of Some Preachers of the Reign of Philip III (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1978), 29–59. Bernardino of Siena’s transcriptions are an exception. 50. “Predica della Cathedra di San Pietro, fatta in Roma, nella Chiesa di S. Lorenzo in Damaso, il primo Sabbato di Quaresima, che fu il giorno a’ vintidue di Febrari, L’anno di Nostro Signore MDXXXIX. I tre libri delle prediche II.6; “Predica della Epifania, fatta in Pavia, nella Chiesa Cathedrale: presente la duchessa di Milano. il dì dell’Epifania, l’anno MDXXXVI, sopra l’evangelio corrente.” Ibid. IV.4. 51. “Homai potremo ragionar pianamente, e come voce sommessa, poi che per gratia di Dio la pioggia vergognatasi dell’importunità sua, comincia pur un poco à temperarsi, e non ci bisogna alzar tanto la voce per vincere lo strepito di questo diluvio grande d’acque cadenti.” Ibid., II.7, 547. 52. For later evidence of a congregant independently corroborating the content of printed Catholic sermons, see Renate Dürr, “Images of the Priesthood: An Analysis of Catholic Sermons from the Late Seventeenth Century,” Central European History 33, no. 1 (2000): 87–107. 53. “Non del tutto come nacquero nude, però non ornate punto.” Musso, I tre libri delle prediche, preface to vol. III, n.p. 54. Norman, Humanist Taste, 5–6; G. DeRosa, “Il Francescano Cornelio Musso dal Concilio di Trento alla diocesi di Bitonto,” Rivista di storia della chiesa in Italia 40 (1986): 60. 55. Commodita della morte al buon christiano predicate alla inclita città di Genova, dal p. Franceschino Visdomini da Ferrara il dì quinto di maggio nell’anno del Signor MDLIII (Venice, 1553). Between 1552 and 1586, Visdomini published ten single sermons. Two of them were published in at least two single editions: Institutione di una republica christiana (twice in 1553); Predica sopra il Cantico di Zacharia (both in 1557). The single sermons reprinted in Porcacchi’s anthology commemorate major events or theological points under dispute. 56. See Grendler, Roman Inquisition, 122–125; Fernanda Ascarelli, La tipografia cinquecentina italiana (Florence: Casa Editrice Le Lettere, 1996); Marco Menato, Ennio Sandal, and Giuseppina Zappella, eds., Dizionario dei tipografi e degli editori italiani (Milan: Editrice Bibliografica, 1997). 57. “Porto i miei libri scritti di propria mano . . . ​accioche col testimonio di costesta Santa Sedia Apostolica . . . ​dandosi alle stampe, possano produrre alcun frutto à gloria di Dio.” I tre libri delle Prediche del Reverendissimo Mons. Cornelio Musso, dedication to Pius IV preceding part II. 58. See Brian Richardson, Print Culture in Renaissance Italy: The Editor and the Vernacular Text, 1470–1600 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1994);

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no t e s t o pag e s 3 5 – 4 1 Brian Richardson, Printers, Writers and Readers in Renaissance Italy (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1999); Paolo Trovato, Con ogni diligenza corretto: La stampa e le revisioni editoriali dei testi letterari italiani (1470–1570) (Ferrara: Unife Press, 2009); Marco Paoli, La dedica: Storia di una Strategia Editoriale (Lucca: Maria Pacini Fazzi Editore, 2009). 59. Predica del Rever. Padre F. Cornelio Vescovo di Bitonto, fatta in Trento, per la impresa contra Lutherani (Venice, 1546). Corrie Norman dates the sermon to 1552 and in fact the two extant 1546 editions do not fully confirm the date. The specific editions discussed in this section are held at the Newberry Library, and I am grateful here for the expertise of the Newberry’s Paul Gehl. 60. Suzanne G. Cusick, Valerio Dorico: Music Printer in Sixteenth-­Century Rome (Ann Arbor: UMI Research Press, 1981). 61. Kevin M. Stevens, “Vincenzo Girardone and the Popular Press in Counter-­ Reformation Milan: A Case Study (1570),” The Sixteenth Century Journal 26, no. 3 (Autumn 1995): 639–659; Grendler, Roman Inquisition, 9–12. 62. Predica del Reverendo Monsignor Cornelio Vescovo di Bitonto. Fatta in Padova nella chiesa del Santo l’ottaua di Pasqua dell’anno MDLIII sopra l’Euangelio corrente. Nella quale si tratta gran parte della Giustificatione, & della Remissione de peccati (Venice, 1553). 63. The initials are lettere parlanti, woodcuts depicting scenes or people whose names begin with that letter. See Franca Petrucci Nardelli, La lettera e l’immagine: Le iniziali “parlanti” nella tipografia Italiana (secc. XVI–XVIII) (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1991). 64. Savonarola’s sermons continued to be published throughout the first half of the century. Certain of his works appeared on the Venetian indices of 1549 and 1554 and the Roman index of 1559 and 1564. After that time, his confessors’ manual saw approximately two dozen editions, but no sermon or scriptural literature was published again in Italy. J. M. de Bujanda, ed., Index des Livres Interdits, 10 vols. (Quebec: Centre d’Études de la Renaissance, 1996). 65. Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (DBI) (Rome: Istituto della Enciclopedia italiana, 1960–) s.v. “Corner, Alvise.” 66. Print shop workers in Italy were often known for having heretical sympathies. For Arrivabene and Giolito’s associations with heterodoxy, see Grendler, Roman Inquisition, 105–112, 305–307; Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies, 135; Silvana Seidel Menchi, “Le traduzioni italiane di Lutero nella prima metà del Cinquecento,” Rinascimento 17 (1977): 31–108. 67. See also Angela Nuovo, Il commercio librario nell’Italia del Rinascimento (Milan: FrancoAngeli, 1998), 261. 68. Il terzo libro delle Prediche del Reverendiss. Mons. Cornelio Musso, Vescovo di Bitonto . . . ​( Venice, 1580).

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no t e s t o pag e s 4 1 – 4 5 69. Prediche del reuerendissimo monsignor Cornelio uescouo di Bitonto fatte in diuersi tempi, et in diuersi luoghi . . . ​con la tauola delle cose notabili (Venice, 1556). 70. Prediche del Reverendissimo Monsig. Cornelio Musso da Piacenza, Vescovo di Bitonto, fatte in diversi tempi, et in diversi luoghi (Venice, 1554). 71. The term “occasional” refers to sermons given on feast days or special events as opposed to the sermon series of Lent or Advent. 72. For Tomitano, see Maria Rosa Davi, Bernardino Tomitano filosofo, medico e letterato (1517:1576): Profilo biografico e critico (Trieste: LINT, 1994); Maria Teresa Girardi, Il sapere e le lettere in Bernardino Tomitano (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1995); Grendler, Roman Inquisition, 101–102. 73. “Prezzzerà adunque Messer Cornelio questa mia nobile elettione, e’l mondo loderà il giudicio mio: l’uno rallegrandosi di cotal mia dedicatione per honorarne le sue fatiche: l’altro godendo i frutti del suo altissimo, e fecondissimo ingegno.” 74. Sebastiano Ammiani, Discorsi predicabili per documento del viver christiano (Venice, 1567). 75. “By emphasizing the primacy of scripture as the model for ecclesiastical practice, the Reformers put the Catholics on the defensive.” Simon Ditchfield, Liturgy, Sanctity, and History in Tridentine Italy: Pietro Maria Campi and the Preservation of the Particular (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995), 5. 76. For some of the vast literature on early modern censorship in Italy, see Adriano Prosperi, Vincenzo Lavenia, and John Tedeschi, eds., Dizionario storico dell’Inquisizione, 4 vols. (Pisa: Scuola Normale Superiore, 2010); Fragnito, Proibito capire; Gigliola Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo: La censura ecclesiastica e i volgarizzamenti della Scrittura (1471–1605) (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1997); Gigliola Fragnito, Church, Censorship and Culture in Early Modern Italy, 2001; Roberto Rusconi, “Frate e monaci, libri e biblioteche alla fine del ’500,” in Libri, biblioteche e cultura degli ordini regolari nell’Italia moderna attraverso la documentazione della Congregazione dell’Indice. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Macerata, 30 maggio—1 giugno 2006, ed. Rosa Marisa Borraccini and Roberto Rusconi (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2006); Peter Godman, The Saint as Censor: Robert Bellarmine Between Inquisition and Index (Leiden: Brill, 2000); Ugo Rozzo, “Gli eretici e la circolazione dei libri proibiti del Friuli del Cinquecento,” in La gloria del Signore: La Riforma protestante nell’Italia nord-­orientale, ed. Gianfranco Hofer (Mariano del Friuli: Edizioni della Laguna, 2006), 67–82; Vittorio Frajese, Nascita dell’Indice: La censura ecclesiastica dal Rinascimento alla controriforma (Brescia: Morcelliana, 2006). The Index was dismantled in 1966. 77. The only work by any author in this study to appear in de Bujanda, Index Des Livres Interdits, is Gabriele Fiamma’s Rime Spirituali. For Ippolito Chizzola, see Chapter 4. For preachers publicizing an index, see Grendler, Roman Inquisition,

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no t e s t o pag e s 4 6 – 4 8 182. For suspicion of printed books, see Grendler, Roman Inquisition, 182; and Rusconi, “Frate e monaci, libri e biblioteche alla fine del ’500,” 21. 78. These included the Ars Concionandi mistakenly attributed to Bonaventure; Thomas (Chabham) of Salisbury’s Summa de arte Praedicandi (early 13th c.); Thomas Waleys’s De modo componendi sermones come documentis (mid-­thirteenth c.); and most famously, Alan of Lille’s Summa. The most comprehensive work for the study of Artes Praedicandi is Th.-­M. Charland, Artes Praedicandi: Contribution à L’histoire De La Rhétorique Au Moyen Âge (Paris: J. Vrin, 1936). Harry Caplan lists the following works published in the late fifteenth or early sixteenth centuries but before the Council of Trent: Johannes de Bromyard, Summa Praedicantium, (1360s) (Nuremberg, 1485, 1518; Paris, 1500, 1518; Lyons, 1522); Stephanus Hoest (d. 1471), Modus predicandi subtilis et compeniosus (Strassburg, 1513); Michael of Hungary (1482), Evagatorium, modus predicandi (Hagenau, 1498; Cologne, 1502; Paris, c. 1505); Nicolaus of Nice (d. 1509) Gemma praedicantium (Caen, 1507; Basel, 1508; Paris, 1523). Harry Caplan, Medieval Artes Praedicandi: A Hand-­List (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1934). See also Marianne G. Briscoe, Artes Praedicandi, vol. 61 (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 1992); Samuele Giombi, “Precettistica e trattatistica sulla retorica sacra in età tridentina: Linee storiografiche e ipotesi di recerca,” Rivista di storia e letteratura religiosa 34 (1998): 581–612. 79. Alan of Lille, The Art of Preaching (Kalamazoo, MI: Cistercian Publications, 1981), 53–55. 80. Ibid., 135, 137. 81. John O’Malley, “Erasmus and the History of Sacred Rhetoric: The Ecclesiastes of 1535,” Erasmus of Rotterdam Society Yearbook 5 (1985): 7. O’Malley speculates that Italians found Traversagni unhelpful because it did not address new preaching styles. See O’Malley, “Form, Content and Influence,” 34. For Traversagni, see Giovanni Farris, Umanesimo e religione in Lorenzo Guglielmo Traversagni (1425–1505). (Milan: Marzorati, 1972); Giombi, “Precettistica.” 82. The best-­k nown theoretical works on preaching in the fifty years before Erasmus’s treatise are the Liber congestorum de arte praedicandi (Pforzheim, 1504) of Reuchlin; De officiis concionatoris (1525), and De rhetorica libri of Melancthon (Wittemberg, 1519); the Ratio brevis et docta piaque sacrarum concionum tractandarum of Melancthon’s disciple Veit Dietrich; and the Methodus praedicandi verbi divini (Cologne, 1529) of Nikolaus Herborn. See also Marc Fumaroli, L’Age de l’éloquence: rhétorique et “res literaria” de la Renaissance au seuil de l’époque classique (Geneva: Droz, 1980). 83. O’Malley, “Erasmus and the History of Sacred Rhetoric.” 84. Adriano Prosperi, “Di alcuni testi per il clero nell’Italia del primo Cinquecento,” Critica Storica 7 (1968): 141.

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no t e s t o pag e s 4 8 – 5 0 85. Giberti tells his curates to “declare the Gospel . . . ​a nd with it, as it seems best to them, some commandment of God, and [they] should speak about some sin and its qualities.” Scholars believe that this passage implies that preaching should, above all, convey the content of scripture to the congregation. Adriano Prosperi argues that Giberti’s term, “dichiarare l’Evangelio,” means something very precise: “[la] lettura delle sacre scritture fatte in funzione di determinati problemi teologici particularmente sentiti anche a livello popolare.” Prosperi bases this conclusion on the sermons of Tullio Crispoldi, Giberti’s close associate, which he takes as examples of the principles laid out in the breve ricordo. Adriano Prosperi, Tra evangelismo e controriforma: G. M. Giberti (1495–1543) (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1969), 244; Prosperi, “Di alcuni testi,” 156–157. 86. “Fuggano massimamente l’ocio, dianosi a qualche honesta fatica o studio. Li studii loro, se forse vi fusse alcuno che non sapesse che si studiare, siano de la sacra scrittura. Et pero habbino in ogno modo la Bibbia, et qualche espositore sopra essa, come saria Niccolò di Lira, et la Catena aurea sopra li Evangelii, et li Psalmi; habbino l’homilario del anno et de’ Sancti, et alcuna Summa, come sarebbe la Summa Angelica o qualunque altra . . . ​Et per tener meglio a memoria quello che haranno studiato et per utile de’ loro parochiani, ogni festa dichiareno loro lo Evangelio, et insieme, secondo che meglio li parerà, dichiareno un qualche commadamento di Dio, et dicano di qualche peccato, et de le loro qualità, accioche insieme inseime i parrochiani imparino di servar li mandati, di fugire i peccati, et di saperli confessare.” Reprinted in Adriano Prosperi, “Note in margine a un opuscolo di Gian Matteo Giberti,” Critica Storica IV (1965): 394. 87. Pasquali lists nine bishops in Italian cities who requested a copy, as well as three in France and one in England, in his introduction to Gian Matteo Giberti, Le costituzioni per il clero di Gian Matteo Giberti, vescovo di Verona, ed. Roberto Pasquali, Fonti e studi di storia veneta 25 (Istituto per le Ricerche di Storia Sociale e di Storia Religiosa, 2000). 88. Prosperi, “Note in margine,” 369; Tra Evangelismo, 327. 89. See Elisabeth Gleason, Gasparo Contarini: Venice, Rome, and Reform (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993); Gigliola Fragnito, Gasparo Contarini: Un magistrato veneziano al servizio della cristianità, vol. IX (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1988); Franz Dittrich, Gasparo Contarini, 1483–1542. Eine Monographie (Nieuwkoop: B. De Graaf, 1972); William Hudon, “Two Instructions to Preachers from the Tridentine Reformation,” Sixteenth Century Journal 20 (1989): 457–470. 90. “Demittat igitur se pius et prudens concionator cognitioni ac capacitati populi tractetque res divinas eo modo, quo capi queat a populo et quo aedificare oves Christi queat in caritate.” Gasparo Contarini, Regesten und briefe (1483–1542),

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no t e s t o pag e s 5 0 – 5 4 ed. Franz Dittrich (Braunsberg, 1881), 309. The translation is by Elisabeth Gleason. 91. Gleason, Gasparo Contarini, 305. 92. Gleason, Gasparo Contarini. The full text can be found in Epistolarum Reginaldi Poli S.R.E. Cardialis et aliorum ad ipseum collectio, 5 vols. (Brescia, 1744–1757; reprinted 1967 by Gregg Press Limited), vol. 3, pp. 75–82. 93. Reprinted in Xavier-­Marie Le Bachelet, “La prédication ecclésiastique d’après le Cardinal Marcel Cervin et d’après le excercices spirituels di Saint Ignace,” Collection De La Bibliotheque Des Exercises De Sant Ignace LXI–LXIII (1920): 160–165; William Hudon dates this work to the fall of 1549 in “Two Instructions”; see also Samuele Giombi, Un ecclesiastico tridentino al governo diocesano: Marcello II Cervini (1501–1555) e la riforma della chiesa fra centro e periferia, Fonti e studi (Ancona: Edizioni di Studia Picena, 2010). 94. “Caveant quoque praedicatores verbi Dei, quantum possunt, ne opiniones haereticorum recitent populo qui eas nesciat . . . ​Ut omnes omnino auditores unum et uemdem sensum jure possint accipere . . .” “Intelligant hoc minime tunc servari, cum adversus ea quae in sacra Scriptura habentur, aut adversus ea quae ab ecclesia per traditionem ab Apostolis ipsis acceptam, aut ab universalibus, legitimis receptisque Conciliis definita aut perpetuo catholicae ecclesiae consensu et concordibus sacrorum doctorum sententiis roborata sunt, quicquam protelerint aut asseruerint.” Marcello Cervini, Instructio ad praedicatores, in Le Bachelet, 161. 95. Although many bulls and descriptive material surrounding the Council were published at its opening, only four copies survive of the decrees of the first session alone, all from 1548, along with two copies of the decree on justification in Latin and one in Italian. See Acta ac decreta sacrosanctae Tridentinae Synodi. Ann. MDXLVI et XLVII, 1548. In contrast, at least thirty-­four separate editions of the official Canones et decreta sacrosanti oecumenici et generalis Concilii Tridentini survive from the period 1563–1569. 96. Prosperi, “Note in margine.” Gleason’s biography presents a more nuanced view, with examples of Contarini’s intransigence, but later scholars have not always followed her lead. 97. See Giombi, “Precettistica,” 593. 98. Norman, “The Social History of Preaching,” 126–127.

2. Mendicant Preachers 1. “Non và occupando questa gangrena, questa peste, o dita, o unghie: occupa mani, braccia, gambe, corpo interi, città, popoli, paesi, nationi, reami. . . . ​ha penetrato per tutto per città, per castella, per ville, per ogni grado, per ogni

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no t e s t o pag e s 5 5 – 5 6









stato, per ogni sesso. Non vedete, che anco i fanciulli, anco le fanciulle hoggidi sono heretiche? Et quanti maestri di schuola? e quanti signorotti? e quanti Prencipi grandi. Ohime lo debbo io dire? e quanti predicatori.” Predica della sapientia christiana fatta in Napoli nella sala reale. Il giorno di San Luca Evangelista, a xviii d’ottobre, l’anno MDLIIII, in I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 368. 2. “Et tu Napoli, che fai professione di Religione, e che ti glorii di tanta cavalleria, anco tu ti sei lasciata tentare da questi heretici, ho detto tentare, non vi dolete, Signori, non ho detto sedurre, pure Napoli mio, una tale, e tanta città dovea subito accorgersi dell’insidie” I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 369. For heterodoxy in Naples, see Peter Mazur, The New Christians of Spanish Naples, 1528–1671: A Fragile Elite (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013) Salvatore Caponetto, La Riforma protestante nell’Italia del Cinquecento (Turin: Claudiana, 1992); Diana Robin, Publishing Women: Salons, the Presses, and the Counter-­Reformation in Sixteenth-­Century Italy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007). 3. The seventeenth-­century book inventory by the heirs of Filippo Giunti includes sixty-­seven works of sermons. Musso and Visdomini are consistently listed as “Cornelio” and “Franceschino” and are the only preachers, apart from patristic saints, to be called by their first names alone. Although one entry refers to “F. Girolamo,” he is elsewhere listed as Savonarola. Heredi di Philippo de Giunta, Catalogvs librorvm qui in Inventarvm bibliotheca Philippi hæredvm Florentiæ prostant (Florence, 1604), 414–416. Likewise, Francesco Panigarola’s Il Predicatore of 1609 refers very frequently to “Fra Cornelio” and “Franceschino,” though it sometimes also uses their last names. See Epilogue and Chapter 5. 4. “Discorso dell’eccell. Dottor M. Bernardin Tomitano sopra l’eloquentia e l’artificio delle prediche di Monsignor Cornellio Musso,” which appears in the 1554 and 1560 editions of Musso’s Prediche . . . ​fatte in diversi tempi. 5. Musso was also appointed to the bishopric of Bertinoro in 1541 and transferred to Bitonto in 1544. For a decade, Musso did not attend to his diocese, but from 1552 until his death he became a dedicated, although largely unsuccessful, reformer. For bibliographical sources on Musso, see Corrie Norman, Humanist Taste and Franciscan Values: Cornelio Musso and Catholic Preaching in Sixteenth-­ Century Italy. (New York: Peter Lang, 1998); Gustavo Cantini, “Cornelio Musso dei frati minori conventuali (1511–1574): Predicatore, scrittore, e teologo al Concilio di Trento,” Miscellanea Francescana 41 (1941): 145–174; Giovanni Franchini, Bibliosofia e memorie letterarie di scrittori Francesani Conventuali ch’hanno scritto dopo l’Anno 1585. (Modena: Eredi Soliani, 1693), 152–156; Luke Wadding, Scriptores Ordinis Minorum (Rome: Nardecchia, 1906); G. DeRosa, “Il Francescano Cornelio Musso dal Concilio di Trento alla diocesi di Bitonto,” Rivista di storia della chiesa in Italia 40 (1986): 80–85; Hubert Jedin, “Der franziskaner Cornelio Musso, Bischof von Bitonto. Sein Lebensgang und seine

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no t e s t o pag e s 5 6 – 5 7 kirchliche Wirksamkeit,” Römische Quartalschrift für christliche Altertumskunde und für Kirchengeschichte 41 (1933): 207–275; G. Odoardi, “Fra Cornelio Musso . . . ​ padre, oratore, e teologo al Concilio di Trento,” Miscellanea Francescana 48 (1948): 223–242; R. J. Bartman, “Cornelius Musso, Tridentine Theologian,” Franciscan Studies 5 (1945): 247–276. 6. Mariano Armellini, Le chiese di Roma dal secolo IV al XIX (Rome: Edizioni R.O.R.E., 1942); Eunice Howe, Andrea Palladio: The Churches of Rome (Binghamton, NY: Medieval and Renaissance Texts and Studies, 1991); Armando Schiavo, Il palazzo della Cancelleria (Rome: Staderini, 1964); Simonetta Valtieri, La Basilica di S. Lorenzo in Damaso nel Palazzo della Cancelleria a Roma attraverso il suo archivio ritenuto scomparso. (Rome: S. Valtieri, 1984). 7. Franchini, Bibliosofia, 252–63; Lorenzo and Giannandrea Barotti, Memorie Istoriche di Letterati Ferraresi, vol. 2 (Ferrara: Eredi di Giuseppe Rinaldi, 1792), 160–165; Gustavo Cantini, I francescani d’Italia di fronte alle dottrine luterane e calviniste durante il cinquecento (Rome: Pontificium Athenaeum Antonianum, 1948); Wadding, Scriptores Ordinis Minorum. 8. In the introduction to his Discorsi Morali, Visdomini notes that he did not have time to compose the work until Borromeo provided it while Visdomini was preaching in his employ. Discorsi morali sopra gli evangelii correnti. Dalla Domenica di Settuagesima, fina alla ottava di Pasqua . . . del Padre Franceschino Visdomini da Ferrara (Venice, 1566). 9. “Il mio Franceschino è la delitia de’ pulpiti, la cetra oratoria de’ nostri tempi,” quoted in Franchini, Bibliosofia, 253; Barotti, Memorie Istoriche, 2:162. For Panigarola, see Carlo Ossola, “Il ‘Queto Travaglio’ di Gabriele Fiamma,” in Letteratura e Critica: Studi in onore di Natalino Sapegno, vol. III (Rome: Buzoni, 1976), 239–286; Prima parte delle prediche di diuersi illustri theologi, et catholici predicatori della parola di Dio; raccolte per Thomaso Porcacchi (Venice, 1565). For Porcacchi, see Sarah Hill, “Tommaso Porcacchi: Frammenti di una ‘selva’ perduta,” in Ricerche sulle selve rinascimentali, ed. Paolo Cherchi (Ravenna: Longo Editore, 1999), 83–100; and Paolo Cherchi, Polimatia di riuso: Mezzo secolo di plagio (1539–1589) (Rome: Bulzoni, 1998). For versification, see Il Vero sugetto delle prediche del Reverendo padra fra Franceschino Visdomini da Ferrara sopra li sette salmi penitentiali di David: Et di alcune alter devote espositioni, udite per me Vital de Iacomo di Vitali dalla sua viva voce, & poste in ottava rima nel l’anno 1553 & 54 in Venetia (Venice, 1561). 10. Franchini, Bibliosofia, 259; Predica delle nuove, et grandi allegrezze di Roma; per la riconciliazione del gloriosissimo Regno d’Inghilterra. Fatta a Venetia dal padre Franceschino Visdomini da Ferrara. . . . ​( Venice, 1555); Oratione funebre fatta in Napoli nell’hon. essequie della serenissima regina d’Ingliterra, dal’ Reverendissmo Fra Francisco Visdomini ferrarese. . . . ​(Naples, 1559). See also Emily Michelson, “An

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no t e s t o pag e s 5 8 – 5 9 Italian Explains the English Reformation (with God’s Help),” in A Linking of Heaven and Earth: Studies in Religious and Cultural History in Honor of Carlos Eire, ed. Emily Michelson, Scott K. Taylor, and Mary Noll Venables (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2012): 33–48; Laetatus sum in his etc. Il salmo di Dauid CXXI esposto nello annontiare la pace seguita fra la Santita’ di N.S. e la maesta’ del rè catolico; predicato . . . ​dal padre Franceschino Visdomini da Ferrara (Venice, 1557). 11. The three-­volume set of Musso’s occasional sermons was published together ten times between 1560 and 1599. Each of those volumes was also published separately: volume I six times before the end of the century; volumes II and III four times each and once in a two-­volume set (see Norman, Humanist Taste). Norman also counts two further volumes of occasional sermons. Collections of Musso’s Lenten sermons continued to be published until at least 1603. 12. Sermons de Très-­Révérend P. et très-­docte Cornelio Musso . . . ​sur les Épistres et Évangiles de chacun jour de caresme et sur le Cantique de la Vierge Marie pour chacun samedy, avec la vie de l’auteur . . . ​traduits en françois, . . . ​par Révérend Père Estienne Allemandi (Paris, 1597); Conciones evangeliorium de dominicis aliquot fesis solmenioribus (Cologne, 1594); and Chrisostomi Italorum id est RPF Corneli Mussi ­conciones (Cologne, 1618) reprint various Italian sermons. Norman, Humanist Taste, 159–162; John Frymire, The Primacy of the Postils: Catholics, Protestants, and the Dissemination of Ideas in Early Modern Germany (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010), 531. Musso’s sermons were published in the Holy Roman Empire in 1594 and 1603. 13. Le cinque homelie consolatorie sopra il salmo nouantesimo di Dauid; del R.P. Franceschino Visdomini . . . ​dell’ordine de’ Frati Minori. (Venice, 1586). Discorsi Morali was published twice in 1565 and once in 1566. Quatro prediche de diuersi soggetti, del padre Franceschino Visdomini da Ferrara. . . . ​(Brescia, 1563). A collection of Latin sermons for Lent and Advent appeared in 1591. 14. Predica del Reverendo Padre F. Cornelio, vescovo di Bitonto, fatta in Trento per la Impresa contra lutherani (Rome, 1546); Predica del reuerendo monsignor Cornelio, uescouo di Bitonto. Fatta in Trento nella chiesa de’Tedeschi, presente tutto’l Sacro Concilio e molti de protestanti. . . . ​( Venice, 1552). 15. “Ritrovandosi in questi nostri calamitosi tempi, beatissimo Padre, la Christiana Religione per gli alti e secreti giudici dell’infinita providenza di Dio, tanta travagliata e afflitta, quanto forse non fu altre volte giammai poi che le fiamme ardenti delle mal nate e cresciute heresie dalle porte dell’Inferno ascendono, scuotono non pur le mura e i tetti, ma anco i fondamenti della nostra fede, si conviene veramente à qualunque Christiano, come à cittadino di sì honorata Republica, anzi come à membro di corpo si pretioso, se ben non fosse occhio, ne mano, ma il minor dito del piede, vedendolo ferito e lacerato in tante parti, nelle nationi intere, nelle provincie e ne’ Regni, risentirsi generosamente, e

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no t e s t o pag e s 5 9 – 6 0 muoversi con tutte le sue forze per aiutarlo quanto piu puote.” I tre libri delle prediche, dedication to Pius IV preceding part II. 16. “Vorrei poter ancora esser più che mai prodigo della lingua e della voce, come solevo, non già con molta speranza di confonder gli heretici indomiti e indomabili sempre, ma si bene con gran fiducia di confermar i catholici sedotti, e ingannati come semplici colombe, ma poiché gli anni gravi hoggimai mi sono sopra; ecco che per fare quanto più posso, vado negotiando con la penna, e con lo stile, e facendo forza à me stesso, per non istar nella vigna e nella casa del Signore otioso, e disutile, raccoglio le viti, e l’uve sparse nelle mie prediche e in segno di lealtà, porto i miei libri scritti di propria mano al Mastro di casa.” Ibid. 17. Alexandra Walsham, “   ‘Domme Preachers’? Post-­Reformation English Catholi­ cism and the Culture of Print,” Past & Present 168 (August 2000): 78. 18. Larissa Taylor, Soldiers of Christ: Preaching in Late Medieval and Reformation France (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1992), 212. 19. “M’è paruto convenirsi che queste [compositioni] escano in quella medesima communa favella, nella quale in questi sacri colli di Roma, per la più parte in viva voce furono da me dettate; che se bene ella, fuori di questo bello, e almo paese nostro d’Italia, communemente non s’usa; pure per la stretta congiuntione, che ha con la Latina, non è forse ad alcun personaggio d’Europa del tutto straniera, e incognita.” I tre libri delle prediche, dedication to Pius IV preced­ ­i ng part II. 20. Gigliola Fragnito, Proibito capire: La chiesa e il volgare nella prima età moderna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005), 262–265; Frymire, Primacy of the Postils, 276–279. 21. “Et veramente dimesticandosi, come fanno, con questa nostra lingua i nostri falsi fratelli, i quali si vede che furtivamente vanno spargendo, mentre si dorme, tanta semeza della loro peste ne’ nostri campi, stimando peravventura, che se potessero alienare dalla vera fede l’Italia, senza difficoltà regnerebbono per tutto con la dottrina loro; Ho giudicato che sia debito di carità, con l’istessa lingua commune ad ogni sorte di nostri populi fare, che si conosca il grano dal paglio, il corpo dall’ombra, la Chiesa dalla Sinagoga, la fede dall’heresia: che anco perciò tanti predicatori catholici, e benemeriti di cotesta santa Sedia, lasciate le materie popolari, le quali convengono à pergami, con zelo non meno necessario che pio, per isgannar [sic] le povere, e semplici anime, si pongono à ragionar di misteri altissimi della Christiana Religione: che ne’ tempi passati, forse con maggior riverenza si tenevano secreti ne’ confini delle tre lingue, nelle quali sono state scritte da nostri maggiori tutte le scienze, e tutte le arti. Come divotissimo servo, adunque della Beatitudine Vostra, considandomi molto della sua gran benignità, la priego . . . ​si degni in vece delle Homelie Latine, che io era solito di farle, ascoltare, ò leggere alcuna di queste mie prediche Italiane.” I tre libri delle prediche, dedication to Pius IV preceding part II.

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no t e s t o pag e s 61 – 6 2 22. “E non di una sola, ma di quante ne furono mai in tutti i secoli precedenti, come si havessero tutti i demonii dell’inferno congiurato contro di noi, onde ne restassero le scritture profanate, i testi mal glosati, i Dottori sprezzati, i sacramenti mal trattati, i santi dishonorati, i monumenti violati, le reliquie dissipate, le imagine deturpate, i voti revocati, le religioni sregolate, le cerimonie obliterate, i vivi scandalizati, e i morti abbandonati.” Franceschino Visdomini, Fatta in Bologna la terza domenica del Sacro Avvento nell’anno MDLX. nella publication del sacrosanto Giubileo, per la prosecution del Concilio di Trento, in Porcacchi, 152. The sermon was presumably delivered in Latin, but reprinted in the vernacular in Porcacchi’s anthology. 23. “E se gli heretici del nostro tempo, come molti ancho de’ passati ci oppongono, che facciamo uguale la creatura al creatore, onde (come son temerarii, e facili a improperare) ci sogliono chiamare idolatri, con dire, che adoriamo i santi come Dio; nasce da manifestissima cecità et ignoranza, che giudica il culto nostro da alcuni moti esteriori.” Franceschino Visdomini, del culto di Dio e de’ Santi, il dì di tutti i Santi, in Porcacchi, 164. 24. “Patir non possono questi Antichristi, la riverenza che noi portiamo a’ Santi . . . ​ mossi da questa rabie et passione infernale frangon le statue, guastan le immagini, violano i monumenti, fondono i tabernacoli, abruscian l’ossa, spargon le ceneri, e quelle inanzi a tutte, che chiuse sono in vasi d’oro, o d’argento, e sotto ombra di zelo pascono la detestabil ferità loro, e dan fomento alla rapacità de’ Principi, che per satiar l’ingorde voglie, accecati dall’avaritia danno favore, e spirito alla impietà, e sotto i temerarii, e scelerati piedi si mettono l’antiqua religion di padri loro . . . ​Si che qua termina l’impura, e sacrilega gelosia, che pretendono havere dell’honor di Dio violato, com’essi dicono, da questo culto, che noi prestiamo a Santi, termina dico in desolare, e spogliar con aperto latrocinio le case sacre, profanare i vasi dedicati a Dio, accrescer tesori all’avaritia de’ tiranni, e bene accommodare gli abominevoli matrimonii, gli immondi, e inquinati letti, le dissolute, e immodeste mense de gli Antichristi, che però con tant’impeto sconcertano, e scontentano ogni bene, perché della iniquità loro gli pasce, et gli satolla il Diavolo.” Ibid., 179. 25. “I luterani gridano: Evangelio, Evangelio! traducono le Scritture in tutte le lingue, altamente ne parlano, empiono i libri, stancano le stampe, spiegano le insegne tutte a favor del santo verbo di Dio, et con tutte queste mirabili esagerazioni non fanno cosa che l’Evangelio comandi; anzi con la lor vita immonda mostrano in effetto l’inimicizia capitale et l’odio mortalissimo che portano all’Evangelio.”...per la prosecution del Concilio di Trento, excerpted in Cantini, I Francescani d’Italia, 107. 26. “Communi, lontanissimi da ogni sottil, o acuta sottigliezza sono, fuggono la sublimità, cercano quanto possono d’abbassarsi, parlano sempre in persona di una di voi.” Discorsi Morali, dedicatory letter.

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no t e s t o pag e s 6 3 – 6 4 27. “Questa parte si ha da trattar con gli Heretici che per mala e traditoria opinione che i scelerati hanno di questa cena, la fuggono, e l’aborriscono come idolatria. Questi acerbissimi nemici di Christo, e del suo amore, questi cani, e scorpioni rabbiosi, e velenosi, che con tanta impietà repugnano alla maggior pietà che mai da Dio gustasse il mondo, come infedeli gia hanno sopra di se il giudicio.” Discorsi morali, 176v. 28. For heterodoxy in Ferrara, see Mario Marzola, Per la storia della chiesa ferrarese nel secolo XVI (1497–1590), 2 vols. (Turin: Società Editrice Internazionale, 1976); Caponetto, La riforma protestante. 29. “Onde è nata in me speranza che in secolo desto, e operante com’è questo, mentre grati di Dio, s’affaticano tanti Angeli di Paradiso a diradicare, e svellere l’infelici, et importune zizanie, che nella purità Christiana ha seminato’l Diavolo, a trar l’amata di Dio città Gierusalemme dell’angustie, e de i pericoli che assediandola nuuoli d’heretici, d’apostati, e d’infedeli non la lasciano respirare: A mostrare al mondo la vera via di ben credere, e di ben vivere, che è quella antica, Romana, e Christiana sola, nel cui seno come nati siamo, cosi vivere, e morire dobbiamo.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, dedicatory letter. 30. Predica nella quale si dimostra la realita della presentia del corpo di Giesu Christo nel Santissimo Sacramento dell’Altare, con la confutatione dell’opinioni di Giovanni Calvino, di Pietro Vireto, di Theodoro Beza, & d’altri ministri sacramentari di Geneva . . . ​dal R.M. Francesco Giuntini Fiorentino Dottore Theologo (Lyon, 1566). Prediche del Reverendo Don Gabriel Fiamma, Canonico Regolare Lateranense, Fatte in vari tempi, in vari luoghi, e intorno a vari soggetti (Venice, 1570). Discorsi predicabili per documento del viver christiano (Venice, 1567). One such passage reads, “Who in our days has profaned the temples? Desecrated the altars? Ruined the sacred images? Removed sacrifices? Dishonored the saints? Violated the virgins? Opened the monasteries? Contaminated the sacraments? Dispossessed the dead? Abandoned souls? Exhumed sacred corpses, burned them, and thrown them in the sea? Changed the Church? Disturbed the world?—if not Luther, that apostate, false, and damned monk?” This passage appears in Vidsomini’s Homelie, 10r–v; a more elaborate version appears in Sebastiano Ammiani, Discorsi predicabili, 49v. 31. Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, quoted on 215. 32. Taylor, Soldiers of Christ, 210–225; Megan Armstrong, The Politics of Piety: Franciscan Preachers During the Wars of Religion, 1560–1600 (Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2004). 33. Hilary Dansey Smith, Preaching in the Spanish Golden Age: A Study of Some Preachers of the Reign of Philip III. (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1978), 148–157. 34. Walsham, “   ‘Domme Preachers’?”; Walsham, “Translating Trent? English Cathol­ ic­ism and the Counter Reformation,” Historical Research 78 (2005): 302.

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no t e s t o pag e s 6 4 – 6 7 35. Frymire, Primacy of the Postils, 38–48, 98–156, 253–257; Philip M. Soergel, Wondrous in His Saints: Counter-­Reformation Propaganda in Bavaria (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993), 94–97, 108–110. 36. Karl Benrath, Bernardino Ochino of Siena, trans. H. Zimmern (London: James Nisbet, 1876); Abigail Brundin, Vittoria Colonna and the Spiritual Poetics of the Italian Reformation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008); Gigliola Fragnito, “Gli ‘spirituali’ e la fuga di Bernardino Ochino,” Rivista Storica Italiana 84 (1972): 777–811; Anne Overell, Italian Reform and English Reformations, c. 1535–c. 1585 (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008). 37. Prediche del reuerendo padre frate Bernardino Occhino senese generale dell’Ordine di frati capuzzini, predicate nella inclita citta di Vinegia, del MDXXXIX (Venice, 1541). 38. “Ma tu città mia di Vinegia, che non voglio dire me, ma de tanti predicatori in questa tua cita, che ti predicano non philosophia, ne fabule, come per il passato: ma il verbo di Dio, e di Christo vivo, e vero, sinceramente, e la salute tua, e la emendatione de peccati: e tu sei quell medisimo, che tu eri. E voglio dir di me anchora, che con tanta verita charita, & amore ti ho eshortato alla salute tua con tanta fatica, e forse tante vigilie, senza un frutto al mondo. Il tengo certo, e fermo che se in Alemagna, o vero in Inghilterra havesse sparse tante parole, o fra Turchi, o Hebrei, il haveria fatto piu frutto di quell che ho fatto, per quel che si vede: benche io spero anchora de veder buoni, e sinceri Christiani.” Prediche del reuerendo padre frate Bernardino Occhino, 9v. 39. “Mi è pervenuto alle mani un libro, ove è scritto tutte le verità & le appropriato della santissima Trinità, & altissima tanto facile che gli fanciulli e le donne poteranno leggere in quello: e leggendolo d’haveranno tanto piacere, quanto haver si possa: ma se voleti adunque che il ve lo dia, voglio me promettiati farlo stampare. Per non moltiplicare in molte parole, dico: questo libro è il benegno Giesu: questo è breve quia verbum abbreviatum fecit dominus. Approbato: Hic est filius meus dilectus, facile, lugum enum meum suave etc. Ogni persona e che sia ignorante, leggendolo, sentiria tanta dolczeza, e piacere quanto mai dir si possa. Per questo venne il figliuol de Dio in terra per far che’l popolo leggesie nel suo libro, e diventassero tutti dottori del Gimnasio del Cielo.” Prediche del reuerendo padre frate Bernardino Occhino, 81r. 40. Camillo Paleotti, brother of Cardinal Gabriele, owned and asked to keep copies of Ochino’s writings in 1559. Fragnito, Proibito capire, 264. 41. Hubert Jedin, A History of the Council of Trent, vol. II (St. Louis: B. Herder, 1957), 53. 42. See especially Carolyn Valone, “The Art of Hearing: Sermons and Images in the Chapel of Lucrezia della Rovere,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 3 (Autumn 2000): 753–777.

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no t e s t o pag e s 6 7 – 7 1 43. Jedin, History, II: 53–67; Gigliola Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo: La censura ecclesiastica e i volgarizzamenti della Scrittura (Bologna: Il Mulino, 1997), 75–81. 44. Roland Bainton, “The Bible in the Reformation,” in The Cambridge History of the Bible, vol. 3 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1963), 6–9. 45. Preface to the New Testament, in John Dillenberger, ed., Martin Luther: Selections from His Writings (New York: Anchor Books, 1962), 14. 46. Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo, 33. 47. Jedin, History, II: 55–58, 86. At least fifteen prelates voted against using the term, arguing that the Council ought to examine recent arguments against the canonicity of certain scriptural books and prepare themselves for possible attacks from Protestant reformers. The term came under further debate in the general congregation. 48. Edoardo Barbieri, “Tradition and Change in the Spiritual Literature of the Cinquecento,” in Church, Censorship, and Culture in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 125; and Le Bibbie italiane del quattrocento e del cinquecento: Storia e bibliografia ragionata delle edizioni in lingua italiana dal 1471 al 1600 (Milan: Editrice Bibliografica, 1992); Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo. 49. Not until 1544 did Catholic theologians begin to recognize how much Brucioli had drawn not only from Luther’s ideas about the biblical canon, but also from Protestant translations, commentaries, and even frontispieces. Ambrogio Catarino Politi’s Compendio d’errori et inganni luterani (Rome, 1564), first published in 1544, accuses Brucioli directly of lifting large sections of commentary from Protestant works. See Giorgio Caravale, Sulle tracce dell’eresia: Ambrogio Catarino Politi (1484–1553) (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2007); Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo, 31, 37, 71. 50. Jedin, History, II: 92. 51. Barbieri, Le bibbie italiane, 461–464; Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo, 36–39. 52. J. Waterworth, The Council of Trent: The Canons and Decrees of the Sacred and Oecumenical Council of Trent (London: Dolman, 1848). 53. Norman, Humanist Taste, 19. 54. Franchini, Bibliosofia; John O’Malley, “Content and Rhetorical Forms in Sixteenth-­Century Treatises on Preaching,” in Renaissance Eloquence (Berkeley, 1983), 46–47, 78–79. 55. Hubert Jedin, “Der Franziskaner Cornelio Musso, Bischof von Bitonto: Sein Lebensgang und seine kirchliche Wirksamkeit,” Römische Quartalschrift 41 (1933): 208–275. 56. Jedin, History, II: 67–78. 57. The first period of the Council started at Trent in 1545 and ended in Bologna in 1547. The Council reopened in 1551 but was suspended in 1552, ostensibly for two years only, but in fact until 1560.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 7 1 – 74 58. “E non si studiano, ò imparino mai scienze humane per instituire, e formarne l’animo nostro, ma per servirne, ornarne, e colorarne le sacre, e sante lettere.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 66v. 59. The sermon was first printed in 1562. The date raises the question of how much it was retouched in the intervening eight years and perhaps made to realign with Tridentine decisions; I posit that although it was surely edited for publication, Tridentine values are too integral to the sermon to have been added later. 60. Waterworth, The Council of Trent, 20–21. “Sono corrottioni delle historie le favole, cosi sono corrottioni della vera dotrina l’inventioni de gli heretici: inventioni veramente, fintioni, imaginationi.” I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 371. 61. “I Luterani non hanno per autentici e libri di Giudit, della Sapienza, di Macabei, con dire ch’ei non sono nel canone de gli Hebrei, e perché gli Hebrei non gli ricevono. Ma noi, dice Girolamo, siamo gratia di Dio, Christiani, e non Hebrei; Gli rinonciano gli Hebrei; perché non sono nel lor canone Hebreo. Gli riceviamo noi, perché sono nel canone, e catalogo christiano fatto, e ordinato ne i sacri concilli Cartagine terzo, Fiorentino, e moderno Tridentino.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 69v. 62. “Tu mutili le scritture heretico, scemi il numero de’ libri santi . . . ​Non è questo rompere le ossa a Christo?” I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 365. 63. “Il Genesi, per cominciare dal primo pasto, vi mostra Christo come Verbo paterno, per cui è fatto ogni cosa. L’Essodo, come un Mose gittato nell’acque del fiume nella mortalità nostra, perché diventi poi Redentore, de’ fedeli. . . . ​Ecco i cinque libri della legge: veniamo all’historie. In Giosuè si vede, come Capitano, che distribuisce la terra di viventi a suoi soldati. Ne’ Giudici, come Signore, che ha da giudicare i vivi, e i morti . . .” I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 360. 64. Sebastiano Ammiani’s Discorsi Predicabili includes such a list, as do the sermons of Felice Peretti and Gabriele Fiamma discussed later in this chapter. 65. For further bibliography on this debate, see Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo, 75, note 2. 66. “Che debb’esser giudice se non la chiesa, senza la quale non habbiamo certezza alcuna di quell’Epistola ch’ella sia buona, ò sia di Paolo?” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 70r. 67. “Quei primi precetti pertinenti alla fede, necessariamente debbon esser letti, ò uditi, ò in qualche modo intesi da tutti, perché senza essi non si può ben credere; i secondi ancora pertinenti alla morale debbon esser communi à tutti, perché senza essi non si può ben vivere; ma l’uso de’ terzi appartien sol à quelli, che nella chiesa han dono d’erudition, d’interpretation, e dottrina, pastori, apostoli, dottori che come colonne, e firmamenti hanno à sostenere nella chiesa i debili, insegnar gli ignoranti, convincer gli heretici, difender la verità.” Homelie, 68r–v.

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 74 – 7 6 68. “Se l’heretico non fosse tanto impudente, io non vi darei altra regola, che la istessa Scrittura sacra, perche in quella certo . . . ​d iradica parimente ogni heresia. È libro di Dio, non d’huomini . . . ​Ma poi che non perdonano i figliuoli del Diavolo al verbo di Dio, che già sapete hanno imparate dal padre loro a violarlo, ad interpretarlo a lor modo, e cosi a fare arme dell’Evangelio contra l’Evangelio, de profeti contra i profeti, di San Paolo, contra San Paolo, di Christo contra Christo. Però bisogna trovare la linea retta dell’intelligentia delle scritture: acciocché il mondo s’avvega, che quando si torce da quella linea, non sei più catholico, ma si dimanda heretico.” I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 366. 69. “Perché non sono venuti a mostrar questo loro oro, che hanno trovato nelle loro minere, per vedere se è oro, ad alchimia?” Ibid., II.7, 366–367, 374. 70. “Io poi con gratissimo animo pregherò sempre divotamente il Nostro Signore Iddio, che favoreggiando i Vostri santi pensieri, i travagli, le fatiche, le spese, conceda gratia alla Beatitudine Vostra, mediante questo sacrosanto Concilio, il quale contra ogni speranza ha congregato in tanto numero, che quasi si può pareggiar con gli antichi; di poter condurre, e fermare la stanca navicella, della quale è nocchiero, in alcun tranquillo seno di mare: convertendo, ò domando gli heretici, i quali come giganti, con si orgogliosa arroganza ardiscono di sfidar à battaglia il popolo di Dio, riformando gli abusi del populo christiano: ricongiungendo le sparse, e divise membra al loro capo; e restituendo alla sua antica riputatione, e al primo splendore l’autorità, e la Maestà della Santa Romana Chiesa.” Ibid., dedication to Pius IV preceding part II. 71. “Pregate Dio, che dia un concilio, che lo prosperi, lo frequenti, e lo conduca à fine; il Diavolo vede la sua ruina, e però fà quanto può per impedirlo, all’ultimo vinceremo noi, vincerà Dio. Orante senza intermissione; che non sa quanto sia buono, utile, e necessario un concilio, vegga, se ha occhi, quanto il mondo fa ciò, che può, per disturbarlo, e da questo giudichi, ch’l concilio è opera, e medicina di Dio per risanar il mondo” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 70v. 72. “Le sante scritture son testimonio, allegate da noi, autenticate de’ santi padri; ma in altro senso da gli Heretici sono interpretate, e quelle che non ricevono commento, sono espressamente (tanto sono impudenti) negate, e ributtate. Che fine haver potrà questa contesa? Da un lato gli Heretici, dall’altro noi, nel mezo [sic] le scritture, la causa è in contradittione, affermiamo noi, negano essi, come si dovrà mai terminar questo dissidio? Con le scritture sole, non già, poi che si vede, che gli Heretici sono arguti, e con ingenno studiano di piegarle al senso loro, e come non possono, liberamente giudaizano, e con iscusa de’ Canoni Hebrei le rifiutano. Et poi per prova miserabile di tutt’i tempi sappiamo che con quest’inganno di verità mascherata, con testimonio di Sante scritture l’Angelo di Satanasso traffigurato sempre sedusse il mondo; tal che se basta a seguir le parole, senza voler cercare il vero senso delle scritture, con quel pericolo, che

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no t e s t o pag e s 76 – 7 8 questi ci vogliono far Luterani, o sacramentarii per certe loro scritture a modo, e seno suo contaminate, con lo istesso ci potran fare Arriani in disonor di Christo. . . .” Delle pene e de’ suffragi del Purgatorio, in Porcacchi, 224. 73. “L’heresia è una cisterna dissipata piena di lezzo, e di bruttura, sarebbe meglio bere veleno, che chinar pure un poco le labbra all’acque sue. Ma quello, che importa è, che gli heretici presumono d’haver l’Evangelio, anzi l’Evangelio puro, la Scrittura pura, San Paolo puro.” Musso, I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 373. 74. “Come hanno quest’ingrati, apostati, e tralignanti figli di cosi buona, humile, sincera, e catolica madre contaminata, e apostata tanta parte d’Europa, inclinati tanti animi, subornato tant’academie, desolate chiese, violati cimiteri, depredati monasteri, cattivate libertà, esautorati principi, se non coll’eloquenza? Con splendor di parole? Con arte di ben dire, e ben scrivere? . . . ​A ltri studiano per insegnare, e non si contentano insegnare huomini, ma vogliono anco instituire i libri medesimi, che studiano; ne cercano d’intendere, ò sapere quel che’l libro mostra, ma di far dire al libro quel che essi sentono, il che non potendo essi far senza violenza; depravano, corrompono, e contaminano le scritture, mescolando di molte zizanie co’l grano, e questi sono gli heretici.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 60r, 66v. 75. “Quanta utilità apporti la stampa alli catholici.” Discorsi predicabili, 266r–270v. 76. Frymire, Primacy of the Postils, 127–132, 264–273. 77. Gabriele Fiamma, Predica dell’altissima cognitione di Dio; fatta in Firenze, nella Chiesa di S. Lorenzo, il Giorno di S. Tomaso Apostolo, l’anno MDLVIII, in Prediche del Reverendo Don Gabriel Fiamma, Canonico Regolare Lateranense, Fatte in vari tempi, in vari luoghi, e intorno a vari soggetti (Venice, 1570). Felice Peretti, Predica della necessità della sacra scrittura à reformar l’huomo, in Prediche del R. Padre fra Felice Peretti (Naples, 1554). For Fiamma, see Chapter 5; for Peretti before his elevation to the papacy, see Franchini, Bibliosofia, 184–201; Cantini, I Francescani d’Italia. Peretti’s later fame did not revive attention to his earlier works and only three of his sermons were ever published. Franchini (pp. 189–190) cites Wadding in noting that the library of the convent of San Isidoro in Rome contains an unpublished manuscript of a Lenten series by Peretti. 78. “Questa è pur cosa insopportabile, che, per essere contumaci, vogliono i moderni heretici biasimar la vita de’ prelate; e . . . ​non vogliono considerar l’auttorità. Forse che sono santi gli heresiarchi. Voi biasimate la vita de’ prelati, per appigliarvi alla dottrina de’ Luterani. Questo è pur vero, e senza dubbio, non fu mai alcun prelato, se alcuno è stato dissoluto, che non sia un santo in comparatione di questi empi . . . ​e fanno professione aperta d’esser nemici di tutte le buone opere; contenti solamente di una fede morta, e maligna: che con parole dolci di Vangelo, di Christo, di libertà rovinano tutti i buoni costumi.” Prediche, 239. 79. Fiamma’s series on saints’ lives commends the Council of Trent for ruling against false interpretations of scripture, arguing that scripture is difficult, and

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no t e s t o pag e s 7 8 – 8 0 that if the populace at large reads it, they will fall into errors and false interpretations, the source of all heresy. Vite de’ Santi libro V, 94v (Venice, 1602). Quoted in Ossola, “Il ‘Queto Travaglio’,” 227. The original title of that opus displays his later preoccupation with heresy: Le vite de’ santi, descritte dal r.p.d. Gabriel Fiamma, canonico regolare lateranen. vescovo di Chioza . . . ​Con le annotationi sopra ciascuna d’ esse, che espugnano, et conuincono le heresie, e rei costumi de’ moderni tempi (Venice, 1581; Genoa, 1586). 80. Paul Grendler, The Roman Inquisition and the Venetian Press, 1540–1605 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977), 118–120. 81. “Questa Santa Chiesa, se ben è stata da gli Heretici travagliata, ne è restata finalmente superiore, e col testo de la scrittura santa ha confuso tutte l’heresie, gittatole a terra, e abrugiatole.” Felice Peretti Predica sopra il misterioso Vangelo della Settuagesima (Naples, 1554). 82. Philip Benedict, Silvana Seidel Menchi, and Alain Tallon, La Réforme en France et en Italie: Contacts, comparaisons et contrastes (Rome: École Française de Rome, 2007); and Simon Ditchfield, “Innovation and Its Limits: The Case of Italy (ca. 1512–ca. 1572),” in ibid., 145–160. 83. Mark U. Edwards, “Catholic Controversial Literature, 1518–1555: Some Statistics,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 79 (1988): 189–208, especially p. 201. 84. “Le scritture . . . ​sono come le vesti, che in mille velami di sacri simboli, figure, metafore, quasi aviluppano, e nascondono quella gran maestà, che non si possa vedere da gl’occhi nostri.” I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 348. 85. “Perciò forse haveva anco questo costume il nostro Christo maestro del mondo, e di parlar sotto sacri velami d’oscurissime parabole alla plebe, e non dichiarare i secreti apertamente se non à gli Apostoli suoi. Et San Paolo, che fu tanto prudente, perché credete, che habbia scritto si stretto in quelle suo epistole dell’altezza della Christiana Religione? Et i profeti, che predicavano a’ popoli sieno stati tanto oscuri, e tanto difficili, se non per dare anco con la secretezza, e difficultà loro autorità, e riverenza alla parola di Dio.” Ibid., II.7, 324–325. 86. I tre libri delle prediche, II.7, 340. 87. “Hai tu notate l’arme del diavolo? L’arme sue sono le scritture sacre, ma pervertite, ma troncate, ma spanate, ma depravate. O heretici, o heretici, riconoscete il vostro maestro in questo giorno. Egli v’ha insegnato a mutilare gli Evangelii a corromper San Paolo, a falsare tutto’l vecchio e nuovo testamente. Quest’è il costume peculiare degli heretici, non allegar mai una auttorità intera.” Delle prediche Quadragesimali del R.mo Mons.or Cornelio Musso (Venice, 1587), Vol. I, 138. 88. “Che parte havrebbe l’huomo nelle sacre scritture, se non gli bisognasse affaticarsi a penetrarle. Oltra, che s’avilirebbono quelle sacre sententie, se fussero tanto palesi, che l’intendesse ogni huomo. Bisogna sudare, stentare con l’arte humana a cavare, a intendere i secreti divini . . . ​Lasciate la superbia, la malignita,

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no t e s t o pag e s 81 – 83 l’arrogantia, andate humilmente alla lettione della scrittura sacra. Non è tanto necessario l’ingegno, quanto la mente purgata, l’affetto pio, il cuor servente, l’oratione profonda, l’intelletto captivato, una fede viva, una carità infocata, un desiderio grande.” Delle Prediche Quadragesimali, Vol. II, 157. This was the sermon for the twenty-­sixth day of Lent, a Sunday. The pericope for that day, Galatians 4:22 (“For it is written, that Abraham had two sons”), traditionally led to discussions of scriptural interpretation. 89. “Si che con giudicio, e diletto bisogna leggere, e pratticare i libri, e le scritture quanti e quante ne sono, e ne saranno mai oltra le sacre, e con regola generale, ciò che con esse non conviene, tutto tutto dannare, e reprobare.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 57v. 90. “Providde poi nella sua chiesa d’interpreti, dottori, apostoli, concilii, acciò à tutti i tempi, e in tutti i luoghi potesse il mondo esser capace, e certo del suo giusto volere, e imparar a viver in gloria sua . . . ​Resta che l’uso, e studio, e intelligenza d’esse, trattarle, leggerle, udirle; ò à qualche modo saper la volontà di Dio à tutti sia necessario. Cosi data la legge disse Mosè al popolo (Deut. 4), Haec est sapientia vestra, e intellectus vester, ut audient universi ecc. Cosi mostra egli desiderare, che tutti siam profeti, e tutti ricevano lo spirito del Signore.” Ibid., 68r. 91. “Un’altra sorte di scolari, anzi dottori habbiamo noi à questi nostri dì, che senza spirito, e senza lettere, fabri, mugnai, pescivendoli, e tavernai, non solamente leggono, ò studiano, ma espongono, giudicano, e insegnano le sacre lettere, ne solamente l’historie, ò le morali, ma le altissime profetie, la profundità di san Paolo, i misterii di San Giovanni, i segreti della predestinatione, giustificatione, retributione, e se maggiori, ò più difficili questioni grattar si possono, di tutte liberamente prononcia l’audacissima temerità dello sciocco, e ignorantissimo vulgo, e glosa, e interpreta, e reproba, e delibera come Aristarco, e guidice inappellabile della verità, e padri, e concilii, e canoni, e chiesa ci son per niente, ove non si confanno co’l suo parer.” Ibid., 66v. 92. See Carlo Delcorno, “Dal ‘sermo modernus’ alla retorica ‘borromea’,” Lettere Italiane 39 (1989): 465–483 and “Forme della predicazione cattolica fra Cinque e Seicento,” in Cultura d’élite e cultura popolare nell’arco alpino fra Cinque e Seicento (Boston: Mirkhaeuser Verlag, 1995), 292–302. Delcorno attributes the topos of the world turned upside down to the sermons of “Predicatori di grido,” or rabble-­rousing preachers, but it appears frequently in the sermons of both the mendicant and the diocesan preachers in this study. 93. “Chi sa leggere, legga, v’è cibo per tutti, vi son l’historie, ci sono le parabole di Salomone, le parti morali, le narrationi del sacro Evangelio; Molte epistole di Paolo, e tutte quelle di Giovanni, le due di Pietro, et una di Giacopo, facili tutte, et commode ad ogni spirito; e in queste anchora, ove nasce dubbio, non giudichi mai di proprio capo . . . ​Si che non è mente bassa, ò intelletto humile, che habbi à disperarsi mai di non poter sapere, quanto è necessario saper per sua

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no t e s t o pag e s 83 – 8 5 salute; ma non cerchi saper oltra i suoi termini; ne cerchi saper con altri mezi, che quei, che legittimi sono; leggere, orare, e consegliarsi con quei, che veraci, e leali, e ordinarii maestri sono.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 71r–v. 94. “Leggano i maestri, e dottori, e leggano ogni parte liberamente, trattando le scritture magistralmente, con vedere, e intendere tutto, e lettere, e sensi, e figure, e tropi, e allegorie, anagogie, e quante altezze, e profondità ci sono; ma sempre con modestia, e humilità Christiana; lontani da quella temeratrice audacia, che non studia per accommodar se alle scritture; ma per piegar le scritture al senso suo; orino anch’essi sempre acciò la loro eruditione sia dono di Dio, e non humana sola industria. Nelle controversie, non ricevono mai altro spirito per giudice, che il comun senso ecclesiastico. Cosi leggendo crederanno; e credendo intenderanno.” Ibid., 72r. 95. See Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo, quotation on p. 77. Whereas Fragnito argues for a deliberate attempt to make the patrimonium fidei inaccessible to the laity, I am arguing here that preachers and others in mediating positions between clergy and laity sought, admittedly within ever narrowing confines, to maintain a practice of allowing laity a means to learn for themselves. See also Silvana Seidel Menchi, “The Age of Reformation and Counter-­Reformation in Italian Historiography, 1939–2009,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 100 (2009): 193–217. 96. “Ma prima voltisi allo Spirito santo, e preghi Dio, che ‘illumini, e non dubiti mai della verità di quanto legge, anzi sia certissimo che tutto è vero, e buono, se à se dispiace, la colpa è sua, che ò non intende, ò non ha il gusto sano: non dubiti anche mai di non poter intendere quanto legge per dono di Dio, che non manca mai à buona volonta.” Homelie dello Spirito Santo, 71r. 97. The Magnificat sermons are published as part of Musso’s Delle Prediche Quadragesimali. See Angelico Poppi, “La spiegazione del ‘Magnificat’ di Cornelio Musso (1540),” in Problemi e figure della scuola scotista del Santo (Padua: Edizioni Messagero, 1966), 415–489. 98. Prediche sopra il Simbolo de gli Apostoli . . . ​del R.mo Mons.or Cornelio Musso Vescovo di Bitonto. Predicate in Roma la Quaresima l’Anno MDXLII nella Chiesa di S. Lorenzo in Damaso (Venice, 1590; 1601). 99. Roberto Rusconi, “Predicatori e predicazione (secoli IX–XVIII),” in Storia d’Italia Annali, vol. 4: (Torino, 1981), 951–1030. Rusconi argues that the Council of Trent, even before it ended, replaced scripture preaching with catechism, causing the great “concept” preaching that would prevail in the seventeenth century to reflect not just literary taste but the end result of a process promoting the doctrinal, not scriptural, aspects of Catholic instruction. His examples are drawn from later in the century than Musso Intellettuali e potere, but Fragnito, Bolzoni, and Giombi, in the works previously cited, follow similar lines of argument. 100. “Se voi sapeste dico come stanno à questa età nelle mani de’ vostri mercenarii, de’ vostri Vicarii, che non attendono se non all’utile proprio . . . ​Quanti falsi

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no t e s t o pag e s 8 5 – 8 7 predicatori, che fingono il santo, e sono i diavoli, vanno corrompendo, e depravando l’Evangelio di Christo? e con l’assentar la briglia al popolazzo scocco, e ignorante, fanno sette ogni giorno contra la Chiesa catolica? . . . ​Vedete gl’heretici prevaler contra i catholici, la casa di Pietro, à cui sete tanto obligati, essere in tanto pericolo Christo istesso, il suo corpo, il suo sangue, esser concultato publicamente, e non lasciate ogni altro pensiero, per andar à soccorrere, ad aiutare . . . ​Christo si mosse e partì del cielo, per aiutare una pecorella sola, ch’era smarrita, e non vi curò di novanta nove, perché erano in sicuro, e voi per novanta nove non vi curate, anzi per cento; che non che n’è una, della quale possiate confidarvi, che sia fuori de pericolo?” I tre libri delle prediche, II.3, 121–2. 101. “Non ha bisogno la Chiesa alla edification sua di cosa alcuna.” Ibid., introduction to vol. II. 102. Euan Cameron, “The Reformation in France and Italy to C.1560: A Review of Recent Contributions and Debates,” in La Réforme en France et en Italie (Rome: École Française de Rome, 2007), 17–33; Euan Cameron, The European Reformation, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012), 132–137; John Frymire, The Primacy of the Postils: Catholics, Protestants, and the Dissemination of Ideas in Early Modern Germany (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010), 256. 103. Catholic preachers after Trent faced the problem of having “relied heavily on their forbears who, after 1530, had led the charge against heresy through the medium of the postil, but who now, after the inflexible pronouncements at Trent, might well have committed doctrinal errors themselves.” Frymire, Primacy of the Postils, 160. 104. The confluence of “Catholic Reform” and “Counter-­Reformation” themes in one sermon shows both the usefulness and the insufficiency, as O’Malley has argued, of these terms. John W. O’Malley, Trent and All That: Renaming Catholicism in the Early Modern Era (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2000); Hubert Jedin, “Catholic Reformation or Counter-­Reformation,” in The Counter-­Reformation: The Essential Readings, ed. David M. Luebke (Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishing, 1999). 105. Lina Bolzoni, “Oratoria e prediche,” in Letteratura Italiana, vol. III.2 (Torino: Einaudi, 1984), 1041–1074; Samuele Giombi, “Livelli di cultura nella trattatistica sulla predicazione e l’eloquenza sacra del XVI secolo,” in Cultura d’élite e cultura popolare nell’arco alpino fra Cinque e Seicento (Boston: Mirkhaeuser Verlag, 1995), 247–273.

3. Sermons and Diocesan Reform 1. Elisabeth G. Gleason, ed., Reform Thought in Sixteenth-­Century Italy, Texts and Translations (Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1981), 81–100.

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no t e s t o pag e s 8 7 – 8 9 2. James O’Donohoe, “The Seminary Legislation of the Council of Trent,” in Il Concilio di Trento e la riforma tridentina: Atti del convengno storico internazionale Trento 2–6 Settembre 1963. (Rome: Herder, 1965), 157–172; Kathleen M. Comerford, Reforming Parishes: Tuscan Dioceses in the First Century of Seminary Education (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2006). 3. Ronnie Po-­Chia Hsia, The World of Catholic Renewal 1540–1770 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 121. 4. The problem of absenteeism was not “solved” by the Council; see Barbara McClung Hallman, Italian Cardinals, Church Reform, and the Church as Property, 1492–1563 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1985); for Borromeo, see John M. Headley and John B. Tomaro, eds., San Carlo Borromeo: Catholic Reform and Ecclesiastical Politics in the Second Half of the Sixteenth Century (Washington, DC: Folger Books, 1988); Wietse de Boer, The Conquest of the Soul: Confession, Discipline, and Public Order in Counter-­Reformation Milan (Leiden: Brill, 2001). 5. In 1538 Lippomano was named coadjutor of Bergamo with the right of succession to his cousin, Pietro Lippomano, as well as titular bishop of Methone. When Pietro was transferred to the episcopate of Verona in 1544 following the death of Gian Matteo Giberti, Luigi followed. Five years later he succeeded Pietro as bishop. He held that position until 1558, when Paul IV transferred him back to Bergamo. See Giuseppe Alberigo, I vescovi italiani al concilio di Trento (Florence: Sansoni, 1959); Lorenzo Tachella, Il processo agli eretici veronesi nel 1550: S. Ignazio di Loyola e Luigi Lippomano (Brescia: Morcelliana, 1979); Pino Simoni, Luigi Lippomano, vescovo e nunzio apostolico del Cinquecento: Profilo bio-­biografico (Verona: Archivio Storico Curia Diocesana, 1993); Oliver Logan, The Venetian Upper Clergy in the 16th and Early 17th Centuries: A Study in Religious Culture (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen Press, 1996). Some of the material here appears in expanded form in Emily Michelson, “Luigi Lippomano, His Vicars, and the Reform of Verona from the Pulpit,” Church History 78, no. 3 (2009): 584–605. 6. See Adriano Prosperi, “Note in margine a un opuscolo di Gian Matteo Giberti,” Critica Storica IV (1965): 367–393; Adriano Prosperi, “Di alcuni testi per il clero nell’Italia del primo Cinquecento,” Critica Storica 7 (1968): 137–168; Adriano Prosperi, Tra evangelismo e controriforma: G. M. Giberti (1495–1543) (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1969). 7. Tachella, Il processo agli eretici veronesi; Logan, Venetian Upper Clergy, 68: 184–206. 8. See also Simon Ditchfield, “In Search of Local Knowledge: Rewriting Early Modern Italian Religious History,” Cristianesimo nella storia 19 (1998): 255–296. 9. DBI, s.v. “Lippomano, Luigi.”

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no t e s t o pag e s 8 9 – 9 4 10. Espositioni Volgare del Reverendissimo Monsignor Luigi Lippomano vescovo di Modone, et Coadiutore di Bergamo, Sopra il Simbolo Apostolico cioè il credo . . . ​ (Venice, 1541), Lettera, unpaginated, preceding Book II. 11. “In nessuna cosa ci siam accorti che punto si sian mutate gli animi di questi Germani: Non è stato persona, ne frati ne Preti, ne secolare che pur habbia mostrato di volerci vedere, et riconoscere per quelli servi che siamo di S. Beatitudine. il S. Dio illumini la mente loro, accioché questa nostra venuta sia di qualche frutto; dal canto nostro non si mancarà in cosa alcuna per ridur queste povere anime. . . .” Archivio Segreto Vaticano, A. A. Arm. I–xVIII, Vol 6527, f. 91, in Tachella, Il processo agli eretici veronesi, 15. 12. For the trip to Germany, see Hubert Jedin, Papal Legate at the Council of Trent: Cardinal Seripando (St. Louis, MO: B. Herder, 1947). Both Alberigo and Tachella emphasize the influence of Lippomano’s experience with heresy on his pastoral work. 13. Prosperi, Tra evangelismo, 244; Alberigo, I vescovi italiani, 84–88; Friedrich Lauchert, Die italienischen literarischen gegner Luthers (Nieuwkoop: B. De Graaf, 1912), 569–584. 14. Aleni, Paolo, Argomenti che debbono essere predicati da tutti i predicatori della parola divina nella prossima Quaresima in tutta la città e diocesi di Verona, in Paolo Guerrini, “L’opera riformatrice di un Vicario generale di Verona nel biennio 1552–53,” Il Concilio di Trento: Rivista Commemorativa del IV centinario 2 (1942): 192–200; Italian translation in Roberto Rusconi, “Predicazione e vita religiosa nella società religiosa (da Carlo Magno alla Controriforma),” (Turin: Loescher, 1981), 309–312; see also Roberto Rusconi, “Predicatori e predicazione (secoli IX–XVIII),” in Storia d’Italia. Annali, vol. 4: Intellettuali e potere (Torino, 1981), 951–1030; Prosperi, “Di alcuni testi,” 158. 15. In Guerrini, “L’opera riformatrice,” 199. 16. Ibid., 195. 17. Luigi Lippomano, Visitationum Libri Dioecesis Veronensis annorum 1553–55: Trascrizione dei Registri X–XI–XII delle Visite Pastorali (Verona: Archivio Storico Curia Diocesana, 1999). 18. Sermoni overo Homelie Devote del Reverendo M. Giovanni del Bene Veronese sopra gli Evangelii di tutto l’anno, secondo l’ordine della Santa Madre Chiesa, utili ad ogni fedel Christiano (Venice, 1562). 19. Sermoni overo Homelie. All quotations and biographical information in this and the following paragraph are taken from the unpaginated dedicatory letter. 20. Some Reformation-­era Catholic preachers, describing their libraries, did not say that they “owned” or “read” sermon collections but that they “used” them. John Frymire, “Demonstrationes Catholicae: Defining Communities Through Counter-­Reformation Rituals,” in Defining Community in Early Modern Europe, St. Andrews Studies in Reformation History (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 178.

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no t e s t o pag e s 9 4 – 9 6 21. Many preachers discussed elsewhere in this study referred to their sermons as “omelie.” 22. Sermoni ovvero Homelie also includes sermons for special Masses, such as the dedication of a church, the feast day of a martyr, or the office of the dead. If a feast day is missing, a substitute is indicated. 23. Model sermons as a genre distinguishable from delivered published sermons were less common in Italy than in Germany (where efforts to reform preaching were more explicit), making Del Bene’s book all the more noteworthy. Anne T. Thayer, Penitence, Preaching and the Coming of the Reformation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2002); John Frymire, The Primacy of the Postils: Catholics, Protestants, and the Dissemination of Ideas in Early Modern Germany (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010); Amy Nelson Burnett, Teaching the Reformation: Ministers and Their Message in Basel, 1529–1629 (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2006); for printed sermons and the broader genre of “sermon literature,” see Marc Saperstein, Jewish Preaching 1200–1800: An Anthology (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989). 24. For a discussion of who owned Del Bene’s work at the close of the sixteenth century, see Epilogue. 25. “Et all’hora si vederanno chiare le bugie de i presenti presontuosi Heretici; quali vogliono, che basti la fede. Sempre ha bastata la fede: a che? A far sane le persone dell’anima congiunta però con carità, con si ha in tutto il santo Evangelio: ma che basti per se a salvar l’huomo senza operare, questo non si troverà in eterno. Ma ben sempre si trova, che bisogna operare, e che la fede senza le buone opere è morta, e nulla ci vale, come dice san Giacomo. Et che le buone opere siano la via, per la quale andiamo al cielo, lo afferma anco san Paolo. . . . ​cosi che non si essercita spiritualmente, quando di sente guarito dell’anima, non sarà mai guarito, ne haverà appetito da sano. Chi dunque nega questo, nega la più chiara cosa, che si possi dire.” Sermoni ovvero Homelie, 72v–73r. 26. “Dirà alcuno: Anzi hoggidi pare, che (non voglio dir i contadini) ma le persone meccaniche siano quelle, che tutto il giorno hanno in bocca la scrittura, & san Paolo. Fallano quelli, fallano questi. Quelli non vogliono imparare, essendo il bisogno loro. Questi vogliono insegnare, non essendo l’officio loro, & se n’accorgeranno, anchor che non se gli possi dar ad intendere, per essere accecati dalla loro presontione, & temerità. Mi dirai, Non è il predicare, & insegnare (parlando delle cose di Dio) un’ufficio libero? . . . ​Et dice, che ne tutti sono Dottori, ne tutti profetano.” Ibid., 263r. 27. Danilo Zardin, “Bibbia e apparati biblici nei conventi italini del Cinque-­ Seicento,” in Libri, Biblioteche e Cultura degli Ordini Regolari nell’Italia Moderna attraverso la Documentazione della Congregazione dell”Indice (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2006), 77.

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no t e s t o pag e s 9 7 – 10 0 28. “Hor havendo fatto questo principio per sapere ciò che celebriamo, entriamo alla dichiaratione del sacro testo evangelico hodierno. Narra San Luca nel ventesimo primo capitolo, che Giesu nostro Signore disse a discepoli suoi. Saranno segni nel Sole, & nella Luna, & nelle stelle.” Sermoni ovvero Homelie, 1r. 29. “San Luca continuando nel primo Capitolo già in buona parte trascorso l’altro giorno, cio che seguitasse doppo la salutatione, & partita dell’Angelo Gabriello, racconta che in que’ giorni postasi Maria in camino ando in fretta su le montagne ne la Città di Giuda.” Ibid., 10r, 171r–v. 30. Carlo Delcorno, “Dal ‘sermo modernus’ alla retorica ‘borromea’,” Lettere Italiane 39 (1989): 465–483; Thayer, Penitence, Preaching and the Coming of the Reformation, 20–21. 31. The IHS monogram of the name of Jesus was popularized by Bernardino of Siena in the mid-­fi fteenth century, and certain devotees of the symbol used it in more superstitious ways. Emily Michelson, “Bernardino of Siena Visualizes the Name of God,” in Speculum Sermonis: Interdisciplinary Reflections on the Medieval Sermon, ed. Georgiana Donavin (Turnhout, Belgium: Brepols, 2004), 155–178. 32. “Chi ha la scrittura, & gli santi comandamenti di Dio alla mano, ha donde rispondere, & confondere l’inimico; percioche il Signore ogni volta risponde con la scrittura al demonio . . . ​Vediamo poi, che non basta haver la scrittura alla mano, chi non la intende; imperoche lo nemico l’allega anchora esso, come suol fare comunemente per la bocca de gli Heretici.” Sermoni ovvero Homelie, 60v–61r. 33. Ibid., 263r. 34. “Accioche per questa via facile, & con poca fatica de’ preti, i popoli massimanete nella Diocese venissero ad imparare, & gustare cose di Dio alla loro salute pertinenti.” Ibid., dedicatory letter. 35. Del Bene’s approach is more consistent with Lippomano’s entire oeuvre than Aleni’s work is; see Michelson, “Luigi Lippomano.” 36. “Il Signore per argomenti della sua verità usa le sante scritture, per condescendere alla nostra infermità ha fatto predir avanti il tempo ciò che era per avvenir al suo figliolo per santi testimonii antichi, nella legge, e ne’ S. Profeti, acciocché da quanto appunto era per patire, non solo non si scandalizzasse il mondo, ma più si havesse a confermare nella verità.” Sermoni ovvero Homelie, 160r. 37. “Et è impossibile versar nelle sante scritture con purità, e con desiderio di essere illuminati, e non cavarne frutto.” Ibid., 160v. 38. For biographical material, see Jedin, Papal Legate; Rocchina Abbondanza, Girolamo Seripando tra evangelismo e riforma cattolica (Naples: Ferraro, 1981); Francesco C. Cesareo, A Shepherd in Their Midst: The Episcopacy of Girolamo Seripando 1554–1563 (Villanova, PA: The Augustinian Press, 1999).

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no t e s t o pag e s 101 – 10 4 39. Jedin, Papal Legate, 24–55, 69–75. 40. Cesareo, A Shepherd in Their Midst, 5–6. 41. “Lasciatemi . . . ​d ire alcune poche parole à queste fanciulli, i quali per ordine mio son venuti ad udir la parola di Dio, perché . . . ​la speranza mia di edere a Salerno qualche renovatione, et qualche lume vero di vita christiana, è più in loro che in voi altri di maggior età.” Reprinted in Abbondanza, Girolamo Seripando, 108. 42. Jedin, Papal Legate, 268–282. 43. Ibid., 283–300. 44. “Le prediche siano desunte dalla s. Scrittura . . . ​siano chiare, palesi, non ambigue o equivocabili . . . ​Non predichino una dottrina dei discorsi pubblici e un’altra nei colloqui privati, ma la stessa sempre e ovunque per l’edificazione degli uditori.” Girolamo Seripando, Discorsi: Il vescovo, la giustificazione, l’impegno politico, ed. Alfredo Marranzini (Rome: Città Nuova Editrice, 2001), 41–43. 45. In Abbondanza, Girolamo Seripando, 90. 46. Seripando’s sermons on the Apostles’ Creed were published three times, in 1567, 1585, and 1586. The Paternoster sermons were not published until the twentieth century, in Abbondanza, Girolamo Seripando. 47. Ibid., 200. 48. Giberti, Breve Ricordo di quello hanno da fare i chierici (Verona, 1530). Reprinted in Prosperi, “Note in margine,” 393–402. Per Li Padri Predicatori (Verona, 1540). 49. See the discussion of Cornelio Musso’s replacement of scripture with catechism in the previous chapter. Giorgio Caravale argues that devoting an entire sermon cycle to the Paternoster in 1559 only became possible after a decade of censorship rescued the prayer from the heretical associations it had acquired from Luther’s commentary on it. L’orazione proibita: Censura ecclesiastica e letteratura devozionale nella prima età moderna. (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2003), 22–23. 50. Cesareo, A Shepherd in Their Midst, 26–30. 51. Seripando’s reluctance to engage with scripture challenges the conclusions of his biographers, who tend to see him as open-­m inded in all regards, considering primarily his work at Trent and as a cardinal, his early tolerance of Lutherans, his public advocacy of scripture, and his losing battle for double justification at the Council. In addition, they take his ardent stance on episcopal residence as an indicator of his entire tenure as bishop. They therefore assume his preaching to be primarily exegetical. Francesco Cesareo emphasizes that Seripando’s Augustinian roots led him to insist that scripture be read and understood. Rocchina Abbondanza Blasi, who prepared the critical edition of the Paternoster sermons, and Francesco Cesareo, in his study of Seripando’s episcopacy, both read Seripando’s “daily bread” passage as an embrace of scripture but do not discuss its message in depth.

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no t e s t o pag e s 10 4 – 10 6 52. “Pane nella scrittura santa principalmente significa il verbo di dio.” “Habbiamo ogni giorno bisogno di questo pane della parola dico di Dio o in voce o in scritto. Perciò ci bisogna ogni giorno o ascoltar la parola di dio o leggerla.” Abbondanza, Girolamo Seripando, 208, 277. 53. “O quanto sarebbe bene s’ogni sera ciascuno facesse conto con se stesso et dicesse: io disi questa mattina nell’oratione che Jhesu Christo m’ha insegnato: Panem nostrum? Ho io udito hoggi o letto niente della parola di dio? Ho ­ascoltato con attentione cio che ho udito? He inteso ciò che ho letto? Ho obbedito con prontezza di cuore a qualche cosa comandata da dio?” Ibid., 227–228. 54. “Diranno alcuni: Et come potiamo ogni giorno mangiar questo pane se non ogni giorno si dispensa, se non ogni giorno si predica? A me certo dispiace questa o ignoranza o negligenza, dalla quale è noto che pochissime volte si dispensa questo pane della parola di Dio. Che cosa sarebbe che ogni giorno nella chiesa si dicessero cinquanta parole semplicemnte senza molta superbia, senza molte sottilità, secondo che lo Spirito Santo dettasse. Io non so dire si questo mancamento venghi da i popoli che non vogliono mangiar questo pane, o da i Pastori che non vogliono o non sanno pascere. Certa cosa è che quei giorni che questo pane si dispensa, più sono coloro che non vengono a pigiarlo, che coloro che vengono, più sono coloro che attendono al pane del ventre, che a questo pane della mente. Ma io vi dico che ogni giorno si dispensa questo pane. Il difetto è vostro che non venite a pigliarlo. Non si dice ogni giorno in tante chiese la Messa? Non se dicono l’hore canoniche? nella Messa non si dispensa la parola di dio nell’Epistola, nell’Evangelio? nell’hore ancor canoniche non si fa il medesimo ne i salmi et nell’altre cose che si dicano per se dalle parole di dio?” Ibid. 55. “So ben le vostre mormorationi. Voi dite, noi non intendiamo ciò che si dice, nella Messa e ne gli Uffici, perché si parla in lingua latina non intesa da noi, ne da molti sacerdoti che malamente la leggono. Lasciamo stare di rendervi hoggi conto, perché la nostra Chiesa usa la lingua latina nei sacrifici, nei sacramenti et in tutto il culto divino, il che ha fatto non solo à tempi nostri, ma sempre. Bastavi sapere che in questa come in ogn’altra cosa è guidata dallo Spirito Santo. Bastavi intendere che in questi paesi, ove hanno voluto sapere pure dello Spirito Santo et hanno nuovamente introdotto la Messa nella lor lingua volgare, Dio ha fatto de i suoi miracoli, ha fatto vendetta della lor teremità et presuntione poiche ha divisso le lingue loro nelle cose pertinenti alla fede et alla salute. In una stessa casa altrimenti crede et parla il marito, altrimenti la moglie, altrimenti il padre, altrimenti il figlio.” Ibid. 56. “Io v’arriverò per un’altra via. Voi che dite di non intendere quel che si dice in ogni giorno nella Messa et negli Uffici si dispensa questo santo cotidiano pane

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no t e s t o pag e s 10 7 – 1 1 1 et per questo et per questo non ogni giorno ne mangiate, ditemi un poco, non sapete voi gl’articoli della fede? Non sapete voi i comandamente della legge? O come saresti christiani altramente? Dunque considerate da voi stessi ogni giorno qualche cosa pertinente alla fede, operate ogni giorno qualch’opera di charità, sapendo di certo che quanto si dice nella messa, quanto si canta negl’uffici, quanto è scritto nella scrittura, quanto è comandato nella legge o tocca alla fede o alla charità. A questo mò da voi stessi vi dispensarete et mangiarete questo santo pane.” Ibid. 57. Michele Cassese, Girolamo Seripando e i vescovi meridionali, vol. 2 (Naples: Editoriale Scientifica, 2002); Rinaldo Fabris attributes to Seripando a primarily pastoral and catechistic intent, which prefers medieval tradition and allegory to exegesis. See Rinaldo Fabris, “Uso della Bibbia nella predicazione dal Concilio di Trento alla fine del Settecento,” in La predicazione in Italia dopo il Concilio di Trento tra Cinquecento e Settecento: Atti del X convegno di Studio dell’Associazione Italiana dei Professori di Storia della Chiesa, Napoli, 6–9 Settembre 1994, ed. Giacomo Martina and Ugo Dovere (Rome: Edizioni Dehoniane, 1996), 47–81. In the few places where Seripando does embark on a line-­by-­l ine exegetical commentary, his interpretation confirms this approach. See for example his explication of Psalm 132, reprinted in Seripando, Discorsi. 58. For heresy in Salerno, see Michele Miele, “Presenza protestante a Salerno durante l’episcopato di Seripando,” in Geronimo Seripando e la chiesa del suo tempo nel V centenario della nascita., ed. Antonio Cestaro, vol. 12.8, Thesaurus Ecclesiarum Italiae (Salerno: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1994), 283–290; as well as Cesareo, A Shepherd in Their Midst. 59. Jedin, Papal Legate, 227. 60. “Quanto al benefitio publico de la chiesa, et alla riforma. . . . ​Comprendevo quanto grande sia la differenza tra l’imaginarsi una cosa, ragionarne, et scriverne bene, et porgere le mani ad exeguirla. Nel’imaginatione . . . ​non sentiamo ne fatiga, ne amaritudine, ne cosa che possa dispiacerci . . . ​ma come comincia a toccar a noi il fare, il mettere ad effetto li disegni et le parole, troviamo di quelle fatighe, et di quei travaglii, che forsi non ci havevamo avate imaginati.” Cassese, Girolamo Seripando, 2:104. 61. Jedin, Papal Legate, 107, suggests that although Valdes and Seripando were acquainted with each other, Seripando did not trust Valdes; see also Miele, “Gironimo Seripando.” 62. Jedin, Papal Legate, 180–185, 221–239. 63. Ibid., 102–103, 221. 64. Ibid., 135 and passim, 156–7, 221–239. 65. Ibid., 213–215. 66. Zardin, “Bibbia e apparati biblici.”

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 1 2 – 1 1 4

4. Treatises for Laypeople 1. Discorsi del Reverendo Padre Donn’ Hippolito Chizzola Canonico Regolare Lateranense, per confutar le particolari eresie (Venice, 1562), 76r–77r. 2. Given Arrivabene’s known associations with Lutheranism in the 1550s, as discussed in Chapter 1, this publication may have been a mutually beneficial declaration of orthodoxy. Arrivabene also published the sermons of Franceschino Visdomini and the decrees of the Council of Trent. 3. George Nugent, “Anti-­Protestant Music for Sixteenth-­Century Ferrara,” Journal of the American Musicological Society 43 (1990): 236. 4. DBI, s.v. “Bernardino, Paolino.” 5. All the authors merit entries in the DBI. For Lippomano’s treatise, see also s.v. “Albertini, Maffeo.” All but Chizzola appear in Friedrich Lauchert, Die italienischen literarischen gegner Luthers (Nieuwkoop: B. De Graaf, 1912); for da Fano, see also Nugent, “Anti-­Protestant Music”; Elisabeth Gleason, “Sixteenth Century Italian Interpretations of Luther,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 60 (1969): 160–173; Sebastiano da Potenza Picena, “L’opera apologetica ‘Incendio di zizanie lutherani’ di fra Giovanni da Fano (1469–1530),” L’Italia francescana 36, (1991): 188–196, 426–431; Vittorio Coletti cites da Fano’s treatise as an example of nascent, and thus still awkward, attempts to write religious literature in the Italian vernacular, in Parole dal pulpito: Chiesa e movimenti religiosi tra latino e volgare nell’Italia del Medioevo e del Rinascimento (Casale Monferrato: Marietti, 1983), 139. 6. Sermoni del Reverendo Luigi Lippomano coadiutore di Bergamo sopra tutte le principali feste dell’anno (Rome, 1541). 7. For an introduction to this field, see Anne Jacobson Schutte, Printed Italian Vernacular Religious Books 1465–1550: A Finding List (Geneva: Librairie Droz, 1983); Jared Wicks, “Roman Reactions to Luther: The First Year,” Catholic Historical Review 69 (1983): 521–63; David V. N. Bagchi, Luther’s Earliest Opponents: Catholic Controversialists, 1518–1525 (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1991); Ronald K. Delph, “From Venetian Visitor to Curial Humanist: The Development of Agostino Steuco’s ‘Counter’-­Reformation Thought,” Renaissance Quarterly 47 (1994): 102–139; Paul Grendler, The Roman Inquisition and the Venetian Press, 1540–1605 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1977); Edoardo Barbieri, “Tradition and Change in the Spiritual Literature of the Cinquecento,” in Church, Censorship, and Culture in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 111–133. 8. Serafino da Fermo, Breve dichiaratione sopra l’apocalipse de Giovanni, dove si prova esser venuto il precursor de Antichristo (Venice, 1541); Jacopo Moronessa, Il Modello di Martino Lutero (Venice, 1555).

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 1 4 – 1 19 9. See Giorgio Caravale, Sulle tracce dell’eresia: Ambrogio Catarino Politi (1484–1553) (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 2007). 10. They include Girolamo Muzio’s Le Vergeriane del Mutio Iustinopolitano: Discorso se si convenga ragunar concilio. Trattato della comunione de’ Laici e delle mogli di’ Chierici (Venice, 1550); Le Mentite Ochiane (Venice, 1551); Il Bullingero Riprovato (Venice, 1562); L’heretico Infuriato (Rome 1562). 11. Lippomano is the exception in this group as the only author whose positions could be considered “official” because of his prominence. Gigliola Fragnito describes the initial encouragement and subsequent ban on vernacular polemical works such as those of Catarino Politi; both the encouragement and the ban may have extended to these works as well. See Proibito capire: La chiesa e il volgare nella prima età moderna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005), 176–178. 12. Catechismo, cioè instruttione, secondo il decreto del Concilio di Trento a parochi (Rome, 1566). The Catechismus Romanus was the first official catechism produced by the Catholic Church. See Pio Paschini, Cinquecento romano e riforma cattolica (Rome: Facultas Theologica Pontificii Athenaei Lateranensis, 1958). For the Roman Catechism in Europe, see Gerhard Bellinger, Der Catechismus Romanus und die Reformation: Die katechetische Antwort des Trienter. (Paderborn: Bonifacius-­Druckerei, 1970) 13. Thomas Graves Law, ed., The Catechism of John Hamilton, Archbishop of St. Andrews, 1552 (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 1884). The work was probably written not by Hamilton but by Richard Marshall, an English Dominican exiled in Scotland. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, s.v. “Hamilton, John (1510/11–1571)”. 14. De Castro’s work was first published in 1539 and appeared in four editions in Italy between 1545 and 1555. 15. “Per li ditti simplici e idioti me son sforzato in lingua materna le cose più necessarie, con molta charita, compendiosamente redurre.” Giovanni da Fano, Incendio di Zizanie, dedicatory letter. 16. “Come adunque gl’huominini dotti hanno particolarmente disputato con varii & acuti lor trattati contra gli heretici convincendogli di manifesta falsità, et difendendo ogni verita catholica, cosi io con le mie piccolo forze, intendo dimostrare a i volgari non in particolare, ma universalmente, qual sia la breve & facil via la qual tenendo ogni buon Christiano si potra guardare dagli inganni, anzi sara sicurissimo della fede.” Bernardini, Condordia Ecclesiastica, dedicatory letter, 13. 17. For terminology and the language debate in a religious context, see John Jeffries Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies: Italian Heretics in a Renaissance City (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 150–158; Fragnito, Proibito capire, 269; Armand De Gaetano, “G. B. Gelli and the Rebellion Against Latin,” Studies in the Renaissance 14 (1967): 131–158.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 19 – 1 2 3 18. “Sarà lecito à questi ribaldi dare alli Christiani a leggere libri prohibiti per sedurli, e prophanare le cose sacre, e sarà prohibito al pastore di dare un libro, per il quale possino far resistentia alli maligni, e preservarsi, ò se pur hanno preso alcuna contagione, immediate risanarsi?” “Anchora a me rincresce sin’all’anima far questo officio, ma la necessità mi constringe à farlo.” Luigi Lippomano, Confirmatione et Stabilimento, dedicatory letter, n.p. 19. “Le donne debbono tacere, & se non sanno, domandino, & non insegnino.” Bernardini, Concordia Ecclesiastica, 68. 20. Chizzola, Discorsi, 56 r–v. 21. Bernardini, Concordia Ecclesiastica, 59–60. 22. “Et percio cerchiamo i frutti della scrittura, che è lo spirito, i quali non si dicono essere manifesti. Imperoche il frutto dello spirito si ritrova con molta fatica, e sudore, e degna prattica nelle scritture.” Lippomano, Confirmatione et Stabilimento, 46v. 23. Bernardini similarly insists that it is impossible for all of Jesus’s preaching to have been recorded, much less the preaching of the apostles. Concordia Ecclesiastica, 72–81. 24. “Questa sentenza non dice, come gli heretici, che le scritture siano necessarie, ma ben dice, che sono utili, non sono necessarie tal che la Chiesa non possa fare senza loro, gli ammaestramenti gli avisi le correttioni e il resto per fare diventare perfetti gli huomini nelle opere . . . ​la chiesa e la scrittura sono propriamente, come due mani, che si aiutano insieme l’una con l’altra, conciosia cosa che la scrittura testificando all’auttorità della Chiesa riceve ancho testimonio dalla Chiesa stessa, di sorte che chi crede all’una, conviene, che creda anchora all’altra.” Chizzola, Discorsi, 63r–v. 25. Heiko Oberman, Forerunners of the Reformation: The Shape of Late Medieval Thought (New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1966), 55–58. 26. “Molti adonche per haver male inteso le sacre scritture hanno fortemente errato. Andonche la sacra scrittura ha bisogno per le sue difficoltà in molti lochi esser dechiarata.” Giovanni da Fano, Incendio di Zizanie, 2v–3r. 27. “Et quelli che non sanno leggere, debbono humilmente udire e imparare da quelli che sanno . . . Humilmente adunque prima debbiamo attendere, e con somma riverentia leggere overamente udire le prediche, dove si dechiara il santo evangelio: e qui mettere tutto il studio di fermarlo nella memoria.” Giaccari, Enchiridio Christiano, 69v–70r. 28. “Le persone vulgari non che non hanno da leger la scrittura per se stesse, ma l’han ben d’ascoltar da altri che la fanno intender e esporre, e che tengono prattica di lei, come i predicatori, i lettori, i prelati, e i curati. Et per questo si fanno i sermoni al popoli, si predica e si lege ne le chiese, acio che quelli c’hanno l’officio d’insegnar dato da Dio per mano di superiori, l’esercitino, e erudiscano i popoli che sono a le lor cure commessi. Ma non debono i volgari e plebei da se leger la scrittura, la qual

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 2 3 – 1 2 6 non intendono, ne si puo ordinariamente intendere, senza il maestro overo interprete che l’esponga.” Lippomano, Confirmatione et Stabilimento, 48v. 29. “Sarà a tale modo intercetta la strada al Vesovo di convincere il popolo per le scritture se sarà in potesta d’ogni uno interpretarle: perche la pecora si fara giudice del pastore suo.” Chizzola, Discorsi, 56 r–v. 30. “Ad alcuni [è] dato il sapere per se, e per altri, e perciò insegnano: gli altri hanno da sapere per se stessi, e sono alcuni, che hanno talmente da sapere l’ufficio proprio, che ad essi s’appartiene saperlo di sorte, che l’hanno da imparare da altri, ne muoversi se non quanto sono mossi da altri, e non pensare di potersi chiarire da se stessi. La causa è perché essendo noi membri nel corpo di Christo, e non havendo tutte le membra quello stesso ufficio . . . ​noi dobbimao credere, che altro ufficio sara di chi sara in luogo dell’occhio, altro di chi sara in luogo del piede, etc. . . . ​È adunque gran pazzia a’ volere, che cosi i Meccanici, come ogn’altra persona ugualmente diano giudicio delle cose sacre, e della religione, e volere, che ogniuno insegni, e si faccia maestro in quelle. Questo è un confondere tutto il bell’ordine della Chiesa. Questo è un volere usurpare l’altrui ufficio dato per la gratia di Dio . . . ​l ’ufficio loro è di lasciarsi guidare, & comandare da chi conosce, & da chi parla nella Chiesa.” Chizzola, Discorsi, 39r–40r. 31. Giovanni da Fano, Incendio di Zizanie, 17r–19r. 32. Giaccari, Enchiridio Christiano, 25r, 114r–v. 33. “Come si debbono regolare gli ignoranti al tempo dell’heresie.” Bernardini, Concordia Ecclesiastica, 206–228. Only Giaccari refrains; his treatise, as previously mentioned, never mentions heresy explicitly and is not intended to acquaint his readers with heterodox ideas, even if only to refute them. Giaccari’s entry in the DBI states that his treatise mentioned so many controversial doctrines that a note in the 1537 edition imposed a fine on any publisher reprinting the work in the next three years. Yet compared to the other treatises in this genre, it is noticeably more circumspect. 34. Paul F. Grendler, “Form and Function in Italian Renaissance Popular Books,” Renaissance Quarterly 46, no. 3 (October 1, 1993): 451–485. 35. G. Wylie Sypher, “   ‘Faisant ce qu’il leur vient à plaisir’: The Image of Protestant­ ­ism in French Catholic Polemic on the Eve of the Religious Wars,” Sixteenth Century Journal 11 (1980): 59–84; Robert Scribner, For the Sake of Simple Folk: Popular Propaganda for the German Reformation (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1994). 36. Ottavia Niccoli, Prophecy and People in Renaissance Italy (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990). 37. There are, of course, some polemical exceptions. Bernardini describes the Waldensians as homosexuals, and Lippomano cites Erasmus as arguing in favor of biblical translations. 38. Anti-­Protestant treatises such asJohann Cochlaeus’s Commentaria de Actis et Sciptis M. Luther in particular were responsible for much of what Catholics

[  2 29  ]

no t e s t o pag e s 1 27 – 1 2 9 knew about Protestants. See George H. Tavard, “The Catholic Reform in the Sixteenth Century,” Church History 26 (1957): 275–288. 39. Lu Ann Homza, Religious Authority in the Spanish Renaissance (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000). 40. Bernal’s first Italian publication is Auisi di coloro, che hanno cura di anime, del reuerendiss. s. don Giouan Bernardo Dias di Luco, vescouo di Calahorra, e de la Calzada (Venice, 1551). See also Controuersia de necessaria residentia personali episcoporum et aliorum inferiorum pastorum . . . ​explicata per fratrem Bartholomaeum Carranzam (Venice, 1547). Italian presses also published works by Juan de Avila, but not until the 1590s. 41. Margaret Aston, Lollards and Reformers: Images and Literacy in Late Medieval Religion (London: Hambledon, 1984), 252–253. 42. David Loades, The Reign of Mary Tudor: Politics, Government, and Religion in England, 1553–1558 (London and New York: Longman, 1991), 113. 43. For Pole, see Thomas F. Mayer, Reginald Pole: Prince and Prophet (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2000); Thomas F. Mayer, Cardinal Pole in European Context, Variorum Collected Studies (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2000); Paolo Simoncelli, Il caso Reginald Pole: Eresia e santita nelle polemiche religiose del cinquecento (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 1977); Dermot Fenlon, Heresy, Scripture, and Obedience in Tridentine Italy: Cardinal Pole and the Counter Reformation (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1972); as well as Constance M. Furey, Erasmus, Contarini, and the Religious Republic of Letters (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006) and Abigail Brundin, Vittoria Colonna and the Spiritual Poetics of the Italian Reformation (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008). 44. Loades, Reign of Mary Tudor, 123–124; Mayer, Reginald Pole, 236–247. 45. For confraternities, see Nicholas Terpstra, ed., The Politics of Ritual Kin­ship: Confraternities and Social Order in Early Modern Italy, 2nd ed. (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2007); Christopher F. Black, Italian Confraternities in the Sixteenth Century (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1989). 46. Danilo Zardin, “Relaunching Confraternities in the Tridentine Era: Shaping Conscience and Christianizing Society in Milan and Lombardy,” in The Politics of Ritual Kinship, 193–196. 47. Black, Italian Confraternities, 63–64; Claudio Bernardi, “Corpus Domini: Ritual Metamorphoses and Social Changes in Sixteenth-­ and Seventeenth-­Century Genoa,” in The Politics of Ritual Kinship: 233–234; Lance Gabriel Lazar, Working in the Vineyard of the Lord: Jesuit Confraternities in Early Modern Italy (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2005), 68. 48. Bernardi, “Corpus Domini,” 230–233; Zardin, “Relaunching Confraternities,” 199. 49. “(Secondo che egli medesimo testifica) ha veduta tutta la dottrina del Lutheranesimo, & comparatala con quella de’ sacro Catholici dottore è venuto

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 3 0 – 1 3 1 in chiara cognitione della verita, & del suo error, pentito è voluntariamente andato a confessare il peccato suo . . . ​statovi lungamente davanti a quell tribunale non è mai potuto esser convinto, per non si essere egli mai scopertamente lasciato intendere.” Girolamo Muzio, Lettere catholiche del Mutio Iustinopolitano (Venice, 1571), 145–146. Girolamo Muzio joined Chizzola in attacking Pier Paolo Vergerio and recounted Chizzuola’s story in his collected letters. See also Martin, Venice’s Hidden Enemies, 88; Enrico A. Rivoire, “Eresia e riforma a Brescia,” Bollettino della Società di studi valdesi 106 (1959): 59–90; Anne Jacobson Schutte, Pier Paolo Vergerio e la Riforma a Venezia 1498–1549 (Rome: Il Veltro, 1988), 134, 153 n.108. See also Giorgio Caravale, Predicazione e Inquisizione nell’Italia del Cinquecento. Ippolito Chizzola tra eresia e controversia antiprotestante (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2012). 50. “È venuto in questa città dove egli havea seminata la mala semeza, per isterpare quella, & per riporvi la buona. . . . ​Due altre prediche ha da fare; la prima è stata generale, le due altre hanno da esser sopra articoli particolari. Et per dirne qualche cosa per vostra sodisfattione, il suggetto suo è stato in distinguere qual sia il proceder de gli heretici, & quale quello de’ Catholici, interpretando quella figura dell’Apocalissi della Donna per seguitata dal Dracone; le due ali della quale egli ha detto significar le due conditioni della fede, cio è Catholica & Apostolica. Et nella interpretatione delle voce Catholica ha trattato dottamente, & copiosamente, che i veri fedeli debbono della lor fede parlar publicamente, & chiaramente, e non andare insegnando la loro dottrina ne in secreto, ne con parole di sentimenti dubbiosi, ne con iscritture senza nome di auttore: conchiudendo che quale non ha animo di dire quello che egli sente nelle cose di Dio, non ha spirito di Dio.” Muzio, Lettere Catholiche, 146; Rivoire, “Eresia e riforma,” 84–85. 51. Risposta di donn’Ippolito Chizzuola bresciano, canonico regolare lateranense. Alle bestemmie, & maledicenze contenute in tre scritti di Paolo Vergerio, contra l’indittione del Concilio, publicata da papa Pio quarto. (Venice, 1562); Pier Paolo Vergerio, Ai fratelli d’Italia. Di un libro di fra Ippolito Chizzuola da Brescia (Tubingen, 1563). See also Le Vergeriane del Mutio Iustinopolitano: Discorse se si convenga ragunar concilio. Trattato della comunione de’ Laici e delle mogli di’ Chierici (Venice, 1550). For Vergerio, see Anne Jacobson Schutte, Pier Paolo Vergerio: The Making of an Italian Reformer, vol. CLX, Travaux d’Humanisme et Renaissance (Geneva: Librairie Droz, 1977) and Robert A. Pierce, Pier Paolo Vergerio the Propagandist (Rome: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 2003). Schutte points out that Vergerio’s own departure was not inevitable; in the period after 1542 religious allegiances were in flux and might best be described as a “protracted war of uncertain results,” Pier Paolo Vergerio e la Riforma a Venezia 1498–1549, 8–9. See also Schutte, “Periodiza­ tion of Sixteenth-­Century Italian Religious History: The Post-­Cantimori Paradigm Shift,” The Journal of Modern History 61, no. 2 (June 1989): 269–284.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 3 1 – 1 3 8 52. John Gwynneth, A Declaracion of the State Wherein All Heretics Do Lead Their Lives (London, 1554). The development of italic type, intended to emulate Italian vernacular handwriting for the press, was not originally seen as a corollary to roman type but was used independently. Only in the second quarter of the sixteenth century did printers adopt it as one way of creating distinctions within a text. Twyman, The British Library Guide to Printing History and Techniques (London: The British Library, 1998); Warren Chappell, A Short History of the Printed Word (Vancouver: Harley & Marks, 1999). 53. “Basta a vulgari saper i commandamenti de la lege, i quali sono dieci, se vogliono andar in cielo, & che sapiano doi esser i precetti de la charita . . . ​Basta finalmente saper i duoi precetti de la lege naturale ch’è: non far ad altri quello che non voresti, che fusse fatto a te. Et tutte le cose che vorresti che gli huomini facessero a te, far a loro. Et con tutte queste, credendo insieme nel mediatore di Dio & de gli huomini, & confidando nel suo precioso sangue, acquisteranno la salute.” Confirmatione et Stabilimento, 52r. 54. “Ma il Signore molte apparitioni, che non sono scritte, fece ne i quaranta giorni avanti la Ascensione, come mostra il parlar di san Luca nel principio degli atti.” Sermoni ovvero Homelie, 170r–v. 55. See Steven Ozment’s argument that the supposed crisis of late medieval religion rested on clerical inability to give the laity their due, and that laypeople were increasingly held to standards intended for clergy. The Age of Reform, 1250– 1550 (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980), 208–222. 56. Andrew Pettegree, Reformation and the Culture of Persuasion (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005). 57. Richard M. Eaton, The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204–1760 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993), 113–136. 58. See for example Gerald Strauss, Law, Resistance, and the State: Opposition to Roman Law in Reformation Germany (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1986); Ozment, Age of Reform, 260–272. 59. Marc R. Forster, Catholic Revival in the Age of the Baroque: Religious Identity in Southwest Germany, 1550–1750 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001), esp. 21–25. 60. Philip M. Soergel, Wondrous in His Saints: Counter-­Reformation Propaganda in Bavaria (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1993). 61. David Gentilcore, From Bishop to Witch: The System of the Sacred in Early Modern Terra d’Otranto (Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press, 1992) Quotation at p106. 62. Zardin, “Relaunching Confraternities,” 199–202. 63. “Si come è uno Dio & uno battestimo, cosi anchora sia in noi una stessa sede, come è scritto, & non siamo da tutte le genti stratiati per le nostre divisioni” Bernardini, Concordia Ecclesiastica, 11.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 3 8 – 1 4 1 64. “O forse anchora pensando che Dio si contenti della sola vista et apparentia esteriore per questo è necessario proveder a questi errori per chiare dottrine, per le quali si possa conoscere, quali in verita di Dio, non in opinione di persone, debbia esser la vita che sola piace a esso Dio, in veri fatti, e non di parole vane e false.” Giaccari, Enchiridio Christiano, 2v–3r. 65. Homza, Religious Authority, 116. 66. I subscribe here to the view of confessionalization as adherence to ritual practices, described in Forster, Catholic Revival in the Age of the Baroque. 67. Ibid., 59.

5. The Generation after Trent 1. “Quanto sia Eccellente ufficio, Il Predicare la parola di Dio, & il sacro Vangelo.” Sermoni Predicabili . . . ​Scritti da F. Serafino Razzi (Florence, 1590). Razzi (1531– 1611) belonged to the monastery of S. Marco in Florence and was a follower of Savonarola. His most reprinted works include hagiographies, including a popular compilation of exemplary extracts from saints’ lives, and “Cento casi di coscienza,” which saw thirteen editions over the course of the century. He is perhaps best known for writing the printed history of Dubrovnik (Raugia or Ragusa) (1588, 1595), and as a musician. For some of Razzi’s secular writings, see Mark Jurdjevic, Guardians of Republicanism: The Valori Family in the Florentine Renaissance (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2008); Stefano Dall’Aglio, Savonarola in Francia: Circolazione di un’eredita politico-­religiosa nell’Europa del Cinquecento, Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento (Florence: Nino Aragno Editore, 2006). 2. “L’ufficio del predicare il santo Vangelo, è forse il piu nobile, che nella Chiesa Christiana si ritrovi. Conciosia cosa che niente piu divino ritrovare si possa . . . ​ dell’essere di Dio cooperatore nella salvazione dell’anime. Lo che specialmente si fa per mezzo della sacra predicazione del Vangelo. Sono percio favoriti singolarmente da Dio i Predicatori utili, e fruttuosi. Onde . . . ​dona loro nostro Signore per lo più, lunga vita in questo mondo . . . ​Gli fa honorare qua giu in terra grandemente fra gli huomini. Ma molto piu saranno dipoi honorati tra gli Angeli, & huomini beati in cielo. Ricevono continouamente augumento di scienzia, & efficacia di persuadere, e di nuovere i popoli al bene operare. Questi sono il Sale della terra, per lo condimento spirituale che donano all’anime. Il ventre spirituale, onde escono i fiumi dell’acqua di sapienza. Il tesoro, di cui si cavano le dottrine del vecchio, e del nuovo testamento.” Sermone Predicabili, n.p. 3. See Ronnie Po-­Chia Hsia, The World of Catholic Renewal 1540–1770 (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 28. 4. “In the last thirty years of the Cinquecento, the moderate line that had prevailed at Trent, which had planned to entrust spiritual and moral renewal of the

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 4 1 – 1 4 3 faithful to diocesan structures . . . ​a nd restore . . . ​a role to Scripture in the education of the laity, was progressively marginalized by the socio-­political strengthening of the Holy Office.” Gigliola Fragnito, Proibito capire: La chiesa e il volgare nella prima età moderna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005), 25; John W. O’Malley, “The Council of Trent: Myths, Misunderstandings, and Misinformation,” in Spirit, Style, Story: Essays Honoring John W. Padberg, S.J., ed. Thomas M. Lucas (Chicago: Loyola Press, 2002), 205–226; John W. O’Malley, Trent: What Happened at the Council (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press, 2013); Christopher F. Black, Church, Religion, and Society in Early Modern Italy (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004), 117–119. 5. “Et à questo singolarmente deono attendere coloro, a i quali principalmente, e per debito d’ufficio appartiene la predicazione, che sono i reverendissimi Vescovi.” Razzi, Sermoni Predicabili. For similar expressions of the value of mendicant preachers, see the dedicatory letter in Porcacchi’s Prima parte delle prediche di diversi illustri theologi (to Raffaele Maffei) (Venice, 1565), and the letter to readers from Girolamo Ruscelli in Cornelio Musso’s Prediche fatte in diversi tempi (Venice, 1554). 6. John W. O’Malley, The First Jesuits (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 91–104. 7. Giuseppe Orlandi, “La missione popolare: Strutture e contenuti,” in La Predicazione in Italia dopo il Concilio di Trento tra Cinquecento e Settecento. Atti del X convegno di Studio dell’Associazione Italiana dei Professori di Storia della Chiesa, Napoli, 6–9 Settembre 1994, ed. Giacomo Martina and Ugo Dovere (Rome: Edizioni Dehoniane, 1996), 503–535; David Gentilcore, “   ‘Adapt Yourselves to the People’s Capabilities’: Missionary Strategies, Methods and Impact in the Kingdom of Naples, 1600–1800,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 45, no. 2 (1994): 269–296. 8. Adriano Prosperi, “   ‘Otras Indias’: Missionari della Controriforma tra contadini e selvaggi,” in Scienze, credenze occulte, livelli di cultura: Convegno Internazionale di Studi (Firenze, 26–30 giugno 1980), ed. Istituto Nazionale di Studi sul Rinascimento (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1982), 205–234. 9. Kathleen M. Comerford, Reforming Parishes: Tuscan Dioceses in the First Century of Seminary Education (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2006); Hsia, Catholic Renewal, 32; Judi Loach, “Revolutionary Pedagogues? How Jesuits Used Education to Change Society,” in The Jesuits and the Arts (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006), 66–85. 10. Black, Church, Religion, and Society, 133, 197–198. 11. Gregory Martin, Roma Sancta (1581), ed. George Bruner Parks (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1969), 86–88. 12. Ibid., 200–201. 13. O’Malley, The First Jesuits, 221–225; Louis J. Oldani and Victor R. Yanitelli,

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 4 4 – 1 4 5 “Jesuit Theater in Italy: Its Entrances and Exit,” Italica 76, no. 1 (April 1, 1999): 18–32; John W. O’Malley et al., eds., The Jesuits II: Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts: 1540–1773. (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2006), 451–550. 14. Jill R. Fehleison, “Appealing to the Senses: The Forty Hours Celebrations in the Duchy of Chablais, 1597–98,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 36, no. 2 (July 1, 2005): 375–396; Mark S. Weil, “The Devotion of the Forty Hours and Roman Baroque Illusions,” Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 37 (January 1, 1974): 218–248; Craig Koslofsky, Evening’s Empire: A History of the Night in Early Modern Europe (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2011), 224–228. 15. Jack Freiberg, “The Lateran Patronage of Gregory XIII and the Holy Year 1575,” Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 54, no. 1 (January 1, 1991): 66–87. My thanks to James Doran for his helpful MLitt work on this topic. 16. Samuele Giombi, “Dinamiche della predicazione cinquecentesca tra forma retorica e normativa religiosa: Le istruzioni episcopali ai predicatori,” Cristianesimo nella Storia 13 (1992): 73–102; Roberto Rusconi, “Predicazione e vita religiosa nella società religiosa (da Carlo Magno alla Controriforma),” (Turin: Loescher, 1981); Vittorio Coletti, Parole dal pulpito: Chiesa e movimenti religiosi tra latino e volgare nell’Italia del Medioevo e del Rinascimento (Casale Monferrato: Marietti, 1983). Coletti argues (p223–224) that in Panigarola’s generation, preaching was no longer intended as an instrument of communication. 17. Paolo-­Maria Sevesi, “S. Carlo Borromeo ed il P. Francesco Panigarola, O.F.M.,” Archivum Franciscanum Historicum 40 (1947): 143–207; Giovanni Pozzi, “Intorno alla predicazione del Panigarola,” in Problemi di vita religiosa in Italia nel Cinquecento: Atti del Convegno di Storia della Chisa in Italia (Padua: Anteore, 1960), 315–322; Danilo Zardin, “Tra Latino e Volgare: La ‘Dichiarazione dei Salmi’ del Panigarola e i filtri di accesso alla materia biblica nell’editoria della controriforma,” Sincronie IV, no. 7 (2000): 125–165; Carolyn Valone, “The Art of Hearing: Sermons and Images in the Chapel of Lucrezia della Rovere,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 3 (Autumn 2000): 753–777; Anscar Zawart, “The History of Franciscan Preaching and of Franciscan Preachers (1209–1927). A Bio-­ Bibliographical Study,” in Ninth Annual Meeting of the Franciscan Educational Conference (Athol Springs, NY: Franciscan Educational Conference, 1927), 242–587; Gustavo Cantini, I francescani d’Italia di fronte alle dottrine luterane e calviniste durante il Cinquecento (Rome: Pontificium Athenaeum Antonianum, 1948); Luke Wadding, Scriptores Ordinis Minorum (Rome: Nardecchia, 1906); Luigi Ferrari, Onomasticon: Repertorio Bibliografico degli Scrittori Italiani dal 1501 ad 1850 (Milan: Hoepli, 1947). 18. Prediche di Monsig. reuer.mo Panigarola vescouo d’Asti. Fatte da lui spezzatamente, e fuor de’ tempi quadragesimali in varii luoghi et a varie occasioni più illustri (Asti, 1591), among many other sermon volumes; Modo di comporre una predica, (Milan,

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 4 5 – 1 4 8 1584); Il Predicatore (Venice, 1609); Trattato della memoria locale (Padua, 1599); Lettione Sopra i Dogmi (Milan, 1582); and the recently re-­edited Vita scritta da lui medesimo, ed. Fabio Giunta (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2008). 19. Wietse de Boer, The Conquest of the Soul: Confession, Discipline, and Public Order in Counter-­Reformation Milan (Leiden: Brill, 2001), ix; John W. O’Malley, “Saint Charles Borromeo and His Preaching,” in San Carlo Borromeo: Catholic Reform and Ecclesiastical Politics in the Second Hhalf of the Sixteenth Century, ed. John M. Headley and John B. Tomaro, 1988, 139–157. 20. In Rome, Milan, Brescia, and Cremona. The later editions are from Padua and Venice. 21. “Si come ancora, se bene noi ci serviamo del Vangelo o tutto, o parte, & intorno alle materie, & a i santi, & a gli heretici; non pero questa si domanda predica di Vangelo, perche il principale nostro fine è la materia, o il santo, o l’heretico; ne adoperiamo il Vangelo per isporlo principalmente, ma per servirsene à uno di quei fini c’habbiamo detto.” Panigarola, Modo di comporre una predica, 11. 22. Ibid., 15–29. 23. “Che il primo punto principale dunque di tutta la predica, deve contenere confuse & allargate, o tre proposizioni, o due almeno, le quali con argomento.” Ibid., 83–89, with quotation on 89. 24. Scholarship that discusses this work includes Frederick McGinness, Right Thinking and Sacred Oratory in Counter-­Reformation Rome (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995), 16–17 and Lina Bolzoni, “Oratoria e prediche,” in Letteratura Italiana, vol. III.2 (Torino: Einaudi, 1984), 1062–1063. 25. See Peter Brand and Lino Pertile, eds., The Cambridge History of Italian Literature (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 181–187. 26. “Di questa maniera niuno credo io essere di cosi debole intendimento, che non vegga quanto si sia levato chiarezza al ragionare, & aggiuntavi di oscurita, . . . ​ ma bisgona ricordarsi che a quell modo di dire profetico, la chiarezza troppo isquisita non istarebbe bene.” Il Predicatore, Vv7v–8r. The pagination is consistently faulty in this book and collation marks should be used instead for page references. 27. “Molto meglio di noi l’hanno saputo fare, e Monsignor Cornelio, e il Fiamma, e’l Franceschino, & altri,” Ibid., Ll7r. 28. Roberto Rusconi, “Rhetorica ecclesiastica: La predicazione nell’età post-­tridentina fra pulpito e biblioteca,” in La Predicazione in Italia dopo il Concilio di Trento tra Cinquecento e Settecento (Rome: Edizione Dehoniane, 1996): 15–46; Corrie Norman, “The Social History of Preaching,” in Preachers and People in the Reformations and Early Modern Period, Larissa Taylor, ed. (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 125–193. 29. “Hor chi mi dichino questi fuori di modo savi, anzi dal vero sapere lontanissimi, qua sia questo verbo di Dio, & di Christo . . . ​ma, à cui non è chiaro, che

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 4 8 – 1 5 1 esso veramente spientissimo apostolo intende, & parla del verbo, e favella procedente dalla bocca di chi predica la fede? . . . ​n iente meno ci sia il sermone o predica di viva voce, verbo divino, che la sua lettera & scrittura . . . ​Prediche efficacissime . . . ​di D. Hilarione Genovese (Genoa, 1587), 135v–136r. Ilarione believed so strongly in the efficacy of the sermon form that he relied on it in publicizing his theories on major abuses in the Church: protections in commerce, improper dancing, and vain preening. Tre discorsi sopra d’alcuni abusi, che regnano in questi tempi nella christianita . . . ​tutti e tre disposti in forma di prediche. . . . ​Di d. Hilariane genouese monaco benedettino, della Congregatione cassinese (Brescia, 1581). 30. Pozzi, “Intorno alla predicazione del Panigarola,” 319. 31. Luca Baglioni, L’arte del predicare (Venice, 1572), 39r–v. 32. “Prima che ne passiamo . . . ​etiandio riferirvi i libri canonici del testamento vecchio; i quali havemo contestati dal Concilio universal di Trento fatto a nostri di registrati nella sessiona quarta.” Ilarione da Genova, Prediche efficassime, 138v. 33. J. Waterworth, The Council of Trent: The Canons and Decrees of the Sacred and Oecumenical Council of Trent (London: Dolman, 1848), 211. 34. See, among others, Roberto Rusconi, “Predicatori e predicazione (secoli IX–XVIII),” in Storia d’Italia. Annali, vol. 4: Intellettuali e potere (Torino, 1981), 951–1030. 35. Gigliola Fragnito, “La censura ecclesiastica in Italia: Volgarizzamenti biblici e letteratura all’Indice. Bilancio degli studi e prospettive di ricerca,” in Reading and Censorship in Early Modern Europe: Barcelona 11–13 de diciembre de 2007, ed. Maria Jose Vega, Julian Weiss, and Cesc Esteve (Bellaterra: Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Servei de Publicacions, 2010), 39–56; Fragnito, Proibito capire; Christopher F. Black, The Italian Inquisition (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2009). 36. The 1559 Index banned vernacular Bibles, and the 1564 Index authorized bishops and Inquisitors to approve licenses to read it; the 1596 Index would be much harsher. Edoardo Barbieri, “Tradition and Change in the Spiritual Literature of the Cinquecento,” in Church, Censorship, and Culture in Early Modern Italy (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 111–133; Hsia, Catholic Renewal, 174. 37. “Accioche piu facilmente possa da molti essere inteso l’Evangelio, che per tutto l’Anno nella Santa Messa viene udito.” Sermoni predicabili sopra gli evangeli domenicali, e festivi di tutto l’anno . . . ​del R. Don Silvestro Cigno vicentino (Venice, 1572), dedicatory letter. 38. “Con questi modi il vero fedele acquista l’intelligentia delle sacratissime lettere: laquale Iddio doni a’ capi chiericati, acciò che eglino illuminati, possano parimente I loro sudditi illuminare, & insegnargli la verità Evanglica.” Ibid., dedicatory letter.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 5 2 – 1 5 3 39. Delle Materie et de Soggetti Predicabili trattati secondo l’ordine osservato dal Beato Re Davit nel Salmo; Miserere mei Deus. Dal M.R. D. Onofrio Zarrabini da Cotigola (Venice, 1586). Delle Prediche del R.P. Maestro Pietro Ridolfi da Tossignano, Dell’ordine minore Conventovale (Venice, 1584). 40. “. . . ​tavole perfettissime, quella che si domanda delle materie, e quella de’ luoghi della scrittura, e poi fare una distinzione di questo modo: che tutti i libri, o trattano la scrittura ex professo, e per modo di Comento, come Nicolao de Lira, come il Gaetano, come Bonaventura in Luca, e simile, overo fanno sermoni, & homelie sopra determinati passi o determinati Vangeli della scrittura, overo trattano determinatamente materie, overo in ogni materia fanno professione di raccogliere molte cose da dirsi. . . . ​si che dovendo tu fare una predica di Vangelo potrai vedere tutti gli Autori di scrittura, ove tratano quel Vangelo ex professo, e poi loro medesimi, e tutti quanti libri hai in cella, nelle tavole delle scritture, per vedere, se incidentemente, ne hanno mai fatta mentione.” Modo di comporre una predica, 38–39. See also Samuele Giombi, “Sacra Eloquenza: Percorsi di studio e pratiche di lettura,” in Libri, Biblioteche e Cultura nell’Italia del Cinque e Seicento, ed. Edoardo Barbieri and Danilo Zardin (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 2002), 186–187. 41. “Ai studiosi delle lettere Sacre, & vogliosi d’intendere gli alti, & bei secreti contenuti in Esse, l’humil servo di Christo fra Girolamo da Pistoia Capuccino Salute.” Delle Prediche dell’humil servo di Christo. F. Girolamo da Pistoia dell’ordine de’ frati minori capuccini di San Francesco (Bologna, 1567). 42. “Intendendo non dichiarare il bel modo di parlare, ma di aprir quei concetti, che hoggi tanto al Christiano necessarii sono, in modo, che non resti circa quegli difficoltà, o dubbio, che dichiarato non sia.” Ibid. 43. “Non mi par fuori di proposito, il dimostrare in questo secondo capo, in quante parti si divideno i due Testamenti, vecchio & novo; onde possa ciascuno agevolmente sapere qual parte habbia il libro de’ Salmi.” Zarrabbini, De’ soggetti predicabili, 2. 44. Lectionaries, which linked specific scriptural readings for the Mass or Divine Office with feasts in the liturgical year, were first compiled in the fifth century, but in the subsequent centuries were used less commonly than capitularia, which provided only excerpts of the passages to be read, or Bibles containing marginal notes for liturgical use. Everett Ferguson, ed., Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, 1st ed. (New York: Garland, 1990). The sixteenth century saw at least fifty-­five separate printings of the lectionary. 45. See Delle homelie di m. Lodouico Pittorio da Ferrara. Parte prima [-­seconda]. Nella quale si espongono tutti gli Euangeli, et Epistole, che si leggono nel tempo della quaresima, secondo l’ordine della Santa Romana Chiesa. Nuouamente ridotta in miglior lingua, & arricchita con le allegationi delle autorità della Santa Scrittura. Per il r.p.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 5 3 – 1 5 5 Francesco da Treuigi, Carmelitano (Turin, 1581/1582). Also published in 1574, 1578, 1579, and 1583. Homiliario quadragesimale di m. Lodouico Pittorio da Ferrara, fondato di parola in parola sopra tutte l’epistole, et Euangeli, che corrono ogni giorno per tutto l’anno, secondo l’ordine della Chiesa Romana . . . ​Nuouamente ristampato, da molti errori corretto, et di bellissime figure adornato (Venice, 1590), with approximately twelve other editions between 1561 and 1600 that refer to updated language or paratext; editions from the 1540s and 1550s do not. 46. Paolo Cherchi, Polimatia di riuso: Mezzo secolo di plagio (1539–1589) (Rome: Bulzoni, 1998), 190–204; Jennifer Fletcher, “Francesco Salviati and Rimigio Fiorentino,” The Burlington Magazine 121 (1979): 793–797; Zardin, “Tra Latino e Volgare,” 138, 148–149. 47. “Havendo io piu volte considerato Cortesissimi Lettori, che pur qualche desiderio spirituale regna negli animi di molti Catolici Christiani, d’intendere nella lor lingua le Epistole, e Vangeli che si leggon nell’anno alla Messa . . . ​ho giudicato non far cosa nuova, ne meno ingrata, a tradurli di nuovo; Ma perche, le traduzzioni vecchie erano assai bene oscure . . . ​m i sono sforzato di ridurli in piu chiara, e bella lingua che sia stato possibile.” Epistolae et Evagelii [sic] che si leggono tutto l’anno alla Messa, secondo l’uso della Santa Romana Chiesa. Alla Messa, secondo l’uso della Santa Romana Chiesa. Nuovamente Tradotti in Lingua Toscana dal R.P.M.R. Remigio Fiorentino, dell’ordine de’Predicatori (Venice, 1567). 48. “Essorta san Paolo in questa epistola i romani, a destarci dal sonno della ignoranza, e de’ peccati, perche la gratia, e la salute per Giesu Christo ci s’è avvicinata.” Ibid., 1–2. 49. Gigliola Fragnito notes the complicated and contradictory nature of prohibitions on vernacular biblical literature in the later sixteenth century, particularly regarding lectionaries. Fragnito, Proibito capire, 91–93, 138, 266; Barbieri, “Tradition and Change,” 116. 50. Fragnito, Proibito capire, 111. 51. Cantini, I francescani d’Italia; Angelico Piladi, Il P. Evangelista Marcellino insigne Predicatore ed Ecclesiaste del secolo XVI (Florence: Studi Francescani, 1944). Marcellino’s secular name was Lorenzo Selva, and he also used the surname Gerbi. 52. The 1584 Bull of Gregory XIII, Sancta mater ecclesia, established mandatory weekly preaching in Hebrew for at least a third of the local Jewish population over the age of twelve, wherever the population exceeded a certain number. Conversionary sermons to the Jews took place at the Oratory of the Company of the Blessed Trinity (Santa Trinità dei Pellegrini), which was founded by Filippo Neri in 1549 for the reception of pilgrims to Rome, and sometimes at the Church of San Benedetto in Arenula, a subsidiary church of San Lorenzo in Damaso. Piladi also mentions San Lorenzo in Damaso as a preaching site for conversionary sermons.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 5 5 – 1 5 7 Rusconi, “Rhetorica Ecclesiastica”; Jean Delumeau, Vie Economique et Sociale de Rome dans la seconde moitié du XVI siecle (Paris: E. De Boccard, 1957), 170; Carolyn H. Wood and Peter Iver Kaufman, “Tacito Predicatore: The Annunciation Chapel at the Madonna Dei Monti in Rome,” The Catholic Historical Review 90, no. 4 (2004): 644; Christian Hülsen, Le Chiese di Roma nel Medio Evo (Florence: Leo S. Olschki, 1927), 209. For Marcellino’s preaching to Jewish audiences, see Emily Michelson, “Evangelista Marcellino: One Preacher, Two Congregations” in Archivio Italiano per la storia della pieta (forthcoming, 2013). 53. See Harry Caplan, “The Four Senses of Scriptural Interpretation and the Mediaeval Theory of Preaching,” Speculum (1929). 54. “Il libro di Rut posto, dagli Hebrei nel secondo luogo, cioè frà i libri profetali, debbe esser essempio à poveri d’esser patienti, & à ricchi d’esser liberali, & honesti, si crede essere stato scritto da Samuele, & essere avvenuto sotto uno de giudici avanti à Eli.” Lezzioni Diciannove sopra Rut. Del RPF Vangelista Marcellino de’ Minori Osservanti (Venice, 1586), 1v. 55. Fragnito argues that mendicant orders, although aware of the poor education of secular clergy, cared little about basing their sermons on scripture, “even those most committed to the religious education of their flock prefered that the sermons of feast days were devoted to explanations of doctrine and Catholic morals rather than the exposition of scripture.” Throughout her discussion of the demise of scripture, she makes no mention of Marcellino or similar exegetes. Fragnito, Proibito capire, 268. 56. “Roma, non’taspettare de ma:—O bocca, o occhi, o naso! et simili, che chi le dice anco faria meglio a tacere.” Piladi, Evangelista Marcellino, 25–26. 57. “Onde havendo Atanasio, Basilio, Grisostomo, il Nazanzeno Gregorio, il Nisseno, e gl’altri predicato a popoli il verbo divino, con molta sapienza, e con molta eloquenza, e per me, e per simil a me, che poveri siamo, hanno lasciata la Santa predicazione con basso stile, con semplicita, e con modi, che, alla povera plebe puo dare copioso cibo, e dico copioso, conciosia cosa, che tal volta una semplice predicazione, fa piu frutto, che non fa una dotta, & eloquente.” Lezzioni Diciannove sopra Rut, 38v. 58. Sevesi, “S. Carlo Borromeo,” 156. 59. Modo di comporre, 3–6. The earliest surviving copy of the Trattato della Memoria Locale was printed in 1598 and in fact combines the two treatises; the work may have circulated at Araceli only in manuscript. 60. “E pure chi espone un vangelo a clausula per clausula senza ridurlo ad unità, al sicuro fa bene, o prafrasi, o commento, ma non già oratione, o predica.” Modo di comporre una predica, 26. 61. “Ho potuto mai fare altro, che predicare, e scrivere.” De’ Discorsi del R.D. Gabriel Fiamma, Canonico Regolare Lateranense, sopra l’Epistole e Vangeli di tutto l’anno

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 5 7 – 1 5 9 (Venice, 1574). For Fiamma, in addition to the DBI, see Carlo Ossola, “Il ‘Queto Travaglio’ di Gabriele Fiamma,” in Letteratura e Critica: Studi in onore di Natalino Sapegno, vol. III (Rome: Buzoni, 1976), 239–286; Emily Michelson, “Preaching Scripture Under Pressure in Tridentine Italy: A Case Study of Gabriele Fiamma,” in The Formation of Clerical and Confessional Identities in Early Modern Europe, vol. 85, Dutch Review of Church History (Leiden: Brill, 2005). 62. Information on Fiamma’s brush with Inquisitors is presumably held in the source cited by the DBI: Archivio di Stato di Venezia, Processi S. Ufficio, b. 22, fasc. 23. 63. “Per dare aiuto a coloro, che si nutriscono ne’seminarii; i quali, dovendo insegnare, & haver cura d’anime, è ben fatto, che vengano di giorno in giorno avezzandosi a leggere, & a contemplar quelle lettioni, c’hauranno eglino ancora a dichiarare a’ popoli, se vorranno fare il lor debito, e sodisfare alla proprie conscienze.” Discorsi, introduction, n.p. 64. “Cosi questa pietosa madre secondo i tempi, e secondo i misteri celebrati recita diverse scritture, atte a giovarci vivamente, il che si potrà venir considerando, & riconoscendo in questii discorsi di tempo, in tempo, e di lettione in lettione.” Ibid., 1r. 65. “Se leggerete attentamente le sacre lettere, troverete, che di rado, o non mai il Re celeste ha fatto alcuna cosa grande . . . ​che prima egli non facesse veder qualche segno avanti.” Ibid., 7r. 66. “Onde molti, mossi da pieta, & da zelo, ragionando al popoli, si son voltati a’ sensi morali, per riformare i costume de’ fedeli piu tosto ch’entrar nel mar vasto, e profondo di questa allegoria, la qual noi vogliamo pur tentar di far piana, e facile con l’aiuto celeste.” Ibid., 135v. 67. Prediche del Reverendo Don Gabriel Fiamma, Canonico Regolare Lateranense, Fatte in vari tempi, in vari luoghi, e intorno a vari soggetti: nelle quali si contengono molti ricordi, utili, & necessari, per far profitto nella vita spirituale, & per fuggir gli errori di questi tempi (Venice, 1570). This collection contains the sermon on scripture discussed in Chapter 2. Sei Prediche del RD Gabriel Fiamma, canonico regolare lateranense, in lode della beata vergine (Venice, 1591). 68. “Intenderete, chi manda, chi è mandato: quando & da che luogo è mandato; e’l ritorno, e’l frutto della venuta, con tutte le altre circonstanze utili, & necessarie, perl’intelligenzza di questo altissimo sacramento. Chi manda? Noe. Chi è mandato? La colombia. D’onde? Dall’Arca. A che luogo? In un diluvio. Quando? Dopo sette giorni. Quando torna? Il giorno ottavo. Che porta l’olivo.” Sei Prediche, 7r. 69. “Però l’eterno padre, quando Christo si battezò, disse, Hic est filius meus dilectus, in quo mihi bene complacui (Matt. 17). Non disse egli, mi ha compiaciuto, ne disse, io ho compiacciuto à lui: ma disse, io mi son compiacciuto in lui: cio è, quel, che mi piace in me stesso, è tutto in lui.” Prediche, 444.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 5 9 – 161 70. “Notate, come parlano le scritture sempre con proprietà,” “Cercate, & ricercate con diligenza le Scritture sacre; penetrate al vivo di loro; non state nella scorza; troverete in ogni parte di loro Christo Salvatore, & la Madre sua.” Sei Prediche, 8r–v. 71. Alan of Lille’s Ars Predica Summa de arte praedicatoria contains forty-­eight sections: an introduction and forty-­seven sample sermons for different audiences. Samuele Giombi, “Livelli di cultura nella trattatistica sulla predicazione e l’eloquenza sacra del XVI secolo,” in Cultura d’élite e cultura popolare nell’arco alpino fra Cinque e Seicento (Boston: Mirkhaeuser Verlag, 1995), 247–273; James J. Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages: A History of Rhetorical Theory from Saint Augustine to the Renaissance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974). 72. For the underestimated collaboration between post-­Tridentine bishops and preachers from mendicant orders and the appointment of mendicant preachers to episcopal offices, see Rusconi, “Rhetorica Ecclesiastica,” 21–24. 73. “Alcuni altri amici ciò all Paternità sua dissuadevano, con dire, che facendosi detti sermoni per mezzo della stampa comuni eziando a secolari, non se ne potevano poscia i Religiosi Predicatori, se non con pericolo di qualche rossore, ò vergogna servire.” Sermoni Predicabili . . . ​di Serafino Razzi. Prefazione di F. Timoteo Buonamici Perugino, n.p. 74. “I secolari havendo dette prediche, o sermoni istampati appresso di loro potranno tra le brigate, e ne i circoli, e ragunanze d’huomini, mostrargli, e dire che quindi il Predicatore, le sue essortazioni, e ragionamenti ha estratti, e cavati, e . . . ​saprebbono predicare imparando da detti libri.” Ibid. 75. “Si come gli ingegnosi, e diligenti discepoli, e secolari meglio apprendono le lezzioni de i loro precettori, e maestri, quando prima da per loro l’hanno lette, & istudiate.” Ibid. 76. “Si risponde prima che Dio volesse, che i secolari hoggi giorno comprassono libri di prediche, e di sermoni spirituali istampati; e non come sovente fanno, libri di ciance, e di novelle mondane: e che altre somiglianti lirbi leggessero. Imperoche con maggiore attenzione dipoi, e con piu chiara intelligenza gli ascolterebbono, & intenderebbono dalla bocca, e dalla viva voce de i predicatori.” Ibid. 77. Roger Chartier, The Cultural Uses of Print in Early Modern France (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1987). 78. Razzi also dedicated his Istoria de gli huomini illustri (Lucca, 1596) to Beccheria. 79. Giombi, “Livelli di cultura” and “Precettistica e trattatistica sulla retorica sacra in età tridentina: Linee storiografiche e ipotesi di recerca,” Rivista di Storia e Letteratura Religiosa 34 (1998): 581–612; John O’Malley, “Form, Content and In­­ fluence of Works About Preaching Before Trent: The Franciscan Contribution,”

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no t e s t o pag e s 16 2 – 16 4 in I Frati Minori tra ’400 e ’500: Atti del XII Convengno Internazionale (Assisi: Centro di Studi Francescani, 1984), 27–50. 80. Dichiaratione delle lamentationi di Gieremia profeta, Rome, Verona, Milan, Turin, 1586; I sette salmi penitentiali, fatti volgari dal reuer. p.f. Francesco Panigarola (Venice, 1588; Rome, 1590). 81. Zardin, “Tra Latino e Volgare.” 82. “Et piu che sono tenute nascoste da le plebi, sono hauute in piu credito, auttoria, maesta, & reputatione . . . ​Et percio cerchiamo i frutti de la scrittura, che è lo spirito, i quali non si dicono esser manifesti. Imperoche il frutto del spirito si ritruova con molta fatica, & sudore, & degna prattica. . . .” Luigi Lippomano, Confirmatione et Stabilimento di tutti li dogmi heretici (Venice, 1553), 47v, 49v. 83. Fragnito writes that the effect of the Congregation of the Index’s activities was a “direct attack on the vernacular” designed to “exclude anybody who lacked Latin from direct contact with the Book and its most minute fragments, and prevent them from knowing the mysteries of the faith in order to dissuade him from a knowledgeable and critical confessional adherence.” Fragnito, “La censura ecclesiastica,” 41, 47. 84. “The criterion often used to contend that Catholics did not read the Bible is extremely misleading: for it stems from a prejudice which takes as its ideal the individualistic reading of the Bible distinctive of the Protestant world in the eighteenth century.” Barbieri, “Tradition and Change,” 127. 85. Among the roughly sixteen publications discussed in this chapter, only one preacher, Ilarione da Genova, dedicated his work to a bishop, Antonio Sauli, who was consecrated as the Archbishop of Genova in 1586, the year before the book was published there. The other works are dedicated to regular clergy such as abbots or generals of orders, high Church officials such as the pope or a cardinal, or noblemen or women, and one (Panigarola’s Il Predicatore) was prepared for publication only posthumously. 86. Danilo Zardin argues that the vast corpus of supplemental material (commentaries, aids, dictionaries) in monastic libraries testifies to the continuing emphasis on and intense desire for scripture in monastic devotion. Danilo Zardin, “Bibbia e apparati biblici nei conventi italiani del Cinque-­Seicento,” in Libri, Biblioteche e Cultura degli Ordini Regolari nell’Italia Moderna attraverso la Documentazione della Congregazione dell’Indice (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2006), 88–92. 87. “Havendo io dall’anno xxxi di mia età fino al presente, che mi trovo d’anni lxvi fedelmente con le deboli forze mie predicato il Sacro Evangelio, & parendomi che non fosse da ascondere in terra il talento commessomi, ho terminato mandare alla luce del mondo questa mia fatica parte del mio piccolo ingegno, se non

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no t e s t o pag e s 16 4 – 16 5 dotto, almen catholico christiano.” Sermoni Predicabili . . . ​del R. Don Silvestro Cigno vicentino, dedicatory letter. 88. “O piu tosto tradditione in commune esso diuno verbo; il quale havemo mediante la parola viva, & la scritta? E ben distinta questa da quella; ma ambi sono stromenti, per cui il divino verbo ci è conceduto; & d’ambi è ugale il valore: & l’una conferma l’altra, & questa rende testimonio di quella, di modo che scambievolmente stabiliendosi insieme, di tutte due, si come di eccellentissimo deposito ne è stata fedelissima depositaria la S. Chiesa da Giesu Chritso; mezzo ambi esteriore necessario ordinariamente (per la divina providentia) ad introdurre ne gli huomini la vera religione.” Ilarione da Genoa, Prediche efficacissime, 135v–136r. 89. “La prima [ragione] si è che cosi fecendoso vita più stabile à queste sue fatiche so dona: che lasciandole solamente scritte à mano. La seconda, peroche senza spesa alcuna propria, anzi con acquistarsi la benevolenza d’alcun nobile Stampatore, si toglie la fatica a molti di ricoparagli. La terza, peroche si acquista, per mio avviso, maggior merito appresso a nostro Signore Iddio, nel fare limosina delle fatiche sue ad altri. E si viene ancora a participare del frutto spirituale, che per mezzo di detti sermoni fare si potra per mezzo d’altri predicatori. E finalmente, verrà egli per questa via, à predicare non solamente con la viva voce, come gia tanti anni ha fatto, e seguita, Diograzia, di fare; Ma ancora con la penna, e con la scrittura.” Sermoni Predicabili . . . ​di Serafino Razzi. Prefazione di F. Timoteo Buonamici Perugino, n.p. 90. “Nessuno, per mio creere, si trovera fra i predicatori, cotanto grossolano, cotanto inetto, e cosi tardo d’ingegno, il quale si metta a recitare di peso, e come si dice, ad verbum, cioè parola per parola, una predica, o sermone d’alcun altro.” Ibid. 91. “La viva voce, l’azzioni esterne, e lo spirito del predicatore alle cose le quali s’insegnano, e si predicano, un non so che di energia, di efficacia, e di valore nel persuadere donano, il quale donare non puo l’istessa privata lezzione, e muta scrittura . . . ​la pronunzia; la quale, come diceva Demostene, è la prima, la seconda, la terza, anzi la somma & unica parte dell’orazione.” Ibid. 92. Francesco Panigarola, Prediche Sopra Gl’Evangelii di Quaresima (Venice, 1605), introduction, n.p. 93. “Quanto a recitatori poi, la loro scusa è tanto efficace e di tanta forza, che non ha replica: cioè, che essi non sanno a mente altre prediche, que quelle, ne da se ne sanno fare, ne di impararne di uno [?] e darebbe loro il cuore, in modo, che se vogliamo, che predichino, bisogna contentarsi, che recitino sempre quelle medesime. Ma se convenga, che si faccia cosi, e che horamai non solo nelle chiese i pergami, ma anche nelle schole le Catedre siano piene di papagalli, cioe di persone, che senza intendere molte volte cio che si dicano, recitano di parola in parola scritti altrui.” Panigarola, Il Predicatore, D 2 v.

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no t e s t o pag e s 16 5 – 16 8 94. Ibid. All of Particella XXVIII in book two, from D 1 r–D 2 v, addresses the question of repetition of sermons, whether from year to year or from book to delivery. 95. “Quello di cui si serve un predicatore per proemio, un’altro tal’hora l’adopererà per introduzzione.” Sermoni Predicabili . . . ​di Serafino Razzi. Prefazione di F. Timoteo Buonamici Perugino, n.p. 96. “Volendo inferire, come dava loro la materia, & il suggetto predicabile, ma non già la maniera del dire, e della pronunzia, ne meno la grazia dell’azzioni, o lo spirito del persuadere.” Ibid. Buonamici’s “pronunzia” is best translated as “intonation” rather than “pronunciation,” as it clearly means the manner of delivery rather than the articulation of words. 97. “E se il libro vi parra vago a vedere, & adorno di molte bellissime figure, darete la lodea al molto Magnifico & honorato Messer Gabriel Giolito, che desideroso di giovare, e dilettare le persone spirituali con le sue stampe, ha voluto adornarli quanto è stato possibile per le forze sue.” Remigio Fiorentino, Epistolae et Evangelii, 1567, introductory letter. William M. Ivins, “Early Florentine Illustrated Books,” The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 3 (1944): 23, describes an elaborate Italian lectionary from early in the century, “one of the most remarkably and beautifully illustrated books ever printed anywhere for any group of men.” 98. Lettioni sopra s. Paolo a’ Romani, del m.r.p.f. Christoforo Syluestrani Brenzone dottore in theologia, esplicate in Siena essendo reggente (Venice, 1592). Lettioni nel Salmo Super Flumia Babylonis di F. Christoforo Silvestrani, Carmelita Dottore Teologo. Alla Santità di n. Sig. papa clemente Ottavo (Verona, 1596). Lina Bolzoni, The Gallery of Memory: Literary and Iconographic Models in the Age of the Printing Press (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001); for trees and tables in organizing academic disciplines, see Joseph S. Freedman, European Academic Philosophy in the Late Sixteenth and Early Seventeenth Centuries: The Life, Significance, and Philos­ophy of Clemens Timpler (1563/4–1624). (Zurich: Georg Olms Verlag Hildesheim, 1988). 99. “Che ha notasi in margine, non solamente i nomi, ma i luoghi ancora minutissimi de gli Autori, perche in questo modo si studia insieme insieme, e scrittura, e padri, & essendo quelle annotazioni fidelissie, perce d’un libro solo, tu n’alleghi in Pergamo più di mille.” Panigarola, Modo di comporre una predica, 33. Panigarola presumably means the folio edition published in Paris in 1577 by Michel Sonnius and edited by the Dominican theologian Antonius Senensis, Enarrationes quas Catenam vere auream dicunt, in quatuor evangelia. Haec catena ab innumeris mendis repurgata marginalibus indicationibus illustrate. Its USTC reference number is 172425. See also Giombi, “Sacra Eloquenza,” 166. 100. Delle Prediche dell’humil servo di Chirsto. F. Girolamo da Pistoia dell’ordine de’ frati minori capuccini di San Francesco (Bologna, 1567), 155r–178r; 298r–311r. 101. “Perche gli avversarii nella nostra fede non perdonano a gli altari, a Sacerdoti, alle Chiese, alle Croci, a Crocefissi, per imbrattare il vero, & istracciare questa

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no t e s t o pag e s 16 8 – 16 9 veste inconfutile, per lacerare quelle sacre poppe della Chiesa di Christo, dove (suo mal grado) sono stati lattati, e nodriti.” Ridolfi, Delle Prediche, dedicatory letter, n.p. 102. “Bisogna contra i maligni Heretici piu insolenti che mai, tendere con l’una mano la spada, e con l’altra edificare come meglio si puo l’hormai disturrte, e rovinate mura di questa mistica Gierusalemme.” Ibid. 103. “Ne fanno gran fede (siami lecito dir il vero) la magnificentia delle Chiese nella Città, e fuori, la singolar custodia delle sacre, e riverende Reliquie de Santi, gli Altari, gli Spedali, i Monasteri ricchi, e sontuosi. Oltra poi quella natural prudenza, che fa risplendere in voi, come in uno specchio tersissimo appresso tutte le genti straniere, e con somma vostra gloria ammirare da tutto il Mondo la maturita nel giudicare la purita del vivere, la carita immenza verso i vostri soggetti.” Ibid. 104. “Pontefice Massimo della gran città di Roma, & pastore universale di tutta la spiritual Greggia di Giesu Christo sparsa dall’Oriente all’Occidente & da un polo all’altro, ad appresentarvegli & a basciarvi i santi piedi & ad adorarvi come Dio in terra . . . ​che potiate potentissimamente de bellare gl’inimici del suo santo nome, & annullare l’empie Heresie, onde ciascun conosca, & segua Christo, verità unica, & sola, & che si com’è un sol Dio vivo, & immortale, una sola Fede, & un sol Battesimo, una sola catholica & Apostolica Romana Chiesa, & un sol capo, prencipe, & pastor di quella.” Onofrio Zarrabini, Delle Materie et de Soggetti Predicabili, dedicatory letter, n.p. 105. Spogli le spogli, di che fu si altiera La Nobil Roma, e i piu sublimi honori, C’hebbero gia gli antichi Imperador, Invitti sempre a la contraria schiera Poscia ch’un novo Re di gloria vera, Ornato, & pien di veri almi Tesori, Vinse hoggi Morte: e grav’odii, e furori Della turba infernal nemica, & fera. Et da lei trasse trionfando in gioia L’Anime sante, lor porgendo aita, Che le fè salve da l’eterna noia Impresa sopr’ogn’altra alta, & gradita Chi fia mai piu che si condanni, o muoia Pur ch’ei sorga con Christo a nova vita. Discorsi Predicabili del R.P. Sebastiano Avezzano da Cesena Carmelitano (Venice, 1569). 106. “Anco à Gentili si dava lo Spirito Santo, & in tutto’l mondo la penitenza: Ma essendo lo spirito santo invisibile, et il mondo mal avezzo alle sue gratie, come

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n o t e s t o p a g e s 1 7 0 – 1 74 si potrà ella conoscere, questa copiosa effusione?” Franceschino Visdomini, Homelie dello Sprito Santo (Venice, 1554), 15r. See also Robert Bireley, “Early Modern Catholicism,” in Reformation and Early Modern Europe: A Guide to Research, Sixteenth Century Essays and Studies (Kirksville, MO: 2008), 57–79; Simon Ditchfield, “Decentering the Catholic Reformation: Papacy and Peoples in the Early Modern World,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 101 (2010): 186–208. 107. Panigarola, Prediche Sopra Gl’Evangelii di Quaresima, 49. The sermons for Saturdays in this collection were written by Di Melfe. 108. “Fra tutti gl’huomini apena due provincie si trovano, a pena due nationi, a pena regioni, ancor delle minori, dale quali venga con un sol culto, e con una medesima maniera adorano Iddio . . . ​i nfino inanzi che habitassero insieme, innanzi che facessero città, e familglie, quando vivevano sparsi a guisa di fiere, chi all’aria nuda, chi sotto gl’alberi, chi nelle spelonche, chi nei padiglioni, Greci, Barbari, & ogni natione, di gia in qualche modo sacrificavano, offerivano, porgevano e voti, e preci a questo sommo Nume. Tutto perche non so è proprio . . . ​i l nuotare a’ pesci, il correre a’ cavalli: quanto è inestato dalla natura, e proprio ad ogni huomo, proprio solo all’huomo, proprio in ogni tempo all’huomo l’adorare Iddio.” Panigarola, Prediche, 277. 109. “Che una sola vera religione si trovi in terra, questo è certo: poiche in un solo si conserva il vero, & ogni verità è una sola. In modo tale, che sendo in questo mondo una sola adoratione vera, che è la nostra (come vedremo piu a basso) & ogni altra adoatione falsa, ben possiamo noi dunque; (o Christiani huomini, e Christiane donne) tener molto ben noi altri felici, e mostrarsene grati, che noi siamo nati animati, e non inanimati, che siamo fatti ragionevoli, e non irragionevoli, che noi siamo nati in una proincia fruttuosissima abondantissima, fertilissima, tutte sono gratie grandi, ma che noi siamo nati tra quelli, i quali hanno il vero culto di Dio, questo è il favore de i favori, li gratia della gratie, e gratia tale, che per ringratiarla non bastano gratie.” Ibid.

Epilogue: Sermons and Their Reception 1. “Hoggidi piu che mai sendo in colmo l’heresie, che conturbano la casa del buon Piero, dico santa Chiesa; però havendo ella bisgono di essere difesa, è debito del Catholico predicatore con la forza della verità arditamente difenderla in ogni loco, e occorrente bisogno. Con tutto ciò bisogna che’l predicatore evangelico, e Catholico molto bene sudi, peni, e si affatichi con prieghi a Christo . . . ​d i ritrovar forma tale accommodata al predicare contra gli heretici.” Luca Baglioni, L’arte del predicare (Venice, 1562), 35r. 2. James J. Murphy, Rhetoric in the Middle Ages: A History of Rhetorical Theory from Saint Augustine to the Renaissance (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974),

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 7 5 – 1 76









297; Lina Bolzoni, “Oratoria e prediche,” in Letteratura Italiana, vol. III.2 (Torino: Einaudi, 1984), 1042; Vittorio Coletti, Parole dal pulpito: Chiesa e movimenti religiosi tra latino e volgare nell’Italia del Medioevo e del Rinascimento (Casale Monferrato: Marietti, 1983), 168; Samuele Giombi, “Livelli di cultura nella trattatistica sulla predicazione e l’eloquenza sacra del XVI secolo,” in Cultura d’élite e cultura popolare nell’arco alpino fra Cinque e Seicento (Boston: Mirkhaeuser Verlag, 1995), 263; for adaptability as the central tenet of preaching in a post-­ Tridentine context, see David Gentilcore, “   ‘Adapt Yourselves to the People’s Capabilities’: Missionary Strategies, Methods and Impact in the Kingdom of Naples, 1600–1800,” Journal of Ecclesiastical History 45, no. 2 (1994): 269–296. 3. LuAnn Homza, Religious Authority in the Spanish Renaissance (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2000), 135–136, 212–213; see also Francesco C. Cesareo, “Review: The Complex Nature of Catholicism in the Renaissance,” Renaissance Quarterly 54, no. 4 (Winter 2001): 1561–1573, for a broader consideration of this topic. 4. The sources that acquaint most students with reformation topics for the first time continue to portray obedience as the primary, even sole, characteristic of Catholic reform. For example, a highly regarded Western Civilization survey textbook widely used in American universities devotes three pages to Catholic reform. It mentions “constructive, positive force . . . ​at work for reform within the Catholic church,” discussing the Jesuits, papal absolutism under Paul III and Paul IV, and the Council of Trent. Yet its single primary source excerpt is Loyola’s Rules for Thinking with the Church, about which it asks, “What are the fundamental assumptions that inform Ignatius’ rules for thinking with the church? What do these assumptions tell you about the nature of the Catholic reform movement?” Its only visual image depicts Ignatius kneeling before Paul III. Jackson J. Spielvogel, Western Civilization: A Brief History, vol. I: to 1715, 7th ed. (Boston, MA: Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2010), 280–283. 5. This approach was explicitly addressed and criticized as insufficient by the reformer Juan Valdes and his circle at Naples in his dialogue Alfabetico Cristiano. See Diana Robin, Publishing Women: Salons, the Presses, and the Counter-­ Reformation in Sixteenth-­Century Italy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007), 22–23. 6. Danilo Zardin, “Tra latino e volgare: La ‘Dichiarazione dei salmi’ del Panigarola e i filtri di accesso alla materia biblica nell’editoria della controriforma,” Sincronie IV, no. 7 (2000): 76–77; Gigliola Fragnito, “La censura ecclesiastica in Italia: volgarizzamenti biblici e letteratura all’Indice. Bilancio degli studi e prospettive di ricerca,” in Reading and Censorship in Early Modern Europe: Barcelona 11–13 de diciembre de 2007, ed. Maria Jose Vega, Julian Weiss, and Cesc Esteve (Bellaterra: Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, Servei de Publicacions, 2010), 49.

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no t e s t o pag e s 1 76 – 1 7 9 7. John Frymire documents the significance of Catholic sermons for the preservation of ritual in addition to scripture, in The Primacy of the Postils: Catholics, Protestants, and the Dissemination of Ideas in Early Modern Germany (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2010), 164–169. 8. For a direct example, see John Frymire, “Demonstrationes catholicae: Defining Communities Through Counter-­Reformation Rituals,” in Defining Community in Early Modern Europe, St. Andrews Studies in Reformation History (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2008), 171. 9. Le biblioteche degli ordini regolari in Italia alla fine del secolo XVI (RICI) (http:// ebusiness.taiprora.it/bib/index.asp). Accessed June 2010. Preliminary results are analyzed in Rosa Marisa Borraccini and Roberto Rusconi, eds., Libri, biblioteche e cultura degli ordini regolari nell’Italia moderna attraverso la documentazione della Congregazione dell’Indice. Atti del Convegno Internazionale, Macerata, 30 maggio—1 giugno 2006 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2006). It should be noted that like most bibliographic databases, this one is subject to human frailty, particularly from the compilers of the original monastic lists, who often found it expedient to obscure or forget details of certain titles. See Roberto Rusconi, “Frate e monaci, libri e biblioteche alla fine del ’500,” in Libri, biblioteche e cultura degli ordini regolari, 16. 10. This evidence supports Fragnito’s contention that vernacular biblical literature was often useful to clergy who were in fact expected to rely on Latin. Gigliola Fragnito, Proibito capire: La chiesa e il volgare nella prima età moderna (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005), 268. 11. Operetta vtile per le religiose nouizze et per quelle che hanno da entrare nei monasteri (Padua, 1559). The inventory is that of p. f. Hieronimo di Bistagno in the convent of Santo Francesco di Aqui, in Piemonte. 12. The RICI project documents 5016 lists in total. See Giovanna Granata, “Struttura e funzionalità della banca data Rici,” in Libri, biblioteche e cultura degli ordini regolari, 291. 13. Sermon material is identified here by forms of the words predica, lettione, homelie, sermoni, discorsi, and where relevant, dichiaratione in Latin and Italian titles. 14. Some entries are listed simply as “prediche” and may overlap with other titles. 15. For the Giunti press, see Luigi Silvestro Camerini, ed., I Giunti tipografi editori di Firenze 1571–1625: Annali Inediti, 2 vols. (Florence: Giuti Barbera, 1979); William A. Pettas, The Giunti of Florence (San Francisco: Bernard M. Rosenthal, 1980). 16. Heredi di Philippo de Giunta, Catalogvs librorvm qui in Ivnetarvm bibliotheca Philippi hæredvm Florentiæ prostant (Florence, 1604). At the Newberry Library, Chicago. 17. In Rome, Lenten preachers gave no sermons on Saturdays.

[  2 49  ]

no t e s t o pag e s 1 7 9 – 181 18. Gregory Martin, Roma Sancta (1581), ed. George Bruner Parks (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 1969); see also Carolyn Valone, “The Art of Hearing: Sermons and Images in the Chapel of Lucrezia della Rovere,” The Sixteenth Century Journal 31, no. 3 (Autumn 2000): 753–777. 19. Anonymous (1576–1593). Diario di anonimo ecclesiastico al servizio di Ippolito Aldobrandini. Archivio Segreto Vaticano, Fondo Borghese IV, 145, 145A, 145B. 20. “Il Padre Carlo andò a Cappella e diede a desinare a un gentilhuomo Todesco non andai a San Paolo alla predica per esser occupato.” Diario, 145B:83v. 21. “Station a San Martin in montagna. Predica al Iesu Adolescens sibi dico surge.” Diario, 145:72v. 22. “Giovedi 28 Io andai con mi lac.o alla predica del Padre Carlo il quale tratto come s’havemo da governar con Dio havendo hieri predicato some s’havevamo a diportar con noi medesimi e dimane predicara come s’havemo a governar con li prossimi et sono tre pietre di fondamento il prologo di quanto bene sia sentir la Parola di Dio come è necessario al fabro il martello al soldato la spada, al scrivano la penna, al studiante il libro, al marinaro la carta del navigare confirmando il tutto con authorità delle Sante Scritture. il thema Nam et ego homo son con argomento essentiale, finale, materiale, e formale ideo mihi adherere Deo bonum est, puer iaces paraliticus e male torquet’ della natura corrupta. Puer, l’intelleto iacet, la volonta, paraliticus il senso, male torquetur il misero corpo, l’aviso in ogni cosa Deus in adiutorium meum intende Domine ad adiuvandum me festina chiamar il Signor Dio in aiuto che sempre e’ preparato darci la gracia la quale ci conceda sempre amen.” Diario, 145A:103r–v. 23. “Cosi piacerà al S. Dio dar a tutti li pecatori et a me p. Cuore di contritione e penitentia amen.” Diario, 145A:107r.

[  250  ]

Acknowledgments

As all students of book history learn, a book is always an act of collaboration. This one, to its benefit, is no exception. Many scholars improved this project with their advice, some so long ago that they may not remember it. Any mistakes are mine, not theirs. At Yale, Carlos Eire, David Quint, Francesca Trivellato, and Ronald Rittgers applied their exceptional knowledge to supervising my dissertation and my training. Ann Blair, Wietse de Boer, Euan Cameron, Simon Ditchfield, Fr. Dermot Fenlon, Paula Findlen, Samuele Giombi, Kenneth Gouwens, Frederick McGinness, Corrie Norman, John O’Malley, Roberto Rusconi, and Larissa Taylor all answered questions during the early stages of research. Deena Aranoff, Benjamin Cohen, Bob Goldberg, Ruth Leah Kahan, Roger Mason, David Mozina, Paul Reeves, Wesley Sasaki-­Uemura, Bill Shackman, and Raquel Ukeles read and commented on draft chapters. John Frymire was a generous and helpful listener at many stages. The wide-­ranging mentorship of Anthony Grafton, Ed Muir, Craig Harline, and especially Euan Cameron has been a gift, and not only because they all read complete early drafts and suggested what kind of book my research might make. Mark Saperstein and Paul Gehl gave extensive specific advice about their fields. Isabel Moreira

ack nowledgments

and Margaret Toscano helped with Latin, and Mary Noll Venables with German. Paul Gehl and Diana Robin showed tremendous generosity, wisdom, and expertise as the manuscript neared completion. This research provided material for many conference and seminar papers. I have learned a great deal from colleagues and listeners in Utah and St Andrews, and I am especially grateful to Shaul Magid and Constance Furey for the chance to present part of Chapter 4 at the University of Indiana, Bloomington, where I received valuable feedback. I am very grateful to Ed Muir for bringing this work into the I Tatti series, to the perceptive anonymous reader, to Ian Stevenson and Alex Morgan and others at Harvard University Press, as well as to Catherine Watterson and Julie Hotchkiss, for their great help. Andrew Pettegree and Philip John made data available from the Universal Short Title Catalogue (USTC) project at the University of St Andrews, thus helping me to draw new conclusions based on quantitative research and enabling Katelyn Mesler to employ her great proficiency in creating the charts. Simon Ditchfield, Sam Garcia, Dimitris Kastritsis, and Beth Plummer helped with other electronic resources. I am grateful to Flavia Bruni for introducing me to the RICI database. Alison Spodek and Wiley Cox answered all sudden desperate technological queries with expertise and good humor. Research for this project brought me, happily, to many libraries, and thanks are due to all the library professionals who have steered me and so many others to the right sources. In Rome, I am grateful above all to the helpful staff of the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, and also to the Archivio Segreto Vaticano, the Biblioteche Casanatense, Angelica, Alessandrina, and the Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale Vittorio Emanuele, as well as to the Biblioteca Statale in Lucca, the Biblioteca Marciana in Venice, and the Biblioteca Marucelliana and Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale in Florence. In the United States, I found valuable sources at the Beinecke Library at Yale, the Rare Book Room of Butler Library at Columbia, Burke Library at Union Theological Seminary, the Andover-­Harvard Theological Library, the Mullen Library at the Catholic University of America, the Library of Con­ gress, and the Augustinian Historical Institute at Villanova University. The Newberry Library proved an inspiring place to work and write. Mayra E. Melendez at Columbia’s Butler Library demonstrated with extraordinary generosity how much difference the kindness of strangers can make. [  252  ]

ack nowledgments

I am very fortunate to have received funding over the course of this research, both at the dissertation stage and afterward, from the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship Program, the Charlotte W. Newcombe Dissertation Fellowship, the Yale Institute for International and Area Studies, and the Newberry Library Short-­Term Fellowship, as well as an International Travel Grant and a University Research Committee Faculty Research and Creative Grant from the University of Utah. The history departments of Yale University, the University of Utah, and the University of St Andrews also provided generous research funding. I am thankful to all of them. Portions of Chapters 3 and 5 appeared as “Luigi Lippomano, His Vicars, and the Reform of Verona from the Pulpit,” by Emily Michelson, Church History, Volume 78, Issue 03 (2009), pp. 584–605, Copyright © 2009 American Society of Church History. Reprinted with the permission of Cambridge University Press. The support of many good friends has had perceptible benefits for this work. They include Emily Brodsky, Alizah Holstein, Chavi Karkowsky, Susan McDonough, Luise Poulton, Beth Plummer, Brent and Alison Spodek, Karene Grad Steiner, Jonathan Tannenhauser, and Bruce Venarde. For many years, this project has accompanied me on strange journeys across oceans, continents, schools, and jobs—from New Haven and New York, where I lived when it began, to sojourns in Rome, Utah, Chicago, and Scotland. Through moments of disjuncture and dramatic change, it has provided welcome intellectual continuity. For personal continuity and extraordinary support, I am grateful to my nuclear and extended families, and especially to my children, born during this book’s long maturation and now getting old enough to ask about it. My parents have consistently provided abundant encouragement, unwavering generosity, enthusiasm, and faith in me. Above all, special thanks to B, who has provided so much support and has shouldered so many extra burdens on my behalf with uncommon generosity and love.

[  253  ]

Index

absentee bishops: 20; Musso on, 24, 85; reform of, 87; see also diocesan reform Advent, 17, 22, 26, 34, 53, 96, 147, 150, 154, 155 Adversus omnes haereses (de Castro), 118 Alan of Lille, 46 Aldobrandini, Ippolito, 179–180 Aleni, Paolo, 90–91, 95, 100, 110, 118, 174 Ammiani, Sebastiano, 63, 76–77 anachronisms in printed sermons, 33 anathema, Tridentine meaning of, 69 Angelieri, Giorgio, 166 antiheretical treatises, 112–139; common Catholic opinion created from, 134–139; in Europe and Italy, 125–128; social status of readers, 118–119; structure and content of, 116–125. See also heresy apocalyptic preaching, 17, 21, 114 apologetics, 168–171 apostolic traditions: 44, 51, 121, 172; defense of by preachers, 64, 72–74, 120–122; Lutheran attack on, 68,

126; Tridentine decrees on, 66, 67, 70 Arrivabene, Andrea, 34, 37–39, 113 Ars Praedicandi, 46–47, 161 Augsburg Interim, 77 Augustinians: 18, 58, 77, 85, 122, 100, 101, 102, 104, 107–109, 151, 157 Avezzano, Sebastiano, 169 Avila, Juan de, 126–127

Baglioni, Luca, 25, 27, 149, 172–173, 174 banned books, 45, 47, 65, 78, 109, 150; see also Index of Prohibited Books Baroque Catholicism, 88, 144 Bavaria, pilgrimages in, 137 Beccheria, Ipolitomaria, 161 Bengal, conversion to Islam, 136 Bernal Díaz di Luco, Juan, 126–127 Bernardini, Paolino: 113, 119–122, 125, 177

index Bibles. See vernacular Bibles; Vulgate Bible; scripture biblical canon: Visdomini’s division by social groups, 82–83; explications of, 155; Lutheran attack on, 68; sermons on, 71–73, 149, 155, 162; Tridentine decrees on, 67–70. See also scripture bishops: 4, 13, 19–21, 30, 47–49, 51, 86, 87–88, 93–94, 129, 137, 138, 141, 142, 149–150, absentee, 24, 85; endorsement of, in treatises, 122–124, 134, 175. See also diocesan preachers; Fiamma, Gabriele; Giberti, Gian Matteo; Lippomano, Luigi; Seripando, Girolamo blasphemy. See heresy Borromeo, Cardinal Federico, 57, 166 Borromeo, Carlo, 6, 13, 47, 49, 57, 88, 129, 141, 145, 148, 160, 162 Brenzone, Cristoforo Silvestrani, 166–167 Brucioli, Antonio, 68, 69 Buonamici, Timoteo, 25, 160, 164, 165, 167

Calvinism, printed sermons responding to, 29 Camaiani, Pietro, 108 Cameron, Euan, 85 Canisius, Peter, 117 canon. See biblical canon Capuchins, 44, 65, 142, 152 Caracciolo, Roberto, 28, 163 Carafa, Gian Pietro, 56, 78, 87 Carranza, Bartolomé, 126–127 Castiglione, Angelo, 15–17, 18, 44 catechisms, 117–118, 138, 177 Catechismus Romanus, 117 Catholic apologetics, 168–171 Catholic culture, post-Reformation rise of, 136–138 Catholic reform, stereotypes of, 6 censorship, see banned books; Index of Prohibited Books Cervini, Marcello, 48, 51–52, 68

Chizzola, Ippolito, 112–113, 115–116, 119–123, 125, 134, 130–131, 173, 178 Cigno, Silvestro, 151, 163–164 Clementine Index of 1596, 45, 150, 162, 176, 180 clerical class: education of, 142; rise of, 138 comprehension, scriptural, 152–156. See also lay scriptural education confessionalization thesis, 9–11 Confirmatione et Stabilimento di tutti li dogmi Cattolici (Lippomano), 91–92, 94, 113, 125, 131–134 confraternities, 30, 128–130, 137, 138, 142–143 Congregation of the Index, 136, 150, 162, 176 Constance diocese of, 136–137 Contarini, Gasparo, 20, 48–52, 82, 87, 108 Conventual Franciscans, 19, 55, 56, 57 Cornaro, Luigi, 37, 39 Council of Trent: 3–4, 7–8, 11–13, 18–21, 24, 27–28, 34, 45, 46, 50–52, 55, 58, 60; confraternities, decree on, 129; defense of by preachers, 74–76; diocesan preach­ ­i ng and, 21, 87–91; endorsement of Costituzioni, 49; generation follow­ ­i ng, 140–171; impact in pulpit, 66–79; Seripando at, 100–103, 107–111, 122, 124, 127–129, 134; scriptural decrees by, 45, 66–72, 82–86, 120, 148–157 Counter-Reformation, as term, 11, 86 crisis of authority, 46–53 Crispoldi, Tullio, 92 cult of saints, 61, 64, 126 cultural Catholic identity, 136–138 cura d’anime, see Diocesan reform

da Fano, Giovanni Pili, 113–114, 121, 122, 124, 125 da Genova, Ilarione, 147–148, 149, 164 da Montalto, Felice Peretti, see Peretti, Felice

[  256  ]

index da Pistoia, Girolamo, 152, 168 da Viterbo, Egidio, 18, 100 de Castro, Alfonso, 118 de’ Cavalli, Giorgio, 34 de Grenada, Luis, 25, 183 Del Bene, Giovanni, 3, 27–28, 133, 158, 174; dissemination of works by, 176–177; scriptural approach, 110–111; sermons by, 92–94, 95–98 Del Bene, Niccolò, 92–93 delectare in rhetoric, 22 della Rovere, Vittoria Farnese 43 della Rovere, Guidobaldo, 43 Della Sapientia Christiana (Musso), 71–77, 84 del Monte, Giovanni, 68, 90 De Officio Viri Boni et Probi Episcopi (Contarini), 20 Dichiarationi dei Salmi (Panigarola), 1, 162 didascalica preaching, 145 di Melfe, Giovanni Battista Cavota, 165 diocesan preachers: bridging gap to ­mendicants, 157–163; crisis of author­ ­ity, 47–53; guides for, 48–52; homilies given by, 26–27; rhetorical style of, 25–27; rise of, 19–22; scriptural ­education by, 110–111. See also bishops; ­homilies diocesan reform: episcopal residence, 87; lay education and, 93–94; Lippomano and Verona, 88–100; practical considerations, 107–109; Seripando and Salerno, 100–109; spirituali vs. intransigenti, 90, 98 Discorsi (Ammiani), 77 Discorsi (Fiamma), 34, 157–158 Discorsi Morali (Visdomini), 58, 62–63 Discorsi per confuter le particulari eresie (Chizzola), 112–113, 115–116, 119–121, 123, 125, 131, 178 Discorsi Predicabili (Ammiani), 63, 76–77 Ditchfield, Simon, 5 diversity in scriptural teaching, 174–175

docere in rhetoric, 22 doctrinal education of laity. See lay ­scriptural education Dominicans, 18–20, 25, 53, 64, 113, 140, 142, 153 Dorico, Valerio and Luigi, 35 “double truth” solution to lay education, 50, 82 drama, sacred, 143–144

ecclesiast, 154 Ecclesiastes (Erasmus), 47 ecclesiastical authority, crisis of, 46–53 ecclesiastical reform. See diocesan reform educating laypeople. See lay scriptural education Emanuele, Carlo, 145 England: antiheretical preaching in, 8, 64; treatises for laity in, 127–128 episcopal preaching. See diocesan preachers episcopal residence, 87 Epistole et Evangelii, see lectionaries Erasmus, 47, 52, 98 Eucharist, 61, 64, 131 exegesis: 50, 68, 135, 145, 172; in Del Bene’s sermons, 96–99, 111; in Gabriele Fiamma, 157–159; in Evangelista Marcellino, 155–157; in Musso’s sermons, 84–85; in Panigarola’s sermons, 145–146, 148, 149, 152, 162; in Seripando’s sermons, 103–104, 107; Tridentine decrees on, 45, 67–68, 149, 150

Fiamma, Gabriele, 34, 63, 147, 161, 163; diocesan model endorsement, 175; mendicant and diocesan sermons by, 157–160; on scriptural teaching, 174; on scripture and heresy, 77–78 Fifth Lateran Council, 18, 20–21, 79 Fiorentino, Remigio, 153–154, 162, 166, 177

[  25 7  ]

index flexibility in scriptural teaching, 174–175 Forster, Marc, 136–137, 139 Forty Hours devotion, 129, 143–144 Fragnito, Gigliola, 69 France: preaching in, 28–29, 58, 59, 63–64; treatises for laypeople in, 126, Seripando in, 101, 109 Franciscans, 18–20, 27, 28, 43, 53, 55, 56, 64, 77, 142, 145, 151, 154, 177 free will, lay education on, 51

genres of preaching: 22–31. See also diocesan preachers; mendicant preachers genus demonstrativum, 22, 23, 46, 145 Germany, 8, 64, 69, 77, 89–90, 126, 136–137 gestures in preaching, 24–25 Giaccari, Vincenzo, 113, 118–119, 122, 124, 125 Giberti, Gian Matteo, 48–52, 141; diocesan reform by, 88, 91; influence on Del Bene, 98, 99; influence on Seripando, 100, 103, 111 Giolito, Gabriele, 34, 39–43, 166 Giuntini, Francesco, 63 glorification of the post-Tridentine Church, 168–171 God’s will, Seripando on, 102–103 Gonzaga, Giulia, 8, 108 Gotardo, Fra, 177 Gregory I, Pope, 26, 28 Guarino, Battista, 26 guides for preaching, see Preaching Guides Gwynneth, John, 127, 131

Hamilton, John, 117–118 heresy: Catholic definition of, 9, 15–16, 44; changing perceptions of, 124–125; Del Bene on, 98; fear of, 172–175; Hamilton on, 117–118; instructions for preachers on, 48–49, 51; Lippomano on, 13, 89–90,

131–133; post-Tridentine preaching on, 168–171; printing of, 131–133; published sermons as weapon against, 16, 54–66; refutations of, 78; scripture and, 15–16, 68, 72, 76–78; Seripando on, 106–109; treatises against, 112–139; vernacular and, 69, 119; Musso and Visdomini on, 71–76, Peretti and Fiamma on, 77–79 Homelie (Visdomini), 58, 63, 71, 72–76, 177 Homilarium (Pittorio), 26–27, 48, 153 homilies, 22, 25–28; vs. mendicant sermons, 155–157; number published over time, 31; revival of, 94. See also diocesan preachers; sermons; genres of preaching humanism in preaching, 22–23

iconoclasm, 44, 61 idiota, as audience for treatises, 118–119 illustrations in printed sermons, 35, 41, 166 Il Predicatore (Panigarola), 25, 145–147, 165 Index of Prohibited Books, 45, 47, 78, 90, 102, 136, 150, 157, 162, 176, 180; see also banned books Inquisition, Roman, 6–7, 9, 45, 90, 107, 113, 134, 157 intonation in preaching, 25 intransigenti vs. spirituali, 7, 90, 98 Italian-language sermons. See vernacular sermons italics, heresy printed in, 131–132 itinerant preachers. See mendicant preachers

Jedin, Hubert, 7 Jesuits, 3, 6, 10; confraternities founded by, 129; education by, 142; preaching activity of, 141–142; sacred music and drama of, 143 Julius II, Pope, 20–21

[  258  ]

index Julius III, Pope, see Del Monte, Giovanni justification by faith: Chizzola on, 115; Contarini on, 50; Council of Trent on, 70, 71, 89; Del Bene on, 95, 98; Musso and, 37, 38, 70; Seripando on, 103, 109; Visdomini and, 71, 82

lay scriptural education, 21, 94–99, 122; antiheretical treatises for, 112–139; common Catholic opinion on, 134– 139; confraternities and, 128–130; cultural identity and, 136–138; differing approaches to, 111, 174–175; diocesan responsibility for, 93–94, 175–176; “double truth” solution, 50, 82; on heresy, 44–45, 51, 91–92; post-Tridentine, 149–151, 161– 163; preachers’ reluctance toward, 173; printed sermons and, 30–31; rhetorical variation in, 79–84; Seripando on, 104– 107; on Tridentine decrees, 66–79; women’s exclusion from, 120 lectionaries, 27, 150, 153–154, 162, 166, 175 Lenten preaching, 12, 17, 19, 22, 26, 34, 53, 56, 58, 80, 84, 91, 102, 113,147, 150, 151, 157, 179 LePicard, Francois, 64 Lippomano, Luigi, 10; antiheretical treatise by, 113, 131–133; disparagement of laity, 120, 173; heretics, advice on, 125; reform implemented by, 88–100; on roles of clergy and laity, 122–123; scriptural approach, 110–111; self-promotion of, 135; Tridentine participation, 89; on unguided scriptural reading, 121 Luther, Martin: 4, 74, 104, 114, 126, 131, 136; on biblical canon, 68, 73; mockery of as heretic, 77, 169 Lutherans. See Protestants

Machiavelli, Luca, 57 Malerbi, Nicolò, 69

Marcellino, Evangelista, 154–156, 174 Marcellus II, Pope. See Cervini, Marcello Margaritae Eloquentiae Castigatae (Traversagni), 47 Marian sodalities, 129 marketing of printed sermons, 35–43 Martin, Gregory, 143, 179 Martinengo, Celso, 130 materia preaching, 145 memory trees in printed sermons, 166–167 mendicant preachers, 17–22; bridging gap to diocesans, 157–163; crisis of authority, 46–47; gestures and intonation used by, 24–25; guides for, 48–52, 145–147, 157–158; vs. homiletical preachers, 155–157; popularity of, 53; post-Tridentine crisis of, 141–142, 161–163; rhetorical style of, 22–25; scriptural teaching by, 149–151, 163 mission preaching, 142 modernization, and confessionalization thesis, 9–11 Modo di comporre una predica (Panigarola), 145–146, 149, 156 monastic orders, 18. See also mendicant preachers movere in rhetoric, 22 music, sacred, 143 Musso, Cornelio, 22–24; on biblical canon, 72–73; criticisms of Church, 84–86; defense of Church, 73–74; disparagement of laity, 173; early history of, 56; evolution in sermons over time, 84–85; heresy, defense against, 58–66; marketing techniques, 35; as mendicant preacher, 54–55; number of works published, 183; Panigarola’s references to, 147; printed sermons by, 33–34, 37–43, 57–58; on scriptural teaching, 79–81; Tridentine participation, 67, 70–72 Musso, Guiseppe, 56 Muzio, Girolamo, 114

[  259  ]

index Naples, Fiamma in, 158; Musso’s sermon to, 54–55, 71, 74; Seripando in, 88, 100, 108; Visdomini in, 56, 57 Nome di Dio society, 129 Norman, Corrie, 53

Oberman, Heiko, 121–122 Observant Franciscans, 19, 27, 145, 154 Ochino, Bernardino: 44, 65–66, 114, 125 octavo format, 39 O’Malley, John, 7 oratorical preachers. See mendicant preachers original sin, 51, 67

Pacheco, Pietro, 82 Panigarola, Francesco, 1, 144–148; bishopric, 160; on Catholicism as one true faith, 170; Dichiarationi dei Salmi, 162; on intonation, 25; number of works published, 163, 183; on paratexts, 152, 167; on preach­ ­i ng, 165; response to Marcellino, 156; Visdomini as role model for, 55, 57 papacy, 23, 65, 75, 77, 109, 126, 150; and mendicant preachers, 18–19, 142 paratexts in printed sermons, 37, 43, 151–152, 167 Paternoster, 98, 102–106, 117 Paul III, Pope, 49, 50, 56, 87, 89 Paul IV, Pope. See Carafa, Gian Pietro Pepin, Guillaume, 64 Peretti, Felice, 69, 77–78. 169 physical performance in preaching, 24–25 Pighino, Sebastiano, 89–90 pilgrimages: in Bavaria, 137; in Jubilee of 1575, 144 Pittorio, Ludovico, 48, 153; homiletic ­sermons by, 26–27; lectionary of, 162; number of works published, 183; on reading sermons, 30–31 poetic device in sermons, 24, 144, 147

Pole, Reginald, 8, 68, 87, 108, 128 Politi, Ambrogio Catarino, 114 Porcacchi, Tommaso, 23, 34, 57, 60 preaching guides, 25, 27–28, 46–52, 63, 178, 175; by Ammiani, 63, 76–77; by Baglioni, 148–149; by Erasmus, 47–48; by Fiamma (Discorsi), 157–158; by Panigarola, 145–147; by Razzi, 141– 142, 160, 164, 166; by Zarrabini, 151, 166, 169. predicabili, see preaching guides printed sermons, 28–43; antiheretical, 16, 112–139; circulation of, 177–178; lay ­education and, 30–31; marketing of, 35; number published over time, 29; paratexts in, 37, 43, 151–152, 167; popularity of, 37; post-Tridentine, 163–167; printing techniques for, 166–167; reach of, 32; as resource for preachers, 93–94, 160; risks taken by publishers, 37–39; Tridentine decrees on, 45; variations in quality, 39–43; as weapon against heresy, 58–66 Prosperi, Adriano, 7–8, 9, 10 Protestants: Catholic descriptions of, 44; fear of, 50, 118–119, 123–124, 172–175; internal dissent, 131; preachers’ responses to, 64; refutation of, 168; sola scriptura theology, 3. See also heresy published sermons. See printed sermons

Quarant’ore, see Forty Hours devotion

Razzi, Serafino, 25; ambivalence toward publishing, 164–165; defense of preaching by, 140–141; oratorical style of, 155–156; paratexts included by, 167; published sermons of, 160–161, 178 reconcilation, 57, 59, 74–75, 84 Reformation Italy as a term, 11–12 religious orders, post-Tridentine, 141–144 residence, episcopal, see diocesan reform

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index rhetoric and rhetorical guides, 22–28; homilies, 25–27; oratorical sermons, 22–25; of Panigarola, 145–147. See also preaching guides Ridolfi, Pietro, 151–152, 168–169 Rime Spirituali (Fiamma), 157 Roman Inquisition: see Inquisition, Roman Roma Sancta (Martin), 143 Ruscelli, Girolamo, 43

sacred music and drama, 143 sacred oratory, 23; see also mendicant preachers Salerno, diocesan reform in, 100–109 Sansovino, Francesco, 23; see also ­mendicant preachers Savonarola, Girolamo, 21–2, 28, 113, 178; controversial nature of, 44; number of works published, 37, 183 scripture: apostolic tradition in, 122; belief as substitute for, 106; crisis of, 44–45, 124; in diocesan preaching, 110–111; heresy and, 68, 72, 76–78; impenetrability, as benefit, 80; instructions for preachers on, 49–51; literalism in, 121; post-Tridentine approach to, 148–157; Protestant heresy of, 66; rhetorical variation on, 79–84; Seripando on, 101–103; Tridentine decrees on, 45, 66–72; unguided reading, dangers of, 120–121. See also biblical canon; lay scriptural education semplici, as audience for treatises, 118–119 Seripando, Girolamo, 13, 68, 70, 88; ­diocesan reform by, 100–109; disparagement of laity, 173; on heresy, 106–109; scriptural approach, 101–106, 110–111; Tridentine participation, 100–102, 107 sermo modernus, 22, 46 Sermoni overo Homelie Devote (Del Bene), 92–94, 176–177

sermons: as anti-heresy weapon, 16; delivery of, 164–165; homiletic, 25–27; inconsistency in, 124; listeners to, 179–181; oratorical, 22–25; as public entertainment, 17, 179; as reactions to current events, 18; rise of vernacular, 29–30. See also printed sermons Sixtus V, Pope. See Peretti, Felice social discipline, 9 social hierarchy, preservation of, 123 sola fide, 128 sola scriptura, 3, 104, 131 Spain: 8, 179, 180; antiheretical preach­ ­i ng in, 63–64; ­t reatises for laity in, 126–127 spirituali vs. intransigenti, 7, 90, 98

thematic sermon (sermo modernus), 22, 46–47 Thirty Years’ War, 137 Tichonius the Donatist, 151 Tomitano, Bernardino, 43, 56 transcriptions of sermons, 32–33. See also printed sermons translations of the Bible. See vernacular Bibles traveling preachers. See mendicant preachers Traversagni, Lorenzo, 47 treatises for laypeople, 112–139; common Catholic opinion created from, 134–139; in Europe and Italy, 125–128; social status of readers, 118–119; structure and content of, 116–125 Tridentine decrees. See Council of Trent typeface, polemical use of, 131–133

Valier, Agostino, 49, 166 Vanetti, Carlo, 51 Vergerio, Pier Paolo, 8, 77, 114, 125, 131

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index vernacular Bibles: condemnation of, 150; as heretical, 106–107; Lutheran influence on, 68; Tridentine discussion on, 69, 73, 102 vernacular sermons: antiheretical, 112–139; English clerics on, 127; number published over time, 30; of Ochino, 65–66; Panigarola on, 146–147; rise of, 29–30 Verona, 10, 13; diocesan reform in, 48–49, 88–100 Vincent of Lerins, 121–122 Visdomini, Franceschino, 8; defense of Church authority, 73–74; disparagement of laity, 173; dissemination of works by, 177; early history of, 56–57; heresy, defense against, 58–66; as men-

dicant preacher, 55; number of works published, 183; printed sermons by, 34, 58; on scriptural teaching, 80–84, 174; Tridentine participation, 67, 70–72 Volpi, Cornelia, 56 Vulgate Bible, 69–70

will of God, Seripando on, 102–103 women, disdain for, 120; as potential ­heretics, 112, 124 written sermons. See printed sermons

Zardin, Danilo, 176 Zarrabini, Onofrio, 151–153, 167, 169, 178

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