One apparent product of the recently awakened interest in Renaissance study is the very attractive and interesting little volume on "Napoleon and Machiavelli," by Frank Preston Stearns." It is not a literary study, as is the author's "Modern English Prose Writers," but a collection of essays on the political theories and teachings of Machiavelli, Goethe, and Dante, and of the political principles prompting the acts of Napoleon.
The study of Napoleon, comprising one-half the book, is highly sympathetic and in parts even eulogistic. Even his much debated treatment of the Duc d'Enghien is, to Mr. Stearns, as well justified as is the court-martial and execution of the associates of Booth for the murder of Lincoln. The harsh and repulsive political theories of Machiavelli's "Prince" are of course condemned; yet the author contends that it is unfair to Machiavelli to think that he would have applied these principles to government in general, or to any other government than the corrupt and extremely localized one of Florence, for whose ruler the memoranda of Machiavelli were intended.
