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And if, as I said, it was necessary that the people of Israel

should be captive so as to make manifest the ability of Moses;

that the Persians should be oppressed by the Medes so as to

discover the greatness of the soul of Cyrus; and that the

Athenians should be dispersed to illustrate the capabilities of

Theseus: then at the present time, in order to discover the

virtue of an Italian spirit, it was necessary that Italy should

be reduced to the extremity that she is now in, that she should

be more enslaved than the Hebrews, more oppressed than the

Persians, more scattered than the Athenians; without head,

without order, beaten, despoiled, torn, overrun; and to have

endured every kind of desolation.