The political tact and sagacity of Lorenzo de' Medici enabled him to develop and substantiate the principle of balance then introduced into Italian politics; nor was there any apparent reason why the equilibrium so hardly won, so skillfully maintained, should not have subsisted but for Lodovico Sforza's invitation to the French in 1494.

Up to that date the more recent wars of Italy had been principally caused by the encroachments of Venice and the nepotism of successive Popes.

They raised no new enthusiasm hostile to the interests of peace.
The Empire was eliminated and forgotten as an obsolete antiquity.

Italy seemed at last determined to manage her own affairs by mutual agreement between the five great powers.
[1] I have attempted to analyze Cosimo's method in the article on 'Florence and the Medici,' _Studies and Sketches in Italy_.
[2] This centralization of Italy in five great powers was not obtained without the depression or total extinction of smaller cities.

Ferrari counts seventeen towns, who died, to use his forcible expression, at the close of the civil wars.