LXX. tyranny of the nobles. It was formally provided, that CHAP. none, except the supreme magistrate, should possess or command the gates, bridges, or towers, of the state: that no private garrisons should be introduced into the towns or castles of the Roman territory; that none should bear arms, or presume to fortify their houses in the city or country; that the barons should be responsible for the safety of the highways and the free passage of provisions; and that the protection of malefactors and robbers should be expiated by a fine of a thousand marks of silver. But these regulations would have been impotent and nugatory, had not the licentious nobles been awed by the sword of the civil power. A sudden alarm from the bell of the Capitol, could still summon to the standard above twenty thousand volunteers: the support of the tribune and the laws required a more regular and permanent force. In each harbour of the coast a vessel was stationed for the assurance of commerce; a standing militia of three hundred and sixty horse and thirteen hundred foot was levied, clothed, and paid in the thirteen quarters of the city; and the spirit of a commonwealth may be traced in the grateful allowance of one hundred florins, or pounds, to the heirs of every soldier, who lost his life in the service of his country. For the maintenance of the public defence, for the establishment of granaries, for the relief of widows, orphans, and indigent convents, Rienzi applied, without fear of sacrilege, the revenues of the apostolic chamber: the three branches of hearth-money, the salt duty, and the customs, were each of the annual produce of one hundred thousand florins; and scanda. loas were the abuses, if in four or five months the amount of the salt duty could be trebled by his judicious economy. After thus restoring the forces and finances of the republic, the tribune recalled the nobles from their solitary independence; required their personal appearance in the Capitol; and imposed an oath, of alle giance to the new government, and of submission to the laws of the good estate. Apprehensive for their safety, but still more apprehensive of the danger of a refusal, 26 In one MS. I read (1. ii. c. 4. p. 409) perfumante quatro solli, in another quatro forini, an important variety, since the florin was worth ten Roman solidi (Muratori, dissert. xxviii). The former reading would give us a population of 25,000, the latter of 250,000 families: and I much fear, that the former is more consistent with the decay of Rome and her territory, LXX. CHAP. the princes and barons returned to their houses at Rome in the garb of simple and peaceful citizens: the Colonna and Ursini, the Savelli and Frangipani, were confounded before the tribunal of a plebeian, of the vile buffoon whom they had so often derided, and their disgrace was aggravated by the indignation which they vainly struggled to disguise. The same oath was successively pronounced by the several orders of society, the clergy and gentlemen, the judges and notaries, the merchants and artisans, and the gradual descent was marked by the increase of sincerity and zeal. They swore to live and die with the republic and the church, whose interest was artfully united by the nominal association of the bishop of Orvieto, the pope's vicar, to the office of tribune. It was the boast of Rienzi, that he had delivered the throne and patrimony of St. Peter from a rebellious aristocracy; and Clement the sixth, who rejoiced in its fall, affected to believe the professions, to applaud the merits, and to confirm the title, of his trusty servant. The speech, perhaps the mind, of the tribune, was inspired with a lively regard for the purity of the faith; he insinuated his claim to a supernatural mission from the Holy Ghost: enforced by an heavy forfeiture the annual duty of confession and communion; and strictly guarded the spiritual as well as temporal welfare of his faithful people". Freedom perity of the Ro man re public. Never perhaps has the energy and effect of a single and pros- mind been more remarkably felt than in the sudden, though transient, reformation of Rome by the tribune Rienzi. A den of robbers was converted to the discipline of a camp or convent: patient to hear, swift to redress, inexorable to punish, his tribunal was always accessible, to the poor and stranger; nor could birth, or dignity, or the immunities of the church, protect the offender or his accomplices. The privileged houses, the private sanctuaries in Rome, on which no officer of justice would presume to trespass, were abolished; and he applied the timber and iron of their barricades in the fortifications of the Capitol. The venerable father of the Colonna was exposed in his own palace to the double shame of being desirous, and of being unable, to protect 27 Hocsemius, p. 398. apud du Cerceau, Hist. de Rienzi, p. 194. The fif teen tribunitian laws may be found in the Roman historian (whom for brevity I shall name) Fortifiocca, I. ii. c. 4. LXX. a criminal. A mule, with a jar of oil, had been stolen CHAP. near Capranica; and the lord of the Ursini family, was condemned to restore the damage, and to discharge a fine of four hundred florins for his negligence in guarding the highways. Nor were the persons of the barons more inviolate than their lands or houses: and either from accident or design, the same impartial rigour was exercised against the heads of the adverse factions. Peter Agapet Colonna, who had himself been senator of Rome, was arrested in the street for injury or debt; and justice was appeased by the tardy execution of Martin Ursini, who, among his various act of violence and rapine, had pillaged a shipwrecked vessel at the mouth of the Tyber. His name, the purple of two cardinals, his uncles, a recent marriage, and a mortal disease, were disregarded by the inflexible tribune, who had chosen his victim. The public officers dragged him from his palace and nuptial bed: his trial was short and satisfactory: the bell of the Capitol convened the people: stript of his mantle, on his knees, with his hands bound behind his back, he heard the sentence of death; and after a brief confession, Ursini was led away to the gallows. After such an example, none who were conscious of guilt could hope for impunity, and the flight of the wicked, the licentious, and the idle, soon purified the city and territory of Rome. In this time (says the historian) the woods began to rejoice that they were no longer infested with robbers; the oxen began to plough; the pilgrims visited the sanctuaries; the roads and inns were replenished with travellers; trade, plenty, and good faith were restored in the markets; and a purse of gold might be exposed without danger in the midst of the highway. As soon as the life and property of the subject are secure, the labours and rewards of industry spontaneously revive: Rome was still the metropolis of the Christian world; and the fame and fortunes of the 28 Fortifiocca, 1. ii. c. 11. From the account of this shipwreck, we learn some circumstances of the trade and navigation of the age. 1. The ship was built and freighted at Naples for the ports of Marseilles and Avignon. 2. The sailors were of Naples and the isle of Oenaria, less skilful than those of Sicily and Genoa. 3. The navigation from Marseilles was a coasting voy age to the mouth of the Tyber, where they took shelter in a storm, but, instead of finding the current, unfortunately ran on a shoal: the vessel was stranded, the mariners escaped. 4. The cargo, which was pillaged, consisted of the revenue of Provence for the royal treasury, many bags of pepper and cinnamon, and bales of French cloth, to the value of 20,000 florins: a rich prize. CHAP. tribune were diffused in every country by the strangers who had enjoyed the blessings of his government. LXX. The tri bune is respected in Italy, &c. The deliverance of his country inspired Rienzi with a vast, and perhaps visionary, idea of uniting Italy in a great fœderative republic, of which Rome should be the ancient and lawful head, and the free cities and princes the members and associates. His pen was not less eloquent than his tongue; and his numerous epistles were delivered to swift and trusty messengers. On foot, with a white wand in their hand, they traversed the forests and mountains; enjoyed, in the most hostile states, the sacred security of ambassadors; and reported, in the style of flattery or truth, that the highways along their passage were lined with kneeling multitudes, who implored heaven for the success of their undertaking. Could passion have listened to reason; could private interest have yielded to the public welfare; the supreme tribunal and confederate union of the Italian republic might have healed their intestine discord, and closed the Alps against the Barbarians of the North. But the propitious season had elapsed; and if Venice, Florence, Sienna, Perugia, and many inferior cities, offered their lives and fortunes to the good estate, the tyrants of Lombardy and Tuscany must despise, or hate, the plebeian author of a free constitution. From them, however, and from every part of Italy, the tribune received the most friendly and respectful answers: they were followed by the ambassadors of the princes and republics; and in this foreign conflux, on all the occasions of pleasure or business, the low-born notary could assume the familiar or majestic courtesy of a sovereign". The most glorious circumstance of his reign was an appeal to his justice from Lewis king of Hungary, who complained, that his brother, and her husband, had been perfidiously strangled by Jane queen of Naples: her guilt or innocence was pleaded in a solemn trial at Rome; but after 29 It was thus that Oliver Cromwell's old acquaintance, who remembered his vulgar and ungracious entrance into the House of Commons, were astonished at the ease and majesty of the protector on his throne (see Harris's Life of Cromwell, p. 27-34. from Clarendon, Warwick, Whitelocke, Waller, &c.) The consciousness of merit and power, will sometimes elevate the manners to the station. 30 See the causes, circumstances, and effects of the death of Andrew, in Giannone (tom. ii. 1. xxiii. p. 220-229), and the life of Petrarch (Memoires, tom. ii. p. 143-148. 245-250. 375-379. notes, p. 21-37). The Abbé de Sade wishes to extenuate her guilt. LXX. Petrarch. hearing the advocates31, the tribune adjourned this weigh- CHAP. ty and invidious cause, which was soon determined by the sword of the Hungarian. Beyond the Alps, more especially at Avignon, the revolution was the theme of curiosity, wonder, and applause. Petrarch had been and celethe private friend, perhaps the secret counsellor, of Ri- brated by enzi: his writings breathe the most ardent spirit of patriotism and joy; and all respect for the pope, all gratitude for the Colonna, was lost in the superior duties of a Roman citizen. The poet laureat of the Capitol maintains the act, applauds the hero, and mingles with some. apprehension and advice the most lofty hopes of the permanent and rising greatness of the republic. While Petrarch indulged these prophetic visions, the His vices Roman hero was fast declining from the meridian of and follies. fame and power; and the people, who had gazed with astonishment on the ascending meteor, began to mark the irregularity of its course, and the vicissitudes of light and obscurity. More eloquent than judicious, more enterprising than resolute, the faculties of Rienzi were not balanced by cool and commanding reason: he magnified in a tenfold proportion the objects of hope and fear; and prudence, which could not have erected, did not presume to fortify, his throne. In the blaze of prosperity, his virtues were insensibly tinctured with the adjacent vices; justice with cruelty, liberality with profusion, and the desire of fame with puerile and ostentatious vanity. He might have learned, that the ancient tribunes, so strong and sacred in the public opinion, were not distinguished in style, habit, or appearance, from an ordinary plebeian; and that as often as they visited the 31 The advocate who pleaded against Jane, could add nothing to the logical force and brevity of his master's epistle. Johanna! inordinata vita præcedens, retentio potestatis in regno, neglecta vindicta, vir alter suscep tis, et excusatio subsequens, necis viri tui te probant fuisse participem et consortem. Jane of Naples, and Mary of Scotland, have a singular confor mity. 32 See the Epistola Hortatoria de Capessenda Republica, from Petrarch to Nicholas Rienzi (Opp. p. 535-540), and the fifth eclogue or pastoral, a perpetual and obscure allegory. 33 In his Roman Questions, Plutarch, (Opuscul. tom. i. p. 505, 506. edit. Græc. Hen. Steph.) states, on the most constitutional principles, the simple greatness of the tribunes, who were not properly magistrates, but a check on magistracy. It was their duty and interest ομοεσθαι σχηματι, και σολη και διαίτη τους επιτυγχάνεσι των πολιτων . . . . καταπατείςθαι δει (a saying of C. Curio) και μη σεμνον είναι τη δέμαρχον οψει .. εσω δε μάλλον εκταπείνεται τω σώματι, τοσέτω μάλλον αύξεται τη δυνάμει, &c. Rienzi, and Petrarcu him. self, were incapable perhaps of reading a Greek philosopher, but they might VOL. VIII. ... Gg |