"Nonsense, I say! Liberals?
Yes, in the way you are a Liberal, and Donna Tullia Mayer, and Spicca himself, who has just killed that other Liberal, Casalverde.
Liberals indeed! Do you flatter yourself for a moment that Antonelli is afraid of such Liberals as you are?
Do you think the life of Del Ferice is of any more importance to politics than the life of that dog there ?" It was Astrardente's habit to scoff mercilessly at all the petty manifestations of political feeling he saw about him in the world.

He represented a class distinct both from the Valdarno set and from the men represented by the Saracinesca--a class who despised everything political as unworthy of the attention of gentlemen, who took everything for granted, and believed that all was for the best, provided that society moved upon rollers and so long as no one meddled with old institutions.
To question the wisdom of the municipal regulations was to attack the Government itself; to attack the Government was to cast a slight upon his Holiness the Pope, which was rank heresy, and very vulgar into the bargain.

Astrardente had seen a great deal of the world, but his ideas of politics were almost childishly simple--whereas many people said that his principles in relation to his fellows were fiendishly cynical.

He was certainly not a very good man; and if he pretended to no reputation for devoutness, it was probable that he recognised the absurdity of his attempting such a pose.

But politically he believed in Cardinal Antonelli's ability to defy Europe with or without the aid of France, and laughed as loudly at Louis Napoleon's old idea of putting the sovereign Pontiff at the head of an Italian federation, as he jeered at Cavour's favourite phrase concerning a free Church in a free State.