So far we have examined the ways in which the northern humanists endorsed and developed the moral and political outlook characteristic of the Italian Renaissance. This has enabled us to underline a thesis which has sometimes been doubted, but which seems inescapable: that it is in fact appropriate to regard the political theory of the northern Renaissance essentially as an extension and consolidation of a range of arguments originally discussed in quattrocento Italy. It is no less important, however, to stress that these arguments were never simply reiterated in an uncritical or mechanical style. As we have already observed, a number of issues central to Italian political debate were scarcely accorded any attention in northern Europe. To complete our survey, we finally need to add that some of the theories evolved by the northern humanists must be understood not so much as continuations but rather as criticisms of earlier humanist themes.

HUMANISM AND THE JUSTIFICATION OF WAR

One important point at which a number of northern humanists tended to criticise rather than to follow their Italian precursors was in their analysis of the role of warfare in political life. As we have seen, the Aristotelian ideal of the armed citizen had played a major part in many quattrocento theories of statecraft. A willingness to fight for one's liberty had come to be seen as part of one's ordinary civic duties, while the business of warfare had correspondingly been viewed as little more than a continuation of politics by other means.