Could this bequest have taken effect, it might have united Italy beneath one sovereign.

But the probabilities are that the jealousies of Florence, Venice, and Rome against Naples would have been so intensified as to lead to a bloody war of succession, and to hasten the French invasion.
The inextinguishable desire for liberty in Milan blazed forth upon the death of the last duke.

In spite of so many generations of despots, the people still regarded themselves as sovereign, and established a republic.

But a state which had served the Visconti for nearly two centuries, could not in a moment shake off its weakness and rely upon itself alone.

The republic, feeling the necessity of mercenary aid, was short-sighted enough to engage Francesco Sforza as commander-in-chief against the Venetians, who had availed themselves of the anarchy in Lombardy to push their power west of the Adda.
Sforza, though the ablest general of the day, was precisely the man whom common prudence should have prompted the burghers to mistrust.